There had been power in that flash. Power enough to spare, and the wolves had known it all along. Dion chewed at her thoughts as if they would keep her from feeling the fire that still burned in her hands. The wolves had leaped with the sense of that power. But they had been too eager; their shield had been too thin. It was about control, she acknowledged. Control over herself to handle the energy, control over the wolves, control over herself when she next faced the elders, to keep that power safe.
“Breathe,” she told herself under her breath. Breathe, and then control.
XVIII
Talon Drovic neVolen
Where do you find conviction
When you follow another man?
—Question of the elders at the Test of Abis
Talon’s odd clarity continued as Drovic’s band dodged east for a day, skirted a marshy lake, and made it another eight kays before Drovic called a halt on the ridge overlooking Welldeath. It was an old village and small—perhaps fifty homes—and it looked as if most of the field workers were in the northern field on the other side of the town.
Drovic handed the message stick he’d prepared to neBoka and watched the other man trot away. “He should be able to leave it at the ring-runner cairn without trouble. While he’s doing that, I want to slip in and out for some supplies before they realize the rest of us are here.”
Talon frowned. “You won’t go alone.”
“I’m taking Slu, Cheyko, and Pen. They’ll watch my back.”
Talon nodded. But Drovic had barely turned onto the village fork a hundred meters when a hill alarm started ringing. Drovic stiffened. “What the hell?” Almost instantly, one of the village alarms began sounding, and then others began chiming in from around the village valley. “Moonwormed rasts. Did they get a description of every goddamn dnu in the line?”
The field workers grabbed their tools and sprinted back toward the village, and Drovic cursed. He whistled a sharp command back toward Talon and, making the decision instantly, spurred his dnu to a gallop. The three riders with him were shadows of his speed. Talon opened his mouth, but the raiders around him didn’t wait. Al and Sojourn, caught half out of the saddle, bounced once and swung up smoothly as their dnu charged with the others, and the whole line surged into motion and swept down the road toward the fields.
There was no time to argue, no time to stop the charge. Follow or let Drovic fall alone. Memories stirred. A cli f rumbled; rocks fell; his mother’s scream, and his father’s . . . Talon’s mind tightened. His fingers shoved the securing strap from his sword. He yanked his bow from its sheath. He strung the recurve on the fly, using one stirrup for a brace. It was a maneuver more easily done at a gallop than a canter—the speed of the dnu smoothed its gait so that, as long as a man kept his seat, he could string bow and draw bolt in less than ten seconds.
In the lead, Drovic’s group did not waste arrows on the slower villagers who had gone flat among the grains. Most of those townsmen did not have weapons, and it was Kilaltian’s job to terrorize them to keep them down, as the man brought up the rear. The village was small—probably why they raised the alarm so quickly, and Talon saw immediately where Drovic was headed. There were only two streets of workshops, and even now, Drovic would take the chance to check for bioforms.
His dnu leaped a ditch on the side of the road and half reared over a woman in the grass. Talon dodged her and cornered hard, his dnu’s legs angled like braces. He brought up sharp in a workshop courtyard and slid from his dnu. Harare and Ki lunged for another door to the side. Talon heard the bolts slide home inside as the doors were barred. He didn’t bother to curse.
The window was flung up, and an archer leaned half out. Eager shooter, eager miss—the bolt bit into the post beside him. Some part of Talon noted the angle, the overreach, the lack of sighting pins. The other part simply reached over and grabbed the man’s compound bow, jerking the shooter forward. He’d have to deal with them now or risk a bolt in the back as he fled. For an instant, he was face-to-face with a lined visage. He noted automatically the shock of shame and sudden fear as the other man let go. Then another set of arms—massive arms, gnarled hair standing out like wires, burn marks like purple pox—reached around the older man and locked on Talon’s left wrist. Talon didn’t jerk back, but his face went pale as a winter eel, and his mind screamed as the damaged nerves were crushed. He didn’t think. He dropped the bow and launched himself over the windowsill, his knife like a claw. There was a wild tangle of limbs as others scrambled away. He heard pounding and shouts as Harare and Ki distracted other workers. But a hammer of a fist hit his ribs, and he forgot the other raiders. He slammed a side kick into a man as the glassman jerked his wrist. Then his knife was against the glassman’s throat, and the knot of workers froze.
