He leaves his own country and goes to another, But he brings the rive evils with him.
Adi Granth: Prabhātī m.v.
Give Pinky his due—if it was his due—the organization was impressive. Pilgrims were already starting to move out when Julian awakened at first light. He had promised to wait for Alice, and by the time she and the other commissariat staff had struck camp and loaded up their wagons, Onkenvier's clearing was almost deserted again, a wasteland of gray mud dotted with smoking ash piles and abandoned latrine fences. Snow was falling gently but with persistence, as if determined to hide the mess the Free had left behind them. The Liberator himself was still there, healing some last patients straggling in, while a fleet of moa taxi chariots was being assembled to carry him and his handlers to the first staging point.
Alice explained that she normally walked with the pilgrims, helping the old or the very young, but that morning she was scheduled to ride with other kitchen workers in a rabbit cart, and she insisted on Julian's joining her. He suspected that she was not being completely truthful, but accepted gratefully, feeling very much a scrimshander because there were thousands of other people who had been just as sick as he. He promised himself that he would pull his weight tomorrow.
The express could not travel very fast through the multitude packing the Fainpass trail, but it did arrive at the next campsite soon after the vanguard. When Captain Smedley offered to assist, he was armed with a knife and aimed at a mountain of several tons of a tuber much like a potato. It was one of the most joyful moments of his life: He had been assigned a job that needed two hands and he could do it.
The node Exeter had specified was marked by a single standing stone in the center of bleak winter pasture a couple of miles from a small village. Soon the Free were settling on it like flies on a cow pat. There was no snow in Lappinvale; the sun shone at times. Seated on an upturned bucket with his back to the wind, Julian peeled spuds into another bucket to his heart's content. He had companions—two women jabbering away in Lappinian, a very deaf old man, and three disgruntled girls who thought they deserved much better. He was quite happy to ignore them and just peel spuds.
Then a shadow fell across his bucket and a voice spoke his name. He looked up in fury. She was swaddled in moth-eaten furs like a shapeless teddy bear, her hair blowing untidily across her face. She wouldn't care how she looked, though; she never had. And she was actually smiling at him as if he should be pleased to see her!
Never in his life before had he wanted to hit a woman, but he did now—very much. "Go away!" he shouted. "Get out of my sight!"
She backed a step. "What's wrong?"
He rose to his feet, trembling with fury. "The word is rape, Mrs. Newton. You raped me!" None of the onlookers would understand English, but he would not have cared if they did.
"Oh, that."
"Yes, that!"
She looked at him uncertainly. "That's a rather extreme way of describing what happened. I suppose I used mana on you. I didn't mean to, Julian."
"Didn't mean to?" He took a step forward, and she retreated again. He was glad to see that she was starting to look alarmed. His anger had surprised her.
"No," she said. "You know how Perhaps you don't. You never had much mana, did you? When you have mana and you want something, it's very difficult not to cause it to happen. The power leaks out. You couldn't stop your hand healing, could you? I wanted you to come to my tent. You did. I wanted you to—"
"I did not want you!"
She frowned as if he had said something a gentleman should not. "I suppose I should have been more careful. I'm sorry, Captain Smedley, truly I am."
But she didn't care. She would have been much more sorry if she had knocked over his teacup. Now he was waving his knife at her, and the onlookers were becoming alarmed. The deaf old codger had struggled to his feet. Julian was so furious he could not find words.
"When I saw what was happening," she said patiently, "I should have stopped, I suppose. Or asked you, perhaps. I didn't think you'd mind. Men usually don't." She smiled knowingly.
"You make a habit of it? Is that the only way you can get a man?"
"Oh, your hand!" Ursula cried, changing the subject. "It's better!"
Julian threw down the knife and made a fist. "A present from an old friend. I should hate to put it to work by knocking your teeth down your throat, Mrs. Newton, but if you don't get away from me now and stay away from me in future, then the Liberator is going to have more healing to do. Now go to hell and stay there!" He was bluffing, of course. She could bring him weeping to his knees with a whiff of mana.
She didn't, but she obviously thought he was making an awful fuss. "I am sorry, truly I am. I just didn't think you'd mind." With a shrug, she turned and walked away.
Shivering with frustrated rage, Julian resumed his seat and began hacking madly at the tubers.