Sunrise Lands

Chapter Twelve

Rover Territory, Eastern Oregon

April 15, CY23/2021 A.D.

Joseph Kuttner's single eye gleamed in the light of the fires as he sat in the folding canvas chair. The Rover chiefs squatted across from him, all hair and eyes and teeth and a strong outdoor stink of badly cured leather and horse and sweat, and of lanolin from the sheepskin cloaks some of them kept around their shoulders against the evening chill. Sparks flew upward into the huge star-flecked dome above, and the gnawed bones of a roasted sheep littered the ground.

"You want us to chop some CORA folks for you?" one of them said, grinning. "What for y'want that? We'd do for our own selves, if them western bastards come on our land."

He spit into the fire, a brief hissing sound. Kuttner nodded politely; he was very glad a dozen Cutters stood behind him, fully armed. These new nomads of the sage brush country weren't former Eaters like the savages you found east of the Mississippi… not quite. They were nearly as dangerous to outsiders; a little less likely to attack, but much more effective if they did.

"I want them dead because one of them gave me this," he replied, touching the scar that traversed his empty left eye socket.

That brought more grins, as he'd expected. It was motivation they could understand.

"And they're enemies of the Prophet and His Son, and so of the Ascended Masters and the Unseen Hierarchy."

A few of them nodded; the mission was going well here. The Rovers' extreme poverty was a major reason. It wasn't that the land here couldn't yield a reasonable living, given how few and thinly scattered the dwellers were. What they lacked were the tools and the skills to make them, or anything much to trade for them in more fortunate areas. The Church Universal and Triumphant was willing to supply them, for allegiance and fighting men rather than for profit. It wouldn't be the first time that readiness to seek out the folk who'd had the most trouble recovering from the Change had aided the sacred cause.

What was that old-world expression? He searched his memory. Ah, "rice-bowl Christians." But from that comes true faith, in time.

"They're soulless pagan idolaters, minions of the Nephilim," he amplified. "Nine of them, and they'll be traveling with a large wagon and many good horses."

They all nodded at that, with eager greed. This was a hard place to scratch a living, even by Montana standards. Men who didn't grasp at anything they could with both hands hadn't survived here.

"And there will be CORA men as well, probably-from Seffridge Ranch. Rancher Brown's cowboys."

That brought more scowls and muttered curses, but a little apprehension as well as anger; they recognized the name of the holding, and of its lord. Kuttner made a gesture with one hand, and a Cutter came forward with a bundle of shetes. The fine steel glittered in the fire light as he laid them out with their hilts towards the four chiefs, and the brass pommels glowed.

"Two dozen good shetes. And many fine bows, and many arrows for each. If you kill them, the Church promises two slaves who understand bowmaking… for the most deserving of you, of course."

The chiefs glanced at one another, calculating who would get the most, and how it would affect their own balance against one another. Making horn-and-sinew horseman's bows wasn't a skill that was common around here, and such weapons were precious beyond words, even more than fine forged swords. Many of their men made do with javelins, or carefully preserved pre Change hunting bows. Those were good of their kind, but they seldom had a draw weight sufficient for modern war. Deer didn't wear shirts of steel, or even cured bullhide.

They didn't kill you if you missed, either.

One of the ones who'd been stubborn about the Church's preaching leaned forward. "Tell me more about the Prophet," he said. "If'n he can hand out gear like that, maybe God does favor him."

Seffridge Ranch,

South-Central Oregon

May 7, CY23/2021 A.D.

"Well, that's a relief, Chief, and no mistake," Edain said, looking back at the mountain peaks.

It was the moment just before dawn, when a few stars still lingered in the western sky. That was cloudless, but the mountains there were snowcapped all along the horizon, like a jaw full of white fangs pointing at the heavens, high enough to catch the ruddy light before groundlings could see the sun rising. The great peaks of the Three Sisters were just visible at the northern edge of sight, eighty miles away and more beneath the endless darkling blue.

"I'll not be arguing with you the now," Rudi Mackenzie said.

The younger Mackenzie was smiling as he grumbled, and his pride was obvious. They'd come through a crisis-not an earth shaking one, but they could have died if they hadn't acted swiftly, and it had been a hard slog afterwards.

