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About halfway to the Great River they saw their first signs of the Gudki. They
practically stumbled over the long-haired, broad-framed corpse sprawled beside
the path. It was already swollen and dark with decay, and large chunks of
flesh had been slashed or torn out.
"They eat their own dead when they can find no other meat," said one of the
Hunters.
The party moved on, with eyes searching even more carefully a forest that
seemed even less friendly than before. When they camped that night Blade
doubled the sentries, and they built screens of logs around their campfires to
shield them from watching eyes.
After two more days it was clear that the Gudki were roaming the jungles in
greater strength than ever before. They found more corpses the victims of wild
animals, snakes, or fallen trees. They found the ashes of campfires, and once
they saw one glowing far off in the twilight. They found bloodstained hide
garments, tufts of long gray hair, and half-eaten carcasses with stone
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spearpoints broken off in their death-wounds. The faces of the Ganthi grew
strained and drawn. They had had much experience fighting the Gudki, but this
was something new, something unknown. They were not yet ready to confess to
being afraid, but they talked more freely to Blade.
"Only a few times have the Gudki come this far north of the Great River," the
Hunters said. "Even when they did, they came only in twos and threes. They did
not hunt, they did not build fires, they slipped through the forest unseen,
like snakes. Now they must be coming here by the dozen. Many hundreds of them
must be north of the river. The gods have chosen to play yet another trick on
the Ganthi."
Blade shook his head. "It is not a new trick, but part of the same trick that
makes the mountains burn.
The mountains burn, and the animals run to the south. More animals means more
meat for the Gudki than ever before. So to hunt this meat more of them come
north of the river than ever before. That is all there is to it."
Blade knew he was right, but after a while he wasn't sure he'd been right to
say it. More often than before, he caught the Hunters and warriors looking
strangely at him. He and Katerina started taking turns watching and sleeping
at night. Early one morning, a spear thudded into a tree near where Blade lay
asleep, missing Katerina by inches. It was a Gudki spear, yet there had been
no signs of the Gudki all the day before and there were none the day after.
Blade kept his mouth shut and his eyes even more wide open than before.
For two more days they marched through jungle that grew thinner by the hour,
and at last they came out on the north bank of the Great River. It deserved
the name. It stretched a mile from bank to bank, a mile of murky green water
that swirled past as a frightening speed.
There were only two ways the Ganthi would get across it. Blade saw that at
once. They could cross on rafts, which would take weeks. Or they could find a
place where the river was shallow, and ford it.
Even that would take time and much care, and they would certainly lose both
people and animals. But it would take days rather than weeks.
Fords existed on the river or so the stories said. Nobody seemed to know where
any of them were, however. Blade decided to divide the scouting party in half,
sending one group up the river and the other down it. Katerina wondered if it
was wise to divide the scouts this way, with the Hairy People roaming the
woods in such great numbers.
"Normally I'd agree with you," said Blade. "But we don't have much time." He
pointed at the sky.
Even this far south, the northern horizon was dark with the clouds from the
volcanoes. "The ashes may already be falling on Thessu."
The scouting party camped that night on the north bank of the Great River,
sentries out and alert.
Three times they saw the faint flickering orange glows of Gudki campfires, far
away in the darkness on the south bank. But the jungle around them was quiet.
The next morning the scouts split, and Blade and Katerina led their group down
the river. They kept as close as they could to the bank all that day and the
next, never losing sight of the water. Every few hundred yards they stopped
and tested the depth of the water with poles. They found only one place where
it was at all shallow enough, and there the bottom dropped off steeply a few
hundred yards out.
They found signs of the Gudki in many places. Blade took care to make camp in
places well clear of the trees, and he ordered that a third of the men should
always be awake with spears in hand. They obeyed him without complaining. They
might think him an offense against the gods, but no one wanted to end up as a
meal for the Hairy People by defying him.
All of the third day they marched along a stretch of rapids where the river
boiled whitely over great slabs of rock. It was dropping down through a range
of heavily wooded hills, and Blade began to wonder if there was any possible
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crossing place for many days' march ahead. He didn't like the idea.
Even if there was a ford far ahead, fifty thousand people could never march
far into these hills to reach it.
Luck was with him, though. At about noon on the next day they reached a spot
where the river broke its fall in a broad level stretch. The river ran fast
there, so fast that the water was white with foam.
But it also ran shallow, and the shallows seemed to extend clear across to the
opposite bank. Blade waded out several hundred yards without finding water
more than waist-deep.
The strong current would be a problem, of course. Just below the shallows an
ugly stretch of rapids began. It would mean certain death for anyone swept
off his feet and carried away downstream.
Children, the old and sick, and the animals would have to be passed across
almost from hand to hand.
That would not be hard, though, since the bottom was firm.
Unless the party going upriver found something better, this was the ford. This
was where the Ganthi would cross the Great River to their new homeland. That
night Blade and Katerina slept soundly for the first time in several days.
The next morning Blade and Katerina led the scouts down to the bank and into
the water. They had to make absolutely sure that the shallow water and the
firm bottom extended clear across to the other bank. They were all going,
since Blade didn't want to divide the party again.
One by one the warriors and Hunters followed Blade and Katerina into the
water. The shorter men staggered as the rushing water rose toward their
chests. Their comrades grabbed their hands, their hair, their spears, anything
to keep them from being swept away. Good luck and quick work kept anyone from
being knocked down and carried off. Slowly but steadily, one cautious step at
a time, they pushed across the foaming river toward the far bank.
Blade held one spear out at arm's length, probing the water ahead of him
before taking each step.
Behind him Katerina followed in his footsteps, spending most of her time
looking back along the file of scouts. She watched to see that they kept up,
and she also watched for any sort of trouble a man swept away, or a spear
coming at Blade's back.
Nothing happened. The shadows of the trees on the far bank reached slowly out
across the water toward Blade. He scanned those trees carefully, searching for
any sign of movement. He saw nothing, and once more the line moved forward. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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