The Gandalara Cycle I (61 page)

I smiled, and said: "Don't back away from it, Tarani."

She recognized the quote, and suddenly started to laugh. "All right, then, we shall be honest with one another. How will you feel, when I ride with Thymas?"

I sighed. "Jealous," I admitted. She laughed again, and then sobered when I threw her question back to her: "How will you feel?"

She thought about it before she answered. "Proud that Thymas would accept me. Pleased for him, that he could make such a major change in his thinking. And I suppose I would feel . . . close to him. Do you understand?"

"I think so," I said.

It's ironic, really.
I thought
that Thymas is jealous of me. Riding may involve a lot of physical contact, bu
t with me it can only stimulate Tarani's imagination. With him, it will bring back memories. That gives him an edge I can't hope to overcome

*Keeshah,*
I called.
*Feel like going for a run?*

*Both?*
he asked.

*No, just me.*

He came out of the forest, shaking his head as an ear brushed against a low branch. Tarani went to him and stroked the fur along his cheek. He put up with it for only a few seconds before pulling away and crouching to let me mount.

I thought for a moment that Tarani felt insulted. Then she smiled, and I decided I must have been mistaken.

"I can see that I'm not the one you want to yourself, Rikardon."

I sat down on Keeshah's back, and he stood up. "I'll be back soon," I promised. "Keeshah's itching for a run; that's all."

She said: "I understand."

I lay forward and grabbed the fur on either side of the cat's wide shoulders, and I tucked up my legs so that my feet rested just in front of his haunches. It felt strange, riding without the warm weight of Tarani's body across my back.

*She can come too,*
Keeshah told me, sensing, as usual, the undercurrent of my feelings for Tarani.

*I don't want her this time,*
I said, and hoped he would accept it.
*Do you?*

*No. Tired of walking. Want to RUN.*

And he did.

At first, we crashed through trees and jumped over tangled brush, but it wasn't long before we were out in the near- desert that lurked at the edge of every watered area along the Great Wall. Then I reached out for Keeshah's mind, and we were one entity, pounding across the grayish sand on the sha'um's enormous paws.

The rhythm of his movement was as much a part of me as my own pulse. He felt the wind sweeping at me, and the way his fur felt against my cheek. It was a raw and natural and savage pleasure, the joy we shared when we ran together like this. When we returned to camp - much later than I had planned - we were both exhausted and exhilarated.

I hugged the big cat good-bye some distance from camp, and walked the rest of the way. I felt more relaxed than I had since the days I had spent in Thagorn, getting to know the Sharith lifestyle. Lonna greeted me, and I shouted a "hello" back at her.

Thymas had returned from Grevor, with fresh food for dinner. That - and the fact that he looked as though his walk had done him good - completed the good feeling that the run had kindled in me. After dinner, we discussed travel plans.

"The old couple who ran the meat shop said that there s a colony of vineh between here and Sulis," Thymas said.

"Wild ones?" I asked.

"Are there and other kind?"

Tarani’s question was serious and I realized that neither she nor Thymas had ever been to Raithskar. So I told them about the vineh who swept streets and paved roads and did other, fairly simple jobs under the supervision of their handlers. Tarani and Thymas looked skeptical.

"Why would I lie about it” I asked.

"It's just that I can't imagine a trainable vineh," He said. "Have you ever seen a wild one?"

"Not really," I answered, thinking of the scuffle I had witnessed in the streets of Raithskar, where a handler had almost gotten mauled by three of the curly haired, apish creatures. "What are they like?"

"Just hope you don't find out," Thymas said. "Then said that this colony has a live-and-let-live attitude, if travelers stick to the road while they're crossing vineh territory. Any place off the road is a battle zone.”

There was a problem with traveling the road. We were trying to keep the sha'um out of sight, and we didn't know how well traveled the road between Sulis and Grevor was. Thymas said that vineh denned in caves, so we decided to swing out south of the road and avoid their territory altogether.

It turned out to be pretty rough country, with lots of ground-hugging bushes that hid the actual contours of the land. But for this day only, I agreed to hurry. I glanced at Thymas and Ronar now and then, and was glad to see that they were handling the pace pretty well. In fact, I was looking back at them when the vineh attacked.

