They got the gear together and saddled an eager condor, largely without speaking. Its darkest feathers had a deep purple sheen, its palest were soft cream. Its head was bald of feathers and was a roughened scarlet. Its eyes were shiny black.

When Coop didn’t know what to do with a strap or harness, he held it out to River who showed him. In short order, they had one of the great birds ready.

Coop caught River looking at him with a combined expression of guarded and impressed. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of the interaction with the dragoncat himself, so as he tightened the last strap across the condor’s chest, he gave the beast a pat and tried to affect an air of only mild interest.

“How long has that beast been here?”

The condor warbled deep in its chest at his touch. It bent its neck to rub its long beak down the back left horn on his head. His HUD showed him a brief wave pattern of the warble then marked it stored. Coop knew the inside of that beak was like a fine-toothed saw blade and could have cut through the behemoth hide of his armor without too much trouble. But the quick gesture from the condor was surprisingly gentle.

River shrugged. “A long time. A hundred years maybe?”

Coop looked at River who looked away quickly.

“He seems friendly.”

“He’s not. He usually growls at anyone who gets near. But he’s been here longer than any of us and he doesn’t hurt people. Mostly.”

Coop grunted and nodded.

River climbed onto the front of the saddle and Coop climbed on behind him. The condor grunted as Coop mounted, then took a breath and shifted. River reached a hand down their shirt and pulled forth a wood and silver item. Sticking one end in their mouth, River gave a long, slow, breath. It was a whistle or call and it made a sound similar to the condor.

The condor shook itself, then made its way from the aerie to the landing with a bobbing gait interspersed with occasional hops. Coop grabbed the handles of the saddle and squeezed with his knees. River kept balance, swaying with the beast, moving as it moved, becoming an extension of it. Coop tried to mimic the small hunter, but adroit movement wasn’t his forte.

River donned a leather helmet with attached goggles, strapped it firm under their chin, then looked over their shoulder at Coop.

“I thought I’d let her have her head. Let her take us wherever she wants. Sound good?”

Coop shrugged but gripped tighter with his knees. The condor whuffed and warbled and adjusted its bald head on its long neck to peer at Coop. He could feel the beast’s torso beneath him, inflating in preparation for flight, which gave him an idea. He used his HUD to engage his jumpack and inflate his own condor bladder. He wasn’t sure how big his harvested bladder was compared to an actual condor’s, how much space it took up in his torso. He reminded himself again that he needed to insist to General Ashpholt he get a look at his cybernetic schematics.

As the bladder inflated, he could feel his buoyancy increasing and eased the pressure of his knees.

The condor shifted, spread its wings. It looked back out toward the empty sky, beyond the aerie’s balcony and launched them into the air before falling into a shallow dive, massive wings spread. And with his bladder inflated, Coop felt he could read the movements of the beast easily; how he shifted to catch the wind or avoid it, how his muscles tensed and relaxed as he used momentum to angle upward and pumped his wings to climb higher.

He eased his grip on the saddle handles and felt loose, light. He watched as Shellback and its surrounding forests fell away. The condor caught an updraft. Coop felt it just before it happened. He shifted just as the condor cupped its wings, lifting them in a high soaring arc. They banked left, and on the inside of their arc was the tallest peak of the jutting mountain range thrusting from the Great Gaia Beast’s back, not unlike spine ridges. The condor made its way around the peak, spiraling ever higher, and a few minutes later alighted at the top.

The peak of the mountain, which appeared a sharp point from a distance, was broad and flat enough for the condor to land, talons scraping across the rock. The great winged beast settled upon its haunches. There was plenty of room for them, but there wouldn’t be enough for a second unless the condors were especially friendly.

It was cold here, his HUD telling him it was just under 10°c. The wind whistled about them. Coop didn’t suffer the cold.

From this vantage, Coop looked to the fore of the turtle and spotted what he was fairly certain was its head. Mist and distance made it hard to tell, even through his HUD. He cast his gaze slowly around. It was an impressive sight, this great moving hillock with its clinging forest, and jutting mountain range, and busy little hamlet.

Coop could see why the condor had chosen to land here first.

Coop looked down the backside of the monastery peak to find a smudge of green that was the meadow where he’d been dropped off, where he’d found Master Yorion infested with bumblebees. And beyond that second peak, noticed a faint purple glow. At first he thought the reddish tone of the mountains simply shifted hue, but with his HUD, he could make out the light spilling between the second and third peak illuminated the tips of the forest clinging below.

