The Errantry of Bantam Flyn (The Autumn's Fall Saga)

by Jonathan French

  Fafnir had already begun the trek across the barrow mound, once again leaving them behind.

  “Are you well, Master Loamtoes?” Ingelbert asked.

  Deglan rubbed his throat and tried to grin. “I once had a delivering mother clamp her thighs around my head. Her hold was tighter, believe me.”

  For the first time, Ingelbert beat Flyn and Ulfrun to laughter. It was forced, the child of fear and guilt, out of place in the surrounding reek, but Ingelbert did not care. He needed to dispel whatever merciless lethargy had seeped into his heart and guard against its return.

  They left the Fatwood by the route they came, finding the sleds waiting for them, along with the porters and Hakeswaith.

  “So you managed to survive, eh stunty?” the ugly whaler jeered at Deglan.

  “Be comforted,” the gnome said wearily, slumping down on one of the sleds. “It was a near thing.”

  Fafnir was already deep in conversation with Skrauti by the time they arrived. The Chain Maker was agitated and insistent, while Skrauti appeared to offer resistance, though his manner was placating. Ingelbert did not bother to listen in.

  “Fafnir,” he interrupted, keeping the anger from his voice, but allowing no timidity either. All turned to look at him. “No more dworgmál. Either speak so Flyn and Deglan can understand, or not at all.”

  The runecaster eyed him curiously for a moment, then gave a slight bow in his direction.

  “As you say, Master Crane. I was simply telling my followers where we are next bound.”

  “This man who cuts down the Warden Trees,” Flyn said, his tone insistent. “Who is he? What grievance does he bear the dwarrow?”

  Fafnir took a deep breath and Ingelbert thought he saw the dwarf throw a quick, guilty glance in Deglan's direction. “I have sought those foretold in the augury a long time. And as I told you on Skagen, many were discovered that gave me hope. Arngrim Crow Shoulders is the descendant of one such man. I do not remember now if it was his sire or grandsire, the generations of man are too brief for me to recall. Crow Shoulders was but a babe, that I know. His forebear fit the augury.”

  “Mortal and shunned,” Ingelbert recited, his perfect memory not allowing him to keep silent. “Friend to folk Fae. Though weak he seems, ever on his shoulder, winged and deathless, a watcher will sit.”

  “Just so,” Fafnir said. “Tyrfing was his name, a tall man, but not overly strong for one born in Middangeard. His own people were wary of him, for he had a kinship with the valrôka, the talking crows who inhabit this land. These birds are far more canny than any animal, understanding the speech of man and dwarf. To the fjordmen, they are a dread omen and not to be trusted, but never was Tyrfing seen without at least one of the valrôka perched on his shoulder, whispering in his ear. This earned him the mantle Crow Shoulders and the scorn of his neighbors. I saw much potential within him. Though he had not the friendship of the Fae as the augury predicted, centuries of searching had taught me that not all things exist for a man in his present, so I waited to see if his future delivered a fellowship with any of the immortals from the Source Isle. Steel I have wrought calls to me and so I am able to easily find those who bear my blades. I gifted Tyrfing with a weapon of my own making and left him in the hands of fate, so that I could continue my search.

  “It was many years before I returned to Middangeard and found he had died a pauper, the sword I gave him now in the hands of his heir. Arngrim was barely out of boyhood, but informed me of his sire's demise with a hatred long matured. Tyrfing had spent his final years as a braggart, pitifully proclaiming to all who would listen that he was the chosen man of a dwarf wizard and he would one day embark on a great geis and return with vast riches. Tyrfing descended into drunkenness and madness, waving his dwarf-forged sword around and talking to his birds. I never told Tyrfing of the quest, but the valrôka are cunning and must have sensed my purpose. I do not know why they tempted the man with stories of glory and power. Perhaps they were trying to goad him to greatness or maybe they simply toyed with him for their own amusement. His kinship with the birds already distanced him from his people, but his ravings turned he and his family into outcasts. Though his children were near starving, Tyrfing would not give up the sword, holding onto it jealously until it fell from his withered fingers on his deathbed.

