They?d seen many of the potato barns in the sandy district behind them; they were three-quarters sunken in the earth to insulate the root crop for storage over winter. That would make it relatively snug. He thought for a moment, then: ?Matti, get the train moving. Fred, Virginia, rearguard. Ignatius, you?re point for the train with Jake. Mary, Ritva, Ingolf, Edain with me; we?ll break trail.? ?Me too,? Pierre Walks Quiet said. ?All right. Let?s be going. Faster we?re settled in, the faster we can cook supper!?
The wind was hard enough to make skiing into it a chore now, even with pine and birch closing in around them; he was glad of the dogsled to hang on to sometimes, and they all gave a little collective grunt of relief as they came into the shelter of the hill. The laneway was probably a farm track by origin, invisible dirt taking off from equally invisible broken pavement in the growing white mist. Half the snow was fresh, slanting down from the low clouds, and half whipped off the ground by the snarling wind, hiding his own legs when he looked down. When they came through the hemlocks the impact was enough to snatch his breath away; even Garbh hesitated a little before bounding forward at Edain?s side, rising and falling in fresh spurts of snow.
It got a little better when they reached the tumbled ruins; someone had planted windbreaks long ago, sugar maples mostly, and beeches. They were bare now, but they were big, towering eighty feet or better, and there were a lot of them with trunks nearly as thick as a man. The farmhouse had been substantial, and old-its remains didn?t have the matchstick look that structures from just before the Change displayed when they went down.
Now it was a pile of board and beam slumped into its cellar, and so were most of the outbuildings; a silo had broken off and left jagged teeth standing upright like a shattered tooth. Nearby the rusted hulk of some machine of the ancient world-the type called tractor -stood forlorn, half buried. The potato barn was a low long rectangle, roofed in curved sheet metal and with ventilators rising from the top like pipes crowned with pointed conical hats. ?Seems perfect,? he said-or rather, shouted.?Let?s take a look.?
They did; the boards of the building?s sides were mostly intact, and the glass in a couple of windows unsmashed. The entrance was double doors, sagging open, down a ramp that must have been for the passage of wagons. They approached, then kicked out of their skis and set those upright in the snow. It was nearly knee-deep on the humans when they put their feet down.
Garbh stopped just outside the entranceway, and even over the wind?s keening he could hear the ratcheting menace of her snarl. Edain and he shouted as one: ?Watch out!?
Warrior?s reflex overrode surprise; he could feel it happening, like a surge of fire through the cold sluggishness of his body. A great dark shape came out of the doors like something shot from a catapult; he could hear the dogsled team going wild in their traces. Garbh leapt for a throat and was batted aside like a rag doll, turning head-over-heels with a whining yelp of surprise. The bear had to rear on its hind legs to do that, though, roaring in gape-jawed rage. That gave Edain his single chance. The longbow spat an arrow, and the roar turned to a coughing gurgle for a moment as the cloth yard shaft transfixed the thick neck.
Rudi had his sword out now, in the two-handed grip; not what he?d have chosen to fight an animal three times his weight, quick as a cat and stronger than a team of plow oxen, but it was a great deal better than nothing or a knife if you didn?t have a hunting spear to hand. The bruin hesitated only an instant, and then it was on him. Like a wall of dark fur it reared, and the paws swung like living maces fit to snap necks and spatter brains.
Whippt.
The claws passed half an inch from his face as he drove in and ducked; some part of him cursed the snow for hampering his feet. He twisted and hewed, and the yard of sharp steel raked a great forearm open to the bone and skidded off that. Blood spattered at him, striking his goggles, blinding him. He threw himself backward frantically, landing on his back in snow that hampered and clung as he tore them off. Only an instant, but the bear was looming over him like the shadow of incarnate Death, ready to fall in an avalanche of teeth and claws. Rudi snarled back at it, coming up to one knee and tensing for the last effort.
A chain snaked out of the night and whipped around the bear?s forepaw. The sickle-blade at the end sank in as Mary set her feet and pulled. The bear?s stroke was thrown off, but at the end of her fighting iron the hundred and fifty-odd pounds of Dunedain woman and her gear traced an arc through the gathering darkness almost as spectacular as Garbh?s a moment earlier. She?d wrapped the end around her waist for leverage, and now it worked the other way.
There was a wail of:?Oh, rrrrrrhaich!? and a thump. ?Firo, pen u-celeg!? Ritva screamed, and loosed an arrow from her recurve.?Firo, brog!?
There was a wet thunk as it hammered into the beast?s hip bone.
That wasn?t going to fulfill the cry of:?Die, foul beast! Die, bear!? But it would help.
Rudi surged up while it was distracted, his whole body twisting into the two-handed drawing slash across its belly. Impact shocked up his wrists and arms, more like hitting an oak pell than a man. Fur and thick hide and fat and muscle parted under the desperate power of the blow, and intestines spilled out like writhing pink eels as he followed through. Something hit him, stunning-hard, and sent him through the air; he tasted blood and felt his face tingle and stars shoot through his vision.
Rudi rolled through the snow, blinded by it. Someone landed across him as he did-Ingolf, he realized, as he heard the flat vowels of his curses. They struggled to get up without cutting each other open on longsword or shete, and then an arrow hissed between their heads. ?Be sodding careful!? he bellowed.
Back on his feet he could barely see the beast through the horizontal wail of the snow, though its moaning bellow was loud. Pierre Walks Quiet had an actual hunting spear with him, lashed to the dogsled. Now he?d gotten it free, and he dashed in and thrust. The long point went home in the bear?s chest, but it charged even with its staggering feet tripping in its own guts. He ran backward through the snow, half falling, until the butt-cap of the spear rang on the side of the buried tractor. The machine rocked backward, but the impact drove the weapon deep into the charging animal as well.
Rudi and Ingolf hobbled forward. Edain was already there; even Garbh was, limping but game. Her master shot twice, Ritva once, and then Rudi and Ingolf each slammed the edge of their long blades into its spine.
The bear sank forward; Pete?s thin form wriggled out from beneath it, the arms and chest of his parka wet with its blood and fluids. The animal gave a last whimper, pawed at its neck, and went limp. ?Back! Let Brother Bear die!? Rudi snapped.?Is everyone all right? Sound off!?
His folk did. Ritva returned with Mary?s arm over her shoulder; the one-eyed Ranger staggered over to Ingolf. ?Are you all right, honey? Bar melindo,? he added. ?I?m… just… thumped…? she wheezed, half collapsing against him.?Nothing… broken.?