"And the Persons' own children...?"
"Those," Richard said, "— Boston also takes for itself. Though many of us... many cannot have children at all."
Baj said, into silence, "But the woman who Walked-in-air — Patience."
"From her, Baj," Richard said, "— they hold her child."
"The fools hoped they'd made a God-baby at last," angry Nancy lisping the s's into th's, "— to push the turning earth closer to the sun, and bring Warm-times back again."
"That is... not possible."
"So I think." Richard nodded. "For a few New England Talents to manage through the air is one thing. But greater than that, they don't have in them."
"They have shit in them," Nancy said. "And Patience's baby is only a dreamer — though a great one, dreaming forward and back."
"So . .. Boston rules the East by holding hostages from both fathers and sons."
"See how a Once-prince knows the means." Nancy spat into shrubbery.
".. . I'm sure," Baj said, "that my Second-father understood Boston's way. The Chancellor, and my brother also. But knowing those bonds — and breaking them — are two different things."
"But with the mothers dead," Richard said, "— who are also daughters dead — then the bonds are broken for Persons and the tribes."
Errol, restless, tried to tug away, but Richard kept hold of him, made soothing puh puh sounds as the boy settled.
"Which is why we travel so far north and east, Clever Fencer." Nancy seemed to smile at Baj, but wasn't smiling. "— We go to join Shrikes and the Guard, their peace made to march together against Boston. A great revenge for you as well, Sunriser."
Richard sighed as if he were very tired. "... While the Guard attacks the city's southern and easiest gate — an attack sure to fail, and only to draw all regiments of the town Constables there — Patience will lead us and a few others down the north gate, then across Boston to the Pens.... There, in what time the Constables allow us, we are to break all loving bonds."
Baj took a breath."... Kill them? Kill the women?"
Silence, but for gentle winds through summer leaves. Silence .. . that most definite of answers.
* * *
After hours of descending — Baj with scrapes and bruises from a nasty fall — after those weary hours into late after-noon, hanging half the time from stunted tree to tree, they'd reached the first long level of young grasses, wild flowers in meadows stretching along the stream. Baj's legs had said, "Thank you," as he strode at last with no climbing up or down. He'd slid his bow off his shoulder, drew a broadhead from the quiver at his back in case of game here, on the valley's plain.... But no game came grazing as they walked to the river named New. Only a red-shouldered hawk swung slow circles above, beyond any arrow's reach.
It was surprising how the sight and sound of the stream affected him — a fair-sized river, not simply tumbling mountain waterfalls — a river running in roaring rapids from short-summer's melt, roiling, glittering along. It struck Baj's heart.... Memories of so much greater a river, of the Mississippi swollen by centuries of summers' melts from half-a-continent of ice, came to him so he stood dreaming.
The others stood beside him, though recollection of no great river could be running through their hearts. This lesser brawling stream, carving through green country — with, of course, more mountains to climb just beyond it — might it support some lesser Jesus, floating with its currents?. .. Baj, breathing deep of air with river-haze risen in it, felt sick with longing for great water's smell and currents, for the sway of the deck of a summer sailing-boat beneath his feet... the slide, speed, and rumble of ice-rigged ships before the River's wind.
For the first time since he'd fled before the king, he found a poem forming in his mind, as if a dam of clotted timbers had been shaken loose by rapids. But the better the poem might be — of loss and the River — the more painful to make and remember.... Better pass in silence, than examine wounds with a burning-glass.
"How do we cross this?" he said.
"With great care." Richard untied the thick coil of braided-leather line from his pack. Shook the coil open. "No easier ford?"
"Likely, yes — but two or three days east, and deeper into the Robins' country."
"It was frozen," Nancy said, "— when we came south."
"This can be managed," Richard said, kept an end of his line, and knotted the other around Errol's waist. "It might be otter blood, not weasel, the boy swims so well — seems to mind only water falling."
"I see." But that thundering stream, though not toppling in a fall, appeared to Baj to be very difficult swimming.
