“We’ll have to work that out when we encounter them,” Durik said. “And hopefully before either Kloin or Abelard get to them.”
• • •
The village’s name was Barrowdelve. It lay at a confluence of narrow woodland paths east of Fallowhearth, a collection of log cabins, lumber yards and sawmills surrounded by overgrown stumps. Durik claimed that years before such logging communities had been commonplace, when civilized – or, as Logan called them, semi-civilized – people had first started to clear the forests. Once Blind Muir had blanketed all of Upper Forthyn, from the foothills of the Dunwarrs to the walls of Frostgate, but the work of generations had shrunk its thorny borders and left these patches of isolated woodland scattered across the countryside.
It became apparent as the three rode into Barrowdelve’s little square that hard times had finally caught up with the forester village. It looked deserted, sitting silent in the rain. Doors and shutters stayed barred, and nothing stirred as Durik reined in his mount and looked around.
“Abelard and his men passed through here recently,” he said, judging the flooded hoof prints pockmarking the village square. “Two hours, maybe three.”
“The locals are probably just tired of providing welcoming committees for visitors from Fallowhearth,” Logan said ruefully, glancing around. Durik noted that, despite the rogue’s light tone, he’d thrown his sodden cloak back over his shoulder and had one hand resting on the ridiculously bejeweled pommel of his sword.
Durik sniffed the damp air before dismounting and crouching, inspecting the marks in the thick mud more closely.
“There are other prints beneath the hoof markings,” he said. “But they’ve been trampled on. They’re difficult to read in these conditions.”
“So, we’re dealing with a whole missing village now,” Logan said. “Perfect.”
“Could the clans have taken them?” Ulma asked.
“I doubt it,” Durik said slowly, standing and turning. “But perhaps she can tell us?”
An aged woman had been sheltering in one of the log cabin’s doorways, overlooking the square, at least since Durik had dismounted. Silent and still, she’d gone unnoticed by the other two.
“Pollux’s hammer,” Logan swore as he spotted her, making Ishbel snort with fright.
Durik approached the woman. She made no attempt to draw back from him. She was stooped over and wizened, her hunched shoulders draped in a plaid shawl. Her thick brown hair was tangled, parts of it plaited together into dozens of braids. In her bony hands she grasped a short wooden stave, its top carved in the rudimentary likeness of a snarling dog or wolf. Durik stopped before her door, towering over her, and splayed his fingers over his chest.
“Greetings, elder,” he said.
The woman said nothing. Instead, she reached up with her free hand and, slowly, brushed Durik’s face. The fingers probed his tusks, edged around his nose, and swept up over his brow.
“You are an orc,” the woman said, her voice a dry croak. Durik realized that she was blind.
“I am,” he said. “And I mean you no harm. My name is Durik.”
“I am Ann Mogg,” the woman said.
“My companions and I are seeking those who passed through your village this morning, Ann Mogg.”
“I did not speak with them,” she replied. “They stopped here only briefly.”
“Do you know which way they rode?”
“You will discover that for yourself,” Ann Mogg said. “You have the smell of a hunter about you.”
“That is true,” Durik said. “If I may, I will ask one more question, and then my companions and I will leave you in peace.”
“You wish to know where the people have gone,” Ann stated.
“Yes. Have the clans taken them?”
Ann Mogg made a hacking sound that Durik eventually realized was laughter.
“No, they have not. I was a clanswoman, once, a long time ago. I married a forester when this village was first planted. I have lived here since that day, but I haven’t seen the clans pass through for many years. That was before the gods took my sight from me.”
“Then where have the village folk gone?” Durik asked.
“South. Blown away on the wind of a rumor. These days it gusts stronger than ever.”
“They thought the clans were going to attack them?”
“I told them such a thing would not happen, but these days ignorance and stupidity are far stronger than the words of an old woman. They left three days ago.”
“And they abandoned you?”
“I refused to leave. This is my home.”
“Did the clans come in the end?”
Ann Mogg scoffed. “A few youths from the Redferns this morning. They left me alone, took a few chickens. I told them to.”
Durik digested the news. It was as he had feared – the clans were simply foraging, not raiding the surrounding countryside, and it made it even less likely that the group they were pursuing had anything to do with Kathryn’s disappearance. But Abelard, for starters, wouldn’t accept that. He glanced up into the rain. It showed no sign of abating. A few hours more and the tracks would start to become difficult to read.
“Will you be able to take care of yourself out here, alone?” Durik asked. Ann Mogg smiled thinly.
“My husband passed almost twenty winters ago, pathfinder,” she said. “I will live twenty winters more, if the gods will it.”
“Very well,” Durik acknowledged. “We must be on our way. Those we follow will be drawing ahead of us.”
“Further than you know,” Ann Mogg said. “Farewell, pathfinder.”
“A group of clansfolk have passed through here,” Durik reported back to Ulma and Logan. “The villagers fled before they arrived.”
“They’ve hardly left the place looted and ravaged,” said Logan. “Not that I imagine there’s much to steal.”
“Because you and I both know the clans have no squabble with the people of Upper Forthyn,” Durik said. “But we need to prove that to Damhán, and Adelynn. We need to find these Redferns.”
