The Burning City

by Jerry Pournelle

  “So you organize a lot of people and go kill them,” Kettle Belly said. “That’s what we do. If a town gets mean enough, we get all the wagoneers together and go burn them out.”

  Whandall thought about trying to organize enough Lordkin to destroy the Toronexti. Nobody knew how many they were, where they lived, nor even who they were behind those masks. They were backed by the Lords, it was said. Nobody could fight the Lordsmen.

  The top of the hill was a natural fortress. A spring bubbled up in the center of a ring of boulders that formed a natural castle large enough to enclose a wagon train and all the livestock. Over the years the Spotted Coyote clan had smoothed out the area inside the boulder circle and built corrals and pens and shelters, and big cook fire rings. The smells of bison stew wafted to the wagon train.

  Kettle Belly and a small dark man about his age shouted and gesticulated at each other. Whandall thought they were pretending at passion as they went through a ritual. Kettle Belly would throw up his hands in disgust, and the Spotted Coyote leader would gesture outside the circle, grinning as he pointed out a small column of smoke a couple of miles away. Kettle Belly looked worried, then shouted again…. Eventually they came to some agreement, and money changed hands. By then dusk was falling and the stew was done.

  They ate dinner around a big campfire. Logs had been arranged in a circle to form seats and backrests. It was pleasant to sit back and relax with the prospect of a night’s sleep without need for guard duty.

  Whandall pleaded exhaustion when Hickamore wanted to talk about Morth of Atlantis, and soon the wizard was deep in conversation with a man twice his age who wore a mantle of wolf skin. A Spotted Coyote boy came around to fill everyone’s cup from a goatskin of wine. Whandall sipped appreciatively. It was not as good as the wine Kettle Belly kept in his wagon, but it was smoother and more pleasant than anything that made its way to Tep’s Town.

  A pleasant evening. Willow sat next to him, tired because the girls had been hopping on and off the wagon all day as the hills became steeper and they had to get out and push.

  Flirting. Courtship is serious flirting. Flirting meant being amusing and funny, and Whandall didn’t know how. He looked around to see how others were doing it.

  Not far away Carver sat with Starfall, the blacksmith’s dark-haired daughter. They sat very close together. Whandall couldn’t hear what they were saying, but Starfall seemed to be doing all the talking as Carver sat listening attentively. That seemed like something Whandall could do, but Willow wasn’t saying anything!

  “Did you like the dress I bought you?” Whandall asked.

  “Yes, very much. Thank you.”

  “You don’t ever wear it.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t want to wear it here, with all these strangers,” Willow said.

  “Kettle Belly says they’re safe,” Whandall said. “They’re not—” He cut himself off.

  “Thieves?”

  “I was going to say ‘gatherers.’”

  “Oh.” She looked at him with wide eyes. “I keep forgetting,” she said.

  “That’s good.”

  She smiled softly. “Be right back.”

  Carver was still listening to Starfall. She moved closer to him. Whandall had no trouble imagining her warmth against his side. The boy said something, and Starfall laughed appreciatively. Other couples were talking softly, boys smiling, girls laughing. If only he could hear what they were saying!

  Willow returned. She was wearing the blue dress Whandall had bought, and the gold-and-black onyx necklace.

  “That’s—wonderful,” he said, settling for that, although he wanted better words. “I knew it would look good on you.”

  “And it does?”

  “Better than I thought,” Whandall said.

  Her smile was haunting. She sat next to him, not as close as Carver was sitting to Starfall, but she had never been so close. He could feel her warmth radiating against his side, warmer than the fire. They didn’t talk for a long time. Whandall kept trying to think of something clever to say, but nothing came to mind, and it was enough just to be close to her.

  When Carver and Starfall left the firelight circle and went off into darkness, Whandall thought Willow was about to say something, but she didn’t. He imagined standing up, taking her hand and leading her to privacy and secret places, but he did nothing, and he wondered if his legs had forgotten how to obey him.

  Suddenly she smiled at him and touched his face. Her touch was light and smooth, as she ran her fingers along his tattoo, down his arm, still smiling. Then she sat close to him, and they stared at the fire.

