Among the Powers
by Lawrence Watt-Evans
originally published as
Denner’s Wreck
Smashwords Edition
Publishing History:
(published as
Denner’s Wreck
)
Avon Edition, April 1988
Science Fiction Book Club Edition, 1988
Fictionwise Ebook Edition, November 2005
FoxAcre Press Print Edition November 2009
FoxAcrePress Ebook Editions December 2010
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment
only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
If you would like to share this book with another person, please
purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading
this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your
use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your
own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this
author.
Print ISBN 0-9818487-0-2
Print 13-Digit ISBN 978-0-9818487-0-9
Smashwords ISBN 978-1-936771-04-2
Copyright 1988, 2008 Lawrence Watt-Evans
All rights reserved
The Annals of the Chosen:
The Wizard Lord
The Ninth Talisman
The Summer Palace
The Obsidian Chronicles:
Dragon Weather
The Dragon Society
Dragon Venom
Science fiction from FoxAcre Press:
Nightside City
Realms of Light
Shining Steel
Among the Powers
Short story collections from FoxAcre Press:
Crosstime Traffic
Celestial Debris
author website:
www.watt-evans.com
cover art © George W. Todd III
ISBN 0-9818487-0-2
13-Digit ISBN 978-0-9818487-0-9
Copyright © 1988, 2008
All rights reserved
Takoma Park, Maryland
Dedicated to my agent
Russell Galen
Clarke’s Third Law: Any sufficiently advanced
technology is indistinguishable from magic.
—
Arthur C. Clarke
Some of the physical characteristics of the planet
Denner’s Wreck were determined using
“World Builder,” a computer program designed by
Stephen Kimmel with the assistance of Dean R. Lambe.
The author extends his sincere appreciation.
“
Lord Grey the Horseman rules a vast domain far
to the south and west of our village, a broad expanse of open
grassland where his horses roam free, and no mortal is permitted to
set foot without first proving his worth to the land’s master. Here
Lord Grey’s horses run unhindered—and what horses they are! Faster,
stronger, smarter than mere animals, these creatures are a match
for any man. They run like the wind itself, their hooves like
thunder and their manes waving like the grass before the storm, and
woe betide any hunter fool enough to venture near. The horses of
Lord Grey can dodge any trap, tear any rope, outrun any pursuit.
And if a man should somehow capture one despite these obstacles,
then he must face the Power himself, for Lord Grey knows instantly
when one of his proud children is touched by a mortal’s
hand...”
—
from the tales of Atheron the
Storyteller
The sun was high in the heavens at mid-secondlight,
shining fiercely down on the shadeless plain. Bredon could feel its
light clearly, bright and warm on his back, pouring over him like
honey as he crouched in the tall grass.
He blinked away sweat, then cautiously
raised himself up to peer over the waving blades.
The plain lay palely green before him, flat
and even to the mountain-rimmed western horizon. Warm wind hissed
and muttered around him, through grass already half-bleached by
summer and well on its way to becoming golden hay.
His gray hunter’s vest lay crumpled on the
ground at his heel, dropped there when he had stopped to crouch.
The thin leather garment had been designed for comfort and
convenience and had served him well in the year he had worn it, but
in the long wakes of pursuit it had begun to chafe him, to feel
unbearably hot and confining by light and heavily clammy in the
cool darks. He had removed it a couple of hours ago, just after the
wake’s second sunrise. He now wore only short bleached cotton
breeches, but he had carefully dragged the vest along rather than
risk losing it.
His companion crawled up, eerily silent in
the tall grass, and lay beside him. The newcomer followed the first
youth’s gaze to where a magnificent grey mare stood quietly
grazing, then whispered, “Give it up, Bredon. The horse is
bewitched, probably a creature of one of the Powers—no ordinary
mare could have eluded us this long. You’ll never catch her.”
“Oh, yes, I will,” Bredon hissed back. “I
don’t care if I have to chase her all summer, I’ll keep after her
until I catch her. Look at her! With a horse like that I’ll have my
pick of any girl in the village. Riding her I could be the greatest
hunter in the grasslands. I’ll be rich enough to be an Elder inside
a year.”
The other stifled a sigh. “Bredon,” he said,
“she’s chewed through our ropes, dodged our traps, outrun us and
outwitted us for six lights and five darks. What’s left to try? How
do you plan to catch her?”
“I’m not sure yet, but I’ll do it somehow.
If you want to give up you can go home without me.”
The answer was quick and definite. “Walk
back a hundred kilometers alone and unarmed? No, thank you!”
Bredon rolled over and looked at his comrade
with mingled affection and annoyance. “Mardon, has anyone ever told
you that you’re a coward?” he asked politely.
Mardon shrugged. “No more often than you’ve
been called a stubborn fool,” he replied, plainly unoffended.
Bredon smiled. “That’s probably true,” he
admitted. “Well, if I’m a fool, O Wise One, then why don’t
you
devise some means for trapping that mare?”
