Chapter Two
Night lightened gradually toward dawn.Neither of them had slept much.They packed up the horses and set out, munching trail rations as they rode.For the first hour or so, the trail wandered up hill, then it began to dip and rise, each rise higher than the last until they passed over the shoulder.
Clouds were moving in, marching across the sky in a billowing gray front sinking down to meet them as they climbed. The weather would be warmer for the next day or two, warm enough to rain instead of snow, Petre thought, and was glad.Snow would make their tracks too easy to find.Rain could be used to their advantage.
As they descended into a little bowl high up on the ridge, Celeste suddenly threw her head up and stopped, ears pointed, nostrils flaring at some sound or scent Petre couldn’t catch.Any moment she could whinny, giving them away.Petre slid from her back and cupped his hands over her muzzle, willing her to silence, realizing again that she was not his horse and may not obey him.
The blast of the stallion's neigh practically in Petre’s ear was deafening.Instantly horses appeared in the woods below them as though they had materialized on the spot.Blueskins!Too late now.
The Blueskins deployed in a ragged line, every rider, every horse watching them.Dressed for battle, the warriors had been sneaking quietly through the trees.
But now this group of war-ready Blueskins had seen the horse and woman for whom they were about to fight.It seemed unlikely that they would let them pass, not when more honor could be gained by capturing them.
When Is had traveled through this land with John, the Blueskins had accepted his "ownership" of her because John had fought and defeated one of their best warriors.Petre doubted they would extend that ownership to him but he had to try.
He stepped forward, away from his horse and assumed a proud stance, hands on hips, chest thrown out.Secretly he suspected the Blueskins didn't see a great warrior in front of them.His round face was more suited to laughter than staring down fierce warriors and his body refused to show its fitness in the classical hard-muscled way.
For long heartbeats the Blueskins assessed him from behind their frozen faces.Then one rider moved his horse forward.When he was fifteen meters away he slipped from its back and advanced on foot.
Petre's heart sank.He and Is would not be allowed to pass until Petre had proven that he was tougher, more courageous and a better fighter than any man who cared to challenge him.Great honor would be bestowed on each man who tried to take Is and Lark from him, even if that man failed.But if one of them beat Petre, that Blueskin would win Is and Lark and even greater honor.Under these conditions every man present was likely to challenge him.
Petre resisted the urge to glance behind him.There was no way out except to fight.He had to focus on that.He dropped into the ready stance his people used – a stance that looked so deceptively unready – weight in his center, knees slightly bent, muscles and mind in a relaxed state.The last was the hardest, but also the most important, and he didn't quite make it work.
Though all the Hluit practiced a martial art, Petre had never been in a fight where death was a likely outcome.In fact, he had never been in a fight where anything much was at stake except that he would lose and be kidded for it.Although his people trained in self-defense, they didn't stage matches or recognize winners, but in their own unofficial ways the young men constantly tested each other.Petre was accustomed to losing those contests when he couldn't avoid them altogether.
But to lose here meant death.It also meant that the Blueskins would take Is and the stallion and all hope would be lost for his people.
Petre focused on the man in front of him.A good eight inches taller than Petre, the manoutweighed Petre considerably and all his weight was solid well-coordinated muscle.He would have reach on Petre and a greater strength that didn't even bear thinking about.
Petre would have to rely on speed and cunning to make up the difference, but he didn't feel very cunning.He was uphill of the Blueskin but Petre couldn't think how to use this to his advantage.The footing, slick pine needles on a slope, would interfere with his speed and balance more than it would with the Blueskin's strength.Meanwhile the other Blueskins were dismounting and forming a half circle to watch.No help there.Is's voice cut into Petre’s wildly yammering mind.
"I'm traveling with him," she announced, glaring at the Blueskins."I won't go with you."
Not an eye flickered to her.It didn't matter what she wanted.Even though she was a legend, almost a god to them, she was still a woman.Like any other woman in the Blueskins' eyes, listening to her would be a loss of stature.They might in-a-sense worship her but they would not obey her.
The Blueskin sensed Petre's distraction and feinted.Not yet an attack - he was wary of the power Petre must have, for how else had he captured Is and Lark – so he was only testing.Petre held his ground.
The man began to circle, moving lightly on the balls of his feet, showing grace and coordination to match his size and strength.
Petre knew a dozen ways to overcome a larger, stronger opponent but now his mind went blank.Then stillness came over him. This moment, this man became Petre's entire universe.There was no room for thought.The man closed with him as sure as death.Death, the great focuser.It came when it would, irony or no irony, and a person's need to continue living not withstanding.
Petre was aware of every detail as though all of his senses had doubled in intensity.He could hear the man breathing, see the sheen of sweat over his rippling muscles as he feinted again.Everything had become – of all odd things – beautiful.The orange and black slashes of paint across the warrior’s blue tinted face and arms, the play of light and shadow over his skin, even the fierceness of his expression seemed perfect somehow.There was no fear in Petre now, only awe at the incredible beauty and intricacy of life.He felt his connection to all of it and understood that he was about to die.
There was no fear or grief in him, but improbably, joy.Everything was so perfect, so right.The whole world and everything in it was connected . . . in love with itself.There were no words for it, only a certainty he felt through his whole being.It was as though for each movement the man made there could be only one conclusion.If the man stepped with his right foot his whole body would have to move just so, and then Petre would step with his left foot, not forward, but to the side. There seemed no other option for the man, no other option for Petre.The Blueskin would move just so . . . and Petre would move just so.
Petre felt the exact moment at which the man started the swing.So slow it seemed, so easy to avoid the fist that should have doubled Petre over.Easy to move just enough to the side.Effortless to turn, match velocity with that fist as it went by and lead it forward and down just a bit further than the Blueskin had intended.Even the way the Blueskin's feet left the ground and somersaulted clear over his shaven head, which might have been surprising, wasn't.Petre’s mind was caught in the cartwheeling of the man’s limbs flashing through sun and shadow, the orange streaks of paint leaving trails through the air.The second warrior, who picked that moment to charge from behind intending to grab and choke Petre, was part of it all.It would have been impossible not to match his forward movement and duck properly to lead that man's momentum.
He went flying over Petre's back, drawing his own airy spirals of blue and orange.And then he collided with the first man just as he was regaining his feet.Something ungraceful, disharmonious and angry happened between the two men, jarring Petre out of his trance.He thought wildly, I'm doing it!I’m really doing it.And in that instant his foot slid on the pine needles. As he twisted to regain his balance his other foot went out from under him too.
He felt two things as he fell: astonishing joy that he had at least been able to experience those moments of transcendence, and profound disappointment for having lost it.He ended ignominiously on his backside on the ground.The third Blueskin was on him already.One hand closed on Petre’s shoulder, the other on his throat.He was struck by the realization that this was how he wou
ld die. This was how he would leave Is.
The Blueskin had inadvertently caused Petre to twist around so Petre was able to get his knees under him.Ignoring the choking hand, he grabbed the hand on his shoulder and pushed off with a foot, spinning on one knee as he ducked under the man’s arm.The Blueskin ended up with his arms crossed.Using the momentum the Blueskin had given him and adding his own force, Petre twisted the man’s wrist hard enough that his other hand was forced to let go of Petre’s throat.Petre rose to his feet as he completed the turn and cranked the man’s wrist with enough force to cause the man to fall backward.
