The Hounds of Skaith-Volume II of The Book of Skaith

by Leigh Brackett

  "Go there."

  Stark mounted broad steps, the hounds slinking at heel.

  Minds up there can touch. Kill?

  No!

  Klatlekt had disappeared. Stark stood. He listened to the silence that was not quite silent, and the hairs rose at the back of his neck.

  A little wind came. It fingered his hair. It went snuffling lightly down the height of him and across the breadth of him, and then it flickered cold across his face, and he thought that some of it went in at his eyes and blew swiftly through the windings of his brain. It pulled free of him with a tiny chuckle and went to pluck at the hounds and set them whimpering with their fur all awry.

  N'Chaka!

  Still. Still.

  It was not easy to be still.

  The small wind went away.

  Stark waited, listening to sounds he could not quite hear.

  All at once there was sound and enough; the rushing susurration of half a thousand pairs of wings a-beat on the air. The Fallarin flitted from their doorways, to stand among their rising thermals and graceful whirlwinds.

  Stark continued to wait.

  One came alone, from between two curling ribbons of stone that overarched the largest opening. He wore a brief kilt of scarlet leather. A golden girdle clasped his waist, and a king's torque circled his neck. Otherwise he was clad in close dark fur against the cold. His body was small and spare and light. The wings that sprang from his shoulders were dark-leathered and strong, and when he descended to the platform his movement was assured, if not beautiful. But Stark knew why they were called the Chained. The genetic alteration their ancestors had undergone, hoping to give their descendants new life on a dying world, had cheated them cruelly. That inadequate wingspan would never know the freedom of the high air.

  "Yes," said the Fallarin, "we are clipped birds, a mockery above and below." He stood before the high seat, looking straight up into Stark's eyes; his own were yellow as a falcon's, but too full of a dark wisdom for even that royal bird. His face was narrow and harsh, too strong for beauty, with a sharp nose and jutting chin. But when he smiled he was handsome, as a sword is handsome. "I am Alderyk, and king in this place."

  Round the circumference of the bowl, from lower galleries, a considerable number of the four-armed things had appeared. They stood quietly, watching.

  They were not being menacing. They were merely there.

  "The Tarf," said Alderyk. "Our excellent servants, created by the same hands that made us, though not of human stock, and with greater care, for they function admirably." His gaze dropped. "You also have your retainers."

  The hounds felt the force in him and growled uneasily. Alderyk laughed, a sound not entirely pleasant. "I know you, hounds. You were made, like us, though you had no choice in that making. You are Skaith-born, like us, and I understand you better than I do your master."

  The yellow eyes, somber-bright, returned to Stark.

  "You are the future standing there, a strange thing, full of distances I cannot plumb. A black whirling wind to break and scatter, leaving nothing untouched behind you, not even the Fallarin."

  His wings spread wide, rustling, then clapped shut. A buffet of air came from nowhere and struck Stark's face like an open palm.

  "I do not altogether like you."

  "Liking is neither here nor there," said Stark mildly. "You seem to know me."

  "We know you, Stark. We live solitary here in our eyrie, but the winds bring us news from all the world."

  And perhaps they do, thought Stark. And there are also the Harsenyi and the Ochar to peddle whatever tales go up and down the roads of Skaith. The whole north had known about Ashton being brought to the Citadel, a man from another world, and the prophecy of Irnan had followed hard on his heels. The Wandsmen themselves had spread knowledge of Stark throughout the darklands in their eagerness to capture him. It would have been strange if the Fallarin did not know all about the events that were beginning to shake the foundations of their world.

  "We knew of the prophecy," said Alderyk. "It was interesting to speculate on the possibility of its fulfillment."

  "If the winds bring you news from as far away as Skeg and the city-states, surely there's a breeze that whispers from your own doorstep."

  "We heard all that was said there. And perhaps . . ." He cocked his dark head birdwise and smiled. "Perhaps we heard you speak by the Hearth of Hann. Perhaps, even, we heard the sun-haired woman talk of blooding in a place of rocks."

