Detecting the Hunter as she washed out a cooling cloth, Granny raced over to him.
“She’s fine. I just put her to sleep. She’ll come around in about ten minutes,” the Hunter said. A light flip of his black shoulder put Tae’s body into the air, and an agitated Granny caught her. Taking a quick glance at Lance, D remarked, “He won, didn’t he?”
“I’m surprised you could tell,” Granny said with a grin. “That fool Clay is laid out in the bushes over yonder. The farmer gave it to him pretty good. But Clay’s not all bad, either. He fought bare-handed to the very end.”
“Get everyone into the wagon. I’ll stand watch,” D said, his eyes on the flow of the waterfall all the while.
“You mean those two yahoos, too?”
“You can have them sleep outside if you like,” D told the old woman.
“I’ll do just that. Good luck with the guard duty.”
As Granny carried Tae in both arms and walked unsteadily toward the wagon, Lance got up. His face was a mess. “Is she okay?” he asked.
“You needn’t concern yourself with her, you useless thug. The nerve of you, going off like you’re something special and getting your good-for-nothing face beat purple in a fistfight. And just so you know, I won’t hear of you asking me for the day off tomorrow,” Granny snarled.
Even after the old woman had vanished into the wagon with Tae, her ill-tempered remarks still hung in the air.
“It seems you beat him,” the Hunter commented.
Raising his head, Lance looked at D with a strange expression on his face. He couldn’t believe the young man would bother to say that to him. “Back in the old days, I was a little hellion,” he said. “Besides, you can’t beat a farmer barehanded. Hunters and warriors came to my village a lot, and they taught me some fighting moves, too.”
“Sounds like he bit off more than he could chew,” D said as he turned toward the bushes Granny had mentioned. The head of a shadowy figure was listlessly rising from them. “Was this about the girl?” D asked Lance.
“Yeah.”
“You really went at it, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t just stand there and let him beat the hell out of me.”
“Well, that may be a bit of welcome news,” said D.
“For who?”
“There’re not a lot of men who’d get their face blown up to twice its normal size for someone else. I bet the girl’s never met anyone like that before. I’ll tell her what happened.”
“Don’t bother. That’s not what I had in mind,” Lance said, sighing.
An arm sheathed in black was offered to the young farmer, making his eyes go wide. Grabbing it by the wrist, Lance pulled himself upright.
“So there you are, you lousy sodbuster!” Clay roared, his massive body being carried closer by an uncertain gait. When his face came into the light, it was nearly twice as swollen as Lance’s. “What do you say to a rematch? I ain’t taking no for an answer.”
“Maybe later,” Lance said, smiling for some reason.
“Shut your hole!” Clay bellowed, and he was about to grab hold of the smaller man when an arm in black restrained him. “What do you think you’re doing?! Let go of me!” he shouted at the Hunter.
“Let him go, D,” Lance said as he rubbed the back of his neck to loosen it up. “I thought I’d settled this once and for all, but if he hasn’t given up yet, there’s not much else I can do. Okay,” he told Clay, “now swear to me again that if I win, you’ll stay the hell away from the girl.”
“No problem, and Vampire Hunter D is my witness.”
The figure in black stepped away from them.
Shouting something, Clay took a swing at Lance. The warrior was stumbling over his own feet.
After ducking the blow, once Lance heard it whistle through the air above him, he rammed himself headfirst into Clay’s stomach.
Ouf! With a howl more akin to an explosion, the warrior’s massive form flew into the air with ease, and Clay landed on his back in the same spot by the water where Lance had been lying. The ground rumbled.
Leaping into the air, Lance slammed his elbow down on his opponent’s solar plexus with the full weight of his body. Something resembling water sprayed from Clay’s mouth; his body shuddered, and the battle was over.
“There won’t be any more rematches.”
Lance nodded at D’s remark. Clay didn’t move a muscle.
