Dream Drive Ch. 07

"I will!"

Chaki quickly caught up to them. "Wait up, Jackson!"

"What's wrong?"

"If you're late, I can vouch for you, with Shaka's word," Chaki said. She broke into a sprint. "Pick up the pace!"

They'd only run a short distance before Jackson was grabbing at his stomach. "Hang on. Just - cramp. Real bad cramp."

Chaki gave him an incredulous look. "A what?"

"How -- you people do this -- beyond me."

"Jeeze, Jackson," Palla said. "You stink at running!"

"Why'dya -- think -- came last?"

They dashed across the border of the Windseeker tents and into one of the main dirt paths between the camps. Chaki led the way, shouting ahead to clear away bustling traders and people still heading toward the contest.

The crowd thickened once they reached the edge of the archery field. Chaki considered trying to push through, but the elder of the Three Hills was almost done introducing the game. She turned and sprinted along the outside of the crowd.

Jackson puffed more words. "Can't we -- just -- through the center?"

"We won't make it in time." She grabbed his arm with her free hand. "Come on!"

They burst into the edge of the clearing just as the elder finished. "Our first rider shall be Tatanka Ska, of the Windseekers! Tatanka Ska, I wish you good fortune!"

The crowd turned into a mix of cheers and murmurs. Everyone was excited to see what Jackson would do in the contest.

Jackson, meanwhile, was bent over his knees. He struggled with his breathing. "Okay. That's -- that's it. No more running. Ever again."

"Jackson, there you are!" Vuntha was walking over, leading Smallgrass and his own horse. "Where's your bow?"

"Bow. Bow." Jackson patted at his clothes. His hair was more disordered than usual, which was saying something, and his face was coated with sweat. "I didn't bring one. Fuck."

"Here, take mine," Chaki said. She unslung her weapon from her shoulder and offered it to him. "Vuntha, lend him your quiver."

"Grassfires and ash," Vuntha said. He offered Jackson his quiver, who duly put it over his shoulder. "I told you to come ten minutes ago. What were you doing?"

Jackson opened his mouth, and took a breath, but he just ended up heaving it back out and shrugging. "Who cares? Horse. What am I doing, exactly?"

"Are you prepared for this at all?" Vuntha said.

"Tatanka Ska, if you would!" the elder called.

Jackson pulled himself up onto Smallgrass's back. Smallgrass snorted a bit, but she remembered Jackson quickly enough and settled onto her hooves.

"Jackson," Palla said, "just ride along that fencing. You have to try to hit each target as you pass it. The closer you are to the center, the more points you get. Make sure Smallgrass is at least at a canter or it won't count. And then you come back the other way and get a second shot at each one."

"Right. Okay."

Jackson looked pale, and not at all okay. "Are you alright?" Chaki asked.

Jackson didn't answer. He just steered Smallgrass toward the end of the series of posts. He smacked her rump. Smallgrass took off immediately -- and much faster than necessary.

The people in the crowd exchanged glances. The other contestants nearby murmured. "Slow it down!" Vuntha called. "Don't show off!"

Jackson flew down the fencing. He rode her all wrong -- his body was bucking hard, rather than working with the horse, which would throw off his aim. Admirably, he managed to ready his bow in that state and fire at all five targets.

He missed every shot.

He reached the end of the posts, turned Smallgrass around, and brought her back. At this point, her gait was a little slower; Jackson wasn't getting tossed up and down so much. They cantered back down the other way.

Again, he missed every single target.

The crowd was silent. Jackson rode Smallgrass back to their group. He slumped off the horse. "And now my ass is killing me."

"Jackson..." Vuntha blinked a few times. He looked at the untouched targets, then back. "Is this some part of your plan you didn't tell me about?"

"Uh, no," Jackson said. He took a long gulp of air. "I didn't practice this at all. It's kinda individual, so I didn't need to do well."

"But, Jackson," Palla said, "even if you win the spear tournament, you won't have enough points to place!"

"The win condition isn't for me to get a lot of points. It's for Vuntha to beat Boonta. Everything else is just details."

"That was still a little embarrassing," Vuntha said. He lowered his voice. "Well, it's not like anyone needs to know what we're doing."

Chaki frowned. She might possibly have built up a tiny fantasy involving Jackson winning the games and presenting her with the Gem-Flower along with a declaration of everlasting love in front of a huge cheering crowd consisting of all five tribes.

As always, his mind was turned toward the goal. It was admirable how he could throw everything else aside, pride and honor included, to make sure his enemy was defeated. But it didn't match her mental version of events.

