The Renegades of Pern (17 page)

“We could also—” Crenden’s eyes narrowed as he looked deep into the campfire’s flames. “—take a different route.”

“If Thella hadn’t been scared off by Asgenar’s guards,” Temma said, emerging from the darkness to join them, “I’d worry more.”

“What say, Temma?”

She grinned as she hunkered down and swung the klah kettle over to pour herself a cup. “Chatted up one of the hold ground crew before we pulled out. Thella’s quarry—those thieves of hers—are a harmless joiner and his family, and they’re now in Benden’s charge, you’ll be glad to know.” She winked at Jayge. “Let your conscience be easy, lad. Though it’s a shame Asgenar didn’t catch that pair.” Temma pulled her mouth down in regret, then smiled. “But they didn’t take the girl either. That’s who Thella was after, the girl who hears dragons!” Temma looked skyward for a moment, her expression briefly envious. “That could make very useful listening in times like these. And more reliable than one of those fire-lizard creatures they’re bringing up in droves from the Southern Continent.”

“Southern?” Crenden regarded her in surprise.

“Brother, I think we’re going to have to talk to Borgald. He’s far too traditional in his attitude. I think we ought to look for trade possibilities with the south ourselves.” Temma chuckled at Crenden’s surprised reaction. “We’ll get through this journey first and see what we hear at Far Cry. They’re always up on the latest rumor.” She rose. “Nazer and I will be first patrol. Wake you at second moonrise, Jayge. Get some sleep.”

“Don’t
you
fall asleep,” Jayge countered with a snicker. “Private joke,” he added as he felt his father’s disapproval.

After resting the beasts three days, the Lilcamp-Borgald train yoked up to begin the final leg of the long journey up the Igen River Valley. The track ran partly through forest and partly along the riverbank. They did not have to worry about Thread, for they would not be far enough north to be involved in the Telgar Fall.

Halfway to Far Cry, just where the track narrowed, with a steep drop to the river on one side and rocky forested slopes on the other, the raiders struck. Afterward, Jayge realized that they had chosen the best possible point for an ambush. There was no room for his people to maneuver to avoid the rockslides that were loosed, battering the lighter wagons and sending three down the drop into the river. Even one of the big ones, hit with an enormous mass of rocks, was tilted off-balance and fell, the legs of the helpless burden beasts pawing for footing.

It was just pure luck that everyone was out of the wagons at the time, lightening the load for the beasts straining up the slope. It was lucky, too, that no one had discarded their arms, even though they had felt a false safety so close to Far Cry.

Choking on the dust, listening to the bawl of frightened, injured animals, the screams of wounded people, and unintelligible shouted orders from both Crenden and Borgald, Jayge kicked Kesso past the milling runner and burden beasts he was herding. He reached the last wagon, one of the biggest, just as the raiders piled down the slopes, hollering and slashing at whatever was in their way.

Jayge saw an attacker leap to Armald’s back from the height of the bank. Roaring, the big man tried to dislodge the raider who was stabbing at his chest. Jayge, trying to come to his aid, was beset by a half dozen, trying to pull him from his runner. Kesso was a fighter, hooves and teeth, whirling on his hindquarters so that no one could get within sword’s length of his rider. But before Jayge could help, Armald had been overcome, a bloody lifeless lump on the ground.

Slicing at his attackers, Jayge broke loose just as he heard Temma and Nazer shouting for help. Individual fights were in progress up and down the wagonline. Jayge caught a glimpse of Crenden, Borgald, and two of the drivers trying to protect the animals. Some of the women and several of the older children had armed themselves with prod poles and were doing what damage they could.

There was no room to maneuver Kesso on the track, so Jayge spurred the excited beast up the steep hill, managing incredible leaps over the uncertain surface and then reversing, to skid down the slope to attack from behind the men opposing Temma and Nazer. Nine, Jayge counted. Wicked odds, and Nazer and Temma fighting brilliantly. Rising in his stirrups, he launched his belt daggers, each blade finding its mark in a back. Then, using his boot dagger, Jayge leaned over Kesso’s left side and sliced the nearest man from buttock to shoulder just as he saw a spear catch Temma in the shoulder, pinning her to the side of the wagon. Nazer shielded Temma with his body, his swordwork dazzling as he tried to defend them both, but he was too close set and wounded in arm and leg. Jayge hauled Kesso to his hindlegs, walking him forward to drop him and bringing two more down. Then he flung his knife at the man with sword raised to slice off Nazer’s head. As he dropped from the saddle, something came whizzing past his head, and he heard his sister Alda’s triumphant shriek as a heavy iron pan caught a toothless woman in the chest. More heavy pots rained down on the attackers as Tino yelled encouragement. Kesso continued to kick back, effectively clearing Temma’s right side.