There were at least twenty of them, clawing their way out of an overgrown ravine and coming straight for us. There weren't any young ones, either; these were adult males, taller than a Gandalaran, at least as strong, with no sense of reason to which we might appeal.

They were out to get us.

In Ricardo's world, a mounted man had an advantage over infantry in that he could strike from above. But in Ricardo's world, the cavalry wasn't riding sha'um.

I can recall a second or two of the wildest ride I've ever had, as Keeshah roared his challenge, leaped forward and slashed and snapped at the nearest four vineh. Then Tarani and I were left behind, rolling on the ground.

A vineh thudded down on top of me, his hands pulling at my head and shoulder to get room for his underslung jaw to close on my throat. I curled up, got my knees under his hips, and pushed. I couldn't throw him off, but I managed to lift him enough to get my hands around his throat. His neck was so thick, the muscles so strong, that for a minute I was afraid I couldn't hurt him at all. Then my right thumb found a soft spot and dug in.

The beast made a strangling sound and grabbed my arms to stop the choking. I heaved with my legs; we rolled a couple of times, and I came out on top. Using the vineh's throat as a pivot, I jumped up and brought both knees down on his chest. I felt a rib crack, and the beast's eyes went glassy.

I drew my dagger and finished him, just as a hairy arm grabbed me around the throat and jerked, nearly twisting my head off. The pain and lack of air canceled out my eyesight, and I saw the swirling, undefined colors of unconsciousness closing in on me.

The pressure was released suddenly, and I could breathe. When my vision cleared, I saw Tarani pulling her sword out of a vineh's back. I got Rika up in time to stop another one from attacking her from behind.

"Where's Thymas?" I gasped.

"Over there.” She tossed her head, and then whirled to face a vineh who was trying to rush her from the side.

I looked in the direction she had indicated. Thymas had backed into the rocks, so that he stood in a shallow passage, and a frontal attack was the only kind possible. With sword and dagger, he was managing to hold off three vineh, but he was leaning to his right, to protect his wounded side, and his face was already gray with fatigue.

"Rikardon!"
Tarani warned me. I ducked down and caught the running vineh across the middle with my shoulder. I intended to flip him over my back, but he was too heavy and my balance wasn't perfect, so we went down together, grappling. But I had knocked the wind from him; he didn't fight me as I used my dagger. Tarani guarded me as I stood up, and we discovered that we were alone among the fighting. Except for the three vineh keeping Thymas at bay, the rest of them were in two great snarling and snapping crowds roiling around the sha'um.

Keeshah was holding his own, whirling so quickly that the vineh were forced to keep their distance. But Ronar was slower, and the vineh were applying their favorite trick of attacking from behind. Even as we stood there, we saw vineh converge on the cat's flanks. Roam screamed in rage as teeth sank into his hindquarters, and be rolled over to get his hind claws into play.

Immediately, all ten or twelve vineh jumped the cat, trying to immobilize him with the sheer weight of their bodies. Tarani and I ran to help, leaping across the ring of dead beasts to harry the outer layer of Ronar's attackers. The vineh were so frenzied with the prospect of victor, over the sha'um that they didn’t notice us until we had killed two apiece. Then they turned and rushed us. Through the forest of curly haired bodies, I saw Ronar stagger to his feet. Clearly, he was close to exhaustion, but he lashed out at the nearest vineh, opening claw-gashes three inches deep across the beast's back.

Tarani and I tried to retreat, but the tangle of bodies provided unstable, blood-slick footing, and within seconds, we were surrounded.

It wasn't the first time I had reason to be grateful for the Gandalaran body I had “inherited”. Young and fit, Markasset had been an expert swordsman, and his reflexes took over in times of physical danger. But I know I'd never have survived, that day, without Tarani to guard my back.

That s one I owe you,
Thymas, I thought.
Thanks for teaching this woman to fight.

With Ronar's help, we reduced our attack ground to five vineh. But Serkajon s sword was getting heavier by the minute, and my hands didn't want to hold on to it. Tarani seemed in as poor a shape as I felt; her clothes were bloody, her movements slowing.

