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intersect the swift at an angle.
"Come!" Tabor said, as their slower mounts fell behind. "I know where he will
have them do it."
He cut away sharply northward, and Dave followed. In a moment they crested a
small knoll in the otherwise level sweep of the prairie; turning back, Dave
saw the eltor swift and the hunters converge, and he watched the Dalrei hunt,
as Tabor told him of the Law.
An eltor could be killed by knife blade only. Nothing else. Any other killing
meant death or exile to the man who did so. Such, for twelve hundred years,
had been the Law inscribed on the parchments at Celidon.
More: one eltor to one man, and one chance only for the hunter. A doe could be
killed, but at risk, for a bearing doe's death meant execution or exile again.
This, Dave learned, was what had happened to Tore's father. Ivor had exiled
him, having no other mercy to grant, for in the preservation of the great
eltor swifts lay the preservation of the Dalrei themselves. Dave nodded to
hear it; somehow, out here on the Plain under that high sky, harsh, clear laws
seemed to fit. It was not a world shaped for nuance or subtlety.
Then Tabor drew silent, for one by one, in response to Levon's gesture, the
hunters of the third tribe set out after their prey. Dave saw the first of
them, low and melded to his flying horse, intersect the edge of the racing
swift. The man picked his target, slid into place beside it; then Dave, his
jaw dropping, saw the hunter leap from horse to eltor, dagger flashing, and,
with a succinct slash, sever the beast's jugular. The eltor fell, the weight
of the Dalrei pulling it away from the body of the swift. The hunter
disengaged from the falling beast, hit the ground himself at frightening
speed, rolled, and was up, his dagger raised in red triumph.
Levon raised his own blade in response, but most of the other men were already
flying alongside the swift. Dave saw the next man kill with a short, deadly
throw. His eltor fell, almost in its tracks.
Another hunter, riding with unbelievable skill, held to his mount with his
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legs only, leaning far out over the back of a madly racing eltor, to stab from
horseback and bring down his beast.
"Uh-oh," Tabor said sharply. "Navon's trying to be fancy." Shifting his
glance, Dave saw that one of the boys he'd guarded the night before was
showing off on his first hunt. Riding his horse while standing up, Navon
smoothly cut in close to one of the eltor. Taking careful aim, he threw from
his standing position-and missed. The flung blade whipped just over the neck
of the prey and fell harmlessly.
"Idiot!" Tabor exclaimed, as Navon slumped down on his mount. Even at a
distance Dave could see the young Rider's dejection. "It was a good try," he
offered. "No," Tabor snapped, his eyes never leaving the hunters. "He
shouldn't be doing that on his first hunt, especially when Levon has trusted
him by taking only twenty for seventeen. Now if anyone else is unlucky. . .
."
Turning back to the hunt, Dave picked out the other new Rider. Barth, on a
brown stallion, went in with cool efficiency, picked out his eltor and,
wasting no time, pulled alongside, leaped from his horse, and stabbing, as the
first hunter had done, brought his beast down.
"Good," Tabor muttered, a little grudgingly. "He did well. See, he even pulled
it down to the outside, away from the others. The leap is the surest way,
though you can get hurt doing it."
And sure enough, though Barth rose holding a dagger aloft, it was in his left
hand, and his right hung down at his side. Levon saluted him back. Dave turned
to Tabor to ask a question, but was stopped cold by the stricken expression on
his companion's face.
"Please," Tabor whispered, almost a prayer. "Let it be soon. Oh, Davor, if
Gereint doesn't name me this summer, I will die of shame!" Dave couldn't think
of a single thing to say. So, after a moment, he just asked his question.
"Does Levon go in, too, or will he just watch?"
Tabor collected himself. "He only kills if the others have failed, then he
must make up the numbers himself. It is a shameful thing, though, if the
leader must kill, which is why most tribes take many more hunters than they
need." There was pride in Tabor's voice again. "It is a thing of great honor
to take only a few extra Riders, or none, though no one does that. The third
tribe is known now over all the Plain for how bold we are on the hunt. I wish,
though, that Levon had been more careful with two new ones today. My father
would have-oh, no!"
Dave saw it, too. The eltor picked out by the fifteenth Rider stumbled, just
as the hunter threw, and the blade hit an antler only and glanced away. The
eltor recovered and raced off, head high, its mane blown gracefully back.
Tabor was suddenly very still, and after a quick calculation Dave realized
why: no one else could miss. Levon had cut it very fine.
The sixteenth hunter, an older man, had already peeled off from the small
group remaining. Dave saw that the Riders who had already killed were racing
along on the far side of the swift. They had turned the eltor so the beasts
were now running back south along the other side of the knoll. All the kills,
he realized, would be close together. It was an efficient process, well
judged. If no one else missed.
The sixteenth hunter played no games. In fast, his blade high, he picked a
slower animal, leaped, and stabbed, pulling it clear. He rose, dagger lifted.
"A fat one," Tabor said, trying to mask his tension. "Gereint'll want that one
tonight."
The seventeenth man killed, too, throwing from almost directly over top of his
eltor. He made it look easy.
"Tore won't miss," Dave heard Tabor say, and saw the now familiar shiftless
figure whip past their knoll.
Tore singled out an eltor, raced south with it for several strides, then threw
with arrogant assurance.
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The eltor dropped, almost at their feet. Tore saluted briefly, then sped off
to join the other Riders on the far side of the swift. Seeing that throw, Dave
remembered the urgach falling two nights before.
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