“No?” said Sauk, his tone equal parts shock and outrage.
“I … can’t,” said Berun. “Things are different now.”
Lewan. That’s what it all came down to. The boy wasn’t everything. There was the Old Man, Talieth, Sauk, and Sentinelspire itself, all facets of Kheil’s old life that Berun had hoped were dead and buried forever. Going back to them … it would be too much like stepping back into Kheil’s skin. There was the thought of Chereth, his beloved master, a prisoner, possibly being tortured or worse, but every thought of the old druid only reminded Berun of his oath. I swear I will not come after you, save on your word alone. By my blood upon thorn I swear it. By blood and thorn had he been given life, a second chance. He couldn’t defile that. But beyond all that was Lewan. He couldn’t forsake the boy. Like Berun, Lewan was alone in the world. All they had was each other.
Sauk held his scowl a good long while, but then he smiled and shook his head. “Nothing I can say to change your mind, old friend?”
“Sauk, you must understand, I have … other responsibilities now.” He took a deep breath and offered up a silent prayer. “I will help, if I can. But you must allow me to do it my way.”
Sauk’s smile went feral. “Now there’s the Kheil I remember.”
“You said it yourself,” said Berun. “The Old Man has new guardians, things none of us understand. If he’s somehow leeching power off Chereth, then I need to find others who understand such powers better than I do.”
“You mean druids.”
“Yes.”
“But you—”
“I’m no druid, Sauk. Chereth was my master, and he taught me many things. Had he continued to teach me … someday, perhaps. But now I am simply a servant of the wild. I’ll be no help to you. But perhaps I can find those who will be.”
“There’s no time for that.”
“If I can find a grove, there are rites I can perform to contact help.”
“I can’t allow that.”
“Why?”
“Make no mistake here,” said Sauk. “We’re out to kill the Old Man. Kill him dead and put him on a pyre. But the Fortress of the Old Man, the blades—those will live on. And you know our ways. Invitation only, and only those wishing for our … services. You think I’m going to allow you to bring a flock of tree lovers into a fortress that has stood undiscovered by outsiders for generations? You know us better than that, Kheil.”
“Berun.”
“Berun, then! I don’t care what you call yourself. We must stop him, and we need you—and what you carry—to do that.” The earnestness in Sauk’s eyes hit Berun. “Don’t you want to help your old master?”
“I do. But rushing to my own death won’t help him. If half of what you say is true, if the Old Man’s powers are beyond Chereth’s, then I can do nothing against him. I’ll need help.”
Sauk’s gaze hardened again. “That the way it is, then? Despite what you call yourself now, you have to remember that we were once as brothers. I come to you asking for help and you turn me away?”
That felt like a slap. Something tingled deep in Berun’s mind. Not shame, exactly. More like confusion and a niggling fear that there was some truth to the half-orc’s words. Still, his mind was made up. The only sure way of getting Chereth out alive was to find help. And there was Lewan to think about.
“My mind is made up, Sauk.”
The half-orc’s shoulders slumped, just for a moment, then he stiffened again. “I was afraid you’d say that. Have it your way.”
Sauk whistled, a harsh shriek between his bottom lip and top teeth that cut through the darkness. For several moments nothing happened, and then he heard it. Something approached through the woods. Not Taaki. The tiger would never make so much noise, even in the dark.
Two more of Sauk’s men emerged from the wood, and between them walked Lewan. The boy’s bow was gone, and his quiver and sheath hung empty from his belt. His left sleeve had been ripped halfway off his shirt, dirt and mud smeared him, and he had grass and twigs in his hair. He seemed unhurt, but his eyes had the look of a deer that had been outrunning a wolf pack and knew it could run no more.
Berun leaped to his feet, his unstrung bow clutched in one hand. “What is this?”
The half-orc rose and put out a placating hand. “Easy. Calm yourself. We need you—and what you carry. The boy will be safe as long as you come with us and behave yourself.”
Berun stared spears at Sauk for several long breaths. It didn’t seem to bother the half-orc.
“Lewan,” said Berun, looking to his disciple, “are you hurt?”
