Portals of Infinity: Book Four: The Sea of Grass

by John Van Stry

  Rhys gave Rachel a wink and suddenly grabbed Smoke, dragging her off to what was obviously their bed.

  Smoke obviously did not appreciate the gesture, or Rhys's intentions.

  "Reminds me of us," I said looking down at Rachel as Smoke scowled at me while making a number of rather nasty threats at Rhys.

  "That's how I can tell they love each other," Rachel purred. "Now, off to... Eep!" Rachel exclaimed as I pinched her.

  "And that's how you know I love you," I purred and smiled at her as she rubbed her butt and scowled at me.

  "No sleep for you tonight, mister..." She growled.

  The next day Rachel checked with Second Carso one last time, as he would be leading the troops. Meanwhile, Third Sylace gathered up the rest of the cavalry who would be returning to Hiland with Rachel, and we headed off to the Aldar village.

  We only stayed there long enough for me to gather up the priest that Henry had “borrowed” and briefly meet with the Aldar chief, then we continued on to the Glisan village.

  I found it interesting that the female, Yarsha, who had shown an earlier interest in Henry, was still around, and that Henry was obviously working on becoming accepted into the Aldar tribe. Except for the mark of Feliogustus on his clothing that showed he was a priest, and those on his teepee, he dressed like the tribesmen did, and the skins by the teepee made it clear he had been hunting.

  I suspected he'd be married by the time I caught up with him again.

  Rachel spent three more days with me in Glisan, because I would be staying and she would be leaving. The Glisan village would be pulling up and moving to their winter grounds soon and Fel had told me he wanted me to go with them on that migration.

  I wasn't too worried about Rachel on the return trip, four hundred cavalry was quite a lot of people, and they were going to ride straight for Midway, and bypass Tradeson. They would get there in about a week, probably less, as they would now be moving quickly.

  I took the time to ride out to the two tribes I hadn't meet yet; Hawthorne and Ash, and spent a day at each one checking with the priest who had settled there. Both of them were doing well, and seemed to get on nicely with the members of the tribe.

  Feliogustus's religion was taking hold rather quickly it seemed, and I had to admit I would be curious to see how things fared once they settled into their winter grounds, where the tribes were separated by only a few hours’ ride, instead of a few days.

  Twelve

  The Sea of Grass - to the North

  I looked out at the plains ahead of us from my seat on Tom's back. We had broken camp over a month and a half ago and were getting near to the winter grounds for the tribe. It had been rather educational so far, they had packed the entire camp up in one day. I learned later that it had taken as long as that because there were a lot of smoked meats to be packed.

  Sure enough, that night all the teepees were set up within an hour, and the next morning they were struck just as fast.

  That's not to say that they made camp every night and broke it the next day, most times we stayed in the same place several days as they waited for the Narzhum herds to continue on their migration. The Narzhum were the primary source of food and skins for the Mowoks, though they would hunt anything, especially any boars that they found, but a single adult Narzhum could feed the tribe for almost five days, they were that big.

  So the Narzhum pace set the tribe's pace. Plus, it was apparently not a good idea to get in front of the migrating herds; they had a tendency to pack up into much larger groupings in the fall.

  "So how much farther until we get to the winter grounds?" I asked Rees who was riding with me today as we followed the tribe.

  Rees pointed to the mountain range that we'd been approaching for days now. "We'll start up into the foothills tonight. Another week and we'll be at our camp."

  I nodded, "How far up into the mountains do you go?"

  "Not very, high enough to not have to worry about any of the floods in the spring and to have better protection from the winter storms that blow across the plains. Low enough to avoid any of the snows higher up."

  "I though it didn't snow here?" I said surprised. The weather had been getting warmer as we moved north. Not by a lot, but enough to notice.

  "At the camp, it is rare to get snow, and even if we do, it rarely lasts more than a day. Higher up in the mountains however, it does snow, the tops remain snow covered for the entire winter and water will harden up there. We use the hardened water to help keep our food fresh longer, that which has not been smoked."

  I nodded; refrigeration using river ice was something that even my ancestors had worked out long ago. I wondered if they'd invented icehouses yet.

  "If you want to join me, a few of us will be riding ahead to the winter camp tomorrow, to check the route and let the elders know of our coming arrival."

  "Sure," I agreed. Steve and the new priest, Jaeson, had the routine for moving the teepee from campsite to campsite down at this point, and had integrated fairly well with the rest of the tribe. I wasn't worried about them making it the rest of the way. "I would like that."

  The next morning we left before sunrise, before they had started even breaking down the camp. There were five of us total, Rees, his wife Water, Hans, and another that I'd never met before.

  "How long a trip is this?" I asked as we rode out. I had five days of dried rations with me, hopefully that would be enough.

  "Three days if we can move quickly." Rees told me.

  "What do we have to watch out for?"

  "Narzhum, wild wolats, things that would avoid the entire tribe, but might be willing to tackle a smaller party. With the herds drawing together, those that prey on them are drawn closer together as well. Competition for food is getting harder, so everyone gets more aggressive. Odds are good that we will have to change our plans at least once as a herd gets in the way.

