Dragon's Winter (25 page)

Huw grumbled, “I don’t like this place. It stinks of wizardry.”

“Baby,” said Orm. “Your feet stink worse.”

Edruyn said, “How does he know where to lead us?”

“Have you never heard of maps?”

“But there are no landmarks.” He waved an arm at the white emptiness.

Finle, arms filled with frozen meat, said, “The Hound has been here. I heard him say so.” The men fell abruptly silent. “And so have we. This is Ashavik. Dragon brought us here three years ago September. We were hunting elk. They gave us hot bread to eat. Orm, you remember the girl with the braid and the blue kerchief, who smiled at you?”

“How can he remember one girl?” Huw said. “There have been so many girls.”

But Orm said, “That was here? Are you sure?” Finle nodded. “Aye, I remember. The well was there. But it was all green...” His voice trailed away.

Hawk had just finished her meal when a voice at her elbow said, “Archer? Excuse me.” It was Derry, bundled so that only the reddened tips of his ears showed. “Dragon would like to speak with you.”

She followed him to the roofless house. Macallan was there, and Azil, and Dragon. He was holding a rolled map loosely between his bare hands. Despite the cold, he wore no furs, only his usual dark clothes, and over them a simple wool cloak. She felt the link between them: she saw it in her mind’s eye, gleaming like a rope of fire across darkness.

“My lord. You sent for me.”

“I did,” he said. “I need your changeling eyes. We have entered our enemy’s country. Will you go aloft, and scout for us?”

The request did not surprise her. It was work she knew well. “As you wish, my lord. For what shall I look?”

“I want you to find the mist. You have heard men speak of it? It is a device made by my enemy: a wall of fog, inhabited by nightmare. You will know it when you see it. I want to know where it is, and how long before we reach it. Take care not to enter it.”

“I will take care, my lord.”

Aloft, she made a pass over the camp, and then swung north northeast. Pale clouds hovered over her, vast and pitiless as the sea. The winds were chill, slippery as oil beneath her wings. She passed a flock of ptarmigan, wheeling and darting in the wind. She flew over a burned village. In the middle of it, surrounded by broken stone, a skinny-sided elk pawed the snow, hunting for some living greenery. Three red foxes worried their kill. Nothing else moved amid the ruins save shadows, and snow-spume.

Quite suddenly, in the moment between wing-beat and wing-beat, the land beneath her vanished under a thick, roiling grey cloud. She slowed her flight, and dropped toward it. The fetid smell made her sneeze. Wisps of rank fog coiled upward to meet her. Fell voices seemed to whisper inside it. She circled lower, straining on the very edge of hearing, but could not distinguish words.

Repelled, she drove upward into the white sky. By the time she reached the war band, it was twilight. She landed, and changed to human form. At first she thought the men had raised their tents amid the ruins of yet another village. Then she realized: what she had first taken for walls were rock formations jutting from the snow. In the grey light, the spires seemed enchanted, a tribe of hunched and hooded old men, caught in the cold and turned to stone. The new camp was well east of where she had left them. Tethered horses stood in the shelter formed by rocks, feed bags on their noses. Their jaws worked steadily.

Nine canvas tents sprouted around a common center. Dragon’s tent sported the dragon banner. He was not there, but Lorimir was, and Azil, and the physician. Fire danced in a low-footed brazier; the air smelled of meat cooking.

Lorimir waved her to a cushion. She sat, rubbing her shoulders. Azil handed her a leather-bound flask. “Careful,” he said. “It’s hot.”

The wine eased the ache in her bones. She closed her eyes, and saw white behind her eyelids. No one spoke to her; she was grateful: her mind was wordless, caught in the white wild soundlessness of the hawk’s flight. Lorimir and Macallan talked about a lame horse.

Derry brought her a skewer of cooked, savory meat. She had nearly finished when Karadur came out of the darkness. He gestured her to stay seated, and went himself for meat. Azil gave him a mug. He sat on a cushion. The firelight glinted on his hair.

He said, “What did you see, hunter?”

“Ice,” she answered. “Snow. I saw places where men had once lived, but no men. I saw elk, and a flock of birds, and a trio of foxes feeding in the snow.”

