Wolfwalker - Wolf In Night Part 3

Death, they howled.Power. Old death. Burning, new fire, new death.

The slitted eyes seemed to glow.

"Don't-" she cried out.

The packsong blasted back through her, cascading over the slitted gaze. Her mind seemed to right itself, twisted up and out, back to the clarity of chill night. Yellow eyes faded. Wolves nipped at her thigh and turned her away from the fork. Blindly she obeyed.

"Old death?" she tried to ask. "New death?"

Grey Vesh ignored her question.Not that way, First Mother snapped instead as she tried to look back.

Hurry. Clumsy human.

That last was an afterthought, almost a goad, and Nori forced herself after the wolves. The Grey Ones feared the fork toward the cliff even more than they feared the worlags. What shocked Nori enough to follow was the sharpness of their fear. Old death, fevers, and burning pain-she recognized the taste of disease. But it should be faded, faint in their minds. Moons, but it should be years, even centuries old.

There was only one thing could make such a memory: Plague.

She'd seen it. She'd felt it. Her mother had made sure she could recognize it through the memories of the wolves: The slight tremors and rising fever. The convulsions that could snap a man's arms and back as his muscles contracted like vises around his bones. The blinding fire that burned in the veins and twisted a man's mind into coma and death. Full half of the colonists had perished in the first wave of alien plague. A third of those left had died in the second epidemic. And then there had been the martyrs. Even after eight hundred years, it was still viable, the plague.

Nori had been to the Ancients' domes twice, where the colonists had lived at Landfall. There had been bones there, hundreds of human skeletons, strangely lit rooms where the walls glowed without sign of a single lantern. There had been papers that had fractured or powdered when she touched them, odd equipment she didn't understand. Plague lived there, in the ruins of the first county halls. No one knew what caused the disease, only that the Aiueven, the alien birdmen, had sent the plague, and man could still contract it.

Plague here, in the forest? Nori must have misunderstood. With the bond so new, the fear of worlags was simply confused with other images. It was impossible to catch the death-disease away from the Ancients' domes.

But Grey Vesh nipped at Nori's knee, and another wolf bit at her heels when she tried to turn again to the cliff. She jerked back onto the forest trail. They snarled and pushed her into a wide arc around the ridge where they s.h.i.+ed from death.

"Dammit," she cried out. "It's safety. I can climb out at the cliffs."

Death, death.Grey Vesh slammed into her thigh and snapped at her elbow.

She staggered left and missed another game trail that led toward the stone ridges. "d.a.m.n you, it could save your pups."

Burning death,Grey Vesh snarled back in her mind.Dead wolves, dead pups. Dead humans, the wolf finally snapped.

She had no more breath to argue. The best she could do was glimpse the rocks, pale and steep. In the moonlight, the cliff bit at the earth like a stone jaw half sunk into flesh. There was a darker scar on its face, as if the rocks had broken in recent years. It gave the ridge the look of a snarling poolah. She noted the location in the back of her mind, then raced on in the midst of the wolves. Now there was only Ironjaw Creek three kays away and shallow as a bigot.

Behind her, the thick trees swallowed the rancid scent of a drying seep and its rotting richness of reeds.

She never saw the turquoise sheen of the shallow puddles that the rain had been diluting. Never saw the faint, yellow-green glow from the dying lilies that wept into the swamp.

IV.

An ally makes a good friend, Except when he's at your back.

-Nadugur saying East, onWillow Road . . .

Payne's sister didn't turn up at Wakje's wagon, nor among the crafters, nor with the last of the cozar wagons. Payne was about to check with yet another merchant when he caught sight of the wagon's chovas. The man riding guard was Murton, the Sidisport chak who had dumped him in the river.

Thechovas glanced back and caught sight of him. "Hey, neBentar," the man called out. "Sorry about that dunking."

