Jager finished and turned to face the prince, only to find that the Verander was holding the small dagger of Grey Jager had made for his escape attempt. Jager could not help but gasp.
“I found it by your boots,” Wittendon said.
“My liege,” Jager began.
“I assume it fell from the table,” Wittendon added, pausing. “Odd utensil. Unusually shiny.”
Jager was about to make excuses and then just laughed—he was going to be executed anyway. “These are unusual times.”
“So I keep hearing,” Wittendon replied. “Well then, let’s get on with it. Relieve yourself and I’ll take you to some special quarters tonight.”
When Jager returned, Wittendon had put the dagger in the slot Jager had sewn in his boot. “Clever design,” the prince said.
Jager put his hand deep into his apron pocket and gripped the key he’d made, slipping it in his sleeve before he began to put on his boots. The prince knew of his plan and there was nothing left now but a final desperate attempt. As Jager finished knotting the laces of his boots, he slipped the new key into the lock of the shackle and quietly turned it. He expected to hear nothing as he had heard every night for the last few days, but somehow the alloyed pick he’d created while lost in thoughts of his family made a tiny click and the lock snapped open.
Jager ran.
No guards waited outside. Jager guessed that since the prince had been sent, the guards had been dismissed. Jager only knew one route well enough to travel quickly at night, and his feet found the path to the mines. The road would be fairly empty—Veranderen and wolves had little reason to travel that way. Though he had no idea what to do when he reached the guard.
Jager darted from darkest point to darkest point and waited for the sounds of the prince to be at his back. He was halfway up the base of the hill before he heard the steady footfall of his captor. The prince moved evenly, briskly. Jager knew he could not out-pace him for long, but if he could get to the mines he could hide there. If only he knew how Pietre had done it. No Verander would have the strength to follow him into the mines. Of course, what he would do after that was a problem. There was no way out except for the entrance. He supposed he would be left to starve to death or that a band of well-paid humans would be sent in after him. But if he could get to the mines, then perhaps he could find another way out of them—a turn he had missed, a narrow place to squeeze through, a thin wall that could be pickaxed until it broke.
“Seriously?” Wittendon grumbled to himself as he heard the man pick up his pace, stumbling up the footpath. He hadn’t anticipated an escape. He knew the wolves of the guard would surely kill the prisoner he intended to free if he didn’t hurry.
He stayed in his flesh form, but it still took less than five minutes to catch up to the human. “Friend,” he said at Jager’s back.
Jager pulled the crude Grey dagger from his boot and stumbled back.
“Friend,” Wittendon repeated. “Do you think I allowed you to keep that blade because I wanted a fight?”
Jager threw the dagger without a pause.
For the second time that week, a knife sank into Wittendon’s upper chest.
Jager ran again, assuming the Verander wounded, but Wittendon threw the dagger back so that it landed with a thud in the dirt at Jager’s feet. He slid to a stop, staring down at the knife.
“Friend,” Wittendon said again, more firmly this time.
“Do not pursue my family,” Jager pleaded. “And be quick with it.” He bowed his head against the fatal blow he expected.
“That seems a little dramatic,” Wittendon said, picking up the blade, wiping it on his cloak, and handing it to the man. “And what exactly does ‘friend’ translate to in the human dialect?”
Jager looked up, unsure of what to do or say. Gingerly he took the dagger Wittendon handed him. “Your chest?” he said.
“Yes, well, it still surprises me too,” the prince remarked. “Now about these mines…I suppose you know them just as well as anyone.”
“And better,” Jager said slowly.
“Good. Because someday I might like a tour.”
Jager just stared at him.
“But before the wolf guard hears us and betrays us both, I’ll show you part of a system of tunnels I’ve just recently become acquainted with.”
Jager looked at him suspiciously.
“You don’t think that boy of yours flew here, did you?”
Jager gasped, but Wittendon ignored it, moving a stone in the hillside a foot to the right and revealing an opening Jager never would have found.
“But Pietre—” Jager began.
