Chapter 19

I will not brag that my chat with my people in December resolved all the difficulties facing our budding community, and I will not imply that my relationship with the other women improved once I’d bedded Binda. In truth it didn’t, in either case, though life did get easier in a manner of speaking. People started coming to me to arbitrate for them when something came up. Even Sygor seemed to have relaxed a bit. It helped that he’d taken an interest in Trika.

Trika was a cute girl who was certainly not a woman as far as I was concerned, but she was getting there quickly according to the opinion of the women in the cave. She was a year and a half younger than Sygor, but even by his standards, she was an eligible mate. Thus he’d taken time to speak with her on occasion, particularly when she was busy working. One of the many jobs I’d delegated to others was assembling arrows for the men in the cave. Trika had agile fingers and she was good at securing arrow heads and fletching to the shafts that I produced. Sygor saw that work as a useful task, seeing as he needed arrows for the bow that I had made for him. He used the work as a way to start conversations. He thought he was being very clever about it. Every woman and a few men knew exactly what he was doing. It was therefore not overly surprising when Tonya came to me in January to speak to me about her daughter. Naturally she came with an entourage. Ramie was there as spokeswoman for the group.

“Jake,” Ramie stated pointedly, pulling my attention away from my work and making me aware that I needed to put on my ‘chief hat.’ “We would like to speak to you for a minute.”

I nodded, and then waved them all to come and sit by me. That was something else I’d had to get used to in the cave. People often sat with me to chat, with very little formality; but, when it was a serious matter, they would hold back until I offered them a seat. It was like that when Tonya had come to see me.

“What do you wish to speak about?” I inquired politely, opening the door for the women to begin telling me what they had to say. It was another formality that I had needed to accept.

“We wish to speak to you about Trika and Sygor, and learn what you think of them as possible mates,” Ramie informed me without much fuss or muss. “Tonya wishes to know how you feel about it.”

Our cave was in a very unique circumstance in that I was technically responsible for all the unmated women in the cave. In a tribe, a youth would approach his father about what he wanted to do in regards to taking a mate. The father would feel out the father of the girl to see what he thought on the matter. If the girl’s father was amiable, then negotiations would begin to determine if the girl and boy would mate, and what would the terms and conditions be for any dowry paid for the girl’s hand. Unfortunately, I was not only responsible for Trika, but I was responsible for Sygor, too; thus making me the only person in the cave capable of arbitrating the issue. The women knew this to be a fact and they accepted it wholeheartedly. They also knew that I had no real objections to the issue so long as everyone was happy. This delegation was simply a matter of formality.

Still, I made use of it. I did question Tonya on Trika, pressing her on her daughter’s suitability of becoming Sygor’s mate. I think I took her by surprise on a couple of points, including her intentions for herself, and her younger daughter. Technically they both were part of my women. I had even bedded Tonya once as part of my making the rounds and ensuring all the women in the cave remained content. It had been an amiable liaison, but one I was certain wouldn’t be occurring again, unless Tonya showed a little more interest in it than she’d showed the time we’d been together. I got the distinct feeling that her interests lay elsewhere, though I hadn’t yet seen her with a woman. I had to ask, though. Technically Sygor could take Tonya to his hearth as the mother of his mate. If he felt that generous when he mated Trika, Trona would go as well.

It quickly became obvious that Tonya intended to move to Sygor’s hearth if Trika became his mate. It didn’t really matter that we really only had the one large hearth in the centre of the cave, or that everyone ... including Sygor ... was actually at my hearth; that was her intention. In truth, I didn’t care, so long as Sygor didn’t mind.

That was the big question facing the women; would Sygor mind? Personally, I was more interested in whether or not Sygor would actually ask for Trika as his mate. I asked about this, turning the question to Ramie who was ramrodding the show. The expression on her face showed me that they didn’t know.

“Don’t you think you should at least wait until Sygor has spoken to me about it, first?” I asked out of curiosity. “It isn’t like he can take advantage of Trika while we’re bottled up for the winter, you know? How about letting me speak to him first and see what his intentions are? Then we can talk again.”

