by Barb Hendee
No one ever interfered with its kind’s comings and goings.
Hkuan’duv signaled Kurhkâge to follow, leaving A’harhk’nis to guard the chute’s entrance. He rose and turned into the stony passage, but he had barely taken three silent steps when the majay-hì’s head reared again.
Its crystal blue eyes glinted in the dark space, and a low growl rolled down the stone chute.
Hkuan’duv froze, but the majay-hì tilted its head upward, and he followed its gaze.
A flicker, darker than the night sky, dropped down between the chute’s high walls.
Somewhere out the chute’s bottom, Chap heard the hiss of fallen snow driven by the wind. Then it stopped, too suddenly. Chap raised his head from Wynn’s coat.
Above him, a bird’s caw trailed out like a scream.
Chap lifted his eyes skyward in surprise. No bird could survive up here.
A black shadow dropped out of the night, darker than sky or stone. It passed high through the chute’s stone walls.
Chap felt a heat spread within him . . . on an urge to hunt. His heart pounded as his awareness filled with the presence of an undead. But as he traced the shadow’s passing, it took the shape of a large bird—perhaps a raven.
Wynn, get up!
She stirred, lifting her head to look about.
Another flicker dashed between the chute’s high walls in the shadow bird’s wake.
This one was not black. Muted in the blizzard, it was as white as the snow, and leaped between the chute’s sheer walls.
Chap’s hunting heat turned suddenly cold. He shook free of Wynn’s grasp, lunging out with his head high. He tried to spot that fleeting patch of white, and then he saw two tall figures at the chute’s bottom.
Their cloaks were covered by white cloth, but the corners were tied around their waists—across the gray-green tunics of the Anmaglâhk.
Hkuan’duv thought he saw a raven’s black silhouette. Its wings were so wide that one tip brushed the high stone wall. As it descended through the chute, he glimpsed the wall beyond it.
No, he saw through it—as if the mere shadow of the large bird had lifted from the stone and moved in the air. It dove straight for his face.
Hkuan’duv ducked at the last instant. As he turned, he never got out a word of warning.
The shadow shot straight through Kurhkâge’s upper chest.
Kurhkâge’s one wide eye did not blink as the black form flashed out of his back and arced up to vanish in the dark. His gaping mouth quivered as he stopped breathing and collapsed against the chute’s side.
Hkuan’duv snatched Kurhkâge’s cloak front and lunged for the chute’s lower opening.
What was this shadow of a raven?
Kurhkâge’s cloak tore in Hkuan’duv’s grip.
His arm snapped straight behind him, jarring his shoulder. Loose stones made his foot slide, and he quickly shifted his balance. He glanced back to see what had snagged his companion, expecting a crack or the edge of a rock.
Hkuan’duv stared into a woman’s face, nearly as pallid as snow.
Not the one he tracked, the one called Magiere. All his senses sharpened in alarm.
Colorless crystalline irises stared at him from within eyes shaped like slanted teardrops—and they closed to menacing slits. Her oval face narrowed smoothly to the chin, like a hint of elven heritage. But those eyes were far too small below thin-swept black eyebrows that were not those of his people, not even those of a half-blood. She was human, but not of any race that Hkuan’duv had ever seen.
Wild obsidian hair dangled around her head and throat, hanging nearly to the chute floor, for she crouched sideways upon the sheer wall, anchored by one hand as if her nails could carve into the stone. Her narrow-limbed body was completely naked, yet she did not shiver in the freezing air. Her other delicate hand was wrapped tightly over Kurhkâge’s face, pinning his head to the chute’s wall.
Hkuan’duv released Kurhkâge and grabbed for a stiletto on his wrist. But his hand never reached the hilt.
The woman’s face wrinkled in a silent snarl as she spun down from the wall, and her small hand lashed out into his chest. His feet lifted from the chute’s floor as he hurtled back through the air.
Snowy ground and black sky spun before his eyes. Both stopped suddenly as he slammed down amid a spray of fallen snow. He penetrated through to frozen earth, and his shoulder and arm crushed against his side. He lay at the gully’s far side, a good distance from the chute’s opening.
Hkuan’duv’s chest ached as he rolled over, gasping.
The woman stepped into the open, her narrow feet sinking through the snow.
Wind whipped her long hair about in writhing black tendrils, exposing her throat. Hkuan’duv caught the metallic glint, thick and golden, of something hooked about her neck, and then his gaze caught on something else.
