by R. J. Grieve
Gorm, aware of his larger kindred’s propensity for ambush, barked out: “Look behind you! There’ll be more!”
He had barely spoken when with a series of gravelly thuds, several more descended from the rock walls, landing in a menacing crouching position, swords already drawn.
Iska, being the only one unarmed, shrank back out of the way, hoping to be overlooked, but the others braced themselves for the attack.
One launched an assault on Vesarion, and with little warning he found himself exchanging vicious blows with it. It was over six feet in height, every bit as tall as he was, and it soon became evident that it was a powerful and cunning opponent. Getting his customary double-handed grip on his sword, Vesarion directed many blows against it of impressive power but it deflected them all with seemingly little effort. When it appeared that neither was able to make much impression on the other, it disengaged for a moment and began to circle around him, assessing him, whilst emitting a soft, menacing hissing noise through its sharp teeth.
Sareth was in even more trouble, for her opponent was not only stronger than she was, but almost as fast. Remembering Parrick’s words, she kept moving, feinting unexpectedly to left and right, suddenly withdrawing in an attempt to unbalance it, refusing to be coerced into a contest of strength. But despite all this, it was herding her towards a narrow bay in the rocks in an attempt to trap her. She knew that once it had her cornered and she no longer had the room to play off her tricks against it, the fight would be over. Sensing its advantage, it lunged at her with such speed that her parry came a fraction too late. The edge of its blade nicked her arm, causing a splash of crimson to appear on the sleeve of her white linen shirt.
Gorm was frustrating his opponent by refusing to fight. It pursued him angrily but instead of facing it, he was scuttling around as busy and elusive as a cockroach. However, when he saw Sareth’s plight, he charged to her rescue as fast as his sturdy legs would carry him. Coming up behind her single-minded opponent, with the greatest of glee, he plunged his short sword into its thigh. It let out a terrifying roar of pain and spun its sword backwards so quickly that had Gorm been only a little taller, he would have been decapitated. As it was, the blow sliced so close that it caused him to duck and roll out of the way over on one shoulder.
Vesarion, refusing to be put on the defensive by his opponent’s tactics, began to circle, too, watching it keenly, and detecting a small opening, he sprang into the attack. Abandoning his usual two-handed grip, he lashed out with the full length of his right arm and caught the Turog by surprise by the extent of his reach. The tip of his sword ripped across its shoulder, slicing with impressive accuracy between the steel rings on its leather cuirass. It staggered back in astonishment, and seizing his chance, Vesarion rammed his sword with immense force into its chest. Hastily jerking his weapon clear, he prepared to attack again, but there was no need, for his adversary was clearly finished. It sank to its knees, the light dying in its cruel eyes, then crashed forward onto its face.
Sareth, in the meantime, was still in trouble. Her opponent, refusing to be distracted by Gorm’s intervention, had redoubled its efforts against her. The course of the fight had brought her into her brother’s proximity but he was so fully engaged that he could be of no help to her. Gorm danced in and out of the two fights like an annoying wasp looking for the opportunity to sting, and finally managed to bring down Eimer’s opponent by cutting its hamstrings. Eimer, not wasting such a gift, soon finished it, but Sareth’s enemy had achieved what it has been trying to achieve. It had boxed her in between the rock walls in a position from which there was no escape.
Gorm flew to help, but Vesarion was quicker. The Red Turog, beating down Sareth’s last defence, was preparing its final blow, when out of the corner of its eye something alerted it to its peril. It whirled round with a snarl just in time to see the razor-sharp edge of Vesarion’s sword being swung towards it at shoulder height. The blow was delivered with such cutting-force that it sliced through its exposed neck, severing its head from its body. It stood suspended for a heart-beat, pumping blood, before collapsing in a gory heap.
The two remaining Turog, seeing that all was not going to plan, sprang up the rock face again with astonishing agility and were soon gone from sight.
“They’ll be back,” observed Gorm to Vesarion sourly. “Gone to find more Turog.”
But Vesarion was paying little heed to him, for he had just noticed the splash of crimson on Sareth’s sleeve.