"Still, it was interesting," Rudi went on.

Ingolf groaned: "Too much like nearly freezing to death again for my taste, and to hell with interesting."

"Where's your sense of adventure?" Rudi asked with a snort.

"It died with a Sioux arrow through the gut about seven years ago," Ingolf said, genially enough to take most of the sting out of it.

"It wasn't that cold," Rudi said aloud.

To himself: And I'm not that much younger than you, my friend. And I'm in charge. Then: And there was that dream… I don't know Who sent it or what it meant, but I do know it frightened the squeezings out of me.

"Cold enough to get you and your friend out of your kilts," the easterner went on. "For a while."

Rudi and Edain were back in the pleated skirtlike garments, and had their plaids pinned at their shoulders.

It isn't that I really mind wearing pants, Rudi thought. It's just that I'd rather not unless there's a good reason.

Garbh plodded at her master's heels with her tongue hanging out, occasionally raising her shaggy barrel-shaped head to sniff with interest.

About the way I feel, Rudi thought.

Not near the end of his tether, but it was good to be down out of the high country, and next time he went that way he intended to wait until June.

They walked on southeast down a gentle slope, through open forest of ponderosa and lodgepole and jack pine, tall straight trees but more slender and less close packed than the fir woodland on the western slope. It was inter spersed with grassy meadows bright with golden-orange blanket flowers and nodding lilac-colored mariposa lilies; pine and strong-scented sage filled the cool thin high-desert air, stronger than the scents of leather and sweat. The snow was gone, but at better than four thou sand feet May wasn't what you'd call warm; it got a little less chilly as the sun cleared the horizon and sent long fingers of light through the trees.

"At least our packs are a lot lighter," Rudi said cheerfully.

"That's because we're about out of food," Edain teased.

"Where's your sense of direction?" Ingolf asked Rudi. "Not as dead as my sense of adventure, I hope."

"It's been years since Mom and I visited out here, and we came over Highway 20 through the Santiam Pass and then down the railway from Bend," Rudi said. "But…"

He closed his eyes for an instant and called up the terrain, half maps he'd seen, partly his teenage memories of the visit, partly a picture those made in his head. They'd crossed the old Burlington Northern tracks yesterday evening, so…

"… that was Bedpan Burn back there, I'm pretty sure. Silver Lake Road should be a little east of here. That'll take us right south to the ranch."

They pushed on. Then Garbh stiffened, pointing her nose south and making a small muffled sound just as they reached the cracked and frost heaved pavement of the old road; the breeze was from that direction too. Rudi flung up a hand. Something was crashing through the brush ahead of them. They all melted behind trees and reached over their shoulders for arrows. Then they relaxed when they saw it was a red and white steer, gaunt with winter, all legs and horns. It faced them and snorted, then went back to grazing on the fresh new growth; the beast was a little thin, but too well conditioned and too used to humans to be feral stock.

"We're close," Rudi said, and the others nodded.

You couldn't leave stock wandering on their own for long, not with wolf and coyote, bear and tiger and mountain lion around, not to mention rustlers and horse thieves. This was the time of year ranchers started moving herds up towards the higher country, as the snow pulled back into the mountains. They passed more cattle and sheep as they walked, and saw riders pacing them on the edge of sight. Probably one had dashed on ahead to alert the camp, which was all to the good. You didn't want to surprise people, especially not people with bows and protective attitudes towards their livestock.

A little farther and they smelled woodsmoke, with an overtone of frying bacon and brewing chicory. Rudi cupped his hands around his mouth as they walked on through brush and onto the edge of a wide opening with only scattered trees.

"Hello! Hello, the camp!" he called.

Calling out like that was considered good manners hereabouts. He did it again:

"Hello! Hello, the camp!"

Dogs barked and voices rose; Garbh started to growl back, then quieted at Edain's whistle and stayed close to his heel, apprehensive and aggressive at the same time with the stress of being in a strange pack's terri tory-her kind weren't so different from human beings, in many ways.