  "We will avoid the river to the west of us, as the herds will stay close to that. There are a few smaller streams we will have to cross, and we can get water there."

  I nodded, it made sense.

  The first day's ride was fairly easy, we saw nothing that worried us, the few small groups of suzhen we came across scattered before we drew near. We stopped briefly every couple of hours or so, for Rees to blaze a marker for the tribe to follow. He'd cut a branch off of one of the trees, hung it with a strip of bright cloth tied to it, and cut a pattern of notches in the wood.

  "What are the notches for?" I asked later that evening when we had settled to make camp.

  "To let the scouts know who left the blaze. If we come across any problems, I'll send Hans back to change the last marker."

  Rees also set a watch that night on the camp, and the wolats were all kept close by and not allowed to wander off, not that any of them seemed the least inclined to get very far away from us. I could see their noses working fairly often, obviously there were a lot of scents in the air and even the wolats knew that there was strength in numbers.

  The second day we left before sunrise once again, and hit our first snag before the sun had even made it halfway into the sky.

  "Wow, look at them all," I said as we looked down into a valley that must have had a thousand narzhum in it. Probably more.

  Rees looked at it and shook his head, "Let's try the next one east. Hans, go change the last marker."

  Hans nodded and rode off. At least Rees had only set it about twenty minutes ago, and he caught up with us just as we reached the next valley. This time Rees swore, and I agreed with him. There were a lot of narzhum in this valley as well, but there were several large packs of wolats too.

  "Now what?" I asked watching a rather large pack of wolats off in the distance feeding on a narzhum that they must have killed earlier. There was another pack circling in the distance watching the first one, probably planning on moving in when those had eaten their fill.

  "Back the way we came," Rees sighed. "There is another valley west of the first one, if that one is n
ot clear, we will have to go through the hills between them. That will not be an easy path for the tribe to follow."

  Everyone nodded and followed him off and Hans was sent to change the marker a second time.

  The third valley was clear, and we were able to move through it, but we'd wasted several hours back tracking, so by the time we came out of it, it was getting dark and we had to find a place to camp for the night.

  I was woken up sometime late in the middle of the night as someone kicked my foot. I sat up quickly, a bit surprised, and grabbed my weapons. Cat, the other Mowok who I hadn't met prior to this trip was kicking Han's foot; Rees was already getting up and his wife Water was looking around warily.

  I could see the wolats were all facing out from the embers of the fire, standing around us, and their tails were out straight behind them. Something had them spooked.

  "What do you think it is?" I asked Rees as I got to my feet.

  "Narzhum don't move at night, unless something makes them move. It could be a bear, or one of the mountain beasts." He paused.

  "Or?"

  "Or it could be a pack of wild wolats."

  I grabbed my bow, and a handful of arrows. "How bad is that?" I asked, though I was pretty sure it was bad.

  "Packs can run as large as eighteen, though that is rare. They will see our group of five as something easily attacked."

  I nodded and moved in front of Tom. I could see his ears were tracking something, but I wasn't able to spot anything out in the darkness yet. I stood there a moment looking out into the darkness, then when I heard a noise I hastily fired an arrow at the sound and was rewarded with a “yelp” followed by a low growl.

  Tom and the other four wolats started to growl and hunker down a bit as they did so. The fire behind me started to get brighter; I guess someone threw some extra fuel on it to make it pick back up. As they did I saw shapes start to resolve in the darkness, there were at least six of them, and they looked like wolats to me.

  "Tom!" I said loudly, as he started to move forward, causing him to stop and look at me. "Wait."

  He growled but stayed where he was, the rest of ours holding still as well.

  The wolats outside the camp started to draw closer. They were running back and forth and starting to make soft barks as well as growling rather loudly. I could see that they were nerving themselves up for the attack, and that there were about twelve of them. I checked the others; they all had their spears out and were poised, ready to throw.

  I looked back to the invaders, looking for the alpha. It took me a minute to pick him out, but once I did, I drew my bow back and readied an arrow.

  "I see the leader," I said softly.

  "Which one is it?" Rees asked.

  "This one," I said and let my arrow fly just as the alpha reversed course and hit him in the shoulder.

  Everything slowed down at that point and I put three more arrows into the leader, then one each into the two following him.

  The leader howled and turned to charge, and both Tom and Rees's mount charged to attack. I couldn't see the others, but I dropped the bow and drawing my swords I charged as well, running between Tom and the other male, who were both making a direct line for the Alpha, obviously knowing instinctively where the threat came from.

  The clash when we all collided was muted, the sounds of heavy bodies coming together as Tom and Rees's mount growled and bit, savaging the other male, who was trying to bite Tom, but instead got a mouthful of steel as I attacked his muzzle and face. When he turned to try and bite me, Tom got him by the throat and the other male got him by the shoulder and the Alpha made a rather horribly gurgling howl as I heard a crunching sound come from Tom's jaws. The Alpha collapsed to the ground, his body jerking, as Tom held on to his neck.

