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FIFTEEN

They left the “road,” which had been angling southeast, and held eastward, pressing now at Achikh’s urging. One never knew, he said, how early the first heavy snow would come to the high mountains. Or if it came particularly early, whether it would melt or stay. Each day they broke camp at dawn and rode till dusk or dark. They walked infrequently, making good use of their remounts, and avoided herdsmen’s camps as much as they could without major sacrifice of time. So far the Kazakhs hadn’t been hostile, but the danger was there.
They made no morning or noon fire, eating leftover marmot for breakfast as they rode, with curds and semi-liquid airag at their midday break. Most mornings were cold now. Sometimes there was frost on the grass, and one morning slivers of ice on the edge of the waterhole they’d camped by.
But except for a three-day span of showers that were not especially cold, the days were bright and warm, and virtually cloudless. The diet no longer bothered Baver, and the occasional diarrhea he’d been troubled with, early in their trek, was long past. He found himself enjoying this part of the journey, despite getting up and breaking camp in the morning chill.
From time to time he wondered about Nikko and Matthew, but now without frustration. He’d become somewhat fatalistic; he’d get back to them when Nils did, if Nils did. Meanwhile there were further lessons in Achikh’s language and in wildland ecology. It seemed that Nils and Hans understood the steppes nearly as well as they did their forests, as if the same principles operated in both. The landforms, the orientation of streams, had more meaning for Baver now. Actually he’d known much about them before. His problem had been in relating the information to the reality around him.
Now it seemed to him that if he found himself alone here, he might well make his way back to the country of the Northmen by himself, though he’d have to beg his food.
The country had been unusually flat for a time, and they made excellent progress. Now it became rolling, and judging from the direction of stream flow, they were gradually climbing. One day as they topped a hill, he glimpsed distant mountains, a faint bluish line peeking over the horizon of tawny, early autumn grass. The next day he watched them grow, slowly but clearly. That afternoon, crossing a small ravine, the travelers found scrubby pines on the northeast-facing slope, the first pines they’d seen since leaving the Balkans. By sundown the mountains, though still far off, were near enough to show snowfields near the crest.
The next day Achikh changed direction, angling more to the north, putting the mountains somewhat off his right shoulder. Still they grew gradually nearer. Occasional other ravines had pines now. A couple of days later, the mountains, the Altai, lined the eastern distance as far as one could see to north and south.
Far to the north, they could just see a high snowpeak that Achikh judged was three days ride ahead. This peak, he said, must be Belukha, the great mountain that Shakir had told them of. They’d cross the Altai to the north of it.
The next day they topped a rise to see a broad basin in front of them. Near its center, perhaps four kilometers away, lay an extensive camp of round felt tents, several times as many as in Shakir’s camp. Bands of cattle grazed the basin’s bottom and slopes, tended by men on horseback. Achikh swore, and gestured the others back, joining them behind the hillcrest a minute later.
“They are Kalmuls,” he said. “Their tents are laid out in the Mongol way. I didn’t think they’d be so far this side of the mountains.”
They turned southeast then, keeping the crest between themselves and the basin. “Why should we fear the Kalmuls more than we do the Kazakhs?” Baver asked.
“The Kalmuls are thieves,” Achikh said. “Not just in time of need, but always. It is their way. It is also their way to kill those they rob. And always they encroach, if they see the chance. If some Kazakh band was grazing this area this year, the Kalmul scouts would have told their chief, and they would have stayed away. Next year they will probably leave, expecting the Kazakhs to learn of them by then.”
Baver shivered. “And if they knew we were here, they’d kill us?”
Achikh grunted a yes. “And with a camp this large, we’re likely to find more of them. Side-camps at least. We’ll go straight toward the mountains, ride till dark, and ride again when the moon rises. When we get to the foothills, we’ll turn north through the forest. It will slow us, but . . . ” He shrugged.
“What will we do if they see us?” Baver asked.
