"We care, yes," Hren said. "Do you?"
Jack grimaced. Stupid, useless, pain-in-the-neck animals . . . but Draycos was right. A few days ago, in a better state of mind than he was in right now, he'd considered them worth saving.
More to the point, Draycos considered them worth saving right now. "Yes," he told Hren. "I do."
Hren was silent for a moment. "Then we will continue on," he said. "Even if you have brought us here to die, far from our people and the berries we most love."
"You're not going to die," Jack assured him, wishing he really believed that. "We're not going to abandon you."
"It would seem young Alison has already done so," Hren countered. "Yet hear me: We will not give up our lives easily. Not for any creature."
"I know you won't," Jack said. "You're a strong people, Hren, despite your casual ways. As for Alison, she hasn't abandoned anyone. She's just tired. We'll let her sleep, and she'll be fine." He looked back over toward her.
And as he did so, a flicker of gray caught his eye. Taneem was back from her hunt, strolling casually toward the rest of the group. "There she is," he said with relief. "Taneem! Taneem, come here!"
The gray Phooka didn't answer but kept padding her way through the milling crowd. Jack opened his mouth to call her again.
And stiffened. She wasn't just coming to rejoin the herd.
She was heading straight toward Alison.
"Taneem!" Jack called again, dashing toward her. Whatever the Phooka was doing to Alison, she had to be doing it while she was on the girl's skin. If she got back on—"Taneem! Draycos!"
To his left, he caught a flash of gold scales through the trees as Draycos bounded toward the girl and the gray dragon.
But they were both too late. Taneem got to Alison first and set her paw almost delicately on the side of Alison's neck. An instant later, the Phooka was gone, sliding beneath the collar.
"Blast!" Jack snarled as he braked to a halt at Alison's side. "Can you get her off?"
"No," Draycos said, his voice grim as he peered down into Alison's collar. "Not without Taneem's permission. I am sorry. I should not have left her."
"Don't blame yourself," Jack growled. "I'm the one who sent you away in the first place." He took a deep breath. "Whatever's happening, we'll just have to see it through. Let's get this stretcher rigged and get out of here."
They gathered the Erassvas and Phookas together, and with Alison nestled into her vine hammock between the green bellwether and a dark blue-green Phooka, they headed off.
Draycos didn't have many opportunities to see how things were going at the front. With Jack now having to lead, he had to cover both flanks of the group, watching for trouble as well as keeping the Phookas from wandering too far away.
But even with the bulk of his attention outward, it was quickly apparent that there was less herding necessary than there had been on previous days. On his third great circle around the travelers he made a point of moving in close enough to see what exactly was going on.
And was greeted by an extraordinary sight. The ten Erassvas were all walking closely together just behind Jack and Greenie, playing follow-the-leader as they'd been doing since Alison first set up this particular marching order. What was new was the fact that the Phookas, too, were mostly staying close to both the Erassvas and Jack himself.
Draycos wondered about it as he returned to his outward sweep. Were the Phookas still leery about predators after the previous day's Kodiak attack? That might explain why they were staying close to the boy carrying the guns.
But it hadn't been anyone with a gun who had chased the Kodiak away. Draycos had done that. Yet there was no indication that the Phookas had even registered that fact, let alone were acting on it. It wasn't because of the bellwether, either, the one Jack called Greenie. While the Phookas had always followed him, they had never shown any particular interest in staying close by as they did so.
No, there could be only one reason the Phookas were staying so close to Jack. Somehow, in their dim and undeveloped minds, they had latched onto him as their leader. Their guide.
Their herdsman.
Jack might not think he had the patience to be a herdsman. He might not particularly like the task. But there was no denying that he had a talent for it.
You have many talents, Jack, Draycos had assured the boy earlier. When the time comes, you will find the job that best fits you.
It would be Draycos's job to make sure the boy lived until that time came.
CHAPTER 21
They'd been traveling about two hours when they hit the edge of the bog.
Hit it quite literally, in fact. Jack didn't even spot the silent, algae-covered water until he'd taken his first knee-deep step into it.
"How's it look?" Jack asked as Draycos reemerged from between a pair of droopy-leaved trees, picking his way carefully across a narrow land bridge.
"Like most such places," the K'da replied. "A great deal of water, much of it nearly impossible to see until one is already in it."
"Could you tell how big it is?"
"I estimate it is at least a few miles across," Draycos said. "It will take the rest of the morning to get around it. Possibly longer."
Jack chewed his lower lip, an idea beginning to play at the edge of his mind. "What if we go through it?"
Draycos arched his neck. "You must be joking. Didn't you hear what I just said? Bogs and swamps, particularly unfamiliar ones, are among the worst places possible for a soldier to make a stand against an enemy."
"Normally, sure," Jack agreed. "But this isn't a normal military situation. Frost wants me alive. He wouldn't dare attack around this much water, even with just tanglers. Maybe even especially with tanglers."
Draycos twitched his tail. "Yet if he should decide to take that risk, we would find ourselves with little maneuvering room."
"Yeah, but his men would be in the same boat," Jack pointed out. "And since you K'da seem to fight as well from trees as you do from solid ground, you'd run rings around them."
Draycos twitched the end of his tail. "I still do not like it."
"Neither do I," Jack conceded. "But Alison's in no shape to fight right now, and I really don't want us to have to face down Frost's men without her. Seems to me that every hour we can keep him off our backs is an extra hour for her to try to snap out of whatever's gotten its grip on her."
He nodded toward the bog. "The only question is whether we can get all the way through without losing anyone. And whether there's more than one way out the other side. Be kind of counterproductive if we went all the way through and then came out to find an ambush all set up and waiting for us."
"As to the latter, I expect there will be multiple exits," Draycos said. "As to the former . . . we will find out soon enough."
The bog was humid, full of buzzing insects, and disgustingly smelly. But aside from that, it wasn't nearly as bad as Jack had expected.
The Erassvas, for all their bulk, turned out to be surprisingly nimble when it came to maneuvering along narrow land bridges. Even when they strayed off the path, they tended to float high enough in the water that it was easy for them to pull themselves back to safety. The insects and odors didn't seem to bother them at all.
Even better, Jack quickly discovered that Greenie had a knack for finding a path through the pools and stands of reeds. After the first mile, in fact, Jack was confident enough of the Phooka's abilities to send Draycos back to the rear of the party to watch for stragglers.
Through it all, Alison and Taneem dozed peacefully.