Wolfs Soul

by Jane Lindskold

  Kabot snapped in his Rhinadei-accented Pellish, “Quick! The villagers must have caught up to Wythcombe and his gang. Cover me. Necklace and out.”

  Wythcombe? Firekeeper thought in astonishment. How do these noseless ones know he is here? Did they catch his scent as Blind Seer did theirs? I think not. This has the sound of a plan made in advance and often refined.

  Indeed, after Kabot spoke, there had been no pause among the trio. Without completely abandoning caution, the three began to walk more quickly, alert for their first sight of what had so alarmed Hohdoymin’s band. Firekeeper noted how fingers were crooked or hands rested on items strung on belts or around necks. She suspected that even though none of Kabot’s trio carried a staff like Wythcombe’s, this did not mean they did not have some means of focusing their magic. Leaping out in front of them would be purest puppy foolishness, so instead Firekeeper tilted back her head and howled.

  The sound was clear and chilling, meant to freeze the prey in its tracks, and Firekeeper was not disappointed. The jungle, already stilled from the passage of so many humans, grew even quieter, as if the very wind amid the leaves was holding its breath. The upheaval among the members of Hohdoymin’s band ceased for a long moment, the warriors paralyzed by purest fear. Firekeeper did not intend to rely only on sound alone, however. Her bow was strung. Swift as thought, she sent an arrow to bury itself as threat and warning in the trail at Kabot’s feet.

  The spellcaster stared at the arrow not so much in the panic Firekeeper had hoped for, as with calculation. But Kabot learned almost immediately that time to calculate was not among the resources at his command. From where Wythcombe and the others had waited in the trees came the sound of four humans and a goat descending in haste. Kabot was not a fool. He knew that he and his companions were caught between two dangers: ahead, some fifty or so, armed and angry; behind, some unknown threat.

  Or maybe not completely unknown, Firekeeper thought. That is worrisome.

  Farborn flashed overhead, shrieking that he would check on the humans and Rusty. A breath later, Blind Seer’s head bumped against Firekeeper’s arm. The great grey wolf carried Hohdoymin’s necklace in his mouth. The cant of Blind Seer’s ears told Firekeeper that it was not the best-tasting prey he had ever hunted, even as his tail expressed pride at a successful hunt.

  Since no beads were dropping from the strand, Firekeeper guessed that Blind Seer held the broken ends in his mouth. She reached down, and took the strands.

  “Can you knot it off and put the thing around my neck? Blind Seer asked.

  Firekeeper replied by doing as he requested, then tapped her canteen in mute offer of water with which to rinse his mouth. Blind Seer shook his head, then tossed it back to howl the cry that the One gives when summoning the full pack to the hunt. Firekeeper flung her own head back, adding her voice to his. The pair had practiced making two sound like many more, and she delighted in mixing in a descant of yaps and barks to Blind Seer’s deeper, rhythmic call. For good measure she threw in a jaguar’s near roar and the eerie scream of a panther. They had seen wildcat tracks. If Hohdoymin’s people did not know to fear the wolf, they would know to dread the great cat that drops from above to take its prey.

  Hearing the wild song, Kabot and his two companions began to back away. One howl and a single arrow was nothing to the possibility that something with many voices lurked among the tangled vines and broad-leafed trees. Firekeeper tilted her head, asking Blind Seer if they should give chase.

  “Let Wythcombe fight with them,” Blind Seer said. “You and I must make sure that Hohdoymin’s band does not retreat this way. Didn’t Kalyndra say that Hohdoymin originally lived in a village near a lake closer to the plateau? Let us give him reason to tuck his tail and run home.”

  Firekeeper agreed. She did not think Kabot’s trio would surrender meekly just because Wythcombe demanded it. If Hohdoymin’s warriors came upon the two groups while they were fighting, then it might go badly for them all. Better to drive these warriors toward what they would surely believe was safety. Besides, such singing was a great deal of fun. Wolves, like most wild hunters, enjoyed chasing what ran.

  “Take cover, dear heart,” Blind Seer ordered. “You do not look like the local humans. Best we not remind these that they set out to hunt those from the plateau.”

