by Tom D Wright
So I tell her the words I always imagined saying: “My name doesn’t matter. Just call me the Lone Ranger.”
What might have been a cheesy response feels anything but cheesy; unlike when it was child’s play, a man actually died here, and a woman suffered an all-too-real sexual assault, so my words feel extraordinarily tangible when I say them. If anything, they humble me.
As I jump on my new horse and turn to ride away, it occurs to me that there are enough similarities that it actually may not be too far from the truth.
We make a quick journey back to our encampment and arrive a couple hours after midnight, according to the polestar.
When we enter camp, Little Crow removes the blindfold and presents our prisoner to Malsum. The hoodlum practically craps his pants and then starts pleading for his life in Spanish. When Little Crow sets the beast to watch over the Hombre, the lioness pushes the man down and places her massive paw on his chest. And when she licks her chops he actually starts sobbing.
As we relate the events to Angie I see her hands clench with anger, until she gets up and feels her way over to the Hombre. She leans down to whisper in his ear, and the man’s eyes grow wide while he silently watches Angie sit back down. I forgot that Angie and her mother were captured by the Disciples from an Hombre band, so Spanish is her native language.
“What did you say to him?” I ask her, as she sets her cane down.
“That Malsum has a fondness for human balls, and I’m just looking for an excuse to cut his off and feed them to her. So if I hear another word out of him, I’ll start with the left one.”
I go to sleep confident that the man is not going to budge.
The next morning we break camp, and Little Crow shifts the saddlebags from Malsum onto one of the horses we obtained. Then he fits one of the horse saddles into Malsum’s harness for Angie to ride on.
Being blind, she cannot manage a horse effectively, but as long as she holds onto the saddle horn, she does not need to do anything. Malsum is the ultimate seeing-eye animal.
We seat the Hombre on the saddle-less mount, and I take the reins of his horse as we head out. I will certainly miss Saffron, but the Hombre horse is docile enough, so I will have to come up with a name for him.
We cut across the fields toward the southeast. The farmers we pass stare at us, or more specifically, at Malsum. From a distance, the huge cat with Angie as a rider probably appears to be some sort of mutant horse, but no field workers are curious enough to approach us and investigate.
Around midday, I see the dust of a small mounted group in the distance, in the direction of town. One of the horsemen carries a large black banner with a red symbol on it. The modified reverse swastika with arms of scythes that represent the four seasons of the year signifies Disciples. I bid Little Crow to wait while I dispose of our prisoner.
But first, I reach into my pack and remove a laser lighter which I obtained in trade from the captain of Bridget’s Secret before I debarked in Port Sadelow, and stuff it into an empty saddlebag that I place on the Hombre’s horse. The fuel cell is dead and I have a spare lighter anyway, so I can afford to lose one. The Hombre mutters something as I close the saddlebag flap, but when I look at him he glances at Angie, sitting on Malsum, and looks down silently.
After leaving my pack with Little Crow, I lead the Hombre in a trot toward the Disciple patrol, which turns to meet me as they see us approach.
The column turns out to be a dozen mounted soldiers. “Are you a citizen of this town?” one of them challenges me when I ride up.
“To be sure, I’m not,” I reply. “I’m just a merchant from up north looking for goods to trade in, but I have a prisoner I’d like to turn over to you. He attacked a farmstead last night. I was staying in their barn and I agreed to bring him to town for them.”
“We have no need for prisoners, especially ones who haven’t troubled us,” the Disciple growls. They probably do not want to be out here in the first place, riding around in dry, dusty fields. But I know the way to a Disciple’s heart.
“You’re one of those Disciples, right? You might find this criminal more interesting than you realize,” I reply, then lean over and pull the laser device out of his saddlebag. “He had this weird tech thing on him. I can’t understand all his funny talk, but it seems they have a wagon full of this stuff back at their camp. It’s about a day’s ride straight west toward the mountains.”
The Hombre glares at me, but says nothing. The Disciple leader examines the laser with a growing grin and shifts in his saddle to examine the Hombre with great interest.
