Wild Country

CHAPTER 12

Firesday, Messis 10

Jana stowed the cheap carryall in the overhead rack and took a window seat, setting her daypack on the seat beside hers to discourage anyone from joining her until she had time to think. The carryall, which she’d purchased yesterday at a store near her hotel, held the clothes and toiletries she’d need during the trip. Her two suitcases and three boxes of belongings were in the baggage car, along with the possessions her fellow travelers were bringing with them to Bennett.

Karl Kowalski hadn’t been there to see her off, but Michael Debany had been waiting for her. Or maybe he had been assigned as the police presence that morning to make sure no one caused trouble for any terra indigene who might be boarding the train that day. Either way, she’d spotted him scanning the crowd and realized he’d been looking for her.

“Karl did a little digging on that phone number you gave him. The captain shut him down fast when a name popped up.”

“Why?”

“This guy is out of bounds. You don’t ask questions about him unless you want some powerful people paying you a call. And by powerful, I don’t mean human.”

“Gods, I’m sorry. I just wanted to be sure someone at the academy wasn’t screwing with me. I didn’t mean . . .”

Debany took a step closer—almost close enough to feel uncomfortably intimate. “Man out of bounds. A cryptic message. Karl and I figure he’s getting some girls to safe houses. You know what I’m saying?”

She nodded. Blood prophets. There had been a lot of talk at the academy about those girls. At least, there had been a lot of talk about them until the war between humans and the Others eclipsed every other topic.

But . . . Didn’t someone have to ask a question before a girl spoke prophecy? Why would someone ask a question about her? Or had the girl seen something moments before an accidental cut that had ended with that phone call?

“I looked up the name last night,” Debany said. “On my own time. Public records. Your caller is an ex-cop. Was involved in some sort of scandal before he fell off the grid. The newspaper reports were suspiciously lean on information and totally devoid of speculation. That means everyone wanted this to go away. Even at the academy no one was telling stories, which should tell you something. But the call was legit, and this job is legit.” He stepped back and held out his hand. “Good luck, Deputy.” After she shook his hand, he stepped in close again. “If you come across one of those girls . . .”

Information hurriedly offered before Debany stepped aside so that she could board with the rest of the passengers going to Bennett. Even then, despite having the travel papers that proved she was part of the group, it had taken John Wolfgard’s intervention to convince the conductor that she was supposed to be seated in the car reserved for the terra indigene.

When the train began to pull out of the station, John Wolfgard held up a list and said, “Simon Wolfgard asked me to be the liaison for the people traveling to Bennett. Before we get too far away from Lakeside, I need to check the papers of everyone in this car.”

Jana opened the daypack, which held her traveling papers, a notebook and pen, and a couple of books, among other things she wanted within easy reach. John barely glanced at her papers, since he’d already seen them a few minutes ago, but he gave everyone else’s papers a thorough look before he checked their names off his list.

The conductor walked in and conferred with John, who then signed off on the passenger list of people riding in the earth native car.

Once the train picked up speed and they were really on their way, Jana sat back and watched the land roll by—and wondered where they would be when the train pulled in to observe the “no travel after dark” curfew.

Before entering the government building for this early morning meeting with Tolya Sanguinati, Jesse stopped and looked around. People were up and about, heading for their jobs. How much would change over the next few days as the new residents arrived?

The dining room had been buzzing with speculation about the new arrivals. Most of the young Intuit men who had been doing the sorting and moving furniture talked about apprenticeships and which professions might be filled as different businesses opened again. Would there be a doctor and a dentist? What about a garage mechanic? What about . . . ? What about . . . ? What about . . . ?

She hoped there would be enough trained adults who stayed after they realized what they were facing, enough diversity in professions to fill the basic requirements of a community. The gods knew, Prairie Gold had one doctor and a nurse practitioner who doubled as a midwife, and she was grateful to have them in her town, but there was no one here in Bennett.

Nothing she could do about that. Besides, this meeting wasn’t about the newcomers. This meeting was about Joshua Painter. Or more to the point, what he represented.