“Did not use this tunnel,” Wittendon finished. “That is correct. But you’ll find there are many tunnels connected underneath this land.”
The newly-freed captive started to step through the opening and stopped. Turning back to Wittendon, Jager held up his hand, palm forward. The prince looked at him for a moment, then slowly raised his own hand. Their palms met in the human way—flesh to flesh. “Thank you,” Jager said, before turning into the opening of the tunnel.
Wittendon nodded. “A cat waits in the tunnel to escort you to your village. Don’t be concerned if she talks like a poetry book.
“Poetry,” Jager said, “would be the least of my concerns tonight.”
Wolrijk had been watching the oldest prince for a while now. Everyone assumed that when you were in love you acted strangely. Wolrijk wouldn’t know. What he did know—and what everyone else seemed to forget—was that there were other reasons to act strangely. Wolrijk followed prince and prisoner. One moment two dark silhouettes were on the side of the hill just south of the guard, and then in a blink the human was gone.
Wolrijk waited until Wittendon had slowly descended the hill, and then he followed the path the two had taken. It led in ragged switchbacks up the hill. Twice Wolrijk made his way up and down the path and twice he found nothing. Pausing at the bottom, he looked up once again. Carefully he gauged the distance, searching the outcroppings to his left and right. When he was nearly to the top of the switchbacks, he saw it—a large stone that could be pushed to the side, revealing a narrow crack. Pulling his ribs in tight, he squeezed through. A few steps further and the blackness was complete.
Slowly he made his way along the high, dank walls of the cavern, feeling for any dips or drops, pressing his body against the right side of the rock so as to be guided through the most perfect blackness he had ever known.
The caverns stretched on for miles, winding and forking. Wolrijk was careful to note each direction change, each unusual smell. But as the caves wound further in, his thoughts started to muddy. He walked more slowly, wondering whether or not he would be able to find his way out. At a certain point, the cavern narrowed. Wolrijk pulled his shoulders back, inching forward and panting until finally through a small hole far ahead, a tiny light blinked on. The light grew bigger as Wolrijk pushed through the last lengths of the tunnel into a cavern where the man holding the light turned. A human with an old wrinkled face—nearly as patchy and ugly as Wolrijk’s own—leaped forward, making the sign of the seven—thumb and forefinger extended, hand upside down. The man ran at the wolf with a small blade. Yet, even at the peak of life, a man was no match for the Night Hunter. This one, old and cracked as dirt in the sun, had barely lifted his weapon an inch before the mighty wolf was at his neck.
The lantern fell with a crack and then the light went out, encasing the tunnel again in blackness.
Blackness was what the cat Ellza had been waiting for. Quickly—before the wolf realized that the old man had not been alone—she ran. The supporting beam was at the south end. It was to be collapsed in case of emergency. The keeper, Winterby, dead. The malformed general in their halls. She barreled into the beam with all the speed and force she possessed.
Wolrijk had been slowly moving forward, following the sounds of paws that obviously knew these caverns better than he did. All at once, the running stopped and there was a
loud crack. He felt it first, then breathed it as the dust began to rise. He had been crawling low to the ground, feeling the dips and turns of the tunnel with his forepaws. Now he turned blindly and ran back the way he’d come. He was relieved at last to stumble over the old man’s body, ready to squeeze his way into the narrow canal, but the rock above him trembled, crumbling down as stones rolled over the opening. Wolrijk turned and ran to the only other open hallway. Behind him, he could hear the walls as they collapsed, could feel the gritty dust settle beneath his feet and in his fur.
As he ran, the path seemed to go up until he reached a small crevice, barely more than a crack in the stone. No man would ever fit through. Wolrijk wasn’t sure he would either, but with his paws stretched out, his shoulders and hips were narrower than a human’s. Besides, there were no options left to him. Deftly, he squeezed through the tight space hoping it would open up, though as he crawled through, it only got tighter. The minutes crept like hours and his breath came in short, ragged wheezes. He had to keep his front paws out long and his shoulders squeezed in tight, pushing himself along with his hind legs. His heart hammered into his head and he thought he was going to be sick when, finally, in front of him, a small breeze touched his face. He sucked the clean air in and pushed forward until after several long minutes the tight burrow released him—scraped and panting—into the night. He stumbled out near the top of the hill; and found himself facing the Grey mine.
