Songs_of_the_Satyrs (16 page)

***

The satyr was still holding Amilee’s hand when the Ship of Fools came rumbling near an hour later. In the frosty air, Erstwhyle was shivering, teeth chattering. But he hadn’t dared remove his robe from the girl.

Instead, he dreamt of vengeance.

We are bards, protected by a brotherhood. This girl was my charge.

But that wasn’t quite right.
He
was a bard, not Amilee. She’d only come to teach him. The fact that he loved her would change nothing in others’ eyes.

But the prince had stolen Erstwhyle’s reward and tried to have him butchered. For that, the Dark Prince would be ridiculed and scorned, humiliated in every land. Bards would sing of his base desires.

It might not sting much, but who knew? Merchants who might have traveled to the land would now shun it. Lords who might have offered support would turn away. Songs and crude jests had unseated more than one king.

Erstwhyle recognized the pounding hooves of draught horses, the creak of an axletree, and the squeak of oversized wheels as Baron Blunder drove up.

“Whoaaa . . . ,” Baron cried to the horses. He sat for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was rough with emotion. “Poor lass! Think we can bury her in this hard ground?”

Erstwhyle shook his head. “I promised to take her home, to her mother.”

Baron Blunder grunted approvingly.

Erstwhyle picked up the girl, so small and pliant, and staggered to the wagon. Baron Blunder opened the door, and they laid her upon her bed. Erstwhyle found the waif’s dress, still dirty and stained, and pulled it onto her, then laid a blanket over her. He wouldn’t be able to sleep in the ship tonight, maybe not for many nights.

He climbed out and stood in the daylight.

“They said at the castle that you took your gold, then slipped off into the night. I thought I’d never see your tail again,” Baron Blunder said.

Erstwhyle shook his head. “It was a lie. The prince stole my prize and tried to have me killed.”

Baron Blunder said, “There’s a good song in that,” and then fell silent.

Erstwhyle’s thoughts were clouded. “His men will be hunting me. I had to leap down from the castle wall.” He knew that tracking him would not be hard.

***

For long hours Baron Blunder used the lash and sent the horses plodding up little-used roads, into remote mountain villages that wouldn’t see three strangers in a winter. The snow grew deep as they climbed.

Erstwhyle knew that if they could get high into the mountains, the snow might cover their tracks. The skies were heavily laden, gray as slate, and by midday snow did indeed begin to fall. Two hours later a strong gale kicked up, and big flakes began to swirl around them.

The baron chose strange roads, going ever higher into the mountains. There were no signs to guide him, but he seemed to know the way. He had been at this a lifetime.

At last they reached a fork in the road. One trail climbed while the other dropped into a serene valley. There were no cottages or fortresses as far as the eye could see—only dark empty forests and falling snow. Down in the valley, wolves began to howl.

“Which way?” Erstwhyle asked.

Baron Blunder shrugged. “I’ve been lost for hours.”

Erstwhyle studied the trail helplessly. Baron Blunder urged the horses uphill.

“Why this way?” Erstwhyle asked.

“I’d rather die of frostbite than by wolves.”

***

Exhaustion took its toll. As night began to fall, Erstwhyle nodded off and woke to find Baron Blunder carrying him, struggling to open the door to the ship.

“What’s happened?” Erstwhyle asked.

“Get some rest,” Baron Blunder said. “I’ll drive through the night.” He bore Erstwhyle into the ship, which seemed warm and quiet. Outside the wind wailed.

Erstwhyle felt dazed. He listened to the shrieking wind and felt desolate. “Aren’t you going to sleep?” he asked.

“Not tonight,” Baron Blunder said. “I think that we’ve made it safe. No one is chasing us.”

No, we did not make it safe. Amilee did not make it.
Erstwhyle’s heart ached.

***

In the dark, a dream came: Erstwhyle was perched upon a snowy crag with the wind swirling around. Below, the valley was filled with the howling of wolves.

As he trembled, he looked up into the storm and saw something flying toward him. Vast were the wings, perhaps a hundred spans, and the creature was dark, like the clouds at the heart of a hurricane.

In seconds it was upon him—a reptilian head with teeth as sharp as shards of ice. As it wheeled past him, he smelled the terrifying odor of putrefaction. It was dead, old, and odious.

