"I am being named Hufferrrerrr."
"Ok, Huffer, now listen. I have never, and shall never, belong to anyone! I don't know what Yenjil Thallon told you, but it is not the practice of two-legs to have more than one mate! And when they do mate, it's usually with the same species! If he wants to bed half the wenches in Fengotherond that's his business, but I draw the line when he starts taking up with cats!"
Silence rang in her ears. The music had stopped, and a number of leotaurs were staring. She had not realized her vehemence, but the thought that she had been with a man who—
"You are being in a misunderstanding, good two-leg female," Hufferrrerrr rumbled in apologetic tones. "While it is being truth that The Thallon has wives among our tribe, it is not being truth that he consummated his marriages. If he does not return in two more summers time, the chief's she-kittens will be free to seek another. What you have said, he said also."
"You mean he didn't..."
The leotaur broke into a fit of hissing laughter, which spread like wildfire. The music burst back to full volume, and the feast roared on. Avari was so relieved that her assumptions about Yenjil were mistaken that she didn't even notice.
The Shadowknives rode hard under cover of night, anger driving them to push their stolen mounts hard. Each of them rode one horse and led a spare. The farms from which they had gotten the horses had also supplied extra saddles, bridles and food. The farmers had no further use for such items.
Their anger was with themselves, and the ease with which the quarry had evaded them in departing the city. Darkmist had said to watch the north road and the docks, and so they had. Only in desperation had Dart finally checked the east gate. A few gold coins loosened the tongue of the greedy tax assessor, who gave them good descriptions of the four thieves. Now, following the clear trail of the huge beast the warrior woman rode, nothing could keep them from their quarry.
CHAPTER 16
A horn sounded outside the lodge door, reverberating inside both the structure and Avari's aching head. When the blast subsided and the pain eased, she risked opening her eyes. Lynthalsea stirred nearby, smiling weakly, while DoHeney still snored. Shay was absent. Avari gazed longingly at her rumpled bed, willing herself not to fall back onto it.
"That was either the call to breakfast, or we're being attacked," she croaked, her tongue tasting like an old sock.
"I sincerely hope the latter," the elf said as she rose. "After last night, I don't think I will eat for a week."
"Ah, awake at last!" New waves of pain lashed through Avari's skull at Shay's entrance. "Well, at least two out of three." His prodding toe elicited only a snort from DoHeney.
"How come you're so cheerful this morning?" Avari asked as she rose amid the protests of her pounding head.
"I am not cheerful," the half-elf corrected, prodding the dwarf harder and receiving a growl. "I am simply eager to continue our journey. While you all slept, I arranged a guide and provisions. Our mounts have been groomed and saddled by our hosts and await our departure, which should be directly after breakfast, if you can disentangle the dwarf from his blankets." Shay strode out with the same enthusiasm with which he had entered. Lynthalsea and Avari looked at each other.
"What has gotten into him?" the elf asked, moving to help Avari hoist DoHeney from his bed.
"Beats me. Maybe something's worrying him." Avari grabbed an arm and lifted, avoiding his flailing fists. "Remember Fengotherond? He gets antsy when he's anxious."
"Um-hmm. I'll ask later." Lynthalsea snatched the dwarf's ankles. "Well, we've got him. Do we drop him on the cold ground, or would the river be more invigorating?"
The two women grinned; the decision was unanimous.
"The river!"
DoHeney's eyes flung open and he began to struggle in earnest, but his companions had a good grip. He cursed and raved the entire way, to no avail. Afterward, he had to admit that the water was refreshing, though a bit chilly.
After a hangover-quenching breakfast, they joined Shay by the horses, and Avari was taken aback. The same leotaur she had talked to last night stood beside Behemoth, laden with weapons and outfitted for the trail.
"Huffer!" she called. "You didn't let that sly half-elf talk you into being our guide, did you?"
"Oh, no, Miss Avari Two-leg, I most assuredly did not." He smiled a fanged grin and patted Behemoth on the neck. "I asked him if I might be having the honor of accompanying you on your journey. So, it was I who was being the talking into person."
