“I am not afraid of going there!”
“I did not say that you were. I meant only that others can take the risk. You have done your part, and more, many times over.”
“That is also not important. What I fear most is our dependency on the murgu and the city. We will go now because we must, then one day we will have to go again. But one time when we go it will happen. Once when we are in the city we will be seen by the murgu. And what then?”
“You worry too much. Life is to be taken one day at a time.”
“That is no longer true. When we lived in the mountains and followed the deer you could say that. No longer. We are in a trap and there is no way out.”
“We will be a bigger hunting party this time. We will bring back many death-sticks.”
“No. Impossible. The risk is too great. Two hunters at most. And we will leave our own death-sticks behind here. Then, when we are distant from the sammads, we must wash ourselves and the skins we wear, many times. If there is a sickness it must not spread to the death-sticks we bring back.
“I do not understand your talk of washing and sickness.”
“Neither do I,” Kerrick said with a twisted smile. “But I was told about it by one who knew. This was before we met and I had been very sick…”
“Then it was a marag who told you this?”
“Yes. And after the attack on the city, then the valley where they grew special plants just to kill us, you can see clearly how much they know of living things. This marag of great knowledge told me that disease, infections, are spread by small living things.”
“I have seen grubs in wounds.”
“Living creatures even smaller than that, so small that you cannot see them. I know it is hard to believe, but I am just telling you what I was told. So perhaps what is killing the death-sticks passes from one to the other. I don’t know. But if we can stop it by washing ourselves then we must do it.
“Surely we must. And any hunter would smell better for a good washing. It will be you and I then. We will go.”
“No,” Kerrick said with sudden firmness. “You are a sammadar and I cannot tell you what to do. I will take one who will obey me, who will do as I order. We will go in silence and avoid the murgu. Avoid killing if we see any of them. If you were there, and that should happen, would you obey an order not to kill?”
“I would not. You speak the truth in that. But who would you take? Your sammad is small, the boy Harl the only hunter you have.”
“He is skilled and silent in the forest. He will go with me. That is the way it must be.”
“You are making a mistake—”
‘I might be — but it is my mistake.”
Herilak frowned angrily but could think of nothing more to say. The decision had been made. “When do you leave?”
“Very soon. This time we must go there and get the death-sticks, bring them back before the others that we have here die. They must be ready for us when we need them.”
There was little to add after this and they parted in silence.
Kerrick was still awake the next morning at first light, had slept little during the night. He lay unmoving, listening to Armun’s gentle breathing, until sunlight touched the wall of the tent. Only then did he slip out quietly and go to the shelter where he kept the hesotsan, to unwrap it carefully and hold it up in the light. The dead area was there, bigger now, still there.
The flap of the hunters’ tent had been thrown back and Ortnar sat in the morning sunlight. His dead leg was stretched out before him on the ground, his perpetual scowl etched with deep lines into his face.
“I want to talk with Harl,” Kerrick said.
“I still slept when he left, well before light. He knows a place by the stream where deer come at dawn. He will be a good hunter one day.”
“I will speak with him when he returns.” There was nothing to add, Ortnar was never one for small talk. Kerrick turned away and went to his own tent. Armun was awake, stirring the fire to life.
“I saw you looking at the death-stick. You worry too much about it.”
“It is more than a worry. It has the sickness.”
“Not again!” The words were a cry of pain, wrenched from her.
“Again. I will have to go to the murgu city. Again.”
“No, not you. There are others who can go.”
“Others could surely go — but they would never return. Only a Tanu who is half marag can understand that murgu city. Now I will eat and rest. I slept little last night.”
The sun was high in the sky when he awoke. The sky was bright and he blinked into its glare. Harl was sitting outside, waiting for him in patient silence. Seeing him like this, his mind still clouded with sleep, Kerrick looked at him as a stranger. No longer the small boy, but a hunter grown. As soon as he saw that Kerrick was awake he stood and came over to the tent.
“Ortnar said you came to find me, you would speak to me.”
“He told me that you were hunting. The deer came?”
“Right beneath me. Two are dead. What is it you want?”
Like Ortnar, he had no time for small talk. He used words like arrows, sharp and swift.
“I want you. Will you go to the murgu city with me? My death-stick has the sickness.”
“How many will go?”
“You and I alone.”
Harl’s eyes opened wide. “You went with the sammadar Herilak last time.”
“I did. And he killed the murgu we met. This time I wish to rely on skill in woodcraft and not killing. I wish to see and not be seen. Will you go with me?”
Harl smiled and held out his clenched fists, one above the other. “I will go. We will bring back death- sticks?”
“Yes. But you must tell me one thing now. Will you do as I order you to? If we see the murgu of the city they must not be killed. Will you do that?”
“You are asking a difficult thing.”
“I know. But if you do not do it, then another will. You are of my sammad. If you will do as I ask you, then there will be no other hunter. It is your choice.”
“Then I choose to come with you. I will do as you order, sammadar. When will we leave?”
“In the morning. Spear and bow only. The death-sticks stay here.”
“What do we do then if we meet a large marag that we cannot kill with spear or arrow?”
“We die. So it is your skill in the forest that will lead us away from them. Can you do that?”
“Yes. We will do as the sammadar says.”
They left at dawn, and by the heat of the day they were well upon the track south. When they came to the ford across the narrow river they took turns to scrub themselves clean in the clear water, one washing while the other stood guard. Harl could not see the reason for this, still he did as he was told. He grumbled about getting his bow and quiver wet, spread his arrows on the grass to dry. Kerrick looked at their packs of dried meat and ekkotaz.
“You cannot wash the meat,” Harl said. Kerrick smiled.
“True. But we can eat it. Before we enter the city we throw away what we haven’t finished, the bags as well. The last time we went I cut up the leather to bind the death-sticks. The illness could have been passed on that way. This time we will use split saplings and vines to hold them. They must not get the sickness again.”
On the second day Harl stopped them with a raised hand, listened to the forest ahead. There was something there, large. They made a long swing out through the trees to the shore, went along the sand for the rest of the day. Only when the coast became swampy and impassable did they return inland. There were no other disturbances after this and they made very good time. When they reached the now-familiar outer reaches of the city Kerrick called a stop.
“We will go back to the last stream we crossed. Get rid of the meat bags and wash again.”
“We will eat all the meat we can first.”
