Its eyes stared out at her, their irises strangely milky, like a blind man's. There was no mistaking those blank orbs.
"It's a Kalvaman."
∗ ∗ ∗
Jendara hurried down the gangplank and headed straight for Fambra. The woman pulled her into a close half-hug, pounding her shoulder with her fist. "I'm very glad to see you, Jendara," Fambra said. "Your worries seem to be coming true." She rubbed her eyes. "Damn, I'm exhausted. We sailed all night to get here."
Jendara led the woman up to the shore and sat down on an abandoned barrel. "What happened?"
"When you left Alstone yesterday, we set out for some of the northwestern fishing grounds. We met a few other Flintyreach fishing boats and spread out. After working for a few hours, we were just considering heading back when a group of raiding vessels appeared. They grappled one of the other boats. I tried to get to the boat, but the wolf-things on board—"
"Wolf things?" Jendara interrupted.
"They might have been dogs, I couldn't tell. There were men, too, and between the men and the wolves, the attackers had already pulled the three fishermen into their boat. Our boat gave chase, but we stopped when..." she trailed off.
Vorrin caught Jendara's eye. He had beaten her to the shore, and carried a mug. He pressed it into Fambra's hands. "Have some tea," he encouraged her.
She took a gulp and wiped her mouth with her fist. "I wish it were something stronger." She shook her head. "I'm going to have to drink myself to sleep for a week after that."
Jendara squeezed her shoulder. "You don't have to talk about it now."
"No, you need to know." Fambra took a deep breath. "The bastards had killed one of the fishermen. A guy I knew, young fellow from Orcmoot. They just stood him up in the prow of the boat and slit his throat, right in front of us. To show us.
"And one caught his blood in a mug and drank it."
She sagged, and hugged the hot tea close to her chest.
Vorrin pulled Jendara away. "She said there were wolves on board? And they attacked fishing boats?"
Jendara nodded. She thought of the bear-man Vorrin had decapitated. "The attackers we saw were men wearing bear hides that somehow looked and sounded like real bears."
"So maybe the ones Fambra saw were similar, but wearing wolf hides." He began to pace. "I've never heard of anything like it."
Jendara frowned. "I have. And so has everyone who lives on the islands. Remember our boar hunt?"
He stopped pacing. "What about it?"
Fambra looked up from her tea. Jendara nodded at her to included her in the conversation.
"Morul smudged the boar's hide with smoke so a witch couldn't use it to transform herself into an animal. I always thought it was a story. But what if it's not?"
He frowned.
"Skinwalkers," she mused. "We need to talk this over. Get everyone up to the meeting hall, as fast as you can. This is big trouble."
"More of my clan are coming," Fambra said, getting to her feet. "After what happened to our friend, we'll do whatever it takes to handle these monsters."
Jendara had no doubt of that.
∗ ∗ ∗
Inside the meeting hall, lanterns filled the space with a soft golden glow. A low fire crackled in the central hearth, giving off the scent of good cedar. The afternoon should have felt peaceful, the hall cozy. Instead, the shifting and shuffling of close to a hundred nervous people made the space claustrophobic.
Jendara cleared her throat. "Is everyone here?"
Morul stepped up on the low podium beside her. "All the villagers are here, save for a few out in the farthest fishing grounds. I'm still waiting on the outer homesteads."
Jendara glanced around for Yul, but she couldn't see his corn-silk-colored braids. She would have liked to have him beside her. People always took the quiet man seriously.
Still, she had Morul, Sorind's richest man and chief. That counted for a lot. She raised her hands.
The crowd fell silent.
"Look," she began, "over the last several days, there have been a lot of strange things happening. Like that longship that attacked my ship yesterday, or the people who attacked my friend Fambra."
The crowd murmured a little. Jendara cleared her throat.
"I know many of you have heard rumors about what we experienced out on Flintyreach." The crowd gave small sounds of assent. Jendara knew more than a few crew members had gone drinking the night before, and they'd surely told tales at the tavern. It was time people knew the truth. "Well, it's worse than you might have thought it was."
