Doublesight (8 page)

“What was that?” The arrow did not fly. The bow relaxed.

Lankor pushed off with all his strength. He leaped, then took three full steps and swung his staff across the head of the archer, cracking him hard enough to throw him to the ground.

Nayman was already swinging his broadsword across the shoulders of the man closest to him.

The last of the three fell to the ground with his arms protecting his face. “No! I beg you,” he screamed.

From where Rend and Mianna hunkered down, came the strength of a powerful voice. “Don't kill him,” Rend said.

Nayman yelled back, “There were only three.”

“I'm coming.”

Lankor heard Rend trot through the woods, Mianna at his side. “Good work, you two.” He appeared in the dim light, a dark figure, tall and broad like his sons.

Lankor and Nayman flanked the man on the ground, who sat in silence.

“Why were you trying to kill us?” Rend said.

The man cowered and hesitated.

Nayman said, “He's trying to come up with something.”

“No. I'm wondering if you'll kill me anyway.”

“We should,” Nayman said.

“But we won't,” Rend said.

The man looked from Nayman to Lankor and back. “They might.”

“Not without my saying so,” Rend assured him.

The moon, on its walk across the sky, entered a position where light settled more fully over them. The man chewed his lower lip, attempting to size up the situation before he spoke. “There's a war brewing,” the man said.

Rend looked puzzled. “Between who?”

The man shifted to sit more comfortably. Lankor placed the butt of his staff against the back of the man's head. “I don't like that,” the man said to Rend.

Rend nodded to Lankor, who drew back the staff.

“Might I say without injury?” the man bargained.

Lankor watched as Rend considered his answer. If the decision were up to Lankor, he'd knock the man out and leave him there.

“Your name?” Rend said.

“Dig. That's what they call me.” He nodded toward Rend. “I have two boys of me own. In the village ahead.”

“Why would you attack us?”

“The doublesight,” Dig said.

“What of them?”

“The evil ones are back. They attack at night and steal children.”

Rend laughed. “A tale to keep children from running off.”

“It's true. All around Brendern, Kurstom the Great is hunting the doublesight down. He announced that there would be no more raids on his people.”

“What's this got to do with a family traveling in peace?”

“You're traveling at night. Only doublesight, a nocturnal doublesight, owls or thylacines, or cougars, travel in the dark.” Dig swallowed. “Unless you are one of Kurstom's army. Your swiftness is like that of an animal, might I say. Like that of a doublesight.”

“I don't know these woods, and hoped that we would find an Inn soon,” Rend said. “We will be more careful from now on. Where's your village?”

Lankor braced himself when Rend lied. His father never lied.

“To the East.”

“We wouldn't have passed through. We are going almost due south.” Rend got to one knee in front of Dig. “We'll let you go and you will wait for your friend here who was knocked out. He'll have quite a headache. The two of you will return home with your dead friend. We won't pass through your village and you won't follow us. You can see that we are nothing but a family traveling away from your home, not toward it.”

Dig nodded his head. “We'll go home. I'll tell them not to worry. Shall I say you are a soldier?”

“You do that.” Rend stood. “Is there a clearing up ahead where we might camp?”

“Several. Maybe a mile for the first one.”

“We'll post guard. You'll leave us alone.”

Dig hid his face and answered, “Yes.”

Lankor noticed the grief in Dig's face and thought that the dead man must be a brother or friend.

Rend turned to go and Mianna followed. Her sword flashed as she placed it back into her sheath. Lankor wondered if she were as quick with the blade as Rend. As he and his brother stepped away from Dig, the man crawled to the dead man and rolled him over, probably in the hopes that the wound was not mortal. Lankor knew better. Nayman had been trained, as were they all, by Rend. War made up much of their history, as they were used by Sclan as fighting machines before Sclan turned on them. This long history of fighting was in their blood even though few battles had occurred in The Lost the last few decades.

Away from Dig, Rend repeated, “Great job tonight,” as he helped Mianna with her pack.

“Do you believe Dig?” Nayman asked.

