Charles Ingrid - marked man 02 The Last Recall

by Charles Ingrid

  Drakkar was already in motion doing Thomas' bidding, grabbing gawkers by the elbows and steering them toward the nervous horses and mules. "Where there's one wolfrat," the Mojavan prince said to the wrangler, "there's more. That's why."

  Diego joined the healer at Stefan's elbow. Trout, a tall bony fish of a boy, was cleansing the wound before Stefan even had Watkins at the fireside. He was not a Protector, just a stitch 'em and set 'em healer, and a hard worker. As Trout worked on stitching the scalp back in place, Diego pushed back the boy's torn sleeves and began to daub ointment on the ragged scratches. Watkins kept up a litany of yelps.

  Stefan leaned over him. "Put a sock in it, Watty."

  The pale boy stopped a moment. "I—I'm hurt."

  "Yeah, and if it wasn't for the Lord Protector, you'd be dead. I submit to you that there are more wolfrats where that one came from. You wouldn't want to be attracting them, now, would you?"

  The boy let out another "Ow!" as Trout took another stitch in open-mouthed concentration that reminded Blade of a hooked fish. Diego said, "Think of this." He put his hand on the boy's forehead and Watty gradually quieted.

  Stefan watched them oddly. Then, he said abruptly, "What are you doing to him?"

  "Nothing. I just . . . quieted him a little." Diego's face was shadowed under the hat he wore at all times, but Thomas thought he saw fear and resentment hidden deep in those eyes.

  Trout said breathily, "Almost done."

  Watty's face was moon-bled pale, his eyes large. Stefan shifted uncomfortably before telling Diego, "Thanks. Better go get saddled."

  Quietly, Diego stood and found his horse at the line.

  Thomas turned thoughtfully from watching them and jumped a little to find Drakkar at his elbow, also quietly observing the fireside scene.

  Denethan's heir looked keenly at him. "That boy," he said softly, "isn't what he appears to be."

  "No," said Thomas. "He isn't." He gathered up his reins as Jenkies brought Harley to him. "The question is: what is he?"

  "He's not one of yours ... a Protector candidate?"

  "Not that I know of. Is he one of yours?"

  "Not that I know of, though I thought so at first. I think he bears some very, very close watching." Drakkar spun away to find his horse and tack.

  Thomas stood, disturbed, watching Trout finish with Watkins and help the boy to his feet. He could not afford enemies or sabotage among the company. He did not like his thoughts.

  Chapter 14

  Alma rode soundlessly behind the trail of boys. The night had paled, giving way to gray twilight before dawn. Her eyes felt gritty and gummy and she only wanted to tumble into her blanket and sleep.

  She wondered how it was she had managed to soothe Watkins into relative calm, but she'd done it before with animals and had seen Lady do it many a time. Was it a Protector talent? She prayed not. She had seen what the demands of duty had done to Lady and to Sir Thomas. They had little time for themselves and the dangers of using a power burned out . . . she shuddered in memory of the recent nester attack and the toll it had taken. She had her destiny and that was enough of a burden. All they asked of her was that she bear children, a seeming impossibility. She would not worry, but she knew that she was special, her physical form showing no signs of the adaptive aberrations that many of the survivors carried. It didn't matter that she was a little frailer, that her sight was not as keen or her stamina as great. She was purer. If only she could convince the others that it was not a gift, but a curse. Her life was not her own.

  It would help if she could bring her husband back home. She couldn't do anything until they were far enough along that Sir Thomas couldn't send her back— at least, not alone. She watched Stefan's rigid back through the nighttime gloom as he rode several pairs ahead. The company was stilled, as if their very breathing could draw a pack after them. She wondered if he could feel her watching him. Even if he could, what good would it do her? He saw nothing but Diego when he looked at her.

  The very hairs at the nape of her neck where the fleecing shears had cropped her hair close but unevenly seemed to prickle. She stirred in the saddle, half-turning about.