There were a fair number of folk around the fires there, tending gear or getting ready for the day or striking tents; three covered buckboard wagons were parked nearby, and plenty of hobbled horses nosed at the ground. The humans included both sexes and all ages down to infants, all dressed in drab sensible leather and linsey-woolsey and sheepskin. A woman spun wool with a spindle and distaff as she watched a half dozen toddlers; that was less efficient than a spinning wheel, but you could do it on the move and do something else that didn't need hands at the same time.

Three men already in the saddle cantered over and pulled up with casual ease, leaving the reins lying loose on their mounts' necks. One wore a mail shirt, and the other two had breastplates of cowhide boiled in vine gar and strengthened with chevrons of thin steel splints painted brown; they all had curved swords at their belts, full quivers over their backs and round shields at their saddlebows marked with the intermingled S/R of their ranch. The man in the mail shirt had a horse tail mounted on the top of his helmet as a crest as well.

None of the three men had drawn swords, but they all had their short, powerful horn-and sinew recurve bows in their hands and a shaft on the string. They drew up a fair distance away, and kept their eyes moving to make sure there weren't more strangers hidden in the trees.

"Howdy," their leader-the one with the mail shirt and the horse-tail crest-said. "You folks know you're on Seffridge Ranch land? Mind tellin' where you're from, and where and what your business might be?"

Rudi nodded. "Hello. We two are Mackenzies from over the Cascades," he said. "And our friend here is from out east-far east, from beyond the mountains, not from Pendleton," he added. CORA and Pendleton don't mix well. "We're here to see Mr. Brown."

The cowboy's brows went up; he was a leathery man of about thirty, with sandy colored stubble on a sun-tanned face and blue eyes already cradled in a network of wrinkles.

" You want to see the Rancher his own self?" he said, sounding dubious. "I'm line boss here in this section. You got something to say, say it to me."

Behind him, one of the men muttered: "Not even saddle tramps."

Rudi nodded, concealing his amusement. People on this side of the mountains attached a lot of importance to your horses, and they looked down on men who traveled far afoot. He liked horses well enough himself and considered Epona one of his best friends, but he thought the attitude ridiculous.

"Mr. Brown is expecting us," he said. "Who we are is between him and us, sure, and our business likewise. No offense, but he wouldn't be thanking you for asking too many questions. If he thinks we're wasting his time… well, in his own house he'd be able to deal with that the way he thought best, wouldn't he?"

The cowboy gave a brisk nod, which set the horse tail on his helmet bobbing.

"He's had a good deal to do with Mackenzies before, I know that," he said thoughtfully, eyes narrowing. "And he's got a fair passel of guests to home right now, all of 'em foreign."

Then he came to a decision, and called over his shoulder: "Cody! Hank! Tommy! Git over here! Rest of you, there's plenty to do. We got eight hundred head to move."

Cody looked enough like him to be his younger brother and probably was; Hank was even younger, but dark and thickset; Tommy was about sixteen, a slender redhead. They were armed and equipped like the first three; so was every man here and a fair number of the women.

"These folks are here to see the boss. Tommy, you get back to the homeplace and let him know. Cody, Hank, cut them out horses and take 'em on down to the house."

The three travelers stood and watched the ranch hands break camp. Most mounted up and moved out to get their herds moving north into the old national forest. The rest finished dousing their fires and policing up their gear, ready to resume their slow journey up to the sum mer pastures where they'd live until fall. One young girl came over shyly and gave them each a buttered biscuit with a piece of bacon in it. A few of the others looked dubious, and he caught a mutter of, "Witches."

Cody and Hank brought them saddled horses. They seemed to be watching as the three mounted, and half hoping they'd do so with a clumsy scramble. Rudi smiled, put a hand on the cantle and vaulted easily into the sad dle, feet finding the stirrups. They followed the old road, riding off the broken pavement to spare the hooves; the potholes had been filled in roughly to keep it passable to wagons, but dirt was easier on the horses' feet.

After an hour or two the two young cowboys were chattering merrily, and asking questions about the strangers' gear.

"Them longbows don't look too handy," Cody said dubiously.

"The dead pine," Rudi replied conversationally, nocked a shaft, drew and shot in one supple motion, before the cowpony he was riding had time to crab.

