Legacy - Lois McMaster Bujold [64]
“Now what?” said Fawn.
“The company will assemble at the headquarters tent. Most folks say good-bye at home.”
“Right, then.”
He hooked up his saddle, Fawn tottered after with the saddlebags, and they went out to where the horses were tied. Razi, Utau, and Mari were saddling theirs, in the light of a torch held aloft by Cattagus. Sarri stood ready to hand things up. In the east, across this arm of the lake, the black shapes of the trees were just growing distinguishable from the graying sky. Mist shrouded the water, and the grass and weeds underfoot were damp with dew.
Cattagus handed the torch to Sarri long enough to hug Mari, muttering into her knotted gray hair, “Mind your steps, you fool old woman.” To which she returned, “You just mind yourself, you fool old man.” Despite his wheezing, he gave her a leg up, his hand lingering a moment on her thigh as she settled into her saddle.
Dag gave Copperhead a knee to the belly, ducked the return snap of yellow teeth, and tightened his girth for a second time. He turned to grip Fawn’s hands, then embraced her as she flung her arms around him and held hard. He put her from him with a kiss, not on her lips, but on her forehead: not farewell, but blessing. The tenderness and terror of it wrenched her heart as nothing else had this anxious morning.
And then he was heaving himself up on Copperhead. The gelding, clearly refreshed by his holiday in pasture, signified his displeasure at being put back to work so early in the morning by sidling and some halfhearted bucking, firmly checked by his rider. The four patrollers angled onto the road and vanished in the shadows; Fawn saw a few more mounted shapes trotting to catch up. Those left behind turned back silently to their tents, though Cattagus gave his niece Sarri a hug around the shoulders before he went in.
Fawn was entirely unable to contemplate falling back to sleep. She went into her tent and straightened her few belongings—housekeeping was a short task with so little house to keep—and tried to set her mind to the work of the day. Spinning was endless, of course. She was helping Sarri with her weaving in return for share of the tough cloth she was presently making and for teaching Fawn how to sew a pair of Lakewalker riding trousers, but it was too early to go over there. She wasn’t hungry enough yet to eat more plunkin.
Instead, she traded her shift for a shirt and skirt, put on her shoes, and walked down the shore road toward the split to the bridge. The gray light was growing, with the faintest tinge of blue; only a few pricking stars still shone down through the leaves. She was not, she discovered, the only person with this notion. A dozen or more Lakewalkers, men and women, old and young, had collected along the main road in small groups, scarcely talking. She tried nodding to some neighbors she recognized from the plunkin delivery chore; at least some nodded back, though none smiled. But nobody was smiling much.
Patience was rewarded in a few minutes by the sound of hoofbeats coming from the woodland road. The cavalcade had already broken into the ground-eating trot of the long-legged patrol horses. Dag was in the lead, riding alongside Saun, listening with a thoughtful frown as the young man spoke; but he swiveled his head and flashed a smile at Fawn in passing, and Saun looked back and managed a surprised salute. Others along the road craned their necks for a glimpse of their own, exchanging a few last waves. One woman ran alongside a young patroller and handed up something folded in a cloth that Fawn thought might be a forgotten medicine kit;