Her left forearm and hand were coated with dark red. She clutched a bloodied mass that dripped a spattered trail behind her.
A’harhk’nis circled out with both oversized curved blades in hand.
He was not tall for an’Cróan, but this feminine apparition would barely reach his collarbone. She crouched so deep and quickly that A’harhk’nis stalled in his first attack.
Desperate to help, Hkuan’duv struggled to all fours. His left arm gave way and he crumpled.
The white woman shot up from the snow directly before A’harhk’nis.
A’harhk’nis had barely reversed his blade’s swing when her free hand shot straight for his throat. His feet left the snow at that impact, and the white woman rose with him, falling upon him as he toppled.
Hkuan’duv saw her tiny mouth widen around fangs and jagged teeth. He tried to rise again as she drove her face into A’harhk’nis’s throat.
Fresh powder splashed around them. Hkuan’duv took only one step before the wind cleared the air. A head of whipping black hair snapped up amid settling snowy mist—and a wet tearing sound filled the gully.
Blood spattered from her mouth as she threw back her head.
With a crack of bone, her narrow arm whipped out, tossing a bulk too large for the red mass she had held. Cold sank through Hkuan’duv as he watched the object hit the gully wall.
It bounced with a mute thud. A shredded hood came loose from it, exposing locks of blond hair. Hkuan’duv watched A’harhk’nis’s head fall.
Runnels of blood flowed from the ragged neck stump to mar the snow.
The white woman still straddled A’harhk’nis’s torso. Blood ran from her jaws down across her small breasts. She ignored Hkuan’duv, simply staring at the red mass in her other hand. Thin steam rose from it in the cold air.
Somewhere in the dark space of the chute lay Kurhkâge’s body. Hkuan’duv steeled himself as the small woman stood and cast aside Kurhkâge’s heart.
What was this creature who felt no cold and slaughtered two of his own with so little effort? He tensed when she turned icy eyes on him—and a snarl sounded on the wind.
But not from her. She whirled the other way.
The majay-hì burst from the chute’s opening.
Hkuan’duv caught movement above, and a shadow dropped through the blizzard.
He threw himself over a mound of snow, and his injured shoulder grazed a boulder beneath the white covering. The shadow raven passed through the mound a hand’s length behind him, and he heard the majay-hì’s snarling snaps.
He did not wish to abandon the dog, but two of his companions had been slaughtered before either could strike once. He could not throw his life away. He had to live to fulfill his purpose and serve his people.
He had to run.
Wynn’s sight had barely cleared when Chap bounded down the chute. She braced against the cold wall and struggled up. By the time she hobbled down the loose stones, Chap had leaped out into the gully, but Wynn stalled at the chute’s bottom.
Something lay slumped against the wall.
She heard Chap’s snarls, but she hung there in the d
ark, staring at the body.
The tall elf’s one eye was locked open in perpetual shock, and his mouth gaped. There was only a mass of old scars where the other eye should have been. The front of his cloak was so stained, at first it was hard to see the hole surrounded with severed shards of his ribs amid his tunic’s shredded remains. He was covered in his own blood.
Wynn could not even cry out.
Run! I will find you.
Chap’s words echoed in her head. She lifted her gaze from the corpse and saw his forepaws strike a white figure from behind.
Chap’s adversary seemed like a white-cloaked companion of the corpse lying near Wynn. But then she saw that this person was much smaller.
The pale figure barely flinched as Chap collided with its back and pushed off, landing aside. The black-haired figure whirled, and a choked squeak escaped Wynn’s throat.
Naked and frail, the woman was no taller than Wynn, but her pallid face and torso were covered in blood. Chap darted at the woman, and her tiny mouth mirrored his snarl.
The woman had teeth as canine as Magiere’s whenever she sank too far into her dhampir nature. But this woman’s strange narrow-slitted eyes were colorless.
How could an undead exist here in these desolate peaks with no life to sustain it?
Wynn spotted another body at the woman’s feet. She barely made out the gray-green breeches and tunic, obscured in snow and more blood. And its head was gone.
Chap danced around the white woman, as if simply trying to keep her attention. She lunged at him again and again. Her narrow fingers were so quick that twice Wynn thought the woman had caught him.
Wynn could not leave Chap like this, but she could think of no way to help him.
The woman flashed forward, clawing at the dog. When he spun away behind her swing, she lashed in reverse and caught him with the back of her hand.
