Chapter 1-3

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Chapter 1 – Nests in the Grass (D30)

Cilanti 3, 1072 (Day 3, Second Month of Spring, Vega Year 1072) – 5am

 – Basalt Traps, South Plateau –

Hagos loved being outside, especially at night, especially when the moon was putting on a show. He had planned tonight’s scout to take advantage of the full moon so that he could cover more ground and finally finish marking the smoothest route, all the way to the edge of the black rock plateau. Finding a way across the leagues of empty bedrock had turned out to be the easy part. Unfortunately, finding a safe way down the other side, had so far eluded him.  

     He had a good feeling about his directional choice this morning and when the wind picked up, and the freshet pushed him along, the young scout put on a burst of speed, just for the joy of it. He checked his chronometer to see how much time he had left until sunup, just as the echo of a whistle blew in from behind him. The lanky scout skidded to a stop, did a one footed one-eighty, closed his eyes and listened for all he was worth. 

     He assumed it was Dala, or one of the other scouts, one because there was no body else crazy enough to be out here and two, the blast whistles all sounded a little bit the same and he recognized the pitch. He waited for the count of twenty but the wind had died down and there was not a single sound to be heard except the beating of his own heart. He shook his head and muttered, “Doof, what are you waiting for,” and took off running. The other scouts were exploring the yellow grass valley to the north but it was a few leagues away and Hagos knew for sure that it would take him at least an hour of zigging and zagging to get back.

     After twenty minutes of solid effort, he thought he might be close enough for a try, so he stopped, pulled out his whistle and blew a double blast and then cupped his ears and closed his eyes and listened. Sure enough, carried in on the edge of the wind, he heard a single short blast, repeated at five second intervals. He blew his whistled answer again, two short blasts and was rewarded with a triple, each thrill rising an octave.

     When he heard the agreed upon signal for “no danger”, Hagos breathed a sigh of relief and started running again but this time, he forced himself to slow down a bit. The windswept bedrock was a minefield of ankle twisters, sudden drop-offs, insurmountable basalt cliffs, and slick-rock gullies that meandered for leagues, and always in the wrong direction. 

     Yesterday, he’d skirted past a water drilled hole that was three tent poles deep and at least two across. The perfectly circular pits were scattered at random, across the hard rock plateau and Hagos knew that if he ever fell into one of those, he would never get out and no one would ever find him. He gave a little shiver and nervously switched his new light panel up to high beam. 

     Hagos knew from his research, and stories told by Neelow and the other Lecters, that these desolate, flood scarred lands were full of death for the unwary or the un-watered. They had been on the path south for almost a month now and at first, especially those first seven days, the trekking and scouting was as easy as glass. 

     After they left their mountain home and lost the pavement, seven days out, it got a bit harder, but compared to these last two weeks of night walking, those cool spring days seemed like a dream. Now, one month on, their little cart caravan, and most of his friends, were stuck behind a washout six leagues back, and he’d been trying for three nights to find a safe path across the ancient volcanic plateau.

     During the daylight, the featureless moonscape of bare rock held few directional clues and it was a challenge to judge distance or direction. At night, it was all but impossible and he’d had to keep track of his steps and a sharp eye on his needle pointer to ensure he was heading the right direction. After mistaking one gulley for another and getting lost and running out of water, twice, the experienced scout, understood first hand the dangers of not paying attention. 

     Tonight was the first night of the full moon, but now, with an hour or so to sunrise, he’d lost the moon and definitely needed his light. He stopped to take a drink of water and patted the new light fondly. The thin panel was quickly becoming one of his favorite pieces of gear. Lyra had helped him sew the small rectangle to the front of his vest and now he couldn’t figure out how he had ever survived without it. 

     Hagos secured his water flask and tightened the waist belt of his back sack and then re-tied his head wrap. The silky length of twist dyed fabric was purple and blue and red, but mostly purple, his favorite color. The maker had decorated the fabric with the silhouette of a tiny little man with long lanky limbs and silly spikes of hair. She had cleverly embroidered the subtle pattern all along one edge and if your ran the fabric through your fingers, at just the correct speed, the embroidery merged into a charming animation of a tiny little man, running in great leaping bounds with his spiky hair bouncing wildly in the wind. The scarf was a gift from Mari and more precious to him than water. 

     After twenty more minutes of hard running, he spotted the bamboo groves and changed his trajectory. From a distance, the oddly spaced, perfectly circular groves, standing out here in the middle of the endless leagues of bedrock, didn’t make a single bit of sense. The small group of travelers had discussed it at length and Neelow had posited that the seeds had likely blown in on the wind and had taken hold wherever they’d found water. He was very well read, so the group tended to believe him, but Hagos had to also consider Mayzee’s counter argument because it made just as much, or just as little sense as Neelow’s. “I think if that were true, the seeds would have filled more of the pits. Crazy as it sounds, I think someone planted them.” 

