The Baying of Wolves

by J. Thorn

  The Cygoa were not stopping. The brief pause in battle, and the fear of Ghafir’s bow, had slowed their pursuit, but now that the Elk were retreating they pushed up onto the bridge to follow, locking shields and lowering to a crouch to hide from the arrows.

  How many of his men had escaped the carnage? Jonah didn’t know, but as he backed across the bridge, eventually reaching the midpoint, he estimated that a third at least—maybe as many as half—had fallen at the foot of the bridge, but an equal number of Cygoa lay dead on the ground.

  There was a roar ahead of them, among the Cygoa, and for a few seconds the pursuit halted and chaos erupted among the Cygoa ranks. Then several warriors fell onto the bridge, knocked down by the charge of a raging figure that broke through the ranks.

  It was Rav. His hair was wild and there was a glare of insanity in his eyes as he raged through the Cygoa, swinging his club left to right, smashing down any that approached. Then several other warriors pushed from behind him, and Gunney appeared at the rear. The group burst from the Cygoa ranks and began to run the distance between the opposing forces.

  Before Jonah could even mention it, Ghafir was firing, loosing arrows at any Cygoa that tried to stop the group.

  “Hold here,” Jonah shouted, determined to give Rav, Gunney and the others a chance to reach them. He would not leave his friends, and he was about to charge forward but saw that Rav and Gunny had cleared the Cygoa line, along with the other Elk warriors. They were well away from the reach of the Cygoa weapons now and running toward them.

  The Cygoa front line had collapsed into disarray, and Jonah took advantage of this. He needed to give them distance, let his men regroup and form their own line. What he had was a ragged line made up of less than half of his remaining men. He glanced back toward the end of the bridge, and saw that none of the warriors who continued running had fled. Many of them had slowed near the end of the bridge, and were turning, looking back, undecided.

  “Back up,” he shouted. “Keep backing up.” He glanced behind, seeing the end of the bridge only a few yards away.

  Do I hold the bridge? Jonah wondered, or run off it? If we hold the bridge we can keep the Cygoa where they are, but if we let them get off here we may be overrun. He saw the edge of the great ravine pass. He was over solid ground now. “Halt!” he shouted. “Hold here!”

  The line stopped dead and held, facing the Cygoa ahead of them. Rav, Gunney and the other warriors reached the defense line and pushed through. “They’re weakening!” shouted Rav. “They’re less of them than it looks. Lots of bodies left back there.”

  Then the arrow thudded into Jonah’s shield, the force knocking him backwards, behind the line. Rav stepped into the gap, heaving a shield from the ground and blocking the hole. Ghafir frowned as Jonah got to his feet and held up the shield. The arrow had pierced it, the head sticking three inches out of the other side, barely inches from his wrist.

  Ghafir looked confused, and Jonah could almost hear the thought process going through the man’s mind. Ghafir had already killed the only enemy archer. Hadn’t he? The tall man scanned the bridge as Jonah climbed to his feet, and was looking to where the slumped body of the hunchback scout should have been. Jonah glanced that way, and saw that the scout wasn’t there. Instead the man was up on his feet again, now ten yards closer to the bridge, and taking aim once more.

  There was a shout from the Cygoa line as Ghafir took aim with his last arrow. He’d burned through forty of them in less than twenty minutes and now Jonah could see that he had none left in the quiver at his side. This was the last one.

  The leader of the Cygoa appeared at the front of the Cygoa line, and Ghafir swung his bow to meet the man, just as another arrow thudded into an Elk warrior a few feet away. The man fell with a cry, the arrow jutting from his shoulder. Ghafir swung back to the scout, cursing. The arrow would have been enough to take out the leader, but the scout was more urgent.

  Ghafir aimed, as his opponent did likewise. Their arrows flew at the same moment, but unlike the scout, who now stood on the edge of the great breach and couldn’t risk moving, Ghafir sidestepped and Jonah saw that the arrow that had been aimed at Ghafir, not himself, as it whistled past. Jonah turned back to the scout in time to see him stagger as Ghafir’s arrow struck him in the neck. The man thrashed at the protruding shaft for a moment before falling forward into the massive ravine.

