Chapter 6: How They Crossed the Mountains
"We're going to take him with us."
Gwen took half the time to comprehend implications as it had taken Arthur, pinning her gaze past him to the psychic at the second skid-cart, raking him up and down. Arthur didn't bother glancing back to see whether the young man was reacting with that eager grin of accomplishment or the frozen apprehension to declare his intentions to a stranger and an enemy.
Another stranger and an enemy.
"You mean he's going to-" she started.
"Yeah," Arthur answered. Turning to catch the psychic's eye, he called out, "Hey. Fifty paces that way is a culvert under the track. I want the slide-boards and the ties you'll find hidden there – we might need them later."
The young man dipped a nod, dismounting the skid-cart to lope swiftly down the track. Arthur thought, he could've taken the key so the three of them couldn't take off on the skid-carts and leave him behind, but he didn't.
Arthur thought, Why the hell send him out of earshot. He doesn't need to actually hear, to overhear.
The psychic's gait never faltered. Never a twitch like he wanted to turn around and scrutinize Arthur for those thoughts.
Gwen said, "How did you-"
"He came to me." Arthur caught the caution in her eyes as she conveyed her doubts in a single succinct glance. "I know. I'm not stupid. I figured, best to play it out, and be ready for anything."
"The Essetirians?" she asked.
"Diverted. Distracted." He believed; though it was an undeniable fact, he'd seen the vehicles – truck and train – with his own eyes, the dispersion of the Essetirian soldiers was based on the word of the psychic who wanted to defect. Unfortunately it was also undeniable that the young man might have several reasons to lie, and was probably better than most at choosing a lie they'd want to believe.
"So we're doing this," she stated.
He repeated, to offer reassurance, "We're doing this."
At that moment Lancelot's knees wavered, and Arthur reached to help Gwen with his weight.
"We got you. We got you," she soothed, but didn't resist Arthur maneuvering himself under Lancelot's arm. "Pendragon, we need to get off this track, if we're going – the resort is going to open and there'll be all kinds of traffic."
"Yeah," he grunted, stumbling awkwardly with Lancelot to the nearest skid-cart. "Here, get your leg over here." The pilot wobbled, half-aware. "Thompson, is this meramine, or-"
"Fever," she said shortly, shrugging her kit into the seat-compartment of the other machine. "Infection, probably. I left the air-cast on because it's the only one we've got and I didn't want to risk… But, he's got contusions up and down that side, concussion and I don't know what all."
Arthur tugged the kit off Lancelot's good shoulder as the pilot slouched against the small square seat-back of the passenger's area behind the driver. Probably it dug itself up under his shoulder-blades, but it was better than nothing. "You've got his forearm secured to his chest?"
"Yeah. Under the parka."
That made it problematic to tie Lancelot to the seat-back. Arthur would have liked to pass some cord or something under his arms, but they'd make do. "You want me to ride with him, then, or do you want to-"
She bit her lip in an expression of indecision, as if what she wanted was at war with what she expected of herself.
So he pre-empted her decision. "Yeah, for starters, anyway. I'll drive this one, as long as you trust him as your passenger."
She moved to join Arthur; the psychic was on his way back but not close, yet; the wind blew against the slide-boards, making them unwieldy at best. "Do you trust him?"
Arthur said deliberately, "I believe him when he says he wants to be free. He wants to get out, and knows he needs help. He said he trusted me."
"That's something." She set her jaw, considering, then roused as the psychic came panting up, carrying the slide-boards awkwardly, banging about him as the breeze pushed them. "Hi, I'm sorry, it's nice to meet you. Unusual circumstances, of course – I'm Gwen. Scout Thompson, but it's silly to be formal when we're about to – ah. This is Flyer Pilot Lancelot, and of course you've already met Arthur."
"Arthur. Yes. Hi."
The psychic quirked him a meaningful expression, and Arthur rolled his eyes, taking the slide-boards to stow them beneath the seat of skid-cart number 9. Yeah, we kinda skipped introductions. Unusual circumstances.
