The Protector's War (53 page)

The peaks about weren't tall, even their destination was a bit under five thousand feet, but they made a tangle of sharp ridges and deep V-shaped valleys, mostly densely covered in trees right to their summits, woven with a net of creeks and small lakes. Now and then a view opened up to the east and showed the white cone of Mt. Jefferson, and sometimes the Three Sisters farther southward, less often Mt. Hood far to the northeast. Mostly the land reared in close about them. Then they passed an old fallen park sign, deep in a swale, and angled east behind a tall butte.

A sound not quite like a chickadee greeted them. Using the signal was wise; when the war-cloaked figure rose from the side of the trail nobody sank an arrow through the body beneath. A hand in an archer's glove threw the hood back above a Mackenzie helmet covered in the same fabric, and an implausibly young face grinned at them. Black eyes snapped in a brown face beneath a shock of raven hair that showed around the edge of his bowl helmet—it was Sanjay Barstow Mackenzie, one of the adoptees Chuck and Judy had rescued from a stalled schoolbus just after the Change, while they were on their own journey from Eugene to Juniper's cabin.

“The Archer sends greeting, and you're where you were supposed to be,” the young man said; he was just turned nineteen. His voice held a slight sardonic edge, as if he was surprised to find them there. “He says Nohorn Butte there will hide you from Table Rock if you're careful with your fires.”

“Tell Sam to teach his grannie how to suck eggs,” Rowan growled. “What sort of idiot does he take me for?”

Sanjay's grin grew wider: “Well, he didn't specify what
sort
exactly, but if you want me to
guess
I could come up with a few—” He cut off at Rowan's snort, and went back to business: “The Dunedain say it's just as our secret Witch-kin in Molalla said: a launcher, and a lookout station there. They'll lead us into position before dawn, and you're to be ready for the frontal attack on the signal—three fire arrows, out over the gate.”

Juniper nodded. “We'll be ready,” she said.

Sanjay took in the disassembled mule deer slung across one packsaddle; they'd done a rough job of draining and butchering, then packed the meat and edible organs back into the hide in a shapeless blood-wet bundle.

“Ah, you were lucky, by Cernunnos!” he said.

“Ah, you mean we were
quiet,
” Rowan boasted. “He crossed the path not a hundred feet ahead of me. One shaft—the heart—ten paces and he dropped.”

To be sure, he's still a young man,
Juniper thought, smiling to herself.

“Lucky I said; lucky I meant,” Sanjay jibed.

“Ah, you mean we can
shoot,
” another of the party chuckled. “And Cernunnos rewarded us for it.”

“Well, the Horned Lord may have taken
pity
on you,” Sanjay returned.

Even as they joked, two of the Mackenzies were lifting the hundred-odd pounds of meat to the ground; they opened the hide, cut some of the raw leather loose and rewrapped a thigh and half the ribs in it. Others helped Sanjay load it into his oiled-leather backpack. The slender fine-boned young man's step didn't falter when another forty pounds went on his back, along with the weight of his brigandine and weapons and gear. He touched the stave of his longbow to his helmet brow in salute to Juniper and disappeared into the woods upslope, climbing the hillside in a series of springy elastic bounds without touching his hands to ground or trunk, kilt swirling around his thighs, the dandy-gaudy peacock fletchings of his arrows bobbing.

“This is a good place,” Rowan said, looking around. “Aidan, Donnal, Susie, get water. Tom, Ed, Silvermoon, you're first watch. The rest of you, set up camp here. I'll make the fire.”

Juniper rubbed her jaw to hide a smile; evidently he'd taken Sam's warning to heart. She went to help those setting up a picket line to hold the horses; that was a rope stretched between two trees, and a pile of oats and alfalfa pellets from the sacks for each beast. They were out of the logged-over section here, into what had been National Wilderness territory; the trees were tall, a hundred feet or better in mixed stands of hemlocks and firs—Douglas, silver and grand—mostly grown up since the last wildfire went through here over a century ago. By the side of the stream a little southeast were some Douglas firs that looked to be four or five times that age, towering living columns near two hundred feet high and twelve through at the base.

