Califia's Daughters

by Leigh Richards

  “When are you due?”

  “Another seven or eight weeks,” she said, and continued with more information than Miriam would ask for. “This is my third time. You’ve seen my daughter, the girl in the wagon.”

  Miriam did not look surprised at this unwonted gift of intimacy, Judith noted, and she had manners enough not to ask about the other pregnancy: lost or healthy male, neither was her business.

  “A blessing on your life” was all she said, a phrase that covered both Judith and the life she carried. Judith found herself warming to the woman.

  The next hour was primarily a matter of fueling bodies and relaxing tense muscles, guests and hosts alike settled on benches before the long tables. An unstated agreement had been reached to set aside explanations and questions while more urgent matters were dealt with. Underneath, however, testing and probing was going on. Watching each other eat and drink and listening to apparently inconsequential talk made for the beginnings of understanding. Those seated near the man and boy, though too polite to gawk, nonetheless missed none of their words or gestures, and there was quite a bit of casual coming and going in the vicinity of that table.

  By the time the guests reached their thick wedges of berry pie awash in equally thick cream, conversation was flowing more easily, helped no doubt by the mugs of beer that had gone down the thirsty throats. The moon lit the Valley and the lamps gave an air of festivity, and it was some time before Judith noticed Dian leaning against the shed with a plate in her hands, looking on as usual. Although, on closer look, she was alone; that was not as usual. Judith excused herself (her place across from Miriam was filled the instant she stood up) and went to join Dian.

  “Where’s Culum?” she asked.

  “Lying on the boy’s feet,” Dian answered around a mouthful of food.

  Judith looked more closely and, indeed, the table seemed to have been built over a pale boulder shape. “I hope he doesn’t stand up under that table.”

  “Everyone has good reflexes,” Dian answered. And the platters were nearly empty, anyway. “So, what do you think?”

  “They seem a good lot. Exhausted, of course. My curiosity’s killing me, but it’s sure to be a long and complicated story, and Kirsten and the others will have to hear it too. I was thinking I might let Miriam off the hook tonight and set up a general meeting at the house first thing in the morning. Would that be okay with you?”

  Dian grinned, her teeth dark with berries. “Of course not! I’ll lie awake all night wondering, just like you will. But you’re right, it’d be cruel to keep them up in the state they’re in. In fact, I figured you might decide to put it off, so I asked Lenore to arrange for some beds. I thought Miriam and the man and boy should go in the big house with you, but I had them scatter our other . . . guests around, one or two to a house. I don’t want them all together. And I’m also keeping the sentries at double strength for the next couple of days.” She glanced up at a burst of laughter from the tables surrounding Isaac, and smiled wryly. “Just because we like them doesn’t mean we should be stupid. Oh, yes—tell them they’re all going to be searched before they go up. Jeri and Laine will do it. I’ve told them to be polite about it but thorough.”

  “If you think it’s necessary. Where will you be?”

  “Oh, around,” Dian said vaguely.

  “I can imagine. Anyway, that sounds fine. We’ll probably finish here in about half an hour. I’m sure Miriam will want to check on her two wounded as soon as she can.”

  “Tell her that I helped Ling—and Susanna, so I’m sure you’ll hear every detail—take out the arrowhead, and with the help of some of your precious ice we got the bleeding stopped. Ling was just starting a transfusion when I left. And I went up to the caves and let everyone know that they’d probably be able to come down first thing in the morning. Kirsten told them stories for a while, and they’re settling down for the night—they didn’t seem terribly disappointed that we weren’t calling them back instantly. Can’t think why.”

  Judith laughed, grateful for the relief of humor. It was true, the alerts that sent the people to the cave might be serious affairs, but the enforced leisure made it a social occasion as well, a dramatic break from the grinding toil of daily life. And as Dian had noted that morning, there was usually a higher than average number of babies born forty weeks later.