     Hagos eyed the pits and wondered. The bamboo had firmly established itself in just a few of the hundreds of water-drilled pits that dotted this section of the plateau. Not surprisingly, blight had conquered most of the groves and now the grey stalks of giant grass stood in desolate circles and filled the morning with their wretched clatter.

     As he ran past the largest grove, Hagos angled northwest and climbed up and across a massive spine of basalt and then down the edge of the collapsed cliff face on the other side. He dropped down into the second channel and this time, he knew it was the right one because on the way up and out this morning, he’d hidden a cache tag behind a pile of rocks. 

     He finished up his second flask of water, retrieved the tag and then climbed down into the gulley, marveling again at the leagues and leagues of branching channels that drained this plateau. They had never seen anything like it. Unlike normal drainage patterns, these great channels meandered and twisted across the empty landscape like the veins in an enormous leaf. Neelow said it was more proof of the glacial flooding he was endlessly yacking about. Hagos believed him, based on the scarred landscape, it seemed true, but it was very hard to imagine that much water. 

     Fifteen more minutes of zigging and zagging dumped him out into the edge of the yellow grass valley, just as the sun peeked above the horizon. The golden light illuminated the small narrow butte which stood thirty feet above the oddly flat valley. Hagos could just make out the shape of the huge basalt boulders that were lined up along the top edge and the other three scouts, each standing on top of a different boulder and facing three different directions.

     Ketari spotted him first and when she waved and jumped down out of sight, the other two followed. As soon as he saw that his sister really was all right, Hagos slowed down to a fast walk. Dala didn’t often whistle for help and he’d run back in a bit of a sweat.

     When he arrived at the base of the basalt hill, he found all three scouts standing in the shade of a small grove of bamboo. Tucked in next to the grove stood a beautiful little grass hut, newly built. He strode up and touched Dala on the shoulder and looked around the little verge but he didn’t know what to focus on first; the elegantly designed little hut or the thick stalks of green bamboo, clacking musically in the wind.

     Eber, the most experienced of the four scouts, watched in silence as Oden ran out to greet Hagos. The puppy in training tried very hard not to jump on the returning scout and when he didn’t jump up, and got a pet instead of a reprimand, he wiggled even harder. Hagos scratched him under his fluffy little chin and said, “Good boy, who’s a good boy?”

     Eber grunted, checked his chronometer, squinted at his delighted partner standing there with her hand out, and asked sourly, “Again you win! How did you know?” 

     She accepted the quarter chit with a wink and then flipped the flat ceramic disk up into the air and caught it neatly in her vest pocket. It landed with a musical “tink”, and she said with a barely suppressed grin, “He always whistles the same volume. If you paid attention, you can hear how far away he is.”

     Hagos had to hide his grin when Eber grunted again. The older scout hated to lose a bet, even one for a quarter, and always went silent when someone got the better of him, especially if it was Ketari or one of the other scouts.

     Hagos almost caught Ketari’s barely suppressed giggling so he quickly changed the subject and said, “You got back fast.” 

     Ketari admitted, “We weren’t very far. Almost as soon as we left this morning, we crossed the little man’s trail. It leads straight from the edge of the salt flat to here, so he must have known about the grove, cuz you can’t see it elsewise. We split up and scouted all the way to the salt flat and there’s only one set of prints coming this way, his. No one followed and no one is nearby or Oden would have told us. We were half way back when Dala whistled.”

     Eber, waited politely for her to finish and then came straight to the point. “I will go get Lyra.”

     Hagos frowned and tugged on his chin braid in silent disagreement. Eber looked askance. He was the most experienced and usually the one leading the discussion. Hagos stared down at him, eyebrows up. Eber squinted up at the taller man, still not convinced, and Hagos put his hand on his mentor’s shoulder and then said without heat, “I am faster, yes? But you are a better shot. Stay and keep them safe and maybe catch a couple of rabbids for the cooker.”

     Eber raised an eyebrow at the implied criticism, nodded, pleased at the complement, and then after a beat, he handed Hagos his flask and nodded his head side to side in reluctant acquiescence. 

     Hagos slung the strap over his shoulder and then peeked into the grass hut and took careful note of the sleeping man and his ragged state. With a wave he started running again, and disappeared out of sight almost immediately. 

     Dala looked at the empty water flask and fussed, “I didn’t check his gear.”

     Ketari patted her arm reassuringly. “Running is his natural state. He’ll be fine, they’re only a few leagues away and it’s still early.”