Inside one of the wagons, three men went still. Then there was a flurry of quiet action. The blond man s.n.a.t.c.hed the lists and papers on the table and stuffed them into his jerkin. The second man grabbed a map they'd had handy and laid it out over the now bare wood. The third reached back and picked up a packet of trade agreements to spread out over the map. As Payne's dnu reined in beside Murton, the three inside began a quiet murmuring about trade routes in the east.

Payne hid his disgust at the greeting. Murton's voice had been, of course, loud enough to catch the attention of every outrider nearby. The man got on Payne's nerves like a splinter in his shorts. But Payne smoothed his expression. With a ninan left to reach the Test town, he figured he'd better get used to splinters. "I'm asking along the line," he said shortly. "Have you seen my sister in the past few hours?"

"Black Wolf?" The outrider gave him a speculative look. "Moons, neBentar, you worry more about her than a rabbit in a lepa's den."

He shrugged.

The older man said dryly, "If you can't find her, it's probably because she doesn't want to be found, especially after that leaf trick. How she knows where to find those things . . ." Thechovas shook his head. "She's probably waiting near the front of the line."

Payne kept his voice steady. "No one's seen her ride forward."

But the man caught the undertone anyway. "Dik spit, neBentar, you're not thinking of calling a search?

That's a h.e.l.l of an overreaction."

Payne dropped his pretense of a smile. "Not if she's actually missing."

"Don't get your shorts in a twist, boy. Black Wolf will laugh her head off when she turns up atChileiwa Circle after you've started a panic. Your parents will have a field day when they hear about that."

Payne stifled his instinctive response. There might be ten folk left in the county who didn't know he was the youngest son of Aranur of Ramaj Ariye and the famous Wolfwalker Dione. Attention from the girls he didn't mind. Taking flak from a chak like Murton was a different story. It was one of the reasons he preferred traveling with the cozar when he wasn't in a hurry. The cozar didn't care if he was Aranur's son, only that he worked his share of the line. In fact, with few exceptions, the only real ranks or t.i.tles used among the cozar were those of location, not lineage. A message master was the wagon with the birds and ring-runner supplies, not the person most skilled at writing, carving, or hawking. Duties rotated, depending on who was in the train, and people were judged by what they did, not by how they were born. Only the -vanat the end of a task indicated someone whose skills were high enough to hold a permanent t.i.tle, and the -vanwas used only for strangers who required the formality. Among themselves, the cozar were known simply by their rep-names, like Repa Ripping White or Tatsvin Ten-Bones, or in Nori's case, Black Wolf.

Murton cast him a sideways look. "She's probably out planning tonight's antic in spades," the man prodded again. "The painted faces on the dnu? The wheezing saddle? You should watch your backside more. She'd pick on a lepa if she thought it would bite The Brother."

There it was. Payne shrugged grimly. He should have expected Murton to get his name in sooner or later. The cozar had called him The Brother ever since he was twelve, but every time Murton said the rep-name, it turned into an insult. Payne prayed the rep-name didn't stick past his Test. It was depressingly accurate. His life in a nutsh.e.l.l: always watching out for Nori, always responsible for her.

Sometimes, hearing "The Brother" made him want to pound some bones in, as if he would never be a man himself, just one more appendage of Nori.

Murton shook his head at Payne's shrug. "Even if she's out on the trail, she's four times as skilled there as you. You might as well worry that a poolah can't find its own den." The man's dnu danced nervously at a crackling sound, but thechovas controlled the beast easily. "She's playing a joke, nothing more.

She'll be back by fireside."

"She's already played her prank for the day, and she would never make me worry on purpose." Not when it could rouse the cozar. The caravan folk would descend on the forest like a flock of pelan.

They'd pick apart every bush in case she'd fallen or been set upon. They'd scour the creek banks, check every ravine. She'd never intentionally cause the kind of search she herself had led so often.

"She's made no bones about not wanting to Test."

"Doesn't matter. This is my Test, not hers. Besides-" He shrugged and hid a wince at a deep bruise.

