The Eye of the Hunter

by Dennis L McKiernan

  Riatha looked at the sky. “E’en though it seems a storm is in the offing, hence hiding all trace of our presence, we cannot rely on the fortunes of the weather. List, ere we go to ground, first we must lay a false trail, one the Spaunen will follow this night, for I deem thou art right, Gwylly—they will come this eve once more, searching for me again.

  “Yet if they do, they will not find us, for we will be well hidden in the Rûpt’s own caves, where I spent yesternight.”

  Faeril’s eyes widened in amazement. “You spent last night in the caves? These caves?”

  Riatha smiled. “Aye, in one they do not use. Where else to hide but in a place they think not to look?”

  Aravan barked a laugh as he laced the last thong on the spare frame pack they had brought with them, a pack now filled with a share of the supplies. “Where else, indeed?”

  Riatha stepped to the pack. “Come. Let us lay that trail for the Rûpt to follow, and I will tell ye all of my adventure as we go.”

  After shouldering her own gear, Faeril turned to the Elfess. “False trail you say, Riatha? Let me tell what I did to fool the maggot-folk.” Faeril giggled, remembering her vision of Rūcks and such searching for a secret door in solid stone. “Perhaps we can use the trick here.”

  Riatha raised a questioning eyebrow.

  Again Faeril giggled, then grew sober. “Here is what we can do. First, let us cut some pine boughs and then backtrack up the trail we made coming from the monastery to here, walking out beside it, taking care not to step in our old footprints. About a mile from here we will pass a sheer stone face. We will go on beyond the face a furlong or two, now on top of our track from the monastery. A furlong beyond we will stop, start back, and brush out all tracks heading toward or coming from the monastery, thereby keeping the Foul Folk from going there. Instead, when we get back to the stone face, we stop brushing and walk from our trail to the face, as if there were a secret door hidden therein. Then we lay a trail from that stone back to our original trail, and step in our own prints back to here.

  “Only you, Riatha, will need to lay a new trail on the return while we step in our original tracks, for you were not with us as we came from the monastery.

  “Now think how what we do will look to the maggot-folk. If we are careful, they will not be able to tell which tracks were laid first, hence will believe that we came out a secret door concealed in the stone, walked to the pit, looked about, and then returned to the secret door and went within.

  “Perhaps they’ll knock for admittance.”

  All burst out in laughter, and Riatha clapped her hands. “Hai! Another clever vixen in this band.”

  And so, carrying out Faeril’s scheme, the five set forth from the pit, moving back up the trail, taking care not to step in the tracks.

  * * *

  One after another, down from the bent tree they rappelled, swinging into the mouth of the cave high above the floor of the arena. They had laid the false trail and had returned to the rim of the sheer-walled pit. Evening was on the land, the overcast had grown darker, and snow began to flurry. Wind moaned through the mountains, driving south to north, up the main valley between hemming massifs, wailing into and over the canyon and pit and beyond. And now the five entered the cave high on the sheer western wall, its dark interior swallowing them whole and sheltering them from the blow.

  Being the smallest, Gwylly and Faeril moved all the way to the back of the hole, there where the roof and walls came together. Ere taking a seat, Faeril explored the narrow crevice at the rear, discovering that she could squeeze into the crack, finding that beyond a turn it twisted away into the darkness, but she did not explore any farther.

  Hooded, with his face covered, Aravan lay at the mouth of the cave and peered outward, standing watch.

  Between the Elf and the Warrows, Urus sat on one side, his back to the wall, Riatha on the other, her back to the stone as well.

  And they waited.

  Riatha gazed across at Urus, the Baeran leaning against rock, his eyes closed, resting in shadow. He was a giant of a Man—easily two or three hands taller than Aravan—with broad shoulders and trim waist and slim hips. And his strength was enormous. His face was covered with a close-cropped full beard, reddish brown, lighter at the tips, grizzled, and his hair was the same. Though his eyes were closed, she knew them to be a dark amber. He was dressed in deep umber and wore fleece-lined boots and vest. A morning star depended from his belt, the spiked ball and chain held by slip-knotted thongs to the oaken haft. He was wrapped ’round with a great brown cloak. He was exactly as she had remembered him. He was Urus.

