Brother Blacktooth St. George threw away his rifle, picked up a pistol from the body of a slain officer, and ran south for his life. A bullet struck the ground near his feet, but he was unsure which of three sides was shooting at him.
As he ran around the bend near the crest of the ridge, he noticed a wide tunnel under a rock where something made its home. It was just big enough for him to slip into, and he dived for it, feet first, praying earnestly that the owner was absent. The tunnel sloped downward as he slid into it and it was somewhat deeper than expected. He braked his slide and found his face two feet from the sunlit opening. Between the straps of his sandals, he felt wiggling fur with his feet; something bit his big toe, tiny fangs but sharp. He kicked it off. Other mouths were chewing on his sandal straps. My God, I’m in a cougar’s den, and I am going to die!
Today is like any other day in being the day of death. Today a war is going on and I am not a Daniel in this den, O Saint Leibowitz. Still, it’s the only day I’ve got. Last week it was a thunderstorm, and the wet body of a lightning-struck warrior. Year before last a cyclone killed seventeen Jackrabbit peasants. Then the locusts, the locusts, the locusts, and the emaciated corpses found frozen last winter. Just like any other day, he noted, as a bullet ricocheted off the rock above his head. The spent lump of lead fell into his waist and he picked it up to inspect in the dim light. It was no bullet from a Grasshopper or Valanan weapon, but a musket ball from a Texark or an outlaw piece. The fact gave him a general idea of the direction of the enemy.
He felt around with his feet, kicking kittens away. Their teeth were needles. What was keeping their mother? Afraid of the fires, perhaps. He too feared them. “In here, we’ll choke to death,” he told the kittens.
While he was thus indulging himself in more fear and self-pity than was usual before he had so recently killed a man, something came and darkened the light from the end of the tunnel. He prepared to die.
Hail Mary full of grace the Lord is with thee…
“Ho! Who is down there?” The language was Rockymount, but the accent was from Asia. Nimmy looked up to see a rifle aimed at his face.
“Don’t shoot, it’s Blacktooth. Is it safe to come out?”
“It’s not safe anywhere yet,” said Gai-See, “and the fire is getting too close. Give me your hand.”
Nimmy shook a playful kitten loose from one trouser leg and crawled upward into the smoky light of late afternoon. The din of battle had subsided, except to the east where Texark troops were still holding off gleps trying to get at the weapons. The warrior and the monk climbed the ridge and lay on the ground to look over the top. They could make out the bodies of Chuntar Hadala and Major Gleaver; both had been killed by Gai-See, who, like Wooshin, was prepared to execute anyone who betrayed his master.
“Where is Woosoh-Loh?”
“Ulad shot him when he saw me execute our master’s enemies.”
“But I saw—”
“My brother lived long enough to kill his killer.”
Nimmy observed a detail of Grasshopper warriors hastily hitching three of the wagons to draft horses they had stolen, for the fire was coming closer. The wagons’ defenders had scattered during the infantry skirmish. The Valana Militia had been destroyed, by death, desertion, and the absence of command. From the east, Texark cavalry was riding toward the scene, but warily, for behind the ridge to the south was the Demon Light’s main force, and just to the north was the advancing wildfire. Half a mile from where they lay, a Texark trooper rode to the top of the ridge to observe the Grasshopper order of battle. Gai-See rolled over, lifted his rifle, aimed very high, and fired. The impossible shot fell close enough to frighten the trooper’s horse, and alerted the Grasshopper, who joined Gai-See in firing on the scout. The scout retreated. Gai-See stood up and looked south. Eltür’s warriors were watching. Evidently they were not shooting at militia uniforms.
“Look!” said Gai-See, pointing. “Somebody killed a big cat.”
Blacktooth stood beside him, then went to investigate. The animal lay on the rocks twenty paces west of them. It was a female.
“Come on,” he said to Gai-See, and went back down the ridge to the cougar’s den. Soon they had recovered the kittens, but three Nomads rode up with drawn guns and spoke in Grasshopper.
“Drop your weapons at once, citizens! Surrender.”
They complied, but Nimmy smiled at the polite word “citizens,” and replied in the same language. “The troopers are riding toward the wagons, you know. We’ll gladly surrender, but we’ll need our weapons to get home again.”
One warrior rode to the top of the ridge. The other dismounted and recovered the guns. As he unloaded them, he spoke to Blacktooth.
“You are the man who came out to parley with the sharf. He says you are a servant of the highest Christian shaman. Is that so?”
“It used to be so.”
The warrior handed him back his unloaded pistol, then returned Gai-See’s empty rifle.
“You are the man who killed the cardinal and the major, are you not?”
Gai-See nodded. The other warrior came down from the ridge and said, “We’d better tell Sharf Eltür it’s time to attack. Let’s go!”
They both rode away, leaving the two to follow on foot with empty firearms. As soon as the warriors returned to their command, the main party of Nomads split into two groups, one of which rode to the bottom of the ridge, dismounted, and climbed it on foot; they took prone positions on the crest as snipers. From the fact that heavy smoke was blowing south over the ridge, and that the snipers did not commence firing at once, Nimmy deduced that the fire was delaying the movement of the cavalry toward the wagons. Every time a trooper mounted the ridge to the east to reconnoiter, he was fired upon by the main Nomad party. The Texark commander probably wished to cross the ridge before riding west, but the Grasshopper made it impossible. At least some of the wagons were being pulled west by Valanan draft horses driven by Nomads. The rest would soon be caught by wildfire, if not captured first by Texark.
By sundown, the rest of the wagons had been swept up in the fire; some exploded, all burned. Burned too were the bodies of the slain, but the wind subsided at twilight and the blaze did not cross the ridge. Sharf Bråm had rounded up and fed all the militia survivors who surrendered their arms. The few who refused to give them up, mostly spook officers who feared revenge by Valanan conscripts, he ordered killed. He ordered his warriors to treat the prisoners of war with courtesy, but the Grasshopper fighters were too full of playful malice toward farmers for the farmers’ comfort. Food was shared, but dipped in sand. One warrior lent Nimmy a leather pouch large enough for three cougar kittens, then claimed the monk had stolen it. There were less than forty exhausted captives, but some other deserters had perhaps escaped capture by the Texarki or the Nomads.
When he saw Nimmy among the refugees, Demon Light called him to his side as interpreter. After laughing at the kittens, he returned the monk’s pistol and ammunition. Nimmy immediately asked permission to turn the weapon over to Gai-See. “My eyes are too weak to hit anything. I killed a man by mistake, when I meant to miss him.”
Eltür sent for Gai-See and after a brief conversation through Blacktooth concerning the warrior monk’s continuing loyalty to Brownpony, the sharf gave him his weapons back. Then he looked at the smoky sky.