Shadow Prowler

by Alexey Pehov

  “It doesn’t feel all that much like home.”

  I had no sentimental yearnings at all for the walls of Avendoom.

  “But it still is your home. Do you know what my most cherished wish is?” she suddenly asked.

  I looked into the yellow eyes and shook my head very slightly.

  “I want finally to go home. To see my native forest, my family, my palace, my daughter. Why do you smile? Do you think this is too much like a woman?”

  “No, milady. I don’t think that. Everybody wants to go home at some time. Especially if their child is there.”

  “I have not been in Zagraba for two years. I have traveled all over Siala with my unit. The last time we went as far as S’u-dar. Ell, Egrassa, and I were the only ones who returned. The rest remained behind in the snow.”

  “My condolences—”

  “Don’t,” she interrupted me gently. “We have a different attitude to death. We are not people, after all. Elves regard it more lightly and accept it more easily. All depart this life at some time. Sooner or later it happens. Running away from it is foolish—and closing your eyes to it is even more so.”

  Silence fell again, with only an occasional hiss from something between the coals and the wind fluttering the hairs that had come loose from the elfess’s braid.

  “I’ve been wanting to ask,” I began. “Why did you get involved in this adventure? After all, this is our misfortune. This is a human problem.”

  “The dark elves concluded an alliance with Valiostr.”

  I said nothing. Alliances are made and they are broken. That is a matter of high politics, and an alliance, even if it has held for several hundred years, is no reason for sticking your head into a hungry ogre’s mouth.

  Miralissa understood my unspoken thought.

  “Harold, are you always in such a gloomy mood?”

  “It all depends on the circumstances.”

  “You must understand that if we do not help you now, then we shall pay for it later. The orcs have nominally acknowledged the authority of the Nameless One, even though he is a man. But they have only acknowledged him because it is in their interest to do so. Since the Spring War they have not managed to make any progress across the continent, not even once. They were finally driven back into Zagraba.”

  “I understand.”

  “If the Nameless One crushes Valiostr, then the Border Kingdom, the ancient land of the orcs, will be left without protection. The Bordermen will not be able to hold out against the full forces of the Firstborn. If the Nameless One is satisfied with vengeance and his armies halt in Valiostr, that will not be the end. The orcs will gather strength and take Isilia and in time they will undermine Miranueh, and then they will think of some reason to turn against the Nameless One. They are proud and inclined to think that they can defeat a man with their yataghans, even if he has the power of a thousand magicians. Or perhaps they will leave Valiostr in peace; there are plenty of other lands to the south.”

  “The south is strong. It is Garrakh, the Empires, the Lowlands, Filand, and the light elves if it comes to that.”

  “When a landslide gathers speed, the lower it gets, the more dangerous it becomes. They will be hard to stop. In their obsession with the greatness of their race, they will exterminate all. The orcs are the gods’ Firstborn, after all. Siala was granted to them, the ogres retreated into the shadows, and all the other worms—other races—appeared here through some misunderstanding. Only the orcs are worthy to live, the others should be dispatched into the darkness. Sooner or later the elves’ turn will come. And without the support of men, the war will be hopeless. We will drown in blood, Harold. That is why the elves are helping Valiostr. We want you to hold fast in the present, or we shall perish in the future. We shall fall. We shall lose everything. The Nameless One is only the beginning. Merely the snowball that will set in motion the avalanche of a new division of the world. We will all have to work as a team . . . you and I must work together.”

  I nodded, flattered. The orcs really had been building up their forces for a long time, and the only reason they weren’t already testing the sharpness of their yataghans was that the combined forces of Valiostr, the Border Kingdom, and the dark elves were still just about able to restrain them. But if just one of those three were to disappear, the Firstborn would have a lot more breathing space. There would be a little gap in the dam, and a little trickle would flow through it. And everyone knows that water wears away stone. After a while the dam would burst.

  “I shall lead the group tomorrow,” Miralissa suddenly announced. “Milord Alistan and Eel will go back. We have to know what has happened to Tomcat and Egrassa.”

