to wake her to the danger. “Get away from there!” or some such.
She answered me without turning around. The words come out kind of in a growl, so though they was low I could make them out even over the shouts and screams that was coming from the gather-ground.
“Stand in the fire, boy.”
I thought I must of misheard. The whole thing was like a dream, but that was the strangest of all. Anyway my feet weren’t likely to move right then even if I told them to.
Ursala took one step after another. She was turning her hands slowly, the hand with the burning branch and the hand with the rock. The drone shifted in the air. I would of swore it was turning tight little circles too, following the movements of Ursala’s hands.
I had heard stories about witches. I thought I was looking at a witching right then. The time must of run out for us and yet the drone didn’t fire. What it did was come down to meet Ursala as she come, like as if she’d whistled it to her. She was holding the burning branch out in front of her now, still circling and circling. The hand with the rock was drawed back, and I seen the muscles in her arm bunch up.
That part I got pretty much straight in my mind, as you can probably tell. But after that my remembering is all tangled up again. Mardew Vennastin come running right by me, his shoulder hitting me hard and making me stagger. I seen his hand was up and the cutter was in it. I seen the bar of the cutter was shining silver, so the blade was ready to be sent out to cut something.
He was resting the cutter hand on his other hand to steady it. His head was tilted to one side, so he could sight along the line of his arm. And Ursala was stood in front of him, right between him and the drone.
I don’t remember deciding to move. I almost don’t remember moving at all, but my hands was around Mardew’s arm, most sudden, and I was pulling it down towards the ground. Mardew sweared a terrible oath and snatched his hand free again, which didn’t cost him no effort at all for I was not what you would call strong.
Then there was a sound like a bushel of eggs all cracking at once.
Mardew brung the cutter up again, only there was nothing now to aim at. He lowered his hand back down to his side, very slowly. There was a look on his face that was kind of wildered and kind of sour, all at once.
The drone was on the ground at Ursala’s feet, bent almost in two. The rock was still in her hand.
“Put that thing back on safety, Mardew Vennastin,” she says. “Before you slice your own foot off.” She said it the same way she told me to jump in the fire, without turning her head but still knowing in some way he was there.
Mardew looked like he was going to answer her, only he couldn’t find the words. He turned on me instead, his face all alight inside with strong feeling, most of which was anger.
“Do you want to tell me why you laid hands on me, boy?” he asked me. He spit out the words like he didn’t like the taste of them. I didn’t either, come to that. Mardew was only two years older than me, and I was done with my Waiting, so that “boy” didn’t sit right at all.
He shoved me in the chest with the hand that didn’t have the cutter on it. “I’m a Rampart about his duty,” he says. “You know what happens to people who get in the way of me?”
I stammered out a sorry that I didn’t really mean, and he roared at me, “Sorry don’t help. I’m bringing it to the Count and Seal and you’ll be whipped for it. Damn fool boy!”
He was wild, all right. He would of said more, or maybe done more, but then he looked all around at the people that had come up behind him from the gather-ground. I never even seen they was there until then, and I don’t think Mardew did either. One of them was Haijon. Another was my mother, her face very pale.
“The boy was helping me,” Ursala said, all quiet-like, “to bring down this drone.”
“That’s Rampart work,” Mardew said.
“Usually it is,” Ursala agreed. “But