Island in the Sea of Time

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

October, Year 1 – February, Year 2 A.E,

Jared," Martha said, stooping to kiss his forehead where he sat in the wheelchair.

"Martha," he replied.

Thank You, he added in silence to God; he wasn't much of a praying man, ordinarily, but this was a special occasion. Jared cleared his throat and looked up the gangplank at the Eagle and her crew. It was a cool, bright day, and the flags were flying at her masts in a wind that smelled of salt and fish.

"Best we get out of the way, I suppose," he said.

She nodded, and they stood to one side as the others came down-crew and cadets by squads, and the wounded, limping or on stretchers. He tried to look each one in the face and print the features on his memory forever, returning their greetings with solemn nods. The crowd spilling up the dock behind him, filling it and Broad and Easy streets behind him, was almost equally respectful, parting for the ambulances… and nobody begrudged the precious remnant of gasoline they burned.

"Eagle departing!" the boatswain's voice barked.

A pipe shrilled, and the ship's bell rang three times and once again. Marian Alston stood at the top of the gangplank, crutches under her arms. She blinked as a voice called from among the cadets and crew crowding the dock:

"Three cheers for the skipper!"

Cofflin joined in the three crashing shouts, self-conscious but loud as he felt his wife's fingers squeeze his. Alston nodded, then drew herself up slightly and saluted the dock; those who'd sailed south with her answered in snapping unison. Swindapa came up to steady her as she maneuvered slowly down the gangplank, then sank into a wheelchair beside the Chief's.

"Christ, we're a matched pair," she muttered, as they endured the necessary formalities.

"Not all that long, I hope," he said.

"The medic says it was a nice clean puncture-blade went in with the grain of the muscle, not across it. Should heal without any loss of function."

When the street emptied somewhat, their partners wheeled them about and began pushing them up it.

"You up to that, Martha?" Cofflin asked anxiously.

"Jared, I'm pregnant, not ill," she replied tartly, then stroked his head for an instant. A smile went between her and Swindapa.

Cofflin's head turned to Alston. He swallowed. "There…" He cleared his throat and began again. "There aren't any words except thank you, and that isn't enough," he said. "And, ah-"

Alston's broad-lipped mouth quirked. "You're welcome, Jared."

He turned in his chair and reached out a hand. "Look, I mean it. I owe you Martha's life, and our child's. That's one hell of a big debt. When you need me, I'll be there, whatever it is. All right?"

She took his hand in reply; it was narrower than his, the fingers long and slender, with a grip like steel wire in his big fisherman's paw.

"I was doin' my job… but I may take you up on that, someday." She sighed. "It's going to be a while before we can go after Walker and finish the job," she went on. "We aren't ready. Weren't ready for what we just did, but we were lucky."

Martha snorted. "I don't believe in unearned luck," she said.

"Earned or unearned, we were still lucky." She looked down at her leg. "Well, I'm not going anywhere for a while. Spring, then." Alston looked over her shoulder and smiled. "By the way, you should probably thank 'dapa here, too. She saved me, at least."

The Fiernan beamed. "Yes, I did-Marian was hurt, and all at once Moon Woman filled my bones with fire and my liver with strength… We're here."

The two women watched the Cofflins negotiate the stairs; someone had put in a ramp for the chair. Swindapa frowned slightly as she pushed Alston's back down Orange toward the junction of Liberty and Main.

"They didn't say much when they saw each other," she said.

"Well, they're Yankees," Alston replied, smiling. "They like to squeeze all the use they can out of a word, or an expression." Then she yawned. "Tired."

"Of course you are. Home soon, and you'll get better fast." She shook her head. "You need lots of sleep, and-" She continued in her own language. Alston looked over her shoulder and raised her brows. The Fiernan continued: "Someone to… keep your spirit warm. Cuddle, you'd say. Everyone knows that speeds healing."

Alston laughed. "I believe it may," she said. "It very well may, 'dapa."

Her head turned eastward, and her voice went harsh and flat for an instant. "And I'm going to need all my strength. Yes indeed."

With the Tartessians acting as go-betweens, the formal meeting with Daurthunnicar was delayed several days for ceremony's sake. When all was arranged the sun was nearing the edge of the world, on an evening that fell clear and warm for autumn.

"Glad of the delay," Walker said, looking critically at the quarterhorse stallion. "Bastard here needed to get his land legs back."

The horse still wasn't fit for hard work; standing idle in a cramped stall in Yare's hold all the way across the Atlantic had lost it some condition. Still, it had enough energy to try to rear a little. Walker slugged it down with a hand on the bridle, pulling up and back as it rolled an eye and stamped.

"None of that, Bastard," he said. "You're not some yuppie's pet now."

He'd been raised a cowboy on an old-fashioned working spread, and didn't have sentimental illusions about horses. They were near-as-no-matter brainless, often malicious, and dangerous, a primitive, less valuable form of organic pickup truck. Rich hobbyists could afford to spend years coaxing a horse into doing tricks; when you worked the range, you needed it to do what you wanted, right then and there.

Walker swung into the Western saddle and looked behind. His followers were drawn up, except for the few on the ship; he'd left them the firearms, save a Colt and shotgun for himself, but everyone wore island-made armor and carried spear, sword, crossbow. They marched across the fields in good order, following a beaten track that ran down to the beach. Isketerol walked at his stirrup, with his cousin and a clump of men from the ships.

The rahax came a third of the way to meet him, standing tall in his chariot; a considerable concession, implying that Walker was a guest of rank, rather than merely a suppliant. The American swung down from the saddle, put his hand to his heart and bowed.

"Greetings. The favor of your gods-" he listed them, which took a while-"and great good luck be with you always, Daurthunnicar son of Ubrotarix, rahax of the Iraiina."

The shrewd little eyes in the heavy, bearded face blinked at him. After a long moment, he nodded. "Come, you are peace-holy in my steading, welcome beneath my rooftree. Be my guest, drink and eat of my bounty, and we will talk."

"Okay, boys, we're guests," he said, turning to his followers. "Keep your hands off the women, unless you hear me say different, and watch your manners. This is tricky and I don't want any of you queering the deal."

Jared Cofflin reached out and cut the ribbon. Above him the vanes of the new windmill began to turn with a rumbling of gears. Water gushed from a thick pipe onto the sloping inner face of the holding tank. Cheers rang out behind him, first from the crews who'd built the pumping engine, then from hundreds of islanders behind them, most of whom had spent pick-and-shovel time on the basin that would hold the water. The big wind machine was much like the eighteenth-century Old Mill in outline, a round cone of beams and planks on a circular base of mortared stone, ending in a timber circle twenty feet above.

Steel ground on steel from within. The wind was brisk out of the north, carrying scudding tatters of iron-gray cloud with it, from a dark horizon. A few spatters of cold rain came flicking into their faces. Hard to believe it's November already. It seemed longer than eight months since the Event; and it seemed sometimes as if it were still a dream, that he might wake any morning to the sounds of cars and television.

Cofflin turned to face the crowd, leaning on his stick to spare the healing knee. Coleman allowed that, as long as he didn't overdo it. He smiled inwardly; Alston was still on strict bed rest, and snarling abominably. Swindapa must be a saint.

"When the rest are finished," he said, pointing to the foundations of five more spaced along the earth berm of the reservoir, "we'll have twenty-four-hour running water again throughout the town. Three cheers for Ron Leaton and Sam Macy and their teams!"

The cheers were long and heartfelt. Twenty-four-hour flush toilets again, by damn, Cofflin thought, grinning. That was one thing few people could get used to doing without. And the composting sewage works is so useful. The engineer and the carpenter waved and smiled themselves.

"Civilization, brick by brick," he said to the two men and their workers, as the gathering broke up.

"Plank by plank," Macy said, looking pridefully at the structure.

"Gear by gear," Leaton said with equal conviction. "And those cogwheels are six feet across, the main ones. The bevel gears weigh a hundred and fifty pounds each."

"Good piece of work," Cofflin said, clapping them each on the shoulder. "Now, when can we get the whole project wrapped?"

Whump.

Walker fired the last shot and held the shotgun to his face, blowing into the open breech. The first rifled slug had killed the aurochs, but he'd put the whole six-round magazine into the beast, all at the head. What was left looked as if something very large had chewed on it, and then spat it out again. The locals were suitably impressed.

He walked around the animal. It had stood a good seven feet at the shoulder, and the hump was still level with his eyes now that it had collapsed upright. "Wild cattle" didn't give any idea of its size and ferocity; it made a bull bison look like a Jersey milker. Sort of like a cross between a cow and a rhinoceros, he thought. Blood pooled out on the sere yellow leaves and dead grass that carpeted the little clearing. The oak trees roundabout still bore a few leaves, but mostly their huge gnarled limbs reached for the sky like a giant's arthritic fingers from the massive moss-covered trunks. It was chilly enough that the Iraiina were all wearing thick leggings and double tunics as well as their usual kilts and cloaks. The American wore mackinaw and ski pants, and a cap with earflaps. He didn't want to blend in too much. A touch of mystery helped with his purposes.

All hail the wizard-chief, he thought.

Thumbing more shells into the breech of the shotgun, he looked around. Some of the Iraiina chiefs looked as though they'd prefer to be running just as far and as fast as they could; they made covert signs with their fingers, spat aside, stared out of pale faces. The half-dozen young warriors who'd sworn service with him looked terrified but even more proud as they drew knives and advanced to begin skinning and butchering the ton-weight of animal. After a moment one of them came over to him with a slice of the heart; the man's arms were red to the elbow.

"Yours is the hunter's right, lord," he said to Walker.

"My thanks, Ohotolarix," Walker said and took a piece between his teeth, cutting it off with his belt knife and chewing the hot rank meat.

Tough as boot leather, he thought. The chiefs' followers were building a fire. He chewed with relish. Well begun, half done.

"There's nothing men have ever made more beautiful," Cofflin murmured.

"Men in the generic sense, yes," Martha said, nodding agreement with the sentiment.

It was raining outside, freezing rain that turned to glistening treacherous black ice underfoot; the big sheet-metal building drummed to the beat of it. Even with the steam-powered compressor thumping and shedding heat in one corner, the interior was chilly. The huge shed had been built for storing boats overwinter; now it was used for building them. Saws whined and drills whirled, filling the air with the fresh sappy scent of cut wood. The ribs of the schooner curled up from the keelson like the skeleton of some sleek sea beast cast ashore, embraced by the cradle that held them in place while the frame was spiked and treenailed together. The interior braces were mostly in place, and the shell of planks was starting to go on. A crew heaved at a line as they watched, and a big curved shape of oak went up on a pulley rigged from the roof and swung down to where the deck would be. Other hands reached up and guided it down. Already the half-built ship looked as if it yearned for the water, to turn its sharp prow southward and race for the unknown seas.

"How does she shape?" Cofflin called up. "Everything looks good from here."

