CHIRRRIIITT … CHIRRRIITIT!
I jumped, almost throwing my cloak aside. The tree toad had seemed to be calling from inside my ear. The sudden movement reminded me how stiff I was from sleeping on the ground. Not quite the ground
itself—Weasel had shown me how to put fan leaves over fir branches to keep the worst of the dampness from me, but I still felt cold and wet as I slowly eased into a sitting position, pulling the cloak around me, trying to get ready for the morning routine.
Get up; follow Weasel, either through the swamp or along the ravines, and forage anything that was edible. Then bring it back, rest, and repeat the process in the afternoon. How long had it gone on? It seemed like forever, but probably the ordeal had lasted less than an eightday.
I glanced over at the lean-to. That was where Sylvie lay. She had caught the damp fever first. Huddled into a ball in a corner of the lean-to, her shakes rustled the branches.
Hsst
…
hsst, hsst, hsst
…
hsst
…
hsst, hsst, hsst
…
The pattern was nearly regular, almost like rain, except that it rarely rained in the damps. Instead there was an almost continual ground fog and mist that kept everything damp, all the time. That’s why every damper’s hutch, lean-to, or cave, for the few who had staked out the bouldered area at the southern end of the marshes, had a fire pit—as much to ward off the damp as for cooking or heat itself. Not that there was a lot to cook over those fires, especially not with the heavy unseasonable rains and the cold winds that had rotted and stripped even the winter fruits and those that were usually edible for months after harvest, like the chysts.
Weasel was nowhere in sight, but had clearly been up earlier, since a wisp of smoke rose from the fire pit.
Whatever else the Enemy had done, they had ruined the weather and the crops, even the fruit trees.
As on so many days, the wind whistled through the swamp firs, and the mists and clouds were so heavy that not even the outline of the sun was visible. I shivered, either from the chill, although my cloak, bedraggled as it had become, was certainly warm enough, or from watching Sylvie suffer.
Thwapppp.
The slap caught me unaware and dropped me into the muddy grass.
“Damned witch … you did it to her …”
Vran was waving his crossbow. Luckily for me, it was not cocked. But that wouldn’t take him long, not with his muscles, especially fueled by anger.
Although I gathered my feet under me, I remained on the ground, wondering if I would have to dive away from him in plain sight and reveal that I was in fact one of those damned witches.
“More than likely, she got it from cleaning one of those swamp rats.” Weasel’s voice was matter-of-fact. The long knife he normally carried
in his belt was out, and he was testing the edge with his thumb.
“Sticking up for the witch again?”
“Hardly. Witches don’t ever get sick. So if she caught it from him, he’s not a witch.”
While I was seldom sick, I’d had my share of illnesses growing up. All I could figure was that since I had not been ill in the damps, where everyone seemed to suffer, that Weasel thought I never was sick.
“Hunnnh?” Vran missed Weasel’s subtleties. “Swamp rats?”
“Never mind. We’ll get some of that marsh rice. Boil it, and maybe Sylvie can eat that.”
Vran looked at the huddled heap that was Sylvie.
The cold morning wind whistled again, and I stifled a shiver, looking from Vran to Weasel and back again.
Weasel turned without saying another word. Vran kept looking at Sylvie. I scrambled to my feet, grabbed my pack, and followed Weasel.
Once past the swamp firs shielding the camp, he did not head north for the marsh, but instead southward toward the main branch of the creek that eventually became the Faiyren River. Before long we were nearing the cut the river had worn through the low hills that bordered the swamps.
I could hear the low rushing roar of the river where it billowed from the damps into the small canyon that turned into Faiyren Gorge. We were nearing the pond above the rapids where, sometimes, Weasel had been able to catch migrating wetbill ducks with his snares.
He stopped and turned to face me. “What are you going to do, Sam?”
I knew what he meant. Sylvie was going to die. Vran would blame me, and nothing would stop him from using the crossbow. Nothing.
I shrugged, aware somehow in that post-dawn chill that another change was coming. “Have to leave, I guess. Unless you have some other ideas.”
“If you really had to, you could have left days ago.”
I didn’t answer that question. I shrugged again. “Nowhere to go. Can’t do much of anything, except read and write and do some math. That doesn’t count for much right now.”
For the first time, Weasel looked puzzled. “What do you mean? There are always jobs for clerks, or bookkeepers.”
“Not now. Stores are all looted, those that are left. ConFed Marines control the roads. They’ve burned out most of the gentry, at least between Bremarlyn and here.”
Weasel’s mouth dropped open. “Why didn’t you say anything about that?”
“I thought you knew.”
“Sam, nobody in the damps knows
anything.
