The Steerswoman's Road (61 page)

“Don’t you wonder what a wizard likes?” Bel asked Kammeryn. “What
he feels makes his life good? I do. And I keep thinking: power. And what does
he think will make his life better? More power. If Slado wants more power, when
will he stop? When a harmless steers-woman did nothing more than ask questions
about pretty gems, he sent his underlings to hunt her and kill her. I know, I
was there, and we barely escaped with our lives. And Slado is spreading his
power: he’s been making new holdings in the Inner Lands, and if he keeps on
doing it, so that his puppet wizards are everywhere in that country, what do
you think comes next, Kammeryn?”

Kammeryn spoke without hesitation. “No wizard can reach us
here. They are far away.”

Bel held his gaze; she did not speak; she pointed to the
sky.

A man to the left of the circle indicated a desire to speak.
Kammeryn was long in recognizing him; his eyes were still on Bel’s, but they
were shuttered, shielding the thoughts moving behind them.

“Perhaps,” the old man began after receiving permission, “perhaps,
as the steerswoman said, this wizard couldn’t stop the Guidestar from falling.
Perhaps he’s growing weaker, not stronger.”

Bel turned to him. “Then, what does a person do when he’s losing
his strength and doesn’t want anyone to know?”

And it was the seyoh who answered, thoughtfully. “He uses
what strength he has more often. More forcefully. And more visibly.”

“Whether he’s growing or fading, for us, it’s the same
result,” Bel said. “He’ll come here; or he’ll send his minions; or he’ll send
his magic. We have to be ready.” She drew a breath. “This is what the
steerswoman needs from you: to travel with this tribe, as long as it moves her
nearer to the fallen Guidestar, and to be free to leave when it doesn’t. And
this is what I need from you: to come and go, leave and return freely, anytime
I choose.”

There was a stir. Several persons wished to speak,
requesting permission by glance or gesture.

Bel spoke louder, as if the flurry were audible as well as
visible. “If we come near another tribe,” she told the council, “I need to
speak to them, and tell them everything we’ve just told you. It’ll do no good
for only one tribe to be prepared. I have to tell them all.”

Kammeryn waited as the requests slowly subsided, until only
one member persisted.

It was a dark-haired man past middle age, his face and neck
crossed by scars. “That’s too dangerous. We don’t know if we can trust you. You
might betray us to another tribe, and bring them down on our herds.”

“I won’t.”

“They might follow you back to us.”

“I won’t let that happen.”

“How could you stop it?”

“I’m very good.”

“If you stay among us, then your duty is to this tribe, and
no other. You follow our laws, abide by the words of our seyoh, and do nothing
that risks our safety.”

“There’s a higher duty than duty to the tribe.”

“No.” The man showed no emotion. “It is the only duty. If
this tribe suffers, if our people die, then what does it matter what happens to
strangers?” He turned to Kammeryn. “Let them stay for seven days, then send
them away. For anything else, you need a consensus. If you call for a
consensus, I will not agree.”

Bel slapped her hand down forcefully on the carpet. “My
people are in danger, or they will be, all tribes, all Outskirters. If not
soon, then one day, and who can say when?” She faced Kammeryn. “If you don’t
help them, you’re hurting them. Your tribe. Yourself.”

“Can Outskirters fight wizards?” Rowan was surprised to hear
herself asking.

Bel looked at her: the first acknowledgment of Rowan’s presence
since Bel had finished asking questions and cuing answers from a steerswoman. “It
doesn’t matter if we can. We will.” Then she seemed to speak to herself, but
clearly, definitely. “Everything I know about Slado and his wizards, I hate.
Everything I know about my people, I love. And this is what I love best about
them: They fight.”

Dismissed, Rowan and Bel left the council to continue its
deliberations. Rowan felt dazed by the turn of events; distractedly, she gazed
around the camp.

A spit was turning over the fire in the center, tended by an
old woman who spoke to a child as she worked, the child squealing laughter.
The two mertutials who had dug the fire pit were standing to one side of their
creation, prodding the ashes with a stick and shaking their heads in vague
dissatisfaction. A group of warriors lounging outside their tent were engaged
in a discussion that alternated quiet words with bursts of hilarity. Garvin sat
on the bare ground by Averryl’s tent, deep in conversation with the small
blond boy who had guarded the rain fly during the invasion of goats. In the
distance, someone was blowing a series of breathy notes on a flute, with much
experimentation, very little skill, and a few frustrated curses.

