The Protector's War (46 page)

Hutton spread his gauntleted hands. “You folks and us, we've got different ideas of what a
dangerous criminal
amounts to,” he pointed out. “That's why we don't have no extradition treaty with y'all.”

Stavarov opened his mouth, then visibly realized that argument would be playing into Hutton's hands; with every second the fugitives he sought were that much farther away.

“Get out of our way or we'll kick you out of it,” he snarled, and reined his horse around, spurring back to his own men at a gallop.

Hutton grinned to himself, looking up at the sun to estimate the time; it wasn't a good idea to try wearing a wristwatch under armor, particularly since nobody was making any replacements for wind-up watches that got smashed.

Around two o'clock; say they think the people they're chasing are moving at ten miles an hour…

“Bows out and ready,” he said to his own trumpeter. “One shaft, then Parthian retreat. And pass the word, aim at the horses when you can—but hit the men if you have to.”

That took only a few seconds; Hutton grinned harder as he thought of young Stavarov's dilemma. Unlike the Outfit's A-listers, Protectorate men-at-arms didn't carry saddle bows as well as lances; they relied on their infantry for missile fire, and had to get within ten feet of you to do any harm. They could wait for their crossbowmen to come up…but that would take time, which was the whole point of the matter, and Hutton could just pull back out of range and make them deploy all over again. They weren't trying to
beat
him, they just wanted him to go away so they could barrel on south and catch those weird refugees, whoever they were.

He could read a snapping of temper in Stavarov's savage gesture. The long curled trumpet Arminger's forces favored rang out, and the lances came down in a glittering wave. The horses went forward…walk…trot…canter…Then they settled into a steady hand gallop, and the earth shook under the pounding of a hundred and twenty hooves. In the fields on either side of the road divots of earth flew up as the horseshoes churned at the turf; he could see Stavarov himself coming straight at him, his kite-shaped shield sloped up under his eyes and covering his whole left side, the double-edged blade of his lance head aimed at the Bearkiller's midriff.

“Now!”

Hutton raised his bow, drew, loosed. A volley slashed out from the Bearkiller ranks; carefully aimed, and at no more than a hundred yards' distance. The arrows twinkled once in the sun as they reached the top of their shallow arcs, then snapped down towards the Protectorate's men-at-arms. Hutton's horse turned in place under the pressure of his thighs and rocked into motion. He'd been directing the Bearkillers' breeding program for most of a decade now, and he'd folded a good deal of old-style quarter horse into the mix, for the jackrabbit acceleration that their powerful haunches produced. The Protectorate men-at-arms were well mounted, and a long race would be a toss-up, but the Bearkillers had a definite edge in acceleration.

Hutton could see that, as he drew another arrow and turned in the saddle to fire over his mount's rump. That let him see the results of the first arrowfall. Some of the shafts stood quivering in shields, or had glanced off the mail of hauberks despite the bodkin points, or simply missed. Others had penetrated, and riders were down, one being dragged by a foot caught in the stirrups, some simply falling out and clutching at the steel and wood in their bodies.

What really disrupted the charge was the arrows hitting the
horses
. Wounded, they bolted, or turned bucking and plunging, or fell under their neighbors in a chain-reaction of tumbling and tripping thousand-pound animals. They were much larger than their riders, unarmored, and they had far less ability to face pain and injury for the sake of obeying orders.

Which makes you wonder who's smart and who's dumb,
he thought, wincing slightly at the piteous screams the wounded animals made, full of an uncomprehending agony. He'd always liked horses…

The rest of the men-at-arms bored in, grimly intent. Hutton shot again, aiming low, and a charger reared with an arrow through the fleshy part of its left forelimb. The distance between the two forces narrowed until he could see the flared nostrils of the horses, then opened out again.

“Trumpeter,” Hutton called. “Sound
fall in, column to the enemy's right
.”

That would let the Bearkillers shoot, and if the Protectorate force turned to chase them…why, then, they could
still
shoot at their pursuers, and the enemy would be heading away from the fugitives.

Gonna be one frustratin' day for that Russkie-boy,
Hutton thought as he angled his horse westward; hooves rattled on asphalt, crunched on gravel, and then the animal bunched and gathered itself and leapt the roadside ditch.

 

The bandits' tracks were clear enough to Havel in the field to the east of the road. They ran straight eastward towards the Willamette, went past an overgrown drainage ditch and became clearer still where they'd ridden down the wooded stream bank beyond, straight into Palmer Creek. That was where they'd hidden and waited for the tempting ranchers and their horse-herd to come north from the Crossing Tavern. They'd abandoned their plunder and those eastern-bred horses ran free through the roadside meadows, but all the gang members who'd managed to run away had done it on horseback. Havel leaned over in the saddle as they passed the mess of blankets and cooking pots and buzzing flies that told of the outlaws' wait, and kept to the front as they moved down the low slope to Palmer Creek.

His mount breasted the stream and the others put their horses to it as well, the beasts tossing their heads as they felt for footing; cold water poured into his boots and lapped at the—waterproof—lower edge of his bow case. His eyes scanned up through the trees and brush on the other side, and the edge of the water. The hoofprints there were fresh, still filling where they'd stamped down through the leafmold, bits of dirt fallen where the horses had taken the bank ahead. His own surged beneath him as it climbed out of the water in their wake.

“I make it eleven,” he said.

Luanne Larsson kicked one boot free of the stirrup and leaned far over in the saddle, holding to the horn. “Twelve,” she said, pushing her round bowl helm back by the nasal to examine the soft black soil. “Blood trail, there, though—don't know if it's the man or the horse,” she went on, swinging back erect.

“Halt for a bit, then. I want to get back into my gear.”

Signe and Havel dropped to the ground; their regular battle mounts were along on leading reins, and their own war harness was bundled across the saddles.