  Carver had a sappy grin at breakfast. It faded when he went to hitch up the mare. The pony reared and tried to trample him. Whandall watched, frowning, as Carver shouted at the pony. Someone in the next wagon party laughed loudly.

  A few minutes later, Greathand the blacksmith came to Whandall’s wagon. He wasn’t unfriendly, but he seemed preoccupied. “Need a favor,” he said. “Like to have Willow bring one of your ponies over to my wagon.”

  “Sure. Why?”

  “Rather not say until I know,” Greathand said. “If you don’t mind.” The blacksmith seldom asked favors. Whandall was pretty sure no one ever refused him when he did ask. And there was no reason not to do it. Was there?

  Willow had heard. She led the smaller of the horned ponies over to them. Whandall had to look twice: it was as large as the larger one had been the day before, and without the black star marking on its forehead Whandall would not have known which one it was.

  The ponies changed size sometimes. Whandall had asked Hickamore about it. “Magic changes along the road,” the wizard had told him, then asked how Morth cured skin diseases.

  Willow followed Greathand toward his wagon. Whandall watched her lead the pony for a moment and remembered her smiles last night. But there was work to do loading the wagon.

  When Willow came back, Greathand and Kettle Belly were behind her. They waited until she led the pony back to join the others. Greathand stood back and let Kettle Belly talk for him. “These aren’t your kin, but it’s your wagon,” he said.

  “Willow’s wagon,” Whandall said.

  “You’re in charge,” Greathand said. “That boy Carver doesn’t have a father, and he’s in your wagon!”

  “Yes,” Whandall said. It sounded like an admission but Whandall didn’t know why.

  “So we can talk to you about him,” Kettle Belly said. “What’s his situation? Profession?”

  “He knows how to make rope, and sell it,” Whandall said. “Why?”

  Greathand frowned. “Why are you—?”

  Kettle Belly held up a hand. “Ropewalking. Expensive to set up, but a ropewalk makes good money,” he said. “Have to have a place to do it, though. Not on a wagon train.” He turned to Greathand. “Starfall doesn’t have a wagon yet. Want to think about a different dowry?”

  “She can’t take back a ropewalk!” Greathand said. “But she didn’t want a wagon anyway. She’s always talked about living in a town year-round.”

  “Well, we can work that out, then,” Kettle Belly said. “How old is the boy?”

  “Sixteen, I think,” Whandall said.

  “Little young,” Kettle Belly said.

  “Starfall’s only fifteen,” Greathand growled. “If the damn fool hadn’t made such a big thing about not being able to harness that mare, maybe—anyway, Starfall’s all excited, so I guess it’s got to be. Whandall, we’ll talk when we’re over the pass, discuss arrangements, where the kids want to live, what it takes to set up a ropewalk. You tell Carver he’s a damn lucky boy.” The blacksmith went away, still muttering under his breath.

  Whandall frowned at Kettle Belly. “I saw Carver and Starfall go off together, but they weren’t the only ones last night!”

  “They’re the only ones that all of a sudden can’t harness one-horns,” Kettle Belly said. He grinned. “I always thought you were putting me on, but you really don’t know!” He laughe
d at his enormous joke. “Whandall, everyone knows it! Nobody but a virgin can harness a one-horn. Yesterday Carver could harness the mare and Starfall didn’t have any trouble with the stallions. This morning—”

  “I’ve been stupid.” Many cryptic things were becoming plain.

  “Doesn’t work that way in the Valley of Smokes, then?”

  “No.” Whandall thought about it. “Ponies are smaller, don’t have real horns. It surprised us when ours grew those big horns. Magic! Kettle Belly, what happens now?”

  “Well, you heard. Greathand will have to come up with another kind of dowry. I don’t know if he can afford a ropewalk—he’s got Fawn to marry off too—but he’ll do what he can. Carver have any shares in your stock?”

  Whandall nodded. “He’s not poor. This is all new to me. What happens if they don’t want to marry?”

  “Come on—they knew there were one-horns in the wagon train!”

  “Carver didn’t know what that means.”

  “Starfall did,” Kettle Belly said. “You trying to tell me that it’s different in the Valley of Smokes?”

