Chapter 12: Retreat

"I feel fine!" he snapped irritably. "I ain't sick, or nothing. I just can't use any of the mental powers they've taught me. I try, and I try, but nothing happens. I don't even get any more of my hunches, like I used to do back before we came here."

"Take it easy, Kid," Mike soothed, tossing another stick of wood on the fire as they sat on the ground outside their tent. "What's happened is, you've probably just blown a fuse or something. From what they tell me, that was one Hell of a blast of energy you was putting out, there at the last. You held off fifty or sixty topnotch adepts, all by yourself. So all right, you can't throw things around bareminded. So what? I ain't got none of them fancy powers, and I'm doing okay."

"The powers will almost certainly come back," Zarinthe added, snuggling close to Mike's side. Since the night of her rescue, she'd seldom let him out of her sight. "You did too much, too soon. Your mind is like a muscle that's been overstrained. You just need to give it time to rest."

"Yeah, but when will they come back? Even The Goddess couldn't answer me on that one. We're just starting the worst part of a long war. We'll need everything we can get, just to stay alive when the Dark God puts on the pressure. There's no safe place on all of Gardhe where we can put the women and children while the fighting's going on, either."

"You've got more problems than that to solve." Mike grinned at him. "One of these days, you'll have to decide whether you like Ahlenya or Charis the best. When you do, I'm gonna enjoy watching the fireworks. From a safe distance, that is."

"But, why should he have to choose?" Zarinthe was puzzled by Mike's attitude. "They have all three become very good friends. It is only because Chad has not favored either of them with his affection," the Gardhian word she used was one that translated closer to 'family grouping' than to 'marriage', implying a semipermanent relationship, "that there is any strain between them. If he favors either one, the other would still be a friend. Usually, in a situation like this, we have found that the best way is to form a group of three."

"Yeah, I know," Chad admitted with an embarrassed smile. "I talked the whole thing over with Doranthe a long time ago. I just haven't made up my mind what's the right thing for me to do. I don't suppose there's much chance of us getting back home, and I'm really not all that sure that I even want to. But if we do go back, I certainly can't show up there with two wives. I'm not about to go back there by myself and leave them behind, either. Another thing, though it isn't as important. Public attitudes aren't the same as when my folks were kids, but there's still a lot of people who frown on 'mixed' marriages. Anyway, I'm not about to try to choose between them. I'm not sure that I could. When the day comes that I'm sure that I'm not going back, I'll take both of them, gladly, if they'll still have me. It won't be any 'semipermanent' thing, either. It'll be for keeps!"

"I'm certainly glad to hear that," a soft voice spoke from behind him.

"I am, too. We were beginning to think you didn't like us, or something."

"Charis! Ahlenya! You're both supposed to be out on patrol!"

"We got back early." Ahlenya snuggled close beside him where he sat.

"And I'm glad we did," Charis added, sitting even closer by his other side. "Now that we know how you feel, we won't always have to be worrying about which one of us you like the best."

"But... ," he protested, uncomfortably aware of the broad grins of the others around the campfire. "I just got through saying that I wasn't ready to decide anything yet."

"We heard what you said." Ahlenya smiled tenderly up at him. "So, now all we have to do is to help you to decide that you really want to stay here. From what you've told us about the world you come from, this Earthe of yours, I know that I would not like to live there. It's certainly not the place where I would want to raise our children."

"Nor would I," Charis agreed solemnly, but with a twinkle of laughter in her eyes. "It doesn't sound at all like a nice place for us to live, with all of those silly laws about what you can and can't do, when it's really nobody else's business."

The men and women of 'Chad's Gang' saw plenty of action in the next few weeks. Most of it was just what he called 'playing tag' with the Landsmen's soldiers who were patrolling the main roads in everincreasing strength. They could no longer lay in ambush the way they had at first. The soldiers had taken care of that by cutting down the huge old trees along the roads that had shaded travelers since time immemorial. Now Chad's fighters had to conceal themselves in shallow trenches overlaid with ground vines, and snipe at the soldiers whenever they had the chance. For the most part, they spent their time just watching, trying to find out what they could from the enemy's movements.