     Dala nodded and turned to leave. She had the morning watch so she took Oden up to the top of the basalt ridge they’d just climbed down, and set up the scout’s hide between two huge boulders, each at least ten feet square. The camouflaged box-tent had a cool wall but the cramped space made it difficult for her to relax into the watch, so this time she toted a sunshade and a bubble stool with her, hoping the taller space would ease the tedium of trying to fit her six foot tall frame into a four foot tall canvas box.

     Ketari and Eber found a flat spot nearby and set up the scout tent and started prepping for lunch. Ketari set the cooker up and loaded it with water, soaked corn, a half dozen cubes of salt cured belly meat, a handful of half cooked bonzo beans and two whole garlic buds. With practiced ease she locked down the lid of the ceramic pot, clipped it into place, cranked the cooker’s spring and then turned the device to face the rising sun. 

     The cooker would follow the sun and should shut down when it hit temperature, but she set her chrono alarm for noon, just in case. Once the device started ticking, she left lunch to cook and walked around to the other side of the tent to see what her partner was up to. 

     Eber had dug a hole deep into the sand of the bamboo kettle and then waited patiently for the hole to fill with dirty water. Once the mud had settled, he set up the battery pump and filter. Within minutes he had a bucket full of clean water which he used to charge their cool pads.

     Ketari eyed Eber’s mud splashed trousers, rolled her eyes, took the pads out of the bucket, shook in a handful of soap flakes and said, “We’ve got privacy, some free time and a bucket of water... I don’t know ‘bout you, but Im’ma take a bath!”

     She stripped down to her skin, spun around so that her braids flared out and then posed with one arm up, and the other pointing straight at the tent. Eber blinked at the sight of Ketari’s skin, he usually didn’t get to see so much of it all at once. She wasn’t super curvy like Triz, or tall and elegant like Lyra, but she was smart and strong and beautiful, and best of all, she was his. 

     *** *** ***

     It had been twelve years, almost to the day, since he had fallen for her and he still couldn’t quite believe it. It had hit him like a bolt of fire, out of the blue but she was much too young to court, so he said nothing about the intensity of his feelings. He didn’t confess his love to her until after she’d gone, but everyone knew. That next day, when they came back from the hunt, it was very obvious to anyone looking, that he was completely smitten and red eyed with jealousy to any young man who came any where near her. The whole thing was a bit of a scandal because he was twelve years older and she had been one of his students. 

     Only sixteen and very unsure of her burgeoning feelings, she immediately left to stay with friends and she finished her lessons in Dalta City. Eber, not a man to easily confess his feelings, especially not with words, wrote to her every day. The letters were full of stories about the daily life she was missing and she could see the effort it took, just from all the crossed out words and mis-spelling. 

     He kept on doggedly, day after day and as he wrote her about the mundane, his love, not just for her, but for the people and for his “family” of friends and students and his small tribe of hunters, it all leaked out onto the page. She didn’t mean to, she didn’t want to, but she fell in love with an almost illiterate man because the only way he could show his heart and prove his love was to write to her. 

     Two years later, she came back to Dolmani Town and as soon as he saw her face, he ran to the Administrator’s office and applied for a Writ of Ceremony. He grabbed Lecter Ebersol’s hand and pumped it and shouted, “Ketari is home.” 

     He handed her secretary the fee, his face glowing with joy, and waited with impatience as the young man filled out the contract. When he stopped and looked around for Eber’s intended, Eber frowned at him so fiercely the secretary flinched and dropped his pen. Kevari handed it to him and nodded her approval, so the secretary continued filling out the form, but this time he kept his head down. When Ketari appeared out of nowhere and took Eber’s hand, the Administrator blinked in happy surprise and said, “Well there you go. Love is, what it is”. 

     *** *** ***

     Eber frowned as hard as he could, as he tried with all of his might not to break out into a huge grin, and then with the most ridiculous pumping of knees and elbows, he sprinted towards the tent, never once taking his eyes off of her. 

     With out looking, he unstrapped his boar spear and leaned the heavy bladed weapon next to the door flap, yanked off his sun cloak, unbuckled his knife harness and still without taking his eyes off of her, he tossed everything into the tent. He dropped the tent flap and then turned to face Ketari straight on. 

     He stood up straight and tall, threw his hands out and shook them and with an extravagant leer, he unbuttoned the top button and only the top button of his leather vest. 

     Ketari giggled and dove into the tent, completely forgetting about the bucket of soapy water. Eber followed, his face aglow with joy. As he sealed the tent flap he said gruffly, “We have chores you know,” and Ketari giggled even harder. 