“Presumably before Abelard,” Ulma added.
“And how are we going to convince the clansfolk to come with us back to Fallowhearth?” Logan asked. “Or Highmont for that matter?”
“They’re hungry,” Durik said. “Otherwise they wouldn’t be roaming this far south at this time of year. Food can be a powerful motivator.”
“Which way, then?” Ulma asked.
“The hooves of Abelard’s band continue east, into the forest,” Durik said. “I can only assume they are following the tracks of the Redfern. There are traces beneath the more recent prints that suggest a group of four or five, on foot.”
“Lead on then, pathfinder,” Logan said, pulling his cloak close around his shoulders.
They rode beyond the bounds of the village and in amongst the boughs of the forest. The rain fell in fat, heavy droplets that pattered on the mulch underfoot, creating a continuing, soft susurration. The carpet of autumn leaves made the tracking easy – Durik led them on into the wood, arcing slowly north.
Beside a lightning-blasted ironroot, the tracks diverged. Durik halted and dismounted to inspect them.
“Abelard lost their trail here,” he said as Logan and Ulma rode up. “He split the group into three to try and pick it up again.”
“How do we find the northerners now, then?” Logan asked.
“Simple,” Durik answered. “We follow the group that went the right way.”
“You can still read the clansfolk’s tracks?”
Durik gave Logan a look, and the rogue shrugged.
“Just checking you really are the greatest pathfinder in Terrinoth.”
“Only you would make a claim like that,” Durik said, in no mood for Logan’s games. He felt as though they were fallin
g behind, and on the hunt there was no feeling he hated more. “They turned hard east again. Five riders following them. They’ll catch up with them soon. We must hurry.”
• • •
It was early afternoon when they heard a cry echo through the trees. It was followed by an angry shout. Durik cast a glance back at Ulma and Logan, then set his stirrups to his horse’s flanks, leaning low in the saddle to avoid the branches and twigs that whipped at him. He heard more shouts, and a clash of steel, ringing cold and hard through the wet woodland.
His stallion burst through the undergrowth into a small, leaf-choked hollow, overhung by a bent old yew. At its center a group of Abelard’s horsemen were attacking a huddled trio of clansfolk. Five riders were striking with swords and maces at two of the men, clad in wool and plaid and armed only with staves. As Durik arrived one fell, his skull split by a brutal blow. A fourth was already lying dead beneath the horsemen’s hooves, alongside a brace of trampled poultry.
“Stop!” Durik roared and charged into the fray. Kloin was leading the group of riders, and he turned his horse sharply to intercept the orc as another of his men chopped his sword down through the stave of the next clansman, hacking open his throat.
“This is none of your business, orc,” Kloin snarled, but Durik wouldn’t be denied – without slowing, he barreled past the captain, his large stallion thrusting the smaller mount into a stumbling retreat. As he did so he untied his short boar spear from around his shoulders.
A single clan member remained, a girl with a silver torc around her neck who screamed in terror as the man-at-arms who had cut open her kinsman’s throat raised his bloody sword to cut her down in turn. Durik lunged, at full tilt. His spear caught the man in his unprotected armpit as he brought up his arm to strike, and Durik felt the impact judder up the haft as it plunged through heart and lungs and jarred off a rib. The weight and momentum behind the strike lifted the man from his saddle and sent him tumbling into the leaf mulch, still skewered by Durik’s spear.
Shock at what had happened gave Durik enough time to dismount and draw his long skinning knife. Kloin was the first to respond – with a cry of rage he swung his sword at Durik. It rebounded with an ear-aching clang from a second blade. Logan, still mounted, pushed his horse in between Kloin and Durik, raising his sword once more. Ulma had arrived on the other side of the surrounded clanswoman, her mallet in one hand and a vial of fizzing purple liquid in the other.
“You just made me break a promise, captain,” Logan said.
For a second, Durik thought the furious men-at-arms were about to fall on them in a hacking, stabbing frenzy. Logan’s voice, strong and clear, again cut through the tension.
“Four against three. Not great odds for anyone wanting to take on the Borderland Four. Even less so when you consider the fact that we also have a clanswoman whose kin you’ve just murdered on our side.”
“It’ll be three against three if I throw this,” Ulma added, shaking her vial menacingly. “Immorlative. Which one among your fine gentlemen wants to burn first?”
“This is an outrage,” Kloin shouted. “I won’t stand for this, you murdering scum!”
“Look who’s talking,” Logan shot back at him.
“These people are savages,” Kloin fumed, pointing his sword at the girl cowering between the trio.
“They have harmed no one,” Durik said. He knelt down beside one of the fallen clansmen. He was only a youth, barely come of age. His pale face seemed strangely peaceful, a cruel contrast to the vicious red gouge in his throat. He was dead.
“Did Abelard give you leave to slaughter these people?” Ulma demanded of Kloin.
“They resisted,” the captain said. “My men were only defending themselves.”
“Five grown soldiers, armed and armored, forced to defend themselves by butchering three starving boys and a girl?” Logan responded. “In better circumstances you’d make me laugh, captain.”