  “Won’t they disappear, too?”

  Markauz and Eel were excellent warriors, and in case of need their assistance would be far from superfluous.

  “Let us hope that my cousin and Tomcat have forestalled any unforeseen circumstances.”

  “What happened, anyway? Why did they leave the party so suddenly?”

  “Tomcat saw something.”

  “Tomcat saw something?” I echoed in amazement. “But you don’t send men off somewhere or other just because someone has seen something. Anyone could imagine that he saw something.”

  “Tomcat sees things that others do not,” Miralissa said in a quiet voice, and put her charred stick down on the ground. “Do you know that before he joined the Wild Hearts he was an apprentice with the Order?”

  “I don’t believe it.” Somehow I couldn’t imagine this short fat man with a mustache as a magician’s apprentice.

  “But nonetheless, it is true. I don’t know why he left the magicians, but he still has his knowledge. Tomcat notices interesting things, although sometimes he himself cannot explain his instinctive feelings. Wake up any of the Wild Hearts and ask them what they would trust most, what they would choose in a moment of danger—reason and facts, or Tomcat’s shadowy feelings? I am quite sure, Harold, that they would all choose the latter. This ordinary-looking man has proved right and guided their unit away from danger too often.”

  I made the effort to put a few more branches in the flames.

  “That evening when you saw the key, Tomcat came to me. He said that he sensed danger. Not even danger, but its phantom. Something was being prepared behind our backs, and something else was following right behind us, about a hundred yards away. He could sense someone watching us, but no matter how hard he looked, he couldn’t find anything.”

  “Did you believe him?”

  “Why not? What sense would it make for him to lie? Since we judged it impossible to turn the expedition back and go dashing off with no particular destination in mind, Alistan and I decided to carry on, but to turn off the busy highway onto this road. We are not so easy to spot here, and if anything happens, others will not suffer. Tomcat and Egrassa, the junior prince of the house and a knowledgeable shaman, were to go back and see what was happening.”

  “And stop it . . .”

  “If possible, but that was not the main goal. Tomcat said that it was not far, only three leagues away at the most. By any calculations, they should already have caught up with us.”

  “There’s a hostile shaman somewhere nearby?” I guessed.

  “Yes, you’re right. But even I didn’t sense anything.” She reached up and gently picked a small leaf from my shoulder. “If not for Tomcat’s caution, we would already have been attacked from behind.”

  “And how long are we going to run like this?”

  “Certainly as far as Ranneng. You must agree that joining battle with someone unknown is too dangerous; we might lose the advantage that we have at present. And there are magicians of the Order in the city, so our enemies will not venture into it.”

  “Pardon me, milady. But I do not agree with you there,” I said, and shook my head. “If they could get into the king’s palace, they will certainly get into Ranneng.”

  “Do you suggest that we should not enter Ranneng at all?”

  �
��It could be that they are trying to lure us there.”

  “Why?” she asked, looking at me curiously.

  “Let’s just call it a premonition.”

  “Like Tomcat’s?”

  “No—unlike Tomcat, I am sometimes wrong.”

  Miralissa’s black lips smiled sadly.

  “Perhaps you are right. But we cannot do without the city. There is no way we can avoid it. Otherwise, once past the Iselina, it will be too hard without fresh horses and supplies. In any case, attacking us there is not the same as attacking us here when there is not a soul around. We shall be in Ranneng in three days. There are still two hours left until dawn, go and sleep.”

  “I won’t fall asleep now.”

  “I have to compile a few spells. Just in case. I sense there may be trouble ahead.”

  “Then I will not disturb you. Good night.”

  A slight bow of the head and she had already picked up her stick from the ground and was drawing signs in the ashes.

  I went back to my place and straightened out my crumpled blanket. As morning approached it had turned cooler and the first, topaz-like drops of dew had appeared on the stalks of the grass.