The boy blinked and looked at Berun. His jaw started to quiver, but he clenched it and swallowed. “I’m fine, master.”
“He just had a good long run that didn’t end well,” said the man to Lewan’s left. “We did him no harm.”
Berun returned his attention to Sauk. “Free the boy, and I’ll come with you.”
“You will come with us anyway,” said Sauk. “And so will the boy.”
Berun ground his teeth, looked off into the dark, and took a deep, controlled breath. He’d have to play this just right. He’d done this before, but never against so many, and never against a hunter like Sauk.
Closing his eyes, Berun let out the breath, nice and slow. Still standing, he relaxed his muscles and took another breath, this time through his nose, drawing in strength. Keeping his gaze set on the dark, Berun reached out with his other senses.
Scent. He smelled the wood smoke of the campfires, the thin stew bubbling in a cast iron cauldron, the damp of the streamside mud, the slight musky tang of sweat, leather, and unwashed clothes from Sauk and his men.
Sounds. The crackling of the nearby fire, loudest of all. The shuffle of men beside their fires, their low conversation, the scrape of their boots over ground. A slight breeze rattling the tops of the trees. Crickets, frogs, a night bird or two. The flutter of a moth past his ear.
Feeling. The air, tinged by smoke, passing in and out of his throat, filling his lungs. The soft scrape of his clothes against his skin. Cool air along his left cheek, warmer air on the right side that faced the fire. And deeper down, deep behind his eyes where men could only see in dreams, Berun sensed Perch, the edge of the little animal’s mind touching his own. Berun knew that the treeclaw lizard crouched above them somewhere in the darkness amongst the branches, watching. Perch could sense the tiger in the area, taste her scent on the air, but he couldn’t see her.
Returning his gaze to the half-orc, Berun said, “Nothing I can say to change your mind?”
Sauk stood, slowly, watching Berun, perhaps sensing something out of the ordinary. He returned Berun’s stare, eye to eye. “No,” he said.
“That’s what I thought you’d say.” Keeping his face turned to the half-orc, Berun fixed his gaze on the man on Lewan’s left. That one, he told Perch. Strike. Tooth and claw. Tooth and claw!
Perch’s excitement lit up. Fight-fight-fight! Strike-tooth-and-claw!
A shadow fell from the darkness overhead.…
Chapter Six
And hit the man next to Lewan in the face. The man went down screaming, the lizard hanging on.
Berun shouted, “Lewan, go! Go!”
The man on Lewan’s left thrashed on the ground and slapped at the leathery shape clawing at his face. The other man had hold of Lewan’s forearm. The boy twisted and brought his knee into the man’s crotch. The man’s eyes squeezed shut and he crumpled to the ground.
Lewan, eyes wide, cast one quick glance at Berun.
“Go, Lewan!” shouted Berun, just as Sauk screamed, “Get that boy!”
Seeing five men coming for him, Lewan turned and ran for the woods. Sauk’s men leaped after him. Berun let his bow slide down his grasp so he held it only a foot or so from the end. The bow was only thick in the middle and wouldn’t make much of a staff, much less a club, but it might serve to distract the half-orc if nothing else. These men, if they were from Sentinelspire, were most likely
trained killers. The best at what they did, surely. But Berun was willing to bet that Sauk was the only true woodsman in the group.
Berun turned, cocked his arm, and swiped the bow outward, aiming for Sauk’s face.
The half-orc sidestepped and ducked. He turned and looked at Berun, his lips curling in a snarl over his incisors. “That’s how it is, then?”
Seeing their master facing off against Berun, two of Sauk’s men—Val and Gerrell, if Berun remembered right—stopped just inside the reach of the firelight and turned around.
“Let him go, Sauk,” said Berun. “The boy isn’t in this.”
“He is now,” said Sauk—and lunged, aiming a jab at Berun’s face.
Berun sidestepped, brought the bow up, and turned the punch aside—just as Sauk’s left fist hit him in the gut. In that last instant, he thought he felt Sauk’s knuckles scrape his backbone. All breath burst out of Berun in one gasp. His legs turned to water and he fell. His next thought was plain, stupid pride—he was grateful his bowels had held and he hadn’t retched up his last seven meals. Then his thoughts vanished. His vision blurred and his body poured every bit of energy into getting breath back into his lungs.