The fourth Blueskin was already coming but Petre was back in that special place where time was slow and everything followed its predestined path.The man's grabbing hands missed Petre's shoulder by an inch as he spun back in the other direction.For an instant the blue-tinted hands were right in front of Petre's face.It was easy to grab one and twist the wrist back on itself, changing the man's direction faster than his body could follow.The wrist made a small arch, turning back the way the man had just come.The body made a bigger, slower arch, legs flying over the warrior's head.When the man was fully committed to the somersault Petre let go.
The next Blueskin came charging from the line and suddenly froze.His eyes went wide, staring past Petre.Petre turned to see Lark trot forward, great hooves lifting high with suppressed power, flat yellow teeth bared, ears pinned against his neck, nostrils pulled into angry slits.Petre caught only that frozen glimpse before everything shifted to the quick time in which it was really happening.The stallion lunged, his front feet striking out in quick succession, quicker than any human could move - connecting twice.The Blueskin's head snapped back just before his body was flung through the air like a boneless rag.
Petre's moment of calm shattered with that man's bones.He spun desperately around; all the Blueskins were backing slowly away, their eyes riveted on the war horse.Lark, shaking his head and stomping his front feet, advanced on the nearest man.There was no doubt the stallion would rear again, strike and kill, but that man could not break and run.Pride would make him stand and be killed.
Is was on the stallion's back, but she had no control of him now.Petre saw no way to stop Lark.The fight was over. Lark did not need to kill anyone else, but Petre didn’t know what to do.The war horse was as likely to kill him as any Blueskin if he got in the way.
At that moment Celeste came past Petre at a trot, making a deep base-rumbling sound that was surprising from a mare who was usually so feminine.Petre had heard that sound only a few times before, and only when a mare had a desperate need to quiet a young colt.It held reassurance but also command.It was the sound of an older wiser horse speaking, a mother to a colt.
The stallion stopped in his tracks.For a moment more he held himself in an aggressive posture.Then Celeste reached him.Her nostrils fluttered as the rumbling sound she made took on a gentler note. Towering over the smaller mare, Lark lowered his huge head and touched noses with her. Though his head alone was nearly twice the size of hers, he would never harm her.His nostrils whuffled softly as the tension left his posture.
Petre took a slow breath and stepped toward Celeste with confidence he didn't feel.He kept his movements slow and non-threatening, and kept her between him and the stallion.The moment of truth came as he mounted, exposing himself to Lark's teeth and hooves.To his relief, Is turned the stallion and set off, so he didn't have to go in front of those massive, deadly hooves.He did not know if he would be safe from them even though he was riding Lark's beloved mare.
Petre didn't have to look back to know there were no Blueskins following.Reaction set in and he began to shake.He could have died.Is could have been taken, the whole mission ended as suddenly as that.He reached out and caught a handful of Celeste's black mane, steadying himself.
It didn't matter to him where they went as long as it was away from the Blueskins.But when they came to a little open meadow, Is slipped from Lark's back and slid his bridle off in one practiced motion.Without a glance at Petre she sat down on the grass and wrapped her arms around her knees.
Petre had no choice but to dismount too.He could see there was no pushing Is.He settled himself beside her, not too near, and waited.Her hair hung about her face, tangled and unbrushed.Her lips, which Petre had once thought so sensual, were drawn into a tight line.He looked away before she could catch him watching her.
"Is he dead?" she finally asked."Did Lark kill him?"
Petre visualized the way the Blueskin's head had snapped back, heard the terrible sound of Lark's hooves striking his chest, and saw again the distance the man had been thrown through the air and the boneless way he had landed.
"Yes," he said softly. "Lark killed him."
They were silent a while, both dealing with the suddenness of a man's death.
Is gestured to Lark grazing contentedly beside the mare. "The stallions don't ever do that," she informed Petre. "Once they start getting aggressive, they don't ever calm down.They get more and more dangerous.It takes them three days.Then, even though I've trained them all their lives, I can't handle them any more.No one can, except the berserker they're keyed to."
Her voice was filled with the pain of the horses she had lost that way, gentle, kind animals she'd trained and loved who had turned unmanageably dangerous. "But look at him,” she said of Lark.“I could walk up to him right now and he wouldn't harm me.You could. It shouldn't be that way."
"Maybe, he's not going to change . . ."
"No, you don't understand," Is cut him off."I never taught him to rear and strike.He did that himself.I just . . . when you went down, I thought they'd kill you.I couldn't just sit there.I sent him forward.I don't know what I expected, but I couldn't do nothing.I just wanted him to push the man back, or something.I didn't mean for him to kill that man."She stopped herself."Or maybe I did.I was furious.But not really at them, they were just being men."
She ran down, leaving Petre wondering at the men she must have known in the Alliance.The Blueskins had intended to kill him and rape her, and she said they were ‘just being men.’
"Maybe Lark isn't like the other stallions," Petre suggested gently.
"No."Her voice was angry."He has the scar under his forelock.He has the implant, just like all the others.When his berserker gets close enough it will make him impossible to manage.The only person who will be able to control him then will be his berserker."She had seen it happen too many times to doubt it.
"But maybe," Petre said."If we were at Amil's cabin we'd be too . . . too far away.Maybe it won't activate across all that time."
Is turned away from him and Petre could see that she had already resigned herself to Lark's loss, just as she had lost all the other horses she had ever loved.He could think of nothing to say.
"You've never seen them change."Is's voice was dry of any emotion."They would bring the colts to me as one or two-year-olds."In spite of herself, pain caught in her throat and Petre could imagine how appealing a horse like Lark would have been as a colt. All legs, with great knobby knees that he would grow into one day.He could imagine Lark’s inquisitive eyes in his long serious face topped off by a little fuzz of a mane standing straight up.
“I usually had five or six horses of different ages and different levels of training.It was just them and me at the border station.I would have years to train them," Is said, her voice flat again.She wouldn’t say, “and years to love them.”Instead she said, "I'd train them to accept a rider, and I'd ride them in the mountains until they were fit and sure footed.And then I'd train them to be . . . "Her voice shut down again.Is had involved herself deeply with each horse, and they had trusted her and given themselves to her completely.
"Then their berserkers would come."Is looked away from him, staring at something he couldn't see, but he heard the anger in her voice."And the horses would go mad.I couldn't believe it at first.I almost got myself killed before I finally accepted it. Lark will be the same way.He'll try to kill anyone who gets near him.Me.You.
Anyone."
"But if you keep him far enough away from his berserker, it might not happen,” Petre pleaded.
"That may be impossible."
"But weren’t you thinking of doing that when you took him?"
"No.I didn’t think about it at all.I just had to get out of the Alliance.I couldn't stand it anymore.I didn't know if I'd make it.It seemed more likely that I’d be killed before I had to worry about Lark changing.”
Petre was suddenly overcome with fear that Is had already given up too much.She was still moving inexorably toward her own death and he could not stop her.
"I saw John take on a whole band of outlaws once,” Is said, “I guess I should have known you could handle the Blueskins like that.I could have kept Lark out of it but I didn't know you didn't need help."
"I didn’t know either," Petre admitted.His hands made a small blunt gesture of defeat."I thought they'd kill me, and take you . . . and . . . I desperately didn't want that, but you've seen.I'm not very good at our martial art.I skip practice a lot.Is, I don't even like to fight. Then . . . everything slowed down.I could see everything before it happened.It was almost . . . easy."He finished, still in awe of the experience.He could feel Is looking at him, but he couldn't meet her eyes.
"Ondre would say that your attitude is good," she told him."The whole purpose of your art is to not fight."
"I know.I just didn't know it would work like it did.When I really thought I would die everything changed."