“You’re hurt!” he exclaimed, wiping his brow with the back of his hand. “Here, let me see.”
“It’s just a scratch,” Sareth assured him, trying to deflect him. “Honestly, there’s no need to fuss.”
But he sat her down on a rock and rolling up her sleeve, gently began to clean the blood away with his handkerchief.
With a sound of relief, he said: “It’s just superficial. Those animals are both strong and fast. Not easy opponents.”
As he tied the handkerchief tightly around her arm, he discovered she was smiling. “That reminds me of something Parrick used to say. He said that if he had to choose between strength and speed, he would choose speed every time. But when I asked him what I should do if I ever met an opponent who was both strong and fast, he gave me a piece of very wise advice.”
“What was that?”
“One word – run!”
He laughed. “Wise advice indeed.”
She called across to her brother who, with Iska’s help, was unavailingly trying to revive the unconscious librarian.
“I’m in need of some practice sessions, Eimer. Will you oblige me?”
“No,” he answered without hesitation.
“Not very gallant, Eimer,” Vesarion declared.
“You only say that because you have never had a practice session with my wild-cat of a sister. Most people go a little easy when they are practicing for fear of hurting a friendly opponent – but not Sareth! I could hardly begin to count the cuts and bruises she has given me over the years.”
“I promise, I’ll be careful,” she offered contritely.
“I’ll think about it. By the way, we can’t seem to get any life out of Bethro. He’s just lying here like a felled tree. Any suggestions?”
Vesarion smiled wickedly. “Try Sirkrisian spirit,” he advised smoothly, “given neat.”
By the time the tears had stopped running down Bethro’s face and his coughing fit had eased, Gorm, who had disappeared off after the Red Turog in an attempt to find out where they had come from, arrived back.
“Lost them,” he announced glumly, then turning his eyes on Bethro, asked: “What’s up with him?” in callously indifferent tones. But when he saw the blood on Sareth’s shirt, that was a different matter.
“Sareth hurt!” he cried in alarm and was not reassured when he was told that it was only a scratch.
“Red Turog sometimes coat edge of blade with poison,” he informed them anxiously. Nothing would do him but to inspect the injury himself but afterwards he seemed a little less fearful. “Small cut,” he confirmed. “Not enough poison to kill. Maybe make Sareth a little sick. Fever, maybe, but not kill.”
“You’re sure they’ll be back?” Vesarion asked.
The small Turog nodded in a vigorous manner that brooked no doubt.
“Then I think we must get out of this maze, for it is nothing other than a trap. There is another staircase arising out of the far end of this valley and perhaps it will bring us up to more open territory. Certainly, before nightfall we must find somewhere more secure that we can defend.” He turned in some concern to Sareth. “Are you ready to move on?”
“Yes. I’m fine. I don’t think the blade was poisoned because I feel perfectly well.”
For the rest of that day they ascended staircase after staircase, creeping up the unrelenting face of the stark mountainside until they emerged above the network of dry river-courses into a more open area of jumbled grey rocks and giant boulders interspersed with narr
ow, deep fissures, perfectly designed for breaking an ankle. Painfully slowly, they began to pick their way across the desolate, windswept place, conscious not only that the light was beginning to go, but that they had yet found no place that offered them any safety.
Moreover, Sareth, who had started out full of energy, was now bringing up the rear, lagging a little behind, her eyes overly bright, her cheeks unusually flushed.
Vesarion, glancing back, noticed her some distance below the others and retraced his steps until he arrived by her side. Without speaking a word, he lightly placed his hand on her forehead.
“You’re running a temperature,” he said briefly.
She sighed. “I think I’m turning out to be a liability.”
“Yes, you are,” he unexpectedly agreed with her. Startled, her eyes flew to him, until she saw the mischief in his expression. “I mean,” he continued, warming to his theme, “you throw yourself in the path of avalanches and pick fights with Red Turog, not to mention acquiring a witch and a rodent for your best friends. You’re something of a handful, wouldn’t you say?”
She was chuckling appreciatively by now. “And that’s not even counting getting a fever when we least need it.”
