Page 25 of Circle of Days
“I just did,” said Troon.
Scagga got angrier. “All right!” he said. “Plant your seeds. Pull up weeds. Watch your crop grow tall.”
“That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
“And then we will drive the herd across it and trample it all. And when you say to me: ‘You can’t do that!’ I’ll say: ‘I just did.’ Now, what do you say to that?”
Ani guessed that Troon had already thought of this possibility, and she was right. He pointed to the young men, who grinned and shook their weapons. Troon said: “Any cattle that trample our crops will be slaughtered.”
“You won’t be able to kill them all.”
“But at least we’ll have plenty of meat.”
Ani saw that this was getting nowhere. She said: “We’re not here to threaten you, Troon. We’re just finding out what’s happened, so that we can report to the other elders and the herder community.”
Scagga added: “And they’re going to be very angry about this.”
Unnecessary, Ani thought, but it makes him feel better.
“Go ahead,” said Troon. “Be angry. But the Break is farmland now, and it always will be.”
The elders turned away and left, heading for home.
Ani was tired the next day. She supposed it was because she had walked all the way to Farmplace and back in two days. Perhaps I’m getting old, she thought. How many midsummers have I seen? Both hands, both feet, both hands again, and my left hand and my right thumb and one more finger. Shouldn’t I be able to walk for two days without feeling tired?
Perhaps not.
The elders met at the circle of tree trunks in Riverbend. It was quiet and still. The trees had been created by the earth, and she sensed that the Earth God was here.
A lot of villagers came to the meeting, whether they were elders or not. This was usual when there was something big to discuss. Many of them just sat and listened, but occasionally they would have a collective reaction, sounds of agreement or doubt, surprise or disgust. This was useful to the elders, because they got an instant public response to what they said.
Ani began by saying: “Well, the farmers have dug up the entire Break, a large area of pasture that our herds have grazed for as longas anyone can remember. It’s also our path to the river, so now if we need to water cattle in the west of the plain we will have to drive them on a long detour, all around the far end of West Wood. But Troon would not listen to our protest.”
Scagga spoke up impatiently. “We have to start making arrows—flint-headed arrows. We’ll need as many as there are farmers to be killed. More, probably, as archers sometimes miss. And bows.”
“Wait a minute,” said Ani. She knew that Scagga had been born in some faraway place, and had been driven away by a war—a war that in his mind he still wanted to fight. He had to be restrained. “We haven’t decided to go to war, and we won’t make that decision if I have anything to do with it.” She saw women in the audience nodding agreement.
Scagga said: “We outnumber the farmers! There must be ten of us to every one farmer. Maybe more. We can’t lose.”
“Perhaps,” Ani said. “But how many of our people will have their skin pierced by arrows, their heads smashed by clubs, their flesh sliced open by sharp flint knives? How many of us will be killed before we can say we have won?”
Keff intervened. “Too many,” he said. “War is a last resort, Scagga, not a first response.”
Good for you, calm Keff, thought Ani, with your black beard and your big belly.
Scagga said: “If we let them get away with this, they won’t stop! How much more land are we willing to lose?”
The young men murmured agreement with that. Young men were quick to anger, Ani had noticed. She hoped her Han would not turn out that way.
Encouraged, Scagga added: “They won’t be satisfied until they’ve dug up the entire Great Plain!”
There were louder shouts of assent from the young men.
Ani stepped in. “We should bargain with them. Let them have extra land, as long as they don’t block our access to water or pasture, or interfere in any way with our herds.”
“You’d have us all be cowards!” said Scagga.
“I’d have us all alive,” Ani retorted.
