Prince Wolf

by A. Katie Rose

  Feria.

  After grief-racked dreams filled my thin slumber, I woke in the thin hours before the dawn. Struggling to my feet, I padded on into the darkness, my head down, my tail flipping, lifeless, against my hocks. Over hills, past the spiked ruins of dead trees, across boulders the size of a house in Soudan, I walked, seeing little. I drank listlessly from tumbling streams, bounding south, the way I wish I travelled. Ever northward I walked, climbing steadily, drawn to that lit beacon, the one fire inside my skull that was Darius.

  I almost missed them.

  A distant wail upon the cold northern wind. I heard it, and dismissed it immediately as not worth considering. Not Feria, not Ly’Tana, who the hell cares. Wait. I paused, my right front paw raised to take the next step. I cocked my head, listening hard. That was the sound of wolves howling.

  There were no wolves here. As Darius’ beacon glowed within my brain, mine also shone within the minds of all wolves. Had any been near, no doubt they’d have made their presence known to me. If for nothing else than to offer their respects.

  Wolves howled.

  Gods above and below.

  I didn’t hear them with my ears. They howled deep within my mind.

  Their dire warning.

  “It’s a trap –“ Darius began.

  “Shush.”

  The light icy wind died. At its swift departure, the soft sough of the pines whispering to themselves fell silent, quenched. As though a hand fell across them. A squirrel, outraged at my presence in its domain, scolded me from the branch of a nearby fir. It suddenly flicked its tail and vanished. In a wild burst of wings, a flock of birds shot out of the treetops and within seconds winged out of sight. At my paws, a hardy mountain beetle, not yet in winter hibernation, curled up its eight segmented legs and died.

  Tongu.

  Yet, it wasn’t Tongu that loped out from under the trees and spurred rangy horses toward me. I recognized four, no five Yuons by their scent of y’bex and their swinging ropes. Not many Yuons found themselves in the Arena dancing with me, but tales of their legendary courage spread to all points of Khalid. They roped and conquered the fearless and aggressive y’bex bulls, their horses as nimble as they were brave. Not a one flinched from my size, scent or bared fangs as they bore down on me at a strong lope.

  A heavy loop settled about my neck. With a flick of my power, I made it vanish. A second sailed from the hands of an expert drover, but I wasn’t there. A simple thought transported me several rods away, behind them. As though guided by one mind, one intellect, they spun their horses. Spreading wide, swinging their ropes, they thought to catch me within their net. The terrain of heavy rocks, thick pockets of pine, spruce and fir, and a steep incline behind me gave them the slight advantage. Their horses found decent footing amid the smaller stones and brush of the highland tundra, their riders able to swing their ropes in wide loops without the danger of entangling them in tree branches.

  Another rope slid around my neck. I changed into my human shape within a blink, and the rope dropped to the ground at my feet. Before its owner pulled it taut, I leaped up and down, snarling, back in my wolf body.

  “You boys want to play?” I growled, facing them, my ears flat. “Let’s dance.”

  “I don’t think you should –“

  I ignored Darius as I dismissed the warning deep within my skull. Too many days of grieving, of loneliness, of the distant echo where my heart once loved, I was spoiling for a fight. I needed someone to blame for this atrocity my life became, and these fellows offered themselves at a ripe opportunity.

  I charged forward. I didn’t attack the nearest horse. Instead, I chose to leap atop a huge boulder to my left, taking the high ground. Every battle instinct screamed at me to make them come to me. Battles were won on home-field advantage, of taking and holding that piece of crucial terrain. I heeded not the instinct and its knowledge. I used the boulder as a springboard, and leaped high and fast.

  The grey horse tried to dodge. It spun hard on nimble hooves, but not before my full weight took it, and its rider, down. I had no real use for my fangs, bared as they were. My full weight crushed the rope-happy Yuon between me and his trusty mount. The horse died, screaming, as I broke its spine. Both thrashed under me, in their death throes, as I transported myself back to the boulder.

  “Score one for the Wolf of Connacht,” I intoned, my voice deep. “Yuons, zero.”

  Those boys didn’t take the loss very well, no, not well at all. Yelling like banshees, they twirled their ropes and charged me, four on one. Despite my height several rods over their horses’ heads, they tried to reclaim my neck with their lassos. Like party streamers, the braided twine loops sought my vulnerable neck.