She explained what happened at the quarry, the terrible violence. She asked Vorrin and Boruc to tell about the hunting expedition, letting them describe the creature she'd shot out on the causeway. She beckoned to Fambra.
"This woman has her own tale to share."
Fambra recounted the story of the wolf-things that had taken the fishermen. "That's not all," she said. "There were two other raiding ships. One harried us all night. We got away in the fog, but there's still a chance it caught our trail."
Mumbling in the audience turned to a dull roar punctuated by raised voices. People clamored to be heard.
Someone pounded the floor. Jendara turned around. She'd forgotten the injured man from the raiding boat, resting in the corner the wisewoman used as a kind of hospital.
"The same thing happened to me." He grabbed a shelf on the wall to pull himself to his feet. Vorrin hurried to help support him.
"I'm Hazan, from Battlewall. I've been saving up to build a homestead on one of the little islands up west of Dragon's Rib. Found a real nice spot, too." He winced and gritted his teeth. Beneath his loose linen tunic, Jendara could see layers of white bandaging—he'd probably broken a couple of ribs as well as cracking his head.
"My brother and I were headed north to make sure everything on my homestead site was ready for the winter."
The villagers went silent, their eyes riveted on the man.
"It was getting dark. It ain't safe to sail at night out there—too many rocks. So we were about to throw out an anchor and get some shuteye when Byrni saw something moving out in the fog. A lost longship, he thought. Good salvage." Hazan drew himself up to his full height. For an Ulfen man, he wasn't particularly tall, maybe even a little shorter than Vorrin. There was still blood streaking his dirty blond hair. "He steered us up to the longship."
"What happened?" Jendara asked.
"He went to tie us up to it, but then creatures jumped out of nowhere. I'd say they were bears, but they weren't like any bears I ever saw. Not that I could see much—mostly I just heard the growling." He stopped for a second, his breathing gone ragged. "One bit into Byrni's face. I tried to pull him back into my boat, but it knocked me down. I got back up, and something hit me in the head. Lights went off, and I fell. But before everything went black, I heard a bad scraping sound. I reckon we came up against a reef, and their longship must have taken damage. But I don't know nothing. I wasn't even myself until I woke up here in this meeting hall."
Lots of murmuring at that. Jendara shook her head. Those creatures had ripped off half of Byrni's torso.
"I was lucky," Hazan said. "The next man might not be."
The crowd riled up again, the voices climbing into pitches of fear and resentment. Jendara caught Morul's eye. This was getting ugly, but there was still one more piece the people needed to know.
"There's nothing for it," Morul whispered. "Tell them."
Jendara nodded, then stepped forward and spoke.
"I know who they are."
She kept her voice level, but the noise in the room suddenly dropped as people turned back to her, expectant.
"What do you mean?" someone demanded.
"The raiders," Jendara said. "They're skinwalkers. From Kalva."
The silence hung for a moment, like a drop of water falling through the air. Then it exploded.
"She's out of her mind!" a voice shouted. "Skinwalkers and Kalvamen!"
; "People are dying, and she's telling us fairy tales!" yelled another.
"They're not fairy tales!" Jendara spat back, trying hard to keep her anger in check. "I've fought them—killed them! We cut off one of the bear-thing's heads and watched it turn back into a man's. A man with milk-white eyes."
"And where is it now?" A big, red-bearded man she recognized as a farmer named Helge pushed his way to the front. "Show us this magic head."
Damn. "We threw it overboard," Jendara said. "But my crew all saw—"
"Your crew aren't islanders," Helge shot back.
Jendara made a fist. "And what's that supposed to mean?"
Morul grabbed her shoulder. "Easy," he murmured, then louder, "Jendara's done more to protect this community than you have, Helge. She—"
"Idiots!"