Coop tapped River’s shoulder and pointed. “What’s that?”

River looked, then tapped the helmet over their ear and shook their head.

The condor shifted again, spreading its wings, but paused, as though giving them a moment to prepare, which Coop appreciated. It leapt from the peak and dropped into a steep dive angling its wings so as to match the stone slope of the mountain. Coop could feel himself lifting from the saddle, only the straps holding him to it. He could hear the leather creak, the buckles strain.

He realized his condor bladder was making him too buoyant for the dive, but releasing it was how he utilized his jumpack and that seemed a bad idea. Instead, he tried to do something he’d never done before, releasing the air slowly, like letting out a breath in meditation. He focused on that task and nothing else for several moments before he felt air easing from the vents along his back and hips. He found himself pleased at this newfound control as he settled into the saddle.

The condor sped only a hundred meters or so from the surface of the stone mountain. And as the stone spike of a mountain gave way to the forested hill of the turtle shell, the condor adjusted so it matched the rounded slope of the treetops, rustling the canopy with its passage.

As the condor’s dive leveled into a long glide, Coop looked down over the side to find their shadow racing not far below. He hoped there wasn’t anything lurking just below the canopy, waiting to snag a passing snack. He suspected the condor knew the terrain of the Great Gaia Beast well, and would know if there was a predator lurking below.

Suddenly, the forest dropped away, like they’d come to the edge of a great cliff. Coop realized that, essentially, they had. He could see more forest top far below, the forest through which the Great Gaia Beast traveled. From this perspective he could see, not far as distance in gaia beasts was measured, two of the smaller turtles plodded along nearby, their shells covered in greenery, but neither of which had the great stone spikes marking the Great Gaia Beast.

The condor continued past the edge for a while before tilting to the right and taking a great, swooping curve back around, giving Coop his first good look at the titanic turtle. From this distance, he could almost imagine it was just a regular turtle. The bottom edge of its shell didn’t quite clear the top of the forest through which it traveled, but he could just make out the greyish green skin of its legs and head. The shell of the beast was a steep slope around its sides moving into a gentle curve at the top where the Shellback settlement was. The stone mountain range was four reddish spires running down the center of its shell like a spinal ridge. He noticed that purple glow again in the valley between the second and third spikes.

The condor worked its wings several strong beats and Coop took air into his condor bladder, almost like taking a slow breath. But he could not recall having ever taken a breath, so he wasn’t sure what it felt like. He lightened again. The condor gained speed as it swung about, angling down to skim the treetops, putting them about on level with the bottom of the Gaia Beast’s shell. Soon they were alongside the turtle.

River tightened the straps holding them to the saddle, then looked over their shoulder and shouted. “I think we’re going mite hunting. Hang on!”

Coop made sure he had a good hold of his sword in his lower left, gripped hold of the saddle handles in both his uppers. The condor flew gently alongside the Great Gaia Beast for a bit, left wingtip nearly touching the canopy of the forest below, right wingtip nearly touching the hardy, twisted trees clinging to the cliffside of the turtle’s shell.

Coop found a gap ahead between the canopy and the shell and realized that was what the condor was aiming for. He held on tight and might have closed his eyes except he couldn’t.

The condor folded its wings and dove through the gap, getting under the turtle’s shell. Though the clearance was low, the space under the turtle’s belly was relatively clear, whatever tress had been in its way were largely knocked flat. The beast extended its wings for several wingbeats, gaining speed. It banked back to the left, aiming for the front left leg of the turtle.

From a distance, the skin almost looked delicate, like finely worked leather that fell in careful folds, stretching and relaxing at the turtle moved, almost as though in slow motion. As they reached it, the condor angled back, as though trying to stand upon its tail feathers. It folded its wings against its back, and grabbed on to the skin of the turtle with its shiny, black talons. The talons weren’t near enough to pierce the monstrously thick skin, but they were enough to grab hold.

Carefully, the condor climbed up the leg to where skin met shell. Here the skin was almost in excess, the folds deeper and more frequent. Within those folds, Coop saw the mites.

