chapter 6
Amric and company followed the road into the forest as the morning sun crowned the trees with gold. A dark and verdant world closed about them. Mammoth, ancient trees towered above the thick brush and entwined their branches hundreds of feet overhead. Sunlight spilled through that high canopy, dappling the road before the riders. Taut as a bowstring, Amric rode ahead on his bay gelding. The feeling of being watched had been with him since they left the cave in the pre-dawn hour, like a nagging itch between his shoulder blades. It faded from him now, as the foliage walled off the plains behind them, to be replaced by a pervasive sense of wrongness. To be sure, a myriad of expected noises enveloped them, the buzz of countless insects and the incessant chatter of birds. The warrior saw no signs of land-bound creatures, however; no movement or recent tracks from vermin or game or natural predator, and the voices of the birds echoed down from high overhead. Nothing dares approach the ground, he realized.
Amric cast a backward glance over his shoulder. A short distance behind him rode Halthak and Bellimar, the former appearing to breathe only when he could avoid it no longer, and the latter with a languid air of curiosity. Valkarr brought up the rear of the procession on his blue dun, scanning to either side and behind them. His black eyes met Amric’s, and the Sil’ath’s expression made it plain that he felt something amiss as well. Facing forward once more, Amric opened his senses to his surroundings, letting the forest whisper its secrets to him. This was his element, and even corrupted as it was, he could read the woods like the worn pages of a familiar book. Moving at a guarded pace, they rode on, following the road as it curved deeper into the wilderness.
It was mid-morning when they came upon a fork in the road. One branch headed eastward and became little more than a trail, so much did the undergrowth encroach upon it. The other branch veered more southward and was as broad as the road in had been, with deep ruts from wagon wheels. Amric consulted the maps given them by Morland, and found that the southern fork led to one of his mines, which explained the higher traffic and the furrows from carts heavily laden with minerals. The mine was a short ride from the fork, according to the map, and Amric led them down that path. Their destination was down the other path, but the detour would cost them little time, and this many weeks later there was no way to tell from the marred surface of the road where the Sil’ath party might have explored and become detained. Or, came the thought before Amric could quell it, if they had even made it this far.
The mine road clove into the forest, arcing further southward for a time until the ground grew rockier and the vegetation began to thin. The path crested a rise, wound around a ridge of boulders jutting upward like the massive knuckles of some behemoth, and then fell away into a large basin. Amric drew rein before the apex of the road, dismounted and tied his horse to a low branch. The others did the same, and then followed him as he left the road. A few quick leaps from boulder to boulder carried him high enough to peer down over the ridgeline without exposing more than the top of his head to the other side. Valkarr followed on his heels, his movements just as nimble, and Halthak and Bellimar joined them both moments later. Together, they studied the scene below.
The clearing was a great bowl in the earth, devoid of any vegetation beyond scattered patches of dry scrub grass, declining gradually on this side and rising more abruptly on the far side into the foothills of the mountain range. The trees parted around this cleft in the earth, standing like silent sentinels on its lip in disapproval of the mortal intrusion here. As a result, the basin was bathed in sunlight, which only made the yawning mine entrance blacker by contrast. The entry was set into the hillside and framed by stout timbers, twice the height of a tall man and forty paces across. Four sets of cart tracks ran into the maw and were swallowed by darkness within a few paces. There were no carts in sight, though there were scattered pieces of broken equipment such as picks and helmets strewn about.
“It is shelter at least,” Halthak said. “We could camp here on the return trip.”
“I think not,” Amric replied. “Look into the shadows within the mine entrance.”
Halthak squinted into the distance, and shook his head. “I see nothing.”
“Look at the wall at the edge of the light, just past the second timber brace. Be patient and let your eyes adjust.”
Amric waited while Halthak stared and strained. Dust motes danced and swirled in the shafts of sunlight before the entrance, and, coupled with the deep shadows behind, did much to mask the interior detail. The longer one looked on, however, the more a portion of the movement seemed incongruous with the idle play of the breeze, and the more evident it became that there was motion on the walls inside the mine. Amric looked aside, watching Halthak’s expression, and he knew the moment of recognition because the healer blanched and his eyes bulged.
“What are they?” the Half-Ork whispered.
“Varkhuls. A great many of them,” Amric said, quirking a smile at Bellimar as he echoed the old man’s words from the previous morning.
