L. Modesitt - Fall of Angels

A single clang on the triangle echoed through the morning. Ryba and Nylan looked up to see Llyselle ride acrossthe meadow. Llyselle bounced slightly in the saddle, but Nylan knew that he bounced even more when he rode. He didn’t have Sybran nomad blood-or training. The tall, silver-haired marine reined up outside the cooking area, but before she could dismount, Ryba stood there, Nylan not far behind her.

“There’s a herder down there, waving a white flag,” Llyselle announced. “He’s got some sheep or goats, and something in cages.”

“Let’s hope he wants to sell something.” Ryba pointed at the nearest marine-Siret. “Go find Narliat, and Ayrlyn, and ask them to join us.”

“Yes, ser.” Siret glanced at Nylan with a strange look in her deep green eyes, then turned away, but Nylan could tell she was definitely thicker in the midsection, unlike Selitra. Yet Selitra had been sleeping with Gerlich, and she didn’t seem pregnant. But Siret, the silent silver-haired guard?

Before long, Narliat limped up, using a cane, but without the makeshift leg cast he had worn for so long.

Ryba repeated Llyselle’s explanation.

“Most herders would not come this high with you angels here. Once this was good summer pasture, but now …” The former armsman shrugged. “Times have been hard, and your coins are good. He would not have to drive animals all the way to Lornth or to Gallos. The cages-they might be chickens.”

“What does the white banner mean?” asked Ryba.

“Ser Marshal, it means he wants to get your attention. Beyond that? I do not know.”

“Hmmmm … we need all the supplies we can buy or grow, and they probably won’t be enough.” Ryba glanced up at the tower and then back to Ayrlyn and Narliat. “How do we approach this herder?”

“You walk down with a handful of people, I suppose,” began Ayrlyn.

“Just one or two-not the marshal or the mage,” added Narliat. “Powerful angels should not start negotiations with herders.”

“We did with Skiodra,” pointed out Ryba.

“That, it was different, because it was under a trade flag and Skiodra was himself there, and he is a powerful trader.”

“If you say so.” Ryba glanced around. “All right. Everyone! Get your weapons. Let’s hope we won’t need them. Meet by the triangle at the watch station on the right … by the road to the tower.” She turned to Fierral. “Where’s Gerlich?”

“Where he is every morning. Out hunting.” The head marine’s voice bore overtones of disgust.

“If he shows up … tell him, too.”

Nylan hurried to the lander where he reclaimed his sidearm and the blade he had forged, which was too small for the overlarge scabbard. He tried not to fall over the damned thing every time he wore it. Ryba might never be without her weapons, but he couldn’t work with a pistol at his side and a blade banging his leg.

Ryba had the big roan saddled when he reached the watch station.

The herder waited below at the foot of the ridge. Occasionally, the man looked up the slope, then back at the milling sheep, or shifted his weight as he leaned against the side of the cart.

Finally, after talking to Fierral and Istril, Ryba nodded.

Carrying the small circular shields they had reclaimed from the last brigands, with Narliat between them, Berlis and Rienadre walked down the ridge toward the herder, who had a white banner leaned against his cart. Beyond the herder were perhaps five ewes with their lambs.

Nylan and Ryba watched from the rocks at the top of the ridge as the three neared the herder. The herder and the three talked, with Narliat doing most of the speaking. Finally, Berlis turned uphill and gestured.

Neither Nylan nor Ryba could make out the words.

“Do you think it’s all right?” asked the captain.

“I don’t know, but nothing’s going to happen if someone doesn’t head down there. From what Berlis is trying to tellus, the trader won’t trade unless a more important person appears.”

“I don’t like this,” muttered Ryba.

“All right, ride down. That gives you more mobility-and have Istril and some of the others ready to charge like those old Sybran cavalry.”

“Very funny.”

“We need the sheep, and maybe those chickens, and you know it. So does the herder. He’s gambling that you just won’t steal them. You’re gambling that it’s not some kind of setup.”

“Wish I could see … everything …”

Below them, Berlis gestured again.

“You can’t?”

“It comes and goes, and some of it … makes no sense. Some is too clear.” Ryba vaulted into the saddle. “Fierral! Istril! Stand by. Llyselle, you ride with me-on the right.”

Nylan noted that the trees at the base of the ridge were on the right, but before he could speak the two started down the ridge, riding slowly. He kept watching, but nothing changed. The herder watched as the two riders neared, and so did Berlis and Rienadre.

Abruptly, Llyselle’s horse reared, sending the silver-haired marine flying. Ryba bent low in the saddle, turned her roan toward the trees, and charged.

“Let’s go!” Fierral and the others galloped down the ridge.

Feeling as if he were making a big mistake, Nylan followed on foot. He was halfway down the ridge, his worn boots skidding on the rocky ground before he realized he was alone.

Ahead, the mounted marines charged into the trees. Nylan heard the reports of the sidearms and saw the sun flash off Ryba’s blade. He kept moving, but, by the time he neared the herder’s cart, the action was over.

Llyselle was limping toward the cart, looking uphill past Nylan, and the engineer turned and saw Ayrlyn riding down, carrying two large plastic sacks with green crosses on them-medical supplies or dressings. Nylan wished he’dbeen smart enough to think of a horse or medical supplies, or something. Instead, he’d just run into the middle of what could have been trouble, too late to help and without any support.

He pursed his lips as Ayrlyn rode past. There was still trouble. Llyselle was holding her right arm, cradling it, as though it were broken or injured, and Narliat and the herder were still under the cart. Fierral and Istril had charged off downhill through the trees.

Nylan kept walking, his eyes checking on all sides. As he neared the cart and the beginning of the forest on his right, he saw several bodies near the trees, and one on the open ridge ground, with two marines beside her.

The downed marine was Stentana-an arrow through her eye. An arrow, for darkness’ sake.

Nylan counted eight brigand bodies and, his eyes elsewhere, almost tripped over his scabbard. He caught himself and turned at the sound of hooves, reaching for the blade, but the riders were Istril and Fierral, and they led two more horses, each with a body slung across it.

Nylan turned toward the cart. There Ayrlyn was treating a wound caused where an arrow seemed to have ripped into Berlis’s thigh. Llyselle stood beside Berlis, waiting.

“Strip the bodies and make a cairn down there, over by the rocks,” commanded Ryba. “No sense in dragging them up the mountainside. Take all their clothes. We need rags as well as anything-but the clothes all need washing, and then some.”

Since he didn’t seem to have been much use, Nylan plodded toward the woods, and grabbed one of the bodies by the boots and dragged the corpse toward the rocks where Ryba had pointed, but toward an area where small boulders seemed more plentiful. Damned if he were going to make burial hard on himself, not for men killed as a result of their own failed ambush.

Nylan forced himself to strip the bandit, barely more than a youth despite the straggly beard and the scar across one cheek. The bandit’s purse held only two silvers and a worncopper, but both silvers were shiny. The man wore a quiver, but had dropped his bow somewhere. He had no blade, just a knife that was badly nicked. As for clothing, he had worn a tattered and faded half cloak that had once been green of some shade, a ragged shirt, once brown, trousers, also once brown, but of a differing shade, and two mismatched boots, both with holes in the soles. No undergarments, and no jewelry.