  “Arngrim took up the blade, vowing to use it to restore his kith. He killed the valrôka that continued to perch on Tyrfing's corpse and hunted the birds with a vengeance from that day forth. When I met the lad he already wore the makings of the cloak of feathers which caused him to retain his predecessor's name. He told me he would see me pay for the ruination of his kin, for the mother and sisters who went to their funeral pyres with empty bellies. As this youth spoke his blood oath, I saw the man he would become. Tyrfing Crow Shoulders had been a man worthy of derision, Arngrim Crow Shoulders would swiftly become one to fear. I should have slain him then.”

  “Why did you not?” Ingelbert asked, his curiosity sounding cold to his own ears.

  “You wish me to say I spared him because he was still a stripling?” Fafnir replied with a small snort of self-deprecation. “No. That was not the source of my mercy. It was the quest. Always the quest. I thought Arngrim would prove to be the man Tyrfing was not, the one to fulfill the augury. So I left him alive with the sword in his possession. Now, he pursues the revenge he swore would be his and my people pay for my failures.”

  “The boy is now a man,” Ulfrun said. “Time to bring him a thunderhead of war. Tutor him in the ways of vengeance.”

  Skrauti and the other dwarrow porters voiced assent, but Fafnir held up a hand, calming them. “Arngrim will know my displeasure for what he has done. The wrath of the dwarrow is terrible and we shall visit it upon him. First, there is a more pressing task before us.”

  “And that is?” Flyn asked bluntly.

  Fafnir gestured to the north. “The vættir from the Fatwood barrow are on the march. They must not be permitted to reach the Corpse Eater. So many to feed upon will only make her stronger. They must be hunted down and destroyed.”

  “So many,” Flyn repeated, frowning. “There are twelve of us. How many wights escaped the barrow?”

  The Chain Maker met the knight's gaze squarely before answering. “At least a thousand.”

  Ingelbert felt the blood drain from his face. To the coburn's credit, Bantam Flyn did not so much as blink. Deglan was disturbingly silent.

  It was Hakeswaith who finally spoke. “Impossible.”

  “Without help, yes,” Fafnir agreed. “But there are some who already stalk the vættir. Some with whom we might ally.”

  “And be forever sullied by such an alliance!” Skrauti said with passion, but Fafnir silenced him with a look.

  “Could we not get ahead of the wights,” Flyn suggested. “Reach the Corpse Eater before they do and slay her?”

  “The Corpse Eater dwells many leagues to the north, Bantam Flyn,” Fafnir replied. “The vættir do not rest. They pause only to kill and there will be little prey for them in this remote country. We cannot out-pace them. Even now, catching up will be difficult.”

  Deglan nodded in Skrauti's direction. “Your servant there seems put out. Who are these hunters he would rather not have as friends?”

  Fafnir took a deep breath. “We dwarrow have our outcasts, the same as man. We refuse to name them, but I believe the giants call them—”

  “Bone Chewers,” Ulfrun finished for him, curling her lip.

  “They are the most reviled of my people,” Fafnir went on. “Rightly viewed as dangerous madmen and guilty of irredeemable wrongs. A deranged cult, they are thankfully few, but none so skilled in dealing with the vættir. They pursue them relentlessly, almost as tireless as their prey, for which they ever hunger. For you see, like the Corpse Eater herself, these most twisted of my kindred have attained great power by consuming the flesh of our dead.”

  NINETEEN

  Deglan came to love and loath the sleds. The first days in M
iddangeard, he tried to refrain from riding unless absolutely necessary, and for only long enough to regain some strength, a practice which quickly spiraled into a private torture. He would trudge through the increasingly impossible drifts, his legs screaming in protest as they quivered into uselessness, all the while yearning to be drug along with the baggage. Then, inevitably, came the sinking moment when he had to call a halt, his pride ground to dust by the snow, save that last furious kernel which wailed as he clambered wearily aboard the nearest sled. The dwarrow porters never said anything, and Deglan tried to comfort himself with the delusion that they were secretly grateful for the momentary pauses. Toadshit, of course. He was extra weight for the pair that was saddled with him. No matter. All he cared about was the sled. Each was a sanctuary and a cage, a means of deliverance and a source of shame.

  Now, he always rode. It was simpler to endure the daily protracted feeling of weakness than repeatedly admit that the land had bested him. The dwarrow were not much taller than he, but the breadth of their bodies nearly equaled their height and they possessed a depth of seemingly limitless endurance. Deglan doubted even the heartiest gnome could manage the wilds of Middangeard. And it seemed all of Middangeard was wilderness.

