IN THE MOUNTAINS OF FIRE by Dolores J. Nurss
Volume
IV: Braided Paths Chapter 29
The Care of Children in Time of War
Saturday, September 26,
2708 Plaintive birdcalls waft
over the hills, blown like ash upon the wind.
"Help! Wounded!" they cry to
those who know. I shudder, remembering
the first time I whistled that, myself, when the snake got Miko. But I hold the troops back. "For all we know," I tell them, "It could be
ol' Whitesleeves himself singing us in." Little Hekut turns dark
eyes on me. "You're gonna let ‘em die—is
that it?" "Nope, I'm going in after
them," I say as I pack up a few supplies.
"Alone. I'm a medic,
remember? Bijal, you're in charge." "But..." "You're in charge." He's long overdue to ride the horse that
threw him. "See that I've got an intact
troop to come home to." "But how will you find us
on the march?" Bijal asks. "When I make the ‘Where are
you?' whistle, I'll cut it off abruptly in the middle the first time, do it
whole the second, and add an extra trill on the third. Do not respond till the third
call." Before anyone can say any more I
take off through the woods, rifle in arms, in the general direction of the last
whistle. Oh great! Cashew-vine interlaces the underbrush at
every turn. A pretty plant, with tasty
nuts—if you burn off the capsules around them full of poisonous oils—but the
slightest brush gives you the most miserable, burning rash wherever it touches
you. I zigzag through a maze of the
nasty stuff, losing valuable time. At
last I get far enough from my own people to whistle "Where are you?"—original
version—to the alleged wounded. It takes
several tries before I get an answer, as I move closer and closer towards where
I saw the gunfire flashes. Finally "Here!" comes the
reply. I twist and turn their way,
holding a dialogue of trills back and forth to keep me on track in this devil's
garden, till I come around a boulder and see eyes staring at me from the bushes
in its lee. I strike a fighter's stance
immediately, barrel pointed their way. "The bird-code's
compromised," I say, "So come out with your hands up till I know what to make
of you." No response. "Out with you!" I bark. "We can't all..." I shoot off some
bush-twigs. "Don't argue! Everyone who can stand, on your feet! Pull back the boughs so I can see the ones
lying down, too." Gunsmoke hangs on the
air as they file out, one by one, about a half dozen youngsters, all told (including
the two lying inside in dark-encrusted rags) children dirty with mud and blood
and the kind of powder burns you get when you make your own artillery. I lower my weapon; they've
shed their blood too recently for the cause to have changed sides, I decide,
and none of them look up to torturing me for secrets if I'm wrong. "Sorry," I say, as I dig out a lump of
Rashid's antiseptic soap. "I'm still
changing bandages on a man who trusted a turncoat in Lyanfa." They look at me blankly, till I repeat myself
loudly. The barrage must have
half-deafened them. "Lyanfa!" they
exclaim. "Nobody ever goes there!" "We're not from here,
normally," I say as I pour icy water from my canteen over my hands and lather
up, then rinse, feeling their eyes all over me.
Glad that I filled the skin nearly to bursting the night before, I hand it
over to them; they look dehydrated, but haven't dared light a fire to boil snow. As they pass it around, I crawl into the
crackling shelter of the bush to examine the two kids down, my elbows taking my
weight to keep my hands clean. "So now
we know better." I probe and sniff the
wounds as my charges moan and jerk away, then press my cheek to fevered brows,
trying to estimate their temperatures.
"Hey—save some of that water for the
wounded, okay?" Both have lost a
lot of blood, but a bullet only grazed the boy's ribs. The girl's abdominal wounds, on the other
hand, should have killed her by now. I crawl back out. "Who's in charge?" A craggy-faced mountainfolk
boy steps forward and shakes my hand.
"I'm Nayal," he says. "How's it
look, Doc?" I take him aside. I turn Nayal to where he can read my lips and
say, "The boy needs his infection taken
care of, but I can show you how to debride the wound and brew up the proper
medicines." "And Sarai?" I force myself to look him
in the eye. "She needs last rites." His eyes water as he turns away. I put a hand on his shoulder. "I'll send over some oil with the supplies
coming your way." "Supplies?" he says
distantly. I wonder how close this "officer"
is to cracking under stress. The others
gather around closer, guessing what we speak about and wanting to hear more. "Sure. We can spare some. Medicine for fever and for cleaning wounds,
food, even a couple guns and the ammo to go with them." "And oil for anointing," he
sighs. The others look punched by the
words, but not as if it had been the first blow to land on them. "Also a few fresh troops,
if you can use them; too many march with us right now." "So you can't absorb our
numbers." "No," I have to say, "I'm
afraid I can't." "Three bands," he tells
me. "We took ‘em on, three bands all
together. And, and, and this is all we
have left." I pull him closer to me, my
arm around the boy. "I heard the barrage
you endured. The fact you have any
survivors shows damn good leadership."
Except in the original attack.
That troop has some hardcore firepower. His hand lightly touches
mine on his shoulder, and it looks too small for this business. "Can you spare another officer? I just got patched in because everybody
better died." "You bet," I tell him
softly. "We've got nothing but
veterans." But the others shake their
heads, wide-eyed, and a girl says, "We follow Nayal. Nobody but Nayal." Sunday, September 27, 2708 "Here,"
Tanjin says, passing me a carrot as we strike camp. "Eating
out of turn?" I hand it back to
him. "Officers can't set a bad example,
Tanjin." "Take
it," he insists. "You only ate half your
breakfast ration." "She
does that," Lufti puts in. "She wants to
make sure we all get enough, so sometimes she goes without." "But
we've got almost more than we can carry," he grumbles, loading up his pack. ("No, really," I
protest. "I've had enough porridge. Thanks, anyway." "But you haven't had it my
Mom's way," the freckled redhead persists, "with butter—well, what the army calls butter, anyway—and
syrup and nuts." Oh my—that does sound
good. Sarge says, "You think that
flavored grease is good for anything but oiling machine parts?" Speculatively I say, "If
you add some sweet spices to mask the aftertaste, I think it sounds pretty
tasty, actually...but no." I try to stop
the freckled man as he gets up for ingredients.