“Keep riding. If there are only a few, they may not attack us. And they may decide we are not worth a day’s ride, or half a day’s, to get help.”
Achikh pulled ahead of them then, pausing near the top of every hill to dismount, crawl to the crest, and see what lay on the other side. When they were well past the basin, they swung due east toward the mountains. It was necessary then to cross the narrow valley that, northwestward, opened into it. Achikh lay longer than usual, observing, before remounting and leading them on. There were patches of pinewoods on the slope they rode down, and they avoided talking; Kalmul warriors might be within hearing, unseen among trees.
The mountains were conspicuously nearer by sunset. Forests clothed their foothills and lower slopes, dark blue-gray with distance. Their higher shoulders were lighter gray—alpine tundra—while the farther, higher ridges and peaks showed dark gray stone, with crescents and patches and stringers of last winter’s snow. Belukha reared to the north, head and shoulders above the others.
They rode till twilight, then camped beside a brook in the cover of trees. They made no fire, pitched no tent.
The moon, a sickle, rose somewhat after midnight, and they rose with it. Before they left, Achikh had them take their axes from the packhorses and lash them to saddle rings. “Why?” Baver asked.
‘We may be chased.”
“But—the axes add weight! They’ll slow our horses!”
“If we’re chased closely, we’ll lose our packhorses. And to be in the forest in winter without axes . . . We’d be better off caught.”
It seemed to Baver they’d be better off to carry their bedrolls then, but he said no more about it. They left, breakfasting on airag, passing the bag around as they rode. By sunup the foothills were noticeably nearer. By afternoon the hills they rode over were steeper and more broken, their east slopes more forest than not. After a short while they came to a valley with a small stream that ran southwest among groves of poplars, pine, and aspen. Achikh turned them upstream, riding the hillcrest.
They’d continued a few kilometers when Achikh saw the leather tents of a travel camp, hidden from them till then by trees. He hissed a warning, and motioned them back from the crest.
“Do you think they saw you?” Baver murmured.
The big shoulders shrugged. “If I was, then there’s no one there except a slave or two keeping camp. Otherwise we would have heard them. I saw four tents, but there may be more.”
“Four tents? How many people would that mean?”
“More than twelve; perhaps as many as twenty. It’s usual to sleep four or five in each, as we do.”
They rode on then, seldom stopping but never hurrying, the Buriat and the two Northmen watching and listening constantly. Baver too was mostly alert, woolgathering only occasionally.
Near sunset, as they approached the crest of a hill, a band of Kalmuls crossed it the better part of a kilometer to their right. Both parties saw each other at the same time, and the Kalmuls started toward them at once, galloping, whooping warcries. Achikh thumped his heels against his horse s ribs and sent it running over the crest, the others following, angling down the other side.
As they’d crossed the crest, Achikh, Nils and Hans had looked back. More than a dozen Kalmuls were in noisy pursuit. Several others, slaves, had stayed behind with the Kalmuls’ pack animals, which were loaded with wild game; it was a hunting party. They’d glimpsed antlers of elk and moose, then saw no more of them, for there was open forest on this side of the ridge, and they had entered among the trees.
In the openings, the humps and holes of pocket gophers were numerous. Rocks stuck up from the ground, and there were fallen trees to jump over. It seemed to Baver that his horse, at a full gallop, was in imminent danger of going down, pitching him headlong.
It was impossible now to see their pursuers, to know whether or not they were gaining, but Baver had no doubt they were. On him at least. For he was falling behind the others, even behind Nils, whose weight must surely slow his horse. He knew the others would be kicking and urging their horses to as much speed as they could get from them. He, on the other hand, was holding on desperately, not urging at all, doing his best not to fall off. He’d ridden thousands of kilometers since he’d left the ting ground, but none of it at a full gallop. His horse left the ground, clearing a fallen pine, and landed with a jar that nearly unloaded him.
Soon he passed the two pack horses, and saw the remount string veer off downslope. Perhaps, he thought, the Kalmuls would see them, and stop to capture them, but he put no faith in it. Then even Nils was out of sight ahead, and Baver, in desperation, put his heels to his horse after all.