When it came to the fighting rings, his sister was no gentle teacher. She had fists like small steel hammers, elbows even harder, and a stubborn determination to train him up right for rank. Compensation, most likely, for not being able to Test herself. With the specialized training she had received, he might never achieve her skill in the rings, but at least he could best almost any student anywhere near his own age. He tried to force another smile, as if it was indeed a joke. "She'd never miss watching me get thrown around by a dozen ranking fighters."

The older guard chuckled. "That's not something I'd miss, either. I hear you're finally taking your firsts in Abis and Cansi. Been a bit of speculation as to why you haven't done so before. I would have thought the son of a weapons master would be encouraged to Test early, not late."

Payne's smile thinned. "Rank isn't everything."

Murton nodded. "I hear that a lot from the unranked. I mean no offense, of course."

"Of course," Payne bit off.

Inside the wagon, the men grinned slyly at each other. They had two bets riding on The Brother. The first was when Murton would get him to challenge. The second was how badly the outrider would crack the boy open once he had him down. They had argued briefly over the near-accident on the bridge, but had finally decided it didn't count toward the bet. They were hoping for blood on the boy, not just for a missing body.

Outside, Murton added, "I don't see why you're so upset, neBentar. They say she's been looking out for you for years every time you two hit the trails. She's old enough now to not to want The Brother tagging along every time she leaves the train. In fact-" He gave Payne a sly look as he picked a burr off his dnu. "-she was walking out with B'Kosan last night. She's probably riding the frontage trail with him and not wanting to be disturbed."

"I'll look into it, thanks." He spurred his dnu away at a canter.

Murton called after him, "Give my regards to B'Kosan."

"Moonwormed p.i.s.sant," Payne muttered to his dnu. Nori might be more at home on the trails, but she hadn't walked out with B'Kosan. She'd had to rebuff thatchovas ever since the man had joined them. It had been B'Kosan who followed Nori around, not she who encouraged the guard. h.e.l.ls, for Nori to walk out with B'Kosan was like a wolf stepping out with a dog: it was bound to end in violence. Not just from Nori, either. Last night, when Nori had gone to gather night herbs from the verge, Payne had barely had time to sling on his swordbelt when B'Kosan had come back to fireside. Payne had smothered a dark satisfaction. Thechovas had been limping.

Payne looked along the wagon line, then out again at the forest. No moonbeams penetrated the thick, textured folds of black-greens. The only lights now were the glowing road, the lanterns inside a few of the wagons, and the four moons overhead. On the ghostly road, the spoked wheels made illusive, hypnotic patterns. Payne listened as much with his mind as his ears, but the moons glowed silently above the rumbling wagons. He breathed, "Nori-girl, where are you?"

No wolf howls answered him. No badgerbear roars or bihwadi cries broke the quiet on the other side of the verge. If there were Grey Ones nearby, he could not hear them. Just the stuttered trot of the wagon teams, and the tiny cries of the tree sprits. He muttered another silent curse and rode forward along the line.

V.

Grasp: "Things are looking up, friend."

Grasp's Friend: "That's because you're blind."

-fromPlaying with Swords, traditional staging Nori was two kays south of Ironjaw Creek, running hard for the water. She had husbanded her strength, but her breath came now in urgent rhythm. Her hands were slick with sweat.

She turned onto a wide game track that, even in the dark, felt familiar. The wolves snarled, but she refused to change direction. They were adding distance to her path, distance the worlags didn't have to run. She built a picture of human scouts and projected it desperately into the packsong.Men. Where are the nearest men?

Rishte caught the sense of the question and pa.s.sed it on to the grey. From him, it swept out from wolf to wolf, pack to pack in the night. The images snarled back. Men at the rock circle, men at the fork, men on the wide river trail . . .

Without the eye contact, Rishte's voice was too thin to understand. A river trail? Perhaps Deepening Road? It was the major route along the steep, rugged canyon that contained the River Phye. She knew dozens of scouts along that route and half the council ring-runners. ButDeepening Road was seven or eight kays away, at least four oldEarth miles, too far with worlags behind her.