"I'm Merlin," he went on. "I'm really pleased to meet you, too."
Arthur could see where the name suited him; there'd been a birdlike quality to the child he'd seen on the recording. He stripped his gloves and held them in his teeth, unthreading the ties and boot-strings they'd rigged the slide-boards with.
"Sorry," Gwen said again, effort sounding in her voice. "We'll have to get to know each other later. Just now I've got to get these things back to… to Scout Pendragon. But you don't have coveralls either?"
Arthur glanced at Merlin's legs – black uniform trousers tucked into the tops of his boots.
"Thermal underwear," Merlin said. "I'm fine."
Arthur returned to his skid-cart to see that Gwen had finished removing the coveralls from Lancelot's legs, and that Merlin was easing the last parka sleeve from the pilot's good arm. Lancelot cooperated silently – pale and biting his lips shut. Thermal underwear or not, if those uniform trousers weren't water-resistant, they were going to have to trade off wearing them. Extra layers weren't helpful if they were snow-soaked.
"Donated to a good cause," Merlin suggested, holding out the parka.
Arthur grunted around his gloves, beginning to secure Lancelot against the half-sized seat-back. Better than nothing; at least he wouldn't fall off if he couldn't keep himself conscious enough to balance upright.
"Scout Pendragon?" the psychic added softly, as Arthur straightened, and his eyes flashed the wariness Arthur remembered from the recording, when the card-man entered the room.
So he hadn't gotten that detail of Arthur's identity and parentage from Arthur's mind. Or else he was a really good actor. Arthur grabbed the parka, stuffing his arms in before spitting out the gloves. "No relation."
Merlin frowned, cocking his head and glancing to Gwen, who handed Arthur his coveralls.
"It's complicated," she deflected, easing but not excusing a lie that might be both glaringly obvious and therefore offensive, to a psychic. "Don't worry about it, it's nothing to do with you."
"Just say Arthur," he told Merlin, buckling the coveralls and mounting the driver's seat of the skid-cart.
"Arthur," the psychic said, like he was trying it out to see if it fit. Then he smiled, and turned to follow Gwen to the second bike.
"All right back there?" Arthur said over his shoulder, pulling his boots up from the ground and gripping the steering-bar.
"I feel awful," Lancelot groaned weakly. "It hurt so much, for so long…"
"Yeah – those meramine patches, though? Can't knock you out." Arthur watched Gwen situate herself, and Merlin tucked his knees behind hers, gloved hands wrapped around the slim bent balance-bars next to his seat. "Can't keep you on them steady for two, two and a half days. Even if we had enough, mate, that would do you more harm than good."
He squeezed the accelerator to move forward, off the track to follow the southern route the Essetirians had blazed yesterday. And if his passenger moaned again, he didn't hear it over the burrr of the skid-cart engine.
The wind they were generating at this speed plucked at the edges of his weatherproof outerwear, sensation without temperature, and the plastic shield above the steering-bar diverted the airflow away from his gloved hands. That left only chin and jaw exposed, and if he lowered his head, the face-shield did its job.
Not bloody bad. Better than yesterday – whole helluva lot faster, too.
Snow fell every night in the mountains, but not enough last night to cover the tracks made by the Essetirians with their four vehicles. The sun rising behind them threw their shadows forward, and Arthur let the certainty of the tracks they followed free his attention to focus on the peaks to their left. The last few linked hilltops that protected Camelot's border - all too well for their purposes, at the moment.
He recalled the topographical maps, reading the irregularly rounded marks, remembering the lowest points and trying to connect them in a possible path for two skid-carts. Except those maps didn't show the rocky obstacles on the slopes or how thickly the trees clustered…
Brrrap! Brrrap!
He startled, but realized the sharp note that echoed from the snowy slopes around them was the warning horn from Gwen's skid-cart behind them. Easing off the accelerator, they fish-tailed gently to a stop as he gripped his fist tightly in his lap, then spread his fingers and wiggled them to relieve the tension of controlling their speed with his right hand.