  And as she drank in the sight of him, the Dara’s mind drifted back to a time long past. Ah, Reín, my mother, thou didst warn me long ago in Adonar when thou didst say, “Love not a mortal Man…it will shatter thy heart.” Mother, perhaps it is the fate of daughters to walk in the tracks of their dams. Thou and thine Evian, me and mine Urus—Adon knows, I do love this mortal Man. Yet I cannot tell him so, for I could not bear to see the anguish in his eyes as he grows old and I do not.

  Outside, the wind moaned. Urus shifted, opening his amber eyes, looking directly into Riatha’s gaze of silver.

  CHAPTER 20

  Urus

  4E1911 to 5E988

  [The Past Millennium or So]

  Oi!” called Beorc. “Did y’ hear that?”

  Uran cocked his head in the wind and listened, hearing nought but the sound of air swirling among the crags of the Grimwalls. But then—wrauu—came the faint cry. “Sounds like a cub. Lost.”

  “Aye,” responded Beorc.

  Uran shouldered his gear. “Well, there’s nothing for it—we’ve got to see that it’s all right.”

  Beorc, too, shouldered his goods. “Take care, Uran. The sow may be about.”

  Nodding, Uran led the way, the two Men moving higher among the crags.

  Wrauu! “There is no mistaking that call,” grunted Uran as the two clambered up slope. “It is a cub, indeed, for nought else squalls so. One in distress, too, if my ears hear straight.”

  The Men were in the mountains west of Delon Isle, there in the River Argon. Scouting for the spoor of Spawn, for reports had come to them that the Grimwalls once again had become a dangerous place to be. Yet the Wrg had not begun raiding; it was as if they were waiting for some signal, or for some leader or event to come. But Modru was said to be in exile in the Barrens, and had been since the Great War some thirty-nine hundred years past. And Gyphon was banished beyond the Spheres for those same thirty-nine centuries. And none else had been capable of assembling the entire Nation of Spawn, hence the renewed numbers of Foul Folk here in the Grimwalls at this time was a mystery. And so, in the spring the Baeron had come from the Great Greenhall and had set up station on the Isle of Delon in the clear waters of the Argon, and had begun sending scouts into the mountains to keep track of the Wrg.

  Dressed in varying shades of brown, Uran and Beorc, brothers, were a pair of these scouts. Typical of all Baeron Men, they were tall and muscular Uran, the elder of the two, stood some six feet six and weighed a jot over sixteen stone. Beorc, the younger brother, was mayhap a half inch taller but weighed a bit less, coming in at fifteen stone and some. Both had brown eyes and dark brown hair, and Uran sported a beard, while his brother was clean-shaven. Uran, at twenty-four, was married; Beorc, at twenty-one, was not.

  And now in the early morning sunlight of a late summer day they climbed to see what was amiss with a Bear cub, a cub wrauling in distress. That these Men did so was not surprising, for Bears were special to the Baeron—Bears and Wolves, alike—some folk even claiming that there was a mystical bond ’tween the Baeron and these beasts. Why, some claimed that the Baeron were able to talk to Wolves and Bears. As to the actual truth of the matter, few knew, if any, and none would say for sure.

  Wrauu!

  “Up there,” called Beorc, pointing. “No cub, but still a Bear.” Uran looked, and indeed he did see what appeared to be the dark form of a
large Bear lying on the edge of a boulder-laden flat above.

  Higher they climbed. “Fox!” called Uran. “No, two! — Three!”

  A flash of red fur betrayed a fox scrambling away among the stones of the rocky ’scape.

  Uran stood with his mouth agape. “Adon! My eyes must be playing tricks. I thought I saw…” He fell silent, reflective, and resumed climbing.

  “What?” No answer came to Beorc’s question.

  “Well, no matter what you saw, Uran, foxes couldn’t bring down a full-grown Bear, be it sow Bear or boar.”

  Wrauu! The wraul of the distressed cub sounded near.

  “Mayhap they were after the younker,” replied Uran, clambering upward.

  “Hola! Look!” Uran pointed up slope at what appeared to be another felled Bear farther back on the flat.

  Beorc held up his hand and tested the wind. “’Ware, Uran. The wind blows that way. Mayhap they are but asleep; it would not do to startle them.”

