Sunrise Lands

Rudi rested the butt of his lance on the toe of his boot and nodded. The rancher's men formed up in a rough column of twos and trotted away eastward, their hooves a growling rumble on the hard alkaline dirt. Dust fol lowed them as the sound faded away; there wasn't any way around that with so many horses.

But we want them to be seen. Let's see, they've got a mile to go, he thought. Of course, we seven don't want to be seen…

Ingolf looked up at the sun. "Nothing shows up at a distance on a clear day like a bright lancehead," he said, and flipped his down and buried the point in the mud of a drying puddle for an instant. "Everyone, get it muddy."

Everyone did, though not eagerly in some cases. "Hell of a thing to do to good steel," Odard grumbled.

"You can wash it soon in blood, hopefully," Mary pointed out, as she unhappily followed suit.

Vain as peacocks, Rudi thought affectionately as he looked at his sisters… and Odard. Or as cats.

"And I said stop showing off, Odard," Mathilda added sharply. "The point is to kill them, not make them applaud our chivalric brilliance."

"Point taken," Odard replied.

"Let's get going," Rudi said, as the Baron of Ger vais reluctantly daubed the bright-polished steel in the puddle.

They did, straight eastward rather than a little north of east as Bob and his men had done. That put them on course for a gap between two high rocky hills or low mountains; the one on the left had the remains of an old radio tower on it, and the one on the right a name, Red Mountain, from the ruddy sandstone of the cliffs. Seven horses put up a good deal less dust than twenty; the plume from the rancher's party was bigger still be cause half a dozen of his men were dragging clumps of sagebrush behind them on their lariats. Feint to distract, then strike to kill…

The CORA men said the Rovers were wild and undis ciplined to a fault, but that might be prejudice speaking. Hopefully not. Ingolf agreed; from his tales, the Sioux were the same way.

Mathilda was on his left. "I hope the Mormons who were supposed to buy Rancher Brown's horses hold out till we get there," she said, leaning closer. "It would be sort of futile to do this if they were all dead already."

"Thanks," he replied with a grin. "I didn't have worries enough to occupy my mind the now!"

Edain and Alex would be seeing to that. He forced aside worry for the young man, and even for the thought of having to tell Sam Aylward that his boy had died so far from home. That Sam would be so brave about it made the thought worse, not better.

It'll either work, or it won't, he told himself. And if it does. .. well, my totem is Raven, but maybe Ingolf's is Coyote. It's a trick worthy of the Trickster!

"Hssst!" Edain breathed quietly.

Hooves clattered on rock and gravel. Two Rovers passed by below at the bottom edge of the hill and stopped by the rough stone circle of a well. If they saw his horse and Alex's back in that ravine…

They both lay motionless, letting their war cloaks hide them, gray-green fabric with sagebrush twigs stuck through the loops. He could see fairly clearly through the gauze mask of the hood; the Rovers looked up the slope for an instant before they heaved the heavy timber cover off the well and threw in a leather bucket on the end of a lariat. His hand closed on the grip of his longbow, and he could smell the acrid sweat beneath his brigandine, strong even with the overwhelming smell of dust and creosote-like scents baked out of the bushes. The two horsemen were only fifty yards away; an easy shot.

At fifty yards, I'd be certain-haven't missed a shot like that since I was a kid. Father Wolf, totem of my sept, strengthen me now! Don't let me flinch!

The older Rover was a man in his thirties, bald or shaven-headed, with a long dark brown beard tied into two plaits with leather thongs, and a bucket of javelins slung across his back. The younger was about Edain's age; the yellow hair on the front of his head was cut down to stubble, with a patch at the back grown long enough to braid. The bearded man had a boiled leather breast-plate over a ragged shirt and threadbare jeans tucked into rawhide boots; the blond youngster wore only a breechclout and a bracer on his left arm, his sinewy feet bare in the molded leather stirrups of his mustang's sad dle, but he carried a good recurve bow and had a quiver over his back. Both had shetes at their belts, and round shields and leather helmets sewn with plates of metal slung at their saddlebows.

The younger man kept watch while the older hauled up water hand over hand, carefully holding the bucket so the horses could drink without spilling much.

"I hope those farmers got some pretty gals along," the young man said.

"Hey, what'll Sandy say about that?" the other asked.

"She'll say, 'Thank you kindly,' if I bring her a Mor mon gal to do the camp chores and help with the baby," the young man said.

Then he clutched boastfully at his crotch for a moment. " 'Sides, I got plenty. I ain't a wore out old man like you who couldn't get it up with a rope tied to it."

"Yeah, the sheep all run when they see you comin', Jimmie," the other man said dryly. "Rams and ewes both."

They both laughed as they swung back into the sad dle. The older Rover went on: "Me, I want their gear. My kids could use some blankets and coats, and my ol' woman needs a new cookpot pretty bad since the patch come off the old one."

Edain gave a silent sigh of relief as the two men can tered off northward, disappearing behind the bulk of the hill.

"Let's go," he hissed to Alex, then saw with a start he was already halfway to the crest.

He followed, placing his feet carefully; the last thing he wanted now was to start a rain of pebbles and rocks. Even the quiet snick-snick of the arrows in his quiver sounded as if some malicious redcap or boggart were doing a heel clicking tap dance on his back. At last he reached the crest overlooking the ruins where the Mormon expedition had camped.

"They're still holding out," he said, licking his lips and then spitting to get the bitter-sour taste of alkali out of his mouth.

"As your master said they would," Alex Vinton replied.

Edain scowled at him. "I'm a Mackenzie. We don't have masters. Rudi's my Chief. And my father was first armsman of the Clan for sixteen years."

He glared, leaving the as opposed to body servant and bum-kisser to the by blow of some gangbanger-turned-lord unspoken… for now.

"No offense, no offense," the older man said soothingly. "Let's get on with our work."

The two lay behind a greasewood brush atop the ridge behind the ruins of Whitehorse Ranch; the sun was half way down the sky towards the west, still baking spicy medicinal smells out of the herbs and bushes. Edain cau tiously raised the precious pair of field glasses he'd inherited from his father, making sure they wouldn't catch sunlight and betray the position.

The Rovers were prowling in closer to the wagon fort; he saw fire-arrows flick out and stand in the tilts of the prairie schooners. Ordinary arrows snapped at the men who stood to throw buckets of water at the spots where the burning ones hit. A dozen Rovers rode in close, and there was a scrimmage along the northern edge of the laager, figures doll-tiny even through the glasses.

"They're something determined," Edain said thoughtfully. "Both sides."

"Your first battle?" the man from the Protectorate asked.

"No," Edain replied shortly. "Second, more like-one real fight, some skirmishes." Then he went on: "Look!

Half of the Rovers are drawing off to that well north of here to water their horses. Let's go!"

They headed downslope; their own mounts were hidden in a short ravine at the rear of this hill. Garbh paced beside him, silent but bristling all over, lips peeled back from her long yellow teeth. He tried to walk as quietly as he could, but rock rattled and slid as they went crouching down the juniper-strewn slope.