“Why would you turn this man over to us?” the Disciple asks. “Do you expect some kind of reward?”
“The fact is, he’s a rapist and murderer and I would just as soon have killed the man. But my hosts compelled me to bring him to someone that would render lawful justice. Would that be you?”
“Yes, indeed,” the Disciple says, almost salivating as he looks at the Hombre. “I assure you, this man will receive the most thorough and complete justice we can render.”
I have no doubt about that as I drop the reins to the man’s horse and head back toward Little Crow and Angie. Since no Disciple saw me in Georges, I was not worried that they would recognize me as an Archivist. Still, I breathe a sigh of relief after they let me ride off. When I turn and glance back, they are already trotting toward town with the Hombre.
If my gambit pays off, the Disciple force in this region will be preoccupied for a good while, and they will clear out a local pestilence at the same time. I am trying to think of a suitable name for my new horse when I get back to Little Crow and Angie, only to find them bickering again.
“I tell you it’s true: a male porcupine pees on the female to get her interested in him,” Angie insists.
“No, they don’t. No female would find that interesting. You wouldn’t get all excited if I peed on you, would you?”
“I invite you to try it and see what happens!” she challenges him.
Little Crow turns to me as I ride up. “Where did you find this shama who thinks she knows more than a brother of the land?”
Shaking his head in disgust, Little Crow urges his horse forward and we set off southeast again as we resume our pursuit of Danae’s captors. Now that we have disposed of our unwanted guest, we push our horses to trot for a while, and then drop down to a fast, ambling gait.
I want to urge my mount keep trotting, but we have a long road ahead of us. Provided we pick up the trail, this marathon chase will likely last for days.
The sun is nearing the horizon when we cross the last fields. We wait for a small caravan to pass by heading north before we turn onto the worn road heading directly south. After the travelers fade into the dusty haze, Little Crow pulls up and sidles over to me.
“Do you still have something with Danae’s scent?” he asks.
I swing my pack around and unzip a small side pocket. I forgot all about it, but her shirt is still there. Little Crow winks at me as I pull it out, and he calls Malsum over. After helping Angie dismount, he holds the garment to Malsum’s nose and the cat takes several deep sniffs. Then Little Crow points to the ground.
“Track, Malsum. Track.”
We take a stretch break for a few minutes and give the horses some water and a handful of whole oats, while the lioness searches the area for some scent. I hope for some confirmation that we are on the right track, but Malsum finds nothing. As we resume our southward trek, the beast keeps sniffing for a scent, but she clearly does not pick up anything.
Dusk is deepening when we approach a small community. I ride up to a farmhouse while the others wait out on the road. When I near the building, a man steps through the door warily to greet me. I raise an open hand to show that I am unarmed.
“My companions and I are weary from a long day of riding and would pass the night in your barn if you have the room. We can pay you some coin for your trouble.”
The man squints at me for a minute, thinking, then
spits over the rail into the yard. They must make chewing tobacco around here. That often proves to be a valuable commodity; if I get a chance to come back this way, I will have to trade for a handful.
“I reckon not,” the man replies. “Ain’t got no room for guests, I’m ‘fraid.” As I start to turn my horse away, he continues. “But a piece further down the road is the widow Halpern. She been known to put up travelers, regular-like. Might be she’ll even throw in some bread and a bowl of soup, if’n she got it.”
“Well, that sounds like a right smart deal,” I respond.
“Go past a couple more places. She’s the one on the left with two dead trees in front of her house. Ring the bell on one of the trees and she’ll come right on out.”
I thank the man and head back to the road. The widow’s homestead is about another half mile. Little Crow moves Angie onto his packhorse before he sends Malsum off to forage. Hopefully not on someone’s livestock.
Sure enough, when I ring the bell, an elderly woman comes out onto the porch, but I also notice that Angie sits up straight, as if suddenly stung by a hornet. Then she fumbles to pull the hood of her riding cloak over her head hurriedly.