Richard climbed down to a leaning birch... and tied the line's end off in a double knot while Errol, appearing eager, trotted away a distance upstream with the coil, loosing the length as he went. Then, reaching the line's other end, the boy suddenly galloped down the river's bank there, and dove into the roil of water... his knives still in his belt, and still wearing his moccasin-boots.
"Not good," Baj said.
Richard came back up the bank. "Watch...."
But there was nothing to watch, except once or twice a flash of slender black line looping through foaming white water.... Then, almost halfway across, the river there divided by boulders fountaining up sheets of spray, Errol's head appeared — blond hair slicked dark and flat — was shaken so drops flew, then vanished again. This time, Baj could follow him, and saw here and there under shallow racing current the boy frog-kicking .. . frog-kicking, but very swiftly, then seeming to writhe along through and under the river, with the river, coming downstream with it at an angle toward the opposite bank, the braided line wavering in and out of sight behind him.
"Wonderful," Baj said, thinking that otter blood was possible there.
... Errol had almost reached the other side. His shadow lay in swift shallows like a weary char at breeding. He seemed to rest, then raised his head, shook water from his hair again, and crawled out onto the pebbles, apparently weary, no longer magically swift and sure.
"I cross next," Richard said, once the boy had tied his line-end to a tree almost directly across from them. "If the rope holds me, it will hold you two." Baj heard the big Person's belly rumble. Hungry, of course — as they all were. Though occasional birds were well enough, it was long past time for the promised deer.
... A crossing easier said than done — an ancient phrase, and one of the most useful. Baj and Nancy stood on a trembling bank of mud and stone, and watched Richard in the current.
His pack left behind, he still seemed to wear one, his back humped with muscle, his loose shirt soaked so drifts of dark hair — or fur — showed through as he fought the river in sheets of spray, going on all fours over stone through shallow furious rapids. Held beside him, the slender braided line whipped and looped over and under swift water.
The river's noise was surprising. There seemed to be shouting in it, a mob's raised voices. Only at Break-up had Baj heard the Mississippi speak — then, and in places where it struck Island's stone walls.
Richard had battered his way half-over — more than half-over, when he slipped. Nancy shouted "No!"
He slipped at a boulder — lost the line — then just caught himself, gripping a smaller rounded stone, the river striking him in a wide bright fan of fast water then streaming around and over him like silvered glass. He'd caught himself, but did not get his feet back under him.
Then it was the river against Richard. And while Richard stayed and wasn't swept away, he did no more. Crouched, clinging, he held on — and it seemed to Baj, couldn't shift his grip without losing it.
Baj said, "Absolutely foolish," speaking to himself as he dropped his pack and pulled off his boots — poor boots, too, soles worn almost through by damned mountains. "... Absolutely foolish." He unbuckled his sword-belt, let it fall, and ran down the bank to the leaning birch the line was knotted to. He heard a "Don't!" from Nancy — gripped the wet leather, braided no thicker than a man's thumb, and stumbled
, slid, and half-dove into the river.
"Floating Jesus!" The cold gripped him, and the smashing weight of water.
Baj-who-was-Bajazet, a son of great men, will be swept away to die with a thoughtful part-bear — and only two other oddities will live to know it.
He would have been gone in an instant and swiftly drowned but for the rawhide line. It sawed his hands, sawed his side when it looped that way in rapids, but he loved it dearly and wouldn't let it go.
The odd thing was how shallow the river ran over these boulders and shelves of stone — no deeper than his waist, if he could have stood. Wonderfully clear water where it wasn't foam — every pebble beneath perfectly seen. Clear water, the great glacier's milk not yet descended.
It picked up Baj's feet — stockings stripped away at once — and took them out from under him, bannered them away downstream so he clung to the bowing line, and that only. There was no getting to his feet again. The river — New River, as Richard had called it — would not let him.
"Move, or die." It was a voice he knew, and only after handover-handing sideways along the rawhide... slowly out into deeper rolling currents .. . did he recognize it as his own.