All these mountains will look like this, when Eilir's grandchildren walk them,
Juniper thought, looking up into that majesty.

Undergrowth was sparser under the shade of the canopy, save where the steep rock just north kept out the roots of the big firs; the crest was five hundred feet above them, and Aylward was right—it would hide anything but a pillar of smoke nicely.

“Sunset's in about five hours,” she said.

Rowan put the lower tip of his bowstave to the earth, looked at the length of the shadow it cast and nodded; then he glanced up at the three-quarter moon—up since two hours past noon, and it wouldn't set until about the same before dawn.

“Hmmm,” he said. “Rendezvous on the way with Cynthia at two hours past midnight. Call it four and half miles to Table Rock as the raven flies, another threeonfoot…three hours' travel, and the pace to leave us fresh at the end. Plenty of time if we leave at sunset, and we'll all be the better for a meal and some rest.”

She opened herself to the weather, looked at the sky, sniffed deeply. “More cloud later, though not soon. Perhaps a little rain. Damp and heavy dew, certainly. That'll lay scent and muffle sound.”

Rowan nodded again; he broke the deadwood for the fire himself, feeling to make sure it was bone-dry all the way through, to burn without smoke. Then he set up a screen of woven branches before he kindled it with his lighter, making a fire that quickly turned to embers low and hot. The meat of the deer was cut into chunks and strung on sticks, with no seasoning but salt as it sizzled at the edges of the fire. Soon he was saying over and over again:

“Keep that back there, the Dagda club you dead, don't drip more grease on the coals, keep it off to the side, it makes less smoke that way!”

To go with it two thin griddle plates were set over the coals; onto them went a batter made from stream water and the coarse meal everyone carried in their haversacks. It had baking powder and salt already mixed with the stone-ground flour, and it quickly rose and bubbled and browned into a thick biscuitlike wheat cake that went well with the last of the strong-tasting sour-cream butter in its Tupperware container. Despite the packhorses, they had only the most basic foodstuffs along; the bulk of the loads were weapons and tools to make them—bowstaves, strings, arrowheads, bowyer's draw knives and little printed booklets on the art of turning Pacific yew into longbows.

Gifts, so to speak,
Juniper thought a little grimly.
To the Protectorate's common folk.

She juggled a hot gobbet of deer's liver from hand to hand until she could bite into it and lick the delicious juices from her fingers. Someone made an inarticulate sound of pleasure, then said:

“Venison always tastes better like this.”

“When you're famished?” Juniper said. “Of course!
Is maith an t-anlann an t-ocras.
Hunger is a good sauce.”

A small cauldron boiled water for herb tea—they had some water-purification powder along, but it tasted bad and the folk in Corvallis charged the earth for it. Bringing creek water to a hard rolling boil for fifteen minutes killed the giardia parasites just as dead, and a few handfuls of herbs were easy enough to carry. Cold, the excess would go into their canteens.

One of the watch came in to report, and to take food back to his companions. “Silvermoon's up on the crest,” he said, jerking a thumb in that direction. “And yes, I reminded her not to let the binoculars flash when she had them pointing west. Nothing between here and there that she can see.”

He made a wide circling gesture. “No man-sign on any side, either; not recent enough to see, at least. I don't think they patrol this far.”

Juniper nodded. “That post is there to watch for people trying to get
out
of the Protector's territory,” she said. “There's nothing east of here for a hundred miles except the Cascades, and he holds Highway 25 and 26. And Hood River northeast, but he has that too.”

