A Forthcoming Wizard

by Jody Lynn Nye

  Tildi took a big breath to shout, but something clapped over her mouth. She gasped as she saw a huge male wearing leather gauntlets hold her tightly. He was clad in a dark green tunic over sable fur.

  Rin twisted to see what had touched her side. “Let her go!” she shouted. She reared, trying to dislodge the werewolf. Her hooves skidded on the slope. Rin snapped the whip at him, but he dodged it.

  “Not you,” he said. His blazing eyes bored into Tildi’s. “Get down. Run! Run! Go now!”

  Before she could wind the whip up for a second blow, he disappeared into the fog with the speed of thought. Rin twisted to face her.

  “You heard him. I don’t intend to wait for a second invitation.”

  “But what about our other friends?” Tildi asked.

  “They’ll have to fend for themselves,” Rin said grimly. “They’re well capable of it, I vow.” Without another word, she launched herself down the incline. Tildi could hardly stand the terrifying scenes that came and went as swiftly as she could blink. Around them, shapes surfaced in and out of the mist, knights and werewolves rolling over and over together. The humans flailed at their hairy attackers with mace and knife. The lycanthropes gnawed at mailed shoulders and necks. Red blood poured over the blue-and-white-clad breast of a knight lying on his back. He was dead. Tildi couldn’t recognize his face, so contorted was it with fear and pain. Two werewolves lay not far from him, huddles of fur on the clay-smeared earth.

  “I’ll get you across the river,” Rin promised. Her hooves thudded on the slippery ground. A woman screamed just a few feet from them.

  “No! Not the bridge!” Tildi listened. She swung off Rin’s back and used her hovering charm to let herself lightly to the ground.

  “What are you doing?” Rin twisted around and reached for her. “You could be killed!”

  Tildi eluded the Windmane’s grasp.

  “Irithe told me not to leave the ground. She wanted me to run south. Which way is that?”

  Rin threw up her head and sniffed the air. “The water is that way,” she said, pointing to their right. “Straight ahead.”

  “Hurry,” Tildi said.

  A werewolf somersaulted out of the mist, followed by a knight wielding a war hammer. It was Pedros. He blinked at Tildi.

  “Smallfolk, run! Save the book! Get to the abbess! She’s back there. No, you don’t!” he shouted as the werewolf leaped back, landing on his chest, rope in one hairy hand. Pedros rained down blows of the hammer on the lycanthrope’s back. “The Scholardom!” he yelled.

  Tildi’s eyes were blinded by tears as she dashed away. The two were lost in the swirling white, but she heard their grunts and cries of pain as they scored against each other. She wanted to launch herself into the air, to get away from the fighting, but she remembered Irithe’s warning not to leave the ground. She threw an arm over the book and ran, heedless of the twigs scoring her skin and slapping her in the chest.

  Another terrifying tableau met her eyes as she slipped sideways to avoid a thornbush. Romini lay on the ground on his face as a werewolf tied his legs together. Tildi retreated and ran around the other side of the bush. Her heavy boots made her clumsy. She bounced and bounded down the hill. Shapes loomed up at her, coarse shapes with many fingers reaching for her face. She threw up a hand to protect herself. To her amazement, green fire bloomed on her hand. She hurled it at the shape. Just before it touched, she saw that it was a bare tree. For a moment, the demon fire drove back the fog, showing her that the beclawed foe was nothing more than a dead tree.

  Too late, she groaned. The green flames consumed the twisted, naked branches in a twinkling.

  “Never do that again!” she shrieked aloud. What if it had been a living being? What if it had been one of the troubled tree-men cared for by the elves of Penbrake? She would have done murder! “Serafina! Where are you?”

  No answer from her master.

  “Serafina!” More howling and screaming resounded down the hill toward her. Tildi realized with horror that she was alone. She stopped and shouted at the mist. “Rin? Where are you?”

  A bellow that could have been Rin’s came down to her, followed by a chorus of sharp howls. Tildi was too terrified to do anything but break into a run again.

  Had the werewolves taken everyone? Was she alone now?