"Uh-huh," Avari said, eying Shay suspiciously. "Well, at least the horses like you. How is it that your people are so good with animals? Seems like they'd be frightened of you."
"Ah, yes," the leotaur admitted. "This is something to which I am not knowing. The great four-legs are akin to the beasts we are being hunting, but we have always been in friendliness with them. Even the wild ones are being usually of friendly to us."
It took a moment for Avari to decipher the explanation; a simple "I don't know" would have sufficed. Making a mental note not to ask him too many questions, she clapped him on the shoulder, affixed Gaulengil in front of her saddle and mounted.
Hufferrrerrr and Behemoth, Avari soon discovered, got along famously. In fact, the leotaur was the only one Bo would tolerate riding near. Consequently, they scouted ahead, talking on occasion, but usually traveling in watchful silence. Once in a while they would stop, the leotaur's keen ears swiveling at the sounds of bird or insect. As the others drew near, the trio would once again scout ahead. Around mid-afternoon, Shay's lilting whistle reached their ears. Avari looked back with concern, but relaxed at the half-elf's leisurely wave; he just wanted to talk.
"Shay's got something on his mind," she said to Hufferrrerrr. "Shall we go see what he wants?"
"I am already in the knowing of what it is that he is wanting to be telling you," the leotaur prattled. "Go and talk. I will be keeping listening and watching."
Avari shrugged, then kicked Bo into a gallop, racing back to the group at a dead run just for the fun of it. She pulled him up in a shower of dirt clods only steps in front of the others.
"What's up?" she asked, patting Bo to calm him. She didn't like the looks on her friends' faces. "Something's wrong."
"We are being followed." Shay's tone was so serious that Avari was startled by it.
"Where? How far back?" She scanned the rolling grasses behind them, but an army could hide among those low hills.
"They are not so close that you need to string your bow, but they are back there. The chief and the shaman said that a hunting party sighted mounted figures last night. They went to investigate, but the strangers were wary. The Shadowknives have continued the chase."
"So what do we do about it?" Avari asked, a hint of bloodlust coloring her words.
"I was fer settin' a trap fer the slimy buggers," DoHeney put in, rubbing a fist in a palm as if grinding the assassins to powder, "but Shay says we'd best jist continue on an' see if they're still with us. Seems our new friends volunteered to delay 'em a bit."
"Shay, what did you talk them into?"
"I persuaded them into nothing, Avari." Shay's indignant look appeared genuine. "They insisted on helping. They said the Shadowknives would make good sport."
"Sport?" Avari was flabbergasted. How could anyone consider interfering with such deadly fiends sporting? Then she recalled how easily the leotaurs had surprised their own group.
"The leotaurs should have a distinct advantage," Shay said, echoing Avari's thought. "My worry is that they don't understand how devious Shadowknives are."
"The way I see it, it'll be a perty fair match," DoHeney said. "Them Shadowknives may be trained assassins, but I don't think they've ever run up against anythin' like our furry friends. These leotaurs're nothin' if not predators. If I had ta bet on it, I'd put me money on the cats."
Shay and Lynthalsea looked skeptical, but Avari shrugged and nodded, whirling Bo to rejoin Hufferrrerrr. If their new friends were as lethal as she suspe
cted, the companions might not have to worry about the Shadowknife assassins at all.
"Get up!" Dart barked, prodding his sleeping kinsmen. "It's near dusk, and we've got to pick up their trail."
Dart's mood was edged with irritation. All had been going well, or at least better than their humiliating defeat in the city, but last night they had been forced to leave the trail when an armed group of aborigines stumbled upon them in the dark. The wide circle they had taken around the primitives' camp had cost precious time.
"What are you worried about?" Whip asked. "That beast the woman rides leaves prints a blind cave rat could follow. We'll have them by morning. In this tall grass they'll be easy prey."
"Fine," Dart spat, "then you won't mind explaining to Lord Darkmist if you miss your shot, again."
"It wasn't I that missed, it was the—" Whip's excuse died on his lips as the grass shivered with a tremor they felt through the soles of their boots. A low rumble like distant thunder became barely audible. The assassins exchanged looks; an earthquake seemed unlikely. The sound seemed to be coming from the west.
