Dave Duncan - West of January

“Oh, Knobil!” His voice went so quiet I could barely hear it over the wind. “Do you really think I’d care about that?”

I dropped my bag of food over the side. I eyed the bedding longingly and decided it would be cheating to take it. Loners sleep on bare ground. I clawed myself up to the mast until I was upright.

Quetti also rose and he picked his way closer, saying “Knobil?” again, more threateningly.

“Yes, Quetti?”

“You’re trying to prove yourself again! I won’t argue that you’re not capable of being a herdmaster, because I’m sure that you are. But why go about it this way? No herdman is going to ride up to a water hole like this with his eyes closed, just so you can skewer him! You know how grass holds tracks! He’ll see them, and then what’ll you be?”

“A winner!” I said. “You don’t know how those big lunks think, lad. He’ll also see your wheel marks and assume that angels made the tracks. If he doesn’t, then I just have to show myself—”

“And he’ll be off like a scared roo!”

“The hell he will be! He won’t know I’m a cripple, will he? He’ll try to kill me, to stop me trailing him back to his herd. Don’t you see? And I have a secret weapon—this bow of mine has twice the range of any bow made in the grasslands. I doubt that any herdman could even draw it. They’re big, but no one’s ever taught them the knack. My arrows are better, too. So, my shoulders against his legs? That’s a fair match—”

“You’re crazy!”

“Then I’ll make a good herdman.”

“You’ll starve to death first!”

Quetti did have a point there. I glanced around at the bar ridges, barren of anything but grass, rippling in the scorching heat—not a sign of animal life, not a cloud. Yet to use the chariot to find a herd and then lay my ambush in its path would certainly be cheating. I could not kill a man without giving him some sort of chance. But how long would I have to wait?

“Someone will drop in,” I said. “There may be roos—”

“They’ll eat you before you eat them!”

I shrugged and held out a hand. “Bye, friend. Thanks for the ride… Keep an eye on that front axle.”

Quetti narrowed his eyes, ignoring my hand. “Let’s try it this way, then. Angels trade sometimes—I’ll buy a few woollies and a couple of girls for you.”

That arrangement would not suit my purpose at all, but how could I explain this to Quetti? He had the sense not to ask too many questions, but he must have known that I was up to worse things than killing one herdman. This farewell was much harder than I had hoped. “And what will those girls see, old buddy? A crippled dwarf, a yellow-haired freak! It’s not me I have to prove myself to—it’s them! The only way I can impress herdwomen is to ride up on their owner’s horse with…with his head under my arm.”

I still remember the spasm of nausea I felt as I said that.

Quetti noticed. “And of course you’d need herders, too, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course.”

He blinked and shook his head sadly at me. I could almost believe I saw tears form in those ice-blue eyes. Not like Quetti!

“I’ll scout around—”

I’d had enough—we’d both start weeping like toddlers in a moment. “Stay out of it!” I snapped. “Even if all you do is to divert a herd in this direction, you’ll still be breaking your angel oath. This is my life, wetlander. Let me live it out.”

I clambered out of the chariot, awkward as a landed fish. I slung my bow over one shoulder, my quiver over the other, and I hefted out a bag of jerky.

By then Quetti had moved to the driver’s seat and was leaning on the gunwale. “All right! I promise I won’t send any herds this way. But I’ll come back in—”

“I’ll put an arrow in you. I mean it!”

He muttered something I missed. Then he shrugged. In silence we shook hands and smiled at each other uncomfortably. We had run out of words, and some things do not fit into words very well anyway.

Braced against the thrust of the wind, I stood barefoot in the grass and watched his sails dwindle away along a ridge until they were wiped out by the rippling heat. Then I spun around and roiled off down to the trees.

By the time I reached them, Loneliness was chuckling in my ear.

I WAS DISAPPOINTED TO DISCOVER that there were no miniroos around, but of course barriers of ocean and mountain would have thinned out the wildlife as much as the people who shared the same habitat. Probably there would be few roo packs, either, although that was a knife with two edges. I made a fishing rod and caught nothing; few grassland lakes contain fish. Birds passed overhead once in a while, but there was nothing I could do about that: only angels have guns.

So my existence was limited by the contents of my grub sack. That made life simple. I stowed the bag carefully in a tree, in case something with three eyes came by while I slept. If something with two eyes came at those times, then I would never awaken, so there was no complication there, either.

Herdmasters scout water holes. If one arrived before I did, then he would almost certainly approach close enough to let his horse drink. He would likely ride all the way around, checking for skulking loners, like me. I could hide in the undergrowth, and my arrows would reach any part of the shore. I was ten times as good with a bow as any herdman. If my shot was true, I would fell him. If his horse did not bolt, I could ride back to his herd and claim it. If I could find it. Life was very, very simple now.

I explored the terrain until my feet were sore. I made myself a comfortable place to sit. I sat. I wished I did not already feel hungry. And I wished that Loneliness would stop laughing.

A shot awakened me. The all-red chariot stood on the skyline. I heaved myself to my feet and reached for my bow. Quetti was already starting down the slope, hatless so that the sun blazed on his golden hair. Obviously he had believed my threats, and the shot had been to avoid catching me unaware and provoking a reflex attack. Good angels are cautious types.

I had eaten once and slept twice. That was not long enough for him to be seriously worried about me. Nor had there been time for me to have changed my mind, so there was something new. I laid down the bow and waddled out of the trees to meet him.

He came to a halt before he was within knife range and warily raised a hand in the sign of peace.

“Approach, friend!” I said. God in Heaven! It was good to see a human face again.

He came closer and stopped again, his faint mocking smile playing over his lips. He needed a shave, and his eyes were a sleepless red. “Doing all right?”

“Fine.”

He chuckled, disbelieving. “Remember when we first met, Knobil? You told me what had happened to your knees—and there you were in a spinsters den.”

“So?”

“I said you didn’t have much luck.”

Again I said, “So?” What was amusing him? If he was playing a game, I could not see what it might be.

He paused to yawn—mostly for effect, I supposed. “Your luck’s just changed.” He gestured a thumb over his shoulder. “I stopped to check out the sweeties at the first camp I came to.”

“And?”

“The herdmaster’s name is Gandrak.” He grinned to let the suspense build…“He’s dying.”

“What? Why?”

“Fell off his horse. I think he’s twisted his gut, or something. Nothing I can help with, Knobil, and he’s very close to death. His women are in a panic.” The pale eyes were wide and guileless.

“This is on the level? You’re not setting this up?”

Quetti shook his head.

“A herdmaster should win his herd by killing a man—”