by John Dalmas
We went. She didn't have anything more to say all the way to her cabin. I didn't either, but my brain was going a mile a minute.
I knew just what I was going to do: get me a job around there somewhere, on a farm or in the woods. It wouldn't need to pay cash; bed and board would be plenty, and the bed could be hay in the barn. I had twenty-seven dollars in my shoe, more than enough to buy a pistol and a good rifle, and plenty of shells. And I'd be back on top of Injun Knob before dark, on the night of the next full moon.
PART 2: The Twice-Stolen Bride 5: Xader
" ^ "
The top of Injun Knob appeared ordinary in the moonlight, half bald, its scrubby trees scattered. The gate hadn't opened yet, but Varia could feel it. Chuckling, Xader put his arms around her from behind, groping her through her housedress: "Might as well enjoy ourselves while we wait," he murmured, and kissed her neck. His inborn psionic talent was sufficient that, unless she took him by surprise, he could hold off whatever magic she might try with handcuffs on. So she stamped hard on his instep, and swearing, he let her go, stepping back from her.
Abruptly the three of them were swallowed into a deep bass indigo nothingness, a nothingness with a gut-wrenching, mind-numbing sense of distortion, followed by a moment of suspension while the gate examined them. Then Varia found herself running like someone who'd just jumped from a moving car. As if the gate had spit her out. Unable to windmill her manacled arms for balance, she fell headlong onto grass. A minute later, hands raised her to her feet, a small hand on one side, a larger on the other.
She stood not in midnight now, but in sun-dappled high noon, and looked about her. They were no longer on the mountaintop, but in a cathedral-like grove of large old basswood trees. The grass was lawn-like, almost without saplings, as if grazed between the monthly openings of the gate. And in fact, on this side, in the world called Yuulith, animals and humans could enter the site freely until the first distortion of the matrix, the Web of the World, when the gate began to regenerate. Then it physically repelled them.
Several rough-clad men with spears had been waiting to collect anyone or anything that came through. They held back though, recognizing that these were part of the Sisterhood. Ignoring them, Idri first untied the bandanna that held Varia's mouth shut, then removed the gag from between her teeth, leaving the handcuffs on. For just a moment she watched Varia work the kinks from her jaw, then turned and slapped Xader, the sound almost like a small-caliber pistol. Idri, like Varia, was considerably stronger than she looked.
"She's still a Sister, Xader," she snapped, "and don't forget it. Keep your hands to yourself, and remember who you are."
Remember what you are, Varia corrected silently. A cull. Occasionally a guardsman clone was flawed in some unacceptable way, and the whole batch was either kept for labor or quietly disposed of. It occurred to Varia that the Ferny Cove disaster might have left so few guardsmen alive, culls were used more widely now.
Xader had flushed with resentment. But it wasn't the slap that had stung him, Varia knew. He'd harassed her before, in the Packard, with the curtains drawn and Armik driving. And Idri had allowed it, to a point. Perhaps she rationalized it as punishment for Varia's deserting the Sisterhood, but basically she had a sadistic streak. Sitting in front, she'd ignored Varia's muffled complaints, grunted through her gag, but when Xader's hand went into his victim's pants, as it invariably had, Idri had turned as if she had eyes in the back of her head, slapped him, and chewed him out. He'd laughed and stopped-in his brutal, offensive way he was good-natured-but in an hour or two resumed his harassment.
No, what stung him now, Varia told herself, were the witnesses, the tribesmen who'd seen it. And no doubt he considered himself entrapped, for this time he'd been slapped without even putting his hand up her dress.
Varia wondered if this meant the end of his abuse. With her gag out, she could complain in words, and Idri could hardly ignore her.
The tribesmen at the gate had been respectful enough. At Idri's order, one had led them to the village headman, who'd loaned them horses and an escort. There Idri had removed Varia's handcuffs, and both had dressed themselves in tribesmen's breeches, for riding. Then they'd ridden to Oztown and the chief's compound, arriving at dusk. Idri wasted no time; made arrangements that same evening for a squad of warriors as an escort. They left the next morning at sunup, riding eastward through mildly rolling wooded hills, and occasional large openings with farms and villages.