After a kilometer more, his mind began to function. He was impressed at how his mount kept galloping. They’d been angling downslope continuously. Now he was leveling off, pounding along near the bottom as he entered a glade. The ravine had narrowed, and ahead narrowed more, its sides steep, the near side almost precipitous. At the far edge of the glade, he saw Nils and his horse disappear into denser forest, dense enough that it seemed suicidal to enter it at a gallop.
Seemingly Baver’s horse agreed; it slowed perceptibly as it drove toward the thick growth of trees. As it plunged into them on the game trail they’d been following, they passed Nils standing behind a high-jutting rock, sword in both hands. Baver slowed his horse sharply, managing not to lose his seat, and drew to one side behind a dense growth of young pines. It was dim there; the hour was sunset, and they were among trees, deep in the bottom of the ravine. His hand found his pistol, drew it and released the safety. Then he simply sat his horse, peering through a gap in the trunks, back along the trail.
Sooner than he’d expected, the first of the Kalmuls thundered in amongst the trees. Nils had drawn himself back out of sight, and to Baver’s dismay let the first two horsemen thunder past. He found his pistol pointing, and as the first of the Kalmuls raised his sword, shot him from the saddle, the horse galloping by so near, Baver’s mount shied. The next Kalmul, not prepared to face an attack by miniature thunderclap, drew up, the horse rearing, and Baver shot again. This bullet hit the animal under the jaw and drove up into its brain. It went over backward onto its rider, who screamed. Baver’s pistol banged again, and the scream cut off abruptly. Another horse had charged up riderless, leaped the fallen horse, and ran on.
Baver wasn’t sure how many rounds he’d fired, how many he had left. He looked toward Nils. A horse was down there too. Nils had cut the forelegs from under it and was in the process of dispatching its rider. Another Kalmul lay nearly cut in two beside the trail. Baver could hear shouted Mongol, back in the opening, but the string of charging warriors seemed to have paused. Then, sword sheathed, Nils surged through the thicket of young pines and began clambering up the steep near-precipice behind him, half hidden by its trees. Without stopping, he glanced back at Baver and shouted one word: “Ride!”
Baver took time to holster his gun—he needed both hands to ride at a gallop—then turned his horse and rode.
He’d gone less than a hundred meters when he saw Hans coming back. “Go!” Baver shouted. “Nils said ride!” Then he was past the young Northman, who hesitated a moment, then turned and followed, catching up and staying close behind. Behind the thudding of their own horses’ hooves, Baver could hear others following now, and suddenly Hans’s horse screamed. The sound added speed to Baver’s, and there was Achikh, sitting his horse behind a great boulder, bow in hand and arrow nocked as Baver galloped past.
Without thinking, Baver drew back his reins. His horse stopped more quickly than he’d expected, and he ended up on its neck, clutching. Dropping to the ground, he knelt behind a thick-boled pine. There was a shout, then another, as Kalmuls poured into sight not forty meters off. One plunged from the saddle, an arrow in his chest. The others reined in their horses and drew their swords. With both hands Baver leveled his pistol, the way he’d done on the range in training, but more quickly. And fired. The round banged loudly, and one of the Kalmuls half fell, losing his sword, clutching at shoulder or neck.
Changing targets, Baver shot at another, and with the sound, this man fell backward, sliding off his horse’s rump, one foot hanging for a moment in a stirrup. The others hesitated for just a moment, then Achikh sent an arrow into another, and he too went down.
The other two turned their horses and charged back the way they’d come.
Baver stood watching after them, immobilized by the realization that he had killed—at least wounded—four human beings. And felt no shock or guilt at it! He wasn’t quite sure how to take this latter fact.
