To the Gap (Daughter of the Wildings #4)

by Kyra Halland

  This wasn’t the time to tell her the real reason for his fear, not with the other hands around, so he just hugged her again. “I guess I’m not as used to it as you are.”

  “I was worried about you, too, but I figure you can manage yourself and Abenar. Anyhow, we were about to go after a couple hundred head that took off that way. We sure could use your help.”

  “The more hands, the better,” one of the Strawdale men added. “And we hear from your little lady you’re pretty damn good at tracking cattle.”

  A foolish pleasure that they wanted him along replaced that sense of not belonging in Lainie’s world. “Sure, I’ll help. But,” Silas said to Lainie, “I want you to stay by me the whole time, got that?”

  “You’re nervous as a chicken in granny’s kitchen tonight,” she said with another smile. “If it’ll make you feel better, I’ll stay right next to you.”

  The group mounted up and rode out in search of the stray cattle. True to her word, Lainie stayed right at Silas’s side as though bound there. The bunch of cattle they were tracking had only gone another league or so and stopped at a running stream, where they were slaking their thirst. They had also had the courtesy to not take refuge in any thorny thickets. Silas, Lainie, and the other hands had them back to the main herd well before dawn, then Lainie went to the grub wagon to start working on breakfast while Silas and the other men rode back out to help round up the rest of the cattle.

  Thanks in large part to the efficiency and skills of the Strawdale hands, the whole herd was rounded up, checked for the proper brands, and counted by early in the afternoon. Exhausted, hungry, and dirty but with several hours’ work yet ahead of him, Silas stopped by the Windy Valley grub wagon for a quick bite to eat before heading back out to the herd. As he spooned up his cold leftover corn mush, the message he’d received the day before weighed heavily on his mind. His protective instincts urged him not to frighten Lainie with it, but, as she had said herself, it didn’t help matters when he hid things from her. Not telling her, and leaving her unaware of the true extent of the danger, would be no kindness. Like it or not, he was going to have to tell her about it, as soon as he could find time and privacy.

  He fetched a fresh horse from the remounts and rode out to the herd. A short time later, Lainie, on Mala, rode over to him. “You feel that?” she asked quietly.

  Silas reached out with his mage senses. Power, strong and right up close –

  He hastily pulled his mage senses back in and shielded his power even as two strangers on horseback approached the herd, not far ahead of where Silas and Lainie were. “That’s them,” he murmured.

  “Yeah. They aren’t even bothering to shield hardly at all now.”

  “What about you?”

  “Mine’s in,” Lainie said.

  Silas made sure the camouflage on his own shield was smooth and seamless. The mages might still detect him, but, not being Wildings-born, they would never find Lainie when she had her power suppressed deep inside herself. Still, better safe than sorry. “Good,” he said. “Now go back to the wagons.”

  “No. You’re the one they’d be after, not me. Anyhow, they might just be rustling. After a stampede’s a good time for it.”

  Before Silas could tell her again to return to the wagons, one of the mages, short and pale with a brown mustache, called out, “Hey, mister!”

  Silas was the closest trail hand and the mage was looking right at him, so he couldn’t pretend he didn’t know the man was talking to him. “Hey, there, stranger!” he called back as though he were nothing more than an ordinary, innocent cowhand and this was a perfectly ordinary, innocent encounter.

  “We’re lookin’ for your trail boss.” The man’s exaggerated Wildings drawl failed to hide his crisp upper-class Granadaian accent.

  Silas had been told this was a common opening gambit for rustlers. So these fellows could just be looking to make off with some cattle, or it could be a pretext to snoop around the herd and crew, searching for renegade mages. He watched closely for any indication that the mages recognized him and Lainie. “I think he’s riding back with the supply wagons right now.”

  “Fine herd you’ve got here,” said the second man, a taller, darker-skinned man, clearly of Island heritage. “Forn’s Crossing?”

  “Among others.”

  “Been on the trail long?” the taller man went on.

  “More than two months.”

  “Had much trouble?”