“Indeed,” said Bellimar. “They are not harmed by sunlight, but they loathe it and become disoriented and half-blind by it. That man-made cave is a perfect abode for them, and there is no way of knowing how many are in that deep network of tunnels, or how fast they are multiplying. Come nightfall, it will be like kicking a nest of hornets; they will issue forth from the mine and carpet the vicinity, seeking prey.”
Amric nodded. “Agreed, and given the scarcity of local quarry, we should put a good distance between ourselves and this location before then. Let us be gone from here.”
Stealing back to the horses, the mounted up in silence and rode back up the mine road.
Outside the forest, a lone rider approached the cave in the foothills where Amric and his companions had camped the night before. Halting at the foot of the trail that led uphill to the cave, the rider gazed in that direction for a long moment, then downward at the tracks on the road, and finally to where the road pierced the forest in the distance and disappeared. Turning back to the cave, the rider reached up and released the veil that exposed only the eyes, and swept back the traveling cloak’s hood. Auburn hair tumbled free to be tugged by the breeze, and the rider drew deep, unhindered breaths as she scented the air. An unadorned silver circlet sat upon her brow and tamed her mane of hair over fierce green eyes. Swinging one leg around, the rider dropped lightly to the ground, using one hand to steady the long quiver bristling with arrows slung across her back. From a sheath tied to the saddle, she slid a recurve bow nearly as tall as she. She braced it against the ground and strung it in one deft motion. With a whispered word to the black mare, she draped the reins over the saddle horn and ascended the trail.
In her sewn buckskin leathers and oiled cloak, she made little noise as she climbed, bounding up the uneven trail with supple ease. As the mouth of the cave neared, she loosened the knife in its sheath at her side, and one sun-browned hand snaked over her shoulder to draw an arrow with a wicked curve-bladed head and nock it to her bow. From afar, she had seen the riders depart the cave and enter the forest this morning, but precautions were justified given the dangerous nature of her quarry coupled with the other foul creatures crawling about the countryside.
She darted into the cave and dropped into a crouch just inside. The sunlight did not penetrate far, and she gave her eyes time to adjust to the gloom. Once the darkness yielded its secrets to her, she rose and padded further inside. The cave was deep but empty, an ideal location to camp in hostile country. She wondered if they would revisit it on the return trip––if they returned at all. She slid the arrow back into her quiver, and knelt by the remnants of the campfire, sifting through it with the point of her knife. She crept to the back of the cave where horse dung had been swept to its farthest recesses. At last she returned to the mouth of the cave, verifying that her black mare still waited in place below, and she surveyed the broad vista that could be seen from this vantage point.
She frowned. This was not as good a location for an ambush as she had hoped. One could see far from here, and there was little concealment on the spare hillside for a huntress and her horse. It would be difficult to approach unseen from without if they kept any kind of watch. She and Shien could hide here in the cave, striking before they were aware of her presence, but there was no guarantee that her target would be first into the cave, or even that she would have a reasonable shot before she was discovered. The cave was deep, but one could see the full extent of it once one’s eyes adjusted, or with the aid of even modest light. She could hope for them to return during the day and be sun-blinded at the mouth of the cave for precious moments, but they were unlikely to make camp until after nightfall.
Her prey was formidable enough, but she was forced to admit that his companions appeared capable as well. They would not give her more than a few seconds of opportunity. She could nock and fire two arrows in the time it took for a man to make one running stride; it was conceivable she could slay them all, with only a touch of luck. Luck favored the prepared, however. She needed one perfect shot before they overwhelmed her.
The huntress reached over her shoulder, and her expert fingers found the fletching of a different type of arrow in her quiver. She drew it forth and studied it, as she had done so many times. Shaft, fletching and tapered head were all obsidian black; the head itself was comprised of an ingenious mechanism ensuring that the four swept-back blades would unfold upon impact to cause additional damage upon entry and untold trauma upon extraction. This was almost incidental, however, to the primary killing power housed within the missiles, and for which she had paid a king’s ransom. She rolled the black arrow between her fingertips and the razor edges of the blades spun ravenous fire from the sunlight, as if the arrows themselves were eager to fulfill their grim mission. With an effortless twirl she slid the arrow home into the quiver once more. She had only three of that kind, and she could not afford to waste them. Anything less devastating would not be sufficient for the task.