No getting to his feet. No looking either way. Only his left hand slid left... his right hand slid to follow it. Cold hands that grew colder as he moved along so slowly, fast water hammering his face and beating his breath away.
After a while that seemed a long while, Baj was no longer certain he could feel his hands. Thrashed and spun this way and that in the rapids, afraid his numb grip might loosen and let him go — he slowly drew himself up against the current, the most difficult thing... most difficult thing. Felt the wet line against his face for a moment, Felt it snap against his face again, opened his mouth to pouring water and braided leather, and bit down hard.
So by hands and teeth he held on. And was able to slowly work one hand's fingers at a time — or thought he worked them — clenching, unclenching in a dream of noise and cold and motion.
Then he opened his mouth to let the line snap free, but still gripped it in his hands — better hands, now — and began again that slow sliding to the left. One hand, then another.... Began that, and dreamed he would do it to the other bank, and grow warmer all the time, though the river furled and unfurled him like a banner.
He woke to a shout like a big dog's bark, turned his buffeted head to the left, and saw, amid fountaining sheets becoming rainbows, Richard's soaked heavy-browed face, the thick shoulders awash.
Then, it was the simplest of things. Hook a right elbow over the whipping line... let go with the left hand . .. and give the hand into Richard's almost-paw like a gift, so the Person — with that slight additional purchase — made one great heaving motion, caught a rock's definite edge, and hauled himself up to the rawhide to grip it and begin to crawl to the left again, forging a way to the riverside, Baj laboring behind him.
... When they stood, sodden and exhausted, on the north bank of New River — Errol already gone to sleep in thick grass beside them — Nancy, on the south bank, a loop of the braided leather knotted around her waist, was busy gathering the three packs and their weapons — the sheathed blades, Richard's ax, and Baj's bow and quiver — into a single very large and ungainly bundle, and lashing it four-square with doubled knots at the rope's end.
"Mistake. The current," Baj said, and cupped his hands to shout. "... It's too big! Tie the packs . .. tie those separately along the line!" A call quite useless against the river's noise.
"Too fucking big!" Baj and Richard scrambled down the bank to take hold of the rope to haul her across.
Nancy, prepared, seemed to still hesitate.
"Afraid of noisy water," Richard said.
"She went through the waterfall."
"Not the dangerous same."
The girl stood on the opposite bank, the awkward bundle — big as she was — lying at the line's end a few feet behind her.
"It's going to — that load's going to swing downstream as she comes over!"
"Yes, it is." Richard wrapped both hands around the line. Baj stood a little behind him.
Across the river, Nancy appeared to make up her mind... stepped carefully down the bank as if the river might rise up to seize her... then in a rush ran into the current.
She struck the water, went under, turned and seemed to tug at the tied bundle, so it came heavily toppling down after her and into the river.
Then the girl was swimming, and Baj saw she swam as a frightened puppy might, straining, her head up, paddling in roiling crashing waters.
"Now....!" Richard heaved back on the line, Baj with him, and the braided leather rose whipping out of the rapids, dipped under again... then up, dripping, water squeezed spraying out of it along its length.
Baj saw Nancy's white face amid white water — saw the heavy bundle behind her bob free of some obstruction and begin to drift faster and faster downstream.
Nancy was drawn under.
"No good," Baj said. "No good."
"Pull..."
"No good!"
Halfway across, Nancy seemed to come no closer... then began to drift a little downstream with the rapids, downstream after the tumbling bundle at the line's end. Her hands splashed in that desperate paddle.
"The rope's tied off! It'll hold!" Richard heaved on the line, grunting with effort.
"Hold to pull her in drowned!" The river noise seemed louder. "The packs..." Baj let go of the rope and ran back up the bank. Errol, awake, was sitting cross-legged, watching Nancy in the river.
"Knife!" Baj reached down and drew a blade from Errol's belt, then turned and ran down and into the river, reaching up left-handed to hold the line.