Two high soaring ravens had watched the chase with interest. Beneath their individual awareness, ravens have something of a hive intelligence. Thus they knew, from the experience of others, that men pursuing men often means death to men and horses, and food for ravens. They are scavengers who find their food by sight, not scent, and have superb vision. They are also very curious, noticing the incidental as well as the important. They were aware, for instance, that one of the humans was exceptionally large and had unusual hair, with long, straw-colored braids.
Even their sharp eyes couldn’t make out what went on beneath the thicker growth of pines, but they heard an unusual booming sound that repeated, heard a horse scream, and another. Men and horses drew up in the opening, then two turned back to where their horses could begin picking their way up the steep slope. After a minute s hesitation, the other horses charged on into the forest growth.
The great black birds began to circle downward to investigate more closely, croaking loudly in their deep harsh voices. Finally they perched in the top of a pine, peering down between the branches. There were bodies on the ground, of men and horses. Another human stood on the trail with arrow nocked and ready, watching the big, yellow-haired man climb the slope above. He shot just one arrow; it rattled and fell among the dense young pines on the slope. Then the bowman settled back to watch and wait.
There were more booms farther along the ravine.
The watching ravens continued to call. Another, near the edge of hearing, passed the report on, both the simple cry and the mental imagery beneath it. Except for the fallen men and horses though, it meant little to the birds.
A few minutes later, the Kalmul riders who’d ridden on, came back to where they’d first been ambushed. By now dusk was definitely settling, and the refugee on the slope was lost to their sight among rocks and trees. They counseled briefly, then called to those who’d climbed their horses to the ridgetop to cut off the refugee’s escape. There was a moment’s exchange of shouts, then they all started back the way they’d come, back to their cohorts who’d been told off to collect the pack horses and remounts. They’d lost nine men and three horses—Choban would be enraged by that—but at least they wouldn’t return to camp empty-handed.
And obviously the people they’d chased were not entirely human. The one, the giant, had yellow hair! And equally obvious, they had a very strong kam with them, a powerful shaman who made small thunders to kill with. And anyone with any sense at all feared thunder. With luck, then, Choban would settle for the horses, and not send them out to track these people down.

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FIFTEEN

They left the “road,” which had been angling southeast, and held eastward, pressing now at Achikh’s urging. One never knew, he said, how early the first heavy snow would come to the high mountains. Or if it came particularly early, whether it would melt or stay. Each day they broke camp at dawn and rode till dusk or dark. They walked infrequently, making good use of their remounts, and avoided herdsmen’s camps as much as they could without major sacrifice of time. So far the Kazakhs hadn’t been hostile, but the danger was there.
They made no morning or noon fire, eating leftover marmot for breakfast as they rode, with curds and semi-liquid airag at their midday break. Most mornings were cold now. Sometimes there was frost on the grass, and one morning slivers of ice on the edge of the waterhole they’d camped by.
But except for a three-day span of showers that were not especially cold, the days were bright and warm, and virtually cloudless. The diet no longer bothered Baver, and the occasional diarrhea he’d been troubled with, early in their trek, was long past. He found himself enjoying this part of the journey, despite getting up and breaking camp in the morning chill.
From time to time he wondered about Nikko and Matthew, but now without frustration. He’d become somewhat fatalistic; he’d get back to them when Nils did, if Nils did. Meanwhile there were further lessons in Achikh’s language and in wildland ecology. It seemed that Nils and Hans understood the steppes nearly as well as they did their forests, as if the same principles operated in both. The landforms, the orientation of streams, had more meaning for Baver now. Actually he’d known much about them before. His problem had been in relating the information to the reality around him.
Now it seemed to him that if he found himself alone here, he might well make his way back to the country of the Northmen by himself, though he’d have to beg his food.
The country had been unusually flat for a time, and they made excellent progress. Now it became rolling, and judging from the direction of stream flow, they were gradually climbing. One day as they topped a hill, he glimpsed distant mountains, a faint bluish line peeking over the horizon of tawny, early autumn grass. The next day he watched them grow, slowly but clearly. That afternoon, crossing a small ravine, the travelers found scrubby pines on the northeast-facing slope, the first pines they’d seen since leaving the Balkans. By sundown the mountains, though still far off, were near enough to show snowfields near the crest.