It is already dark, with only a hint of light left in the western sky, so the farmwoman holds out a lantern with one hand while supporting herself with a cane in the other.
“Who is it that comes ringing my lodging bell?” the diminutive woman inquires. She is no taller than a large child, and rather scrawny, but she has a surprisingly powerful voice.
“Three weary travelers and their horses, just looking for a place to stay the night, and some hot food if you have it,” I reply. “We’ll be moving on at first light, and won’t be any trouble.”
The woman moves to the edge of the porch. “Show me what you have to exchange for my hospitality. Mind you, I don’t care what currency your coin might be, but I’ll value the metal fairly.”
I swing down off my mount, pulling several of the coins Dr. Faukner gave me out of my pocket while I walk up to the woman. When I hold out my hand, she pokes through them until she selects a large and a small silver piece.
“This will do. Follow me around to the backside.” She hobbles off her small porch, and we follow her along a stone walkway that leads around a small vegetable garden and past some trees, to a large barn that faces an open, unfenced field.
We enter the structure, and the matron lights a lamp that stands ready. She quickly sizes up Little Crow and me as we swing down off our horses, but for some reason Angie stays on her mount.
“You seem like decent enough folk. Settle down wherever you care to and I’ll send some food out in a few minutes.” After the woman tromps off, Angie cautiously dismounts as well.
I am grateful that we do not have any fellow lodgers, because if we did, awkward would hardly describe what would happen when Malsum returned.
The first thing I do is start a fire in the oven which sits off to one side. The pile of firewood next to it is meant for providing warmth to lodgers, but a bin of charcoal behind the oven indicates that it sometimes doubles as a blacksmith forge during the day.
Little Crow and I take care of the horses and get them settled for the night in a couple of stalls outfitted with some grain feed. I have a few pieces of dried fruit in my pocket—something that looks like apricot—and my horse eagerly takes it out of my palm. Then he starts snuffling over my duster looking for more apricot, and now I have a name for my mount.
Meanwhile, Angie uses the cane I fashioned for her to feel her way around the barn. She stumbles into obstacles a few times, but is getting accustomed to exploring her surroundings, and she works her way over to me.
Grasping me by the shoulder, she whispers, “When we came in, was there a small stone wall enclosing a garden, next to a huge boulder?”
“Yes, there was! How did you know?” Angie cannot see my furrowed forehead, but she surely hears the puzzlement in my voice.
She purses her lips and nods without answering me, then says, “I’m going to use the outhouse.”
“I’ll lead you there,” I offer.
She pushes my hand away and says, “I know where it is, I’ll find it on my own.”
Using her cane, Angie works her way to the entrance of the barn, and after pausing for a moment turns to the right and heads into darkness. If it were anyone else I would be worried, but Angie will do what Angie wants to do.
By the time she returns fifteen minutes later, the widow has already brought out our supper. The food is just a meager stew, mostly root vegetables, with some token meat that I cannot quite identify but would guess is mutton. After a long day of riding, any hot meal tastes like a feast.
We are scraping our bowls with bread crusts when Malsum silently emerges from the darkness, a hare dangling from her jaws. The lioness drops it at Little Crow’s feet and then curls up in a stall in the darkness across from us.
Picking the animal carcass up, he tosses it into Angie’s lap, and the woman jumps. “Here, skinning a rabbit is woman’s work. Oh yeah, that’s right. You can’t do anything useful.”
I shoot Little Crow a ‘Dude!’ look, as I reach to take the rabbit, but Angie grips it tight and slaps my hand away. Reaching into her belt, she removes a small knife and after feeling over the animal, inserts the blade and begins slicing through the pelt.
The incisions are hesitant at first, and a couple of times she nicks her fingers while guiding the blade, but she works in grim silence while Little Crow and I watch, and eventually she peels the pelt off.
With a quick motion, she flings the bloody skin toward Little Crow. He barely manages to block the flying mass before it hits his face. Then, without a word, she holds the skinned carcass out by the legs until Little Crow stands up and takes it.