We knew there was an Enemy, and some damage to the capital, and a few soldiers on the road. Other than that …” He spat on the ground. “This is the place where you go when there’s no place else to go, when even the back alleys of Horesard and West Inequital won’t take you in.”
“Between the Enemy and the looters, most of the towns are gone,” I added. “Not much food, either.”
Weasel wasn’t looking at me at all. He just kept shaking his head. Finally, he grinned. “The main road is downhill and about two kays southwest. If you head east, you should reach Esterly in about a day. You’d better get moving.”
I shook my head.
“Long story, Sam. Vran will be after both of us before too long. One way or another, there’s a chance I’m clear. You say Bremarlyn’s gone?”
I nodded.
“You know the prosecutor there?”
I did, but I wasn’t about to admit that he was my father.
“No.”
“You don’t lie well, Sam. Is he still alive?”
I shrugged. “I don’t think so, but I really don’t know.” That was the truth. I had no idea whether my father had died in the blaze. Somehow, I doubted that my mother had, but I felt I’d never know that for sure.
“That’s good enough for me.” He began to move, even more quickly, down the trail. Then he stopped, and turned, his voice low. “And you’d better keep moving or Vran will catch up to you.”
Within moments, Weasel was out of sight.
I kept moving, until I was a good half kay downhill from the top of the rapids. The rumbling
swush
of the water at the top had subsided to a continuous rush. I slowed at the sight of a patch of wild onions and a flowering thorn. The thorn seed pods weren’t bad, and the onions actually tasted pretty good. You couldn’t eat too many at once, though.
I eased some onions out of the damp soil, wiped off one and ate it, forcing myself to chew it slowly and in small bites. I stashed a handful in my pack, and then began to pick some thorn seed pods. Maybe a half dozen were edible. They went into the pack. Nearby was a blue chyst tree, but it had been stripped clean, either by the squirrel rats or the weather or by some other damper.
Weasel, even in the days I had followed him, had shown me a few more things to put into my stomach, besides the obvious fruits. I’d even gained back some little bit of the weight I’d lost. My mother would have laughed, I knew, at my coming to eat whatever was generally edible. My father would have nodded sagely.
As I thought of them, I had trouble focusing on the tree or on narrow path, partly because I was shaking, and partly because the tears got in the way. But I couldn’t stop any longer, not with Vran and his crossbow lurking behind me. So I straightened up and lurched down the path Weasel had started on—the one that led to Esterly.
Every once in a while I looked back over my shoulder, but I could see no one behind me.
“Freeze, damp rat!” The harsh voice had the ring of authority.
I froze, then slowly let my still-watering eyes turn toward the voice.
The Confed Marine uniform caught my eye first, then the shredder, which was aimed at my midsection.
From the noises on the other side of the trail, I could tell at least two others were in hiding. The grin on the marine’s face dared me to run, as if he were just itching to turn the shredder on me.
Except for my eyes, I stayed frozen. If I had to, I could probably dive under the now and escape. But what good would that do—except deplete my fragile energy reserves?
“That’s a very good swamp rat. Because you’re so good at taking orders, we just might have a use for you, damper.”
I didn’t say a word.
“Don’t you want to know, damper?” He paused, and his voice turned nastier. “Answer me!”
“Yes, sir.”
“A polite damper. That I can hardly believe. Not too old, either. Might even be some hope for you, boy. Why are you here?”
“Looters … got my family, relatives … Enemy got the rest …”
“Well, you’re in real luck today, boy.” He stepped back, still keeping the shredder aimed at my midsection. “Just head straight down that trail to our camp. I’ll be right behind you; so don’t get any ideas.”
I followed his instructions to the letter.
Another half kay further, at the base of the slope, were several tents and a portable stockade. Two ConFeds with shredders guarded the fence. Inside were three other men, two youngsters like me, and a bearded man who was about the same age as the forcer who had caught me.
“Just keep moving, swamp rat. Stop right by the gate there. And don’t move.”
A faint sickly odor drifted toward me, but it disappeared before I could place it. It was clear they wanted me alive, for whatever purpose, and that it would be easier to escape from the stockade later than attempt anything immediately.
“Got another one for you.”
“Did you check him?”
“No. Thought you could do it.”
One of the guards set his shredder aside, while the other two continued to keep theirs leveled at me.
“Let’s see the pack.”
I handed it over.
“Ugghhh …” He didn’t even bother to empty out the onions and seed pods, or the partly moldy chyst in the bottom. Half of it was good. He dropped the pack by the gate. “We’ll take the hatchet and the knife. Set them on the ground.”