  Drakkar's mocking stare met her glance. She turned back in the saddle and pulled her hat down lower. And what had that troublemaker from the desert been thinking? She swore he was telepathic. He seemed to act even before Sir Thomas ordered, finished sentences that had just been begun, and then there was that crooked smile which no amount of trail dust and discouragement could seem to wipe off his face. If Drakkar told her he was the devil himself, she wouldn't be surprised. Talk about the Warden compound and classrooms had been veiled and secretive. The dragon boy, they'd called him, with those poisonous talons, feathered crest, and burning blue eyes. He had a quick, sharp tongue and the men in his guard had been as fierce to protect his name as his body. She had grown up thinking that Denethan was the devil himself and any son of his would bear his curse.

  It was said that Denethan had sent him to Sir Thomas to keep him from being murdered. She could believe that. He could provoke a stone into arguing. She set her lips. He had not given her away, but she did not doubt that he knew her secret. Was he interested in making a fool out of Stefan? She'd seen Drakkar dispute Stefan's leadership. What did the arrogant Mojavan want from them, all of them, anyway?

  She put her mind to ignoring that stare that bored into her back, as uneasy as it made her. Was he thinking about unmasking her, or about payment to keep her secret? Her nerves felt tight, stretched like fine wool being spun into yarn. She undipped a gourd that bumped her knee and took a sip, the water flavored with a bitter herb that kept her voice rough and coarse, a crucial part of her disguise. And surely, after all the riding she'd done these past few days, her butt had firmed and hardened like the rest of them.

  She put her heel to her horse. Rubio and Watty were talking about the great crater in hushed, subdued tones as though they were going to view a great monument or one of the wonders of the old world.

  "A man would die if he fell in't. It's city blocks long and wide, and almost as deep. And if he slept by it for more than a couple of days, he'd glow in the dark."

  "Go on," Rubio countered.

  "It's the truth. Radiation." Watty flipped his hair from his forehead. The bandage turbaning his head gave him a rakish look. He held his bandaged arm a little stiffly. Rubio had taken charge of their two pack mules.

  "I'd like to take a chunk of it with me. D'you think it would kill me?"

  Rubio said, "A man wouldn't live that long. A nester'd scalp him first."

  "Probably." The two boys lapsed into silence.

  Watty added, "I'll ask Sir Thomas anyway."

  She'd seen the crater. It was respectable. More so, if one knew that it was responsible for the demise of the world as men then had known it. It was another obstacle for the company to traverse, besides dealing with the lack of safe water and forage. She thought she knew what Sir Thomas was doing: molding a company, seasoning them, letting them know they could depend on each other, as well as training them for In-City. The mappers didn't know what they would face beyond the College Vaults once they turned north. Vast amounts of wilderness, perhaps, forever changed by the death and rebirth of the world. There would be other In-Cities, different but just as treacherous as this one. Blade used whatever was at hand for his classroom. Survivors of the Seven Counties already knew how precarious life could be.

  The only good thing about seeing the crater was that they would turn south and east and would soon pass beyond the point of no return.

  Ketchum was waiting patiently, sucking on a long straw of dried grass much as if it were an unlit pipe when the dean wiggled backward out of the tunnel. He'd beefed up more than he thought, though he would never again return to his former mountainous self. He flexed his back and shoulders as he stood. This new bulk was muscle and it made him all that more intimidating. He stood head and shoulders over most of the nesters and Coun-tians, the product of better nutrition a
nd all around good health.

  The nester gave him an unfathomable look. The man's face was dirty. He did not believe in wasting water to wash himself while on the trail. The dean pulled a handkerchief out of his trousers and mopped the sweat and dust off his own face. He was no longer a one-eyed king in the land of the blind. He had all his faculties. Now he could reach out to other lands and take them all. Then the winnowing would begin. As the chaff is separated from the wheat, so must the human be separated from the beast.

  He had no doubt he was up to the task. His seed would be the foundation.

  "Did you do what I told you?"

  Ketchum spat out the straw. "A sharp-eyed man will spot the trail. Too plain and the Protector will suspect the traps you've laid."

  The dean wipfcd his hands as well before folding his handkerchief neatly and putting it away. He looked back at the tunnel. "They'll never know what hit them," he said. "Most of them will die. A few may make it through. I rather hope they do." He relished the thought of a maimed Sir Thomas Blade coming after him for vengeance or lingering for days in a pool of blood and body parts, cursing his name. He smiled tightly.

