Outposts

by Vickie Knestaut

  “He has to come down sometime,” Brand said.

  “No,” Trysten said with a shake of her head, finally letting go of the breath she’d been holding. “He’s gone.”

  “Gone? What do you mean he’s gone?”

  Trysten turned to Brand. “He’s gone. Back to wherever they come from.”

  “What? What do you mean? Who was that?” Brand asked. “What do you mean wherever they come from? Oh. Wait. That was an Original? He just looked like a man to me. An ugly man, but still, just a man.”

  Trysten looked back up to the top of the tree. “Yes,” she said. “That was an Original. A cowardly, lying Original who will say anything to get his own way.”

  She returned her sword to its scabbard and gazed at the peaks towering over either side of the pass. Her hand pressed her pendant beneath the leather bodice of her riding armor as if making a wish.

  She turned to Karno. “Anything?”

  He glanced down the slope behind him as if making sure nothing had changed since he last looked. He turned back to her, then shook his head. “The ground over here is torn up pretty bad. It looks like a bunch of people went racing down this way.”

  Trysten walked over and peered into the woods below them. Tracks crossed the carpet of pine needles where people had run and slid down the slope. The white flesh of a few freshly broken branches punctuated the gloom of the woods below.

  “Let’s see where the trail goes,” Karno said.

  Trysten looked to the sky. The horde circled overhead. Hordesmen peered over the sides of their dragons and watched the activities below.

  “We have to try,” Trysten said, although she didn’t feel much hope. She took a deep breath as her mind split off in a dozen directions, each path trying to figure out what to do and who best to assign the task to. She looked at Karno and Brand.

  “I want the two of you to follow this trail. Look for signs of the workers. I’m going to take Elevera and the horde back to the village to organize a proper search party and get them back here as soon as possible. You two, stay together and stay alert.”

  Karno and Brand each nodded their understanding. Brand glanced at Karno. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed. He hadn’t been a hordesman long enough to have a beard that concealed his neck.

  “What of the Original?” Karno asked. “If we should happen to run across him again in the woods?”

  Trysten looked back to the treetop for a second, then shook her head. “You won’t see him again. If you find the workers, bring them back here. I’ll return as soon as I can.”

  Karno nodded again. Brand stared at the Dragoneer for a second, and then his attention went to the tree before rising up to the horde circling in the sky.

  “Good hunting to you,” Karno said. “And to us.” With that, he motioned for Brand to follow, and the two men slipped down the slope and disappeared into the woods.

  Trysten waded out to Elevera and climbed into the saddle. Streaming water, they climbed through the trees to join the horde overhead.

  What she had told Brand was accurate. The Original was a liar who dealt in puzzles and riddles to manipulate her, pretending to know her when he didn’t. Still, it was hard to resist finding out if Aymon was alive.

  Two things she did learn for sure though — the Original was afraid of her, and when his dragon form asserted itself, she could read him like one of her own.

  Chapter 28

  The sun was approaching the mountain peaks in the south by the time Trysten and the horde returned to the outpost. As they neared the worksite, one of the trees shivered slightly, then shook again. Someone was taking an ax to it.

  Trysten’s eyes widened in surprise. Below, people milled about. Brand raised his hand and waved in the horde’s direction, but Trysten wasn’t sure if he was waving at her, or at Belara, who flew behind, bearing Caron and another volunteer.

  Trysten had been shocked when Caron volunteered for the search party and at first, wanted to object. The idea of Caron tromping through The Wilds with the eyes of the Originals watching her seemed too risky. Would they do something to her mother to get to Trysten? Kidnap her? Hold her for ransom? Her mother for Elevera?

  But common sense suggested that if the Originals wanted to kidnap Caron, they could do it wherever she was, and they hadn’t made any moves toward her so far. Besides, Caron knew how to fly a dragon, and she was a sharp shot with the bow, exactly what Trysten needed if she hoped to get the outpost finished. So she welcomed her mother’s help and hoped it would encourage others to volunteer as well.

  Trysten directed Elevera to land in the clearing, and as soon as she set down, Jurdun, Karno, and Brand ran up to her.