  Judith went back to the table to reassure Miriam about her wounded rider and about her chances for a solid night’s sleep before having to account for herself. The party broke up shortly after that, the participants trudging wearily up the road to their beds by the light of the swinging lamps.

  Dian squatted in the shadow of the mill, her unstrung bow cradled loosely against her side as she studied the passing strangers. One of them looked in her direction, a small blond woman with the sharp features of a vixen—but when the stranger glanced away again, Dian decided that she’d just been curious about the mill itself.

  No one else showed any interest in her, but she examined them closely, marking the great fatigue in their shoulders and awkwardness in empty hands accustomed to holding weapons. In Miriam she saw the beginnings of relief, as of one slowly straightening after setting down a heavy burden, and she wondered at it. In the man Isaac she noted again his awareness of the subtle currents around him and a calm acceptance of his place in those currents. There was also great affection in the way he held the now-sleeping child, chest to chest, one thin shoulder tucked under the man’s stubbled chin, two sandaled feet dangling free. Judith’s face she glimpsed in the wavering lamplight, listening to Miriam. Judith, too, looked relieved beneath her chronic look of strain, as well as preoccupied—no doubt speculating, along the same lines as Dian, how this group was going to affect the Valley. And finally, Dian looked at the dogs. She trusted her dogs as she trusted few humans, and the animals seemed to like these strangers. Culum especially had formed an immediate bond with the child, Teddy, which fact interested Dian greatly. Even now he walked at the man’s side, so close that his rough coat occasionally brushed the boy’s naked leg. She stayed silent and still until all the guests and the last of their escorts had disappeared behind the high corn, and then she stood, stretched her tired muscles, and walked up the solitary road in the moonlight.

  The next morning dawned blue and gold, with a sure promise of heat. Those who had spent the night in the cave came down at first light, and the sun coming over the surrounding hilltops found them at chores and sitting down to early breakfast tables, chattering excitedly but at low volume, so as not to awaken these intriguing visitors. There were frequent glances cast up at the main house, in hopes of seeing the man or the boy, but as yet all was quiet.

  By the time Dian came riding up the road, a large buck strapped behind her saddle, four rabbits dangling in front, and a pack of dogs ebbing and flowing around the horse’s trotting hooves, most of the visitors had arisen and were at the tables of their host families, making the first awkward attempts at conversation. Dian had taken her dogs out well before dawn, both for exercise and to supplement the day’s supplies. Despite the inevitable gore and violence of the kills, and despite not having been to bed that night, she returned refreshed, purified as always by the simplicity of death. As Dian passed the first houses of the Valley, she came across Carmen’s oldest stepdaughter, Lupe, walking up and down the road, patting and comforting her screaming two-year-old sister. Lupe grimaced at Dian, and said in a loud voice, “Ella no le gusta los estranjeros.” Dian nodded in sympathy; she might not go so far as to say that she didn’t like them, but there was no doubt, fascination and fear would set the tone of the entire Valley for days.

  Dian left the meat at the kitchen, then rode to the barn and rubbed down, watered, and fed her horse. When she went to the kennels to do the same for the dogs, she found Susanna in residence, sitting on the floor with the latest litter of puppies. The girl gave Culum a thump on his side by way of greeting and grinned up at her aunt, one puppy cradled to her chest and three more mock-fighting
across her still-adolescent legs.

  “Puppies have such a great smell, don’t they?” she said. “It’s like sweet and sour milk.”

  “You used to smell like that, mewling and puking at your mother’s breast,” Dian told her. “And your personal habits were every bit as irresponsible as these guys’.” She laid the rifle, coat, and saddlebags on a table and went to liberate puppies and girl, brushing ineffectively at some of the more unsavory stains on her niece’s clothing. After a minute she gave up, returned the puppies to their mother, and took her things down the hall into her quarters to see about her own breakfast. She called back over her shoulder at Susanna.

  “What’s your mother got planned for the morning?”