I did speak to Sygor later on that day, shortly after our evening meal. It had been one of the better days in a long time and I’d let Rugar organize a hunting trip to give the men something to do besides working on my pet projects and playing checkers. The hunt had been successful with Rugar and Kobo making the kills. They’d brought back two does for our supper and larder.

“So tell me, Sygor, are you intending to ask for Trika for your mate?” I asked the young man once I’d led him off into the corner of the cave that I used as my work area. I had a small fire pit there and it was lit. The small blaze kept us warm while we spoke.

My question startled Sygor. He looked away for a moment and when he looked back his cheeks were flushed, and they weren’t flushed because of the heat of the fire.

“She is only a friend,” Sygor stated bluntly. “I haven’t asked her, yet, and I do not know if I will. I just like talking to her. I am still thinking of going to the Horse People for a mate. It is a possibility.”

“Which is fine with me,” I told the youth, “but the women can be busybodies, sometimes, and they are already planning your mating with Trika. Now I’m not speaking to you to pressure you into a decision or anything like that. I’ll tell you truthfully that while I think Trika is a good worker in the cave, I also feel that she is too young to be mated. It might be better if she waits until next fall to think about it.”

“You may be right,” Sygor agreed hesitantly, not certain if he should or shouldn’t, but certain that it was the answer I wanted to hear. “It would allow me to visit the Horse People first. Then I will know what my options are and what my best choice should be.”

“Yeah,” I muttered in agreement, “that might just be the ticket for you; however, I do want to make some things clear to you before you make any decision. Trika is what my people would call a ‘package deal.’ If you do take Trika for a mate, Tonya expects you to take her and Trona to your hearth as well. What do you think of that?”

Sygor didn’t think well of that. He was a young man and did not desire to share his living space with his mother-in-law. He frowned at that idea and shook his head.

“Why should I take Tonya and Trona to my hearth?” Sygor asked bluntly. “They have your protection; they do not need mine.”

“That will be between you and her,” I told Sygor bluntly, ensuring that he got the drift of my message quickly. “I’m not going to interfere in the negotiations if they ever do happen. Tonya, though, has certain expectations. It doesn’t matter to her that she has a hearth to sit at and someone who will see to it that she has food and clothing, regardless of what is expected of her. If you do choose Trika as your mate, you will have to set the terms. If you don’t want Tonya then you’d better be clear about it from the start. I will not take the blame for your decision.”

Sygor wasn’t happy with my stance, but he was happy to be forewarned about Tonya’s intentions.

That wasn’t the end of it, but it was the end of my part in it. Ramie came to find out the outcome of my talk with Sygor, bringing Tonya along because the woman insisted on hearing things first hand. I made it known that Sygor was still thinking about heading off with me to the Horse People in the spring to see if he could find a mate, there, and I had decided Trika would not be mated until Fall at the earliest. It didn’t make Tonya happy. I simply made it clear that I didn’t want to hear another word about it until Sygor had made a decision.

Sygor wasn’t my only problem come January. My biggest problem was what to do in the spring once we’d visited the Horse People. I was still hoping to pack up the entire cave and move it further away from the drop site and General Ridgeway. What worried me the most was the fact that six of the women in my cave were pregnant. With luck most would deliver early in the summer. Regardless of that, the pregnancies could delay the move and limit just what we could do. It wasn’t as if I could call up movers to pack us up and ship everything to our new home and once there I couldn’t call in help to set the new home up and to provide us with food.

When the weather was good I rode out of the valley and onto the plateau to have a look around. Most of the time, when I did go out on the plateau, I saw nothing but white stretching in every direction, for miles and miles. On the few times I did spot something unusual, it turned out that it was a wolf or another predator roaming about in search of a meal. I ignored them if they kept their distance and didn’t prove a nuisance. If they did, someone in the cave got a new fur coat.