The word cracked through the tumult like a whip. The crowd turned, stunned and silent, and parted down the middle.
Gerda stood in the back of the room, glowering and holding a walking stick like a scepter of office. She stalked forward toward the podium, the blue tattooed swirls standing out on her cheeks. Men twice her size looked down or shrank back as her disapproving gaze passed over them.
Gerda stopped in front of the podium and turned to address the crowd. "These raiders killed some of the best men and women in my clan, butchering them like animals. Jendara and her friends have fought and killed them to protect your island, yet you doubt her?"
Helge looked uncomfortable, but crossed his arms and bulled ahead. "Kalvamen and skinwalkers are just old stories."
"And you don't trust old stories?" Gerda spoke softly, but Jendara could have sworn the whorls on her cheeks began to glow in the firelight. The old woman turned to Jendara. "This skinwalker—describe his eyes again."
"Milk-white," Jendara said immediately. "All filmed-over like an old man with cataracts, but worse—across the whole eye."
"There it is, then." Gerda turned back to the gathered islanders. "You've all heard the stories. You know the signs. The Kalvamen have come south once more, and there's no time to waste arguing. The question now is what you're going to do about it." She stepped forward to join the assembly, then turned back to Jendara. "So what's your plan?"
Jendara hoped the surprise didn't show on her face as she squared her shoulders and looked out at the villagers. A few heartbeats ago, they'd been on the verge of shouting her down. Now they were all looking to her for salvation—even Helge.
No matter. It was time to think of all those town meetings she'd half-slept through when she was a wee sprog of a girl, all those times her father had crafted a way to feed the clan in a famine or cut off a mainlander raiding party before it reached their village.
A plan.
"What we really need is solid information about these monsters. We don't know where they come from or what they're doing on our islands, and we're running scared. My plan is to organize scouting parties—all volunteer, of course—and send them out into the northwestern fishing grounds to see if we can find those monsters. As my father would say, ‘Who knows the land has the upper hand.' Well, we're going to take that upper hand."
Someone cheered. Jendara thought it might be Glayn. She risked a glance out at the faces in the crowd. They were still looking at her expectantly.
As they should. Sending out scouts was important, but until the scouts returned, these people were still facing an unknown danger that might or might not be planning an attack on their own island. She set her jaw. "In the meantime, return to your homes and prepare to defend them. Sharpen your swords. Keep your armor by your door. Tend your fields in pairs, and if you work in the village, post lookouts around the perimeter." She raised her voice. "Anyone interested in joining a scouting party, join us here at the speaking platform."
The crowd rumbled into motion and speech. Jendara knew it would take a while for the crowd to sort itself out.
She caught Vorrin's eye and gestured toward the back corner of the room. "Are you—"
"Organizing a scouting party? Of course. Tam and I can take the skiffs." He held up a hand before she could speak. "I know we've been working hard to get our trade goods to Varisia, but I'm starting to think people here are in immediate danger. Besides," he shrugged, "If we go late in the season, we may be able to make a better profit. Our goods will be unexpected. We'll have to stay on the mainland for the winter, but I have some connections. It won't be so bad."
Jendara's mouth opened and closed without sound. She hadn't expected any of this. "Stay in Varisia for the winter?"
"Or even Cheliax. Absorb some culture. It would be good for Kran, don't you think?"
She steered her mind back to the task at hand. "Kran. That's just it, Vorrin. You can't go on this scouting mission."
He shook his head. "What?"
"We were attacked in sight of Sorind. The island's clearly a target. I'm hoping to get the scouting parties in and out as fast as possible, but we can't leave Sorind undefended."
He folded his arms. "And you want me to stay here as a kind of nursemaid."
"Not nursemaid!" She was getting too loud. She needed to calm down. Jendara took a deep breath. "Look, this is as close to a home as we've got. I can't let anything happen to it."
He must have heard the strain in her voice, because he took her by the shoulders. "I know you won't." He pulled her closer. "And you're right. The Sorinders are strong, but most of them lack combat experience. They're not raiders or warriors."