Pressing her lips into a tight, bloodless line, she started down the trail toward Shien, skipping feather light between rock and hard-packed earth to leave no sign of her passage. She doubtless had some time before they would emerge from the forest, after whatever task they were about, and in that time she would continue to search for the perfect place from which to strike down a fearsome foe. If nowhere else provided a greater advantage, she would return to this cave and lie in wait. She unstrung and sheathed her powerful bow, then stepped into the saddle. With one hand she stroked the mare’s glossy neck, and with the other pulled her hood up and refastened the dark veil across her face. Her eyes flashed like emeralds beneath the cowl as she scanned her surroundings once more, and then she swung her mare about and rode toward the forest’s edge.
Amric held up one hand, bringing the small column of riders to a halt. He remained thus, unmoving, as the seconds gathered into a minute, then two. His vision strained to pierce the screen of vegetation framing the sinuous trail ahead, and his hearing grasped for the incongruous sounds that had alerted him. He was about to lead his companions into the undergrowth to give a wide berth to whatever was before them, as they had done several times already this day, when he realized that something was different this time. On this occasion, even his keen senses may not have given warning early enough, as whatever it was, it had gone silent and was listening for them in return.
The warrior closed his raised hand into a fist, and the riders behind him guided their mounts into quiet turns, taking slow steps back the way they had come. Once out of hearing, they could seek a way to circumvent the obstacle and be on their way once more. Amric pulled back on the reins, having his bay gelding back-step a few paces before he would turn it, and he whispered soothing words in the tense animal’s ear. Just then, a mischievous gust of wind blew toward them, rustling the foliage and carrying the forward scent to the horse’s flaring nostrils. The bay shuddered and gave an anxious toss of its head accompanied by a soft snort, and the undergrowth before them exploded.
Dark, wiry forms hurtled through the brush, clawing for him. Amric muttered an oath and one of his swords sang free into his hand while he jerked on the reins with the other fist. Even had the bay been a war horse, inured to the clash of battle and a fearsome weapon in its own right, he was not an expert enough rider to manage the animal with only his knees such that he could wield both blades. And it was evident the gelding was no war horse, as it bleated a shriek and its eyes rolled in terror at the sudden assault. Amric had time to count roughly half a dozen figures of varying sizes, all somewhat humanoid in shape, and he had an impression of rags hanging in tatters over jet-black frames. Then, with blinding speed, they were upon him.
He sent vicious cuts into them, and he felt the force jar back through his shoulder as his blade bit into that black hide, much tougher than bare flesh. They swarmed against his horse, crooked hands clutching at its neck and mane, pulling at its flanks, clawing at the saddle and his flexing leg in its stirrup. His sword described an arcing blur, and a grasping hand spun away from its wrist. He followed with a murderous backhand slash, and the hairless black skull lolled back, attached only by the barest scrap of corrupt hide. Their very flesh seemed to catch at his weapon, and it was an effort to pull it free and to retain his grip at each stroke. He lunged forward and, his thrust propelled by thick cords of muscle, slammed his blade into the chest of a creature with such force that a foot of cold steel burst from its back. To his astonishment, the creature wrapped its hands around the blade skewering it and gave a savage twist of its torso, trying to wrench it from his grasp. Kicking his foot free of its stirrup, he placed his boot against the thing’s chest and launched it away even as he pulled savagely back on the hilt of his sword, clearing it.
The creatures surged over the swordsman’s horse, ripping at his clothing and seeking to bind his arm. Amric glared in cold fury down into their visages as they writhed up after him. They were deepest black everywhere beneath a swaddling of cloth that hung in shreds from their frames, including even the inside of their gaping mouths, their bared teeth and where the whites of their eyes should have been. He realized with a chill that they shed no blood when struck, and had voiced neither cry of pain nor growl of anger. But for the slap of their bodies and pawing strikes, and the rasp of the rotten cloth about them parting as they scrabbled to climb over their fellows in their haste to reach him, they were utterly silent. Even the ones to whom he had dealt crippling blows were clawing at him with unfaltering vigor; only the one he had all but decapitated had fallen away and not risen again.
The bay’s legs began to buckle under the weight as the creatures sought to drag mount and rider to the ground, and then Valkarr was there, crashing into them atop his dun gelding, his blade cleaving right and left. As his horse fell to its knees, Amric rolled from the saddle and away from the bulk of his assailants to land on his feet. His other sword flashed into the air. One of the creatures, a barrel-chested thing that resembled a hairless black version of the beast men he had seen back at the Sleeping Boar, ducked under Valkarr’s horse and wrapped its burly limbs about the animal’s legs. The dun stumbled and pitched forward, and Valkarr leapt from the saddle as he drew his second sword. The figures pursued the warriors, pawing their way over the downed horses as if they were already forgotten.