"Something just doesn't add up," Chad complained to Doranthe one evening. "They don't seem to be doing anything but marching enough squads of soldiers back and forth between their cities to keep the roads open for traders. They aren't making a single serious move in our direction. If the other Landsmen are anything like Khuran they won't ignore us, they'll attack."

"It's got me worried, too," Doranthe admitted ruefully. Chad noticed how haggard he'd become in the last few weeks. He seemed to be keeping going on sheer nerve, his confidence shaken by what looked like a hopeless situation. "You're right, it isn't like them to act this way. Stan, you've just spent more than a month in Khurani. What do you think of what's going on?"

"Now that you mention it, it does look kind of strange," Stan's deep voice rumbled softly. He scratched at his head of orangered hair that was getting almost long enough to curl down around his shoulders, Gardhe style. "My guess would be that their Dark God is fixing up some new kind of a dirty trick for them to play on us. Like they did with the thought screens, only this time it's almost sure to be something a whole lot worse. From what I learned about Him while I was in the city, He tends to think in straight lines, using machines and physical weapons instead of mind powers the way The Goddess does. Speaking of mind powers, Chad, are yours coming back yet?"

"Not a bit, unless this is one of my hunches. I don't think that it is, though. I've been doing all of the exercises they use for teaching kids and everything, but all I've gotten out of it is a whole lot of crazy dreams."

"Dreams?" Cymwis looked interested. "What kind of dreams are those?"

"Nothing that'll do us any good, and hardly ever anything that really makes sense. Some of it's really weird stuff. All kinds of funny looking landscapes and crazy animals. Long skinny animals with green fur and six legs, running around on blue snow. Grassy plains covered with shaggy, longhorned buffalo and packs of funnylooking critters like wolves. Bare rock under a black sky, with a little bitty blue sun overhead. Once I even saw bunches of big lizardcritters living in a kind of a city. Other times, it's nothing but a black sky full of stars, or just pure blackness. Never the same thing twice, and none of them's anything like I've ever seen or heard of before."

"Sounds like you're getting pictures of worlds in other universes," Stan mused. "I've heard that some of them are pretty weird, all right. I agree with you, it doesn't sound like anything we can use right now. Keep trying, though. Maybe you'll turn up something. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Khuran and his friends are up to."

"Maybe he's figuring on keeping us from crossing over into the southern half of Gardhe when winter comes up here," Chad suggested.

"He could be," Doranthe agreed. "But I don't see why he would bother, since not all of us cross over. The cold season doesn't really trouble us that much. The herds will be gone, but there would still be plenty for us to live on. We've got stored supplies, plants, and all the wild animals we need to eat. We cross back and forth mainly because it's always been our custom. The only thing that he would gain would be to improve his people's morale. The northern half of Gardhe is looked on as The Dark God's property, while the southern half is supposed to be the realm of The Goddess."

The conference finally ended on this note of uncertainty. Chad went back to his work of watching the movements of the enemy soldiers and getting to know the countryside. The tent city had been moved several times since he and Mike had joined them, ending up each time much farther back in the hills. Caches of food and weapons had been hidden where they might be needed, but little else had been done.

"It's got me stumped, Kid," Mike told him as the two of them rode along at the head of a sixman squad drawn from the original 'Chad's Gang'. A rumor of secret activities had reached Doranthe, and they were following it up. They were in some relatively unknown country on the far side of a low mountain chain, several days ride to the north and east of where the tent city was presently located. "They just sit there in their cities, getting ready to make their move. There's nothing we can do about it except wait and worry. It's like they was laughing at us, daring us to do our worst, and when they're ready, they'll just reach out and wipe us off the map."

