By Tooth and Claw Read online

  Table of Contents

  Bury My Heart

  A Clan’s Foundation

  Sanctuary

  Feeding a Fever

  New York Times best-selling authors S.M. Stirling, Mercedes Lackey, Eric Flint, and Jody Lynn Nye return with four novellas. The cat-like Mrem, our heroes, battle the deep reptilian intelligence of humanoid dinosaurs in a Bronze Age world. After the extinction asteroid does notstrike Earth, the dinosaurs keep evolving–but so do the mammals. We mammals have achieved humanlike shapes, but now it’s cold-blooded, magic-using reptiles against the hot-blooded, hot-tempered descendants of cats.

  BAEN BOOKS BY MERCEDES LACKEY

  BARDIC VOICES

  The Lark and the Wren

  The Robin and the Kestrel

  The Eagle and the Nightingales

  The Free Bards

  Four & Twenty Blackbirds

  Bardic Choices: A Cast of Corbies (with Josepha Sherman)

  The Fire Rose

  The Wizard of Karres (with Eric Flint & Dave Freer)

  Werehunter

  Fiddler Fair

  Brain Ships (with Anne McCaffrey & Margaret Ball)

  The Ship Who Searched (with Anne McCaffrey)

  The Sword of Knowledge (with C.J. Cherryh, Leslie Fish, & Nancy Asire)

  Bedlam’s Bard (with Ellen Guon)

  Beyond World’s End (with Rosemary Edghill)

  Spirits White as Lightning (with Rosemary Edghill)

  Mad Maudlin (with Rosemary Edghill)

  Music to My Sorrow (with Rosemary Edghill)

  Bedlam’s Edge (ed. with Rosemary Edghill)

  THE SERRATED EDGE

  Chrome Circle (with Larry Dixon)

  The Chrome Borne (with Larry Dixon)

  The Otherworld (with Larry Dixon & Mark Shepherd)

  HISTORICAL FANTASIES WITH ROBERTA GELLIS

  This Scepter’d Isle

  Ill Met by Moonlight

  By Slanderous Tongues

  And Less Than Kind

  HEIRS OF ALEXANDRIA SERIES BY MERCEDES LACKEY, ERIC FLINT & DAVE FREER

  The Shadow of the Lion

  This Rough Magic

  Much Fall of Blood

  Burdens of the Dead

  THE SECRET WORLD CHRONICLE

  Invasion (with Steve Libbey, Cody Martin & Dennis Lee)

  World Divided (with Cody Martin, Dennis Lee & Veronica Giguere)

  Revolution (with Cody Martin, Dennis Lee & Veronica Giguere)

  Collision (with Cody Martin, Dennis Lee & Veronica Giguere)

  BAEN BOOKS BY S.M. STIRLING

  THE DRAKA SERIES

  The Domination (omnibus)

  Drakon

  Drakas! (anthology)

  The Prince (with Jerry Pournelle)

  THE “WAR WORLD” SERIES WITH JERRY POURNELLE

  Blood Feuds

  Blood Vengeance

  THE FLIGHT ENGINEER SERIES WITH JAMES DOOHAN

  The Rising

  The Privateer

  The Independent Command

  THE GENERAL SERIES WITH DAVID DRAKE

  Warlord (omnibus)

  Conqueror (omnibus)

  The Forge

  The Chosen

  The Reformer

  THE BRAIN SHIP SERIES

  The City and the Ship (with Anne McCaffrey)

  The City Who Fought (with Anne McCaffrey)

  The Ship Avenged

  BAEN BOOKS BY JODY LYNN NYE

  View from the Imperium

  The Grand Tour

  School of Light

  Waking in Dreamland

  The Ship Errant

  Don’t Forget Your Spacesuit, Dear

  License Invoked (with Robert Asprin)

  WITH ANNE MCCAFFREY

  The Ship Who Saved the World

  The Death of Sleep

  The Ship Who Won

  Planet Pirates (also with Elizabeth Moon)

  BAEN BOOKS BY ERIC FLINT

  RING OF FIRE SERIES

  1632

  1633 (with David Weber)

  1634: The Baltic War (with David Weber)

  1634: The Galileo Affair (with Andrew Dennis)

  1634: The Bavarian Crisis (with Virginia DeMarce)

  1635: The Ram Rebellion (with Virginia DeMarce et al)

  1635: The Cannon Law (with Andrew Dennis)

  1635: The Dreeson Incident (with Virginia DeMarce)

  1635: The Eastern Front

  1636: The Papal Stakes (with Charles E. Gannon)

  1636: The Devil’s Opera (with David Carrico)

  1636: The Saxon Uprising

  1636: The Kremlin Games (with Gorg Huff & Paula Goodlett)

  1636: Commander Cantrell in the West Indies (with Charles E. Gannon)

  1636: The Viennese Waltz (with Gorg Huff & Paula Goodlett)

  1636: The Cardinal Virtues (with Walter Hunt)

  Time Spike (with Marilyn Kosmatka)

  Grantville Gazette I–VII (ed. by Eric Flint)

  Ring of Fire I–III (ed. by Eric Flint)