  “You’re back! What happened?” Trysten asked Jurdun.

  “We were attacked,” he said. “They caught us by surprise. Had a bunch of men up there, on the cliff. They popped up like devils and began to let loose a hailstorm of arrows. Others came screaming in from either side of us. They had us surrounded. We had nowhere to go but down the hill.”

  “We found them hiding in the woods below,” Brand said.

  “Indeed,” Jurdun said. “We had a few wounded men. I was afraid we had been flushed like fowl, sent fleeing into a trap. Why else would they have left us such an obvious avenue of escape?” Jurdun waved a hand at the slope behind Trysten.

  “They stole everything,” Karno said.

  “Well, not everything,” Jurdun said. He nodded at the other end of the pool where a few men stood around a tree being felled. “They overlooked one ax. We’re using it to clear out more ground.”

  His voice quit abruptly, and he looked away, his face tight with pain. They were clearing ground to build a cairn for Ambeoda.

  “Well, we don’t need the search party anymore,” Karno said as he craned his head back to watch the dragons circling above. “But we do have some wounded to take back. I hope you left that contraption on Belara.”

  Trysten looked up as well. The hordesmen peered down at her, waiting.

  “I was thinking,” Jurdun said, “we should keep a hordesman in the saddle at all times. Had I been seated on Ambeoda when the attack began, I could have ended it pretty quickly. The men on the cliff were nearly within reach of firebreath. And had I been able to take wing, some firebreath in the canopy might have been enough to distract the rogues. It would have given us time to respond.”

  “Excellent idea,” Trysten said. “Make it so.”

  “I was also thinking about something I saw in the south,” Jurdun went on. “The garrisons along the southern border are forever plagued with attacks from nomadic raiders. In response, the King has ordered the construction of fortifications. I saw how they were built. We could make one here. We’d only have to do three sides. Let the cliff face be the fourth side. A dragon could provide cover from above. It would give us a place to shelter and defend ourselves should we come under attack again. Now that the rogues are emboldened, it’s only a matter of time before they come back. I need every hand you can give me. The faster we can get this fort built, the sooner we will be able to withstand the next attack.”

  “There you have it,” Brand said. “I’ll stay.”

  Trysten nodded to Jurdun. “It sounds like a good idea. What do you need?”

  Jurdun chuckled. “Everything. They stole everything.”

  “We didn’t bring any tools, but we did bring food and tents. The search party expected to be here overnight.”

  “We’ll get by,” Jurdun said. “Come back tomorrow with whatever you can bring me. Hands. Tools. Food. Weapons. A lot of weapons.”

  Trysten undid her restraints and slid off of Elevera. She sent the dragon back into the sky, then signaled for the next one to come down. Two-by-two, dragons landed in the clearing and off-loaded equipment and resources. Those who were not hordesmen were asked to stay and work on the outpost.

  To Trysten’s relief, all but a few people agreed. When the volunteers stepped off, the wounded who could ride were l
oaded up. And then finally, after all of the hordesmen had set down, Caron brought Belara to ground.

  As soon as the pink dragon touched down, Brand and Karno immediately went to work setting up the sling for a villager who had taken an arrow to the small of his back. The man had been dragged to safety as the workers escaped, then carried back, and blood loss had made him too weak to ride. By the color of his face, Trysten could tell that she was sending the man back to Aerona to die, but hopefully, he would be with his family and not alone in The Wilds.

  Karno and Brand worked on the sling while Trysten explained to her mother what was going on. Immediately, both Caron and her passenger agreed to stay. Jurdun asked Caron to hunt for their meal, and for the passenger to help set up the tents. As Caron turned to Trysten, Trysten reached out and gripped her mother above her elbow.

  “Be careful,” Trysten said.

  Caron grinned an easy grin. “We’ll be fine. The rogues are probably too busy selling off our goods to bother with us tonight. I imagine it’ll be a few days before any of them thinks to see if we came back.”

  Trysten stepped in closer to her mother. “Keep your eyes open for the Originals, too.”

