We found a route down from the mountains that did not allow the dead men to follow us, though it could be argued that it came closer to killing us both than they might have. I say “we,” but Snorri led the way. My navigational skills are more suited to the city, where I can find a low dive with unerring skill. On mountains I’m more like water. I head down, tumbling over rocks where necessary.
In their haste the retreating mercenaries hadn’t collected all of their fallen comrades’ mounts, and better still, we found Ron and Sleipnir browsing on the lower slopes. Neither horse was anything to boast about, but they were used to us, and we loaded them with the most useful items we’d managed to steal off the strays before driving them off. Sleipnir continued her placid munching at the saw grass while Snorri heaped his loot upon her, flinching only when he climbed aboard. To be fair, it looked as if they should take turns—I thought the Norseman fully capable of carrying his mare up the valley.
“We should look out for Edris and his friends,” I said. Not that I’d stopped doing exactly that at any point. “Oh, and that necromancer bitch.” The idea of some death-sworn beauty lurking out amongst the rocks was unsettling. That she could frighten Edris with just a look, return the dead, and might well slip into our camp in the middle of night was the stuff of nightmare—not that I planned to sleep again. Ever. “And Maeres might yet have an agent on our tail . . . and if those corpses know where to—”
“How about we just look out for trouble?” And Snorri led the way north.
? ? ?
We spent another night on high ground, our beds as cold and stony as the one before, the shadows just as threatening. Worse—if it could get worse—as the sun set Snorri grew distant and strange, his eyes drinking in the gloom and growing even blacker than they had been when slaughtering his foe and painting the slopes red. The way he looked at me just before the last burning piece of the sun fell behind the mountain’s shoulder made me consider hobbling away as soon as he slept. Though minutes later he seemed returned to his old self and reminded me to aim downslope if nature called in the night.
With the mountains demoted to scenery, we followed the borderlands, first along the border with Scorron, which would soon be the border with Gelleth. Snorri kept his eyes always fixed on the horizon, hunting the north, mine always turned south, towards home, and to look for what dangers might be on our heels. Borderlands offer swift travel to those not seeking to cross over as the folks there are often occupied with their neighbours and not so keen to question travellers, to detain them, or to seek taxes from them. Such lands are, however, unhealthy places to linger. Many of my own worst experiences occurred on Red March’s border with Scorron—all of them in fact, until I met Snorri.
In the province of Aperleon the kingdom of Rhone meets the duchy of Gelleth and the principality of Scorron. Monuments to the dead of a hundred battles crowd the elevations, most in ruin, but the land is lush and people return to resettle it time and again, as people are wont to. Snorri led the way along the approach to the town of Compere, famed for its cider and for the quality of tapestries woven there. Where he learned this stuff I couldn’t say, but the Norseman would always win some new fact or other from even the shortest of exchanges with passersby.
The summer found us at last and we rode in bright sunshine, sweating beneath our travel-stained rags, throwing dark shadows and swatting at flies. We saw few people, then fewer still, all steering away upon their own paths, drawing back as if we might carry contagion.
Further on, the land took on a neglected air. Ron and Sleipnir plodded placidly between high hedgerows, Snorri’s white skin turned red in the sun, and for a moment I started to feel at ease, lulled by the heat and the arable peace. It didn’t last. We soon found fields untended and overgrown, farmhouses empty, their animals gone. In one place churned earth, an abandoned helm, a crow-pecked hand. A chill returned to me, despite the warmth of the day.
The castle of Rewerd’s Curse—the ancestral seat of the House Wainton—stands on a high bluff of pale rock some miles from Compere Town. It watched us with empty eyes, the walls black with smoke, the cliffs beneath it still stained a rusty colour as if the blood of the last defenders had poured from the gates and overflowed the plateau. The sun had started to sink behind the fortification, making serrated silhouettes of the battlements and sending its shadow questing towards us, an accusing finger, long and dark.
“This is fresh.” Snorri drew a long breath through his nose. “You can smell the char.”
“And the rot.” I regretted sniffing so deeply. “Let’s find another path.”
Snorri shook his head. “You think any path is safe? Whatever happened here has passed.” He pointed to a faint haze ahead, indistinct trails of smoke rising to join it. “The fires have all but burned out. You’ll find more peace in ruins than in any other place. The rest is all waiting to be ruins. Here it’s already happened.”
And so we rode on and came by evening to the desolation of Compere.