  WITH DAVE FREER

  Rats, Bats & Vats

  The Rats, The Bats & the Ugly

  Pyramid Power

  Pyramid Scheme

  Slow Train to Arcturus

  WITH MERCEDES LACKEY & DAVE FREER

  The Shadow of the Lion

  This Rough Magic

  Much Fall of Blood

  Burdens of the Dead

  Sorceress of Karres

  WITH DAVID DRAKE

  The Tyrant

  THE BELISARIUS SERIES WITH DAVID DRAKE

  An Oblique Approach

  In the Heart of Darkness

  Belisarius I: Thunder at Dawn (omnibus)

  Destiny’s Shield

  Fortune’s Stroke

  Belisarius II: Storm at Noontide (omnibus)

  The Tide of Victory

  The Dance of Time

  Belisarius III: The Flames of Sunset (omnibus)

  JOE’S WORLD SERIES

  The Philosophical Strangler

  Forward the Mage (with Richard Roach)

  Mother of Demons

  WITH DAVID WEBER

  Crown of Slaves

  Torch of Freedom

  Cauldron of Ghosts

  WITH K.D. WENTWORTH

  The Course of Empire

  Crucible of Empire

  WITH RYK E. SPOOR

  Boundary

  Threshold

  Portal

  Castaway Planet

  EDITED BY ERIC FLINT

  The World Turned Upside Down (with David Drake & Jim Baen)

  The Best of Jim Baen’s Universe I–II

  BY TOOTH AND CLAW: CLAN OF THE CLAW, BOOK TWO

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2015 by Bill Fawcett & Associates

  “Bury My Heart” copyright © 2015 by Mercedes Lackey and Cody Martin

  “A Clan’s Foundation” copyright © 2015 by S.M. Stirling

  “Sanctuary” copyright © 2015 by Eric Flint

  “Feeding a Fever” copyright © 2015 by Jody Lynn Nye

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1403

  Riverdale, NY 10471

  www.baen.com

  ISBN: 978-1-4767-8040-5

  Cover art by Stephen Hickman

  First printing, April 2015

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas


  New York, NY 10020

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  By tooth and claw / Mercedes Lackey & Cody Martin, S.M. Stirling, Eric Flint, Jody Lynn Nye ; edited by Bill Fawcett.

  pages cm. — (Clan of the Claw ; bk. 2)

  ISBN 978-1-4767-8040-5 (paperback)

  1. Science fiction, American. 2. Fantasy fiction, American. 3. Evolution (Biology)—Fiction. 4. Mammals—Fiction. 5. Reptiles—Fiction. 6. Alternative histories (Fiction) I. Fawcett, Bill, editor. II. Lackey, Mercedes, author. III. Martin, Cody, author. IV. Stirling, S. M., author. V. Flint, Eric, author. VI. Nye, Jody Lynn, author.

  PS648.S3B9 2015

  813’.087620806—dc23

  2015002505

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Pages by Joy Freeman (www.pagesbyjoy.com)

  Printed in the United States of America

  * * *

  Song of Petru

  XVII

  Sword

  They fled the sea

  Torn by the storm

  The way was lost

  But He spoke and

  Sartas begat Mreiss

  And the Lawgiver

  Danced the Way

  * * *

  Bury My Heart

  MERCEDES LACKEY & CODY MARTIN

  The encampment of the Clan of the Long Fang was not in disarray, but the practiced eye would have seen that there were many things wrong with it. Where were the tents of the Dancers? And there did not seem to be nearly enough tents for all of the Mrem in the camp; Mrem liked their space, except in the deep cold when it was good to pile together and share warmth, but from the look of things here, the Mrem in this clan were crowding as many bodies into each tent as could physically fit there. They were also missing many of the amenities of even the poorest war band; no mills or ovens, only a few baskets or pots arrayed outside the tent-flaps or hanging from the posts, almost no carts or wagons, and barely any herd beasts for a clan of this size.

  The Clan of the Long Fang was destitute. Destitute, but alive. This was how the coming of the New Water had left them. They had been the clan nearest the break-through point—or at least, they had been the clan nearest the point where the water had come rushing in that had actually had any members survive. The waters had taken all of the Dancers that had been with the clan, and it was little short of a miracle that many of the elderly, the females and the young had been on a gathering expedition and had managed to climb trees to escape the first of the flood. Many had not been so fortunate, swept away by rushing water mere feet away from their loved ones. It had been another miracle that the hunting males had been able to get to them and get them out as conditions worsened. But the Dancers had all been in camp, on the flat dancing-space where they practiced, and had perished. What hope could there be for a clan without Dancers to pray for Assirra’s entreaty to her husband?