“Thank you for joining us, Jesse Walker,” Tolya said when she entered the conference room across from his office.

As she said hello, Jesse realized she was looking at the town council—looking at who really ran this town. And she wondered if there ever would be a human included in the group.

The six Sanguinati were present. So were Virgil and Kane Wolfgard. They were all strong predators and were in control of the government and law, as well as the vital businesses like the bank, post office, and train station. The surprise attendee was Garnet Ravengard, who worked in the saloon and wasn’t what Jesse would have considered a dominant predator.

The last individual in the room, standing apart from the others, was Saul Panthergard.

Saul fixed on her and snarled, “You think we stole a human cub?”

Surprised by his anger, Jesse took a step back.

“An orphaned cub isn’t stolen,” Tolya said soothingly. “Jesse Walker knows that.”

“This isn’t about Joshua.” Jesse tried—and failed—to keep her right hand from closing over her left wrist as the feeling that she was standing on a precipice almost overwhelmed her. “Not about him alone.”

Tolya guided her to a chair. “Sit down. Saul has agreed to tell us what he remembers of Joshua coming to live with the Panthergard.”

Jesse sat. So did all the Sanguinati. Virgil and Kane remained standing, along with Saul, whose hands shifted into paws.

“I was young,” Saul said. “Not a cub, but still young enough that I was living with my mother, still learning how to hunt. My mother’s sister had an overlapping territory and they often hunted together. Unlike the cats whose shape we can take, the terra indigene are not as solitary.”

Jesse nodded to indicate she understood. No matter what shape they took, the terra indigene were first, and always, terra indigene. They might mate based on the animal shape they could assume, thus reinforcing that form, and that shape might have some influence on their nature over decades or centuries, but that didn’t change the basic fact that they were a species that had been the dominant predators since the first creatures began to walk or fly or swim and had branched out to wear the shapes of other predators in order to remain dominant throughout the world.

“My . . . aunt . . . had lost her cub,” Saul continued. “She was wandering, grieving, not really hunting, when a human cub suddenly ran toward her and scrambled under her belly just like a Panther cub who was frightened. She led him to a place where he could hide, and somehow he knew to remain hidden, just like a Panther cub.

“She retraced his trail and heard humans. Angry voices. Harsh voices. Searching for the cub. Then one of the males said, ‘Forget it. He won’t survive out here.’

“She followed them to a place filled with death. Male cubs about the same age as the cub who had found her. That’s what she guessed since she’d never seen human young before. All those cubs had been clubbed to death and left for the carrion eaters.

“The humans would kill the cub if they found him. She’d lost her own cub. My aunt returned to the human cub and led him to her den, then asked my mother for help. The Panthergard didn’t spend time around humans. They didn’t know how to care for a human who was so young. They asked for help from terra indigene who could assume human form and did sometimes go to a trading post. I don’t think my aunt ever told anyone beyond the Panthergard about the dead human cubs. What was the point? She was interested in the living cub.

“My family learned how to shift to human form, learned how to speak human words so that Joshua could learn. We learned what foods were safe for humans and how to cook meat so that he would not get sick. And we taught him how to be Panther. And he . . .” Now Saul hesitated.

“And he knew things,” Jesse said softly. “What happened when Joshua got cut? A human boy was bound to get cuts and scrapes growing up. My boy certainly did.”

Saul thought for a moment, then shrugged. “My aunt licked the wound clean. It healed. When he got older, Joshua would take pieces of plants and sometimes mash them up with water and put the mess on a wound to help it heal better and faster. He knew things about our territory that we didn’t know, just as we knew things he couldn’t know since he was human and not terra indigene.”

“What difference does it make?” Virgil growled. “Joshua is grown. He survived because the Panthergard helped him.”

Jesse looked at all the terra indigene in the room. “What does he smell like to you? Why would a Panther, seeing a human, not see prey? Why did none of your kind make use of the . . . meat . . . left in that place of death?”