Chapter 2 – Main Camp

Half a league to the north, Hagos scrambled out of the maze of drainage channels and up onto the windswept plateau. As soon as he was out of the shade, his gauges started going off so he had to slow his pace. He could feel the heat rising off the rock and he knew better than to push it. Off in the distance, the basalt stepped up into giant terraces and the heat shimmer that came off the rock made the cliff face look like it was dancing. Because of his glacial pace it was close to noon by the time he arrived back to the boulder strewn gash where the rest of his travel group had gotten stuck. 

     As he approached the big tent and the social circle in front, instead of stopping for permission from the hidden watcher, he gave a quiet whistle and kept jogging forward. When the scout didn’t stop, Kahili, assigned to the morning watch, popped out of his hiding place in the grass and raised an inquiring eyebrow. Hagos waved in acknowledgement of the watcher’s questioning look, but he didn’t slow down. Kahili correctly assumed that the scout must have some big news, or he would have never passed by without stopping, so he grabbed his gear and the loaded crossbow and followed Hagos up to the well organized campsite. 

     Elos, the mongrel pup, had been assigned to guard duty and he was taking it very seriously. He was half the age and already twice the size of his half siblings Spot and Victory. Instead of a long coat of silky white fur, he had a thick double coat, speckled and spotted with white and tan and brown. Like his sibs Xuxo and Oden, they were still puppies and had not yet grown into their feet. Kahili shared a tent with Lyra and her puppy Xuxo insisted in sleeping smack dab in the middle. Every time she kicked him in the giblets, he would shift over and then wonder just how much bigger the little dogs were gonna get. 

     Elos had heard the approaching scout’s whistle but he ignored it. As the two men got closer to the big cool tent, the little dog walked out of the shade and gave them both the hairy eyeball. Kahili, as a test of the dog’s training, took a step into the social circle to see what he’d do, and was rewarded with a curled lip and a dangerous sounding growl. 

     Lyra had also heard the scout’s whistle. It didn’t wake her up, exactly, she had been drifting between sleep and wakefulness all morning. Her circadian rhythms were wrecked from night walking and her brain and body had not yet adjusted to sleeping during the day time. Instead of the endless futility of trying to convince her fully awake brain that it was time for bed, she was sitting against the inside wall of the tent, trying to figure out what was going on with Jaymo’s camp stove stew. 

     At first glance, it didn’t seem very much different from everyone else’s hominy and pork stew, but it was so much more delicious and it had been driving her crazy trying to figure out why. She’d been watching him cook for the last two weeks and this morning she dreamt about last nights stew in such detail that she swore that she could still taste it. She wanted to get down his technique for pre-roasting the green chimayo peppers before she forgot, but her recipe notes got interrupted by the puppy’s growl. 

     She breathed out a little huff of frustration, capped the little bamboo ink bottle, wiped the tip of her glass pen on the back of her hand and slipped the blotter paper into the open page of the big ledger before setting it down on top of a nearby bubble stool. Lyra popped out the tent flap, and with a wave and a word, she released the dog from guard duty. Elos wagged his tail with doggy joy and practically galloped across the sandy campsite to greet Kahili and the returning scout. 

     Kahili gave him plenty of praise and Hagos slipped him a tough piece of pig jerky as a reward. The dog sniffed the dried meat and then looked at Lyra for permission. Lyra nodded and the little dog snatched up the rare treat and gobbled it down. Hagos said approvingly, “Good Dog! Training is coming along.”

     Lyra nodded happily and called the small alpha, aptly named Hunter, out of the tent and put him on duty with a sharp, “Guard” command. 

     She pointed left, right and center, repeated the command and then with a bow she pulled the tent flap open and nodded her partner and the scout inside.

     Kahili gave her a kiss on the forehead and then leaned against the center pole and watched sleepily as Hagos fussed with his gear. The scout was swaying a bit and Lyra pointed at a nearby bubble stool and frowned at him until he sat down. She handed him a cup of cold water and then glanced down at his wrist gauge. It was showing yellow, which meant he had run back much too fast. She frowned at Kahili and he shrugged as if to say, “Don’t look at me.”

     She sighed in frustration and instead of trying to get the scout to talk, she pulled a pair of cool sleeves out of the bucket next to the door and frowned at him until he slipped them on and switched the dial up to high. “What is the point of hauling all this gear to keep us safe from the heat, if you won’t use it?”

     He shrugged and enjoyed the cool. Somewhere in the dark half of the tent, a tinkling alarm was quickly silenced. Five minutes later Le’on and Triz came out from behind the privacy divider, geared up and dressed for cover. They silently nodded a greeting and left for their watch.

