Into the West, page 17
None of the villagers looked happy about being near enough to the things to stack the bodies. Ultimately, they didn’t pile them as much as pull them near each other and back off. Kordas pulled on the ley-line until he was full of power, then released it with a gesture at the pile of loathsome bodies. Fire erupted from them with a whoom, and a wavefront of heat that made everyone stand back.
The villagers all stared at him with expressions of awe that were very gratifying to him. Even more gratifying was when their expressions changed, first to faint surprise suggesting that something had occurred to them, to a mixture of gratitude and something else, which he suspected meant they had just now put two and two together and come up with a very unsettling “four.”
That he’d had this power all along.
That he could have used it on them to drive them out of their homes and resettle his people in their village.
That he hadn’t. That he’d instead bargained for passage like a peaceable and reasonable fellow.
The expressions turned again, to bewilderment. Because since he did have all this power, why hadn’t he used it on them?
To be honest, he really didn’t want to get into an explanation. Just let them keep wondering and counting their blessings.
“Now,” Kordas said, “I think we’ll be getting on. We may have a very long way to go before we find our new home. But I suggest,” he added, prompted by his training, “that you make some plans, and perhaps some channeling-walls and pit-traps, in case those creatures do return. Where did they come from?”
The blacksmith answered gravely, “North an’ west. We thought y’was mad to take the river. Everything bad in the world is up there.”
Of course it is.
A guard and a villager briskly approached, and offered up sacks of—he didn’t want to go into that right now, but they were undoubtedly body parts from the things. “We was pickin’ up, an’ we thought the mages would want parts of ’em. An’ we was policin’ bolts an’ arrows, an’ we—we thought you oughta see this.” The villager handed over a fistful of arrows she’d tied together. Their tips were spotless, serrated steel backswept barbs, designed to bite deep and stay there, and they bore helical fletching to induce silence and accuracy. None of the arrows were fully intact, but two things were crystal clear about them.
They all had fresh monster blood drying on them, and they were neither of villager nor Valdemaran make.
The silence around the scouts’ campfire was absolute, and it was so cold now that the sun had set that the only sounds to punctuate that silence were the lapping of water against the bank and the barges, and the crackling of the fire in the middle of their circle of tired and hungry faces. The downriver scouting hadn’t been obviously dangerous but it had been painstaking for them, and stopping for rest and reporting over a warm meal was welcome all around. Delia and the scouts listed off the things they’d made note of, and then Amethyst spoke up.
When Amethyst stopped her calm recitation of the encounter Kordas and his Guard had had with the monstrous hound-things, the expressions of weariness, at least on the faces that Delia could see, had been banished. Though they all had food in their hands, no one was taking another bite, and no one was chewing.
For her part, Delia stared at Amethyst in mingled shock and outrage. “Why did you wait until we stopped for supper and sleep to tell us all this?” she demanded, before any of the others could speak.
“Because nothing bad happened,” Amethyst said placidly. Delia continued to stare at her in disbelief. Anger started to rise in her. How dared the Doll not tell them—or at least her!—that Kordas had been in danger? Amethyst had no right to keep such things from her!
But before she could have another outburst, Sai tossed a pebble at her, hitting her cheek and distracting her.
“Amethyst is right,” he said. “There was no point in stopping to hear what was going on. We were all busy with the task the Baron set us, which was to scout ahead for dangers and for potential places to build a settlement. It doesn’t affect us—”
“I’d dispute that,” Ivar replied mildly. “We need to watch out for packs of monster snake-dogs. Or were they dog-lizards? With poison fangs, apparently.”
“All right, point taken,” Sai replied, a little crossly. “But aside from that, we are much too far ahead of the front of the migration to have gotten back in time to help, and Kordas is a perfectly capable mage on his own, besides having had some of his Guard with him. He had Rose. He could easily have had her summon more guards, or more mages from parts of the convoy that actually were close enough to be of some help. No matter what happened, Amethyst knew it would all be over before anyone here could say ‘We must ride to the rescue!’ which would have been stupid, anyway.” He turned back to Amethyst. “Is there anything else we need to know?”
Amethyst shook her head.
“All right, then.” Sai went back to setting up the big pot full of hearty stew they’d be eating in the morning after it spent the night buried in the coals and ash of the cookfire. “Now we know there are strange and dangerous creatures out here, and we need to be more vigilant. There are things that Jonaton, Venidel, and Endars and I can do that will give us some protection.”
“Shield shells,” said Jonaton, rubbing his hands together with anticipation of something more interesting to do than keeping a bored eye on the forest bordering the river. “We aren’t going to need shields all the time, and it would be a waste of energy to keep them up that way, but we should have spell keys and break triggers made up so we can deploy shields in an instant. Big ones for the boats and camp, small ones for each of you.”
“I’ve got good night sight,” offered Endars. “I don’t mind sleeping days to keep watch at night. We won’t be moving in the dark, so the shield won’t have to be as large to cover us and the horses. Might be a time saver, over protecting a whole boat.”