  Susanna followed Dian into the house and helped her return equipment and clothing to their respective racks. “That’s why I’m here—Mom sent me to fetch you. That woman, Miriam, wants to meet with you and Mom and Kirsten and a bunch of others, I forget who, as soon as you’re ready. Why are they here? I was busy with Ling last night—did you hear that Jenn—that’s her name, Jenn—looks a little better this morning, and Ling’s pretty sure she’ll live? Anyway, Mom wouldn’t tell me anything this morning but to come here and wait for you, but I want to know what they’re doing here. Nobody ever tells me anything. I’m not a child, you know. How can a man travel like that? Why did they bring the boy? What do they want?”

  Dian laughed and placed both hands on the girl’s shoulders, bending to look directly into the excited young eyes and saying clearly, “My questions exactly. And maybe if you’d let me get myself together, we can get them answered.”

  “Okay, okay,” said Susanna. “I’ll go tell them you’ll be down in a bit. But there’s breakfast there—Mom’s even making coffee!”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I’m clean and the dogs are fed.”

  Half an hour later Dian trotted up the three steps to the kitchen door. Someone else had been up early, for there was a rich yeasty odor of fresh bread beneath the sharp tang of bacon. She followed the smells and the voices past dining room and library to the cool veranda. The veranda was large, wrapping around two sides of the house and fully ten feet deep, but this morning it was packed, with more people standing outside the screened walls—theoretically, one adult from each house, so all the forty-odd families might be represented, but it looked as if the entire population was here, even the babies.

  Remnants of breakfast lay on the long table in the room just inside the veranda, and Dian paused to pick over what was left, peering into the empty coffee carafe with chagrin, then carried her plate to the door, where a couple of women shifted to make room for her. There was no sign of the man or his son, but Miriam and two of her women were sitting at the far end with Judith, Kirsten, and Ling. Peter was there to represent the menfolk, with Anthony, the senior male in the Valley. Laine sat in another corner and nodded to Dian, although there was no sign of Jeri, who had also been up all night.

  Miriam was describing her band’s trip through the destroyed cities on the other side of the hills; her narrative seemed to be drawing to a close. Dian watched her covertly as she ate, studying the woman’s black hair and eyes and her strong, compact body. The stranger spoke with an air of authority and self-assurance, her voice quiet and even. Only her posture in the chair revealed her discomfort, as she sat stiff-backed in its softness.

  “I’m very sure they didn’t know that Isaac and Teddy were with us,” she was saying. “If they had, they would never have let us get away so easily. They were just probing, and it was only bad luck that two of us got in the way of their arrows.” She paused. “We had gambled on that, of course. We decided to send a small enough caravan that people would think us of little importance. As it was, we were almost too small.”

  That seemed to mark a good pausing place, for Judith stood up and began to organize a flow of dirty plates and utensils toward the kitchen. When most of the dishes were out, Judith looked down the length of the veranda at Dian.

  “We wondered if you were going to join us.”

  Dian hastily swallowed her mouthful of sweet roll. “Sorry if I held things up. But you did get your revenge—to think I missed coffee because of a few lousy rabbits.” General laughter was followed by shouts of triumph as Lenore came from the kitchen bearing a solitary cup of tepid, greasy-looking coffee and presented it to Dian, who held it up, sniffed it deeply, and finally slurped it with exaggerated appreciation.

  “Ah, the nectar of the gods! Bless you, Lenore.” She placed the coffee on the floor between her feet and wiped the last smear of egg from her plate before adding it to a passing stack of empty plates. She retrieved the cup and savored the contents while the room was settling down again. When it was quiet enough to hear children playing in the pond, she lowered the half-empty cup and looked across the intervening heads at Miriam. “I’m sorry I missed your story,” she said in a carrying voice. “I was looking forward to it. Perhaps we can get together sometime, so I can ask you a few questions?”

  Which was a roundabout way of asking, What do you want and how long are you going to be here?

  Miriam looked down at her hands, fiddling with the narrow silver band around the ring finger of her left hand, then met Dian’s question head on.

