Leave Quixote and Blue Star to face these beasts alone! She shook her head, waved them off. no. Only when the car rose did she realize what she had done. Oh, God, how silly. How silly. And yet …
The Hippae was before her, circling just out of reach, darting forward, then back. He could maneuver more quickly than Quixote could. Quixote kept his head toward the beast, dancing, as though he wore ballet shoes, as though he stood on tiptoe. Behind her she heard Tony yell. She didn’t dare look. Again dance, dance. Then Quixote charged. She hadn’t signaled him to do it. He simply did it. There was an opening, the lance found it, and they were dancing away again while the Hippae sagged before them, yammering at the sky, its neck half cut through.
Five, her mind exulted as she tried to find Tony.Five.Six was standing over her son while Blue Star fled toward the distant gate as though she knew where it was, as though she had been told it meant safety. Great jaws wide, the crouching Hippae howled at the boy, ready to take off his face in one huge bite. Quixote raced forward, screaming….
There was a furry blur on the Hippae’s back. Another between the jaws and the boy. Another at its haunches, clawing at it. Three foxen. The screaming battle tumbled to one side and rolled toward the hill. Tony lay still.
She dismounted and struggled to get him onto Quixote’s back. The horse knelt to receive him, again without a signal to do so. Then Marjorie was up once more, holding her son before her, and they were running the way Blue Star had gone. Not really running. Moving, at least.
Down the hill, other foxen had taken on the other Hippae. Rowena was just behind Rigo. Millefiori came behind, limping badly.
“Now,” thought Marjorie. “Now bring out your damned aircar or airtruck or what-have-you. Now.”
And it was there, only a short distance from them all, with Persun Pollut driving it and Sebastian Mechanic dropping out a ramp for the horses.
“I knew you wouldn’t leave the horses,” Persun called as they came aboard. “I told Asmir you wouldn’t, but Roald said you wouldn’t be that silly.”
Silly, she said to herself. Silly. As though that were the answer to a problem that had bothered her for a very long time. In her mind she sensed an enormous, unqualified approval.
Headquarters had been set up in the order station under James Jellico’s watchful eye. A dozen eager volunteers offered to rub down the horses. Aside from Millefiori’s bad leg they seemed to be all right. In one corner Dr. Bergrem was looking at Rowena with an expression of concern. Rowena had broken something in that fall. Her shoulder, maybe. Something inside her had broken as well. She sat still and white-faced, unresponsive. When Marjorie went to her, she was whispering Sylvan’s name, over and over.
“We found him,” Marjorie said. “We went out and found him, Rowena.”
“What?” she asked. “How?”
“He’s dead, Rowena. The fall broke his neck. They didn’t touch him.”
“He’s not … oh, he’s not—“
“No, Rowena,” she cried. “He’s not. We brought his body back to be buried.”
She returned to Tony, who was sitting white-faced in a corner, slowly coming to himself. Beyond him she saw Brother Mainoa seated at the tell-me. Marjorie fumbled awkwardly at her pocket flap with hands that seemed frozen from their long grip upon lance and reins.
Her fingers were made of wood. Eventually she got the pocket open and the letter out.
She laid it before Brother Mainoa. “I think this should be sent to Semling,” she said.
He read it, his face turning gray as the sense of it reached him. “Ah … ah,” he murmured. “Ah, yes … but—“
“But?”
He rubbed his forehead, started to speak, stopped to think again. “If you spread this around now, there will be panic, rebellions, riots. Then, if we find a cure, the authorities will be so occupied with maintaining order, they won’t be able to disseminate the cure. This letter shouldn’t be made public until there’s a cure, Marjorie.”