  In a colossal leap, I dove down, over their heads and the rumps of their horses. I struck the hard stony ground with a jolt, snapping my teeth together, and sent upward a shower of dirt and small stones from beneath my paws. I recovered more quickly than they. Spinning, I slashed the hamstrings of two horses before their Yuons could turn them.

  Whinnying shrilly, the horses scrambled to keep their footing, staggering on three legs. Though consummate horsemen, neither Yuon kept his mount upright. The first went down, flat upon his side, his human’s leg snapped under him. The second dove neck-first into the stony tundra, and tossed his master onto his head. With two Yuons out of commission, one yelling for help as I stalked forward, the other out cold, I now evened the odds considerably. The one I might ignore as no fun at all, but the lively fellow? He needed my personal attention.

  The remaining Yuon pair reined their horses around and sank spurs into coarse flanks. Swinging their ropes, they charged, intending to both distract and capture me. I had plenty of time. With the vocal drover fast under his thrashing horse, I dug my hind legs into a tight bunch. One heavy thrust into the loamy tundra and that bad boy died under my wrath.

  Something bit me.

  An involuntary yelp broke through my teeth. Dismissing, for the moment my intended victim, I ceased my rush. Something sharp and highly painful, burning like a white-hot poker, delved into my sensitive right flank. What the hell was it? A late wasp? A poisonous thorn? Whatever it was, I needed it out like right now. It bloody hurt.

  I didn’t exactly ignore the threat of the Yuon pair, still swinging their ropes. Nor did I fail to see the Tongu hounds crashing through the underbrush with their slavering jaws wide. Their masters followed hard on their paws, their oily, roped hair hanging from bald skulls and serpent tattoos bouncing on their shoulders.

  The enemy closed in. I knew it, witnessed it, yet couldn’t stop it. Only pulling that horrid object from my fur occupied my frantic attention. I can’t fight properly with that bloody thing in there. I swiveled around to bite and gnaw that nasty, burning pain, my teeth chewing into my thick fur. Growling, whining, thinking a late wasp burrowed in there and set its barb deep, I nibbled and yanked at what I thought was the wasp’s stinger.

  I found instead a tiny steel needle.

  Pulling it from my flesh, I flexed my tongue and mouth, trying to spit it out.

  Its metal tip pierced my tongue, spreading its evil numbness. I shook my head sharply, sending it flying into the brush. Suddenly my tongue refused to work. Slobber dangled from my jaws. In my sight, trees suddenly grew sideways from the tilted boulders and undergrowth. I flapped my ears, trying to set things right and regain my balance. I staggered sideways, instead.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Darius’ tone held a sharpness I hadn’t heard before.

  “I don’t know –“

  The numbness spread like a wildfire in a dry wood through my face and my body. Reeling, almost falling, I remained upright only by sheer willpower alone. I hardly noticed nor cared when the Yuon ropes settled about my neck. I took a feeble step, and tripped over the legs of the horse I mangled. I fell across its heaving body, the captive drover now screaming in agony and fear. I snapped my jaws perilously close to his vulnerable throat. His bladder let go. Under th
e terrible weight of a horse and me, the Yuon might die a horrid death, and he knew it.

  Unable to feel my paws, I didn’t know upside from down, sideways or up. My head spun sickeningly, my guts threatening to repel the contents of my stomach, which was…nothing. The trees, sky and grey boulders whirled about me as though they’d grown wings. The nooses tightened about my neck, but their presence had the same effect on me as an annoying fly. I paid them no heed as I tried again to rise.

  “Gods ab –“

  My legs refused to obey me. As I struggled and thrashed on the wildly kicking, terrified horse, its rider’s screams magnified ten-fold within my sensitive ears. In a gallant effort to rise, the horse pitched me off and sent me rolling like a limp sack into the scrub oak and bramble. While I sent my will into my confused feet, commanding them to obey me, they stubbornly resisted. I flopped about in dead leaves, pine needles and twigs, trying to get up. My limited brain capacity sent messages my limbs failed to receive.

