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He pointed down the slope in the direction of the lower line of
trees.

Three columns of smoke rose where the grass still burned from Jodi's
napalm strike. 'The sand-burrowers in its belly must come out to free
the snake. That will be the killing time. But you must be wary. They
have sharp iron that-strikes long blows with the speed of a rattler's
tongue.

You must be brave but not foolish. You must hunt them as you would a
fast-foot - quietly and with great cunning."

Motor-Head leapt to his feet and crossed his arms angrily.

'She-ehh I Are the Bears to hide when their blood runs hot? I'
'Hey-YAHH!" roared the warriors. Even those with burned faces and raw
swollen lips joined in the traditional response.

Mr Snow rose painfully to his feet, steadied his aching legs and jabbed
a warning finger under Motor-Head's nose.

'Listen, bonehead! There is to be no fancy, toe-to-toe knife work. I
didn't just give this my best shot to have you all mown down! This is
not a rumble over a piece of turff. We are taking on an iron snake
full of sand-burrowers. They don't fight the way we fight. There's no
stand-off. They are not going to wait while you spit on the ground."

He swept his eyes over the rows of squatting warriors. 'The moment
they see the end of your nose they are going to try and blow your heads
off!" He waved an arm in the air. 'The way the cloud warriors struck
from the sky! That's the way you must fight today! You must be as
brave as Bears but you must strike like coyotes I We have to wear them
down. Pick them off, one by one."

'Heyyy-yaahhh ..." The response came as a reluctant growl from the
warriors' throats. It was clear that they, like Motor-Head, were not
happy at the prospect, but Mr Snow's authority could not be challenged
when expressed in this forthright manner.


'Go - quickly!" ordered Mr Snow. 'The river runs dry.

And remember - the sand-burrower is not a man, but an animal. You do
not fight animals. You hunt them." He stretched his left arm towards
them, his hand extended, blessing the path they would take to the
river. 'Go! May the great Mother guide your arm. And may she drink
the blood of our enemies and not from your cups!" 'Hey-yahh!" cried
the warriors. They leapt to their feet and shook their weapons at the
sky. 'Hey-yah! Hey-yah!

Hey-YAHH!!" Mr Snow watched them lope away towards the trees and the
Now and Then River that lay in the valley below. A party of
clan-elders summoned by a runner from the settlement's forest hide-out
joined him and together they set about the doleful task of despatching
the dying. This was done with the aid of a narcotic shag, the dried
shredded fragments of a psychedelic mushroom the Mutes called Dream
Cap. Taken onto the tongue and swallowed, Dream Cap quickly induced a
state of anaesthetised euphoria.

When it could be obtained, it was used in the crude bone-setting
operations and basic surgery performed by some medicine men. Its
purpose here was not primarily to ease the pain of dying but to loosen
the bond between the warrior's spirit and his earth-body.

The elders gave the drug a few minutes to take effect, then aided by Mr
Snow, killed the hideously burned warriors with a quick knife thrust
through the heart.

It fell to Mr Snow to despatch Little-Feet, a young, fourteen-year-old
Bear whose left leg had, in places, been burned through to the bone.

He placed his hand on the boy's forehead and put the point of his knife
on the slim chest. His hand trembled. His eyes glistened with
tears.

Little-Feet's drugged eyes fluttered open. He made an effort to focus
on Mr Snow. 'Will I go to the High Ground, Old One?"

'Yes,' said Mr Snow. 'When the sun goes through the western door, you
will walk the golden islands in the sky and when you are rested you
will come again to our people as a child of the earth and do mighty
things in our name."

'But I have not chewed bone,' said Little-Feet. 'I have no
standing."

'In the eyes and the heart of Mo-Town our great sky-mother, you have
great standing,' said Mr Snow. 'She has told me this. You have braved
the fire of the cloud warriors and are truly a great Bear."

'I would have standing in my eyes also,' said Little-Feet.

'Let me die with my hands on sharp iron."