  Uran loosened his morning star from his belt. “Something is not right, Beorc.”

  When Beorc had taken his mace in hand, the two Men resumed climbing, going more slowly, more warily.

  They came up level with the downed Bears. Now they could see that altogether there were four of them, slain, feathered with arrows, the Bears lying before a low opening in the rocky slope.

  Wrauu! The wraul of the distressed cub came from the dark slot.

  Carefully, the Men approached. “Look!” hissed Uran. “Armor. Weapons. Abandoned.”

  Scattered across the flat was what could be construed as evidence of battle—chain mail, helms, cudgels, bows, arrows, boots, clothing—abandoned, or so it seemed.

  “Rach!” cursed Beorc, taking up a black-shafted arrow. He stirred the clothing, finding ashes, dust. “Forbanet Wrg! No wonder there are no corpses.”

  Wrauu!

  Uran examined one of the slain Bears, the beast pierced with black-feathered, black-shafted arrows. “This is Rutch work. At least they didn’t get the cub.

  “Stand awhile, Beorc. Let the wind carry our scent into the cave. Mayhap the cub will come out once it smells who we are.”

  Beorc squatted, stirring ashes with the arrow. “Hola! What is this?”

  He held up a tiny arrow, no more than five inches long. Its point was discolored, as if coated with something. Taking care not to touch the darkness, Beorc handed the minuscule shaft to Uran. “’Ware the point. Mayhap it is poisoned.”

  While Uran examined the arrow, Beorc sifted through the remains of other Rutcha, their corpses turned to ashes by the coming of the Sun. “Uh,” he grunted. “Here is another…and another. What manner bow—?”

  Waa…The tone and tenor of the cub’s cry changed pitch dramatically, climbing upward, becoming less of a hoarse wraul and more of a plaintive wail. Waaahh…

  Uran leapt to his feet. “That’s no Bear cub,” he gritted, moving to the low cave mouth. Cautiously he peered in, then reached. “Aye, no cub this! Instead, it’s a wee bairn!”

  Uran turned to Beorc, and in his arms he cradled a squalling child, perhaps six or eight months old, male, unclothed.

  Beorc dropped the tiny arrows and whipped off his cloak, handing it to Uran to wrap the baby in. “You’ve good lungs, my wee Manchild,” said Uran above the yowling as he enfolded the bairn in cloth.

  Beorc squatted down and looked into the enshadowed cave, finding that it was but a shallow hollow. “No cub at all. No place for one to hide.”

  While Uran gently rocked the baby and rumbled a wordless tune, Beorc examined the slain Bears, then studied the ground up slope and down, carefully reading what he could from the tracks.

  When he returned, the child was asleep. Uran continued to rock the baby. “Well?”

  Beorc took up the tiny arrows. “All these Bears, they are boar Bears. Not a sow among them. And for boars to travel together…well, it’s—it’s unnatural!

  “The tracks tell that they came downhill from the col above, four boar Bears and a cub! D’y’ hear me, Uran? I said that boars, boars; came with a cub! And that’s not all: there were foxes—three, maybe four—and the overlap of prints tell that they walked among the Bears!

  “The signs say the Rutcha lay in ambush. When they attacked, the cub took to the cave, and the boars stood before it.

  “Whether the Wrg were slain by the Bears”—Beorc held up the tiny arrows—“or by these, I cannot say, for Adon’s Ban destroyed the evidence of such.

  “That Rutcha would lay in ambush to slaughter Bears is not surprising, for Foul Folk revel in such butchery. Yet, Uran, I ask you this: Why would boars travel together? Why would they tolerate a cub? Why were foxes among Bears? Who cast these arrows? And where is the cub?

  “The only answers that I can think of are…are…”

  Uran spoke. “Are perilously strange, aye. Heed, Beorc: as to your first four questions, I deem the foxes were among the Bears, for they were ridden by those who cast the arrows: the Hidden Ones—in this case, the Fox Riders. And that’s what I thought I saw on the back of the fox as we climbed—a tiny person astride—a Fox Rider.” Beorc’s eyes widened at Uran’s words, for even though they followed his own line of reasoning, conjecture was one thing—confirmation, another. Still, he remained silent.

