One of the caravan drivers walked up to them. He didn’t speak, but his approach prompted Gulgit to say, “I’ll leave you while I report in and see to our cargo. Unload your belongings and wait here, I’ll send someone to take you to a tent where you can stay as long as you want. I’ll find you later.”
Mark and Maghen piled their belongings thirty yards off the road and sat for the next three hours. Then a man came and led them into an area with hundreds of small tents carefully laid out in rows. Communal outhouses and water barrels were distributed at regular intervals. They had food reserves and fed themselves, followed by Alys and Maghen falling asleep on the cloaks inside the tent.
Mark watched the people. Some moved among the tents, while others stayed near their tents. Most of their clothes could only be described as shabby, but everyone seemed warm enough for the climate. Whatever people’s circumstances, he sensed their feeling of commitment. He recalled news reports of refugee camps on Earth where the inhabitants projected hopelessness. But not here. Children played as children do. Adults willingly performed tasks as if they were routine. Men and women leaving or entering the area moved with a sense of purpose.
When Gulgit found their tent, Mark thought he detected a change in demeanor. Gulgit seemed to be weighing new information.
“All unloaded?” asked Mark.
“Oh, yes. No problem there. The wagons got emptied over two hours ago. What I’ve been doing for the last hour is talking with some of our leaders. They were appreciative of your role in getting us past the Narthani patrol. When I mentioned you were interested in a place called ‘Amerika,’ they passed over it. However, it got their attention when I told them about the Narthani chasing you for reasons you don’t understand. Then they got really interested when I mentioned there might be some connection between you and the man Yozef Kolsko. They’d heard details about the Narthani defeat when they tried to annex Caedellium, that island north-northwest of Landolin.
“Details are scarce, but the name Yozef Kolsko seems to be associated with whatever happened. Although none of us, including you, know what all this means, our leadership decided it has an interest in your reaching Caedellium. There’s not a lot we can do—Caedellium is a long way from here, and we don’t have access to ships that far west. However, the season prevents me from returning to Drilmar for more weapons shipments for several months. I’d normally wait here, helping where I can, but I suggested I’m dispensable enough here that I could help you get to Iskadon. It’s a trading port in Sulako. It’s about three hundred miles from the Rustal border, and to get there means crossing the Gongalor Mountains.”
Mark didn’t attempt to hide his sigh of relief. “Gulgit, I can’t tell you what good news that is. I’ve sat here wondering what was next for us. I’d envisioned getting enough provisions and starting west with no more than a hope about the next stage of our trip. I confess I felt a bit desperate, especially about Maghen and Alys.”
“Don’t be too optimistic yet,” said Gulgit. “The Gongalor Mountains are some of the highest on Anyar. The weather is turning, and if we don’t get over the mountains in the next three to four sixdays, the best passes will be blocked by ice and snow.
“One positive is that the border between Rustal and Sulako runs along the crest of the mountains and is usually manned only by watchmen. We can either bribe them, or we can force our way through. Once we’re in Sulako, we just have to be careful not to violate their customs and alert officialdom. I don’t know the route or speak Sulakoan, but a guide has been assigned to us, and he speaks the language. We’ll also be accompanied by two guards.
“Once we’re in Iskadon, Suvalu should be spoken enough that we can try to find you a ship heading west. I wouldn’t recommend trying to cross two thousand miles of Sulako on your own without knowing the language and the people.”
Mark had numerous questions, but one predominated. “When would we leave?”
“As soon as possible. Tomorrow, unless you don’t think your family will be ready for another trek. We’ll be going by horseback. I’m told much of the way doesn’t have roads, and we’ll need to cover as much ground as possible to get over the mountains before the way is impassable or we’re trapped. I’ve already arranged for twelve horses—six to ride, three for packs, and three extras.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to lighten your already meager belongings. I’ve taken the liberty of bargaining away one of your rifles in exchange for good horses. One of our raid leaders is interested in trying it, after I told him what you did with those monsters. You can keep the shotguns and the single-barreled pistols. The double-barreled ones are too unusual, and we want to minimize the attention we draw, especially after crossing into Sulako.”