They were a symmetrical beast, with broad, flat shells, four pointed legs running down either side, and a small head with giant mandibles. Coop’s HUD labeled them Saucerplate mites, parasites that fed off bigger beasts until draining them dry, then burrowing in the earth and hibernating until an unlucky beast rested nearby. His HUD had no record of seeing them so big, nearly a meter in diameter.

The fold they approached had five mites. The parasites took no notice of the condor and its riders. The condor climbed slowly, like a stalking cat. There was a moment where nothing happened. Coop could hear the click of the mites’ feet on the turtle’s skin, the scritching crunch of the mites’ mandibles working away patiently. Then the condor’s neck extended, its head snapping forward like the tail of a whip, to strike a mite, cracking its shell. The mite popped off the skin of the turtle and the condor caught it, working its beak like a quartet of sawblades, cutting the parasite into pieces and swallowing them in chunks. Coop was fascinated, and watched as the condor carefully devoured the other four mites in quick succession.

The fold of skin shifted, beginning to close, and the condor scrabbled backward down the leg. The Great Gaia Beast’s steady plod would open and close folds in its skin, leaving a way for the parasites to gain access and protecting them from predators who weren’t as careful as their condor.

River twisted to look at him.

“This isn’t usually how we initiate new condor riders. How you holding up, Mr. Coop?”

Coop nodded, keeping his eyes on an opening fold he suspected their condor prepared to harvest next. “It’s fascinating. The mites seek warmth and blood. The inside of a skin fold tends to be softest. Even so, the mandibles of these mites are likely one of the few things capable of piercing the skin. Then the blossom of tentacles under the mandibles can push though whatever cracks have been made, finding blood. The Great Gaia Beast is a fantastic host for these little blood suckers. There’s almost certainly no way they could suck it dry. And the condors, they must have been here longer than the humans, yes? That aerie looked natural. I suspect they clean off excess parasites. The Great Gaia Beast is its very own biome.”

Coop would have bit his tongue on his sudden gregariousness. He couldn’t recall having every talked so long. It was the kind of enthusiasm for observing nature he associated with Dr. Ark.

For the first time in a long time, he could suddenly picture her clearly.

She’d been a short woman, round, with soft features. Her dark, curly hair, often tangled, was held back in an absentminded bun. Her eyes were dark and obscured by thick-rimmed glasses. She typically wore denim jeans, thick-soled boots, and whatever tshirt was least dirty. Her labcoats didn’t last long and were dingy, frayed, and holey. That was before she’d been bitten, fallen ill, and become a vampire.

It was strange, remembering her this way, seeing her in his mind’s eye. In his memory, she was a titian of myth. A towering figure in the UPSF. But like this, she was a plain, unassuming woman with a sardonic expression on her lips and a curious tilt to her brow. It was as familiar as looking into a mirror.

Coop shook his head. “I’ll bet Dr. Ark would have loved to see this.”

“You mean Dr. Cypress Ark?” River gave him a funny look.”

Coop nodded.

“Sounds like you knew her.”

Coop gripped the saddle a little tighter and shook his head. “Everyone knows about her. Without her research, none of us would be living here.”

River grunted and shrugged.

The condor popped off the turtle’s leg with a strong hop and a backbeat of its wings. Coop let his bladder inflate slowly, taking some weight off the condor’s back, until it settled into a lazy glide under the turtle’s belly.

Coop’s HUD warned him of the movement beneath them. He glanced over the side to his right. The flattened trees and undergrowth of the forest littered the space beneath them, and it shifted as something moved beneath it. Coop passed the sword behind his back from his lower left hand to grip the handle with his right. He drew the blade as a great serpentine beast with jaws wide, fangs glistening, hood flared, burst from the detritus of the Great Gaia Beast’s wake, and lunged at the condor. The condor banked hard to the left but was hemmed in by the trunks of the forest on all sides and the underbelly of the turtle above. There was room to maneuver, the underside of the Gaia Beast was massive, but it was like there were in a cavern with no exit, moving at a plodding pace.

Coop lashed out with his sword. She sang like brassy trumpets and thumping bass and dancing piano. It wasn’t any of the songs he’d heard from the turntable, but it was variation thereof.

The condor’s evasive maneuver made Coop’s strike miss. It slowed with several backbeats of its wings and the serpent coiled, preparing to strike again. The condor couldn’t hover. It had to keep moving forward to maintain flight. Coop was certain if it landed, it would be at a significant disadvantage to the serpent.