“Take the heads!” Amric commanded. “Cut instead of stab!”
Amric hurled himself back into them. The creatures pressed forward in a mass, heedless of their own injuries, seeking to crash over him like a wave. His swords whirled in a glittering net around him as he spun through the knot of bodies. A grasping hand and forearm parted company with the rest of its arm; a slick black skull tumbled to the sward even as its sunken pit eyes still sought its prey; a sharp kick bent an exposed knee the wrong way with a sickly crack, and its owner was propelled to the ground by the force of the blow. All the while, his flickering blades turned aside clutching hands and flailing fists. Then Amric was through the horde. He risked a look at Valkarr to see that his friend had beheaded one of his assailants and sidestepped the other’s charge. In that instant, one of the throng he had just cut through swung a wild fist that bounced from Amric’s mailed shoulder and struck him across the temple. It hit with the force of a blacksmith’s hammer, and for a moment lights burst before his eyes and his vision swam. He back-pedaled as he spun away and fended off their relentless attack.
His sword licked out and its tip passed through an ebon throat, but the creature, unperturbed, came on. Powerful arms sought to encircle him and bind his arms, even as another came in low. As he glanced down, Amric had to blink away the blurriness from his sight to confirm the impossibility of what he was seeing. The creature whose knee he had shattered, rather than crippled, had merely bent each of its limbs at an unnatural angle and was skittering across the ground like some giant, hideous spider, driving at his legs. The warrior lashed out in lightning cuts with each sword, hacking aside a sweeping arm above and cleaving the skull of the crawler below. The latter faltered and sagged, pitching face-first onto the trail.
The standing creature changed tactics and grappled for one of Amric’s swords. A whistling arc from the other sword removed its head, and it toppled backward to strike the ground like a felled tree. Amric turned to see Valkarr spin around his last attacker and send it stumbling forward with a thunderous blow to the back. Pouncing after it, the Sil’ath warrior struck the head away, and the body took several more steps before crashing to the earth.
Amric whirled toward the only remaining sound of skirmish, in the direction of Bellimar and Halthak. The old man had retreated a few yards down the trail and was still astride his panicked horse, but the Half-Ork was on foot, facing the last attacker. He swung his heavy staff in a tremendous overhand curve, striking the forehead of his assailant with a resounding crack. It was a blow that would have felled an ox, but the creature merely staggered to regain its balance and then surged forward again. It extended one hammer fist to clout Halthak in the head so hard it lifted him from his feet. As the healer crumpled, the black thing swept his limp form into its arms and raced down the trail as if the listless weight of a man meant nothing to it.
In an instant, Amric and Valkarr were bounding down the trail after it. Bellimar wheeled his mount into its path, but the creature darted to one side, shouldering aside the frightened beast. It was momentarily slowed, however, and that was more than enough for the pursuing warriors. Each struck out at a pumping leg, and the abductor sprawled to the ground, releasing its unmoving burden. The creature sank its black fingers into the earth and wrenched about hard, twisting to face them in a blink. It lurched toward Amric, who struck away its grasping hand, and Valkarr’s downward slice sent its gaping head rolling across the trail.
The warriors spun in unison to face outward, chests heaving from the frenzied exertion, swords held low and ready against any new assailants. The impenetrable foliage about them was still but for the idle breeze, and gave no sign of further approach. The birds above had fallen silent, but within scant seconds of the conflict’s end below, their prattle ascended to its previous volume. In moments, the only noise out of place was the panicked thrashing of one of the horses where it had plunged into the undergrowth and now sounded thoroughly dismayed by its options. Amric saw Valkarr’s blue dun stamping its hooves on the trail as shudders coursed through its flanks, and he realized it was his own mount that had left the path.
“See to Halthak,” he told Bellimar. “We will gather and quiet the horses.”
Bellimar nodded and slid from his sway-backed mare, which was placid once more. Valkarr collected his own mount and Halthak’s, while Amric glided into the thick of the forest on panther’s feet to locate his bay gelding. To his great relief, the animal was uninjured and not far from the trail. He did not relish the thought of being on foot as they penetrated further into the forest, or worse, when they needed to leave it. The horse had wandered into a pocket draped with sinuous vines that blocked its progress, and it was as loath to make contact with the web of vines as it was to retrace its steps. Amric sheathed his blades and approached slowly, speaking soft and soothing words to the wild-eyed beast even as he continued to eye his surroundings for new threats. It was the work of several minutes, but he managed to calm the gelding enough to lead it back to his companions.
