"West, mostly," Clematis told them. "Toward the ocean."

^9^ Tracks in a Broken Land WHEN they awoke, snow had frosted the flat prairie like one vast sheet cake, hiding the single track and merging the sod station even more than before with its landscape.

Manda found Tom and Furbetrance helping the station hands clear three inches of feathery snow from the courtyard and off the station roofs.

"I slept longer than I planned. I'm sorry!"

"No problem, missy," said Furbetrance. "I've been up and about for only a few minutes myself. Found these people shoveling the snow and offered to melt it all away for thema-like this."

He gulped a great breath and blow-torched the ice and snow from the area before the factor's door, burning off last year's dry grasses as well, leaving the ground hard and dry.

He napped his wings vigorously to fan the smoke and steam away. The shepherds laughed and cheered but scurried back to their chores when Talber appeared, scowling in the bright sun on the snow.

"Good morning. Princess, Librarian, and Dragon!" he called. "Breakfast is served. Will you come?"

"At once!" cried Furbetrance. He plowed his way through a remaining snowbank to the dining hall wall and thrust his head through a window thrown open for him. "What's cooking? Smells so good!"

"We work hard and eat hearty," said Talber. "Flapjacks and syrup, bacon and eggs, honey butter, bread, and rasp-berry tea. Plenty for all!"

A bell clanged overhead as Tom and Manda took their places beside the Factor, and shortly the large hall filled with people, shedding their warm coats and mittens, talking and laughing to each other, greeting the guests, especially the 73.74.Don Callander DRAGON COMPANION 75 Dragon, cheerfully and politely.

"You've a happy lot, here," commented Manda in approval. "It's a good sign of a well-run establishment."

"This is the sociable time of year for us," explained Talber, spearing a stack of pancakes and drowning it in maple syrup. "Much of our spring is spent moving the sheep from winter to summer pastures. First comes lambinga- we're hoping it won't get too cold again. Ewes who drop their lambs early have to be found out. Wolves and coyotes can be a problem."

Manda listened as she ate, making interested sounds around the tasty breakfast.

"Your people won't see home for months at a time this summer?"

"That's the life of a shepherd. Your Highness. Next week we'll shear, now that the coldest weather is past. They'll go up to pasture in the hills, and shepherds and their dogs will stay with them all summer long, moving them as needed until they bring them back down in the fall."

Tom sought out the fur trapper. Someone must have suggested he improve his appearancea-and odor. He was newly bathed, clean shaved and wearing clean clothes. He looked much younger clean than he had dirty, but was still rather shy. Tom found him seated by himself at a table in the back of the hall.

"Come up and sit with us while we break our fast," he invited. "I'd like to ask you some questions I'm sure only you can answer."

Unwilling to refuse a great person. Clematis nodded reluctantly and carried his heavily loaded plate to the head table.

A robust shepherd's lass brought Tom sausages and pancakes, bumping him good-naturedly with her hip as she served him, laughing when he turned to see who was there.

Manda flashed a smile at her young man but continued her conversation with the Factor, learning all she wanted to know about sheep.

"Now what will you do?" Tom asked Clematis. "Summer is your time to trap?"

"No, sir! The best furs are the winter peltsa-so winter is my busy time."

He attacked the plate of eggs and bacon, eating furiously.

"What will you do now, I wonder?" repeated Tom gen-tly.

"Well, sir, haul my winter's take to market." "And that is where?"

"Over west, to Wall," admitted the trapper.

"I don't know the country myself," Tom told him. He hauled out the Historian's thick packet of maps and together they studied a selection as they ate. "Where is Wall? On the coast?"

The trapper paused, his fork half-raised, before he nod-ded and pointed with the little finger of his fork hand.

"Ships come in the summer to buy raw pelts. Pay in cash. I buy supplies, take care of any business I have with bankers, lawyers, get drunk once or twice with old friends, then go back to Broken Land. Live in peace and quiet, repair my gear, maybe make some new traps, do some hunting for winter larder. Things like that."

Tom allowed him peace to tackle his second helping of everything within reach.

