Destiny's Road (22 page)

No telling how high he was when he began to be afraid.

Climbing in the dark was crazy. The notion had come to him in his sleep, fully formed. He was climbing in the dark because he would be conspicuous in daylight, against gray rock with no plant growing anywhere.

The little moon continued west. A trace of light touched the mountain face now. The cleft narrowed, but Tim was able to pick out handholds and footholds. Then those ran out. All his muscles were shaking with fatigue. They'd throw him off the cliff if he kept this up.

Down a bit and over, a rock face was trying to split off, leaving a ledge.

Not as wide as he'd hoped. He lay with his back pushed hard against the rock, and was asleep before the trembling stopped.

Dawnlight and terror. He'd forgotten where he was. The slope stretched a vast way down. He was exposed and conspicuous on a rock cliff, hunted by men with guns.

Far away, the shadow of the Crest Mountains crept steadily from the sea onto shore.

In early summer he'd been on shore looking up at where he was now. What had he seen? Backlit by a rising sun that hadn't cleared the peaks, this whole face of the mountains would be black. He would be invisible. Nobody would look this high anyway.

Tim Bednacourt began to climb again, Cracking had put ledges over his head to block him, but cracking gave him handholds and footholds. He rested on the trunk of an incredible scrub-oak tree that had sunk roots into the last of the main split. When the sun lit the southwestern face of the range, he was on the narrow side of the Crab Peninsula.

Nothing grew at the crest, and little grew lower down. Flame had scoured this side of the range too. Nobody had since bothered to weed out Destiny life. This was the steeper side, a straight drop to angry waves, and not many plants had the tenacity to cling to the rock; but some did. Tim could make out Destiny colors, black and bronze and yellow-green, but Earthlife greens too.

He couldn't see a way down.

There was nothing to eat up here.

He found a flat spot to sleep out the noon hours. He made several klicks that day, picking a way along the crest, his eyes on the alien beauty of the wild shore. At evening he didn't bother with fire. He chewed a handful of barley, and waited for full dark.

Then he slipped between two peaks and looked down.

A bright orange light glared below him, just at the Road. Left and above, a mere orange spark glowed too.

He blocked the fires with his hand and let his eyes adjust.

From world's end to world's end, the Road was a gray-black line through black rubble. The shore was more vivid: there was white phosphorescence in the waves.

A faint yellow smudge far to his right: fires along a beach. The autumn caravan must be past Tail Town by now. If the caravan had sent out a yutz-hunter, Tim would have seen his fire too, and closer. It wasn't there.

The caravans hadn't sent hunters.

That bright fire must be huge, to be so steady. The distillery? It would be just below him, their dinner fire.

As for the orange spark, he must be looking down into somebody's fire pit.

He'd found what he sought. Two cookfires burned on the mountain this night: the Homes and Wilsons gathered at their dinner, and a handful of wanderers above, dangerously close to the first. The Homes and Wilsons would have to be warned. And surely they'd feed a wanderer some speckles? He slept on the mountain, cold but quite safe in a cleft between two peaks. Dawn gifted him with an amazing view. Shadow covered the Crab's broad side, but here were details never seen by a caravan.

Below the Road was a wide stretch of meadow. Destiny black was not having much luck against Earthlife green. Half a hundred head of sheep grazed. Four big buildings near the Road must be the Wilson dairy, barn, and dwellings.

The caravan had partied on Home turf, that big cookout area in a horseshoe of one large and several small buildings. Around the Home establishment was more meadow, but it was the yellow of wheat. High on the mountain... were those goats?

Of wanderers and bandits there was no sign.

He was hungry, but he delayed going down. He'd fought hard for this view, and it was very pleasant.

He could follow the line of Road a long way before the curve of the Crest hid it. Far to the left: the Shire? He couldn't be sure. To the right, nothing, nothing... the line of a caravan, far, far away.

At the western edge of the Home meadow was a single monumental tree in a regular array of white dots.

Tim heard a gunshot.

