Their horses were strong and splendidly conditioned. Thus for more than an hour they jogged without a break, then changed mounts and trotted another hour before slowing to a walk. They stayed on the road; to leave it would only slow them. And pursuers would undoubtedly have hounds which could track them easily in the forest. For the first three hours, the land along the road was as much clearings as woods, with a small village in every major opening. Finally they entered low forested hills, and having heard no sign of hounds, dismounted to lead their horses awhile.
In those three hours, no one had spoken, aside from functional suggestions and Macurdy’s few orders. For one thing, Macurdy’s ruined mouth made talking painful. Melody’s and Jeremid’s thoughts were mostly on the possibility of capture, and why on Earth they were doing this. Macurdy’s were on escape, and on how hard he dared push the horses. He was willing to wear them out, if it resulted in pursuit being abandoned, but he dared not break them down. Because of his size, he’d taken two of the company’s larger horses, but even so, he was a heavy burden for them.
When a meadow came into sight ahead, Jeremid said they’d best stop and let the horses graze a bit. Macurdy agreed. They took time to hobble them; there were hobble straps in every set of equipment, and they couldn’t risk losing a horse.
Their pursuers would undoubtedly have a pack horse carrying a sack of oats, Jeremid said, which meant their mounts would hold up better. And the White River lay less than an hour’s ride ahead, if they kept pushing. There they’d have a choice of either swimming their horses downstream or up, or straight across. Which with luck would confuse and delay pursuit.
So they rested less than twenty minutes. At the White, they swam upstream, even though it was harder on the horses. Then, instead of coming out on the other side, where their tracks would be looked for, they came out on the west bank again, and followed it upstream for several miles, on foot again, leading their horses to rest them. The hope was that their pursuers would overlook the west bank option.
At length they reentered the water, crossing this time. Then Macurdy led off eastward through untracked forest. Until, abruptly, a voice froze them. “Macurdy! Macurdy!”
None of them spoke. Their eyes scanned the woods.
“No no, Macurdy! I’m up here! Blue Wing!”
They looked up in unison to where the great raven sat in a tall, thick-boled walnut tree.
“I saw you crossing the river, and wondered why humans would be riding so far from any road or trail.” Blue Wing paused. “Why are you?”
“We’re in trouble,” Macurdy said, “and we think men might be following us. Soldiers with hounds. We’re trying to leave a trail they won’t find.”
Blue Wing said nothing to that, and it seemed to Macurdy that the bird comprehended neither his problem nor his strategy. A raven’s solution to danger would be flight, he supposed. “I wonder,” Macurdy called, “if you’d do me a favor?”
“Ask and find out.”
He described the road they’d fled on, and the form that any successful pursuit would take. “I will look and see,” Blue Wing said, and with a thrust of legs and wings, lifted into the sky.
They rode on then, not hurrying, for this was old forest, long unburned, and though the hills were mild, the ground had gotten pocked and humped, over the centuries, from the tipped‑up roots and mouldering trunks of windthrown trees. Only once did they pause, to shoot and gut a turkey. Three miles farther, they came to a small isolated clearing, more or less level, with a cabin and outbuildings of logs. From a little distance, their roofs looked more or less intact, but saplings were already invading the clearing. There was still abundant grass though, beaten down and grayed by winter’s frosts and rains, and tinged green by the new growth beneath it. Macurdy wondered why the place had been abandoned.
By then the sun was low. They rode over to the buildings and dismounted, hobbling the horses and leaving them to graze. Inside the cabin, things had been smashed, and bones were scattered around, the broken skulls human.