You could use a longbow from horseback, particularly when the target was directly to the left; it just wasn't easy. Snap, and then an instant later the shaft was quivering like an angry wasp in the trunk of the dead ponderosa pine a hundred and twenty yards away, while birds flung themselves skyward from it in alarm.

Cody gave him a look and cantered his horse across the slope to retrieve the shaft. He tried tugging it out, then gave up and dug at it with the point of his knife. When he came back he was shaking his head ruefully.

"OK, mister, you can shoot with that beanpole there," he said. "My daddy went west with the Rancher in the War of the Eye and he told me about Mackenzie longbows… still, I'd say a saddlebow is handier."

He raised his own weapon, copied from pre-Change recurve hunting bows, to illustrate what he meant; it was around four feet long, with flat-section laminated limbs that curled forward at the tips.

"It certainly is, when you're riding," Rudi acknowl edged. "The longbow holds up better in wet weather, though."

Ingolf shook his head. "Not if you're careful about varnish."

"And that doesn't matter as much out here, where it don't rain all the damn time like I hear it does over the mountains," Cody added.

They spent a pleasant hour talking bows, horses and hunting as they traveled. Then the men drew rein and looked southward as they came out of the last of the forest, where it trailed off into the occasional stunted juniper amid grass and sage and wildflowers.

Cody smiled, obviously expecting them to be impressed. "Quite somethin', ain't it?" he said proudly.

Ahead was open country, and they looked down onto a plain of sagebrush and bunchgrass green with spring and splashed by yellow bee plant. It was cut by a small river lined with cottonwoods, running westward towards a stretch of marsh. Water glinted in the diversion ditches that irrigated fields of dark alfalfa and a patchwork of other crops; cattle and horses and sheep and long-necked alpaca moved over the broad pastures beyond under the eye of mounted herders.

"That's the homeplace," the cowboy said, waving at a clutch of buildings, toy-sized in the middle distance. "There aren't many so fine."

A little village clustered there around the low-slung fieldstone ranch house, amid a wider setting of corrals, bunkhouse, paddocks and big barns of old-style sheet metal and newer ones of sawn boards; the square stone tower at one corner of the big house was probably new, too. John Brown's holding had been a good sized spread even before the Change, and afterwards he became one of the movers and shakers of CORA, the Central Oregon Ranchers' Association. He'd annexed several smaller ranches that didn't have good natural water, and as much of the old national forest as he wanted to claim and had the men to hold.

Couple of hundred people, more or less, Rudi thought. Pretty much what one of our farming duns has, or a Bear killer strategic hamlet, or a knight's-fee manor up in the Protectorate. Though there may be nearly as many out at the line camps this time of year.

That wasn't many for tens of thousands of acres, but the bones of the earth were closer to the skin here than they were in his lush homeland west of the mountains, and Brown had taken in as many townsfolk as he could feed after the Change. The cowboy clucked to his mount and they all moved forward again. Half a dozen more riders were on guard; two came up to escort them in, one of them with a light lance bearing the rancher's sigil on the pennant.

"They say Bend is a lot bigger," Cody went on. "But I say you'd travel plenty and find nothing better than this!"

Ingolf blinked, caught Rudi's eye, and lifted a brow.

Yeah, it's not much of a muchness, the Mackenzie acknowledged with a slight shrug. But sure, if they want to get excited over it, let's not be a wet blanket about it, eh? And it's probably a nice enough place to live. I don't like big cities myself.

There was no wall around the settlement, but all the houses were stone, with fireproof tile or sheet metal roofs; all the windows could be closed with steel shut ters that had narrow slits for shooting arrows, and angle iron posts set in concrete stood ready to carry tangles of barbed wire if need be. You could see how the ma sonry improved from the earlier houses to the later ones as hands gained skill, but they were all built thick and strong. The snout of a Corvallis-made catapult peeked over the top of the tower.

People were finishing breakfast or already at work, but they stopped to watch the strangers ride in. The smith was a brawny brick-thick man in a leather apron and sweat stained shirt beneath; he and his assistants paused while he plunged a white-hot knife blade into a quenching bath before they came out to wave. Many of the other folk came out also, from saddlers' shops and bowyers' and a big open-sided shed where carpenters were putting together something complex-probably a pivoting hay lift.