Chad watched the low hills around them uneasily as Mike rambled on. This new country was a bare and uninviting semidesert compared to the greener lands to the south and west. What few trees they saw were stunted and far apart, the ground vines scanty and yellowish. The clusters of vard burrows were small and scattered, and they had seen few larger animals. In the mountains behind them they had seen several longtailed chorg, huge bearlike vegetarians that were normally placid but dangerous when angered. There had also been stubbytailed mountain cats, whose normal prey was a species of small fourhorned goat. All were wary, seldom seen.

For the last half a day or more the ground had been sloping upward in front of them. Ahead lay another range of mountains, a dark and forbidding tumble of jagged peaks stretching far into the hazy distance to either side. Beyond the first rank of snowdusted mountains rose a single irregular white cone. Lower stone masses, protruding on either side, gave it the appearance of an earthgiant's head and shoulders, glowering down at them over ranges of lower hills.

"Hey, Farlhe! Have any of the Followers explored this part of the country before?" Chad directed the question to one of his men.

"Almost never!" The rider glanced around, nervously. "This has been a place to stay away from, a place where people drop from sight and are not heard from again. It is a land in the power of the Dark One. Also, there is little feed for our animals here."

"We'll push on into the foothills today and tomorrow," Chad decided. "That'll give us a good idea of what that country is like. After that we can swing farther to the east and have a look at that area before we start back..."

"Look out!" Mike yelled a warning as a tight group of blackclad cavalry swept down on them from around the side of a low hill. Bowstrings twanged and grahls squealed.

"Follow me!" Chad led his men in an equally pellmell charge, but in the other direction! Their pursuers' arrows fell wide or short, and the soldiers were quickly left behind by the picked grahls that Chad and his men were riding.

"That was too close!" Mike gasped as they pulled their mounts down to an easy trot. "If they'd just waited a couple of minutes longer, they could of had us cold."

"Yeah, but what worries me is what they're doing here at all," Chad answered. "Unexplored country, hundreds of miles from nowhere, and all of a sudden, Wham! I'd like to know a few details. Like, what're they doing here, where'd they come from, where are they going? Stuff like that. They gave up on us mighty easy, too, like we weren't worth bothering about. I sure wish we had one of Doranthe's scouts with us, so's we could watch them from a distance. I guess we'll just have to make out with what we've got."

"What're you gonna do?"

"Send someone back with word that something's up." He turned to one of his squad. "Buran, you're the lightest man we've got, and your grahl is in real good shape. Go back to that place just this side of the mountains where we camped the night before last, and wait for us there. If nobody shows up with news in three days from the time you get there, head back to Doranthe anyway."

"But what about you?" Buran protested. "Where will you be, if I don't hear from you?"

"Dead, captured, or running for our lives. Don't you worry about it. Your job is to see that Doranthe knows that something's going on up here. Now, get moving!"

"Okay, but if you don't show up, I know some people who'll come looking for you." With this parting shot, Buran kicked his heels against the flanks of his grahl and trotted back along their trail.

"We'll rest our animals a few more minutes, just in case. Then, we'll swing back the way we came, but stay off to one side of the trail. That way, we'll keep an eye out in case they're tracking us. Hey, Mike! You know what?"

"What?" Mike asked, suspicious of Chad's sudden grin.

"This reminds me of the westerns I used to read, and old JohnWaynes on TV. The ones with the cowboys, and rustlers, and Indians and stuff."

"Well, maybe so," Mike grinned back at him. "Just remember that we're the Indians this time, and don't let yourself get carried away."

They circled around to where they could look back over their trail, but there was no sign of the soldiers who had chased them. They cautiously filed along, keeping just below the tops of the ridges where they would be hard to spot from any distance.

"There's where they jumped us. Let's see if we can tell where they came from, and which way they went." Chad posted a lookout on the top of a nearby hill, while their best tracker studied the trail.

"There's been lots of riders and wagons back and forth over this trail recently," was the report. "It's a new trail, though. Hasn't been in use more than a couple of months, if that long."

"We'll follow it. See where it goes from here. This could be real important. We'd better find out what's going on out here, and the sooner we do that the better off we'll be."

