The Protector's War (52 page)

“Now, we've dedicated this town to the God and the Goddess, and that's something else to celebrate. There's one thing I want each and every one of you to remember, though: That does
not
mean that it's any less the hometown of our friends and kinfolk who still follow other ways. There are many pathways; what matters is that they head for the same place, and rightly walked, they all do. Remember that!”

And don't be unkind to poor Reverend Jennings and his flock,
she thought, nodding to where they stood among the crowd. Dwindling and aging though they were; not more than one in five here in Sutterdown, less elsewhere in the Clan's territories. And few of them under thirty these days; she suspected their children would be the last Christians among the Mackenzies.
Poor wee, well-meaning, bewildered man.

She raised her arms and her voice, casting it to reach them all.
“And listen to the words of the Great Mother, Who of old was called Artemis, Astarte, Dione, Melusine, Aphrodite, Ceridwen, Diana, Arianrhod, Brigid…Sing, feast, dance, make music and make love, all in My presence, for My law is love unto all beings…all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals.”

She paused, put her hands on her hips, and tossed her head. “Well then, what would you be waiting for the now? Didn't you hear what the Goddess just said? Get out there and have fun, by Divine command! Go! Scat!”

The drums roared, and a long chain of dancers began to weave its way through the flower-decked streets.

 

It was the third night of the Beltane festival, and Juniper Mackenzie and her First Armsman were down in the parkland outside Sutterdown's western gate. Juniper's mask was that of a raven; it overshadowed her mouth without covering it, which was convenient as she watched the dancers and nibbled on a skewer of chicken grilled with an intriguing honey-mustard-garlic glaze. By unspoken convention, festival masks meant you weren't really you, and so nobody could approach her on business.

She felt a little hoarse from the singing she'd done over the past days, and the talking; her legs were slightly sore with all the dancing. She'd been around a dozen maypoles, and presided at games and contests, in archery and swordplay, running and wrestling and jumping, music and dancing, judged pie-baking and embroidery and cabbages of unusual size and children's cherished hand-reared prize sheep. The festival
had
been fun; also useful, taking the pulse of her folk, chatting with leaders from this dun and that, quite a few quiet sessions with the Brannigans and others prominent here in Sutterdown; they'd agreed to repay help they'd had with the town wall by assisting several smaller settlements to improve their defenses, and take a lead in the building of Dun Laurel.

The likelihood of another serious clash with the Protector had been glumly accepted.

Other needful things had gotten hammered out: the new high school, a preliminary consensus to clear the pilings of the bridges in Salem at low water, after Lughnassadh, if they could get the Bearkillers to help, which she was fairly confident of. The look and range of goods brought to sell or swap also told her much about how farms and workshops and trade were going, as much as Andy Trethar's record books. Things were going well, or would be if war wasn't looming over them; in some ways her people were better off than the Bearkillers. They seemed to have a broader range of handicraft skills, if perhaps less machinery, and they didn't have to support a group of full-time fighters either, or Corvallis's heroic but slightly crazed determination to keep their university in being.

To top it all off, Rudi had led the Juniper Ravens—his Junior Little League team—to triumph in the inter-sept competition just that afternoon, and was now sleeping off a well-earned ice-cream gorge back at the hostel Sutterdown's Ravens had set up in an old building for the use of visiting members of their sept. Most of the town's residents were of the Elk totem, and many had been Elks even before the Change, but there were a fair scattering of others.

Juniper gave a reminiscent smile that verged on a purr.
Speaking of topping…
On the second day of the festival she'd also managed a
very
pleasant time of her own in a Beltane bower with a friendly Sutterdown shoemaker of her acquaintance, a handsome man who had extremely educated hands.

And Sam and I got something still more private yet put together, too,
she thought with a mixture of grim resignation and wistfulness.
I've plenty of good friends, but love, that hasn't come my way. Someday, Goddess willing…

The pair near the bonfire were doing a sword dance in modern Mackenzie style, only distantly related to the old Scottish version. Here the swords were Clan-style short swords rather than claymores, and they were laid in turf with one edge down and the other up, points inward to make a circle divided into four Quarters. The dance was done with a partner, though still with one hand on the waist and the other high, and it involved a good deal of stepping and leaping; the tune was “Ghillie Chalium,” which began slow and then went more and more swiftly as fifes and pipes squealed, bodhrans rattled, and the fiddle rang.

