Part 23 (1/2)

She grinned in return.

”I'm to mention that Bafaro's son is available to carve the reply. I don't think they really believed my compet.i.tion,” he emphasized, ”would stay with one train long enough to do it herself.”

Nori shrugged. Few knew she had been doing Ell Tai's message rings since she was seventeen. She took no coin-the old Ell had done her more than one favor, so the carving wasn't listed as council duty, and she was careful to work in private. The only reason Jezeren knew her work, and she his, was that they had trained with the same master carver.

Nori had been drawn to the work from the beginning. The patterns seemed natural, as if she could see through the wood as she worked. That, and the slitted eyes that watched her thoughts seemed to approve of the patterns she carved. With the wolf so close in her mind, she didn't examine the patterns too carefully as she tucked the formal ring back into its pouch and snapped it onto her belt.

Jezeren's partner looked as if she wanted to speak, and the mirror man glanced at Nori's small bundle of books and said quickly, ”Are those the monthly trade?”

Nori nodded. ”Two cla.s.sics, one modern.” She handed them over and tried to avoid meeting his partner's gaze. The woman had already called her the Daughter of Dione, Jangharat, Black Wolf, and The Sudden on the stairs up to the tower. Jangharat, she understood. She'd earned the Tumuwen name, ”shadow of the forest,” years ago when scouting with her mother. But how the tower woman had ever heard that last rep-name, The Sudden, was beyond her. She dreaded going back down, where she could be obligated to a meal and an endless half hour of gossip. Instead, she hopped up on the message table and leaned her shoulders against the wall as if settling in. ”Tai's message master has always liked Landfall, ” she offered. ”Thought you might not mind a reread.”

The mirror man leaned back in his own chair. ”Aye, it's a good one. I always liked that scene with the third alien, myself.”

”It's alright,” Nori answered diffidently. ”My favorite is still the part where the wolves. .h.i.t ground the first time.”

”You mean the part where they scatter?”

”You know that wasn't a scatter,” she corrected. ”More of a loosing of the wolves. If you're willing?”

She gestured at the water bota.

”As you like.” He nodded. ”No, they scattered, Black Wolf. They were so far gone when they hit the trees, it was three days before any one of them was seen again.”

”Excuse me, maDione,” the tower woman interrupted. ”Would you like some tea or rou instead of plain water? We have some excellent brews down in the kitchen. We can talk more easily there, too, catch up on the news.”

”My thanks, but water is fine.” Nori barely glanced at her. ”I have to disagree,” she went on to Jezeren almost without pause. ”The Landers knew where the wolves were. That whole scene is an a.n.a.logy of freedom: to be loosed on an open world after a year and a half on a colony s.h.i.+p, paying aliens to haul them across hundreds of solar systems, only to dump them on the wrong planet, where they couldn't know if they could make it.”

”It's not freedom if you're still tethered to the landing site-”

”Which they weren't,” she answered. ”Except by their desire to remain together.”

”That's not an a.n.a.logy of freedom, but of the fear they had to overcome to spread out on the world.”

The tower woman resisted the urge to roll her eyes. ”Black Wolf,” she tried again. ”Perhaps you'd like to try some of the early roast? I'd be happy to serve you myself, perhaps find out what's happening in the pre-Test rounds?”

”Later, later.” Nori waved her away and continued, ”They feared nothing at that point that isn't always an issue on any colony planet. What were the dangers? What were the risks? They faced everything the moment they set foot down, and they didn't do it like timid mice, but in one fell swoop.”

”One fell swoop is right. They had eleven years before the Aiueven came down hard enough to kill off more than a third of the population. And again, I'd say that that isn't an a.n.a.logy of freedom, but a cautionary tale-”

The woman tapped her finger against her chair and tried once more to interrupt, but Kettre gave her a wry smile. ”We could be here a while,” she murmured. ”They can argue this story for hours.”

”You'd think the Wolfwalker's Daughter would have better things to do when she's riding tower duty,”

the woman said, a bit too sharply.

