Freedom’s Choice Read Online Free Page B

out the waterfall through the copses of lodge-pole trees. “Plenty of stone, too, ready to build from,” she added, jerking her thumb over her shoulder at the rocks behind them.
    â€œNot bad at all,” Joe Marley said, already closely examining a handful of the ground vegetation and discarding the varieties he recognized. He was the team’s botanist.
    â€œIt is very pretty place here,” Leila Massuri said in her careful English, her contralto voice making inflections almost musical. She gazed around her with an almost dreamy smile on her unusual face. She was Maltese by birth, corralled by the Catteni in a demonstration raid in Marseilles. “So why was it blocked off?”
    â€œWe look closer,” Zainal said, and he pointed at Joe, Sarah, and Whitby. “You go right with Slav. Rest of us go left and meet at falls.”
    Zainal gestured for Fek and the rest to accompany him as he waded across the stream, not more than knee height at this point. Once on the other side, they spread out in a loose line, checking the ground, noting which of the low bushes would bear fruit in season, and generally sizing up the environment.
    â€œNo rocksquats. That’s odd,” Kris said when they had been traveling a few moments. She pointed to rocky projections where the stupid but tasty creatures would be likely to perch, since they enjoyed the sun.
    â€œThere were some,” Zainal said, and pointed to a little heap of bones just visible through the branches of a low shrub.
    â€œNo night crawlers then,” Leila Massuri said with a shudder. She was a Fourth Drop and remembered all too keenly that the person next to her had been absorbed bya night crawler before her horrified eyes just as she was waking up.
    â€œI’m not sure I like the possibility of more omnivores,” Kris said, although, in truth, they hadn’t seen much in the way of other hostile creatures in their considerable travels, except for the aerial marauders which either Slav or Fek warned them about. They camped in the vehicle or on rock heights to avoid earthbound scavengers.
    â€œThings do die of old age or of falling off high places,” Leila suggested.
    â€œThis stream gets swollen, to judge by the height of these banks,” Kris said, pointing to them.
    â€œSpring melt,” Whitby said. They could not see the higher ranges, now hidden by the unbroken line of cliff surrounding the valley; mountains which were snow-clad all year round. Sarah McDouall had quipped that it must have annoyed the mechanicals to have so much unusable uphill land. Whitby’s face had had a hungry look on it as he had surveyed the towering peaks.
    â€œNever did get to the Himalayas,” he had murmured, “but those buggers’d be great fun.”
    â€œLater,” Zainal had said, but grinned as if he understood the mountaineer’s yearning.
    Now the Catteni stopped to squat beside dried dung, partially covered by dirt. Grooves did suggest the claw marks of an animal of considerable size.
    â€œOld,” Zainal said, finding a stick and poking the droppings.
    â€œBig,” Kris remarked, and looked around the glade.
    Zainal picked up the desiccated patty and dropped it into the sack he kept for fire makings. Then they all continued on their sweep, more vigilant now. More dried dung was found but all examples seemed to be old and Kris was somewhat reassured.
    â€œReminds me of a place I went to once in Yellowstone Park,” she said when they reached the far side ofthe valley, and its stony barrier. Craning her head, she peered upward, looking for cave entrances, but saw nothing, not even a ledge to give access to even the most agile creature. “We could use this wall for backing and build outward,” she said. “If we could get one of the vehicles to maneuver through the pass so we could transport all that stone someone dumped across the pass.”
    â€œWe’d need explosives to move