"That's part of your teachings too," she reminded him."Removing all ego from an encounter.Not fearing to win or lose, or to die.Just embracing the moment."
"Yes, but I didn't know I could do that."
"Sometimes it's like that," Is said pensively.
Petre was reminded that she must have done many things she had not known she could do.Stealing the stallion, fleeing alone into the wilderness, facing the Blueskins and facing the Mirror - all were brave acts.But coming to trust John enough to love him after all the Alliance had done to her might have been the bravest thing of all.Petre dared to think that if she could do that once – if she could heal herself that much once – might she not be able to do it again?He pushed the thought away roughly and stood.
"Let's move on," he said more gruffly than he had intended.
Is rose obediently and went to Lark.
"I don’t even understand why the Blueskins want me," she said as they mounted.
It was not an easy question to answer.The Blueskins were a tough tribe of warriors.They often went in small war parties to raid the outlying Alliance farms.They sometimes took women back to their camps and kept them as sort of slave/wives.But no one had ever known them to organize into big war parties like they were doing now.It was unlike them to take on the better-armed and better-mounted troopers.They liked one-on-one conflicts where courage could be displayed and honor won.
Blueskins didn't care anything about Alliance policy.They wouldn’t change their ways for political or moral reasons.
“They have a legend about you, Is,” Petre said, “or at least about a woman with hair the color of shadow on a huge horse the color of the ground.According to that legend the woman and her horse will appear sometimes, out of nowhere, and disappear again just as suddenly.They believe the horse comes out of the ground and the woman out of the shadows and then they go back into them.They think it is magic and they want that magic, that strength, for themselves.If one of them can capture you, that magic will become his.”
“But Ondre told me that the legend existed before I ever came here, before I was even born,” Is objected.
“We think that when you were alone in the Boundary, running away from Blueskins and troopers, Lark may have taken you back in time, so that sometimes the Blueskins you saw were years in the past.When they saw you appear and disappear, they told their people about you and the story was passed down the generations.”Such a sensible explanation, Petre thought, so simple.And so impossible.He could understand why Is was having difficulty accepting it.
It was hard for Is to think of how people, maybe hundreds of years ago, could have seen her and told others the story before she was born. From her perspective, life seemed to be going along, one day following the next in order.The idea that she might have influenced things in the past so that she was already known was hard to accept.
They climbed out of the bowl and from there it was a straight shot to the top of the ridge.To their right the world dropped away, ridge after ridge fading from dark green to distant violet. To their left a shoulder made a gradual descent into the forest below.
“That’s the way we have to go,” Petre told Is.“At the bottom of that shoulder, off to its left side, where we can’t see from here, that’s where Amil’s cabin is.”
Is looked where he was pointing but said nothing.
“Maybe you should lead,” Petre suggested.
They descended the shoulder, avoiding the crest and staying a little lower down on its side so they would be more difficult to spot if anyone were looking.This hid them but, unfortunately, it also hid what was happening on the other side of the shoulder.So it was that when Is decided it was time to cross over the crest she almost rode straight into two Alliance troopers.The troopers were as surprised as Is.The one nearest her recovered first, forced his horse to surge forward and made a grab for Lark's rein.Lark reared from the unexpected pain in his mouth, dragging the trooper off his smaller horse.Is kicked the man in the head making him let go of the rein.The second trooper saw his buddy go down, drew his weapon and fired.Is screamed in pain.The sound panicked Lark.His great hooves dug into the ground as he took off at a gallop.The trooper took aim for a second shot; Petre shouted and drove his heels into Celeste’s side.The mare lunged forward and plowed into the trooper's horse with such force that the horse was thrown to its knees and the trooper pitched over its head.
Petre didn't look back.If the man recovered fast enough to shoot, it would do no good to have seen it coming.This side of the shoulder was open with few trees for cover.It would have been smarter to turn back the way he had come but Is was going this way.The only thing Petre could think to do was to put himself between her and the trooper with the weapon.
Celeste flew over the ground.Petre crouched low on her withers.The next shot went wide of them to their right.It was like nothing Petre had ever seen before.A chartreuse streak stained the air.An evergreen ahead and to their right burst into flame.The horses shied, veering left.
“No, Is!” Petre screamed.“Don’t turn.They’re trying to turn us.There might be more troopers in that direction.”He saw Is trying to pull the panicked stallion back on course.
Celeste, lighter and quicker than the great war horse, was closing the distance between them when, suddenly, she stumbled.Her outstretched neck disappeared from in front of Petre as her front hooves missed their stride almost as though the ground had been pulled out from under her.Petre had just time to kick his feet loose from the stirrups as they fell.At the speed they were traveling he would probably be thrown clear of the horse as she somersaulted.They might both roll and get up again not that much worse for it.If she didn't roll over him! The ground rushed at him with incredible speed and he was out of time.
Just as Petre expected to feel the impact, Celeste's front feet found solid ground and she flung her head up trying to recover.For an instant he couldn't believe the gallant little mare could do it.Then he was fighting to throw his own weight back against the momentum that was carrying them both forward and down.For another few strides the mare staggered, then as suddenly as she had lost her balance she recovered it. She stretched out her neck and ran as hard as she could.Petre's feet automatically found the stirrups and he regained his position over her neck before he thought to look back.He expected to see the trooper closing on them – a bad stumble like that should have cost them ground – but instead there was only an empty field stretching away to the crest of the hill.No troopers anywhere!
Petre whipped his head aroun
d to face forward again.The hair crawled on the back of his neck.Two horses and two men couldn't just vanish.
Then he understood. It wasn't any ordinary rock or hole that had tripped Celeste.Between one galloping stride and the next they had crossed into a different time, a time when there weren't any troopers to pursue them.
As Celeste pulled alongside the stallion, Petre saw the unnatural way Is was clinging to Lark's mane.The gray color of her face sent fear though him that overshadowed everything else.
"You're hurt!"He expected her to pull up.
Instead she stared straight ahead, jaw set, and kept going although she slowed to a walk.
"Is please . . . let me see how bad it is."But she kept going.
"Is, we have to stop."
"No," she growled through clenched teeth.
Petre saw blood spreading in a dark stain down the side of her jacket, down the thigh of her pants.He watched as it ran along the skirt of the saddle and dripped to the ground in bright red splatters on the grass.He couldn't stand it.
"Is, we have to stop.You're bleeding too much."
"No."
"If you pass out we'll never find Amil's."
"If we stop now, we'll never find it."With her words the great stallion turned sharply left into a steep descent.
Petre dropped back and let Celeste follow.He had no idea how to stop Is anyway.He dared not grab the stallion’s rein or place himself across the horse’s path.
They were descending into thickening forest.Branches reached over them, blotting out what was left of the afternoon.Petre was acutely aware that it was later here than it had been just a few moments ago when they had run into the troopers.Though he could barely make out the dark form of the stallion and his hunched rider in front of him now, Celeste never hesitated, sure and confident with her superior night vision.Petre was reduced to listening to the stallion's footsteps, listening for the sounds Is would make if she fell from his back.Listening . . . to the calling of an owl.
They rode for what seemed like hours.Petre’s heart veered crazily between hope that Is knew what she was doing and fear that he was letting her push herself too hard.Finally they broke out of the forest.Afternoon had turned to night.An almost full moon rode high in a sky bleached by its light.Only a few of the very brightest stars were visible.A glimmer of water caught Petre's eye.Running along the valley floor a stream sparkled under the moon's light.Dry grass swished as the horses walked into the open.With a start Petre recognized where they were.He twisted around to look where the ruins of Amil's cabin should be, but there was only a dark, impenetrable shadow.Ruin?Or house?An owl hooted again, a soft, almost welcoming note. A moment later Petre saw the flash of white feathers catch the moonlight as the bird swooped from the trees.
