There had been no attack, just the trailing to herd the men to the northeast. And Rynch had lost the first tight pinch of panic, though he knew the folly of underestimating the unknown.
They climbed with unspoken consent, going clear to the top, where they huddled together on a four-foot tableland. Hume unhooked his distance lenses, but it was toward the rises of the mountains that he aimed them, not along the back trail.
Rynch wriggled about, studied the river and its banks. The beasts there were quiet, blue-green lumps, standing down on the river bank or squatting in the grass.
"Nothing." Hume lowered the lenses, held them before his broad chest as he still watched the peaks.
"What did you expect?" Rynch snapped. He was hungry, but not hungry enough to abandon the islet.
Hume laughed shortly. "I don't know. Only I'm sure they are heading us in that direction."
"Look here," Rynch rounded on him. "You know this planet, you've been here before."
"I was one of the survey team that approved it for the Guild."
"Then you must have combed it pretty thoroughly. How is it that you didn't know about them?" He gestured to their pursuers.
"That is what I would like to ask a few assorted experts right about now," Hume returned. "The verifiers registered no intelligent native life here."