“Eat!” The goblin thrust a wad of hard wafers into Rap’s hand. They tasted like hay mixed with honey, but he was starved and chewed them greedily, crouching by the hearth.
Little Chicken had not eaten that day, either; he sat by the door and munched loudly, apparently finding the vicinity of the fireplace too warm for comfort. He also talked continuously with his mouth full, in his usual laconic phrases. ”Moon up. Go to Porcupine Totem. No rush now. Cheep-Cheep make good show. If Fledgling Down, not last so long.”
“How can you know that?” Rap asked, squirming. His farsight told him that Fledgling Down was already sitting on the platform, being hailed by whatever his new name was. He had recovered much faster than Rap had done.
“Good blood!” Little Chicken explained: Cheep-Cheep’s brother Sweet Nestling had lost to Raven Claw two winters before and had done very well, the best show in many years. “First dug out toenails,” he said. “No scream. Said `Thank you.’ Then hammer toes flat, one by one, with rocks. Said `Thank you.’ Much applause. Then—”
Rap had lost his appetite. “I don’t want to hear!” he squealed. For an instant the old mockery gleamed in Little Chicken’s eye.
“Then sharp stick from fire . . .” If Rap disliked hearing such barbarities even when they did not concern him personally, then here was a way to get back at him. So Little Chicken proceeded to narrate all of Sweet Nestling’s death agonies in meticulous detail. He spoke with great admiration, sounding sincerely regretful that he had not been allowed to try to better the performance, and watching Rap’s nauseated reaction with bitter joy. By the time the meal was over, Rap knew that Cheep-Cheep was already hanging in the middle of the lodge, waiting for his long ordeal to start. He must get out of range quickly.
“Let’s go,” he said, wondering if he would freeze to death before Cheep-Cheep died. “How many horses do we take?”
Little Chicken frowned. “No horses. Run.”
“Run all the way? No horses?”
“Horses?” Little Chicken spat. “Horses for babies and old women. Men run!”
Before Rap could argue, a handful of bear grease was pushed in his face. Little Chicken spread it with care, on Rap’s lips and eyelids and even on the insides of his nostrils. Then he adjusted Rap’s hood, pulling down and lacing a mask that Rap had not known existed, covering his face completely except for eye and nose holes. He did the same for himself and turned for the door, conversation now being almost impossible.
He was serious, obviously—they were going to run to the mountains. He began a slow jog as soon as his moccasins touched the snow. Rap fell in behind him, not truly believing that the feat was possible. All the way? The cold would freeze their lungs in minutes.
They jogged out the gateway and started across the clearing. Two men against the wastelands? Two boys . . . Rap felt horribly vulnerable, much more so than when he had set out from Krasnegar with Andor. Perhaps, it was the absence of the horses, perhaps just that now he knew more. Only the two of them, master and slave? He had trusted Andor completely. How could he ever trust Little Chicken, who might well intend to imprison Rap in some convenient spot and then put his good ideas into practice? One more companion would be a wise precaution, Rap decided.
Fleabag, sleeping happily in his snow hollow, jerked his head up as if he had heard a call. He rose and shook himself. He bowed low to ease his front legs. He pointed his nose at the sky to stretch his back legs. Then he set off into the forest in a wolf’s long, easy lope.
4
Buckskins were indeed better than furs-for running. They weighed nothing, they seemed to let the sweat out without letting the cold air in, and feet could flex inside the soft moccasins and so stay warm. Encased in grease and leather, Rap jogged over the moonlit snow behind Little Chicken and gradually began to feel more confident. Fleabag soon joined them and then took up position ahead.
After covering a league or so, Little Chicken dropped to a walk. He snapped off the icicles below his nose so that he could open his mask, but when Rap raised his mitts to do the same, the goblin knocked his hands down.
Red and puffing, he studied Rap impassively for a moment, then asked, ”Blisters? Rubbings?”
Rap mumbled something incoherent and shook his head.
Little Chicken nodded in grudging satisfaction. “You run good, town boy.”
Rap grinned, but only to himself. He nodded.
“Go much faster, then?”
Rap nodded with less certainty, and the goblin chuckled as he closed his hood, but when he broke from the walk into a jog again, he kept the same pace as before.
Any resident of Krasnegar needed good legs. Rap had hoped that his week on horseback might have left him in better shape than Little Chicken was. As the hours crept by, he discarded that idea. The night became a blur of snow and trees, of shadows and moonbeams, of pounding heart, of smoky breath out and icy breath in, of chest burned by the frigid air, of Fleabag loping along, always at a distance, of Little Chicken ever just ahead, usually jogging, rarely taking a walk break. At times they must run with hands held high to divert branches, at times they were slowed to a snail pace by cluttered deadfall. But mostly they just ran. There was no conversation and Rap would not have been capable of it anyway. He was soon unable to think or feel anything except a steady, grinding, suicidal resolve that the town boy was going to keep up with the goblin.
Just before moonset they came to Porcupine Totem, and when the dogs began to bark, Little Chicken stripped off the masks. He pushed Rap ahead as they approached the doors. By that time Rap was too weary to wonder why, but he was accepted as Flat Nose of the Raven Totem without question. Most of the clan were absent, visiting Raven Totem for the entertainment, but there were a couple of young men left in charge, and many old folk, and some children too young to travel.
The village layout was very similar to the Ravens’, perhaps a little larger. Rap staggered into a lodge that seemed quite identical and met insufferable heat and glare. His knees almost buckled on the spot. Yet the household had been asleep and was only just reviving the fire for the visitors, so perhaps the hall was really quite cool. Little Chicken’s fingers expertly unfastened Rap’s buckskins for him, and he stepped out of them with relief, sank down on the hearthstones, and greedily drank of whatever it was they gave him. His mind was as full of smoke as the ceiling. All he wanted was sleep, sleep, sleep . . .
Then Little Chicken, stripped to a loincloth as he was, pushed him down flat on the big fireplace and produced a bucket of the inevitable grease, contributed by the hosts. He inspected Rap’s feet carefully, then set to work at giving his legs a vigorous massage, skillfully unknotting the tendons and easing the aches. It was heaven.
“Soft, town boy,” he growled contemptuously.
Rap agreed, thinking that he could not have run another two steps. When the massage was over, he offered to do the same for Little Chicken, although he knew he would be very unskilled. Little Chicken’s eyes flashed in anger. “For trash?” Probably he did not need a massage. He looked as fresh as when he had started out, hours before. After snatching up a dish of food that was waiting by the side of the fire, he stalked to the door. Rap’s farsight showed him heading for the boys’ building. It was then that Rap realized why he had been pushed forward for the introductions, and why the skin around his eyes hurt—which he had not noticed before. It was only after he had gulped a quick meal and thanked his hosts and rolled up in a greasy, stinking fur to sleep that he wondered what Inos was going to say about that.
He had hardly closed his eyes, he thought, when Little Chicken was shaking his shoulder and starting another massage to loosen muscles knotted up in sleep. Then he sternly ordered Rap to go out to the pits right away. Two of the women rushed to prepare food for the guests even as Rap was being dressed again by his handler. Little Chicken obviously took his duties seriously, whether they be to die entertainingly or to serve a master. He would allow Rap to do nothing that he could do for him, not even lace a boot; he would accept no help for himself. In his own eyes he was trash, neither boy nor man, merely a possession that should try to be useful and must pamper this fragile nongoblin. He led the way southward without another word. Had it not been for the first glimmers of dawn light, Rap would not have believed that his stay at Porcupine Totem had lasted more than a few minutes.