A menacingly low voice echoed from everywhere and nowhere. “Let the hunt begin . . .”

Erstwhyle woke and knew it was no normal dream. It had been a sending. The Dark Prince was coming!

***

Midnight found the Ship of Fools climbing into the forest, struggling through the snow.

Baron Blunder had taken a lantern, and now he forged ahead of the horses through the storm, lighting the track. Erstwhyle drove. To both the right and left were dangerous ledges, dropping into the forest.

Erstwhyle had no idea where they were going. He only hoped that somewhere higher in the mountains, the trees might be thick enough to provide shelter and Crydon would give up the chase. Snow was falling, enough to cover their trail. With luck the strong winds would blow away any traces.

Suddenly there was a cracking sound, and the whole wagon tilted. Erstwhyle had driven off the road. He imagined the Ship of Fools plunging down the cliff, and his heart pounded. Everything went into slow motion.

He leaned left, tried shifting his weight so that the wagon would stop tilting. If it went over, he’d have to jump for safety.

For long seconds the wagon canted, and Baron Blunder rushed back, pulled the horses by the reins, and urged them back onto the road. The horses forged, straining and stamping their hooves until the ship righted.

Moments later they rounded a curve and found a mountain crevasse. Tall pines rose up on either side of the road, and Baron Blunder pulled the horses into their shadow. A few feet ahead, trees had been chopped down, but only a few. The road simply ended.

Erstwhyle realized they were on a woodsman’s trail.

“We’ll stop here until this storm blows over,” Baron Blunder said.

The baron freed the horses from their harnesses, led them into the shelter of the woods, and then started a campfire. He was good with fires, amazing in fact, and soon the two of them were sitting beside a blaze. They had little to eat, only a bit of dark bread, some raw onions, and parsnips.

Still, the blaze pushed the shadows of the forest back, and they sat in the warmth of its glow, while flames licked the air and embers went wafting upward, like stars rising into the night. A haze of blue smoke soon filled the little glen.

They had a glum meal, and long into the night, Erstwhyle caught Baron Blunder staring at the wagon. They had known each other so long, they hardly needed to speak. The baron longed for bed, but would not sleep in the same room with a dead girl.

“You think he’s hunting us?” Baron Blunder asked.

“I know he is,” Erstwhyle said. “I had a dream.”

“What kind?”

“I dreamt that I was on a cliff. A dream dragon flew overhead and said—”

“Let the hunt begin,” Baron Blunder finished. The fat man looked up sheepishly and shrugged. “I had the same dream, like a daydream, only . . . I felt it in me bones.”

“Do you think he’ll find us?”

The baron shrugged. They’d done all they could do. Baron Blunder wasn’t the kind to resent fate.

A voice boomed through the woods, circling like a hawk, hissing and snarling, “I’ve found you!”

Erstwhyle and Baron Blunder leapt to their feet, eyes searching. Erstwhyle peered down the road, the way they had come, but saw nothing.

“Run!” Baron Blunder shouted, turning for the woods. However, before he had a chance to run, a black arrow sprouted from his back. Then two more. He cried out and staggered forward, dropping to the ground.

“Hold!” Erstwhyle shouted. “We’re bards! We’re under protection of the guild!”

In that instant, shadows seemed to stretch from the woods and coalesce into shapes. On the road a dozen mounted men appeared—huntsmen with the Dark Prince. Hounds in spiked collars and leather masks the color of blood lunged forward, barking.

The prince laughed. “Fool! You think the guild can help you? Why, you left my castle a day ago, crept out with your reward. And who is to say what happened here, so far in the woods, with only the wolves as your witnesses? Most likely, it was some robbers that found you.”

The silence had been an illusion, Erstwhyle realized. Crydon had ridden him down, with huntsmen and horses and dogs. Erstwhyle had never heard a sound.

He peered to his right and left, overwhelmed and confused. What was real, what was not? Were these men mere phantasms, like the dream dragon?

“So, please me,” the Dark Prince said, his voice whispering among the pines. “You will take off your clothes and run. This time it will be a proper hunt.”