Marian Alston came out from behind a rib and climbed down the board staircase stiffly, limping over to them with a roll of plans in one hand.

"Shapes like the beauty she is," she said. "We'll have her ready to come down the slipway by the beginning of February, and then we can fit her out and mount her sticks and start on the next."

"Fast work," Cofflin said.

"The next one will go a lot faster, with what we've learned. And Leaton's made up some more compressed-air power tools. It'd take a year, if we were usin' hand methods only."

"Decided what to call her yet?" he said.

"Well, that's not entirely my say-so…" Alston began.

Cofflin snorted. "The hell it isn't, after what you did."

"Frederick Douglass, I thought. He worked as a caulker in a shipyard for a while, you know, before he got free. And Harriet Tubman for number two."

Martha nodded. "Excellent choices, Marian," she said, sighing and sinking back on an upturned bucket. Her stomach curved out the loose dress she wore. "More sore ankles."

"You work too much, Martha," Alston said.

"Hell, those are my lines," Cofflin grinned. He tilted his head up and looked at the bulk of the schooner. "I envy you something… straightforward like this."

"Speaking of straightforward," Alston said, tapping the rolled plans into her other hand, "I'll need to make some promotions when we commission the schooners. Bump Ortiz and Hendriksson to lieutenant commander and give them each a couple of ensigns and lieutenants. I have my eye on some of the upperclassmen for that."

"Sounds good," Cofflin said. Alston was always conscientious about recognizing the supremacy of the civil authorities, and he didn't interfere in her bailiwick. "I assume your second-in-command agrees?"

"Certainly. I'd like to move Sandy up to commander as well, for symmetry's sake. For that matter I'm going to be leaving her in command of Eagle a good deal of the time, when we get to Britain."

Cofflin nodded. "Again, no problem. We can put together some sort of ceremony, I suppose. I wish everything went as easily."

"Don't tell me-y'all've just come from another Constitutional Committee meeting?"

"Almost as bad," Cofflin said, shuddering slightly for effect. "Finance." He dug in one pocket of his parka. "Here. Three bucks."

He flipped the coin to Alston. She caught it; it was gold, about the size of. a dime, with LIBERTY on one side beneath an eagle's wings, and Republic of Nantucket: 1 A.E. on the other. The picture inside that was a lighthouse-specifically, Brant Point lighthouse at the northwestern entrance to the harbor.

"I thought you were going to use the Unitarian Church tower?" she said. "Don't tell me…"

"All the other denominations objected. One-tenth of an ounce fine gold, though, eighteen-karat-smelted down from jewelry. Starbuck swears gold-based money'll work. God knows we need a currency. Swapping is so damned awkward."

"Useful for trade, once the locals get the idea." She looked down at the coin. "Can't say 'queer as a three-dollar bill' anymore, can we?"

"Ah… hadn't thought of that." He gave a dry chuckle; it was funny, when you thought about it. "Starbuck's bad enough on Finance, but everyone on the Constitutional Committee has a bee in their bonnet."

"We need a constitution, and that's more important than this." She jerked her head at the schooner. "Much as I hate to admit it."

They both sat on stacks of boards, and began to massage their injured legs with an identical gesture. "The Twin Gimps," Alston said.

Cofflin snorted. "You could spend more time on the Constitutional Committee, then," he said. "Since it's so damn important."

"A cobbler should stick to her last and a sailor to her ship. I just don't have your capacity to endure fools," she said, with a slight momentary smile he'd learned was her equivalent of a grin. "Didn't I get the Arnsteins to enroll? Aren't they a help?"

"Too much. Every time I turn around they're telling us how the Republic of Venice or the Hanseatic League or ancient Athens did it-Ian's always trying to pin some unpronounceable Greek name on everything we do, at that. It's as intimidating as hell. Then Sam Macy loses his temper with them, and I have to smooth it over."

"Thus getting your own way," Martha pointed out. "Politics may not be your trade, dear, but you're learning it."

Damn, but it's… energizing… being married to someone smarter than you are, he thought.

"How's it look, basically?" Alston asked, leaning forward to get out of the way of someone carrying two buckets of hot tar on the ends of a shoulder yoke. The strong scent made Martha hold her breath for a moment.

"Oh, a republic with a chief executive-everyone seems to like the name-and a Council, reporting to the Town Meeting and with appointments subject to confirmation, and the Meeting to pass laws and review and vote on all the major decisions," Cofflin said. "That's the bare bones. Right now we're thrashing out whether the militia should be separate from the Coast Guard, and whether the commander of that should be called an admiral or not. Want to be an admiral?"

"Only if I can wear one of those fancy fore-and-aft hats and gold braid," Alston said dryly.

"Talk of calling you people the Republic of Nantucket Navy, too."

That brought her upright and indignant, as he expected. "Look, Cofflin-" She saw his grin, and relaxed. "Sorry, but tell them Guard people would rather barbecue their mothers. No offense-I know you were a squid."

"None taken," he said. "And they're debating whether the Town Meeting can amend the constitution with a simple majority or not; Arnstein's strong for a two-thirds vote two years running. Goes on about something the Athenian Assembly did." He lifted a brow. "Hung some admirals for losing a battle, it was."

"Sounds reasonable," Alston said. "Christ, you know how a crowd can get, 'specially when someone tells them what they all want to hear."

"You could come and tell the committee…" he said.

"You've got a fund of low cunning, Jared, you know that?" she said. "Maybe. If I've got time. After Christmas."

"So at this point, you just pack up and go home," William Walker said.

Shaumsrix scowled; he was an experienced war chief by Iraiina standards. "Of course. We can't take the fort, we don't have enough men, and if we wait here too long many will get sick in this cold and wet. Or nearby chiefs will come and overfall us with numbers we can't match, even though this chief is at feud with all his neighbors. We've taken many cattle and sheep, and horses, yes-I admit that your riders let us surprise them that way. Now we should go home and guard against their revenge."

Walker leaned his hands on the pommel of his saddle and looked around at his own followers. Most of them were mounted; chariot ponies broke to the saddle easily enough, and at thirteen hands were big enough to carry a man if he changed off every so often. They stamped and fretted a little, their newly shod hooves squelching in the damp earth, breath blowing white from their flaring nostrils into the chilly air of late fall.

"Time for our next surprise, boys," he said. "Break out the axes."

An ox-wagon creaked up behind them. Not the local kind, two solid wheels and two beasts; this was as close as he could get to a Boer trek wagon or a Conestoga, with eight yoke pulling it via a stout iron chain. It wasn't fast, but it could carry a couple of tons of weight pretty well anywhere.

"More magic?" the Iraiina said fearfully.

"Just a little applied mechanics," Walker said. Shaumsrix made a sign with his fingers.

It took all that day and most of the next to set the engine up. At last Walker stepped forward and took the lanyard. A swift tug…

Thack-WHUMP. The long arm of the trebuchet whipped upward.

It was nothing but an application of the lever: the short arm carried a timber box full of rocks, the long a sling at its end to throw rocks or other projectiles. The bigger medieval examples had been able to throw a ton of weight half a mile. This was a bit smaller, but ample for his needs.

"Devil's in the details," Walker snorted to himself, watching the barrel of lard wrapped in burning rags arching up into the blue November sky. At least we've got some decent weather for a change. Most of the time he'd been wading in mud while he worked on the damn thing back at base.

He leveled the binoculars and watched. The target was a round earthwork dunthaurikaz, a little fortlet with perhaps a dozen big huts inside, and a stockade surrounding it made of upright logs rammed into the top of the earthwork. Pathetic even compared to the Western forts he'd seen on TV when he was a kid, but nearly invulnerable by here-and-now standards. The defenders had been standing on the platform behind the ramparts, shooting an occasional arrow and yelling insults. He could understand them, more or less; their language and the Iraiina tongue weren't far apart-about like the difference between BBC English and what a small-town Texan spoke. The screams of fear as the barrel flew toward them were understandable anywhere. It struck near the sharpened points of the logs and snapped two off as it shattered. Burning tallow flung in all directions, spattering. Wood began to catch.

"Haul away, boys!" he called.

Four horses were waiting. They were local chariot ponies, but he'd had proper horse-collar harnesses made up, not the choking throat-strap yoke these people used. A strong rope ran back from them to the pulleys, and the longer throwing arm began to swing downward with a creaking of its raw timbers, hauling up the great box of rocks on the other end. John did a good job on the ironwork, he thought. But then, the blacksmith always did a good job, it was a habit with him… and Walker had done enough work with him back on the island to know exactly what he was capable of, and how fast.

The crew snapped the iron hook into the loop bolted into the arm. Ohotolarix came up beside him.

"Lord, that thing is a marvel-but we don't want to burn all the loot, do we?"

The young Iraiina swaggered, hand on his new steel sword, but there was plenty of deference in the way he spoke to his new chief.

"Good point," Walker said. To the crew at the trebuchet: "Give 'em a stone this time, men."

Four of them lifted a three-hundred-pounder into the heavy leather sling. McAndrews adjusted the stop ropes, frowning in concentration.

"That ought to do it, sir."

"Go for it."

The tall black jerked at the cord that tripped the release. Thack-WHUMP. The rounded boulder spun through the air. For a wonder-aiming this thing was by guess and by God-it struck not far away from where the barrel had. Four logs snapped across, raw white splinters showing in their heartwood, and a man arched out to land crumpled in the wet pastureland between the fort and the invaders. The chiefs and warriors who'd agreed to come along on this raid shrieked and beat their axes on their shields in glee.

"Reload."

"We'll batter them to sausage meat, lord!" Ohotolarix said with wild enthusiasm.

These people are like kids, Walker thought, not for the first time. One minute they were all agog over a novelty, then next sulking in the corner or stamping and waving their fists in quick anger… not what you'd call dependable. On the other hand, they can learn. At least the younger ones.

"No we won't," Walker said. "Because they can figure that out themselves, and any minute now…"

The narrow gate of the fort was hauled open. Hands thrust a gangway through, over the muddy ditch that surrounded the settlement, and two chariots thundered across. Behind them ran forty or so men, all the adult free males in this chiefs following, bellowing their war cries. The Iraiina whooped themselves, and ran to meet their foes.

"Remember what I told you!" Walker barked. "Shoulder to shoulder! March!"

His own little band tramped forward, spears lowered and crossbows ready, swinging around the clot of combat where chieftains hurled javelins and taunts from their war-cars and footmen met in milling, deadly chaos. Grossly outnumbered to begin with, none of the enemy fought long. Walker met one of the last, an axman bleeding but still wolf-swift. The tomahawk chopped at him, trailing red drops. He brought his katana up in a looping curve to meet it, and the ash-wood slid off steel. The American planted his feet and swung, drawing the cut across the native's neck. The contorted fork-bearded face went slack and dribbled blood, then collapsed. A few others, perhaps seven or eight, threw down their weapons.