Being so close to the mine’s opening weakened him further and for several minutes he sat, breathing heavily. When he had rested enough, he turned back to inspect the small fissure. It was not a point through which any man could crawl, but it was a place through which a young boy could wriggle. This was how the boy had gotten the stone.
Wolrijk smiled his ugliest smile. Wolrijk didn’t like the idea of an arrogant child wandering around with a stone he’d stolen from the mines. Wolrijk had taken the mother. He could take the father as well. Two prizes. Soon enough the boy would find his way to the wolf.
Chapter 38
Wittendon stood before his father with the news. Wolrijk stood at the king’s right—fresh scrapes along his belly and front quarters—while several of the members of the Königsvaren stood at attention near the back. “The Greysmith is escaped, my lord,” Wittendon said.
The king stood quickly, fury spreading over his features.
His wolf guard took a step back, but Wittendon remained unmoving. “The shackle was open. The room empty.”
Crespin banged his staff on the floor, sending streaks of black smoke across the tiles. “How? How was it broken?”
“Not broken, my lord. Open. Picked by a tool of his own creation.”
Cursing, the king flung his robe back and turned. “Go for him,” he said to the wolves. “Search the woods. And if you cannot find him there, go hunt his soon-to-be widow as a ransom.”
“Shall I go,” Wittendon asked bowing.
“Don’t be stupid,” the king snapped. “The Mal begins in six days. You’ve more important business than digging through leaves and human hovels.”
“And General,” the king said, turning to Wolrijk. “Perhaps the human has escaped execution for now, but in every record it will appear that he has not. I will not have gossip seeping through this kingdom that a middle-aged human can just waltz out of the king’s domain. Is that clear?”
Wolrijk nodded.
“Then go,” the king shouted to both general and guards.
The Königsvaren broke into a run, a trumpeter issuing a rally to the hunt. Other wolves joined them as they ran, whipping through the woods like winds of death, until they were a great mass of gray fur and yellow teeth, capable of covering acres of forest in minutes. Still they ran for hours, finding nothing.
Wolrijk ran ahead and was gone until deep in the night when he returned to the pack. “Brothers,” he said, “the village will give you answers sooner than the owls and bats of this wood. Come.”
Humphrey now knew many things. He had seen countless creatures slip beneath the earth, had heard whispers of a rebel band called the Septugant. He knew one of the dog sentinels was dead while the other had barely survived the forest fire. The survivor could remember little—only that after the flames encased his brother, another creature, white as an angel, had reached out and dragged him by the hind leg to somewhere higher and cooler than the flames. The surviving dog had lain low on the ground, drifting in and out of consciousness, and when he had come to, the white creature—and every other living thing—was gone.
Since then a few other dogs had entered Zinnegael’s woods, and among some of the dogs a subtle rallying had begun due to the fiery death of the head sentinel Silva. “For Silva,” they whispered, touching necks—a pass code of sorts, an agreement to leave their packs and fight alongside a crew of humans, cats, and other creatures. Humphrey was surprised more dogs didn’t join them. Since the fire, several water sources had become contaminated, food was scarce, and—oddly—pups had started to go missing. Humphrey had never heard of such a thing; dog pups were well watched, and not easily stolen. Some of the olders whispered the word ‘pet,’ a term Humphrey had only ever heard once when he’d seen a bright yellow bird in a dingy metal cage. Humphrey didn’t like to think of it and closed his eyes to shut out the memory, listening to the free-singing birds of the wood.
Listen. That was mainly what Humphrey did. He had expected a mission to mean daring and adventure, but so far it had meant lots of sitting, a bit of hiding, and hours of lonely listening. He missed Markhi. He missed Alekas and her willow-soft coat. He missed Carina and the gentle way she had combed the rotherem through his fur. Rolling around in a bush of it could never compare. But more than anything, he missed Pietre. It had been several weeks since they had seen one another.
