The Skeleton King (The Silk & Steel Saga) (10 page)

A hand grabbed her ankle, yanking
her off balance.

Kath spied a flash of steel as she
fell. Kicking sideways, she knocked the dagger from his hand. The ground hit
hard, stealing her breath. Gasping, she reached for her sword but the soldier
rolled on top, his weight crushing her down. He pinned her sword hand with his
knee and wrapped his hands around her throat. A veteran with gray in his beard,
he glared at her, his face contorted in hate. “
Die, witch!”

She bucked beneath him, trying to
win free, but his weight was too much. His hands tightened to a deadly choke.
She pounded him with her left fist, but he only sneered, his hands squeezing
harder. Desperate for air, she stretched her left arm, reaching for a gleam of
steel.

His rank breath hissed in her face.
“You
bewitched
the horses. You
murdered
my men.”

Darkness threatened. Her hand reached
the dagger. She plunged it into his neck, all the way to the hilt. His eyes
widened in surprise. She jerked the dagger free, releasing a fountain of hot
blood. His hands went to his neck, as if he could holdback the tide of life.
Gasping, she pushed him away, and rolled to her feet.

Blaine rushed to her side, his blue sword in
his hands. “Are you hurt?”

Kath struggled to keep her voice
steady. “Be careful of the dead.”

He nudged the dying soldier with
his boot and then swung his great sword in an overhead arc. Blue steel
descended in a rush, severing the head. “Good advice.”

Shuddering, she took a deep breath
and resumed the search; careful to make sure the nearest bodies were truly
dead. Keeping the dagger in her fist, she ransacked the saddlebags. It took six
horses before she found everything she needed.

She carried the load back to Duncan. “I found a
surgeon’s set of tools.” Unwrapping the leather bundle, she displayed a set of
sharp knives and bone crackers, instruments fit for a torturer.

“Good. I’ll need them.” He sent a
passing glance toward her but then his eyes widened, staring at her blood
drenched chainmail. “Are you hurt?”

“One of the dead got rowdy.”

He studied her face and then
nodded, reaching for a flask of wine. “I need a fire.”

Zith moaned in pain.

Kath shuddered, afraid of losing
another companion. “Where’s Danya?”

Duncan’s voice was weary. “She seems
unharmed, no sign of any wound, but I could not wake her.” He shrugged. “The
monk needs our help or he’ll surely die.”

“I’ll start the fire.” Numb with
worry, she ripped up fists full of dry grass, using her dagger to dig a shallow
pit. One of the dead horses had carried a bundle of fagots, a stroke of good
luck. She retraced her steps, dragging the bundle back to Duncan. Stacking the wood in the bottom of
the pit, she added bits of dried grass for tinder and used a flint to strike a
spark. It was the first fire they’d had in many days. Kath stared at the
flames. “A beacon for our enemies.”

“It can’t be helped.” Duncan worked to staunch
the flow of blood.

She nodded. “What now?”

“I’ve tried to get some wine into
him but it won’t be enough.” He set a dagger in the fire, placing the blade in
the heart of the flames. “Get a stick for him to bite on, and keep it in his
mouth.” He looked at Blaine.
“Do your best to hold him still.”
 

They moved into position. Kath
cradled the monk’s head in her lap, working the stick into his mouth, while Blaine pinned his
shoulders down. The wound was wicked. Splintered bone protruded from the torn flesh
of his left arm, only a strip of muscle holding the hand to the forearm. Kath
stared at the wound, knowing it could well cost his life.

Duncan doused the wound with wine.

Zith writhed in pain, a muffled
scream.

Kath held the stick in place, her
stomach churning.

Duncan selected a knife from the surgeon’s
tools. “Hold him still.”

Kath looked away, unable to watch.

The monk bucked and screamed, his
gaze wild, his face ashen.

Duncan hissed, “Keep him still!” the rasp of
a blade cutting bone.

Blaine pressed the monk’s shoulders into the
ground while Kath held his head. A scream bubbled from the monk’s throat…and
then he lay still. Duncan
finished cutting, discarding the severed hand in the flames. The fire snapped
and sizzled, releasing the stench of burnt flesh.

