Legacy - Lois McMaster Bujold [0]
SHARING KNIFE
Volume Two
LEGACY
Lois McMaster Bujold
Contents
Maps
Chapter 1
Dag had been married for a whole two hours, and…
Chapter 2
The bridge the young man guarded was crudely cut timber…
Chapter 3
Fawn turned in her saddle to look as they passed…
Chapter 4
Beyond the clearing with the two tent-cabins, the gray of…
Chapter 5
Bag left on a mumbled errand soon after it was light…
Chapter 6
Dag returned from the medicine tent reluctant to speak of…
Chapter 7
They turned left onto the shady road between the shore…
Chapter 8
They were making ready to lie down in their bedroll…
Chapter 9
It was midnight before Dag returned to Tent Bluefield. Fawn…
Chapter 10
Three days gone, Fawn thought. Today would begin the fourth…
Chapter 11
Another night attack—without the aid of groundsense this time.
Chapter 12
Dag knew they were approaching Bonemarsh again by the growing…
Chapter 13
Dag woke well after dark, to roll his aching body…
Chapter 14
By sunset, Fawn guessed she had covered about twenty-five miles…
Chapter 15
He had floated in an increasingly timeless gray fog, all…
Chapter 16
For the next couple of days Dag seemed willing to…
Chapter 17
Some six days after striking the north road, the little…
Chapter 18
Fawn woke late the next morning, she judged by the…
Chapter 19
Fawn let out her breath as Dag settled again beside…
About the Author
Other Books by Lois McMaster Bujold
Copyright
About the Publisher
Maps
1
Dag had been married for a whole two hours, and was still light-headed with wonder. The weighted ends of the wedding cord coiling around his upper arm danced in time with the lazy trot of his horse. Riding by his side, Fawn—my new bride, now there was a phrase to set a man’s mind melting—met his smile with happy eyes.
My farmer bride. It should have been impossible. There would be trouble about that, later.
Trouble yesterday, trouble tomorrow. But no trouble now. Now, in the light of the loveliest summer afternoon he ever did see, was only a boundless contentment.
Once the first half dozen miles were behind them, Dag found both his and Fawn’s urgency to be gone from the wedding party easing. They passed through the last village on the northern river road, after which the wagon way became more of a two-rut track, and the remaining farms grew farther apart, with more woods between them. He let a few more miles pass, till he was sure they were out of range of any potential retribution or practical jokers, then began keeping an eye out for a spot to make camp. If a Lakewalker patroller with this much woods to choose from couldn’t hide from farmers, something was wrong. Secluded, he decided, was a better watchword still.
At length, he led Fawn down to the river at a rocky ford, then upstream for a time till they came to where a clear creek, gurgling down from the eastern ridge, joined the flow. He turned Copperhead up it for a good quarter mile till he found a pretty glade, all mossy by the stream and surrounded by tall trees and plenty of them; and, his groundsense guaranteed, no other person for a mile in any direction. Of necessity, he had to let Fawn unsaddle the horses and set up the site. It was a simple enough task, merely laying out their bedrolls and making just enough of a fire to boil water for tea. Still, she cast an observant eye at him as he lay with his back against a broad beech bole and plucked irritably at the sling supporting his right arm with the hook replacing his left hand.
“You have a job,” she told him encouragingly. “You’re on guard against the mosquitoes, ticks, chiggers, and blackflies.”
“And squirrels,” he added hopefully.
“We’ll get to them.”
Food did not have to be caught or skinned or cooked, just unwrapped and eaten till they couldn’t hold any more, although Fawn tried his limits. Dag wondered if this new mania for feeding him was a Bluefield custom no one had mentioned, or just a lingering effect of the excitement of the day, as she tried to find her way into her farmwifely tasks without, actually, a farm