“I was going to bring it back!” Argun exploded.
“Sure you were.”
“Bitch!” he growled, grabbing at her pastry. But his thoughts were so loud she couldn’t help reading his intention before he moved. She moved the pastry out of the path of his hand as he lunged.
He missed.
Jadyn regarded her pastry with disfavor. She could still remember how wonderful it’d tasted, but suddenly she had no desire for another bite. She tossed it to the grass at his feet, “On second thought, have it. Have the whole thing. I’ve lost my appetite.”
Argun leaned toward her. For a second, his loud thoughts warred. He wanted to hit her, but he feared the reaction of bystanders. Just before he leaned away, he thought, I’ll let her go for now. I’ll follow her and catch her where it’s less crowded.
Nylin was on her feet too. Jadyn turned to her, saying, “Let’s go.” To her surprise, her voice didn’t tremble.
She looked back. Argun had the pastry in his hand. She would’ve sworn he was about to stuff it in his mouth, but seeing her looking, he turned toward a trash receptacle. She rounded the corner, then, thinking about how she didn’t want him to see her, she quickly stepped back around to check on him.
He was wolfing the pastry and walking after them.
I’ll bet he’s not actually working, she thought. Probably thinks work’s beneath him. She turned to Nylin, “He’s coming after us. Let’s duck into this next shop and hope we lose him.”
Nylin nodded, “Great idea.”
Inside the little store, Jadyn stopped near the entrance so she’d be close enough to keep Argun from noticing them. When Nylin stopped also, giving her a curious look, she said, “I think he’s less likely to see me if I’m hiding just inside the door here. He’ll probably be looking deeper. Also, he’ll be looking for two women, so we shouldn’t be next to each other.” She waved, “You go on in and hide in the clothing.”
Jadyn stepped behind a shelf and watched Argun walk by. With a shiver, she saw his unseeing eyes sweep right over her. This is so weird, she thought, awed by her own ability. She contemplated the possibility of trying to change Argun into a nicer human being. After all, he spent a lot of time trying to mold me into a different person, she thought. Then, But I haven’t liked that at all. Eva and Kazy’d say I have no right to change him unless he asks for it.
She wasn’t sure whether she agreed with the Hyllis’s philosophy, at least in the case of a jerk like Argun. After a few moments, she decided she should wait until she had a lot more experience before she started changing people without their permission.
***
Racine strung his bow and pulled several arrows out of his quiver, sticking them point first in the ground so they’d be easy to snatch. One of his men had been riding east on the Clancy Vail road and had come on a small party riding west. He’d quickly ridden back to gather the band. They’d only been able to find nine of his men, but since there were only supposed to be four or five of the travelers, that should be plenty. Though, he thought uneasily, you’ve gotta wonder how a party of four managed to get past Vargas’ mean sons-a-bitches to the east of us.
It’d been almost a year since Racine’s group of highwaymen had seen anyone come from the east. Groups fresh out of Cooperstown had kept coming from the west until recently. But for at least ten months, any people coming from Clancy Vail to the east had been picked off by Vargas’ guys before they got this far.
Things had gotten bleak. The only groups taking the road had been big caravans with lots of guards. Groups too big for even Racine’s full team to take on. He thought he knew what’d happened. In the old days, there’d only been Racine and his men stopping small groups and shaking them down for what they thought the group could afford. But then, Vargas showed up and started taking even more from the eastbound groups after Racine’s men had taxed them pretty dry. And the westbound groups had arrived at Racine’s area after Vargas had taken everything they had, leaving them destitute and not worth stopping.
So, Racine’d started taking everything of value from the eastbound groups.
Then westbound groups just stopped coming, either having never started, or having been killed by Vargas.
Shortly after that groups stopped going east. Well, Racine was pretty sure they were still going east, but they went as add-ons to the big caravans or banded together and hired big troops of mercenary guards.
That bastard Vargas killed the goose that laid the golden eggs, Racine thought bitterly. For a moment, he wondered whether he should just hold up this little group—however they’d gotten by Vargas—taking a heavy tax rather than killing them like the last few groups that’d come his way.
He grimaced, Nah, it’s been too long. We need the cash.
He looked at the bowmen on either side of him. They both had arrows nocked, “You guys ready?”
They both nodded.
He looked down the straight stretch to the east of them. Still no sign of the little group that was supposed to be coming. He called out to his men, “Show yourselves.”
Three men stepped out from either side of the road and waved their machetes. Well, except for Jim who had a real sword. Racine told the three on the south side of the road to spread out a little. Then everyone backed into the brush again.
They’d wait until the oncoming party was between the bladesmen in the trees, then the archers would start shooting. He and his guys weren’t the best archers, but with three of them shooting, hopefully, they’d hit two or three of this little group. That’d make it a lot less dangerous for the guys with the blades.
He’d heard Vargas only had one guy who could shoot a bow. Seems crazy, he thought, he could train a couple more and keep his men safer.
Once again Racine wondered whether Vargas kept his men safe by threatening little groups, offering to let them go unharmed if they laid down their weapons, then killing them anyway. I’ve heard he’s a heartless bastard, but that seems pretty sick.
