"Couple of weeks. Travel's slow here. I'll have you Home inside two fortnights, Exeter, promise.” She twisted her awkward mouth in a smile. “A month, that means."
What could he say? “Fair enough."
She glanced at him quizzically.
He shrugged. “They all say the war'll be over by Christmas."
"So keen to kill? How long till Christmas?"
That she had to ask was a shock, a reminder of how very far away England was.
59
"WELL, THEY OBVIOUSLY DIDN'T SENSE US,” MASON said. “Let's go."
Edward rose from the wall with relief. “What happens if they turn back and follow us?"
"Down here, they'd catch us easily. This is moa country. They can't handle heights, though. We'd have to try to get to the hills.” She walked on for a few minutes, then added, “But we wouldn't make it."
"You know, you're full of cheerful information."
She chuckled. “If there's only two, I may manage to handle them."
He wondered how the members of the Service came by their mana. It might be an impertinent question.
The three of them walked in silence back down to the dragon, and again Edward had to squeeze himself into the gap between Mason and the bony plate. It was about as comfortable as riding on handlebars.
Once on the road, though, Cuddles ran smoothly. They sped by the temple, detoured around the town, and rushed on through the night, heading west.
He tried to keep watch behind. He felt worn-out by this interminable day. A few hours’ sleep and he would be ready for anything. Talk was too difficult, so he just sat without speaking, wishing he could dismount from his uncomfortable perch—wishing, too, that he had not been such an unmitigated bounder as to walk out on Eleal when she needed his help.
After half an hour or so, Onica pulled the dragon in behind a copse of trees and made her lie down so the riders could dismount. There they were hidden from view but could look back along the dirt track crossing wide meadows of moonlit grass. They would see the reapers if they came.
"Just a short break,” she said, stretching. “Hungry?"
"If you are going to eat, I could nibble something."
"Like a roast ox?"
"With potatoes and gravy, please."
She rummaged in one of the panniers and produced a small bundle wrapped in a cloth. She sat down and opened it, revealing some lumps of a hard bread. Edward was more than happy to sink to the grass and stretch out, finding new joints to put his weight on. He bit into one of the crusts. It was nutty and fresher than it looked, with a pleasant spicy flavor.
The golden-haired youth squatted down and took one also.
Edward said, “How the devil?..."
The boy smiled at him, chewing.
"What?” Onica asked.
"Nothing. Forgot what I was going to say. Tell me about Zath."
She grimaced. “What do you want to know?"
"Well, I don't like having an enemy who tries to kill me for something I haven't done and don't intend to do. Suppose I wrote him a note—"
"He'd never believe you! Zath's the worst of them all. I told you the native theology is only an approximation. The Man has always been god of both creation and destruction, symbolized by his hammer. Zath was his persona as god of death, but no one ever assumed the role—who would want to? About ... oh, about a hundred years ago or so, someone did. Whether he asked Karzon for the post or it was all Karzon's idea, I haven't the foggiest. Doesn't matter. Zath invented the reapers. He may have stolen the idea from Indian thuggee."
"Their murders give him mana?"
"In spades. Human sacrifice died out a long time ago on Nextdoor, just as it did at Home, but it generates huge amounts of mana. He's enormously powerful because of it, although his technique's very wasteful—the deaths don't happen on a node, and they're mostly a long way away from Zath himself. It's just that there are so many of them. In doctrine he's only an aspect of Karzon, but in fact he's by far the stronger now. The Five are worried about him, worried he may decide to promote himself to full Pentatheon membership."
"Can't they gang up on him?"
She laughed grimly. “Honor among thieves? Who bells the cat? Mana is power and power always has friends."
He looked at the youth, who grinned, shrugged, and went on eating.
Mason fell silent too. She seemed to be thinking hard, so Edward respected her silence. He had decided that Onica Mason knew what she was doing. She was a very competent ... whatever she was.
Cuddles was grazing without standing up. She could probably do so for quite a long time before eating everything within the reach of that serpentine neck. Trumb was setting behind the peaks. Yellow Kirb'l had appeared, low in the south. He considered asking for an explanation of that rogue moon's motion but decided he was too fagged out at the moment to take in a lecture on astronomy.
Onica reached for the cloth. “Finished? Time to be on our way."
"Yes, thank you, ma'am.” He stood up and peered back along the road. He could see no sign of the reapers. As they walked back to the dragon, he blurted: “Did you know my father?"
"Yes."
"I'd like to hear about him some time. I feel I hardly knew him."
She clambered into the saddle, keeping her back to him as she answered. “I knew him intimately. Does that shock you?"
"Of course not!” It did, though. He had never imagined the guv'nor having a lover. The information saddened him, emphasizing that his knowledge of his parents was that of a twelve-year-old. He had never really known them, and never would. They had died because of Zath and the Filoby Testament.
Onica held down a hand and helped him up with a surprisingly powerful heave. He wondered how old she was.
"He was a fine man, widely respected. I was very much in love with him. We drifted apart later. It was long before he met your mother, of course. All right, Cuddles, old girl. I know you're tired. Wondo!"
Did that long-ago affair explain why Monica Mason had come to aid Cameron's son? But why had she gone visiting her former lover at Nyagatha? That sounded like bad form, or was he just naive? There were too many questions to ask, too many pitfalls and unforeseeable hurts lurking in the possible answers.
He lost track of time. Uncomfortable as he was, he began to find the motion of the dragon soporific. He tried to keep watch behind them, but in the moonlight he probably would not have been able to see the reapers approaching until it was too late to do anything about them. Trumb and Ysh had set; now golden Kirb'l ruled the sky. The night was taking on a sense of nightmare, one of those awful dreams that never end.
Then Onica shouted something and pointed.
Houses. Lameby.
She skirted the hamlet, cutting across fields. Cuddles turned out to be as skilled as a horse at jumping fences, although Edward found the landings exceedingly unpleasant. Then they were on the road again, and it angled down into a narrow ravine, a dry streambed. A steady, low-pitched roar must be the voice of Susswater.
"Damn!” Onica said. “Zappan!"
The dragon stopped, claws scrabbling in gravel.
Silence, except for the bone-jarring rumble of the river, not even a whisper of wind, here in this little gorge ... Walled on either side by steep cliffs, the track disappeared around a sharp bend about fifty yards ahead. The gap showed a glimpse of mightier, moonlit cliffs in the distance, and the far end of a bridge. Like the one he had seen at Rotby, it was suspended from heavy chains, but here there were no towers. The anchors must be set in the rock of the canyon itself. The near side was hidden around the corner.
"Trouble?” he whispered.
"At least two of them,” Onica said. She sighed. “It's a logical place for an ambush. I should have thought of it."