She'd managed to insist that the sword blades be dulled first, and that had become the rule—she hoped. She'd never been one to think that life could be made smooth and safe altogether, but…

It's appalling, the younger generation's attitude towards risk!

“I'm keeping an eye on that young man,” she said aloud.

“Me too,” Aylward replied; his wolf mask was pushed back so that he could tip up the mug he held, full of Brannigan's Special, a dark Guinnesslike malt brew of extraordinary potency. “Moves like a big cat, doesn't he?”

The dancer in question was Rowan Carson Mackenzie, one of the leading lights of Dun Carson, whose heart had been his father's farmstead before the Change; he'd changed his name from Raymond when he became a Dedicant. He was in his midtwenties, a broad-shouldered long-limbed man two inches over six feet, arms heavy-muscled from his trade of blacksmith and bladesmith, with a jut-jawed face. Like most male Mackenzies his age he shaved his beard save for a mustache and wore his hair at shoulder length, spilling from under his flat bonnet in a flaxen torrent and whirling with the effort of the dance. His sister Cynthia was dancing with him, and their feet flashed and blurred as the pace of the music picked up and they sprang from one Quarter to another.

“He's big, which rarely hurts,” Aylward went on. “Strong as a bloody ox, which
never
hurts, and he's very quick, which is even more important. Works hard at it too; you've seen him with that ax he made.”

Juniper nodded, finishing the kebab and tossing the stick into a trash barrel. She had seen it; the weapon was much like Dennie's, built to the ancient Viking pattern, and Rowan handled it like a willow switch at practice or in competitions. He'd fought with it, too—against bandits, and in a few border skirmishes with raiders from the Protectorate—and won a fearful name. She had her doubts about that ax…And before that, he'd been just barely old enough to be in that initial battle with Arminger's men, back in the harvest summer of the first Change Year.

“Good shot, too, if not quite as good as Cynthia,” Aylward enthused. “Bends a heavier bow than hers, of course—heavier than me. And he's clever, and he's got motivation.”

“That's why I've got my eye on him,” Juniper said. “Perhaps a little too much motivation, Sam?”

“Natural enough, Lady,” he said. “After all, Arminger's men did kill 'is father, back in the first Change Year.”

Juniper shook her head. “Cynthia hates Arminger because he killed their father,” she said. “Rowan's…obsessive about it. I meant that I was keeping an eye on him to see if I could help ease his soul, somehow. Black hatred like that damages you more than the one it's aimed at.”

Aylward shrugged and spread his hands, and Juniper sighed in turn. They were close friends, but that didn't mean they saw everything the same way—or that they should, of course.

“Perfect for this job we have in mind, though,” he said. “Both of them are good at rough-country work.”

Juniper nodded. “At least they're well past twenty-one,” she said. “I don't want to second-guess you on your job, Sam, but aren't most of the rest a bit…young? I doubt the average is much above voting age. Sanjay and Dan Barstow don't shave much more than their sister Aoife.”

He nodded towards the Carsons. “They're older than those two were, the first fight we had,” he pointed out.

“We were desperate and fighting at our doorsteps.”

“Thing is, Lady, it's the younger ones who've had the most training now, and at the most impressionable ages, especially the ones we've picked for this job. The best archers start with the bow as a kiddie. They've grown up rough, too, rougher than anyone our age. On this trip they'll need all the youthful endurance they can get. And they're…more adjusted to the circumstances, if you take my meaning. Also they're less likely to have young children of their own.”

“What about you and me?” she said, with a quirking smile.

He shrugged again. “I've got enough age and treachery to make up for youth and strength,” he said. “And you're needful for the political side.”

The dance ended with a long-drawn roll from the bodhrans and squeal from the pipes, and a chorus of hoots and claps. Flushed and happy, the brother and sister came over to where they stood—which was near a table that bore beer kegs and mugs, and trays of eatables.

She smiled at their greetings as they tapped the barrel. “Rowan, Cynthia, merry met. All's well at home? Are Joanne and Jack along? I should have asked before, but the Sutterdowners have been running me from one thing to the next.”

“Joanne's fine and sends regards, Lady Juniper, but she didn't fancy the trip seven months along,” Rowan said. “Besides which, little Morianna has just learned how to say
no
.”

Juniper winced and laughed, and raised her mug. “All my sympathies. And you, sir, are a black traitor to run out on Joanne at such a time. And yours?” she went on to his sister.