When he returned with the bay on his heels, Halthak was sitting up with his head resting in his hands. His pebbled flesh looked pallid, and his eyes were unfocused as he glanced up to nod at Amric’s approach.
“How are you feeling?” Amric asked, tying his horse to a nearby tree branch with the others.
“Like my skull was used to toll the great bell of some cathedral,” Halthak answered in a rueful tone. “But as soon as I can concentrate, I can heal it. I will be fine.”
Amric clasped the healer’s shoulder as he strode past, and he dropped to one knee near Bellimar, who was examining the corpse of one of their assailants. It looked as if it had once been a man, or was cast in the shape of a man, but all hair had been removed and every exposed inch of its flesh was a glistening black. And black to the core, Amric noted, as he observed the cross-sections where its arm and head had been severed. There was no blood seeping from the wounds, no bone or red flesh visible within. It was swathed in coils of some filthy canvas material that were falling away from it in tatters, as if it had been bound tight in layers of ceremonial cloth at one point. It appeared to be otherwise naked underneath.
Amric’s gaze raked over the other bodies, and found them all identically garbed and featured, except that they had not all been of the same race; three were human, two were beast men, one an Ork, and one he could not place, some slender and angular creature with a long beak-like snout. They were all like twisted golems cast in the shape of actual humanoid races.
“I have seen many dark creatures as the corruption touched our homeland,” Amric muttered. “But these I have not seen. What are they?”
Bellimar shook his head, his brow furrowed as he ran the cloth between his fingertips. “I do not know. I have never seen these either, and I thought I had seen every misshapen thing wrought of magic this world had to offer.”
There was an undercurrent to his statement that gave Amric a fleeting chill. He studied Bellimar a moment before speaking again. “They are strong, fast and impervious to pain. They fought without any regard for their own welfare, ignored the horses in favor of pursuing us instead, and appeared intent on capturing rather than slaying. For what possible purpose, I wonder?”
“We can only guess at this point,” Bellimar mused. “Though I would wager Halthak is very fortunate to be pondering that question here with us right now.”
The Half-Ork gave a vigorous nod as he pushed himself to his feet. His color had returned, and there was no longer a swelling bruise along the side of his face. He walked past them and bent to retrieve his staff.
“Is anyone injured?” he asked. “I can heal you now.”
“Nothing but bruises and scrapes here,” Amric said. “All of which can heal on their own without need of magic.”
Valkarr nodded at this, and folded his arms.
“Do not be so certain, swordsman,” Bellimar warned. “Come, you should see this.”
The old man rose and walked from the trail, and Amric followed. The head of the creature which had snatched up Halthak was lying on the grassy sward a few feet from the hard-packed earth of the path, facing away. Bellimar nudged it with one foot, and the head lolled toward them. Amric growled an oath and had a hand halfway to sword hilt by reflex before he caught himself. The head’s grim mouth was still working in a morbid parody of speech, gaping and grimacing at them in soundless fury. Like the rest of its body, it had no hair; there was no beard or stubble, no hair atop the head, and no trace of brows above eyes which rolled to fix upon its intended prey like twin pits of midnight.
“Whatever force powers these creatures appears to be housed in their heads, as you noted during the battle, for the bodies are unmoving,” Bellimar said, staring down in pitiless scrutiny. “The skulls you split are inert as well. Any head merely severed, however, is still animated.”
Amric stifled a wave of revulsion as the thing leered up at them, still straining to reach them. “Unsettling, but what has this to do with trivial abrasions––”
Even as he said it, he saw what Bellimar meant. The head had come to rest on the grassy sward beside the trail, and the vegetation was dying beneath it in a spreading circle. As Amric watched, several more broad blades of grass bent to the ground in slow curls, brown corruption crawling up the stems to overwhelm the green. On the solid trail, devoid of flora, there had been no visible effect, but here the putrefaction was unmistakable. Amric inspected a scarlet scrape on his forearm, and frowned to himself. There was no hint of corruption yet, but did he imagine a strange itching at the edges of the wound?
“You suggest that the wounds, minor though they might be, could fester if not treated,” he said in a quiet tone.
“Worse yet,” Bellimar insisted. “Their auras appear similar in signature to Unlife, and I fear their energies will spread through your system in a manner that is more than mere physical infection. If that is true, then no poultice will cleanse it from you.”