Noticing the sharp way Tolya looked at her, Jesse thought, He knows why I’m asking about the boy’s smell. And he suspects the same thing I do.

“If Joshua survived, could there have been other boys in other places who survived because they were raised by someone other than the humans who had been their original keepers?” she asked.

“You’re wondering if other male offspring who were at the breeding farms somehow escaped when they were taken away to be slaughtered,” Tolya said.

“Yes,” Jesse replied.

“Why kill the males?” Stazia Sanguinati asked. “Wouldn’t you want them to breed with the sweet bloods?”

“One stallion with the traits and bloodlines you want can cover a lot of mares,” Jesse said. “And based on what I saw yesterday at the saloon, Joshua has too dominant and aggressive a personality to be easy to handle and would have caused too much trouble at a breeding farm. I have a feeling that was true of any male toddler who managed to escape.”

Silence. She felt their anger crawling over her skin like bugs she couldn’t see. So many of their forms mated for life or raised the dominant pair’s young as a pack effort. She’d heard about the abandoned cassandra sangue, had even entertained the idea of fostering one or two of the girls who had been rescued. And everyone had heard about the callous treatment of the infant boys.

“You think Joshua is an Intuit,” Tolya said. “And yet you’ve seen him many times in town with Saul and said nothing about this until now.”

Neither did you. “I didn’t get a feeling about him until yesterday when he said that Simple Life man was a marsh. I knew what he meant. Treacherous. Dangerous. And I had the feeling that women of a certain age and look wouldn’t be safe around that man.”

“Like Barbara Ellen and Lila Gold?” Tolya asked.

She nodded. “Joshua sensed it moments before I did. But I hadn’t sensed Joshua’s nature, which is why I think he’s not Intuit in the same way that I am.”

“Does it matter?” Virgil asked. “He sort of smells like you under the scent of Panther. Well, smells more like you than us.”

Jesse studied the Wolf. “Smells like me?”

Virgil thought for a moment. “Not quite like you. You smell like prey. He . . . doesn’t.” He looked at Saul.

Saul shrugged. “He didn’t smell the same as the humans at the trading post, but we just figured it was because he was ours.”

“The cassandra sangue don’t smell like prey,” Tolya said. “The terra indigene don’t drink their blood or eat their flesh because they are Namid’s creation, both wondrous and terrible. Their blood was used to create drugs a few months ago; drugs that could make someone so passive they were helpless or make someone so aggressive they would attack and kill without provocation.”

“I remember hearing about gone over wolf and feel-good,” Jesse said. “I hadn’t realized those drugs were made from the blood prophets’ blood.”

“They were—and they affect humans and terra indigene alike.” Tolya looked at the rest of the terra indigene gathered in the room. “I met Meg Corbyn, who lives in the Lakeside Courtyard. Her scent is unlike any other kind of human. She is not prey, despite the allure of her blood. Joshua doesn’t have the same allure, but . . .” He turned to Saul. “Did your aunt react to Joshua’s blood when she licked a cut or scrape?”

“Not that I remember.” Saul frowned. “I remember her being happy that she had a cub again, even if he wasn’t Panther.” He focused on Jesse. “Why does it matter?”

Jesse’s right hand tightened on her left wrist until it hurt, until she knew there would be a bruise, as she struggled to explain what she was feeling. She usually didn’t have feelings about people she hadn’t met. “If one boy was saved, maybe there were others who escaped, who were found, who were saved by terra indigene who could make room for a young human in their family. Maybe an Intuit family or a Simple Life family found a lost boy and raised him as their own. Maybe someone has found boys like that in the past few months.”

Tolya suddenly tensed, and she knew she’d finally said what she needed him to understand.

“Saul’s family accepted that Joshua sensed things about the world that they could not, and that acceptance may be true for any terra indigene who finds a child like him,” Jesse said. “But it might help them to know that these boys might be the children of cassandra sangue, might claim to see things that make no sense. And I think Intuit and Simple Life communities should be told as well. An Intuit boy adopted by someone in an Intuit village? His abilities won’t be unusual.”