The next day Achikh changed direction, angling more to the north, putting the mountains somewhat off his right shoulder. Still they grew gradually nearer. Occasional other ravines had pines now. A couple of days later, the mountains, the Altai, lined the eastern distance as far as one could see to north and south.
Far to the north, they could just see a high snowpeak that Achikh judged was three days ride ahead. This peak, he said, must be Belukha, the great mountain that Shakir had told them of. They’d cross the Altai to the north of it.
The next day they topped a rise to see a broad basin in front of them. Near its center, perhaps four kilometers away, lay an extensive camp of round felt tents, several times as many as in Shakir’s camp. Bands of cattle grazed the basin’s bottom and slopes, tended by men on horseback. Achikh swore, and gestured the others back, joining them behind the hillcrest a minute later.
“They are Kalmuls,” he said. “Their tents are laid out in the Mongol way. I didn’t think they’d be so far this side of the mountains.”
They turned southeast then, keeping the crest between themselves and the basin. “Why should we fear the Kalmuls more than we do the Kazakhs?” Baver asked.
“The Kalmuls are thieves,” Achikh said. “Not just in time of need, but always. It is their way. It is also their way to kill those they rob. And always they encroach, if they see the chance. If some Kazakh band was grazing this area this year, the Kalmul scouts would have told their chief, and they would have stayed away. Next year they will probably leave, expecting the Kazakhs to learn of them by then.”
Baver shivered. “And if they knew we were here, they’d kill us?”
Achikh grunted a yes. “And with a camp this large, we’re likely to find more of them. Side-camps at least. We’ll go straight toward the mountains, ride till dark, and ride again when the moon rises. When we get to the foothills, we’ll turn north through the forest. It will slow us, but . . . ” He shrugged.
“What will we do if they see us?” Baver asked.
“Keep riding. If there are only a few, they may not attack us. And they may decide we are not worth a day’s ride, or half a day’s, to get help.”
Achikh pulled ahead of them then, pausing near the top of every hill to dismount, crawl to the crest, and see what lay on the other side. When they were well past the basin, they swung due east toward the mountains. It was necessary then to cross the narrow valley that, northwestward, opened into it. Achikh lay longer than usual, observing, before remounting and leading them on. There were patches of pinewoods on the slope they rode down, and they avoided talking; Kalmul warriors might be within hearing, unseen among trees.
The mountains were conspicuously nearer by sunset. Forests clothed their foothills and lower slopes, dark blue-gray with distance. Their higher shoulders were lighter gray—alpine tundra—while the farther, higher ridges and peaks showed dark gray stone, with crescents and patches and stringers of last winter’s snow. Belukha reared to the north, head and shoulders above the others.
They rode till twilight, then camped beside a brook in the cover of trees. They made no fire, pitched no tent.
The moon, a sickle, rose somewhat after midnight, and they rose with it. Before they left, Achikh had them take their axes from the packhorses and lash them to saddle rings. “Why?” Baver asked.
‘We may be chased.”
“But—the axes add weight! They’ll slow our horses!”
“If we’re chased closely, we’ll lose our packhorses. And to be in the forest in winter without axes . . . We’d be better off caught.”
It seemed to Baver they’d be better off to carry their bedrolls then, but he said no more about it. They left, breakfasting on airag, passing the bag around as they rode. By sunup the foothills were noticeably nearer. By afternoon the hills they rode over were steeper and more broken, their east slopes more forest than not. After a short while they came to a valley with a small stream that ran southwest among groves of poplars, pine, and aspen. Achikh turned them upstream, riding the hillcrest.
They’d continued a few kilometers when Achikh saw the leather tents of a travel camp, hidden from them till then by trees. He hissed a warning, and motioned them back from the crest.
“Do you think they saw you?” Baver murmured.