"Climb that rise," Dart snapped at Whip.
His careful choice of the dry riverbed to conceal their camp now foiled their view. Dirt, grass clumps and pebbles showered down the incline as Whip sprinted to the high ground while Dart and Garrote readied the horses.
"Something's coming!" Whip called from the crest of the hill. "But that blasted ball of fire in the sky is right in my eyes! All I can make out is a dust cloud."
"Get back down here!"
Dart doubled his efforts with the horses and tried to ignore the way the ground quaked beneath his feet. If it was big enough to raise a cloud of dust and tremble the earth, he wanted no part of it. As Whip bounded down the hill, the rumbling grew louder. Occasionally a faint roar would rise over the tumult. Dart felt his heart begin to pound, as if trying to be heard over the din.
"All right!" he snapped as he mounted. "Let us—"
A maelstrom of antlers and hooves plunged over the bank and down into the riverbed in a solid mass. The panicked herd of caribou charged as a single maddened beast, blind to what lay before them, be it a cliff or three horrified assassins.
"Go around! Go around!" But even as he screamed and spurred his mount, Dart knew that his orders were too late.
There were too many animals, all panicked. The caribou were smaller than the horses, but size was no obstacle to the piercing antlers and clawing hooves. The mounts could make no headway against the stampede. Equine screams of pain and fear were joined by that of a man, though Dart could not see who it was. The leader of the assassins huddled atop his mount, trying to guide his animal through the fray.
The rope to his spare mount was suddenly wrenched from his hand, the horse screaming when its leg snapped. It disappeared beneath the flood of caribou. For the first time in many years, Dart prayed to Pergamon for salvation. Perhaps the Lord of Pain heard his plea, for when the flood of animals ebbed and finally stopped, he still sat astride his horse.
All signs of their camp had been obliterated, and none of them had escaped unscathed. He felt his own mount shudder and looked down. Dart dispatched his horse with a well-placed dagger thrust, dismounting as it fell. He had killed the injured beast not out of kindness, but to prevent it from panicking at the sight of its own disembowelment. A cursory inspection told him no important baggage had been lost with the two mounts, so he let them lay; he wanted out of this area, now.
Whip's knee had been slashed by an antler; he writhed in his saddle while attempting to staunch the flow of blood. Fortunately his horses were in fair condition, as were Garrote's.
"We will leave at once," he instructed his kinsmen. "I will ride your spare mount, Whip."
Whip did not answer, but continued wrapping his wound and muttering curses at everything within sight. Dart's hand edged into his cloak as he considered ending the man's whining the same way he had his horse's. He did not want to have to drag a wounded man along, but he stayed his hand. They still had a job to do, and he would need both of his kinsmen to finish it.
He was about to spur his new mount when a roar cut into his worried thoughts. Whatever it was, it was close.
"What in the Nine Hells?" Whip groaned through clenched teeth, startled out of his cursing.
His answer came over the rise in a line of twenty armed and war-painted leotaurs. Each bristled with weapons, shield and bone armor; this was obviously not a hunting party. The Shadowknife leader's last fleeting hopes that the stampede had been a coincidence melted. His consternation fled at the telltale fidgeting among the beasts; he had seen house cats in Fengotherond twitch in such a manner just before pouncing on unsuspecting mice. Dart did not intend to be a mouse.
"Run for it!" he screamed, spurring his horse.
The leotaurs howled, charging down the bank with swords raised and spears flying. Terror urged the assassins' mounts to unanticipated speeds, causing the shafts to fall short. Quickly outdistanced by the longer-limbed horses, the leotaurs gave up the pursuit, which worried Dart all the more. He understood predators, and did not like the feeling of now being prey.
CHAPTER 17
Behemoth cropped a wind-twisted clump of grass and chewed disgustedly. It was a far cry from the verdant carpet that he had trod days before. The rolling hills of grass had given way to foothills of short, brown, winter-dead turf, then highlands of hard-frozen tundra and weeds. Their horses puffed and heaved as they trudged higher, and the temperature plummeted until the water froze in their flasks. Declining vegetation, boulder fields and bare areas of red cinder defined the landscape, but the scenery was not Avari's main concern. The Icewall Peaks were.
