“Huh.” Cob’s head, in the starlight, looked frosted; Luap could not see his expression. “Well. If you’re sure. But you might have a word with your sentries, just in case.”
Luap groaned inwardly. Get out of his warm blankets to rouse sentries to watch for nothing? But nothing less would satisfy Cob, and after all, the sentries were supposed to be awake. He nodded, pushed the blankets aside, shivering again at the cold. “I’ll stir them up. If nothing else, all these horses might draw a wildcat.” Cob rolled himself back in his blankets, and Luap headed for the sentry posts.
Cold, clear air chilled his face, his hands; when he breathed, his chest felt bathed in ice. Even under the pines, starlight trickled through; beyond the trees, he could see a silvery glow over the silent land. A horse stamped, in the picket lines, and another was grinding its teeth steadily. Luap heard nothing he should not hear, and nearly fell over one sleeping sentry in the speckled shade.
He shook the man awake. “Wha—what’s wrong?” It was Jeris, one of the youngest he had brought with him.
“You’re supposed to be standing guard,” Luap said. “Marshal Cob got up to use the jacks and found you all asleep.”
“I—I’m sorry.” In the dark, he couldn’t see Jeris’s face, but the voice sounded worried and contrite enough. “There was nothing—and it was so quiet—and . . . and cold, and . . .”
“I understand, Jeris, but with all these horses we must worry about wildcats or wolves. We haven’t cleared this plateau, you know.”
“Yes, my lord.” The words came smoothly; in the dark, off guard, Luap suddenly realized how that would sound to Cob and the others.
“Don’t say that,” he said sharply. “They don’t use that anymore. Just call me Luap, or sir, if you must.”
“But my—but, sir, it’s not respectful—”
“Respect includes doing what I ask, doesn’t it? Don’t use ‘my lord’ while our guests are here. It will upset them.” And would Jeris remember? And remembering, would he obey? Or would he, in the spirit of youthful investigation, ask Cob why it would upset them? Luap shook his head and moved to the next post. Sure enough, all the sentries were asleep, and as he went from post to post, Luap himself began to feel a vague unease. Wouldn’t one have stayed awake? Wouldn’t one of them have wakened at the turn of night to use the jacks, as Cob had? For that matter, why were all the travelers sleeping so soundly?
But he could not hold that anxiety when he got back to the clearing; he wrapped himself again in his blankets, finding to his dismay that none of his body warmth remained, and was asleep before he realized it. He woke at the sound of the cooks working about the fire; half the travelers were out of their blankets already. For a moment or two, he lay quietly, trying to remember what had bothered him in the night, but he couldn’t. It was a morning as clear as the day before, too beautiful for dark thoughts.
They started early, before the sun could strike heat from the rock. Down from the pines, into a narrow rocky defile. When they came around a knob to see the little tributary canyon below them, Cob drew rein. “So that’s your future pastureland. You’re right: it’s perfect. There’s even water.”
“And quicksand,” Luap said. “But we’ll work that out. Be sure you follow the stakes.”
Down the length of that little valley, so oddly shaped with its nearly level floor and its vertical walls. Then up again, into the morning sun, to climb around the rockfall, back into the shadow of the main canyon.
Luap led the way down that steep slope, uneasily aware that the signs of magic in use were all about them, plain to be seen if any of the visitors wanted to notice. Would they? Would they know what those smoothly carven walls meant? Would they realize that the natural canyon had not been blocked by natural falls of stone, filled with natural fertile terraces ready for planting? Cob knew, of course; he had explained it all to Cob. And the Council of Marshals knew, in theory—he had come out here to train the mageborn in the right use of their powers. But he knew they had no idea what that really meant, and the common yeomen in this group would never have seen magery used in all their lives. How would they react? In his mind’s eye lay the image of this land as he and Gird had first seen it . . . he could still hear Gird’s dismissive “not farm land.” Now each crop gave its own shade of green, its own texture, to the terraces; smooth green fans of grain, bordered by rougher, darker bushes yielding berries and nuts, a ruffle of greens and redroot vines. The fruit trees, just coming into bearing. . . .
“I thought Gird said this was no good for farming,” said Cob, just behind him.
“We worked hard on it,” said Luap.
“Mmm. You must have. You couldn’t have taken this much soil, not through that little cave. Two sacks, is what I know you took.”
“No, we didn’t.” He left that lying, and hoped Cob would do the same.
“Magery, I suppose,” Cob said, and spat. “Well. It’s what you came for, after all, isn’t it? A place for the magefolk to do their magery without upsetting anyone?”
Even from Cob he had not expected that quick analysis and calm acceptance. Luap nodded. “Yes—although we had peace in mind more than magery to start with. And here it can’t be used against anyone.”
Cob peered up at the canyon walls. “No—unless enemies come upon you, which doesn’t seem likely. The horsefolk don’t come within hands of days of here, and who else could there be? Have you found any folk at all?”
“West of these mountains is flat land, with a caravan trail and a town—Dirgizh—that’s a waystation for a folk called the Khartazh. They have a king somewhere north. They don’t come into these mountains; they claim they’re haunted by evil spirits.”
Cob snorted. “Whatever you are, you’re not evil spirits—unless they mean whoever was here before you and carved your original hall.”
“I doubt it’s either,” Luap said. “Until we smoothed the trail, it was difficult for people, and impossible for horses. Robbers laired in the mountains just east of the trade trail and preyed on travellers; I think the king’s men just didn’t want to worry with ’em. It’s easier to say mountains are haunted than to admit they’re too rough for your taste.”
“That’s so. Like a junior yeoman I had in my grange back east, who was sure some mageborn had magicked his hauk. He could not believe he was really that clumsy and weak. It took me three years to convince him that he was his own curse. Speaking of that, how’s young Aris?”
“Curse? Aris?”
“No, I’m sorry. He’s his own blessing, I was thinking, unlike Tam back home. Are he and Seri still like vine and pole?”
Luap grinned. “Yes, but not married. You’d think they were still children.”
“It may be best. Seri’s not one to mother only her own children. What does she do?”
“She’s our Marshaclass="underline" insists on drill, cleaned those robbers out of the mountains between us and the trade route, set up guardposts—”
“Good for her.” Cob’s horse slid a little and he grunted. “You couldn’t get out of here in a hurry, could you? Going up must be slower.”
“That’s one reason we’d like to keep some horses in that upper valley,” Luap said. “Every time we take a party up and down this trail, we have to rebuild it. Foot traffic’s not so hard on it; if we could climb up then ride out, that would help.”