Passage - Lois McMaster Bujold [33]
Because why else would a Lakewalker be riding alone, and if the news Dag bore was bad, perhaps this patrol was about to acquire a more urgent task than their routine search patterns. His mind would not connect Dag, in Lakewalker gear on what was obviously a patrol horse, with the party of farmers that his patrol was rounding.
Dag touched his hand to his temple in a courteous salute, but said, “No, sir. Just travelin’ through.”
The patrol leader’s shoulders eased in relief. “Any news from the north?”
He meant patrol news, Lakewalker news. “All was quiet when I passed through Glassforge, three days back.”
The leader nodded. He looked as if he’d like to pause for fuller gossip, but the last rider cleared the obstructing wagons and kicked her horse into a trot to take up her place in the re-forming double file. He contented himself with a return salute and a “Travel safely, then.”
“You, too. Good hunting.”
An acknowledging grimace, and he trotted after the others.
Dag took back his place as Fawn’s outrider as the two wagons creaked into motion again. Fawn twisted around in her seat to watch the departing patrol, turned back, and glanced across at Dag. Concern shone in her big brown eyes, though for what cause Dag was uncertain.
Tanner, too, cast a curious look over his shoulder. “So, all those Lakewalkers are going off to hunt for blight bogles, are they? With their, their ground-senses?”
“Yes,” said Dag. “Pearl Riffle Camp doesn’t cover as big a territory as Hickory Lake—that’s my, was my, home camp. Hickory has eight, nine thousand folks, the biggest camp in Oleana. Doubt Pearl Riffle has eight or nine hundred. They can field maybe two or three patrols, barely a company. But their more important task is right here, keeping the ferry crossing open in case of need. If the Glassforge malice had gotten out of hand—more out of hand—we might have called on Lakewalker camps from south of the Grace to help out. Or the other way around, if they ran into trouble down there.”
“The way Hickory Lake sent Dag’s company west to fight the malice that came up in Raintree, couple of months back,” put in Fawn, for Tanner’s sake. And, at Tanner’s next question, went on to give him an accurate summary of the summer’s campaign, if sketched in broad strokes, and all in terms a farmer might readily grasp, because, after all, Fawn was one. Which drew braver questions from the teamster in turn. Dag listened in grateful silence, backing her with an occasional nod. This fruitful exchange lasted till the wagons reached the bottom of the long slope and turned across the narrow floodplain toward the river.
When they reached the crossroads, Dag said, “Fawn, do you think you’d be all right staying with Whit for a little? I’d like to pay a visit.” He jerked his head upstream.
“Sure. This is the camp where Saun and Reela stayed, right?”
The two were fellow patrollers injured in the Glassforge fight, sent down here as the closest place to convalesce. Saun had been Dag’s own partner; Fawn had made friends of a sort with Reela, laid up in the hotel afterwards with a broken leg. “Yes,” Dag answered.
“Do you have friends here? Or k—” She cut short the last word: kin.
“Well, I’m not sure,” he said, passing over her little stammer. “It’s been a while since I was down this way. Thought I’d go check.” Which was not exactly the reason for his detour, but he was reluctant to discuss the real one in front of Tanner. Especially as Dag himself was doubtful of the result. “I’ll find you two after my errand. Might be a while. Stay by Whit, right?”
“Dag, I don’t need my brother to guard me every minute.”
“Who said it was you I thought needs a keeper?”
She dimpled, taking this in; he cast her a return wink, possibly more cheerful-looking than he felt. The wagons turned right onto the downstream road toward Pearl Bend. Dag wheeled Copperhead around and trotted in the opposite direction.
Across a shallow run and over a rise, he came to the camp’s perimeter and let his groundsense ease open just