It was a compound bow, the kind with pulleys to maximize the force of the projectile and minimize the arm strength required. The business end of the arrow had a broad head, designed to cut its way in and do some damage. Although Peter had given up killing animals for food or sport after the war, he’d been a bow-hunter in high school, and knew that the arrow, at this range, would probably go all the way through his body and a fair distance into the tree limb behind him. Unless it hit bone, in which case it might well become a permanent part of his anatomy, for whatever short time remained to him as he bled to death on a trampoline at the top of a giant redwood.
The bow had a quiver holding three more arrows, so she had several opportunities to put a hole in him.
Peter had led a Marine infantry platoon for eight years in two war zones. Many professional soldiers had pointed their weapons at him, and it was never something he’d enjoyed. But it was the amateurs who really made him nervous. Again he saw the flutter at the edge of her eye. A stress reaction.
“I’m going to sit,” he said calmly. “Maybe you’d like to tell me what’s on your mind.”
With his fingers laced on the back of his head, Peter crossed his ankles and lowered himself to a sitting position as the netting gave gently beneath him. It felt like he was floating. It would have been pretty cool if it weren’t for Riot Grrrl pointing a medieval weapon at his center of mass.
She didn’t say anything. She was still thinking. The branch she was standing on creaked and swayed in the breeze, but it had no effect on her.
“You could rest your arms,” he said. “You look pretty strong, but I’d rather not get shot by accident.”
She didn’t relax her arms. Finally, she spoke again. “How did you find me?”
“I wasn’t looking for you,” he said. “I was hiking north and a grizzly bear chased me up a tree. I kept climbing. I saw your rope.” He shrugged. “I got curious.”
“You’re a bad liar. California grizzlies are extinct.”
“He might have been on vacation from Montana,” Peter admitted. “But he was brown and very big and he took a bite out of my boot. Here, I’ll show you.” Peter slowly unfolded his legs and held up his boot so she could see the bite mark in the sole. It was fairly dramatic.
She glanced at the boot, then looked Peter up and down with a critical eye.
He wore fast-drying hiking pants thinned down by the trackless miles, and a high-tech T-shirt that was supposed to keep him warm wet or dry, but after several months of almost continuous wear it had begun to smell like a goat’s ass. Washing his clothes in a stream helped with the dirt, but not the stink. He figured it was some kind of chemical reaction with the technology of the fabric. He’d carried cleaner clothes in his pack that he usually wore after he stopped hiking for the day, but they were probably shredded and covered with grizzly drool now.
“Well,” she said. “You don’t look like one of them.”
Her voice was rough and scratchy for her years, which he put at late twenties to early thirties. Around Peter’s own age. She didn’t look like a chain-smoker. From her T-shirt logo, he figured it was from screaming at punk rock shows. Or maybe smoking Humboldt County’s finest. Northern California was filled with strange characters gone a few extra steps around the bend. Like a Riot Grrrl in a tree with a bow and arrow.
“What do they look like?” he asked.
She just shook her head. “Better you don’t know.”
“Give me a hint,” said Peter. “Bikers? Dopers? Cops? Aliens?”
The corners of her mouth quirked up in the hint of a smile. She let the tension out of the bow, but still held the arrow nocked to the string. Her shoulders sagged, and for the first time he saw how tired she was.
“Can I put my hands down?”
“No,” she said. “You’re leaving, back the way you came. The only question is, are you going slow, or the express route?”
“I’d prefer slow,” he admitted. “What are you doing up here, anyway?”
“I don’t know you well enough to have this conversation,” she said.
“I’ll tell you anything you’d like to know,” Peter said. “I was born outside of Bayfield, Wisconsin. My dad’s a builder. My mom’s an artist and a teacher. I was a lieutenant in the Marine Corps, honorably discharged. My hobbies are backpacking, carpentry, and current events.” He smiled winningly.
Her mouth quirked again, just slightly. Maybe she wouldn’t put an arrow into him.
“Not many people could free-climb it up here,” she said grudgingly. Then, “Not many people would be that stupid.”
“I prefer the term ‘eccentric,’” said Peter. “How did you get up here?”
She turned the bow slightly. “See the fishing reel?”
It was bolted to the composite above the grip. Peter had known guys who went fishing with a bow with the same kind of setup, although this seemed like an odd place to do it.
“You shoot a weighted arrow through the bottom loop in that green rope, which pulls the fishing line through the loop. Use the fishing line to pull a leader rope, then another rope large enough to climb. Clip on your ascenders and up you go. The only challenge is when you have to jump the knot. Then untie the first rope and pull it up behind you. Keeps the local idiots from climbing up and killing themselves on our gear.”