  The nester put his reins in his hand. The horse jerked its head up and backed away, the whites of its eyes showing in fear. The dean growled and snubbed the horse close in order to mount. As he settled in the saddle, he looked at Ketchum .

  "You ride on ahead. I'm going to stay here for a day or two."

  A frown creased the dirt-crusted face as the nester swung astride his own pony. "The Protector is close. They swung below the crater two days ago and headed north yesterday."

  The nester network for gathering news was formidable.

  The dean did not doubt its accuracy. He gave a slight grunt.

  "Then I won't have long to wait. I want to see them ride in.''

  "He will scent you."

  ' 'I doubt that.'' The dean pushed away the nester's superstitious fear of Blade.

  "You do not know the man."

  His hands balled into fists upon the reins. His horse came to a halt with a whicker of pain and fear. "You have nothing to worry about. He's a freak, Ketchum, and I have everything I need to stop him."

  The tracker's eyes scanned him. The dean sat tensely until the man nodded thoughtfully.

  "Perhaps," he said, "you do. I will wait for you in camp, Chieftain." He made a sign of respect, wheeled his pony about and put heel to it.

  The dean reined back hard, until his horse foamed at the mouth pinkly, to keep it from following. Ketchum's fear would not keep him from the pleasure of watching Blade and the others fall into his ambush. Nothing would keep him from that exquisite enjoyment.

  Stefan had taken his hat off. The expression in his light blue eyes was one of heated exasperation, but it was not for Alma. He never looked past Drakkar to see her. The mappers were afoot and dispersing, setting up camp rapidly. Blade was gone, putting wards on the fringe boundaries of the sleeping area and the two men were nose to nose. "You won't take first watch, you won't clean up the cook site—I'm getting a little tired of your nonparticipation, Mojavan. The welfare of this company depends on cooperation." Stefan's voice dripped with sarcasm. He had said Mojavan, but he might as well have said mutant.

  Drakkar spread his gloved hands. "You have whatever you want of me."

  "I want someone to start digging the latrines."

  "Except that, of course." Drakkar examined a bit of lint on his folded cuff. He looked remarkably calm and unruffled, but from the rear, Alma could see a restlessness among the feathers lying flat upon his head and shoulders, as if a breeze disturbed them.

  "And what's your excuse this time?"

  Drakkar lifted his head. "I simply don't care to do it."

  "You don't care to do it," Stefan repeated flatly. "You're too good to dig latrines. Why? You shit like the rest of us."

  "Perhaps, but my Talent lies more in other areas. I had hoped you'd ask for volunteers."

  Alma was too familiar with that pale anger under the tanned face, the pinched nostrils, the slash of red across high, flat cheekbones. She hoped Drakkar was as familiar with the danger signs as she. She held her tongue, afraid to interfere. The other boys about the camp were watching discreetly, pausing among their various chores.

  "Volunteers? And what would you be good enough to volunteer for?''

  "Let me take the horse-line out for clean water. We're low on supplies and won't be in the foothills for another day."

  "This is In-City."

  Drakkar made a diffident movement. She could not see the expression on his face from where she stood, behind and to the side, but she was certain the hidden anger on it matched Stefan's. "If I say I can find clean water, I can do it."

  "If you can find water, don't you think you might get your hands dirty digging for it?''

  "I don't see," Drakkar said mildly, "why you're so set on my performing one task over another. I have the Talent to find water and we could use it. Let someone else dig the latrines."

  "Because we can't afford for anyone to be too good to do the down and dirty jobs. If you were falling off a cliff, I wouldn't want to be too good to give you a hand—or the other way around."

  Drakkar tilted his head slightly. Alma could see the feathers ripple. Their panoply of blues and greens looked like a mirage in the sunlight. "You have a point," he said slowly, reluctantly. "But as neither of us is falling off a cliff and water is necessary, perhaps I could dig . . . latrines . . . tomorrow."