Getting to his feet, Lance looked down at his vanquished foe. In a matter of seconds, the same grin he’d worn moments earlier covered his face again. For although Clay’s fierce countenance was contorted with pain, it was also etched with an undeniable smile.
.
Two hours passed.
Even the activities of the fungi might’ve been governed by biorhythms, for a deep blue filled the darkness and enveloped the party by the water’s edge.
D set his saddle down by the campfire and rested his head on it as he reclined there. The men with the badly swollen faces lay covered by blankets a few yards away. Had the moon been out that night, it was so silent that they would’ve heard its beams raining down.
D mentioned the incident with the spider people to no one. His eyes were shut. The Hunter might have considered himself to be the only one they were after, or perhaps he was confident that if they attacked him there he could carve his way through them. Whatever the case, as his gorgeous form lay at rest, there was no hint of tension about him.
The wagon’s door opened without a sound and Granny peered out from the driver’s seat. She was about to say something to D down on the ground below when a rusty voice beat her to the punch.
“Get some sleep.” Most likely, the Hunter had caught some otherwise imperceptible creak from the door.
“Well, I can’t,” Granny said, wearily muttering encouragement to herself as she hobbled down from the wagon and headed over to D rather nonchalantly. The jar on her hip swayed back and forth. Though she gave the impression of being fiercer and more determined than the average old lady, seeing the way she walked just then with her wrinkled cheeks and bleary eyes was like catching a glimpse of some gorgeous dancing girl’s true face laid bare when the makeup comes off back in her dressing room. Surely there were nights when the crone felt an acute longing to open that fabric store.
Circling around behind D’s back, she took a seat. “Have some?” she asked, thrusting a jug of liquor at his refined countenance. It was the cheap sort of fruit spirits that could be found in great quantities at the general store in any post town.
“No.”
Curt as D’s reply was, it was odd that it didn’t seem at all intended to offend the listener.
“Oh, that’s right. I must’ve mistaken you for someone else,” Granny said. Pulling out the cork, she took a swig. Three times her throat bobbed, and after pulling the jug away, the crone wiped her lips with the back of her hand. A long sigh escaped her. “About some of the things that were said to you today—don’t take it personally. And I don’t just mean what I said. From what I hear, Tae had some pretty harsh things to say too, right? Well, I’d like to make up for that. Kindly accept my apologies.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Honestly?” Granny said, breaking into a broad grin like a little kid. “Ah, I’m glad to hear you say that. I didn’t think you were a petty man or anything, but it’s still a relief. We’ve got a long ways to go yet. And we really are counting on you.”
“You should get some sleep.”
“Stop trying to get rid of me,” the old woman replied. Wrapping both hands around her knees, Granny watched the endless ripples on the water’s surface. “You know, don’t you?” she said after some time passed. “You know about the girl—that she’s pregnant. And that it’s probably a Noble’s baby. If someone doesn’t fix it, she’ll be having that kid sooner or later.”
Saying nothing, D continued to lie there with his eyes closed. As to what sort of thoughts passed through his mind, no
one could say. “What’ll you do?” D then asked, muttering the question.
“What’s this? You’re actually interested in someone else’s fate? I’ll take her home, of course. That’s my job, after all.”
“In that case, you didn’t need to bring it up at all.”
“Well, there are times I just feel like doing or saying something funny. I bet you get the urge sometimes to just lie out in the sun and get a tan.”
“She’s not going to be very welcome, even back at her own home,” D said, returning to the topic of Tae. “Especially not if she’s going to have a Noble’s baby. And she won’t be able to hide that. It doesn’t matter how strong anyone says she is; strength probably won’t be enough to resolve this problem.”
“You trying to tell me not to take her back?” Granny said in a tone charged with defiance. “Because that’s the one thing I simply can’t do. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again—this is my job. No matter what happens later, everyone’s overjoyed at first, and there’s coin in it for me. What comes next—well, forget it. I’d just be repeating myself. You’ve already heard my spiel on the matter, and hearing it again ain’t gonna make it any more interesting.”
“How’s her sewing?”