“Let’s just hope that Gorm was right and that it won’t amount to anything. Still, I think we need to get you out of this cold wind to somewhere you can rest – preferably somewhere that those animals can’t find us.” He looked at Gorm. “Is there any chance that we could loose them?”
“Red Turog good trackers but bare rocks not give many clues.”
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’.”
Iska had gone on a little ahead and was standing on a boulder staring intently up the mountainside into the swirling mist that concealed the peaks some distance above them.
“Look, Eimer,” she called, staring fixedly at something high above them. “Do you see it?”
He stood beside her, his eyes following the direction of her finger. “Can’t see a thing but mist,” he said eventually, and turned to go.
“No. Wait!” she commanded, detaining him by catching hold of his cloak. “Just there! Wait for the mist to part again.”
“There’s nothing there.”
“Just wait,” she repeated tensely.
As he watched, the grey, shifting veils of mist did indeed eddy apart for a brief moment, torn by the rising wind, and before they closed again, Eimer saw high above them, on a stormy pinnacle of rock, a dark fortress.
Chapter Nineteen
The Fire Sprites
Vesarion stood on the boulder, facing into the rising wind, intently studying the mountainside above him. The mist was frustrating him. Sometimes it tore apart to give a brief glimpse of the fortress, at others it coalesced to form a curtain almost completely opaque. For a long time he stood, as if struggling to come to a decision, ignoring the hard pellets of snow that the wind was whipping stingingly into his face. At last, he jumped down decisively and returned to the others.
“I couldn’t get a very clear view of it,” he explained, “but I think it is much further away than it seems. Certainly it is considerably higher than our present position and it’s difficult to gauge what may lie in between. I could see a snowfield stretching in front of it, dotted here and there with fir trees, but the mist was playing cat and mouse with me, giving me only the most fleeting of glimpses.”
He turned to Gorm. “”Do you know anything about it? Do you know who lives there?”
“No one,” said Gorm bluntly. “Other Turog say black castle is evil place. Best not go there.”
“What do you mean by evil?”
“Don’t know. Never been there.”
“Why is it even there at all?” asked Eimer. “It may be abandoned now, but why was it built in such an inhospitable place in the first place?”
Bethro, of course, had a theory. “It must have been built to guard the pass through the mountains. The Keeper said that although the left hand path was dangerous, it did provide a means of crossing the mountains, did he not?”
“He did,” confirmed Vesarion. “Let us hope that you are correct, Bethro, and it does indeed guard a pass, because I have been standing on that rock for some time now, trying to see a passage between the peaks and I can see nothing. At first I thought that the low cloud and mist must be hiding it, but for an instant the wind whipped the mist away and I could see right up into the heights of the peaks and I could see no obvious way through them.”
Eimer, pulling his fur-lined cloak closer around him, said: “At this stage, it hardly matters. This wind is rising and rapidly whipping the snow into a blizzard. If we don’t get some shelter soon, crossing the mountains will be the least of our worries.”
Vesarion looked at Sareth who was visibly shaking with cold and forced himself to overcome a nebulous sense of foreboding that had taken hold of him ever since he had beheld the fortress.
“You are right, we have little choice in the matter,” he agreed. Looking doubtfully at Sareth, he said: “The fortress is some distance away, and we’ll have to move fast, as the light will be gone soon, do you think you can manage?”
She summoned up the ghost of a smile, even though her teeth were chattering together.
“Yes, of course. I’m keen to find out what sort of h-hospitality is on offer. Whatever it is, it’s bound to b-be an improvement of this.” Then pulling her hood up, she declared in very typical fashion: “You’d think that the one advantage in having a f-fever is that at least you’d feel warm, but I feel only marginally warmer than a glacier at the m-moment.”
It was left to Iska to voice what they all had been secretly feeling ever since the castle had come into view.
“I’m only going because I have to. There’s something about that place, even from a distance, that I don’t like. However, as the only other alternative is to freeze to death, I’ll give it a try.”
Eimer attempted to be reassuring. “Don’t worry, Iska, Gorm said it is deserted, so there is nothing that could hurt you.”