Kettre shrugged. ”I'd be happy to try the roast and the rou. You know-” She leaned in conspiratorily.

”-I was with the searchers who went out to find her when she left Ell Tai's train the other night.”

The woman's eyes gleamed. ”I'd love to hear all about it.”

Kettre winked at Nori, who pretended not to notice. ”. . . not until the end,” Nori went on as the other two women made their way down the stairs. ”That's when Sarro Duerr realizes what he has to do to buy the freedom they thought they had at Landfall-”

The lower door shut on the stairs. For a moment, there was silence in the tower room. Nori and Jezeren looked at each other. ”New partner?” Nori asked finally.

”Aye, out of Sidisport. Moons, but I thought she'd never leave.” He stood up. ”When she saw the Daughter of Dione riding in the courtyard, she just about tripped on her own pants to meet you.” He pulled a book off the shelf, bent the spines back, and eased a flattened roll of paper out of the gap between the covers.

Nori hopped off the table. ”So what have you got?”

Jezeren was all business now. ”The usual gossip, a few notes of interest. You'll want to check these.”

Nori looked the papers over as he shuffled them out for her. She copied two into her old, punctured scout book, then showed Jezeren some of her own recent notes. He compared them to his message log, then looked at the large map that was painted on the wall. ”There's been a lot of movement in that area,”

he murmured.

Nori nodded. ”Payne thinks something's up. Raiders, maybe. We have a couple Tamrani riding with us now. They're not saying anything, but they wouldn't be heading for the Ariyen council if something big hadn't disturbed them out of their Sidisport lairs.”

”I'll pa.s.s word to keep a sharp eye.”

She turned to the page with the raider code. ”Then there's this.”

He studied it closely. ”I've seen this before,” he said slowly.

”When?”

Her question had been sharp, and he glanced at her before answering. ”Not this exactly, but the form of it, and not through any tower traffic.” He looked out the window, thinking. ”Council meeting,” he recalled. ”Closed session, last year, early fall.” He glanced at her. ”This doesn't surprise you.”

”I thought it was the same. I was asked to watch for it on duty.” The tower man started to copy it down in his private book, but she stopped him. ”It's dangerous, Jezeren. I was warned two ninans ago, just before we set out for Shockton. Scouts are going missing when they go after samples like this.”

He regarded her thoughtfully. Then he nodded and turned back to the lines, setting them in memory instead. She knew he'd remember. He might not be able to tell a weed from a tree, but he could recall almost every message he'd ever seen.

She hesitated as she put the scout book away. She'd known him since they were children, but he was a man now. What did she really know of the person he'd become? And was it Rishte who made her more wary now, or the slitted eyes inside her mind that hated humankind? She shook both off and, watching Jezeren carefully, said, ”That miscount-the eight messages? I need to send the ninth myself. Coded, falsified origin.”

Jezeren looked over with a frown. Coded messages required a sender's name in the log. It was one of the ways the county made sure the towers weren't used by criminals to plan their raids and crimes.

Jezeren fingered the large tally book, then tilted his head, closed the book, and stepped away to the window. There he turned his back to her and stared silently out at the forest.

Nori didn't wait for him to change his mind. She moved swiftly to the northbound mirror, checked the light level, then took the flash handle and began flicking the shutters efficiently. She sent the watch code, waited the scant seconds for the answering ready signal, then began her message. Begin, begin, begin; priority high; message to Dione. And then the coded portion: Check all gear. Watch for worlags. Avar Avan. End, end, end.

She signed it with her Sikinya scout name, one that would tell her parents that the danger could be subtle and deadly. There were only ten or twelve people who knew that name, and all were family. She didn't use the wordplague, even in code; that would be something to speak of in person. She didn't specify a destination, either, just her mother's name. The towers always knew where to find the Wolfwalker Dione. They'd send the message fast.

When she finished, Jezeren turned and checked that the mirror was closed, then went to the tally book.

”How do you want it logged in?”

”Ell Tai's train, via a night rider.”

”You've taken care of that end?”