“She seems to have a real knack for it. She was rattling away at it earlier, too. Not that I have a clue what she’s making,” the old woman said. “So, what do you suppose will happen with her kid? It’ll be a dhampir, won’t it?”
“If it’s a Noble’s child.”
“I was wondering if maybe you couldn’t look after it . . . you being a fellow dhampir and all. You could teach it all it needs to know from the very start. I mean, you’re Vampire Hunter D, after all. It’s not like you couldn’t afford to feed a girl and her baby. I’m sure you of all people could find some way of making a living besides being a Hunter, couldn’t you?”
“Is that what you think?” D asked.
“Yes, indeed.”
“Then why am I still a Hunter?”
Granny nodded gravely, as if she’d been waiting for him to say that. “Because you’re too awkward. Your pride won’t allow you to mix with normal people and live the slow life. That Noble blood is tricky stuff. No matter how you might bend your principles or how much you might try to accommodate the world, you couldn’t allow yourself to do that. I suppose it’d take, say, a hundred years before you’d settle into it.”
“Why a hundred years?”
“What I mean to say is, if they tried at it hard enough for that long, even a Noble could wind up being agreeable to their situation. Of course, I’m not sure there’d be any guarantees where you’re concerned.”
“Why do you think that?”
Granny gazed at D intently. “You’re out looking for something.” She said this casually enough, but the words were tough as steel. “People are always making a big deal about ‘Hunters this’ and ‘Hunters that,’ but if you ask me, they’re all just a bunch of muscle-bound social misfits. There’s only one thing any of ’em care about—being good at killing. When it comes to the worst of the lot, the killing is the whole point of it. Some have wound up plying their skills on upstanding folks; others have been killed by fellow Hunters. Take a peek into their dreams sometime. They’re all either pitch black or blood red. And out of the lot of them, there’s only one word you’ll never find in their heads. I’m sure you know what that is?”
“I don’t know. What?”
“‘Tomorrow,’” Granny said with quiet confidence. “But you have it in you. Heck, it doesn’t even matter whether you think you do or not. And it doesn’t even have to be the word tomorrow . . . it could be dream or hope or rainbow . . . or even love. Don’t laugh. I tell you, there’s a huge difference between those who’re looking for something, and those who’ve never had it. But in your case, I get the feeling it’s something altogether different.”
“What do you think it is?” D asked.
“I don’t know. I can’t even imagine what it’d be. But you’re searching for something, nonetheless. And I bet you could tell Tae’s baby all about it someday, too.”
The Hunter said nothing.
“You should do that. Shoot, once I’ve brought her home, it’s no skin off my nose. Run off with her if you like. There’s a girl who’d be tough enough for a life of one road trip after another. And if she wanted to settle down when the kid got older, you could go back out on the road alone. After you’ve seen to it that the little one has a proper ‘education,’ of course.”
“Sorry to say it, but there’s someone else far better for the job.”
“Huh?” Granny said, knitting her brow as she turned around. Under a lumpy pile of blankets some way off, Lance was staring at them. “Spare me. You think a plain old farmer’s cut out to handle a dhampir? I can just imagine him trying to run away in the dead of night if it went after him. Even a dhampir’s real parents can’t hold back its Noble blood.”
While it wasn’t immediately clear if he’d caught the crone’s remarks of bald-faced contempt, Lance got out of his blankets and lethargically made his way over to the campfire. “I heard your conversation,” he said as he gazed at the flames.
“Well, you shouldn’t have,” Granny said angrily. “D, you knew he was awake and you still let him listen in, didn’t you?”
Of course, D kept his silence.
“I don’t know about all that stuff,” Lance said in a weary tone. “But I’ve got a feeling I’m up to it.”
“Up to what?” Granny asked, her face growing pale.
“Well, you know—making a life with the girl,” Lance replied, flushing madly.
“Sonny, you must still be talking in your sleep. You, a lousy little farmer of all things.”
“What does the girl’s family do?” D asked.
