Swords From the East Read Online Free Page B

to fall lean. They had been driven hard. All their instincts led them to follow blindly after the one who happened to be the leader.
    "Well, they will carry their skins a good way for us yet," remarked Petrovan the next morning as the men were preparing to mount. "We can get a good price for the skins."
    "We might have had the white buck," grumbled Orani, "if you had attended to the old man of the mountain that night in his yurt."
    He had had his vigil for nothing. Even Orani-who had attended to more than one man who was in his way-would not try to ambush three riders in daylight. And Maak, who had only a bow, could never attempt it now. Moreover, on the snowbound steppe not a rabbit could hide.
    "Gr-rh!" hissed Petrovan. "The river will be cold-look at the ice on the bank!"
    He was glad that they would not have to swim their horses more than halfway over the ford. Even the shaggy steppe ponies did not relish the em brace of the black Irkut; but the reindeer scarce heeded it as Orani drove the herd down, crashing through the border of thin ice, out on the ford.
    Petrovan hitched up his knees and yelled for the Mongol to wait with the pack animals until the reindeer had crossed. He had fortified himself with black tea and brandy, and the blood raced through his stout body, well protected by the mink coat.
    "Hey," he shouted to the servant, "take care of those packs or I'll send you to trim the -'s corns! "
    Now that he was leaving the Syansk behind his mood was pleasant. Not that he had been alarmed by the Mongol's remark that Maak was perhaps making magic, sitting on one of the peaks of his hills, talking to his tengeri. But Petrovan had feared that even in the snowstorm the reindeer keeper might find his herd and cut it out.
    "He is like the reindeer after all," Petrovan thought. "He is a khada-ulan- obokhod, an old man of the mountain. Where he is driven, he will go."
    Then the Siberian scowled. His horse was swimming, and in spite of his efforts to keep dry, the man was wet to his waist. An icy chill shot through his nerves.
    "What in the fiend's name are you about?" he roared at Orani.
    The half-breed, almost across the Irkut, had let the reindeer get out of hand. The leaders of the herd had no sooner gained footing on the farther bank than they about-faced, throwing the great mass of animals into confusion.
    Orani bellowed and waved his arms to no avail. The herd churned the water, tossing their horns. Then they started back toward the Mongol and Petrovan.
    At the same instant, Petrovan stopped cursing and Orani ceased his unavailing shouts. A white buck paced down the farther bank to the river edge, and on the white buck was Maak.
    They had heard the reindeer keeper give no command, but the herd went before him as he splashed into the water. They could see that his face had changed. Fasting had thinned it, and it wore a fixed smile.
    Orani's musket cracked. He had pulled it forward from his back where it had been slung. His pony, however, was flustered by the reindeer, and the bullet carried wide.
    Hastily the half-breed reloaded and settled himself in the saddle. Maak's white buck was swimming toward him steadily, not twenty paces away. Ten paces. Orani held his shot, sure of his aim this time.
    Maak was leaning forward, one hand on the antlers of his beast. The water was up to his belly.
    "Ho!" he shouted.
    His free right hand went back to his shoulder. An arrow flashed in it; the bow held on his other hand twanged, and as the musket of Orani flashed the reindeer keeper threw himself sidewise into the water.
    "Hide of the !" muttered Petrovan.
    He could see the arrow sticking in Orani's throat. The half-breed slumped into the black surface of the Irkut.
    "They are both dead," thought the trader. "Well, that is not so bad."
    Nevertheless his nerves were running chill, and he turned his horse's head back to the Syansk shore, in the midst of the herd. The reindeer could be brought under control, and Orani's wages were