The big shoulders shrugged. “If I was, then there’s no one there except a slave or two keeping camp. Otherwise we would have heard them. I saw four tents, but there may be more.”
“Four tents? How many people would that mean?”
“More than twelve; perhaps as many as twenty. It’s usual to sleep four or five in each, as we do.”
They rode on then, seldom stopping but never hurrying, the Buriat and the two Northmen watching and listening constantly. Baver too was mostly alert, woolgathering only occasionally.
Near sunset, as they approached the crest of a hill, a band of Kalmuls crossed it the better part of a kilometer to their right. Both parties saw each other at the same time, and the Kalmuls started toward them at once, galloping, whooping warcries. Achikh thumped his heels against his horse s ribs and sent it running over the crest, the others following, angling down the other side.
As they’d crossed the crest, Achikh, Nils and Hans had looked back. More than a dozen Kalmuls were in noisy pursuit. Several others, slaves, had stayed behind with the Kalmuls’ pack animals, which were loaded with wild game; it was a hunting party. They’d glimpsed antlers of elk and moose, then saw no more of them, for there was open forest on this side of the ridge, and they had entered among the trees.
In the openings, the humps and holes of pocket gophers were numerous. Rocks stuck up from the ground, and there were fallen trees to jump over. It seemed to Baver that his horse, at a full gallop, was in imminent danger of going down, pitching him headlong.
It was impossible now to see their pursuers, to know whether or not they were gaining, but Baver had no doubt they were. On him at least. For he was falling behind the others, even behind Nils, whose weight must surely slow his horse. He knew the others would be kicking and urging their horses to as much speed as they could get from them. He, on the other hand, was holding on desperately, not urging at all, doing his best not to fall off. He’d ridden thousands of kilometers since he’d left the ting ground, but none of it at a full gallop. His horse left the ground, clearing a fallen pine, and landed with a jar that nearly unloaded him.
Soon he passed the two pack horses, and saw the remount string veer off downslope. Perhaps, he thought, the Kalmuls would see them, and stop to capture them, but he put no faith in it. Then even Nils was out of sight ahead, and Baver, in desperation, put his heels to his horse after all.
After a kilometer more, his mind began to function. He was impressed at how his mount kept galloping. They’d been angling downslope continuously. Now he was leveling off, pounding along near the bottom as he entered a glade. The ravine had narrowed, and ahead narrowed more, its sides steep, the near side almost precipitous. At the far edge of the glade, he saw Nils and his horse disappear into denser forest, dense enough that it seemed suicidal to enter it at a gallop.
Seemingly Baver’s horse agreed; it slowed perceptibly as it drove toward the thick growth of trees. As it plunged into them on the game trail they’d been following, they passed Nils standing behind a high-jutting rock, sword in both hands. Baver slowed his horse sharply, managing not to lose his seat, and drew to one side behind a dense growth of young pines. It was dim there; the hour was sunset, and they were among trees, deep in the bottom of the ravine. His hand found his pistol, drew it and released the safety. Then he simply sat his horse, peering through a gap in the trunks, back along the trail.
Sooner than he’d expected, the first of the Kalmuls thundered in amongst the trees. Nils had drawn himself back out of sight, and to Baver’s dismay let the first two horsemen thunder past. He found his pistol pointing, and as the first of the Kalmuls raised his sword, shot him from the saddle, the horse galloping by so near, Baver’s mount shied. The next Kalmul, not prepared to face an attack by miniature thunderclap, drew up, the horse rearing, and Baver shot again. This bullet hit the animal under the jaw and drove up into its brain. It went over backward onto its rider, who screamed. Baver’s pistol banged again, and the scream cut off abruptly. Another horse had charged up riderless, leaped the fallen horse, and ran on.
Baver wasn’t sure how many rounds he’d fired, how many he had left. He looked toward Nils. A horse was down there too. Nils had cut the forelegs from under it and was in the process of dispatching its rider. Another Kalmul lay nearly cut in two beside the trail. Baver could hear shouted Mongol, back in the opening, but the string of charging warriors seemed to have paused. Then, sword sheathed, Nils surged through the thicket of young pines and began clambering up the steep near-precipice behind him, half hidden by its trees. Without stopping, he glanced back at Baver and shouted one word: “Ride!”
