this part of Kregen, a tall, broad, comfortable seat. Uthnior buckled on his crossbow with care, strapping the quivers of bolts alongside, checking the swing of the three swords and the variety of polearms he carried. His provision bags went the other side. Barty pulled his lower lip.
“You have brought a mighty fine array of weaponry, Jak. Tell me, Uthnior, what is it best for us to take?”
I did not fail to notice that the guide carried a short but powerful bow, a compound reflex weapon of considerable beauty and precision, over his shoulder. The quiverful of arrows to match were fletched with a neutral greeny-browny set of feathers. But the steel heads were all wide, keen, wedge-shaped flesh-cutters, with vicious barbs. This bow, it was clear, was his personal close-range missile weapon. The crossbow was for the fancy shooting.
Uthnior looked at my Lohvian longbow. The quiverful of arrows were fletched with the brilliant blue plumage of the crested korf of the Blue Mountains. As to the piles, they were my usual mix, different heads for different tasks. “That is a bow from Loh, I think,” he said. “A longbow?”
“Aye. You have seen one before?”
His reply astonished me although it should not have.
“No. Never.”
This showed yet again the sheer size of the island of Vallia. Away up here the hunters used crossbows or the reflex bow. The longbow was virtually unknown. And yet, the weird thing was, if I took a flier and flew due east for eighty or so dwaburs I would arrive in the island of Zamra. Most odd. Of course, the heartlands of the Northeast lay farther to the north, mainly around the Stackwamors, which was why the reivers had full rein down here.
“We must shoot a match, Chavonthjid, when opportunity offers.”
“I would welcome that. Although I fancy this longbow of yours clumsy to handle.”
Not prepared to get into an argument over that — what he said was true for one unskilled in the use of the supreme Lohvian longbow — I urged us to complete our preparations and to mount up and ride. We wanted to get into the foothills before nightfall.
In the end I stuck to my usual custom and took my accustomed arsenal. Barty hewed to the middle path and selected a mix of weapons that made Uthnior merely smile, rather than frown, and we set off. Uthnior, it turned out, had a grandmother from the Northeast. He was at home here. If I give the impression that for a Southern Vallian to venture into these parts was like trespassing into enemy territory, then I give a false impression. We were still in Vallia and the emperor’s writ still ran here, albeit very often evaded or downright ignored. These people paid taxes to the Presidio and emperor in Vondium. They were Vallians and proud of it — if they could be Northeastern Vallians. It was the agitators who fomented unrest, hanging their banditry on the respectable peg of self-determination — or so I was led to believe. I thought them wrong. But, equally, I know that big does not equal best, and small can, indeed, be charmingly beautiful.
There is an old saying that has its echo on Kregen — A good big ’un will beat a good little ’un. I looked always to the future, past the time when Vallia would have come to an arrangement with the countries of Pandahem, and achieved peace with Hamal — and I hoped without having to thrash them in a long and costly war — and brought in the whole fantastic continent of Havilfar. When the groupings of islands and continents called Paz were truly one — then we could deal with the Chanks. We would have to deal with the devils from over the curve of the world before then, of course, dolefully so, as best we could.
We broke in among the foothills of the Kwan Range and we made camp in a secluded gulley with water and fodder to hand. We had seen not a soul. The game abounded, and regarded us rather in the light of trespassers, evidence of the infrequency of human intrusion.
In the course of a regular season Uthnior would guide just the one hunting party, and there were other hunters each with his own patch; he had been free to take employment with Barty because his hunting party had called it off over the recrudescence of the border troubles. He’d never married, seemingly preferring the open freedom of the hunter’s life. His home was where he happened to be. He appeared to me a competent, grave, inwardly content man, with a deep understanding and love for the strange ways of nature upon Kregen.
As was becoming increasingly my habit these days when I met fresh acquaintances, I studied this hunter with the Kroveres of Iztar in mind. Would he or would he not be found worthy to be admitted to the Order? Already I had been impressed by his manner. As for Barty, that young man for all his virtues had some way to go yet before the Order would consider him.
We pressed on again while the golden and pink moonlight gave us illumination, She of the Veils and the Twins lighting the way through the broken country. Ever upward we trended. The six-legged totrixes were an uncomfortable ride; but I am used to their waywardnesses and, deprived of a zorca, made the best of them.
We traveled for the rest of the night and as the last small hurtling moon vanished in the haze off to our left Uthnior indicated we should make camp again.
The fire we built was small, compact, shielded by a rocky overhang. When full daylight came we doused it and sat, resting, looking about as the light brightened. Barty could not rest for long.
“Can we not push on, Uthnior?”
The guide pulled a grass stem from the corner of his mouth.
“You hired me to guide you to the camp of the Hawkwas. I know the area they frequent — and avoid it. In general terms I can take you straight there. You will be observed closely over the last dwabur or so.”
Listening quietly to him I made no comment; but I guessed accurately what he would say next.
“Complete directions can be given you. I will be happy to do that. But you must go on by yourselves at the end. I shall wait three days for you. No more.”
Ten
The mizzle of rain eased and a wan grayish daylight seeped through the massed clouds. Hillsides, woods, bushes, open swards dripped water. Barty swung off his hooded cape and the water sprayed. The totrixes ambled along in that skewed six-legged gait. Uthnior slid his cape off expertly and let the water drain off into the grass.
Gray clouds hung about the mountains. The pass ahead glinted with a waterfall’s sudden silver.
“Five burs ride beyond the pass,” said the guide, pointing. “Then I leave you to go on. There is a cave. Three days I shall wait. After that-”
“You needn’t go on!” exclaimed Barty. “If we don’t come back in three days we’ll be dead. I know.”
Uthnior had little experience of airboats, for his hunter clients liked to get into the saddle as soon as possible, and at the time I took at face value his assertion that fliers would be useless in the maze of valleys and gullies and hilly peaks around us. The Kwan Hills were no place to crash in, that was certain. Our six-legged mounts ambled along and the twin suns struggled to pierce the thick cloud layer above. That pass ahead, with its thread of silver, the dark sodden slopes on either hand, the cavernous bellies of the low-lying clouds above — my fingers began to twitch.
“Here they come!” I bellowed and ripped out the longbow.
They bounded down the slopes screeching like demons, leaping from tussock to tussock, waving their weapons, ragged bands of men and women, their armor and harness dun-earth in color and wet, wet with the wet ground on which they had lain in ambush.
“Hawkwas!” yelled Uthnior, and his bow was in his hand.
Reflex compound bow and Lohvian longbow spat as one.
Barty’s bow slapped out a little later, as the hunter and I loosed again. In this kind of sudden fierce attack as fighting men and women roar at you, screeching, aiming to top you, you have to assume that, have to understand