"Don't kill them!" Walker yelled, pointing his blade to the warriors who'd surrendered. "I want prisoners."

"Well struck, lord!" Ohotolarix said. His own short sword was red. "Now we plunder!"

The flanking move had done more than end the fight quickly; it had also put Walker's band nearest the gate. "Double-time!" he shouted. First plunder, then burn.

The inside of the fortress was stink and chaos; the locals had driven much of their stock inside, and brought themselves from steadings all around, packing it far beyond its usual capacity. Hairy little cattle bawled and surged in panic; sheep milled in clots; women and children ran likewise. One or two of the mothers had already cut their children's throats and plunged daggers into their own chests, or hung themselves from the carved rafter ends of their houses.

"You, you, you, get those fires out!" Walker barked. "The rest of you, round these people up! They're no use to us dead. Get their stuff over there."

He pointed to the… porch, he decided… of the biggest building in the fort. Almost certainly the fallen chief's dwelling; the roof ran out a dozen feet or so beyond the wall, supported on wooden pillars, and there was a raised floor a bit out of the mud, covered with the same cut reeds used inside.

The other Iraiina were surging into the fort in his wake, but even their chiefs were a little, overawed by the foreigner who'd won the favor of the rahax and shown such command of war-magic. Instead of flinging themselves on the plunder and women they shouted commands to their own followers, enforcing them with an occasional cuff or shove. The burning sections of the palisade were put out or dragged away, the livestock herded out to await division, the survivors kicked and pushed and spear-prodded into a mass.

"Chief Hwalkarz," one of the charioteer lords said. "As you wished, we have done."

Men were shouting in glee as they dragged out their booty. Bolts of woolen cloth, clothing, furs, bronze tools; some gold and silver ornaments, more of bronze and stone and shell. Pottery jugs and skins of mead and beer were added; they called out reports of stored food, grain, cheeses, smoked and pickled meat.

Happy as kids at Christmas, Walker thought, smiling and wiping his sword.

"Here's what we'll do," he said to the two Iraiina chiefs. "You can have all the bronze and cloth, and half the gold and silver."

They whooped and pounded him on the back; Ohotolarix looked a little startled, then relaxed. The bronze tools and weapons weren't much use to them, and they could trade for cloth.

"We divide the food and livestock equally-half for me, half for you two to split. Half the prisoners are mine, and I get first pick. Is that just?"

"Just and more than just," the senior of the two Iraiina leaders said; he was about Walker's years, although he looked a little older with his weathered face and several teeth knocked out in fights. The dark-brown braid of his hair was bound with leather thongs and wolf fangs; it twitched as he looked around. "Never shall you or your men lack for meat and drink at the steading of Shaumsrix son of Telenthaur."

"That is good," Walker said politely. Sucker. He had an eye on several of Shaumsrix Telenthaur's son's followers, and he suspected the Iraiina would be less than pleased when they switched allegiance.

"We should make a thank-offering to the gods," he went on.

"Else no few of our fear-despising heroes will lie sleepless in dread of Dead Walkers," the Iraiina chief agreed. "Hmm. One horse and, eka, four cattle? That will make enough fresh meat for the victory feast." He grinned, a carnivore expression. "We've given enough man-meat to please the Mirutha and the Crow Goddess. He of the Long Spear was with us, and the Blood Hag drank deep."

"Your word is strong," Walker said, clasping wrists with the other man. "Let it be as you say."

He walked over to where the prisoners waited, weeping or stoic or watching with silent dread. The men and older boys had been bound at wrist and ankle and shoved into a hut with a barred door. The locals were surprised he hadn't just cut their throats… but then, the Iraiina had little idea of how to make men work. Three among the remainder caught his eyes, two girls about twelve and an older one of eighteen or so, holding the younger ones against herself. They looked enough alike to be sisters and probably were, with seal-brown hair and gray eyes. Their clothing was good by local standards, the bright plaid wool of their long dresses woven in a sort of herringbone twill, and the older wore a gold bracelet; they all had shoes, which was swank among the natives. The way their hair tumbled loose to their shoulders meant they were unmarried.

Alice said she could use some more household help, he thought. Fair enough; it was wasteful to have a qualified medico doing scutwork, and he wanted to keep her happy. Not to mention…

"You," he said, smiling and beckoning.

The younger ones whimpered, and the older girl clutched them tighter. "You, come here," Walker went on. They stumbled to him. I must look strange, he thought. Rumors about the new wizard who'd taken up residence among the Iraiina would have spread far, too.

He gripped the older girl by the hair, just hard enough to immobilize her, and checked her over. Some of these women carried razor-sharp little triangular bronze knives tucked away in the most unexpected places. There was nothing beneath her clothing but girl though, shaped very pleasantly… and these people didn't wear underwear. Walker looked around while his hand moved beneath her skirt. The girl trembled and closed her eyes, biting at her lip. She didn't seem very surprised, though; this was what happened after a lost battle, here.

"All right, boys," he said in English. "Party time. Pick one each. Remember, the supply's limited, and you'll be taking these back home, so don't get too rough." Then he repeated it in the more formal phrasing of Iraiina.

There was going to be a lot of work, getting all this stuff and the people back to the base he'd named Walkerburg. No reason not to relax tonight, of course. A raw whoop rose from his followers, and the war bands of the other chiefs jostled, waiting their turn to pick. He noticed McAndrews hanging back. Can't have that, he thought.

He released the brown-haired girl for a moment and grabbed another, a full-figured blonde in her twenties who was wiping away her tears and trying to smile at the conquerors. Obviously one with an eye for the main chance. The ones glaring defiance or standing slumped in despair wouldn't do for a shrinking violet like the cadet from Tennessee. The eyes went wide in alarm as he ripped the dress off her shoulders and shoved her over to McAndrews; nobody around here had ever seen blacks before.

"You're entitled to your share, Ensign," he said. The younger man stuttered, obviously torn between horror and temptation. "You wouldn't want anyone to think you were looking down on us, would you?" Walker said. His smile was cold. "Not hurt anyone's feelings? I'd just purely hate to have you hurt m' feelings, McAndrews."

"Ah… no, of course not, sir."

"Good man. Have fun."

Laughing, he turned and pushed the brown-haired girl he'd chosen into the hall, scooping up one of the jugs of mead as he passed; her younger sisters tailed along uncertainly. It was dark and smoky within, but the turf walls and the fires smoldering in pits down the length of the floor kept it reasonably warm; there were a few low wicker partitions, but otherwise it was just one big room, with tools and bundles of herbs and hams hanging from the low rafters. He led the others behind one of the woven barriers; the younger girls huddled in the corner, clinging to each other. Furs and wool blankets covered straw.

"What's your name?" he asked, shedding his sword belt and hanging the weapons carefully behind him. No sense in taking chances, he thought, undoing the latches of his armor and swinging out of the suit.

"Keruwthena, lord," she said, clenching her hands and looking down. Then she forced her eyes back up. She seemed a little reassured that he looked like other men beneath the steel.

"Lord, my sisters… they're very young," she went on, as she unfastened the pins that held her gown at the shoulders.

Meaning, please don't throw them to your men, he supposed. "Don't worry," Walker said. Not often your fantasies come true so precisely, he thought, laughing at the hammering of his own heart. "They're safe enough, if you're going to be sensible."

Some time later he rose and began dressing. Keruwthena did too. "I…" she said. "I am glad you are not a cruel man, lord," she said after a moment. "The stories…"

Walker finished off the jug of mead. "Not cruel unless I'm crossed," he said genially.

A woman in her position's best hope was to end up a prominent warrior's possession, and work her way up to minor wife and personal freedom, or as much freedom as a woman ever had among the eastern tribes. She doubtless thought she'd lucked out, with him. Then he laughed; Keruwthena tried a shaky smile, and the two young girls stared at him in terrified awe.

You're lucky so far, he thought. But then you haven't met Alice yet.

It was still near-dark along Main Street, and cold fog swirled about the iron lampposts and the trunks of the great elms, blown in the damp chill air from the sea. Jared Cofflin ambled slowly up the street, past the small crowd already gathered near the bulletin boards at the Hub, the store halfway up Main; there wasn't enough paper to print a newspaper yet, but the Inquirer and Mirror continued its hundred-and-seventy-year tradition by posting a newsletter in strategic places. He inhaled deeply, taking in the cold salt air, as familiar as breathing itself. Snow tonight, most likely. Or mebbe not. Everything else had changed, but walking up the brick sidewalk in a December fog still felt the same.

As if to give him the lie, a shrill steam whistle split the air. That must be one of the tugs, heading out to haul back another raft of mainland firewood and charcoal and planks while the sea allowed. Moisture dripped down his collar, and he hurried his pace a little. Another new smell reached him, one he didn't mind at all-the scent of new-baked bread in wood-fired ovens.

His stomach rumbled. Smells great, tastes delicious, doesn't keep worth a damn, he thought; so it had to be baked fresh every day, which meant a couple of dozen new bakeries to use the fruits of the harvest. A couple of slices with an egg or two and some cranberry preserve made a decent breakfast. Possibly we'll have coffee again about the time I die, he thought. Angelica Brand was growing several hundred seedlings in her greenhouses, and the plan was to drop a boat down to Puerto Rico in the spring and plant them out along with the oranges and lemons and whatnot. God knew if it would work; the birds might eat them all, or something.

In the meantime it was pleasure enough to walk without pain in his leg, even on a damp cold morning. Lucky the bullet hadn't done much damage to bone and tendon as it drilled its way through; lucky it hadn't been a hollowpoint, too. He nodded greeting to friends and acquaintances, and once to a mainlander, an Indian struggling not to gape around him, a blanket wrapped about his shoulders. The sight set his teeth on edge. It was impossible to avoid all contact, he knew-if nothing else they were within canoe-paddling distance of Martha's Vineyard and the continent- and Doc Coleman was taking every possible precaution, but still… What will happen will happen.

At least the locals had proved reasonable enough, once you learned how to approach them. Eager to trade for cloth and tools, too; pelts, deerskins, birch-bark containers of maple syrup, gathered nuts and dried berries, roots and herbs.

He heard feet on the sidewalk behind him and turned. Alston and Swindapa were running side by side, sheathed swords in their left hands pumping back and forth with the movement of their legs. She's not limping either anymore, he thought with satisfaction. Alston must be back in fighting trim. He was glad of that, for her sake, and… And frankly, she was like a penned she-wolf for a while there. They slowed to a walk as they came up to him, wiping the sweat from their faces with the towels slung around their necks. You could work up some heat even in this weather, and they were wearing thick track suits and gloves.

"Mornin', Jared," she said, breathing deep and slow.

"Morning, Marian, Swindapa," he said.

"You're out early, I see."

He shrugged. "Martha didn't feel well last night, so I thought I'd let her sleep when she finally could." One drawback of marrying late was that she'd never gotten used to having someone else in the same bed; and when you piled morning sickness on top of it, a lot of rest got lost. "The doctor says it's natural enough. Why do they call it morning sickness?"