Humphrey lay down among the dead leaves and placed his head to the ground wishing to sleep.
The sound started as a gentle throb—something like the sound of a flowing creek. And then it increased into a rumble that was soon thunder in Humphrey’s ear. Lifting his head, he watched as the wolves of the Königsvaren flowed through the forest. He did not expect to be seen, and was surprised when one struck him on the back. “Speak, loner,” the wolf commanded in his harsh wolven voice. “Have you seen a human man come through these parts?”
Humphrey shook his head as though groggy from being awakened and the wolves pushed onward, the thunder of their feet fading, though it headed in a direction Humphrey knew all too well. Adventure. Of course it would come when he was about to take a nap. He stood slowly, stretched once. And then, on paws as big as Carina’s dinner plates, he ran through the darkness.
Pietre woke before the cats, just as dawn began to break the blackness into gray. His shoulders were shaking, his body weak. He did not know how Zinnegael withstood the dreams of this place. He got up and dressed, ready for the day’s instruction. Ever since he had arrived the animals had been training him. His legs were strong from jumping, his arms sore from climbing. His shoulder ached from practice with his new weapon. Zinnegael had sewn a special new goatskin for his stone—a long, skinny sack with a netted opening where the stone rested. This, she promised, would allow the stone to make physical contact with his enemies. “And you’re going to want that,” she’d said. Looking at her hand, wrapped in a tight bandage, Pietre hadn’t argued.
As morning yawned into a pale purple sky, cats and dogs gathered on a field deep in the wood. Yesterday Pietre had run with the few rebel dogs who had joined Zinnegael’s rebel band; today he was supposed to skulk with the cats. Savah disliked his word for it. “Stillness training,” she called it. But whatever the name, it meant that he moved as quietly as a boy of thirteen possibly could. He had gotten good at it. He could now move with a gentle padding of foot, shift like a shadow, and breathe as a corpse. Or, as the wild little Emie pointed out, very nearly so.
“Impressive,” Zinnegael said, putting out raspberry donuts and hibiscus tea for their morning meal. Her finger was sti
ll covered with ginger-scented gauze. “Who’d have thought a boy your age could move like a whisper in the leaves.”
“You’re one to talk,” he said, grabbing a donut. “You wander around all day like you’re eighty.”
“Well, one day I will be. Why not practice now?” she said, lifting the teapot and wincing.
Pietre stopped chewing. “How is your hand?” he asked.
“Oh this?” she said. “Don’t worry about it; in fact, I’m really quite pleased.”
Pietre looked at Zinnegael like maybe the wound had gone to her brain, but she ignored him. “And how was your sleep?” she asked, pouring the tea.
“The usual,” he replied. “Haunted.”
She sat, but he remained standing. “You have not brought her,” he said after several minutes. “You have not fulfilled your promise.”
The witch pursed her lips and carefully unfolded a napkin.
“She is gone,” he said, stating it like a fact instead of a question.
“Your mother has been more difficult to locate than anticipated, yes,” Zinnegael said. “Your home is empty. And you were correct about the message—there is one scratched into the trunk—one about going to the dog Humphrey.”
Pietre closed his eyes to see the same darkness that greeted him when he wished to dream his mother. “And my father?” he asked.
“I must tell you,” she said, “and I am sorry, but according to all accounts of my spies, including that of the Veranderah Sadora, he was yesterday executed by the king.” Zinnegael sighed. “The rebel captain sends her condolences—”
“I do not need her condolences,” Pietre said. He walked to the east to watch the purple haze as it drifted up over the horizon. It could not be. He knew from his dream that his father had seen the hut—his mother’s deserted room—the covers of the bed tucked in tight and flat. His father had wandered from room to room, leaving doors open, touching everything. And then his father had smelled something—waxy, familiar. In the dream, his father’s skin had prickled and he had reached for something in his boot just as a figure came into view, backlit by a single candle in the tool room.
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