“Did you find the mist?” She nodded. “How long, do you think, before we reach it?”

“A day, my lord. Two, if we are slow.”

“We will not be slow. Thank you, Hawk of Ujo. You have done me good service this day. You must be spent. Go and sleep.”

“Enemy in the camp! Awake. Awake! The horses! They’re killing the horses!”

The horrifying cry lifted through shrill animal screams. Flinging themselves from their bedrolls, fearful men grabbed for weapons and raced bootless and cloakless over snow.

The clouded sky had cleared. Under a vast corona of stars, skeletal warriors on gaunt pale steeds galloped soundlessly through the camp. They wore tall metal helmets, and bore swords, shields, and long spears made of ice. Grinning, they thrust spears at the running men.

Hawk, half-asleep, nocked an arrow and shot at the skull-face beneath the nearest helmet. The fleshless warrior, gazing directly at her through his arched eye-sockets, laughed, and faded. Her arrow flew through him, and buried itself in snow. Other shafts, loosed by other hands, sped through their macabre targets. In the center of the camp, Olav howled, and swung his long-handled ax at a pale warrior’s throat. It glided dreamlike through gleaming bone, without hindrance or effect.

Someone shouted in pain. Lorimir’s voice rose powerfully above the melee: “Hold! Archers, hold your arrows!”

They froze, breathing hard. Noiselessly, the ghostly warriors rode between the tents, and vanished into smoke. The horses milled in the horse lines. An eerie silence settled over the camp. “Torches,” Lorimir said. Half a dozen men brought torches. By their light, all could see the buried arrows, the churned, unbloodied ground. Men on the ground clutching their sides rose, feeling for mortal wounds that were suddenly absent.

One man knelt, swearing, a Keep arrow through his arm. Macallan bent over him. “A flesh wound. Not serious. Help him to my tent,” he said briskly. “Any more hit?”

“Gods, they were illusions,” someone murmured. The word spread across the camp. “Illusions. Phantoms. Ghosts.” A man laughed in astonishment and relief. Murgain shouted at his men to collect their arrows.

Karadur had not joined the fighting. He stood at the mouth of his tent, watching the horse lines. “Herugin,” he said, his deep voice carrying across the camp, “report!”

Herugin came jogging into the torchlight. “My lord,” he said grimly, “three horses are dead, their throats and bellies torn. Wargs. Three broke free of their tethers, but one has already returned, and the other two will, I think, come back of themselves.” He took a slow breath. “Three men are dead, as well.” The laughter stopped. “Tonio, Ralf, and Ferlin. They were sleeping among the horses. They were killed in the same manner.”

They were all men of Herugin’s wing. “Take me to them,” Karadur said.

They threaded their way among the nervous horses to the edge of the camp. The dead men had been wrapped in blankets and laid upwind of the lines. Herugin lit a spill. The dragon-lord knelt beside the first man. Grimly he drew back the blanket. An eyeless face gazed palely into the starry night.

Herugin said, “That is Tonio. He was youngest. You remember, he played the flute so badly...”

“I remember.” Karadur moved to the second man. “Ferlin. He was my page. He was so proud to be taken into the garrison.” He moved to the third man. “Ralf—he has a wife in Chingura, has he not?”

“Her name is Shela. A new baby girl, too.”

“This, too, will be paid for.” Karadur patted the blanket into place. “When we get home, we will do them honor...” He rose. “You know that we must leave them here.”

“I know,” Herugin said. “They will understand. They would not want us to delay.” They returned to the center of camp.

“Lorimir, from now, sentries walk in pairs,” the dragon-lord said.

“I have already ordered it, my lord,” said the captain.

“It was a clever tactic, to distract us with illusion while the wargs killed. We must not let it happen again.”

Footsteps sounded at their backs. “My lord,” a voice said. Three men appeared from the direction of the horse lines. The man in the middle, arms held fast in the grip of the other two, was Rogys. “We found him among the horse lines. I have his sword.”