"Don't worry," Marian said. "There's a lot of variation. I was sick at unpredictable intervals right into the seventh month. And everythin' went smoothly enough come the time."

" 'Bye, Jared. I got to get breakfast ready, it's my turn," Swindapa said, giving Alston a kiss. "French toast today. Maple syrup!" She dashed off, vaulting smoothly over one of the sidewalk benches and pelting up past the shuttered Pacific Bank.

"Glad to see you're back in shape. Must be a bit of a trial, keeping up with all that youthful energy," he said, grinning.

She rolled her eyes. "Oh, tell me 'bout it, Jared. 'Sides, I've got sisters-and both of them hit two hundred and thirty pounds by their second baby. Powerful incentive to sweat."

He turned his head sharply. "… that the sort of role model we want in front of our young people-" came from behind him. Sound was tricky in a fog like this.

Alston's head was turning too, the friendly expression congealing into that flat glare she had. She'd gotten a lot less likely to let that sort of thing pass recently. Cofflin turned on his heel and stalked back down the street, halting when he came to Lisa Gerrard. He'd recognized her voice; she was on the School Committee, and spoke often. Very often. He thrust his face into hers, conscious of the cold anger in him and holding it back. The words came out slow, deliberate, and bitten off:

"Well, actually, Ms. Gerrard, I do consider Captain Alston an acceptable role model. Considering that she saved Martha's life and nearly got killed doing it, and that she led the expedition that got us the food we're eating this winter, and everything else she's doing for this ungrateful island, I consider her an excellent role model. And when you, Lisa Gerrard, have done one tenth as much for the common good, maybe-just maybe-you can criticize her. Until then I suggest you shut… the… hell… up!"

He'd started loud, and the last part rose to a bellow. Whistles, cheers, and clapping came from the crowd around the bulletin board, and Gerrard retreated in confusion. Cofflin gave a curt nod to them and stalked back to Alston, who stood waiting with her brows raised.

"Why, Jared, I didn't know you cared," she said. "Thanks, by the way."

He snorted, but the tension relaxed out of his shoulders. "How's the ROATS program coming along?" he said, slightly embarrassed.

"Not bad, considerin', although we surely miss Martins. Leaton says the turntables and hull bracing shouldn't be any problem. Come on, I'll fill you in. 'Dapa's learned to make a smokin' piece of French toast with turkey eggs and barley bread."

John Martins turned away from the open end of the smithy. From here he could see the workers-slaves, in iron collars-putting up a new building, with a couple of the Americans supervising. There were already half a dozen frontier-style log buildings around a square, William's house, accommodation for his retainers, storehouses and workhouses and stables, and the smithy. The square itself had been roughly cobbled with round stones from the river, and the whole settlement kept reasonably dry with drainage ditches-refinements not current in these parts. Another working party labored to hollow out split logs, the chain-link hobbles between their ankles clinking as they moved. The logs would be strapped back together with iron bands and used to pipe in water from a spring not far distant.

One slave stopped a little too long to stretch his back, and the overseer's cane whistled. There was a pop, a yelp, and the man began working again with furious speed. Walker had mentioned that he was using Roman methods, including the ergostula, the windowless half-underground jail where most of the male slaves were kept shackled at night.

"Oh man, that guy is, like, an ore" he muttered to himself.

"What say?" one of the apprentices said.

There were four other men in the smithy with him, two of Isketerol's Tartessians and two Iraiina who'd sworn service with Walker. Not counting the poor bastard in the collar working the bellows, of course. He and the men learning from him were communicating fairly well now, in bits and pieces of each other's languages, despite the way Walker kept sending him new ones. Eventually you got across what you needed to, and teaching helped take his mind off the general shittiness of the situation. The smithy was warm and close inside, well lit by the glow of the big charcoal hearth as well, despite the rainy dimness outside. He turned back to the forge, explaining:

"Like, this is cast iron, man," he said, taking a piece that had originally been in the Eagle's ballast out of the forge and laying it on an anvil. "It won't forge like the wrought stuff we've been working-it's too brittle."

He demonstrated with a blow of his hammer. The iron split, showing gray at its heart.

"You gotta get the carbon out. So y' heat, sorta stir the puddle of melted stuff around, y' hammer to get the slag out, and heat again."

"Eventually," he went on, "it gets to be, you know, wrought iron. Then you can work it like we've been doing, or harden it up again to steel. Like, you need a rilly big hearth for a finery, not just a forge like this-this is just to give you an idea."

He picked out a piece farther along and bent it into a curl shape with a few skilled blows. Each of the others duplicated the process under his critical eye.

"This cast iron," one of the Tartessians said, "it is the same as will come from the blast furnace when it is finished?"

"Yeah, man, right on. You got it."

The twelve-foot-high fieldstone furnace was nearly complete, and there was ore and limestone and charcoal in abundance; mineral deposits didn't change, and they had the Ordnance Survey maps. They did need cylinder bellows and water-powered draft, though, which was taking a while. Judging from the way things had gone with other stuff, they'd have to fiddle around a good long while to get it to work really right-there were lots of little things the books never mentioned. Meanwhile they stockpiled materials.

"That little sucker will put out a thousand pounds a day, and then-"

"Good work, John," a voice said from the entryway.

Martins turned, gritting his teeth. Walker was standing there, holding the reins of his quarterhorse stallion. "Bastard here needs a shoe on his left fore. Kicking again."

Martins grunted wordlessly and took a blank from a rack on the wall and flipped it into the forge to heat. Then he took up pincers and rasp and walked around to the left side of the horse. Walker gripped the bridle more tightly- Bastard was well named and found the bent-over rump of a blacksmith an irresistible temptation, teeth-wise-and Martins pulled up the left forefoot, gripping it between his knees. He took the pincers and began drawing the nails on the loose shoe.

Behind him Walker spoke to one of the Tartessians: "You learn?"

"I learn a great deal, lord! Already we can do many of the simpler tasks. In some ways this iron is easier to work than bronze. A great pity it's so difficult to cast, but it works well beneath the hammer. The blast furnace"-he used the English phrase-"goes well too, soon it will be ready, and we learn how to find the ores of iron. There is much of it back home, I think."

The hoof hissed as the hot iron touched it, and the glowing shoe gave a shuffffff as it was quenched in a bucket of water after he'd tapped the final adjustment; he drove the nails home that held it in place, and crimped them. Both the Iraiina apprentices could already do that much, but it didn't hurt to show them again. He hated the thought of anyone messing this up and hurting a horse's feet.

"Be seeing you, John," Walker said, swinging into the saddle. "Promised Daurthunnicar I'd bring Bastard over to cover some of his mares." He slapped his mount's neck. "Now that the locals've seen what he can do, he's in stallion heaven."

"Aren't we all, boss?" laughed one of the three riding escort; it was Rodriguez, the ex-Coast Guardsman.

The four horses clattered across the cobbles and then their passage turned to the softer thudding of hooves on dirt.

Martins stared sullenly after them. It was bad enough when Walker was around, but much as he hated to admit it, it was worse when the renegade was gone. Some of the things that Hong woman did… his eyes slid away from the big two-story log house across the courtyard. Of course, he'd thought about running.

Shit, I think about it all the time, man. This is, like, totally Mordor here. That dude's head is in a truly fucked-up place.

But he'd seen others who ran brought back with hounds, flogged… and once, crucified. He might make it, especially if he could steal a horse, but Barbs certainly couldn't. She wasn't the outdoor type, and their natural-method contraceptives had failed, badly. At least Walker didn't have him in an iron collar or chained up at night. Not yet. Plus there wasn't anywhere to run when you thought about it. From what he'd seen most of the locals were every bit as ferocious as Walker, just less systematic. He'd heard the Earth Folk were more mellow, sort of laid-back, but they lived a long way away to the west.

Barbara came out of his own smaller cabin and banged a spoon against the bottom of a frying pan. "Time to break for lunch," Martins said gratefully. "C'mon, you guys."

"Well, I'll admit that you're a pretty good pool player, but nobody could make that shot," Cofflin grumbled. "Besides, don't you have to go baste that turkey again or something?"

The basement recreation room of Guard House was dominated by the billiard table; the other end of the room held only a set of well-used weights and some Nautilus machines, both brought in since the Event. The oil lantern over their heads provided more than enough light, and it was no more than medium chilly, something everyone had gotten used to since the beginning of their first winter without central heating.

Marian Alston grinned like a shark as she chalked her cue and pulled back the sleeves of her sweater. Got him, she thought. Not a bad player, but you needed killer instinct for pool. Good to have someone to shoot with, though. You could really relax over this game, and it bored Swindapa like an auger.

Although there are some drawbacks to hanging out with straights. Wouldn't understand the turkey-baster jokes, for instance.

"Know, Oh Cofflin, that my state of karmic spiritual enlightenment puts me beyond all need for your praise. Yet not beyond need for your beer. Extra bottle on this shot? Thirty-seven up and with anothah three I win."

"Well… all right."

Smack. The white caromed off a cushion, kissed one ball, then tickled the twelve. It spun on the edge of the pocket, wavered, and settled again.

"Damn! If you hadn't reminded me about the turkey, I'd have done it," she swore.

The smell from upstairs was getting better and better, mingling with the lingering aroma of the baking she'd done earlier in the day.

"All right, then, I'll split that beer with you." He ambled over to the cooler and took out a bottle, part of the Cofflins' contribution to the Christmas quasi-potluck dinner. "One good thing about this weather is you can get the beer really cold."

"Amen." She looked at her watch. "I will have to go look at that turkey-"

"Marian." Martha's voice. "You'd better come up, I think."

"Oh, hell."

She laid the cue down and took the stairs at a bounding run. The other early arrivals-Martha and the Arnsteins, Sandy Rapczewicz and Doc Coleman-had been sitting in the kitchen, for the warmth and to nibble. Swindapa was standing by the black-iron stove, long spoon still clutched in one hand, tears streaking down her face in slow trickles.

"Hey, honeypie, it's all right, I'm here," Alston said softly, reaching for her. " 'Sail right, sweetheart. There, there, Marian's here, sugar."

Swindapa dropped the spoon and gripped her convulsively. Alston made a waving gesture toward the stove with her free arm and led the Fiernan out into the vacant sun-room. They sat on one of the sofas, and the tears became racking sobs. Outside snow fell in huge soft flakes, batting at the windows like slithery cold kitten-paws.

"I miss my mother! I want my family!" The words trailed off into unpronounceable Fiernan consonants, gasped out into the hollow of her shoulder between sputtering heaves of grief.

And this time of year is a big family feast over there, too, Alston thought, making a low humming in her throat and rocking the other, stroking her back through the check shirt. Fiernan don't leave home, at least not the women, From what Swindapa had said, a girl usually just moved elsewhere in the greathouse and built a hearth of her own when she started having babies, staying in the same huge extended family all her life. The other's misery wrung at her; she buried her face in the silky hair and crooned.