  “To me, knights!” A shape in white and blue fell into her path, measuring its length on the stony ground. It was the almoner Brouse, sword drawn. His lips were drawn back from his teeth, which were gritted in concentration. When he saw her, his mouth dropped open.

  “Smallfolk! Thank the Mother and Father.” He scrambled up. “Come with me! I will guard you!” He held out a hand to her.

  Tildi was ashamed to feel how grateful she was to be near one of the knights when all she had wanted to do for weeks was to get away from them, but there was no time to think about that. She didn’t want to be alone in the confusion. She ran to his side and huddled beside the split skirts of his habit that were splashed with mud and blood. The book stayed with her, pressing against her like a friendly cat.

  “They are inhuman beasts,” Brouse said, turning his head from side to side, listening. “Stay close to me, please. We must find our way across the bridge. The others will join us if they can, but we must get to the Scriptorium. We will be safe there. It is not far beyond the river. Hurry!”

  A howl drowned out his last words. It was so close that it felt as though the werewolf were right beside them. She clapped her hands to her ears, trying to block out the angry noise.

  “Follow me,” Brouse ordered. He produced a handful of blue fire, both for protection and illumination, and set off downhill at a run.

  Tildi ran through the thick whiteness, now becoming gray as the sun went down and the full moon rose. She kept low behind Brouse’s bulky, pale shape. It ducked and bobbed. She followed it, feeling as she had in the first days when she first had the book, removed from all things, all sensation. None of what was happening to her seemed to be real. She had become numb to the number of twigs that had pummeled her, the stones that slipped under her feet, the tops of the boots slapping against her shins, the harsh cries battering her ears. She had no idea which way south was. If the fog held, she would elude Brouse once they reached the river but before he could get her onto the bridge.

  Where were the horses? Where was Rin? Was she certain the werewolves were the allies that Irithe had spoken of, or was the peace between humans and their kin broken for some offense that had happened while she was in the north? Would the werewolves treat her as they did the humans? Did they see her as an ally against the knights, or would they see her as a collaborator?

  Suddenly the towering shape before her collapsed.

  “Oof!” Brouse grunted. Unable to stop herself, Tildi ran into his legs and tripped to the ground. She felt around her for the book. It was safe. It hovered over her head. Another shape, long and thin, was in the air above her as well: a rope. Someone had slung it between two trees, to catch anyone who got this far. She and Brouse scrambled up. Suddenly they were surrounded by a press of bodies, five huge werewolves in long tunics. Too swiftly for Brouse to respond, they knocked him off his feet again and began to loop cords around his limbs.

  “Save yourself,” he gritted. Tildi backed away, the book following her.

  Something light touched her on the back of the neck, and she screamed. She tried to leap away, but hairy claws each greater than the size of her head, bigger than she had remembered from Olen’s council, larger than she had ever dreamed, clapped her between them. All the air was knocked out of her lungs. She gasped aloud.

  “Smallfolk!” Brouse shouted. They must have gagged him, because he spoke no more.

  Tildi struggled in the strong grasp. The green fire came to her hand as she prepared to defend herself to the death.

  One big paw clapped down on top of it, and it went out. Tildi gaped up at her captor.

  “Not necessary, little sister,” he said in a voice deeper
than the bowels of the earth. “I am a friend. Irithe told me not to let you reveal all your secrets. Now, come!”

  The paws lifted her off the ground and wrapped her up in one massive arm. Long black fur blotted out her sight of the fog.

  Chapter Eleven

  he fog hid all but vague shapes. Magpie whirled on his heel, sword drawn. It felt as if they were all drowning in grayness. It was unnatural. He couldn’t see more than an arm’s length ahead of him. If the rain had been bad for visibility, this was ten times worse. How had the weather changed so swiftly? He had been knocked off his mare several yards back, and he couldn’t see her in all the haze.

  “Tessera!” he shouted.

  Her answering whinny sounded more like a scream than a reply. He called again, hoping he could figure out where she was.

  The cries and shouting of the knights at bay seemed at once adjacent and far away from him. Two figures, one dark and one light, wrestled together a couple of yards downslope. He dashed down to help, and lost his footing. By the time he tumbled into the place where he had seen them, the opponents were gone. All that remained was churned-up wet earth with boot prints and long footmarks with pinpricks before the toes to indicate sharp claws. He knew that cast of footprint!