It was Gabon who helped solve my problem. He’d been sitting one night with me after supper, helping to work on a saddle for Agar and out of curiosity I’d struck up a conversation with him, speaking to him in his own language. I’d done so in order to become proficient in the Horse People’s dialect. I spoke the common language as well as I spoke English, but I’d let the Horse People dialect and the Plains People dialect slide over the first part of the winter, using both of them sparingly. Being aware of this, I wanted practice in the tongue so that when I met Agar again, we could speak without a translator. To me it would be the polite thing to do as well as the politically correct thing to do. Out of curiosity I asked Gabon where his people wintered.

Gabon took my question in stride and my curiosity. The welcome opportunity to speak his own tongue loosened him up and he became talkative. I already knew from my chats with Bogdi and people I had spoken to at the encampment that the Horse People wintered near a box canyon on the far side of the plateau where the escarpment joined the mountain range. Gabon told me about the place, and what life was like in the Horse People cave during the winter. From the sound of it, their cave wasn’t as active or as fun as ours. He’d actually smiled at that, letting me know that our winter here had been the best that he’d ever known. I thanked him for the compliment.

As we continued to work and Gabon continued to talk, the man told me a number of tales about his people and how they lived on the plateau. To the Horse People, the plateau was the world. It was the only world they needed to know. However, from time to time a hunter left the tribe ... much as Tonko had left the tribe ... in search of adventure. When that happened, and if the adventurer ever returned, the tribe revelled in the stories that he brought back with him. One such story had been passed down by Gabon’s family. He told me that a distant kinsman had once journeyed south beyond the mountains, and he’d found marvellous lands that were bountiful with life, but sparsely populated. According to Gabon, there was a pass in the mountains lying south of the lake. Beyond that pass were new lands, waiting to be seen.

That conversation sparked a curiosity in me that eventually blossomed into a plan.

“I think we should check out that pass after our visit to the Horse People,” I told Clara and Gabby one afternoon near the end of January. “It might be the answer to our problem with Quantum. If there are valleys and other lands on the other side of the pass waiting to be discovered, then there might be a place there that we can go and hide in until we are ready to strike back at Quantum in force.”

“Do you really want to confront Quantum,” Clara asked tentatively, looking at me with concern on her face, “even if we do find a place to slip away to and hide? Wouldn’t it be better to just avoid them if we can?”

“No,” I told her bluntly. “The fact is that Quantum and Ridgeway are too dangerous to ignore. They came after Gabby intending to kill her. They would have killed you to get to her. O’Quinn couldn’t tell us why, except that Winslow ordered it and Ridgeway had directed how it was to be done. If Quantum does come back here again, they’ll still be looking for Gabby, intent on killing her for some reason that only Quantum understands. I’m not going to let that happen. In fact, if we can find a place to hold up for any real period of time, where I’m not spending my time worrying about where our next meal will come from, then I’m going to start teaching a few of our younger members how to fight the way I was trained.”

“Are you really going to turn these people into an army?” Clara gasped aloud as the reality of my statement sank in. “Do you really think that is fair to them?”

“Yes I do,” I replied without any hesitation, “and if you stopped to think about it, you’ll agree with me. Regardless of what happens down the road ... whether Quantum comes after us, or I go after them ... these people will be at risk, because they live with us. If I don’t train them to defend themselves against all possible threats (and not just the stray wolf that comes snooping around our smokehouse), then I’m not being a responsible leader. I’m thinking about their own good as well as ours when I suggest training them. If anything does happen, at least there will be some in the cave who’ll be able to act, and not just react. It might mean the difference between life and death for the others in the end.”

Clara couldn’t argue the point, though her face did reflect her discomfort with my answer. I could understand why she felt the way she did. I had my own reservations about my plans for the future. I knew that there would be limitations in what I could achieve with the resources at hand. These people certainly weren’t going to stand for anything as strict as ‘boot camp’ mentality when it came to teaching them what I felt they needed to know. I’d already seen that when I showed them how to clean and take care of the shotguns we’d acquired from the compound and the men that I’d killed. They weren’t stupid people, but they did have their own way of learning, and it wasn’t the same as mine. I had to remember that and adapt accordingly or I’d drive away those people I needed the most. If nothing else I could train them to patrol our area on a regular basis in an attempt to prevent anyone from sneaking up on us again. Now that was something that most of the hunters could do without too much difficulty. I’d have to start pushing that soon.