I do prefer the gas pedal, he thought, twisting in his seat to check on Lancelot.
Behind the plastic face-shield of his helmet, the pilot blinked slowly, lethargically, disoriented for a moment til he focused on Arthur.
"How are we doing?" Arthur called over the purring of the engine.
Lancelot licked his lips. "Thirsty."
"Yeah," Arthur agreed, reaching back to tap Lancelot's knee in sympathy. "Didn't get any breakfast, either."
The pilot's brows drew together in confusion, and Arthur realized, probably he and Gwen had eaten a hearty meal at the bed-and-breakfast. Lucky them.
Arthur swung his leg over the front of the skid-cart to dismount without jostling Lancelot. "Gotta pee yet?"
"No…"
Arthur crunched through ankle-deep snow to approach Gwen, who met him halfway, leaving Merlin hovering beside their skid-cart.
"We had an idea," she said, tipping her face-plate up to address him.
"I haven't had breakfast," he said bluntly, continuing on to her vehicle. "Merlin – did you eat anything at the hotel this morning?" Merlin shook his head, and Arthur bent to open the seat-compartment of their skid-cart.
"I raided the kitchen last night," Gwen told him, gesturing at her kit. He unzipped it to find – "We're well-stocked with packaged fruit pastries and peanut-butter granola bars. Pickled eggs, if you eat 'em."
Pickled pickles made sense. Pickled anything else, not so much.
Arthur ripped into a pastry without bothering to check the flavor, tossing one to Merlin – who dropped it because his hands were busy removing his gloves and he had to fish it out of the snow bank gingerly with bare fingers.
"What's your idea?" Arthur said to Gwen, cramming half the pastry in his mouth and bending for a bottle of water. That was plentiful – all around them, and with motors and fuel and weather-gear, no fear of lowering body temp drinking snow.
"I've seen maps," Merlin offered, brushing away crumbs. "Maps of this range, specifically, for… identification purposes. I know a route that will work."
Arthur scoffed. "Maps don't show you how thick the trees are, or how deep the snow."
"No, but… I can – I can find a route. I can re-route if we need to…"
Course he could. Course you can, Arthur thought at him cynically – and if he heard the thought, fine. Merlin's cheeks reddened and he dropped his eyes.
"So convenient," Arthur said aloud to Gwen, who was watching him for his reaction.
She shrugged. "Motives aren't ulterior if you've made them clear to those around you," she said. "If it gets us across sooner, I'm in."
And she'd say that because she was counting the minutes til they could wheel Lancelot into a high-tech trauma center.
"Lancelot's thirsty," he said bluntly, handing her the half-full bottle of water.
She took it, exchanging a silent glance with Merlin, then turned to crunch her way to Arthur's skid-cart. Arthur fished in her kit as Merlin snagged a water for himself, and found the magenta-rimmed binocs. Slamming the seat-lid shut, he hoisted himself up to standing on it. He had to tip his chin up to bring the binocs to his eyes properly under the helmet's face-shield, and scrutinized back the way they'd come.
No movement. They were too far to hear any normal noise from the opening resort, but he could hear no echoes from unseen pursuit, either.
"How far's your range?" he said down to Merlin without looking at him, still panning the descending slopes of their backtrail.
"Would you believe me if I said they hadn't left Ealdor yet?"
Arthur lowered the binocs and studied Merlin's face – serious, and the slightest bit unhappy. But not surprised. "You read my thoughts," he said. "Doesn't do me much good to lie to you, and both of us know it."
Merlin twisted the cap of the water bottle. "You thought about killing me."
"Yeah." It was only good scout-craft, to consider all options.
"More than once."
"Well, I didn't go through with it, did I?" Arthur shot back.
"Not yet." Merlin's expression didn't change.
Arthur frowned. How deep did Merlin's range go? Did he really doubt Arthur's honor, to suggest he might change his mind about keeping his word if it became expedient? That he might turn on someone who'd essentially surrendered to him? He bent his knees and shifted his boots and let gravity thump him back down to earth next to the skid-carts, and hung the binocs around his neck, the strap sliding awkwardly over the face-plate, and slipping down the back of the helmet over the hood of his parka.