There was a loud “thock” sound on his left.
Racine turned to look. Charlie was staring down at a feathered shaft sticking out of the left side of his chest. What the hell?! Racine thought.
Racine had just turned and started to step behind a tree when something punched him in the chest.
He looked down.
The back end of an arrow was sticking out of his own chest.
As Racine dropped his bow, then dropped to his knees, grabbing at the arrow and wondering if he could pull it out, he heard another wet “thock” sound from his right. Though his head was fuzzy and his vision was dimming, he turned just enough to see Taron falling with an arrow in his chest.
His last thought was to envy the skills of the archer who’d killed them.
~~~
Daussie was on watch but she’d stopped in the middle of the road. Tarc urged his horse up beside her. While Hareh moved the gelding up just behind their horses he sent out his ghirit to see why they’d stopped. He couldn’t sense anything bigger than a rabbit but knew Daussie’s ghirit reached far beyond his own. He glanced back at Eva. She’d stopped the mule and stood patiently waiting beside it.
Though Hareh’s heart was thumping, she didn’t look worried. She looked sad.
Daussie was telling Tarc there were three men on each side of a straight stretch of road around the bend ahead.
Tarc nudged his horse forward, “There must be more than six men. The others have to be beyond our ghirit’s range. I’ll ride ahead to see what kind of ambush they’ve laid.”
Hareh wanted to protest Tarc’s leaving them. Or wanted to go with Tarc. He felt embarrassed that he wanted the protection of someone several years younger than he was, but the shame didn’t keep him from craving it.
In an effort to be constructive, Hareh gritted his teeth against the dread and sent his ghirit out again. He still couldn’t sense anything within his range but small animals and birds.
He decided to practice his teleportation. He didn’t
want to waste any of his cayenne extract so he reached down to the ground with his ghirit. He pictured it grasping a bit of dirt, then ported it into his hand. Opening his palm, he saw the pinch of dirt. If he concentrated longer he knew he could port more, but decided it was enough for practice. He ported a bit of the dirt to a location was that racing toward a boulder at the side of the road. He saw the puff of dirt appear just before the rock’s face and splash onto the front of the boulder. There was a click he thought’d come from a tiny pebble in the dirt. He did it again with the rest of the dirt in his hand, then decided he’d better stop practicing. He didn’t want to be tired when he needed his abilities.
As he sat waiting, something kept tickling his thoughts about the click of the pebble hitting the big rock.
Suddenly Tarc spoke from behind him. Startled, Hareh spun, unable to believe Tarc had snuck up behind him without his notice.
There was no one there, but Tarc’s voice kept speaking.
Hareh stared wide-eyed at Daussie as the voice said. “They’ve got three archers set up at the end of the straightaway. Other than that the three men on either side of the road are all there is, a total of nine. I’m moving to where I’ll have a good shot at the archers. Once I’ve taken them out, I’ll let you know. You can come around the corner and on down the straightaway until you’re close enough to use some cayenne. Mom can do her thing with the six men and we’ll move on. Maybe these guys can tell us how much farther it is to Cooperstown.”
“Okay,” Daussie said, getting down off her horse.
“What the hell was that?” Hareh asked, thoroughly spooked.
Daussie shrugged, “Tarc can use telekinesis to vibrate air molecules and make sounds; the sound of his voice in this instance. It’s nothing new or weird.”
“What do the words ‘vibrate,’ and ‘molecules’ even mean?!”
After Daussie explained the words, she had to tell him how they related to making sound. When she was done he was shaking his head at the depth of her knowledge, and how much he had to learn. I’m truly going to have to get used to getting schooled by people younger than I am, he thought with dismay.
It was only minutes before Tarc’s voice was back to tell them the archers were dead. Hareh, Daussie, and Eva mounted up and continued down the road. Hareh kept sending out his ghirit, making sure there were only the six men to deal with.
As they approached the area bounded by the men in the woods, Daussie said, “I’ll take the ones on the left and you take the ones on the right, okay?”
“And I should try to splat them in the face with a drop of cayenne, right?”
She nodded, “Or you can just put a droplet deep in their nose. Either one’ll take them out of the fight. Depends on which is easiest. If you can locate their nasal cavity, do that. If you think you can throw a drop at them the way we talked about, then the fumes’ll get in their nose and their eyes. You can use a smaller drop if you put it directly in their nose.”
“How big a drop are you talking?”
“In the nose, about the size of a big grain of sand. To hit the face, a little smaller than a pea. The small size means you can teleport into the nose faster. You just need to be sure you can locate it with your ghirit.” She glanced ahead, “We’re getting close now. Can you sense their nasal cavities?”
Hareh sent out his ghirit, “Yeah.”
“Okay, start doing them. As soon as I hear one cry out on your side, I’ll start doing the ones on my side.”
Hareh sent a tiny drop into the spaces deep in the nose of the closest guy. The man immediately clapped hands to his face.
Hareh sought the next guy with his ghirit.
When he tried to find the third man, the guy was stumbling backward, hands on his face. Daussie touched Hareh’s shoulder. “I did your third guy after I finished my three. Don’t give him another dose.”