“I hear more speculation than fact,” Amric said.
“I realize you want no part of mysterious forces coursing through you, swordsman, including healing magic such as the Half-Ork possesses.” Bellimar leaned close as he spoke, and held Amric’s gaze with his own. “But you can no longer prevent it. The decay you see before you may be no less virulent within your body. You cannot choose magic or not. You can only choose between that which you mistrust on principle and that which you mistrust based on evidence.”
Amric’s jaw clenched, but he knew the truth in Bellimar’s words. He stared down at the loathsome object, still wild in its unceasing efforts, and found himself speculating at whether its path to becoming the travesty now before him might have begun with a similar infection of dark energies. He imagined its origins as a mortal man, and his disgust became tempered by pity, followed by an unfamiliar sensation: fear. He would not become like this thing. Amric looked up and found his emotions mirrored in Valkarr’s expression. The Sil’ath, like all his kind, had an equally strong aversion to magic, and Amric exhaled in relief when he read in his friend the same resignation he himself felt. He had not relished the prospect of convincing his friend as to what must be done. With an almost imperceptible nod to Amric, Valkarr stepped over to Halthak and bowed his head before him.
The healer reached out and laid one gnarled hand on the bare flesh of the Sil’ath warrior’s muscular arm, and he closed his eyes in concentration. Amric knew the Half-Ork had healed himself back at the bandit camp on the night they met, but his view had been obstructed as he approached the camp unseen in the darkness. Now that he was witnessing the healer employ his talent in the daylight and in close proximity, he half expected a glowing nimbus of light to surround Halthak as his magic issued forth, but there was nothing so dramatic. In fact, the only indication of something unseen transpiring was an abrupt stiffening of Valkarr’s posture. As for Halthak, his protruding lower lip tightened, and then twisted in apparent distaste. After a few seconds, his hand dropped to his side. Valkarr took a hesitant step back from him, running his fingertips over his skin where a moment before had been a myriad of small scrapes.
“It feels foul, unclean,” Halthak said. “I am able to absorb and overcome it at this early stage, and it may be that your body’s natural defenses would do the same in time, but I cannot say for certain. I do not know how quickly it will spread.”
“One cannot be too cautious,” Bellimar insisted.
Amric nodded, took a deep breath and walked to the healer. As before, Halthak raised his hand to contact Amric’s arm and closed his eyes. The warrior braced for whatever unpleasant sensation had startled Valkarr and felt… nothing. Well, almost nothing. He sensed an odd stirring within for a fleeting instant, but nothing more. He peered at Halthak’s face, watched a frown bloom there, and saw the bushy brows draw down in focus.
“I do not understand,” the Half-Ork murmured. “I can feel my magic build, but it goes nowhere, as if it is being turned aside.”
Amric did not see Bellimar actually move, but somehow the old man seemed suddenly to be leaning forward with rapt intensity. Halthak’s face twisted in determination, his forehead creased and eyes squeezed shut. Still the swordsman felt nothing, save for the insistent clutch of the healer’s knobby hand on his arm. Amric glanced at the others. Bellimar was engrossed, flushed with excitement and doubtless viewing the scene with his mysterious Sight; Valkarr looked curious and more than a little alarmed, no more certain what to make of this than Amric.
The swordsman returned his attention to the healer. Sweat beaded Halthak’s brow, and there came an audible grinding of teeth as the muscles bunched beneath the furry tufts of hair along his jaw. Amric closed his eyes as well, questing for the slightest sensation around his scratches and bruises, as well as at the point of his contact with the healer.
Ever so slowly, it came. Distant and feeble at first, warmth built at those locations, comforting, inviting, suffusing. After gathering moments it withdrew, drawing his injuries along with it, and it left in its void a cool and bracing sense of revitalization. Before Amric’s wondering eyes, the angry welt on his forearm faded, and its twin appeared in the same place on the Half-Ork’s arm. There he saw the grey flesh knit over it and close, and within seconds the injury had vanished. Halthak’s hand fell away and he sagged, leaning on his staff as he gulped in one lungful of air after another.
“I have never felt the like,” he gasped at last.
“Were my injuries so different than Valkarr’s, so much harder to heal?” Amric asked, perplexed.
“No, it was as if I was walled away from them. It was like trying to pierce the city wall with a dagger. In the end, as I reached the limits of my endurance, it felt for all the world as if something finally allowed me in. I can find no better words to describe it.”
