The Renegades of Pern

by Anne McCaffrey

  ‘And I thought between was cold,’ Asgenar muttered under his breath, flexing his gloved icy fingers and working his toes in his fleece-lined boots. He turned his face slightly so that the puffs of warm air from his fire-lizard kept his nose from freezing. A little trickle was running from one nostril, and he sniffed, then glanced to either side of him, wondering if the troopers had heard him. The lad on his right did not look old enough to be a veteran, but the burly man on his left was exactly the kind to guard one’s vulnerable side. His name was Swacky, Asgenar remembered.

  Larad had insisted on being in on the frontal assault, though any of the others would have been glad to spare him. The Telgar Lord had been like that as a fosterling, too, Asgenar remembered. He had hated to be gulled, and he had been dead keen to set matters right once he had learned that he had been made a fool of.

  Day had never taken so long to come, Asgenar thought, feeling the cold eat through his heavy coverings. He was beginning to shiver and tried to control it.

  ‘Sir,’ someone whispered from his left, and he saw a hide-covered bottle extended. ‘A sip’ll stop that.’

  Asgenar gratefully accepted and gasped at the raw spirits. He had expected nothing more potent than hot klah.

  ‘It did!’ he mouthed, still feeling the heat of that sip.

  ‘Pass it on. The lad’ll need it, too,’ Swacky said, nodding to Asgenar’s right.

  All in the same state, Asgenar thought and passed it. He experienced a mild shock at his first glimpse of his neighbor’s face; the boy was older than he had looked in profile, and his expression was far more grim than cold. He mouthed a thanks and sipped easily, seemingly accustomed to such rough liquor.

  Not just grim, Asgenar thought, returning the bottle to Swacky. His neighbor was more intense than that: vindictive and bloodhot, despite the freezing cold. Asgenar hoped that there was experience there as well as incentive. A false move would flush their quarry, and they would have to go through the whole thing all over again. He wanted the matter settled that morning. There were other important things to attend to.

  The sun was finally above the eastern peaks, its clear light painting the snow in gold dappled with shadowed blues and blacks. The plateau above and to their right glistened, sparkling as sun struck ice like beams of light bouncing off diamonds.

  Suddenly the signal was given, and the men who had lain or crouched just in front of the trampled-down forecourt of the hold sprang to their feet and charged forward, wielding a ram to force the door, but the door proved to be unbarred, and the impetus of their forward motion put the men of the first troop into the main cavern before they could unsheath their swords. Larad pushed past them toward the chamber that he felt his sister would be using. But there were sleeping bodies along the corridor, and someone had wit enough to trip him, yelling at the top of his lungs while Larad sprawled untidily on the stone floor. Asgenar helped him to his feet while Swacky and his other companion plunged on down the gallery, swinging left and right at the sleepers who, awakened by the racket, rose to fight.

  Even as Larad yelled at them to take the right fork, Swacky and the younger trooper turned to the left. Others surged in behind them, and Larad and Asgenar went on alone. When they reached their destination, they found the door barred and had some difficulty angling the ram for maximum effect.

  When the door was finally hanging on its hinges, the room they entered was empty except for scattered pieces of clothing. Asgenar spotted the other doors, and the battering ram was brought into use again. Each successive room showed signs of frantic packing. Asgenar consulted his map of the complex and tried to relax. True, there was a series of smaller chambers off the main one, but all exits were well guarded. No one could escape.

  Shouts resounded, often making the words unintelligible. A messenger found Larad and Asgenar to tell them that the main chamber was secure, all the left-hand tunnels cleared of their quarry, and prisoners taken.

  ‘Any chance that Thella’s among them?’ Asgenar asked.

  ‘No, sir, I’ve her face right here,’ the man said, holding out the sketch in his hand. ‘Several women but not one like her!’

  ‘This is the best set of apartments,’ Larad said in a quiet, taut voice. ‘These have to have been hers.’

  Asgenar did not remark upon the obvious, that there had been unmistakably male accoutrements in two of the rooms. They moved forward to crouch in a narrow, low tunnel. Asgenar dropped to crawl on hands and knees and ended up, with Larad, in what appeared to be a dead end.

  ‘Can’t be,’ Larad said. ‘Glows! Forward some glows!’

  ‘There was an exit to this group, I know it,’ Asgenar said, frustrated.