The current — snaking around and past him with such pouring weighty strength and bitter cold — now seemed familiar, a dangerous discomfort, but not dreadful.
He couldn't see Nancy through battering spray and foam, and trusted to the slender slippery line — stretching under strain, and sooner or later bound to snag on sharp rock and part — trusted that to bring him to her. He dragged himself along, half swimming, half kicking over rounded rock and scattering pebbles in the flow, and shouted to her — but couldn't hear himself.
Water smashed into his left ear as if a man had struck him with a fist of ice. The pain lanced through, and Baj ducked his head away as the line yanked at him... yanked again, streaming away with the river's flow.
Then Baj went faster, skidded down along the line, glimpsed trees — on which bank he didn't know — and struck large stones with elbows and knees. The river tried to turn him, roll him over and away and off the braided leather. His left hand was burning where he gripped it — burning with the only heat there was in a world of cold.
He heaved up, gasping for a breath in sheets of spray — slid down the line with the river, and struck a softer thing than stone.
A narrow hand... wiry arms came round to grapple, and Baj felt the girl's lean smallness buckle to him — saw as they both rose riding a spume of water, her face contorted with terror, and called "I have you, sweetheart...." By which he meant nothing personal.
They spun and rode together, and Baj kicked to try to turn them so she struck no rocks. He saw a flashing in the surf, and was surprised to see the knife still in his right hand. It reminded him what it was for, and as they whirled along, Baj steadied with that motion, didn't fight against it — and in the spinning through foam and noise, reached quite easily behind the girl, found the whip end of the line tugging... tugging them along, and sliced the bundle free.
... Then, much easier, the taut leather stretching from distant Richard by a distant tree, they slowly struggled swinging nearer and nearer to that bank, until Baj got to his feet — bare feet with no feeling — stood battered by crashing water... and step by step, the girl clinging, aiding, marched through shallower clear streaming water to pebbles and the sand.
... They found the pack-bundle by nearly night, stranded on a stony bar two miles downstrea
m, only a fairly dangerous swim from the north bank. Errol went and roped it for hauling over.
All was there, Nancy'd knotted it together so tight and well. All there — though soaked as the arrows' fletching — and needing a drying fire, the steel blades wiped and tallowed.
* * *
That night, aching and bruised in exhausted sleep, Baj dreamed not of water, but of his First-mother, though he'd never known her, though she'd been murdered when he was a baby — murdered as it was now intended for other mothers to be murdered. The details, in his dream, were vaporous as smoke, but the sorrow hard as iron.
The Lady Ladu... He'd seen no portrait of her, had — as he grew — met no older Kipchak merchant or mercenary officer who'd been so privileged at Caravanserai as to have met the wife of the Khan Toghrul. Only the old librarian, Lord Peter, had been able to describe her to him, and that when he was already a young man... So, for all his childhood in the court of the Achieving King, Baj had imagined his First-mother as lithe and beautiful, a black-haired slant-eyed queen, ferocious... but tender toward him, and loving.
He had still been a little boy, when he was first shown a man's severed head — its pigtailed hair floating, its ruined eyes half-open, bobbing in the vodka filling a large blown-glass jar. It had been his first sight of such a thing, and the only time King Sam had burdened a child with such.
"It was necessary, Bajazet, that this was brought for you to see. It is what is left of the man Manu Ek-Tam, who betrayed your First-father's memory, murdered your mother and your father's friends, then threatened the peace of the Rule."
The king had tossed a cloth over the thing.
"— Now, you need not waste an hour of your days on vengeance... but only reflect on your First-father's intelligence, courage, and competence in command... and the love your mother and your father's friends certainly felt for you." The king had gripped Baj's shoulder so hard it hurt. "The love we, your Second-family, also feel."
The child Baj had dreamed that night — though instead of his imagined superb First-mother, only a plump, plain woman, seeming to him a nanny or nurse, appeared hovering over, smiling, in the faintest of baby memories.
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