     Hagos still wasn’t saying anything, so Lyra shrugged good naturedly and poured him a cup of water. He drank half in one big gulp and then poured the rest over his head. It spangled in his jumble of curls and dripped down his face and made streaks in the dust which always got through the masks, no matter how well molded. He used his facecloth to blot the water off his hair and face and then thriftily wiped the dust from his face and hands with the damp fabric. 

     Hagos continued to ignore Lyra and instead he inspected his gear, retied his head wrap, filled his water flasks and plugged his batteries into the tent’s new charger panel. The indicator light flashed green in only a few minutes and he nodded happily at the speed of the transfer. 

     When he packed his battery boxes away and finally sat back down, Lyra asked in exasperation, “More?” as in “give me more information”, not whether or not the scout wanted more water. Kahili smirked when Hagos took the flask and drank it dry. Lyra made a groaning noise at him and rolled her eyes. He blithely ignored the impatient shake of her foot and asked hopefully, “Lunch?” 

     Lyra pointed her chin at the solar cooler. Hagos had been so focused on keeping his temperature down during his epic run that he’d missed lunch and didn’t realize it until just that second. He extracted a medium sized plastcube from the cold box and pried off the lid. Between the two of them, he and Kahili made short work of the entire container of cold leftover stew. Lyra blinked at the speed at which the food disappeared and had to hide a smile when Hagos belched extravagantly.

     With a happy sigh he asked, “Did Jaymo make this?” 

     Lyra rolled her eyes at the empty cube and said, “I’ll tell him you liked it, a lot!” 

     One of the puppies, “Spot” by name, strolled over and sat in front of them and looked longingly at the food container and then back at Lyra with pretty much the best puppy eyes in the history of puppies. Lyra grinned and with a flick of her fingers, she gave the fluffy white dog permission to eat.

     Hagos scratched the puppy’s tail end which made the fluffy puppy even happier and he wound up sitting on top of Hagos’ feet as the scout leisurely filled his pipe. Hagos moved his bubble stool closer to the tent flap and carefully blew his smoke outside so it wouldn’t bother the others. 

     Ten minutes later Hanzen and Dox came in from their watch and Lyra dropped her head into her hands in an extravagance of frustration when she finally realized what Hagos had been waiting for. It must be news indeed if he needed everyone to hear it at the same time.

     Lyra, finally out of patience, asked, “Hanzen is here, I am here, everyone “sleeping” back there is listening! What has happened?” 

     Hagos said without preamble, “Dala found a man.”

     Hanzen watched Lyra’s twitching foot and had to pinch his lips shut to keep from laughing. Lyra stilled her foot and flashed him her best squint eye.  Hanzen took a deep breath, stifled his laughter as best he could and asked, “Aaand?”

     Hagos shrugged and said, “He was asleep, elegant grass hut, beautifully made, barely alive, ragged clothes, something untoward happened to him.”

     Lyra shot Hagos a dark look and muttered, “I don’t know why you had to wait, that was what? Twenty words?” 

     Hagos twiddled the bead on the end of his chin braid and watched in silence as Lyra, Hanzen and the others immediately got ready to leave. Hanzen checked his pack sack, stuffed in his sun cloak and cool gear, two extra flasks of water and all of the weapons that he could carry. He eyed Lyra’s over burdened arms and multiple carry sacks and considered the distance they had to run and her tendency to over pack. 

     He pushed her with his hip as he passed by but he was over-burdened himself and when she moved to let him pass, he missed. Now, instead of a friendly tease, he mis-stepped into her so hard that he almost fell on top of her. Lyra reacted faster than thought and stiff armed him away with such a fierce shove, that he and all of his gear went flying. 

     He almost yelled, “I was just teasing. What was that for?” and then he saw her face. She was getting better at hiding her feelings, but today he could clearly see the worry and anxiety. He shot a glance at Kahili’s wide eyed astonishment at Lyra’s overreaction and decided that maybe today wasn’t a very good day for kidding around. 

     He cleared his throat and said, “My pardon, it’s a little tight in here.”

     Everyone else in the crowded tent had of course overheard the news and almost the entire group had raised up a bit, ready to volunteer. As he was leaving, Hanzen poked his head around the privacy divider and selected a small group of their strongest and most rested members and with a shrug, the rest went back to sleep. He nodded at Neelow and said, loud enough for everyone in the tent to hear, “Neelow is First while we are away. Mayzee is also First. Guard well, we will send word.”

     He wanted to go as fast as possible and that would only be doable with a small group, but with the heat, they would need at least four mono-carts just to haul the big cool tent. Not to mention all the camping gear, food and extra weapons. The new tents were the only thing keeping them alive in this desolate land and they couldn’t go anywhere without one.

