Stormrider (2 page)

And she could not leave them.

She projected anger, gathered her resources, suppressed a new shudder, and thought of the things she would have to say to Strongheart once this was over and the sour sweat of fear had dried. This was not for food, nor was it for the safety of the pack, this was something else! Something beyond her meager experience of the pack. She would demand an explanation from Strongheart.

He and his companions danced expertly with the bear, baiting it, holding it, positioning it. Strongheart directed and protected. He sent One Eye against the bear in such a way as to protect him from his own blindness, then exposed Littlefoot to less frontal attack, taking into account her weakness: the deformed back foot. They worked smoothly, as a team. And Tanith was one of the pack, expected to do her part or the functioning of the pack would collapse, bringing disaster.

All right! So be it! Her finely conditioned body hummed with expectation as she rushed the bear’s blind side, the wind carrying his noisome scent to her nostrils but not hers to his. Leverage, surprise and power. She had to use them all and use them fast. Despite years of training and the experience of having faced deadly adversaries, her belly churned and her mouth soured as she launched herself.

She went in swiftly from behind as Strongheart directed the diversion in front. She hit the massive bear with all her strength, clipping him just behind the knees, and slashed downward tearing the hamstring of the leg nearest her with her digging knife. Blood spurted hot and sticky. The bear gave a thunderous roar and began a long, slow, collapse. Tanith’s heart convulsed. It didn’t appear she was going to make it clear. She sent a brief prayer to the Goddess. If she died now she will have failed. Her quest to regain the amulet would be ended. Something flashed past her.

Strongheart plowed in. Everything started to come apart. Jaws agape, canines flashing wetly in the bright afternoon light, he dove for the bear’s throat, leaping over Tanith in a cannonball assault. She witnessed the rest in a blur. Wolf charging. Bear falling. Those terrible sickle-like bear claws swinging in a wide arch. She ached, her bones fairly shrieked with the knowledge it was going to be a close thing, a very close thing indeed.

The ground leapt up to slam into her shoulder and hip as Tanith pressed away. No good! Not fast enough! She flailed as an icy finger of near panic caressed the length of her spine and the bear’s heavy paw passed so close claws caught her in a glancing swipe. Fired ice followed the course of the bear’s claws running up her left breast and over her shoulder. A numbing shiver rippled through her body. Despite the muted power of the swipe of that great paw, it delivered hot agony. Tanith kept moving; tumbled, tumbled, clutched in vain at shrubby grasses and rolled clear. She heard, more than saw, Strongheart take the bear’s throat in a single savage pass.

Gurgling sounds bubbled from the bear’s torn throat as he thrashed wildly, tearing up the fragrant grasses in his death throes, bringing Tanith’s earlier meal to her throat in a much less pleasant form than the one it had been consumed in. His throat gone, the mortally wounded bear could not even roar his agony and anger. A ground-shaking tremor, a deep wheeze and then silence. Profound and complete.

Tanith rolled slowly over onto her back, stared up into the incredible blue of the sky’s vastness and in her heart asked the deities of this world for their forgiveness in the taking of this bear’s life.

She gave a quick glance up at Strongheart who had come to plunk himself down at her side, panting heavily, reeking of bear and blood. He looked down at her sprawled in the grass from his elevated, sitting position and gave her a quizzical look, tongue lolling from his mouth.

His mind touched hers, telegraphing thoughts.
Why do you feel you need forgiveness for making the only choice for a being of flesh . . . ?

Tanith breathed heavily, willing the incredible tension of battle to drain away from her body into the cool earth beneath her back. It took a little time for the pounding roar of her blood to calm so she could consider Strongheart’s question.

“It was not by my choice, it was yours—and we destroyed a living thing by it. For what?”

In defense of another living thing—choices all choices. To live in the world of flesh, choices must be made.

Tanith sighed. “Are you going to confuse my life further by becoming a philosopher as well as bond-mate?”

Strongheart panted a little less heavily, expelled a forceful breath and licked his nose with a quick swirl of pink tongue.
I was what I was before the pack was joined
.

Tanith rolled to her knees, slowly. It wasn’t every day one tackled a bear with success and everything seemed to hurt. Tanith swept straggling hair back from her face and had a look around. “Well, good. Great. Me, too, but looking back I’m not sure what that was, so give me some time to get the hang of this, all right? How are the others? Any damage?”

All is well.
The softness of Littlefoot, at about eighty pounds, the smallest of the pack. She was nursing a deep, bloody furrow across her shoulder.

I will live.
This from One Eye, limping badly, but unperturbed.

Only the man needs your help now
. Strongheart was on his feet, first shaking out his matted pelt with great vigor, then moving toward the man sprawled only a few feet from the dead bear. There was not so much difference between them save the fact the man breathed.

“And if he is enemy . . . ?”

Strongheart, a little disgusted.
He is not
.
Enemy is dead. They fought . . . there . . . in the trees . . . it is what awakened bear and drew his anger.

Gaining her feet in one graceful movement, catching a stitch in her shoulder where the bear had grazed her, Tanith went to the fallen man and quickly checked on his condition. It was not good. The bear had done a thorough job on him. His hide had been almost flayed from his back. And there was another bloody wound in his side that had nothing to do with the bear, not to mention a lump on his head whose origin was anybody’s guess.

“We’ve got to get him away from here and back to where I can take care of him,” Tanith murmured to herself. And that was going to take some doing for this was no small man.

Working swiftly she did the best she could to stem the copious flow of blood. The sight of so much of it turned her stomach and she glanced toward the wolves.