"Not anymore. But the thing is, Merlin, you could lie to my face all day long, and I'd never know it."
A surprising smile twisted at Merlin's mouth as he lifted his own bottle to drink. "I doubt it."
Testing, Arthur said, "Have you ever had sex?"
Merlin choked instead of swallowing, his face bright red and his eyes wide. Arthur gave him his most charming smile, and Merlin stumbled a step back. "No, thanks!"
"Not offering," Arthur reassured him. "But you might be right about not being able to lie convincingly. You see if you had, you'd have snorted and said, Of course, real arrogant. At your age. If you'd wanted me to think you had."
"Well, I…" Merlin blustered, but Arthur turned away at the sound of Gwen's boots approaching.
"We should go," she said brusquely. "I think we should follow Merlin's directions. We need to stop every few hours anyway to check Lancelot. He's in a lot of pain, and his fever isn't really cooling like I thought it would, to be out here. I'm worried about his arm."
"All right," Arthur said, and gestured to Lancelot. "You want to drive with him, though? And I'll let this one tell me where to go."
Merlin snickered, and Arthur belatedly realized his unfortunate choice of words. Gwen pointed at the psychic, though, and ordered Merlin, "Be nice. He's fragile, really."
Arthur hissed, slapping at her gloved hand and she gave him a dimpled grin before turning back to Lancelot.
Stone castle. No thoughts escaping. Stone-bloody-castle, and especially not that thought.
Arthur stepped over the skid-cart's seat, deliberately not thinking about the vehicle's latest driver straddling this very position, and felt Merlin settle in behind him. "Where to?"
"Start angling up instead of following the valley floor," Merlin called in his ear. "See those trees there? Head for those."
"The black spruce?" Arthur lifted the binocs to study the area pointed out by the psychic before letting them hang from his neck again. Knocking down the face-shield, he squeezed the accelerator.
Their treads flipped bits of packed snow into the air as they passed Gwen and Lancelot. Slower now; a bounce over snow-covered obstacles was more dangerous with the skid-cart tilted, the center of their collective balance shifted. They were making tracks into untraveled territory also, and if the snow was too deep to slip away underneath the engine, if they were too heavy for the skids to lift them up, the going became a lot more tricky.
But the further west they went now meant the further east they'd have to return before getting Lancelot to Stansford, the closest to Ealdor on Camelot's norther border. Not a rail-stop town, though… Otherwise they'd have to go an extra half-day further west to Lyster.
Maybe it depended on what they found on the road between the two towns.
Arthur tried to remember whether he'd ever heard if Lyster's trauma ward had a chopper for relocation of emergencies.
"I've never ridden in a helicopter," Merlin shouted over the rushing air and grinding engine.
Arthur glanced back, enough to see that Gwen's skid-cart was keeping up. Lancelot couldn't lean into the tilt like Merlin could; he'd have to remember that.
"I've jumped out of a helicopter before," he called back. And oh, if he was being honest with a fellow who could read minds, "Twice."
"Good stories?" Merlin shouted.
Arthur didn't answer, focusing on the black spruce. Maybe he didn't fully trust Merlin showing Gwen the path he'd chosen for them to take, but he also didn't like her having to think about Lancelot's weight distribution, behind Arthur where he couldn't see them. Surely it would be too cruel for Lancelot to suffer two accidents, though…
He blinked and inhaled deeply of the cold air. Had to stay awake. Had to stay…
The spruce loomed over them, and Arthur studied the route pointed out by the psychic – an easy-enough cut across and up the next hillside, two steeper drops bisected by a wide-ish ledge.
Nearly midday now, and his nearest layer of clothing damp with sweat under his weatherproof gear. He blinked, easing the tendency to squint against the brightness of the snow, even in the absence of the sun.
Beyond the stand of spruce trees, the angled ledge was more exposed than their trail so far, higher on the hillside. The snow was softer, unpacked, and liked to fly up before them and all around.