  That startled Stark, though not greatly. The Fallarin had the power to move winds—sorcery or psychokinetics, the name mattered little—and it was not unlikely that they could see and hear farther than most, even if it was simply a matter of reading his mind.

  "Then you know why Ildann brought me here. You know what I want from you. Tell me what you want from me."

  Alderyk ceased smiling. "That," he said, "we have not yet decided." He turned and signaled to one of the Tarf. It scuttled quickly into a doorway, and up on their high perches the Fallarin clapped their thousand wings, and an angry gale whirled snarling around the cliffs. The hounds whined dismally.

  The Tarf came back, bearing something on one of its arms. It climbed to the platform and came to Alderyk, who said:

  "Let him see the thing clearly."

  The thing was a huge proud bird, feathered all in bronze and iron. It fretted because its feet were bound and its head hooded with a bit of cloth. Ever and again it opened its beak and cried out harshly, and Stark understood the word it spoke.

  "It is a Swiftwing," he said, remembering the bronze-and-iron flash in the sky, "and it calls for war. It belongs to a chief named Ekmal."

  "I think it is his son you have out there."

  "I was told that he would be my guide to this place. No harm has come to him."

  "Nonetheless, Ekmal calls the clans to war." Stark shook his head. "The Wandsmen call for war because of the Citadel. They are determined to have me prisoner, or dead, along with my friends. The boy is safe enough, and Ekmal knows it."

  "A fine witches' brew you've set boiling in our northland," Alderyk said. The Fallarin hissed, and again the wind surged angrily. "The Swiftwing came to seek out Romek, the Ochar Hearth-Keeper. We brought it here instead. The creatures are winged powerfully, but they cannot fly against our currents. We wished to know more before we let Romek have its summons."

  He motioned the Tarf away. It withdrew to the east point of the platform, gentling the great bird. Alderyk's eyes held Stark's, yellow and cruel.

  "You ask for windfavor as war chief of all the Lesser Hearths, to take Yurunna from the Wandsmen. Why should we grant it, when it means war with all the Ochar? Why should we not give you to Romek for the Wandsmen, or to the Springfire to feed Old Sun?"

  Stark said, "Old Sun will grow no stronger no matter how you feed him. He is dying, and the north closes in. This is true for you as it is for the Lesser Hearths, and for the Ochar, too, though they don't accept it—they think the Wandsmen can keep them fed forever."

  "And can they not?"

  "The Wandsmen will decide that, not the Ochar. There is revolt in the south. Things have changed with the coming of the ships to Skeg. Too many folk hate the Wandsmen and wish to find better worlds to live in. There may be a breaking of power."

  "Will be," said Alderyk, "if you have your way. Why should we let you use the Lesser Hearths to gain your own ends?"

  "You live on the tribute from these people. Surely you know better than I how scant it grows."

  There was a rustling of wings and a sigh from the high perches. Alderyk's eyes were two points of yellow fire, burning into Stark's mind.

  "Are you saying that we too must leave our place where we have lived for centuries and find ourselves a better world?"

  Wind buffeted Stark from all sides, deafened him, caught the breath from his mouth. The hounds cowered. When the wind died away he said, "The north-folk must move sooner or later for their lives. The Lesser Hearths are dying out. The Wands
men are interested only in retaining their power, and where they must sacrifice to do so, they will. Make your own choice, but you would be wise to leave a road south open for yourselves when you choose to take it. In the meantime there is enough at Yurunna for all, if you control it."

  Silence. The stillness of dead air.

  "And you would lead?"

  "Yes."

  There was a sudden commotion among the Tarf, and one of them came rushing across the open and onto the platform, to crouch at Alderyk's feet.

  "Lord," it said, clicking and rattling in its shocked haste, "there has been a killing below. The pilgrim truce is broken, and the Ochar hold the entrance to the cleft."

  13

  For one long moment Alderyk neither moved nor looked away from Stark.

  "A black wind, to break and scatter . . ."

  Up along the high perches the ranks of the Fallarin moved and shifted, with a hissing of wings and voices.

  Stark braced himself for an assault. None came. Yet the air was so charged that he looked for lightning bolts to play between the twilit cliffs.