Venidel, Sai’s apprentice, added, “Our first ones should probably make spherical shields, to save time. They can’t stop everything, but they’re strong for their size. I guess we should just go for fast and simple.” Venidel was an earnest, gangly, ginger-haired lad near enough to Delia’s age not to matter, who looked useless, and was anything but. A farmer by birth, affable Venidel had come into his power fairly late by mage standards, but he took it seriously. “Hotseeds could hold the spellcharge, since none of it’s meant to be permanent. I think we have hotseed pod shells in the provisions, though I hate to use them up.”
“We can live with bland soup, as long as we’re living.” Jonaton chuckled. “Straight twigs, cleaned mud, seedpods, what else will we need—”
The four mages dove into a conversation that left the rest of them out in the cold, but Delia didn’t mind; she was too busy trying to sort out her galloping feelings. On top, and dominant, was that Kordas had been in danger and she was angry she had not been there to help him.
Because surely, went her runaway fantasy, he would have seen that I had run to help him, rather than running away to hide. And maybe one of the creatures would have attacked him at a moment when he was unaware, and I could have saved him, and he would have taken me into his arms and . . .
And she found herself blushing so hotly that the fire on her cheeks felt cool, and she was mortally glad there was no one about with Mind-magic to “read” this preposterous faradiddle and laugh at her.
It had been one thing to entertain such fabulous notions before Kordas had been summoned to the Capital, when they had all been safe in the manor and the worst danger any of them faced was a late supper. It was quite another when they were here in a strange land, and when practically within days of the first party crossing the gate, these hellish monsters appeared.
Instead of making up fancies, I should be listening to Sai and the others discuss what magic tricks they can use to ward off danger, and to fight. And I should be trying to figure out how my Fetching Gift can help if some weirdling creature lurches out of the forest with a belly full of hunger and the certainty that we look tasty!
So for once, she listened to her more sensible side and accepted the flatbread-and-jam slice that was passed to her, occupied her mouth with that, and listened while the mages all speculated.
“I think,” Sai said at last, “there was a book in your library, Jonaton, that talked about Change-Circles and what sometimes happens inside them?”
“Oh good gods, I haven’t cracked that book in a dog’s age. And now it’s—” He waved vaguely to their rear. “Well, if I am remembering correctly, if you got two or more creatures caught inside one, there was about an even chance each that they’d die, get weakened in some way, get enhanced in some way, or fuse together in some hellish monstrosity that might or might not die. Something about life itself makes them fuse—there are no accounts of nonliving things joining.”
“That sounds like those snake-dogs, doesn’t it?” Hakkon asked.
“Well yes, except that you never got the same thing twice out of a Change-Circle, and there was an entire pack of those things.” Jonaton pulled on his lower lip thoughtfully. “Amethyst, what did Kordas tell you about them again? Besides the description and the poison fangs.”
“That he believed they were either diseased, heavily inbred, or both,” Amethyst replied. The firelight made the amethyst cabochon embroidered into her forehead glow as if it was a third eye. “Rose saw them, and attests that they did have various obvious deformities.”
“So they probably aren’t the product of a Change-Circle,” Endars opined.
“But . . .” Everyone looked at Venidel. He gulped, but bravely continued. “But there are creatures like worms and slugs, snails, and some fish that don’t need male and female because they are both.”
Delia stopped chewing, because that sounded too mad to be true. But it was clear that the mages, at least, had either known that already, or were prepared to believe it coming from Venidel.
He is an expert on animals and how they react to magic. He was the one who had concocted the idea of the charms put on their animals that kept them “tethered” to their home barge.
The elder mages looked at each other, then back to Venidel, then at each other again. “I suppose it’s possible,” Sai conceded. “We knew that we could encounter anything, and we are officially in Undiscovered Country.”
“The people who live in it certainly discovered it!” Bart Fairweather laughed. “Well, expect the worst, hope for the best, I suppose. It’s too bad none of us can fly. It would be awfully nice to have something or someone scouting overhead.”
Sai and Jonaton both broke up in laughter. “Sadly, flying is a dream,” Sai informed him, as Jonaton wiped his eyes over the change of subject. “Oh, every baby mage dreams of the day he can fly, but . . . well, you can do it, but it’s not very practical. You run out of your own power to control the magic, and when that happens—” He picked up a pebble, held it high, and dropped it. “Splat.”
“The few mages I ever knew who could do it just used it to impress women,” Endars said sourly. “And all they did, really, was rise up to about head-high, spread their arms, and smirk and look important. Or at least they were under the impression they looked important.”
“Did it work?” Venidel asked, now clearly intrigued. “On women, I mean.”
“Yes.” The tone of Endars’s voice, and the way he bit off the word, suggested to Delia that there was a story there.
Probably a sad story about Endars wanting to impress a particular woman—or girl—only to see one of the show-offs win the “contest” before it could start.
“You never see female mages pulling that particularly obnoxious piece of asshattery,” snickered Jonaton. “It’s always the boys with no brains who make up for their lack of wit by strutting and flashing their feathers.” He smacked Endars on the shoulder. “Trust me, anyone who falls for that trick isn’t worth impressing.”
Endars’s mouth squinched over to the side as if he didn’t quite believe it, but he nodded after a moment.
“So you fell for it?” Sai poked back.