The horses turned toward the cabin site and for a brief moment moonlight glinted off a roof .Relief flooded Petre.The cabin was whole!They had found it.Be here, he prayed silently.Be here, Amil, please.
As they approached, the wooden planks of the porch creaked and a man walked out into the moonlight.His white hair caught the light and gleamed like the wings of the owl had gleamed.Petre breathed relief.The old man stepped down from the porch.His glance took in the war horse and his wounded rider.He turned to say something to Petre and stopped suddenly.For a moment he stood motionless, as wary as a hunted rabbit.He is afraid of me, Petre thought.But that's ridiculous.He was just expecting John, not me.
Amil was the first to recover. "Bring her inside."
Petre slipped from Celeste's back and reached up to help Is from her saddle.She started to dismount but collapsed into his arms."We're here," he whispered."You got us here."But she was already unconscious.Gently he touched his lips to the top of her head, letting himself breathe the scent that was hers alone and willing his strength into her.When he looked up, the old man was watching him with eyes that held the intense keenness of a night predator.
Petre hesitated, unsure of this man.Amil turned and went back into the cabin without a word, leaving Petre to make up his own mind.Petre became aware of a warm slippery wetness soaking his arm where it crossed Is’s side.The blood made his mind up, he carried Is to the door, then paused.There was something familiar about this place.Something . . . maybe only Is's description of it.The only light inside was a dim red glow from a wood stove.Then Amil opened the stove and sparks exploded in a shower as he tossed a chunk of wood onto the coals.Something familiar?Then it was gone.Flames leaped up.Light blazed across the bookshelves floor-to-ceiling along two walls just as Is had described it.
Petre carried Is in and laid her on the floor near the stove because he didn't see a better place.The cabin had only a small table with three chairs, a sleeping palette in a far corner, and walls of books.
In the light from the fire Petre could see that Is’s whole side was sodden with blood.There was a tear through her jacket as though it had been cut with a knife. He wondered how any weapon could have done this to her from a distance.When he undid her jacket he saw how the slice had gone through her flesh as well.Blood had soaked everything and was still coming.Petre felt sick in his stomach. This was a bad wound. If internal organs were injured, there might be little he could do. Steeling himself, he started to work the jacket off her shoulder.Lifting her arm made blood flow in a sudden spurt.
Amil knelt by them. “Sit her up a little.Support her head.I’ll get this off.”
They soon had the wound exposed.A horrible gash started under her left shoulder blade and traveled around her ribcage in a downward spiral.The flesh and muscle of her side hung open exposing what looked to be ribs when she breathed.
“Lay her on her side,” Amil directed.The wound gapped wide as they repositioned her.A thick clotty blood welled out.
Amil stood abruptly."I need water."And a moment later, moving about his kitchen area, he said. "Good, good.I have freemoss."
Petre knelt on the floor cradling Is's head on his thigh. Freemoss grew abundantly in this area, forming a thick soft mat over rocks and fallen trees.It could be used almost like a sponge or it could be eaten.Either way, its medicinal properties were probably better than anything Petre had in his pack.
Is’s skin was pale even in the orange light.One of her eyes came open a slit revealing nothing but white behind it.There was too much blood, old black clotted stuff, and new cherry red.Petre hesitantly lifted the flap of torn flesh and closed it so the edges of the cut touched.Holding it together with his thick blunt fingers he again willed his life into her.
Amil returned with a bowl of water and several clumps of freemoss and began to sponge the wound.The water was only slightly warmer than frozen as it ran over Petre's fingers.Blood sloughed from the cut and ran in rivulets down Is's stomach and back.Goose bumps rose on her skin and her nipples contracted.Petre eased the edges of the wound apart, letting Amil run the cold water over the bloody exposed flesh.As quickly as the blood was washed away more came, but in those quick glimpses they could see that the wound had not gone deeper than her ribs and had not cut into her internal organs.Relief eased from Petre with his breath.
"Not deep," Amil agreed."Just loss of blood, and shock.Close it now.”
Petre carefully replaced the flap of skin so the edges aligned.Blood still seeped out.Amil sopped it up with the freemoss.
“What happened?" he asked.
"Troopers shot her."
Amil's hands hesitated.One white eyebrow arched in surprise.Then he continued to sponge the new blood away.
"Shot her?With what?"
"I don't know.Some sort of projectile.”Petre didn’t want to explain that the troopers were from a different time and the weapons were different from anything Amil would have known.This one could slice like a very sharp knife without touching the person with anything more substantial than light.
Amil continued to wipe the new blood away.His hands were gentle, competent, even loving.Petre watched with an odd mixture of emotions he was too exhausted to explore or even name.
“That’s proba
bly all we can do with this,” Amil said.He took the bowl of bloody water and freemoss away and came back with a towel.They dried Is and applied pressure to the cut but it continued to bleed.
"It should be stitched," Amil said.
"I have clips in my pack that will hold it together," Petre said.
"Good enough.Here, let me hold her while you get them."Amil moved in close as though to replace Petre and from some deep place, the mistrust Petre had felt earlier resurfaced.He hesitated, not wanting to leave Is. The moment stretched awkwardly.
"Well?" Amil finally asked.It was a question, not a challenge and it opened the door for any response.
Chiding himself, Petre eased Is into Amil's hold and went out to the horses.The moon made the night nearly as light as day and he could see Lark trying to graze with his bit in his mouth, trailing his reins on the ground.Petre took a moment to slip off Lark's bridle.The great stallion let Petre interrupt his grazing without the slightest show of aggression.Petre undid both saddles, speaking gentle praise to the horses as he worked.He found the first aid kit in his pack and brought it along with Is's pack into the cabin.
Warmth from the cook stove had noticeably permeated the room.Petre had to trust that their pursuers would not be able to see this light.Amil was as Petre had left him, supporting Is and applying pressure to the cut to keep it from bleeding.Now it seemed foolish to have mistrusted the old man. Petre knew he was overtired from their days on the road, exhausted from worrying about Is, and wound tight from their last narrow escape.
He took an antiseptic cream from his kit and smeared a little along the lips of the cut.Then as Amil held it together with his fingers, Petre pressed one end of a clip into Is's skin on one side of the cut, spanned the torn flesh and pressed the other end of the clip into the good flesh on the other side.Is murmured at the new pain and Petre hesitated.His fingers rested lightly on the next clip, reluctant to push it into her flesh and cause her more pain.He was aware of Amil watching him and of what he revealed about himself but he didn't care.When Is didn't wake, Petre finished with the clips.They would hold the cut together while it healed.By the time they were no longer needed the small teeth that were now imbedded in her flesh would have dissolved.Petre placed a pad of freemoss over the clips and taped it down.Alliance technology could have cleaned and sealed the wound with light, but the Hluit had only more traditional methods.
Is had begun to shiver from the cold water and loss of blood even though the stove was blasting out so much heat Petre was sweating.
“We have to get her cleaned up and into something dry,” Amil said.
Petre lifted Is into a sitting position and they worked her bloody shirt and jacket off her other shoulder.Her leather riding pants were a sticky mess and Petre imagined that Is would be embarrassed, and possibly furious with him, as he helped Amil get them over her hips and off her legs.Blood covered her thigh.Amil brought him some clean water and freemoss.
