Dies the Fire (62 page)

Juniper used the more conservative thigh-over-riser method for her lighter weapon, and then relaxed slightly at the next horn call.

All around her people paused as they reached for jacks and bucklers and spears and quivers.

Huu-huu-huu, huuuuu-huuuuu,
repeated twice. Three short and two long meant
friendly visitors,
not attacking bandits, in the current code.

The sentry rode over the ditch and into the field from the western edge, raising Juniper's brows again; it was Cynthia Carson Mackenzie, with ends of blond hair leaking past the metal-and-leather cheekpieces of her bowl helmet. She was in jack and full fig—longbow and quiver across her back, buckler hooked over the scabbard of the shortsword at her belt, and spear in her right hand. That also held the reins of a second horse.

“Where's Ray?” Juniper asked as she pulled up.

Sentries never operated in groups of less than two, and it was her brother's mount the blond girl was leading, with the stirrups tied up to the saddle. The usual patrol was three, and three threes to make a squad; mystically appropriate, and solidly practical.

“He's with the others,” Cynthia said. “We thought you'd better come quick, Lady Juniper. It's Sutterdown—they're here, by our . . . by the old Carson place.”

“Someone from Sutterdown?” she replied.

She took a moment to put her shirt back on; Sutterdown was a straitlaced community these days. Then she slung her quiver over her back on its baldric and thrust her strung bow through the carrying loops beside it before she buckled on her sword and dirk.

“We
told
them no visitors until the sickness passes out there.”

“No, not just visitors. The whole town, and a lot of others. Lady, you'd better come.”

“Coming, coming,” Juniper said, alarmed. “Sam, get the word out.”

Anything out of the ordinary was likely to be a threat.
Not while we're getting the grain in, please!
she thought, as she put a foot in the stirrup, swung aboard, and took the reins.

That wouldn't make them up stakes and head for Mackenzie land, though. Nobody let in anyone who might be infected; and anyway, from what she'd heard, Sutterdown had been singularly fortunate—which in turn was fortunate for the Clan Mackenzie, since Sutterdown and its associated area neatly blocked off the rest of the Willamette and made a buffer against the Death.

They cut across the laneway opposite, through a field in shaggy pasture with a couple of dozen recently acquired and painfully thin ranch-country Herefords gorging themselves in it, and then along a dirt-surfaced, tree-lined farm lane in grateful shade to the old Carson place.

The laneway from
that
gave out onto a paved local road; the house was on a slight rise, brick-built, a hundred and twenty years old, and until recently it had been bowered in century-old maples and oaks and ash trees.

Those had been cut down and a square was pegged out about the farmstead, where the ditch, mound and palisade would go when they had time after the harvest. Juniper regretted the trees—they'd been beautiful, and had stood so long—but you couldn't leave cover near someplace you intended to live. In the meantime it was their border post and base for the frontier patrols.

Juniper's eyes widened as she saw the crowd filling the road beyond the house. There were at least a hundred people there, both sexes and all ages, and a round dozen vehicles, horse- or hand-drawn; all of the men and a lot of the women were armed, mostly with improvised weapons of various sorts, spears made from fitting knives to the ends of poles, pruning hooks, axes, machetes, a scattering of bows and crossbows—and Aylward-style longbows they'd bought in the past few months. Few had any body armor, or worthwhile shields.

They also looked thinner and dirtier and more ragged than her clan on average, and a few were bandaged; some of the bandages seeped blood. She recognized individuals from Sutterdown, and the farms about that centered on it.

The area between her lands and Sutterdown had been tranquil—by post-Change standards—not least because both communities were fairly well organized, and acted together against reivers and Eaters.

Most of them rested quietly, except for the crying of children. There were five armed Mackenzies strung across the road, spears or bows in their hands. Three of the Sutterdown folk stood arguing with the guards, trying to come closer and then flinching back at shouts of warning. It didn't look like a fight brewing—they wouldn't have brought their families along if they were going to try and run the clan off the disputed Smith land—but she didn't like it at all. They
knew
about the quarantine regulations; and had their own, for that matter.

“Stand back there, and we'll talk,” she called as she reined in; the horse's hooves rang hollow on the asphalt.

Juniper dismounted; no sense in towering over the men waiting for her and putting their backs up even more. Men were strange about things like that, even the best of them—which these weren't.

“Sheriff Laughton,” she said, nodding in greeting as polite as you could make without coming close enough to shake hands; he was a middling man of about her own age, in a long leather coat covered with links of light chain sewn on with steel wire.

“Dr. Gianelli.” Slight and dark and balding, glaring at her.

“Reverend Dixon.” Heavyset before the Change, sagging now, and glaring twice as hard as the doctor, in a black business suit and tie that fit him like a flopping sack. There was a mottled purple look to his face that might be anger, or might be ill health, or both. Judy would have prescribed a regimen of herbs and meditation to control choler, and willow bark to thin the blood.

“We need to talk to you, privately,” the preacher said abruptly, stepping forward; he had a Bible in his hand, with a golden cross gleaming on the cover and his finger inside it marking a place.

One of the Mackenzies leveled his spear and prodded the air six feet in front of the Sutterdown man with a growl. The bright whetted steel and the tone stopped the cleric as if the point had been at his chest. The spearman spoke: “That's
Lady Juniper,
to you! The Mackenzie gave you your titles! Show some manners, cowan. You're on our land.”

Juniper held out her hand soothingly, making a patting motion at the air. “Ray, let's be tactful. Manners work both ways.”

Then she turned back to the Sutterdown leadership; as she did so she stripped the glove off her right hand. One of the flaps from a burst blister had been bothering her. She bit it off and spat it aside, then caught the odd looks directed at her.

“We're just finishing up our harvest?” she explained, puzzled. The Sutterdown folk would be too.

