Visitors (Pathfinder 3)

Future Umbo was wrong, though. In the rush of emotion after saving Kyokay, he had hurried home to Mother and that was the disastrous mistake. Not saving Kyokay, but taking him home.

Now that Umbo knew he could save Kyokay, he wasn’t going to unsave him because future Umbo was a hysterical mess. He had just watched Father beat his younger self. It made Umbo sick with fury even now. He hated that man—not his real father at all. Just Tegay, master cobbler, wife beater, child beater, and evil fool.

But I didn’t see it. I didn’t just save my brother from the water. I can think more clearly, and I’m going to save Kyokay and leave the future unchanged.

It meant he would skip a bit of practice swimming to make a few more preparations. He would need more blankets. He would need a much heavier knife than his everyday knife, or the jeweled knife that he rarely used and feared to break. But that was a simple matter, to swim across the river in the night and steal the heavy leather-cutting knife from Father’s—Tegay’s—workbench. Sharp. Yes, Tegay was kind and caring to his tools. Anything it touched, it would cut.

It might also rust, since it got plenty of underwater time as Umbo swam back across. When he stole blankets, though, he had to use the boat to ferry them, then use the pulley line to haul it back across to the far side. Couldn’t have wet blankets for this.

He cached everything near the ferry, then went back to swimming and watching.

He saw the tale unfold—Kyokay running to the stone stair, Umbo following after, but too far away. Kyokay laughing, knowing he was doing something stupid and wrong, but delighting in it.

But there was now an added complication. Umbo knew that when he had done this the first time, everything had worked out well enough—broken bones, but alive, not drowned. Now, though, besides trying to concentrate on the things he had planned to do, he had this nagging doubt: Am I doing it exactly as I did it before? Or slower? Or wrong somehow? Will I fail now, though I succeeded before?

Kyokay fell. Umbo slowed him so much he was afraid he might exhaust himself so he’d have nothing left to slow time for himself as he swam. But how could he do less than his strongest, fiercest effort? What good would it do to save strength for later, if he didn’t keep Kyokay alive now?

Kyokay twisted himself in midair so his legs would enter the water first. Smart boy, thought Umbo. Don’t get your head anywhere near those rocks.

Umbo plunged into the water and swam directly to where Kyokay was being churned by the water. His legs were broken, feebly waving around with extra bendings. And a dark patch spreading from one leg made it clear that a bone had broken the skin. Can’t worry about infection now.

He got to Kyokay and the boy was able to grip his hand, then cling to his shoulders as Umbo swam strongly to shore. He dragged him up out of the water and realized at once that he couldn’t leave that bone sticking out. He used the jeweled knife to slice open Kyokay’s trouser and then he gripped the boy strongly and pulled the bottom of his leg away far enough to put the jutting bone back in place. Then he tied strips of Kyokay’s own trouser leg around the wound to keep the leg from moving and to keep the wound closed. It was a ragged job and if it wasn’t fixed soon, if the bones knit back together as Umbo had left them, Kyokay would never walk right again. But he was alive.

Kyokay bore the pain well, but the reason was clear. He was trembling, then shaking with cold. The numbness helped him bear the crude bone-setting without screaming. But now Umbo had to get him warm and dry.

As for himself, he was used to the cold water, after all that practice, and the exertions involved in setting and binding the leg had kept him warm. So he worked on getting Kyokay as warm as possible.

Some of the shivering probably came from shock. But Umbo couldn’t do anything about that. If he was going to get help for Kyokay, he’d have to move fast.

He carried the boy swiftly, knowing that every stop caused him pain. But he had to get away before anybody from Fall Ford started searching for the body of the boy who had fallen.

He laid Kyokay on the gravel landing area at the ferry, then went for the cache of blankets and leather-cutting knife. With the blankets he made a kind of bed and then lifted Kyokay and put him back down in the bottom of the boat. With Kyokay’s weight, the boat was now firm on the gravel, though the current tugged at the other end. The rope connecting the boat to the iron ring was slack. So he could cut it without the boat getting away from him.

When the rope was cut—and it took only two swipes with the leather-cutter—Umbo thought of throwing the knife into the middle of the river, so Tegay could never again use it to beat a child. But no, that was one of the tools with which Tegay provided for the family. And in this world, Tegay had not beaten Umbo’s brains out. If this worked, would never beat young Umbo again. So Umbo laid the knife in plain sight in the middle of the gravel, where anyone using the ferry would stumble across it. It would get back to Tegay’s bench.

Then Umbo pushed the boat out into the water. The current took it so swiftly that Umbo had a few moments of fright as he struggled to climb up and over the side to get in it. Nothing deft about that operation. But he finally got into the boat and then laid the rower’s plank across the middle and sat with his legs straddling Kyokay, who wasn’t shivering as badly now, so maybe it had been only the cold and not the shock of the wound that had him shaking so much before.

“How did you get down into the water so fast?” Kyokay asked.

“You fell very slowly,” said Umbo.

“Yes,” said Kyokay in wonderment. “I did. But I still hit very hard.”

And then he closed his eyes. With all that pain, he couldn’t be asleep. Unconscious, then. Exhausted. Maybe in shock after all.

But all Umbo could do was row like a demon. The current was fast—Umbo wanted to go faster. What would have been several days’ journey upstream might be only a couple of hours going down. He had to get to Bear’s Den Crossing before dark, or he’d float right past it and then Kyokay really would be in a dangerous position.

It took till the last light of dusk, but Umbo saw the wharf and tied up at it. The boat he had come up on was gone—of course it was gone, the owner had to keep the boat moving. But when Umbo carried Kyokay into the tavern where he had bought his provisions for the journey to Upsheer, whom should he see at one of the tables but the pilot he had parted with so warmly.

At once the pilot was on his feet, clearing away dishes to let Umbo lay Kyokay on his own table. A bonesetter was called for, and a stitcher too, once they saw the blood-soaked rags binding the wound. The pilot asked no more questions after Umbo said, “I saw him fall, and I knew nowhere to take him but here.”

“What about Fall Ford?” asked the pilot.

“We were already downstream of it,” said Umbo. “And you—your boat is gone.”

“My brother took it back. I’m here waiting for my wife to deliver my firstborn. If she doesn’t hurry, I’ll take the boat you came in and catch up with my brother.”

Umbo didn’t want to lie to this good man, but he knew he had to, for the future’s sake. “This poor boy thinks I’m his brother. Kept calling me by his name. Bobo or something like that.”