Still keeping well to one side of the trail, they scouted cautiously ahead. They found nothing but empty spaces, a deserted trail winding through sparse forests and semidesert the rest of that day and all the next. On the third morning, Mike spotted a low cloud of dust not far ahead of them. Taking care not to kick up a betraying dust cloud of their own, they stationed themselves behind the crest of a barren ridge and waited.

The sun rose higher in the sky. The cloud of dust slowly crawled toward them along the trail. At last a company of at least fifty mounted soldiers came into sight. They were escorting a string of four highwheeled wagons, each pulled by a sixgrahl team.

"Whatever they're hauling, it must be pretty damned important," Chad mused. "There aren't enough of us to try anything. We'd better send back word of this, too. Let Doranthe decide what he wants done. Maridke, you and Fenn ride back to where Buran is waiting. If he's already gone by the time you get there, one of you will have to take the word back by yourself. One or both of you come back to where the soldiers chased us. Follow their trail south to where it crosses the mountains. Find out where it comes out, and then head for home. Be careful! They'll have that part of the trail well guarded. They won't want anybody to stumble on it by accident."

Thus assured that word would be carried to Doranthe, the remaining five scouts pressed on. The country grew rougher as they climbed, making it harder to keep the trail in sight. Their grahls had been bred in and for the lush forest country, and grew irritable in the cold uplands. The animals were also having a difficult time finding enough to eat and drink among the bare rocks and sparse vegetation.

Three more days of hard traveling brought them past the summit of the first mountain range, and once again they were in dense timber. The trees here had short, thick limbs on tall, slender trunks. Mike said that their spiky bluishgreen foliage reminded him of Earthly spruce trees, though they smelled more of cinnamon, but Chad was too concerned with keeping in sight of the trail to pay much attention to them.

They were threading their way through a narrow valley when they heard a party of soldiers coming down the trail. Chad led them on a headlong plunge through the prickly bushes. He hoped that if the soldiers heard anything, they would think that they had kicked up a herd of wild animals. After all, there weren't supposed to be any enemies within hundreds of miles of this place!

"That was too close for comfort," Mike gasped when the soldiers had gone on by. He had red welts across his forehead where branches had whipped, and a bleeding scratch down one cheek.

"Yeah. Hey! Something's going on up the trail. Those soldiers must have been scouts for another caravan. Let's leave our grahls here, and see if we can sneak up on them." Chad tied his grahl to a convenient stub of branch, slipping off through the underbrush.

"Quiet, now," he whispered. "We're almost there."

Soldiers were milling noisily around. One of their four wagons was canted across the trail, leaning toward its broken wheel. Some of the men were futilely prying with hackedoff branches, trying to lever the axle up high enough to slide a boulder under it. A spare wheel lay nearby, ready to be slipped onto the axle in place of the one that had failed.

"Heave, you ninnies!" A redfaced officer was pacing back and forth, shouting at them. "Get that wheel mounted. We're late already. It'll mean all of our hides, if we don't get this last load out in time for the attack."

"It's no use, sir," a noncom gasped. "The load's too heavy. We'll have to unload the wagon first."

"All right, but handle those crates gently! Too much banging around, and they won't work at all. Or what's worse, they'll flash back at the men using them."

The sweating soldiers unloaded box after long narrow box from the crippled wagon, boxes that weighed heavy for their size. Chad motioned his men to stay where they were, crawling off to one side to where a shallow gully meandered to within a few feet of one pile of boxes. He waited until everyone's attention was centered on the repairs to the wagon. He hoped they were, anyway. He crawled forward, moving scarcely a foot at a time. At last, the boxes themselves hid him from the soldiers. Slowly, carefully, hoping that the noise he made wouldn't be noticed, he pried open the top of a box and drew out an object swathed in protective wrappings.

He pushed the lid of the box back down, wishing that he had some way of pounding its fastenings into place. His heart hammered until he felt that it alone was enough to give him away as he crept back, dragging his prize behind him to where he was again hidden in the gully. Rejoining his men, he motioned for them to retreat, almost afraid to breathe until they were once more well away from the trail.