Moonrise

Some children were bending, looking for stones.

* * *

Richard came to rouse Baj at dark before dawn – startling him so he rolled out of his blanket, the rapier half- drawn before he woke.

A massive shape in the night, Richard made a reassuring puh puh puh sound. 'We're up, and we go. We had our fire-place; now we run away from it.' He stood waiting while Baj rolled the blanket, settled his sword-belt and dew-damp pack, bow, and quiver, then he lumbered softly away.

Baj yawned and followed, tramping through pine scrub. His battered boots were already uncomfortable – the sole of the left was separating a little on the side.

… By sun-well-up, they were off the mountain, and trailing along a draw where little waterfalls ran musical as if the mountain wept to see them go. It seemed to Baj a promising notion for a pretty poem, when he had leisure to write it… had pulp-paper, quill pen, and squid ink. And happened still to be breathing.

Nancy had had nothing to say to him all morning. A relief, and an annoyance. Whether it was her part-father fox – whose supposedly minor contribution seemed to have had considerable effect – or one of the parent humans involved, the result had been a girl (a Person) very slow to forgive… It seemed to Baj he'd been too easy, too courteous with her. She was not, after all, an Island lady. Not even some girl-Ordinary of a river town. An oddity, was what she was. A pain in the ass…

Here, in the folds of the mountain's skirt, breezes blew warm enough for stands of rhododendron just blossoming in thick unfurling purples… ragged whites. Baj found it difficult to imagine the Warm-time world, when these must have been cool-weather plants and blooms, not constrained to so short a summer. Those people would have enjoyed flowers for half the year…

Richard leading, then Nancy, then Baj – Errol, as usual, pacing somewhere beside or behind – they trailed wending through flowering shrubs, the green heights of their last mountain close above and behind them… the heights of the next rising before.

Birds flew sifting through the foliage, a flock of little birds as bright gold as any Kingdom coin. They whirled, chirping, then spun away into the trees.

Baj followed the others through this wild garden, overarched in places by great oaks and what he thought might be tulip trees. Then out onto a level sunny enough for drifts of small blueberry bushes and bilberry, already started fruiting – forced, as all growing things were forced, to hurry before Lord Winter came again.

Poems everywhere, it seemed to Baj – and if not for his boot, and difficult Nancy, he would have been… content. He bent to comb a little cluster of blueberries from a short bush as he passed, found them still sour-tart but very nice.

A startled yelp up ahead. – Then a scream.

Baj thought of Nancy, drew and ran, flicking shrubbery aside with the rapier's blade. Damned boot…

He came running out into a wider glade, and four figures turned to watch him. The three Persons – and a woman. She was short and almost fat, with considerable gray streaked through brown hair plastered flat with grease, and decorated with a tuft of blue feathers. Barefoot in a sheepskin kilt, she stood with veteran breasts bare on a torso scarred with intricate feather patterns from her belly to her throat.

A woven berry-basket lay upturned beside her, picked blueberries spilled like little semiprecious stones.

There were no other tribespeople in the glade.

Baj sheathed his sword, paused to catch his breath. '… Is anyone with you? Anyone near?'

The tribeswoman only stared at him, mouth tight shut. Richard and Nancy stood as silent.

Baj walked closer to the Robin – certainly a Robin woman by the feathers in her hair. He held his hands out to show no weapons. 'We are travelers, and mean you no harm.'

Silent staring.

'Your village… how near?'

Then the woman answered in swift clattering pidgin, through which only fuck and you came in clear book-English. Recovered from startlement, she seemed a little tough.

'Mind your manners, savage!' Baj said, and was instantly amused at such haughty nonsense – by a Once-was- a-prince with broken boots and partial beasts for friends.

A long silence, then. Only buzzing insects, only a few birdcalls sounding.

Errol came trotting into sunlight, shook his head.

'She came alone,' Richard said.

The woman stared at him, surprised apparently to hear him speaking.

'Her village,' Nancy said, 'can't be far, for her to come out by herself.'

'I apologize,' Baj said to the woman, '- for my rudeness. This is your country, not mine.' He made a passing and going way gesture. 'We only travel through.'

She stood staring at him. She was more than old enough to have been his mother – certainly was someone's mother… grandmother. The picked berries, likely baked in wild-oat flour with sheeps' cheese, would be meant for childrens' pleasure.

'Baj,' Nancy called as if to wake him. 'Baj… we cannot let her loose.'

'Her village,' Richard said, '- must be an easy walk. So, an easy run for the warriors who would chase us down.'

A silence, then, of different quality than woods noises left when still. Baj felt a cool shadow, as if a cloud had come over, though the sky was sweet blue, with no cloud in it. 'If we left her, and she understood – don't they honor promises they give? Oaths?'

Richard cleared his throat. 'Their women cannot swear honor.'

Baj saw in the woman's eyes that she understood enough. Intelligent eyes, a very light blue… He saw she must have been pretty, in a stocky, sturdy way, when she was a girl.

She seemed tensed to run a hopeless running. A tiny vessel pulsed at the side of her throat.

I don't have the right, Baj said to himself, then said aloud, 'We don't have the right.'

'No,' Richard said, '- we don't. But must do it anyway.'

'Her children,' Baj said, and knew it was a stupid thing to say.

More of that clouded silence.

Baj felt something in him leaning… leaning, and he leaned against it. 'We tie her hard to a tree, and leave. It will be a while before they come searching, and find her. Time enough for us to be well gone.'

'Unless they come searching soon,' Nancy said. 'Unless other women come after her to pick blueberries.'

'Chance enough to take,' Baj said.

'No, Baj,' Richard shook his head. 'A chance too much to take.'

'We tie her,' Baj said, '- and leave her.'

'No.' Richard, looking sorrowful, weary as a festival's dancing bear, took his ax from his shoulder.

As if he were dreaming, Baj recalled his sword's engraving – With Good Cause – and drew it. He faced Richard, stepped out a little for room.

Richard said, 'Oh, dear,' looked even sadder, and held his ax now with both hands.

'We tie her, and leave her.' Baj was surprised how steady his voice sounded… and how, as he spoke, he was considering what best chance he might have against this so formidable Person – formidable and, of course, a friend. A poor chance. A poor chance no matter what, though perhaps time and space, if he was fast enough, for one thrust only before the great ax caught him… There was the oddest feeling of freedom.

'No no no!' Nancy came bounding, shifting in between them as if she were dancing. Baj was pleased to see she hadn't drawn the scimitar. There was not enough of him to kill the girl… to save the woman.

He stood still and on guard in the sunshine, as if to let his decent sword decide. The left-hand dagger wouldn't care.

Nancy stood panting before him. He smelled her sweet vulpine odor in the sunshine warmth.