Chap’s silver-gray body shot across the gully with a yelp that ended when he slammed against the gully wall.
He slid down, his body pressing a hollow in the snow. He lay there coated in white powder and did not move.
Wynn opened her mouth to call to him.
Something flashed in front of her—and she stared directly into crystalline irises.
The white woman was so close that Wynn’s quick breaths shot vapor across her red-stained features. A narrow, blood-smeared hand latched around Wynn’s throat, slamming her shoulders against the chute’s wall.
Wynn sucked a breath and screamed, “No, do not!”
The tight grip vanished.
Wynn slumped down the wall, her feet slipping on loose stones as she cowered.
The white woman stood backed against the chute’s far wall, seeming to cower like Wynn, but not in fear.
Instead, she stared back at Wynn in pain and fury, with bloodied hands clamped over the sides of her head.
Chap drifted back to consciousness. His first breath made him whimper at the sharp twinge in his ribs.
This undead was like none he had hunted; she left him cold and terrorized inside. Her deceptively fragile form moved so quickly and with such power. Yet she had not fed on her prey—only slaughtered them, as if incensed that they dared cross her path.
Chap struggled to rise, and the pain sharpened in his chest. Then he heard Wynn scream.
“No, do not!”
He lunged for the chute’s opening and movement brought agony. When he rounded into the darker space, he pulled up short.
Wynn cowered alone at the chute’s left wall. And to the right stood the white woman, clutching her head.
No—covering her ears.
Chap’s instinct urged him to attack before this thing came back to its wits. But even uninjured, he had barely kept out of her reach and then failed. She had killed two anmaglâhk, and yet now she was backing away from Wynn.
Why?
The woman slowly dragged one hand down her cheek, fingertips smearing bloody lines below one oddly shaped eye. Her narrow fingertips came to rest on her small stained mouth.
Wynn tried to shift closer to Chap.
The white undead stepped forward so quickly she seemed to blur. He snarled at her as he shouted into Wynn’s thoughts.
Do not move!
Wynn froze, but she began shaking uncontrollably. The white woman held her place as her fingertips traced her own lips.
She did not even look at Chap but watched only Wynn’s face. Chap’s eyes flicked between the two of them.
Not Wynn’s face—but her mouth.
Had Wynn’s cry somehow hurt this thing? Or was there something else . . . the words Wynn spoke?
The white woman kept fingering her mouth as she stared at Wynn’s. The sound of the sage speaking had somehow stopped this undead.
Speak, he told Wynn, but she glanced toward him in confusion. Talk . . . it distracts her.
Wynn’s voice shook as she spoke. “We . . . are lost. We only want to find our way back.”
The woman flinched at every phrase. Her features wrinkled once, and then her expression shifted to startled fascination.
Chap lifted one paw to step closer to Wynn.
The white woman lunged before his paw settled. She slammed Wynn against the chute wall with a bloodied hand.
Chap went rigid. If he attacked now, Wynn would die. Then he heard another moaning caw from overhead.
Two shadow birds drifted high in the air above the chute—above this undead—hovering on their translucent wings. The woman’s thin black brows furrowed as she cocked her head like a crow. She studied him with sharpening suspicion in her delicate features—or was it recognition?
Chap tried to think amid the fear. He needed some way to hold the woman’s attention long enough to get Wynn free.
The woman whirled, gripped Wynn’s coat, and leaped up the chute as if the sage weighed nothing.
Chap lunged upward over the shifting stones.
Wynn!
When he reached the chute’s top, a harsh wind struck his face. Both Wynn and the white woman were gone.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Welstiel scried for Magiere two or three times a night. Keeping his group close to hers yet remaining undetected proved a tedious balance. He glanced east, away from the peaks. Dawn was still a way off, but throughout the night, the snowfall had increased to a blizzard. Welstiel tired of fighting the weather.
“We stop,” he called out.
Chane said nothing as he searched for a place to set up their shelter. Since entering these mountains, he had almost ceased speaking at all. Welstiel did not care—conversation was wasted effort. He waited for Chane to finish setting the tent around a hollow dug in the snow, then stepped in and pulled out the heavy steel circlet.
With a brief trace of his fingertips and a thrumming chant, Welstiel evoked the circlet’s power to conjure fire, but only at the lowest level. Its marks glowed and slowly filled the tent with warmth. The monks huddled close, their mad faces dull with relief. Chane crawled in last and reached his hands toward the circlet as Welstiel turned to leave.