After a while the tight grip around her chest relaxed and the sobs faded into sniffles. She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket, wiping her companion's face and smiling wryly as she remembered the screaming Valkyrie figure who'd stood over her on the shore of the Coatzacoalcos. After another while of silence, Swindapa sighed and blew her nose.

"I feel better now," she said, smiling, cuddling with a mercurial change of mood.

Didn't apologize for crying, either, or say thanks, Alston noted. An American would have. At least she'd learned to use a handkerchief instead of her fingers. Well, the fact that you love someone doesn't make them more like you.

Her mouth quirked. She'd always-well, ever since Jolene left-had dreams about the ideal Significant Other. Someone black, of course. About her own age, and with similar interests, just enough difference to be interesting… And here I'm settled down with a blond bukra teenager from 1250 B.C. who prays to the Woman in the Moon, she thought. Well, you had to work at any relationship worth having.

"Glad you do feel better, 'dapa," she said tenderly.

They went back into the kitchen. Sandy Rapczewicz had the oven door open and was standing over the turkey with baster in one hand and spoon in the other, looking irresolute. "I have the deck there, Ms. Rapczewicz," Alston said. "It's nearly ready, anyway."

"Thanks, Skipper," the XO muttered. She was still a little tender about the face, but the bones were knitting well, the rather lumpy Slavic countenance unaltered.

"The secret to a really good turkey," Alston went on easily, "is keeping the flesh moist-'specially with these lean wild ones."

The bird weighed about twenty pounds, the upper limit with the woods-caught types from the mainland the island was rearing now. She prodded a fork into the joint between drumstick and body. The juice ran clear. "Right, let's take it out and let it stand for a little while. Now everyone but volunteers out of the kitchen-this is the tricky part."

Getting everything to the table at the same time and neither overcooked nor cold was difficult.

"I feel as if I were mutilating my eldest son," Miskelefol said dolefully. "And this climate! It's bad enough in summertime. In winter the damp would rot the testicles off a Sardinian."

"You've seen what the Yare-the Eager-can do," Isketerol said cheerfully. A Tartessian crew was training on her, under the supervision of Walker's men. "Think what this will be capable of. And it keeps the men busy over winter."

Both men peered out the door of the hut. They had broken up the hulls of the Wave Treader and the Foam Hunter for their wood, and put up improvised stocks to hold the frame of another ship. One about two-thirds the Yare's size, considerably shorter but broader in the beam. Back home on the Middle Sea, a ship's hull went up first, with the boards fitted to each other tongue-and-groove, and the frame put in later as strengthening. The Eagle People method was to build the frame first, cut the planks straight, and then nail them on, twisting them as necessary. It was just as strong, and much easier… once you were used to it. The sailors practically had to be driven to it, full of mutterings about bad luck. Not to mention doubts that caulking would hold out the water, even when they'd seen with their own eyes.

The other cause of delay had been the need for iron smithwork. Isketerol looked out from the edge of his hut and smiled as the distinctive clang… clang came from another hut closer to the beach. Now he had two men of his own skilled in the ironsmith's art, at least the beginnings of it, and they were teaching others. And they'd helped with every stage of setting up the blast furnace, learning that mystery as well.

"When the Sea Wolf is finished, we'll load her with a cargo of sixty tons of iron, cousin," he said. He slapped the younger man on the back. "Then we'll sail her and Yare into Tartessos town and be richer than the king. You saw what tools and armor made of iron can do."

Turn a bronze spearpoint as if it were made of lead, for starters. Everyone will pay high at first, he thought. But the price will come down. No matter. He'd charge high prices to have his smiths teach the skills to begin with, and meanwhile sell widely.

And then… who knew what he'd do then?

The turkey was a skeleton, and the mashed potatoes, peas, squash, and carrots mostly memories-cherished memories, because vegetables were a strictly rationed luxury this winter, doled out in grudging lots to hold off scurvy. The pumpkin pie tasted a little odd with honey as the sweetener, but lacked nothing but whipped cream otherwise-milk was still worth its weight in gold, almost literally. Sandy Rapczewicz looked down at her plate for a second. 'Then she looked out of the corners of her eyes at Coleman, who nodded; Alston could see her gathering herself for an announcement.

"Think I didn't know?" she said, forestalling it.

"Yeah, well," she said. "We were… well, sort of waiting, you know, Skipper?"

Waiting to be sure we were here for good, Alston thought. Rapczewicz had been married, back up in the twentieth. But the Event was as final a method of divorce as death, and considerably more so than a decree nisi.

"Congratulations," Alston said aloud, glancing from her to Dr. Coleman. A bit May-September, but I'm not in a position to talk. "Just one thing, Sandy. Get married by all means, but if you get pregnant before this spring's operations, I'll perform an operation on you. A hysterectomy, with a blunt butterknife. I'm goin' to need my XO."

"Sure, Skipper," Rapczewicz said, grinning in relief. "Wouldn't miss it for the world."

The guests joined in carrying the dishes back into the kitchen, then trooped back into the front parlor with drinks, and plates of dried-cranberrry muffins and cookies. Alston looked at them a little wryly. Lost in time, and we still play bridge and have Christmas dinner parties. It was such a workaday crowd, among the period-piece splendors of the mansion. One of the better things about the Event was that it had amputated the social pyramid at both ends, though. No masses of poor, and by definition nobody on the island could be rich these days.

They exchanged the gifts piled under a miniature tree, then Coleman sat down at the piano and began tinkling something vaguely Straussian from the book of sheet music someone had given him. Swindapa pulled her up by the hand and did a creditable waltz. Where the hell did she learn that? Alston wondered. They'd never danced together before; she felt rusty by comparison. Damn, this is nice. She really is graceful as a deer. Sweet-smelling, supple, strong, looking at her with that guileless smile she knew full well covered an unselfconscious, inventive randiness. Damn, and here I thought I was the cold, self-contained type…

Several of the other couples rose to dance as well. "Can I cut in?" Cofflin asked after a moment.

"Sure, but with who?" Alston said, smiling secretly to see him blush. "And who leads?"

"You were really warning Sandy, weren't you?" he said quietly as they danced off. His style was basic-competent. "I don't think fighting's an 'unlikely contingency we should be prepared for' with this British expedition, is it?"

"Hell, no." They swayed aside to avoid a table. "Should have cleared the room for this… Unlikely? No, not with Walker over there. If he's cleared out of Britain, that's one thing. If he hasn't…"

"You get to kick some Iraiina butt?" Cofflin said gently.

"I confess, wouldn't be the least pleasin' thing in the world." Her eyes touched Swindapa, where she led Ian Arnstein through the steps. "Think, though, Jared. King William Walker, wherever he is, is a deadly threat to us. We're not talkin' about a Lisketter here. He knows too much. The knowledge will make the locals dangerous to us, and if Walker gets enough power, he'll be dangerous to us-as the only potential limit to his power, he has to strike at us. It's the way he'll think, believe me."

"I do believe you," Cofflin sighed. "Worse luck. Ayup, I'll back anything within reason at the Meeting." His face hardened. "God damn Walker."

"May God damn him indeed. But I'll do my best to help."

"Friends come!" Walker shouted at the top of his lungs. "Friends come! Friends come!"

That was Iraiina law; if you didn't call out three times when you approached a steading, you were assumed to be hostile. In this case it was purely formal; Daurthunnicar's scouts had seen him some time ago. Several of them were mounted, with simple pad saddles and stirrups. Bastard trumpeted a challenge at their mounts, and he reined him in sharply; the quarterhorse swiveled its ears back, but he'd taught it to know better than to buck. Walker would still be very glad when there were a couple of his get old enough to break to the saddle-mares would do, a gelding by preference, of course. Riding an uncut stallion was taking machismo to absurd lengths.

He threw back the hood of his cloak. It was a typical English winter day of the better variety: fleeting patches of sun, interspersed with gray overcast and occasional chill drizzle. He'd almost prefer a hard freeze and some snow, but that didn't happen often in southern Hampshire. It was amazing how cold the Nantucket-made armor and underpadding were, when you thought of how uncomfortably hot they could be in warm weather. He'd be glad to change over to the set of fancy duds in the leather trunk the pack-horse was carrying. The fields were a sodden sort of green, patched with brown and occasional puddles. Mud sucked at the horses' hooves, coating their lower legs and spattering the trousers of their riders. The smell was rich and earthy, mixed with damp wool from their cloaks. Those were woven from raw fiber, unfulled, with the grease still in it; he was surprised at how well they shed water, almost as good as a rubber slicker.

There were other changes around Daurthunnicar's ruathaurikaz, besides stirrups and horseshoes. It had gotten bigger, and one of the new buildings was made of horizontal logs. A couple of wheelbarrows were leaned up against the walls of buildings; it was amazing how much difference those made. Beside the bronze-casting workshop was a small ironworking smithy, and instead of all the women grinding grain by hand, two male slaves walked around a rotary quern pushing at a beam, linked to it by chains from their iron collars.

The heads nailed above the hall doorway were very much in the local tradition, though. None of them had had time to weather down to skulls.

Cuddy nodded to the gristmill. "Great what you can find in books, isn't it, boss?"

Walker grinned. "Actually, I got that one out of a movie, Bill," he said.

He'd suggested they use horses here on the mill when he built it for them; that would be quite practical with the new harness he'd introduced. Everyone had looked at him as if he'd recommended eating their own children. Odd people, the Iraiina.

"You know, if we did stay here, we could be running the place in about five years," he said to Bill Cuddy. "Running the whole of England."

The former machinist grunted and looked around at the trampled mud, pigs rooting for slops, a blue-fingered girl in a tattered shift milking a scrubby little cow into a bucket carved out of a section of log.

"This?" he said. "Run this, boss?"

"Well, Walkerburg's already a lot better. Not as much already built as in Greece, yeah, but less opposition, too."

"You thinking of changing the plan, boss?"

"Just a notion. The climate here sucks dead dog farts, I give you that. I'll think about it."

They swung down out of the saddle, armor clanking. He'd kept the conversation with Cuddy quiet; Ohotolarix was picking up English fast, and there were things he preferred to keep private. Retainers came up to take their beasts, and two unsaddled Bastard and led him gingerly off to the round corral where the hobbled mare waited. By the time they got there they were being dragged by the horse, rather than vice versa. His enraged squeal cut through the air.

There were a lot of horses in the other pens, and four extra chariots stood in a wicker-walled shed. Well, well, he thought, drinking off the ceremonial horn of beer that marked you as a guest. Another tribe, ready to talk alliance with the Iraiina. Our efforts are bearing fruit. And some Tartessians were there, lounging about the entrance, trading warmth for fresh air.

"Good to see you again, blood-brother," Isketerol said, shaking wet from his own cloak; by the look of him, he hadn't been here long. "We should talk, later."