“Only twice,” Jonaton replied, and the laugh was welcome all around.
“Besides, it takes a special sort of crazy person to have a relationship with a mage, especially if they themselves aren’t mages,” Hakkon said lazily, as he held up a bit of bread and jam to Jonaton, who opened his mouth like a baby bird wanting to be fed. Hakkon feinted the bite away, then popped it into Jonaton’s mouth. “And would you really want to be with someone as crazy as me?”
“Of course I do!” said Jonaton, and made silly puppy eyes at his partner. “And I am known far and wide for my excellent taste.”
Delia rolled her eyes, recalling a few of Jonaton’s outfits that . . . well, they looked like bags. Colored in hues not found in nature, and with some impressive ornamentation, but bags nevertheless. Not something she would have said was in “good taste.”
“I’ll pass, thank you,” Endars replied, but he didn’t look nearly as sour.
Delia was the first to head for bed, and not just because she was still trying to sort through some very uncomfortable feelings. The barges used for the scouts had been modified. The one the women were using was one of the “kitchen” barges, the kind that would accompany workers to remote sites. It had been modified for Alberdina’s use as an apothecary and infirmary as well as for Sai’s special cooking. The front two-thirds was the kitchen, which was how these were normally set up, but instead of stored food, the back third held the close-stool and the women’s beds and personal storage. And since Alberdina was not young, and one of the bottom beds needed to be reserved for someone injured or ill, that meant that Delia and Briada were on the top bunks. Delia was above Alberdina, and it was just less awkward all around if she was in the bunk when Alberdina came to bed. No chance of accidentally stepping on Alberdina, or flailing and kicking her.
Besides Sai’s food, there was another thing that the scouts had that most of the rest of the convoy didn’t. Apparently a good long while ago, when he first started venturing out past the borders of the Empire, Ivar had come to Sai with a request. He’d wanted some way to remove his scent—and maybe to clean himself up at the same time—that he could use at least daily.
Sai had presented him with a towel that could be used morning and night that did just that. And once they’d arrived at Crescent Lake, he’d been making more such things—even a scrub with a rag and warm water was going to be less than pleasant come winter. The towels were made, he claimed, of mushrooms. They were supposed to be living sheets of fungus that would absorb and thrive on whatever filth was rubbed into them. He’d given two to each of the scouts when they were putting their personal things away. “One to clean yourself, the other to roll your smallclothes in when you go to bed,” he’d said. “In the morning, your smalls will be cleaner than if they’d come from the Baron’s laundry.”
It wasn’t anywhere near as nice as a good long soak in a proper bathtub with proper hot water, but it did clean you really well, including your hair. And Sai hadn’t exaggerated about what the second one did for underthings, either. They came out of the rolled-up towel better than the laundresses had ever cleaned them.
And that was another thing: it was also less awkward if she got her “wash-up” before the others bedded down. She still felt uncomfortable being naked in front of two people she didn’t know very well. It wasn’t that she was particularly bodyshy, but rather that Valdemarans tended to associate nudity with privacy. Healers often made private examinations when the patient was nude, but bathing was done alone, and unless one was extremely wealthy and could afford a handmaid, clothing changes were done in private as well. Therefore, being bare made her feel like she should be alone.
The little stove was going, but it was still cold enough that she hurried through her cleanup and back into a particularly warm, loose shirt and trews and clambered into her bunk. There was just enough soft light from the little lantern at the front door to aid her into place. Outside she could hear voices; it sounded like the mages were bidding everyone goodnight. Then Alberdina apparently said the same. A moment later she heard and felt Alberdina board the barge.
She pretended to be asleep, on her side with her face to the wall. After an interval of soft sounds and the slight rocking of the barge, she heard and felt Alberdina settle into the bottom bunk.
She carefully eased over onto her back and pulled the covers up tight under her chin. There were so many thoughts buzzing in her head, like a hive full of annoyed bees, that it was just too hard to sort them out. And her emotions were tangled up in all of it. Finally one thing rose to the top. Kordas sent me away on purpose. And it wasn’t because of my Gift. Really, there was no other conclusion that anyone with the sense the gods gave a goose could come to.
A part of her was angry, and part of her was jealous of her sister, and another part of her was determined to do so well out here that her name would be in every single report that Rose gave to Kordas on their progress. That part of her was a whole different little tangle all on its own. Send me away, will he? I’ll show him! And Think you can send me off and forget me? You’ll hear about me more often than if I was still back there! And Will you be sorry you sent me away?
Part of her wanted to be vital to the group. She did like them, she liked all of them, and Hakkon and Jonaton she loved like brothers, and Sai was practically her grandfather. She honestly wanted to make them proud of her and happy that she was there, so happy that they’d fight to keep her with them.
Delia had listened to Amethyst’s calm recital of the attack on the village with horror. Even more so that Ivar and Sai had seemed unsurprised to hear about it. As they had lived at Crescent Lake, her early fears of being in a wilderness had faded—with that many people all in one place, it wasn’t really a “wilderness” so much as a temporary city, and the things she had feared, like bears and wolves and pards, if they’d had any sense, wouldn’t come within sniffing distance of Crescent Lake.
