Mitchell Smith - Moonrise

These mounts coming, were like deer, but black, and much bigger – and had a swift odd ambling pace, fast as a horse, and looking slow to tire.

"What -?"

"Moose," Nancy said. "Only females, and bred big."

"Female moose," Richard said, "have bad tempers, can break a Person's back with a kick."

"I've ridden one," Nancy said. "They won't let Richard near them."

"My grizzled portion," Richard said. "But I was Infantry, anyway… Uh-oh." He swung his ax down to the tundra, left its handle leaning against his leg. "Baj, quiver that arrow, and ease your bow. Do it quickly."

"The Wolf-General," Nancy said, reached out for Errol, drew him to her, and held him still as Baj knelt to unstring the bow.

"You know," Patience said, "I've only seen her in Tea-party Parade, with other Guard commanders."

"Be careful," Richard said. "Careful. You're about to meet… she who no one cares to meet."

There was no sound then but the north wind… and the rapid, approaching hoofbeats of the six riders, their dark mounts – big-eared, droop-nosed, humped at the shoulders – galloping with a stilted rocking gait that seemed not troubled by knots of tundra grass.

Baj could make out the rider in front, dressed dark, and sitting knees-high like a racing jockey… The others glinted in steel armor. One of them – with a furred head, and looking wide as two men – bore the green-banner standard.

They came on as if they were charging to kill.

"Stand," Richard said, "… stand still."

They stood still. Through the hide soles of his moccasin-boots, Baj felt the tundra trembling to hoofbeats.

The first rider came to them – and pulled up hard in a short slide, so the rearing moose's heavy split hooves ripped tussocks, spattered Richard with cold mud.

"My General…" Richard started to raise his right hand.

The rider's voice sounded high and harsh as a woodsman's saw. "If you salute me, Deserter, I'll have your hand off."

Richard put his hand down as the five other riders thundered up, and the Wolf-General laughed. It was a grim laugh to see – a snouted muzzle, barely a mouth, wrinkling away from wolf's fangs, a long red tongue. Then she sat her saddle, silent… examining them.

Certainly, it seemed to Baj, the General had much human in her, but it showed only enough for a wolf's head swollen larger for sense, for shorter ears – though furred slate gray – for claws become useful almost-hands, for shoulders enough to swing a sword or ax… and for slanting eyes a woman's deep and lovely blue. She was white-furred at the throat above a breast-and-back cuirass of some dark metal – bronze, Baj thought – shaped down its front to indicate rows of small breasts. She was lightly furred, thigh to stirruped boot and along her arms. Her dark gray hair rose – much as Nancy's – in a crest from her forehead. A bronze pig-nosed helmet swung from her saddle-bow beside a scab-barded heavy straight saber.

Neither she nor her restless mount bore any decoration at all. There was only muscled bulk, bronze, steel, fur, and fangs… The Person's eyes, though – so gentle and rich a blue as she sat considering them – seemed to Baj decoration enough.

Of her escort, four – lean riders in steel chain-mail – seemed almost fully human, near-Sunrisers, though with odd bones under scarred and savage faces. The fifth, the banner-bearer, was a Moonriser-certain, short, squat, and wide-shouldered. He was tufted black, with paler undercoat, and had round furred ears. The muzzle was blunt, the small eyes the color of stone.

"General," Patience said "- I've seen you on parade."

The Wolf-woman stared at her. "You will not Walk-in-air, unless by my orders and following my orders." Her voice, harsh with high vibration, was unsettling to listen to. "- Disobey, and I'll send riders to follow until you grow tired. Then they will bring your head to me."

"If I choose the air," Patience said, "and without your orders – you'd better send formidable riders to try to take my head."

"I have no others." The Wolf-General sidled her big mount almost into them, then leaned from her saddle and held out a clawed hand. Patience went to take it.

"Sylvia," the General said, shook Patience's hand WT style, then straightened in her saddle and glanced at Nancy, Errol, then Baj. "You, Sunriser-boy, are supposedly son of the Achieving King?"

"He was my Second-father… ma'am."

"And your first, the Khan Toghrul?"

"Yes, ma'am."

She stared at him. "It's difficult, just the same, to see any greatness in you."

"Difficult for me to feel any greatness."

The General granted, said, "Hello, Nancy," turned her mount, hacked its huge side with bright spurs, and the moose lunged from among them… gathered and paced away into its swift and awkward gallop.

As the five riders reined to follow, the banner-bearing Person said, "Captain, welcome back."

Richard said, "Fuck you, Sergeant." And, as the escort rode away, "Stay clear of that one."

"Might be a good idea," Baj said "- to stay clear of all of them."

"If We didn't need them…" Patience sighed. "I suppose we're to follow?"

"Go!" One of the Shrikes gestured with a javelin.

"My question answered," Patience said, as they hiked on. It was, Baj found, almost impossible to step between the grass tussocks – unless, of course, one had been raised to it from childhood. It seemed better to simply stomp along, hoping for no sprained ankle… though where the tussocks didn't rise, the mossy tundra was soft and flower-decorated as fine carpet.

The Shrike chief, Dolphus, came to walk with them. "Our general," he said, "is in an amiable mood. She rarely shakes anyone's hand. Rarely has casual conversations. And often is having someone skinned and sprinkled with sea-salt… An expensive hobby."

"And is this fierceness," Baj said, though disliking the Shrike, "- is this fierceness her talent, or beside it?"

The Shrike turned. "Ah… a sensible question." He walked along, javelins across his left shoulder – and stepping, Baj saw, neatly between clumps of grass. "Her fierceness, I think is beside her talent. She's beaten us in battle three… four times, large fights and small. Never as a furious wolf might leap for your throat, but rather as a pack will chase and pace and circle until you stand surrounded, exhausted, and already bleeding from bites."

"True enough," Richard said over his shoulder. "She has a genius for it."

"I would say," Dolphus-Shrike smiled at Baj, "- I would say that she would have given either of your fathers fits. You know that usage?"

"I've read as much as you," Baj said. "And written, besides."

"No!" the Shrike made his face of astonishment. "A truly literate River-prince. Well… 'Will wonders – '"

"' – never cease,'" Baj said, and he and Dolphus-Shrike exchanged a fellow look, though guarded.

… They came to the marching camp – the Shrikes drifting away – and into noise and broken formations, what seemed, at first, only confusion as the soldiers, infantry and cavalry, were settling in.

A sentry, ax-armed and in steel half-armor with a small bright brass circle riveted to each shoulder pauldron, stood in their way. A Person of Richard's bulky blood, though not quite as large, and with fur-tufts rust red, he said, "What's your business here?" The tone incurious at such an odd party arrived out of wilderness, though the small brown eyes were interested.

"Our business is our business, Corporal," Richard said. "Now, whistle up your officer."

The corporal stared a moment more, then placed two large horn-nailed fingers in his jaw, and whistled a single high trilling note. He wiped the fingers dry on his leather sleeve, and stood watching them… waiting.