  Whandall remembered Willow’s story of what happened to Dream-Lotus. “No. Not for kinless,” he said. Carver must have known what he was getting into. Whandall remembered incidents with Fawn and Rutting Deer, chances he had, things he might have done.

  It was different here, because there weren’t Lordkin here, and he could never explain that. “No,” he repeated.

  Kettle Belly squinted up at the rising sun. “Burning daylight,” he said. “We have to get moving. Whandall, you’d better explain this to Carver.”

  “Yes. Does he have any choices?”

  “Well, he can take a wagon as dowry, if he wants to learn this life. Being married to Greathand’s daughter won’t hurt him a bit.”

  “What if he runs away?”

  “He’d better run damn far from the Hemp Road. Forever.”

  CHAPTER

  45

  They made camp in a boulder field. Large rocks helped form a natural rectangular fortress, nothing so refined as the place the Spotted Coyotes had built. Wagons filled in gaps among the big rocks. Whandall watched their placement—all wagons in sight of each other. They’d traveled until near sunset to find such an open place… an easy trek down the gorge to the river… but wouldn’t any bandit know just where wagons would stop? And the boulders and the rising and falling ground around them could hide all of Serpent’s Walk and Bull Pizzle together.

  But Hickamore drank strong hemp tea and sang, and when he came out of his trance was satisfied. There were bandits near, but they only watched. They had no plan, no purpose, only their envy.

  The sun had set, but the west was still red and orange. Whandall sent two of the Miller children to keep watch outside the wagon circle. “Stay very still, and if you hear anything, shout and run under the wagon. But yell first!”

  Then he had Willow, Carver, Carter, and Hammer sit down around the fire.

  “We need to talk,” Whandall said. “Carver, you knew what was expected when you went off with Starfall.”

  Carver looked very solemn. “Yes. Well, I knew it in my head,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking much, though.”

  “Starfall was,” Willow said.

  “How are you so sure?” Carter demanded.

  She shrugged. “Girls always are. In Tep’s Town you might get away with being careful, but it’s a big risk. Out here—believe me, Starfall knew what she was doing. So did you, I think.”

  “It’s so—permanent,” Carver said. “That’s what I’m having trouble with.”

  Carter nodded in sympathy.

  “So what do you want to do?” Whandall insisted. “I think I’m supposed to negotiate for you. Where do you want to live?”

  “I can make rope,” Carver said. “Well, if Carter will help. Carter, I’ll teach you my part if you’ll teach me yours.”

  “Greathand can’t afford a ropewalk,” Carter said.

  They all looked at the wagon. Then they looked at Whandall. No one said anything.

  Whandall grinned. “Depends on Willow,” he said.

  “Me! I don’t have anything, except the dress you bought me. I don’t have anything at all!”

  And she was near tears. Dowries. Was that the problem? “The wagon. The ponies. Willow, they’re all yours.” He’d been thinking how to say that. He’d waited too long.

  “One of the ponies is mine!” Hammer protested.

  Whandall shrugged. “Argue that with Willow,” he said. “But Kettle Belly says one pony is worth a team of bison, so Willow has a wagon and team.”

  “And the mare?” Carver demanded.

  “I have a claim,” Whandall said. “I helped catch her. The hemp and tar too—part of that’s mine. I won’t claim it, though. Willow can have my share.”

  “Why?” Willow asked. “It’s very nice of you, Whandall, but why?”

  “I know why,” Carver said. “Don’t you?”

  She didn’t answer, but she had the same vague smile that had appeared when Whandall said she owned the wagon and ponies. She looked quickly at Whandall, then looked away again.

  “Don’t forget, the wagonmaster gets a tenth,” Whandall said. “Now about the gold.”

  “Morth gave that gold to you,” Carter said. And Carver said, firmly, “Yes.”

  Whandall nodded. “I’ll share. I needed you to move it for me. Still do. There’s enough for your ropewalk, I think, if you and Carter stay together. I keep half. You, all of you, share the rest any way you decide.” Half would still be a lot. “Half after the wagonmaster gets his share.”