"That we should, later."

The rahax's hall was thronged with warriors and guests tonight, heavy with the smells of woodsmoke and cooking and beer and damp dog from the hounds that lay growling amid the feasters' feet. Daurthunnicar came down from the carved seat along the southern wall to greet him and lead him to the stool of honor at his right hand. Over to the left were half a dozen visitors; they wore their long fur-trimmed woolen jackets and went without the leggings Iraiina wore this time of year, and their hair was in twin braids rather than the single ponytail of Daurthunnicar's folk.

Easterners, an embassy from one of the Kentish tribes. Looking rather sullen, but polite enough. Or scared.

A huge platter of smoking roast pork was borne in before the rahax. He directed the server to carry a portion of the loin to Walker. The American smiled at her; she was Daurthunnicar's daughter, a statuesque blond young woman with gold on her wrists and in her braids. The rahax was really doing him honor. That was the champion's portion of the carcass, too.

As he reached for the meat, someone shouted. Walker looked up sharply.

"No! No!"

It was an Iraiina, one of Daurthunnicar's own followers, with a holding not far from the high chiefs. A big man, but not one ounce of it fat; his shoulders were a solid knot of muscle. Face and arms were seamed with scars, although the man couldn't be more than thirty, and he had a formidable collection of gold arm rings, a tore, and a checked plaid tunic that clashed horribly with both. He stamped and roared:

"No! Why should this outlander get the hero's meat? Let him eat husks with swineherds!"

The whole hall was thrown into confusion. Men stood, yelled into each other's faces, shook fists as pro- and anti-Walker factions coalesced. Some of the women were screaming too with excitement, and the easterner guests weren't bothering to hide their smiles. Daurthunnicar surged erect, frowning like a thundercloud, and waved his sword-everyone else had to hang his weapons on the wall-until the uproar died off to a low babble. He yelled at the big Iraiina:

"You shame your rahax by insulting his guest! The man he has made wehaxpothis, a chief among our tribe. You shame the brave warriors who have sworn to follow him."

Ohotolarix certainly seemed to feel so; he was half off the bench, fingering his eating knife and glaring blue-eyed murder. Walker reached out and put a hand on his arm, gently urging him back to his' seat.

"No, this is good," he murmured. "Wait-remember what I told you. Anger is like fire, a fine servant but a poor master. The fool will fall on his own words."

Daurthunnicar was shouting: "He has brought victory and much booty to the camps of the Iraiina, new things to make us strong. Your forefathers are ashamed, Tautanorrix son of Llaunnicarz!"

"No!" the strongman declared. "He is nothing but a wizard. He offends against old custom and law, his slant-eyed wife is a witch, and the gods and Mirutha will shun us for harboring them, stealing our luck. Send him away, lord, or better still, cut his throat in the grove and make a bonfire of his goods and followers, to appease the Mighty Ones."

More uproar, with Daurthunnicar shouting louder than anyone. Walker stayed relaxed, leaning back with his horn of beer. Totally clueless, he thought. These people didn't have the least conception of government, or even of war, really. They fought like tigers individually or in small groups, but their sole idea of a war was a series of big raids, until one side or the other got sick of it and moved out or paid tribute. And this near-riot was their concept of how to settle policy questions.

He waited until the shouting had passed its peak, then rose to his feet. "Hear me, lord," he called, not raising his voice much but pitching it to carry through the swell as if it were storm-roar at sea.

"Hear me. This fool and son of slaves-"

Tautanorrix roared again, wordless, his face turning purple.

"-has offered you offense by breaking the peace of your hall, like a mannerless swineherd. As your handfast man, let me punish him."

Near-silence fell through the firelit dimness of the big turf-walled hall.

"And since he might fear my sword is enchanted, let us fight here and now with only the weapons the gods give to every man," he went on, holding up his clenched fists. That provoked a surprised rumble. "To the death, of course."

Laughter at that, fists and the pommels of knives pounding trestle boards until the pottery tableware rattled. That bitch Alston wasn't completely wrong, he thought. This is a lot like a biker gang. Guts and toughness were everything. He'd put his stock up considerably by challenging Man Mountain here, and he'd have lost everything if he'd backed down.

Daurthunnicar's fork-bearded face swung back and forth between them, little blue eyes narrowed. On the one hand, Tautanorrix was a valued supporter. On the other, Walker had made the chief rich-and unlike virtually every other subchief of the tribe, he'd consistently deferred to his patron, thrown his weight behind him in council, and given him shrewd advice on how to increase his own power, make himself a real king. The idea was strange to the Iraiina chieftain, but he'd taken to it like a Russian to vodka. And Walker had a strong following of his own among the younger Iraiina warriors.

The rumbling voice of the high chief went on:

"You are both warriors of note, forward in shedding blood and manslaying, generous in feeding the Crow Goddess. Indeed, it might be said that you're among the best of us. If you fought, the tribe would lose whoever died." A long pause. "But words have been passed which cannot be brought back. Hear the word of the rahax! Let these men fight. Let the Wise Man see that no enchantments are used, only strength and skill and luck."

More rousing cheers from the warriors and warrior guests and their women, and cat-yowls of excitement as the betting began. Daurthunnicar was a shrewd leader in his way; he knew when to rule by taking this pack of wolves in the direction it wanted to go. Tautanorrix bellowed with glee.

The rahax held up his sword again. "The tribe must be one, here in our new lands. So I, your rahax, will pay the blood and honor price to the kindred of the man who falls. Let both of you swear, in the name of your kindred, that they will take the price and not seek blood for blood; that is honorable, because this is no killing by stealth, but an honest challenge."

Walker nodded. "Hear the wisdom of our rahax!" he said. Sotto voce in English, to Cuddy: "If I lose, kill the bastard."

Tautanorrix sneered: "I will break him between my hands and give his body to the Blood Hag. Yet the word of our rahax is wise."

Daurthunnicar went on: "And the victor shall be acknowledged by all men as the champion of the rahax, first among the warriors of the Iraiina folk, with an honor price of a hundred horses and two hundred cattle. In acknowledgment of this, he who is victor here shall take as his wife my daughter Ekhnonpa."

That brought full silence. The rahax had no living sons, although he was well provided with nephews. That made the marriage all the more significant, since whoever wed the chiefs daughter would be a member of the chieftain's kin by tribal law, and eligible himself to become rahax.

Oho! Walker thought. Well, maybe I will stay.

He vaulted over the trestle table into the open space between the firepits. Isketerol was leaning back with a raised eyebrow; Walker slipped him a wink as he stripped off coat and shirt and T-shirt. Tautanorrix blinked surprise but did the same, save for the gold bands on his arms and neck. His chest was shaggy with the same yellow hair that swung in a braid down his back and cascaded from his chin; the skin was almost blue-white where it hadn't been exposed to the sun. Blue-and-crimson rings of tattoo circled his biceps under the gold armlets.

The American looked at him critically; about two-forty on the scales, he judged, and built like a Swedish weight lifter. So, he's fifty pounds heavier, stronger, and probably fast too, Walker estimated, taking slow deep breaths. He put right fist to left palm and bowed slightly, then brought both fists up.

Normally he thought of fair fights as something for suckers, but this time there had to be a real battle, something the audience could understand.

Tautanorrix bellowed and leaped, arms wide to grip and crush.

The attackers came at her steadily, unintimidated, moving the shields just enough to block. Alston took a deep breath and launched herself forward in a shoulder strike, pinning the other short sword back as she did. Her armored shoulder punched into the shield before her with a metallic crack. The man behind the shield staggered backward, away from his companion. She followed up, slamming at him until the shield boomed and he was wavering back on his heels. Then she had to wheel herself as his companion came up, boring in and stabbing.

"Stop," she called.

The trainees did, leaning on the shields and panting, the double-weight wooden training swords dangling from their hands. Elsewhere in the high school gymnasium the noise continued unabated, the whack of wood on the pells, or on the metal of armor. Most of the trainees were wearing wire face protectors as well; they'd had quite a few accidents involving broken noses or lost teeth, and Alston had been utterly intolerant of any toning-down of the regimen. Others were doing unarmed combat, or climbing up ropes and over barricades in armor. There was a heavy smell of whale-oil lanterns and sweat, and a cold damp tang to the air; snow lay a foot deep outside, and the huge empty spaces had been designed for central heating, not wood stoves.

She controlled her own breathing, keeping it slow and deep as she felt the sweat soaking her padding turn chill, and watched the purple faces of the two youngsters. Siblings, Kenneth and Kathryn Hollard, about two years between them; they had the Yankee look, light brown hair and blue eyes, long bony faces.

"You two have been really practicin'," she said.

"Yes ma'am," they chorused, with grins of enthusiasm.

"Why do you want to volunteer for the expedition?" she said.

They looked at each other. "Ah…" the young man said. "It needs to be done."

Good answer, she decided. More thoughtful than most his age. They weren't talking about the other reasons, of course: boredom, longing to travel, even the desire for adventure. Her mouth quirked slightly at the corner.

"Mr. Hollard, Ms. Hollard, remember that adventure is someone else in deep trouble a long way away. I can tell you that having a spear through your leg is no… fun… at… all. Sterowsky!"

The sailor barking at a group ramming spears into a wall-mounted target came loping over. He'd recovered reasonably well from the blow of the obsidian rake across his face, but the scar was still purple along its edges and his beard was growing in white along the line. It pulled up his mouth into a continual half-sneer.

"Want to show me off again, ma'am?" he said.

"If you don't mind."

"De nada, ma'am."

The two young islanders had turned a little pale.

"Not everybody can come, and there's militia work to be done here, too. We'll need qualified instructors. Listen, you two-people are going to get killed, people are going to get cut up, crippled for life."

"Ma'am… I'd rather go with the expedition." They spoke in almost-unison, like a bad mixing job on a record.

Alston nodded. "You understand that you'll be under military discipline?" she said.

"Yes ma'am. Our dad was in the Marines."

"All right then; you can both sign up and move into barracks." She wanted the teams that would be fighting together to live tight for as long as possible first. You did better with people who knew each other than with strangers. Her eyes went to the girl. "After you report to the clinic and get the IUD fitted."

Kathryn Hollard blushed; her brother grinned at her with an elder sibling's lack of compassion. "Ah, ma'am, I'm, uh-" she began.

"No exceptions. Virginity isn't a reliable contraceptive." As opposed to mister-ectomy, but that was a minority taste.

She could see them deciding whether or not to smile. Good kids, most of the islanders were, not many attitude problems-but not very deferential either. They settled on shy grins; she nodded in reply.

"Meanwhile, back to work. Mark 'em down, 'dapa."

Swindapa made a note on her clipboard; she'd more or less fallen into the role of aide-de-camp and general factotum. Alston sighed and went over to the side of the big room for a dipper of water.

"Oh, 'lo, Jared," she said, looking up.