“Knock them over! Knock them over!” The shout reverberated above the shouts and cries, the noise of fighting and bawling beasts. “Get as many over as possible!”

“No, leave off. Dragons in the sky! Leave off!” someone else bellowed. “Dragons!”

Abruptly the attackers fell back, scrambling up the bank. Jayge was of no mind to let a single one of them leave alive. He took Nazer’s sword from the wounded man and retrieved his own daggers before he leaped over the debris. He had as much trouble finding good footing on the sliding bank as the retreating raiders, but he slashed and prodded, hoping to strike flesh and bone.

“Dragons? Where? Sear your hide!” Despite the distortion of fury and volume, Jayge recognized the voice. Thella! The raiders were Thella’s! Temma would wish she had listened to him and been more wary. But they were so close to Far Cry Hold!

“In and out! A bronze!” was the answering shout, and Jayge, also recognizing the second voice, missed his next stroke. “Let’s get out of here!”

Jayge could not spare time to find either speaker as he clawed up the slope, his quarry just managing to keep out of reach. He had to catch the man before he could disappear into the forest. There was enough sense left to Jayge to realize that it would be foolhardy to attempt pursuit there, unless the dragonrider returned to sweep the forest. With a desperate surge, Jayge felt the sword slice deeply across the raider’s foot and heard the man’s scream. But the man was suddenly hauled up and out of Jayge’s reach. Jayge, overbalanced by his effort, rolled heavily down the bank, landing on a pile of rocks.

Dazed and winded, it took him a few moments to struggle to his feet. There were cries for assistance all along the train. Jayge saw her then, poised on a boulder that jutted out over the track, surveying the damage her ambush had caused. Then he saw her bring her arm back to throw. The dagger snicked across the tendon of one of Borgald’s beasts, casting it to its knees. Filled with rage at such viciousness, Jayge launched one of his own blades. But Thella did not wait to be someone else’s target. She whirled, leaping up the bank and disappearing quickly from view. And the last of her raiders had gained the heights and were quickly lost up the slope.

“No, don’t follow,” Crenden bellowed from the front of the train. “We’ve got people and beasts to help.”

Cursing at his bad luck, Jayge clambered over dead raiders on his way to the last wagon. Tino was already trying to help Nazer, while Alda was making her way down from the wagon top.

“I got two,” Alda was shrieking at the top of her lungs. “I got two with pans.”

“You better find those pots,” Tino told her firmly. “And fill them from the river. And bring out the brazier. We need hot water.”

“Get the fellis first, Alda, and the numbweed pot,” Jayge said, wondering how Temma could possibly be alive with that hole in her shoulder. Nazer was weak with blood loss from several deep wounds, but he insisted that they attend Temma first. Together Tino and Jayge stanched the flow as best they could until Alda brought them the medicines and proper bandages. Traders were accustomed to dealing with trail injuries, but more serious wounds would require a trained healer’s skill.

“I’ll get the hot water,” Alda said when they had done all they could for Temma and Nazer. Sniffling back her tears, she went off to retrieve the pots she had thrown.

Sorrowful bawling reminded Jayge and Tino that there were other considerations almost as important as Temma and Nazer. Of the two yokes hauling the big wagon, both off-siders were dead, their backbones hacked in several places. Their bodies had, fortunately, afforded some protection to their yoke mates; both were bleeding, but the cuts were superficial. Jayge and Tino could not shift the dead beasts, but they slapped numbweed salve liberally over the wounds of the survivors, poked some fellis into the beasts’ mouths, and hoped that would ease their torment.

It was only then that Jayge and Tino heard Borgald’s loud complaint.

“If the dragonrider saw this, he
must
help us,” Borgald was shouting, repeating the words like a chant as he bent over his prized burden beasts, patting them here and there, oblivious to the blood pouring from severed arteries onto the gravelly roadway. “Do you see them coming, Jayge?” Borgald raised a bloody hand to shield his eyes from the sun, peering forlornly at the sky.

Jayge and Tino exchanged pitying looks and walked on, carefully avoiding the hand and foot of a man buried under a rock slide. The little milch beasts had been caught by it, too. Jayge wondered if maybe he and Tino should try to round up the animals he had been herding along the track. They would be scattered all over, maybe even slaughtered, along with half the train’s folk and burden beasts.