The glassman’s hands crushed together. The man’s strength was phenomenal—Talon could actually feel his veins squishing inside his pulped muscles. Some part of his brain noted the racks of vials and flat dishes, beakers and tubes and forms. If this wasn’t a supply house for a biolab, then he was a balding badgerbear. He ignored the scream of his own mind, ignored the urge to warn the craftsmen to hide their wares next time. Instead, he let the edge of gray in his mind seep into his eyes until they near-blinded him. “Release me,” he breathed.
Cold fingers moved along the glassman’s spine. The glassman found himself unable to close his hand farther. Talon could have drawn the blade a hundred times across the glassman’s throat in the time the man stood there staring. That slate gray gaze reached inside the villager like fear. The glassman let go slowly. There was a gasp around him.
Talon backed away to the window. By the time the glassman half stepped forward, Talon had already vaulted the railing and hit the saddle smoothly. “By the moons,” the glassman breathed. Even with his bulk, he had to fight for a place at the window.
Talon ducked a hasty arrow that overflew his position from a workshop across the street. Drovic had already whistled the command to retreat, and Talon kicked his dnu to a hard gallop to follow. An arrow struck the dnu’s neck at an angle, cutting one of the reins and sticking in the saddle horn. He jerked the bolt free and stuffed it automatically in his quiver. The loss of the rein didn’t bother him yet. He rode more by his knees, and the dnu was too well trained to slow. Talon passed on the command to retreat. “They’re bolted in,” he shouted to Sojourn and Mal as they whipped around the corner of another building. Oroan and Wakje sprinted out from a house one street over; Roc and Weed from another. A war bolt hung out of Weed’s lower back, but the lanky man pulled it free and vaulted into the saddle. It had hit his belt, cutting skin only shallowly. NeRuras was not so lucky. The three arrows buried in that man’s chest felled him heavily on the stones.
Drovic and two others were already past the end of the street. The older man was cursing. The villagers had been too prepared. The workshop doors had been bolted as soon as the last workers ran in, and the craft buildings had been cleverly placed to overlook each other. Only the homes had been easy targets. Talon glanced back. NeRuras wasn’t the only one down; NeFirth was missing, and Slu’s sleeve was torn and bloody. Another few moments, and those in the main street would have been running a gauntlet of archers. There were other ways, he thought in fury. They could have ridden away or gone in more slowly, more deceptively, even bribed someone for the information about lab supplies. But no, Drovic had to charge in, had to draw his blade to kill to get what he wanted. The older man couldn’t see county folk as anything other than targets.
Talon burst out with three others into the half-weeded fields. Ahead of them, villagers popped up like rabbits trying to evade the wolves. Most of them were far enough to the side that they were out of reach. One boy was not so lucky. He was in their path, and his short legs would never get him free of their hooves.
“I’ll take him!” Fit shouted.
But the knifeman’s voice had a thread of excitement that made Talon’s jaw tighten. “He’s mine,” he snarled back.
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Fit shot him a challenging look and spurred his dnu viciously, but Talon had the angle, and his own dnu seemed to sense his urgency, for it put on a burst of speed. He leaned down, caught the sprinting boy by the scruff, and jerked him up. The boy screamed and flailed with wild, untrained blows. “Play dead,” Talon snarled in his ear. He brought the knife down in a vicious blow that never touched flesh, then threw the boy into the stinkweed. The youth cartwheeled limply and hit with a flop of limbs. He didn’t move as they thundered past. Talon hoped he wasn’t broken.
Fit cursed behind him as they ducked back into the forest. “I could have used a tack boy,” he snapped.
“We don’t have time for hostages.”
The other man didn’t answer.