  After a moment Uran added, “It is my thought that the Bears and Fox Riders were escorting the cub, taking him to a place of safety, or to his kindred.”

  Beorc looked over his shoulder and up slope, as if he suspected that even now eyes were upon them. Seeing nothing untoward, he turned back to Uran. “And the cub?”

  Uran sighed, looking down at the sleeping babe. “Beorc, I deem I hold the cub.”

  * * *

  While they waited, Beorc stirred through all the ashes of the slain Foul Folk, gathering diminutive arrows, taking care not to touch the dark smear on the minuscule points. He laid the tiny shafts out side by side on a flat rock. “They’ll want them back, I shouldn’t wonder.”

  The Sun climbed up the sky, and Uran sat in the shade of a great boulder and rocked the sleeping babe. “He is exhausted, Beorc.”

  “Mayhap he travelled through the night.”

  Uran nodded.

  Beorc came and sat beside his brother. “If the Fox Riders are proportioned to their stature as we, then by the length of the arrows, those Folk stand no taller than my foot is long.”

  Uran grinned. “A small Folk, but a large foot.”

  Beorc barked a loud laugh, quickly stifled, for he would not wake the babe. The sleeping child stirred but slept on.

  At last Uran stood. “They are not coming for him.”

  Beorc looked up at his elder brother. “You would take him with us?”

  “Aye, we can’t leave him here.”

  Beorc nodded, gaining his feet. “Then let us go. And a surprise we’ll be bringing to the camp.”

  Uran looked down at the babe. “Only temporarily, Beorc. I’m of a mind to surprise Niki.”

  Beorc’s eyes flew wide. “You’d take this wee one to your wife?”

  “Aye.”

  Shaking his head in bemusement, Beorc scrambled down from the flat and reached back up, and Uran handed the child to him, then descended after. And in this manner, down the slope they went, when necessary, passing the babe from hand to hand as they clambered down each ledge.

  Now and again they would scan back up slope, and when they had gone a furlong or so, Beorc called in a low voice, “Hola, brother. Look and see.”

  Carefully cradling the babe, Uran turned about.

  High above on the brim of the flat stood five foxes gazing down.

  * * *

  “Given to us by the Hidden Ones, you say.”

  “Aye, Niki,” responded Uran. “That they did.”

  Niki bent over the child, spooning warm milk into his mouth.

  “Followed us all the way, they did,” chimed in Beorc. “Flitting through the woods, through the shadows of the Great Greenhall. Every day for five days…
till we got here, till we came to the village.”

  “Well, what did you feed him for those same five days?”

  “Well-chewed rations, love,” answered Uran. “I took my lessons from the Wolves.”

  “Don’t forget the berry juice,” added Beorc.

  Niki glanced up at the Men. “No wonder his stomach is upset. But I judge there was little else you could do.

  “I don’t suppose he has a name.”

  Cub! both Men said simultaneously.

  “Cub? What kind of a name is that for a child?” Niki spooned more milk into the baby’s mouth, the tot grinning from ear to ear at the Woman’s face, reaching out to clutch at her russet hair. Niki smiled back, and the babe laughed, his amber eyes sparkling.

  “He shall be named Urus, after your grandsire.”

  And that settled that, though Beorc and Uran often called him Cub.

  * * *

  Urus was a happy child, and he prospered under Niki’s care and Uran’s guidance. He developed swiftly, seeming to go from crawling to walking overnight, and likewise from babbling to talking, though when Niki and Uran looked back on it, they realized that winter had come and gone. Another year passed and another, and Urus ran through the forest with the other children, playing in the leafy galleries of the Great Greenhall, the child tall for what they guessed to be his age.

  When Urus was perhaps four, there came a clamoring from the glade center, and the boy threw open the shutter and looked out. Waddling across the sunlit sward came a great Bear. Calmly in its path stood Niki, water pail in hand, the Woman still.

  Niki was unafraid, for Bears and Baeron had long held each other in respect, but she was astonished when a cub came bolting from her cottage, squalling, thundering across the grass toward the boar. The boar raised his muzzle and snuffled the air, then sat back on its haunches and waited, and was bowled over by the younker Bear. There was much shrill growling by the cub, matched by deep rumbles from the boar, and they rolled about on the sward in mock battle.