Dragonback 04 Dragon and Herdsman (24 page)

"Maybe," Jack said. "I somehow doubt the mercs will notice the
changed attitude, though."

"Or will care even if they do," Alison agreed. "Let me see that
gun, will you?"

"Don't worry; we dumped the tracker," Jack assured her, putting
the safety back on and handing it over.

"Unless they got cute and threw in a backup." For a moment she
turned the weapon over in her hands, poking and prying and peering at
its various components. Then, with a grunt, she handed it back. "It's
clean."

"Like I already said," Jack reminded her, "So what was this
all-day nap of yours all about?"

"Fraggled if I know," she admitted. "But I
do
feel a whole
lot better than I did yesterday. Maybe I was just tired."

"Join the club," Jack said with a sniff.

"I'm sorry—would you like to ride for a while?" Alison asked
sweetly, gesturing to the vine hammock at her feet.

"What about Taneem?" Draycos asked before Jack could come up with
a suitably sarcastic answer.

"She's fine," Alison assured him. "She's been sleeping most of the
time, too, I think. But she's fine."

"This from your vast experience with K'da?" Jack put in.

Alison gave him a look of strained patience, then lifted her
collar an inch and peered down into her shirt. "Taneem?" she called.

For a moment nothing happened. Then, the upper right side of
Alison's shirt stirred and the top of a dark gray K'da crest pushed up
against the cloth as it transformed into three-dimensional form. Alison
opened her collar a little more, and the crest was joined by the top of
Taneem's head and a single silver eye peering through the gap. "Yes?" a
tentative voice asked.

Jack felt his mouth drop open a little. Taneem was actually
speaking
?

"This is Jack, Taneem," Alison said, pointing to him. If she was
surprised by the Phooka's new verbal skills, she didn't show it. "And
this is Draycos. Do you remember them?"

The single visible eye swiveled to look first at Jack and then at
Draycos. "I think so," Taneem murmured.

"They're friends," Alison said, talking to the Phooka as if to a
young child. "Do you understand?"

The eye swiveled to Jack, then back to Draycos. "I think so," she
said again.

"Good," Alison said. "Then—" She broke off as the dragon crest
abruptly flattened back down onto her skin. "Taneem?" she called.
"Taneem?"

There was no response. "She's a little shy, I think," Alison said.
"Still, it's progress."

"It is indeed," Draycos agreed, his tail making slow circles again.

"Aren't you glad now that we saved them?" Jack asked.

An instant later he wished he'd kept his mouth shut. Draycos spun
to face him, his crest stiff, glowing green eyes glittering
unpleasantly. "Sorry," Jack apologized hastily. "Sorry. I didn't mean
it that way."

The crest relaxed a little. "I know," Draycos said, some of the
fire going out of his eyes. "Yet you are right. To my shame, you are
right. For a time I did not permit myself to hope."

"Just don't hope too high and too fast," Alison warned. "This
whole thing is
very
new to her. She's not going to be operating
at the level of a K'da poet-warrior any time soon."

"
I'm
just glad she's able to talk," Jack said. "And in
English, yet. Is that what you were muttering in your sleep? English
lessons?"

Alison frowned. "What are you talking about? I don't talk in my
sleep."

"How would
you
know?" Jack countered.

"My parents told me," Alison retorted. "What was I saying?"

Frost, Neverlin, Braxton
. . . "Just your basic nonsense
muttering," Jack said. "Nothing I could make out. So you weren't
teaching her English?"

"Not that I know," Alison said, still looking troubled. "I assume
she picked it up the same time Hren and the other Erassvas did. So
what's our current plan?"

"We've veered east from their last ambush attempt, so it's
probably time to turn north again," Jack said. "If your guess a couple
of days ago was right, we've still got two or three more days before we
hit the river."

"Then we'd better move it," Alison said. "What was this about an
ambush?"

"It didn't work," Jack said. "We can leave the details until it's
too dark to travel."

"Fine," Alison said. "You can go back to your herding—I'll take
point."

