They slept poorly that night. The water was a great balm, but the deaths were too much, too brutal and random after The Massacre. That’s what they called it now, “The Massacre”. Mazelton thought it lacked something. A bit of geography or imagery to tie it to. The Green River Massacre. The Mount Kailo Massacre. The bend in the trail didn’t have a particular name, nothing around there seemed to have any sort of particular name, but that was less of a problem and more of an opportunity for a propagandist. The Massacre of the Innocents. That always worked. The Massacre of the Innocents, at the foot of Kailo Mountain. The Green River ran red with their martyred blood.

“Come, children. Come and hear. I was there that murderous night. You will hear the true story from me, the senseless massacre by the barbarous Collective, the sacrifice of the Mother of Martyrs, and how Father Sun’s rays burned away our fear. How we rose as one and drove them from our midst. Come and hear, come and hear. I was there and will tell you the truth.”

“And then the Survivor’s march down Broken Stone Ridge. The poison left by the adder’s bite, as the exhausted and mourning marchers tried to reach their promised land. The last cruelty the Collective inflicted on the Innocents to try and break their heroic spirit. But we were not broken, no. We. Were. Not. Broken. We endured, as the Great Dusty World endures all hardships. World without end. Amen.”

It wouldn’t take much. It wouldn’t take much at all. Mazelton started drafting a short letter, to be read to covens across the continent. Perhaps he would send it all the way back to Humble Iolan. There was a man with an eye for politics. Not one to let minor details get in the way of the right story. He frowned thinking about what he wrote. It would sound better read aloud, but it was unforgivably clunky written down. What to do…

Polyclitus looked around the camp as everyone got ready to move out.

“Alright everyone, YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE. The good news is that it will be a short travel day today. About ten miles, give or take, and the last three of that are on the flat. We have another three miles of bad slope, four of more gentle slope, then on to the floodplain of one of the most important rivers of the whole continent. You guessed it, we reached the Mattapan.”

Polyclitus was forcing himself to sound upbeat. Nobody was in the mood, Polyclitus included.

“And since we are at a place where a major trail intersects a major river, that means?” He waited half a beat less than he usually would have. “A town. Correct. In this case a Dusty Canton. They run a small trading post, and open an enoteca when caravans come through. Which I expect will be popular today.”

Getting rat assed drunk sounded amazing, yes. Unfortunately, Mazelton didn’t want to die so close to home, and the only thing this canton might have that could touch him would be wood alcohol. Happpy thought, maybe they grew hallucinogenic mushrooms?

“The Sky Runners also keep a little office here. Might be that you want to send some letters. I know I do.” Polyclitus didn’t hide the darkness in his voice. Mazelton reckoned that life was about to get very expensive for the Collective. They would get a chance to really test their famous self reliance.

“So!” He clapped loudly. “We are going to take it slow and steady. Same order as yesterday, and if your wagon isn’t ready to roll when it’s your turn, you get to spend the day here and come down tomorrow. I don’t advise you test me on what happens otherwise.” Polyclitus looked hard over at some banged up wagons. “Alright, that’s everything. Pack up and roll out!”

And that’s exactly what they did. It was somehow worse today. Watching the poorest, most broken go down first, so that when their wagons gave out, they wouldn’t kill the people ahead of them.

Mazelton wished he could carve something, polish something as they went. Just something to keep his attention. The emigrants had stopped hoping for a safe journey. They were simply resigned. Fatalistic. It stank of despair.

Mazelton tried to write a letter to Danae in his head-

Dear Danae

I want to be home with you so badly I can’t even think. I want it so badly I started a war. The same war we all knew was coming anyway, but I think this could be it, the spark that lights the prairie fire. But between dry mind armies of slave machines, their puppet tribal bands, the Sea Folk, and a giant flying invulnerable stone god, the Collective and their machine guns seem downright cute.

Probably less cute for all the people who died. Oh, and some of our neighbors will be death warriors, cultivated by hidden militants in our midst. Just what a safe, quiet farming community needs.

Let’s not build me a cottage. Let’s just dig a big hole. We’ll pull the hole in after us, and come up again when it’s all over. When the Apocalypse comes again and wipes the world clean. It will be a hard life, and likely a short one, but we will spend it together in peace and love.