“Let’s focus on the short term first,” Gabby suggested, drawing my attention back to the original discussion. “How do you plan to explore this pass and the land beyond it?”

“I was thinking of taking only a small group with me when I go back to visit the Horse People,” I explained. “Once I’ve dropped off the saddles and we pick up the horses that Agar had promised me, I’ll ride south and see what I can find. I figure that by travelling light and with only a few people we’ll be able to cover a lot of territory fast.”

“It’ll still take you at least a month going there and coming back,” Clara pointed out. “Are you sure you want to do that so close to Gabby’s due date.”

I pursed my lips at that question. No, I didn’t want to miss the birth of my child. I’d served with guys whose wives had delivered a kid while they were serving overseas. It sucked the big one, to put it bluntly. Still they had done their duty, and I couldn’t shirk mine. Finding a safe place for my people to live, and for Gabby to raise our child, was more important than being on hand to welcome my child into the world. I just hoped that Gabby could forgive me.

“It has to be done,” I told Clara and Gabby pointedly. “I don’t like it, and I’d much rather be here to say hello to my child when it is born, but this trip south is important to our long term survival. I’ll try and make it as quick as possible, but I can’t promise anything. I have no idea when the pass will be open. Everything will depend upon the weather.”

We left the conversation at that point. There wasn’t anything any of us could really say, other than it sucked! It had to be done, though, and there was no way of knowing how it would play out in the end. For the time being we’d let the matter lie. As always, there were other worries to address and other concerns to focus on.

Sickness was a major concern in the cave, and one that took up a lot of Clara’s time. Luckily, she had a good group of women supporting her. It helped make our life that much better.

I found out early in our stay in the cave that Clara had spent a lot of time indoctrinating the women that I’d inherited from the Hilltop People into her way of thinking about hygiene and health. It helped that Clara was openly recognized by the community as our healer. People actually listened to what she said; especially if it was about not getting sick.

Clara’s big push had been hygiene, from the start. My nightly baths in the river had been inspirational in more than one way. Almost all the women had taken to bathing, as did the kids. For the kids it was an opportunity to have fun in the water. From there the education expanded. It helped a lot having metal cookware and dishes to eat off of. Having them and keeping them clean helped eliminate a number of bacterial related health problems. It meant that cooking containers got emptied routinely and thoroughly cleaned so nothing was left to go mouldy in the pots and to decay. It also meant that food got cooked thoroughly. There wasn’t a chance that a chunk of meat might end up on someone’s plate that contained all sorts of microscopic bad guys that would result in the person ending up with diarrhea or something even worse.

Hygiene wasn’t the only area that Clara worked on to keep our cave healthy. Diet was another. As much dried fruit was going into the meals as possible, to help ensure that everyone got a balanced diet and the right amount of vitamins needed to survive the cold winter.

People still got sick over the course of the winter, but it was contained. We could ensure the cave stayed warm. We could feed them and make certain that they kept clean and their living spaces were kept tidy and neat; but, eventually, someone got a sniffle. The good thing was that colds didn’t get worse and nothing really spread.

That was a big fear of mine. Rugar had told me over morning tea that his father had died one winter of a cold that had sunk deep into his chest. In fact four men had died of illness that winter in the caves that the Hilltop people moved to when the snows threatened to fall. It was, in fact, common to lose anywhere from ten to twenty percent of the cave population due to sickness during the confined winter months. He considered us to be very lucky. I just made certain I thanked Clara for all her hard work, every time I saw her moving about the cave checking up on everyone there.

By February we had three saddles completed. The first one was the roughest looking of the lot. I knew that it would end up staying with us, as I wouldn’t give such shoddy work to Agar. It was still usable, though. I had put it on the stallion one bright sunny day. I’d given it a workout to make certain that the stirrups held up to any strain put on them, and that the seat was comfortable enough to sit in for hours at a time. It passed all the tests I put it through.