The Outskirter's Secret Read Online Free PDF

after their guides through the
brush. Presently she spoke again, with a nervous half-laugh of
relief. "Do you know," she said, pushing aside a low branch to aid
their passage, "for a moment, I was afraid you were going to tell
me that your people eat their dead."
    "No," Bel replied. "You'd have to go much
farther east than my tribe, for that."

 
4
    " T hree left?
Three from two dozen?" The dark, angular man leaned close to the
wounded warrior's face. "And how could that happen?"
    The single war chief who had survived the
raid twisted his leg involuntarily under the ministrations of an
elderly healer. "Outnumbered. Outmaneuvered. Ambushed."
    "And how many did you take down?"
    A wince, either of pain or dismay. "Hard to
see. Maybe five."
    "Five!"
    Seated nearby, Rowan wondered which five of
the brave villagers had fallen, and found in herself small sympathy
for these Outskirters.
    The camp was pitched against the edge of the
forest, one side nestled beneath overhanging evergreens, the other
open to a green, rolling meadow, where the tent shadows now
stretched away from the vanishing sun, long fingers indicating the
east. The tents themselves were of varied construction and
materials: tall pavilions of billowing cloth, battered with age and
usage; long low structures of stitched hide; canvas shelters in
military style. Looted, Rowan guessed, from various sources, over a
period of years.
    The tribe's leader was dark-haired, his face
a complexity of sharp angles and weathered lines, and he wore his
patchwork cloak with the rakish flair of an actor, over canvas
trousers and an Inner Lands cotton shirt. He mused, small eyes
glittering. "They must have had warning." Rowan did not volunteer
explanation, but despite herself glanced at her companion.
    Bel sat across the fire from her, halfway
back amid a group of lounging and seated warriors. A thin,
bedraggled woman of middle age was moving among the people, passing
out slices of venison from a wooden platter. She reached Bel, and
Rowan saw but did not hear Bel's "Thank you." The serving woman
paused momentarily in surprise, then continued on without
reply.
    "Well." The leader sat back on his haunches
and blew out his cheeks expressively. "Well, it happens." He
dismissed the mystery with blunt pragmatism. "Fall almost on us,
winter coming," he reflected. "We'll have to move further out, take
on one of the goat-tribes." He scanned the encampment, counting
heads. "And we'll have to be clever about it." He addressed the
assemblage in general. "Think about it. Any ideas, talk to me." He
caught Rowan watching him, nodded a greeting, and moved over to
join her.
    "And you're an odd one, Rowan steerswoman,"
he said, as someone shifted to make room for him to sit, "wandering
out in the wilderness."
    "I'm often wandering out in the wilderness,"
she replied. "In fact, I enjoy it."
    "But never through such dangerous lands as
these." He tilted his head at her humorously, firelight and fading
sunlight combining to highlight high cheekbones. "Hanlys, Denason,
Rossan," he introduced himself, then added, "seyoh." Rowan
recognized the Outskirter term for a tribe's leader.
    "You and your people are the most dangerous
things we've yet found on our trip, Hanlys," she commented, knowing
this would be taken as a compliment. "And if I understand
correctly, you won't harm us."
    "True enough. We're obligated. Unless you
decide to harm us now, that is."
    "It isn't likely. I believe Bel and I are
going to need all the friends we can get." The serving woman had
reached them, and brusquely handed the seyoh and Rowan their food.
"Thank you," Rowan said, offhand, and the woman turned away
abruptly, changing her course to distribute in another section of
camp. Unfed persons to Rowan's right voiced rude protests, which
the server ignored.
    Rowan looked after her. "Did I say something
wrong?"
    Hanlys snorted. "Shocked her, more like.
We're not soft on our servants, like some." He tilted his head
infinitesimally in