Heading north, as it turned out, was easier said than done.

The first obstacle was a line of crumbly-edged cliffs like the one
the ill-fated red Phooka had fallen down on the evening of their first
day in the forest. Alison found a way through, but it cost them time
they didn't really have to spare.

The second obstacle was another bog, or perhaps an arm of the same
one they'd spent the day slogging through. Alison was half-inclined to
go on in, citing the same reason of enemy stalemate that Jack had given
Draycos earlier in the day. She seemed surprised and even a bit
embarrassed when she learned that the party had already done that once,
and that Jack for one had no interest in a repeat performance.

The sun was dropping toward the horizon and a line of evening
clouds was creeping across the sky when they finally finished circling
the swampland and Alison called a halt. "What do you think?" she asked
as Jack and Draycos joined her. "We've got maybe another hour of light
left. Do we want to keep going north, or should we angle northeast and
get back to the path we were on earlier?"

Jack peered through the trees, studying the terrain. Neither
direction looked any better or worse than the other. "I vote for
northeast," he said. "That'll put the bog at our backs, which means
they probably won't be coming at us from that direction."

"And we'll have a place to retreat to if necessary," Alison
agreed. "So we'll angle northeast until dark, then turn north again
tomorrow?"

"That should work," Jack said. "Draycos?"

"I have no objections."

"Good." Alison craned her neck. "Anyone seen Taneem? She hopped
off just before I called break."

"She is over there," Draycos said, flicking his tongue to the side.

"I see her," Alison said, nodding. "Taneem? Come on, girl. Time to
go."

Obediently, Taneem trotted toward them. She eyed Jack and Draycos
a little nervously as she approached, sidling gingerly past them as if
afraid to touch either of them. She placed one of her forepaws on
Alison's outstretched hand, and a second later had gone two-dimensional
and slithered up the girl's arm. "At least she's not completely
oblivious to the universe, like the other Phookas," Jack said.

"No," Draycos rumbled. "Instead, she has become excessively timid."

Jack had hoped the K'da wouldn't notice that. "Give her time," he
urged quietly. "Like Alison said, she's new to this."

"I know," Draycos said. But Jack could still hear the
disappointment in his voice. "Come—help me get the rest of the Phookas
moving."

He padded away. Jack looked at Alison, lifted his eyebrows. "I
don't know," she said, shrugging helplessly. "But he's right—let's get
moving before we lose the daylight."

It was quickly clear that neither the Erassvas nor the Phookas
were really interested in going any farther. As Draycos set off on his
moving-sentry duty he could hear Hren complaining to Alison, insisting
they be allowed to settle down for the night. For her part, Alison
responded by ignoring his protests and continuing to walk.

The Phookas, without the ability to complain, simply began
dragging their feet. Draycos could hear Jack's running footsteps
weaving in and out of the herd as the boy urged, cajoled, and
occasionally ordered them to keep going.

Once or twice Draycos heard the sound of a light slap when none of
the words would do the trick. More frequently, he heard a muttered
curse that the boy had apparently borrowed from Uncle Virge's vast
collection of such words. Clearly, Jack was as exhausted as the rest of
them.

But one way or another, he kept the herd moving, and he kept it
mostly together. Draycos kept an eye out for stragglers as he ran the
perimeter, again finding himself impressed by Jack's ability at the
task. There were very few stragglers that made it anywhere near
Draycos, and even those Jack usually managed to snag before the K'da
had to step in.

The sky overhead was darkening, and he was starting to look for a
suitable place to camp for the night, when he heard the sound of the
Malison Ring floater.

He froze in place, swiveling his head back and forth. It was
coming up from behind them, from the south, he decided. And unlike
earlier that day, this time it was headed straight for them.

The long-expected attack had begun.

"Jack!" he called, turning inward toward the main group. "Alison!
They are coming!"

"Where?" Alison called back.

"Above and to the south," Draycos told her as he leaped over the
last line of bushes between them. Across the way, he saw Jack hurrying
toward them, gripping his machine gun awkwardly across his chest.