She made a frustrated rumble at the back of her throat. "You'd better have a good vow gift, Jackson."

He glanced up. "Uh...okay?"

"Tatanka Ska!" They all looked up. Katran was stalking toward them. He was staring at Jackson. "What are you doing?"

"What did it look like I was doing?" Jackson said. "I failed miserably."

Katran squinted. "Don't think I can't see through you. I won't let you scamper away from me and have this one win." He cocked his head at Vuntha.

"I have a name," Vuntha said.

"It isn't worth saying."

"What did you say?"

"I have no need for the name of an unskilled warrior that uses Shakhan's warrior as a crutch," Katran said. "Shall I repeat myself a third time?"

Vuntha went for his bow. Jackson grabbed him, stopping him from pulling an arrow free. "Let go of me, Jackson!"

"Dude, chill!"

After a moment of shock, Chaki grabbed Vuntha's other arm. "Vuntha, stop!" she said. "People are watching!"

"Yes, unnamed one, people are watching," Katran said.

Vuntha growled and shoved them both away, but Jackson caught him across the face with his hand. Vuntha dropped back. "Don't get in my way!"

"You gonna stop giving a fuck?" Jackson asked.

Chaki glanced between them. They stared at each other for a moment, both breathing. Vuntha slowly relaxed; his shoulders slumped. "Yes. I am."

Katran snorted. "Tatanka Ska, I don't know what your strategy is, but it will not work. I will see to that." He made his way back toward his own horse.

Vuntha let Jackson guide him away. His face was red -- from Jackson's strike as much as his anger - and his knuckles were white on the shaft of his bow. Chaki had never seen him even close to being this angry -- but then, it had been a terrible insult.

"I'm tired of that arrogant son of a bitch and a horse," Vuntha said. "Jackson, why didn't you try in that contest? What's going on?"

Another archer was already riding. The crowd cheered as he struck the first few targets. Everyone was focused on the event.

"Pow-wow, real quick," Jackson said. He gestured in toward himself.

Chaki and Vuntha exchanged a glance. "A what?" Chaki asked.

Jackson sighed. "Just come here." They gathered close, putting their heads down and standing shoulder to shoulder. "There's no secret strategy," Jackson said. "Vuntha, you just need to do good on this one by yourself. We've got a different problem."

"What's that?" Vuntha said.

"The lottery," Jackson said. "Boonta and Katran are going to fix it. Boonta's going to make sure he's stacked against easy opponents, and Katran is going to get you in the first round."

"I thought you had a plan."

"I did," Jackson said. "I was going to use my spiderbot to undo whatever they did remotely, but that just got turned to jello by the bugs. Where's the lottery?"

"Hey," Palla said. "What are you talking about?" He ducked around the outside of their ring. "Let me in!"

"Palla," Chaki said, "take Smallgrass back to the herd."

"Come on!" Palla said. "I never get to do anything!"

"Palla, please. Not now."

"Fine!" Palla shouted. He stomped off toward the horses.

"The lottery is in that long tent over there." Vuntha broke their circle to indicate it. Jackson took a quick glance at it; there was a man wearing a necklace of feathers standing outside, arms folded. He looked official. "That's the man in charge of the lottery. By the way, you should give him your cord."

"How is it done, exactly?"

"He mixes the cords randomly and then pairs them together," Vuntha said. "After the archery contest, we'll enter to see who our cord is paired with."

"Wait -- how do you tell the cords apart?"

"Just remember the number of beads," Vuntha said. "Mine has 23."

"Okay." Jackson squinted in thought. "How can we get you inside that tent without anyone seeing?"

"Me?" Vuntha said.

"You," Jackson said. "I stand out too much."

"But the games!"

"You're going last because you won the race, right?" Jackson asked. "There's time."

"Well, I suppose so."

"I cannot believe," Chaki said, shifting against his hand, "that you two are having this discussion."

"We're just undoing what they've already done," Vuntha said. "This is a lot better than what we did in the race."

Chaki turned a gaze like fire on Jackson. "I knew it!"

She felt him shrink in their bond; the sense of him curled up like a threatened mouse. "I barely cheated. I wouldn't even call it that. Creative problem solving."

"Why don't I take your creativeness and split your skull with it?"

"Chaki, do you know who that guard guy outside the lottery tent is?"

Chaki's paused at Jackson's question, mouth was still open, ready to continue her tirade. She glanced toward the tent, then back. "That man? That's Haanak, from the Three Hills. He's one of the chief attendants for their elders."