  “A flooded crossing. And two stampedes.”

  “Includin’ one last night, I believe,” the shorter mage said. “As a matter of fact, that’s what we need to speak to your foreman about. Good talkin’ to you.” The two strangers rode past Silas and Lainie, heading for the back of the herd.

  The mages had shown no sign of knowing who Silas and Lainie were, but that didn’t mean Silas felt easy enough to take his eyes off of them. “I’m still hungry,” he said to Lainie. “I want to get something else from the grub wagon.” Besides being an excuse to follow the two mages, it would get Lainie back to the safety of the wagons and the bosses, where, with any luck, he could persuade her to stay. And he really was hungry.

  They rode after the two mages to where the supply wagons and the bosses were traveling clustered together at the rear of the herd. Bington, who was driving the Windy Valley grub wagon, tossed them each a leftover biscuit. Even half a day old, Lainie’s biscuits were better than anyone else’s. They ate their biscuits and drank from their water bottles and rode a little closer over to where the two newcomers were speaking with Landstrom, Endis, and the other trail bosses.

  “As I was sayin’, some of our cattle have gone missin’,” the short man said, “an’ we suspect they might have been rounded up by your boys this mornin’.”

  “Understandable, given the stampede,” the tall man added. “But we’d still like our cattle back.”

  “Not likely,” Endis said. “My hands have all been trained to double check the brand marks.”

  “Mine too,” the Strawdale and Discovery bosses added.

  “Mine as well,” the Forn’s Crossing boss said. “So, were I you, I’d watch what I was sayin’. You wouldn’t want to be wrongfully accusing us of nothin’.”

  “Now, now. I’m not sayin’ anyone did anythin’ wrong,” the shorter man said. “But mistakes can still happen, right? Tired trail hands tryin’ to get the strays all in, they’re not goin’ to look at every single animal when they just want to get the herd rounded up, right?”

  “Wrong,” Endis said. “These men know better than that. Still, you’re welcome to ride through the herd and take a look, if you want. But if you decide to cut out any cattle, you come get me or one of the other bosses first, and show us which ones you mean to take. Along with your certificate of ownership from your co-op for the brands on them, of course.”

  The shorter man tipped his hat. “Certainly.” He and his companion rode off, making their way forward into the herd.

  “If they’re… you know what,” Lainie murmured to Silas, “wouldn’t it be easy for them to change the brands on any cattle they took a fancy to?”

  “Easy as falling down,” Silas answered. “Hey, boss,” he called over to Endis. “I’ll ride after those fellows, make sure they don’t try anything funny.”

  “Thanks, Shark.”

  “You stay here,” Silas said to Lainie. Without waiting for her to agree or disagree, he rode off after the would-be cattle thieves.

  A moment later, Lainie pulled up beside him on Mala. “I’m not letting you deal with them alone,” she said. “Especially not if they’re hunters.”

  Frustration boiled up inside him at her refusal to listen. “I told you to stay out of it. There’s more going on than you know.”

  “What?” she demanded.

  “I can’t talk about it right now.”

  “But –”

  “Damn it, just get back to the wagons. Now!”

  Her cheeks reddened in an angry flush, and sh
e took in a sharp breath. Then, without a word, she turned Mala sharply about and galloped back to the grub wagon.

  Now he had done it, Silas thought as he watched her go. He had never raised his voice at her like that before. She was going to be mad at him, and rightfully so – but his frustration with her was no less justified. Why wouldn’t she listen to him, especially when it was for her own good?

  He rode on after the mages, and his emotions soon started to settle down. On reflection, he had to admit that when he was her age, nineteen or twenty, he’d never wanted to listen to anyone either. Years and hard experience had taught him that maybe sometimes other people did know what they were talking about and might be worth listening to. Maybe it was asking too much to expect her to just take his word on things. He would have to make time to tell her about the new message as soon as he could.