Releasing the accelerator, he let the skid-cart slide to a slow stop.
Second law of thermodynamics, wasn't it?
His eye sockets ached from constant vigilance, and his hand cramped inside his glove. His ears rang in the stillness as he shut the motor off, and his skin buzzed beneath his clothing. He unhooked the chin-strap of his helmet and knocked the face-plate up and out of his way so his breath wouldn't fog the clear plastic. Neck muscles complained as he stretched his chin in every direction possible, and his shoulders agreed with the general protest.
"Want me to drive for a while?" Merlin asked lightly, shifting and contorting to bring one leg over the seat between their bodies, and the sole of his boot knocked into Arthur's spine. "Sorry."
"Watch your step," Arthur said tiredly, ignoring the bump and apology both as inconsequential. Over the side of the two-to-three pace wide ledge, it had gotten to be quite a long way to tumble.
Topography didn't take crevasses into account, either.
"I'll check on Gwen and Lancelot," Merlin offered, one hand on the skid-cart for balance as he waded through knee-deep snow, back behind them.
Arthur pushed himself off the seat by groaning degrees – they had yet to travel all afternoon, and possibly tomorrow – and opened the storage beneath. Fuel dial showed pay-attention levels, so he stripped his gloves to unfasten the gas container from its compartment. Untwist the cap from the fuel tank access, uncork the container spout, and upend the thing, gurgling and wafting faint fumes.
For a moment he closed his eyes, and the tang brought him back to the local filling station near the Pendragon manor, filling his turf-bike or the estate cargo truck, dusty and warm in the sun, anticipating a cold drink and another afternoon well spent, exhausted and satisfied. And maybe Leon was at the next pump filling his own bike…
"Are you all right?" Merlin's voice startled him.
His eyelids were stiff and cold, cheekbones numb and the tip of his nose felt damp. The fuel container was empty, and he was swaying on his feet.
"Dammit," he said roughly, rubbing the sleeve of the parka over his eyes, chafing his skin to wake himself up again. Swiftly though, and the cap of the fuel jug back in place, stowing it back underneath the seat.
Merlin was watching him, extracting granola and pastries from Gwen's kit by feel. "She says she's fine. Says Lancelot's pulse and response clarity is decent, but she gave him another patch. Says I gotta watch you to see that you're all right."
Arthur gave him a glare that didn't need words, or a psychic interpretation. Which – contradictory – made Merlin grin, though his face looked as stiff and chapped as Arthur's felt.
"Here." He handed Arthur a purple condom packet with the unwrapped barley-and-apricot bar.
"Said I wasn't offering," Arthur mumbled. Then frowned and gave his head a shake, realizing that none of that box probably were condoms – just as Merlin frowned and tilted lack of comprehension also. Did he not recognize an ostensible contraceptive when he saw it?
Maybe not.
"It's not meramine?" Arthur managed, cramming the bar in his mouth and ripping open the little square packet to find an adhesive patch. Meramine wouldn't do him any good – it was way too strong for a muscle ache, and warning labels would strongly urge him to reconsider driving anything wearing one.
"No, it's a stimulant," Merlin said.
Arthur gave a rough sigh, unzipping his parka and shrugging to be able to reach his bicep muscle without sticking the patch to any of his layers of clothing. "I'll take a cup of coffee instead, any day."
"Yeah." Merlin nibbled the bar like he didn't have much of an appetite.
Arthur swallowed half a bottle of water at one go, then retrieved the binocs again and balanced his boots on the skid-cart seat to turn scrutiny on their backtrail, the hills that obscured Ealdor from their position.
"They know, you know," Merlin said, below him.
"What?" he said inattentively.
"The others. They know I'm not in the truck. For a while, now."
Arthur made a noncommittal noise. On one hand, the psychic could be a very useful source of information. On the other, you had to trust he was telling the truth… But that left him wondering at Merlin's motivation. It didn't really make sense that he'd trade his situation in Essetir for something that might be very similar for a very long time in Camelot – and might even be worse. Unless help and freedom ended at the border, and he meant to disappear into the general masses…
But if he was helpful, and they made it because of him, was Arthur going to try very hard to introduce Merlin to Gaius and his department as a defecting psychic? Was defecting a word? It was a strange one.
