The Scourge of God c-2

by S. M. Stirling

  "Most of my boys, they get a sniff of a woman and they can't think of anything but putting her flat on her back," he went on, with a male laugh. "Or bent over a saddle, according to taste."

  Ingolf shrugged again. "Silver's harder to come by. And gold doesn't take sick and die on the road, or run off and get et by wolves or tigers, or get the galloping miseries and kill itself. Silver and gold you can trust."

  "Oh, things can get confusing for a while when someone finds a big cache of bullion in one of the dead cities," Jed Smith said.

  Ingolf grinned; the old time's coins were worthless, except as raw materials for arrowheads, but the new currencies hadn't settled down yet either.

  "How often does that happen these days?" he said. "The ones near where people live have been picked over, and the others… friend, you do not want to go there."

  "Yeah, I've heard," Jed said. "So, what do you say to forty-five dollars a head for these twenty-five? And the older children thrown in with 'em."

  "I say you're kidding me and it's not funny," Ingolf replied. "I say you're a thief. I say you'd get half that much in a wet dream. I say get serious or don't waste my time."

  Jed scowled at him. "They'd fetch that back to home."

  "You're not home," Ingolf pointed out. "You've got over a hundred women and their kids to get back to your ranches over the mountains, all the way to the Upper Missouri. They'll have to walk, and it's getting late in the season. What happens if you run into blizzards in the high country?"

  Jed reflexively cocked an eye at the heavens; they were mostly blue, with a few towering clouds like mountains of whipped cream in the sky. Anyone who made their living from the earth and feared the weather's fickleness would recognize the glance. So would a soldier.

  "Should make it before the passes snow up, if we push 'em," Jed said.

  He absently popped the lash of the riding quirt thonged to his wrist. Ingolf shrugged.

  "That'll wear on them. And you're not planning on keeping them all yourselves, are you?"

  "Oh, Black Void, no. They'd be nearly as many all up as the free women on Rippling Waters then. That'd be trouble, 'specially at first, give 'em too much chance to dream up something bad together. We'll swap at least half for livestock. Our range on Rippling Waters can carry a lot more than we've got, good grass goin' to waste."

  Ingolf looked at him in surprise; a cowherd could double every three years. Jed caught the glance and explained:

  "We've had a couple of bad winters, and lost some to lobo-wolves and tigers, more of the damn things every season. There've been too many prime hands away fightin' to ride guard proper or to cut enough field hay. A healthy woman who knows weaving and cheesemaking or leather work will fetch ten good breeding an' milking heifers or twenty steers, easy. That's why I let the Runamuk and Sweet Grass boys take most of the stock from here; easier to get one gal home than twenty cow-beasts."

  Ingolf smiled like a wolf. "That may have been true before your war with Deseret ended, but now the prices you get for everything you took will go down, sure as sure, with so much loot chasing the livestock. And the women will eat every day, and some of them will die and leave you with nothing for your trouble. Selling some to me now means you don't have to try and move them in a glutted market… and the bullion you get you can carry on one packhorse and lend out at interest until prices for livestock drop again."

  Jed grunted, pulling at his beard and looking as if he'd tasted something sour. Ingolf had explained his bargaining strategy to Rudi, and it was based on the Cutters' wants, just as a real trader's would be. In the end, cattle and sheep and horses were the only wealth that was really real to the plainsmen…

  "Well, hell, Mr. Vogeler, you're makin' me feel guilty at unloading any of 'em on you," Jed said dryly. "Mebbe I should pay you to take 'em off my hands."

  Ingolf shrugged. "Newcastle's a city. There are plenty of workshops there, and farms around it, and police and a town wall to keep order. We make a lot of stuff for the Sioux and for trade-they buy our buffalo-hide shields and our bows as far east as Nebraska-and we can make more if we get more hands. Hell, if you could sell us men, we could use them in the coal mines and the lamp-oil works."

  "Which means you can afford to pay more than my neighbors for the gals."

  "But they're not worth as much to you, which is what matters in a bargain. If I push on to Twin Falls, I'll get what I need even cheaper; I can buy from the Church's officials, or your army quartermasters. And you're not selling me the best you have here and you know it. Come on, Mr. Smith, make it worth my while to turn back now and save an extra two weeks' travel."