  “Kettle Belly doesn’t know about that gold,” Carver said. “No way he could know.”

  “We could hide it,” Carter said eagerly.

  “No.”

  “Whandall—”

  “No,” he repeated. “We tell the wagonmaster.”

  “Why?” Carter demanded. “He doesn’t know—he can’t know.”

  Whandall tried, but words came slowly. “I said. I promised.”

  “A Lordkin’s promise,” Carter said. “Made to a thief!”

  “Kettle Belly’s not gathering,” Whandall said. “He’s—he’s working with us.”

  Carter looked to the others. Some understanding flowed among them. Carver said, “All right,” and shrugged.

  Whandall felt like an outsider. There was a long silence. Finally Whandall got up and left the wagon. No one spoke until he was too far away to make out words, then Carter and Carver began speaking excitedly.

  CHAPTER

  46

  “Come in,” Kettle Belly said in invitation. “Have some wine.”

  “No, thank you,” Whandall said. “I have something to show you.”

  “Yes?”

  “Not here. At Willow’s wagon.”

  Kettle Belly frowned at the setting sun. “Time to set the watch,” he said. He began pulling on his boots. “Willow’s wagon, you said? Not yours?”

  “Hers after her father died,” Whandall said. “In the Burning.”

  “Makes sense,” Kettle Belly said. “I keep forgetting about the one-horns.”

  “The ponies are hers too.”

  “Well, of course.” Kettle Belly tied off his boot laces and held out his hand for Whandall to help him up. They set off at a brisk pace with two of Kettle Belly’s nameless sons following. “Good. Let’s go. You and Willow getting along all right, then?”

  Whandall didn’t answer.

  “And it is my business,” Kettle Belly said. His tone was serious now. “Everything that happens in this wagon train is my business until we get to Paradise Valley.”

  “Pelzed used to say things like that.”

  “Who’s Pelzed?”

  “Someone I used to know. I think we ought to hurry.”

  Kettle Belly was taking two steps to Whandall’s one and didn’t have breath for an answer.

  “Leave that alone,” Willow shouted.

  “Why?” Carver d
emanded.

  “Because—”

  “Hello, Willow,” Kettle Belly said.

  Carver turned quickly. He was holding a gold nugget in both hands. It was pulling him to the ground.

  “That’s what we wanted to show you,” Whandall said. “We have gold.”

  “I see that,” Kettle Belly said. “More than that?”

  “What’s in the wagon.”

  The wagon bed was open, and Kettle Belly looked. He said, “That’s a lot of gold.”

  “I know. It’s refined gold too.”

  “Where did you get it?” The shaman’s voice. They turned to see Hickamore come out of the shadows.

  “Damn that lurking spell!” Whandall shouted.

  Hickamore grinned. “I wondered if you would tell the wagonmaster.” He turned to Kettle Belly. “Now, Black Kettle, behold the skill of your shaman and the value of our bargain. Dowries for all your daughters in your share alone!” Hickamore cackled. Suddenly he stiffened. He went past Carver and reached into the false compartment of the wagon, now open.

  “Stop that!” Carter shouted.

  Hickamore ignored them. His skinny arms lifted, holding two nuggets both as big as his head, as if they floated up under his palms. “Refined, you said. A wizard absorbed its power. Morth? Is that who you meant? He didn’t take it all, boy!” The old man’s voice had gained in timbre and volume: it must have been audible throughout the camp. “Here.” He handed a nugget to Carter (who dropped it) and one to Hammer (who staggered), took the nugget Carver was holding, and lifted it high. His face twisted in joy. His eyes rolled back into his head, and he stood entranced.

  “Now what have you done?” Kettle Belly demanded of Whandall. His two sons stared at the shaman. In the shadows were Bison folk who had followed Hickamore’s voice toward possible entertainment.

  Carver and Carter had given over shouting at Kettle Belly. They watched the shaman. Willow ignored Hickamore to stare at Whandall, looking at him in a way she never had before, not unfriendly, certainly not angry, but as if she’d never really seen him. Before Whandall could speak to her, Hickamore recovered. He grinned wildly. “More gold calls. It’s kin to this,” he said.