Coop loosed the straps holding him to the saddle, pulling at them with his strength when his fingers weren’t dexterous enough, ripping and popping. The condor beat its wings to get up to speed, angling for height before remembering the belly of the Gaia Beast, then banking to the right as the serpent struck again. The serpent missed, but only barely. It could strike faster than the condor could bank and Coop was certain that within the next several moments, it would catch the bird.

Coop let his bladder inflate to its fullest, extended his claws, and pushed himself to stand upon the saddle. The serpent coiled again. Coop pushed his HUD to focus upon the serpent, how it moved, how it tensed,

The HUD labeled it a Slickscale viper, a venomous beast with a robust immune system that could heal most any wound. It was the liver of this beast that fueled his own regenerative properties.

The condor worked its wings desperately trying to circle around and head for the rear of the turtle, opening space between it and the serpent. The serpent tensed, preparing to strike.

Coop let the moment come to him.

He leapt over the top of River, startling both rider and condor. The condor faltered, falling back. He engaged his jumpack with a thought, without using his HUD, and it launched him forward just as the serpent struck. Rather than taking the condor upon its shoulder or breast, the serpent met Coop coming forward, claws outstretched, sword at the ready. He gripped the sword in both hands, held forward, and caught the serpent upon its scaled throat.

The scales were strong and shifted the point of the blade to the left. The blade skittered across a few scales before catching between and shoving its way in. She sang like the trill of a trumpet, the beast’s heartbeat like a steady bass drum. The behemoth leather at the palms of his gloves held fast to the snaggle-barbed handle of the blade as she slid in, pulling him along.

The serpent recoiled, whipping about, trying to reach Coop with its great, glistening fangs. He held fast to the handle of the blade and struck with his claws, not so much to attack the beast as to hang on.

It could not reach him with its jaws as he was just under its chin, but it lashed with its tail, whipping at him, trying to dislodge him. He could feel the blood of the beast draining into the sword. She drank quickly, greedily, but it was a large beast and would not be felled quickly. His HUD flashed warning after warning as his body was clubbed by the scaled lash of the serpent’s tail. The poison coating its scales couldn’t have affected a typical cyberized body, but the Cypress class power armors were built from harvested beasts. He could feel weakness infecting his joints. It might have burned. His HUD tingled and buzzed, flickering as the serpent’s venom interfered with his sensed.

Coop knew if he could just hang on, the sword would drain the beast until it died. But his body was taking a beating and he wasn’t sure how long he could hang on. He flicked glance into the upper left of his visual display, noting his energy reserves had dropped to 57%, working hard to keep him healed, conscious, alive. He decided he couldn’t just hang on and wait for the sword to kill the serpent. He’d have to risk being thrown free, to engage a new attack.

He released the handle of the blade with his right hand. It tore free with a rasp and though he knew the behemoth hide would repair, the sound still made him cringe. He spent a moment prepping the nozzle on the underwrist and selected the Icespitter mink saliva.

The tail of the beast struck him again and his vision doubled. His display fuzzed and blinked out. His ears roared. His arm wavered as he tried to aim it. The beast coiled and thrashed, trying to dislodge him, making moving targets of its tail. Coop waited, trying to focus his senses, until it tensed to strike again, and it in that moment its tail was still.

The saliva of the mink crackled as it spewed from the nozzle. He swept his arm wide, knowing his attack wouldn’t be accurate, hoping it would be enough. Bracing for the next blow.

But it didn’t come.

The serpentine beast hissed in pain and fury. It jerked, but the frozen saliva held fast. The beast wasn’t frozen to the ground so much as the ice was frozen to it, weighing it down. Coop knew he had only moments before it broke free. The overlay of his HUD blinked on and off and he had to focus on nothing else for a few of those moments to engage his shield. He swapped the mink saliva for the Mudcoat bovine bile, pointed his underwrist up at the beast’s snapping jaws, and hoped his shield would be enough to protect him. The bile surged and roiled within him and through the conduits, up the length of his arm, through the nozzle, and into the serpentine beast’s face.

The sensors of his armor were dull and fractured. But he could hear the crackling fire, could feel the beast writhe. Globules of bile dripped upon him, sizzling upon his telekinetic shield, draining it steadily.