They slowed to let the others catch up, and Talon caught Drovic’s nod of approval. He nodded back, his gray eyes hard, and Drovic never saw Talon’s flare of ambition that judged the father’s weakness instead of taking pride in himself. Never saw the steady gaze that had a hint of wolf. Instead, Drovic whistled his commands to re-form, and Talon fell back to lead his own group, seething with the gray.
XIX
Ember Dione maMarin
Power corrupts;
Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Power burns;
Absolute fire is absolute strife.
Power heals;
Absolute healing is absolute death.
—Randonnen proverb
Outside in the twilight where the wolves could see them, Kiyun tried not to flinch from the suppurating wounds on Dion’s hands. Dion tried not to flinch from the pain. Tehena just tried not to flinch. They stood in a rough circle in front of the passhouse, and the wild wolves watched them from underneath the trees. Dion’s jaw was white with pain, but her violet eyes were sharp and focused.
In spite of herself, Tehena asked, “You sure you want to try this?”
Dion gave the woman a wry smile that was strained around the edges. “Would you go even one more hour like this if you had another option?”
The scrawny woman shrugged eloquently.
Dion glanced at Kiyun. He gave her a wry nod, then placed his hands on her shoulders to give her some of the strength in his body. Dion felt the warm weight of his palms and took a breath. She reached toward the wild wolves.
In her skull, a male wolf snarled softly. She held out mental hands toward the trees, and Gray Lash lowered his head and growled more audibly. The three humans didn’t move. After a moment, Lash eased out and warily circled Kiyun. Tehena stiffened as the wolf sniffed at her legs, but the creature continued to circle until he was facing Dion. Violet gaze met yellow. There was a shock of intimacy beyond the mental gray, and Dion felt the male wolf’s thoughts. She smelled the overpowering odors of humanity over the crisp cold of the snow, caught the odor of jerked meat and the stew that Tehena had put on the passhouse stove. And she felt the pain through a second set of nerves. The wolves could feel her just as she felt them, and the burning in her hands, which she barely held at bay, ate into their concentration.
There is fire in your paws.
She nodded mentally. Help me heal it.
Gray Lash’s voice took on a hint of puzzlement as he felt her intention. You walk with us, but you seek a di ferent pattern.
With the power, her use of the internal healing had changed, and they didn’t understand. She kept her voice soft, knowing they could read her words as she thought them. “It’s something you will remember if you look back far enough.”
Gray Lash was joined by Gray Murah and Hrev. Then walk with us, Wolfwalker.
Their trust was almost palpable, and Dion felt her chest clench. “You honor me,” she said softly.
You hold our lives, they returned. You hold our future. We need that.
Lash was the first voice along the inside of her skull. Gray Murah followed, and behind them, the rest of the pack joined in. The invisible bonds between them tightened. Her mind, her thoughts, spun dizzyingly to the left, then plunged down into darkness, into her body and pulse. The pain was suddenly a fire in her mind, not just in her hands—a blast of wild sensation that inundated the pack. She felt the wrongness of the burns, the blistered flesh, the rightness of the channels that would seal the flesh again. She saw the power in all the heartbeats. It was fast, too fast. She was already past the edge of control. She tried to pull back, but the power began to break free.
Then her heart jerked, and her breath rushed into her lungs twice as fast. It was the wolves, shifting and howling into a stronger wall. They became a whirling shield of lupine senses, as if those physical strengths would anchor her to her world. She gasped, yanking back against the gray cords. They surged forward, forcing the gray more thickly around her, but she shoved the wall sharply away. The power inherent in their bodies and minds was not for her. Moons, but it would trigger the plague that lay dormant in them and burn them out like shells. She cut off the depth of that wild merging and stepped back from that gray energy shield. It was her barrier now, not theirs. It protected her from her own pain, but also from their power. It was her mental pattern that stamped it now and forced it into place.
