Fall of Angels (The Saga of Recluce #6)(15)

"They're gone, frig it!"

Nylan led the horse toward the lander shells and the half-grubbed and ditched plot, not quite sure what to do with the animal. At the least, he needed to find someplace to tether it. Several marines were working over two angel bodies as he led the horse toward the nearest lander, where, absently, he tied the reins around an internal door loop. No one was going to be closing the door anytime soon.

Then he hurried through the fallen horsemen. One moaned as Nylan passed. He looked down at the hole in the man's abdomen, and his guts twisted at the blood. The man moaned again. Nylan knelt. There wasn't much he could do.

The soldier muttered something, blood oozing from the corner of his mouth. Had he fractured ribs in his fall from the horse? The man's hand clutched Nylan's, and he muttered, "Nerysa . . . Nerysa . . ."

His hand loosened, as did his jaw.

Nylan closed the dead man's eyes and slowly stood. Then he walked toward the group between the end lander and the plot where three gathered around a prone figure in a ship-suit.

"It's no use." One of the marines sat back and wiped her forehead.

The unmoving figure was that of the junior officer- Mertin. Above sightless eyes and streams of dried and drying blood, his forehead looked slightly lopsided.

The marine stood. "Those blades are more like iron crowbars. Not much edge. Damned sword caved in his temple. He just stood there and shot, never ducked He got about four of them."

Nylan looked toward the other grouping. "Who's that?"

"Kyseen, I think. Mangled leg. Three of them hit her at once. She got two. The third got her with his horse. She still got him."

Nylan shook his head. The entire fight still seemed both horribly real and terribly unreal.

From what he could tell, several other marines were also down.

From the hillside above, Ryba rode downhill, leading three more riderless mounts. More to the west, another marine and Gerlich were on horseback, trying to corner several more of the riderless horses. Nylan counted nearly a score of mounts being held, tethered, or chased.

Nylan glanced back toward Kyseen.

"Dumb bastard!"

Since she sounded as though she had a chance for recovery, and since he was certainly no medtech, he walked back toward the uphill side of the lander shells where Ryba was directing the construction of something where the horses could be tethered.

"Nylan!" ordered Ryba. "Get a couple of marines and check the bodies. Those that aren't too badly wounded we'll try to save for information. Gather all the weapons, anything valuable, and have your detail bury the rest deep enough that scavengers, or whatever they have here, won't get them. Keep any cloaks or jackets or armor or boots-if they're in good condition."

Nylan nodded. While he didn't like the idea, he understood the need.

"Don't bury any of the dead horses yet." Ryba made a sour face. "Maybe we can butcher some and stretch out the concentrates."

Nylan frowned. Horse meat? Maybe it would be better than concentrates, but he had his doubts. To stop thinking about that, he asked, "Who got away besides the fellow in white?"

"Maybe a half dozen. One or two were wounded, I think." Ryba turned her mount toward the end of the meadow where Gerlich lurched in the saddle as his mount nearly carried him into an overhanging pine branch. "Use your legs, Gerlich, and your head!"

Nylan pointed to the three nearest marines. "You, you, and you-we're the scavenger - and - burial detail." He saw Huldran. "You too, Huldran. We'll start up by the rocks and sweep down. Carry the bodies to the lower end of the meadow, near the drop-off." He gestured.

"That's a long ways," pointed out a tall woman, who, like him, had come out of the mysterious underjump with silver hair.

Nylan tried to remember her name. Was it Llysette?

"Llysette, it's downhill-"

"It's Llyselle, ser."

"Sorry. In any case, Llyselle, it is downhill and away from the water, and it's going to be hard to bury them deep enough to get rid of the smell. There are rocks there, for a cairn, if necessary."

"Yes, ser." The four gave him resigned looks.

"Why don't we just drop them over the cliff?" asked Huldran.

"That would probably just cause more trouble with the locals, and we don't need that."

"How would they know?"

Nylan shrugged. "I don't know, but they've got something-call it technology, call it magic. They knew Ryba was our leader, and they knew we came from space or the local equivalent."

"Great.. ." mumbled one of the other marines.

"Stow it, Berlig," said Huldran tiredly. 'The engineer's usually been right, and these days that counts for a lot. Let's get on with it."

'Take any weapons, knives, any gadgets or coins. Jewelry, too," added Nylan. "The more we find, the more we might be able to figure out about these people."

The sun had dropped behind the mountain peaks by the time Ryba, Gerlich, and their work crew had completed a makeshift corral for the captured mounts and by the time a large cairn and five individual graves had been completed and filled in the southwestern corner of the open area, just beyond the end of the meadow and less than two dozen steps from the beginning of the drop-off.

Saryn was by the cook-fire area, making an attempt to butcher a dead horse. Nylan shook his head, but kept walking toward the stream. He needed to get the blood and grime off himself, if he could.