Rigg wiped his mouth and nose with a kerchief and then glared. “Get her up the rock, the two of you. Get her up there with Umbo and then get back down here and put on your packs. We’re going to have to run that mile if we’re going to get this done before General Citizen and his men get here.”
“General Citizen himself?”
“I know his path,” said Rigg.
“Not Mother, though,” said Param.
She would see for herself soon enough. “Mother too,” said Rigg.
“She came to see him catch us? To see us die?”
“Or to see us go through the Wall,” said Rigg. “They’re on horseback and they’re galloping now. Get up onto that rock!”
Fast as they went, it took five minutes for the two men to put Param atop the rock, get back down, and put their packs on.
“Ready?” asked Rigg.
“Yes,” said Olivenko.
“As I’ll ever be,” said Loaf.
Rigg led them the two steps to the ancient path they were going to follow, right where it entered the Wall. He held Loaf’s hand, and Loaf held on to Olivenko. Then, watching the path intently—for it was very faint and old—Rigg reached up and pumped the air with his fist.
At once he saw the path begin to reveal an animal racing along, over and over. No, he thought. It’s moving too fast, we’ll never keep up. But then he realized that was just the way the path worked. The animal was walking. As he had hoped.
He had never seen such an animal before. It was a little smaller than a deer, and it was obviously a plant-eater, not a predator—he had analyzed that correctly. But it wasn’t fur covering it, or scales—something more like feathers, but with barbs on the ends.
Oh, wonderful. I found a giant porcupine.
But he saw that as long as he laid his hand on it firmly and didn’t stroke upward, he wouldn’t be harmed.
Touch it, he told himself.
Yet he knew that if he made it panic, if it ran away, this would never work. He forced himself to watch the spot in the path where the creature’s line of sight had just passed him, where, by appearing exactly then, he could touch it before it knew he was there.
He reached out and laid his hand on the crown of its shoulder and at once began to match its pace. The feathers were harsh-feeling under his hand, but there was no pain. And all around him, the landscape was changed now. He was in the past. The sky was dazzling—it was noon here, and the climate was hotter. Not a cloud in the sky.
The animal bore his touch, his presence. Perhaps it had no fear of him because it had never seen or smelled a human being. Perhaps it didn’t believe its eyes. Perhaps this is how it showed fear, by continuing to move, its pace unchanged.
Rigg allowed himself to glance back and see that the others were still with him.
Olivenko was reaching out with his free hand. He touched the animal at the rump, just above where its thick, almost reptilian tail separated from the haunches. Still the animal did not bolt. Then Olivenko let go of Loaf’s hand, so Loaf could also touch the beast.
Once Loaf also had his hand on the animal’s back,
Olivenko worked his way around behind it, making a light leap—pack and all—over the tail without losing contact with it—and then working his way up the other side until he was nearly parallel with Rigg.
No farther, come no farther forward, thought Rigg.
Olivenko didn’t hear him, but apparently he had sense enough to understand the danger. Keep out of its sight, that was the plan, for now Rigg could see that the eyes were not placed like a cow’s eyes, or a deer’s. They were pointed almost directly forward, like a lemur, an owl, a man. In their position right now they could not be seen. Perhaps the nerves in its skin were not as sensitive as in mammals’ skin. Perhaps the feathers kept it from feeling them as long as they made no sharp movements.
And for all they knew, they could let go of the animal entirely, now that they were in its time, and remain in the past. But Rigg couldn’t be sure of that. He had never gone so far back in time before. Without this animal to hold him firmly focused in this moment, could Umbo’s power hold them here?
They had gone a quarter mile like this before it occurred to Rigg to notice that he felt nothing of the Wall. It was as if it didn’t exist. Because it didn’t. He had come to a time before humans came to Garden, and there was no Wall, and no enemy fast approaching behind them.
How fast? Rigg dared not look for the paths of Mother and Citizen, for that would mean taking his concentration off the animal who was their guide. It seemed to him that they must be going much more slowly than their pace across the ground suggested, because the sun had moved away from noon and their shadows were stretching in front of them. How long had they been walking? Only a few minutes, but it had been high noon and now it wasn’t.
The animal’s shoulders bunched and released, the muscles flowing under Rigg’s hand. It was not a herd animal, or Rigg would not have chosen it—herds would have been too dangerous. A solitary beast. He wanted to follow it for days, for a year, to find out how it lived, how it mated, whether it gave birth or laid eggs or some other method entirely, as yet unguessed by human mind, how it passed the winter, what it ate, what would eat it. How could his forebears have had the heart to kill this beast and all its kind?