     Lyra had already discarded about sixty different packing scenarios and as she watched Hanzen survey the gear pile, she forestalled the endless discussions and asked, “Four mono-carts and full back sacks, five total?” 

     Hanzen nodded in agreement and then asked a bit wistfully, “Did we come up with the same solution because it’s the best solution or because we were both trained by Mari?”

     Kahili, who knew any discussion about Mari would upset Lyra, broke in and said, “I thought exactly the same and she didn’t train ME. It’s really the only way forward, literally. And I am coming, yes?”

     Hanzen clapped him on the back eliciting an annoyed, “Ow!” and said, “Of course.”

     It took an hour and a small group of volunteers to unpack, break down and repack the big tent and the rest of the gear into four manageable loads. It took another four hours to portage the carts and the supplies over the boulder strewn gash that was blocking their way south. Once they were clear of the boulders, Hagos buckled on the mono-cart’s waist strap, switched on the motor, flipped the switch to low and started jogging down the narrow trail, closely followed by Hanzen, Kahili and a reluctant Doxman.

     Dox didn’t like leaving Mayzee and the younglings but he knew they would be safer with the larger group than they would be running around the badlands with him, looking for trouble. 

     That left Lyra with Hunter and Xuxo bringing up the rear. She wasn’t hauling a mono-cart which put her in charge of the dogs and the dripper. They had it set to drip out a steady trail of UV paint so that when the heavy carts finally cleared the rocks, they’d have a clear trail to follow. 

     It was a blue sky day and the heat was brutal. Kahili knew that without the adjustable shade and cool tech they carried, they would never have survived it. They kept to a slow pace and took frequent breaks to cool down and switch out their pads. It took fifteen minutes for the gell to soak up enough water to work properly and everyone was very grateful for the extra stops. With the bulk and weight of the mono-carts, even with the motor assist, it took hours to navigate the maze of ups and downs and the entire time, the image of the little man, alone with no gear, no food or water, in the one hundred degree heat, kept popping into Lyra’s head. She imagined that he must be tougher than described and wondered what in the world he was doing this far south, this close to summer. 

     With practiced ease, she checked the dog’s temperature gauges and battery packs. She knew Hunter could tolerate some heat, but no one was sure yet about the mixed up pups. They seemed to be tolerating the heat better than the other puppies, and Lyra wondered if it was because, unlike their domesticated counterparts, the wild dog population had developed a different set of genetic traits because they lived outside. Or maybe their thick undercoat kept them cooler? Thinking about dogs, and pedigrees and the plasticity of DNA kept Lyra’s brain busy for most of the run and she was glad for the distraction. 

     They arrived at the bamboo grove near to sunset and found Dala, sitting in the shade on a bubble stool, writing in her journal. Nearby, the scout’s tent was ready for occupancy and the camp kitchen was set up and ready for use.

     Dala nodded towards the readied campsite and said first thing, “There is no one about, we are safe.”

     She nodded at the little grass hut and continued, “The little man’s been mostly sleeping. He’s taken some water but no food.”

     Lyra noted the empty strap on Dala’s pack sack and guessed that the scout had leant her sleep pad to the little man inside. Dala stood up and stretched and headed towards the scout tent and the other’s followed. She pointed towards the west and said, “Eber and Ketari are on the hunt with the dog to see if they can scare up some freshies. And they said they found shade.”

     Lyra looked interested so she elaborated. “Way on the other side, where the water drains off this butte, there’s a gravel bar, the biggest I’ve ever seen. Use the finder, Ketari said they marked it with a Lecter tag. It’s plenty worth the effort. There’s a dry gully cutting through the gravel, it’s fifty feet, deep and narrow, so it should have good shade most of the day.”

     She pointed to a nearby hillock that was topped with a colonnade of basalt columns and snapped off boulders. “The hide’s up there, between the first and second boulder.”

     Hanzen nodded and said, “Good spot. Dox, you’re with me.” He switched off the cart motor, unbuckled the belt, checked his water supply and went to take the evening watch. 

     Lyra handed Dox her longbow, a handful of iron tipped arrows and nodded distractedly as he sketched a finger salute her way and followed Hanzen up to the hide.

Chapter 3 – The Little Man

Mio awoke with a start. He listened intently and could just make out the timbre of voices and the low hum of battery powered carts. 

     The group had stopped a ways away from his little shelter and they made no pretense of who they were or why they were here. They had found a man alone in some distress and it certainly seemed like they were here to help. They were being very careful, which he appreciated, especially after what he’d just been through.

     Without warning, the hut’s arched doorway was blocked by a large fluffy face and it took a few seconds for his addled brain to recognize the silhouette as “puppy” and not “threat”. He made a kissy noise at the little dog and she wagged her entire body in joy at her discovery. 

