by Barb Hendee
As the leader looked back to Leesil, Helen pulled her skirt up and jerked a long iron knife from her worn boot. Another long moment and an elder woman appeared from behind a hut with a woodsman's ax in her hand. None of the other villagers moved, and one woman pulled her two girls farther back against a hut wall. The boy with the broken mace stepped a little closer to his superior, eyes frightened.
"Odds change," Leesil countered, and he separated his blades so that it was clear he held two. "That's the way of luck."
The shawl-masked deserter stepped toward the old soldier, but the leader raised a hand as if he knew without looking. His man stopped short.
The leader backed up with the same slow and careful steps as when he'd first entered. He reached the village's far end, his men following, and just before he turned he cast one long look at Helen. Everyone remained silent and poised until the deserters were out of sight, and then Helen sighed.
"You just saved us a month's work," she finally said, now puzzled as she looked over Leesil and then Magiere. "You'll pay for nothing tonight. Let's hide those horses before they circle back through the woods to find them after dark. We'll lock em up in the smokehouse."
"What if those men come back after we leave?" Wynn called.
Leesil turned to see her standing in the wagon's bed, pale and distressed. He walked over and dropped his blades in the wagon's back. Wynn had seen many things on this journey that were almost beyond her ability to bear. He took the crossbow from her shaking hands and set it down next to his blades.
"We do what's necessary in the moment," Leesil said. "That's all there is."
"That is not enough," she whispered.
He didn't answer and turned to find Magiere watching him again.
The sleeper rolled, lost inside his dream of glittering stars all around. And the dark between began to undulate.
The movement sharpened slowly into clarity, and stars became glints of light upon massive black reptilian scales. The coils of its body were larger than the height of a man and circled on all sides of him, writhing with no beginning, no end, and no space between.
"Where?" the dreamer asked. "Show me where."
This time, no cryptic words came. Black coils faded away.
He found himself standing on a snow-covered slope looking into a valley locked in a perpetual winter. High mountains shot up on all sides like teeth into the cloud-smothered sky. And there in the maw of the valley stood a six-towered castle coated in ice. It was immense in size, but it was dwarfed by the white peaks that surrounded it.
"There?" he asked.
Look deeper. The orb is close.
The words slipped like a whisper into the dreamer's thoughts. He trudged downslope through snow so old it crackled under his boots as he sank knee-deep with each step. When he reached the valley floor, he made out the entrance through the high outer wall.
Twin gates of ornate iron curls joined together at the high top in an arched point. Beyond them were matching-shaped iron doors in the castle's front atop a wide cascade of steps. Mottled with rust, the gates were still sound in their place, sealing in whatever the castle held. Each of the tall towers was topped with a conical spire fringed with a curtain of ice suspended from its roof's lower edge.
As he approached, the left gate swung outward of its own accord on hinges as large as his own leg. Three ravens sat atop the wall staring down at him with pinprick eyes. One cawed in agitation. Beyond the gate, the barren courtyard was carpeted in snowfall that had crusted with years of cold. Except for the walkway and steps.
The iced stones were cleared all the way from the gate and up the stairs to the towering iron doors. Someone… something remained in this place.
He took a step across the gate's threshold.
Welstiel's eyelids opened. The castle faded beyond sight and touch.
"No! Show me more!"
Welstiel rolled to his feet, twisting about as he tried to get his bearings. The previous dawn rushed back to him.
He and Chane had found a deserted hovel and slumbered for the day on its floor, covered only by their cloaks. Broken pottery strewn about was the only sign that anyone had ever lived here. No stools, wooden table, or cook pot had been left behind.
For the first time, Welstiel's dream patron showed him the resting place of what he sought—an unknown treasure that could alter his detestable existence. He was certain, if astonished and more frustrated than ever before.
In the past few moons, his dream patron had begun whispering of the treasure by calling it an "orb." Welstiel had hoped for further enlightenment.