“Sean's well over that fever, and little Niamh's fine too—I keep telling this hulking lout, all you have to do is say
Want to take a nap?
and then right afterward
Want a cookie?
Do that a couple of times, and they learn
no
isn't the answer to every single thing. Jack wanted to keep a close eye on the new vineyard, though, and we're just putting in the foundations for the crusher.”

“Brannigan's vineyard needs some competition,” Juniper agreed.

Cynthia's brother smiled a wolfish smile. “And neither of our spouses are around to try to talk us out of…something.”

“Ah, and here's two more,” Juniper said, giving him a quelling glance.

A chant went up in the middle distance:

Then it turned into a cheer as a pair took a run and leapt over a bonfire flaring in a trench. The group broke up in laughter and shouts, streaming away to the high-school amphitheater where
Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne
was being put on. All but the pair who'd leapt for luck and love; they walked over to Juniper, and turned out to be Astrid and Eilir. They joined the two from Dun Carson at the barrels, and then in a circle around the Chief.

I finally got her out of the covenstead,
Eilir signed.
Meditation and prayer, prayer and meditation! It would be too much for Samhain, and this is
Beltane,
for Her sweet sake!

Astrid flushed a little and opened her mouth, but Juniper held up a hand. “Dear, Eilir's right. For us, this world isn't a preparation for another. The God and Goddess
are
the world, and it's our rightful dwelling-place; to know Them, you have to live
in
it. It's the Summerlands that are a preparation for coming right back
here
—another life is a gift, not the loss of nirvana. Remember the Charge of the Goddess!”

Crossing Tavern, Willamette Valley, Oregon

May 12th, 2007 AD—Change Year Nine

“
I
thought you had some direct action in mind, back on Gunpowder Day,” Mike Havel said. “Good for you. If Arminger's barons think they can violate the truce on the quiet whenever they like, I'll be damned if we can't do likewise.”

He grinned. “And each of us can blame it on the others.”

Juniper nodded. “It's a cunning fellow you are, Mike. We left Chuck and Judy in charge at Dun Juniper, and the fair at Sutterdown this Beltane was a good cover for what we had to do. No better time to gather the right people secretly, and to leave unnoticed.”

What a wealth of living that packs into a couple of sentences,
Juniper thought, looking around the Crossing Tavern's private room at them. Mike's eyes, friendly and shrewd and as ruthless as a wolf in winter as his strong white teeth ripped the meat off a pork rib; his Signe's blue gaze, intelligent and not in the least friendly; the calm strength of Will Hutton that always reminded her of Sam, and the polite curiosity of the English group.

“Arminger has been nipping at us for years, and we've been nipping right back,” she said, taking a sip of her ale. “It was time to sink some real fangs right in his arse. And while there may or may not have been an underground of Witches in Europe in the old days, there most certainly is in the Protectorate this ninth year of the Change, and other folk who're friendly to us and not him—secretly, of course. Relatives of those who've made it out and settled among us, for starters. First our people gathered by twos and threes, slipping away and eastward, up into the mountains on the old tracks.”

“Safer than trying to sneak over the border around Salem, say?” Mike asked.

“Less conspicuous, certainly,” Juniper said. “Except for the odd hunter not many go up into the high country these days, and most of those stick to the lower levels; the game's thicker there, and it's safer. We've never been able to scour the mountains completely clean of bandits and Eaters, not north of Route 20 at least. Too big, and too far from our duns. We can't spare the people for constant patrols. Plus there are too many ways to slip over the mountains.”

“Yeah,” Will Hutton growled. “Them CORA folks, they don't watch any of their side as close as they should, 'cept maybe the main passes. Lots of wanderin' folk and broken men east of the mountains, always a few coming on to the west. Worse these last two years, with the war in the Pendleton country.”

Juniper nodded. “But nothing that's a threat to a big well-armed party, so we drew together at Elk Lake, and worked our way north to Table Rock in three separate groups, not too far apart. Forest country, still a bit chilly and wet in May, but tolerable if you know how. The Protector doesn't entirely ignore that area, though. It's where runaway serfs head for, to begin with…”

 

Table Rock Wilderness, Willamette Valley, Oregon

May 6th, 2007 AD—Change Year Nine

 

Not enough birds,
Juniper thought suddenly.