But the Turog effectively scuppered this attempt at cheer. “Said the first bit. Not second.”
For the remainder of that day, they toiled across the area of broken rocks and deep fissures, working their way ever higher. They battled constantly against a vicious wind that hurled particles of snow and ice at them with such velocity that it soon had their exposed faces raw with cold. By the time they reached the snowfield that lay before the fortress, dusk was beginning to close in as stealthily as a hunting cat. A level area of violet-blue snow lay before them, pristine and untouched, save for writhing snakes of white being driven across it by the relentless wind. Here and there dark firs, leaning before the gale, spread graceful, downward-sweeping skirts from which the wind was stripping the snow. On the far side of this, reared up a sheer pinnacle of rock, stabbing like a needle towards the sky, its steely sides dark against the whiteness. It stood proud of the brooding mountainside that loomed up behind it, its bare face flecked here and there with whiteness where the snow found ledges horizontal enough to rest upon. Although somewhat dwarfed by the massive bulk of the mountain, the pinnacle was still awe-inspiring, soaring above the snowfield crowned by the black diadem that was the fortress. The builders of the castle had provided access to their eyrie by incising a path into the face of the rock that zigzagged steeply upwards until it reached the dark walls. The castle, although exuding ancientness, seemed strangely intact. Vesarion, looking at it closely, decided that for whatever reason it had been abandoned, it was too complete to have been the assault of an enemy. A few torn rags of mist, like evicted ghosts, still clung stubbornly to the tops of the many tall, forbidding towers, resisting the efforts of the wind to drag them away. The keep, visible above the curtain wall, was not a single building like Sorne or Ravenshold, but a jumble of connected buildings, from which arose many tall towers around which could be seen tiny flecks of black, tossed about by the assaulting wind against a backdrop of bruised clouds.
“Ravens
,” pronounced Bethro, raising his voice above the wind. “It reminds me of the old name for the capital of Westrin – Sadris Karn – the Fortress of the Ravens,”
Iska looked at Vesarion, her eyes widening in astonishment. “Ravenshold is like that?” she exclaimed, staring horrified at the grim edifice before her.
“Well, no, not exactly,” he replied, leaping to the defence of his beloved home. “Ravenshold is a stronghold that was designed to secure our borders from incursions by the Turog and so it is a little stark on the outside, but it is pleasant and comfortable enough on the inside. Moreover, although it is snow-bound in winter, at this time of year its valleys are green, laced by many streams, with pastures full of lambs. The air above them is scattered with swallows and its rich woodlands are not dead, like this, but are alive with young deer and many birds.” Then realising he was waxing almost poetical, he added severely: “Whereas, I don’t think this place ever thaws.”
Eimer, who had been staring up at the fortress, more than a little intimidated by it, added: “Besides, I hate to contradict you, Bethro, but they are not ravens, just common old crows – and lots of them. I wonder what on earth they find to eat up here?”
Bethro merely sniffed, not pleased at being corrected, but Gorm, rather ghoulishly, had his own suggestion: “Dead bodies,” he announced morbidly.
“T-there’s another p-problem,” stammered Sareth, cheeks scarlet but still shaking from the cold. “If we cross that s-snowfield, we will be leaving a t-trail that a blind man could hardly fail to see.”
Vesarion raised his face to the leaden sky as if searching for answers. “Then we must hope for a heavy fall of snow.”
Yet when they had waded their way across the snowfield to the foot of the pinnacle and he looked back, he was forced to concede that they had left a trail so obvious that they may as well have erected a signpost. However, as if a greater power had heard his request, the snow was indeed beginning to fall again, whisked hither and thither by the hysterical wind. For the first time since he had entered such frozen regions, he found himself willing it to continue. They had reached the foot of the path by now, and he leaned back to view the fortress now directly above. All that was visible from such an acute angle was the vertiginous rocks and a section of curtain wall. The only apparent occupants of the castle could be heard cawing and cackling in their harsh voices, as they squabbled over roosting places for the night in the bleak towers.