Petre was glad when Amil went away again, leaving Is some privacy.Blood was all down her side and her leg.Petre cleaned her up the best he could.He could not help but appreciate her beautiful form and the softness of her skin in the warm firelight.She had stopped shivering and seemed to be in a deep, peaceful sleep.The grief of the last few days was gone from her face and she was beautiful to Petre in a way that made his heart hurt.
When he had Is clean and dry he put one of Amil’s shirts on her and together the two men got her into her sleeping bag.Petre folded his wool vest for her pillow, making her as comfortable as possible.As he smoothed the hair back from her face, a deep sadness stole into his heart. She would never accept this kind of care from him if she were awake.
Amil had stayed in the background but Petre felt the old man watching him.He knew he had revealed too much to this stranger – how he loved this woman who had loved John and did not love him – but it was true and he could not have acted in any other way.When he confronted Amil with his own gaze Amil looked away.
"You look like someone I met once," Amil said lamely."But that was a long time ago.It couldn't be you, I suppose?"
"No," Petre said."I never met you before."But he wondered at the feeling of familiarity the whole place held for him and decided it must just be from the way Is had described the place to him.
"I'll wash her clothes in the stream," Petre said, feeling the need to do something concrete and familiar.
"You should not go that far.She does not hold you like she did John," Amil said in a rush.
The hair stood up along Petre's back."You . . . you know?We didn't just ride in here.We…” he let it trail off, unable to say those impossible words.
"Yes," Amil said gruffly, "I know you’re from the future.What happened to John?"
"He is dead."
"Huh."It was a sound of denial.
"It's a long story," Petre equivocated.
"All I have is time," Amil replied, and Petre was aware of the layers of meaning in the old man's words.His mistrust resurfaced stronger than ever.
"Come on boy," Amil snapped."If you will not tell me what's going on, how can I be of help?You have come to me for help, no?"
Exhaustion clouded Petre's mind like a drug.He had no good reason to distrust this man so.
Amil turned away from him, removing the challenge and the pressure of his impatience."We'll have tea," he said more civilly, "wine, if you prefer, and talk.I do not often get visitors here.You will excuse me my roughness?"
"Yes, I understand."Petre accepted the apology, such as it was."I am also not at my best tonight.We will make allowances for each other, and I will drink tea.Wine would knock me out right now."
Amil gave a good-natured sounding chuckle."No doubt you will be easier to converse with than John was," he said.As he began preparing the tea he told of how John and Is had appeared at his doorstep. A girl riding what could only be a stolen war horse, and a man riding bridleless on a mare of such beauty and refinement she could only have come from the breeding program of great horsemen.But the man could not speak at all.
"When he tried to say anything he would start to laugh hysterically, or maybe cry.I couldn't tell which.But he was desperate to get a message across."Amil gave a shake of his shaggy head, remembering."And her," he cocked his head toward where Is slept, "she was like a wild cat ready to defend him."He paused and looked at Petre speculatively."Much as you are ready to defend her, I would say."
Petre met Amil's eyes.Let him see the truth there.
Amil nodded a little to himself and turned away.Petre watched him setting out teacups and kettle, putting pinches of leaves into his little homemade strainer.His movements were precise and unhurried, nothing wasted.The beautiful porcelain cups were at odds with the rustic cabin.
"You will find you do not need to protect her from me," Amil said over his shoulder."I am interested only in the truth.It is why I took the books,” he gestured at the walls of bookshelves.“They contain the true history of our world.They are the record of the beginning of many experiments, the chronicles of many lines of research that fell out of favor or needed to be covered up for one reason or another.They were to be burned.It was in the best interest of the leaders of ‘our Great Alliance' that certain things be forgotten."
He brought the teacups to the table and met Petre's eyes."Although I rescued this information from the certain destruction of fire, it will just molder away here and be lost.Nothing would please me more than if something that I saved in my day could be used by your people who are so far in the future.”
Amil's simple words touched a chord in Petre's heart.Truth and honesty were highly prized in Hluit society.Because of their nomadic existence, their history was handed down orally, and it was extremely important not to let inaccuracies, let alone deliberate lies, slip in.
"My people also desire true answers," Petre said, "not the Alliance lies.”
"So we will trade our stories, eh?And see what truth we can make of them?"
"Fair enough," Petre agreed.
 
; Amil brought a pot of hot water from the wood stove and poured it into the kettle to steep.The pungent steam rising through the tea leaves carried the promise of relief from fatigue and made Petre realize how tired he was.
"For me," Amil said, "John's visit raised more questions than it answered.I had never heard of his people or their horses.Before I stole the books, I had spent many years as a Librarian at the Research Center at Court South where all records are kept.I felt I should have known about any horse breeding programs and any people who were not the usual Alliance citizens.But . . .” Amil opened his hands as though showing he had nothing.
“We are nomadic horse-herders,” Petre said.“We live in the Boundary.We have lived this way for many generations now.We are descendents of a small group of people who were so disaffected with the Alliance that they were allowed to go live behind the Boundary.The Alliance looks on us as an experiment in utopian living.They expect us to fail.”
“No doubt you see yourselves quite differently,” Amil suggested.
“We would like them to recognize us as a free and sovereign people.”
Amil gave a little grunt of understanding.
“I will tell you our history if you want,” Petre volunteered, “but first tell me about John.”
"Yes, John.He was desperate to get his message across.We finally settled on a system where he pointed to words in a book and I wrote them down.Unfortunately, whatever the Alliance had done to him to keep him from talking, affected his ability to communicate in any fashion.He didn’t seem able to read anything except one of the ancient texts.It was written in the root language from which our present day speech arose, but it is long since dead.No one speaks it, and only a few can read it well."He sighed."I am not one of those few.When I had finished writing the words he pointed to I could barely make sense of them.I hope your people did better."
"Your translation was quite good," Petre told him."It was just that you could not possibly have understood some of the references John made."
Amil leaned back in his chair. “I understood that he was a spy for his people and I was able to ascertain that he had been at Court Center.From that I knew that he had been spying in the highest and most secret research center of the Alliance.I could only guess that his mysterious 'people' had the education and background to have been able to prepare him to pass as an Alliance citizen of the Scholar class."
"Yes," Petre said. "Although we live a simple life without the technology the Alliance has, we are not uneducated.It has always been our practice to keep spies in the Alliance.It keeps us informed as to their intentions toward us, but it is also good for each generation of our people to have firsthand knowledge of the Alliance people."
"Know thine enemy," Amil said.
The overly simplistic statement stopped Petre short.
"They are not necessarily our enemy," he said dryly.
"Oh?"Amil was surprised."Then you have not come here to find some information that might help you overthrow their government?"
"No, we only seek information that may give us the leverage we need to ensure our own future."
Amil snorted."Your people are naive."
"There are a few hundred of us, there are hundreds of thousands of them,” Petre responded in his people’s defense.“We are nomads living with the land.They have great technology and vast cities.We have no desire to overthrow, or to rule.We only want to be left in peace."
Amil turned away and Petre had the uneasy feeling that Amil did not believe him.
Amil drew the strainer full of leaves out of the water and poured the dark steaming tea into their cups and the moment passed.
"I seem to remember that John's message was littered with words for urgency and extreme danger," Amil kept a conversational tone.
"Yes," Petre admitted.It had not been a well-ordered and concise message.It reflected the disarrayed thought patterns caused by the damage the Alliance had done to John's mind.But the warning had come through clearly.
"He seemed to be trying to convey that he had found a 'key' to something," Amil remembered."I could only translate that thing as a 'mirror/non-mirror.'What in the world is that?"