“
You're
harvesting, personally?” Sheriff Laughton said. “Lady Juniper,” he added hastily as the guards scowled.

“I'm the clan's leader by the clan's choice,” she said shortly.
And to Anwyn with your stupid rumors about the Witch Queen.

Aloud she went on: “I'm not their master. Everyone takes a turn at the hard work here. And what brings you here on this fine day, with all your people?”

Dixon took a deep breath. From what she'd heard, he was the driving force who'd held Sutterdown together, persuaded and shamed and tongue-lashed and sometimes outright forced people into cooperating and doing what was necessary; a strong man, if not a good one, and very shrewd. The fact that he was here asking for help showed that.

“We were attacked,” he said bluntly. “Not by the ordinary sort of trash, road people and Eaters—we could deal with
them.
By about a hundred men, organized, with good weapons—much better than ours.”

All three flicked their eyes to the improvised militia among the crowd on the road, and then to the near-uniform, purpose-made equipment the Mackenzie warriors carried.

Dixon cleared his throat and continued: “They hit us just before dawn, killed six of our people who tried to resist, ran us out of town. They claim—their leaders claim—to be from Portland and say they've come to settle and govern the area, and they made demands.”

“Demanded that we give them a third of our crops, and every family send someone to work for them one day in three!” Sheriff Laughton said indignantly.

The doctor took up the tale: “Said they'll burn the town and all the farms if we don't obey! They say they work for . . . what was it, the Portland Protective Association? And said their leader is the
baron
of this area.”

“The Protector, that was who they talked about mostly,” Dixon said. “Perhaps . . . ah, we should have taken your warnings about this Protector more seriously. But we didn't expect anything this early in the year.”

Neither did I,
Juniper thought, feeling an inner chill.
But farmers are most vulnerable when the crops are ripe. A band of Eaters would be
less
of a threat.

Eaters tended to be self-destructive and usually more than half mad, and they also died of disease faster than anyone else, naturally enough—a case of catching whatever you ate had. They were like wildfire: hideously dangerous, but inclined to burn itself out quickly.

“We need your help . . . Lady Juniper,” Dixon said.

The last came out as if he had to force it; for herself, she didn't care, but she couldn't let an outsider scorn or disrespect the clan. Reputation
mattered
these days; it might be the margin between being left in peace and attacked.

“I'll need to talk this over with my advisors, and put it to the clan's vote,” she said. “I'd be inclined to help you, gentlemen; it's what neighbors do, and these people are likely to be a threat to us, too. But the plague . . . you understand why we've been very isolated since the outbreak.”

The doctor spoke: “None of our people have the plague,” he said, and the others nodded vigorously. “I swear it.”

He looked around. “I can . . . I can reassure you on that, Lady Juniper. If we could talk privately.”

Decision firmed. “That's as it may be. I'll have to ask you to scrub down and change clothing at least, before we can go up to the Hall. Ray, show them where.”

They'd got the bathrooms in the old Carson place functioning, if you didn't mind hand-pumping and toting wood for heating.

“It shouldn't take long.”

“Yes, Lady Juniper,” he said, scowling and signaling them towards the farmhouse with the point of his spear.

“And Ray?”

He looked at her, then flushed and hung his head when she shook an admonishing finger; his face looked very young then.

“Be polite. And see that drinking water's brought out for all these folk and their beasts; they're our neighbors and friends, not our enemies.
Aithnitear car í gcruatán
; a friend is known in hardship. Threefold, remember?”

When the Sutterdown men had gone, Juniper turned to her escort; Cynthia had the best horse and was the best rider besides.

“I want . . . Judy, Chuck, Dennis, Diana, your father, and Sam, ready for a private conference at the Hall, and fast,” she said.

She looked out at the fresh refugees.
Curse it, these are people who were doing all right until today! They had crops harvested, they were going to
make
it!

“And tell Diana to throw together what ready food we can spare, load a wagon and have it brought down here—we can push it out to them. Eternal Soup ought to do, and maybe some bread and dried fruit. Git, girl!”

Cynthia left in a thunder of hooves. Juniper spent the time pacing and thinking, and once sent out a rider with more orders. Other members of the clan trickled in to take over making sure that the people of Sutterdown didn't surge past the notional line that marked the boundary, and the scouts went back about their business. One emergency didn't mean that another might not pop up.

When the three Sutterdown leaders came out they were in plain dark sweatsuits, though Dixon still grasped his Bible. The wagon arrived promptly at about the same time; Diana had probably diverted something meant for the harvesters, or a party of herd-watchers.

Juniper turned to the men: “We'd like to leave the food on the road, and then have your people share it out. It's not much, but . . .”

“Thank you very kindly,” Laughton said, sincerely.

After the spring and summer past, giving away food was something people took
seriously.
Even Dixon nodded. He'd been accused of many things, but never of taking more than his share, or letting anyone under his authority do so either.

“And if you'll follow me?”

They perched in the buckboard, one of the ones her clansfolk had
liberated
from a tourist attraction; it was odd how long that idea had taken to spread. Juniper took the reins and flicked them on the backs of the team. She took the long way round—the fewer people who knew about the other way up from the back of the old Fairfax place, the better.

She could feel them gawking as she drove past the mill, working now and roofed, although the walls were still going up; past the truck plots and potato fields and watering furrow; past haystacks, past archers practicing on deer-shaped targets and others who used sword and buckler on posts or wooden blades on each other; past a hunter, coming in with a brace of deer slung across the packhorse that walked behind her jaunty bow-crossed shoulder.

The Mackenzie clachan,
she thought wryly.
I wonder what Great-uncle Earl would think of it now—that respectable small-town banker, who left the place to
me,
of all people? Or any of the other Mackenzies?