“And now to seal the wound.” Duncan retrieved the
dagger from the flames, the blade glowing cherry-red.

Kath closed her eyes, sending a
prayer to Valin.

Hot steel hissed against flesh.
Kath’s stomach roiled, but mercifully the monk never woke.

“It is done.” Duncan sounded weary to the bone. “Now it is
up to the gods.”

Unable to keep the bile down, Kath
staggered away from her friends. Kneeling in the grass, she bent double as her
stomach convulsed. The horror of the day swept over her, so much blood, so much
death. She heaved till her stomach was empty, and then lay spent in the grass,
too tired to move.

The sun set in a blaze of red, a
bloody sky for a bloody day. The moans of the dying fell silent, muted by death
or the mercy of a dagger. Weariness claimed her. She lay on her back, searching
for the first star, for a ray of hope in the darkening sky.

“Are you well?”

She hadn’t heard him approach, a
shadow in black leathers. Embarrassed to be seen wallowing in her own stink,
she tried to rise, but the chainmail weighed her down.

Duncan knelt beside her, his hands gentle.
“Let me help.” He eased the harness for her throwing axes from her shoulders
and then helped her out of the chainmail. She sighed, relieved to be free of
the weight. He pulled her to her feet. Pain lanced through her left leg. She
bit back a scream. Her left leg crumpled under her weight. Duncan caught her, a pillar of strength. “Are
you hurt?”

Suddenly slick with sweat, Kath
shuddered. “One of the god-cursed hellhounds clawed my thigh. I’ll be all
right.” A strangled laugh bubbled out of her. “Was it only this morning that we
fought the hounds?”

“A hell of a day,” he lifted her
into his arms, “and a lifetime ago.”

He carried her back to the fire, a
single blaze holding back the night chill. The others surrounded the fire pit.
Zith lay swathed in blankets, pale as death, but at least he slept. Blaine lay on the far side
of the blaze, huddled next to Danya, his arms wrapped around the dark-haired
girl.

Duncan whispered, “Is she awake?”

Blaine shook his head, his face lined with
worry. “She hasn’t moved or made a sound since the battle.” He tucked a blanket
under her chin. “She’s pale as a ghost and cold as death but she still
breathes.”

The wolf whined, burrowing next to
the girl.

“Keep her warm. Perhaps she’ll wake
with the dawn.” He eased Kath down onto a bedroll. “Now let me see this wound
of yours.” He pulled her boots off and then used a dagger to split the leg of
her pants, peeling the leather away from the wound.

Kath gasped with pain, surprised by
the ugliness of the wound. Five claw marks ran the length of her thigh, puffy
and raw, surrounded by bruised skin.

Duncan hissed, “You fought on this?”

“There wasn’t much of a choice.”
She shrugged. “Besides, it didn’t hurt so much before.”

“Well it’s going to hurt now. Those
claw marks are shallow but they have to be cleaned.” He handed her a flask.
“Have a swig of this, but don’t drink it all.”

She took a sip and almost choked,
liquid fire burning down her throat.

“More.”

She tipped the flask and forced
herself to swallow, tears crowding her eyes.

“Good.”
 
He took the flask and handed her a strip of
leather. “Bite on this.”

She tried to make light of it. “At
least the scars will be interesting.” She bit the leather and closed her eyes.
The strap tasted foul, almost as bad as the liquor.

Agony exploded in her thigh, a
searing sting. She arched her back, biting the leather, fighting a scream. Pain
pulsed through her, seeming to last for an eternity, but then it faded to a
dull ache. Spitting out the leather, she lay still, breathing hard, drenched in
sweat.

Duncan tore long strips from a blanket,
doused them in brandy and bound the wound. “Now let me see your arm.”

She tried to sit up but her head
spun. “My arm?”

“You’ve got a sword cut on your
right arm but it doesn’t look deep.”

She stared at the shallow cut. “I
never noticed.” She lay back and let him work, staring up at the night sky, too
many clouds to see the stars. His hands were gentle but she hissed when he
cleaned the cut. “Where did you learn to do this?”

“Growing up in the Deep Green, you
see a lot of wounds from clashes with the white eyes.” He shrugged. “We all
learned.”
 

