Robert Adams - The Witch Goddess

They had never really caught their quarry, rather the pack beasts, moved by the herd instinct, had straggled to join them during the long, fiery and danger-filled night, as they rode first in one direction, then another, in order to avoid the forest fires. Indeed, in the smoky darkness, it had been some time before any of them noticed that the saddled troop horse was not one of their mules, the big beasts being about the same size.

When they had come upon the creek, Cabell had led them upstream, recalling that the track crossed it somewhere to the east of their position. The prisoner had been taken, he and his pony together, upon the tiny island. The tall, rawboned, extremely filthy man spoke English—of a sort, very slurred and much debased—but so far had said nothing more than what might have been prayers to a god or gods and what were clearly curses.

“He seems to be under the impression, sir,” concluded Sergeant Cabell, “that we are ‘ghost-pale Ahrmehnee,’ whatever that group or race is. From what little he’s said so far, and precious little of that of a repeatable nature, I would imagine that he was part of a large raiding party that was mauled, routed and chased off the plateau by a better-armed band of warriors. He had an arrow through his left forearm when we found him, but we removed it and bandaged him up.”

“Where is the arrow?” demanded Corbett. It was produced, and after studying the black-shafted missile for a few moments, the officer turned back to Erica.

“It’s not Ahrmehnee, Doctor, or Moon Maiden, either. And it’s no hunting arrow. Offhand, I’d guess a Middle Kingdoms origin, and that would tend to fit in well with these two warhorses. But what the bloody hell are northern mercenaries doing over here in the western mountains? The Ahrmehnee have no need of them and never, so far as I’ve ever heard, hire them on. The Confederation employs them, of course, but no unit of Confederation troops could possibly have gotten so far west; the Ahrmehnee would’ve exterminated them well east of here.”

She shrugged helplessly. “I have no ideas on the subject, Jay. But let me give that prisoner an injection. Maybe he can tell us more.”

“Doctor, he’s not one of ours, in any case. Whoever attacked and wounded him back up there before the quakes and eruption can be of no interest to us just now. What is of immediate importance is getting quickly to an area that wasn’t so thoroughly burned out, where there will be graze for the animals. And that’s why we’ll halt for only an hour, here, then push on south, so if you want a bath, you had better go on downstream and get about it; we’ll water the animals here and a detail will fill our containers a bit farther upstream.”

“But, Jay, I think we should take the time to interrogate this prisoner. Right now, we have no slightest idea just what we may be riding into. And we’re less than half our original numbers, too.”

“Doctor,” he replied firmly, in a tone that brooked no argument, “I’ll say again what I said yesterday to you and Dr. Braun: I am military commander of this mission, you are of no rank, militarily. This is a command decision I have just made, based upon my training and experience.

“Insofar as our reduced numbers are concerned, there are still thirty-two troopers and noncoms, plus you, Dr. Braun and me. For all that our ammo supplies are critical, Doctor, for this time and place we are well armed, possessing as we do the only firearms on the entire continent, north of our Broomtown base; you’ve seen what superstitious awe our rifles aroused in the Ahrmehnee, so just imagine what the reaction of primitives like this prisoner would be.

“No, Doctor, although I hereby register your objection, we march on in…” He consulted his wristwatch. “Fifty-four minutes.”

With the addition of the spare animals from Cabell’s group, there were now sufficient to bear the remaining packs, and mount every trooper, as well. As the worst of the mountains now lay behind them, both Erica and Jay forsook their sure-footed but rough-gaited mules to mount the strayed-in warhorses, and they covered far more ground during the afternoon’s march, for all that Corbett enforced a routine of alternating gaits and an hour on foot for every hour in the saddle.

By the light of a breathtakingly lovely sunset, the vanguard rode back to lead the main party into a small, bowl-shaped vale thickly grown with winter-sere grass and bisected by a tiny rivulet trickling down from a small, spring-fed pool high on one of the surrounding hills. Although fires had clearly raged all about this minuscule oasis, during the preceding day and night, it had for some reason remained untouched.

After Gumpner had seen to the posting of guards and the hobbling of the unsaddled and unloaded animals, the senior noncom approached Corbett. “Sir, we’re going to need food for the men. We could send out hunters, but I think the prisoner’s mount is dying.”

The skinny, shaggy little pony had been wobbling and stumbling for most of the afternoon, causing Corbett to at last have the barbaric-looking man tied into the saddle of one of the two mules supporting Braun’s makeshift horse litter. Now he went with Gumpner to examine the runty animal, which stood listlessly, swaying, head hung low and not even trying to graze; Corbett mentally agreed that the beast looked more dead than alive.

Nor were the two men long in finding the reason. A narrow stab wound on the near-side flank just a bit above the stifle was sullenly oozing serum; the wound had apparently closed soon after being inflicted and, hidden from easy view under the thick, woolly winter coat, had gone unnoticed by either the rider or his captors, with what little old blood visible being attributed to drippage from the arrowed arm of the man.

Corbett nodded curtly. “A gut thrust. From the poor creature’s looks, he’ll be dead before sunup. Go ahead and put him down, Gumpner, then have the men butcher him for us. As soon as the detail has the prisoner securely staked out, Dr. Arenstein will inject him with the truth drug, then she and I will question him; I’d like you and Cabell to be there when we do.”

“Sir!” The grizzled noncom drew himself up and rendered the hand salute.

But afterward, Erica said, “I think we wasted the dose of pentathol on him, Jay, insofar as military information is concerned, anyway. But what he told us about his people, these Ganiks, is as fascinating as it is disgusting. I always felt and said that the twentieth-century ecology freaks were pure, certifiable nutcakes, and this distant descendant of some nameless bunch of them seems to bear me out.

“Also, I can now understand why this Jim-Beau became so violent and hysterical when the troopers stripped him and bathed him back there at the stream this morning. That word he kept screaming, ‘plooshuhn’—what he meant was ‘pollution,’ Jay; obviously these cannibal scions of lunatic fanatics have become so fearful of polluting streams that they no longer wash either their bodies or their clothing, ever… not unless they get caught out in the rain or happen to fall into water. God, how can they stand themselves from day to day, much less each other?” She wrinkled her nose and shook her head.

Corbett nodded. “A very savage, primitive people. I hope we don’t run into any more of the bastards, but from what little I could understand of this one’s atrocious language, we would seem to be smack-dab in the middle of their stamping grounds and the track we’re following is, he attests, one of their main north-south routes. Therefore, Doctor, I’m marching southwest for one day, then we’ll head back due south. It may be a bit longer and a lot rougher trip, but, let’s hope, a safer one.

“Without any sort of a track, it may be necessary to dismantle the horse litter and tie Dr. Braun into a saddle tomorrow. Do you think he can tolerate traveling that way? I don’t want Sternheimer accusing me of killing one of his scientists.”