Mr Snow took the boy's hands and placed them over his own on the handle
of the knife. Little-Feet gripped his hand and wrist tightly.

'Now!" he cried, pulling hard on the knife.

'Drink, Sweet Mother!" Mr Snow thrust the long blade swiftly and
cleanly into Little-Feet's heart. 'Mo-Town drinks,' he said,
quietly.

He sat back on his heels and watched the boy's life ebb away.

And wished yet again that, with the help of the Sky Voices, he might
truly understand why the world was ordered thus.


ELEVEN

The storm which had swept over the wagon train cleared with the same
mysterious rapidity with which it had developed. Less than an hour
after the flaming wreckage of Jodi Kazan's Skyhawk had plunged into the
raging flood waters, the Now and Then River had been reduced to a
narrow ankle-deep stream linking a chain of muddy pools, leaving The
Lady from Louisiana high and dry, its lead cars lying tilted across the
river bed, trapped amidst a crazy tangle of trees, boulders and sodden
vegetation.

Hartmann, the wagon master, was relieved to see clear skies overhead
but he, like Steve Brickman, sensed that The Lady's ordeal was far from
over. He ordered Colonel Moore, the Senior Field Commander to despatch
his linemen to form a defensive perimeter around the wagon train while
Stu Barber, the First Engineer, took-a party out to inspect the flood
damage.

Steve had a word with Ryan, the wingman who had been made acting
section leader following the loss of Kazan, then sought out Buck
McDonnell and asked permission to take a small party downstream to look
for Jodi.

The big Trail Boss turned him down flat. 'She was skewered, roasted,
then drowned in mud sauce, Mister.

Nobody walks away from that. Besides which, we don't waste wingmen on
bag jobs. Get back to your post and get ready to fly."

Wearing sealed helmets fitted with armoured glass visors, moulded face
plates, air fdters and two-way radios, and clad in flexible body armour
that gave them the fearsome anonymity of warrior ants, the linemen ran
down the ramps dropped from the belly of the train and formed quickly
into eight-man combat squads. Each man was armed with a
three-barrelled air rifle and bayonet. Spare magazines, six
canister-type flame-grenades, a machete, reserve air bottles and
rations were carried in belt packs and pockets on the chest and
thigh.

The force was led by Captain Virgil Clay, the Junior Field Commander
and they were followed out of the wagon train by Barber, the First
Engineer, Buck McDonnell, and the twenty-strong damage control party.

Clay, known by his radio call-sign 'ANVIL TWO', sent two squads
upstream, two down, and sent three more squads up each bank to cover
the open ground on each side. Aboard The Lady, the rest of the crew
manned the weapon turrets, or stood ready to reinforce the groups on
the ground should the perimeter come under attack.

They didn't have long to wait. Ginny Green, the first lineman to clear
the mud-slide on the right-hand bank took a bolt through the chest.

The impact of the ten inch-long missile lifted her clean off her
feet.

Arms outstretched, her body did a sloppily executed back-flip and hit
the ground like a sack of rivets. The seven linemen behind and on
either side of her hit the deck, shoved their rifles out in front of
them and peered cautiously over the top of the bank. The first guy to
poke his head up got a bolt through the back of his neck.

'Shit!" cursed the squad leader. He ducked below the top of the slide
and flipped the transmit switch on his helmet from the squad channel to
the Field Commander's. 'Anvil Two, this is East Side One. We have
struck out twice and are taking fire from both banks. Advise. Over!'
Clay's voice came back through his earphones. 'East Side, this is
Anvil Two. Mow the lawn. Standby to jump-off.

Out."

'Mow the lawn' was lineman jargon; a call for an extended, heavy burst
of out-going fire in which a stream of bullets were pumped into every
hummock of grass, every bush or piece of scrub in the fan-shaped area
that formed a group's immediate front. Anything that could furnish
cover for a Mute warrior was riddled with lead.

Stu Barber, the First Engineer, moved under one of the wagons and spoke
to Hartmann via one of the outside tv
cameras fitted for that
purpose.
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