Dies the Fire

Havel made polite introductions; everyone dismounted, and politely declined refreshments-that was polite these days. Food wasn't something to take for granted. Since getting out of the woods and into farming country they'd managed to keep themselves in tortillas and beef, especially since Ken Larsson rigged up a portable horse-powered flour mill, but he was glad they'd also managed to find a crateful of multivitamin pills; scurvy might have been a problem otherwise.

It would be a while before anyone had much in the way of fresh vegetables, and ca

One of the wagons held their handicraft projects on the move, and some of the products. Havel led the two leaders over to it and showed them what was on offer: lance- and spearheads, arrowheads and arrows, shields, fighting-knives and swords. Those included the first ones Will had run up; with Pamela's help he'd refined the second model considerably, adding a subtle curve to the grip and a forefinger-hold, and making the blades lighter and better balanced. The originals were still superior to anything the locals had, from the way they handled them and throttled exclamations.

"Now, these we can really use," Reines said, eagerly fingering a little pamphlet Pamela had done up on basic sword work, with illustrations by Signe and Astrid. "We do have a fair amount of livestock we could spare, seeing's how we aren't shipping the yearlings out and we can't cut as much hay-"

"Wait a minute, Howie," Ru

"We need weapons, and this stuff looks a hell of a lot better than anything we've been able to cobble up. When we weren't busy staying alive," Reines said. "We especially need weapons with the folks disappearing on the road up past Kamiah."

"Drifters," Ru

Well, that's fucking tactful of you, Havel thought, keeping silent and watching the argument.

"The Smiths disappeared out of their goddamned house," Reines snapped. "And we've had stock rustled."

"Whoa," Havel said softly, raising a hand. "You folks probably don't want to quarrel in front of outsiders."

That shut both of them up, but Reines cast him a look before going on smoothly, the anger leached out of his voice: "That's true. And why don't you folks move in closer? After we have the doc check you over, but you look cleaner than most folks around here, come to that. You could come to di

Havel and Reines nodded imperceptibly at each other. Ru

Michael Havel looked into the fire, lost in thought- though also conscious of a vague longing for a cup of coffee. They'd camped in an empty space on the outskirts of town for the past week rather than take the offer of vacant houses; it was bad for morale to scatter too much and unsafe, too. In fact, he'd had more than one inquiry about joining up, after the Bearkillers had put on a bit of a dance and BBQ and a fencing display, to repay the do Reines had gotten the town to lay on-once Mr. Ru

Seen that before, too, he thought. Withdrawal symptoms- no TV, no radio, no Internet, no movies, no nothing except the same faces and voices. Even small-town folks were used to being part of a bigger world than you can reach in a day's walk. The way we keep moving makes it a little easier to take. Although I do admire the way Reines has kept things together.

He must have murmured that aloud. Ken nodded from the log he sat on over on the other side of the campfire, stirring the embers with a stick.

"He wasn't mayor before the Change-some sort of real-estate man with a sideline in cattle. Everyone was rather vague on how exactly he'd acquired the office, did you notice?"

Havel shrugged. "He seemed popular enough. And he's doing a good job."

"Uh-huh. We've seen how important a good leader is. The places that just went to pieces, it was where there wasn't anyone to get people moving together in a hurry."

"Some places it just seems to happen on its own, sort of," Havel observed.

Ken snorted: "Yeah, we've seen places like that-all one of them. A committee is the only form of mammalian life with more than four legs and no brain."

"Interesting what he had to say," Havel said. "We could use that livestock and gear; we'd have somewhere near enough horses, and enough stock we'd be independent for meat. The problem is, how do we smoke out his problem? Whoever it is, they've obviously got the smarts to hide when a posse comes looking."

Ken shrugged. "Well, from Reines's point of view, that's the beauty of the deal. We don't get paid unless we get results, he doesn't risk any of his own people, they don't have to neglect vital work, and if it turns out OK he not only gets a solved problem and some powerful political mojo, but he gives Ru

"You're a cynic," Havel said.

"I've been on the fringes of politics for a long time," Ken said. "You have to be, if you're in business on the scale I am… was. I prefer to think of myself as a realist. On the whole, I'd put my money on Howie Reines-he's got a lot more experience than Ru

Havel nodded. "Notice something about Ru

"The costumes? I'm not surprised at that. Will's right- it's the sort of thing you'd expect, psychologically speaking. Though I suspect they had to read anthropology texts to get the details!"

"Nah, I agree about that. What I noticed was that more than half of them didn't look even part Indian, including some of the ones all gussied up like Chief Joseph on steroids. Give you odds in a couple of generations, there'll be a group here who call themselves Nez Perce-or Tsoop-Nit-Pa-Lu-but look a lot more like me, or even Eric."

Ken gave him a considering look. "You know, you're probably right about that. Wouldn't be surprised if the same thing didn't happen in a lot of other places, too. For that matter, long-term, we're going to see a lot of ethno-genesis going on in the next generation or so."

At Havel's look of bafflement, he went on: "Tribes, ethnic groups, call 'em what you will. Little groups forming around a community or a leader and starting to think of themselves as a people. Mayor Reines's bunch too, for that matter. Anyone who can do the job-and the first little group will sort of set the tone for those who join up. Like a saturated solution forming around a seed-crystal. It's just starting now, of course, but give it a few years, or generations."

"Yeah, I suppose a lot of these guys like Reines or like Ru

Ken shook his head. "I doubt there will be any history books for a long time," he said. "I wouldn't give mass literacy more than another generation, most places-less in some-and a lot of the world's going to lose the concept of writing altogether. Too many lost skills to reinvent."