“Never said you couldn’t.” Viv forestalled her with a hand. “You asked what happened to me once, and I told you. Only fair I ask the same. Equals, yeah?”
“Shoulda made you bring a book. Then you coulda read me to sleep instead.”
“What did you do before Murk?”
The gnome studied her sausage with great animosity. “Joined up with a couple of mercs I ran into in Cardus. At least, I thought I did. I guess I didn’t make a big impression on ’em.”
Gallina waited defiantly for a jibe from Viv that never came.
“We were huntin’ a bunch of thieves. Kinda half-assed thieves. If you’re gonna steal somethin’, why a bunch of scrolls? Anyway, they were camped in this tangle of woods south of the city, so we head out and set up a camp of our own. The forest is big, and we gotta cover as much ground as we can to find ’em fast. So, we split up, the four of us, and do some scoutin’.”
She stopped talking and weighed how much to say. Viv let her.
“So I’m doin’ my thing, stayin’ out of sight, headin’ east beside this old dry river gully. A deep one. And the ground just …” She made a whooshing noise and waved her sausage. “Right out from under me, and down I go. Pretty beat up when I hit the bottom. And I can’t climb out. It’s hard stone and straight up. So instead, I’m followin’ this thing and lookin’ for a slope. But you know what likes livin’ in old dry riverbeds like that?”
“Something that likes to hunt things that can’t get away,” said Viv.
“Rocktoads. The poisonous ones. A whole bunch of ’em. Course, I did all right, didn’t I?” Gallina patted the knives across her chest. “But it was night again before I found my way out.”
“And?”
“And by then I figured I should just head back to camp, see what’s what. But they were gone, all three of ’em. Camp struck.”
“They didn’t even wait a day?”
Gallina didn’t look at her, but at the hills receding behind the wagon. “I hike my ass back to Cardus, and there they are, countin’ out the bounty. They rounded up the thieves while I was runnin’ and killin’ toads. Didn’t really need me, I guess. Probably forgot I was even there.”
Viv watched her face. The sausage lay in the gnome’s lap, uneaten.
“Fucking bastards,” said Viv sincerely.
Gallina sniffed and wiped her nose. “Well, it wasn’t all bad. Turns out some people pay a lot for toad tongues.”
Viv reached over and squeezed her shoulder.
Then they both sat back and finished their sausages.
When they were done, Viv breathed deep and let the cold air curl down in her lungs and watched the night wick away from the countryside.
She idly ran a thumb along Blackblood’s fuller, thought about what was to come, and felt as though she were emerging from the fog of a weeks-long dream.
* * *
When they arrived at the farmer’s holding, the sun was up, and ribbons of mist were burning off the lowlands in the dawning heat. The farm consisted of a cottage, a jumble of outbuildings and fenced paddocks, a long, thatched barn, and a sizable garden, all encircled by fields filled with hayricks. Bastion oak crowded the slopes up out of the valley.
They heard the bleat of waking sheep, anxious for their morning fodder, and a dog delivered big echoing barks across the breadth of the valley.
The farmer was out on a stool when the mules trundled to a stop in the big looping turnout before the cottage. Even seated, Viv could tell she was tall. Lean and hard, with a tangle of handsome gray hair, she puffed on a pipe in one hand, waving them in with the other.
“So, a Murkie finally decided to take a peek?” she asked around the pipestem.
Viv and Gallina vaulted out of the wagon and stretched.
The farmer looked them up and down, gaze settling on Viv as she strapped the greatsword and saber back on. “Meg,” she said by way of introduction.
“Hey, Meg,” said Gallina, flashing the bounty sheet. “Still havin’ trouble? My ass hopes we didn’t ride down here for nothin’.”
The farmer laughed with an edge of bitterness as she got to her feet. “Aye, that I am. Have to keep the flock close, and don’t dare take them to the south pastures. Now, they’re comin’ up around the place after dark. Nothing I can do but bar the door, keep the dog in, and wait it out.”
“They’re taking sheep at night?” Viv studied the paddocks, the jackleg fences still intact. “Are you fixing the fences when they bust through?”
“They don’t come every night, but often enough. And when they do, I’m always a few head shy in the morning. Funny thing, the fences are always fine. They must be leapin’ over.” She shook her head.
“Blood?”
“Not usually.”
Viv frowned. “That doesn’t sound like a spineback.”
“You’ve seen ’em?” Gallina asked Meg.
“Once or twice. I think there’s a nest near the meadow two hills south. And that sound they make? Like rocks rubbin’ together? You don’t soon forget that.”
“All right,” said Viv. “Point us in the right direction, and we’ll see what we can do. Can our driver stay here with you?”
Meg nodded. “Tea’s on,” she called to the sea-fey.
Viv stared south at the hills and stands of bastion oak and, presumably, the meadow beyond. She had seen—and slain—her fair share of spinebacks, and her skepticism was growing by the second.
* * *
When they had passed beyond the first line of oak, Viv called a halt and unslung the leather bag.
Setting it on the ground, she fished inside for one of the bottles, popped the cork between her teeth, and dusted Satchel’s bones with a few gentle taps of a forefinger.
As she resealed the phial, Satchel assembled himself in a pearlescent rush, flushing with crisp blue light as consciousness bloomed in his eye sockets.
“I don’t know why I’m worried about this,” said Viv, hiking the bag over her shoulder again and rising to her feet. “What’s anything going to do to you?”
“I assure you, there’s no cause for concern.” His hollow voice held no doubt.
“I guess. Although in my experience, spinebacks like to crack bones between their teeth.” She clenched her fist demonstratively. “I feel guilty that you don’t have a weapon or something.”
Satchel flourished a hand, and the phalanges narrowed to long, wicked points.
Gallina whistled. “Well, I’m convinced.”
They trooped together over a set of low hills, with more mountainous terrain humping up to their left, stitched with scattered copses of oak. A rumpled spread of pastureland appeared as they topped a rise. The meadow grass was high and still dewy.
Some grouse startled once, but apart from the far-off surge of breakers, the only sounds were the shushing of their feet through the grass and Gallina’s mutters whenever it swatted her in the face.
As Satchel forged ahead beside them, Viv couldn’t help watching out the corner of her eye, surprised by his silence and the alertness of his posture, an aggressiveness she’d never observed in him. Her first inkling of potential menace had been those deadly-looking fingers, and that had bloomed into a larger uneasiness.
Although she was increasingly positive it wouldn’t matter anyway.
Signs were scarce—no trampled grass or torn earth, no evidence of hunting. Spinebacks were messy eaters and untidy with their leavings. If they were in the area, she didn’t think they were nearby, and she had a growing conviction that the pack had moved on entirely.
Still, they’d made the journey. There was no reason not to check the area. She was impatient, but she could be thorough. At least, that was what she told herself.
They combed the meadow and slowly began to track through the shallow valleys between the hills on the other side of it, which were studded with shale and half-buried boulders.
“Well, this is a pain in the ass,” muttered Gallina as she shoved away another sheaf of grass at her eyeline. Viv was relieved that she was the one finally complaining.
“We should give it another hour, at least,” said Viv, scanning upslope for any sign of a den or burrow.