Xader left Varia carefully alone, though from time to time she felt his eyes.
They traveled till dusk before camping. The new escort were swaggerers, warriors of the chief's own elite. Undoubtedly they'd heard of the rape at Ferny Cove, for they eyed the Sisters appraisingly, without the respect they might once have shown. But they'd said or done nothing more offensive than look. Then Idri started the supper fires with simple hand gestures, reminding them of the Sisters' reputation for dangerous sorceries.
The escort ate separately from its charges, except that Idri invited their sergeant to sit beside her. When they'd eaten, the escort and Xader had laid down their beds a little distance from the Sisters, screened by undergrowth. The men, including Xader, had warm sleeping robes against the night chill. The Sisters, with their powers, used only a pallet and a single light blanket.
Varia was awakened by a powerful hand clutching her throat, cutting off her air. The voice that murmured to her was Xader's, and she smelled whiskey on his breath. "There's a knife in my other hand," he said. "One sound and you're dead." He let go her throat then, threw the blanket aside, fumbled with the drawstring on her breeches and began tugging them down. She could sense the knife an inch from her throat; it move to her belly as he got her breeches off her buttocks.
"Idri will crucify you for this," she whispered.
Xader chuckled, seemingly without rancor. "Idri's over by the creek bank, bobbing up and down on that sergeant's pole. And when she's done with him, she'll sleep like a sow-like the sow she is." Again he chuckled. "I know."
Her breeches were down to her knees now, down to her ankles. She struggled, twisting from side to side, intensely conscious of the knife. Idri pushed you too far yesterday, she thought panting. When she wakes up, I'll be dead and you'll be gone. Sarkia will chain her in a Tiger barracks for that, but it won't do me any good. He pricked her waist with the knife tip then, numbing her will, and using a bare foot, freed her of her breeches. Then, bare from the waist down, he forced himself between her knees. The Sisterhood must be in bad shape, she thought, or you wouldn't dare do this. Sarkia would set Tomm himself on your trail.
Once more he chuckled. "Put it in for me," he said. His face smirked in hers, his breath reeking. "I'll show you what a good man's like."
She might have cooperated-it seemed her best chance for survival-but his boast was an affront to Curtis. Reaching down as if to comply, she found his testicles, and willed a powerful jolt of electricity through them. The knife which had jabbed her waist, she fully expected to plunge into her guts, but in his agony, he lost it. As he screamed, she squeezed, with hands that had milked cows for years.
With all her strength, she rolled him off, still clutching, willed another jolt, then tore his scrotum half off, cords stretching and giving. His body doubled with spasm, then went slack. She didn't entirely trust his unconsciousness, and held on grimly while scanning with her cat vision for the knife. Someone, a sentry, had grabbed a torch and hurried over, stopping a few yards off to stare. Glancing back over her shoulder, Varia's large green eyes caught the man's and held them, dominating him even as she crouched over Xader with her buttocks bared. "Never try to rape a Sister," she hissed at him, "or you'll end up like this one."
Round-eyed, the sentry said nothing. The whole camp had wakened at Xader's scream, but they kept back. Except for Idri, who arrived only partly covered by the sergeant's long, unbuttoned tunic, his saber in her hand. Xader's eyes were open again, wide and glazed with shock, and sweat greased his forehead, though
the night was chill. Varia sent another jolt through him, not as strong, bringing a thin whinny of pain.
Idri cursed. "Let him go!" she ordered.
Varia did, snatching her breeches from the ground. "Go ahead, Xader," she said. "Here's your chance to tell her what you told me: that she's a sow in heat."
Psychically Varia felt the crackle of Idri's rage, but it wasn't aimed at her. The Sister stepped and thrust, the saber striking Xader beneath the ribs and riding in. He squawked like air released from a bladder, then went slack again, and blood stained his twill shirt, purchased at J.C. Penney's in Evansville, Indiana, in another universe. Idri wiped her blade first on his bare thigh, then on his sleeve. "Leave him here," she told the wide-eyed sentry. "Let the vermin clean his bones." She turned her gaze to Varia. "Put your breeches on. You have my apologies, for what they're worth. I should have known he'd try something like this."