Amric faced Bellimar. “Did your Sight reveal what happened there?” he asked.
“Not with any certainty,” Bellimar replied. “I saw Halthak’s healing energies gather and finally begin trickling across to you, then grow into a flood as it did with Valkarr. Halthak’s aura became vibrant with the exertion, while yours was as absent as ever. There was a bright flash as the transfer began, but it was very brief, and might readily be explained by the healer’s forces being pent up as they were. I may have been given a piece of the puzzle, however, if I can but deduce its place in the larger theory.”
“Ponder as we ride, then,” Valkarr said. “We have tarried here too long, and more things will be drawn to the commotion, may already be coming. We should put some distance between us and this site.”
Amric nodded as he stared down at the animate head. “After,” he amended quietly, “we ensure none of these things still stir to greet us on the return trip.”
He reached over his shoulder to draw forth one gleaming sword, and behind him, a metallic whisper told him Valkarr had done the same. Amric’s grey eyes were like thunderclouds as he took a resolute step forward.
Halthak rode through a twilight world of deepening shadows, his hand absently patting the neck of his chestnut mare as his restless eyes roved all about. The setting sun drew lingering crimson talons across the heavens and transformed the canopy above to a blood-red blaze. The fiery display did not reach the ground far below, however, where the riders followed a frail, ephemeral path through the ever thickening murk. Halthak’s nerves had been clamoring since they entered this accursed forest, and at a near fever pitch since the encounter with the unnatural black creatures in the morning, but to his immense gratitude they had managed to avoid any further conflicts since then. There had been more moments of acute tension, to be sure, as they led their frightened mounts through the thick, tangling undergrowth, but the preternaturally keen senses of the warriors had allowed the riders to steal through this hellish jungle undetected like so many wraiths.
Bellimar rode ahead of him, slouching relaxed in his saddle as if he traveled through a scenic country estate. Halthak had no idea how the old man could be so serene in the midst of this place, but he envied the man his composure, whether real of affected. Behind Halthak rode Amric, cool as ice on the surface, but the healer knew he was tense as a coiled spring beneath. He had yet to see the warrior truly caught by surprise, even when faced with the blinding rush of the attack earlier; his whirlwind response, the speed and ferocity with which he had cut his way through that tangled mass of jet-black bodies, had stricken Halthak speechless in wonder. At the head of the column, no less fearsome in dealing death earlier, rode Valkarr. His thick scaly tail extended back over both the saddle and his blue dun’s rump to mingle there with the horse’s black tail. A part of Halthak’s mind, hungry for distraction, wondered if the Sil’ath sitting a horse was as uncomfortable for horse and rider as it appeared to an observer.
Valkarr twisted around in his saddle, made a short, chopping motion with his left hand and looked a question at Amric. Halthak looked back in time to see Amric nod in return, and then Valkarr put heels to his horse and sped ahead down the trail to vanish into the gloom. Bellimar glanced back over his shoulder at Amric with one delicate eyebrow arched, and then he lounged forward once more. Halthak slowed his mare and fell into step alongside Amric.
“It is getting dark,” Halthak said in a low tone, feeling foolish even as he stated the obvious. “Will we halt soon?”
Amric gave a tight nod, his flint-grey eyes flicking from side to side. “We are looking for a suitable place to stop.”
“I––I apologize for the difficulty in healing you this morning,” the Half-Ork said. “I have spent much of the day considering its cause, and how I might prevent it in the future.”
“Do not fret over it,” Amric chuckled. “I am not the most cooperative of patients, given my aversion to magic.”
Halthak shook his head. “Valkarr shares that aversion, and administering to him felt no different than a thousand times before. No, your case was somehow different.”
“Have you any theories on the matter?” Amric said, craning his neck to search the vegetation enclosing the trail behind them.
“At first I suspected your lack of aura, in which our friend Bellimar shows so much interest, as if you have an unnaturally low affinity for magic in general. No matter how much I mull it over, however, it does not quite fit.”
“How so?” Amric asked, sparing him a quick look askance.
Halthak frowned, pensive. “Well, I have treated many people with no inherent ability to speak of, and it has never affected the application of my magic on them. I suspect those individuals had very weak auras, if what Bellimar says is true.”
“Bellimar did not say I had a weak aura,” Amric reminded him. “He said I had no aura whatsoever, unlike any person he has encountered before. You should not be troubled that your talent cannot easily reach someone forsaken by magic.”