  "You'll get a lot more than forty-five dollars each when you get home," Smith pointed out.

  "On the ones who live; some won't," Ingolf said with an air of patience. "Plus there's the tax to the Oceti Sakowin, and the cost of transport, food, depreciation on working stock and those wagons I want to buy from you, and my men's wages… I'll give you fifteen each for all twenty-five and that's generous. They're none of them as good quality as the one we've already bought. And I should get a bulk purchase discount-"

  Rudi had been avoiding looking at the women who waited, mostly in stolid silence beside the little bundles of food and spare clothes that would go with them, many with children clutching at their skirts. A few of the women wept, but the children were too frightened, and most of their mothers looked like they'd used up a lifetime's tears. They all glanced back at Picabo, though, as a party of young Cutters came through the gate, whooping and shoving one another in rough horseplay. Edain and Rebecca were in their midst, and they both looked as though a wagon had just run over their puppy.

  No, Edain does, Rudi thought. Rebecca looks more like a queen surrounded by oafs, and walks like it. She's a fine brave girl… no, a fine woman, and no mistake… but perhaps not the best person to impersonate a slave.

  Jed and Ingolf turned from their leisurely bargaining. They listened to the story-told in bits and pieces by excited youngsters-and the older Cutter's scowl would have done credit to a summertime thunderhead.

  "You damned pup!" he said after a moment, and snatched his hat off. He looked as if he'd like to hit Jack with it again, too. "What're you thinking of, playing grab-ass with someone else's property? And these folks are guests in our camp, under the Prophet's protection, too! You're a disgrace to the Rippling Water brand!"

  "It was a little forward of her ass he grabbed," Lin put in, and then subsided at a look.

  Behind him Odard looked at Ingolf and Rudi, his brows fractionally raised. The man from Wisconsin shook his head very slightly, and Rudi flicked his eyes in agreement. If the "Sioux Chief" intervened, there was no telling how things might go-probably back to a duel to the death between the two young men.

  For once Jack wasn't backing down from his uncle's anger; he certainly looked determined enough. He flushed at the Rancher's insult, but stood straight and went on doggedly:

  "Uncle Jed, she hit me. In front of everybody! And he didn't do anything but try to face me down! Am I supposed to let a slave gal hit me like that, or a stranger walk on me?"

  Jed spat disgustedly just before the pointed toes of Jack's tooled-leather boots and then waved him aside. He lowered his voice as he spoke to Ingolf:

  "Mr. Vogeler, I'm sorrier than I can say about this. I can't make the pup apologize… not even if they were still fixing to fight serious. As it is, though… well, if the arrow hits your bought gal, I'll give you two of ours in recompense, and you can pick which. And Jack's going to pay for it, you can bet on that!"

  Rudi walked over to Edain. "What happened?" he said quietly. "Beyond the obvious."

  "Father Wolf be my witness, Chief, I just challenged the filthy scabhteara to a shooting match!" Edain whispered frantically. "I figured I'd be sure to beat him at that, but it would be even odds with cold steel. It was those sodding bastards who had the idea about the apple!"

  The brown-haired Cutter named Lin cleared his throat as his comrade
s and others of the Rippling Waters men gathered around, letting their preparations drop.

  "Hear the terms of this shoot!" he said, trying to be formal. "Eddie here can shoot three arrows. If he misses the apple and the gal with all three, then our own Jack gets the gal, or Eddie pays him forty-five dollars cash money. If he hits the gal, then he and his bear the loss 'cause he isn't as good a shot as he claimed. If he hits the apple, then Jack has to pay him forty-five dollars fine for groping his bought gal and being a natural-born stupid dumb fuck as we all know he is."

  "Fuck you, Lin!"

  "Not while there's sheep on Rippling Waters, Jack," Lin said cheerfully. "They smell better'n you, too. Let the fun begin!"

  "No help for it, then." Rudi studied the younger Mackenzie's face. "Ground and center. No, I mean it, clansman! Breathe in-breathe out. Slow and steady."

  Edain obeyed, and a little of the gray tightness left his face as he controlled lungs and heart.

  "I don't know if I can do it," he said, and held up his hand.