“They’re farmers,” Granny said, somewhat crestfallen.
“Then it doesn’t sound like an odd match at all.”
“That’s right,” Lance agreed. “Leave the baby to me. I’ll help the kid find the life that suits him best.”
“The world’s not as simple as all that,” Granny declared. “For the most part, dhampir men and women are gorgeous. As babies or even small children, they’re goddamn cherubs. Heck, there’s plenty of folks who’ll try to get close to someone they know is a dhampir. But sooner or later, when that Noble blood shows itself the ones who buttered them up with all that sweet talk are the first ones to take to their heels. And what the blazes are those they leave behind supposed to do, eh? You’ll do the same. I’m sure of it. So, stop trying to be so glib.”
“That’s telling him, you old hag!” another voice added nastily.
Lance and Granny turned to see Clay coming toward them.
With his hatred-filled eyes fixed on Lance, he added, “She’s a lot more than a lousy sodbuster like you deserves. Before this trip’s over, you’ll be dead anyway. Then anybody who wants to can woo her.”
“And you think you can win her heart?” Granny asked, glaring at Clay with her hard gaze until he looked away. “You might want to consult a mirror,” she sneered. Granny’s eyes then shifted to Clay’s hip. “Say, does that weapon of yours have any use besides killing?” she asked.
“You’re joking, right?” the warrior snarled back like a beast. His right hand skimmed by his hip, and an elegant note resounded. Apparently, the weapon could also be used precisely as its form suggested. “I got this beauty after killing a Noble,” Clay told them. “Found it in his concert hall. Just look at her, would you? The strings are silver and the body’s gold. And she plays music like you never heard before—music that’s pure heaven.”
“Then play something.”
“Excuse me?!”
“Don’t give us that sour puss,” the crone said. “You’ve gone and got our attention. Now, why don’t you play us a tune that’ll tug on our heartstrings? If you can’t manage that, a lullaby will do.”
Clay snorted angrily. “Right. You’re flat out of luck. I don’t use it
for useless crap like that. This little treasure keeps me alive. You think I’d play it for a bunch of scum like you?”
“Sure you wouldn’t play it for her?” D said.
Everyone turned toward the wagon then, even Clay. A tiny figure was crouched in the driver’s seat. The eyes that looked at her held so many various emotions that Tae had to divert her own gaze from them.
“You’d like to hear a tune, wouldn’t you?”
The girl’s pale face bobbed sharply in reply to Granny’s question.
“Well?” D asked. Astonishingly enough, it almost sounded like he was ribbing the warrior.
Clay remained hesitant.
“Oh, is that how it goes? The Frontier’s top warrior turns down a young lady’s request? You can kill folks just fine, but can’t even make one girl happy—I guess men aren’t worth spit these days.”
“You’ll eat them words!” Clay said in response to Granny’s insults. He began grinding his teeth together as his whole body trembled with rage. It wouldn’t have been strange if he’d unleashed an explosion of ultrasonic waves just then. “It’s really more than your grubby little ears deserve, but I’ll play you one of my best songs. Just don’t get so swept up by my sweet voice you go and jump in the lagoon or anything.”
Granny and Lance cried out with surprise and delight and clapped their hands.
Clay’s rough fingers took to the strings. It was as if the white darkness gave birth to the sounds. Granny’s smirk disappeared.
The song was about a man and a woman who lived on the Frontier. The man traveled, and the woman chased along after him. And then both the man and the woman grew tired and settled down into their own lives without ever meeting each other. Long, peaceful days stretched by, and then one day the woman suddenly recalled her old love and gave up everything to follow after him.
High and low, Clay’s voice flowed along the ground and danced across the sky in a way that made Granny bug her eyes. His voice was so rich, his notes so precise. The warrior had undergone a remarkable transformation into a troubadour.
Having laid the weary heroine to rest in the cold earth, Clay intoned a few words of prayer, and then halted his fingers on the harp.
Pilgrimage of the Sacred and the Profane Page 13
