The Two Souled flowed around the caravan, alternately friendly and nacing. The mobility their cheve gave them was stunning. They would trot along the caravan, then gallop up a hill to have a look around, then back down to the caravan, then zip off around the short, pockmark hills. Which is a strange way to describe a hill, but Mazelton couldn’t think of a better way to describe them.
This was clearly a stretch of country where Bad Things happened. The countryside had gone from an almost perfectly flat prairie (he could imagine mile tall glaciers working like an adze, smoothing the land flat as they scraped away all the “excess”) to lands that could be described as “hilly.” Or maybe just rolling. The land would sweep up five or ten ters, then dip into a little crater, then up and down again. Like the earth’s skin had erupted with acne. Thousands of these little pockmark hills, stretching to the horizon. So filled with rainwater, turning into stagnant seasonal ponds. As the day ward up, the flies ca out in force, sotis to the point of blocking sight. At this point, most of the wagons had bought insect barrier cores, but you could sure tell the ones that hadn’t.
Mazelton had a warm, happy thought about the Collective emmigrants. His wagon had a halo of collapsing insects. Mazelton had long since installed a little awning over Duane’s bench. The piter pater of dead greenheads was downright soothing.
Insect horrors aside, the hills were creepy. They were tightly clustered together, to the point where they were touching, most of the ti. Where they didn’t touch, streams had ford, a new hydrology, slipping around historical scars. Mazelton didn’t know what kind of weapon made that sort of impact. It didn’t seem to be heat based, or if it was, the heat had long since scattered. He tried to shake it off, but the alieness of it got to him, especially with the spirit beasts ghosting around then bursting out with furious noises at… sothing. Sotis at each other, or the wagons, or sothing that only they could see. They sure made life hell for the rabbits and rodents as they passed.
Sleep deprivation did a number on him. Well, he had been working the whole ti.
Lunch was called at the shores of a surprisingly large lake, rimd with white powder. The Dusties fell on the powder with great enthusiasm, as did Cookie and the Two Souled. He asked Duane about it and got a shrug in reply. He then asked a passing caravaneer about it.
“Saleratus. You know. For bread?”
“Can’t say I have ever heard of it.”
“Oh. Well. I don’t know how it works, but if you add it to biscuits or bread it helps make them more puffy and light.”
“Don’t you need…” Mazelton groped desperately for a mory, repressed firmly, from the ti of the Bread Incident. “Ale Barm. You scoop the stuff off the top of the fernting beer and put it in the bread, right?”
“Sounds right to , but you can’t brew beer in rolling wagons. Many have tried, believe . So… no ale barm. You might have noticed we mostly eat flat and quick breds. Or dumplings. That kind of thing.”
Mazelton nodded.
“This will give Cookie so more options.”
“Variety is good.”
“Right?”
Everybody got tired of the sa bland foods. Puffy biscuits sounded like little heavenly clouds. Still, as happy making as the Saleratus was, he couldn’t get over the deadness of the lake. The water was apparently safe to drink, but the chalk white Saleratus rim looked chemical, dead. Like the whole lake was reminding you that life, like pleasure, was brief.
As the afternoon rolled on, Mazelton found himself accompanied by a Ianto, long of limb and longer of wind, who spoke the language of the Eastern Edge near flawlessly. Ianto wanted to talk about everything. Everything Mazelton had seen, everywhere he had been, how polishing worked, everything. Which would have been fine… well it would have been acceptable, were it not for the fact that Ianto Longshanks seed surgically grafted to his damn Cheve, aning that his head was almost three ters in the air. Mazelton was a hair taller than average, but he still had to crank his head all the way back to have a conversation.
“So you can make it from the Cold North Sea to Fish Wier in a week?”
“A few days, more like. Get everything lined up just so, and you could probably make it to Sky’s Echo in a bit over a week. Boats don’t have to sleep.”
“But they are so slow!”
“Faster than you would think, and rember, even if they are slower than a horse, they don’t get tired and move all day.”
Ianto thought it through, and shrugged.
“So people mostly move around on the rivers?”
“Sort of. Rivers that are deep enough and wide enough to get a boat through. That's a lot of rivers, but not all of them.”
Mazelton rubbed his neck.
“So if you can get around on rivers and lakes so fast, why take a wagon out across the plains?”
“Because there is no river that goes where I want to go, and getting there by boat would an traveling for about two years by sea. And I am not a good sailor.”
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Ianto looked at him in disbelief then rubbed his own neck.
“Hard to imagine.” Ianto gave a little smile. “I see enough things to keep interested here on land.”
“Oh? Anything good recently?”
Ianto’s smile widened.
“How about a whole abandoned city popping up out of nowhere?”
“Impressive, I’ll give you that. What happened?”
“We don’t really know, actually. There is a big lake about two weeks ride north and east of here, really big, and deep. Great fishing around there, so we migrate through the area after the ice lts.”
“Did you catch one thiiiis big?”
“Hah! Nope, I was trading with other bands. Which is where the new city cos in. So there are so good sized rivers and streams that run south out of the lake, and one of these rivers had a pretty huge bank. Like, a big run of steep hills that went on for miles and miles, then cut off for no apparent reason. Both sides of the river- we always figured it was just an odd canyon.”