This land near Table Rock was home to many; she'd been listening to a golden-crowned kinglet until just a second ago. All at once they were silent, on both steep slopes above and below the trail…

“Whoa!” someone exclaimed, up near the head of the column.

The Mackenzies halted; it was eight, just two hours after sunrise, and May was still chilly enough in the mountains for the horse's breath to show as white plumes of steam in air crystal-clear and scented with fir sap and pine. Juniper could see over the heads of the dozen or so on foot ahead of her. She went mounted as a concession to age and rank; there wasn't enough grass on these upland trails for more to ride, unless you wanted to get into a circular-argument trap where more horses carried fodder so you could have more horses carrying fodder. She still didn't see what was ahead for a moment, because her mount was forgetting its training, snorting and trying to rear on the narrow forest track. From the sound of it, so were the four packhorses behind her. Where they thought they could go was a mystery, since the land was forty-five degrees from vertical in all directions and densely covered in big trees and underbrush.

Bear
was her first thought, when she saw what blocked the trail, along with minor irritation; they were common here in the western Cascades and most likely it would trundle off soon enough. Then she got a better look; brown, higher at the shoulders than the rump, dished face, and big—very, very big.

Grizzly! What did the man say? “I expected this, but not so soon!”

There had been rumors of grizzly sightings in the last couple of years, but nothing confirmed—like wolves and buffalo, they'd been half wishful tale rather than fact. This was Old Eph right enough, an adult male with the beginnings of the whitening on his hump hairs. Probably he'd been born right after the Change, and wandered in westward from the Montana-Wyoming mountains, or down from British Columbia, looking to stake out his own feeding ground. Grizzlies needed big territories to support their bulk, and with guns gone and humans scarce again they were spreading fast throughout their historic range. In Oregon that meant everywhere except some of the southeastern deserts, but she hadn't thought they'd make it this far in only nine years. A jolt of excitement went through her as she watched the majestic beast move its long neck back and forth enquiringly.

At least Earth is healing Herself. Thanks and praise, Lord Cernunnos of the Forests, Lady Artemis of the Beasts!

Then she decided it was perhaps more pleasant to contemplate the bear's majesty at a distance; say, viewed through binoculars across a valley and a nice swift creek. And that up close like this it was perhaps more exciting than she wished; grizzlies were a
lot
more temperamental than ordinary black bears. This one looked to be still slightly gaunt from winter, and hungry. It also seemed to be sniffing the air with mounting interest, which was unfortunate—it could smell the horses. And even more, the blood-and-meat scent of the butchered mule deer carcass slung over one of them.

They'd split the Mackenzie war band into three to work their way through these mountains, with the Rangers scouting on ahead and carrying messages between the columns. Sam was with one group, Cynthia led another, and Juniper presided over this, with Rowan handling most of the actual leading. He was near the head of the column, and flung up a hand to freeze everyone in place. Two in the lead leveled battle spears; the rest put arrow to string and made ready to draw; the movements were quick, fluid. The razor edges of the broadheads glinted in the olive-green gloom of the morning forest as light flickered through the needles of the Douglas firs and hemlocks.

“Shall I shoot?” someone said.

The archers sidled out to get a clear field of fire; that wasn't easy given the footing, but the path did curve a little towards the west. Between them they could probably put a dozen shafts into the beast inside a second, but…

“Don't be a fool,” Rowan said, his voice steady but pitched low. “There aren't enough of us to use the meat and we can't pack the hide out, and he might get through to us anyway. Shoot if he charges or I say so. And get those horses under control!”

Juniper did; she was riding Eilir's Celelroch, and the well-trained beast quickly subsided into tense quiet. Between her daughter's knees the Arab mare probably wouldn't have started acting up at all; Juniper was a good rider, Eilir a superb one. The people tending the pack animals took a little longer, and the bear was getting more curious about the smells of blood and meat.

Rowan stepped up between the spearmen—although one of them was a spearwoman, if you wanted to get picky. His shaggy hooded war cloak made the big blond man look even larger—it was loose-meshed cloth mottled in shades of green-brown, and sewn thickly with narrow dangling loops. This last day, they'd all taken the time to stick twigs and vegetation in the loops, which made you look bulkier except when you were keeping very still, in which case it made you near-as-no-matter invisible. Rowan faced the bear and slid his bow into the crook of his arm. His right hand reached out, and effortlessly snapped off a thumb-thick, arm-long branch from a hemlock that rose from lower down the slope to stand beside the trail.