Men at the fork-she didn't get that. Pira Forks, perhaps, but that was clear on the other side of the cliffs. It might as well be on a moon. The men at a circle of rocks felt closer, north and west on a hill. Bell Rocks was in that direction. It was a scout camp, only four kays away, off the main trails on a side loop.

This time of year, with the worlags hunting, someone else might have been forced there to wait out the night. She felt a spur of hope. Ariyen scouts were well armed.

She projected a memory of the place, and Rishte growled. One of his packmates nipped at her heels as the wolves again tried to turn her off the track.Death, death. Danger. Rishte seemed to beat the words into her mind.

"Armed men," she managed. "Bell Rocks is safety."

But Rishte growled again, and his teeth seemed to bite at her thoughts.

Danger like the cliff?She didn't realize she had projected the question so strongly, but Rishte answered.

No. New death, cold death and marrow.

She gagged. She could almost taste the marrow. Cold death-cold bones? The wolves feared the cliff because it reminded them of plague. There was no sense of plague up ahead. So they avoided Bell Rocks for some other reason. Carca.s.ses would draw worlags and bihwadi, so this was probably just an instinctive reaction to avoid the predators. Men would never butcher an animal where others might later ride. She tried to form an image of the slinking, doglike bihwadi, then of poolah with their tooth-ringed maws.

All she got back was a wary sense of danger. It was scavengers, then. The idea was actually a relief.

She couldn't chance running into more worlags, but she could easily outclimb bihwadi. Rishte sensed her determination to go on and snarled into the pack. Another wolf snapped back, then slammed into Nori's thigh to try to turn her away from the loop path. She was almost thrown from the trail. Rishte snapped at the other wolf, but Nori shoved through them both. The other wolf didn't hit her again.

Ahead, Rishte whipped under a heavy log. Nori dove after him and rolled, following through a scurry of leaves and rotting twigs. She was spitting out debris when she realized that she could as easily have vaulted that log as rolled through underneath. She was too close to the wolves, too caught up in their urgency. It was now affecting her judgment. She pushed back the wolves, hit her stride, and went into the clearing in a full-legged run.

And tripped on the half-fleshed corpse.

She tucked up and jumped awkwardly, but her toes caught the b.l.o.o.d.y rib cage. Tangled bones tumbled thickly into a wash of moonlight. She landed in a crouch and whipped around, her breath ragged and tight.

Human. Dead.

New death. Near death. Cold.

Now she understood. "G.o.ds-" She couldn't help the word. And not one body, but two. The wolves had known. That's why they had tried to herd her away.

She took in the scene as fast as she could. Scavengers had already eaten most of the flesh and guts. The doglike bihwadi had had their meals first. The dung and musk marks were a dead giveaway for the sly, pink-eyed creatures. The antlike largons had started in after the bihwadi, their insect jaws tearing out perfect half-circle bites. Now thin lines of writhing black led away through the crumpled gra.s.ses. The tiny nightants were still working where the largons had had their fill.

She squatted and quickly lifted leaves away from the bones. The edge of a metal b.u.t.ton gleamed under a fern like a forgotten note of fear, and she identified the guild pattern as she turned it over in the moonlight.

Messengers, then, or what was left of them. But all the way out here? She was in Gambrel Meadow, at least a full kay off the main trail. The only claim this clearing had to usefulness was as a hunter's meadow, and that was in early fall. In spring, with the worlag packs scouring the woods, it was as dangerous as an off-trail swamp. There were thick logs jammed up against the trees where flooding along the creek had wedged them in-good for shelter or for defensive fire, or for forest cats or poolah. Nearby she caught sight of the bolts permanently sunk into the trees from which to suspend the gambrels. Now a long, stained rope dangled from one set and twisted in the cold wind. Nori felt suddenly sick. There were older bones in a rough pile to the left, cracked and missing their marrow.