"Mackenzies! " the smith called, sounding happy to see them, a white grin splitting his sweat- and soot-streaked face. The man went on: "I trained in Dun Carson!"

Rudi reined aside and leaned over to shake his hand; it was hard as something carved out of cured leather, and strong even by the young clansman's standards.

"Cernunnos and Brigid bless you, then, friend," he said.

"Goibniu strengthen your hand," the smith replied; it sounded a little odd in the flat twanging range-country drawl.

Now that Rudi looked, there was a mask of the Lord of Iron over the hearth, together with the crossed spears and cow horns-not as conspicuous as the patron deity of smiths would have been in a Clan settlement, but there. He made a reverence to it before he rode on. Most of the people here were Christians-there was a small Protestant church, and an even smaller Catholic chapel. He hoped it didn't cause the smith any trouble, but it probably wouldn't. Even a generation after the Change, metalworker's skills were still rare enough to be very valuable, and the CORA charter allowed freedom of religion.

Along one enclosure paced a great black mare, looking like another species amid the rough coated ranch quarter horses. Epona whinnied indignantly when Rudi rode by with only a wave-John Brown, Rancher of Sef fridge, was an old friend of the family, but he might get a bit huffy if Juniper's son stopped to greet his horse first. There were other western horses there as well, Epona's two daughters, and a clutch of sixteen-hand warmblood destriers that dwarfed the smaller range breed and out weighed them by a third or more. He didn't recognize them, though the four dappled Arabs his twin half sisters rode for serious business were familiar.

Rancher Brown stood to meet them on the veranda that wrapped around the old stone ranch house, a leathery man in his sixties with thinning white hair and skin wrinkled like a relief map but still erect and strong.

"You fellas get on back to the herd," he called to Cody and Hank. "Tell Smitty I know these folks and was ex pectin' 'em. And don't any of you go flappin' your lips about it."

Then he beamed at Rudi and came forward to shake his hand after he dismounted.

"Not that it'll matter, seein' as Smitty and his crew aren't coming back down for quite some while. You're looking all growed up, boy," he said.

"This is Edain Aylward Mackenzie and Ingolf Vogeler, friends of mine," Rudi said. "And you're looking the same as ever, Uncle John."

He'd been sixteen the last time the rancher came west of the mountains on CORA's affairs, but Brown and Juniper Mackenzie had done business from the first Change Year, and they'd fought the Protector together even before the War of the Eye.

"And you're a liar," the older man said with a wry smile. "Mirrors still work, boy. Come on in, all of you. All your other friends are here."

All two of them? Rudi thought, a little puzzled. And they're my sisters… well, half sisters… what are the twins up to now?

The big living room held leather-upholstered furni ture, racked weapons on the walls and a bearskin rug and more sheepskins on the floor; there was a mounted cougar head over the wide stone hearth. The twins were there, grinning their sly little fooled you, ha ha grins, but they weren't alone by a long shot. Mathilda and Odard had the grace to keep their faces straight. A thin inconspicuous man he recognized as some sort of hanger-on to Odard was there too, and a warrior-monk from Mount Angel, a dark close-coupled man with swordsman's wrists.

Yes, he was there that night… his name's Ignatius. That's nine, he thought, his mouth thinning with anger. Well, now I know where the destriers came from.

He looked at his half sisters. They saw his face and did a creditable imitation of what he thought of as their aunt Astrid's elf-lord-with-a-pickle-up-the-ass expression of hauteur.

"Let me guess," he said heavily. "You didn't have to tell her "-he looked at Mathilda-"so you could get her in on it without technically breaking your promise. And Matti, you heard something from your mother, so you could tell them"-he nodded to Odard and his servant-"what you'd heard from her."

Mathilda smiled and mimed clapping. "And nine is traditional."

The twins nodded seriously at that.

Father Ignatius spoke before Rudi could ask: "The abbot guessed," he said succinctly.

Mathilda went on: "It will give you a better chance, Rudi. And this is important. The Prophet thinks so…"

Ritva and Mary nodded vigorously. "We ran into a CUT preacher in Bend, and he started a riot we got sucked into. Not a nice bunch."