But this dream had been different from any other. His patron of dreams said little, yet there was this vision. Welstiel had seen an ancient and forgotten stronghold, and would recognize it, if he could find it. But why had the vision been stolen before he stepped in the gate? The waiting and half-hints took their toll upon him.
He stepped to the huts doorless opening and looked outside. Chane was nowhere to be seen, probably out hunting. Welstiel did not have the strength to go searching for him and squatted down. Since leaving Droevinka, he had awoken nearly every night with the same memory.
In the Apudalsat forest he had secretly watched Magiere and Chap circle in upon Ubâd, his father's old retainer and confidant. The mad necromancer had cried out: "Il'Samar! Come to your servant and aid me!"
Coils like waves of vaporous and glinting black earth had appeared in the forest, circling on all sides of the clearing. The name by which Ubâd made his plea was unfamiliar to Welstiel, but he knew those coils as well as his own reflection. He knew its whispering voice in the dark—his patron of dreams. And it had abandoned Ubâd as Chap tore open the withered old schemer's throat.
How the coils had appeared outside of Welstiel's dreams was mystery enough, but how was the conjurer of the dead connected to Welstiel's patron? Most troubling was that the patron had abandoned Ubâd in his final moment of need.
"But it has not abandoned me," Welstiel whispered to himself.
He believed the voice in his dreams assisted him, guided him. Soon he would never need to feed again—to debase himself with blood. The power of the orb would sustain him somehow. His longing for freedom was an ache that constantly nagged him.
Yet still there was Ubâd, betrayed in the clearing. Welstiel tried to put this aside.
His patron had called Magiere "sister of the dead." Welstiel had slowly manipulated her for years to fulfill his plans, and he grew ever more certain of her role to play. The path to the castle doors had been clear of snow, as if something still resided there. Something for which he would need a killer of the dead.
Welstiel stood up, fastened his cloak, and attempted to smooth his hair back as he stepped outside. Tiny snowflakes drifted down through the dusk. It was time to search for his wayward companion.
In the previous night they had passed a few huts off the road among the trees. Chane had likely gone back.
Along with Magiere's frustrating deviations, Welstiel grew concerned over recent changes in Chane. Since rising from his second death, Chane's feedings grew more brutal. He singled out women with coal-black hair and the fairest complexions. The association to Magiere was obvious. Otherwise Chane remained silent and withdrawn. He had not spoken once of the sages' guild and took no further notes in his journals, but also showed neither satisfaction nor quiet euphoria after a kill. Careless in his feeding habits, Chane showed little to none of the resourcefulness Welstiel once valued.
And Chane still wondered how he had risen from a second grave.
Let him wonder.
Chane's begrudging awe helped maintain Welstiel's limited control of the tall undead. And after all, the resurrection was a simple thing, though Welstiel had been uncertain it would succeed until he made the attempt. It had started with little more than a hint acquired years ago, in the very land from which Chane's fledgling sage hailed, where the Guild of Sage-craft was founded. Welstiel had been well traveled in his early years as a No
ble Dead. How else could he have promised Chane a letter of introduction to the guild there?
Gaining that hint, and other knowledge of vampiric nature, had been a dangerous exploit that nearly cost Welstiel his existence. An old vampire living secretly in Calm Seatt, the king's city in Malourne, did not care for his own kind invading his territory.
Pawl a'Seatt—even the old undead's surname was a puzzle. Little more than a reference to the city in which the vampire lived. Welstiel learned bits and pieces from him, such as one scornful proclamation.
Blood is not the life; life is the life.
At first it made no sense, but Welstiel's careful questions gained him more pieces to ponder in the following years. Blood, as an element of the living, was a medium and conduit that carried life energy upon which the undead thrived. The medium was convenient and quick, and nothing more. The very presence of an undead drew life energy to it in slower, unnoticed ways.