  Another shape hurtled past him, hurrying downhill, this time close enough for him to see the long snout and thick fur pelt. His guess was confirmed. They were werewolves. What were they doing here so far from their home in the south, or any of the trading ports along the river?

  A long snout emerged from the heavy fog close to his face. Magpie leaped backward and slashed with his sword. The werewolf ducked underneath the blade and came up within his guard. Father, but they were fast! It snapped a loop of rope off its belt and flexed it in both hands. The two of them moved around one another. Magpie thrust his sword at it. The werewolf dodged in and tried to catch his sword hand in its rope. Magpie countered by advancing into its guard. He threw all his weight into its chest. It toppled off balance and tried to sidestep. He swept a leg underneath its feet. Surprised, it fell backward. As he dove for it, it rolled away from him and escaped into the enveloping mist.

  He had not succeeded in striking it. Why had it fled? What were they doing here? Had they mistaken the party for someone else?

  He heard the sound of grunting and scuffling near him. For a moment, the fog parted enough for him to see two large lycanthropes hustling a longlegged knight down the slope. The man was bound tightly with darkcolored ropes, and a rag was stuffed in his mouth. Magpie bounded after them, but the ground was too wet for him to move fast. He slid and came down hard on one knee. The fog closed again, leaving him unable to determine any direction except downhill. He picked himself up and wiped the mud from his palms onto his already sodden trousers.

  The rising moon lit the fog with an eerie radiance, making it even harder to see. The sounds of battle were everywhere. Something was different, he realized, something odd. He looked down at his chest. Then it struck him: there were no runes. The silvery words he’d become accustomed to seeing day after day were gone. That could be for only one reason.

  “Tildi!” he shouted. Where was the girl? The book followed her like a hound. Where she went, it went. Had these raiders carried her off?

  There was a cry of answer, but such a stentorian bellow couldn’t have come from the smallfolk girl’s throat.

  “Let me go, you monsters!”

  Magpie whirled. Another knight, the woman he knew as Vreia, stumbled into view. One of her wrists was caught fast in a loop of rope, but she was striking out with the mace in her other hand. A band of werewolves scrambled to surround her, avoiding the random blows.

  “Prince, aid me!” she cried.

  As soon as they saw him, two of the werewolves dragged their prey back into the fog, and the rest came after him. Magpie backed away, sword raised in a position of guard. He came up against a thornbush. It was as good as having an ally watching his back. The werewolves feinted, ropes at the ready.

  A gust of wind from downhill swept a curtain of fog into their midst. Magpie blinked at the cloudy whiteness, trying to keep his foes in sight. They slunk in and out of sight, so the few looked like an entire host. He turned from side to side.

  “Wait!” he cried. “We are friends.” He switched to their language, a harsh guttural plaint. “I have traded with you many times in peace.”

  “Who is that?” a voice called back in the same language.

  “Pay no attention,” a second voice shouted. Magpie recognized it as female. “Get all the humans!”

  “But I mean you no harm!”

  Hands thrust through the thornbush at his back and seized him around the neck and waist. Magpie tried to twist away. His natural impulse to recoil from the twigs hitting his face caused him to close his eyes. The moment was just long enough for the others to swarm him. Several hairy arms pushed his upward. He gasped as something sharp pressed into his wrist. He felt his sword fall from a suddenly nerveless hand. Loops of rope seemed to be everywhere. He kicked and writhed, determined not to let them take him.

  “Do not move, or it will be worse for you,” a hairy face growled at him.

  In no time he was unable to move, even if he wanted to. The werewolves had him trussed up like a pig for the spit with knots that would not slip. He fought to keep them from thrusting a wad of linen into his mouth, but one put a sharp thumbnail into the joint of his jaw. It opened just enough for them to wrench his mouth open. While he tried to spit out the gag, they tied another piece of cloth around it to keep him from doing so. Thankfully the linen was clean. It tasted of nothing but fresh dye. Another cloth was tied around his eyes.