“Peace between us today, brother bear,” he said. “You go your way, and we'll go ours. Everyone get ready!”

Juniper echoed the thought in her head, her hand making a sign, concentrating her will like a dart.
So mote it be!

Rowan took the branch in his left hand; now his right moved to his belt, slowly and carefully, and brought out a lighter. The alcohol-soaked wick caught immediately as his thumb spun flint against steel in a shower of sparks, and the hemlock needles went up with a
woosh
as he touched the flame to them. Then he waved it overhead, yelling; to the bear's senses a twelve-foot figure tipped with the terror of fire. The rest of the party raised their arms and waved them as well, shouting nonsense—or in a couple of cases, prayers. The bear half reared, nostrils wrinkling, and let out a deep moaning grunt of protest that showed its long yellow teeth.

Juniper had noticed years ago that predators were less afraid of humans since the Change; even before that they'd known the difference between a man with a gun and one without quite well, and they'd quickly realized that the dangerous noisemakers were gone. They were still wary of fire, though, and by now the bear's weak eyes and keen ears must have noticed that there were a good many of the irritating, noisy bipeds as well as the tempting smell of food. Hunger and aggravation warred with caution, and then the great beast turned and crashed off into the rhododendron thickets. The noise of its passage gradually dwindled, and the normal forest sounds replaced it.

Phew!
she thought, shaken.
That could have been unfortunate!

The clansfolk waited until the bear was obviously gone; a member of the sept named for him gathered tufts of cinnamon fur from the bushes, chuckling with delight as he wrapped them in a rag and tucked them into a pouch—they would make much-admired marks for his bonnet clasp, and fine gifts for friends who were of his totem. The rest kept their eyes busy, then calmly resumed their steady ground-eating pace; a few discussed the meeting in low tones for a while, then went quiet again. She knew that was mostly simple prudence; they weren't very near enemy-controlled territory yet, but they were well north of any area the Mackenzies controlled or made safe. Yet most of it was that they simply didn't care much, beyond having an interesting story to tell when they got home.

I do not understand the younger generation of our Clan,
she thought, shaking her head a little.
I love them, but I do not understand them, even my own dear son. And even Eilir is stranger to me than she would have been, in the old world.

Most of those here were younger than her daughter, who'd been fourteen nine years ago; Rowan was the eldest at twenty-six. Only blurred childhood memories of the time before the Change remained to the youngsters, and that had left its mark. It was more obvious on this venture, days alone with her juniors.

What is it exactly?
she thought.
It's not just that they're hardy and tough. So are Sam or Chuck…or myself myself, to be sure. Or that they're devout Witches; so am I, and a legion of our converts are wildly so, like drowning folk clutching at a sturdy log. I think it's that they just…take it all for granted. They're not haunted by the Change, this is their world. And it's not that they believe in the Craft; it's the
way
they do. It's not an affirmation with them; they believe the way we believed in atoms.

Plus they didn't hold themselves quite like late-twentieth-century Americans, or walk like them, or sit like them…and there was an indefinable something in their speech, too.
And in the way they treat me.
It wasn't the sometimes embarrassing reverence of those who'd joined the Clan in the Dying Time and lived because of it, although there was a deep respect. They were ready enough to banter with her, or argue for that matter, but underlying it…

The fact of the matter is they really
do
think of me as the Goddess-on-Earth, and they're easy with that, too—a lot easier than I! They've grown up foreign to me and their parents, and that's the long and short of it. Their children will be more alien still.
Juniper shook her head.
Later,
she decided.
Time to think of such things later.

The season was less advanced than down in the warmer lowlands to the west, earth wet underfoot, a damp chill in the air whenever they were out of the sun, but the effort kept them all warm. The path wound through forest still as the long day wore on into midafternoon; they were pushing to reach their destination well before nightfall, and merely gnawed biscuit or other trail food as they walked, and swigged from canteens. This had been private land, mostly regularly harvested for timber and replanted. Nine years hadn't changed it all that much, although fires had left patches of open ground where bushy thin-leaf huckleberry grew thickly in a profusion of small yellow flowers, mixed with manzanita pink. Wildlife and birds were thicker too, in this rich edge habitat without many human hunters; the paths and trails more overgrown, kept open more by paw and hoof than boot or wheel.