When Tom had gone off with two bark plates loaded with food for his friends there was nothing much to do but smother the fire with shovelfuls of dirt—and only then with a bucket of water. They all made a murmured apology for disturbing the earth here, laid out their crumbs as an offering for the birds and the spirit of the crag, and settled in to wait. Some went over their gear again, checking the fletching on their arrows, flexing their brigandines to make sure all the rivets that held the metal plates between the layers of canvas or leather were sound, scanning every inch of their longbows for cracks and the horn tips to make sure they were still tightly glued.

The
veeep…veeep…
of steel on hone sounded quietly, as the blades of swords and spears and dirks, the edges of arrowheads, were ground a little sharper. It was the sort of obsessive detail-work you did on tools that might mean the difference between life and death; then everyone went over the maps one last time. When that was done, many of the young warriors sat in facing pairs, painting each other's faces and hands with triskeles, spirals, abstract patterns, or the forms of their totems. Sam disapproved of the fashion for painting up before a fight—he claimed it reminded him too much of football hooligans in the old days back in England—but even the First Armsman hadn't been able to forbid it. When it was finished Rowan's face was overlain with a dragon's in gold and black and scarlet, with the tail curving around his neck.

And to think I once thought I was joking when I told Dennie that he'd have them all painting their faces blue if he kept up with the Celticity,
she thought.
Little did I imagine! Here I'm to blame, though. The patterns are all from my library. Who knew just loaning books would…well, there's not much else to do in wintertime, at that.

Those who'd finished set gear by and rested quietly; a few lovers went aside—they might be dead this time tomorrow—and others played cards, tossed dice, or told stories. She heard a snatch of that: “…and then he said as the outlaw turned at bay: 'This is the most powerful war bow in the clan, and even I can't hold the draw forever. So tell me, punk, do you feel
lucky?
”

Rowan took extra care with his great war ax, rubbing a swatch of raw wool up and down the smooth ashwood shaft, checking the rawhide binding at the lower end, taking out a pocket hone to touch up the broad curved cutting surface. That had a blade of hard spring steel, welded with forge fire and hammer into the mass of a head made out of twisted bundles of softer low-carbon rebar; that let the rear face serve as a smashing hammer on targets that would shatter the cutting edge. When he was finally satisfied he rubbed the wool over the metal—the lanolin kept rust from starting—and slipped on a leather cover fastened with a snap.

It was a trifle cruder than Dennie's weapon, but skillfully made, and graven with runes and symbols that had made her blink a little the first time she'd seen it bare and close enough to read them.

And made me wonder where he dug
those
up. They weren't in any book
I
lent to DunCarson! Bane and blight and ruin were worked into that metal with every hammer stroke. I'd as soon
go into battle with a rattlesnake in my naked hand! Yes, it's a terrible weapon, but it will betray him in the end; doesn't he realize that?

Quiet fell. Juniper Mackenzie set herself cross-legged, controlled breathing, brought up the image of a still pond reflecting the crescent moon and sank inward. More and more of the others followed her, unless they had immediate tasks to do. When she stirred it was just short of the time for leaving; the westering sun touched the distant Coast Range, and eastward the high Cascade snows burned crimson along the horizon of encroaching night. Overhead the moon shone through patches of clear sky and glowed when streamers of white haze covered it; the air smelled moist.

“Come,” she said, and they knelt in a Circle around symbols scratched into the dirt with a dirk for an athame—but the best symbol for a sharp knife was still a sharp knife.

Here could be no elaborate rite; nor was this one she would have chosen to lead, except from hard necessity. The quiet words still rang in her mouth and in the cold wind that blew along her spine and into mind and heart. And at last:

“…so come to us, Lugh of the Shining Spear, Dread Lord, mighty Warrior, All-Conquering Sun; come to us, Badb-Macha-Neman called the Morrigan, Great Queen of Battles, raven-winged and strong, Chooser of the Slain! Your own faithful people call upon You, and to You we dedicate the acorn harvest of the red field. Arise and come with storm and terror, in blood and in wrath! So mote it be!”