Baver took time to holster his gun—he needed both hands to ride at a gallop—then turned his horse and rode.
He’d gone less than a hundred meters when he saw Hans coming back. “Go!” Baver shouted. “Nils said ride!” Then he was past the young Northman, who hesitated a moment, then turned and followed, catching up and staying close behind. Behind the thudding of their own horses’ hooves, Baver could hear others following now, and suddenly Hans’s horse screamed. The sound added speed to Baver’s, and there was Achikh, sitting his horse behind a great boulder, bow in hand and arrow nocked as Baver galloped past.
Without thinking, Baver drew back his reins. His horse stopped more quickly than he’d expected, and he ended up on its neck, clutching. Dropping to the ground, he knelt behind a thick-boled pine. There was a shout, then another, as Kalmuls poured into sight not forty meters off. One plunged from the saddle, an arrow in his chest. The others reined in their horses and drew their swords. With both hands Baver leveled his pistol, the way he’d done on the range in training, but more quickly. And fired. The round banged loudly, and one of the Kalmuls half fell, losing his sword, clutching at shoulder or neck.
Changing targets, Baver shot at another, and with the sound, this man fell backward, sliding off his horse’s rump, one foot hanging for a moment in a stirrup. The others hesitated for just a moment, then Achikh sent an arrow into another, and he too went down.
The other two turned their horses and charged back the way they’d come.
Baver stood watching after them, immobilized by the realization that he had killed—at least wounded—four human beings. And felt no shock or guilt at it! He wasn’t quite sure how to take this latter fact.
Two high soaring ravens had watched the chase with interest. Beneath their individual awareness, ravens have something of a hive intelligence. Thus they knew, from the experience of others, that men pursuing men often means death to men and horses, and food for ravens. They are scavengers who find their food by sight, not scent, and have superb vision. They are also very curious, noticing the incidental as well as the important. They were aware, for instance, that one of the humans was exceptionally large and had unusual hair, with long, straw-colored braids.
Even their sharp eyes couldn’t make out what went on beneath the thicker growth of pines, but they heard an unusual booming sound that repeated, heard a horse scream, and another. Men and horses drew up in the opening, then two turned back to where their horses could begin picking their way up the steep slope. After a minute s hesitation, the other horses charged on into the forest growth.
The great black birds began to circle downward to investigate more closely, croaking loudly in their deep harsh voices. Finally they perched in the top of a pine, peering down between the branches. There were bodies on the ground, of men and horses. Another human stood on the trail with arrow nocked and ready, watching the big, yellow-haired man climb the slope above. He shot just one arrow; it rattled and fell among the dense young pines on the slope. Then the bowman settled back to watch and wait.
There were more booms farther along the ravine.
The watching ravens continued to call. Another, near the edge of hearing, passed the report on, both the simple cry and the mental imagery beneath it. Except for the fallen men and horses though, it meant little to the birds.
A few minutes later, the Kalmul riders who’d ridden on, came back to where they’d first been ambushed. By now dusk was definitely settling, and the refugee on the slope was lost to their sight among rocks and trees. They counseled briefly, then called to those who’d climbed their horses to the ridgetop to cut off the refugee’s escape. There was a moment’s exchange of shouts, then they all started back the way they’d come, back to their cohorts who’d been told off to collect the pack horses and remounts. They’d lost nine men and three horses—Choban would be enraged by that—but at least they wouldn’t return to camp empty-handed.
And obviously the people they’d chased were not entirely human. The one, the giant, had yellow hair! And equally obvious, they had a very strong kam with them, a powerful shaman who made small thunders to kill with. And anyone with any sense at all feared thunder. With luck, then, Choban would settle for the horses, and not send them out to track these people down.

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