Before I thought, I pulled off my own boots and, without stopping to roll up my breeches, I waded into the wash of the water and set my hands on the slimy cord a little behind hers, lending my strength to the battle. She looked over her shoulder, a shadow of a frown at first between her sun-bleached brows. Then she gave a nod, ackowledging my offer of help, and we jerked mightily together.
In spite of the force we used that stubborn length would not give. Thus, after two such pulls, I loosed my hold and drew my sword. She nodded again but held out her hand demandingly, so I found that, in spite of myself, I allowed her to take the weapon from me, splash farther out, and while I held the vine taut, she brought the steel down cutting the cord through in two swings. She returned to grasp the end of the vine with one hand, with the other, she preferred my sword, hilt toward me.
“My thanks, Elron of Garn’s House.” Her voice was low, a little hoarse, as if she seldom used it. That she knew my name I found surprising, for none of our party had had speech with her mistress during the journey. Nor was I noteworthy among my Lord’s meiny. Not that Garn could boast of such a battle force as a full war band.
“What will you do with this?” I waded back to the beach and, though she neither asked for nor refused my aid, I still held to the vine and helped drag it after us.
“The leaves dried and pounded,” she said as a man would discuss the setting of a plow into new ground, “can enrich the soil for planting. Also it has other properties which Zabina knows. This is a good find, taken at the best of its growing season.”
I surveyed the slimy length we pulled free of the water, sand now matting down its long tendril leaves, and thought that indeed strange things must be better than they appeared.
Then she was gone, without another word, towing the weed along behind her while I rubbed sand from my legs before drawing on my boots once again. The evening shadows were well advanced and I went back to our own camp to eat and wonder what the next day would bring and how much longer we would travel on before we found the land of Garn’s choice.
As I held a bowl of crumbled journey bread, softened with several dollops of stew meat made from dried meat, and spooned up its contents, I stopped, with the spoon halfway to my mouth, staring as two newcomers came into the full light of our central fire. Quaine, who had been sitting cross-legged beside Garn, waved them on, though Garn himself did not raise a hand and only regarded them with a cold, level stare across the rim of his drinking horn.
Though I had seen Lord Tugness a number of times during these last days of journeying, this was the first time he had been so close that I might have put out a hand and flicked finger upon the end of his sword scabbard.
He was a short man, heavy shouldered, since his favorite weapon was the battle axe, and much practice with that had given him the muscular strength which, in another man, would have been in sword arm or thinned away by the need for agility. On horseback he was impressive; on foot he walked with a short stride which made him appear top-heavy.
Like the rest of us, he wore a mail shirt over travel jerkin, but tonight he carried his created helm, the wind blowing through his thick, ragged growth of red-brown hair. Unlike most of our race he also had a noticeable growth of facial hair, a matter in which he appeared, against custom, to take pride, and this he had trained into a fringe of beard about his wide mouth. Above that his nose was not much more than a blob of flesh so that his breath came constantly in snorts—the broken and flattened cartilage the result of a fight in his youth.
Beside Garn he slouched and looked far more like a rough blank-shield hired for some slightly unsavory task of secret rapine than a lord of lineage as long and as well songed by the bards as any House which had come through the Gate.
Taller than his father and much sparer of frame was his son-heir, who came into the full light a step behind. He was a spear-shaft of a youth who shambled as he walked, his arms hanging. Of course, those who knew him or had heard of him were well aware he was not the staring simpleton he looked. His skill with the crossbow was a matter of comment. But he was a silent shadow of his father, having little to do with those his own age. If one addressed him he was likely to stare round-eyed and answer slowly in as few words as possible.
Lord Tugness came straight to the point, just as he would ride with axe ready against any opponent. However, it was to Quaine that he spoke, ignoring Garn, even hunching a shoulder a little as if to shut out the sight of his old-time enemy.
“When do we get free of this devil’s stew?” he demanded, kicking into the loose sand, sending bits of grit flying to make sure that the Sword Brother understood his meaning. “My fore team is already neck-galled from pulling and we have no spare beasts. You have promised us land, Sworder, where is it?”
Quaine showed no sign of affront. He had arisen and stood facing Tugness, his fingers locked in the fore of his belt as he met the clan lord’s stare.
“If the Flame favors us, Lord Tugness, we shall be within arrow flight of your land before sundown tomorrow.”
Tugness gave one of his heavy snorts. I saw his fingers curl as if they held an axe. His eyes, under the brush of his heavy brows, demanded recognition from the Sword Brother.
“We would be on good land.” Again he stamped with his boot into the sand. “This stuff gets even between a man’s teeth when he eats, down his throat when he drinks. We have had our fill of it! Be matters as you say, Sworder!” His last words might almost be a threat, as he swung his heavy body about, sending sand spurting on those nearby. Behind, Thorg, his son-heir, trod with a lightfootedness which might almost be that of a scout in enemy land. Also as he went Thorg suddenly lifted his head a little and I found him looking straight at me.
I was young and Garn recked me of little account, as I have well known since childhood. Still I am able to see promises which men’s eyes may hold, even though the rest of their faces give no sign of feeling. I stopped in mid-bite when I caught that look from Thorg. My first reaction was surprise. Then I hoped with all my might a moment later, I had not shown it For why should the son-heir of Tugness, whom I had never had any reason to cross in any way, show me black and deadly hate? I told myself that I was not—that I could not have been—his enemy except that I was of my House and he of his, but I could not put aside the belief that there was more to his. feeling concerning me than any formal feud. His look, then, troubled me.
There was a moon that night, fair and cold, and silver-clear. Its beam helped to hide those stars which were not as they should have been. There are old tales that the moon plays a part in the lives of men, setting upon them its touch in mind and heart, even as the sun can show its mark on skin by browning with its fire-heat. But moon power is not for men, it is a thing of the women and those among them especially who have the wise knowledge.
I had drawn a little apart from the row of men who were asleep, waiting to take their turn at night sentry duty. I rested some distance from the wains. Thus it was that I saw in the moonlight the Wise Woman stride, tall and with a hurried step, along the sands. Behind her but a step or two came Gathea, a bundle in her arms held close to her breast, as if she carried a child or some treasure which must be closely guarded, even from the moon’s rays.
North they went along the sands and I knew that no sentry would dare to speak with them, or even perhaps let them know that he saw them passing. For it was very plain that the Wise Woman was now about some business of her own craft. Yet there was one who moved in the shadows, came to a line of rocks which were the last bit of cover before the open beach.