“But an isolated Simple Life community might feel threatened by a child who senses things, who warns of danger before it happens,” Tolya finished. “The humans might think it’s a sign of illness or madness if they don’t know it’s normal.”

Or they might think the child is evil and kill him, she thought. “It could still be a sign of illness or madness, but it might not be. And it might give comfort to the people who found the dead children, who found the blood prophets who had been left to die, that not all of the unwanted children died. They just followed their instincts to a better place.” Jesse looked at Saul and smiled.

He studied her and nodded, finally satisfied that she posed no threat to his human kin.

“I will send word to the terra indigene,” Tolya said. “Can you contact the Intuit communities?”

Jesse nodded. She was part of a group of Intuits who received information about the cassandra sangue through Steve Ferryman, who lived on Great Island. She would send an e-mail to everyone on the list. The people in the Midwest would receive her message. So would the Intuits manning the communications cabin that could transfer messages to the cabin that was just across the Northeast border. They would send it on to Steve.

“Speaking of Simple Life, what do we do with the howler I put in jail yesterday?” Virgil asked.

“The other men insist they only know what he told them, that he asked to join them at the border station so he wouldn’t have to travel alone,” Garnet said.

“He had a ticket and clothes in a carryall,” Virgil said. “The clothes smelled like him and matched what he and the other Simple Life males were wearing. So he is what he says he is.”

“Being Simple Life doesn’t mean he’s a good man,” Jesse said.

“I’ll call the train station closest to the border and see if anything happened near there recently,” Nicolai said.

“Ask if there was a news report involving women of a certain age and look,” Jesse said. “The man might have needed to disappear quickly if he had behaved badly.” A lame way of talking about assault . . . or worse . . . but she didn’t know what the terra indigene thought about such things.

Virgil snarled. “Well, I’m not calling human law and asking about this human.”

“Then what should we do with him?” Yuri asked.

“We could just eat him,” Virgil replied. When Tolya said nothing, the Wolf growled, “Fine. We don’t eat him, but I’m still not calling any humans. When is that deputy going to show up?”

“She’ll be arriving on Sunsday,” Tolya said.

“I’m going to have to deal with that human until then?”

“Why don’t we put him on the northbound train?” Nicolai said. “The westbound train coming in this afternoon follows a route up to the border of the High North regions.”

“That’s just passing along the problem to someone else,” Jesse protested.

Nicolai smiled, showing a hint of fang. “Not really passing along a problem.”

It took her a moment to realize what he meant. Not passing along a problem; passing along a meal.

Bennett’s town council didn’t want to start a panic among the new arrivals by killing a man when they didn’t have a better reason than that they didn’t like him. But they also knew it wasn’t likely that he would survive long enough to reach another human settlement where he might pose a threat to the females living there.

The meeting ended with the agreement to send the Simple Life man north, and the terra indigene headed off to their various businesses and tasks. Only Tolya remained, watching her.

“Your distress is a scent in the air,” he said quietly. “Predators are attracted by scents like that because they signal prey that is, perhaps, easier to bring down.”

Jesse opened her right hand and stared at the bruise on her left wrist. “Are you going to have a token human on the town council?”

“No. The terra indigene reclaimed Bennett. We run this town. The Elders won’t tolerate this place continuing to exist if we don’t.” Tolya leaned toward her. “And if you, who should know you are safe when dealing with us here, feel distressed by our ways, then how would a human who hasn’t earned our trust going to survive being in a room with us?”

“I wasn’t distressed about being in the room with all of you. I was distressed by the subjects we were discussing.”

“The reason doesn’t change the scent or our reaction to it,” he said gently. “But I will keep your question in mind, and if we find one or two humans who can earn our trust as you have, we will consider having them speak to us about human concerns in an official capacity.”

That was more of a concession than she’d expected—until Tolya added, “And you could attend such meetings as Prairie Gold’s representative. As you’ve pointed out many times, your town and your people have a stake in Bennett’s survival.”

Now, that was more like what she’d expected.