“You know we’re carrying a fair amount of gold,” Mark said. “Will we be using some of that to pay for getting to Iskadon?”
“You may need every coin—there’s a long way to go after Iskadon. The problem is, you need to keep the coin hidden. We should be safe while in Rustal, but I hear bad stories about foreign men being separated from their coin in Sulako. I haven’t traveled there before, but Haldakit, our guide, is familiar with the route to Iskadon. He says we need to be cautious, especially in some areas. He claims to know which ones to avoid.”
“Well, we’ve learned to take each step at a time and not worry about the one after that. We’ll be ready whenever you are.”
“All right then, Mark. Rest the remainder of the day. We leave at dawn tomorrow.”
Maghen was stoic when Mark told her of his meeting with Gulgit. When he finished explaining, she sighed. “It is what it is, Mark. As much as I’d like to stay in one place and not be on a ship, wagon, or horse for at least a few days, if that’s what we have to do, then so be it. If we ever . . . when we get to Caedellium, I want you to promise me I don’t have to move more than a hundred feet for a month from someplace quiet and beautiful.”
He hugged her fiercely. He’d have told her what a trooper she was if she would have understood the reference.
“And Alys?” he asked. “She’s gotten quiet again since the fight on the Dancer.”
“I’m worried that all the travel will make her permanently unsettled. A child needs to know home is safe and always there—something she hasn’t had for the last few months.”
“I know, dear, and I wish it could have been different. All we can do is keep her close to us and try to make it better once we’re in Caedellium.”
He didn’t say the words, but both of them knew that, like her stumble, he could have said, “If we get to Caedellium.”
CHAPTER 34
IN THE SADDLE AGAIN
The Kaldwels were ready the next morning in front of their tent when Gulgit stopped, accompanied by three men and ten horses. Their guide, Haldakit ulu Kurban (Haldakit son of Kurban, in the Rustalian naming custom), was a wiry man of undeterminable age, as men can be who have spent their life outdoors and are seldom comfortable under a roof. Exposed skin was baked and wrinkled from the sun, but his eyes were alert, and he had a soft voice when he and Gulgit talked together in the singsong Rustalian language.
Gulgit smiled at Mark. “Haldakit says we should have gotten a couple of bigger horses for you. The other two men are Yusup and Tazeeb. None of the three speak Suvalu, but they’re all dependable.”
They left the resistance encampment with Mark carrying Alys. They had kept the harness they’d used to occasionally carry Alys on their backs during the ride from Frangel to Rumpas. It left their hands free. Later, the girl would ride in front of them or in the harness, depending on terrain and circumstances, as they took turns with her.
Though it was early in the misty morning, the tent area bustled with activity. No one seemed to take notice of their party. They passed through a second tent city, then a section of the valley with crude wooden structures.
“Some people have been here for over a year,” said Gulgit. “People tend to need the feel for a home, even if it’s made of thrown-together wo
od, rocks, and whatever is available.”
There was no defined end to the encampment. A mix of tents and structures ranging from lean-tos to cabins thinned out for a mile from the last formal living layout before they reached open country. The land turned even scrubbier than what they’d passed through after leaving Orano. It continued that way through flat terrain. They alternated riding at a walk, walking and leading the horses, and cantering twenty minutes each hour.
“We’ll push the horses as much as we can until we reach the Gongalor Mountains. Haldakit is worried about the weather. He thinks we can get to the most direct pass in time, but if snows beat us, we’ll have to detour hundreds of miles north, closer to the sea. The farther north we go, the more Narthani presence we’d run into.”
At mid-day, they stopped at a stream to water the horses and eat cured meat and dried fruit of some kind, while the horses grazed. Mark had observed that the Rustalian riders let their horses graze while traveling, as long as they didn’t fight against moving along at whatever pace the men set. Not that there was much vegetation for the animals to evidence interest in.
