Juniper nodded. "But they're reacting to what we do," she pointed out. "Now we have to move faster, and always be doing something new before they can deal with what we've done. It's only thirty miles to cross the Valley; a day's travel, maybe two."
Sam smiled. "This will draw their troops away from the southern border, too, pull them north and east," he said. "That'll make it a lot easier for our folk and the refugees."
"And we're appropriately dressed," Juniper said, touching kilt and plaid. At his look she grinned and went on, quoting a poem from wars older and more savage than any this land had yet known:
"On foot should be all Scottish war
Let hill and marsh their foes disbar
And woods as walls prove such an arm
That enemies do them no harm.
In hidden spots keep every store
And burn the plainlands them before
So, when they find the land lie waste
Needs must they pass away in haste
Harried by cunning raids at night
And threatening sounds from every height
Then, as they leave, with great array
Smite with the sword and chase away.
This is the counsel and intent
Of Good King Robert's Testament."
Chapter Fifteen
Crossing Tavern, Willamette Valley, Oregon
May 13th, 2007 AD-Change Year Nine
"So that's why they are all stirred up, Juney," Mike Havel chuckled. "Tweaking him, as you said back at our conference. We thought it would be the perfect time to clean out Crusher Bailey, with the Protector himself doing something up the Columbia, and his reserve cavalry all east over the river. Either they've got a lot more cavalry than we thought, or our English friends here are more important than we thought. Perhaps we'd better hear from them before you fill us in on the details of how you got from Table Rock to the Willamette."
Juniper nodded. It had taken only half an hour, spaced out between bites; the good food was welcome after a week of riding, fighting, and snatching meals catch-as-catch-can.
"I'm curious too, to be sure," she said. "And poor Sam's fair bursting."
Sam Aylward grinned his thanks at her-he'd been smiling a good deal since he saw Sir Nigel and the others. He'd spoken of the Lorings, but not often, probably because memories of home were too painful when he thought everyone he knew dead.
"I might as well make the introductions," he said. "Sir Nigel was my CO in the SAS for quite some time, and we were neighbors before that. Tilford Manor's not far from Crooksbury and my father's farm-where it was before he sold up, that is."
"Two of the least successful agricultural enterprises in Hampshire," Nigel Loring said, with a slight self-depreciating smile. "Aylward's father and I were in a sort of race to see who could drag out the agonizing process of bankruptcy longest. I won, but then I had my munificent officer's wages to offset the yearly losses, and I had more assets to borrow against. No, I lie-we did make a clear profit, twice. 1974 and 1987."
I think I like this little Englishman, Juniper thought, smiling back. And if he had a hand in the making of Sam Aylward, he must be some considerable sort of a man.
"And this great lump of a gallybagger here, his father ran the Pied Merlin," Aylward went on. "And he's a second cousin of sorts. Bad blood coming out there, inbreeding: "
"Led me astray with tales of soldiering on his visits home, Sam did," John Hordle said, beaming. "Lies, lies, nothing but lies!"
"The more fool you to believe them, then," Alyward said. He turned to the younger Loring: "And you must have been just down from Sandhurst when things Changed, sir."
"I was, and it was luckier than I thought at the time. But Father was more at the center of things."
The elder Loring took up the story, eventually summing up: ": quite an efficiently managed coup and purge, and we'd been very reluctant to openly confront His Majesty. If it hadn't been for the Tasmanian ship being in port and willing to take us into exile: well, the king might have allowed me and mine to retire to Tilford Manor eventually. On the other hand, he might not have, after the queen had been at him for a while. I'm afraid we'd all become deplorably case-hardened by then. We took Captain Nobbes's offer and sailed from King's Lynn -"
"Ah," Mike Havel said. "And you pulled into Portland in: what, early March? Sorry if I'm cutting you short, it's very interesting and I'd appreciate the whole story when there's time, but we do have immediate local problems with your former host there." A crooked smile. "As did you, I understand."
"Their ship got in the first week of March," Signe said. "But the Protector kept it under very tight security."
"Yes; the Pride of St. Helens was on a world survey voyage, you see."
Juniper leaned forward as well. Aylward felt his ears prick; this wasn't just a matter of far-off things long ago. It affected his new home, and his family and people.
Loring went on: "Well, at first everything went quite well. I can't say that I liked this Arminger chappie even on first acquaintance, but I didn't take against him at once the way poor Captain Nobbes did, we'd seen plenty of worse rulers thrown up by the Change: and when I did realize there was no dealing with him, I flatter myself I didn't show it. Then it became obvious that he was delaying our departure for some reason: "
Portland Protectorate, Willamette Valley, Oregon
April 6th, 2007 AD-Change Year Nine
It was a fine bright spring day as the Protector and his guests rode out from Portland, westward to a manor that he'd suggested as quarters for their visit. The burnt-out suburbs were almost behind them now, although for most of the trip you'd scarcely suspect humans had ever lived there anyway, save for the road itself.
Tall trees left standing before the Change reared among saplings already twice man-height, above a tangled mat of vegetation, vines and brambles and hedges gone wild into shaggy walls; forest had gone even further towards reclaiming the abundant pre-Change parks and natural corridors. It was all washed by recent rain, intensely green, starred with flowers, swarming with insects and loud with songbirds. There was game trace of everything from rabbit to elk and boar, and even emu-plus one astonishing set of pugmarks that were unmistakably tiger, although nothing beyond butterflies and birds showed itself with so many carriages and riders on the pavement. The sound of their hooves rumbled and echoed as the road wound between hills crowned with tall firs.
Reminds me of parts of England, Nigel Loring thought-of the thorn jungles and spreading woodland that had taken over where resettlement hadn't reached, right down to the descendants of game-farm escapees haunting the new wilderness. Like those hippo in, of all things, the Fens. Only an occasional snag of wall or stretch of concrete or asphalt showed the hand of man, or a creeper-grown lamppost.
" Portland 's virtually the only large city we've seen that isn't completely deserted," Captain Nobbes said, turning in the saddle to look behind them at the skyscrapers, and at the unearthly white cone of Mt. Hood floating against the eastern horizon. "Partial destruction is very rare."
"I'm not surprised," the overlord of the Protectorate said. "From my scouts' reports, it's certainly the only one in western North America of any size that isn't empty of anything but bones-usually gnawed bones."
Nobbes nodded. "We've been around the world, and anything that had a population of over a quarter million is dead, and has a dead zone around it. The bigger the city, the bigger the dead zone-and in places where they overlap, there's nothing left. Most of Europe west of the Vistula, both sides of the Mediterranean, pretty well all the Middle East, Turkey, Japan, Korea, eastern China: Well, there's Singapore , but that was a special case-they all moved out in an organized mass."
Lord Protector Arminger-Nigel Loring assumed that was a bit of a joke-nodded graciously.