Prejudice again. She regretted the
question.

“Are you hungry?” He finished binding
the cut.

“No.” She closed her eyes,
remembering the gore of the battlefield. “Not after today.”

“Tea then.” He crushed leaves into
two mugs, lifted a kettle from the fire and poured, releasing a billow of
steam.

She struggled to sit up, wrapping
her hands around the mug, grateful for the warmth and the soothing taste. They
sipped in silence, sitting inches apart, heavy with thought. The truth of the
day hit hard. “We should have died today.”

“Yes.”

In her mind’s eye, she saw
warhorses running amok, trampling bodies beneath ironshod hooves. “Their horses
became demons, death on four legs.”

He nodded, his voice a whisper.
“The power of a Beastmaster revealed.”

A shiver raced down her spine. She
glanced over at Danya but the wolf-girl lay still as death. Kath shook her
head, her words a whisper. “They fought like something possessed.” Images of
the battlefield clashed in her mind. “They didn’t just kill, they destroyed.”
Shuddering, she made the hand sign against evil. “Little wonder Beastmasters are
so feared.”

“She saved us all.”

Kath stared across the fire at
Danya’s pale face. “Just so”

“And now we have to protect her.”

Something in his voice caught at
her heart, a warning she did not want to hear. “What do you mean?”

“There were survivors. Some of the
soldiers ran.”

She nodded, afraid to follow his
logic.

“They must be hunted down and
killed.” He raised a hand forestalling her argument. “Tales of this battle can
never reach the Mordant.” He lowered his voice. “Five stood against a hundred.
It is the stuff of legends.”

She shivered, feeling the touch of
the gods.

“The Mordant is sure to see the
magic behind the defeat.” Duncan
leaned toward her, his voice a whisper. “What will the Mordant do to claim such
a power?”

Her mind balked at the question.

“If word reaches the Mordant, all
the might of the north will be arrayed against a small band of five.”

Her heart thundered. “I’ll go with
you. We’ll hunt them together.”

“My Lioness.” He gave her a slow
smile. “Your courage is without measure but with a wounded leg you will never
keep up. And besides, the others will need you.” Firelight danced on his face,
his golden cat-eye glowing in the dark, his difference and his strength. “This
task is mine.” He leaned toward her, his voice soft. “You know I am the one to
do this.”

The fire snapped, a spray of
sparks. “I don’t want to lose you.”

 
“You will never lose me.” His hand cupped her
face. “My wife.”

She leaned into his touch.
“Promise?”

Fingers brushed her lips as if to
seal the words. “Promise.”

His hand withdrew and she felt
bereft.

Duncan stared at her. “What will you do
tomorrow? Will you go north or south?”

Kath rocked back, ambushed by the
question. She hadn’t thought beyond surviving the day. “I don’t know.”

“You have to decide. I need to know
how to find you.”

She tried to concentrate, pushing
past the weariness of battle. “It seems hopeless to go north.” She shook her
head. “Yet to go south is to give up, to admit to defeat, when the whole of
Erdhe is at stake.” She stared at his mismatched eyes, looking for answers.
“We’ve come too far to give up.” It was as much a statement as a question.

He nodded. “Then you’ll go north.”

The surety of his words convinced
her. “Into the north.” She nodded. “And the gods will just have to help.”

He smiled. “My Lioness.”

She swayed, suddenly dizzy, as if
the decision had robbed the last of her strength.

“But now you should sleep.” He
helped her into her bedroll, tucking the blanket around her shoulders, his
hands gentle. And then he surprised her, lying next to her, pulling her close.
She nestled against him, her head on his shoulder, surrounded by warmth and the
smell of leather. “I don’t want you to go.”

“I know.” He brushed a wisp of hair
away from her face, tucking it behind her ear.

She pressed her face against his
chest, wanting the night to last forever, but she had to ask. “When will you
leave?”

“Before the dawn. The night is my
ally.”

The truth was cruel, a sword at her
heart. She sighed and held him close, listening to the steady rhythm of his
heartbeat, wanting the moon to stop its trek across the sky. But her own body
betrayed her. Weariness claimed her, stealing the night. Exhausted, she fell
into a dreamless sleep.