  “I won’t be staying for any longer than it takes to rest my women and patch up the lesser wounds. I may have to leave behind Sonja and Jenn, the two in your infirmary. I can’t wait for them to heal; our village needs us back.” Here she looked up to face Judith. “Isaac and his son will stay here, if you will have them. They are, to put it bluntly, a gift from my people to yours.”

  The silence was suddenly complete, breathless. Judith, who had also seen the woman’s relief the night before and suspected the reason, was not taken by surprise, but with the closed expression of a seasoned trader she voiced the obvious question.

  “Why? What do you want in exchange for your ‘gift’?”

  Miriam sighed gustily and said, almost as if to herself, “I’m really not the person for this. I’m a fighter, not a talker, and it’s very likely I’ll put my foot in it. But,” she said, firming herself visibly, “our talker is in your sick house with blood leaking out of her shoulder, so—it’s me or nothing.” Her voice, too, grew firmer as she collected her thoughts.

  “We come from a town in southern Oregon, near the Smith River, about three hundred miles north of here. It’s a hilly area, mountainous even, with patches of decent farmland in isolated valleys. Like here, our communities tend to be small. At least, until recently. A couple of years ago a few of the more . . . unsavory communities joined forces with a leader from out of the north. They were then joined by others, and pretty soon there weren’t too many left to oppose them. We are one group who does.” Her voice stopped for a moment.

  “Three hundred miles is quite a trek for reinforcements,” Judith probed, “even if we could spare enough to make any difference to your safety. Surely you have closer neighbors.”

  “Yes. I mean yes, we have neighbors, but no, we are not looking for reinforcements. And it’s not as simple as just fear of petty tyrants. There are things we cannot fight. You see, when our neighbors joined the northern group—the leader calls herself ‘Queen Bess,’ you may have heard of her? No? Well, you will. Anyway, they told ‘Queen Bess’ about a nearby cache of weapons and equipment from Before. Near as we can figure, the things were owned by a band of survivalists who didn’t make it. None of the locals had been willing to touch the things, but Bess sent some of her people in for them. Most of the weapons were useless after all this time, but in grubbing about in the caves where the hell weapons were stored, her people set loose a plague.” Miriam’s face grew taut with the memory. “The first we knew of it were the dead fish in the river. Hundreds of them, stinking up the banks and bringing in every rat and dog pack for miles. Then we started seeing dead and dying animals. And then one day, seven of the women from a town upriver came into our village. They were all terribly ill, vomiting blood a
nd losing great wads of hair. Our healer—she’s only a doctor, but she spent a year in Meijing—she said they were not contagious, that it was radiation, so we let them in and tried to help, but there was nothing we could do. They died. All of them. One of them brought a small baby, who was still alive when I left, but our healer didn’t think she was going to make it.”

  “When was this?” It was Ling asking in her light, accented voice.

  “They came to us the first week of April. We immediately contacted all the friendly families around us, sent scouts to find out what was happening. That’s when we heard about Bess and her part in it. By the first part of May it became clear that all the settlements along the river were threatened. Our drinking water comes from a spring, but our living comes from the river, and there was no group in the hills that could possibly take in all of us—there are more than a hundred of us. But, the poison upriver is moving down. Our reserves will see us through the winter, and when the river freezes it’ll stop the spread—we hope—but next spring we must go. Or we will die.”

  Dian spoke up, her voice clear through the crowded veranda.

  “And you want to come here.”

  Miriam’s eyes swung to Dian as murmurs and gasps showed that not everyone had heard it coming. She nodded shortly, once, and turned to Judith.

  “As I said, I am not the one who should be trying to put this to you, but, yes. We would like to propose that our two villages join forces. Not here, in your valley, but just outside it, where the water from your stream joins that of the other one. It is not ideally protected, but there’s good land and plenty of trees for building with.”

  “Why all the way down here?” asked Judith. “There must be a lot of healthy places between here and there, without having to move three hundred miles?”