The serpent grew more desperate, jerking this way and that. The ice cracked and shattered. The claws of Coop’s upper hands scrabbled for purchase on its scales, tearing some free in a bid to hang on. He tightened his grip on his sword with his left and tried to retake it with his right, but his grip was numb and his fingers were thick. The serpent slammed itself to the forest detritus and Coop’s vision tinted steady red.

There was a crack like a gunshot. It wasn’t like any Coop recognized. He wondered if it was River and that custom bolt-action.

The serpent slammed upon the ground again and Coop’s grip slipped. The red coloring his vision intensified. His HUD disappeared and his senses swam.

• • •

The Slickscale viper was the biggest snake Dr. Ark had recorded on Gaia IV. It was highly venomous thanks to a diet of poison oak and murderous redcap, not to mention all the poisonous bugs available to an undiscerning omnivore.

Of most interest to Dr. Ark had been the beast’s liver. She’d seen the viper tangle with beasts bigger, stronger, faster, that had appeared to end with both dead, but the Slickscale viper almost always revived. The liver produced regenerative cells at prodigious rate, healing the viper from almost any wound. There was no analogous organ in any of her research, and Dr. Ark had hoped to use it to help sick and injured patients. But synthesizing the organ with human biology hadn’t worked.

Eventually she realized she could integrate it with her personal power armor. Her forays into the field required almost constant repairs and while the cells of the liver saw human biology as foreign, it easily adapted to Gaian biology, and her personal power armor was almost entirely constructed from Gaian biology.

• • •

Coop heard a crackling. He wasn’t sure what it was at first. Static in his coms perhaps, or the senses of his power armor unable to keep up with stimuli. But the sound cleared and focused and he realized it was fire. He thought perhaps the Slickscale viper was still on fire and worried if he was this close he might burn too. But as his senses returned and his HUD blinked on, he found himself in a simple camp. The fire was a controlled burn surrounded by stones and fed with wood newly felled.

His vision cleared and focused. He found himself looking up at the night sky. His HUD identified stars, constellations, satellites and other heavenly bodies. It marked his position in comparison to Vesper, the capitol, and Conway, the abandoned city. He was a bit surprised to learn just how far the Great Gaia Beast had carried him from Conway, that they were nearly to the ocean east of Vesper. Drawing a straight line between Conway and his current position, the turtle appeared to be headed for the it.

So much of Gaia IV was as yet unmapped by the UPSF and according to the information fed by his HUD, they were far from human habitation. Other than the settlement of Shellback.

Coop looked to the upper left of his display. His HUD told him he was at 51% energy. The fight with the viper had drained more than he’d have liked.

River sat nearby, leaning back against the condor, rifle against their shoulder. His HUD told him River was awake, but barely. The condor was fast asleep, though its head was up and Coop knew, remembering Dr. Ark’s notes, it was alert, even as it slept. Kitewing condors only truly relaxed in a well-known aerie.

Coop sat up with a grunt, fully expecting to feel aches in his joints, tightness in his shoulders, and a headache behind his eyes. He was surprised to feel none of them. Though his energy was low, his body told him his body and armor were fully repaired. The viper liver had done its work well.

River snorted and cleared their throat. Coop appreciated the hunter had kept watch over him.

“You all right?” River asked, voice thick.

Coop nodded. “Apparently so. The serpent?”

“Dead. Turned to dust. Can’t even harvest it. How’d you do that?”

“The sword of Dr. Ark,” Coop replied, not bothering to explain.

River snorted.

“I take it we’re no longer near the turtle?” Coop asked.

River shook their head. “But the condors are good at finding their aerie. Once she’s ready to go, so long as you’re up for a long flight, we should be able to find our way.”

Coop nodded. “I’m ready.”

River reached back and patted the beast’s shoulder gently. The condor warbled, shifted its wings. “It’ll take a few minutes to come out of his trance. They don’t truly sleep outside their aerie, and it’s a bad idea to spook them.”

Coop nodded. “Earlier, I thought I heard you call this beastie ‘her’. Now it’s ‘him’. Why’s that?”

River nodded and shrugged. “Kitewing condors don’t have sexual dimorphism. Or at least, not the way we tend to think of it. They do need a male and female to procreate, but any one bird might be one or the other or both or neither throughout their lives.” The condor shifted. The ruff of fine feathers about his shoulder raised and relaxed. He opened his eyes, then blinked them rapidly. He took a deep breath and Coop could see the beast’s chest inflating.