  Caron held up her hand. “They’ve appeared in the village how many times? I don’t think that it really matters where I’m at if they decide they want me. But out here, I’m going to be even more on my toes than usual, and I certainly will not be out of an arm’s length of my bow.”

  Trysten shook her head. “Brand took a shot at him. The arrow bounced right off his arm as if he had scales.”

  Caron’s brow furrowed some.

  Trysten leaned in a slight bit more. “Brand and Karno saw him. They said he looked human to them. That they wouldn’t have looked twice at him had they met him in the lane. But he looks incredibly strange to me. Awkward-shaped. Long face. Long neck. Thin shoulders and arms. Hips, and big thighs.”

  Caron’s lips nearly twitched into a grin. “You’re describing a dragon.”

  Trysten nodded and reflected none of her mother’s amusement. “The way they move gives them away. I can’t explain it. It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. It’s like the tooth, in that there are two things there at the same time, all at once, but you can’t see both things. You know they are there, but you can only see the one. But when he moves, you can almost see what is behind him.”

  The slight grin faded from Caron’s face.

  “You should be able to see it too since you can see the pendant,” Trysten said. “He said he’s not responsible for the attack, but that I am. And I think he meant that it happened because I wouldn’t pull our people away from here. I’m convinced they don’t want us to see what’s coming or going through the pass.”

  Caron nodded solemnly, all of her mirth gone.

  “Keep an eye on the pass,” Trysten said. “It might be that whatever it is we’re not supposed to see can’t be seen by anyone other than you and me.”

  “Then why would they want you to pull everyone away from here?” Caron asked.

  Trysten shrugged. “I could be wrong. I’m just saying to keep an eye out and be careful. You might be able to see things that others can’t. I don’t know. But you can see the tooth and no one else can except me.”

  Trysten’s hand drifted up to the pendant beneath her armor.

  Caron nodded again. She reached out and pulled her daughter into a hug. “I’ll be all right, Little Heart. Stop worrying.”

  Trysten grinned. “I’ll do my best. No promises.”

  Caron laid a hand upon Trysten’s cheek. “Tell your father that I love him and that I’ll see him as soon as we’re done here.”

  Trysten swallowed hard. “I will.”

  “Good,” Caron said and patted her daughter’s cheek. She blinked hard, then stepped back. “You better get going. They’ve nearly got Belara ready to go.”

  Trysten looked over her shoulder. Several people were loading the wounded man into the sling beneath Belara’s belly. The dragon looked down at her chest, and then moved her head side to side, confused and amused at what the humans were trying to do.

  Once the injured man was secured, Brand was ordered back onto his dragon to fly her home, and Karno volunteered to remain behind with Ollym. Finally, Elevera was called from the sky, and with a last wave to her mother, Trysten took off.

  As Elevera rejoined the horde, Trysten saw that more than half the dragons had wounded passengers on board. Their injuries ranged from an arrow wound to a sprained ankle. It would be terrible for a Western horde to emerge from the pass and catch Trysten with half a horde, half of which was unarmed, as their bows and quivers were handed over to the volunteers, and their aerial maneuvers would be limited with the injured passengers.

  She glanced at the pass once more, then drew in a deep breath, and turned for Aerona. The rest of the horde fell in behind Elevera as Yallit zipped past her head, turned in a tight circle, and appeared to consider landing right on the alpha before giving up the idea and flying on.

  Chapter 29

  The front door of the cottage opened a crack.

  “Get back!” Trysten heard her father say. “Back!”

  Trysten put down her cutting knife and went to help her father, but he slipped inside and closed the door before she could reach him. The door rattled once, and then Yallit scratched at it.

  “I figured you were here,” Mardoc said.

  Trysten shook her head. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what to do about him.”

  Mardoc chuckled as he crossed the floor to his chair. “There’s nothing you can do with him. He belongs to the weyr now. I hear the hordesmen and the weyrmen and boys all talking about him. He’s the weyr mascot now, and you have to accept it.”

  Mardoc sat heavily in his chair, leaned back, and let his staff rest against the lip of the seat. “Where’s your mother?”