"The men who used your cabin went west, you say. Toward Wall, would that be?"

Clematis considered this for a while, chewing strongly, then bobbed his head.

"Likely. There isn't much else in that direction. No guarantee they went on west, however. Could have turned north. Not likely," he added after second consideration. "Nothing up north but a thousand miles of lakes and trees before you run to Everfroze country, where the ground never thaws."

"I'd like to make you a proposition. Master Clematisa"

"Call me Clem, for short," interrupted the other, and for the first time he smiled, if only very briefly. "Mother named me for a flower, you know. I'd rather be known as Clem."

"Well, Clem, then. Call me Tom."

"A business deal, Tom?" asked Clem.

"Yes. Suppose you came with us back over the mountains to your cabin. Could you track the kidnappers of Lady Rosemary and her children?"

"Could," admitted Clem. "Going that way, anyhow. I can't leave my winter take overlong. Skins rot. Bugs get into *em, too, if they're not cleaned and dressed early."

"We can work that out. We need to know where the kidnappers went with Lady Rosemary."

76 Don Callander DRAGON COMPANION.

77."I can track anything that walks and most what crawls, anywhere, even across hard rock if needed. Those weren't countrymen. City bullies, I suspect. They'd leave a trail a half league wide through woods."

"If you lose any money by guiding us. Historian Murdan will pay you generous compensation."

"I'd be obliged. Good! I'll track for you. Librariana- Tom, that is. Those babies were a pure delight. It bums in my heart that they be stolen away."

"Good!" cried the Librarian. "We'll take off as soon as yon Dragon finishes filling his stomach."

"Take off? You mean afly? Like we saw you last night? Through the air?"

"Don't worry. It's safe enough. The Dragon is a very good friend. He's here also to locate his brother, who went before us to find the lady and her children, you see, but hasn't been heard from since."

"Not at all sure about this flying," said Clem, shaking his head in doubt.

"It'd take us days to reach your cabin afoot," put in Manda, who had learned all she wanted about birthing lambs. "By Dragon, we'll be there in a few hours, over mountains and all."

"You've made a good point, m'lady," Clem admitted, unwillingly. "Fine enough! I'll chance it if you will! Make quite a story to tell over the first jack of ale when we get to Wall!"

Full of good breakfast and good wishes from the herdsmen, bundled against the chill in sheepskin jackets furnished by the Factor, the party gathered in the center of the station triangle, ready to mount the Dragon and fly.

"I'll send word by pigeon to Lord Murdan," Talber assured them. "He'll hear you've been here and hired yourselves a reliable guide who knows the north country."

"Very good of you. Factor," said Manda. "Tell him we believe we've found the trail and are going to follow it, wherever it leads."

Talber and his people waved and called good-byes as the Dragon stretched his wings to full extension over his head and brought them down with a thunderous clap. He and his passengers shot into the morning air. A great cloud of dust and powdery snow flew about them and by the time it had cleared, the Dragon was almost out of sight, arrowing north.

"RATHER lonely place," commented Manda, seated close to Tom. Clem was perched behind them, gritting his teeth and holding on to two rearward ears with a death grip. "But wonderful people! So helpful and friendly."

"Once I traveled in our own West," Tom recalled, "and the people there were friendlier the further I got from crowded cities."

"I'd like to live at Ramhold for a time," mused the princess aloud. "My father would like it, too. He should have been a farmer or a herder, instead of king."

"They say a good king is the shepherd of his people," replied Tom. He was checking a map. "Look! We're com-ing to the Snow Mountains!"

The Dragon circled to gain altitude and leveled out just at the top of Summer Pass. He would have gone on, except that Tom and Clem, after a brief conference, felt that they should take a closer look at the road leading over the pass.

Furbetrance swooped low over a narrow, rocky track. Clem forgot his fear of flying enough to kneel and lean far forward, scanning the ground with squinted eyes as they skimmed slowly along.

"There!" he shouted, minutes later. "Set us down. Master Dragon. Where the path crosses that stream."

Furbetrance backed his great sails and dropped to the pathway with amazing gentleness for one so large. Clem and Tom slid to the ground. The wind made the air biting-ly cold.