"Still trying to discourage volunteers?" he said, nodding greetings to Swindapa.

"Just making sure they know what they're getting into," she replied, drinking deep. Ahhhh. One of the best things about exercise is the way it makes water taste. She shook her head. "Seems to be a lot of enthusiasm."

He chuckled! "Farmers and fishermen used to be the best recruiting grounds," he said. "Now we know why. Even soldiering is easier."

"How's Leaton coming with the reapers?" she said. That would remove a crucial time constraint on the expedition, if they didn't absolutely have to get those hands back by harvest.

"Looks like they'll really work this time. Nobody is going to miss those sickles. Once was enough."

She nodded. "We should take a couple of reapers along." she said thoughtfully. "They'd be a big productivity boost over there."

Cofflin snorted. "Everyone's getting their oar in this thing. It's the clergy, next-they've scheduled a meeting with me for next week."

Alston sighed: "Almost as many as want something brought back from Britain. Still, there's-"

Her face took on the flat, blank calm of intense concentration. Suddenly she smiled and snapped her fingers. "That's it!"

"That's what?" he said.

"Old military saying. Amateurs talk tactics, dilettantes talk strategy, professionals talk logistics."

He frowned. "I've heard that, but just how does it apply-"

" 'Scuse me, Jared." She hefted her bokken and headed back toward one of the practice groups, quickening her stride. Someone had just tried something that Jackie Chan would have had trouble pulling off on his best day.

There was a clattering thump, and a trainee landed half off a mat. She lay gasping while her opponent leaned on his spear and panted.

"Don't tell me," Alston said. "You watched a lot of martial-arts movies, right?"

"No ma'am," the young woman said. "It was TV-Xena, Warrior Princess."

Alston closed her eyes for an instant. Lord, give me strength, she thought. "Well, let me show you why lifting your leg above your head is a bad idea. Especially when you don't have a scriptwriter on your side."

Tautanorrix swung a fist the size of a ham. Walker slashed the edge of his palm into the Iraiina's wrist. His heel flashed into the back of the bigger man's knee, and the warrior landed face forward in the dirty rushes. His face was thoughtful as he rose, shaking a numb arm.

That's the last thing we need, Walker knew.

"Looking for your mother down there?" he asked. "Or for your mare's heart?"

That brought another bellowing charge. He met it with a front stamping kick that flashed between Tautanorrix's outstretched arms and thudded into the big man's chest; the flat of it, not the deadly heel. The Iraiina stopped as if he'd run into a brick wall. Walker felt as if he'd kicked one, as the impact jarred into the small of his back.

Christ, but this fucker's built. Tautanorrix's hands came up to protect his torso; his face was a splotched pattern of purple and white. This time Walker's foot went out like a frog's tongue darting for a fly, aimed low. The heel slammed into the top of the Iraiina's kneecap with a sound like a maul striking wood.

Tautanorrix tried to grab for the foot and nearly fell. The warrior's quick downward glance showed the kneecap twisted offside, like a lumpy growth under the skin on the side of his leg. He bent down and twisted it back into place with a pop. Talk about your high pain tolerance, Walker thought. He circled, and Tautanorrix pivoted on his good leg to follow.

"I thought you were supposed to hit me, swineherd," the American said through a grin.

This time Tautanorrix ignored him, utterly intent. Well, overconfidence could last only so long… The granite fist flashed out toward his taunting grin. This time both his hands met it, slapping it aside and then locking around the bigger man's wrist. He pivoted on his rear foot, leaning far over and pulling Tautanorrix with him. His left foot slashed upward into the Iraiina's armpit. Tautanorrix came up on his toes, mouth gaping in a hoarse grunt. Walker released him and flipped away with a fancy handstand and twirl that ended with him back in fighting stance. Tautanorrix stood swaying, his right arm dangling useless and dislocated.

"Time, big fellah," Walker panted and came back in, fluid and fast. "Time to die."

The left hand struck at him. He blocked, grabbed the thick wrist, and locked the other man's arm tight with a twist, pivoting. His own right forearm slammed into the locked elbow, and it broke with a sound like green branches snapping. Walker screamed out the Ida, launching a flurry of fist-strikes, face, belly, throat, slashing with the tips of bladed fingers at the other man's forehead and eyes. Tautanorrix lurched and stumbled, swaying like a cut-through tree, his ruined features sheening with blood. Walker grabbed him by the belt of his kilt and the base of his braid, bending him over and smashing his own knee into the Iraiina's face over and over again. Bone splintered.

He looked down, panting, naked torso slick with sweat and the dead man's blood. First time, he realized. First time he'd been able to keep on with the hand-to-hand until the other fucker was dead. He turned, feet dancing, fists flung over his head in an instinctive gesture of triumph. The Iraiina were roaring out his name, Daurthunnicar among them.

His daughter Ekhnonpa stood watching the victor with shining eyes, her hands clenched at her breasts, chest heaving. Walker met her eyes and grinned.

Man, this is great, he thought, as his followers pushed forward with blankets to wipe him down and a horn of beer for his thirst. It doesn't get any better than this.

"Thank you," the Catholic priest said, accepting a cup of sassafras tea. "You understand, Chief Cofflin, that the division of the Visible Church of Christ has long been a scandal."

Father Gomez looked tanned and fit; he'd been shoveling salt along with the prisoners he was supposed to rehabilitate… had rehabilitated, Cofflin reminded himself. He trusted the little priest's judgment.

So did his colleagues, evidently. The Town Building office held the pastors of the Episcopal and Baptist churches as well, the Congregationalists, the Methodists… even the Unitarians. Only the Quakers and Jews were missing, and neither were very common on Nantucket, particularly the former-ironic, since the island had once been a stronghold of the Friends. Cofflin looked out the square-paned window for a second, as wet snow clung to it and more fell down onto the quiet dockside. The hulking shape of the big motor ferry sat there, dim and dark in the winter's afternoon, looking chewed on where half the superstructure had been disassembled. Symbolic, Cofflin thought. Old things broken up for material to make the new. He stirred uneasily. This sort of thing made him embarrassed.

"I know you gentlemen and ladies"-the Congregational minister was a woman-"have been holding a conference."

"We have indeed," Gomez said. "We've been trying to come to some understanding of what God meant by the Event, in a specifically religious sense. Some things are obvious. Questions of episcopacy and papal supremacy are… well, completely moot. We think that this means that God is telling us to fall back on the simple wisdom of the early church; wherever two or more of us are gathered in His name, there He is… and all believers are one."

Cofflin nodded. That made sense. For that matter, there'd been something of a religious revival on the island since the Event. Not showy, and there'd never been many fundamentalists here-Unitarians and mainstream Protestants were in the majority, with the Catholics a not very close second. More people had been showing up of a Sunday, though.

The Congregational minister went on: "At the same time, God is also telling us something by the very fact that it was Nantucket that was thrown into the sea of time. And not, say, Sicily or an island in Indonesia."

She looked at her colleagues. "There's a certain balance of denominational forces here that's pretty well unique. And we're in a world where, say, Islam or Buddhism is completely absent, even Zoroastrianism. No other what you might call competing higher religions."

"So you're going to unite and form a single church?" he said.

Gomez spread his hands. "More of a federation."

"Congratulations… but there's no question of a state church, I hope you realize that."

"Of course."

"Well, then, what exactly is the point of all this?" Cofflin said.

The clerics looked at each other. Gomez cleared his throat and took up the thread: "Well, Chief Cofflin, you must realize that God is also telling us something by putting us in a world still wholly pagan. Some of it reasonably clean paganisms like… oh, like Ms. Swindapa's. Others abominations like the Olmec jaguar cult. Obscene by worldly standards, and possibly of demonic inspiration."

Cofflin nodded grimly. Cultural autonomy be damned, that deserved to be scrubbed off the face of the planet. The problem with eliminating undeserving customs, though, was that it was hard to do it without wiping out the people who held them. He was a lot less enthusiastic about that.

"Well, the obvious inference is that God wants His word brought to these people… There are some technical issues to do with the effect of the Incarnation on man's fallen nature, but I won't bother you with that. Basically, we're called to spread the Word, and to do that, we need some help from the government of our new republic here."

"Oh. Missionaries?"

"Certainly. On a more secular note, conversion will also make trade and other peaceful relations easier."

"Hmm." Cofflin pondered. "What exactly did you have in mind?"

Funny, William Walker thought. The Iraiina verb for "to marry" was wedh. It also meant "to carry away," which was precisely what you did with the bride. Ekhnonpa was a big young woman, but he lifted her easily onto his saddlebow; a pleasant armful, and her face was nice enough-not exactly pretty, but it wasn't paper-bag-ugly, either. It would have been a chariot in an entirely traditional upper-class wedding. She shivered a little through the fur cloak and leaned against him; he waved and called back greetings to the guests who thronged Daurthunnicar's steading. They roared out good wishes, mostly of an obscene nature, with plenty of puns on "riding home," the bawdy mirth of a stockbreeding people. The women crowded close, pelting them with handfuls of wheat and barley for fertility. Ekhnonpa had been in high good spirits all through the ceremony-the viewing of the dowry, the handing over by the father, the bride and groom eating from a loaf cut by the man's sword-but now she became a little subdued.

The grass in the fields was silvery with frost where tips lifted out of last night's snow. The branches of the oaks were a tracery of silver where the path ran beneath, and a mist of ice crystals drifted down, reddened by the morning sunlight. Breath puffed white from men and animals. Walker fell back beside the light horse-drawn cart that drew up the rear of the procession.

"Here, wife," he said. "This will be more comfortable for you."

She made a small sound of surprise at the heaped wool and bearskins under the padded leather canopy, more so at the smooth ride the springs gave, glowing with satisfaction at this demonstration of her man's status. Her two attendants were already sitting there; he could hear them chattering to each other as he rode back to the head of the line. His men called congratulations, waving spears or slapping him on the back as he passed.

"No, I don't have any objection," Isketerol said, taking up the thread of the conversation as their horses paced side by side. He'd adopted trousers and jacket and cap with earflaps for winter wear. "Even better, if you stay here. More for Tartessos in the Middle Sea, and richer trade- you'll want to buy wine, oil, dried fruits, things like that."

"It'll depend on what happens this winter and spring," Walker said. "I think I can build a position the Nantucketers won't care to mess with, particularly not if I'm prepared to be reasonable about trading. Which I will be." For a while, he added to himself. "And then again, if I can open peaceful relations with the island, I can attract more specialists here. I can certainly offer them a better deal than they have back home, and good luck to Cofflin and the captain if they try to stop it. Pretty soon you'll have ships on that run." And so will I, of course. You're a good buddy, Isketerol, but I'm not giving you a monopoly.

The folk of his own steading came out to greet them as they arrived around noon; the winter sun was fairly low in the southern sky. He stopped to put Ekhnonpa back on his saddlebow. She looked around, awe plain on her face as they rode into the courtyard.