  Trysten’s breath stopped. “What?”

  “Your mother,” Mardoc repeated. “I haven’t seen her all day.”

  “She didn’t tell you?”

  Mardoc turned slowly in his chair and pinned Trysten with a look. “Tell me what?”

  “Oh, fish and birds,” Trysten muttered. She took a deep breath. “The outpost was ransacked last night. Jurdun’s dragon was killed where she stood. We couldn’t find any of our people, so Brand and Karno stayed behind to look for them while I came back here to ask for volunteers to help form a search party.”

  Mardoc nodded. “I heard the bell ring for villagers to report to the weyr, but...” He slapped his hand down on his twisted knee.

  “Mother volunteered.”

  Mardoc raised an eyebrow, regarded Trysten for a second, and then sat back in his chair.

  “I couldn’t tell her no,” Trysten said.

  “That’s right,” Mardoc said. “You couldn’t. She is a grown woman capable of making her own decisions.”

  “I’m sure she would have told you,” Trysten said, looking at her father. “But I didn’t give her much time. We had to get going. When we returned to the outpost, Brand and Karno had found Jurdun and all of the workers. They’d been attacked by wildmen. Everything stolen except for one ax. Several of the villagers were injured, one seriously. Mother and several other volunteers chose to stay behind and help with the outpost fortifications. Karno stayed as well. I know it’s risky, but —”

  “She’ll be fine,” Mardoc said. “And frankly, the others will be better off for her presence. Your mother is a formidable force with a bow.”

  “I think my mother is a formidable force with anything,” Trysten muttered.

  “That she is,” Mardoc chuckled. “Much like her daughter.”

  Trysten turned back to the vegetables on the table. “I thought I’d make us some dinner,” she said.

  “Doesn’t the Dragoneer of Aerona weyr have something more important to do? I saw Paege return with his half of the horde.”

  “The Dragoneer of Aerona weyr has nothing more important to do than have dinner with her f
ather right now,” Trysten said.

  She turned back to her preparations and picked up her knife, ignoring the small grunt from her father as he pushed himself back to standing.

  “You don’t have to help,” Trysten said. “You’ve had a hard day, I’m sure.”

  “A hard day of watching younger men work and telling them how to do it right,” Mardoc said. A moment later, he plopped down on a stool beside Trysten. “Now how might I help?”

  Trysten grinned, then slid him a cutting board with half of a carrot on it. She placed the knife beside it. “I’ll check on the fish.”

  Mardoc began to chop the remainder of the carrot while Trysten went to the fireplace with a rag folded to protect her hand from the heat. She uncovered the lid of the oven and opened it. Steam poured over the edge. She dropped the lid back in place and used a small, long-handled spade to shovel more embers over the top of the oven.

  “That smells wonderful,” Mardoc said.

  “I think it’s going to be done before the vegetables are. I also got some bread today, on my way home.”

  Mardoc chuckled. “It’s like you were trying to prepare me for some bad news. How is Rast, by the way? I heard that his caretaker came back with him?”

  Trysten returned to the table. “Rast is fine. Clemens’ contraption worked very well. We used one like it to fly one of the wounded men back from the outpost. Rast is in a lot of pain. They couldn’t help but bump him up a good bit while dragging him down the side of the mountain. He said that riding home in the sling was the most comfortable part of the journey.”

  Trysten took the kettle from the hob and carried it to the water bucket to begin filling it.

  The chopping stilled. “When do you suspect that the outpost will be finished?” Mardoc asked.

  Trysten looked at her father. “I don’t know. Jurdun wants to build a fortification of some sort. He said he’s seen them built around the garrisons in the south. They protect against marauders.”

  “A week?” Mardoc suggested.

  Trysten shrugged. She placed both of her hands against the table and looked at her father. “You’re the one with experience in building things. How long do you think it will be? They’ve had all of their tools stolen except for a single ax. I have some hordesmen gathering more tools, and they’ll take them out first thing tomorrow. I need more people out there, but I’ve already taxed the village so much. I was really quite shocked how few people volunteered for the search party.”