“And who is this sweet little lass?”
Jasinala shivered with terror. “It’s a boy, sir.”
“He’s a fine young fellow,” I said hastily. “Er…you’ll do better next time.”
“Oh, I shall try, sir!” She seemed hardly able to believe my benevolence. Real herdmasters disapproved of women who bore sons. Pretty little thing, I thought. I smiled again to reassure her and rolled over to the next.
Tolomith, she said. She seemed very little older than Jasinala, but she had three small children clutching at her. I eyed the youngest and made a guess. “You are bearing?”
She nodded unhappily. “I think so, sir. But I can—”
“No! Keep it! I wish you safe labor, Tolomith.” I was no impatient, sex-mad Anubyl. Alongside all these children I felt like a grandfather.
And unless something terrible had happened to all my seafolk offspring, I certainly must be a grandfather by now, many times over!
But Tolomith was beautiful.
Then the third…
“I am Allinoth, sir.”
“I am Knobil.”
She was about my age, grizzled and plump. There were ten children clustered around her, but no babes, no toddlers. Her two oldest boys flanked her like trees. She must be a survivor of the great disaster, while Jasinala and Tolomith would be the next generation. The herdfolk were only just reestablishing their culture.
I saw bewilderment chase the fear from Allinoth’s face and realized that I was grinning widely at her. I was thinking how this camp would have seemed to me when I was traveling with Violet, and how disgusted I would have been then had he chosen Allinoth’s tent for us to share. Likely I would adjust to having child wives in time, but at the moment this mature mother of ten seemed a much more interesting companion for me than those two unfortunate girls. Yet why should I think of them as unfortunate? They probably thought themselves very lucky not to have been sold to the traders.
Allinoth’s oldest daughter was holding her chin up defiantly. She had her hands behind her, and I decided she was pulling her robe tight so I would notice the bulges.
“And you?”
“Haniana, sir.”
“You’re very beautiful.”
She blushed and smirked sideways at her mother. Well, I would certainly make her wait longer than she expected.
Then I could look at Allinoth’s sons. As Quetti had said, three were near to adolescence. The two largest were obviously twins, alike as two arrows and skinny. They flinched at my attention, but their cold and sullen gaze was telling me that a crippled midget did not meet their standards of manhood. They were both holding their arms very close to their sides.
“Your names?”
“Karrox, sir.”
“Kithinor, sir.”
“Can either of you use a bow?”
They shook their heads in terrified denial.
“Then, after I have enjoyed some of your mother’s cooking and perhaps had a little rest… I shall start your lessons. Look over there!” I pointed across the lake, to where one far tree stood apart from all the others, in solitary defiance. They turned to stare uncomprehendingly. I took my time, for it was a very difficult shot, even for me. Then my arrow streaked over the water…thunk!
“Like that!”
Their eyes flicked back to mine, brimming with instant respect. I wondered if the future of Vernier had been changed by that one deft bowshot.
“Karrox, organize the herders. Kithinor, dig out my arrow—carefully! Then you can both cut a good stout, straight branch apiece. About this long and this thick. I’ll show you how to shape it. Of course you won’t be as good as me for quite a long while. But we’ll work on it together. And riding lessons, too!”
One flew off like a startled bird, the other began berating the youngsters. I turned back to their mother, who was glowing at me as if she had just been promised Paradise.
“I have not tasted roast dasher since I was a little older than them,” I said. “Have you any dasher meat?”
She beamed, nodding. “It’s not quite fresh, sir, but certainly not tainted yet.”
I smiled an uneasy acceptance.
“And afterward, sir? We should make up a tent for Haniana?”
I was about to say that as senior, she was entitled to entertain me first. But Haniana smirked again and pulled her shift ever tighter, and I remembered Rilana, my sister, and her ambitions at that age. No real herdman would have hesitated for an instant—and I was already far from being the ideal herdman. I resigned myself to staying in character for the role I was playing.
“Of course,” I said.
Allinoth sighed with relief. “And…sir? You did mean what you told my boys? You will not send them out yet?”
“I meant it. I have big plans for them.”
Twins! Truly the Heavenly Father was smiling on my madcap venture. I inspected the horses, then went over to the hearth and played with a couple of toddlers until the food was ready. Afterward Haniana got what she wanted. She seemed to enjoy the process a lot. To be honest, so did I.
Oh, my beloved Haniana!
—13—
GOD THE FATHER
AND SO I HAVE TOLD YOU WHAT YOU WANTED TO KNOW—of Heaven and the angels, of my early life, and of how I returned to the grasslands in middle age. Surely you will not also have me tell of my greater shame, of the killing time and the crimes I committed when I was old?
You will? Ah, you youngsters are callous…
—2—
ALWAYS I HAD KNOWN that what I planned must shed much blood. Always I had hated the thought. I would like to think that a little more than pure cowardice kept me procrastinating so long in Heaven, and if so, then it was the hatred of bloodshed.
And even after I had taken over Gandrak’s family—even as I worked to bend the twins to my purpose—I still clung to a faint delusive hope that perhaps the herdmasters would be willing to negotiate.
Ha! The first one certainly wasn’t. His name was Trathrak, and he came out at full gallop, with arrows flying like hail. I was riding slowly toward his camp, through billowing grass high as a man’s belt, heading downwind so my voice would carry. I was unarmed, and I held my hands up to show I came in peace. Michael, had he been there, would have screamed that I was being a suicidal fool. He would have accused me of insane delusions of inadequacy that required me to prove myself now because I had gained my herd without killing for it. Sometimes too much insight can blind a man, and he would have been completely wrong in this case, of course—I went unarmed only because I wanted to talk.
Ironically, I should have died had I carried a weapon.
I did now know Trathrak’s name then. I knew only that he had many more woollies than I, with four tents showing, and he had been unfortunate enough to steer his herd near to mine just when my plan demanded its first victim. I soon knew that he was big and quite young, and I quickly came to understand also that he emphatically did not want to talk. He wanted to stamp my corpse into a floor mat. I turned tail and fled before the blizzard. As a lifelong coward, I was good at fleeing.
He gained on me, partly because I let him do so, partly because I was being careful to retrace my exact trail. I had headed straight for the sun on my way in, and therefore my shadow should guide me out, but in long grass at full gallop that is not as easy as it sounds. Trathrak drew closer, his arrows zipping by me much too near. Then, just as I decided that I must have strayed from my path and was about to die, Karrox rose up on one side of him and Kithinor on the other.
It was their first battle, and they were still only boys—they could have been excused a miss or two. They did not miss. With icy deliberation, they each put an angel’s steel-tipped arrow into Trathrak’s ribs.