  There was a slight quiver to it.

  "You can," Rudi said. "You're the laddie who won the Silver Arrow younger than any before you, and then beat me for it the next year!"

  Edain's grimace showed his teeth. "That was just a target!"

  "And this is just a target," Rudi said, and forced all sympathy out of his voice; if he couldn't banish fear, he'd have to make Edain use it. "And that's what you're going to do, because you must. Invoke Them… and then get out there and let the gray goose fly, clansman!"

  The young Cutters had hustled Rebecca over to the town wall. She stood with her arms crossed, staring straight ahead with a faint smile on her face as they placed the apple on her head; it was a large one, bright red, and still unwithered. Rudi looked aside and noticed Jed Smith looking at Edain… with a considering expression in his eyes.

  "That young nephew of yours is a mite soft," he said quietly to Ingolf. "Getting all bothered about a bought gal, as if she were kin or his sweetheart."

  The man from Wisconsin shrugged. "Young guys are like that around women," he said. "Especially young, pretty women."

  "You should've let him screw the bitch silly and get over it," the Rancher said.

  "Well, Good Lance decided he fancied her, you see. I'll still get her sale price, but otherwise…" Ingolf shrugged. "I'm not going to piss off a Sioux clan who're good friends now to let my own nephew blow off some steam and get the girl out of his head."

  "Ah," Jed said, glancing over at Odard. "Good thing he's not too mad about this."

  "He may be. Hard to tell, with Injuns. But they're sticklers for taking up a challenge, you know-at least, the Sioux are."

  "Right. Well, I'd have lent you boys some of ours… let's hope your Eddie can pull off that shot. I swear, even if Jack is my sister's son, the little bastard is such a pain in the ass, I almost wish it was him there with the apple on his head!"

  Edain strode out to the mark Jack drew in the scrubby grass with a boot heel. It was fifty yards to the wall where Rebecca waited, far enough that her face was mostly a blur and the apple only a red dot. He looked expressionlessly at her, at the movement of the grass in the light irregular wind. Then he stripped off his leather jacket, tossed it to the ground, and laid bow, quiver and sword belt on it. Jed made a grunting sound and watched more closely as the young clansman flexed his arms and rotated them slowly to stretch sinew and tendon, working his fingers as well. Cords in his forearms stood out sharply, moving beneath the taut white skin. Edain was only average in height, but he looked strong even in that company, and he had quite a few scars for a man so young.

  Then he picked his leather-and-steel bracer, adjusting the straps to fit his bare forearm, took up the bow and strung it Mackenzie-style-bottom end over the left instep and right thigh over the riser, pushing down with his body weight as his right hand slipped the cord into the notch in the elk-antler nock. When that was done he picked the agreed three shafts from his quiver, all with hunting broadheads that had started their lives as stainless-steel spoons. The triangular heads were honed to razor sharpness, and they glittered in the strong sunshine as he rolled each arrow over his thumbnail to test its straightness.

  He's using broadheads because he hopes they won't break the skull bone even if he misses, Rudi thought sympathetically. Not a hope, my friend. At that range and with a draw that heavy…

  "That's a good bow," Jed said slowly. "Strange-looking, but it's made by someone who knows what he's doing."

  "We've got first-rate bowyers in Newcastle," Ingolf said. "Have since the Change."

  "But I've seen Newcastle bows, and they're our style, pretty much-we buy some from you, traded hand to hand. I've never seen one quite like that 'un."

  "We got the idea from farther east," Ingolf said easily. "Just these last couple of years. Too long for easy horseback work, but some of the younger men have taken them up."

  "What's that wood? It doesn't look like bois d'arc."

  "Yew. Grows in the canyons," Ingolf lied with easy fluency.

  Jed Smith could almost certainly read, unlike many of his younger cowboys. But he probably didn't have occasion to do so very often, and he certainly couldn't go look up the natural vegetation around Newcastle, Wyoming.

  Ingolf went on: "They're good for hunting on foot in the Black Hills up north of town, or shooting from the town walls. Don't have to cure in a hotbox, or be lacquered against the wet. And they're cheap, a tenth or a quarter the cost of a saddlebow, so you're not out of pocket so much if you damage one."