Mathilda gave them a quelling glance and continued: "… and so does your mother. I don't know about the Prophet, but I've always taken Lady Juniper's ideas seriously."

He nodded, touched despite his irritation. And nine… that many aren't really more conspicuous than five, but another four good sword arms might make the difference in a tight spot. It's luck and the whim of the Trickster either way. Judgment call.

There wasn't much sense in pitching a fit; he had no way of stopping Mathilda from following him except to turn back himself.

Of course, when and if we get back… Oh, sweet Mother-of-All, what if I come back and she doesn't?

"You realize your mother will kill me?" Rudi wasn't quite sure whether he was serious or not. "If something happens to you, she'll kill me slowly."

I like Sandra, but…

She'd saved his life when he was her husband's pris oner as a child during the War of the Eye-saved it several times, in fact. And she'd always been kind to him when he was visiting afterwards, and he'd learned a good deal from her. The problem was… he wasn't a kid anymore. With Sandra, you never knew. Was she capable of acting nice for twelve years as an act of calculation, just to get on your good side?

Oh, yeah. She's capable of it, no doubt about it. But would she be after doing it the now?

Sandra's daughter looked a little daunted, and then brightened-probably thinking that it would be the bet ter part of a year before she saw her mother again, or more.

"That's the least of your worries," Mathilda pointed out. "For now, at least. Mom's back in Portland or Castle Todenangst." A grin, half-ironic. "And even the Spider's reach has limits."

Of a sudden, Rudi threw back his head and laughed. It would be a year, and he was still young enough for twelve months to seem like a long time.

"Well, when you're right, you're right," he said; her smile warmed him. "And Matti-I'd have done exactly the same thing in your place."

He turned and introduced the others. Odard had seen Ingolf before, and met Edain once or twice, and was smooth as ever, but when he and Vogeler shook, their forearms clenched a little as each took a squeeze. Rudi hid his smile at that-two strong men taking each other's measure, a bit like two strange dogs bristling and stalking around stiff-legged and then sniffing each oth er's behinds. The more so as Ingolf was a tried fighting man, and Odard just enough younger to be extra touchy about the fact that he wasn't.

"Pleased to meet you again, Sheriff Vogeler," Odard said when they'd finished.

He worked his right hand a little. That was a mark of a certain respect, and so was the form of address; Association nobles didn't always admit that the titles of eastern sheriffs were comparable to their own… and Odard was technically a baron now himself, while Ingolf was a younger son and landless wanderer.

"Pleased to meet you again, Baron Gervais," Ingolf said, impeccably polite.

He didn't flex his hand. That might mean he'd won the little unspoken exchange-he was bigger and heavier boned, after all-or it just might mean that he had six years more experience and was better at hiding things. Or both; probably both.

Behind them, Rudi saw the three young women exchange a glance and roll their eyes skyward ever so slightly. He knew exactly what they were thinking: Men. That made him cock an ironic eyebrow at them.

Girls have their own way of playing who's-the-boss; if we do it like dogs, they're more like cats, he thought. It's sneakier, usually, but it's the same game, sure. And they can play our way if they want.

He shivered slightly, inwardly, at a memory. Tiphaine d'Ath had told him once that she even had an advantage at it; she skipped the preliminary strutting and chest beating flourishes men expected and just killed whoever she thought was a threat. Of course, that had its draw backs too; it made her hated almost as much as she was feared. Let the fear weaken, and the hate would become active.

There was a reason for the rituals; they let men settle their positions without fighting to the death every single time.

Rancher Brown had caught the byplay between the two younger men too, and snorted softly; with him it was probably that he had nearly seven decades of perspective, and was an old alpha dog who was sensible enough to let the sixty well armed youngsters who followed his banner do his growling and sniffing for him.

"Come on in."

The breakfast table was still set in the dining room, though it looked as if half a dozen people had already eaten. Mrs. Brown was there, a quiet middle aged blond woman a fair bit younger than the rancher-his first wife had died not long after the Change when some medicine she needed to live ran out. The current Mrs. Brown's children were there, down at the end of the table, two girls of eight and ten and a boy a couple of years younger than Edain.