She stumbled across the clearing and yanked at the weeds already growing through the barely cleaned bones. There were rotting clothes and skulls for at least four skeletons. Her hands trembled as she pushed aside a scapula and caught a dull gleam of light too clean and regular to be natural. It was wire, and it circled two wrist joints still held together by taut-dried ligaments. She stared back at the fresh bodies, as if the moonlight lied. Then she groped for her scout book. She needed to mark this down, get this information to her father. But her hand sc.r.a.ped only air. "Oh, heckfire and d.a.m.nation."

She had no scout book and only a few minutes to spare. She looked around to set what she could in her memory, but she was missing something. The boots, she realized, and the socks were gone. There weren't any packs or belt pouches, either. She lifted the trampled gra.s.ses near the fresh corpse and found five small message tubes opened out and empty. Heavy brush, trussed limbs . . . The ring-runners hadn't been caught on the loop trail. They had been marched here barefoot, through hotflowers, blackthorn, and brambles. Which meant the raiders who had caught them were staking out the main trails.

Death. Fresh death. The wolves had known. They hadn't wanted her to take this trail, nor to risk their cubs at Bell Rocks. They had known: the kill trail led like a road map from here to the creek to the camp.

She'd find no scouts at Bell Rocks now. It was raiders up ahead.

"Dammit, G.o.dsdammit." She didn't even notice she cursed as she sucked in air to catch her breath. She could go on, could try to get around the camp, but if the raiders noticed her in the dark, she would look like another ring-runner. Raiders were always eager for news of a rich s.h.i.+pment or merchant train. Men like that would not lift a hand to help her. They would laugh while the worlags tore her apart outside their circle of fire. Then they would search her for any message tubes, and burn her limbs for their panbread.

Moonlight shafted through the trees, lighting the b.l.o.o.d.y bones. Black shadows darkened further with the brightening light, and the grisly skeletons stretched into distortions of human beings. The night breeze lifted and fell, and her sweat grew cold and clammy. Then, behind her, the worlags' chittering burst out excitedly. They had caught the smell of the decomp bodies-and her fresh blood smell on top of that.

Nori's spine turned to ice.

A blood-rush surged in the wolves' mental voice.Wolfwalker, the worlags, Grey Vesh snapped.

Nori took off across the clearing. Rishte snarled and raced after her. On the edge of the wolves, she snarled back. For an instant, the two tones meshed. Her legs pounded faster. Her hands stretched out.

Voices blended, emotions caught. Fear met and fed fear. The fragile communication twisted, clung. Her mind and Rishte's began to turn in the same direction till the link became a stronger cord, wound with lupine fury. It was the strength of hunting and feeding, of fighting for food against a stronger beast. It was the strength of survival, and it blinded her.

She slammed shoulder-first into a tree. "Dik spit!" She staggered back out of the roots.

Rishte snapped at her, as shocked by the abrupt, broad pain as she was. Even the pack stiffened with their link. The bond, the link, the change- Her mind s.h.i.+fted through pain, and the wolves poured in more smoothly. Speed, they urged. Run, run.

Half deafened, half paralyzed by the pack, by Rishte's voice, Nori stumbled back onto the trail.

Hurry. Fight-protect. Pups.Run. The wolves pa.s.sed each sense along through the faint mental voice of Rishte. Mud, darker, wetter-that way. And, footworm there. Jump over- She could hear the rush of water now. The fear that ate at her throat would choke her soon, and the wolves were feeding that terror. Everything her mother had told her was clear as claws on gla.s.s. The wolves, the bond, the creeping grey in her mind that turned into a torrent. The need to run, to turn and slash at the worlags that hounded her. The desire to bristle and bite at the danger up ahead. She tried to wrench back from the mental snarls as she'd been told to do when the bond got too intense, too uncontrolled. Her mind twisted to the right, up, out of the fog. Away from the grey, just as the Ancients had been taught to do, just as the alien birdmen had taught the Ancients themselves. It cleared her vision abruptly. The silence cut like a knife, both ways.

Rishte howled.