Finders-Seekers

by Gayle Greeno

  “Well, it’s true.”

  “Fine. Do you always tell everyone everything you know about me?” she mindspoke back.

  “Wait! She’s trying again.”

  “Too easy. Try harder one now, no be lucky guess. Now you tell what I t‘ink and tell it be true or makin’ bel’efe.” She had pulled free of Mahafny and sat stiffly, right hand clenched white-knuckled on a leather waist pouch, dark eyes narrowed, alert as a hawk as she stared at the ghatta.

  The ghatta made a little whining noise, her skin twitching. “Oow! She’s prickling! Ouch! Tingling, can’t read!” Panicky, Doyce reached to stroke the ghatta, trying to reassure and encourage her. A snap and crackle of static leaped from the ghatta to her outstretched hand, enough to make her flinch at the shock. “Thank you, that cleared the prickles!” Khar sounded absolutely as surprised as she was. “It’s as if they generate a flow of negative energy.”

  Doyce struggled to remain alert but relaxed, ready for anything the ghatta might transmit, no matter how unlikely. Would Addawanna play devious, think a lie to try to fool them? And then, despite herself, Doyce’s mouth curved in a reminiscent smile, as if she, too, had lived through the stream of images Khar began to transmit, faster and faster. She gave herself over to the sounds, the smells, the sensations....

  “His name was Nathan—Nakum. No, that was the name you gave him, Nakum, back in the meadow with the white star flowers weaving their perfume from stem to stem until the whole meadow was garlanded in it, and in the smell of the tiny wild strawberries crushed under you, until you were striped with their juices.... That, that was where you conceived your daughter, wasn’t it?” Even after more years than she knew, Doyce saw the images as vividly as if they had happened a moment ago and she a voyeur on the scene. “And then, you’d chase each other down to the stream....”

  “No more. ’Nough! Happy-sad dat you see clearer dan me.” An abrupt chopping motion cut Doyce off, and she sat, still enmeshed in the next sequence of images, disappointed as they flickered away from her. Khar had halted as soon as the command was uttered.

  Addawanna touched her right earlobe with strong, gnarled fingers, setting a small, purple shell pendant waggling and twisting. “From Nakum, like yours from your love.” Doyce touched her own garnet rose in automatic response. “You lose, too. Like od’ers here lose. Not one of dem! One of us!”

  “It seemed right to give something in exchange. Worth it, I think. They believe we are Gleaners, too.” “Go now,” Addawanna rose, fingers kneading at her waist pouch as if she derived some comfort or strength from it or its contents, whatever they might be. “Not much one o’d woman can do, but try. Mebbe dey lis’en. Mebbe it work.” She bent to leave, then cast an indignant look at the ghatta. “I no fergit!”

  “What won’t she forget?”

  “That I’m hungry. You got to eat, but nobody brought anything for me!”

  And Addawanna was as good as her word, for even as they settled themselves back on the dirt floor, striving to find a comfortable position, a teenaged boy slipped inside, bearing a bowl of broth. His grin and the set of his eyes, though not their color, a hazel-gray, convinced them of his kinship to Addawanna. He stared hard at the ghatta, his face intent, eyes wonder-struck. Excitement hummed through him until, trying to appear impassive, he turned and bolted from the hut.

  The morning wore on, leaving them tense and bored, alternating bouts of calm with nervous pacing and jumpiness at the slightest noise. None of the other ghatti had contacted them, and Khar lay asleep, conserving her energy, injured body striving to heal. An occasional tiny snore whistled through her nose and her ears twitched at the sound, then she would drift into a deeper slumber. Doyce didn’t have the heart to wake her. She and Mahafny roughly tracked the passage of time from the shifts of light that poured through the smoke hole. No one had returned with another meal, although the sun had now reached and passed its zenith.

  Bouts of talk intermingled with long silences, until their individual silences and thoughts became too heavy to bear and one or the other broke the stillness with a sudden spate of chatter, only to let it dwindle and die. For the fifth time, Doyce marched around the perimeter of the walls, swinging her arms, forcing herself to take measured strides. Nine across, then left turn, twenty paces, then left, nine more, then left again and down the final leg.