  “Why aren’t you asleep?” Uncle asked me peevishly as he made his round of the camp. “Even the horses are sleeping like logs, and here you are making a racket. Ah, you’re as green as they come. In your place I’d be glad of every free minute I could get.”

  He walked away, muttering quietly.

  Well, what the Wild Heart had said made sense. I lay down on my improvised bed, and immediately leapt back up, trying not to shout out. Some swine had put a briar in my blanket! I cast an angry glance at the jester, but he was sleeping calmly. Or at least pretending with consummate skill.

  No point expecting a leopard to change his spots. I stopped worrying, threw the briar as far away as possible, and lay down. And at that very moment I almost choked on my own laughter. Someone had come off even worse than me, only he didn’t realize it yet. Loudmouth was still sleeping with his mouth wide open, and there was a dandelion stalk sticking out of it.

  The last thing I saw before I fell asleep again was Miralissa, a solitary figure sitting beside the fire, drawing incomprehensible signs on the ground. I wanted to go to her, but knew I could never follow this road where it might lead . . . even if she let me. She is what she is—an elfess and a royal one, no less, and a magic user. Harold is what he is—wolf-single, thank you, and planning to stay in that happy state. We were comrades, no more. That was fine with me.

  23

  VISHKI

  Guess who was to blame for the general tumult and commotion the next morning? Why, Kli-Kli, of course. Miralissa caught the goblin just as he was writing “eensy weensy spider” in the ashes beside the elfess’s magical signs. Naturally, she almost tore his hands off for his artistic efforts. And so all morning the goblin tried to keep as far away from her as possible.

  “Harold!” he whined guiltily, not having found any more willing listener in our little party. “I really didn’t mean anything by it! I thought they were just scrawly scribbles and that was all! Please talk to her for me. She’s very mad at me.”

  “I think you should talk to her yourself. I don’t have any influence with her.”

  “You do. You have the most influence on her royal elfess majesty.”

  “Oh, really? The elf princess listens to the thief? The madhouse is just down the road, they’re expecting you.”

  “Harold, she doesn’t think of you as a thief, she thinks of you as a Dancer.”

  I looked at him blankly for a moment, then shook my head. A Dancer.

  Eel was already in the saddle, waiting for the count.

  “We’re setting off now. Follow this road and do not turn off anywhere. We’ll try to catch up with you by evening.”

  “If we do not meet along the way, look for us in Ranneng, at the inn called the Learned Owl,” Miralissa told them in farewell.

  Alistan nodded, then he and Eel dug their heels into the sides of their steeds and went galloping back to the place where Egrassa and Tomcat ought to be.

  “Come on, men,” Uncle said with a clap of his hands. “Mount up.”

  That day was the hottest of our journey so far. The sun was so pitilessly fierce that even the stalwart and obstinate Arnkh removed his chain mail. Honeycomb stripped completely down to the waist, exposing his bulging muscles, with their abundant display of scars and tattoos. Many others followed his example. Kli-Kli borrowed some rag from Marmot and tied it round his head, after first moistening it with water from a flask.

  The road set our backs to the hot sun and wound between open fields and thickets of low, scrubby bushes. There were no clouds and the azure blue of the sky was so painfully bright in our eyes that we had to squint all the time. Apart from the imperturbable elves, the entire party looked like a herd of cockeyed, delirious Doralissians.

  The syrupy, incandescent air flowed into my lungs in a clammy, scorching wave. I would have given half my life if only it would rain.

  After about two hours of uninterrupted galloping under the unblinking eye of the intense sun, the broad fields fell away behind us and fused into the horizon, giving way to a hilly area with a generous scattering of low pine trees. Instead of the smell of wild grasses and flowers, the constant buzzing of insects and chirping of crickets, we caught the sharp scent of pine resin and heard the serene, impassive silence of the forest.

  The road wound between the low hills, sometimes climbing up onto one of them and then immediately, without pausing, diving downward again. Smooth ascents alternated with equally smooth descents, and the journey continued like that for quite a long time.