  Sartas Rewl was not going to lie down and wail in the face of such misfortune. As the talonmaster for his clan, he was now all that stood between them and annihilation. If there were no Dancers, well, then Aedonniss would have to notice their bravery by Himself. He and Reshia, his mate, had herded the bedraggled survivors together with claw and soft words as needed. Reshia had scolded them into scavenging what was left of their tents and supplies from the waters . . . or, let it be said, scavenging what was left of . . . someone’s tents and supplies. There were hides with markings no one recognized, and eventually, bodies no one recognized among the debris. Soon it was obvious that their plight could have been worse. He had cuffed and cajoled the males into a massive hunt at a moment when all they wanted to do was sit down and howl their grief into the sky. Reshia had done the same with any of the females, the children, and the elderly who could still manage any sort of task—patching tents, hastily smoking the meat that the males brought in, putting together an encampment that would allow them all to survive in the critical days after the initial disaster. Oh, and bullying them into pulling up and moving the camp every day, as the waters rose, and rose, and rose. It seemed like there was no end to all of the water, as it washed away everything the Clan of the Long Fang had fought and worked for for over a generation. “Sing the Mourning Songs,” Reshia said sternly. “But sing them while your hands are working. Those who have gone will not be better honored if all of the clan dies.”

  Reshia was not a priestess; fortunately not a Dancer, as fate would have it, though she had aspired to be one when she was younger. Despite that, she had a granite will to her that commanded almost as much respect as her mate’s leadership.

  It was not only the hunting males that brought in meat. Some of the elders, whose nerves and stomachs were strongest, scavenged among the wreckage and, at least in the first few days before the bodies began to rot, hauled in the carcasses of those animals that had perished and were good to eat. Kits helped, too, catching the many smerps that had fled the rising waters. What little food they had would not keep indefinitely, and with the devastation from the valley flooding, it was uncertain how much more the clan would be able to procure. The meat they gathered needed to be cured as soon as possible; a complication, but not one they could shirk if they wanted a steady food supply. Hunting was not always to be depended on . . . and with the New Water continuing to rise, could become uncertain. The smoke from the curing fires rose thick; for lack of carry-baskets, the females packed the slabs of blackened meat in layers of leaves and bound them together in bundles, wrapping those in turn in more leaves. More luck, such as it was: the riding and burden-beasts had survived, snapping their tethers and fleeing before the flood. So eventually they came back, or were found, and could be loaded with these provisions as they were created. There was little else that could be done for sustenance; the waters had seen to that.

  It was cold comfort to see the Liskash bodies were far more numerous than those of the Mrem in some places. There were always more Liskash, no matter how many drowned or were cut down. Most were the simpler cousins of the Liskash sorcerers; a few, however, bore signs of the cold intellect of the most hated sort of Liskash. It was too much to hope that they had all died in the flood. Even if the ones that had held territory in the hot valley, now underwater, were all gone, those in the lands outside would see this as a chance to expand that should not be allowed to slip away. The Liskash hated each other almost as much as they hated the Mrem, and were constantly fighting one another; one small thing to thank the gods for.

  And . . . as Sartas had known would happen, the Liskash came for them. There was no shelter or safety from the Liskash, now. They were on the lizards’ territory, and the Liskash would not abide free or living Mrem on their lands. Slavery or death were what the Liskash brought with them for any that stood against them.

  * * *

  By the time one of the roving groups of Liskash had found them, the clan had managed to survive two full moons, always in retreat from the waters, never quite sure what they were fleeing to. But a few stragglers from other clans had come through, with a rumor. The Clan of the Claw, always a strong clan, had survived the flooding intact. And they were gathering together any that would come to their banner. They were far to the south, however, across uncertain lands; it would be a perilous journey for the Clan of the Long Fang, even if they were still fully equipped.

  So now Sartas’s ragged band of survivors had a destination: rally to the Clan of the Claw. And a goal. Survive the journey.

  * * *

  The Clan of the Long Fang had been trekking slowly for the last few weeks. They were slowed by sickness, by lack of food, by the weak and injured, and the elders. More wagons would have helped—but the few wagons they had were needed to carry the tents. With so few arx, all but those that could not move on their own had to walk. They were also slowed by the kits—not that the kits couldn’t keep up, but because no opportunity to forage along the way could be wasted. A handful of berries, a few roots, even an armful of edible shoots could mean the difference between “enough to go on” and having another
person too weak to keep up.

  No matter what Sartas seemed to do, however, his people kept dying. He was walking beside his mount when the news came; the few warriors that still had mounts (no chariots were left) saved them for scouting or for fighting. Everything that was left was precious to the clan, now. The heavily wooded lands that they had favored had suited them well when they had only needed to move to keep hunting grounds fresh . . . now they had to fight their way through those same woods, and progress was achingly slow. “We need to move faster. We’re covered by the trees, but it is only a matter of time before we are found at this rate.” Sartas scratched behind his ear in annoyance, the only nervous habit he ever exhibited. Tall and lean, Sartas was very much like the rest of his clan while being so very different at the same time. Unlike some other clans, who boasted members of wildly different coat colors and length, Long Fangers were fairly uniform in color and appearance; dense, sandy-gray fur, shading to cream on the face and underbelly. And they had two very distinct characteristics; tuft-tipped ears, and naturally bobbed tails, both very useful in woodlands. Long Fangers, if tall, also tended to be heavy; it was the short cats that were lean. Sartas was tall and lean, and very, very quick. It was a combination that had made him more than usually deadly against the Liskash.