BooksBarbecue
Back Daughter of Eden
Chapters (68)
  1. Title page
  2. Dedication
  3. Part I
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Sixteen
  20. Seventeen
  21. Eighteen
  22. Nineteen
  23. Twenty
  24. Twenty-one
  25. Twenty-two
  26. Twenty-three
  27. Twenty-four
  28. Twenty-five
  29. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 20. 20:25 MT.
  30. Part II
  31. Twenty-six
  32. Twenty-seven
  33. Twenty-eight
  34. Twenty-nine
  35. Thirty
  36. Thirty-one
  37. Thirty-two
  38. Thirty-three
  39. Thirty-four
  40. Thirty-five
  41. Thirty-six
  42. Thirty-seven
  43. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 22. 20:05 MT.
  44. Thirty-eight
  45. Thirty-nine
  46. Forty
  47. Forty-one
  48. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 25. 15:30 MT.
  49. Forty-two
  50. Forty-three
  51. Forty-four
  52. Forty-five
  53. Forty-six
  54. Forty-seven
  55. Forty-eight
  56. Forty-nine
  57. Fifty
  58. Fifty-one
  59. Fifty-two
  60. Fifty-three
  61. Fifty-four
  62. Part III
  63. Fifty-five
  64. Fifty-six
  65. Fifty-seven
  66. Fifty-eight
  67. Also by Chris Beckett
  68. Copyright page

As they came nearer, we saw there were two high men in middle of them, with fancy coloured fakeskin draped over the backs of their bucks. When they were up close to us, one of them pulled off his headwrap to scratch his face, and we saw it was Leader Hunter, Strongheart’s third son, and our own guard leader. At once, whether we were on the path or standing out there in the deep snow, all of us knelt and bowed. The two of them waved in acknowledgement as they hurried past, in that almost lazy way that high people wave to low ones. Then they were gone in their glittery cloud of tiny stars, and we all got busy dragging people out of the snow who had got stuck, and retrieving footwraps that had been pulled off.

We only found out later that the other high man was Leader Mehmet, Strongheart’s oldest son, and the one who would be Head Guard after him. The two of them and their dad had got right down into Circle Valley and had been making their way across it when the news reached them about the Johnfolk coming from across the Pool. They’d talked it over, the three of them, weighing up the different alternatives, and in the end they decided it was best that Strongheart carried on and went to the four hundredth Virsry, while these two came back to lead the fight.

Strongheart and his sons had never before invited the heads from Brown River and Half Sky to come to the Virsry, but they’d done it this time in the hope of building stronger links between the three different lots of people that shared Mainground. And right now, they’d figured, that was more important than ever before. The Riverfolk had always played that game of sometimes leaning to their fellow Johnfolk in New Earth, and sometimes leaning to their neighbours, the Davidfolk, on Mainground. But with the New Earthers attacking our ground, they were going to have to come down on one side or the other, and which side they chose would depend a lot on who they thought would win. And so the most important thing right now – or so Strongheart and his sons decided – was to seem confident and to celebrate the Virsry exactly as planned.

‘You were going to say something, Auntie Angie,’ said Trueheart, when we were all finally moving again.

‘Was I? I’ve quite forgotten if so. It was probably nothing much.’