  Firekeeper melted into the cover of the jungle, while Blind Seer ran openly down the path, every line in his lean, muscular body a challenge. Blind Seer stopped outside of the range of the long spears, and waited to be noticed. The war band had recovered from its initial shock, but had not reassembled into a coherent pack. Instead they shouted and argued in small clumps. Firekeeper and Blind Seer didn’t need to be able to understand their language to tell that some were urging a return home, while others were determined to fulfill their mission.

  Hohdoymin sat on his backside in the middle of the trail, legs splayed, poise vanished. He may have had a magical gift for making himself liked, but doubtless having been knocked over by an enormous creature and having his necklace ripped from him had been disorienting. Two of his six bodyguards were offering comfort. The other four were trying to restore some sort of order.

  Astonishingly, none noticed the great grey wolf that stood between them and their retreat until he howled a sharp command for attention. Perhaps it was because Blind Seer was wearing their leader’s necklace over his own proud ruff, but no one as much as shifted from leg to leg, much less raised a weapon or reached for a throwing spear. Blind Seer bared his fangs in both threat and smile, then carefully raised one foreleg and pointed. The point was a gesture he had learned from hunting dogs, but there was nothing doggy about it now. Combined with those gleaming fangs, the motion communicated both threat and command. The nerve-shattered war band obeyed. First in ones and twos, then in a panicked rout, they tore down the trail away from what must have seemed like the wilderness incarnate.

  Only Hohdoymin refused to join the flight. Hands outstretched, fingers bent into claws, he bounded to his feet. He would have run at Blind Seer and tried to wrest the necklace from him if his bodyguards had not prevented him. Hohdoymin screamed at them, but they dragged him after the rest.

  Blind Seer and Firekeeper might have followed to make sure that the retreat was complete, but Farborn dove from the sky and circled them with tight-winged eagerness.

  “Hurry back! You are needed! I will watch these warriors and bring warning if they find their hearts and return.”

  As one, Firekeeper and Blind Seer let the fear song they had been building die in their throats. Fading into the thick undergrowth, they raced back toward where voices angry and shrill promised that they were indeed, as Farborn had said, needed.

  VII

  KABOT HAD BARELY given Uaid and Daylily the command to move ahead when a piercing wolf’s howl broke though the jungle’s stillness. His hair prickled up along the back of his neck at that call of the primeval night sounding in broad daylight. A moment later, an arrow buried itself in the path, promising that whoever howled had more than sound to offer.

  Daylily whispered, “Do we go forward or back? Something has the militia in a turmoil. The arrow seems to want us to back up.”

  Uaid was listening along the way they had come. “I just heard a crack, like a branch breaking or something.”

  “So we’re caught between two threats,” Kabot began. He would have said more, but a riot of wild howling and barking, seeming to come from all directions, made speech nearly impossible. Daylily’s now-green eyes widened and she began to edge back the way they had come. Unwilling to split their tiny group, Kabot motioned to Uaid, and they hurried after Daylily.

  They nearly collided with a group of people who had been running up the trail toward them. Daylily practically ran into the arms of a stately older woman with the dark skin of the locals, whose ropes of woolly hair were streaked with grey and ornamented with a variety of charms. Wythcombe stood nose to nose with Uaid. Seeing his pursuer, Kabot leapt to one side and found hims
elf alongside a young woman who was struggling to keep a very large goat wearing saddlebags from dashing away in panicked flight. Slightly behind these first three stood a handsome young man whose dark hair was kept out of his grey eyes with a wide band of dark-blue fabric.

  In memory, the Voice spoke, “His companions include several bearing weapons, a monstrous wolf, falcon, and… a goat.”

  “Kabot!” Wythcombe’s initial expression of honest relief was replaced with one far less friendly. “We’re here to take you back to Rhinadei.”

  Kabot acted more quickly than he would have thought possible. With his left hand, he grabbed the young woman by one shoulder. Hauling her back against him as a shield, he drew his long belt knife with his right hand.