Strongheart, Littlefoot and One Eye waited patiently near her, ready to return home. Tanith had yet to become proficient in this sort of thing since her landing in Nashira, but she could manage. It just took a little more time than she liked. This so-called Non-Enemy could die while she was wasting precious time out here trying to formulate a way to transport him back to her camp. It might be more efficient to just move her camp to him. But, no, her camp was well placed. Here they would be too exposed. There were still the slave traders to worry about. They might not be too interested in the man except perhaps to shoot him, but she knew only too well she would draw their attention. And, at the moment, she was certainly not eager to join a pitched battle with herself as the prize.

She left the man long enough to throw together a make-shift traveler that came out looking something like a bough bed with a double-pole extending in front with which to drag it.

Her task complete, Tanith flinched at the burning across her breast caused by the wound and glanced down at her ill-deserved patient. He was still unconscious, dead weight, and he had fallen on his belly, plainly in unconscious defense of his mangled back. Still, considering the agony being on his back would undoubtedly cause him, Tanith had planned on transporting him on his belly. She was a strong woman, but she couldn’t lift him, so she would have to roll him onto the traveler.

She positioned the conveyance and spoke softly to the man. “Sorry, one extra jolt. You’re not exactly going to be much help so we’ll have to do it my way.”

Bracing herself on her knees she rolled him onto his back, drawing from him a hoarse moan made all the more poignant by the fact that she would have bet he would have bloodied his mouth to bite back that tearing sound, had he been conscious. She didn’t wait, but rolled him a second time so he wound up where she wanted him, belly-down across the traveler.

He drew a deep sigh.

“You’re welcome.” She slanted a look at the big silver wolf. “Strongheart . . .”

She did not have to finish. With a yawn, Strongheart joined her at the front of the traveler and ducked his head into the loop she held in readiness. Then he leaned massive shoulders into the supple branch, testing it. Picking up her end, Tanith started out for home, sharing the burden of the litter in tandem with Strongheart. Littlefoot and One Eye fell in behind.

They covered the ground much more quickly than Tanith would have imagined. Even so, it was slow going and hard work. She was going to have aches and blisters and it would be some time yet before she could tend her own wound.

“Great stars and blisters the man is heavy,” was Tanith’s only complaint, and that came as they neared her permanent camp, Strongheart solid at her side.

You would find me no less heavy were you to carry me in such a manner alone.
Strongheart’s subtle reminder that he shared the burden. This despite the fact he seemed not the least bit hampered by it.

“You would be worth it,” Tanith shot back. “I’m not so sure he is.”

They stopped below her camp, on the greensward forming a half-moon at its base. Strongheart ducked out of his harness while Tanith rotated her aching shoulder and looked down at her patient. It would be flat impossible to get him up above to the cave so she resigned herself to playing nursemaid here below. At least she would have access to her supplies and the site was sheltered, concealed, protected. The wolves were nursing their own minor wounds, so she was left with the man.

She didn’t bother to roll him from the traveler since it would subject him to another stiff jolt. All his serious wounds were in his back—including the one in his side which the bear had had no part in inflicting.

Tanith hurried up to the cave carved out of the pale blue stone of the cliff looming high above. The climb was steep, but not so steep as to prevent the wolves from ascending the nearly invisible path.

She collected everything she would need in only a few moments, a hundred thoughts trying to cram their way into her head while she focused on channeling her energies into helping this pseudo-friend, possible-enemy, with whom Strongheart was so taken.

The sun was moving toward darkness with its usual swift transition when Tanith descended, arms laden with medical supplies and a light generator. She set up the small portable light, activated it and dropped the other supplies nearby. Very few technologies had survived her craft’s somewhat rough arrival in Nashira and after having spent considerable time here they seemed incongruous with the springy mat of fragrant grasses they now lay upon. Indeed, they didn’t meld well even with the more newly acquired plant medicines in her small medical kit either.

Neither was she a doctor though she’d had some tutoring in basic medical assistance during her training as a Janissary—a custodian/protector. She gave her approach to the bloody mass, which bore some little resemblance to a man’s back, a few moment’s consideration. She had to use her more advanced supplies wisely. There would be no more until she left Nashira to return to her Antaris home. No more, unless the ship this man had arrived in was fully supplied and equipped. One look at his face was enough to tell her he had to have come to Nashira in a ship—just as had the other man, now dead. Neither was one of The People. Ships . . . supplies . . . She chided herself for thinking of permanence when she should be planning a departure. The presence of ships would provide the means once she found the amulet for which she searched.
That
was what she should be thinking of, not how to remain longer.

Tanith frowned and cast Strongheart a sidelong look. The wolves had certainly complicated her life though she did not object to them—as did this man lying so helpless on the ground ñ and she certainly did object to him. She would have to use most of the good stuff she had left for him. The silver wolf met her gaze, gave her the equivalent of a wolf-like shrug then lay down nearby as if that was his way of lending assistance.
 

She sighed. She would have to use the tape that could seal a wound yet allow it to breathe on the worst of the rent flesh. For the smaller wounds she would have to use old-fashioned stitches, a process that made her skin crawl in sympathy. First she’d have to clean the whole mess—and it really was a mess.

Tanith opened the bottle of plant wash she had distilled for the sterilizing of wounds. It was not of her technologies, but at least it did as good a job and, thank the goddess, was easily replenished.

“Well,” she murmured, casting Strongheart one last glance as she spoke to her inert patient, “Strongheart seems to think you’re worth all this. You better be.”

She was hunched over his back, holding a cloth soaked in plant distillate when the words drifted softly to her ears.

“I am.”

By the blue moon of Nashira the man spoke! He could hear her!

Flustered, Tanith snapped back. “You are what?” Her tone of voice was not especially apropos of the sick and injured.

“Worth it,” A sigh, barely words. Then, amazingly, a smile before he settled back into unconsciousness.