  He pushed the horse he was riding that afternoon, a white-marked bay that took no nonsense from any cattle, a little faster to catch up with the mages. Well away from the wagons, the two strangers reined in their horses in front of several cows, blocking their way and forcing the trailing cattle to bunch up behind them. The taller, darker mage dismounted and touched one cow’s rear flank, where the brands would be.

  “Say,” Silas shouted. “That’s my Daisybell! I raised her from a calf; she ain’t one of yours.”

  The two mages jerked their heads up to look at him.

  “Why, er…” the taller mage stammered.

  “Sorry to say you’re wrong, boy,” said the shorter mage, considerably less flustered. “She’s got our brand on her.”

  Silas rode over and dismounted. He examined the bossy’s flank; instead of the the brands that should have been there, two different symbols that he recognized as mage family glyphs were burned into the hair on the cow’s flank. Bold of them, or stupid, to use mage family symbols as their brand. “Hey, you changed her brands,” he said, loud enough that the other hands nearby could hear him. “What are you, wizards?”

  A couple of trail hands started riding over. The two mages eyed their approach. “Why, um, certainly not,” the taller mage said.

  Silas and the other trail hands surrounded the two cattle thieves, on foot and on horseback. One and two at a time, several others joined them. The hands drew their guns, and Silas did so as well. The mages drew their own guns, handling them awkwardly, with a lack of familiarity and experience. Which only made them all the more dangerous.

  “I’ll go get the bosses,” one of the trail hands said, and rode away.

  Silas considered the odds if it came to a fight. Using magic, two mages could easily take less than a dozen Plains, even if those Plains were armed. On the other hand, using magical attacks would make it impossible for them to shield themselves against bullets, and they were surrounded by the better part of a dozen men who knew how to shoot better than they did. As well, attacking with magic would reveal them as mages to a crew of some seventy or more Plains who would gladly hang them. They should have made their move back by the river, when it was just the one herd, Silas thought, instead of waiting so long for an easy chance that was turning out to not be so easy.

  The tension grew as the standoff dragged on in the hot sun. Sweat trickled down Silas’s back and the side of his face. The rustlers’ faces were also beaded with sweat. They were tempted to unleash their power, Silas could tell. Though they weren’t wearing their mage rings, he noted the slight, almost involuntary movements that were the beginnings of gestures that would shape magical attacks; he could almost feel their instinctive urge to use magic. He prayed fervently they would restrain themselves; if they attacked with magic, his own instincts to use his power to defend himself might prove irresistable.

  He should just shoot them now. He could take them both down before they could strike back. But firing a gun in the middle of the herd would be a good way to start another stampede. And if he was wrong about the mages’ shooting skills, a gunfight could break out that would lead to more blood being shed and, by the rules laid down for the drive, an inquiry that Silas would rather avoid. He saw more than one cowhand’s finger twitch on the trigger of his gun; he wasn’t the only one who was fighting the temptation to shoot without first giving the confrontation a chance to be peacefully resolved.

  After a wait that seemed longer than it probably really was, Landstrom, Endis, and the Strawdale boss rode up with the hand who had gone to fetch them. “We got a problem here?” Landstrom asked.

  “You boys put those guns away,” the Strawdale boss said. “We don’t want any more stampedes. Or anyone getting themselves killed. We got a schedule to keep, and it’s gonna be hard enough without anyone going off all hot-headed.”

  As the hands, including Silas, reholstered their guns, Endis asked the rustlers, “Find your cattle?”

  The mages glanced at each other, frowning. Silas could imagine the difficulty of the spot they were in; taking only one cow was more trouble than it was worth, but it was too late to change any more brands or to claim they hadn’t found their stock.

  “Er, yes,” the taller, dark-skinned mage said. “I think this is the only animal we lost. We’ll just take her and go.”

  “Let’s see your certificate of ownership,” Landstrom said.

  “Well, that’s no problem.” The shorter, fair-skinned mage took a folded piece of paper out from the inner pocket of his dark brown duster. Silas was sure it would have the appropriate names, signatures, and reproductions of their “brands”, and that it was all forged. Still, if the herd could get out of this with the loss of only one cow and no fighting, it seemed like a good deal to him.