Their gazes met and briefly locked, and it was Idri's that turned away. Yes, Varia thought as she pulled her breeches on, you knew what he was like. Probably he'd been in trouble for bothering local women at Ferny Cove, and you saved his skin. You'd love having power over an oversexed fool like that.
But she said none of it. They had hundreds of miles to go, and she was Idri's prisoner.
6: Welcome Home!
" ^ "
On the third day after crossing the Great Muddy River, they rode down out of wooded hills into the broad east-west valley of the Green River, an extensively cleared plain. At the edge of vision to the north they could see high hills dark with forest. The country they traveled through was new to Varia, though not to Idri, who whenever they crossed into a new kingdom, arranged for local escorts.
Unlike the west side of the Great Muddy, the people here lived under kings. The highway the Sisters rode was dirt-mud after rains-and along it, the farmers lived in tiny hamlets at intervals of a mile or less, half a dozen to a dozen cottages in each, plus outbuildings. Every few miles stood a village, and about once a day they came to a real town, with a reeve's palisaded fort. On a few occasions the party slept in inns, but more commonly, Idri obtained space for them at some manor house.
Clearly the Sisterhood retained some part of its old reputation and respect here, for nowhere were they refused an escort, or food or lodging. Though the obsequiousness common before the disaster at Ferny Cove was reduced now mostly to courteous or sometimes grudging compliance.
As they rode, Varia had abundant time to think. She and Idri had little to say to each other; their antagonism dated from long before Varia had arrived at Evansville with Curtis Macurdy. As girls, they'd vied for a coveted executive apprenticeship in the Dynast's office, and Varia had been chosen on the basis of a higher responsibility score, superior performance on decision-making tests, and greater talents in magic. Her only weakness had been an undistinguished aggressiveness quotient. But after a year on the job-a successful year she'd been assured-Varia had been sent to Farside, with the explanation that she provided the best blood line for breeding with the newly located Will Macurdy. That and better adaptability than any other of her clone.
Nonetheless, fifteen years later, when Idri replaced Liiset at Evansville, it had been quickly apparent that her resentment was alive and well. And now-Now her look, her bearing, her aura, and an occasional oblique comment said to Varia, I'm better than you. You think only of yourself; I think first of the Sisterhood. But when they stopped at an inn, she took a room for herself, and took the sergeant of their escort to bed with her. Behavior entirely at odds with the Sisterhood's hard-earned image of aloof superiority. Behavior that each escort would talk about and exaggerate at home, cheapening the Sisterhood.
Yet surely Sarkia knew of Idri's weakness, and tolerated it. What will she think of my weakness? Varia asked herself. Will she look at it as a foible? Or as treason? A misdemeanor, she decided. There's probably not one other Sister who's provided as many children as I have.
East of the Great Muddy they crossed three kingdoms. Then the broad valley narrowed, the country became semi-mountainous, the farmland discontinuous, the clearings ever smaller and more scattered. The men walked tall, looking self-reliant, not subservient like the peasants Varia had been seeing. These were tribesmen ruled by elected councils and chiefs. They raised crops, but herding was their principal livelihood.
Yet the road was better, and the mountain streams were bridged with stone. Dwarf work, according to the sergeant of their latest escort. Varia saw her first dwarves ever, a party of three. Not dwarves in the Farside sense; the dwarves of Yuulith were a unique phenomenon, the similarities limited. They were thick bodied and their legs were short, but not their arms, for their gnarly hands hung almost to the ground. They stood about four and a half feet tall. Packs and crossbows rode on their broad backs, swords at their hips, and they passed without a nod. Their mission must be friendly, the sergeant said when they'd gone by. Otherwise they'd have carried poleaxes as well, and shields slung on their packs.