If that energy maintained a higher undead, a Noble Dead…
If that energy was how one healed its physical form…
There had never been a chance to test the theory, until Chane stupidly faced off with Magiere and was cut down.
As with so many folktales and superstitions of the living, beheading was not a permanent way to finish one of Welstiel's kind. Such severe damage merely incapacitated a vampire, placing it into a dark dormancy until enough life was absorbed to heal itself, or its separated parts rotted beyond recovery.
But Chane was suspicious, wary, and even in awe of what mysteries Welstiel seemed to know. This secret was just one of many that Welstiel would keep unto himself.
Welstiel left the horses tied to a tree and made his way on foot. He pushed branches aside and cut through the forest, back to where he remembered six intact huts with cookfires still smoking. Upon seeing the corner of a thatched roof through the branches, Welstiel slowed to listen.
Chane had become more adept at luring victims out of their homes. Welstiel was uncertain how or even why. He almost never caught Chane feeding inside of a dwelling since they had left Droevinka.
Welstiel closed his eyes and listened, letting his senses expand into the night. If Chane would only take more care in disposing of bodies, Welstiel would simply wait for him to return, but Chane could not be trusted anymore. One night south of Soladran, he had slaughtered a young, black-haired woman and her two small daughters right behind the woman's house, leaving the bodies where they fell. Welstiel had cleaned up after his companion once again.
He heard soft sounds, but not the drifting wind or skittering of a squirrel among the branches. He moved silently around the cluster of dwellings and through the forest, and the sounds grew more apparent. Heavy breathing and the thrash of a struggle.
Welstiel rounded the thick trunk of spruce to see Chane in profile.
He had a young woman pressed against the tree with his hand clamped over her mouth and jaw. Her eyes were wild, but her throat was mostly intact beneath Chane's teeth as he drained her slowly. Pale and cleaner than most peasants, she had long black hair, which was no surprise. From the corner of her eye, she saw Welstiel.
Her weakening expression filled with hope. She doubled her effort to shove Chane away and let out a muffled cry. Chane's hand closed tighter about her mouth. A muted crack of bone silenced her as she stiffened in pain, fingers twitching in the air.
Welstiel let his senses retreat until the darkness masked the detail of what he saw. He stood in silent distaste, waiting for it to end.
Chane must have noticed something, for he pulled his head back from the woman's throat. Even in Welstiel's normal night-shadowed sight, Chane looked like some beast come in from the wild. His cloak and shirt were halfway off one shoulder, and his face was smeared in blood. Some of his hair caught upon his bloodstained lips and stuck there.
Welstiel reached his limit of tolerance with Chane's recklessness. About to step in and end this night's butchery, he suddenly held his place and stared into Chane's eyes.
There was little intelligence or recognition there, but neither was there the savage pleasure Chane took at the end of his hunts. He looked lost to the world, as if not even aware of what he did. It was all a habit he mindlessly clung to.
"Finish it," Welstiel said.
The words must have registered. Chane wrapped his teeth halfway around the woman's throat and ripped outward. Blood and torn flesh came away in his mouth. He didn't bother to catch the girl as she dropped limp to the ground, flopping over when her shoulder hit an exposed tree root.
Chane spit flesh from his teeth and leaned against the tree. He wiped his lips with the back of his hand, swallowing hard.
Welstiel looked down at the girl lying crooked on the ground. He felt disgust at Chane's need to touch this lowly peasant, to put his mouth on her, but still wondered at Chane's lack of pleasure.
"Did you plan to properly dispose of that?" Welstiel asked.
Chane did not answer.
Welstiel stepped in to pick up the body, then stopped, reaching a sudden decision. "I weary of this. Bargain or no, either you become useful once again, or leave and find your own way. Clean this up yourself."
Chane did not look at him, but after a moment he nodded once. Welstiel turned away, ever more puzzled.