  Before illumination could be brought, they heard an ominous rumble, and felt the stone beneath their fingers and knees shake. The sound seemed to continue for a long time.

  ‘Lord Asgenar, Lord Larad? Are you there, sirs?’

  ‘Yes, Swacky. What was that noise?’

  ‘Here, Jayge, take the basket—you’re more agile than I am. Sirs, it was an avalanche. We’re going to have to dig our way out.’

  ‘Avalanche?’

  Larad’s anxious expression, lit by the glow basket, matched his worried tone, but the crouching young trooper seemed to make nothing of their cramped and closed-in condition. His face reflected so much hatred and frustration that Asgenar was stunned. A man that young ought not to feel such passions, he thought.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Jayge said. ‘They’d a deadfall arranged. Someone got out to release it. They’ve used that trick before. Didn’t anyone think to check?’

  ‘You forget yourself,’ Larad said icily.

  ‘Jayge?’ Asgenar slewed around and took the glow-basket from him. ‘You were in that ambush at Far Cry, weren’t you?’

  ‘Yes… sir.’

  ‘Bloodkin lost?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he replied, the courtesy not as sullenly added. ‘This isn’t the dead end it looks like! See the marks there on the ground. Something’s scraped.’

  Larad and Asgenar heaved and pushed, thinking of a cantilevered slab.

  ‘Lords,’ Swacky called. ‘You’re needed out front. We’ll keep on here.’

  Larad and Asgenar crawled back out to where they could stand erect again, and Swacky gave a fuller report.

  ‘The Benden Weyrleader’s got his dragons digging us out. We’ve accounted for all but three of the faces in those drawings, and some who weren’t, plus one guy who swears blind he’s got to talk to whoever’s in charge. And there’re troops following every alley and furrow in the place.’

  Larad swore under his breath, his expression unreadable.

  ‘Which three faces, Swacky?’ Asgenar asked.

  ‘The woman they call Thella, the empty-faced man someone said was dragonless, and one other, a real brute.’

  ‘Swacky, you’re too broad to crawl that tunnel,’ Asgenar said, letting Larad digest the news. ‘Find someone else to go down and help Jayge. And a crowbar or chisel would be useful if you can find such tools in here.’

  ‘We found an awful lot of stuff, Lord Asgenar. They’d settled in with nothing missing.’

  ‘Thank you, Swacky. The tools, please, and as many men as needed to find that exit.’ He took Larad by the arm and escorted him back to the main chambers.

  The smallest room, which had only one entrance, was where the prisoners were being guarded. One of Larad’s men greeted the two Holders and returned the drawings. ‘There’re all here, and sixteen more, Lord Larad.’

  ‘Any casualties on our side?’ Larad asked, noticing bloody head wounds and other signs of injury among the prisoners.

  ‘A broken bone or two when the avalanche caught people unawares. Them,’ the trooper said contemptuously, ‘we mostly caught still in their bedrolls. There’s one over in that small room that you should speak to.’ He nodded to his left, in the direction of the main hall of the complex, where one of Asgenar’s foresters stood guard. ‘And there’s some fresh klah in the pot,�
�� he added, gesturing to the bigger hearth where a fire had been freshened and a huge kettle was slightly steaming. ‘They lived pretty good all right.’

  Asgenar steered Larad toward the hearth, and a trooper sprang to serve them. Then they went to see the man the guard had mentioned.

  When they entered the room he rose, smiling with obvious relief. ‘Did they escape after all?’

  ‘I’ll ask the questions,’ Larad said sternly.

  ‘Certainly, Lord Larad.’ He turned his head to nod politely at the Lemosan. ‘Lord Asgenar.’ Then he waited.

  ‘Who are you?’ Larad asked after a long pause. The man showed not the slightest bit of tension or insolence.

  ‘My name is Perschar, Lord Larad, a journeyman whom Master Robinton hoped could penetrate this band. I gather that someone finally sent you the sketches I’ve been dropping whenever and wherever I could. I’d swear Thella has eyes in the back of her head. Did she escape? Please, the suspense is very hard on my stomach.’

  ‘Perschar? Would the name Anama mean anything to you?’ Asgenar asked, pulling at Larad’s sleeve before the other could interrupt.

  ‘Of course!’ The man’s long face was wreathed with a happy smile. ‘Lord Vincet’s second daughter. I did her portrait, oh, far too many Turns back, I fear. She’ll be grown and married, with children of her own to be painted, I’ve no doubt.’

