Frostflower and Thorn

by Phyllis Ann Karr

  Clopmule stopped, held up her short torch, squinted in Thorn’s direction, and grinned. Keeping her torch ready and her face toward Thorn, she leaned to one side and patted Dowl. “Good mutt. Hey! Good mutt.”

  It was a trap, of course. The other warriors were waiting in the tunnel. Maybe they had come down one of the entrances remaining between here and the outer wall, to take her from both directions, make sure she could not run out. (Did the blasted tunnel even come up beyond the wall, or had her damn Ladyship lied about that, too?) Clopmule was the bait for the trap, and—Smardon’s hooks! what could Thorn do but take the bait?

  Inmara’s warrior straightened, leering at Thorn. “Who the Hellbog sent you spying, comrade?”

  Clopmule did not recognize her? Thorn remembered she was wearing dyed hair, a fake scar, and a dirty face, but—Hellstink, the priestess had known her almost at once, and in thicker shadows than these.

  “Arun? Inraven?” Clopmule began the list of neighboring farmers. “Not Duneron? Na, he married her Ladyship’s sister. Well, don’t worry, comrade. His Reverence will blister it out of you.”

  Warriors’ God! Inmara had not sent the cow—Clopmule had just come limping down here alone to sacrifice. And if she thought Thorn had slipped in through the tunnel to spy for a raid, that meant the other end was still open. Pulling her finger out of the grub’s mouth, Thorn shifted him into her left arm. He lost no time screaming again where he had left off.

  “What the Hellstink do you have there?” said Clopmule. “A grub? Vuck’s claws, what’re you doing with a grub?”

  “I’m nobody’s damn spy.” Thorn tried to hoarsen her voice. Did Maldron allow his workers to buy and sell babies? “I’m bringing the brat in for a friend.”

  “Unh. That stableman’s sickly brat finally die? Well, you picked a Hell of a time to come messing around here with strange grubs to sell.” Clopmule seemed disappointed at missing a chance to catch a spy.

  Gods, thought Thorn, is the stupid bitch going to fall for it? Is there really some worker trying to replace a dead grub, or is this cow setting up another trap? “Grubs always pick a Hell of a time to come pushing out,” she said, stepping forward.

  Clopmule grunted again and stepped in front of her. “Well, let’s have a look at the little bugger.” She bent forward and pushed back the blanket with her crooked forefinger. “Damn, it’s ugly.”

  “Takes after its mother.” Thorn was easing Stabber out of his sheath. Now, while Clopmule was bending over the brat, would be the perfect time to punch a hole in her stomach.

  “Gods, that’s good stuff in the blankets,” said Clopmule. “Where the Hellbog did you steal blankets like—” She broke off and stepped back without warning, staring down again at the dog. “Hey! That the mutt—?”

  Thorn lunged, knife arm extended. Clopmule sidestepped and parried with the torch. Thorn retreated into the alcove, cursing. The brat squalled and wiggled in her left arm. The dog yelped and danced—it was anybody’s guess whether he would get in the way or keep clear.

  Clopmule planted herself medium-wide stance in the alcove entrance, transferred the torch to her left hand, and drew her sword. “Thorn, hey?”

  “Look, you bloody cow, I know you got it six days ago. I know you’re in no shape to—”

  “Wasp got it. Takes more than a greasefingers like you to get me in a vital spot.”

  Thorn studied Clopmule’s chest, the bustline smaller than she remembered, not bouncing…the damn cow was strapped in tight—she had to be hurting a Hell of a lot more than she let on. Give Clopmule this: the bitch was no whiner. “No,” said Thorn, “I guess it’d take a pretty damn long sword to get through all that fat.”

  Clopmule chuckled. “And that’s her Ladyship’s new brat, is it? Gods, his Reverence should give me a chance to put a couple of wires through you for what you did to me and Wasp.”

  Damn! thought Thorn. I need Slicer in my right hand, not Stabber. How do I change without giving Maldron’s cow an opening? Then she grinned. Clopmule would not dare rush her as long as she held the baby. Maybe the grub had its uses, after all! “And what’s his Reverence going to do to you if you hurt this brat while you’re trying to get me, Clopmule?”

  “If that stinking brat gets cut, it’ll be your trouble, not mine.”