Now, when the view allowed, they could see true mountains ahead, the Great Eastern Mountains, with jagged crests against the sky, snow fields and glaciers glinting on the upper slopes. Once their lead man called back that a great cat, a jaguar, had crossed the road just ahead, pausing to glower at him before disappearing into the forest. And on the mud along a stream bank, they saw the tracks of a night-prowling troll.
At last they entered a kingdom of the dwarves, the Dwarves in Silver Mountain. By their leave, men dwelt within its edges, living much as they did just westward, but paying land fees. For dwarves were not greatly interested in the surface, and at any rate considered these no more than foothills to the greater mountains just eastward.
In a north-south valley was the new Cloister of the Sisters, a sizeable area protected by spells and a stockade. Inside were buildings of new lumber, and areas of tents. Crews of men, no doubt hired from some king, were busy at construction. In the south end, gardens had already been set out, and new grass grew emerald between paths. In the center, Varia could see what could only be the Dynast's "palace," a large canvas pavilion. Stacks of white marble blocks stood nearby, promising a real palace like the one destroyed at Ferny Cove. She wondered where the wealth had come from to have all this built so quickly. Or indeed how the King in Silver Mountain had come to approve their settling there, for in general, dwarves avoided commitments with outsiders, except for business.
Despite her uncertain but surely not favorable status, Varia was excited to see it. Clearly many more of the Sisterhood had escaped Ferny Cove than Idri had indicated, no doubt dispersed and traveling under cover of spells cast by the more talented. Taking with them more wealth, probably in jewels, than Varia had supposed.
And in this kingdom, the community would have the protection of the dwarves, whom even the ylver relied on and were careful of. For it was dwarves who dug the ores and smelted much of the metal used by men and ylver between the oceans; dwarves who crafted the better tools and weapons. Dwarves were quick to take offense, and very slow to forgive. Further, to seriously offend any dwarvish kingdom was to offend all of them, despite their differences, rivalries, and occasional feuds. And tradition told that when they made war, they were relentless and grim, while no one knew how many thousands could come pouring from the bowels of the mountains.
This, she told herself, was a good place for the Sisterhood to recover and grow, and build its strength.
A page, a pre-adolescent Sister, showed them to separate quarters. Varia was taken to a low, temporary barracks, where she would share a room with clone mates. There were feather beds, and a large copper tub. Water, the page told her, was piped from a hot spring.
Her clone mates were at their duties, and though she was eager to see them, it felt good to be alone. She soaked and soaped, scrubbed her skin with a brush and toweled herself dry, then donned a clean robe and luxuriated on her feather bed.
And examined her situation. There seemed essentially no chance of getting back to Farside and Curtis-
not in the near future. But life could be good here; she could adjust. There'd be lots of work, and time would bring opportunities.
That evening she ate in a women's dining hall with perhaps a hundred Sisters. Three of her clone were there; she recognized them like she recognized her face in the mirror, and shared an embrace and happy tears with Liiset. After supper, the two of them walked around the extensive grounds-a large village, essentially. They talked, Varia saying little about the Macurdies and nothing at all about her capture. As if Idri had simply requested her to come; as if she'd returned willingly. While Liiset ignored Ferny Cove, speaking of construction projects and planting, new developments in ceramics, and promising new magicks for manipulating physical traits during embryogenesis.
Finally a cold evening breeze from the mountains sent them indoors. It had been an affectionate reunion. Liiset was more serious than in years past, hadn't shown her whimsical humor, but that was hardly surprising after the events at Ferny Cove.
Meanwhile it seemed to Varia that she was home now, in the sense of childhood home, even if it wasn't the same location she'd left more than twenty years before. A ruder, relocated version of home.
For the first time since she'd been kidnapped, she lay down relaxed. And as she waited for sleep, it struck her that Sarkia would still be interested in Curtis; she'd gone to a lot of trouble to get children from the Macurdy line. Surely she'll let me go back for him, Varia thought. Or more likely have me taken back.
She didn't doubt he'd come if she asked him. She'd put a condition on the asking though: She'd share him with the others, but Sarkia would have to let the two of them live together as man and wife.