  ‘He’s Perschar, all right,’ Asgenar assured Larad. Taking a seat at the table, he noticed that Perschar had not been idle while waiting. There were more sketches.

  ‘It was the only way I had of dropping information. Not that they suspected me, but it was as well not to raise any doubts whatsoever. The Lady Thella—’

  ‘The woman is holdless,’ Larad said harshly.

  ‘Exactly her problem,’ Perschar replied with some acerbity, then sighed. ‘She styled herself Lady Holdless, and, while not appropriate, as she did hold here—’ His long hand made a graceful gesture indicating the room they were in. ‘—she was devilish quick, quite brilliant with her schemes—flawless almost, so I had to be cleverer still. Did she escape?’ His eyes sought Asgenar’s, almost pleading, certainly urgent.

  Asgenar nodded, disgusted. ‘We think so. But until we’ve reestablished communications with those outside, we can’t be certain.’

  ‘We had every hole out of this warren covered,’ Larad said, stalking about the small room.

  ‘I heard the avalanche,’ Perschar said in a lugubrious tone. ‘That means someone got out. I’d lay odds with a Bitran, she did. Unless you caught Giron or Readis. Those three used the right-hand rooms.’

  ‘The guard said all but three of the faces in your invaluable drawings are accounted for—Thella, the dragonless man, and the heavyset man.’

  ‘That’d be Dushik. Thella sent him off on some special affair as soon as we made it back here. So at least Readis is accounted for, if they’re the only ones missing. Yes, either Giron or Thella herself loosed that avalanche. She was rather taken with the notion. Had all of us working on it during the last Fall. Bloody cold work.’ Perschar shivered dramatically. ‘Is there any more klah in the pot?’ he asked hopefully.

  It took just as long for the dragons to dig them out as it did for Perschar to discover, after he had drunk his klah, that Readis was not among the prisoners. And it took twice as long for Jayge to discover how to open the clever door.

  ‘And there was where we underestimated Thella,’ Asgenar said with as grim a smile as Larad’s. ‘Gone up a bit, you might say,’ he added, unable to stifle the observation as he stared up the vertical tunnel through which escape had been effected. ‘Your charts were a trifle out of date, Larad.’

  Larad cursed and Asgenar listened sympathetically.

  Jayge had scrambled up the rungs of the ladder and come out well above the entrance stormed by the troops. ‘The avalanche was set off from here,’ he hollered down. Both men clasped hands on their ears against the echoes his call set up. ‘A bronze dragonrider says that he’s sent out sweep riders. They can’t have gotten far on foot.’

  Larad leaned disconsolately against the wall, shaking his head, and sighed at the futility of their efforts. ‘She knows how to use snowstaves. She’s very good at it.’

  ‘We can send messages ahead to be on the lookout for three refugees. Send copies of Perschar’s sketches,’ Asgenar said as Larad once more got down on hands and knees to navigate the low tunnel. ‘We’ve blocked up most of the caves we think she’s been using. She’s going to have a long cold trip before she finds any safety at all.’ He saw Larad, just in front of him, shaking his head. ‘If we can get just a little cooperation from Sifer, Laudey, and Corman, surely someone will notice three such unusual people out and about at this time of year.’

  Once they emerged from the tunnel, Larad strode purposefully through the rooms where troopers were already gathering up the more expensive-looking articles of clothing and miscellaneous items. Asgenar followed, storing up hopeful suggestions, racking his brains to think of some logical and ultimately successful course of action. It was ludicrous that they should have failed. Yet they had.

  When Asgenar saw Larad making for the eating area, he paused, looking around for one of the Benden dragon-riders. F’lar, F’nor, and three troopers, still busy jotting down notes on improvised slates, came out of the storage area of the cavern.

  ‘I found the Kadross Hold grain. They’ve got stables back there, baled fodder in quantity, and supplies enough to eat as well as Benden Weyr does,’ F’lar said, slapping his heavy fleece gauntlets against his leg. ‘What’re we going to do with those, anyway?’

  ‘Whose hold does this place fall in, Larad? Yours or mine?’ Asgenar asked.

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘Well, sort of. You’ve got all those mines, and I have trees, but trees don’t need much tending in the winter, and your mines can be worked year round.’

  Larad turned, a look of surprise on his face, but Asgenar felt that was an improvement on despair.