  Probably the bitch was right. With everything else against her, Thorn would get the blame for anything that happened to the grub. But for all that, not even Clopmule might really be ready to see a baby slashed open. “Not that much extra skin off my lips,” said Thorn, “but how are you going to take her Ladyship’s look when you bring her baby back dead?”

  Thorn edged around slowly, aiming for the gap between Clopmule and the right-hand wall, keeping the grub between herself and Maldron’s warrior. She stayed as far back as she could, but the only way out was finally going to put her within easy reach of Clopmule’s sword. The most dangerous place would be at the opening: if Clopmule waited until just the right moment, she could crunch Thorn against the corner where tunnel and alcove walls joined. So far, Maldron’s cow had not made a move; but Thorn did not like the shape of her lips, and she might not be able to tell what Clopmule was planning until too late.…

  Fortunately, Clopmule lunged early. Thorn was not quite far enough to get rammed against the corner—she still had room to jump backwards. Her right elbow hit the sacrifice-ledge, going numb against the hard marble, but she held on to Stabber. The baby was yelling its guts out and the dog was barking its damn throat bloody, but for a moment Thorn had to keep her mind on Clopmule. Not until she was sure Maldron’s warrior was not going to follow up at once could she glance down at the brat. It wasn’t bleeding, and it couldn’t be squalling like this if it had connected with Clopmule’s sword. Maybe Maldron’s bitch did not give a damn whether or not the brat got hurt, but at least she did not seem to be aiming at it on purpose.

  Of course not. As long as Thorn held it, the grub was hampering her own movements, while Clopmule stayed free. Let the brat get killed, and Clopmule must know Thorn would fight like Bloodrastor First of Warriors. “Look, you bloody bitch, I’m going to put the grub down. No use letting him get hurt.”

  Clopmule leered. “Go right ahead, comrade.”

  She agreed too easily. Clopmule had never been any match for Thorn with a sword—especially now, when she was walking around with a half-healed slit in her breast and Thorn was desperate. “Truce until I get him down and stand clear of him?”

  “You’re a damn blasphemer and the gods sent me down here to catch you, Thorn. I’m not promising anything. But go ahead and put the grub down.”

  “Smardon’s fingernails up your bloody slot.”

  “Up yours.” Clopmule chuckled again. “I’m on the gods’ business. I think I’ll cut off your thumbs for my sacrifice tonight.”

  Maybe the damn cow was in favor with the gods—she had been keeping up her private sacrifices, probably nightly. Maybe this was a big divine trap being sprung on Thorn. Warriors’ God, thought the swordswoman, couldn’t You have found a better bitch to spring Your trap than this stinking cow?

  But you did not worry about such things in the middle of a fight. You just fought and hoped. Besides, if there was a God of the Sorceri, Thorn ought to have someone on her side. And…“Look, Clopmule, what happens between you and me is one thing, but how do you think the Birth Gods will like you if you slash a baby?”

  “How do you think they like you for getting the grub in my way?”

  Thorn adjusted her grip on Stabber. “I know you’re still hurting, Clopmule. You know and I know I can slice you to catfood in a fair fight. Let me go and save your slimy guts.”

  “Azkor’s claws in your eyes.” Clopmule did not shout it. She said it with a grin. “I told you, Thorn, the Warriors’ God is making me a gift of you. Now put the damn grub down.” She waved her torch. Thorn remembered, uselessly, her dream about fighting with a flame on the tip of her sword. Hellstink, she would settle for having Slicer in her righ
t hand.

  “All right, Thorn, go on holding the damn grub if you want,” Clopmule went on, “and we’ll stand here until Snaste and Redbone come down to sacrifice at dawn.”

  Maybe it was as well Clopmule had not let her walk out. The cow would have limped off for reinforcements. Thorn backed up slowly. She had to go ahead and risk putting the brat down. Where would be the safest place? Right beneath the God’s niche? Too close to the bloody brazier—if it got knocked over, she would smell roasted baby. Gods, it was hard to concentrate with that bloody cow grinning at her! Right beneath the sacrifice ledge, that would be best. The ledge to her right, so if she got Clopmule she could grab him up again on the way out.

  She squatted slowly, keeping her gaze on Clopmule. Fourteen to thirteen Maldron’s cow would jump before Thorn had a chance to get Slicer into her fist.

