After a half hour’s progress, Ryan called a halt and asked J.B. to take a sextant reading for their position. The Armorer complied, and then said, “We need to move over there—” he gestured across the blacktop “—if we’re heading southwest. How far out do you think they’re camped?”
Ryan shrugged. “Could be some way. I’d guess they’d put at least two days’ distance between themselves and Crossroads, just for sec purposes.”
“Gonna be a long haul, then,” Mildred commented. “And what if we miss them?”
“They not miss us, if get close.” Jak grinned.
Despite the fact that the area seemed deserted, and it was dark, they still crossed over the blacktop one at a time, keeping low while the others provided cover for whoever was making the trip. Vigilance couldn’t be dropped for a moment.
Once they were all over, they headed into the scrub and the first clump of dwarf elms before establishing a camp. Ryan took first watch while the others tried to snatch some sleep. They had no idea how long it would take them to find the Gate, and they would need to be awake and alert when the sun rose once more.
FOR TWO DAYS they trekked across the lush earth of the region. There was no sign of a camp, and no indication that anyone other than themselves had passed that way for some time, which was no surprise. They knew from experience that the Gate could camouflage a camp better than any other tribe or group they had come across, and they knew that the tribe was also adept at covering its tracks. And yet it seemed that this land had been unspoiled by human habitation for some time.
The first day was uneventful. The trek wasn’t difficult, and it was merely a matter of covering the territory and keeping alert for danger. The fact that there was no sign of anything except small mammals and birds made it hard to keep their alertness on triple red. Perhaps that was why the events of the second day caught them unawares. It was a double disaster that caught them off guard.
Since daylight on the first day, they had been aware of a hill much like the one that they had emerged from when leaving the redoubt some weeks before. It was right in their path on a southwesterly course, and from the first they had marked it as a possible Gate camp. Certainly it was wooded enough to provide cover, and its raised sides would enable the tribe to scout the land for miles around. So when they finally reached the foot of the hill, they ascended with caution. There was no sign of any human life, but this was, after all, the Gate tribe. Anything was possible.
“Of course, it does strike one quite forcefully that perhaps they are camped on the far side of the hill,” Doc commented as they climbed.
“Well, we’ll find out soon enough,” Mildred said, looking back.
The gradient of the hill wasn’t particularly steep, but it did have a few signs of soil erosion, and in places parts of the rock and soil had fallen away to form sudden ledges. They were passing just such a point, and as Mildred’s foot came down on the spot where Ryan, Jak and Krysty had just walked, the soil and scree beneath, holding the earth onto the rock, began to move.
Mildred didn’t even have time to register the shift of the earth beneath her feet before she was pitched sideways by the sudden space that appeared underneath her. She felt herself turn in the air, as if in slow motion, as she began to fall. The sky and the hillside turned around her, and she was aware of her companions appearing at the corner of her vision, jolted from view by the crack of her head against the rocks, barely cushioned by their covering of soil, as she turned head over heels, her thick coat providing some protection from the impact of her body on the rocks.
“Millie!” J.B. yelled from above, moving forward to see her tumble over down the side of the hill. He edged closer, testing the loose surface as he watched her body hit the hillside like a rag doll.