10

Duncan

An eerie stillness filled the
night, as if the spirits of the slain hovered close. Plagued by worries, Duncan eased from the
bedroll, careful not to wake Kath. He tucked the blanket around her shoulders,
relieved that she slept. The other companions lay still as death, felled by
exhaustion. Stretching, Duncan
shrugged off his own weariness, knowing the battle could still be lost. He
reached for his longbow, hung a full quiver on his belt and strode towards the
killing field.

Clouds hid the moon, a pale smudge
in the midnight sky, but there was more than enough light for his golden eye.
He walked among the dead, reading the signs. Faces stared up at him, frozen in
masks of horror. Horses lay twisted and broken, impaled on spears. Mangled
bodies littered the grassland, torn apart and trampled to a sea of gore. He
shook his head at the carnage. So many dead, a hundred defeated by five, a
slaughter written in blood, yet all the dead wore the same armor, bore the same
foul symbol. The truth was easy to read, too easy. The battlefield screamed of
magic, a truth that could damn them all. Urgency gnawed at his mind; the
survivors needed to be hunted down and killed, stopping the tale before it
spread. He shivered feeling the hand of fate, knowing this was his task.

A shadow in dark leathers, he
prowled the killing field, reading the fall of trampled grasses. Sorting a confusion
of footprints, and telltale signs of blood, Duncan searched for his prey. The first trail
was easy to spot, three men cutting a fresh swath through the grasses, fleeing northwest,
at least one of them wounded. They ran in a wild panic, flailing through the
waist-high grass, leaving a trail a blind man could follow. But the second trail
was more subtle, obscured by hoof prints, a hint of blood giving it away.
Crouching low, Duncan
studied the signs. The second group was smart, retracing the trampled path of
the charging horses. An occasional boot mark imprinted the hoof prints, proving
men on foot traveled north instead of south. The cavalcade of iron-shod hooves
made the trail hard to detect and harder still to read but Duncan persisted.

Needing to know their numbers, he
loped along the trampled grass, crouching now and then to check for signs,
looking for differences in the boot prints. He backtracked twice to make sure,
cursing the answer written in the ground. Six perhaps seven men traveled north
at a jog. Two groups fled the battlefield…heading in two different directions.
The task would be harder than he thought, but there was no one else to do it.

Needing supplies, he returned to
the others. The campfire still blazed, a beacon in the night. The wolf chuffed
a greeting, green eyes glowing in the firelight, and then settled next to
Danya. Duncan
nodded, grateful for the wolf’s vigilance.

The others slept, exhausted from
the fight. He crossed to the far side of the campfire, drawn to Kath like iron
to a lodestone. Standing over her, he stared down. Exhaustion etched her face.
Even asleep she looked determined. She’d fought like a lioness despite her
wounded thigh, doing her best to save them all…and now it was his turn to do
the saving.

She sighed and turned, caught in a
dream, a lock of blond hair falling across her face, her right hand reaching
beyond the blanket.

He fought the temptation to tuck
the wayward hair behind her ear and take her in his arms, knowing she needed
every moment of sleep. A sense of urgency pulled him away.

Knowing time was against him, he
quickly gathered a few supplies, a water skin, a flint, and a small pouch of
dried meat. He checked the water skin to make sure it was full, with two groups
to track down; the task would take longer than he’d like. Determined to travel
light, he left his bedroll and his saddlebags, keeping stealth and speed as two
of his greatest weapons. A second knife slid into his belt and then he checked
to make sure he had a spare string for his longbow. Slinging the water skin
over his shoulder, he strode to the edge of the firelight and then paused.

He turned back for a last look at
Kath. Crossing the distance in three strides, he pulled the silver warrior’s
ring from his long hair. Engraved with Aspen
leaves, the symbol of his clan, it was the one token he carried from the Deep
Green. Kneeling, he set the ring in Kath’s outstretched hand, his voice a
hushed whisper. “Till I return.”

Her hand tightened around the ring
yet she did not wake.

Even asleep, she claimed her own.
“My Lioness.” He took a last look, memorizing her face, and then turned and
strode into the night.