On the one hand, we're going someplace marshy,
Havel thought, as they helped each other into the hauberks.
On the other, it's someplace people might try to kill us. On the balance, I'll wear the armor. And we can handle a dozen raggedy-assed bandits, but there may be more of them
—probably are
more of them…

“I like a man who knows his mind,” Nigel Loring said; which was both a compliment and a hint. He looked Havel up and down. “Good gear, by the way.”

Havel nodded. “Easier to make in quantity than what you're wearing,” he replied. “Not that it isn't a pretty suit.”

“We took the design from museum pieces, actually,” the Englishman replied, pronouncing the word as
ekshually
. “Now, as to what we're doing…”

Havel settled his palm-broad sword belt, bloused the hauberk above it slightly—that shifted some of the weight to your hips—and pulled a map out of Trooper's saddlebag. The well-trained horse stayed steady as he spread it against the saddle.

“I originally planned to trap Crusher Bailey wherever he jumped me,” he said. “But the troops I had planned for that are now screening against the Protector's men who are chasing
you
. I…
really
don't want to let Crusher get away and rebuild his gang, either.”

He looked at his party; Signe and him, Eric and Luanne, and the three Englishmen; he knew his kinsfolk's quality, and from the look of it the foreigners were good men of their hands too. That wasn't surprising, from what he'd been told…

“So we're it. Let's push them hard enough they don't get any fancy ideas, like setting ambushes.”

Sir Nigel leaned over and looked at the map, then up at the country ahead. “Seems to be something that requires action,” he agreed. “And we certainly owe you a debt for your hospitality, Lord Bear. Alleyne, John?”

The other two nodded, Loring's son gravely, the bowman grinning from ear to ear. “Whatever you say, sir,” John Hordle said. “Never a dull moment!”

He had an accent that reminded Havel of Sam Aylward's, though not so thick. He was younger, perhaps in his late twenties, with a face like a ham, hands the size and shape of spades, little russet-brown eyes above a nose something had squashed years ago, and a shock of dark auburn hair and orange-hued close-cropped beard that did little to hide a thick scattering of freckles. He wore a green-enameled chain-mail shirt, and carried a longbow in the old medieval style, a simple tapered stave of yew, a full quiver of gaudily fletched arrows across his back; a long double-edged hand-and-a-half sword and a dagger hung at his waist. Eric blinked at him, obviously not much enjoying someone looming over him the way he did over most others; the Englishman would be six foot seven in his stocking feet, and Havel thought his shoulders were as broad as a Bearkiller sword was long, scabbard and all. The battle-gear made him look like a cross between a young Santa Claus and some ancient heathen god of war.

“Let's go, then,” the Bearkiller lord said, putting his foot in the stirrup.

They broke back into the sunshine, instinctively spreading out in the bright sunlight; past an abandoned sheet-metal building that bore the faded logo of a fruit-packing company, past derelict farmhouses and collapsing barns, through meadows blue with camas flowers and iris, red columbine and pale pink twin-flower growing more common as they headed southeast; bird and butterfly started up as the horses breasted the tall grass and weeds. The fleeing outlaws were not in sight, but their path was obvious enough. Then Luanne cried out:

“Horse! And man too, I think.”

The horse was standing with its head down and hidden in the rank growth nearly as tall as it was. The head came up as the Bearkillers and their guests approached, and it whinnied at them—or more probably, at their horses. A man struggled up too, clinging to a stirrup, falling back with a cry of despair as the horse shied, then scrambling awkwardly back into the saddle as it steadied. Luanne gave a whoop and unlimbered her lariat, whirling the loop of braided rawhide over her head as she charged. The fresher horse closed quickly. Luanne had been ranch-raised in Texas and an up-and-coming junior-rodeo star before the Change; the circle of leather rope landed neatly about the man's shoulders and jerked him screaming from the saddle as she snubbed the lariat to the horn of hers.

The others reined in; the man was lying half-stunned, weeping and cursing and trying to staunch a stab wound in one shoulder which he couldn't reach with the lariat on him. Luanne kept the tension on the braided rawhide expertly tight, backing her mount whenever the outlaw tried to get any slack on it.

Havel smiled grimly and swung out of the saddle, drawing his sword. The outlaw howled as the Bearkiller's boot caught him on the wound; he could do no more than paw feebly as he was disarmed. The cries of pain and panic died away to a frantic gurgle as he felt the prick of a sword point under his jaw. The fallen man bared yellow snaggled teeth in a doglike grin of submission, their look fruit of malnutrition and neglect since the Change; Havel judged he'd been about twelve back then.

“Look at me, you worthless sack of shit,” Havel said, pushing the helmet back so that his face was clear; he'd discarded the irritating contacts some time ago. “Who am I?”

The sweating face went even paler beneath its fuzz of mouse-colored beard. “Oh, Christ,
Lord Bear
.”

“Bingo first time, asshole; the guy you just tried to rob and kill. You listening?” A fractional nod and a wince as it moved against the shaving-sharp point of the sword. “So you know my word's good. Here's the deal. Lead us in to your hideout—we know pretty much where it is, so don't get any bright ideas about stranding us in the swamp—plus telling us everything we want to know, and you get to live. Yes or no?”

“Shit—Crusher, he'll—”

Havel put a little pressure on the sword point, and a bead of blood appeared; the outlaw jerked fractionally, turning it into a trickle. The Bear Lord transferred the point of the long blade to the tip of the bandit's nose; it followed his movements with mechanical precision, and he stared at it with cross-eyed fascination.

“What exactly is Crusher Bailey going to do to you that I can't?” Havel asked reasonably. “And I'm right here. He isn't.”

The bandit's eyes shifted to the ring of figures around him, then desperately to the bright world beyond. It would be hard to die on a spring day…