Considering the challenge, Mardon peered
dubiously about at the empty grassland and asked, “Have you ever
been here before?”
Bredon glanced back over his shoulder at the
mare. “I think so,” he said. “I believe my father and I came near
here hunting rabbits once. It’s hard to be sure, out here, but I
think this was the place.”
“Rabbits?” Mardon was puzzled. “Why did you
come so far?”
Bredon shrugged. “Why not?”
Mardon had no answer to that. He knew, but
did not understand, that Bredon and other members of his family
often acted on whim. He ignored the question and asked, “Did you
get as far as those mountains?” He waved vaguely in the direction
of the peaks that adorned the western horizon.
“No,” Bredon answered. “I’m not really sure
we even got this far, but I
think
we did. It looks familiar.
And those mountains are further away than they look. My uncle said
he rode for five full wakes once, lights and midwake darks both,
and only got to the foothills.”
Mardon wiped sweat from his cheek and waved
a hand to dismiss any thought of traveling so far. “It’s probably
just as well,” he said. “I don’t think I’d care to meet the Powers
of the mountains, Gold and Brenner and the rest. It’s said they’re
an unfriendly lot.”
Bredon snorted. “The mountain people
probably say that the Powers of the plains are a nasty bunch.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter, anyway,” Mardon
said. “The mountains are too far away to do us any good.”
It was Bredon’s turn to look puzzled. “What
use could mountains be?”
“In the mountains we could trap the horse in
a canyon or a cave,” Mardon explained patiently.
“I guess that’s true,” Bredon said. “We
could
trap it somewhere, couldn’t we?” His expression turned
thoughtful as he considered for a moment.
“That gives me an idea,” he said. “If I
remember correctly, if this is the place I think it is, there’s a
waterhole back that way a bit, with deep, sticky mud under about
five centimeters of water. I got my hand stuck in it when I tried
washing off the blood after I gutted a rabbit. If it’s still there,
and we can find it, maybe we can herd her into the mud. It won’t
stop her completely, but it should slow her down enough for us to
get a rope on her that she can’t chew off.”
Mardon mulled that over for a moment, then
admitted, “It
sounds
good.”
“Good. It’s northeast of here, I think. You
circle around and we’ll start the chase.”
“Right.” Mardon slithered back through the
grass and vanished.
Bredon waited patiently for Mardon to
reappear. Finally, just as he was beginning to grow uneasy, Mardon
suddenly jumped up from the grass on the mare’s far side, yelling
and waving his arms wildly.
The mare shied and started toward Bredon.
He, in his turn, jumped up and shouted.
The horse started, then turned and galloped
northeast, in exactly the direction Bredon wanted her to take.
Grinning and yelling, he set out after her.
Mardon followed less enthusiastically. By staying well apart and
varying their noise they controlled the mare’s direction fairly
well; if she attempted to turn to either side the man on that flank
would shout more loudly and pursue more closely.
Whenever she was actually galloping she
would quickly gain on her tormentors, who would fall silent and
lower their arms. Each time this happened she would slow and stop,
thinking she was safe, only to be forced into a new burst of speed
when the humans drew near again and resumed their noise.
There was little danger that the mare would
flee further than her hunters could pursue. Bredon and Mardon both
knew that men are far more persistent than horses.
During one slow amble toward the tiring mare
Bredon paused, his vest hanging from one finger, and sniffed the
air. “I smell water,” he said. “We’re getting close.”
Mardon sniffed, and nodded agreement.
A few moments later, as Bredon scanned the
plain, he noticed a break in the even green of the grass. “There,”
he said, pointing.
Again, Mardon nodded without comment, and
circled out a little further, correcting the mare’s intended
course.
A moment later, at Bredon’s signal, he began
whooping. The mare shied and ran, straight toward the pool. She
plunged heedlessly through the grass and into the water. The youths
heard her hooves beat on the hard ground, and then a moment of
tremendous splashing, which ended abruptly when, tripped by the
mud, the horse fell and vanished from their sight behind the waves
of green.
Ignoring everything but their prey, the two
charged headlong across the plain and reached the waterhole within
seconds of each other.
The mare had struggled to her feet, but was
up to her fetlocks in muck, her whole hide soaked and dripping. She
turned her head, staring at them with eyes wide with terror.
Bredon readied his only remaining rope,
determined to keep it where she could not chew it this time. He was
scarcely four meters away when the mare abruptly stopped her
thrashing. Her great brown eyes went calm as she said, very
distinctly, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
Bredon’s mouth literally dropped open, a
reaction he had always before considered to be artistic license on
the part of the village storytellers, rather than something that
really happened. Mardon, in turn, was so shocked that he tripped
over his own feet and fell flat on his face in the mire at the edge
of the pool.
The air was suddenly full of roaring
laughter. Following the sound, Bredon and Mardon both looked up at
what should have been empty sky.