  “Charge!” Andmar’s voice boomed, and the Cygoa rushed forward. But as Andmar moved to lead the charge, there was a flutter of movement coming in fast from the north. Jonah watched as an arrow appeared, thudding into the side of the tall man’s head and bursting through the opposite side of his skull. Blood and flesh sprayed the two Cygoa warriors nearest to their leader. Both stopped dead, shocked expressions on their faces, and the rest of the arrows fell upon them. A half dozen Cygoa dropped, one tumbling off the bridge to fall into the ravine below.

  “What the—” Jonah had no words, but he looked to the north, along the edge of the breach, and saw them just as Declan spoke.

  “Briar and the hunters. They came back!”

  Jonah felt his heart lift as he spotted the dozen fur clad hunters, and their leader, hunched together a dozen feet from the breach, thirty yards along the edge.

  We have chance, he thought. With their help, we can win this. We just must hold them off until they are weakened. Let the hunters take them down. “Hold here!” Jonah shouted, but even as he spoke, panic broke out among the Cygoa and they broke, some running back across the bridge, others running toward the waiting Elk.

  Then the ground underneath them shifted, nearly knocking Jonah over. Then it shifted again, this time violently enough to cause the line of panicking Cygoa to fall forward. Those immediately behind tripped and fell over the ones in front, dropping shields and weapons as they fumbled to right themselves.

  But it was already too late. The bridge moved, and Jonah saw the other side plummet downwards maybe ten feet, the rocks and dirt wrenched away as the weight of the massive metal structure crushed the far wall of the ravine to rubble.

  “Get off the bridge,” came a voice from behind. Most of the Elk holding the line broke off and ran, as did Jonah, but then, as he reached the edge, he stopped and turned back. Gunney was down on the bridge, and Rav was next to him, one arm around the warrior and the other still holding his club. There was a massive wrenching noise as the other side of the bridge collapsed further, and the ground under Jonah’s feet lurched to a steeper angle, throwing him off the edge of the bridge and onto the hard ground.

  A huge plume of dust blew up yards away from him, followed by a grinding noise. Jonah hurried to his feet and leapt forward, dropping his axe and reaching for Gunney and Rav as the bridge finally fell away. His hands flailed in the air as he tried to grasp those of his friends, but it was too late. Gunney and Rav fell into the breach, following the massive bulk of the bridge.

  Jonah tottered on the edge of the ravine for a moment before collapsing back onto the dirt, where he sat helplessly, watching as the figures of his friends disappeared into the darkness below. Beyond them, the entire force of Cygoa plummeted into the depths of the ravine.

  A shadow fell over him, and Jonah turned to see the shocked face of Declan.

  “They fell,” said the boy. “Rav. Gunney. They…”

  “Yes,” said Jonah. “They’re gone.”

  Chapter 17

  A sharp spasm of pain tore Seren from unconsciousness. She sat up quickly, grimacing as a shock ran up her leg from her ankle. She opened her eyes and felt a surge of panic building as nothing changed. All she saw was darkness. Then, as she tried to calm herself, telling herself that it was ok—she wasn’t blind, she couldn’t be—she noticed a faint glimmer of light coming from above. She took a deep breath, relieved, still looking upwards, and her mind raced to remember where she was.

  She had been fleeing from the strangers, yes, for two days, or maybe three? They had followed her to this place, and she had found... What had
she found? Something strange in the woods? Sorcha was nowhere to be found. What was it? Traps! She had found the traps in the woods, and the hunters had set them off. They had died, huge holes blown out of them by whatever the traps had triggered. The other men had fled. Had they thought it was she who caused the deaths? Some form of witchery, maybe?

  But it hadn’t been, had it. She was no witch. Something had made a very loud noise, something new, or even something very old.