  ‘Twas as though I had drunk far too deeply of the tasty ale in the Royal Crown Inn. I lay on my left side, my tongue pooling in the dead leaves and dirt beneath my muzzle. My parted jaws panted, yet my lungs breathed in a discordant harmony. I tried to get up, yet only succeeded in twitching my paws. My brain puddled into mush, my limbs dull and unresponsive, I opened my eyes. I saw, however, in a limited fashion. I reckoned my eyes were the only organs I possessed that still worked as they should.

  My sight fastened on the scorpion tattoo on Ja’Teel’s cheek as he emerged from the thin cover of the trees.

  Ja’Teel.

  The sneer on his harelip hadn’t changed. He wore not his riding clothes this time, but a thick black woolen mantle that draped him from shoulders to heels, the hood cast over his head against the fresh mountain wind.

  “Ah, here we are again, my lord Wolf,” he said genially, stepping close.

  As my tongue lay lax on the ground, gathering dirt, I couldn’t answer him.

  “Oh, don’t get up,” he said, chuckling and squatting near my face. His cloak pooled around his ankles. “Let’s not stand on ceremony. We’re old friends, you and I.”

  Behind him, Khalidian cavalry soldiers brushed through the tree branches, their crossbows cocked, loaded and aimed toward my prone form. The White Lion snarled on their thick woolen mantles, the fear in their eyes unable to offer me hope. My hearing worked, after a fashion. Leaving their horses to mind me and keep their ropes taut, I heard the Yuons aid their fellows at my back. The sound of steel striking flesh and the sudden silence of the two crippled horses told me much. In mercy, the Yuons put them down and ended their pain.

  The three Tongu hunters, having hissed their wire-haired hounds to their heels, fell into rank behind him. Like Ja’Teel, they wore thick cloaks around their shoulders to protect them from the late autumn, mountain air, cudgels in their hands. Hounds, shivering under their less than adequate, brindle coats, chuffed low in their severed throats. I felt their feral eyes on me as though rats scurried across my fur.

  “That trick you pulled back there,” Ja’Teel said, his tone admiring and his hazel eyes stone hard, “took me by surprise. I thought I had you, so I did.”

  As I couldn’t answer, I didn’t even think one up. It didn’t matter anymore. His comments floated somewhere in the mush my brain had become, misty and indistinct.

  I lay at their feet, helpless, aware of the trap I stumbled into. I felt/sensed Ja’Teel’s drug hurrying through my blood. It withdrew whatever willpower I had left to me, in my heart, quashed all rebellion, all stamina. Like chilling ice, it numbed both grief and body alike. It left in its wake…nothing at all important.

  “Is he dangerous?” a soldier asked, renewing his grip on his crossbow. Fear-sweat dampened the hair at his brow and trickled to his nape.

  Ja’Teel stood up, his shadow over my face, his thick lips smiling with satisfaction. “Not at all. He’s as helpless as a newborn. He can’t think, he can’t act, he can’t even decide if he’s hungry or not.”

  Not true, I thought vaguely. I know I’m not hungry.

  “We’ve lost one of our own,” a gruff voice spoke from just behind my ears. “And three horses. You owe us a weregild.”

  Ja’Teel’s voice hardened. “I don’t owe you a damn thing,” he snarled. “If you have a complaint, then you take it up with His Majesty.”

  “You hired us. You owe.”

  “His Majesty hired you. I merely paid. Now begone with you, or be gone.”

  Muttering, the Yuon snaked his ropes from my neck. Though their low-voices curses might bypass Ja’Teel’s hearing, my ears picked them up clearly. He’d just made himself some bad enemies, I surmised. Hooves clopped over the stones and vanished beyond the hill. That left me with Ja’Teel, three Tongu and their hounds and four cavalry soldiers. Not good odds.

  Rygel’s dark kinsman toed my muzzle with his boot. “You have spirit, Prince,” he said gravely. “I almost wish I wasn’t ordained to bring you down. You’ve proved your mettle and are a most challenging opponent. If our circumstances had been different –”

  He half shrugged, smiling.

  Nothing much would change, I thought. You’re still a coward at heart and always will be.