The Outskirters were dressed much as Bel was and spoke in
accents little different from hers. To Rowan, they seemed each to carry a similar
air: a combination of confidence, straightforwardness, humor, interest, and
hidden, surprising subtlety.

Like Bel herself. They were her people.

Rowan turned to study her friend. “It seems,” the
steerswoman said, “that you have a mission of your own.”

Bel nodded broadly, but did not meet Rowan’s eyes. “I’ll
travel with you to the Guidestar, to see what’s there; and I’ll see that you
get back to a place you can reach your country from, or help you find a tribe
to take you. But after that, I’ll leave you, and go north, and try to talk to
the tribes there.”

“I’ll be sorry when you go.” She was sorry already. “I didn’t
think, Bel; I didn’t consider what all this might mean to the Outskirters.” Bel
gave an easy shrug. “They’re not your people.”

“No, but they’re yours, and you’re my friend. Now I’m worried
about them.”

The Outskirter looked up at her. “Rowan, you can’t worry
about everyone. I’ll take care of telling my people; you find your Guidestar
and figure out what Slado’s up to, so I’ll have more to tell.”

Rowan laughed, shook her head, and clapped Bel’s shoulder. “I
consider that an excellent division of labor.” They went out into the camp
together.

Garvin waved them over to Averryl’s tent. “He’s livelier,
but confused,” the warrior said of the injured man. “He says he doesn’t remember
walking to the camp. I can’t convince him that he’s stayed put.” The women
joined Garvin on the ground, and Rowan found herself being calmly scrutinized
by the boy. She introduced herself; he responded with “Harramyn.”

“Only one name?”

“I’m too young to name myself like an adult. But my line is
Mourah, and my mother is Kree.” He spoke her name as if expecting an
appreciative reaction.

“So you’ll become Harramyn, Kreeson, Mourah.”

Harramyn nodded, and Garvin made a deprecating sound. “Hari.”
The boy corrected him patiently. “No, I’m too old for ‘Hari.’”

“Are you a friend of Averryl’s, or perhaps a relative? You
seem very worried about him.”

“I’m not related. My mother likes him, but he’s not my
father. She wouldn’t want anything to happen to him. I’m going to help Man-der.”

“Who’s Mander?”

“You
know.” He tucked one arm behind his back, and
wiggled the other enthusiastically.

Garvin gave him a thump. “Don’t make fun of Mander. He can
do plenty of things that you can’t. And never will.”

“Ha. I’ll never have to. I’ll never cross the line; I’m
going to die with my sword in my hand.”

Another voice spoke. “Yes, and sooner rather than later.”
The boy was hefted up by strong hands, then settled down again into the lap of
the red-haired woman from the council meeting. Harramyn frowned and wriggled in
her arms, as he tried to decide whether her comment was a clever jibe or a dire
prediction.

She introduced herself. “Kree, Edensdotter, Mourah.” She resembled
her brother Garvin very little; he was broad-shouldered, pale-haired, she
compact and fiery. His eyes were a wide, deep blue, hers small and close-set,
of a sharp blue so pale as to be almost colorless.

Rowan was disturbed. “Has the council decided so quickly?”
It did not bode well.

“No,” Kree reassured her. “I stepped out, to get you
settled. You’ll be sleeping in with my band, for tonight, at least. With
Averryl here, and Fletcher who knows where, there’s room.”

Bel nodded, satisfied. “Good; that’s better than having a
tent to ourselves. The more people, the warmer, and it’s turning cold all of a
sudden.” She made a suggestion: “If we’re accepted, you could use me in
Fletcher’s place. Or Averryl’s, if he can’t fight.”

Kree considered, then poked her son in the ribs. “Will
Averryl be able to fight?” she asked him.

“Mander doesn’t know.”

Displeased, Kree sat considering implications; from her demeanor,
Rowan understood that Kree was chief of her war band. Kree spoke to Bel. “Are
you any good?” Bel’s reply was a small smile, which seemed to satisfy Kree. “And
you?” she asked Rowan.

The steerswoman winced. “I don’t yet know what my status
should be, if I’ll be permitted to serve as a warrior. But I think I can hold
my own: Bel and I traveled alone from the Inner Lands, and we’ve made it here
safely.”