Lewan used the fall. He’d been running as fast as he dared. But beyond the light of the campfires, all was pitch black, and through the trees he had to cast his arms in front of him and run more by feel than sight, each headlong sprint broken by stumbles over the uneven ground, roots, and rocks. Shouts from behind spurred him on.
Branches scratched his clothes and scraped skin off his face and hands. After a bad stumble that left his shin bloody, Lewan risked a glance back as he pushed himself to his feet. The men had stopped long enough to light torches. He could see two of them amongst the trees, and the distance from them to himself made hope flare in his heart.
Then something roared off to his right. The tiger.
Lewan ran, pumping his arms, heedless of the branches and leaves. He’d run perhaps two dozen steps when the ground fell away beneath him. He hit the downslope, biting his cheek as he did so, and continued a long slide down a hill covered in generations of leaves and fallen branches. When he finally came to rest at the bottom, the avalanche of detritus he’d caused kept coming, burying him.
And so Lewan used it, keeping absolutely motionless, forcing himself to take deep, slow breaths rather than the gasps his body demanded. From somewhere above he heard men crashing through the brush.
“Here!” one shouted. “This way!”
“No.” This voice fainter. “He’d keep to the ridges where the ground is surer. Can’t you see?”
“I can see. But he can’t. He’s got no light, and look how all the leaves are disturbed.”
Lewan’s heart hammered, and he tensed, preparing to run again.
“A tracker now, are you? Just ’cause you follow Sauk don’t mean—”
“Move, you idiots,” said a third voice, and Lewan heard something coming down the hill.
Close now. Lewan could feel the vibration through the ground. The man stopped, probably no more than a pace or two above him, then began moving again.
A toe struck Lewan’s shoulder.
“Got him!”
Lewan erupted from cover, put all his strength behind one fist, and brought it up into the fork of the man’s legs. A pained gasp escaped the man, then he folded in on himself, dropping the torch.
“Ha!” said a voice from above. “That whelp got him again. Same damned place!”
The man lurched onto his knees as his companions started their way down. Lewan snatched the torch from the fallen leaves and thrust it at the man’s face. The man saw it coming and slapped at the fire, then began to fall forward. He screamed in agony as the burning pitch stuck to his fingers, but the thrust had swiped the brand from Lewan’s grip.
Lewan turned and ran, following the course of the valley between the two hills.
“After him!”
“My—hand!” said a voice that was half sob.
A harsh laugh, then, “That ain’t the part I’d be worried about. I’d—holy gods!”
Lewan heard a rustle of leaves on the slope above him, then a mammoth weight hit his back and crushed him onto the leaf-covered ground.
When awareness began to seep back in, Berun saw the blond man—the one Sauk had called Val—standing over him, holding his bow and quiver. The man wore an insolent, almost pleased smile. Another man, shorter and darker, stood behind him. Sauk was crouched beside him, one fist clutching Berun’s torn shirt. The other fist jerked back, and Berun felt fingers scrape the back of his neck just before he heard a snap. His necklace!
Sauk stood, a broken leather braid dangling from one fist. On the end of the braid was tied an intricate knotwork of hardened vines. Something in the midst of the vines caught the firelight and sparkled, almost as if an ember burned there. Erael’len.
“No!” said Berun as he lunged for it.
Sauk stepped back, almost casually, as Berun’s hand swiped at empty air. Then the half-orc stepped forward again and brought the toe of his boot into Berun’s side, just below the bottom rib. Biting back pain, Berun swiped at the necklace again, but Sauk caught his wrist and twisted. Berun struggled, but it was no use. His free hand reached for his knife—
The half-orc twisted harder, tough nails breaking through Berun’s sleeve and piercing skin. Bones in his wrist scraped together, then Sauk wrenched, bringing the entire arm around behind Berun’s back.
Sauk planted one foot in the middle of Berun’s back and said, “You draw steel on me and I’ll tear your arm off. Understood?”
Berun poured the rest of his strength into a final attempt to pull his arm free.