  Stefan took a deep shuddering breath and Alma tensed, afraid of the explosion that would follow. Then Sir Thomas' level voice cut through the air, and she saw him crouched on a concrete block, just above the level of their heads.

  "Commendable and right, Stefan," the man said. "But Drakkar offers us what we need most now. We've had the horses on tight water rations the last three days. I want fresh mounts when we hit the foothills—that's nester territory and we may have to outrun a raiding party."

  Stefan let out his breath. He took a step back, saying, "Tomorrow, then."

  Drakkar nodded. His crest subsided as Stefan stalked away. His boots punctuated his frustration with puffs of dust and gravel.

  Blade jumped down lightly and straightened up. "Take Diego with you," he said. "And don't take more horses at a time than you can handle."

  The Mojavan nodded. Alma hesitated in his shadow, caught up for a moment in Sir Thomas' intent stare. She felt a blush heat her face and ducked her head, shying away from his observation and running a little to keep up with Drakkar's lean, long-legged movement.

  He reached out and caught her by the elbow just when she thought she was in the clear.

  "You were going to get in between them."

  "I—I couldn't let them fight. It wouldn't be good for the rest of us."

  "You thought it was coming to that."

  "Yessir. Drakkar doesn't know how far he can push Stefan."

  "And you do."

  "Y-yessir." Hard to meet his face and yet try not to, try to keep the brim of her hat shading hers. Fear of discovery lanced through her. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears.

  He let her go. "Next time, let them do what they have to do. They're both grown men. They'll learn how to pull with each other.''

  "Yessir." She bounded off before he could say anything else.

  Thomas watched Diego take off in Drakkar's wake. He thought long and hard, and wished Lady were with him. That keen blue-and-brown gaze caught more than he did, sometimes. If he hadn't overheard the conversation, if he didn't know Diego was who he was. ... He shook his head. His vision had gone double for a moment, a curious overlay of images, and he thought he'd seen Stefan and Drakkar squaring off over Alma, her pretty petite face obscuring Diego's. If he hadn't heard the argument over camp duties, he'd have thought they were fighting over her.

  "You've been alone and in the sun too long," he muttered to himself. He trailed in the general direction of the others. Drakkar's defection to finding water meant it was his
turn to dig latrines.

  Alma watched Drakkar find water. He dowsed for it, something she'd seen done only once or twice in her lifetime, both times by Sir Thomas, because the Director of Water and Power had forbidden the practice. Water could be found that way, yes, but clean water . . . she watched him dig down and let it bubble up. His packs were slung over one broad shoulder and he slipped a hand into it and found a set of vials molded together like panpipes. He dipped the vials into the small puddle. He held the vials up to the sunlight and watched as the chemical changed color.

  He nodded in satisfaction. "Good," he said. "Grab a shovel, Diego. We want to widen and deepen this as much as we can."

  "How can you tell?"

  His attention snapped to her. "Water is life in the desert. How can I not know?" He got to his feet, buckskin knees already dampened with the growing font. He began to shovel vigorously.

  Alma tied her string of horses to a thick shrub. Although browned and dulled by the long summer and hot fall, its branches were still pliable. It lived. Maybe its roots fingered all the way into that underground moisture. She had her camp shovel pushed into her belt and worked it free. She stood opposite him and six paces away began to trowel up the packed dirt. Before long, the puddle had spread to her, and a pond began forming. ^

  The horses behind her scented the water and were milling about. She felt their thirst like it was her own, as sweat poured down her brow, soaking into her hat and runneling into her eyebrows. Drakkar motioned for her to follow his lead. They moved several times, going about in a crude circle.

  Drakkar threw her a grin. "Now the fun part," he said, and jumped in. He began to shovel out the muddy bottom.

  Alma watched open-mouthed for a second.

  "Come!" he ordered. "We've got to deepen this as much as we can. Horses can't stomach too much silt in the water.''

  With an awkward, sideways leap, she joined him. The shock of the jump ran clean through her boots. She grabbed her shovel tightly and began to dig. As they worked downward, the water seeped through to meet them, rising rapidly. Soon, they were knee-deep in water, and then waist-deep.