"I've had quite enough breakfast already—thanks, Freck.") "I
just don't have much appetite today," I say as we pull down the branches with
which we made our shelter and scatter them as naturally as possible. "You
never have much appetite." "That's
enough, Tanjin." (Freck pours more rolled
oats into the pan anyway, and adds handfuls of the local cashews. "You have not yet begun, little lady," he
says, adding water from the kettle and mixing in the salt. "Not till you've tasted porridge done up
right." It takes no time at all to boil,
with the water heated already. He drops
in a big glob of butter-substitute and rummages for spices. "Besides, you don't know what mishaps might
befall in this wild world—rebels could spring on us at any moment. Or..." Sarge says, "That's enough,
Freck." He shrugs, but he glares at
Sarge as he says, "Any number of things can happen out here. You never know when you might find yourself
without..." "I said that's enough! You still deaf?" "No sir," Freck
mumbles. "Fully recovered." "You're on my list,
soldier.") "Come
on...just one bite," Tanjin coaxes. "For
me?" "I
said that's enough!" I shove him against
a tree. "Do I have to punish you for
insubordination?" "Go
ahead! Whip me for caring about you!" I
smack him. "I'm your officer—you don't
have to care about me, you just have to obey me!" I
let him go, his face reddening where I struck him, and his eyes as well. He glares at me a moment, then turns
away. "I was out of line...Ma'am." "Okay,
then." And so we kneel to wipe off the
tarps before folding them up and packing them, stiffly, with attention to
detail, trying to pretend normalcy. I
mustn't let them know. I mustn't let
anyone know of the fatigue increasing on me, the soreness and the swollen lymph
nodes hidden by my scarf. They need to
see me as strong. (Sarge turns to me. "Would seconds make you sick, honey?" "No, I don't think so," and
my mouth waters at the scents bubbling up from the pan despite myself. "But if I have any more I won't be able to move. And there's dishes to clean..." "Not with Freck on KP
duty," Sarge says grimly. "Have all you
want." Then he goes off to have sharp
words with the soldier aside from the rest of us. This does taste good!) Everyone's
staring at me. I overhear someone
whispering to someone else, but I can't catch what they say. "Oh
give me the damn carrot!" I snap. And I
eat the thing faster than I expected to, and it tastes sweeter and more
flavorful than I have any right to enjoy. * * * (Ah, my favorite shopping
district in Vanikke! Time to take my
mind off all the recent disturbing developments. Besides, after the purge of my closet, I
really do need a dress appropriate for breakfast with the President. Oh, the many bright paints and dyes behind
the shimmer of perfect sheets of glass—how lovely to work somewhere
sophisticated for a change! And if it
ends before I've hardly begun, all the more reason to relish every moment
remaining. Noisy? Oh my yes!
But rather exciting, don't you think? ...Don't who think? For a moment there I felt
like I chatted with Jake. He would hate
the noise, of course. Why him? Why not him?
Why do I even question it? Pay attention to what
doesn't fit. That sounded like he said
it right in my head. Maybe he did. He's in tune, somehow. Something boosts my ability to home in on him
telepathically, without even trying—and boy is the media ever the message this
time! So, I find myself
psychically resonating with an oracle who seems to want to point out what
doesn't fit, including the fact that he's managed to engage me in the first
place—especially him, who never fancied my telepathic
scrutiny before. And especially
since—now why'n'erth would anyone as graceful as Jake have trouble perceiving
the feminine? I've seen the Big Man
dance, after all. I'm overthinking this. Mustn't give myself headaches trying to
figure out the inexplicable—that leads to nasty forehead wrinkles. Just go with the flow, like turning down this
alley that I've never explored before, probably because it deals with
children's shops, their clothes and toys and such. The air smells cheery with the sweetness of
those sticky globs of candied, puffed-up grain, so popular for rotting the
teeth of your little favorites around here.
And so much glitter and pastels! Well, I must say, if Jake
wanted to pick an "unexpected path" for me, this would certainly be it. I've
never been the motherly type—except for that one time, of course, when Jake
went through that bad patch, and...oh my!
The memory seems to put me on a fast track to his unconscious. That's it—he's reached out
to me unconsciously. How else would the
telepathy that his oraclism absorbed even work?
But he's not the only one, there's also...now what was I thinking? I find myself staring in a shop window at a
brown-skinned doll with exceptionally long black hair, carefully grouped with
others of the same hue. For a second I
can't think at all. Pay attention to what
doesn't fit. I stroll on down the pretty
lane, window-shopping. Something about
the stuffed animals on display bothers me.
I stop and look. All cute, chubby,
and plush, with goofy smiles and red eyes.
Disturbing, translucent red eyes.
Noooooo... Corruption, again. Allowing something as dangerous as that,
toxic for untrained babes, on the market.
How could they? Yet corruption only poisons
people for profit. Magentine packs a hefty
price—hardly a good substitute for a safe, cheap resin.
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