  Smith grunted again, rubbing at his jaw. "Might be worth the trouble, then, for townsmen," he said with kindly scorn for men who lived behind walls and worked on foot.

  That turned to an instinctive duck and snatch at the hilt of his shete as Edain drew, turned on his heel away from the town wall, and loosed. Jack did throw himself flat; Edain had wheeled to face him, and there was nothing wrong with his reflexes. He lay on his back with his fighting knife naked in his hand, gaping upward at the trajectory of the arrow Edain had shot nearly straight up. There was a murmur of amazement from the watching cowboys as something fell back-two things, the arrow and the mallard duck it had transfixed.

  The bird thumped into the dusty earth not more than arm's length from Jack's gape. Two of his friends dodged neatly as the arrow plunged into the dirt with a shunk! The young Mackenzie strolled over, pulled the shaft out of the dirt, then leaned over the Cutter.

  "Are you not going to thank me, then, Jack-me-lad?" he inquired mildly, reaching out with the end of his longbow to nudge the limp blue-green shape of the bird. "You've the makings of a fine roast-duck dinner there, and the flight feathers will do for fletching when you've plucked it. And I'll ask no more of you if you decide to call this quits. Save yourself forty-five dollars, friend… and enjoy your duck."

  Rudi found himself smiling involuntarily. Jed Smith snorted a laugh, and the young Cutter's friends roared until they staggered around wiping at their eyes and slapping one another on the back; a few fell helpless and drummed their heels on the ground. Several urged their comrade to accept the terms, between sputters and whoops. Skill with the bow was the thing they admired most in all the world, after horsemanship and raw courage.

  Jack came back to his feet with a shoulder roll. The Cutters all looked a little awkward to Rudi's eyes when they were afoot, though they were as graceful as panthers in the saddle. That didn't mean the young man wasn't strong and quick, and Rudi judged that he'd be good with a blade. He didn't draw, quite…

  "You got two more shafts, or the split-tail is mine," he said with quiet venom, all garrulousness washed out of him by the hate that made his face go white around the nostrils. "Now shoot. I'm of a mind to see how many ways I can fuck that bitch and you can keep your forty-five dollars."

  Edain shrugged; Rudi thought he alone could see the flash of despair in the archer's eyes, but anger was deeper. He turned and smoothed the fletching of the arrow against his lips, blowing softly
on the feathers and setting the shaft on the string. Then he stood stock still while he took one long breath, drew past the angle of his jaw and loosed in a single continuous movement.

  The arrow flashed out, seeming to drift as it gained distance. There was less than a second before it struck… and Rebecca Nystrup pitched forward on her face, limp as a sack.

  Silence fell for a long moment. "Well," Jed Smith said. "Want me to finish her off for you?"

  TheScourgeofGod

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  NEAR PENDLETON, EASTERN OREGON

  SEPTEMBER 12, CY 23/2021 AD

  BD fanned herself with one dangling end of the loose sun-turban she wore over an inconspicuous steel cap. A quarter mile ahead of her eastbound wagon train on Highway 84 was a baulk of timber studded with blades, mounted on old truck axles with modern spoke wheels. And besides the ten men behind it on foot with pikes and crossbows, a round dozen or more armed cowboys waited to either side.

  It all looked tiny in this huge landscape, beneath a sky blue from horizon to horizon; the weather was clear and dry, typical for fall hereabouts. And just on the comfortable side of warm, also standard, but the wind was from the east and it held the slightest hint of autumn beneath the acrid scent of dust. But no view with that much edged metal in it was particularly friendly.

  "Tia Loba?" the head of her guards said, as some of the cowboys cantered forward and flanked them to either side, just within bowshot.

  "Keep calm, Chucho," she said. "We'll just walk on up to them and have a talk."

  The slow creak and clatter and bounce of wagon travel went on, and the figures around the barricade grew from dolls to men.

  "Whoa!" she said, pulling on the reins, just as they barked out: "Halt!"

  Dobben and Maggie were well trained, once they woke from their patient ambling daze; the big half-Suffolk lead pair came to a stop inside six paces, the rear pair had to halt perforce, and she pulled and locked the brake lever. The four other carts behind them came to a halt as well, and the six guards reined in beside them.