Wynn was surprised when Helen led her into the smith's shop. Leesil, Magiere, and Chap followed, all looking about in mild confusion. Small tables, stools, and one old chair repaired with twine were placed around a crude stone forge. Stalls where horses once had been kept were barren, even of straw. Some stalls had meager stores of piled casks and canvas sacks.
"We've no iron or metal to work anymore," Helen said, tossing a split log into the open forge that now served as a fire pit. "We made this our common house. You can sleep here."
Gazing at the faded tables, Wynn realized these people had not given up. They scratched out a semblance of community as best they could. Other women and children began coming in. Visitors were unusual here, and, though wary, the people were curious.
Magiere unpacked a change of clothes, ignoring the growing numbers inside the smithy. Leesil settled in the back of the room, seeming reluctant to visit with any of the villagers. He had remained darkly quiet since the battle at the border. Only Chap took to the newfound company, letting the children scratch his ears and back.
Wynn shuddered once as Chap licked the smudges from a small girl's face. The child squealed and giggled over the wet attention of a large silvery dog come to visit. But Wynn heard the remembered buzz of a leaf-wing instead and turned back to Helen.
"Can I help you prepare supper?" Wynn asked, now that the fire was reviving.
Helen hesitated. "We'll have more food once we trade the arrow shafts. For now, all we've got is porridge and millet, and all of us ate once today already."
Wynn felt ashamed for even asking. At least in Droevinka, most villagers had food. Two small girls about four years of age inspected the hem of her sheepskin coat.
"If your men are conscripted… taken away," she said, "do they come home on leave?"
"Leave?" Helen blinked, then appeared to understand. "No. We've no grown men shy of forty winters since I was a girl. My father was allowed to stay and make arrowheads for a while, but they took him, too."
Wynn frowned and pointed at Willem. "Then where did the children… ?"
She trailed off, second-guessing the politeness of her question. Helen simply tucked a loose strand of unwashed hair behind her ear.
"Soldiers take more than just livestock and grain. Then leave us with more mouths to feed."
Helen's meaning sank in as Wynn looked around at all the children. Their narrow, dirty faces and ragged clothing filled her with a need to do something. One little girl's arms were so thin that they reminded Wynn of the arrow shafts the women worked so hard to make.
She hurried toward the smithy's rear door, calling out, "I will be back in a moment."
She went to the wagon outside and climbed up into its b
ack. Helen had hidden Port and Imp farther down in the smokehouse. Wynn pulled aside a canvas tarp used to pitch a lean-to tent on the wagon's side and began rummaging through their stores.
Back in Soladran, Leesil had sent her to purchase supplies. Tired of biscuits and jerky, especially since she did not care for meat, Wynn had purchased dried lentils, barley, onions, and carrots, as well as late pears and smoke-dried fish. She acquired a lidded clay pot, a small cauldron, and an iron hook pole for use at a fire. And she found grain and seed-oil for making flatbread.
At first Magiere was furious over what she spent in coin. But the following night Wynn hung the cauldron from the iron hook and made an herbed lentil soup for supper. She heard welcome sounds of satisfaction from Leesil as he took his first bite. Magiere did not comment, but she said nothing more about the money. This type of cooking was time-consuming, and Wynn tended to make large amounts during the nights. The clay pot was used to store the extra, and it was still half-full from the last meal she had prepared.
But now she dug through the supplies with a different purpose in mind, and hauled all that she could carry back into the smithy.
"Have someone fetch the largest cook pot any of you have," she told Helen.
"What're you doing?" Helen asked.
"Making supper. There are lentils, onions, and carrots. I have parsley and marjoram as well. We need to get water boiling, as it will take time to make enough for everyone."
Helen stared at the bounty Wynn pulled from burlap sacks, as if treasure were being poured out on the floor. She shook her head.
"This must be your whole supply. You can't mean—"
"No, she doesn't," Magiere said, striding over. "Wynn, what are you doing? We're trading for a night, not settling in until spring."
