At the Queen_s command

"Very good, sir." Owen sat on a rock beside the blue pool into which the water splashed. A bright rainbow glowed through light mist coming off the water. He pulled his journal from his pack and quickly sketched the falls.

"You're getting a mite better, Captain."

He looked up. "Thank you, Mr. Woods."

"I'm not making nothing of your chicken scratches, mind, but you got the falls right." He carried his sheathed rifle across his shoulders and pointed the butt toward the top. "Two years back me and Kamiskwa was up here come spring. Ice jammed up above there, so you could see everything dry. There's a cave back behind the water. Looked as though a jeopard or two laired there down through the years."

Owen glanced at his musket leaning against a tree. "I'd never make it alone, would I?"

"Nope, but this is more bear country. Don't have much of a taste for men. Now an ax-bird would be on you in a heartbeat."

Owen flipped to the back of the journal and unfolded the Prince's list. "A-ha. Ax-bird. Is that just a legend?"

Woods shook his head. "They exist. More to the south and across the mountains. Mild winter, snow early out of the passes, some of them come over. Hain't seen sign for a while."

The soldier traced his finger down the list. "Giant Ground Sloth? Mammoth? Wooly Rhinoceros?"

"Down south, Fairlee and Ivory Hills. Newland and Felling maybe. Ivory Hills got its name from the Mammoths. We might see one of those Wooly Rhinoceroses he wants. Short of having a cannon, there will be no bringing one back."

Kamiskwa made a comment in his own tongue.

"Add a bigger canoe and a bigger river." Nathaniel walked over, slung his rifle across his back, and hefted the canoe with Kamiskwa. They started off through the woods along a well-worn path.

Owen gathered up his things, including the paddles, and followed. Like Woods, he slung his musket across his back. Bringing it to hand would take a while, so he slipped the pistol into his right hand. He kept his thumb off the firestone, but kept watch as they moved.

They followed no trail, just picked their way between trees and over hummocks. Five hundred feet from the river, near a large standing stone, they overturned the canoe in a sandy depression. Woods motioned for Owen to give him the paddles, which he tucked under the canoe.

"You'll just leave this here?"

"Won't nobody touch it." Nathaniel nodded. "Mystrians will know it's Shedashee, and won't want to be caught dead taking a lend of it. The Shedashee will know it's Kamiskwa's and ain't gonna take it for similar reasons."

Owen studied the canoe more closely. "How will they know? There's not a mark on it."

"Not to you and me, but in magick…" Nathaniel shrugged. "As I said afore, the Shedashee is better at magick than we is. Kamiskwa made the canoe, so there ain't no mistaking who it belongs to."

Gathering their equipment, they set off on a trail paralleling the falls. It gently cut back and forth across the face of the foothills. It leveled out now and again, affording them a chance to rest. After about an hour they reached the gorge's far end and made camp in a clearing that had seen much use.

Owen surveyed the river above the falls. Broad and shallow, with lots of rocks and trees that spring floods had tumbled down from the mountains, it was useless for commerce or troop transport. "If du Malphias is going to use the Benjamin, he'd have to start down below."

"He'd be having plenty of eyes on him." Nathaniel pointed south across the river. "T'other side there is Lanatashee territory. They's in the Confederation, though me and Kamiskwa don't have much truck with them. Altashee this side. Iffen he was a-coming, you'd know."

Owen glanced toward Kamiskwa. "Would your people stop him?"

The Altashee looked up. "Wars between white men do not interest us much. You fight to possess things. You want to control land. We wish to live with it. War is too serious to unleash for silly reasons."

"But you would let us know he was coming."

Kamiskwa smiled. "And we would watch you fight."

Owen nodded. "Nothing could induce you…"

"The Altashee, they ain't mercenaries like Seven Nations tribes. Ungarakii would fight for the promise of warm spit on a hot day. Don't 'spect the Ryngians is paying them much more than that."

"Will we be running into hostiles, do you think?"

Kamiskwa laughed. "No Ungarakii has the courage to come into Altashee land. They dream of it, but such dreams become nightmares."

The Norillian soldier smiled. "Very good."

"Don't mean we won't be setting watches." Nathaniel unlimbered his rifle. "Some times them Ungarakii do dream, and takes a dose of lead to wake them up again."

Chapter Eighteen

May 7, 1763

Bounty, Mystria