“Not bad,” he says with a surprised tone of genuine respect, and takes the skinned animal to Malsum, who swallows it in one gulp like a tasty treat and licks her jaws. He sits down with a chastened look on his face and occasionally glances at Angie as he reflects silently.
A short while later, a young girl comes out to collect the bowls. I would guess that the dark-haired girl is perhaps six or seven years of age. She is quiet and somewhat shy until she gets to Angie and asks, “How did you hurt your eyes?”
At the sound of the girl’s voice, Angie gasps and freezes. Then she slowly turns her head toward the girl and softly responds, “It was an accident with a knife. You should be very careful with knives.”
“Will you be able to see again, after those come off?” The child steps closer and touches the bandages gingerly.
“No, I don’t think so.” Angie reaches out and finds the girl, then gently runs her fingers over the child’s hair and face. Finally she asks in a trembling voice, “What’s your name?”
“Ariadne. But my mom just calls me Ari. I have to go now,” the girl replies as she breaks away. She grabs the stew pot and bowls, and pauses at the barn door. “I hope your eyes get better.” Then the child dashes back toward the house with the dinnerware.
“That’s a good name,” Angie calls out to the retreating footsteps. “Vaya con Dios, mi cielo,” she adds quietly.
I notice that Angie’s shoulders are shaking, and ask, “What did you say to her?”
“Something my mother used to say to me,” Angie responds and then turns away.
A little while later when I change the bandages on her eyes, they are wetter than they were the night before.
Chapter Sixteen
The next morning, when it is time to mount up, Angie pushes Little Crow’s hands away as he offers to help her up onto Malsum. But it is a push, not a slap. Angie has been unusually withdrawn and even introspective, since her encounter with the child last night.
“Don’t be prideful,” he says. “Look, I’m sorry about last night. I was being a jerk.” Something has changed overnight in Little Crow’s attitude and opened up his sympathetic side.
“Don’t be stupid, it’s not about pride,” Angie says
quietly, as she takes hold of his hand. “There will be a time when you’re too busy dealing with real problems and I’ll need to take care of myself. But thank you for offering to help. I just need to learn new ways of doing things.”
They stand there for a few moments while she holds his hand, and I quietly shake my head as I step into Apricot’s stirrups, uncertain whether I know either of those two.
Then, Little Crow steps back. It takes Angie several tries, but Malsum seems to recognize Angie’s limitations, and positions herself to enable the woman to swing up easily. That does not surprise me. Natural selection bred predators to identify weakness in others.
Dawn reaches nearly full daylight by the time we are on the road heading south. After passing through a few more miles of scattered farmland and ranches, we leave the small community behind and start winding through gentle hills devoid of any human presence other than ourselves.
The scrub brush yields to small trees, which are hardly dense enough to call a forest, except in the most generous terms. Still, we pick up the pace as we get our traveling legs, so to speak, and around mid-morning we come across a small campsite next to a stream.
It is not a fresh site; the ashes are cold, and after he jumps down to examine the site, Little Crow says they are a day old.
But when I pull out Danae’s garment for Malsum to sniff, the cat immediately heads to a flattened spot in the grass. My heart pounds when Malsum snarls and sniffs around a bit. She turns and runs up and down the trail, practically prancing. Malsum has definitely picked up Danae’s scent.
It takes me a few moments to realize that I am crying. A suffocating blanket of fear that we would not find Danae’s track has been removed. The relief is almost overwhelming; I quickly shove it into my emotional lockbox.
Little Crow spends about ten minutes walking over the ground, discerning what he can about the group we are pursuing.
“There are seven, maybe eight men. Three of them as well as your woman are riding horses. The others are walking, so we should be able to gain ground on them. It looks like there was some sort of quarrel over here. Not involving the woman, but between three of the men. One of them was probably the leader, I figure he has the better boots. One of the others was knocked to the ground, and it looks like he got a bit bloodied.”