  I turned to my left, along with Rees's steed as Tom took a few more minutes to shake whatever life was left in the Alpha out of him. I could see that at least three of the other attackers had spears sticking out of them, and that the other three of our own wolats were snapping and trying to bite the others as a second set of spears fell amongst the attackers. I looked back and Rees, his wife Water, Hans, and Cat were each grabbing a third spear and getting ready to charge in themselves.

  Then I had to get back into the fight. Rees's steed attacked the one behind the Alpha that was trying to bite him, and I joined in with my swords. The Wolats moved fast, faster than most people, snapping and biting, but my enhanced speed let me move as fast as they were, dodging and thrusting. I realized that we were fighting the Alpha female about the time that Tom suddenly barreled into her from the side, sending her flying as he slammed into her hard. Rees's steed took advantage of the situation and got her by the throat, and I could hear the crunch as he crushed her windpipe, causing her to shake and spasm on the ground as she died.

  Things turned to chaos at that point, with their leaders dead, and several of the other adults wounded, the remaining invaders started to panic, running into each other, barking and yipping rather frantically as they suddenly had no idea of what to do or where to go.

  When it was finally over, there were four dead wolats on the ground, and there were three wounded wolats laying on the ground eyes wide with fear and whimpering in submission. Water's wolat was injured and limping and I could see another three whining and pacing back and forth in the darkness with their tails between their legs.

  "What's with them?" I asked Rees, panting.

  "Wolats are pack animals. They don't know what to do, both of their alpha's are dead and they see the others of their pack on the ground submitting."

  "So what do we do?"

  "We take them into our pack of course," Rees said and whistled at his mount, then pointed at the ones in the darkness, then at the ground.

  I watched in surprise as his mount and Tom went and herded the three into the camp with growls and snaps, and then got them to lie down by the fire.

  "What about the wounded?"

  "We don't have our wolat trainers here, I'm not sure we can do anything about them," he said. "Calming them enough to get the spears out and treat them is not safe."

  I thought about that, I had my cantrips, and I was well rested, so I had all of my healing spells available.

  "Let me try," I said and putting my swords down I carefully approached the first one. He growled and tried to snap at me, but my speed kicked in and I was able to push his muzzle away, and then put a hand on his head and use the spell.

  It worked partially, he looked at me warily, so I spent another minute calming him, then had Rees toss me a rope and I made a makeshift bridle to control his head, then Hans came over and pulled out the first spear, and treated the first wound and then treated the second.

  I had to use another cantrip and use my body weight to hold his head down for that one, but once Hans was done, the wolat just laid there panting, so we moved onto the second one and repeated the process. Sadly the third one died before we could take care of it.

  After all of that I went and did what I could for Water's wolat. The few healing spells I had couldn't do much, but I was able to do enough that Rees was sure it would be able to keep up with us, though it wouldn't be strong enough to ride.

  While I was dealing with that, Rees, Hans, and Water had made bridles for the remaining three and had roped them all together on a line so they wouldn't wander off. None of them seemed too happy about that, but the growls of our wolats kept them in line.

  By the time we were finished, the sun was starting to rise on the horizon. Water would take turns riding double with each of us, to make it easier on the wolats. The new ones would follow on a lead, with Water's mount bringing up the rear to encourage the new pack members to keep up.

  "What will you do with them?" I asked Rees as we finally got started.

  "The three younger ones will be turned over to the pack master to see if they can be trained or not. The older two will probably be turned into pack carriers. Usually the older ones won't take a rider."

  "
They won't run off from the pack?"

  "They might, but I doubt it, none of these are leaders, the tribe's pack will become their new pack. They'll find their place in it and be happy. They're not stupid, once they see how easier their life is in the tribe's pack, they'll settle right down."

  The going was slower that day as the two wounded wolats were having trouble keeping up and none of the Mowoks would even think of leaving them behind now that they had been co-opted into the tribe. Hans and Cat even rode off to hunt and brought back two suzhen, which they butchered when we made camp that night and fed to our new wolats, as well as our own.

  That had a rather telling effect on the three young ones who became a lot more tractable after that.

  By the end of the fourth day we started up in to the mountains, the slower pace as well as the time spent trying to find a path through on the second day hurt us, but we did make the village on the morning of the fifth day. Rees estimated that the rest of the tribe was probably only three days behind us.

  The winter camp was a lot different than the summer camp. First it was not anywhere close to the stream that ran through the canyon it was located in, but was instead on a series level spots that looked to be well over fifty feet above the creek. There was actually quite a bit of space that was obviously for the tribe to set up in.

  But the most interesting thing was the buildings.

  There were four that were made of wood, probably thirty or so feet wide, but about a hundred or more feet long. There were several smaller huts scattered about, the largest of which had smoke coming from it, and the sounds of metal being worked. Apparently the Glisan tribe had a blacksmith! I found that surprising, and wondered how much metal they were able to work.

  "You have a blacksmith?" I asked Rees as we made our way up one of the paths to the camp.

  "Yes, though he doesn't work in the winter. The temperature makes it hard to heat the metal. I'm surprised he's still working this late in the season, but it has been mild today, with little wind."