The rancher's wife smiled as the newcomers loaded their plates with flapjacks and huevos rancheros and bacon and sausage and buttered muffins and toast from the lamp-warmed hot plates on the buffet. There was a-small-jar of maple syrup on the table as well. Rudi used it sparingly; the stuff had to be imported from the Willamette, and he suspected that its presence was in honor of the guests in general and of him specifically.

Everything was still good; he murmured the invocation and pitched in. Mrs. Brown smiled at him.

"You always were a good eater, Rudi. It's a pleasure to see a young man enjoy his food."

He grinned back at her; after crossing the still-frigid Cascades on foot and living mostly on hardtack and jerky while he did it, he certainly was going to enjoy a meal like this. Ingolf and Edain were putting it away with methodical pleasure too.

"It's a pleasure for a young man to eat it, too, Aunt Mabel." Then to the rancher: "I notice Bob isn't here."

Brown nodded at the mention of his eldest son, born before the Change.

"The boy's out getting a horse herd ready to drive east. Saddle-broke, young 'uns four to six. 'Bout a hundred and a bit."

Then he shook his head. "The boy?" He made a tsk sound and gave a rueful chuckle. "I'm gettin' old. Bob has a boy of his own who'll start shavin' in a year or three."

Rudi raised a brow. "Taking a herd east? Boise?"

Brown smiled slowly. "Well, maybe. Maybe not, too. General Thurston in Boise is paying pretty good for saddle-broke four-year-olds…"

"But New Deseret is paying even better?"

"Reckon. Leastways that's what their man promised; their war with this Prophet fella isn't going so well. And the Saints generally keep a bargain once they've made it. Can't always say that about Thurston, if he gets a hair up it about how you're in the way of his restorin' the US of A, which to his way of thinking means truckling to him."

A glint of anger showed through Brown's facade. "And this Prophet bastard out Montana way, he sent a man around not too long ago, tellin' us not to help Deseret, tellin' us like we were his hired hands. Talked trash to some of our people in secret, too, preachin' and tryin' to set them against their Ranchers."

And it's sure Rancher Brown is a bit ticked, if he's sell ing that many horses, potential breeding mares as well as geldings… Rudi thought.

"What did you do?" the young Mackenzie asked, using the plural to mean the leaders of the CORA.

"Told him to stop. When he didn't… well, we give him what he asked for."

"Which was?" Rudi said, willingly playing straight man to the grim oldster.

"He asked for earth and water. Said it was symbolic, a way of acknowledging we'd take his Prophet for bossman and that everythin' here would obey him."

"So you gave him earth and water?"

"Plenty of both down at the bottom of that old well, I'd say. After we dropped him in headfirst."

Odard laughed outright, and made as if to applaud. Everyone else at least smiled, except Mrs. Brown, who winced a little. Rudi didn't find it particularly humorous, but he wasn't unduly shocked either. An ambassador who tried to play politics against his hosts that way for feited protection and could expect to get a spy's treatment. Brown went on:

"After that, we decided we'd sell New Deseret anything they could pay for. The Saints' money spends as good as anyone's; they're good neighbors from all I hear-better than Boise. If they use what we sell 'em to keep this Prophet busy out Montana way, the more power to them."

"And we're heading east, ourselves," Rudi said. What did Aunt Judy say… He remembered, and muttered it: "Gevalt!"

"Figured you were," Brown said. "Even if your sisters didn't say much. Well, I got that letter from your mother, and more I don't need to know."

He nodded towards the twins, who smiled with identical smugness.

One of them said, "We picked up all the gear we'll need in Bend, too. A big wagon, tents, extra weapons, and everything else, paid for out of the Dunedain account at the First National branch there."

"So if you were to head east with the herd…" Brown said delicately. "Well, that would be a help to Bob and the boys, a whole bunch more blades and bows. Comin' back, that won't be so hard; they can move faster."

And we'll be on our way, Rudi thought. A little rest and a good meal brought the excitement bubbling back and forced down homesickness. On our way to the Atlantic!

"It's a favor, and that's a fact," Rudi said, and leaned over to shake Brown's hand again, to seal the bargain this time.

After that the Browns tactfully left. Rudi looked around the knot of his relatives and friends and almost-friends and sighed.

