“I was thinking we had a lot of trees to clear,” Herzer answered, wincing as she probed his abused hands.
“Come down to the stream,” she said, hoisting the saddlebags. “Jody, send the rest down with us.”
“Have you seen Bast?” Herzer asked as they walked to the stream. It was muddy with dirt from the clearing but moving up into the uncleared portion brought them to water that was as clear as gin.
“She’s been around. She’s working with the hunters to bring in game.” She held his hands in the cool water and gently wiped at the accumulated grime. “You need to keep stuff like this clean, Herzer. We’re pretty resistant to disease but surface injuries like this can still get badly infected.”
“I’ll remember that,” he said, grimacing in pain.
“The yellow stuff is suppuration, that’s normal with a skin injury like this, or so Mom tells me. You’re lucky really,” she added.
“How?” he asked as she took the hand out and smeared on an ugly green ointment. There were bits of leaf to be seen in it.
“Unimproved humans would have been days recovering from damage like this,” she replied, smearing on the ointment. “This is supposed to help healing. It’s not much but it’s something and it has stuff in it to keep the bacteria under control.”
“Can I used my hands?” he asked, half hoping that the answer would be “no.”
“I wish you wouldn’t, but there’s too much work to be done to have you idle.” She took strips of cloth and leather out of the saddlebag and started wrapping his hands, first in the cosilk then with the leather. That she ended up tying off to hold the whole collection on.
“The leather will protect the base of your hands. Your fingers aren’t bad, fortunately. Try to keep the damage to a minimum, okay?”
“Okay,” he replied, flexing his hands. The bandages did reduce the pressure on the wounds.
“Your skin will probably regrow by tomorrow then start hardening. Like I said, in this at least we’re lucky.”
“Lucky, yeah,” Herzer said grumpily then paused. “How’s your mother?”
“She’s doing okay,” Rachel replied tartly. “She’s keeping busy and I think that’s good.”
“Rachel, I…” he paused.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she snapped, standing up. “You’re good enough to get to work.”
Herzer looked at her for a moment, then nodded and headed back to the encampment.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rachel sighed as she finished the last of the badly blistered group. Most of them weren’t as bad as Herzer but a few were close. Gathering up her gear she walked back to the camp and looked around for Jody. Fixing the hands had been the easy part.
“Jody, I need to talk to all the females, now,” she said to the supervisor.
“What’s this about?” he asked. “They’re all working.”
“Edmund told me to come up here, Jody, and I know they’re busy. You really want me to have this conversation, though. Trust me.”
“Okay,” he said warily. “Courtney, Nergui, Shilan, Karlyn, Deann! Over here!”
He waited until the women had gathered around and turned to look at Rachel, folding his arms.
“And now you are going to take a walk,” Rachel said.
“Why?”
“Because I said so, Jody,” Rachel sighed. “Just go. Trust me, you don’t want to be in on this.”
He glared at her balefully for a moment and then strode off.
“Ladies, take a seat,” Rachel said, gesturing at a couple of the fallen trees. We have to have a little girl talk.”
She told them about the visit to Bethan and then about what had returned to visit the entire female species, then waited for the outbursts.
“You’re joking,” Nergui snapped. “That’s just…”
“Disgusting,” Rachel interjected. “Also true. And it’s not going to go away.”
“Ever?” Karlyn asked, eyes wide.
“When all the eggs are dumped it stops, say in fifty years. Maybe longer. But then, without the hormones, all sorts of other problems start. Or you can stay pregnant all the time.”
“Fisk that!” Deann snapped.
“Been feeling a little testy lately?” Rachel said acidly.
“What about it?” Deann responded hotly. “All this…” she said, waving her arms around, “it’s bound to make you a little angry.”
“Angrier than normal?” Rachel replied taking a deep breath. “I can feel it coming on me and let me tell you that doesn’t make me feel very damned happy at all. I’m especially looking forward to the cramps. Bethan said it’s like a pulled muscle that just won’t go away.”
“Are we all going to be like that?” Shilan asked. “I’m not feeling… testy. Tired, yes, but not… unusually angry.”
“I don’t know,” Rachel said. “Mom doesn’t have any texts that cover it in detail. We’ll just have to find out.”
“This… this…” Courtney finally blurted out. “This just sucks.”
“Yep, it does that,” Rachel replied. “We’re coming up with ways to… catch the flow. Like bandages to go on your… on your parts. And, remember, you’re all fertile now. Get a little too friendly with your boyfriend and you’re going to be carrying five or ten kilos of fetus and support structure around for months.”
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this,” Nergui snapped.
“Believe it,” Rachel replied angrily. “Believe it. Or don’t and end up bleeding all over the ground! Or pregnant,” she added with a tone of disgust.
“Hey, what’s going on over here?” Jody said, walking over from the cutting.
“Jody, I don’t want to say this again,” Rachel snarled. “Butt the hell out!”
“Look, girl…!”
“No, you look!” she snapped right back. “This is a female conversation. Males are not invited. Now go away!”
“I don’t care who your father is…”
“It’s not who my father is that you have to worry about,” Rachel said, standing up. “We’re done anyway.” She turned back to the women who were still sitting in positions of alternate bemusement and anger. “We’ll try to get the supplies up to you by the end of the day. But be aware that this could start at any time.”
“Oh, great,” Karlyn replied, shaking her head in resignation. “Just fisking great.” She stood up and walked over to an axe, looking for a likely tree branch. As soon as she spotted one she started hewing at it like it was the devil trying to climb out of a pit.
Rachel nodded shortly at the supervisor then went back to her horse, threw the saddlebags on, untied it, mounted and rode away at a canter.
“Is anyone going to tell me what just went on?” Jody asked angrily.
“Noooo,” Deann answered carefully, getting to her feet and wiping her hands. “No, I don’t really think you need to know. Not yet. And when you need to know you won’t want to know.”
“Nope,” Courtney said, getting up and heading over to pick up her water bag.
“Uh, uh,” Shilan added, walking away.
“Not in your dreams,” Nergui replied, finally getting up.
“Just what in the hell is going on?” Jody asked the clearing, shaking his head.
“Strange days,” Herzer replied.
The next two days continued much the same. With decent food — the second day there had even been a mess of venison stew with potatoes — and constant work Herzer could feel his already considerable muscles strengthening. His hands healed rapidly but he kept the wrappings of leather on nonetheless. He and Mike between them had felled the giant tree, an oak Jody told them, that had defeated the other teams, and the group had cleared a large area by the third day when they started cutting the wood to make buildings.