By Jayge’s reckoning, the fugitives would have made very slow progress out of the mountains, even using snowstaves, which were more help on snowy hillslopes than in wooded areas. Benden dragonriders were making frequent random sweeps over the mountains during the daylight hours; and even desperate people would not attempt to travel that terrain in the dark. Despite a grudging admiration for dragonriders like F’lar, T’gellan, and the young K’van, Jayge did not hold out much hope that they would actually catch the fugitives. That would spoil everything. He did not wish it to be that easy.
Jayge felt he had time to spare to search for a possible lair within the complex. Exploring the less frequented passages, he found several promising sites, none with any signs of recent occupation but all with small entrances partially or completely concealed from casual observation.
From one old trader friend of his father’s, Jayge did establish that Thella and Giron had been in the low caverns during the time the Lilcamp-Amhold train had been taking on its shipments for Far Cry. He showed the sketch of Readis to the trader, and although the man had not seen Readis with Thella at that time, the sketch was much admired for itself.
“Why, you expect the man to draw breath. Nice-looking chap. Your kin, you say? Aye, no one could deny the Blood between you. Now whoever did this so handy? What’d they use? Charcoal would have smudged. Leads, you say? They’d be expensive—a’ course, you being trader connected, you’d have the chance.”
With one of his few marks, Jayge bought from a trader a tattered but fairly accurate map of the eastern stakes shores: Keroon to Benden, including Bitra and the easternmost section of Lemos. While in several spots the creases of the hide made the lines difficult to decipher, caves were marked, large and small, watered or dry, as well as all the holds and the best routes for various sorts of haulage. He also listened carefully to the nighttime conversations around the main fires, when the jugs were passed, encouraging conviviality. Apparently Dowell and his family had been such long-term residents that they were well-known. Everyone was still amazed that “their” Aramina had made it to Benden Weyr, where eggs were hardening. Everyone was rather pleased with the notion that “their” Aramina, raised in Igen low caverns, was certain to Impress the queen egg on Benden’s Hatching Ground, and they were basking in her achievement. It had become known fact that Dowell, Barla, and the other two children had gone back to Ruatha, reinstated into their original home by Lord Jaxom, who had given them workmen to repair it, and who generally treated Barla as long-lost Bloodkin. The family was half the world away from Thella, and Aramina was safe in Benden Weyr.
Jayge did not agree. No one was safe from that woman while she drew breath. In his travels as a trader, Jayge had met all sorts of people, most of whom he could forget as soon as he moved on. But Thella was unique. She was the most evil person he had ever encountered. She deserved to be dropped down a smooth hole in the ground and left there.
Finally, with the valuable map and the sketches of Readis carefully wrapped and secured against his chest, Jayge turned Kesso southeast along the bright waters of Keroon Bay. He kept to the well-traveled routes, as a lone rider on back trails would be easy prey for petty thieves, looking for what they could get. Thella’s gang may have been the best organized and most successful, but it was hardly the only one.
Despite the fatigues of travel Jayge did not sleep well. He kept going over and over that fateful raid: the rockfalls, the wagons toppling, and the stones that missed their targets and went on rumbling down the river ravine. He kept reliving his own part in the fight and wondering how he could have saved Temma from her frightful wound; protected Nazer; killed more of the raiders. He was haunted by the sight of that foot and hand sticking out of the rubble. They seemed to twitch in his dreams, as did Armald’s pitiful hulk sprawled on the gravel road. He kept seeing Temma with her shoulder pinned by that barbed spear to the wall of her own wagon, and always Thella, poised on that boulder, directing all that horror—and throwing the knife that severed Borgald’s pet beast’s tendons. To keep from dreaming, he would walk, around and around, watching the sharp, clear stars out over the sea, conjuring the vision of himself lowering Thella by rope into a deep, smooth-sided pit and hearing her screams and then her pleas to be released.
At Keroon Hold, a trader friend of Crenden’s suggested that Jayge help out one Beastmaster Uvor, who was taking four fractious mares to the stallions at the Beastmasterhold in Keroon. At the moment he was resting them from their sea voyage. “Resting his belly from seasickness,” the trader remarked with a sniff. “Anyway, he lost his apprentice to a broken leg, so he’s on his own. You’re good with the beasties, young Jayge, and he’s going your way. Doesn’t hurt to close your hand on the odd mark, as well. He’ll be in this evening, like as not. Come back then.”
With Kesso comfortably stabled and muzzle-deep in a good grain feed, Jayge set out to explore Keroon Hold. He had never been that far south before, and the busy Hold was full of new sights, including a port facility that handled cargo bound for Ista and the west. Jayge walked down to the port and spent a long nooning in a harbor alehold, listening to seamen, listening to people, and listening for any word of Thella. He never asked about her directly but instead discreetly inquired about a dragonless man or showed the sketch of Readis.
He always asked about Benden Weyr, for news of the dragonriders. Courteous interest went down well with the Holds and Halls, which were intensely loyal to their Weyrfolk. He learned that there had been a Hatching and a queen egg but the lucky girl who Impressed Beljeth was Adrea and came from Greystone Hold in Nerat. The Neratians had been exceedingly proud of her, and she was said to be a very attractive but biddable girl.
When Jayge returned to the trader’s, Uvor was there, a lean, likable man who cared for the mares and his own sturdy mount as if they were his children. On the circuitous route to the Beastmasterhold, Uvor named sire and dam of each of his mares for generations back, and never once put a name to his wife or any of his sons. He taught Jayge a few tricks of living off barren land, and what insects and semitropical plants could supplement a diet of the ever present snakes.
It was in the Beastmasterhold that Jayge first got wind of the unusual tradings with the Southern Continent. Four breeding pairs of fine burden beasts and four of runners were to be shipped to Toric at Southern Hold as soon as the winter storms had abated. A Master Rampesi would collect them in a ship outfitted with special belowdeck accommodations for such valuable animals. Jayge questioned the journeymen closely, for it had been his understanding that the Benden Weyrleaders had interdicted all commerce between north and south while the Oldtimer dragonriders remained in the Southern Weyr.
“There’re reasons, you know, new reasons to reestablish trade south. There’re reasons,” an older journeyman assured Jayge, looking as if there was plenty he could add but he was being discreet. “Some say it has to do with mines dwindling down and plenty of rich ore just lying loose over the ground in the South. Some say it’s because the Holders have put pressure on the Weyrleaders to give land to younger sons. A couple of Fort Holder’s Bloods are going, and now that that raider group has been knocked into a deep pit, some of Corman’s might foller.”