  As though he had come to some decision, Alderyk turned abruptly to the Tarf.

  "Bid Romek come to me with no more than six of his men of honor. And say that if the peace is not kept, I will send such wrath upon them as they have never seen."

  The Tarf went away.

  Stark wondered what had happened below, and how many were dead, and whether Ildann was among them.

  "Stand back," said Alderyk. "There. And keep your hellhounds quiet."

  He sat himself on the high seat that was like a wind devil, and there was thunder on his brow.

  Stark went where he was told, to the west point of the circle, opposite the place where the Tarf still gentled the Swiftwing. The hounds were unhappy, sensing great forces about them that they could neither understand nor fight. It was all Stark could do to hold them. His own muscles were tight with strain, and the sweat ran on him. He was acutely aware of the high cliffs and the one narrow door. If things went against him, it was not going to be easy to fight his way out.

  He hated the Tarf with their round unhuman heads and their unhuman brains that cared not a fig for Northhounds.

  The Ochar, at least, were no more than human.

  They entered the bowl, bright orange cloaks dulled in that sunless gloom. They walked across the mossy open ground and mounted the steps to the platform.

  Romek saw the Swiftwing and checked. Then he spoke angrily to Alderyk.

  "Why have you held this summons from me?"

  "Because I wished to," Alderyk said, "and why have you broken truce?"

  "Ildann stirred up mischief among the Lesser Hearths. There were high words, and then blows, and some hot head drew a knife. My man only defended himself."

  It crossed Stark's mind that if the Fallarin knew all that happened on their doorstep, Alderyk must have known this, too. Had he been unable to prevent it? Or had he let it happen?

  "How many are dead?"

  "One only." Romek's shoulders lifted slightly. "A Brown Cloak."

  "One or a hundred, it's death and forbidden." Alderyk's head went sidewise, in the way Stark was beginning to know. "What are your men defending now?"

  A wind, very soft and tigerish, prowled the cliffs.

  "The peace," said Romek, and looked at Stark.

  "Ah," said Alderyk. "You think there might be trouble if Stark is brought to the Springfire."

  In a cold flat unflinching voice Romek said, "There will be worse trouble if he is not. You see the Swiftwing. All the clans of the Ochar are rousing for war, and this man is the cause. If he dies now in the Springfire, with the Keepers of the Lesser Hearths there to see it, then the threat will end."

  "But suppose," said Alderyk, "just suppose that we have decided to give him windfavor?"

  "You would not be so foolish," Romek said.

  "Wise Romek. Tell me why."

  "Because it is on the tribute of the Ochar, more than all the others, that you stay alive—and that tribute comes from the Wandsmen more than it does from us." The orange cloth hid Romek's face, but even so it was plain that a smile was on his mouth and that the smile was insolent. "No matter how the winds blow, the Ochar will be fed."

  "I see," said Alderyk. "And we will not?"

  Romek's hand made a sweeping gesture. "I didn't say that."

  "True, you didn't say it."

  "There can be no such talk between allies. Give us the man, Alderyk, and we'll see that the peace is kept."

  Stark held tight to Gerd's bristling neck on the one side and Grith's on the other.

  Wait. Wait . . .

  Alderyk stood up. In spite of his smallness he seemed to overtop the towering Ochar. He spoke to his people, calmly and without passion.

  "You have heard all that has passed here. We are given a choice, between peace and war, between starvation and the bounty of the Ochar. How do you choose, then? Which shall I give to Romek—Stark or the Swiftwing?"

  Dark wings clattered. Winds whirled around the cliffs, reached out to catch at Romek's cloak and hood and tear away his veil so that he stood naked-faced, white and shamed before them all.

  "Give him the Swiftwing!"

  Alderyk motioned to the Tarf, which moved forward and held out its arm.

  Romek took the Swiftwing. With steady fingers he undid the thong that held the bird's feet and loosed the wrapping from its head. It opened eyes like two red stars and looked at him and cried out, "War!"

  "Yes," said Romek softly. "War."

  He flung the bird upward. It took the air, beating powerfully, circling higher and higher until it gained the sunlight and was gone.