  The dog trotted over, sniffing at the grub. Maybe it was not all that stupid. It seemed to understand the brat needed protection. Too bad the mongrel was more likely to get in the way than protect it.

  Clopmule did not seem to be getting ready for a lunge. Maybe she was so confident in the God’s favor that she actually intended to let Thorn put the brat down and move away. Thorn dropped her glance for about a heartbeat to make sure she had the grub safely on the floor.

  Dowl yelped. Thorn looked up and saw Clopmule springing at her.

  She pulled her arm out from under the grub and rolled. Clopmule didn’t change direction—coming too fast. Damn! How to reach her before—

  There was a crash and something hot hit Thorn’s leg. She struck it away—it was the torch—and rolled again, sat, and slapped the last sparks out of her trousers. It hurt like Hell. The dog was howling…or was it the baby…or both?

  The torch was on the floor, still rolling a little, still burning. Clopmule had fallen full length beneath the sacrifice ledge. She lay quiet—Gods! Right on top of dog and baby! But Thorn could see no movement. Might be a trick. Thorn got the torch and crawled slowly over on hands and knees.

  It was no trick. Clopmule might be alive, but not by much. Thorn poked her lower leg with the torch, and there was no reaction.

  Thorn put Stabber back in his sheath, slapped out the sparks that were taking hold in Clopmule’s pants, and crawled on. She still could not tell who was howling…maybe it was only in her own brain…and she was not sure she wanted to look.

  She looked.

  The brat was yowling full force, its grubby face nothing but open mouth and little screwed-up red wrinkles. Clopmule’s arm had fallen across its body…gods! Only a hand’s-length closer, and her sword, still clutched in her hand, would have hit the grub. It had pushed one of its arms out from the blankets and was hitting its tiny hand up and down against Clopmule’s arm.

  “Make a fist, you stupid grub, a fist,” muttered Thorn, reaching down and trying to curl its fingers up against its palm.

  Maybe the dog had been howling before, but he was whining now. He was caught somehow between Clopmule’s shoulder and the wall, looking at Thorn as if she could tell him how to get out without stepping on the baby. “All right, just a moment, you damn mutt,” said Thorn. “Like this, grub. Watch.” Making a fist, she pounded Clopmule’s arm off the baby. “Just a little bit longer, dog.” She scooped up the grub and scuffled backwards with it, until she could stand without hitting the ledge. “Now.”

  Dowl was already wiggling out. He shook himself, padded over to Thorn, and stood looking up at her and whining. She glanced at him, stooped, and held the torch closer. The dog’s left side had a splotch of blood as big around as a melon.

  Gods! But what was the mongrel doing walking around, then? Thorn could not see anything falling out, and Clopmule’s sword had landed far enough away from the dog. Unless it swiped him on the way past.

  She stepped forward and had a look at the ledge. Blood. Not a lot, but enough. She turned Clopmule over with her foot. More blood, a lot more. The bitch must have knocked her head against the ledge. Her breast wound had popped open again, too, to judge by the dark stain spreading on her tunic.

  “I guess that tells us whose damn side the Warriors’ God is on,” muttered Thorn.

  After putting the grub down again at a safe distance, she rubbed her hand over Dowl’s side. He did not flinch, and she did not feel any raw flesh or new blood leaking up from beneath the hair…no, the wetness was all on the surface, all right. She wiped her hand on Clopmule’s trousers.

  It seemed impious to leave so much blood on the sacrifice ledge, the shrine mosaics, and floor. But Maldron’s warriors would be able to clean it up more thoroughly than Thorn could do the job now. Her candle was still burning where she had left it on the floor near the brazier. She picked it up, shook it out, and stuck it through her belt. It would be useful if Clopmule’s torch burned low.

  The grub had stopped crying and seemed half asleep, but he batted his arm again when she bent over him. She tucked the arm back beneath the blankets. She could not get them folded the way Inmara had, but she guessed they would be snug enough for a feisty brat like hers.

  “You little bugger,” she said, scooping him up again. “Too bad you weren’t a she. Quite a warrior we could have made out of you.”

  Maybe Frost had arranged the damn thing’s sex somehow, when she grew it that afternoon in the weavers’ cellar, to make sure it could not be a warrior. Poor, sneaky little bitch of a sorceress…would she still be alive by the time Thorn got back?