The vineh who faced us now had been at the outer edge of the fighting, and were nearly fresh. They started closing in on us, and I knew we were in trouble. Worse,
they
knew it.

But Keeshah sensed it, too. He clawed his way through the three or four still dogging him, and launched himself, four sets of claws ready, at the group coming after us.

Once Keeshah, Tarani, and I were working together, it penetrated to the remaining vineh that they weren't winning.

It took long enough
, I thought,
as the seven or eight survivors scrambled back into the ravine. We're been fighting for at least a year.

I wanted to lie down and sleep, but there were other things to do first. I found Thymas in the rock niche where we had seen him fighting. He was hunched over and nearly unconscious.

"I think he's all right," I called to Tarani. "Scratched up pretty badly, but alive."

I hauled him up to his feet and put his arm around my shoulders. Tarani was trying to tend to Ronar, who was bleeding badly but too much in pain and shock to let her touch him. Thymas couldn't help control him - in fact, his dazed state was probably communicating itself to Ronar.

*Keeshah, he has to lie down, or Tarani can't help him.*

Keeshah's neck fur was still bristling from the excitement of the fight. Thymas's sha'um bristled and snarled in an automatic defense reflex when mine closed in, but couldn't offer much resistance. Keeshah wrestled Ronar to the ground and lay across his shoulders to keep him still while Tarani cleaned the deepest gashes on the cat's flanks.

I lowered Thymas to the ground and tended him as best I could. He was coming around by the time Tarani got up from Ronar and came over to us.

When Keeshah moved off of him, Ronar rolled up into a crouch and lay there panting. Keeshah cleaned himself - his wounds were mere scratches - and then worked his raspy tongue across the fur on Ronar's back, licking away the dirt and blood. He was careful not to disturb the ointment Tarani had applied to Ronar's flanks.

"We need to rest for a couple of days," I said, watching the sha'um. "But not here. Thymas, can Ronar walk?"

He closed his eyes for a moment, speaking to the great cat. "Yes. But not far.” His hand, pitifully weak, closed on my arm. "This time, Rikardon, you don't have a choice. You have to leave us behind."

"You may be right, Thymas," I said, reluctantly. "But we still have a safety margin for beating Gharlas to Eddarta. We can afford a couple of slow days. If we
do
have to go on without you, at least we can leave you in a more hospitable place."

He didn't have the energy to argue. In fact, he'd been pushing his own and Ronar’s reserves to keep up with the morning's fast pace. Now man and sha'um both were drained, physically and psychologically.

Ronar could barely walk; there was no question of Thymas riding him. I considered asking Keeshah to carry the Sharith boy, so that Tarani and I could keep our swords ready for another attack, but rejected the idea before it really took shape. Keeshah might not have objected - but it would have been a mortal blow to Ronar's pride, which was already down for the count. So Tarani and I traded off supporting Thymas while we all three walked, nervously, eastward toward Sulis. Keeshah circled warily around us and Lonna kept a lookout from the sky.

Thymas's informant had said the vineh lived “between Grevor and Sulis”, so we couldn't be sure of being safe until we had actually reached the next town.

We didn't find it before nightfall. We took a brief rest, and Tarani asked Lonna to locate the town for us

The bird reported that Sulis was close, and the way was fairly clear, so we dragged our weary bodies up once again and plodded on. We stopped just outside the city to find a concealed place for the sha'um to rest. Weary as she was, Tarani took the time to hum Ronar to sleep

*I will guard, and hunt.*
Keeshah told me.
*This one will have meat at dawn; then I will rest.*

*Good, Keeshah,*
I said.
*We will all rest for a day, at least.*

Privately I thought:
They've come a long way - from fighting one another to taking care of each other.
I looked down at Thymas. Tarani's sleep spell had unintentionally zapped him, too.
But then,
I thought, pulling Thymas up from the ground and getting my shoulders under him,
Thymas and I are making the same kind of progress.

I groaned as I lifted him. He wasn't as tall as Tarani, who was nearly eye-to-eye with me, but every inch of him was solid, hard-packed muscle. Thymas was a hefty chunk. -