Faint and distant, crisp and clear, the sound jerked his head straight toward brush that was mostly Destiny black. Three man-shapes were charging downhill behind a gigantic bird.

Tim started down the rocks. At the edge of hearing were voices quarreling in shouts and gasps. He kept his mind on not falling to his death, and only spared the occasional stolen glance for men dealing with a wounded bird.

The ostrich was stumbling now, slowing. The men would have caught it if it weren't running through clumps of vengeance thorn.

It turned suddenly. (Tim hugged rock so he'd be free to look.) One man froze, one tripped, and as the bird came at them screaming, the third man steadied himself. Tim heard another gunshot. The bird fell over and thrashed.

Tim couldn't hurry and he couldn't hide. He kept moving.

The men pulled the bird downhill a good distance to the nearest tree. There they hung it and tore the feathers off, and butchered it. As far as Tim could tell, not one ever glanced his way.

He climbed down as far as the plants grew, and rested.

Guns belonged to caravans. A gun not in the hands of a caravan meant bandits. It seemed to Tim that the surest way of avoiding bandits was to know where they were.

Here was a most convenient trio of bandits. All Tim had to do was follow them.

Burdened by the butchered ostrich, restricted by lesser brush, the bandits weren't making any great speed. He could' hear them; he could almost make out the words.

Two bullets!"

.get more..

"Months till we... weed cutter next time!"

They were circling four or five acres of green-bronze-blackthorn. One of them wanted to chop it out tomorrow. The others thought that a joke: too much work.

Get the next caravan to do it."

Vengeance thorn was nasty stuff. The fractally dividing thorns could punch through shirt or pants, then leave invisibly small needles embedded in flesh. Tim had marked this patch from above: it reached right to the Road.

He could follow these bandits as far as the Road, but what then? Watch where they went, of course, but he'd be seen if he followed. But following bandits wasn't the point, was it? Knowing where they were, that was the point.

Going the other way around the patch would bring him to the brook that fed the distillery.

Tim wanted a drink. If he met someone named Wilson or Home, he could tell a tale of bandits, and maybe get something to eat.

He drank his fill and filled his bottle and washed a little.

The stream ran past a stretch of green grass and a huge, ancient Earthlife tree, and stones in lines and rocks. Not fire-pit rocks, but....he Home and Wilson graveyard? Many communities along the Road used headstones instead of holograms.

The graveyard intrigued him, and he waited there, hoping to see a familiar face. Somehow names and dates had been written into the stones. The oldest dates were sixty years back. The lifegivers weren't all named Wilson or Home. Wanderers marrying locals would take local names, but a bachelor from a caravan would keep his own, and a married couple would keep theirs.

Nobody had come. Sating his thirst let his hunger shine brighter. He could smell cooking now. He followed the smell downslope.

He was following the sour smell of the distillery too. Here. Tim had passed this building, had glanced inside, months ago. The big doors

were open now, and Tim stepped inside to see the huge tanks and arrays of pipes.

The distillery was deserted. Maybe it didn't need much tending. A woman came out of a smaller building next doom and turned away, her long soft brown hair flying. She hadn't seen him in the shadowed building. Layne Wilson, even at this distance, the first familiar face he'd seen. Tim was about to announce himself when he saw the red flash in her hand.

There was a window: not glass, but a wood plank propped open near the ceiling. He had to climb on a cask to see out.

A dozen people were at work around the fire pit. Three men were setting up an ostrich to roast while chatting with Layne. Tim knew the men.

He knew the butchered ostrich.

And the brilliant red can Layne Wilson was shaking over a pot.

First he hid. There was space behind the distillery's huge pressure vessels. He crouched with gun in hand. If anyone discovered him- Think, now:

Was there a legitimate reason why three Homes and/or Wilsons might camp high above a dairy or distillery?

Was there any way an honest distiller or dairyman could put his hands on a merchant's gun?

Or on a speckles can?