  The dog was licking Clopmule’s face. “Come on, you stinking mutt,” said Thorn. She had not cared all that much when Dowl took his time following her out of Inmara’s room, but it disgusted her to watch the stupid animal fuss with Clopmule. “Come on, you bloody turd. Don’t you want to see your sorceress again? Frostflower?”

  Whether he recognized the name, or whether he just wanted to keep close to the light, he padded after Thorn immediately. She studied no more wall mosaics; when they passed another alcove, she did not even turn her head. When she guessed she should be getting close to the wall, she went up another side opening. The clouds seemed to have blown over, but the stars were faint. It was getting close to dawn. For a moment Thorn considered setting fire to the nearest grain field, giving Maldron something else to worry about besides chasing her. But some things you did not think of doing even if you were the slimiest of the scum—to burn a field, to destroy food, would be to outrage all the gods and goddesses and a few of the demons. Thorn returned to the tunnel and did not surface again until it narrowed, slanted up, and led her out into the woods forty or fifty paces on the other side of the wall.

  The opening was hidden in the middle of a thicket. While Thorn extinguished the last efforts of the torch by rolling it on the tunnel’s earth-covered ramp, Dowl snuffled around and located a space between two bushes. Pulling the blankets down over the grub’s face to protect it from prickles, Thorn shoved her way out, paused to make sure of her bearings, and hurled the dead torch to the north. She heard it clunk against a tree somewhere; she hoped, if the searchers came through the tunnel, they would find it and think she was heading for Gammer’s Oak, the Rockroots, or All Roads West.

  Keeping the sun ahead of her, she headed for the river. She had learned how to avoid leaving a trail—she would be rotting off a gibbet by now otherwise—but if the sky clouded over she still risked going in circles in the damn woods. Following the Glant would take longer than cutting southwest across Beldrise and Weldervrise, but only if she could keep from getting lost. She would not be able to sneak into town before dark, anyway.

  The brat was leaking through its damn blankets. Why the Hell had the priestess forgotten to give Thorn a few score extra breechcloths? Maybe she was afraid the swordswoman could not have wrapped them around the grub’s stinking butt without breaking its legs. For a long time in the middle of the day the little bugger howled—good thing nobody else was traveling the Glant Wheelpath. Thorn found a few wild strawberries and tried mashing them and putting them into the grub’s mouth, but a
ll she got was messy fingers. She would not risk drugging it with any other wild berries, and she was damned if she was going to let it suck her tit. Nothing there, anyway. So it would have to go hungry for a while. That gave it something in common with its mother. At last Thorn put her sword away and stuck the tip of her right little finger into the grub’s mouth, holding it there as she walked along. If it was fooled, it was stupider than a pair of blank dice; but eventually it seemed to accept the situation of empty stomach, wet blankets, and mouth full of mother’s finger. It squirmed itself into a knot it apparently found comfortable, stopped sucking, coughed out the fingertip, and went to sleep. “You tough little bastard,” muttered the warrior, glad to get back the use of her hand.

  The western sky was still glowing when they came in sight of Straight Road. Thorn crouched at the edge of the forest until the first stars were out, then made her way to the road, feeling each step before she put her foot down. She carried the grub in both arms now. Like the mongrel, she was too damn tired to do anything but keep putting one foot down in front of the other. It was more darkness and luck, or maybe the favor of the gods, that got them the rest of the way to Frog-in-the-Millstone unobserved.

  She went down the outside stone steps almost carelessly and tapped at the cellar door. Would Frostflower be awake? She tapped again, more loudly, and leaned against the door. Dowl started to whine.

  Eventually Thorn felt the wood shake, heard the bolt being drawn back. Coming out of a hurting, dozing stupor, she stood away from the door. Yarn opened it cautiously and scrutinized her for a moment, then stepped aside to let her come in. Except for the small lamp in the weaver-woman’s hand, the cellar was unlit. Thorn looked at the place where Frostflower had been bedded. The shadows seemed empty.

  Yarn closed the door and rebolted it before speaking. “She is upstairs. She is resting quietly, and seems no weaker.”

  Somewhere on the floor above, a dog was barking. Dowl thrashed his tail and replied. “Shhh!” said Yarn, bending to catch his muzzle.