Pathspace: The Space of Paths (24 page)

The banger, whose name turned out to be
Danforth, just laughed. “Their horses may be tired, but I'm betting
the ones dashing up here won't be. From what these men say, the
lady they let go won't be hurrying, since she thinks your dead
friend has the situation under control. I'll bet that you'll meet
the Texas rescue before the Rado posse even gets underway.”

Brutus groaned.

“
Might as well put him on
someone's horse, and get while the getting's good.” said Danforth.
“I know I will.” He melted back into the shadows and was gone
before anyone could reply.

“
Looks like you're coming
with us,” said Jeffrey.

“
I hope the Texas food is
as good as what we give prisoners in Rado.”

“
I wouldn't know,” said
Jeffrey. “We weren't even there long enough to get fed. And thanks
for reminding me how hungry I am.”

“
Gentlemen,” said Ludlow.
“We can discuss comparative cuisine later.”

The sun was burning out of the east when the
group of riders arrived at the ruined hillside. Their leader
dismounted and examined the rail ends protruding from the scree.
“Just as she described it,” he remarked. “I think the girl would
make a good scout someday, if she wasn't going to be the next
Governor.”

The other riders spread out to look for
ambushers. “Lieutenant,” one of them said, leaning down a little,
why do you think we haven't seen the wizard or his apprentice?
Shouldn't we have passed them on our way here? And where are the
prisoners?”

“
How the hell should I
know?” The man addressed bent down to retrieve something from the
dirt and inspected it. It was the front half of an arrow, and there
was dried blood on it. “Looks like we're not the first to get here.
Don't just sit there. See what you can find.”

After that he stepped closer to the
protruding rails and scrutinized the ground around them. He picked
up two pieces of metal and laid the longer one across the broken
rails. Holding the other one in his hand like a hammer, he rapped
smartly eight times on the crossbar, listening to the way the metal
sounded. Then, after a moment's thought, he hammered out seven
groupings of Morse, smiling slightly as he finished.

“
What was that banging,
Lieutenant?” Another of the men had returned and
dismounted.

The lieutenant took a swig from his canteen.
“Just sending our regards to the Honcho. What did you find?”

“
Looks like two sets of
tracks. One of 'em starts suddenly as if they dropped out of the
sky and started walking. I know, I know, we must have missed the
back trail somehow. The other set was someone arriving on a horse
from over that way, to the east.”

“
Send a couple of the men
to scout it out, sergeant. The rest are with me.”

“
Yessir.” He saluted
smartly and swung back into his saddle to tell the
others.

The lieutenant examined the arrow again.
“Too many questions,” he remarked to himself. “Who shot you? Who
did you strike? And where is the body?”

The arrow did not answer.

“
Evers, Wilson,” said the
lieutenant. “Head back to the outpost and bring some more men to
watch this spot. I'll stay here with the others until you get
back.”

Wilson, a tall man with sandy hair sticking
out from under his Stetson, appeared troubled. “Do you think they
got the wizard, Lieutenant?”

“
No, Corporal, I do
not.”

“
Why not, sir?”

“
Because unless they're
idiots, they would have made him leave his staff behind. And
whatever else the Texans are, they're no fools. Get
going.”

“
Yessir.”

After Evers and Wilson had departed, he took
another sip from his canteen and held up the arrowhead again. “I
hope you know what you're doing, old man.”

Behind a boulder and wrapped in darkness,
Xander hoped so too. He'd heard enough. Struggling to his feet, he
fished out his bottle of stickum and applied some to the staff. He
wasn't sure that he could hold on all the way back to Denver, but
there was no other choice. The few field dressings those men had in
their saddlebags were not going to be enough for his wound, and he
might not survive the bouncy trot back.

I must be getting old
, he thought. Back in the day, no T-rat would've got the drop
on me like that. Serves me right for not paying
attention.

A wave of dizziness passed
through him and he staggered a bit, then he gritted his teeth and
took hold of the staff and began to weave the pathspace tighter
through the swizzle.
Lester, you're going to have to hold
on by yourself until I can get patched up. I'd be no use to you
now.

He un-wove the invisibility spell and turned
up the swizzle flow. In a few moments, the staff was singing its
bass roar again and he rose into the sky.

Although it was mid-morning now, there was a
chilly wind blowing across the rooftop. She ignored it as she
returned the salute from Jenkins. “Any more reports come in,
Steven?”

“
Not yet, Governor. Just
the one that let us know your daughter's safe. No word on the
wizard or his apprentice, but I'm sure we'll hear more
soon.”

“
I'll leave you to it,
then.”

Where are you, Xander? We know you found
them or Aria wouldn't have gotten away. But why weren't you with
her?
As always, thoughts of the wizard and
her daughter were entwined in her mind. How could it be otherwise?
Aria was safe, but what if something had happened to him? She had
no other wizard. Perhaps someday Lester would be able to relieve
him as head wizard, if he survived. But not yet. Xander was
irreplaceable.

Are you sure you mean that in a military
sense?

The intruding thought made
her heart leap.
Where are you?

I'll be there in a minute
. The thought was colored with pain.
I've been
shot.

She sprang toward the stairwell, the guard
standing near the door jerked involuntarily in surprise as she
nearly pounced on him. “Get the doctor. Wound kit. Move!” He gaped
at her, then dashed inside.

She stared around the roof, looking for
something soft for Xander to land on. He'd be coming in sloppy,
probably barely hanging on, from the pain she'd sensed. If this had
been ground level, there would have been hay for horses, but on
this bare rooftop she saw nothing suitable. Grimacing from the
cold, she whipped off her jacket and threw it down. “Steven! Get
over here and take off your jacket!”

He hurried over, puzzlement clear on his
face but obeying.