  Alderyk said, "From this day the Place of Winds is barred to the Ochar. Now go."

  Romek turned and stalked out with his men.

  "Come here," Alderyk said to Stark, and sat again upon the high seat, his face hard and grim. "We too have watched the north close in. We have had our eyes on Yurunna and the growing insolence of the Ochar. We lacked two things, strength and a leader. You offer us both. So we gamble, because if we do not we shall become the cut dogs of the Wandsmen even as the Ochar have." His yellow gaze struck deep into Stark, and a shiver of air ran whirling up the stony curves of the seat. "We gamble, Stark. Let us hope we don't lose."

  They waited until the yellow Qard came in, just before sundown. That night, while torches flared and light spilled from all the high doorways of the Fallarin, Stark was blooded war chief of the Lesser Hearths of Kheb, mingling his blood with the blood of the Hearth-Keepers, beginning with Ildann, and sprinkling a little more on the stones for Old Sun. Alderyk held the knife. When all else was done, he made a slash in the dark fur of his own wrist and marked Stark's forehead with a purling line.

  "I give you windfavor. May you use it well."

  Off to one side, where he had been brought for safekeeping, Jofr crouched and hugged his knees and wept with rage and hate.

  A little more than three weeks later, duly ransomed, he sat beside his father on the crest of a long dune and saw what made him forget his tears.

  Splashed across the dun landscape below, in patches of faded color, was an army, mounted, glittering with spears. The patches of color were purple and red and brown. One-half of the six Lesser Hearths.

  Spread out along the dune, a great mass of burnt orange, was the army of the Ochar. Even the inexperienced eyes of a boy on his first warfaring could see that the extent of the orange line was double that of the purple and red and brown together.

  Jofr laughed and drummed his heels on the flanks of his mount.

  Farther away on that height Gelmar of Skeg looked down and spoke to Romek.

  "Good. The First-Come have done well." He was robed and hooded like an Ochar, having no wish to draw attention to himself.

  "We could always move more quickly than that rabble," said Romek, and added contemptuously, "So far, the Fallarin have done nothing to hinder us. Perhaps they have been remembering wher
e their interests lie." He sought out the distant purple banner that marked Ildann's place in the line of battle that was being formed out of the interrupted march. "The man Stark will be there, most likely."

  But Stark was nowhere in that army.

  14

  Stark was herding Runners.

  After he was blooded, he had let the Hooded Men do what they would at the ceremony of the Spring-fire, taking no part in it himself. The Ochar had left in a tremendous hurry. Romek would be setting about organizing his army as swiftly as possible. Stark had talked strategy with the Fallarin. During those talks he had come to the conclusion that the Fallarin had acquired, down through the centuries, a streak of madness.

  He had sent the Hearth-Keepers away from the Place of Winds to gather their men as quickly as they might, knowing even then that the Ochar, who had begun mustering days before and were less widely scattered, would be ready in force sooner than they could be no matter how they ran. Purple Hann, brown Marag and red Kref could gather most quickly. The other three Hearths were more distant.

  By common consent a rendezvous was chosen, a place called the Tears of Lek, a salt lake not far above Yurunna.

  But it was certain, unless the Ochar had lost all their skill and Gelmar of Skeg all his cunning, that the army of the Lesser Hearths would not be permitted to join its several parts together at its leisure.

  Ildann said, "We three—Hann, Marag and Kref—being the nearest, will surely bear the brunt. We're strong fighters and not afraid to die, but no amount of courage will stand off the Ochar for long."

  Alderyk smiled his sharp cruel smile, and the wings of the Fallarin beat up a laughing howl of wind.

  "We'll see to it that you have help." And Stark had stroked Gerd's ugly head and nodded, hoping that he was not lying. Because if he was, the fierce-eyed chiefs would be leading their people to certain death, in his name.

  So now, like a careful shepherd, Stark moved across the dunes on the broad track of the Ochar host; and the Northhounds ran free, bounding at the edges of the stinking, tattered and thoroughly cowed flock, flicking them with the lash of terror.