Moonrise

It was a relief for Baj to turn away to the Boston-woman, whose eyes were dark as dug anthracite. 'Lady, shall I try to do what our festival wrestlers do?'

'That depends on which of their doings.' Patience sat, legs crossed. Her bare feet were almost small as a child's.

'The nose,' Baj said.

'Ah – well, I suppose you can't do worse to it…'

'Take a breath.' Baj went to kneel before her.

Patience took her breath – her broken nose whistling slightly, like a flute. Baj reached out and pinched it hard, felt a little bone or cartilage shift under his fingers… then yanked it straight to a soft click.

'Christ!' A curse, or prayer, Baj had only heard a few times before. Patience rocked back and forth – almost put her hand up to nurse the nose, then kept it away. 'Felt better breaking!' Drops of blood ran down to her mouth.

'Then they use two flat little strips of wood,' Baj said, 'one along each side to keep the nose straight. Those little strips are tied together at the ends, and both held firm in place with string looped tight around the man's head.'

'And must appear charming,' Patience said, honking like a goose.

'I can do that,' Richard said, and got up to go fashion it.

'If,' Patience sniffed at blood-drops, 'if I don't come out of this beautiful, Prince, you will need to run faster than from Robins.'

'I think,' Baj said, ignoring the 'Prince,' '- you will look even more elegant, once the little wood pieces are off. 'Spints,' is what they call them.'

'I'm still bleeding.' Patience gave Baj a hard look, and spit bright red off her upper lip.

'That will soon stop,' Baj said. '… At least, it did with the wrestlers.' He received another look, so was relieved when Richard came back with two short little splinters of thin-whittled alder, and a length of sewing sinew – moved Baj aside, and sat before Patience to set them.

'We're told those are 'spints,' Richard.'

'Really? Bone-holds, we called them in the Guard. Hold still, dear…'

* * *

Supper that night – and, after argument, with a small fire hidden deep in a cleared pit – was the last scraps of venison, and a bird: a grouse, taken by Errol with a thrown stick.

'We'll need more food than this,' Patience said, though she'd been given the largest small share, and was finishing it fast. 'We can't go tottering on our way. I can't Walk-in-air on nothing… Though now, thanks to our Richard -' she stuck out a small foot, demonstrated her new moccasin-boot, '- thanks to him, I go nicely on the ground.'

'Last of my leather,' Richard said. 'So all be careful of rocks and sharp edges.'

'I'll take the bow out ahead, tommorow,' Baj said. 'I'll find something.'

'Watch out for boar.' Richard grinned at the Boston-woman. 'We had… an adventure, with a boar.'

Errol made his tongue-clicking sound, perhaps recalling the taste of wild pig.

'Whatever,' Patience said. 'Get us something more than this.' She finished a little drumstick and chewed the bones… Bent over the fire's changeable yellow light, she appeared to Baj the very type of Warm-time witch he'd seen drawn in a copybook – perhaps originally meant for children; perhaps not. Her small face, once elegant and fine, now puffed, bruised, and beaten, bracketed with spint-sticks and sinew string as with some half-helmet, ceremonial for a sacrifice.

'You'll look much better soon,' he said, then thought perhaps he shouldn't have.

Patience glanced at him – then slantwise at Nancy, sitting silent beside her. 'Still young, isn't he?… Baj-boy,' she said, 'never mention possible future improvement in a woman's looks, Person or all human-blood. They will not thank you for the reminder that presently, they look ugly.'

'You don't look ugly. You look… interesting.'

Richard made an Um-mm sound.

'Boy,' Patience said, 'leave the subject.'

'I will. Yes.'

'Thank you.' She smiled. 'And I also thank you for the wrestlers' cure. An attempt, at least.'

Baj nodded, but said no more. Paid attention to the fire's modest flames.

'Still Robins,' Richard said, 'further along the mountains.'

'Yes.' Patience nodded. 'At least another nest of them… then Pass I-Seven, wide as the Gap-Cumberland. Farmers there.'

'Farmers,' Richard said, 'though too far north, too near the Wall for best growing.'

'Farmers to be avoided,' Patience said, 'is what they are. And well-avoided, since they're insane, with children raised to be insane, and they murder those few who are not.'

Richard nodded. 'Even the Guard stays clear of those. – Or

did, when I served in it, for fear madness might be catching.'

'What madness?' Baj said.

Patience made a face that looked even odder with her spinted nose. 'The madness… of longing.'

'We'll travel that pass at night,' Richard said. 'And the lady, Walking-in-air.'

A distant chorus commenced… WT miles away.

'Wolves.' Baj had heard them closer on the Map-Ohio river-bank, as the royal boat – the small one, Rapid – had skated hissing past by moonlight.

'True wolves,' Nancy said, and Richard listened to the high-pitched wailing rise and fall, then nodded.

'We used to hunt them,' Baj said, '- on horseback over snow when Lord Winter came down.'

'And caught them?' Patience said.

'The dogs caught them, sometimes – often were sorry they had. Some archers on snow-foots could trail and kill wolves, if the drifts were deep enough… And a snow-tiger came to the river, once, though I didn't see him. Said to have bred in Map-Oklahoma.'

'They came,' Patience said, '- as your First-father's father came. Over the bridge of land from Map- Siberia.'

'I believe that's so,' Baj said. 'It's what we were taught.'

'I've heard of those tigers.' Nancy'd spoken rarely through the evening. 'Still lesser creatures than the great white bears that come down from the Wall.'

'You insult my some-part daddy,' Richard said, smiling the smile Baj had grown used to, '- who apparently was only a grizzled.'

'I have never known,' Patience said, '- what portions were placed and Talent-shifted in my mother's womb to make me.'

'I know mine,' Nancy said, then was quiet, looking into the fire.

'Well,' Richard dug into his great pack. 'I, and all my portions, are going to wreck our Baj at chess!'

… From then, through the game – a rare triumph for Baj – and till time to sleep, only the little fire spoke.

* * *

The next days traveling the mountains north – mountains running above the long valley Map-Shenandoah – they called 'turkey time,' since wild turkey-birds fed strutting under oaks growing in groves down the steep valleys. Errol took some with thrown sticks, and Baj took many with his bow – requiring an occasional tedious search to recover a stray arrow… They had wild mushrooms to eat – cautious of death-angels – and dug roots, berries, and rabbits. But turkey was the main.

'Is there nothing else, no red meat, living in these hills?' Claiming it a reminder of the penalty for pride and inattention, Patience had walked the ground with them most of that day, climbed as they'd climbed, and clambered