  “Doyce, will you stop that? I’m getting dizzy watching you.”

  “Oh, sorry. I just get so stiff sitting still.” Out of stubbornness, a compulsive need for completion, she finished the last leg of her go-round and stopped in front of Mahafny, tried to think of something to say or do as she hooked her thumbs into her pockets.

  “What have you got in your pockets?”

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  “Why not? Maybe it’s not the most exciting of games, but we might find something useful—or at least pass the time.”

  Feet planted wide, Doyce matched her actions to Mahafny’s words and began to rifle through her pockets, tossing the contents on the ground. A comb. A pencil stub. Two lucifers. A piece of twine. A pink crystal, something she’d picked up and carried simply because it was pretty, though she couldn’t remember for the life of her when or where she’d found it. The melted medallion that Vesey had worn and that she had carried with her ever since his death. That went back into her pocket. A few pieces of dried plums, wrapped in a twist of paper. And finally, from her breast pocket, Oriel’s leather day book. How many days since she’d looked into it, had read it as she tried to match her journey to his final circuit? Her own day book lay waiting in Lokka’s saddlebags; she’d been remiss in keeping it current and wondered if she’d ever have the chance.

  She tossed it onto the packed dirt beside everything else. Her final journey seemed to be following a very different script, although the end result might be identical. She shivered.

  “Is that all?” Mahafny protested, weaving the string in a cat’s cradle pattern on her fingers. “I thought Jenret said that you carried anything and everything with you.”

  “In my saddlebags, not my pockets. Besides, I’ve provided entertainment and lunch. What have you contributed?”

  The contents of Mahafny’s pockets proved equally unpromising, either with means of escape or food.

  “No folding shovel. No sacred ritual object of the Erakwa to make them worship us as gods. No secret weapon ready to deal death to hundreds while leaving us safe,” Doyce melodramatized as she parted her hair with her newly rediscovered comb. How long since they’d both had proper baths, not counting the numerous times they’d been rained on? “The folding shovel is in my saddlebags, though.”

  “Wonderful. And perhaps Khar can instruct the horses to tunnel in and rescue us.” Doyce broke into a hoarse crow of laughter, but Mahafny made an urgent shushing sound and sprang to her feet in one economical movement. Khar had already snapped out of sleep, raising her head and upper body, ears flicking back and forth. “They’ve stopped debating and reached a decision, I think. They’re coming this way!”

  “Addawanna’s with them. She says trouble ... trouble ahead, but be brave, we can survive it. She says something more, but I don’t know what she means ... strange people waving things at us.” The ghatta’s voice wavered off into a jaw-cracking yawn of nervousness as she riveted amber eyes on the door.

  Eight men filed into the hut, four on either side of the doorway. Ranging from young manhood to middle age, all were strong and well-muscled, though each exhibited bruises, ghatti claw marks and other wounds from their encounter with the travelers the day before. Initially they all resembled one another, coppery-bronze bodies, broad cheekbones, almond-shaped dark eyes, and black hair cropped just below their ears, though two wore their hair long and in complex braids. Except for the youngest, each boasted an intricately-beaded waist pouch similar to the one Addawanna wore and which they had assumed held the various simples and necessities that everyone carried. Somehow the lack made the youngest conspicuous.

  T
he more Doyce looked, the more their individual features stood out. A stronger cleft chin and deeper set eyes on the one immediately to the right of the door. A broad, tender-looking bruise stretching diagonally from left pectoral to below the rib cage on one of the older men. The hint of a dimple on another’s cheek, a jittery twitch making it visible—the craftsman from the Market Square that day, the one who had disliked Khar’s presence so much. Had he journeyed back to warn that she was in the vicinity? Or had he been in search of her? They all attained separate identities and then merged, blended together again as an implacable one: the enemy.

  “They’re more afraid of us than we are of them. Don’t press them or they’ll overreact.”

  “Why?” Doyce queried.

  “Don’t know, but they especially don’t like me.” Khar sounded hurt. “I can feel it, though I can’t read much else. They all surge with energy, smart like teasels except for the youngest one.”

  Addawanna shouted from outside the hut, “You come out now, slow-like. Bring an’mul wid you.”