I did that as well, wondering why they bothered with the knife. A knife wasn’t much against a shredder.
“You can keep the pack. Now get in there, and don’t cause any trouble. Or you end up like that.” He gestured toward what I thought was a stump, before I saw the flies and coagulated blood around the shredded flesh and bone.
“ … uuuggghh …” Somehow, I managed not to lose what little was in my stomach, but the remaining bitterness burned my throat.
“That’s what happens if you don’t follow orders, swamp rat.”
Click.
He had opened the gate while I was trying not to retch my guts out. None of the other three men even looked toward the gate, although all three stared momentarily at me.
Three steps, and I was inside, clutching my tattered pack.
Clunk.
“No talking. Any of you.”
I sat down and ate the good half of the chyst and another onion. After one look at what I was eating, the three others lost interest. Had I still been at the Academy, I probably would have lost interest too. If not all my appetite and then some. But I needed to keep up what strength I had left, and enough energy for one emergency escape.
After finishing off the onion, I stretched out and used the pack to cushion my head. Besides food, I needed sleep. My days in the damps had been short on both. The ConFeds weren’t out catching people for an execution, which meant they had something in mind. At the worst it was probably slave labor—I hoped.
“NONE OF YOU are good enough to be ConFed Marines! You’re not even good enough to be second-rate Secos! You aren’t even …”
Too tired to ignore the thin man with the hard eyes, I listened to him. Standing at attention with me were the others that the ConFeds had rounded up, perhaps a score in all. Hard bread and water—that was all we had been given, but with my onions, it hadn’t been too bad. The hard-eyed man and the others had rousted us from the stockade at dawn and marched us into town. Esterly, I think, though I had never been that far east of Bremarlyn before.
“ … but you’re all we’ve got left, and it’s my job to turn you into an imitation of the real thing. If you live long enough, you just might make second-rate marines, and that’s twice as good as anything else!”
Why we needed more military personnel after the unseen enemy had turned so much of Westron into dust was still unclear to me. The forcer in front of the ranks kept screaming about the need for discipline and the need for order, but most of the others would have scuttled back into the damps right then—except for the five ConFeds with their shredders and hard eyes ranging up and down our ranks.
So we listened and hoped for some bread, perhaps a ground apple.
“We can beat the Enemy—if we work at it! But looters, scroungers and drifters don’t work. You aren’t looters, scroungers, and drifters anymore. You’re the property of the ConFeds Marines, and you’re going back to work, and you’re going to like it.”
Somehow I still couldn’t see how more ConFeds in uniform, toting shredders, taking food at weapon-point, and screaming at people, were going to defeat the Enemy. Hell, the Enemy thought we were ants—if the Enemy bothered to think about us at all.
“Any questions?”
I had plenty. All they’d get me was trouble. So my mouth stayed shut.
“No brains here? Any questions? Last chance for questions, you dullards.”
“Why … why us?” stammered a thin youngster. “What good will more soldiers do?”
“Step forward, boy!” screamed the ConFed Forcer. His olive-colored singlesuit was dusty. So was his blotchy face, where it wasn’t dirt-streaked with sweat.
The kid who asked the question didn’t move.
“Bring him forward!”
One guard handed his shredder to another and walked up to the pale-faced youth. Yanked him right out of line and threw him into the mud in the middle of the road. The dust that seemed everywhere and the intermittent and unpredictable rains left mud puddles everywhere, even on the once-spotless Imperial highways.
The youngster, not even as old as I was, lay there for a second, then scrambled up and started to run.
Scrut … scrut … scrut … scrut …
The shredders were as terrible as they sounded. He didn’t even look like chopped meat—more like blood pudding sprayed on the ground. If I’d had anything in my stomach, it couldn’t have stayed there.
“That’s the first rule, you worthless bodies. No questions. Not ever.”
At least three of my companions were retching their guts out, but the forcer let them without even commenting. He just waited for them to finish. My stomach stayed knotted tight.
“Now line up. Double file. Double file, two abreast. Move it, and make an effort to keep in step. An effort, damn you! Move it! Move it!”
I held my guts together, somehow, and I marched westward, toward the ConFed complex at Herfidian, back toward Bremarlyn, toward Inequital.
We all marched, and kept marching. We marched past the way-station that had been Halfprince. We marched through the ford at Jillriko—the bridge and half the town, the western half, had been an enemy target—and through the empty eastern half of Jillriko, trying not to inhale too much of the ever-present dust, trying to breathe through cloth scarves that the ConFeds handed out.
The Faiyren River ran brown, like the creeks, and you could see an occasional trout floating belly up. The carp survived, I guess. They survived everything.