"Do you know him?"

"Vaguely," Chaki said. "We have exchanged names."

"I'm going to drop off my cord," Jackson said. "That'll give us an excuse to get close to the tent. Vuntha and I will head back, but he'll slip around the back of it. You stay in front and distract Haanak."

"I am not going to help you cheat!"

"Chaki, I need you for this," Jackson said. "Vuntha will be able to tell from looking at the cords if they did anything. If not, we won't touch them. We're not cheating -- just making sure they don't cheat."

Chaki ground her teeth together, but she couldn't think of a good argument to deny him -- at least, not this time. "Fine," she said. "How do I distract Haanak?"

"I don't know. Beguile him with your feminine wiles."

"I do not throw pretty eyes at every passing man like Malaki."

"Well, we need something," Jackson said. "Just thirty seconds is enough."

"Casual conversation will do fine," Chaki said.

"You sure?"

"I will make it work. I think he enjoys talking about himself."

Jackson nodded, then clapped his hands together. "Break!"

They stood straight from their temporary meeting. "Break what?" Vuntha asked.

"You say break when...ah, just forget it."

Chaki turned -- then paused. She smiled. "Palla!"

Palla was already leading Smallgrass away. "What? Do you have some other stupid task for me to do?"

"Well, I was going to involve you in Jackson's strategy, but since you're so busy over there..."

Palla dropped Smallgrass's neck harness and was at Jackson's side in a heartbeat. "What?" He looked between their faces. "What do you need me for?"

"Palla," Vuntha said. "What about Smallgrass?"

Palla snorted. "She won't go anywhere." And it was true; Smallgrass already had her head bent to pluck at the leaves from a shrub. She was not the most aggressive of horses.

Jackson rubbed his chin. "Come to think, I'll use Smallgrass, too."

Chaki took her little brother's shoulder. He was a ball of barely-contained enthusiasm. Why should she fake interest when authenticity was so conveniently available?

"This is what you have to do," she said.

****

While Chaki was explaining their distraction strategy to Palla, Vuntha was muttering in Jackson's ear. "So, how do I tell if the cords have been arranged against us?"

"You can't," Jackson said. "We don't know which cords belong to Boonta and Katran."

"I thought you said we'd only change things if they were tampered with."

Jackson shrugged. "I lied. You're not looking for anything specific."

Vuntha put a hand over his face. "Angels save me."

"Don't worry. Even if they didn't fix it, you'll just end up blindly randomizing things even more."

"But what about Chaki?"

"What she doesn't know won't hurt her," Jackson said.

It was Vuntha's turn to sigh. "But what am I supposed to do?"

Jackson checked that Chaki wasn't listening, then looked back at Vuntha. "Just go into the tent, find your string, and switch it with mine. If Haanak didn't mess with the cords, there's no way he'll remember all 32 combinations off the top of his head, so we're good. If he did mess with the cords -- meaning he knows which ones are ours - they'll just think he got them mixed up."

"...you really thought this through," Vuntha said.

"This ain't my first rodeo, pal."

"Your first what?"

Jackson huffed in frustration. "Forget it."

****

The four of them made their way to the entrance of the lottery tent, Jackson leading Smallgrass. The tent itself was made of blue cloth, rather than tanned bison hide. Gathered spikes of cloth marked where it was propped up by support posts on the inside.

Chaki admired the rich color of the cloth. Beads and feathers were well and good, but it seemed as though every Three Hills woman was dressed like a miniature rainbow. Hides were durable, but they weren't nearly as interesting.

Jackson had to have noticed her looking at all the clothes back on earth. Perhaps his vow-gift would be clothing. They'd have an equal exchange, then.

She wouldn't mind dressing in the earth fashion; it was exotic and daring, but quite attractive. She still had her hoodie, but it was a bit...bulky. A skirt -- now that was interesting. As long as it was below the knees. Some of those women looked like idiots, waddling around in little strips of nothing that were far too tight. And the shoes! Plastic shells that bent the feet into painful positions for seemingly no other purpose than to make it more difficult to stand upright. She couldn't wrap her head around it.

At least she wouldn't be getting anything useless like that from Jackson. He was nothing if not bluntly practical.

She glanced back up at the tent as they grew close. It was a pretty color, but it was also such a burden, only good for the one purpose. The Windseekers would never bother with something so large. She supposed that the Three Hills tribe, which lived in one spot, didn't have to worry about transport as much.

Jackson left the horse with them and stepped forward to speak with the guard of the tent. "You're Haanak, right? I have my cord with me."