  Doyce and Mahafny moved to the ghatta and each picked up the corners of Doyce’s tabard, lifting the ghatta between them. She cried once with pain at the sudden shift and sway beneath her, and went still, eyes wide and questing. Then they ducked out the door and found themselves herded toward the center of camp, their eight guards ringed as closely as they could without touching the women.

  “Harrap and Jenret are there already. They’re arguing, but they stopped when I told them we were coming.”

  The late afternoon sun was thin on warmth, and Doyce shivered at the difference between the outside air and the stuffy closeness of the hut. She missed the heavy warmth of the sheepskin tabard over her shirt and short, boiled wool jacket. She risked a look up and over the heads of those near her, trying to surmise the two men’s position, but couldn’t see them, hemmed round with a crowd of Erakwa, weapons poised. At random intervals, someone from the outer fringe of the circle would peel free, rushing off on some unstated business, and another would join the edge so that a constant eddying and drifting occurred around the outside, but the nucleus remained solid and unmoving.

  She craned her neck again and stumbled, Mahafny hissing, “Concentrate on where you plant your feet or we’ll dump the ghatta out.”

  Mumbling a generalized “sorry,” she guiltily concentrated on her footing, stretching the tabard corners taut, matching her pace and pull to Mahafny’s. Without realizing it, they had penetrated the outside of the milling circle, drawn farther into the core, the edges immediately overlapping until they were consumed by it. Eyes cast down to watch her footing, she saw swaying legs and shifting feet, some bare, some encased in moccasins, earth with remnants of beaten down, withered gold-green grasses, and at last a pair of booted and a pair of sandaled feet. She obeyed without thought as Mahafny instructed, “Down now. Lay her down.”

  Only then did she trust herself to look up, up beyond the ghatta, beyond the naked legs clustered around her like golden beech trunks.

  Jenret and Harrap greeted them, stripped to the waist, elbows and wrists bound behind their backs. The bruise on Harrap’s breastbone stood out in livid contrast, and more bruises bedecked his upper body, arms, and face, but his smile beamed unchanged: innocent, welcoming, delighted to see them.

  “Lady bless, we’re most all here, then. Where that Parm has gotten to, I don’t know, but I hope it’s not into more trouble. And the little ghatta, how fares she? I felt her tickling my thoughts as you came along.”

  Although she wasn’t sure what rules or strictures might constrain a Shepherd from embracing a woman, nothing could stop Doyce from hugging him. His bulk felt comforting and warm, so much so that she hated to let him go.

  “A bad blow to the head’s left her a bit dicky in the hindquarters, Harrap, but if nothing else happens she may make it.”

  “If nothing else happens, we’ll all be lucky. Good to see you, regardless.” Jenret spoke with difficulty out of a swollen mouth. “No, the other side this time,” he muttered as Mahafny ran a swift, questing hand over it, then touched the makeshift bandage tied round his upper arm. “It’s more the knee I’m worried about. Can’t put full weight on it. Kicks out the wrong way when I need it,” he confessed.

  “So you’ll have to hop off when they let us make our farewells.” Mahafny knelt and began to probe his knee, knowledgeable fingers testing muscles, ligaments, tendons as he swore and tried not to pull back.

  “I’m afraid it’s more complicated than that,” Harrap began and Jenret shot him a rancorous look. “Well, if they’re going to have to watch, and it appears that’s why they’ve been brought here, they might as well know what they’re going to see,” he finished reasonably.

  “You see that group over there—women and children, and old men and young alike?” The Shepherd jutted a stubbled chin toward the wide, open pathway that led to the camp’s center. “Notice what they’re carrying: rocks and tree limbs and antlers and clubs and hatchets. They’ll line up on both sides soon, and our way to freedom lies right down the middle between them all. It’s called a gantlet, and we’re to run it. If we can reach the far end alive, we’ve earned the right to depart. Their promise on it. They don’t like us, but they’ve decided we’re not evil, thanks to your friend Addawanna over there, but they’re still angry that we killed some of their people yesterday.”

  “But that’s impossible to survive! Nobody could survive that!” Doyce shouted. “That’s like giving you no chance at all!”