"I hear it," Alison confirmed grimly, looking up at the dark
canopy of leafy branches high overhead.

"Where are they?" Jack demanded as he ran up.

"Straight above us," Alison told him. "No place to land—must be
planning a rappel drop."

Jack looked up. "No, that's too simple," he said darkly. "Frost
has something else in mind."

Above them, the sound of the floaters lifters changed subtly.
"Perhaps so, but this is certainly part of it," Draycos told him,
looking around. Just to the side of the likely drop zone was a tall,
thick tree. "Get the Erassvas and Phookas out of the way," he ordered,
leaping into the tree's lower branches. "Then stand ready." He paused
and looked down. "Tanglers only, please," he added.

"You got it," Jack said, thrusting his gun into Alison's hands.
"Here—you're a better shot than I am. I'll get the others to cover."

Draycos turned back around and headed up the tree. Out of the
corner of his eye he saw the familiar blood trickles flowing into his
scales, turning them from gold to black. In the deepening gloom, it
would be an effective camouflage.

He was sixty feet off the ground when, with a faint rustle of
branches, six coils of rope dropped into view through the canopy,
unrolling themselves to the ground. Draycos froze, pressing himself
into the crook of a large branch. A second later, in perfect unison,
six Malison Ring mercenaries in quick-drop harnesses crashed through
the canopy, machine gun/tanglers at the ready, sliding swiftly down
their ropes toward the ground.

They were lined up three by three, each soldier of a threesome
separated by two or three feet, with about six feet separating the two
different groups. Apparently, three of them were dropping from each
side of the floater, which clearly wasn't a very big aircraft. The
result was an attack group that was forced to bunch up more than they
probably would have liked.

From Draycos's point of view, it was as good a setup as he could
have hoped for. Bracing himself, he watched as the soldiers continued
sliding toward the ground below.

And as they passed his position, he leaped.

His outstretched left paw caught the nearest rope just above the
soldier's head, his momentum shoving the soldier back into his fellows
as they all continued to slide down their ropes. With his grip on the
rope as a pivot point, the K'da's leap changed abruptly into a
sweeping, horizontal circle. His body caught the other two ropes of his
group as he swung around them, squeezing all three closer together. His
tail snapped out as he continued his circle, snaring the farthest rope
of the other threesome, as his hind claws likewise caught the other two.

And with all six ropes now in his grip, he ignored the sudden
flurry of shouts and activity from below and curled himself into a ball.

And as he pulled the ropes together, the six men suddenly found
themselves clustered together like fruit on a vine. "Now!" Draycos
shouted.

The word was barely out of his mouth when the first of Alison's
tangler cartridges sizzled its way upward, catching the nearest soldier
squarely across his chest. The white threads whipped out, entangling
him and the two men beside him, as the shock capacitor sent a jolt of
current through all three of them. Still firing, she moved sideways
beneath the dropping men, methodically plastering the entire group. A
couple of seconds later, the now-unconscious soldiers had been turned
into something a giant spider might have wrapped up and tucked away for
a future meal. "Is that it?" Alison called.

Draycos looked up, listening for the sounds that would indicate
more soldiers were on the way. But he didn't hear any.

What he
did
hear was the faint noise of drumming hooves
below him. Hooves that were rapidly coming closer.

He turned his head back toward the ground, trying to locate the
sound. From the west, he decided. A moment later he spotted a small
group of bodies racing toward them. "Alison!" he called again. "A group
of horn-headed plant-eaters are coming toward you."

"I hear them," she called back, turning to face that direction.
"Sounds like a stampede."

"Get everyone on the eastern sides of the trees where they'll be
safer," Draycos ordered. He was catching more glimpses now through the
branches as the animals approached. There seemed to be just five of
them, running as if a demon was pursuing them.

A demon, or perhaps one of the Kodiak predators. Draycos shifted
his attention to the trail of scattered leaves swirling behind them,
searching for signs of pursuit.

And because he was looking in the wrong direction, he was caught
completely by surprise when the five animals burst into view beneath
him.