"Be a muddy mess in an hour," predicted Clem, indicating the thin, frozen soil underfoot.

"What did you see?"

The trapper pointed but held his tongue until he had gone down on his knees to examine the ground at the shallow ford.

"They was here, the lady's party. They rested for a while under the overhang there, from the climb up the mountain. You can see the bum of a large fire."

"Now that you point it out, yes. How do you know they were Rosemary's people?"

78.Don Callander DRAGON COMPANION.

79."Iron horseshoes like only the blacksmith at Old Place makes," muttered the trapper. "Woodsmen use hardwood shoes they carve over summers. Last almost as long and lighter to tote."

He ranged over more than an acre and followed the pathway downslope a hundred or more yards while Tom stood shivering under the overhang. Furbetrance moved into its shelter with Manda still in the saddle and blew flame at the cold stone to make a comfortable if temporary nook.

"Two groups of riders met here. Kidnappers from the south. The lady's party from the northeast. Might as well go on to Broken Land," said Clem at last. "It's the same bunch here as stayed at my cabin. Recognize the hoofmarks, especially the mules."

"Let's go, then!" Tom called to him, willingly retreating to the Dragon's warm niche.

"One thing bothers me," said the trapper when he caught up.

"What's that?"

"How many in the lady's escort, could you say?"

"A half dozen mounted men, I heard Talber say," Manda told him as they climbed back onto the Dragon's brow. "Why?"

"I seen sign of twelve horsemen, here. Some of *em never reached my cabin. Question is, where are the missing horsemen?"

"No sign of struggle?" wondered Furbetrance.

"None here."

"The kidnappers may have seized Rosemary or one of the children and forced the escort to surrender under threat of harming their hostage," Tom figured. "The attackers outnumbered the defenders by two to one, anyway."

"Keep your eyes peeled," suggested Clem, resuming his kneeling position, the better to see the ground. "Fly low and slow for a while, friend Furbetrance, so we can see."

Furbetrance did so, adding his own sharp eyes to the others'.

"Two parties rode back a way, together," said Clem shortly.

"And there they parted company!" called out the Dragon. "Want to take a closer look, tracker?"

"Down," agreed Clem.

On the ground he again went to his knees to examine the faint signs of the passing of horses and mules.

"Who furnished the escort, I wonder?" Tom asked Manda. "Certainly they were not Murtal's men, or they would have returned to Old Place."

"I've no idea," said she, looking cold and worried. "Grand-Aunt Murtal has a very small Achievement. She keeps not many servants and only a few men at arms. I can't believe they'd betray their mistress's granddaughter."

"They left her here, whoever they were," insisted Clem. "Not Old Place shoes on their horses. Can't say for sure, m'lady, but it's possible Lady Murtal contracted with some local lordling to provide escort. Lady Murtal wouldn't strip Old Place of armed men. She's too wise a castle keeper for that."

"Hadn't thought of that," muttered Manda. "I think you're right."

"We can fly over to Old Place," Furbetrance suggested. "Take but a few minutes from here."

"No, let's go on to Clem's cabin. We can trace Rosemary's escort later, if need be."

"I wish we'd thought to bring carrier pigeons," said Manda. "We could exchange word with Murdan and Murtal, too. If the escort deserted or betrayed Rosemary, someone is going to pay!"

"Later," Tom insisted. "Finding Lady Rosemary and her children comes first."

"You're right, as usual," sighed the princess. "Go on down the mountain! It's bound to be warmer in lower places. I'm fairly turning blue."

"Pink and blue," chuckled Tom, teasing to cheer her up. "Very becoming combination for you, my princess."

Furbetrance flew faster now, as there was little the tracker could add to the story he read in Summer Pass. Their way ran diagonally across the north-facing slopes of Snow Mountains, a land deeply scarred by numberless vertical-walled valleys cut by snowmelt torrents plunging off the mountains each spring for thousands upon thousands of years.

"It's really quite beautiful," commented Tom, looking down at the seemingly endless pine forest.

80.DRAGON COMPANION 81.