"It's a computer really.But we only learned that recently, from John.For generations we have called it the Mirror.It didn't seem to have an exact physical location but it was capable of killing people.We couldn’t find it if we went looking for it, but then it would kill someone we didn’t think was anywhere near it. But John was somehow able to find its physical location and get inside the actual computer part of it.He was able to use one of its programs to fix what the Alliance had done to him.He could talk before he died."
"So what was this 'Mirror' intended to do?"
"To overcome death.To keep the essence of a person alive after his body dies."
"Ahhh," the sound expressed Amil's fascination."But of course, that would be a project worthy of the attention of the highest Alliance officials."
"Yes.They engineered an entire line of men, berserkers, and created the war stallions like Lark, whose sole purpose is to be killed by the Mirror."This was still hard for Petre to accept. For the Alliance to create such magnificent animals as the war stallions – and the riders in their own way and to train them until they were superb athletes – just to have them destroy themselves was beyond his comprehension.
"The Mirror takes the men apart as it kills them," he told Amil.“Not physically, but psychically.It was supposed to learn some way to absorb them and keep them alive after it kills their physical bodies. I guess their deaths had to be slow. . . like they had to give up their lives, their life forces themselves, or something, not actually be killed.”His voice reflected the horror he felt at the whole idea, but Amil made a satisfied sound, understanding the plan.
"Ahh.Life after death, such a goal would explain the grandiose scale of the whole berserker mythos.In my day, we did not yet have the Mirror.But we had our own berserkers, ones with a bluish cast to their skins.Their purpose was to patrol the edge of the Alliance and drive wild beasts back into the Boundary so the outlying farms would be safe."
"We still have the Blueskins," Petre told him."Only now they live in the Boundary, and their purpose is to prey on outlying farms."
"Kill the Alliance's own citizens?"Amil said thoughtfully.
"Yes.And then the people are told that the purpose of our present day berserkers is to hunt the Blueskins and keep the farmers safe.Alliance citizens don't even know the Mirror exists.They don’t know anything about the life-after-death experiments.It isn’t going to be for them, only for the highest officials.”
"I see," Amil said slowly."So the Alliance still controls its people with fear and lies, just as it always has.The Blueskins are a great way to keep prying eyes out of the Boundary, eh?It's nothing to them if a few citizens are sacrificed to maintain their lies."
"Exactly," Petre agreed."You should know, Is's parents were killed by Blueskins."
"Ahhh," it was a sound of dawning understanding."So she became the perfect tool for the Alliance to use for training its war stallions.She would be willing to see those stallions sacrificed because she believed they fought the Blueskins?"
"Yes." The word came out heavy with the pain and treachery Petre knew Is had suffered."But she reached the point where she couldn't stand to see her horses taken away to their deaths.So she took Lark and fled into the Boundary, even though she knew the Blueskins lived there, and she knew her own government would hunt her down and kill her if they caught her."
"Umm," Amil looked at Is speculatively and Petre thought he saw admiration in the old man's eyes."She is a woman of immense courage."
Petre didn't refute him.His own esteem for Is was great.
"She told me of finding John, dying, after the Alliance had let him escape with poisoned rations," Amil said.
"Yes, it was supposed to be a death sentence and perhaps a warning to our people if we found his body.Is saved his life."
"So John took her to his people . . . to your p
eople?"
"Yes, but John couldn’t leave it at that.He and Is went on and faced the Mirror together.Using the Mirror’s technology John was able to forge some sort of link directly to Is's mind, like the link between a berserker and his horse.Then Is waited outside while John went in and searched for all the knowledge he could.This seems to have gone on for days before the Mirror noticed and killed him."
"I see," Amil said slowly."And does the Alliance know what John did?"
"We don't think so.They probably believe that John died from their poison.They keep track of the Mirror's progress through special transmissions that are sent by the berserkers as they die.John thought that those transmissions were somehow powered by the stallions’ deaths, at least partly.Since John wasn’t a berserker and there was no war-horse involved, the Alliance would not have automatically received a transmission.They would not know about it unless the Mirror told them.But John thought that the Mirror was hiding a lot from the Alliance.It hadn’t told them about other people it had killed, so we suspect it didn’t tell them about killing John either.”
“So has this Mirror succeeded?" Amil asked."Has it created life after death?"
"In a sense.It has every berserker and every horse it has ever killed stored inside it in holographic and digital form . . ." Petre caught himself, wondering if Amil would understand those words."That is, it has pictures, three dimensional pictures that move and look as real as life."
"But that isn't what the Alliance wants," Amil said thoughtfully."They want the essence of the person, not just stored but alive and doing the things that living people do – learning, changing."
"Yes," Petre agreed.
"So, it has failed?"
"John believed it has completed its program but it has not let the Alliance know."
"'A ghost of great power,'" Amil quoted."John had me write that for him.'I have information concerning a man of great power, a beast of great power, and a ghost of great power.'The berserkers, their horses, and . . . the true completion of the Mirror's program.It creates ghosts?"
“Yes.We call them Dark Bodies.They are frightening and disorienting in the same way as the illusions the Mirror creates.They have been known to kill people, but we do not understand the mechanics of how they do it.Is told of John communing with them even before he went to the Mirror, and Is heard them speaking although she couldn't understand them."
"So what is this 'great power' they have?Just to frighten and kill?"
"We do not know.It is one of the things we hope to find out."
"You may search my records," Amil said."But the Mirror was so far after my time I don't know what help you'll find.”
In spite of himself Petre felt a shiver go through him at the reminder that he wasn't sitting in an ordinary cabin on an ordinary night having a conversation with an ordinary man.In Petre's lifetime this cabin was a burned out ruin with only a few chimney stones to mark where the wood stove he was staring at had stood.The man who sat across from him was long dead.But somehow, Is and Lark had brought him to a time when Amil was alive, and their pursuers couldn't see them.
Petre took a big swallow of tea that burned his throat.Porcelain rattled as he returned the cup to its saucer.
"Also stolen," Amil said, noticing."The Alliance's finest. While I was at it, stealing the books, you know, I took a few other things that pleased me.Although I suppose these cups must seem to you a rudimentary technique with clay and heat."
"No," Petre managed to say."They are beautiful.And the making of porcelain has not changed that much."
Amil smiled."Take care, then, not to break them and tell me about these Dark Bodies."
Petre laughed and managed to take another sip without rattling the cup.The old man watched him with a sparkle in his eyes perhaps understanding the challenge Petre had set himself.
"So does the Alliance know about these Dark Bodies, these ghosts?"
"No, John thought the Mirror was hiding them, perhaps because it thinks the Alliance will turn it off when it has completed its program."
"Um," Amil made a sound of disagreement."Or perhaps it has its own plans for these Dark Bodies, eh?"
"What plans?"
"I don't know.But it must perceive the Alliance as a threat to it."
"Or the Dark Bodies may only be its hands and eyes," Petre countered."Maybe it's just trying to study people in some way other than the one it was programmed to use which always kills them."
“But why would it hide that from the Alliance?”
“I don’t know.”
"And to what end would it study people that way?"
"It was programmed to be self-teaching."
"And also to have no morals against killing," Amil reminded, “and so why would it seek another way to ‘study’ without killing?”
Petre had no answer for that.
"No wonder John was trying so hard to warn you."
Petre leaned back in his chair, seeing where Amil was leading."The Alliance has lost control of what the Mirror learns," he acknowledged."It was only supposed to kill the berserkers who are simple minded, know no fear of death, and don’t understand anything about what the Alliance is up to.When it killed Hluit scouts it learned to distrust the Alliance.It has also killed Blueskins and occasionally other outlaws who pass through our lands looking for a place to hide.Who knows what the Mirror has learned from them."