  The forest along the sides of the road grew thicker and the trunks of the trees crowded closer together, hiding almost all the sky behind their leaves. The low, crooked pines gave up their place in the sun to aspens and birches. All the ground in the forest along the road and on the surrounding hills was covered with bushy undergrowth. Now at last, thanks to the dense wall of trees, we had some blessed coolness—the weakened rays of the sun no longer lashed our shoulders like red-hot whips; everybody heaved a sigh of relief and Arnkh hurried to put his beloved chain mail back on, now that he had the opportunity.

  For the next hour we rode in the relative coolness of the welcoming forest.

  But our good mood didn’t last for long. How could it? As yet, we still knew nothing about the missing Tomcat and Egrassa, or about Alistan and Eel. What reason did we have for feeling jolly?

  And so everyone was tense and taciturn. Lamplighter completely forgot about his beloved reed pipe. Kli-Kli didn’t crack any of his eternal dim-witted jokes, and even Deler and Hallas stopped arguing, which was something absolutely unheard of since the very beginning of our journey. The dwarf glowered and stroked the blade of his enormous poleax; the gnome puffed away on his pipe, exhausting his final reserves of tobacco. Uncle growled and tugged on his beard. Loudmouth snarled good-naturedly.

  As soon as the road climbed the next low hill and the wall of the forest no longer blocked the view, one of my companions was certain to look back. But the road was still empty, and we rode on, gradually becoming ever more sullen.

  Miralissa and Ell talked about something in low voices and she occasionally chewed on her lips, either in frustration or fury. Waiting is the worst thing of all. I know that from my own experience.

  At a place where a stream crossed the road, Miralissa said, “We’ll stop on that hill.” She glanced back over her shoulder at the empty road for perhaps the hundredth time that day. “We’ll make a halt there.”

  “Alrighty,” said Uncle, supporting the elfess’s proposal. “We need a rest. It’ll be evening soon, and we’re still riding hard.”

  Uncle was right. My back was aching outrageously after galloping for so long. What I really wanted to do was get down off Little Bee, lie on the grass, and have a good stretch.

  “Harold,” said Lamplighter, riding up and distr
acting me from my daydreams, “do you think Milord Alistan will manage to catch up with us?”

  “I don’t know, Mumr,” I replied wearily. “It’s not evening yet.”

  “I hope Miralissa won’t be foolish enough to send anyone else on these dubious reconnaissance missions.”

  I was also hoping very much that the dark elfess’s sense of reason was in good working order. If anyone else left the party, our numbers would be reduced to a laughable level. Our group needed to stay together for as long as possible.

  The road started running up a hill, and the forest reluctantly slipped downward—the hill was too tall for it, and the time had not yet come for the trees to climb to its summit.

  “A halt,” said Loudmouth, jumping down smartly from his horse to the ground.

  “I don’t think so,” said Miralissa, shaking her head. “Get back in the saddle.”

  I followed her gaze. Up ahead of us, a little more than a league away, there were several columns of thick smoke rising up out of the forest.

  “What is it?” asked Uncle, screwing up his eyes.

  “As far as I recall, it’s Vishki, a small village, maybe forty or forty-five households,” Honeycomb replied.

  “And what’s there that could burn like that?” asked Deler, reaching for his poleax again without even realizing it.

  “Well, it’s definitely not the houses, the smoke’s too black, as if they’re burning coal,” said Hallas, puffing stubbornly on his pipe.

  “Get ready, lads! Put your armor on, and we’ll find out what the fire’s eating down there!” Uncle instructed.

  “And I’d like to know what swine lit it!” said Lamplighter.

  The moment there was something to do apart from the hard riding that the soldiers had grown so sick of during the last few days, they all livened up. Any goal was better than being left in a state of total uncertainty for days on end, not knowing where the enemy was and which foul creature you could feed a yard of steel to in order to improve your own foul mood. I could understand the men perfectly; for soldiers, inactivity is the worst possible torment.