In moments they could hear
the deep roar of Xander's staff. She swung her head around and
located him coming from the southeast, barely over the rooftops of
the other downtown buildings.
Pull up or you'll hit the
wall!

Either he heard her thought or realized at
the last minute that he was too low. The staff curved up toward the
roof and cleared the railing by inches. He flew straight at her and
she stepped aside at the last second and reached out to grab him.
Both of them tumbled to the roof. The staff flew out of his fingers
and slid across the roof and tried to push through the low wall
around the top of the building.

Xander flopped over on his back. His eyes
fluttered open. “Are you all right? Sorry about the landing.”

The front of his clothes were sticky with
blood. “Shut up, you old fool,” she said. “Where is that doctor? If
he forgets his kit I swear I'll throw him off the roof myself!”

In a minute or so the stairwell door banged
open and Doctor Daniels burst out, followed by Steven. He hurried
over to them and set his bag down on the roof as he examined the
wound.

“
Stay conscious. Don't
pass out on me. How'd this happen?”

“
Shot from behind,” Xander
managed. “Careless of me.”

“
Roll him on his side.”
They pulled his cloak off and the doctor located the entry wound.
He pulled herbs and bottles out of the bag and set to
work.

“
How bad is it?” Kristana
asked him, not caring if it sounded like a dumb
question.

“
Could be worse. Looks
like it missed his heart. Of course it did. He'd be dead already if
it hadn't. From what I saw, it looks like he broke the shaft and
removed it himself. He's still bleeding, though. Hand me that rose
bark. Thanks. Lucky for you your daughter started a herb garden
last year. Even luckier we have too many roses.”

“
Why?”

“
Rose bark's a natural
astringent. Helps stop the bleeding.” He poured something from a
bottle on the back wound, then shoved fresh leaves on top of the
shredded rose bark and taped it down. “The oil's a mixture of
extract from oregano, cloves, and cinnamon. Natural disinfectants.”
Daniels spread clean paper on the roof and rolled Xander's back on
top of it to get at the chest wound. Pulling a washcloth out of his
bag, he doused it with the oil mixture and cleaned the exit wound
as best he could. Grim and focused, he darted hands into the bag
again, pulling out more rose bark, herbs and tape, packing the
wound and binding it shut.

“
Can we move him now?” she
asked.

Daniels pursed his lips. “Ordinarily, I'd
say no,” he said. “Not until the bleeding slows. But it's cold out
here and he's stressed enough as it is. We'll get a stretcher under
him and get him inside in a bit.”

Xander opened his eyes again. “They got
Lester,” he muttered. “Someone has to go after him.” He tried to
move and coughed up some blood.

“
Shut up,” said the
doctor. “You've got a punctured lung, you idiot. Unless you know
some healing magic you're not going anywhere for quite a while.” He
turned to face the Governor. “Post some guards if you have to. If
this moron tries to stand up and slip out, tie him to the
bed.”

“
He won't get away,” she
assured him. “Steven, go find a stretcher or get someone to help
you make one.”

“
Don't take him back to
his own rooms,” the doctor cautioned. “Move him as little as you
can. Just get him down to the top floor and out of the
cold.”

“
He's lost a lot of
blood,” she said. “Can we do anything about that?”

“
I'd like to,” he replied.
“But if I remember correctly, he has O negative blood. Any other
kind would kill him.”

“
So I guess I can't
donate,” she said. “I'm A positive.”

“
Nope. The Ancients had
machines to filter out the red blood cells so they could give just
plasma. That would resupply electrolytes, nutrients, platelets for
clotting, and such. But we don't have that these days. All I can do
is siphon whole blood.”

“
Who else in the building
has O negative? There must be someone.”

“
It's not common,” he
said. “The only person I can remember offhand is your daughter
Aria, and she's not here. He's just going to have to hold on until
we find someone else.”

He could hear dripping somewhere. Why was
that? Had Xander spilled something? Or maybe Otto knocked over the
water pitcher on the table. That must be it.

He sat up and looked for the table. There
was no table. He was in a room with stone walls and a metal door.
Instead of a couch, he was sitting on a cot with metal legs. He saw
these things in the dimness of light leaking in from a small barred
window in the door.

Memories came flooding back, bringing with
them a splitting headache.. he explore with fingers and found a
bump on the back of his head. The men from Texas must have decided
to take no chances with him on their way back from Rado.

He held his head and groaned. A cell. In
Texas. Not good.

“
He's awake. Send
word.”

Perhaps he should pretend to be asleep, if
they were willing to let him sleep. No, it wouldn't fool them now.
It looked like he was going to find out soon enough how they
treated prisoners in the Lone Star Empire.

Something scuttled away from him when he
stood up. He decided he didn't want to look and see what it
was.

Someone had taken his boots, because he
could feel cold stone beneath his feet. Why was that? Did they
think he had a concealed knife in one of them?

Well, from what he had heard they would be
sending word. While he waited to see who that would bring, he
examined his cell as best he could from the light coming in the
little barred window in the metal door. The room was roughly
square. He estimated it as being ten feet across. The floor was not
exactly level; it sloped toward a drain in a back corner. The
ceiling was too high to reach, and had a vent set into it in a
front corner diagonally across from the drain.

There was nothing hanging on the walls,
which were smooth stone and mortar.

Going to be hard for even Xander to find
me in here,
he thought. Then he remembered,
and wished he didn't. They'd shot Xander! He had fallen and stopped
moving. In all likelihood he was dead, and there was nothing that
could be done about it.

A terrible sense of loss assailed him. He
tried to tell himself it was mere selfishness. Without the wizard,
he'd probably never learn any more about pathspace. But that was
all right, wasn't it? He never asked to be an apprentice – he'd
been kidnapped.