"All right, first things first, then," he said. "You all want to come with me?"

A chorus of nods. Rudi went on:

"We'll be going a long hard dangerous way, then. Someone has to be in charge, and that one is me. This is not some game; I have to get to this Nantucket place. Ingolf I need for a guide, and because he's got the expe rience, sure. Everyone else is there to help us get there and back again. All that means I'm in command, and Ingolf is my number two. Do you understand what I'm saying, now?"

"Yah," Ingolf said. "In rough country, there's got to be discipline, by God." A grin. "And besides, you're young but you learn quick."

The twins nodded-in chorus. By the Threefold Morrigu, am I going to be able to take having them in my sporran for a whole year? Rudi thought ruefully.

Odard shrugged. "You're better qualified for it than me," he said cheerfully. "Ingolf is too. If I'm going to do something this crazy, I want it to work, by Mary and all the saints."

"Good," Rudi said, ignoring his own doubts-half the battle was sounding confident. "The next thing to re member is that everyone pitches in. Nobody's a nobleman on this trip… or we all are, whichever. Right?"

Odard's nod was a little slower still this time; Rudi judged that he hadn't considered all the implications of Adventure, particularly the part about scrubbing out pots with sand and latrine detail.

"And Odard, your man there isn't going to do your share of the chores, either."

The slanted blue eyes blinked at him. "But of course, Rudi."

Castle Todenangst,

Willamette Valley Near Newberg,

Oregon May 6, CY23/2021 A.D.

Juniper Mackenzie spread her hands. "Your message was the first I knew of it, Sandra."

They weren't exactly friends, but then they weren't exactly enemies anymore either, and they had known each other a long time now. She made a gesture.

"By the Ever-Changing One, by the Maiden, the Mother and the Hag, I swear it. May She turn her face and heart from me if I lie. I didn't even suspect it. Nei ther did Rudi, as far as I know-and he doesn't lie to me. According to the message John Brown sent me, Rudi was surprised himself when he showed up at Seffridge Ranch and found Mathilda there, the creature."

Across the polished malachite of the table, the shoulders of Portland's ruler slumped a touch.

"I believe you," she said quietly, and laid her fingers on an open letter. "That's what Mathilda says… and she doesn't lie to me. I almost wish I didn't believe you. Then I'd have someone to be angry with. Besides that little idiot herself!"

Her fist tightened on the lustrous green stone. It was a small fist; they were both petite women. The force behind it was nothing to sneer at, though; Tiphaine d'Ath and Conrad Renfrew flanked her on either side, symbols of the power that awaited that subtle mind's orders.

"And I can't even send an army to bring her back," Sandra said bitterly. "It's too late. Any force big enough would be too slow, and any fast enough would just make her conspicuous without being big enough to protect her."

Juniper had brought nobody with her except her man Nigel, and that partly because she'd known he would simply refuse to stay behind when she put her head in the lioness's mouth.

And sure, she might have believed a written message. But coming here makes it certain.

"I'm worried for Rudi, too," the Mackenzie chieftain said gently. "Worried sick. And I love Mathilda as if she were my own. If it's any consolation, I fear for her as well."

Sandra's brown eyes met her green. "He isn't your only child."

Juniper's brows went up. "Sandra, do you think that I would mourn Rudi less because I have Eilir and Maude and Fiorbhinn? That they're. .." She hunted for a word. "Spares?"

"No," Sandra said softly. "But your whole life wouldn't be a waste if you lost him. Mathilda is the one thing I can be entirely proud of. What have I worked for, if not for her?"

Then she shook herself and put on briskness. "What can we do?"

Juniper nodded respectfully. "Not a great deal, except keep this as quiet as possible. But news will get out, es pecially now. Mathilda

… I'm afraid Mathilda has made this considerably more dangerous. She is conspicuous all by herself, and even more so when she's not here, if you take my meaning. People are used to Rudi disappearing about his own business for a while, and Dun Juniper is more out of the way to start with."

"We will keep it as quiet as we can," Sandra said. "And there's something else we can do."

At Juniper's inquiring look, she went on: "Get ready for the war."

Juniper nodded soberly, then looked east. "And pray for our children, Sandra," she said. "We can do that, too."