"So," he said aloud, scanning snow-slope and trees with dusted-shadowy boughs and crouching-deceptive shrubs. "If you want to make yourself agreeable to a nation that's enemies to where you were born, does that make you defective?"
Merlin snorted. "Hardy har har. See anything?"
Arthur didn't answer. And didn't ask the same question.
Jumping down, he stowed the binocs as Merlin found a pocket in Gwen's pack for the wrappers of their lunch and closed the seat-compartment. Arthur watched Gwen stretch, hands propped on the backs of her hips to ease tension. He waited til she looked at him, then freed a hand to signal, Let's go.
He waved back, and she lifted one leg over her seat, ahead of Lancelot, who didn't look like he'd moved an inch, as Gwen shuffled kit and fuel jug in the space beneath them.
His bones groaned back into position, and shuddered as he started the engine again, pulling forward and up.
The shortest distance between two points… isn't possible traversing a mountain range. Nor the lowest – nor the swiftest.
Behind him, Merlin felt tense on the seat of the skid-cart, shifting and fidgeting – which affected the balance of the machine enough for Arthur to pay attention to. The stimulant patch helped – he felt himself sit straighter, turn his head more often without worrying about making an error in judgment taking his eyes off choosing their path.
It would be easier in the foothills entering Camelot. Just now though they were actually pointed southeast, which brought them nearer Ealdor, and maybe that explained the psychic's uneasiness.
The psychic's uneasiness.
Stimulating chemicals dancing their way through his bloodstream flicked his instinct. Something you want to share? he didn't say.
The psychic leaned forward, the material of his black coat scratching reverberations along Arthur's parka. "There – that way, do you see?"
Arthur's hum of affirmation was probably lost in the rumble of the motor.
That way ended up taking them down a bit, angling around to the east of that peak, still above the tops of the evergreens growing in the valleys, still below the bald snow topping the looming points. Arthur thought incongruously of the pictures he'd drawn in his early childhood, where a mountain range was represented by a row of inverted V's. Perfectly smooth sides, perfectly pointed peaks, and the valleys between nearly level with the ground outside the range.
Reality was so much more complex. Twice they had to backtrack. Once Lancelot nearly tipped the second skid-cart over and Gwen had to lean far to the other side – over the drop, as it turned out, and lay on her horn for help.
So she went back to driving her original vehicle, with Arthur on the skid-cart with Lancelot.
He'd just begun to wonder if the light was beginning to leave them – past midafternoon – when Merlin's hand rose high above his shoulder to signal, slow to stop.
Lancelot shifted and moaned behind him, and Arthur eased the machine around a tightish corner – rocks under the snow scraped the belly of the engine, shifting the track that propelled the skid-cart, tipping them further toward down-the-slope. Facing nearly southwest again, with Ealdor at their backs, more or less, and distant by two – okay, call it two-and-a-half – mountaintops between, vaguely glimpsed between the tip-tops of pine and spruce.
Beyond the helmeted heads of his partner and their defector he could see what he hoped was the last major obstacle – a wide snow spillway leading up to a narrow V-tip of a pass. Presumably a descent through the foothills beyond… the border… the road.
Camelot.
He released the accelerator and they jolted to an abrupt stop – wet sticky snow and rock beneath. Arthur exhaled roughly. "Almost there," he said to Lancelot. "Look – we're almost there."
Just about the time when a decent plan went straight to hell.
Ahead of them by a stone's easy toss, Gwen was sliding down over the side – presumably headed to the trees for some privacy. Merlin was picking his way back toward Arthur, knee-deep and stumbling slightly, eyes on the placement of his boots.
Arthur twisted about, squinting to study the deceptively-whitened slopes and forested depths behind them, feeling like there was something he had forgotten, or overlooked, or neglected to consider somehow. "That's our path?" he raised his voice to ask the psychic. "That slope that looks ready to release an avalanche if I cleared my throat too loudly?"