  Startled, the girl released the goat and kicked back at Kabot with one foot, catching Kabot solidly below the knee. He winced, but maintained his hold, pulling the girl closer to him and resting his naked blade against her throat in a promise of violence. To his surprise—especially given that the girl wore a sword and had been so quick to counterattack—his captive began to shake, the fight draining from her in an instant.

  When Kabot grabbed for the girl, Daylily shoved the woman in front of her so hard that she stumbled. Then Daylily jumped back so she was behind Kabot and his prisoner. Uaid backed away from Wythcombe. As he did so, he shot Kabot a look that said as clearly as words: “Are you really sure this is a good idea?”

  Kabot had no doubt. “We’re not going back to Rhinadei, Goldfinch. And Rhinadei doesn’t want us, not really, not except as another object lesson. Leave us to find our way in these new lands.”

  “Not new,” objected the dark-skinned woman. “Not yours to conquer. You will find no welcome if you begin your sojourn outside Rhinadei by taking hostages.”

  She spoke the language of Rhinadei, although with an odd accent. In contrast, the dark-haired young man who spoke next had a solidly Rhinadeian accent.

  “Let Laria go,” he pleaded. “You’re terrifying her. Let her go and I promise, I’ll make Wythcombe talk to you about other options. The world outside of Rhinadei is different from what we were taught. Rhinadei has lost touch.”

  There was sincerity in the young man’s words, but something else too, something that didn’t seem right. Again, Kabot remembered what the Voice had said: “His companions include several bearing weapons, a monstrous wolf, a falcon, and… a goat.”

  He’d seen only one person bearing weapons—this girl. He’d seen the goat. But the wolf? The falcon? Was the young man trying to buy time for someone else? Someone who had howled in the jungle? Someone who shot a bow?

  Panic rose. Kabot pressed his knife into the soft skin of the girl’s throat, felt the blood bead forth, then begin to course over where his arm, bare in this horribly hot climate, wrapped around the girl. He was vaguely aware of the softness of her young breasts, of her panicked breathing as she tried to stifle her sobs, but what he felt more acutely than either was the blood: so hot, so full of mana. This girl had a magical gift—a talent he thought—untapped for some time, rich with potential. Something close to Kabot began to respond to this source of fresh power, to his desperate need. Kabot struggled to focus. This of all times was not the time to lose control.

  Wythcombe was staring at him, those familiar eyes in that unfamiliarly aged face alive with pity and horror. The young man had stopped talking and, with his newly acute senses, Kabot could tell he was shaping his mana for some sort of working.

  “Don’t try anything,” Kabot said, his voice thick, as if he’d hit the not quite drunk state of intoxication. “I mean it. Anything happens to me, and I can’t help but damage this girl, this, what did you call her, Laria?”

  “Yes. Laria.”

  The voice that answered didn’t come from any of the three who stood facing Kabot, nor from the goat, who had wandered back and was idly nibbling at the edge of Wythcombe’s sleeve. This voice was husky, just a little deep, possibly female, but right now Kabot would not have been surprised to find it was not human. The husky voice spoke on, simultaneously tight and preternaturally calm.

  “If you kill Laria, you will die. That is the problem with hostage taking. Hostages are only good as long as they live. If Laria dies or is even so badly hurt, then you will wish for a clean death. We promise.”

  The words were underlaid with a growl so deep and resonant that Kabot wondered that the speaker’s throat could both shape words and emit that sound. Then Uaid spoke, his voice so mincingly precise that Kabot knew he was very, very nervous.

  “Kabot. We’re surrounded. There’s a… woman and next to her is a wolf the size of a horse and it’s wearing that necklace. They don’t look at all happy.”

  “Surrounded,” the husky voice echoed. “Yes. Wythcombe may have old fondness for you, but Ranz? I think no. People like you have maked his life not so pleasant. And me and Blind Seer have a trust for Laria. Release her to us now, and we will let Wythcombe have you. Do not release her and, for a little, we have what is called a stalemate. But only for a little and after that little, you die.”