"Exactly," Amil agreed, and sipped from his cup. Petre thought about taking another sip but changed his mind, knowing his hand would shake.
"And then there is the problem of the horse." Amil added. "A horse who can cross the years as well as the miles."His voice had grown wistful.He leaned back in his chair, tipping his head up to stare at the ceiling.Petre fell quiet feeling that the old man must need a moment to digest it all.His gaze followed Amil's.Hand-hewn timbers supported the peaked roof.Several of the dark crossbeams were streaked with white stains.Everything else was unpainted dark wood.
“Do you think he is the only horse they have that is able to do this?” Amil asked.“Because if they have others they may be able to follow you here.”
“We think he is the only one because of the way they are so desperate to get him back, but truthfully we don’t know,” Petre admitted.“I’m sorry that we may have placed you in danger. We had nowhere else to turn.”
“Danger is no stranger to me, boy.And I believe your people are in much worse danger than I.”
“They are,” Petre agreed.“The Alliance intends to kill all of us if we don’t turn Is and the stallion over to them.”
Amil gave him a keen look. “That seems excessive even for them.”
“It seems that way to us too,” Petre said dryly and Amil gave a little chuckle at his tone.
Amil stood abruptly and went to put more wood in the stove.His sudden display of agitation seemed odd to Petre.
Petre glanced over at Is.Her face had regained a little color and she seemed to be deeply asleep.
“Is doesn’t know this, but while she and John were at the Mirror I went on scout duty and I ran into some troopers.” He had gone mostly to put some distance between him and Is.She was in love with John, his best friend, and Petre had never meant to do more than befriend her to help her adjust to Hluit society because John was in no condition to do that.
“The troopers caught me,” he said bluntly.“They had come further into our land than they’d ever come before, so I was following them.I didn’t know there was another contingent behind me.Anyway, they caught me and roughed me up enough to let me know they would have been glad to beat me to death, or any other Hluit they caught.Then they let me go with a warning: Give them Isadora and the stallion or they will find and exterminate all of us.”His blood ran cold with the retelling of it and he heard the drop in his voice.
“I took the message, as they knew I would.Of course they tried to follow me but Des, my horse, and I lost them.My people will not give them Is.We will withstand them the best we can.”
The wor
ds were so easy to say; the actual experience had been terrifying.
He had been riding along a stream bed when he had first seen their tracks.Shod horses.The Hluit and the Blueskins rode their horses unshod.He started to track them, staying well back, taking advantage of every cover, watching out for their scouts.
It was some time before he realized he had gotten himself caught between two contingents, the one he was tracking and another one coming up behind him.He stayed with them using every bit of his skill to remain unseen until he was sure they were headed through Bent Pass.Then he began working his way off to the side, hoping to slip out of the trap he was in as the troops narrowed to get through the pass.Instead, unknown to him, one group broke off from the main body and turned in his direction.Just when he thought he was safe, he found himself surrounded again. This time by troopers who were scouring the woods with the best heat-seeking equipment the Alliance had.
Petre realized his mistake and headed for a nearby gully but it was too late.In his memory he heard the unmistakable click of a metal-shod hoof striking a rock ahead of him.He froze and his horse, Des, stopped motionless.To their left, a bit jingled. To the right, Petre heard the soft giving squeak of leather as someone shifted his weight in a saddle.
It was too late to make the ravine with only trees and shadows to break up their outlines, only luck to hide them.Suddenly horses were visible below them, a line of riders sweeping the forest as though looking for something.Every third man held a small device in his hand, swinging it slowly back and forth in front of him.
Petre held his breath, willing his heart to quiet.Alliance technology could find a person by the heat of his body, or by no more than the sound of a racing heart. With Des sweaty from climbing there was no hope the troopers would miss them.
The closest man spun in his saddle and pointed his device directly at Des.Instantly others turned toward her.For a moment they didn't seem to see the motionless horse.Then one of their horses whinnied a loud welcome and Des moved.But Petre was no longer with her.
"What is it?" one of the troopers asked. "Hluit or Blueskin?"
"No bridle," someone answered."Hluit."
"Silence," the commander snapped.And then loudly, "Hluit, come out or I'll shoot your horse."
Petre, watching from the low branches of a pine saw more horses coming up behind the first line, and more.
The commander leveled something at Des that had a short barrel and some sort of dial at the nether end of it."Hluit," he said again, loudly."I'll start by crippling her."
"That won't be necessary," Petre said as calmingly as he could manage.
Weapons snapped up to point at him in the tree.He eased slowly around the trunk, trying to show that he was unarmed.With so many weapons trained on him, it was hard to let himself drop to the ground
"Bring him," the commander said, and started his own horse forward.
Two men came toward Petre."Walk."
He glanced toward Des but a rider moved between them and tossed a loop of rope over Des's neck.She followed that man obediently as he rode away and Petre had no choice but to walk.
They kept him marching until dusk.When they finally stopped, the spot they chose had many large boulders for cover.Men deployed among the trees and rocks with their weapons ready.
Petre wondered at that.Surely thirty-some highly armed Alliance troopers were not expecting to be attacked?Certainly not by unarmed Hluit. Hluit who practiced a code of peaceful co-existence with each other, the land and all living things. Hluit whose main means of defense was a martial art rooted in non-contention and non-aggression.
And surely this number of troopers didn't fear attack by Blueskins.The bands of warriors were ferocious fighters, but they had never been known to take on this many armed and forewarned troopers.The Blueskins' idea of a good fight was hand-to-hand combat in which courage could be displayed and honor won or lost.
A trooper searched Petre, removing two knives, and missing the one in his boot.Then they led him to stand in front of their commander.
He was a tough looking square-shouldered man who spoke with an impatient angry edge to his words.
"Why were you following us," he demanded without preamble.
"I wasn't . . . " Petre started and something slammed across the back of his knees, hard.He went down, one leg doubled under him and the other shooting out helplessly so that he landed on his back.It was so fast that even his trained reflexes couldn't break his fall.
As he tried to roll to his feet, his calf muscles knotted in more pain than he could ignore.He twisted onto his hands and knees and heard someone snicker cruelly.
"Hluit, do you know why we are here?" the commander demanded.
"No."Petre replied, wondering if they would hit him again for the lie.
"We're here to retrieve government property," the commander said.His hard eyes assessed Petre.
The cramp in Petre’s leg was easing but he stayed down.It could be useful if they thought he was more hurt than he really was.
"We're looking for a woman," the commander said."Isadora Drey, an Alliance citizen.She is a traitor who took one of our war horses.She is nothing to your people.She is Alliance property and so is the stallion she took."He gave a jerk of his head and two men came forward and lifted Petre to his feet.
Petre let himself be heavy on their arms, standing on one leg as though the other was too badly hurt even while he wondered at himself.He couldn't fight this many armed men.He couldn't escape, and he could not hope to prevent them from doing anything they chose to do.But the anger that was always slow to rise in him began to rise, bathing him in heat and recklessness.
The commander drew nearer to Petre.
"Isadora Drey is trash," he said, almost spitting the word in Petre's face."She is not worth anyone dying for her."
Petre met the man's eyes.He knew he should act intimidated and deny ever having seen Is or the stallion.But anger formed a hard knot in his guts.These men would deliver Is for the kind of punishment that had left John unable to speak just as if barbarians had cut out his tongue.In his mind's eye Petre saw John, his mouth working to form a word, his anger and helplessness building. And then he heard the sound his friend had made.Not a word, but laughter, helpless hysterical laughter.He saw John falling to the ground, beating the earth with his fists until no one could tell whether the sound he was making was laughing or crying.