She nodded. It was easier to relax, this close to Vorrin. Easier to think. She wondered why she hadn't noticed it before.
"That's why I should go on this scouting expedition," he said. "You should stay here with Kran and keep an eye on the village," he said.
Her hand crept to the handle of her belt axe. "I can't."
He glanced down and his lips thinned. "You're thinking about your father. About revenge."
"Not revenge, Vorrin. I just can't let what happened to my family happen to anyone here. That's why I have to go. If I can catch one of these bastards, maybe I can finally learn enough to stop them."
He dropped his hands from her shoulders and crossed his arms across his chest. "You've got to stop thinking about the past."
"Jendara," Morul called. "The volunteers are assembling."
She reached out. "Vorrin—"
But he just shook off her hand. "You've got a meeting. And I've got babysitting detail."
He pushed his way through the gathering volunteers without a backward glance. Jendara watched him go, her stomach twisting into knots.
∗ ∗ ∗
There were far more volunteers than Jendara had expected, and it took some time to sort them into crews. Some had boats; most were experienced hunters. Some of the Milady's crew wanted to go, now that they'd seen the creatures for themselves. Jendara was ready for a bottle of lingonberry wine by the time she got them sorted into appropriate parties.
She stopped them before they left the meeting hall to collect their gear. "Now remember: we're just scouting here. Try not to engage the enemy. We'll meet back here to determine what needs to be done, and if it looks too serious, we'll send a delegation down to Hagrim to get real help. White Estrid has the manpower to back us up."
She watched the volunteers file out of the building, sagging a little. It had been a long day.
A voice rumbled from the back corner of the room: "You forgot about your own scouting team." Hazan had propped himself up in the corner, watching the proceeds in silence.
She waved a hand as she turned to face him. "I'll be fine on my own. I'll get a ride on one of the fishing boats."
"There's another boat you could use," he said, getting to his feet. "Mine. It's in good shape, as long as you don't mind a shredded boat cover."
Jendara was tempted. His sailboat would move fast, and let her cover that much more ground. "You're just going to let me use your boat?"
"There's a price, of course." He crossed to the dying fire. In the flickering light, his face wa
s impossible to read.
"Of course." Jendara felt wearier than ever. Some people would take advantage of any disaster to make a copper.
"You've got to take me."
"What?" Jendara shook her head, surprised. "What do you mean?"
"Look," he said, "those things killed my brother. I think I deserve a chance to help bring them down."
"You've got broken ribs and a concussion. Not exactly fighting form."
"I can still pilot a boat," he growled.
She felt a twinge of fellowship for the man. She could understand what he felt. But it also clearly pained him to stand upright.
"Please," he said. "I won't let you down. I...you've only seen me at my worst, but I'm a good sailor, and I can fight."
She crossed to his side and put out her hand. "All right. It's a deal. As long as you keep in mind that I'm the captain. I'm not going to let you do anything stupid."
He shook. "That'll be fine. I'm not in any kind of shape to do stupid things right now."
She had to grin at him. It sounded like something she would say.
∗ ∗ ∗
She went home before she went to the docks to prepare Hazan's sailboat. She didn't know if she'd find Vorrin and Kran there or not, but it made sense as a starting point.
Kran looked up from a plate of cheese and bread when she came in. He gave a half-hearted wave.
"Hi," Jendara said lamely.
He reached for his chalk. Do you have to go?
She dropped down into the seat beside his. "I think so. There's..." She stopped. How could she tell her little boy about what she'd seen at the quarry? How could she explain monsters that tortured and ate their victims? She put her fingers over her eyes and rubbed the tired muscles. There were some things a mother just shouldn't have to do.
He kissed her cheek, quickly. Then his chalk squeaked on the slate. When she looked up, he had written: I was in the meeting hall. I heard everything.
She winced.
Pathfinder Tales: Skinwalkers Page 12