Straightening the leg planted on Berun’s back, Sauk pulled the arm tighter. Though he tried to hold it in, tried to clench his jaws shut, a scream escaped Berun.
“Understand now?” said Sauk.
The tension in the arm loosened. Not enough that he could move it, but just enough that Berun no longer felt as if muscles were tearing.
“Don’t think he heard you.” That was Val’s voice. Berun couldn’t turn his head enough to see, but he felt someone yank his knife out of the sheath.
Sauk let the arm go and put his full weight into the foot on Berun’s back. His ribs creaked and he could only take shallow breaths.
“Just remember,” said the half-orc, “you brought this on. If you’d behaved yourself, you and the boy would be sitting round the fire sharing some soup. Now—”
Shouts of men out in the woods. Berun could hear them. But beyond that, he heard the deep thunder of the tiger’s roar, more shouting from the men, and then screaming. A boy screaming.
“Lewan!” gasped Berun, and he tried to push himself up. It was like pushing against a mountain root.
“You just stay down,” said Sauk. “Taaki isn’t going to kill the boy. But she will catch him, and she’s not nearly as gentle as my men.”
“Let”—Berun could barely take in enough air to speak—“boy—go.”
“No,” said Sauk.
“Why?” He wanted to ask, What is he to you? He isn’t involved. Let him go and I’ll come along, do whatever you say, and a dozen other things, but he couldn’t find the breath to form any words.
“Right now? ’Cause you caused me a lot of trouble. Put my men to a lot of trouble. And you tried to hit me with your bow.” Sauk stepped away, turned his head, and spat. “That wasn’t nice, Kheil.”
Sweet air filled Berun’s lungs, and he rolled over onto his back. Breath was coming easier now, but his gut still hurt—a little higher with that first punch, and Berun knew he’d be holding broken ribs right now—and his arm felt like splinters were tumbling through his veins. Sauk stood a few paces away, arms across his chest. What he’d done with Erael’len, Berun couldn’t see. Val stood beside the half-orc, Berun’s bow and quiver cradled in his arms, the knife in one hand, and the insolent smile on his face. Gerrell stood behind them, spear in one hand, looking as if he d
idn’t quite know what to do.
“Berun,” said Berun.
“Berun,” said Sauk. “Kheil. Leaf-lovin’ blight-beater, I don’t care what you call yourself. Keep this up and Berun might join Kheil, and they can bicker over who is who in the afterlife. But to finish my answer—even if I weren’t annoyed with you, I’d still keep the boy. It’ll give you incentive to behave yourself. I have nothing against the boy. But understand, I’ve got no love for him either. You play nice—no more flyin’ lizards in anyone’s face, no more trying to slap me with your twig-tosser—and you and the boy can go your way once our business is done. You try any more of this nonsense, and I’ll let Taaki have her way with little Lewan. Might even make you watch.”
Berun stayed on the ground. He didn’t want another boot on him just then, but he looked up and glared at the half-orc. “Dukhal.”
Berun had never been fluent in the language of Sauk’s orc tribe, but he knew enough to give a good curse. Dukhal. A bastard whelp. A vile enough insult to any orc, but for Sauk it held a particular barb. He was the son of the clan’s chief and a human slave. His mother had died before Sauk could walk, and he’d spent his childhood competing for—and never winning—his father’s affection and respect among the chieftain’s legitimate sons.
Sauk’s eyes went cold and hard. “There you go hurting my feelings again,” he said. Then his visage seemed to soften a bit and something happened Berun would never have predicted. The half-orc looked almost … sad. Truly hurt. “I see now that Kheil my brother is dead indeed. I was not wrong to bleed for him. Still, we need you. I didn’t lie. Help us with this … Berun. Help us, and you and the boy can go wherever your new god takes you.” He turned to Val. “No need to tie him, but don’t give his weapons back. As soon as he can sit up, put him by a fire and feed him. And keep an eye out for that lizard. Don’t know where it got off to.”
“The lizard?” said Val, looking annoyed. “What do you want me to do with a damned lizard?”
“Give it to him,” said Sauk. “If he can get it to behave, fine. If not, throw it in the soup.” He turned to walk away.
Sentinelspire Page 5