Rend looked serious. He swung his pack across his back and slid his arms through the straps. “I don't want to believe him. Kurstom the Great fought beside Brendern.”

“The Holy Man?” Lankor asked.

“The doublesight Holy Man. Brendern was a thylacine. That's why Brendern Forest is overrun by the animals.” He helped his boys with their packs. “Most of the thylacines are animal only these days. There are doublesight and humans living throughout the forest, mostly fur traders. They live side by side, but I'd guess that the humans don't know which are which. In fact, I'd bet that many of the doublesight don't know which other families are of their kind. Regardless, Kurstom has always been a friend to the doublesight, knowing that we are the most peaceful. We revere life as neither the humans nor the animals do.”

They began to walk. Mianna said, “You are both well aware of the reason for that fact.”

“We are, Mother,” Nayman said. “But we did not bless the dead back there.”

“I blessed him silently,” Mianna said.

“And I,” Rend said. “Had we performed a complete blessing, Dig may have figured us out.”

After a few minutes of walking, Lankor asked, “What brought us back into existence after the slaughter by the Sclan armies?”

“A mistake of the natural world,” Nayman said. “Great Grandfather was born doublesight.”

“I know that story,” Lankor said. “I just didn't know how he was born that way.”

“No one knows,” Rend said. “A throw-back to another time.” He stopped and turned toward his family. “It was supposed to be impossible. He ran from his village and hid out for many years before taking a wife.” He pointed into the darkness that surrounded them. “Let us stop talking about this in the event that others are out there listening.”

“There doesn't seem to be many thylacine in this forest,” Lankor said.

“Dgosh means left-behind,” Mianna said. “For some reason the thylacines stayed in Brendern Forest. Few migrated this far north. Close to Lake Earnwood the weather gets pretty harsh, but farther south along the boarder of Dgosh and Brendern you'll find a few strays.”

“Have you traveled this way before?” Lankor said to his mother.

“A long time ago.” Mianna touched Rend's shoulder.

The sliver of moon lighted the path before them. It lay directly overhead. A clearing spread to their left and Rend headed for it.

“Won't we be conspicuous?” Nayman asked.

“We'll look friendly and unthreatening,” Rend said. “And we'll take turns walking the periphery. Lankor first.”

Lankor nodded. Nayman needed to rest his leg if he were to travel the next day at all. And Rend would not sleep soundly anyway. He'd protect the campsite while Mianna slept beside him.

“Leave that staff and hold your broadsword ready,” Rend said.

“I like my staff,” Lankor said.

“I know, but I want you ready for anything.”

“Do as your father says,” Mianna said. “And put on your cloak. It will be cold out there.”

Lankor threw the staff down and pulled his sword and handed it to his mother to hold until he retrieved his cloak from his pack.

Moss and mushrooms covered the clearing. Nayman and Rend kicked the mushrooms from a space where they were going to lay their blankets, and dredged the moss so they could build a small fire. Lankor felt the space becoming comfortable already, but he wouldn't get to experience the soft ground or the warmth of the fire for a few more hours. He leaned his pack against a sapling, removed his blanket, and spread it from the pack toward the fire pit. Anyone who happened by would see that a guard had been posted and would be more careful about his actions.

Lankor lumbered into the darkness, keeping an eye on the dim glow of moonlight over the camp. In a few minutes, the fire will provide even more light. They had not eaten in hours and the acid in his stomach churned. He leaned against a tree and let the odors of the forest seep into his lungs. The smells were exotic, filled with musk and earth, the scents of a strange place in a land he had never walked nor seen, but had only heard of. If he thought of the trees closing him in as a cave or canyon, it eased his mind. But if he allowed the vast dark of the forest to assert itself, he felt closed in as if the trees were the thick bars of a cage or a maze that was impossible to exit. At the moment, he couldn't see more than a few hundred feet in any one direction and that unnerved him.

He concentrated on the caves of Sclan. Exploring them deep into a mountain, those caves grew tighter to his sides and close overhead, yet he always knew his way out. Once he learned this forest, would it be less frightening to dwell here?