Erstwhyle hesitated. To race through the woods in the dark was a sure way to break a leg, or attract wolves.

“How do I know you’re even real?” he said.

“Strip off your clothes,” Crydon said. He urged his mount forward and with his black lance pierced the satyr’s chest.

A powerful illusionist might show images, even create sounds. But he could not make a spear prick a man.

Erstwhyle gulped, let his cloak slide off. He stripped off his tunic, revealing the curly hair on his chest, the belly ring made of Sardakian gold.

“Now, run,” the prince hissed. “Run for your life!”

Erstwhyle found his nerve. “No,” he said. “Fight me. You’re not half the man I am.” He rabbed the lance and jerked it.

The Dark Prince struggled momentarily, then let go. Erstwhyle fell backward into the snow, and the lance went flying.

The Dark Prince laughed and drew his great sword. “Ha, so there is some fight in you, Goat Man!”

Erstwhyle was on his back, weaponless and weary to the bone. His friends were dead. If I’m to join them, he thought, I’ll give a good accounting.

He leapt to his feet, then grabbed a burning log from the fire and waved it like a torch, startling the Dark Prince’s horse. It reared, and the prince raised his sword, prepared to swing a killing blow.

The Ship of Fools exploded.

The side door blew out, slamming into the prince and knocking his horse sideways. The prince rolled and jumped to his feet. Dogs snarled and yapped, and the prince’s retainers fought to control their own mounts, which neighed and bucked.

In the door to the ship, Amilee stood in her dirty dress, which billowed in the stiff wind. She was as pale as ever, and for the first time Erstwhyle realized that she had been no paler in death than she had been in life.

Her face was a feral mask of rage. She leapt toward the Dark Prince, arms spread wide—and
flew
across the clearing. In one swift motion, she twisted his head and ripped it off. As blood gushed up from his carotid artery, spurting into the air, she brought down her mouth.

“Vampire!” a huntsman shouted, and taking control of his mount, spurred away. The other horses were whinnying in confusion, and in the meager firelight Erstwhyle spotted the priest trying to control his horse.

Erstwhyle lunged past Amilee, slamming his log into the back of the priest’s head, while hounds yelped in terror and raced off into the night, into the storm.

***

“A vampire?” Erstwhyle asked later, as he sat beside the fire with Amilee. It made sense now. He remembered how cold her touch had been. And he recalled how, at first, he had been amazed that she would want to join a troop of fools as they traveled the world.

Of course she needs to travel. She needs to feed.
It explained her penchant for long walks in the moonlight. Yet it still amazed him.

“For four years now,” Amilee admitted. “I didn’t want to tell you. I was afraid that you’d be afraid.”

The fire crackled and a log shifted. Sparks began floating toward the heavens, and she took his hand. Her own was very cold.

“I was afraid,” he admitted, “that you were afraid. I mean, I’m only half human.”

She nodded. She looked content, as one does after a full meal.

“You’re man enough for me,” she said. But her voice was timid. “Am I . . . woman enough for you?”

He looked into her eyes, and fire gleamed in them, sparkling, like a pond on a summer’s day. “You’re so alive. I thought you were gone.”

“I needed . . . soil from my homeland,” she said. “Without it, I was weak. He knew that. It’s why he always took off our clothes.”

Of course, there had been dirt on that old dress!

“You gave me my life back,” she whispered and leaned forward for a kiss. But just as his lips were about to meet hers, she twisted away, aimed lower, and he felt her cool tongue moisten his neck. A numbness seemed to spread out from her touch.

“May I?” she asked. “It won’t hurt.”

Eternal life? he wondered. With the woman I love?

How could it hurt?

***

Hours later, the Ship of Fools rode down out of the mountains, leaving the heights and the snow behind. For a while it stopped at a crossroads on the highway, and there Erstwhyle dragged the body of the Dark Prince to a tree and tied it so he hung from his hands.

There should be justice in the world. This man tried to rob me. He killed my friend and tried to eat me. He made young maidens run naked in the woods, hunting them for sport.

So Erstwhyle hung him beside the road. Before he turned away, he cut a couple of steaks from the prince’s backstrap to eat on the road. He left the Dark Prince as a warning to would-be tyrants.