“You’ve killed one of the baroness’s personal retinue,” Kloin said. “Once we return to Fallowhearth you will all be thrown in irons and you, orc, will hang.”
“Perhaps,” Durik said, standing up and laying a hand on the clan girl’s shoulder. She was shaking and terrified, her eyes red with tears. It was all he could do to keep his rage in check and his expression controlled. He didn’t want to frighten her further.
“We mean you no harm,” he said to her, speaking in Goltacht, the language of the northern clans. “If you come with us, my friends and I will protect you. I swear it by blood oath, on Kurnos’s great horn.”
He slid his knife quickly along the back of his forearm, drawing a thin stream of blood. He knew enough about the northern clans to understand the importance of a promise made with blood.
The declaration seemed to have the desired effect. The girl sniffed and managed to nod. Durik mounted his horse and helped her up behind him, securing her skinny arms around his broad chest. Then he leaned down and dragged his spear from the body of the man-at-arms he had run through.
“We’ll see you in Fallowhearth,” he said to Kloin, holding his furious gaze as he walked his horse past him and out of the hollow. He kept the bloody spear in one fist as Logan and Ulma followed.
• • •
They rode hard for Fallowhearth. Logan knew he didn’t need to stress the importance of speed – Gods only knew what stories Kloin would concoct for Lady Damhán if he arrived back at the castle first.
They were admitted at the main gate, the guards throwing dark glances at the girl still clinging to Durik. He kept her right by him as they dismounted and entered the keep, a protective hand on her shoulder.
“Might want to put the spear away now, Dur’,” Logan murmured to him as they waited outside the main hall. Durik didn’t seem to have realized he still had it in his grip. With a grunt, he tied it back over his shoulder, its tip still red.
Inside the hall, Lady Damhán was waiting for them. Bar the odd sniff, the clan girl had remained silent as they had ridden through Fallowhearth. Now, however, she let out a little whimper. Logan wondered whether she had somehow met Lady Damhán before.
The advisor watched in silence as Durik led the girl in, Logan and Ulma behind them. Logan realized that the tome they had discovered in Kathryn’s chambers was lying open on the banquet table before her. Damhán’s expression remained inscrutable as she spoke.
“You made good time with your return.”
“We had good reason to get back,” Logan said. “Mostly relating to your friend, Captain Kloin.”
“Does she understand the common tongue?” Damhán asked, looking at the girl and ignoring Logan. The rogue didn’t respond – he wasn’t sure any of them had actually paused to consider that question. Durik said something to the girl in a language that he didn’t recognize.
“I understand,” she said falteringly, her voice tinny in the cold hall.
“Where did you find her?” Damhán asked Durik, as though the girl wasn’t standing there.
“We rescued her from your men-at-arms,” the orc said stonily. “They had already murdered three of her kinsmen.”
“Elaborate.”
“We tracked Abelard’s little expedition east,” Logan said, deciding it was best to interrupt Durik before he said something unwise. He’d rarely seen the stoic orc so angry. “We found Captain Kloin attacking a small group of clansfolk. They were unarmed, but they killed them anyway. We… intervened.”
“You convinced Kloin to stand down?”
“I ran one of his men through,” Durik said. “Killed him.” Logan closed his eyes and sighed, any hope he had harbored of downplaying what had happened in the forest now gone.
Damhán seemed unperturbed by the news. She beckoned the girl with one bony finger.
“Come here, my child.”
Logan stayed where he was with Ulma at the far end of the table
while Durik accompanied the clan girl to Damhán’s side. He almost had to push her the last few yards, though Logan noted he also had his hand on his skinning knife. This day really, really wasn’t going the way he had planned it.
“What’s your name?” Damhán asked the girl, ignoring Durik’s looming threat.
“I am Carys Mogg,” the girl said. She seemed afraid of the book resting before Damhán, casting furtive glances at it.
“That is a common name among the Redfern clan, is it not?”
“Yes,” Carys said.
“They are your clan?”
“Yes.”
“And how old are you, Carys Redfern?”
“Fifteen summers… I think.”
Damhán paused, as though considering the information, then placed one hand on the open pages of the tome.
“Do you know what this is?”
Carys shook her head, a little too quickly. Damhán looked at her for what felt like an age, and Logan realized that he was sweating despite the autumn chill. There was something utterly penetrating about Damhán’s eyes, something that went beyond merely being discerning or astute. He couldn’t help but pity the girl.
“What were you doing in this part of Forthyn?” Damhán continued. “You and your clansfolk?”
“We were on our way to Frostgate for the last of the harvest bartering,” Carys said. “The summer has been short and poor. My friends left the camp to go and find food.”
“Or steal food?” Damhán wondered.
“The places we came across were all abandoned,” Carys protested. “The food was going to waste.”
“She speaks the truth,” Durik interjected. “The village we rode through, Barrowdelve, was abandoned.”
“We were looking for the clan’s trail when we were attacked,” Carys said, fresh tears welling up.
“Where was Abelard during this?” Damhán asked, directing the question at the trio.
“He lost the trail,” Durik said. “So he divided his riders. The group led by Kloin was the one that caught up with the Redferns.”
The Doom of Fallowhearth Page 9