The fact sounded familiar, like something he should have already known. He wondered if Dr. Ark had explained it to him once. Thinking on Dr. Ark reminded him of the sword and he cast about to find it a ways off, lying amid dust and bone, glinting faintly in the firelight.

She was humming softly when he picked her up, clean and bright. River had found the wooden sheath, but hadn’t wanted to touch the sword. Coop nodded at their good sense.

There was a part of Coop that remember the mission, that he was here to assassinate the Father, thereby preventing the Great Gaia Beast from tearing through Vesper, or any other UPSF controlled city. There was a part of him that knew he should take this opportunity to build rapport and ask questions: what was that glow? does the Father really have psychic powers? do you think the aliens have really returned?

But the idea of starting an awkward conversation made him cringe.

“You all right, Mr. Coop?”

Coop realized his shoulders were hunched and stood up straight. “Looks like he’s about ready.” He nodded at the condor.

River stood, patting the condor’s shoulder.

The condor pushed to its feet and spread its wings, then gave them an expectant look. They climbed into the saddle, Coop pushing air from his condor bladder to give himself some lift. He had used the organ throughout the confrontation with the Slickscale viper, but some of those times he had bypassed the user interface of his HUD, like it was an intuitive part of his body.

He hadn’t known that was possible.

Lieutenant Azor had told him only his brain remained of his original body. That meant his power armor, the Cypress Class Mk. 009, was his body. Perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised he could bypass the user interface.

River dug under their shirt and withdrew their whistle. They blew into it and produced a similar warble to the condor’s. The condor leapt with a great sweep of its wings.

Coop inflated his condor bladder like taking a slow, deep breath, held his sword firmly with both lower hands behind his back, and held to the saddle handles with his upper hands. The night was deep and dark, chill zephyrs spiraling this way and that. Coop let his body shift and drift with the currents and the condor riding them.

Far below, the wake of the Great Gaia Beast was a kilometer wide canyon through the forest. Its passing splintered trees, its footsteps punched deep depressions. It cut a swath as though walking through a park, flattening grass. Coop wondered what sustained the best: how did it breathe; how did it support its weight; how much did it eat; how much did is excrete; did it always move; did it ever rest; how it acquired the forest-supporting crust upon its shell?

He let these thoughts occupy him as the condor followed the Gaia Beast’s swath and the sense of his power armor took in the world around. He tried to let his mind wander from curiosity to curiosity, allowing his body to be in the moment. It was one of the parts of meditation Dr. Ark was always berating him about.

The sun rose in front of them and Coop’s HUD filtered the glare. River lowered a flap on their goggles. The condor flew steadily, relying on catching updrafts and wind currents and gliding with an expertise that felt effortless. With the light of dawn, Coop could see that the wake of the Great Gaia Beast, a kilometer-wide trench, wasn’t all destruction. There was already new growth here and there, especially in the deep impressions of its footprints. They were largely groves of trees with broad leaves and varicolored blooms. He wondered what caused the growth. Had the turtle’s passing allowed long dormant seeds to sprout?

They flew through the day. River pulled a canteen of water and bag of jerky from a saddlebag. They offered some to Coop, but Coop shook his head.

His thoughts drifted. He watched the lay of the land, the whispy clouds, the condor’s wings, each shifting, adapting to their environment.

Gaia IV was a rough, wild world. But Coop wondered whether the Father and those following the Voice of Gaia, were right to move with it rather than carve out a way to stand against it. Vesper was a bulwark against the chaos of the world, a boulder in a raging river. But the Great Gaia Beast was part of that river, moved with it. Eventually, that boulder would be worn down.

Coop was no stranger to questioning orders. At times he took delight in it. Even so, he had delivered the super-powered cadets into the hands of the UPSF against his better judgment. For all that he’d scolded General Ashpholt, Coop had still done as he’d been told. He found himself uncertain he wanted to carry out the order to assassinate the Father, uncertain whether he could resist.

When the sun was long behind them, Coop’s HUD picked out the faint shapes of the Great Gaia Beast’s mountain range through the haze of distance. He tapped River’s shoulder and pointed. River dug a pair of binoculars from a leather bag on the saddle and peered through them, then nodded.