They tied the men up. Eva started adjusting them while Tarc and Hareh made lunch.
Daussie was still on watch, but Hareh kept sending out his own ghirit—for practice, he told himself—but he couldn’t help thinking it’d all been too easy. No wonder Eva wasn’t worried about this trip. Tarc alone could probably kill a couple dozen men with arrows and disable dozens more by swirling their ears. Even I stopped a couple of them without any trouble. Daussie’s so much better she did four of them while I was doing those two. He glanced at Daussie, She could’ve easily done all six. She just had me do some so I’d feel more confident if I had to do it myself someday.
“Um, Daussie, what if we teleport cayenne directly into their windpipes instead of their noses?”
“It’d probably kill them. Use your ghirit to see what’s going on inside the nasal cavities of the guys you did.”
Hareh did and was surprised to find their nasal passages swollen shut. “Oh…” he said thoughtfully.
“Yeah, they can’t breathe through their noses. They’re staying alive by breathing through their mouths, but if you’d closed off their windpipes they’d be done for.”
“I’ve had an idea—”
She put up a hand, “I’m on watch. Save it for when either Tarc or Eva are on watch.”
When he and Tarc had the lunch ready, Eva was starting on the last of the bandits. While Hareh waited for her to finish, he sat down, picked up a small pebble, began the transport, chose a spot moving very rapidly toward a birch tree, then finished the porting to that spot.
The pebble hit the tree so hard it buried itself in the wood.
That’d be a pretty good weapon, Hareh thought, but the cayenne’s easier and less permanent.
~~~
When they’d resumed their way to Cooperstown, Hareh mentioned his new weapon to Daussie.
“That’s interesting,” she said, though her tone suggested the idea wasn’t new to her. “Remember though, if you really need to hurt or kill someone, you could just port pieces out of vital structures like the aorta or brainstem.”
“Oh, yeah,” he said, embarrassed. “Sorry, I forgot about that.”
She nodded, “It’s a whole lot to take in and retain… Don’t forget your idea though. It might be useful someday. If you were to do the brainstem or aorta thing, the person would just die and no one’d know why—that’s probably what you want most of the time. People’d assume they’d died of some illness and not be looking for a killer. But, if you wanted everyone to know the person was murdered, then your pebble trick would be a way to accomplish that goal.”
They rode along in silence for a while, then Daussie said, “A thrown pebble, not so hard as to penetrate into the person and do serious injury, but hard enough to hurt; that’d be a great way to distract someone. Could be helpful in some situations.”
~~~
An hour or so later, Hareh found himself riding beside Eva. She turned to him and said, “How are you doing with your medical education?”
Nonplussed, Hareh said, “Um, I haven’t learned anything. Should I be trying to ride beside you so you can teach me?”
She gave him a mildly disappointed look. “Sure, but you should be trying to teach yourself when I’m not around. Your fellow students back at that tavern are probably getting way ahead of you because they’re reading the books in the clinic.”
Hareh felt indignant but tried not to show it. “How am I supposed to learn anything about medicine if you’re not teaching me and I can’t do any reading?”
“Have you thoroughly explored your body with your ghirit? Have you compared your anatomy with our anatomy to see if there’re any differences?”
Hareh felt sudden shame. He had an amazing tool he could’ve been using to study the human body but he’d made virtually no use of it. “Um, no. I’m sorry, I should’ve been doing that, and I’ll get started right away. Is there anything else I should be doing?”
“No, but you, Daussie and Tarc could be learning together. Start by finding all the structures in your arm, then asking them the names of those structures.”
Once again uncomfortab
le with the idea of learning from his younger cousins, Hareh said, “Um, I don’t want to bother them.”
She said, “There’s a famous quote from the ancient days, ‘You never learn as much as when you teach.’” Looking very serious, she said, “Make them teach you. It’ll be very, very good for them. They’ll be finding out there’re a lot of things they thought they knew but didn’t, and they’ll have to consult with each other to get the right answers, or perhaps with me. We’ll all learn a lot, not least of which will be how much we don’t know.” She winked at him, “Your learning experience is going to be our exam.”
Chapter Seven
Seri went down the stairs from the clinic and out into the area of the dining room area where people waited to be seen. The only one left was a woman who looked forty to fifty years old. She had a bleak look on her face as Seri approached. “Hello,” Seri said, “are you waiting to see the healers?”
The woman nodded morosely.
“They’re ready for you now.”
The woman stood without speaking.
As Seri guided her to the stairs, she asked, “What kind of problem are you having?”
In a flat emotionless voice, the woman said, “I’m going blind. Like my mother did.”
“Oh,” Seri said. She knew Daussie could treat people who were going blind but that Vyrda and Kazy couldn’t do it without her. They’d told a couple of blind people to come back in a few weeks when—they hoped—Daussie’d be back. Seri turned to the woman, saying, “Um, we can’t…” She stopped speaking, I shouldn’t be telling this woman we can’t treat her. Maybe we can treat her, just not those other people. Maybe she just needs some spectacles like Kazy gave the man yesterday? At the very least she should get to see someone who knows more about it than I do.
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