"Walkerburg," he said.

"It's larger than father's ruathaurikaz already!" she said, startled. "And no palisade?"

"It's our enemies who need walls," he said, and tried to see it with her eyes.

All the buildings of horizontal logs, with split strakes for roofing, and fieldstone chimneys carrying away the smoke. The stone pavement of the courtyard showed, the snow brushed off it; the barn and stables were built to the pattern he remembered from his boyhood. Martin's hammer went clang… clang from the smithy, but otherwise everyone was here. He'd throw a party for the common laboring slaves as well; letting them get blasted and laid on high occasions was good management practice. There were a row of smaller log cabins for his free followers, and the big house he'd put up out of logs from the palisades of plundered settlements.

All in all, it didn't look like his family's ranch in the Bitterroot country of southwestern Montana any more. It looked like the little crossroads hamlet where his grandfather had gone four times a year to lay in supplies.

"Nut a izzy plessta mekka livvin'," he quoted softly, remembering Gramps. "But kip y'feet uffa m' prop'ty. Ent much but it's mine."

"My husband?" she said.

"Nothing," he replied. "Old memories."

He swung down, swept up the Iraiina woman in his arms, and carried her through the big house door. He'd built the place on the shotgun principle, four rooms up and down separated by a hall, with a lean-to kitchen out back. It was fairly comfortable, too. Squared-log walls made good insulation, and Martins had run up some Franklin stoves.

"It's warm!" she said in amazement as he put her on her feet again. An arm stayed around his waist. "Warm as summer!"

Warm as a sixty-degree English summer, maybe.

Ekhnonpa gasped again; she'd never seen a floor of split logs, sanded smooth and covered with rag rugs, or plumb-line-straight walls hung with native tapestries, or a staircase, or proper hinged doors. Nor the brightness that glass-chimney oil lamps and molded wax candles allowed.

"This is like the palaces of the gods," she blurted.

Actually more like summer camp, Walker thought with some pride. But it's a start.

Alice Hong came up. Ekhnonpa made a bobbing gesture, halfway between a curtsy and a bow, as was due to the senior wife.

"Greetings, my elder sister," she said quietly.

Hong nodded to her, smiling, and went on to Walker in English: "All right, if you like big blond horses. Being a cowboy, I suppose…"

"Tsk, tsk, meow," he replied in the same language. "Everything ready?"

"Yes, oh Master," she said, leading the way into the dining room. "The runner got here an hour ago. And I delivered a baby and set a broken leg in my abundant spare time today."

"Cut the sarcasm-I'm hungry."

The table was set for a dozen, his principal followers. Ekhnonpa looked around at the room, the table with its place settings and candelabra, the chairs-those were only for chieftains, among the Iraiina-and laughed nervously. "I can see that there is much I must learn about helping to run a household of the Eagle People. Much my elder sister Alauza must teach me."

Alice had enough Iraiina by now to understand that. She began to laugh into her wineglass. The other Americans joined her, and the Iraiina looked at the ceiling or the table, anywhere but at the chieftain's bride. Servants scurried in with platters of food and baskets of bread, the candlelight flashing on their silver collars.

"I teach well," Alice said, looking aside at Walker. "Don't I, Will?"

"Not this time," he said in English. "Political considerations, my sweet."

She pouted slightly. "You get all the fun, with this bloody log-cabin harem of yours."

"You've been having a good enough time."

"Pickles and ice cream are nice, but they're no substitute for beef," she said. "There isn't enough of you to go 'round, Will, and now there'll be less, and you've developed a really medieval jealous streak."

"This is the Land of the Double Standard, Alice my medicinal querida." For an instant his face went utterly cold, until she looked aside. "I don't give a shit personally, but I can't afford to lose face, which I would if you strayed. If I lose face, you lose your face. Clear?"

"Clear," she said sullenly. "Pass the peas."

Walker did, then helped Ekhnonpa fill her plate. A fork could be surprisingly difficult if you'd never used one before, and he helped her with that too. He kept her wineglass filled. Before long she was blushing and giggling at him, and leaning closer unconsciously. He grinned inwardly. Iraiina men had no technique. In bed they just put a woman on her back and leaped aboard, and outside it they socialized mainly with each other. A little American smoothness went a long way here. And for the present, Ekhnonpa was going to be very useful to him.

"That's fun," Swindapa said, swinging down out of the saddle.

Ian Arnstein stifled a groan. Well, young women are supposed to like horses, he thought. He didn't, and besides that he looked ridiculous on any but a fairly large one. On the Bronze Age ponies… he'd be lucky if they didn't walk out from underneath him and leave him standing like a straddle-legged statue. There'd been a Viking chief with that problem; they'd called him Hrolf Ganger, Hrolf the Walker.

The big barn had two sawdust riding rings inside it, and the board walls cut the chill a little… a very little. It smelled of the sweat and other by-products of horses, despite the snow that lay three inches deep outside. Cynthia Kelton had rented stable space before the Event, to support her habit-the habit being horses, of course. She was about thirty herself, and she'd been plump before the Event; that showed in the looseness of her jodhpurs. There was a visible glow to her as she tutored Eagle's officers and selected members of the militia who'd be going east with the expeditionary force. She would be along herself, to break in local horses they planned to buy on the other side of the ocean, which was considerably easier than carrying any with them.

"Of course it's fun," Kelton said to Swindapa. "And a very promising student you are, too. Nice seat and good hands."

"Better her than me," Arnstein muttered under his breath.

He'd always been convinced that the only purpose a horse served was to take up space that might otherwise be occupied by another large quadruped, say a cow or a camel.

"It's not that bad, Ian," Doreen said, turning out a leg with a riding boot on it to admire the curve.

"I'd rather hoof it myself on shank's mare than saddle myself with one of these things," he said, heading toward the mounting block. "What is it with women and horses?"

"They don't make puns, for starters," she said. "Or leave cracker crumbs in bed."

Marian Alston doubted anything like the Dance of the Departing Moon had been done in Nantucket before. Certainly not by someone in pink bikini briefs spangled with blue flowers. Swindapa was humming to herself as she danced, turning, whirling, leaping, crouching, then slowing to a stately gliding walk in the intricate measure; it was like a ballet laid out by a mathematician with a taste for geometry. Long blond hair spun out in a final spiral as she collapsed gracefully into a pattern of limbs, the fixed look of religious ecstasy fading from her face.

Well, that explains how she picked up the Art so quickly. With that sort of training…

"That will bring our journey luck," the Fiernan said, rising and kneeling up on the sofa at the foot of the bed, elbows on the back and palms supporting her chin. "Oh, it will be good to see my family again! And I'm looking forward to showing you off to everybody, my friends and my uncles and aunts, and having you meet my mother and sisters."

Alston blinked a little. The Fiernan Bohulugi had plenty of taboos. Swindapa wouldn't eat swan, for instance, or eat at all on certain days, or wash clothes or plant in the dark of the moon. But they evidently had different taboos. The thought of acquiring a whole new set of-well, might as well call them in-laws-was a bit daunting. Plus that meant more culture clash. The memory of the day they'd spent going over the concept of monogamy wasn't pleasant; the Fiernan language didn't even have a word for it. And what if she wants to stay home? With an effort, Alston put that thought out of her mind.

She looked out the window; dawn was just breaking, gray through early-spring clouds. "Not worth trying to go back to sleep," she said. The Arnsteins were coming over for a working breakfast, planning diplomatic strategy.

"No, it isn't worthwhile going back to sleep," Swindapa said.

Alston looked down to the foot of the bed. The Fiernan was skinning out of her briefs and crawling up toward her, grinning through a fall of tousled wheat-colored hair. She'd never considered herself a very passionate woman, until now. Live and learn, she thought.

A hand knocked at the door a little later. "Go away!" Swindapa shouted, laughing.

Alston found herself laughing too; then stiffened as it turned into a long shivering moan. They lay clasped together, and then the knock came again-louder this time, and Ian Arnstein's distinctive mumble. She rolled off the bed and snatched up her bathrobe, belting it on as she strode over to the door.

"This had better be good, Arnstein," she said as she flung it open, trying to make the words a bark and knowing she still had an ear-to-ear smile on. "In case you hadn't noticed, breakfast time isn't for another hour and a half."

It was the scholar, looking extremely nervous, and then blushing slightly as he looked over her shoulder.

"Sorry, Captain." He didn't call her that onshore unless it was a formal occasion or he was very nervous. "It's Martha."

Her irritation vanished into a cold clench of worry. "She's all right?"

"So Coleman says, and the baby's doing fine for someone only fifteen minutes old-but they want you there."

Alston blinked; she hadn't realized the labor had started yet. "Oh. Give me a minute, Ian, I'll be right with you."

Swindapa was dancing again with excitement as they scrambled into their clothes and downstairs to where their bicycles waited. They kept to the sidewalks to avoid Main Street's bone-shaking cobbles, then swung onto pavement. Rainwater misted up from the asphalt, soaking her lower legs. For a moment she remembered her own children, something she'd carefully schooled herself not to do. Forget it, woman, she scolded herself. They're a long way away. Three thousand years is an even better wall than a divorce decree.

The streets were quiet, and so was the maternity ward- section, rather-of the hospital. Martha was lying in a freshly made bed with the baby in the crook of her arm; she was tired but triumphant, the baby was as crumpled and formless as babies usually were, and Jared Cofflin had the same sledgehammer-between-the-eyes look that he'd had on his wedding day, only more so.

"Congratulations," Marian said inanely. "Everything went well?"

Coleman was still in his green surgical gown. "For a primigravida in her forties, very smoothly. Nice healthy bouncing eight-pound baby girl," he said, with a workman's pride.

"You wouldn't say smooth if you'd been doing it yourself," Martha said tartly.

"No indeed," Marian said emphatically.

"Does it get better the second time?" Martha asked.

"No, can't say that it does," the black woman said. "But you sort of expect it more." And afterward you feel very, very-

"Is there a kitchen in this torture chamber?" Martha asked sharply.

– hungry.

"You are recovering well," the doctor said, "Someone will be along with a tray shortly. And if you'll pardon me…"

Cofflin cleared his throat. "We've got a name for her," he said. "Marian Deer Dancer Cofflin. Hell of a moniker, but it seemed appropriate."

Alston felt the blood mount to her face, glad that it couldn't be seen. "Ah…" she said. "Er, ah… why, thank you, Jared, Martha." She stopped her feet from shuffling with an effort of will.

"We'd like you and Swindapa to be the godparents, if that's all right," Martha went on. "As neither I nor the baby would be here if it weren't for you. We can have the baptism before you leave."

Marian looked down at the wrinkle-faced form and stroked one arm with a finger. A tiny hand closed around it, rose-pink against black, the nails perfectly formed miniatures.

"That's fine," she said. "Mighty fine. We'll just have to see that there's a good world for her to live in, won't we?

"Ayup," Cofflin said. "Amen."