“Makes sense. Lots of odd canyons out there.”
“Water is weird.” Ianto nodded. “But this ti, there was a landslide. The river got majorly blocked up and flooded around the blockage. I don’t know how long the river had been pushing through the “hills” but it was probably a few weeks by the ti I saw it. Maybe as much as a month. So I start riding towards the canyon, because I was going to et so people there and I could see the ground had collapsed. I get most of the way there, when the Sobak,” he looked over at Mazelton “What you call the Spirit Beasts, they raised the alarm.”
Mazelton nodded, encouraging him.
“They scent sothing they really, really don’t like, running back and forth trying to establish a trail. I hurry over to find out what they were looking at. I get around one of the hills and- buildings. Mostly smashed, but so partially preserved. I can see the water washing away the loose dirt that had been protecting them, revealing them once again to the world. All those odd little hills? Buildings. Once, they would have been big.”
“Congratulations on the windfall, the prospecting must have been imnse!”
“Thank you, but between ti and the river, the pickings were less than you would think. Although that wasn’t the strangest part.”
“Finding a lost city isn’t the strangest part?”
“Not even close. See, that landslide didn’t happen naturally.”
Mazelton looked curiously at Ianto.
“Just along the edge of the river, there were what looked like they would have been docks or warehouses. We know this because sothing blew it up, exploded the dirt everywhere and exposed it to the air. For so reason. Then it cut away a load of sothing, I don’t know what, but you could see rust stains along the ground where it had been working.”
Ianto kept his eyes directly on Mazelton’s face.
“Even cut a big hole in the ground. The Sobak absolutely panicked, saying we would die if we went in. The Shaman said it was poisoned with heat too.”
“Ah. You don’t want to go and investigate it, do you?”
“Hah! No, thank you. I doubt there is anything in there that we want. But since you have apparently found two other holes like this, I am very curious about what you know. And what you guess.”
It was a long, long afternoon. Mazelton collapsed around the campfire co dinner.
“He grilled you good, huh?”
“About right. Polyclitus, what exactly is the deal with the Two Souled?”
“What do you an?”
“I an, they migrate over a pretty big range, but between the cheve and the Sobak, they must eat a TON of food, daily. How can they keep it going?”
Polyclitus ran a skinny hand through thinning hair, staring into the fire.
“They die young, most of them, and they are very good at hunting, fishing and foraging. Which does an that they have been steadily expanding their range.”
“Ah. Pushing out west?”
“Lots of good stuff up north, but not much ti to enjoy it, if you get my aning. So… yes, out west. Also, sothing has them spooked. Buying an awful lot of rifles and ammunition. Don’t want crossbows, muskets, nothing but rifles and, if we had any, heat weapons.”
“Well that sounds good.”
“Mmm. Did you tell them about the slave machine?”
“You know, my neck hurt so much I think I just plain forgot about it.”
“Probably wise. You might need to give the talk about your heat weapon again.”
Mazelton nodded. Then kicked a small rock into the fire.
“Probably. Damn it.”
Mazelton dread of the Sobak that night. They just stared at him. When he tried to get closer, they ran away, then stopped and stared at him again. This happened over and over, as Mazelton chased them, screaming that he was sorry. What for, he didn’t know, but he apologized for it again and again. He woke up reeking of sweat, and sticky with it.
Ianto blessed Mazelton with his presence once more, as the Caravan got under way. Polyclitus wasn’t about to slow down for the Two Souled, and he was determined to make another twenty miles that day.
“So, I heard that not only do you know how to make heat weapons, you even have one with you! On behalf of the band, I invite you to demonstrate it for us. Perhaps when you stop for lunch?”
“I would be delighted to, but I’m afraid I don’t know your customs. I hope you will all forgive any mistakes.”
Ianto laughed loudly.
“Don’t worry! We are all quite friendly. Especially when I woke up and saw all the dead insects around my tent this morning.”
Morning ca and went, lunch ca… and Mazelton went. The display was a bit anticlimactic- he sliced one tree branch in half and drilled a tiny hole through another. He then spent a considerably longer ti explaining why it wouldn’t work for them, even loading it and inviting them to take turns trying to shoot it. Nothing happened, of course, which seed to imnsely irritate the young folks, and made the impassive elders even more stony faced.
Lunch was not offered.
“So is there really no way for normal people to use heat weapons?” Ianto asked as he escorted the still limping Mazelton back to his wagon.
“There are ways, I just don’t know how to build any of them. Ianto, I will speak plainly. Heat weapons are too damn expensive for the Two Souled. The weapons themselves cost a fortune to buy, the cores to run it cost another fortune, and the polishers needed to maintain everything costs a third fortune. Rifles aren’t cheap, but they’re cheaper than heat weapons and often more effective.”
“Not always. Not against machines or armor.”
“Machines?”
“No need to play dumb. I know you killed the slave machene that attacked the caravan. People speak highly of you!”
“I treasure their good will.”
“But you can see how we worry about the lack of effective asures against the machines.”
“Machines, plural?”
Ianto looked pained.
“They don’t pursue, as long as you run away fast enough and don’t hang around watching. But they kill everyone around where they are working. On whatever they are working on.”
He sighed out, hard.
“It was a bad winter, Mazelton, and it will be a bad sumr too.”
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