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It turned out you couldn't rent bicycles, and no money would buy a bike capable of supporting Ahn-Kha. By parting with yet another gold coin to a bike and moped dealer under a canopy of festive plastic bunting, he and Duvalier each got bicycles with tires, functioning brakes, storage baskets, even clip-on flashlight headlamps that charged by pedaling.
After some exploring with Ahn-Kha they found a house deep in the woods, not quite a cabin and not quite a shack. While it rested at a tilt thanks to the absence of a foundation, there was a functioning well and Ahn-Kha got water flowing into the house again with a little tinkering and a lot of root cutting.
The weather turned fair again and Valentine and Duvalier bicycled together, almost unarmed-he brought the .22 pistol, she her sword-carrying stick-starting at the nearest crossroads to the end-of-the-line station and working their way outward, following roads heavy enough to support trucks.
Valentine kept turning them to the north and east, into hillier and more isolated country. He couldn't say what drove him into this particular notch of Ohio. Perhaps it was a line of three legworms patrolling a ridge, glimpsed as they crept through the trees at a distance. Or it was the one true military convoy that passed them coming out of it; three tractor trailers, with Grog troops in supporting vehicles and venerable five-ton cargo trucks.
They were only questioned once, by a pair of policemen also on bicycles. Valentine showed his card and the warrant for the renegade electrician, explaining that he'd learned she had a cousin who lived out in these woods.
"Don't think so, Ayoob," one of the patrol said. "Even during deer season most around here know to avoid the point country. You're better off searching the other side of the river."
So on their third day they risked a predawn ride along the river road to get into the hills early. Other than the good condition of the roads in the region, he couldn't point to anything but a feeling.
"Another feeling. Is it because you can't go back?" Duvalier asked. "Is that why you won't let this go? You need something to do, even a ghost chase?"
Valentine chewed a wild bergamot leaf and tossed its purple-pink flower to Duvalier. "You've been good company. After today you can go find the Lifeweavers. But be sure to tell them about this."
She nuzzled his cheek. The half quarrel had faded.
"Wish we could find out where that's going," Valentine said as they breakfasted on bread and cheese. A green-painted military truck turned off from the river road and approached their position. Black smoke belched from its stack as the truck shifted up.
"Can do," she said, putting the flower between her teeth and picking up her bicycle. "Watch my coat."
"Ali-"
She pedaled madly in the same direction as the truck, and brought her bike alongside. She reached out and grabbed a tie for the cargo bed's canvas cover.
Valentine watched her disappear.
He had little to do over the next three hours but refill their water bottles and worry. When she came coasting down the hill again she had a huge smile.
"I've got a date for tonight," she said, pulling up her bike and accepting a water bottle. "Nice guy from New Philadelphia. Lance Corporal Scott Thatcher. He plays the guitar."
"Thought you were leaving tonight."
"Don't you want to know what I found?"
The jibe Valentine was working on died half-formed. "You found something?"
"It's big, it's well-guarded, and Thatcher didn't offer to take me to lunch inside, even with a lot of hints. You wanna see?"
Valentine picked up his bike as Duvalier shoved her coat into the basket on the back of her bike.
"What is it?" Valentine asked as they pushed up the hill.
"I'm not sure. It looks kind of like a hospital. There were ambulances out front, military and civilian. Big grounds, double-fenced."
They topped a hill; another loomed on the other side of a narrow gully. The road took a hairpin turn at a small stream. "I don't suppose your Corporal Thatcher illuminated you?"
"He said he was just a delivery boy."
A truck blatted through the trees. They pulled their bikes off the road and watched it negotiate the gulley. It was an open-backed truck, filled with an assortment of uniformed men, some in bandages, some just weary-looking.
"Okay, it is a hospital," Valentine said as they remounted their bikes. "Why all the security, then?"
They finally saw it from the top of the next hill.
"This is probably as far as we should go," Duvalier said. "There's a watch post at the end of the trees."