  He had lost track of the exact number of days since they left the longship, his memory not aided by the brevity of sunlight in this permanent winter. He guessed they were nearing a week with no sign of settlement. Deglan felt that was fortunate, for the quarry they tracked would destroy any living thing in its path. He was no loremaster on the subject of wights, but he knew they were dangerous in ones and twos, a thousand was a threat too terrible to measure.

  Yet Fafnir was determined to catch them.

  The path of the vættir was not difficult to follow. A broad swath of plowed snow led away from the northern edge of the Fatwood, a laceration upon the white so deep that the consistent flurries did little to mend it. Fafnir had them travel within the furrow, using the trail blazed by countless lifeless feet to give speed to their pursuit. Ulfrun would often scout ahead, her long, powerful legs transporting her miles away from the rest of the group. She always returned before nightfall, impressively, at a run. One deep breath was all the giantess ever seemed to need to recover from such exertion before she would report to Fafnir.

  The terrain ahead.

  The best place to camp.

  And no sign of the wights.

  This unchanging report was the end to every tedious day of travel. Deglan's world shrunk to the motion of the sled, the howling wind and the narrow view from beneath his hood, which was little more than the backs of two dwarrow laboring against a field of endless white. He tried to refrain from sleeping, to avoid further fueling the notion that he was a babe that needed caring for, but the boredom often lulled him into semi-consciousness.

  At their nightly camps he made vain attempts to be of service, insisting on checking Ingelbert's feet, but ever since Fafnir worked his Magic the man suffered no more ill-effects from the cold. Hakeswaith too had received aid from the wizard's runestones, not that he would let Deglan tend him for any reason. The ugly sea-dog could be bleeding to death and never allow a Fae to touch him. Just as well. Let the bastard die out of spite if it came to it. As for the rest of the company, they were a giant, a coburn and a bunch of dwarrow. None needed his assistance to remain hale.

  Deglan hated admitting it, even inwardly, but there might have been some truth in Fafnir's claims that the coburn were conceived in Middangeard. Flyn had adapted quickly to the harsh climes, his feathers puffing out against the wind beneath his coat and cloak. Of course, the coburn were ever a hardy breed, and Flyn especially had more vigor than brains. The opposite could be said of Ingelbert Crane, but his gawky form hid a stunning endurance and he grew stronger by the day. It was not Deglan's imagination either. For too many centuries he had watched humans suffer infirmity not to perceive a definitive improvement in the normally tenuous chronicler. And Ingelbert's body was not the only thing that had steeled itself. Deglan had almost barked an approving laugh when Crane scolded Fafnir about speaking the dwarrow tongue, but his throat had been too sore. He was also less inclined to goad the dwarf.

  The Chain Maker had almost killed him.

  After the attack, Flyn would have quit this foolhardy quest if Deglan had asked him to. He loved the strutting rascal for that, though he would never tell him so. The end of their involvement in this blasted venture would have been welcome, but Deglan was not fool enough to further risk the runecaster's ire. Through the fog of strangulation, he had learned a frightening truth. Flyn could not overpower the dwarf. Deglan wondered if even Ulfrun could have in that moment. The giantess had spoken to Fafnir, but it was not her words that saved Deglan's life. No, Fafnir chose to let him go. Through dimming eyes Deglan had seen it in the dwarf's face. Mercy had been granted, not coerced.

  Perhaps the wizard knew his chosen champions would disband if he squeezed the life from Deglan. Perhaps he had simply come to his senses, seen past his anger. It was not the first time Deglan's mouth had invoked the wrath of another. It was not even the first time his own words had put his life in danger. For unknown reasons, Fafnir decided to spare him and somehow Deglan found that more disturbing than the memory of the dwarf's aggression. Would the wizard be so inclined to mercy if they tried to abandon his foretold quest? If his precious augury began to unravel around him? Could Crane or Flyn or even Ulfrun do anything to oppose him should it come to a confrontation? The pondering of each of these questions kept Deglan company during his lonely hours on the sleds. Each time he considered the answers he shuddered, knowing the sudden chill in his spine had nothing to do with the wind.

