Chosen of Nendawen Book 001 - The Fall of Highwatch

by Mark Sehestedt

  “Nendawen,” she said.

  And then a new realization hit her. She knew she was near his sacred lands. But near which way? Lendri had said north. But how far? And how could she find him?

  Standing there, wrestling with indecision, hungry, tired, and very, very frightened, she felt her head begin to hurt.

  No. Not just a headache. It was pounding. A steady pulse in the base of her skull. And a cold dread was building. A familiar dread.

  Her eyes widened and she gasped. It was the same feeling that had dogged her whenever that Soran-thing drew close. The closer he got, the harder the pounding in her brain. Lendri had been wrong. That monster had somehow survived, and it was hunting her again.

  It gave her an idea.

  The sun was disappearing behind the wall of the western peak when Menduarthis saw Lendri again. The Ujaiyen had dragged them through the rocky country, and if Menduarthis had a square inch that hadn’t been bruised, scraped, or raked by those damnable thorns, he swore he would never tell another lie. Never. For at least a tenday.

  But as they began to climb a large offshoot of one of the peaks, a treeless expanse, the hunting party had gathered in again, and Lendri’s captors came in close to Menduarthis.

  The pale elf was covered with blood, dirt, and snow, but none of the fury had left his eyes. His gaze locked on Menduarthis.

  “You think the girl will be all right?” Menduarthis asked.

  Lendri opened his mouth to reply, but the uldra laid into them with the whips again.

  “No talking!” one of them said in his own language. Menduarthis had squeezed his eyes shut against the thorned whips, but he thought he recognized Nikle’s voice. Unappreciative little whelp. Since being captured, Menduarthis had begun to compile a list of names on whom he would rain his vengeance as soon as he escaped. Nikle had just moved up five spots on the list.

  Menduarthis heard a chuckle and opened his eyes. Losir was walking behind him, a smug look on his smug face.

  “Feeling more contrite?” said Losir.

  Menduarthis ignored the barb. “May I ask you something?”

  He looked askance to make sure the uldra weren’t coming in with the whips again. They weren’t.

  “What?” said Losir.

  “If you could teleport from the crystals to the mound, why can’t you just teleport back to the crystals from here? Are you really enjoying bruising us that much?”

  Losir frowned. “We tried. Something about these cursed lands … it interferes with our magic. We need to get well away first. We intend to try again at the top of the next height.”

  “Oh, good,” said Menduarthis. “Then home to bed and supper.”

  Losir laughed. “Eager are you? Which part do you hope to taste first? A hand perhaps? Don’t get your hopes up. I think the queen intends to start with other appendages first. She’ll save the bony parts for later when you’ve developed a taste for it.”

  “I thought you said that was Lendri’s fate.”

  Losir shrugged and smiled.

  A ways later the hunters cried out, and the party stopped. Menduarthis wiggled and craned his neck around to see what they were pointing at.

  “Oh, no,” he said. “That little fool.”

  At the crest of the height, profiled against the sky, no more than a long bowshot away, stood Hweilan.

  Losir laughed. “Looks like we get to take all three back after all.”

  He issued an order and several of the hunters ran forward. Lendri had killed both tigers, so Menduarthis half-hoped Hweilan might run. If her luck held, she might get away.

  But no. She simply stood there, watching them come.

  Menduarthis watched, sick at heart, as the two elves and four uldra escorted her down. They didn’t net or bind her, or even take her weapons. Just kept their spears at her back or naked swords in hand.

  Hweilan stepped among the hunters, and Menduarthis saw that she was not well. She was trembling and squinted as if the light hurt. Her jaw clenched and she did not even look at Menduarthis or Lendri as her captors brought her before Losir.

  The eladrin chuckled. “I must admit, you do surprise, girl. You were free. Why come back?”

  Hweilan did not meet his gaze. “Let them go. Both of them. Let me go. Do it quick and run. Fast as you can. Heed me, and I think you might have time to get away.”

  Losir threw his head back and laughed. “Get away? From you?”

  She did look up then, and Menduarthis saw the gleeful fury in her eyes. “No.”