Merlin gave him a surprised lift of the eyebrows, and glanced back as if he could see the difference Arthur's pessimism made, in the slope itself. "I thought it looked an easy route."
Arthur took a deliberate breath. "Don't suppose you could… see how stable it is? Whether it might start to slide away under us when we get halfway up?"
Merlin met his eyes, and his own were a very dark blue. Around them the mountains breathed a mist of tiny dislodged flakes, and the trees sighed. "It doesn't work like that. I see the past, not the future. And it's not like I can read whether the slope has any intention of dumping us down to the bottom."
Arthur had to decide whether to believe him, or not… and chose in favor of.
"Pendragon," Lancelot rasped. His eyes were clear, but clearly pained. "I do have to pee, now."
"Yeah, all right," Arthur said, swinging one leg over the saddle-seat so he could turn far enough to yank loose the highwayman's hitch that secured the pilot to the half-height seat-back. He boosted Lancelot carefully to his feet, helping him balance and get his good arm over Arthur's neck. "Take your chance, Merlin – we should go til we find a place to stop for the night, after this."
Merlin drummed gloved fingers softly on the left-hand brake of the skid-cart's steering bar, and remained where he was.
"Come on," Arthur panted to Lancelot, beginning to stagger forward on uncertain footing – even in the tracks of the skid-cart – trying to keep from jostling the pilot unduly. "We'll take a piss and then drink some more… How do you fancy a snack?"
He said we, but ended up steadying Lancelot from behind as the pilot unzipping and managed his business one-handed, but Lancelot couldn't stand on his own to wait for Arthur. Fever – infection – dammit.
Never mind. Hold it a few more hours. Nothing really out of the ordinary for a mission, anyway.
He maneuvered them around and headed back to the two skid-carts. He could see the ass-end of theirs but not Gwen's, and his pulse picked up a bit – but as they rounded the corner he could see that she was stood on the seat, binocs fitting to her eyes under the raised face-plate of the helmet, her mouth screwed up in concentration. Merlin turned from zipping his trousers and hunched over his crossed arms like he was cold. He glanced up at Gwen and spoke, and neither of them was paying attention to Lancelot and Merlin.
Lowering Lancelot to the seat, Arthur secured the pilot in place with the boot-laces again. "I know you're hurting, but otherwise? All right? You're going to make it?"
"I need another meramine," Lancelot uttered. And if he had to ask for the patch, probably he was due for another one.
Before he remembered that the patches were part of the kit stored in the skid-cart he was currently driving, Arthur glanced back toward Gwen and Merlin. Gwen was stowing the binocs, and Merlin was headed back toward them again.
Ask him if those thermals are still dry and warm, he reminded himself. "Here," he said, digging in their supplies. "Blueberry pastry – this one's frosted." Though probably Lancelot wouldn't be able to taste it in the cold.
Lancelot dropped it in the snow with a gasp, and for a moment Arthur worried he should have slapped the meramine patch on the pilot's skin first.
Then Merlin yelped loud and sudden enough to start that avalanche, and Arthur whirled to see the psychic down, flailing in the snow between the two skid-carts. Maybe he'd stepped on a hidden rock and twisted his-
CRACK!
The unmistakable echo of a sniper rifle.
But we don't have any-
CRACK!
One of the limbs of the trees just down the side of the mountain exploded into flying matchsticks and a shower of displaced snow, blowing sideways all over Merlin. The young man yelped and scrambled toward the far side of Gwen's skid-cart, as if to use the vehicle for cover, and the way he moved told Arthur everything.
Uninjured.
"Come on, Merlin, hustle your butt!" Gwen yelled back.