     Hagos had described the little man’s shelter as “elegant”, and Lyra was intrigued but also worried. Someone with that level of skill had to have run into some terrible kind of trouble and she hoped that it was trouble that they could handle. 

     As she coaxed the puppy back from the low opening, Lyra asked politely, “Hello? May I come in?”

     The man answered formally, “Yes, yes, of course. Please do come in.” 

     He tried to sit up as straight as he could but the small effort exhausted him and he ended up half laying, half sitting against the grassy wall, trying to blink the exhaustion out of his eyes.

     “I am Mio. I’m sorry I didn’t get up, I think I am very sick. Be careful, that red grass is poison…”

     He trailed off as Lyra ducked into the little shelter. In his sleep fuddled mind she looked enormous and he blinked up at the young woman in surprise. “You are a big one, yes you are.” 

     She was dressed for trekking in sand boots, a pair of undyed hennep trousers and a reversable sun cloak. He immediately noticed that all of her clothes were beautifully detailed, well–tailored and finely made. 

     She was wearing the newest style of cool gear and had a brand new, custom fitted face filter. Her black glass goggles hid her eyes and her filter hid her face but when she removed her gear he could see that she was very young and very beautiful. She had long smooth braids, twisted up from the nape of her neck and tied up on top of her head with a bright slash of fabric. Her smooth ebony skin was unburned and she had an open face, bright with curiosity. She smiled at him and he trusted her immediately.

     The lowering sun had barely diminished the heat of the day and the little hut was stifling. He smiled shyly and patted the cool pad in invitation. He had no energy to get up but now that the valley was coming into shadow, sitting out in the open was almost bearable. 

     Lyra sat and leaned against the inside wall of the grass shelter. She tucked her legs into a prezzle and with a twirl of her wrist, she pulled a piece of dried meat out of her sack, some kind of spicy sausage by the smell of it, and used her boot knife to cut off a piece.

     She poked the knife into the sausage and handed the knife and sausage to the little man. He blinked at the trust offered and blinked again when she pulled back her sleave and showed him the inside of her left wrist. She said simply, “I am Lyra. I am one of the Lecter’s for this rag-taggiddy group. What can we do to help?”

     The five narrow tattoo lines surprised him, a lot. First because she was extremely young for a Five and second, she was clearly brand new to the role because all five stripes were still healing.

     His curiosity was immediately forestalled by the delicious smells coming off the sausage. He plucked the sausage off of the wicked sharp tip, spun the knife on his palm and handed it back to her, hilt first. He nodded at the beautifully made knife, well loved and well kept and said softly, “Lovely.”

     Lyra unexpectedly teared up at the comment so he busied himself examining the garlicky meat. As he had been taught, he sniffed it carefully, his eyes closed and his mouth open. His brain must have registered “safe to eat” because his mouth began to water and without hesitation he took a huge bite. 

     When he finished he sighed happily and said, “The pigs down here are the tastiest you’ll ever eat, but watch out, they are scary smart and they’ll clean out your stores in a heartbeat if you leave anything out, even for a moment.”

     Lyra nodded and he asked, “Did you know some of the piggy family groups in the southern valley have learned to swim? Fascinating creatures.”

     Lyra shook her head “no” and then asked, “Aren’t the farms down there on little islands or something?”

     Mio nodded and said, “Hence the pigs learning how to swim. The old records show it only took a few months for them to work out how to get across the canals and up into the test plots. Our clever ancestors figured out how to fence them off pretty quick but those bamboo barriers are long gone by now.”

     Lyra started to ask a question when Mio yawned hugely. He looked shocked at his rudeness and stuttered out an apology. Lyra reminisced, “I love watching the wild animals. The last two springs of school, Hanzen and I got assigned the high meadowlands, to guard the alpaca herd and keep them safe while they had their babies. It was some of my favorite days.”

     Recognizing a fellow lifelong learner, he grinned at her and said, “We will talk more, yes?” 

     She nodded happily and handed him another piece of sausage and a twist-top container, half full of baby onions. Someone had lovingly pickled them with fresh dill and tiny red peppers, the super spicy ones. He looked longingly at the pickled onions, a rare treat, but decided his dehydrated system prolly couldn’t stomach the spice. But when Lyra handed him the sausage, he couldn’t resist. He ate it with gusto, irrespective of his future finicky bowels and complemented Lyra on the quality of the cure. “Best I’ve had in years.”

     Lyra said, “Right? That Mayzee and her box of mold and yeast is a wonder. She and the others are stuck right now, about two leagues back.”