  The bosses looked at the men’s papers, comparing them to the symbols burned into the hair on “Daisybell’s” flank. “Don’t look like no brands I’ve ever seen,” Endis finally said, “an’ I’ve seen most of ‘em. But I won’t argue with the certificate. You fellas take your bossy an’ get gone now. An’ I don’t expect to see you come sniffin’ around any more.”

  The mages still looked unhappy. “On second thought,” the shorter mage said, “We weren’t able to send a herd to the market this year. We’d be willing to sell you this one.”

  The bosses nodded to each other. Landstrom took a leather money pouch out of his pocket and counted out some coins. “Five gildings. A fair market price, minus a little for our trouble in taking her there.” He dropped the coins into the shorter mage’s outstretched hand.

  The mages stared down at the coins. Silas couldn’t quite suppress a smirk. Lying in wait for the last month and a half and going to all the trouble of preparing the ruse, all for a payout of five gildings. It served the sons of bitches right for trying to take advantage of honest working folk. And he could think of ten different ways he could have carried out the whole job more successfully. But then, he liked to think that he was smarter than your ordinary rogue mage.

  Escorted by four trail hands with revolvers drawn, the rustlers mounted up and rode away from the herd. Relief that the danger was past settled over Silas, then quickly fled when he remembered the state of affairs between him and Lainie. The bosses headed back to the wagons and Silas joined them, meaning to find a way to talk to Lainie right away, before any more time went by and things got any worse.

  Along the way, Landstrom asked him, “So you think those fellows were gods-damned wizards and they changed the brands?”

  “Yep,” Silas said. “I saw one of them touch the bossy on the flank before I got there. And Endis is right; those marks didn’t look like normal brands.”

  “Not the first time it’s happened,” Endis said. “We got off easy this time, paying five gildings for one of our own animals. We’ll figure out whose it is next time we do a count.”

  “An’ those two sons of bitches won’t dare come around again now that they’ve been marked as wizards,” Landstrom added.

  If that really was the last they saw of any mages, Silas wouldn’t complain. Somehow, though, he doubted it would be. Not with a drive this big and r
ich, and not with gods alone knew what going on in Granadaia… An itchy feeling in his mind and between his shoulderblades told him something much bigger was waiting to happen. And the last thing he wanted was for Lainie to get caught in the middle when it did.

  Chapter 8

  LAINIE WAS SHAKING by the time she got back to the grub wagon. Tears spilled from her eyes; angrily, hoping no one noticed, she pushed them away. Silas had never spoken to her like that before, not ever. He had never treated her like a child and expected her to obey him without question. And now he was out there alone with two renegade mages – or, worse, mage hunters. She hadn’t been there when her brother Blake was killed, and if anything happened to Silas now and she wasn’t there to help him, she would never forgive herself. She didn’t know if she was more mad at Silas for yelling at her or scared to death for him.

  Mr. Bington, who was driving the grub wagon, halted the wagon next to her. “Why don’t you come sit here next to me, girl, and tell me about it.”

  Damn it, he must have seen her crying. Shame at her weakness filled her, and shame that she and her husband had argued practically in public. She didn’t want to see or talk to anyone, but if she couldn’t tell someone how mad and scared she was, she would burst. At least she could be sure Mr. Bington wouldn’t lecture or gossip. She got down from Mala and climbed up onto the wagon seat beside him. He started the horses again, and Mala trailed alongside, content to take her time and graze along the way.

  They sat in silence for a few minutes. Lainie’s anger, hurt, and fear churned inside her so that she couldn’t begin to say what was in her mind.

  “First real quarrel?” Mr. Bington finally asked.

  “Yeah.” She and Silas had had disagreements before, but it had never come to this. He had never pushed back so hard; he had never raised his voice at her until now. And with no easy answers, she was afraid it was only going to get worse before they got all this straightened out. If they ever did.

  “You get the first one over with, and then it isn’t so bad,” Mr. Bington said. “It isn’t the end of the world.”