The Wild Road by Jennifer Roberson

so much grief and panic, how could he be so indifferent?
    â€œDo you know where he is?” The farmsteader looked beyond her, toward the fire circle. “Rhuan?”
    Bethid glanced back. “He was right there—” But he wasn’t anymore. Neither Rhuan nor Jorda nor Mikal nor Ilona. “The ale-tent,” she said abruptly. “I would look there.”
    But she did not. She went after Brodhi.
    ONCE BEFORE, JORDA and Mikal had found select men among the tent-folk and karavaners. All were older, all unlikely to panic, and all had wits enough to grasp salient points without making judgments or assumptions. Those men, summoned out of the tide of folk who still clustered near the fire ring, now gathered in Mikal’s tent. Seats were found on stools, chairs, and benches. Hastily erected after the storm, the tent showed signs of battering with torn cloth and cracked timbers hastily wrapped with ropes to keep them whole. But then, so did the men show signs of battering; mental if not physical. Mikal found tankards and cups enough to serve them and charged nothing for the ale and spirits.
    The plank across the tops of two heavy wooden barrels was thick enough to support a man. Rhuan boosted himself atop it, legs dangling, boot toes touching the earthen floor. He drank his own share of ale, then set the tankard aside. Quietly he told them what a draka was, described the habits of the beasts, and did not downplay the outcome when a person was taken. “If you see a winged shadow, lie down. Immediately. Wherever you may be. Don’t move, don’t even twitch, until you are absolutely certain the draka is gone. Movement attracts them. Prey attracts them, and that means infants, children, adults, as well as livestock. Crying, shouting, and screaming merely provokes them further.”
    And eventually, as expected, one man asked what all of them were thinking. His hair was a mix of brown and gray. Smile lines webbed the flesh near his blue eyes, though at present no humor touched his face. Rhuan recognized him as a karavaner. Sandic, he recalled. “How do you know so much about Alisanos?”
    As a Shoia, as they knew him, Rhuan replied with casual ease, “Draka are legend among my people. It isn’t Alisanos we know, but the beasts.” Twenty pairs of eyes stared back at him. “There are tales of a time when Alisanos moved, and two draka were disgorged. Many of my people were killed.”
    â€œAnd resurrected?” Sandic asked. “It would seem your people have a greater advantage than we do. Those who fell from our sky will never live again, nor the child who was taken.”
    It prompted murmuring among the others. Rhuan nodded. “That is true. But a truth is also that when killed repeatedly, even Shoia die.”
    That, too, roused murmuring. Concerned glances were exchanged.
    It was Jorda who asked the obvious question before anyone else could. “What happened to those draka? Did you find a way to kill them?”
    The lie came easily because it had crossed his mind the moment he saw the draka. “We fed cattle on thornapple,” Rhuan said. “They went mad from the poison. The draka then ate the cattle—” But he broke off. His vision grayed out and all the hairs stood up on his body. Swearing, he swung himself off the wooden plank. His suggestion to the men was succinct. “Out. Now .”
    The earth rippled beneath his boot soles. A shiver shook the ale-tent. A strong shudder followed it, pewter tankards clanking as they tipped over, were knocked one against the other. Others fell and rolled off the tables, spilling ale. Canvas trembled. The earth beneath groaned. The rope holding one of the poles together came unwrapped, and the tautness caused it to whip through the air. One man, struck, cried out.
    Poles cracked. The tent leaned to one side. Shallow guy-line anchor irons were pulled from the ground. Outside, Rhuan caught at poles and