"You must be Tatanka Ska. I was wondering when you would deliver your beads to me." Haanak was a middle-aged man with short hair starting to lose its fullness. He took the cord in his hand, examined it carefully, and smiled. "This will make the last pairing. I wish you fortune in the contest."

"Thanks," Jackson said. "Come on, Vuntha, let's get you ready for the archery." They started off together; Jackson took Smallgrass's reins again.

Haanak went into the tent to put the cord in place. Jackson made as if to head back to the archery field, but Vuntha peeled off, slipping around the edge of the tent.

Jackson turned Smallgrass at an angle, blocking the view of the side of the tent. With everyone focused on the games, no one was looking their way -- but, in the case of wandering eyes, they wouldn't see a competitor going where he had no reason to. It was a small thing, but Jackson was always about small details.

Haanak quickly emerged; Jackson was forced to keep moving, but Vuntha was already where he needed to be. Haanak gave Chaki and Palla a quizzical look. "You're still here?"

Chaki cleared her throat a bit. "Well, it is nice to see you, Haanak. It must be dull, standing here in solitude."

"A bit," Haanak said. "I don't have much of a view."

"That's a shame," Chaki said.

"I manage," he said. "Well, you two should get back. No one is allowed to linger near the tent."

"Hey," Palla said, "is it true that you killed a bison with a single arrow?"

Haanak blinked, then smiled. "Well, once. That was some time ago."

"How did you do it?" Palla said.

Haanak rubbed his head. "Perhaps we'll have time for the story later."

"You've got a lot of feathers," Palla said, indicating the necklace Haanak wore. "My father had some feathers like that. Did you earn them all counting coup?"

"Some," Haanak said. "I was a warrior myself, once. I never did win the games, but I came close."

"Is one of them from the bison you killed?"

"Well, yes. It was --" Haanak stopped, cleared his throat. "That was perhaps ten, maybe fifteen winters past."

"What happened?"

"We had been spotting the bison for three days as we built a rock trap. On the day of the hunt, we were able to corner them, but we built the end too wide."

Palla gasped. "Did they get away?"

"We were waiting at the closed end, but they had enough room to turn about. We had to race on our horses to catch up to their stampede."

"Is that when you made the kill?"

"I was riding my horse at full gallop, standing in the seat," Haanak said. "I went along the outside edge of the trap; the view was poor with the rocks blocking me. When I fired, it seemed a hopeless shot. I did it more from frustration than anything else."

Palla's eyes were like round moons. "Then what?"

"I fired at the lead bison from -- it must have been at least fifty paces. It sank straight into the heart of the beast, and it collapsed on the spot. Dozens of other bison followed the leader of the herd; they stopped their rush to get out of the trap, and the ones behind them ground to a halt." Haanak chuckled. "We ate well that night. The chief presented me with an eagle feather the next day." Haanak lifted a white feather that had a grey streak on the top. "This one, here, was the one. The best shot I ever made."

"What about that one?" Palla said. He pointed at one that had a golden-brown about the edges.

"This one," Haanak said, "is from when --"

There was a clink inside the tent.

Haanak stopped. He looked at Palla and Chaki. "Did you hear that?"

Chaki cocked her ear. "Hear what? The crowd?"

"No, I feel like there was --" Haanak started turning toward the entrance of the tent.

"Oh no!" Chaki cried. "My dress!" She reached down and grabbed the hem of her outfit. It was frayed in one spot -- nothing a few minutes of effort couldn't fix. She moaned as if it were the end of the sun and sky. "The One-Above, not again."

"Is that bad?" Palla asked.

"Very," Chaki said. "I need a closer look." She dragged the edge of her dress up, exposing her legs. "This will take some time, but I can repair it."

"Oh," Palla said. He was innocently confused. "That's good."

Chaki dropped her dress and straightened. She caught Haanak looking down. He cleared his throat and turned his attention back to Palla. "Ah..."

"The gold feather," Palla said. "What was that one?"

"Right," Haanak said. "Now that was when I really did count coup. It was the year before I made that shot, back when the Three Hills were having a dispute with the Dust-Gatherers..."

****

Palla monopolized Haanak's time for another twenty minutes. Aside from her brief moment of exposure, Chaki didn't have to say a word.

Spirits, that was embarrassing. She hadn't meant to lift her dress as high as her thighs -- surely the ankles would have been enough - but she'd been in a momentary panic. At least Jackson wouldn't care; he was always shockingly liberal-minded in matters of propriety.