“Since we didn’t bring any grain,” said Mark, “I assume Haldakit thinks the horses can graze, but I don’t see much for them here.”
“This is my first time west of the encampment, but Haldakit says by tomorrow we’ll come to where the land begins to rise and there’s more fodder. He’s confident the horses will be fine with grazing while picketed when we stop for the night, during breaks, and along the way. Supposedly, we’ll soon pass through stream valleys with thick grass where we’ll occasionally let them graze for an hour or so.”
At mid-afternoon, the track they’d followed—it hardly qualified as a road—turned north-northwest. They left it to follow a game trail for several miles before it petered out, and they rode in open country. The sun was almost an hour below the horizon when they stopped and picketed the horses fifty yards away. Then they slept.
Their guide and guards took turns standing watch and tending the horses. They moved the pickets twice during the night, as the horses exhausted the grazing within reach.
By early afternoon the next day, the terrain changed from flat to rolling, and the sparse vegetation became thicker stands and occasional trees. The change continued the next five days, as they followed the same routine. Mark estimated they were covering thirty to thirty-five miles a day. He kept a close eye on his family’s horses and the others, but Haldakit seemed to know what he was doing. Their mounts appeared in as good a condition as when they’d left the encampment.
However, they lost one of the packhorses when it stepped into a hidden hole. The leg wasn’t broken, but the horse couldn’t keep up. Yusup and Tazeeb transferred its load to one of the spare horses. They left Haldakit alone with the lame horse, while the rest of the party moved a hundred yards away. Twenty minutes later, Haldakit yelled, the other two men went back, and for the next sixday they ate horsemeat three times a day. At first, Alys refused the novel meat as tasting bad and being too tough. Maghen solved the second issue by chewing the horsemeat enough for Alys to finish. Maghen and Mark agreed that once they got to Caedellium, they would never look at a horse again without remembering.
Only three times in the first sixday did they see other humans: a family living alongside the road in a crude sod house with mangy horses corralled nearby, a single rider who watched them from a hill several hundred yards away, and a twenty-man armed patrol. This alarmed Mark, until Gulgit rode out to meet them and returned to explain that they were resistance.
“The Narthani may be scarce this far south, but you can never be too careful. Although it’s easier to hide an encampment in this unpopulated region, it also doesn’t provide early warning if the Narthani decided to launch a campaign against us. We have patrols going out a hundred miles in all directions, except south. There’s nothing in that direction.”
Mark didn’t comment that if he’d been in charge, he wouldn’t have made any assumptions about what the Narthani could or couldn’t do. He also didn’t get an explanation of what the group of resistance men was doing well beyond the patrol range mentioned by Gulgit.
When they stopped early for the night on the tenth day, sparser ground cover had given way to thicker growth. Scattered groves of trees formed a thick-enough canopy that nothing grew under the center of the groves. Haldakit said they would take an easy day to let everyone rest—horses and humans. The valley they were in had abundant grazing and a meandering stream that all, horses and humans, could bathe in. They could also clean their clothes, which threatened to have a life of their own.
Tazeeb went off by himself, as they set up camp, and returned half an hour later with the gutted, skinned carcass of a pronghorn-size animal. Its roasted meat was the best thing Mark had ever tasted—at least, after days of horsemeat.
Maghen laughed. “After horsemeat, you would have said that about eating a destrex.” The notoriously foul-tasting source of destrex hides was usually eaten only under the direst of circumstances.
They slept until mid-morning the next day, then pushed hard to cover thirty miles. The rolling hills became larger, and genuine forest patches increased in frequency. On the late morning of the thirteenth day, they topped a hill and saw their main obstacle, the jagged, snow-covered peaks of the Gongalor Mountains. They reminded Mark of the Grand Tetons. However, while the main peaks of the Wyoming range were about thirty miles long, the Gongalors stretched the entire north/south length of the continent.
“Good Lord!” exclaimed Mark, standing in his saddle for a better look. “We must still be thirty or forty miles away, and look at that.”