  Ja’Teel’s hazel eyes met mine as though reading my mind. “Once you left Rygel, the princesses and the others,” he said, his harelip rising in his habitual sneer, “you were ridiculously easy to track. You should’ve taken a few lessons from my dear kinsman and covered yourself better. You may be exceedingly powerful for one with so little magical blood, but your skill level –”

  He shook his head as though in sorrow, his eyes dancing. “That silly wolfling almost had you. How’d you think of that little trick, by the way? Stopping her heart? You threw me a curve on that one, I’ll admit. If the soldiers had been more dedicated, this would have ended that night. The survivors, well….”

  Ja’Teel tittered, his slender fingers tapping his lips. “Let’s just admit they survived longer than they cared to. And but damn that Tenzin can get creative. I myself had to admire the nasty tricks he used on his own hunters. I think they’re still screaming, but perhaps that’s only wishful thinking.”

  Tired beyond belief, I shut my eyes. I wished fervently he’d shut up. Go on, I thought. Kill me and have done with it. Just be quiet about it.

  Unfortunately for me, Ja’Teel loved the sound of his own voice.

  “Had I not seen it for myself, I might not believe it. That bugger, he even tortured the surviving dogs to death. Can you imagine? Their creepy half-screams kept me awake most of the night. Gods.”

  He straightened, his head cocked slightly to the left as he considered his minions. “Every Tongu, and their brainless mutts, discovered the price for failure. These fine soldiers won’t make the same mistake. Will you, boys?”

  “No, my lord,” the soldiers muttered, one by one, shifting their feet.

  My keen hearing picked up the frantic thudding of their hearts in their chests, the ragged breathing they hid from Ja’Teel. My nose scented their fear-sweat, stirring only the hackles along my spine. The only reaction I offered. My body betrayed me, succumbing to the poison Ja’Teel jabbed me with, leaving my senses semi-alert, but my will-power so much useless porridge.

  Raising my anger, I managed only a faint lifting of my lip in the semblance of a snarl. I focused my will on clasping his heart in my fist, clamping down and feeling it burst inside his chest. I did it once before to escape an evil trap. Perhaps I can again.

  Ja’Teel didn’t even notice. My fury deflated, collapsed, useless. My magic required determination to fuel it, to keep it burning hot and vivid. I found no resolve to call upon. I felt zero emotion, no self-control to focus with, no fire that inspired either anger, or his brother, rage: the daemon. I saw, heard, smelled and even possibly tasted. I knew all that occurred about me. I just didn’t care enough to do anything about it. That knowledge did me precious little good when I needed my fury if I was to save my own life.<
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  “Your escape cost me, too,” Ja’Teel went on, his tone low, menacing. “King Brutal publicly flogged me, for failing him. I’m alive only because he needs me. I’d show you my scars, but they aren’t pretty.”

  His teeth gleamed in a flashing smile. “I do sooo owe you for that. Once that Brutal fool has you in hand, I’ll help him break you myself.”

  If he expected defiance from me, his disappointment didn’t appear in his expression. His nasty smile remained, steadily, in place.

  “It’s good you sent that idiot griffin away,” Ja’Teel resumed, his brow lifted in good humor. From his leather satchel he pulled another tiny steel needle. “This was intended for her. The dose you took paralyzed your will. I intended for hers to paralyze her heart and lungs. She’d be dead now, so I hope she appreciates the priceless gift you gave her. You saved her life, not once but twice.”

  She saved mine, I thought. I think we’re quits.

  Ja’Teel chuckled, rising to his feet. “I’ve been watching you for some time, as I expect you now know. I saw your grief when she left. It hurt, didn’t it, to send her away for her own good? I almost shed a tear at your sacrifice, but, sorry, my ability to weep over such noble stupidity departed some time ago.”

  Ja’Teel sniggered at his own humor. “Had you not sent her away, you might have someone to die with. I always thought dying alone was the pits, really. Whoever truly wants to die alone?”

  I do, if it means those I love live.

  Ja’Teel bent in half, bowing low, to gaze mocking, into my own eyes. “Love bites, don’t it?”

  It most certainly does.

  His forefinger shook in mock remonstrance. “You should have learned to cover your tracks, silly wolf.”

  I know now, I thought.

  “Since you’ve been out of touch so to speak,” he said. “I feel I should inform you as to the most current information available. I’d like to get you up to speed here, so listen close. I do so hate to repeat myself.”