  With amazing strength, two slightly built lycanthropes hoisted him to their shoulders and carried him downhill. His head rested upon the hairy shoulder of one of his bearers, so it was jogged roughly with every pace. He felt cloth underneath his cheek, not fur. Perhaps, he mused, he could loosen his blindfold by rubbing it against the shoulder of the werewolf’s tunic at each bump. He tried nudging the cloth upward the next time he was jostled. Within a few steps, he could see perfectly under the edge of the blindfold. His captors were so intent upon their footing that they didn’t notice.

  Turning away from the river, they pushed through the thin switches of young willows to emerge in a natural hollow. At the foot of a tree about the same thickness as Magpie’s thigh, they dumped him to the ground, then hauled him up into a sitting position. Once he was firmly bound by his upper arms to the tree trunk, they untied his ankles and left him.

  “Prince Troubadour!” came an urgent whisper. Magpie twisted his neck, trying to see around the bole of the tree.

  It was Lakanta. The blond-braided trader had been tied to a stump of rock that protruded at an angle from the hilly ground. She had not been blindfolded. He wiggled the knot in the cloth against the bark at his back until the rest of the linen sash fell off, but he could not shift the gag at all. She raised her eyebrows at him.

  “Well, now, seems I’ll have to talk for the both of us. No trouble for me. Are you all right?”

  He nodded.

  “Have you seen any of the others? Do you know what became of Tildi and Rin?”

  He shook his head.

  “My apologies. I’ll try and keep to one question at a time—What was that?”

  A loud howl resounded from high up the bluff. They both turned to look in that direction, though they couldn’t see more than a few yards in the fog.

  “Well, well, this is a turn-up,” Lakanta said in a heavy whisper. “They haven’t done this to me since they drank some flux medicine I sold them, and it made things worse. How was I to know werewolves can’t tolerate poppy? I’ve never known them to take hostages, but they do take offense at the least little things that I’ve seen. I wonder what is the matter with them this time?”

  The silver mist roiled and tumbled. From it emerged a pack of eight or so young wolflings, led by a gray-coated, tall-eared female in a flowing robe t
hat had a slit from the waist down at the back to accommodate her thick tail. She pointed at them, and two adolescent males crawled forward on hands and feet. They sniffed Magpie up and down. He tried to assume an amiable posture, as best one could while bound and gagged. They left him, and investigated Lakanta. One of them turned to the robed female and let out a noise that was a combination of snort and sneeze.

  The female approached her. “Stone-woman.”

  “Moon-howler,” Lakanta replied courteously. “I was just passing through here. My name is Lakanta. No family name, no, thank you, if you don’t mind. I’m a trader.”

  “Private talk,” the leader, the female Magpie had heard before, snarled in hushed tones. “Keep your voice low. I am Patha Yelia. I’ve heard of a dwarf that trades among humans, but I thought it was a man.”

  “My husband,” Lakanta said promptly. “He’s dead or disappeared. I pray it’s the latter, but who knows? He always . . .”

  “Less chatter!” Patha snarled, putting a paw over the dwarf woman’s mouth. “I would as soon kill these blue-and-white monsters for the fear they put into my people. What are you doing with these humans? Briefly!” She let her paw up.

  “Some of them are friends of mine,” Lakanta said. “Not all of them, if I must tell the truth.”

  Patha nodded. “It’s as we were told.” She snarled an order to the young ones. One produced a long, thin knife and slit the cord holding Lakanta to the finger of rock. The dwarf woman stood up and stretched her back. “Choose your friends and go. I will take you among the others. Wait, I must appear to treat you as a prisoner.” She produced a rope. Lakanta held out her wrists. Patha bound them.

  “Is there a little one here?” Lakanta asked. “A smallfolk girl. She’s the most important. I am concerned about her safety.”

  “Gone,” Patha said shortly.

  “Gone!” Magpie exclaimed. The gag squelched his outburst into a wordless groan. The others turned to look at him.

  “He’s my friend, too,” Lakanta said. “That’s why I talk so freely in front of him, though the skies know I talk freely in front of anyone.”