     Mio frowned in concern, so she continued, “We were crossing the Pict, just past the broke down dam, but the sonifier started ticking so we had to leave the easier river-side trail. Where we were crossing, this was the closest route marked on our maps. Except almost immediately, we got stuck behind this huge ridiculous gash, filled with huge ridiculous boulders. We can’t go back to the river and we can’t get around it and it’s taking forever to move forward.”

     He nodded and said, “It’s good that you got away quick. That stuff will kill you, no doubt. The river route was allright just a few years ago, but now with the shifting winds, we’ll have to redo all the maps again.”

     He patted his pockets distractedly, trying to find his map book and asked, “Are you hauling heavy carts? That particular rock filled gash, I remember that one, it happened about twenty years ago. The flood came off the rock plateau and tore all of the soil away and that’s what was underneath, those crazy boulders. I keep trying to find a better way across, no luck so far, and every time I don’t, I thank the Mother Father I’m not pushing a cart. Tell them to stay on the left, look for the yellow blaze. It's the “easiest” way, but still a killer. Are they gonna portage or reconfigure?”

     “A little of both I’m afraid, new carts, first time to switch.” Lyra grinned at all the cursing they’d left behind as the cart teams wrestled with stubborn bolts and the new wheel configuration. 

     Lyra considered the little man carefully. He didn’t have a pack sack or any gear and his clothes were torn to rags so it was hard to guess his profession. The soles of his boots were almost worn through, but she could see they were finely made and she knew he must be tougher than an old boot himself, because he’d survived the basalt badlands without water and apparently without any gear. She guessed he was either a surveyor or maybe a map maker for the Guild?

     His memory of the boulder filled gash pointed to map maker so she hazarded a guess and asked, “Are you returning to Sector City?”

     He nodded with a grimace and said, “I WAS going north, but not anymore. I overheard your scout earlier. Are you really going all the way to the Three Rivers Valley?”

     Lyra nodded and said, “Yes, but we will stay with you until you are well enough to travel.”

     She didn’t know why she made the promise. He was no where big enough to help with cart hauling and without his gear and clothes, he wasn’t very prepossessing. But there was something about him, she thought he was indomitable maybe? That was the word that stuck in her brain and she knew in her gut that they should help him, no question. 

     She took a sip of water and considered where they were. She knew that any delay would put a lot of pressure on their water supply and it worried her a little bit. They had a concentrator, another piece of tech gear selected on their behalf by Mari’s contacts in Sector City, but Lyra had been taught, by Mari herself, that it was never a good idea to rely solely on technology. 

     Mio saw the flash of worry in her eyes and said reassuringly, “I came here because I remembered this little grove. What I didn’t remember was, I don’t have my tool sack and sharp rocks will only get you so far. It took every ounce of energy I had left, to build this shelter. When I finally got around to working the bamboo, I could only get a few drops of water to flow.”

     He watched her face, fascinated by the array of thoughts and emotions that showed when she was not guarding herself and he was completely charmed by the young Lecter. She squinched up her face as she tried to recall her training and he watched happily as she ticked through her lessons on her fingers, “Cactus, that’s easy, gotta find the right kind, solar still, you need a plastic sheet and some plant material…”

     He laughed and said, “If you have a long drill with a sharp bit, you can angle up into the node and collect the water that’s released.”

     She nodded her head side to side and said, “We could I suppose, but I’d hate to damage the grove. Is there easier water nearby?” 

     If this man was a mapmaker, then he should know and when he nodded and then shrugged in confusion, she waited for more.

     He blinked at her in exhaustion, laid his head down on his little pillow of grass and said tiredly, “There might be some in the kettle, if you’ve got a good filter... And there’s a tank, fresh and sweet, but it’s hidden, way on the other side of that plateau.”

      He pointed in a vague south south-westerly direction and murmured sleepily, “I knew there was a reason I kept going. I must get my maps back and if she’s still alive we need to help that little girl.”

     Lyra jerked in shock, desperate to ask him more but she could see that he was very sick, and the few minutes that he’d spent sitting up had used up his small store of energy.

     She turned her head and asked loudly, “Can someone please bring me a sleep pad and an extra battery?”

     A minute later Kahili handed in the requested items as well as a small sack of provisions. Lyra laid the thick pad on top of the little man and flipped the switch to cool. She wetted a clean face cloth and tried to wipe some of the grime off his hands, but all the water did was make his grass cuts bleed so she left off and got up to leave him to his rest.

     He sighed in bliss at the cool air that enveloped him and then reached out and touched her arm and whispered, almost too softly to hear, “I don’t want to die alone.”

     Lyra jerked again and immediately sat back down. She was hungry and dirty and itchy and she was sitting on a pile of sharp gravel but she sat as still as she could and held his hand and waited for the little map maker to fall back to sleep.