Petre met the commander's eyes and knew that man saw his anger and defiance.Distantly a part of his mind was yammering that he would do no one any good this way.But he could not stand the thought of the Alliance getting Is back to do something equally awful to her.If these troopers even took her back to the Alliance.They might just exact their own punishment, beat her and rape her and kill her.
A blow from behind caught him across the side of his head and threw him to the ground.For a moment there was no pain.Then it came roaring into his head, loud as Great Falls, threatening his vision with black edges.For a time it took all his strength and all his anger just to stay conscious.
Finally the sound receded and Petre caught snatches of conversation around him."He don't know nothing. He ain't gonna come 'round anyhow.Paul hit him too hard."
A forest of bootlegs surrounded him.Petre tried to get to his feet.Blackness whirled around the edges of his vision threatening to cover him completely.He had to make himself still again to make the world be still.
"Hey, look it,” someone said."Little woman try'n to git up."
Petre was appalled at their viciousness and surprised by their uneducated speech.The Hluit, for all their nomadic lifestyle valued education and free thought, but the Alliance kept all its citizens in ignorance, never allowing them to learn more than the vocation that had been picked for them.For Is that vocation had been training the great stallions for war.For these men it had meant training them to be tough and angry and giving them an enemy outside of the Alliance to hate.Usually that enemy was the Blueskins, but right now this Hluit captive would do.Thes
e men would never be allowed to learn to read, so that they might educate themselves. They would not be taught to do simple math, for they would never have need of that either.They would never have money.They would not be able to get anything the Alliance didn't give them.They would never use their minds for anything except anger and viciousness and fear.And they would not even understand enough to hate the people who had done this to them.
Someone nudged Petre with a foot."Git up, you."
Petre got to his knees.The world swam about him.Faces leered at him.
"C'mon, girlie, git up," someone chided him.Others laughed.
Petre climbed slowly to his feet, willing the trees to stand still around him.Dizziness made his stomach churn.Someone prodded him in the ribs and he took a step so not to fall.His stomach heaved.It took all his control not to go to his knees and vomit like a dog in front of these men.They prodded him again and he took another step and another.His vision began to clear.They had set up camp among the rocks and were taking him toward a headquarters of sorts.The commander who had questioned him before sat under a tarp stretched between several boulders.In front of him was a table and on it lay various implements that Petre recognized as sophisticated tools of Alliance technology.They let him take a good look.
"Do you know what you are seeing, Hluit?" the commander asked.
"All this to find a stolen horse?"Petre sneered, awed by his own audacity because he did not want to be hit again.
The commander gave a nasty chuckle "We have a better way to find the stallion.This is to find your people.All of them.No matter how they run or hide."
The blood drained from Petre's head so fast that his legs gave way.He staggered and nearly fell as the world swooped around him.
Several people laughed, but the commander just watched him with cold, penetrating eyes.
"We can find every person, every child, every woman, and every horse."
He paused to let his words sink in.
"If your people do not turn the traitor, Isadora Drey, over to us we will kill them all."
Again he paused, then continued casually. "To find the stallion, we have brought his berserker.When we are close enough the stallion will sense his proper rider and he will become unmanageable by anyone else.And if the horse does not come to us, we will go to him.His berserker will guide us for he and the horse are connected by a chip in each of their brains.All of our war-horses are connected to their berserkers that way.Isadora Drey knew that.She should have known she couldn't get away with taking him. She should not have placed your people in jeopardy over such a horse."
He took a step toward Petre. "Your people should not try to protect her.She is a coward and a traitor.She has betrayed your people by not telling you the truth of what would happen, just as she has betrayed her own people.Surely she is not worth anyone's life."
He was watching Petre keenly and Petre tried to show no emotion.The woman he knew as Isadora was no coward and no betrayer.
"We have a job for you, Hluit," the commander continued."We are going to let you go and we want you to tell your people what you have seen here.Tell them we will find and kill every last one of them.Tell them how it will really be."He gave a quick nod to one of the men and that man came forward to stand facing Petre.
Petre looked at the hulking man and the others gathered around menacingly.But he thought the commander's words meant they were going to turn him loose, so he wasn't ready for what happened next.
The man reached out and slammed the flat of his hand against Petre's shoulder.Petre reeled back, staggering.His head exploded in white pain.Searing brightness filled his vision.He didn't even know he was falling until he hit the ground.
Over the roaring in his ears he heard laughter.Then someone kicked him in the ribs and he could neither see nor breathe.He sucked frantically at air that refused to be drawn into his lungs and heard the harsh howling of his empty throat as his lungs refused to fill.Blackness threatened the edges of his vision as the light flickered and began to fade.He fought the darkness as though he was fighting his own death.
Air came seeping back into his lungs.But so slowly, too slowly to relieve the screaming need of his body and the howling panic in his mind.Then they kicked him again. And again.While he fought only to breathe.
"Enough."
Petre heard the word through the roaring in his head and the wheezing of his own breathing and he understood that they were going to let him live.
"Let him up."
He made it to his knees.The pain in his ribs kept him from being able to take a full breath.Fear that he would suffocate tried to take over his mind.He forced himself to get control of his breathing, bringing each breath slowly, if shallowly, into his abdomen.
"Look at me, Hluit."
He raised his eyes to the commander's and knew the man saw his fear.The commander nodded with satisfaction.
"Go back to your people, Hluit.Tell them how it will really be.Tell them to bring the traitor to us, Hluit, and none of them needs to die." None of them needs to die anyway, Petre had thought through his own anguish.
“It didn’t make sense,” he told Amil.“The Alliance so overpowers the Hluit, surely they could just walk in and take Is.Undoubtedly with all their equipment they could find her.And they had just told me how the stallion’s special berserker could call him.We could make things more difficult for them, but certainly the Alliance did not really need our cooperation. That’s when I realized that for all their weapons and equipment they really didn’t think they could find Is and Lark without our help.So here we are, hiding where they probably can’t find us, but my people are back there. . .” he made a vague gesture.He didn’t know if any of them were still alive or maybe fighting for their lives even now.
“We didn’t come here just to hide,” he continued.“Is would never have agreed to that.We came to see if we could find something in your records that will help us understand the stallion or the Mirror.The Alliance has lost control of both of them.If we could gain that control for ourselves . . .”
“You could annihilate them,” Amil concluded.
“No, I doubt that,” Petre said surprised and appalled.“We would not do that if we could.We only want enough leverage to make them leave us in peace.”
Amil studied him for a long moment, and then shook his head.“They cannot be trusted, no matter what sort of deal they make.”
“We have to try.”
"Nothing would please me more than if I could help you,” Amil conceded.“But you must understand that all the research that led to the Mirror, and the eternal life experiment it represents, happened long after my time.I doubt that you will find anything in my records to help you there.But the horse?When Is and John left, I made it my business to find out all I could about John's people and their horses.I came across certain references that might help you but I will need time to find them again, and you need rest.”
Petre could not deny that.He sighed, releasing the last of his energy.He was exhausted.Except for occasional catnaps, he had barely slept in days, not trusting Is to take the watch in her defeated and apathetic condition.The constant worry for her, the constant wariness, and the hoping had all taken their toll.
“I’ll wash her clothes,” Amil said.“You rest.Then we will see what we can find
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Thank You,
Lisa Maxwell
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