  Several of the Ujaiyen cried out and pointed.

  “Now what? “said Losir.

  Menduarthis looked up.

  A figure was coming over the rise. Not running, but approaching in a steady unwavering gait. Pale skin. Long hair tossed by the wind. For a moment, Menduarthis thought it might be some of Lendri’s kin come to rescue him. But no. They were all gone, weren’t they?

  And then he drew close enough for Menduarthis to make out the details. He felt his blood frost at the sight.

  It was that pale warrior. The Frost Folk. The one Menduarthis had most assuredly killed back in the Feywild.

  “This is your plan?” said Losir, and he looked on Hweilan with disdain. “We hunt Frost Folk for fun. Whole clans of them. This one will be no more than a distraction.”

  He said something to his hunters in his own language, then drew his sword and stepped forward to meet the newcomer.

  The pale warrior only glanced at him. His eyes were fixed on Hweilan. Now that he saw her, he increased his pace, coming swiftly down the slope.

  Losir stepped in front of him and brandished his blade. He said something that Menduarthis did not catch, then attacked.

  Losir was a fine swordsman, Menduarthis knew. One of the best among the Ujaiyen. But perhaps he was in no mood to play. Or perhaps at the last moment he sensed something amiss and chose a simple attack—one quick thrust between the ribs, aimed to skewer the heart.

  The pale warrior turned his gaze on Losir, locked one fist around the eladrin’s sword arm, and twisted. They were at least a hundred feet away, but still Menduarthis heard the bone snap like a dry branch. Losir shrieked and went down. The pale warrior drew the sword out of his own chest, bent down, and lopped off Losir’s other arm. He picked it up in his other hand and stepped over Losir, who kicked and screamed on the ground as his lifeblood poured out.

  The Ujaiyen charged.

  All but two. One elf who stood guard over Lendri and one uldra over Menduarthis.

  Their attention was focused on the fight. The elf never saw Hweilan step up behind him and bring the hilt of her dagger down on the top of his head. He flopped to the ground like wet dough.

  The other uldra cried out and flicked his arm, uncoiling his whip. He charged her, swinging the weapon in swipe after swipe. Hweilan danced out of the way—the girl was good on her feet—but each strike was coming closer.

  Menduarthis squirmed and struggled, but he only succeeded in tightening his bonds and losing more skin.

  Snarling, Lendri thrashed and threw off his bindings.

  Little bastard chewed through the ropes, Menduarthis said to himself.

  He had. His teeth had gone long and sharp, his fingers curled into claws, and his hair was thickening around his face and shoulders.

  One look, and the uldra fled.

  Hweilan ran to Menduarthis. Lendri was right behind her, and by the time they knelt beside him, he was fully an elf again. She handed Lendri her other knife, and the two set about cutting away the vines.

  Menduarthis hissed through his teeth. “Careful! Some of those thorns are caught in more than cloth.”

  Lendri looked up to the battle. Menduarthis saw his eyes widen, and he gave Hweilan back the knife.

  “Back the way we came,” said Lendri. “Over that northern rise and down in to the next valley. Once you cross the river—frozen most likely—you should be safe. Get him free and go!”

  “Where are you going?” Hweilan and Menduart
his said at the same time.

  “To buy you some time,” he said, and bounded off.

  Menduarthis looked the way he had gone. The pale warrior brought his sword down, killing the elf who held the shaft of the spear piercing the warrior’s gut. The eladrin went down and did not move. The rest of the Ujaiyen—the few survivors whose corpses were not littering the slope—were disappearing over the hill.

  “Forget the thorns,” said Menduarthis. “Just cut, girl. Cut!”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  DOZENS OF TENDRILS OF VINE AND THORNS STILL CLUNG to Menduarthis, but once he could move again, they were on their feet and running. He picked at the tighter creepers and smaller thorns around his hands as they ran.

  Hweilan looked back.

  A huge wolf snapped at the pale warrior, raking at his legs then bounding away. Each time the warrior would pursue, the wolf bounded off. The warrior would break off the chase and continue after Hweilan, and the wolf would charge in again.