Quickly, she separated her mind from the pain. From her own heart, along her shoulders, down her arms, her consciousness swept through her own bloodstream down to her burned hands. She reached, touched the nerves, and felt them scream with overstimulation. She soothed them so that she could start to work, then went on to the charred skin and muscles. She felt the heat that still chewed at her tissues and used the temperature of the cold grass beneath her feet to cool it. Then she let her mind center in the muscles until their threads began to reach out to each other, past the burn-tingling tissues and over the cracked wounds. She touched the torn flaps of blisters and sealed them back together. Cauterized blood vessels broke past the blocks and grew again; cracked skin became solid with scabs before growing a new transparent layer. She could feel the nerves strain to push out the new muscle that began to form. But the beat of her heart tugged at her consciousness. She wavered. The edges of the gray shield started shredding as her focus frayed. A wolf dropped out of the link, then another, and Dion felt her mind spin up and dizzyingly out until her eyes opened.
She stared blankly at the twilight. Power still vibrated in her body.
Gray Lash stood beside her. He looked up and met her violet eyes. Wolfwalker.
“You honor me,” she whispered.
You are ours, the Gray One returned.
The wild wolf suffered her touch for an instant, then shifted away, but the bond was still open, and lupine memories rushed past her mind’s eye, sucking her into a vortex of pain and grief, joy and protectiveness, challenge and lust, bond and loss and emptiness. The overriding howl tightened her own throat until she threw her head back and let loose the beast in herself.
Lash howled with her in the twilight, and the other wolves joined in, fractionally late, their voices rising, falling, falling in the cold sky. She held them at bay with difficulty. Hishn, she sent instead, reaching out for one voice across the distance. She was answered by a din of snarls. Wolfwalkerwolfwalker, the gray voices howled. Gray Hishn’s voice, if it was there at all, was buried under the packsong.
Kiyun closed his eyes and lifted his face as if letting the sound wash over him, but Tehena remained motionless, carefully not tensed as the wolf scars on her arms and legs seemed to tingle. She had challenged the wolves once, and she bore the marks to prove it. What Dion did now still gave her a shiver of fear.
The second howling didn’t echo in the air, only in Dion’s mind, and she let her throat relax. Gray Lash trotted a few steps away, turned his head, and eyed her hungrily. She met his gaze without flinching. They owned her, yes, but she owned them, too. It was the give and take of the bond. She felt the Gray Ones fading, and as if that sapped the last of her energy, she sagged.
Kiyun caught her before she hit the ground, and held her arms till she could hold her own weight. He stared at her hands.
He released her arms. “I’ll be pinched to death by a pack of three-headed worlags,” he said quietly. “The burns—they’re completely healed.”
Dion bent her fingers carefully, then straightened them out again. “Not really. There are only two layers of skin over the blisters, and there’s still damage deep in the tissue. I can feel a bit of burning.”
He shook his head. “But I’ve never seen you do so much. Even with Ovousibas, you usually take half a ninan to reach this stage.”
“Aye,” she said softly. “I learned something from the birdmen.” She had seen their use of energy, and it had been like sustained lightning that sparked and fused wounded edges together, that spurred other tissues to heal. When those aliens fed, it had been like a blaze that stripped everything from the ice and the life around it. Dion’s own use of the internal healing had been crude, weak, juvenile. She used her own body’s patterns to channel her energy, but the aliens saw all patterns of life, not just their own. They simply followed those patterns down through each substance until they found the lowest energies where they could control the bonds between matter. Dion had been shocked by that control. She glanced down at her hands and tentatively tried to stretch back into that power, but it snapped and sparked on her mind. She was beginning to understand now. The patterns the aliens saw were the same as the Ancients’ technologies: the power inherent in matter. It was a sort of clarity, as if she were seeing into the essence of an object and finding at its heart the physics of the Ancients. She wriggled her toes against the bare ground that she could now feel just as clearly. She could not go back to the simple healing from before. With her link to the alien mother, she would always be too close to the power. She had to control it now, for herself, for the wolves, for the world. Rightly done or not, it was the path that she had chosen, for herself and her unborn child.
Silver Moons, Black Steel Page 20