  Deglan was lost in such dark musings when Ulfrun returned from yet another scouting foray. She was early and something was different, something in the set of her mouth. Deglan was not the only one who noticed.

  “The vættir?” Fafnir asked as the giantess came to halt.

  “No,” Ulfrun replied. “But something our Tin Islander companions need to see if they are to survive in Middangeard.”

  “And that is?” Deglan inquired, rousing himself from his stupor.

  “Trolls,” Ulfrun answered simply.

  There was a momentary silence and Deglan took the opportunity to have a look at his fellow travelers. Skrauti and his porters looked to Fafnir with brave faces. Flyn merely slung his sword harness off his back with a practiced motion, and Ingelbert's expression was one of peaked interest. Hakeswaith's face had gone slack, the color drained from his wind-raw cheeks.

  “Well then,” Deglan said, grinning and hopping down from the sled. “Why tarry? Let us go have a closer look.”

  “How far ahead?” Fafnir asked Ulfrun.

  “Not a league distant,” the giantess told him. “And just off our path.”

  The wizard glanced up into the sky. “Night falls soon. I shall take my dwarrow and make camp. Show the foreigners what you will.”

  Ulfrun nodded to the Chain Maker, then quickly retrieved a sizable coil of rope from one of the sleds. She made a beckoning gesture and set off once more. Deglan hurried after her, not waiting to see if any of the others followed. He would need whatever lead he could get and was determined to keep up. Ulfrun kept a manageable pace and Deglan found the walk a welcome relief to his stiff limbs. Flyn and Crane quickly caught up to him, settling into a walk on either side. Deglan did not turn to see if Hakeswaith had been man enough to follow, but he soon caught the sound of the whaler's ragged breathing several paces behind.

  The path of the vættir entered some rocky foothills interspersed with scrubby woodlands. Deglan almost cursed as Ulfrun began leading them uphill, but bit back the oath before giving it voice. It was not pride that stopped him. It was the hands of Bantam Flyn and Ingelbert Crane, gripping gently under his arms, aiding him up the rise.

  “Thanks, lads,” he said, allowing them to help him.

  The steepness of the slope lessened before long and Deglan looked up to find Ulfrun wai
ting for them. She stood at the edge of the furrow left by the wights, staring across a small tract of flat land carpeted in snow. Deglan could see deep tracks cutting across the highland field, evidence of Ulfrun's previous passage.

  “From here you must hold fast to your rudders of speech,” the giantess whispered and, without waiting for an acknowledgment, set off once more.

  Deglan cocked an eye at Flyn. “That means...keep quiet?”

  “You are improving, Staunch,” Flyn answered softly.

  They went in single file after her, Ingelbert taking the lead. Deglan stuck to the chronicler's heels, glad that Flyn was between his back and Hakeswaith's harpoon. The going was much easier, but the absence of the uphill exertion left him feeling very cold despite his hood and cloak of furs. Hob's Knuckles, he had a terrible urge to piss! There was no time, however, as Deglan had to run to keep up with Crane, who was likewise rushing to stay close to Ulfrun.

  They entered a stand of trees stubbornly growing amongst a scrabble of boulders. Ulfrun turned sharply, and again struck uphill, quickly at first, then slowing to pick her way quietly across the rocks. Deglan grasped exposed roots with numb fingers to help drag himself over the terrain. He detected an absence behind him and turned to find Flyn had paused, quickly and deftly removing the steel spurs from his feet. The coburn affixed them to opposite sides of his belt, then swiftly caught up. Hakeswaith was less competent and tripped during the ascent, the barb of his harpoon scraping alarmingly against the rocks. Ulfrun stopped, her head snatching around to glare down the slope at the whaler. The man met her gaze boldly, his crooked jaw frozen into a defiant grimace. They all remained perfectly still for a long time. Deglan could see by the lack of vapor that he was not the only one holding his breath. After what seemed an eternity, Ulfrun signaled for them to continue on.

  They reached the top of the escarpment, where the trees once again laid claim to the ground, and Ulfrun turned to cut through the woods. If Deglan's sense of direction had not completely failed him, then he suspected they were now heading back to the path of the vættir, though much further up the slope than where they had left it. Ulfrun must have wanted to avoid traveling across open ground. Deglan allowed himself a self-satisfied grin when they emerged from the trees and his assumption proved true.