  Moonlight, that’s what she was seeing. It shone down from a gap in the ceiling high above her, maybe twenty feet up, where a layer of bushes, fallen leaves, and branches had built up over the years, hiding the hole she had fallen into.

  She tried to move her leg and grimaced once more, nearly crying out as the pain swept from her ankle to her knee in sharp throbs. Broken, she thought. Must be broken. Maybe. Must be broken.

  Fighting the pain and trying to stay quiet, so as not to alert anyone that may be nearby to her presence, she tried to wriggle her toes and found that not only could she feel them fine but she could move them as well.

  Maybe only a bad sprain, then, she thought, hoping that her ankle wasn’t broken. She was alone in the forest, a place where her pursuers could potentially come back to find her again, maybe bringing more strangers with them. She had to be quiet.

  After a few minutes of sitting there, her eyes began to adjust to the limited light. It wasn’t much but the moonlight was bright enough that once she had gotten used to it she could see that she was sitting on a stairwell that led down into darkness. A dozen steps led down to a flat square of concrete, and then more steps followed, bringing the stairs back on themselves.

  A stairwell of some sort, and old, built from the man-made rock that Logan called concrete. The walls were cracked, and inside the gaping holes she could see the mesh of rusted metal that seemed to always form the heart of the rock. She had always thought it strange and wonderful how the people from ancient times had managed to bury metal inside of rock.

  But what was this place all the way out here? In the middle of the old forest, and in the middle of nowhere. Stairs. Leading where?

  The stairs had to lead down to something, and in the other direction they would lead up and out of the hole, surely? At least she wouldn’t have to climb out of the hole, she thought. The stairs would lead her to the surface. She only had to figure out how to get through the layer of debris that blocked the way at the top.

  Her mind wandered as she sat there. The place had to be ancient. She looked around, waiting for the throbbing in her leg to ease, and it was as she sat there, waiting for the pain to abate, that she spotted her rucksack at the bottom of the first set of stairs. It must have rolled down there when she hit the ground. It had fallen off her back during the fall and tumbled into the darkness, coming to a stop in the corner, barely visible among the debris that had built up against the opposite wall. Seren shuffled down the stairs, not attempting to walk yet, deciding that she shouldn’t irritate her ankle more than necessary. It was easier to sit and shuffle her way down, one step at a time, trying to keep her ankle raised to avoid bumping it.

  Eventually, she got to the flat corner section of the stairs and reached out, grabbing the rucksack and rummaging inside. She pulled out a small, thick-cut piece of wood with a rag attached to the top—one of the torches she had made for emergencies. She found her flint and lit the torch, cursing as it took minutes rather than the usual seconds, and it was then that she realized she was shivering and cold.

  How long had she been lying there? It was dark outside. It must have been at least six or seven hours that she’d lain there, she thought, getting colder and colder, and now her limbs were numb. Her fingers fought to respond, rebelling against every movement, but eventually the torch flared and lit, and the heat from the flame made her sigh with relief. She held one hand up, near to the bright flame, and wriggled her fingers, trying to wrestle some movement from them.

  Out in the middle of nowhere. Probably lost, now, if I can’t find my own trail back. And to top that, stuck down a hole.

  And where was Sorcha? She’d lost track of the wolf when she fled the strangers. She’ll find me, Seren thought. She’ll track me down, I’m sure.

  Seren picked up a stone that lay at her feet and threw it into the darkness, cursing her bad luck and ignoring that it may have been carelessness. And it was then that she noticed, as the stone skipped away down the steps, a line of thread running across the top step of the stairs leading downwards. It was a few feet from where she sat. The trigger line of another trap.

  Her eyes went wide, and her heart started to thump in her chest as she realized what must be just a few feet into the darkness. Another of whatever it was that had killed the strangers that had chased her, whatever deadly device that could make such a loud bang and do such catastrophic damage.