“What is it, Mark?” asked Maghen. He had spoken in English.
“The mountains Gulgit told us about. I can see why he’s worried about us getting over them before it snows too much. These must be higher than the Andes.”
“The what?”
“Uh . . . some high mountains in my homeland. Very steep, like the ones we see. In fact, these mountains might even be taller.”
The next afternoon, Haldakit climbed a hill for a better look, while the rest of the party waited by a rushing stream of ice-cold water. After the guide returned and consulted with Gulgit, Mark was informed of a decision to be made.
“He says it’s chancy getting through the closest pass. If it was him alone, he thinks he could push hard and make it with no problem. However, he’s leaving it up to you because you have your family to worry about.”
“Is there a chance of getting stranded and being unable to go forward or back?” asked Mark.
“He says the most likely worst case is we find it too difficult to continue and we’d be forced to fall back out of the mountains. Then we’d have to go north, like I told you, to lower passes closer to the ocean. There, the risk of encountering Narthani increases. It might cost us the loss of two sixdays if we attempt the crossing effort here, then find we couldn’t do it, and have to return and head north.”
“Let me talk with Maghen.”
Mark went to where his wife watched a laughing Alys chase the planet’s version of dragonflies or butterflies—not either but something in between. He told her of Haldakit’s opinion and Gulgit’s laying out of options.
“If we weren’t with you, what would you do?”
“Head for the closest pass and make every effort to get over it before the snows,” he said without hesitation.
“Then that’s what we should do. If we go north for an easier pass, we come closer to the Narthani and lose time. If we try the closest pass and have to turn back for the northern passes, we come closer to the Narthani and lose time. If we try the closest pass and make it before the snows, then we’ve saved time and don’t come closer to the Narthani. What is there to decide?
“Mark, everything we do next has risks, just as there have been ever since we left the ranch. We’ve come through them enough times that maybe I’m inured to worrying about risks we can’t avoid. Let’s get over these mountains an
d on to the next stage as fast as we can.”
He crushed her in a hug. “No wonder I love you. I’ll tell Gulgit, and we’ll be on our way to those intimidating mountains, which have no chance against someone like you.”
For the next two days, their pace slowed as they climbed toward what looked like an impenetrable wall of peaks. Mark didn’t ask questions, but Gulgit saw his concern.
“I believe Haldakit knows where we’re going. Well . . . I hope he does. Not that we have much choice, except to turn north or go back to the encampment. He says another day and we’ll enter a cleft that cuts diagonally through the mountain range.”
Mark visualized the chain. I wonder if Rustal was part of a tectonic plate separate from Sulako, and the Gongalor Mountains were created when the plates crashed into each other over the last few million years?
He envisioned how the Himalayas had been formed by the Indian subcontinent hitting Asia and the Allegheny Mountains being a byproduct of a super-continent collision hundreds of millions of years ago. The Gongalor Peaks were so sharp, they must have been formed relatively recently and fast—in geological terms.
It was only when they entered the cleft and the upward slope looked to go on forever that Mark began to worry about altitude. The horses visibly labored to breathe, and he noticed it for himself when they walked the horses. His original estimate had been based on the appearance of the range as being similar to the Grant Tetons, which rose from a valley at 6,000 feet to the highest peak at 14,000 feet. There were similar altitude differences for Pike’s Peak in Colorado and the nearby city of Colorado Springs. He had been with a group that hiked the 8,000 feet to the top of Pike’s Peak, and he remembered how the last third of the climb had felt. He felt the same at the top of Pike’s Peak as he now did in the cleft.
The third morning after they entered the cleft, one of the horses dropped to the ground and couldn’t or wouldn’t rise back to its feet. The next morning, a second horse was dead, and two others appeared in serious trouble. To compound Mark’s worry, it began to snow. Four inches covered the ground within an hour, but it stopped as quickly as it had started. Yet although the sun appeared, the low temperature and much of the pass remaining in shadow prevented the snow from melting.
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