  “It’s a chance, and a fair one, by their sights. They’ll untie our hands before we start, and if we grab anything to defend ourselves with as we go along, that’s part of the rules as well.”

  “Except that I can’t run more than a step or two without my knee buckling, so Harrap’s got to run twice as fast to make sure one of us escapes and can escort you both out of here,” Jenret muttered, intent on the gathering crowd. “They promised that much.”

  Harrap butted his shoulder against Jenret’s, tears of consternation in the Shepherd’s eyes. Who to leave, who to try to save? “I’ve told you I’ll hang back, shelter you as much as I can, pull you along with me.”

  “And lose your own chance for freedom and theirs as well?”

  Mahafny inspected one face and then the other. “And I take it if neither of you finish this, this thing, that Doyce and I stay on?”

  “Yes.” Harrap gave an exploratory pull at his bound wrists and subsided. Despite the outer sheathing of fat, his arm and chest muscles stood out in stark relief.

  “What if I run in Jenret’s place?” Doyce pounded at Harrap’s shoulder for attention. “I’m fast enough for a short stretch.” She already bounced on her toes, ready to sprint at the first sound.

  Jenret turned his back to them, surveying the group lining up in readiness, yells of anticipation and anger rending the air. “ ’Fraid not, my love. By invitation only.” He whirled back to face them and his knee buckled. “Damn! Rawn! Where are those ghatti? Can Khar pick up any word?”

  Khar mewed a negative, and sat as upright as she was able, dragging her useless hind legs across the tabard. “Nothing. Not a thing!”

  “Well, we’d best do what we can to stabilize Jenret’s leg.” Mahafny surveyed what was available and shrugged. “Doyce, it’s bound to be tough and the devil to cut, but can you manage some strips from your tabard? Here, I’ve still got my scissors. And give me your belt while you’re at it.”

  Doyce hacked away, fingers cramped and pinched by the effort of forcing the tiny surgical scissors through the heavy fleece and leather. She stopped, rubbed at the angry red indentations on finger and thumb and went back to work. Khar twitched a hind foot out of the way as the scissors came closer.

  “See! It moves! Not much yet, but a little!” The ghatta sounded plainly gratified, and with good reason.

  Hope flared high for a moment, but then Doyce damped it. “That’s wonderful, but don’t push yourself too hard or too soon. Besides, don’t
let the Erakwa know you can move until you have to.” Lifting her head, she realized that she had a helper: the lad in his early teens who had visited the hut before, the young Erakwan with the gray-hazel eyes who so resembled Addawanna.

  He held the strip of leather and fleece taut and to one side, giving her more room to maneuver the scissors. The light hazel eyes seemed to ask for her permission, and at her short nod he reached a tentative finger and touched the ghatta’s front paw. Khar gave a tiny purr of amusement and batted back, shifting her weight to balance, but not a claw flashed. “Purr-fur,” he rolled the “r’s” with a flourish. Looking sidelong at Doyce, his hand crept toward a white hind foot, then he nodded to himself and withdrew without touching, his eyes meeting hers, then shifting away conspiratorially.

  “Doyce, hurry up with that last piece! I think they’re about ready.” Mahafny struggled to wrap and bind Jenret’s knee, lashing the joined belts over a padding of strips from the tabard. With luck it would immobilize the joint, allowing Jenret clumsy but relatively solid movement. “Well, it will either support you or cut off your circulation. How does it feel?” She tugged harder on the end of the belt and drew it snug, watching Jenret’s face to see when she should slacken it.

  Hesitant, Jenret took a few practice steps in the meager space allotted by their captors, tried a sharp pivot on the bad leg and stayed upright. It was awkward and unwieldy; his entire leg had to swing in one straight, unbroken line for him to take a step, but it held firm.

  “Better, much better.” He bent to graze Mahafny’s cheek with a kiss. “I think they’re about ready to take us to the starting line.” He laughed, then his face twisted, the features of a scared little boy showing through. “If I don’t make it to the finish, stop by and explain to Mother. And take care of that one, too.” He raised his chin in Doyce’s direction and a quirky delight brightened his face. “She’s a pure weathervane for pointing toward trouble, but she makes life interesting!”