  “Go! Toward the river!” said Menduarthis. “Once we’re away, he’ll follow.”

  Knowing Menduarthis was right, Hweilan turned and ran. She was utterly exhausted. When had she last slept? In the Feywild, and that hadn’t been a rest so much as a mental pummeling by the queen. But her fear and desperation lent strength to her limbs. She knew in her heart that the thing didn’t care for Lendri in the least. The wolf was only an obstacle in his way. The best thing she could do to help Lendri right now was to get away.

  But just before they crossed a bend in the hill, she heard the wolf let out a yelp of pain. She turned. Less than a quarter mile away, the pale warrior was headed straight for her. The wolf lay motionless on the frost-covered rocks behind him.

  “Lendri!” she screamed. “No!”

  “Run!” Menduarthis pulled her along.

  They did, rounding the bend in the trail and losing sight of the pale warrior. They kept going, and when the thing next came in sight, he was much closer. Despite the broken spear shaft still protruding from his midsection and the gaping sword wound in his ribs, he was running.

  “Up here!” said Menduarthis, and he tried to pull Hweilan up a narrow trail. She saw that it wound up the arm of the mountain to a cliff overlooking their present trail.

  “No!” she pulled back. “That isn’t the way.”

  He grabbed her again and shoved her before him. “I know. I have an idea.”

  Their path ended at the cliff. Before them an old rockslide had collapsed the rest of the trail into the valley, which was a dizzying distance below them.

  “A wonderful idea you had,” said Hweilan.

  She looked back. The pale warrior was still coming. He’d be on them in moments. She gripped her bow tight and pulled Lendri’s knife.

  “None of that,” said Menduarthis, and he pulled her to him in a tight embrace.

  She struggled and pounded his chest with the handle of her knife. “What are you—?”

  “No one likes a coward. Trust me.”

  And then she knew what he had in mind.

  “Oh, gods,” she said.

  The air hit them, swirling tighter and tighter, taking them in an embrace of storm that drowned out all other sound. Hweilan squeezed her eyes shut.

  “Mind the blade!” said Menduarthis, and an instant later they lifted in the air, shot away from the cliff, and down.

  Near the end, it was more fall than flight. They landed in a thick bank of snow crusted by ice. It was soft enough, but Menduarthis ended up on top of her.

  She shook her head and spat snow. “You need to work on your landings.”

  He grinned. “Seems fine from my vantage point.”

  She pushed him off. They stood and looked up to the cliff where they had just been. The pale warrior was standing there, sword in hand, looking down on them. Hweilan saw the glimmer of red in his empty eyes. What had become of the Soran-thing, why it was now Kadrigul, she didn’t know. But she knew that gaze.

  Kadrigul jumped.

  She heard Menduarthis gasp, then the pale warrior hit the ground in a racket of tumbling stones and cracking bones.

  Kadrigul pushed himself to his feet. Broken bone protruded above and below his left shoulder and above his left knee. Part of his skull had caved in, and Hweilan could see shattered ribs poking under his clothes. He raised his right fist. The sword had broken just above the hilt, and he tossed it aside.

  “Hm,” said Menduarthis. He winced at the pain from his torn fingers as he began twirling them.

  Hweilan heard air rushing, and she saw Kadrigul’s cheeks puff and flutter. She remembered how Menduarthis had threatened to kill Roakh. Have you ever seen an old wineskin filled with too much wine? Imagine what would happen if the air in your wretched frame did the same thing.

  Kadrigul stopped and looked down at his expanding chest. It only took a moment, then Hweilan heard a distinctive pop! of tearing tissue as his chest deflated in a rush. She even saw a fine blast of fluid shoot out of both Kadrigul’s ears. Then he looked up and kept coming.

  “Well, I’m out of ideas,” said Menduarthis, and she heard real fear in his voice. “Back to running now.”

  They turned to do just that. Menduarthis made it three steps. Hweilan heard clonk, and then he dropped like a torn pennant. She screamed and looked down in time to see the rock fall away. Blood gushed from his scalp. He was still breathing, but she knew she’d never revive him before Kadrigul was on top of them.