“The Inner Lands ... how far is that from here?”

“About five hundred miles.”

“Eight hundred kilometers,” Bel added, translating to Outskirter
terminology.

Kree permitted herself to be impressed. She gave Hari
another poke. “Show them where to sleep. And where’s their gear?”

The boy scrambled to his feet and disappeared into the tent,
returning with packs and Rowan’s cloak, which he seemed to consider a very
peculiar object.

Bel took it from him and passed it to Rowan. “Lead on, Hari.”

“Harramyn,” he corrected.

The afternoon passed, and very differently from Rowan’s first experience
among an Outskirter tribe. There, people had avoided acknowledging her and
spoke to her only when necessary, or when tricked into it. Here, every passing
person seemed to seek an excuse to come by her tent, to address her, and
especially to call her by name. It was: “Rowan, how is Averryl?”

“Are you really from the Inner Lands, Rowan?”

“Here, Rowan, come lend a hand,” and “Hello, Rowan, what are
you doing?”

“I’m writing,” she answered for the dozenth time, on this
occasion to a mertutial who had paused before her as she sat outside Kree’s
tent. “I’m trying to record the things I’m learning in the Outskirts, and what
I see that I don’t understand yet.”

“Writing ...” The old man thought long, then shook his bald head
disapprovingly. “We used to do that. We gave it up.” And he hurried off on his
duties, arms full of dirty laundry, leaving Rowan bewildered, with a hundred
questions trapped between her mind and voice.

“Ho, Rowan!” But it was Bel this time, returning from a
stroll between the encampment and the inner circle of guards.

Rowan greeted her with relief. “I should have gone with you.
This is getting tiring.”

“I thought you liked answering questions.” Bel settled down
on the rug, stretching her short legs before her and leaning back on her elbows.

“I do. But not the same ones, over and over.”

“Say you’ll tell them later, all together. It can be like a
story. That’s what I’ve been doing. Everyone wanted to hear about Averryl’s
rescue; I’m going to make a poem of it.”

“Please don’t embroider. If someone asks me, I’ll have to
tell the true version.”

“Ha. The true version is what I’ll tell. It was a good
fight.”

“Yes. And I sincerely hope I’m never in another like it.”
She closed her logbook and rubbed fingers that were stiffening in the chill air
over eyes that were blurring from close work. She had been trying to conserve
her paper, writing as small as possible, forcing herself to be concise. Even
with these tactics, there was too much for her to effectively notate: hundreds
of observations, large and small, a sea of detail.

Bel looked at her sidelong. “You’ve been sitting there since
I left you?”

“Yes. Trying to catch up.” She had had no opportunity for
the last few days, and little before that, to make her entries. Looking around,
she realized with surprise that the deepening of the chill in the air was due
to the approach of evening. “I had no idea,” she said.

“A steerswoman never gets lost, except in her own thoughts,”
Bel observed wryly. She thumped Rowan on the back. “Take a walk. Everyone’s
busy getting ready for evening meal and bed. They won’t bother you.”

Rowan left her book and pens in Bel’s care, and was only
greeted twice on her way to the camp’s edge. There, looking out, she could find
no sign of the inner circle, only some twenty goats in two unequal flocks,
nuzzling the barren ground, shaking their flop-eared heads in annoyance.

It was quiet out on the veldt, despite the icy breeze: no
redgrass stood to chatter in the wind, no tanglebrush, no rattle and rasp and
squeal of goblins. Behind her, the camp noises defined an audible delimited
shape, like a safe room with invisible walls. Following an inner impulse, she
skirted the camp, circling around to where she could look out to the east—for
all the past month, east had been her direction, eastward lay her unmarked road
and her final destination, and she found herself seeking it, trailing toward it
as surely as a banner driven by western winds.

As she came around a cluster of tents, she noticed that someone
was sharing with her the quiet fall of evening on the veldt.

Kammeryn stood some forty feet out from the camp, facing the
horizon. Rowan was reluctant to interrupt his solitude, but she was certain
that he had heard her approach. She did not know if it was more polite to greet
him, or to ignore him, or to turn away and walk elsewhere. She made her choice
by making no choice, and stood quietly a few paces to the side and behind him,
waiting for him to take note of her. But he did not acknowledge her, did not
turn to her or speak, and minutes passed.