I don’t regret doing it. Even now, even seeing them sobbing when they think nobody’s watching, I don’t regret it. I would do it again. They were planning to kill us. They brought machine guns. They brought the tools to build industrial systems. They would bury us in materiel. I don’t regret it. But I mourn my dream of a peaceful home, hidden from the strife of the world.”

“I’m such a selfish, narcissistic prick.” Mazelton covered his eyes and laughed. Duane shrugged.

It was a bit surreal, coming down from the high pass into the river valley. You felt like you were diving into the sea. The grey stone and pale scrub grasses grew up, and then you crossed some vast line traced with ruler and razer into the deep green. Pine and fir, crammed together and growing up as high as they dared. As you sank down deeper into the valley, the air got warmer and more humid. The rare flat leafed tree popped out. Animals and birds became more common, then swarming as they chased the insect swarms that rose up for fresh blood.

Sinking deeper and deeper, passing krill and minnows. Down through the kelp beds into the deep.

Mazelton looked back up the way they had come, his whole body turned so he didn’t pressure his ribs. The mountains, the towering, monstrous grey-white peaks… vanished. In their place were dainty, distant lace doilies keeping the dust off the gently rolling green mountains. Where did they go? Where was all that crushing majesty? The indifferent horror of the eternal world?

You couldn’t see it from this deep. He ran a handkerchief around the back of his neck. It wasn’t too hot, but the humidity was coming up as the breeze died down. Oh, a fox!

The road made a broad turn from southwest to west and then- that was it. The road flattened out and the mountains disappeared entirely. All you could see were the shorter green ridges that extended out from the true peaks, breaking down into foothills and from there, flat plains. Now they were too close to base of the mountains to really see them. Maybe when they were deeper in the valley. He could certainly see the mountains on the other side of the valley but… they lacked a certain something.

The Mattapan was… how do you even describe it? Big? It was big, but not so big you couldn’t believe it. He had seen wider, the terrible flood that ran a few days ride north of Old Radler, for one.

Fast too. It was shallow here, so the meltwater from the snowcaps came slicing through, over sandbanks, spraying from rocks and then stilling to a dignified stroll as the riverbed deepened. Like the water suddenly matured with age. Then it was off flying over the rocks again, showing that it had never given up that streak of mischief.

It was so damn pretty. He could see fish jumping up to catch the flies hovering over the water. Tall green and gold reeds lined the bank, giving way to smooth sand beaches and sand banks. It must have been freezing cold. He wanted to go play in it.

It was navigable too. Not just by canoes; actual barges and shallow skiffs moved along the banks, poled with patent resolve by men content to do hard labor for the rest of their lives. It wasn’t busy, exactly, but it had been a long time since Cold Garden. It felt like the entire world had gathered here, to witness their descent from the mountains.

The canton was more or less what he expected- a dense little village of perhaps a thousand souls, surrounded by their circular fields. There was a caravansary just outside the village proper, close to the ford, with the promised enoteca right next to it. The trading post was inside the circle of the village, as was the Sky Runners office. Mazelton looked around curiously. He had seen the Dusty village on Shale Snake Ridge, but this was more than twice the size. A true canton. He was curious about the difference.

The most obvious thing was that everything had the time to grow in. The Dusties didn’t subscribe to the notion that the natural world ended at your threshold. The homes blurred indoor and outdoor spaces, back doors opening into little stone patios crowded with pots of plants clustered around a table and some chairs and shifting seamlessly into kitchen gardens. Then the green swept up again, and out.

Long trellises of beans or gourds, berries and even hops grew up onto the roofs, the roofs covered in herbs that could take the light and heat. They would keep the houses cool in the summer and warm in the winter. Then out from the homes, the green spread through the canton.

Roads were shaded here and there with heavy trellises, the fruits and vegetables hanging down for easy picking by a passing Dusty. You took what you needed to eat, and if there was more than anybody wanted to eat, well, there was pickling, smoking, canning, salting, fermenting, confit, any way that it could be preserved deliciously, it was. Winter was long and terribly bitter- the wasteful died. As did the greedy.

Every inch was used to grow food, or flowers that beautified the gardens and provided homes for pollinators. The canton was just lousy with butterflies.