The fire pushed light farther into the forest and Lankor extended the periphery he chose to walk. As quiet as he could be, he knew that Rend could hear the occasional snap of a twig, or the whoosh of a branch let go. Lankor chose to stop and listen to the night every few hundred feet. He concentrated on staying just outside the firelight. It would be days before they reached the council grounds. He wondered what they would find there.

9

BROK SAT AGAINST A TREE overlooking the plains to the south of Brendern Forest, his sister sitting and his brother lying on the ground beside him. Off to their left, the crow clan danced, drummed, and sang for their dead. Much of the time the dancers appeared to be joyful, which caused Breel to react in the opposite. Her tears sopped Brok's shoulder. Her quaking body could hardly be contained. Occasionally she mumbled words that he could not understand. Her thin fingers disappeared into the thick fur around Therin's neck. When she finally moved perpendicular to Therin so that she could lay her head across his stomach, Brok climbed to his feet and stood beside her.

The moon lay directly overhead and placed a soft glow across the plains. In the distance, Brok thought he saw buffalo grazing. He walked into the tall grass nearby. He needed to consider Oro's invitation, but the strength of vengeance coursed through his blood like acid. He opened his hand. His father's polished sodalite ring gleamed in the moonlight. He felt peaceful while looking at it. He relaxed.

Brok turned to see that his siblings were asleep. They were in the open and still felt safe. There would be time enough to decide their path. Casting the worry from his mind would be good for him. Let the memories fade for a while.

Brok pushed the ring onto his finger. He bent at the knees and placed his hands on the ground. He crawled into the field until he couldn't see the dancers, only the fires sizzling higher and higher into the night sky. In a slow, thoughtful, and painful process, Brok shifted into his beast image. Immediately his olfactory senses kicked in and he could smell the buffalo a few miles away. His eyesight
cleared to the point of being able to see details, an increased contrast between blades of grass, stones, mounds of dirt. And yet, the color of those same objects became dull and muted. His smell was in color, thousands of tiny odors mixed in the grass. There were rabbits nearby, and moles. Worms poked their heads out of the ground at night and created a new odor, different than the odor present during the day.

The sound of crickets clattered in his ears. The air around him was warm, close to the ground and amidst the grass. He moved farther from the campsite until he knew he wouldn't startle anyone with noise. At the moment he felt distant enough from the others, he burst into a full run, leaping occasionally to view where he was. His strong body leaped and turned as he ran full speed. He didn't stop until he stood on a small grassy knoll where he could see the buffalo herd grazing and sleeping. Strategically placed sentinels watched for predators.

For a moment, as a thylacine, Brok had the urge to charge them. But his human mind encroached and he sat. One buffalo snorted, and a few walked off and grazed. The ground had been trampled and eaten into a clear area. Brok shifted into his human image. As all doublesight must do, he longed for both images, but could have only one at a time, the human image being the most natural.

He listened to the crickets. Fireflies blinked all around him. The moon had shifted slightly and shadows lay across the ground, adding bulk to the buffalo, causing the animals to look larger than they were.

Brok wondered what it was like to live that way, completely animal, with literally no human side. Did they yearn for more? And he wondered equally about those who were human-only. Did they want an animal side, physically? He had heard that it was their oneness as a human that caused their sanity to slip, that humans could be more ruthless because when their minds slipped into an animal state, there was no control, no coming back. Was that to be the fate of Therin?

His shoulders and back tensed with the sorrow he felt suddenly for the death of his parents. As much as his face muscles tightened and his eyes welled up, he could not cry for some reason. His thoughts would cut him from the sorrow and connect him to images of vengeance, not against all humans, but against the ones who murdered his family and left only three of them to fend for themselves.

In human form, Brok focused on his own thoughts, and the sounds and images faded at different degrees, dependent upon his emotional state. In deep sadness the entire plain could have been invisible, while in thoughtful openness to the sensibility of the buffalo his senses were more acute on the lumbering animals, but still oblivious of the plains around him. It was during a time of anger, with his eyes closed, imagining the deaths of his enemies that someone was able to creep up on him. It was the jump and snort of a buffalo that alerted him. He turned and saw a shape encroaching.