The possibility that Tim Bednacourt was behaving like an idiot grew stronger with every hour shy of speckles. What he couldn't figure out might only mean that his cranial nerves weren't firing. What would he look like if they found him now? Living where no human lived. A spy hidden in shadow with a bullet for anyone who saw him. Might these dairy keepers and distillers take him for a bandit and execute him out of hand?

It crossed his mind, now, that goats might require tending, and Wilsons would need to gather their milk. That a gun dropped by dead merchants, or dead bandits, might be held for the next caravan by honest men, or might migrate up and down the Road as barter.

Would it be better to simply ask for help?

But Foriy Randall, yutz chef with Lyons wagon, had been carrying the Lyons speckles can when he was shot dead. Tim had seen a bandit whoop and raise it high and run with it. Now Layne Wilson was using a big flattened acrylic-red shaker in her cooking.

Roasting ostrich kept getting into his brain and scrambling his thoughts. Likely his brain wasn't at its best anyway. But the more he thought about it, the less crazy it seemed:

Caravans passed three times a year. Who were the bandits when there were no caravans to rob?

Did they rob locals? But Tim had heard no horror tales, seen no elaborately barred doors. Was there some kind of treaty?

What if a caravan came late or charged too much for speckles or brought too little? What could locals do about that? Twerdahls would give or trade whatever a merchant wanted, as they'd traded Tim Bednacourt.

He eased out from behind the still and caught a scant cupful of what was dripping from the spigot, and moved back into place. He sipped, and thought.

Bandits couldn't run around with that great red can. That was the point of it. Where could they keep it safe?

Layne Wilson returned with the speckles shaker. She entered the smaller building, and left without the shaker.

Waiting for dark would make sense.

But it had grown noisy out there: dinner was well in progress. They'd never notice anything. If they saw him they'd- He was still dressed as a merchant. He took the time to turn his tunic inside out, and turned the collar down. Now his color was gray-brown and the big pockets were hidden. From a distance it might serve. He should have done that days ago. Now they might take him for one of their own.

Now, all in one smooth glide, he-pulled himself back barely in time as a man and a woman wobbled into the distillery, poured a half-liter of whiskey from the collector pail into a jug, and went out with their arms around each other.

Now: out from behind the still, get his balance, adjust the shell and backpack. Walk out through the open door and straight across to the other building and in.

It smelled of metal. A smithy. That didn't take genius: he was looking at an anvil.

Dark as it was, he wouldn't have missed the speckles can. It must be in a cupboard or something. Something easy. Layne had been quick. Then again, caravans did come three times every two Destiny years. There had to be a hiding place, something hard to find and hard to get into.

Damn. He didn't have forever. He'd be lucky to get out of here alive, let alone- Wait now. That anvil was on tracks! And behind it, below floor height, something bright red.

The weight of an anvil would guard that cavity. It was hard to open and hard to close, but they were between caravans, so Layne just hadn't bothered. Tim picked up the speckles shaker. He ignored four guns that must have come from caravans, but he took three speckles pouches full of bullets. He wrapped it all in his tunic and walked out.

He hadn't thought beyond this. It came to him that his patterned green shirt wasn't any less conspicuous. He was running now, into the graveyard, known turf. Could he get up into the tree?

Noise behind him hadn't changed: they weren't after him yet. But terror was in him, and he kept running.

Past the vengeance thorn, walking wide around thorns he couldn't see in the dark. An ostrich leapt to its feet and ran squawking away. Damn, if anyone was already looking, they'd come straight here!

Chop a hole in the thorn patch with his weed cutter? A hiding place? While his mind toyed with the notion, his body was still running uphill, flat out. Despite starvation and speckles deficiency and whiskey and terror, his mind was catching up, and his body was right. He had to go up.

Up, because he had to build a fire. To cook.

He didn't need to build a fire pit. The three goatherds hadn't torn theirs apart: an ostrich had distracted them. They'd even abandoned a can of milk! He set some barley cooking and used the speckles can liberally, before he drained the milk. Earth, he was hungry. Was it sour, or was that just how goat milk tasted?