  Kabot believed what that voice said. He really did. In another situation, he would have surrendered, hoped that he could talk his way around Wythcombe. He’d done that so many times when they were young. But something else was pounding through his system and now he recognized what it was. In anticipation of using Palvalkay to draw Teyvalkay from the village, he had immersed himself in its aura. When the villagers had begun their unexpected exodus, he had dropped Palvalkay into a little bag that he had hung around his neck. It lay there now, and he could sense it licking at the girl Laria’s mana-rich blood.

  Kabot fought to concentrate. Daylily was speaking now, arguing that they needed some sort of promise before they could trust what that rough-voiced woman—Firekeeper, it seemed she was called—to keep her promise. Kabot didn’t pay any attention to the byplay. In the confines of his mind the Voice was speaking to him as Phiona might have done.

  “You don’t need to surrender. Can you feel it? Yes. Fresh blood makes it easier, doesn’t it? You’re learning fast. Now. Open your mind. Tap into Palvalkay. You don’t need to invent an elaborate transportation rote. You’ve done it before. Find the channel, then ride it. Good. Now, see? There are three lines going out. One goes to Teyvalkay. So close, alas, but too far. That wolf would let the girl Laria die rather than surrender it. He’s no fool.

  “Two lines remain. One is shorter, stronger. That’s right. Closer. But I’ll let you in on a secret. You don’t want to go that way, not until you have at least one additional thread. I’ll tell you why when we’re not so pressed for time. So that leaves the other. It’s thinner, more tenuous, but you’re well-rested and have been storing mana. You can do it! I’ll whisper to Daylily and Uaid. We’re not the sort to abandon old friends. Not like Wythcombe, are we? Good. You have it? Then a deep breath, focus on the spell you’re building. Keep a tight hold on the girl. She truly is your shield—as well as a wellspring you can tap again. Now. Daylily. Uaid. Ready? We’re off! Imagine their faces when they see what you’ve done. I could just die laughing.”

  And to the sound of disembodied laughter, aware of Daylily and Uaid linked to him, of the mana-rich weight of the sobbing girl in his arms, Kabot launched into the current that connected Palvalkay to another thread, one so, so very, very far away.

  He heard the girl scream “Firekeeper, help me!” and then he heard nothing at all.

  The scent of Laria’s terror nearly overwhelmed the scent of her freshly shed blood as it trickled over Kabot’s hand and mingled with his sweat. That sweat told Blind Seer its own story: defiance and excitement blending with something very human—the awareness that Kabot knew what he was doing was irrevocably foolish, but that he was going to do it anyhow. The other two humans were shocked more than anything else. Clearly, they had no advance warning as to what Kabot intended to do.

  Firekeeper had stood taut and tense beside Blind Seer, miserable that she could not do more, bu
t also confident that she would be able to rescue Laria. Indeed, Firekeeper’s main concern had been that she might need to wait for nightfall when the advantage would be hers and Blind Seer’s. Now, between one breath and the next, the option of rescue had vanished along with four humans: Kabot’s three and Laria.

  Blind Seer bared his teeth in a smile that was very nearly a snarl. No. Correct that. The option of an immediate rescue has vanished. I know my Firekeeper. Laria will be rescued. Let us hope that the girl is in a condition to appreciate being saved.

  Ranz raced into the newly vacated space, as if he could somehow catch up with the kidnappers. Kalyndra didn’t move from where she had been standing, but looked at Wythcombe.

  “Earlier, you told us how Kabot and his associates had simply vanished from the university towers. Was it like that?”

  Wythcombe leaned his forehead against the polished wood of his staff. “We don’t know for certain what they did last time, since they vanished before we reached them. We only saw that they were no longer where they had been, and knew they had not passed us when making their departure. However, I believe Blind Seer would have reported if he had smelled quantities of fresh blood.” He glanced at the wolf, who nodded. “Now, as then, I suspect that the artifact they have is somehow assisting them.”

  “This time we have artifact, too,” Firekeeper said, pointing to the necklace that Blind Seer wore. “Use it to take us after them.”

  Wythcombe shook his head. “I can’t. Kabot was attuned to the artifact he used. Achieving such attunement takes time. I can’t help but feel that there is something we’re missing. Kabot was always talented, but he has spent the last several decades in a magical hiatus. How did he learn these techniques? How did he become so much more powerful? The theories say…”