Damn. That's what you missed, what you forgot – to think what the Essetirians would do after they discovered the ruse of the empty truck. Forgot to imagine they might have been armed with long-range weapons, might have sent some of their number to vantage points on the nearest mountaintops…
Merlin was wearing the unmistakable Essetirian black. The scouts' weatherproof gear was white-smoke-mottled, and Lancelot's pilot suit a grubby used-to-be-cream. Of course the psychic was the easy target for a marksman close to a thousand paces away, hilltop to hilltop in the snow and eddying mountain winds, but-
They were firing at their psychic. Rather dead than escaped, if they decided he was too far away for them to catch him before he crossed the border – as he was obviously trying to do?
"Go, go go!" Arthur bellowed. "And stay down!"
Gwen hunched low over her controls. Merlin scrunched onto the back of the seat and she revved the motor into swift-skidding action before his butt was on the seat.
Arthur turned, squinting into the distance, estimating the sniper's position from the bare-orange broken bough and the psychic's fall-hide hollow in the snow ahead of him.
"Pendragon!" Lancelot called weakly.
"We're fine," Arthur managed. "No one was hit…" At that distance, with the calibre they'd be using, there would be no such thing as a mere flesh wound. Even a near miss…
CRACK!
Arthur saw the puff of snow in the ascending slope, melting a miniature crater just behind Gwen and Merlin as they disappeared around the curve.
And probably, he and Lancelot didn't present a clear shot for the distant marksman. That might change when they drove forward – and if they recognized Lancelot's flight suit…
Arthur gripped the seat between his knees; his palms were damp inside his gloves. No way of doing this that didn't expose Lancelot except speed. Around a corner blind to a slope just waiting to collapse and roll them violently to the bottom of a fifty-foot-deep drift…
Without the stimulant path itching the skin of his left bicep, he might've tumbled them right over the side without need for an avalanche. The seat of the skid-cart bruised his tail-bone as the machine bounded forward into the flying wake of the other vehicle.
His heart bumped three times against his sternum, attempting to ricochet out of his throat. He waited for the echo of the shot he'd never feel, for the tug of a round passing through Lancelot's body and throwing them off-balance.
Can't hear it over the engine, anyway.
Five seconds to put the curve of the mountain between them and their adversaries in whatever advantageous perch they'd found…
Both Gwen and Merlin were leaning hard to the right, knee-to-chin to combat the tilt of the racing skid-cart, scant warning for Arthur. The downward pitch grabbed at him, pulling his left boot off the kick-plate. He lunged to his right, gripping and twisting the accelerator, fighting the combined weight of the vehicle and the injured pilot-
Merlin twisted to look back, eyes showing wide through the face-plate of his helmet.
The rear of the skid-cart slewed down-hill even as they plowed forward, snow splashing wildly and the whole world was white. His pulse slammed through his body and he panted against his face-plate – if Gwen couldn't hold the first skid-cart upright and steady, blasting forward up the last snowfall to the pass, he'd have no time to stop before he slammed into them, and swerving was going to roll them a dozen times before they stopped.
Up… and up…
Can't shoot over the top into the unseen other side, it might be a vertical drop – would Merlin know that? Arthur couldn't remember exact details of the topo-map at the moment.
Can't slow, because of bullets, and gravity dragging them back down the treacherously-smooth slope.
Cold and nerves shuddered through him and he was frozen like granite with intensity, ready to shatter but holding… holding…
The other skid-cart vanished over the near horizon. Arthur gulped – up, and over-
And out of sight of Essetir.
He pulled his fingers off the accelerator, and squeezed for the brake, grappling against the slewing skids. Loose snow piled and packed and served to slow them and cushion their stop.
Just ahead, at the edge of earshot, Gwen's machine was half-buried in a snow-bank of their own creation, mere paces from the first thick trunks of the forests stretching down into the foothills. Merlin was twisted nearly backwards on the seat, craning to see Arthur and Lancelot, horror clear in his expression.
His fingers trembled as he reached for the key and the plastic #10 tag, clumsy now inside his glove. His whole body trembled in the stillness. Lancelot moaned – at least he was alive – Gwen looked back.
Arthur lifted a hand to give the conventional signal, even though he wasn't the lead vehicle. Slow to stop.
Gwen gave her head a single disbelieving shake.
Merlin grinned.