“I have been turning that over in my mind as well, but it does not explain what I felt when it occurred. I could accept it if my magic had seemed to have nowhere to go, as if no vessel existed on the other side of our contact, or even if I had faced a consistent level of resistance. Instead, I was blocked, turned aside as if my best efforts were feeble scratches against a wall of marble. Furthermore, I had the disturbing sense I was being watched, and that I did not break through but rather was allowed in after meeting some obscure approval. After that, it felt as it always has. It is beyond my reckoning, but I am glad it succeeded at last.”
“And I am grateful for your efforts, Halthak,” Amric returned. “This is no place to fall ill, and having faced those mindless things, I dread the thought of where the infections they carry might lead.”
Halthak shuddered, for the same thought had occurred to him. They rode on in silence for several minutes, navigating the trail as much by feel as by sight now, in the pressing dusk. Valkarr reappeared on the path ahead, shaking his head at Amric, then tapping a finger below one eye and pointing ahead. He then wheeled his blue dun gelding about and resumed his head position. Halthak turned toward Amric.
“What did––?” he began, but the swordsman interrupted smoothly.
“Healer, I saw a spasm of discomfort cross your face each time when you healed us earlier. Do you feel the full pain of the victim’s injury when you draw it into yourself in that manner?”
Halthak paused, confused. “I cannot know for certain, but it seems so, or as nearly as I can judge. Though it is quick to fade once I absorb it, for the wound itself never lasts long. Why do you ask?”
“Curiosity, and regret for having caused you pain,” Amric replied. His hawk eyes rested on Halthak for a moment. “And I regret disparaging your use of magic. Taking the hurt from others is a heroic thing indeed.”
Halthak flushed, grateful for the mask of twilight, and nodded his thanks. Ahead of them, Bellimar turned and looked at them with luminous eyes that somehow caught the crimson glimmer from above.
“They come, swordsman,” he said, sharp warning in his tone.
Halthak’s eyes widened as he looked from Bellimar to Amric. He recalled the question he had been about to ask a moment before. “What did Valkarr’s signals mean, and why did he ride off at speed like that?” he said. “And what is Bellimar talking about?”
“Valkarr has found a place for us to stop,” Amric said. “And he rode ahead in an attempt to draw away whatever has been hunting us for the better part of an hour.”
Halthak’s tongue clove to the roof of his mouth.
Amric chuckled. “Do not look so accusing, healer. There is nothing you could have done, had you known, except worry yourself into a froth. Valkarr sought to lead them away and lose them in the forest while we broke free in a different direction to take a longer way around, but unfortunately they did not take the bait.”
“Then Bellimar meant––”
“Yes, they are closing in. Whatever they are, they initially followed at a great distance, but they are growing bolder as darkness falls.”
Halthak turned frantic eyes to the side, straining to pierce the blackness of the forest. At first he saw nothing as before, and then his spine turned to ice. A scarce twenty paces off the trail, he caught a long shadow slinking low to the ground through a gap between two large trees. He gasped, trying in vain to track it further in the gloom, but as swiftly as he had found it, it was lost again. Ten paces behind where he had seen it, another dark shape appeared for a moment, sleek and swift, and then was gone.
“Do not stare!” Amric commanded in a harsh whisper. “They seem content to pace us while we do not focus on them. I think like most night hunters, they are loath to reveal their presence until ready to close the trap, or risk losing their greatest advantage.”
“Then they are not the same black things we faced this morning,” Halthak said, unsure whether to feel relief or fear at the conclusion. Could the unknown be worse than this morning’s horror? It was a question he was very reluctant to answer.
“No, these are something different, and they hunt like a silent pack of wolves. I have my suspicions as to what they might be, but the failing light has kept me from being certain, and they are canny hunters. Ah, there we are, up ahead.”
Halthak followed the swordsman’s gaze through a cleft in the trees to see a massive square bluff shouldering its way above the forest. Like an anvil of bleached bone surrounded by a mantle of smaller crags and boulders, the monolith reared skyward to be painted crimson by the last sliver of the dying sun.
“When you said we meant to stop, you did not mean to camp,” Halthak said.
That steel grey gaze slid across him before returning to monitor their pursuers, but in that brief moment Halthak was taken aback by the fierce, wintry expression on the warrior’s visage. The man had entered the void of war, he realized, and was prepared to deal death at any moment.
“We need a good place to make our stand,” Amric said. “The day is not yet done, healer.”