This trip is going to get real tricky, real soon, Avari thought as she frowned at the peaks. The sight made her shiver more than the temperature. She nudged Bo into a fast walk.
"Are you familiar with this area?" she asked Hufferrrerrr as the wind ripped at her cloak.
"I am only being a small bit of familiar with this terrain, Miss Avari Two-leg." He reached down and picked up a wedge of black stone. "We come here for the brittle black rock that we are knowing is very good for the making of weapons."
He handed her the piece of obsidian. Its edges were already sharp. In the hands of a craftsman this would be the perfect material to chip into axe or arrowhead.
"How much farther before we have to leave the horses?" she asked. DoHeney's pony was the only mount in their troop capable of negotiating narrow mountain trails.
"Not far, I am thinking," He answered, pointing to the two peaks beyond the next rise. "It is soon that you will be learning why the peaks are being named 'Icewall'."
"Quite a view," Lynthalsea said, her optimism fully intact as she huddled in the lee of her horse and tried not to shiver.
Before them spread a wide tundra-carpeted vale; perhaps verdant in summer, it was now as dead as bare stone. Flanking the vale loomed two craggy snow-capped peaks, which were in turn flanked by even steeper and higher ones.
It looks like a row of teeth waiting for dinner, Avari thought, and dinner is us. But the towering mountains of impassable rock were not the object of their current dilemma.
"It lies within," Shay announced.
"Inside?" Avari asked. "Not beside? Or behind, maybe?"
"Inside," DoHeney confirmed as he studied the map he and the half-elf had made to confirm their triangulation.
"Inside." Avari stared at the map, hoping to decipher a new meaning to the intersecting lines; an alternate solution eluded her. "Well, I hope everyone wore their winter underwear."
The object of her dismay, and what seemed to be the resting place of the next gem, filled half of the vast vale before them. The gargantuan river of ice flowed down between the two peaks, slowly scraping their slopes into rubble in its lethargic flow southward. They had ridden the vale's southern rim with the gems, taking careful sightings to determine where their path lay. Now, they all stood and watched the glacier, as if staring har
d enough would compel it to spit out their prize.
"Well, I don't see any way 'round it," DoHeney said, "and Avari's got a point. I hope ye all brung yer cozy knickers. It's apt ta be a mite chilly in that mountain o' ice."
"It will quite likely be warmer out of the wind," Shay pointed out. "The difficulty will be in finding the entrance."
"There are several cracks and crevices in the glacier face," Lynthalsea volunteered, shading her eyes against the glare.
"Great! So all we have to do is find the right one." Avari's sarcasm was as biting as the wind. "It shouldn't be too hard to sniff out a Dukarr. The stench should lead us right to—"
Avari stopped in mid-sentence. As one, she, Shay and DoHeney looked to Lynthalsea. If she could find Avari in a city of thousands, locating a single human in this barren waste should be easy. The elf acknowledged their silent strategy with a nod.
"Unless he flew in, I should be able to track him right to the ice cliff." She then shook her head with a dubious frown. "But once on the ice... Who knows."
"Oh, I've got confidence in ye, lass!" DoHeney barked with a grin. "Jist git that sniffer o' yours warmed up and we'll be knockin' on that Dukarr's door in no time."
The others laughed, more at the relief of having a plan than at the dwarf's weak humor. Hufferrrerrr laughed, too, though he couldn’t know what they were laughing about, and Lynthalsea wasn't about to enlighten him.
So the thieves arrive at last, Ghendal thought, leaning close to his scrying ice. I was expecting something more... impressive. Ah... but I see they have at least one of the other gems.
The Dukarr mumbled, and the view within the ice shifted; now a close-up of the dwarf filled the polished surface. The pathetic little man swept the enchanted ruby it first one way, then back again. He and his companions argued, gesticulating one direction then another, then repeated the action with the gem.
"What the..." Ghendal looked at his own gem, then back to the ice. "So that is how they found me!" He snatched up the diamond and swept it in an arc. It grew brighter as it faced the vale, then dimmed as it was swept away from its sister stone.
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