  “Alone,” said Kadrigul, his voice a broken rasp. She looked to him. The red in his eyes blazed. “Just you … and me. Come. I will … end it quick. Join … your family.”

  For a brief instant, two beats of her heart at most, Hweilan was tempted. Exhaustion pulled at her. She knew it wouldn’t be long before she gave out entirely. It would be easy to stop running. To stop the pain and struggle. See her family again. See Scith.

  That decided her.

  She knew that even if she did stand before Scith in the next life, if she stood before him a victim, come before him in defeat, she would see the disappointment in his eyes.

  Hweilan raised her knife. “You first.”

  The thing in Kadrigul smiled, a horrid pulling back of dead lips over broken teeth. “Good,” he said, and lurched toward her.

  She side-stepped quickly, testing whether he would follow her. She had to know he’d leave Menduarthis alone. He did.

  “You’re going to kill me?” she said, walking backward.

  “I’m going … to eat … your heart.”

  “Catch me first,” she said, then turned and ran.

  The Kadrigul-thing shrieked. Remembering how he had felled Menduarthis, she ducked and swerved as she ran. Stones skipped off the ground around her, and one bounced off her back. Only her thick clothes saved her a broken bone. The pain was incredible. Her vision darkened for a moment.

  But she kept going.

  She remembered Lendri’s words.

  “North,” she panted as she ran. “Over the rise. Next valley. Frozen river.”

  When she came to areas of open ground, she’d look back. She had managed to put a good deal of distance between her and Kadrigul, but he was still coming, lurching along on his shattered leg. As the late afternoon sky darkened toward the deep blue of evening, his eyes seemed all the brighter, two points of red fire gazing at her from that dead white face.

  The pounding in her head was so strong that she could barely think. Still she ran.

  She came to the woods where the Ujaiyen had captured them. Shadows lay thick in the dusk light. She half hoped and half feared to see the ravens and wolves again, but the wood was empty, silent save for the sounds of her own ragged breathing and footfalls.

  The land climbed again, the trees gave out, and she crossed into the next valley.

  There, below her, she could see the river. Only slightly wider than the path through Highwatch’s main gate and frozen solid. It looked no different from hundreds of other streams she’d seen in her life, but something ab
out it made her bones itch. Something beyond that river watched.

  She stumbled down into the valley, her muscles burning with exhaustion. Every step was an effort. Her knees trembled, and she had to focus all her attention on forcing one foot in front of the other.

  She came to the bottom, wove through the ice-slick rocks that lined the bank, then fell, her hands striking the frozen river. A pulse seemed to radiate outward, just beyond her hearing.

  Hweilan pushed herself up, crossed the river, then collapsed on the other side. Dark pines, ages old, leaned over, covering her in their shadow.

  “Safe,” she said. Lendri had said so. Once you cross the river you should be safe.

  She rolled over on the bank and looked back. Evening was giving way to night. The brightest stars were out, but shadows clung thick among the rocks of the far side. Amid those dark shadows, something pale moved.

  Kadrigul.

  Hweilan watched, her ragged breathing calming, but her heart beating faster than ever.

  The pale warrior stopped on the opposite bank and looked down. She heard him snarl.

  Safe, she thought. I’m safe.

  A small laugh—no more than a cough of air—escaped her, and the Kadrigul-thing looked up, its red eyes blazing in the growing dark.

  He stepped onto the river. His snarl choked off, as if he were in pain, and his gait slowed, as if he were wading through onrushing water. But he kept coming, step by lurching step, dragging his broken leg behind him.

  “No,” said Hweilan, and it came out half a whimper.

  She didn’t have the strength to get to her feet, but she crawled backward as best as she could. She made it perhaps a dozen feet before the bank became too steep, and she slid back down a ways until her foot caught on the exposed root of one of the old pines.

  Kadrigul stepped onto the bank.

  Her heart was beating so hard that it drowned out all other sounds. She couldn’t even hear his footfall as he came toward her, his hands reaching out.

  A snarling shadow bowled into him, and they both hit the ground.

  Wide-eyed, Hweilan watched. It was Lendri, back in elf form, though the growls coming from him were all wolf.