“Let him go,” Dragon said softly. The men on either side of the redhead drew their hands away. The camp was still, a painful stillness in which only torchlight moved, and snow-spume, blown by the night wind. “Herugin, did you know of this?”

Herugin said tautly, “No, my lord.”

“He is in your command, is he not? You should have known. Rogys.”

“My lord.” The words were scarcely audible.

“I ordered you to Marek’s command. I thought you were a warrior. You disobeyed me. Worse. You deserted your post!” Rogys was white. The torch-light gleamed on the hard curves of Karadur’s face. “Lorimir, what penalty would my father have ordered for desertion?”

Lorimir said, “My lord, your father the Black Dragon would have ordered the deserter’s hands severed from his wrists, and he would have been left to bleed to death in the snow.”

A shudder went through the listening men. At Murgain’s side, Finle dropped to one knee and hid his face in his hands.

Karadur said, “Lorimir, have you aught to say?” Lorimir shook his head. “Murgain?” The archery master was silent. “Herugin.”

Herugin said thinly, “My lord, he did not fight or run from capture, although he could have.”

Finle lifted his head from his hands. “My lord,” he said, “may I speak?”

Murgain said sharply, “Be silent, Finle.”

“It was he who first raised the alarm tonight. Had he not been there, and awake, more men might have died.”

Karadur said, “Is that true, Red?”

Rogys nodded. Swallowing, he said hoarsely, “I was sleeping with the horses. The ice warriors rode right by me. I tried to stab one of the wargs, but its scales turned the blade.” He pointed to the sword in Sandor’s hand. The blade was broken.

“I see,” said the dragon-lord. Finle’s eyes kindled with hope. “Byrnik, how many hours to dawn?”

Byrnik, who always knew, answered, “Seven, my lord.”

“Stand back,” the dragon-lord said to the watching men. He extended both hands: fire streamed from them, as it had when he kindled the wood. It poured fiercely across the snow. It circled Rogys, glowing, and the hissing snow retreated from it. Then it subsided, making a bright narrow ring in the snow.

“Till dawn, you will not step beyond the fire,” Karadur said.

Eyes on his lord’s face, Rogys nodded. “I understand, my lord.”

“Seven hours. No one is to help him.” He turned, crossed the frozen camp and entered his tent. In the silence, the sound of the wind could be plainly heard.

The men of the Atani war band slept fitfully that night. Men slept and woke and slept again. Staring scratchy-eyed at tent poles, they listened to the unquiet wind, as the shocking cold crept through layers of clothes and blankets. A
man trapped in the open in winter needs to move, to keep the blood moving. It is colder out there.
The night crawled. When at last the first light of the new day began to seep across the sky, every man of the camp was out of his tent.

The sky was clear, the air bitter cold. Ice crackled underfoot. Shifting from foot to foot, blowing on their hands, the men watched Karadur’s tent.

Huw whispered, “Is he standing?”

Orm said, “Too dark. Wait.”

“I see him,” Hawk said quietly. “He is standing.” She could see Rogys’s silhouette: he was upright, head turned to watch the sun. The boundary of fire gleamed, white-gold, around his feet.

Dragon’s tent flap was pulled aside. Without haste, Karadur emerged. He strolled across the snow crust. Rogys was shivering convulsively.

“Well, Red?” the dragon-lord said.

Every man in the camp could see the lift of Rogys’s head. “My lord,” he said hoarsely, “I have obeyed your command.”

Their eyes met, and held. Karadur said, “And can you walk?”

“I can walk, my lord.” Rogys lurched forward, clearly numb from the knees down.

Hawk held her breath. Don’t fall, she thought, and knew every soul in the camp was praying it with her, you witless, lucky, courageous fool, don’t fall... He didn’t. As he stepped across the fire line, he wobbled, but a powerful arm clamped around him, holding him on his feet. Lorimir snapped an order, and four men dashed across the snow to take Rogys from his lord’s grasp.

By breakfast, Rogys was walking unsupported. Hobbling to the officers’ tent, he said penitently to Lorimir, “Captain, I’m sorry. It was stupid.”

“It was,” Lorimir said shortly. “But you paid for it. Lets hope Marek has not.”