  It could be pointing right at you, she thought, the thing that could take off a man’s head and neck in one loud boom.

  And then her mind raced. Imagine, she thought, if you could hold such a thing. She had not seen what it was that had killed the men, but she had seen the strings that triggered the traps. If it was some demon, the cord lines would not have been needed. If some evil spirit had killed them, it would have done so to her. As crazy as it seemed, Seren decided that she had to get past the trap and discover what lay beyond.

  And she knew she was nuts to even try it.

  You should go, she thought, escape from this hole and leave the thing behind. But what if this was her fate? She had never really believed in much, but even the old fool Logan had said she was destined for important things. Destined.

  Had she been destined to run from those hunters in this direction? To find this hidden place that no one had disturbed since...forever? How long had it been since anyone walked down these stairs? It must’ve lain there, hidden, untouched by man or woman, for centuries, gradually being covered over by fallen leaves and branches until the existence of the traps was completely hidden from anyone until they walked into it. But no one had passed this way.

  Until I came here, she thought.

  How far was this place from Wytheville? Maybe forty miles? All those miles into the wilderness was much further than most hunters would normally travel. She had only come this way because she had been pursued. Normally, while hunting, she would go maybe a mile at most into the thicker forest. Never this far. It was possible, she thought, that this place had never been discovered. The trap—whatever it was that had been set off by the hunters breaking the strings—would have gone off if anyone else had walked through them.

  Anything could be up there, waiting for her, and that made her think at least on the stairwell she was relatively safe for the night. She could defend this spot if something came down—or up from the darkness below.

  Deciding that she had to find out what the trap was, Seren shone the torch around her, double checking the path up the stairs. There were no wires, no strings crossing the walkway up there. She sighed. She’d been lucky that she’d even spotted the wire, but the knowledge that she hadn’t missed another one was a relief.

  So, downwards it is, then, she thought.

  She shuffled forward, leaning against the wall to support her leg, and carefully stepped over the wire that crossed the stairs. She cringed as she lifted her painful leg, her ankle protesting as it was raised and then placed on the stairs below the cord line. The torch lit up the stairwell now, and as she lifted her other leg over the wire and took two more steps down, she traced the string from one side of the stairway to the other. It led directly upward after that, ending its journey attached to something that looked like a broken tool handle.

  Seren frowned but still stepped past it and looked up, holding the torch up, but not too close, her mind racing to figure out what the device was.

  The line across the stairwell was held in place on one side by a pin that was stuck into a crack in the concrete. On the opposite wall, another pin, this one circular at the top like th
e eye of a needle, allowed the string to pass through, and then the string trailed upward to the back of the device.

  The thing was attached by string tied to two large nails that were embedded in the wall, and Seren could clearly make out a single word etched into the strange object. Remington.

  It meant nothing to her, but the fact that the trap was an object that she could touch, and not some fire demon from old legends, sent her mind racing. The object was long and black with two long pipes pointing down toward the stairs and at the back, a thicker section. She couldn’t tell what it was made of.

  It looks like it could be held, she thought. She looked down at the string. If somebody passed through there the string would pull, and the part attached to the device would suddenly be tightened. Whatever it was, she thought that hook-shaped bit in the middle was the key to it. She reached down, keeping well away from where the strange object pointed, and held the torch to the string. After a few seconds, the string caught fire, snapped, and just fell. There was no loud bang. Nothing.

  Quickly she took out a knife and cut the remainder of the string away, and then stood looking up at the strange trap, wondering how on earth she would take it down.

  She wanted this thing in her hands.

  If it could kill a man while attached to a trap, what could it do if you were holding it?

  Two minutes later and she was sitting on the stairs, the strange device in her lap, feeling it’s weight, and she was just thinking there were at least two others out in the forest that she could go and fetch if she dared negotiate the undergrowth and avoid any other traps, when she heard a shuffling sound in the bushes above her. Instinctively, she pointed the device at the hole above, but then she recognized the sniffing sounds and the whine that followed.