  ‘I tell you what,’ Asgenar went on. ‘Let’s leave them with enough to keep them going through the winter—what with the snowslide and all, I doubt they can get out, and I’m certainly not going to ask Benden dragons to give them the treat of their sordid lives. Let’s see who’s alive come spring.’

  F’lar and F’nor found that solution amusing, as did the troopers, who tried to disguise their grins. At the last, a slight smile tugged at Larad’s mouth, and he began to regain his usual manner.

  ‘I think I had better leave someone in charge, after all,’ he remarked. ‘Thella has really improved this place—it’s isolated, but a stout holding.’

  ‘All right then, let’s get busy.’ Asgenar clapped his hands together to call the troopers and foresters to attention. ‘What’ve you got on those sheets? I don’t want to keep the dragonmen here any longer than necessary. We’ll want to move the bulk out as fast as we can.’

  ‘Lord Asgenar, some of the supplies still have purchasers’ markings.’

  ‘Good man, that’ll spare us a lot of trouble. Swacky, organize your troop to haul identifiable things up front. I’ll go separate what this lot—how many are there? Forty? Well, I leave rations for forty for three months. Then we’ll come back to see who wants to work for a living.’

  ‘Meanwhile?’ F’lar asked politely, his eyes dancing at Asgenar’s masterful organization.

  ‘Oh, please, F’lar, find that unholy trio!’

  VIII

  Telgar Hold to Keroon Beastmasterhold, Southern Continent, Benden Hold, PP 12

  When the dragonriders brought Jayge, Swacky, and the other volunteers back to their camp, Jayge collected his pay and a written warranty from Swacky attesting to his character and service, then strapped his gear on Kesso’s saddle and left. Swacky did his best to talk the younger man out of making such a long trip in winter; even the fairly temperate Lemosan valley would soon be clogged with snow. But seeing that his efforts were in vain, he let the boy go and promised to take
the note Jayge wrote his father back to Far Cry. When Jayge took his leave of Lord Asgenar, the Holder expressed his regret at losing such a clever auxiliary.

  Perschar was distressed when he discovered that his sketches of Readis were strangely missing from the roll that Asgenar had copied and distributed. Dushik, whom Perschar called the most ruthless and cruel of all Thella’s followers, had not returned from the errand Thella had sent him on. So, in effect, they had failed in achieving the primary aim of the dawn sortie. Thella, Giron, Readis, and Dushik were still at large—and, as Perschar said without mincing words, exceedingly dangerous. There were plenty of holdless folk desperate enough to throw in their lot with such successful renegade leaders. Finding a new base in the hills behind Lemos and Bitra would not be difficult, and the band could start up all over again.

  Perschar drew several views of Readis to be distributed along with those of Thella, Giron, and Dushik. Ever cautious, he asked Asgenar and Larad to hint to the captives that he, Perschar, had managed to escape. For, he said with a heavy sigh, he might be called on to help again and wanted to do so with impunity. Meanwhile, he rather thought he would like to go back to Nerat. He had not really felt warm since he left, and he had heard that Anama, Vincet’s pretty daughter, now had children whom he would like to paint.

  Lord Larad assigned Eddik, a trustworthy, diligent herdsman, as temporary holder. Most of Thella’s band were genuinely relieved that they were not to be made holdless again. They were all afraid of the possibility of Dushik’s reappearance and were reassured by Eddik’s presence. Larad and Asgenar reinforced that sense of security by offering a substantial reward for any sight of the man in the vicinity, and double that for his capture.

  Jayge was driven by mixed emotions, chief of which was revenging the deaths of Armald and his other friends and exacting retribution for the economic losses sustained by the train from Thella’s attack. And in the back of his mind was always the thought that if Readis had had sufficient loyalty to risk death to stop the attack on his Bloodkin, then perhaps he could be persuaded to leave Thella’s malign influence. Jayge had always admired his big uncle. Readis’s departure from Kimmage Hold had seriously depressed the young Jayge, who could not comprehend why Readis had deserted them in that terrible situation. His father had explained that Readis had every right to leave in search of more suitable employment. And before long Jayge had come to recognize Childon’s many little ways of humiliating the impoverished traders, giving them the most unsavory chores and condescending even about the food they ate and the quarters they were crowded into. Proud Readis could not have endured such treatment. Jayge, only ten Turns old, had had no choice. Even if he had been old enough to strike out on his own, he would never have left his sick mother, Gledia, behind.