“Jayge!” Crenden came striding toward him, bloody but relatively sound. “Did that runner of yours come through this? Can you ride on to Far Cry and get help?”

“Maybe this time a dragonrider will help,” Jayge cried.

“Dragonrider? What dragonrider?” Crenden mopped at the cut over his eye. Irritated by the blood dripping down his face, he tore a strip off his shirt and wound it around his forehead. “If you and the runner are sound, don’t waste time.” He paused, bending to examine a dead raider. “Dead. The ones they left are all dead. I saw that woman kill one herself, a man wounded in the leg.” He kicked at the dead man. “No one’s going to tell us anything useful. Ride, boy. What are you waiting for?”

Jayge swung up on Kesso, only then aware that his left leg was bleeding and it felt as if he had taken a wound across his right hip. He grunted as he settled in the saddle, and Kesso willingly darted forward.

No sooner were they around the bend than a figure jumped into the track. Jayge reached for his dagger when the man waved both arms urgently, limping toward him. A wounded raider, escaping from Thella’s kindly knife?

“Jayge, you’ve grown—but I knew you,” the man said, and Jayge remembered the voice that had given the dragonrider alarm.

“Readis, what in all the—” His uncle? One of Thella’s marauders?

“Never mind that, Jayge,” Readis said, hanging on to the stirrup leather, keeping one hand on Kesso’s shoulder to prevent the restive beast from ramming him. “I’d no idea it was Crenden’s train we were ambushing. She told me another name. I didn’t even know you were back on the road again. Believe me, Jayge! I’d never hurt my own Bloodkin.”

“Well, your
friends,
” Jayge replied, letting scorn edge his voice and seeing his uncle wince, “have damned near done in your sister, Temma. Remember her? I don’t know who else is dead for sure, but we’ve lost almost every burden beast we owned. I counted four smashed wagons at least.”

Readis gave a grim smile. “The only thing Thella fears is dragonriders.” He scrambled up the bank, grabbing a bush to help himself to the top. “I did what I could. I’ve got to catch up. But tell them I tried to stop it once I knew who you were.”

“Don’t try so hard the next time, Readis,” Jayge yelled after him. The underbrush closed in after the hobbling man, and Jayge stared after him. So there had been no dragonrider in the sky! But he had to be grateful for the lie. “Come on, Kesso, we’ve got to get help.”

The only reason Maindy was so quick to respond to Jayge’s message was that the Far Cry holder needed the supplies the train was bringing. Why hadn’t the train set out patrols? Jayge did not mention the offer from Asgenar’s forester. Did Jayge know if the Weaver Hall’s shipment was safe? If not, there would be no cloth to make warm winter clothes. But even as Maindy rattled on with Why didn’t you? and What did they? he was organizing a rescue troop. He had ordered out the hold’s healer, three helpers including his own lady, and every ablebodied man in the hold. He had seen that supplies and enough rope and tackle to lift even the heaviest wagon from the riverbank were packed onto runners, and a half hour after Jayge came in, he was ready to ride out.

“The dray beasts will take their own speed, but we’ll be all ready to hitch them up when they do arrive at the gap,” Maindy said confidently.

To Jayge’s utter astonishment, they returned to find dragons and riders helping Crenden and the saddened Borgald, still mourning his losses. A brown dragon was in the process of lifting a terrified burden beast from the river gorge back onto the track. It was battered, but apart from being scared into dropping and watering all the way up, it would probably recover. But its yoke mate was already being butchered.

Jayge took care of his exhausted mount before he went to see Temma, who was lying, far too pale, in the wagon she had been protecting. Nazer was there, holding her hand, his own wounds bound and his dark skin as bleached as Temma’s.

“You’re back?” Nazer asked, face and eyes dull. Jayge nodded. Nazer carefully placed Temma’s hand down on the blanket and patted it tenderly. “I’ll clean you up. Raiders’ blades often got snake glob on ’em.”

When he emerged from Nazer’s rough but thorough measures, Jayge was feeling no more pain, and his head was only a little dizzy from the fellis draught Nazer had made him swallow. He insisted on going with Maindy’s troops and the green and blue dragonriders who intended to follow the tracks of the retreating raiders. Sufficient bloodstains had been found leading up the hill to warrant a search. Wounded men would not be able to travel fast or far.