Mazelton was a bit curious about the lack of walls, but he didn’t say anything. There were a lot of defense strategies that didn’t rely on them, and the Canton did have a number of quite tall watch towers. Towers that seemed to be flashing light up towards the mountains.

The homes had thick walls. It looked like stone, with small windows. Not big believers in indoor natural light, apparently. The word “pillbox” came to mind, as did “gun loops”. The Canton wouldn’t need reminding that war was coming, and they certainly didn’t intend to rely purely on suicide bombers.

Mazelton wondered if they had any heat weapons. He would finish his personal weapon tonight. Now that he had formed the black sun within himself, he knew just how to make it really upsettingly powerful.

Not fit for mass production, alas. Oh well, it’s not like he wanted to be a weaponsmith.

Duane pulled up with his usual aplomb, and beelined for the enoteca. Mazelton tossed him a handful of rads, and told Duane the first bottle was on him. Mazelton was running low on polished cores, but he still had a few he could trade for unpolished cores. He would need to find out what they were trading for, before he hung out his shingle in New Scandie.

“Hey, you. Polisher. Polisher Mazelton.” A hoarse female voice called to him. It was one of the independents, a woman he recognized, but who’s name he never learned.

“Yes? How may I help you?”

“How’s your handwriting?”

Mazelton looked at her, a bit startled. “Excellent. May I ask why?”

“I was always the numbers person. Never had neat handwriting, so my husband did all the letter writing. I just kept the books. But he’s gone now.”

“May I offer condolences and a blessing?”

“Hah. Yes, fussy man. You may. I won’t be offended by whatever strange gods you call on.”

The words “fussy man” made his cheek twitch, but he still formed his hands into orchids of grief, then into the branches of new growth while making the hunched bow of loss.

“May whatever comes next for him be better than he hoped, and may what he leaves behind enrich his people and the world.”

She smiled politely, then with a trace of wry humor. It didn’t much reach her eyes, but some part of her still remembered what she would have found funny a few days ago.

“That’s about the most non-denominational blessing I have ever heard. I think even an atheist would have a hard time being mad at that.”

“I’m sorry, a what?”

“Atheist? Someone who doesn’t believe in gods?”

Mazelton stopped to process that whopper.

“Never met them, but I suppose they exist somewhere.”

“They do. My husband, for one. I was always the one with faith in the Goddess. May she catch him gently.”

“May she catch him gently.”

“Others I don’t want to catch so gently.”

“I see. How can I help.”

“A fussy man with fussy handwriting. Something people can copy easily. I want to post notices all across the continent in the Sky Runners offices. I will spend half my fortune to do it. It will be my testimony of what happened up on the mountain. What they did to my poor Okam.”

She shoved a mass of pages, densely written with jagged characters, whole sections scribbled over, crossed out, or circled with arrows pointing to different places or entirely different pages.

“Need you to write it up plain. Maybe dress it up some, make people want to read it. Okam could always catch people that way. I can’t. Just say it plain, but somehow, even saying it plain, I can’t get the words out right.” She looked frustrated.

“You always talk so smooth and polite. You have excellent handwriting? Make it good and I will pay you.”

Mazelton was quietly reading through the pages, eyes moving smoothly through the thickets of words.

“No need to pay me. We all survived that night together. I am… content to do the work.”

“Content to do the work. Yes, that sound like you. Fussy man. Tell me fussy man, how many did you kill that night?”

“I? I was riding back from prospecting. The bastards shot me. It took me days to heal up and make my way back to the caravan. You can imagine how I felt, coming back into a firefight.”

“Can’t have bothered you that much. You killed at least three of the bastards.”

Mazelton froze, his eyes going still.

“When I realized that Okam had passed, I just sat next to him. Waiting for a stray bullet to take me too. I just stared out into the tree line, and watched men with guns disappear. You looked like a demon, fussy man. There would be a man, a tree or a bush, then you would be there, then nobody would be there. I guess you looked like a Ma for the first time since I’ve known you. I haven’t told anyone. Why would I?”

Mazelton smiled softly and slowly.

“I think I can improve this some. Make people want to read it. Forgive me, but I don’t know how to spell your name?”

“Xerice Prum. P-r-u-m. The Widow Prum, now.”