So perhaps they did not understand about me; us; all of us who are the Forest. They were surprised when I did not fall as they hacked at me; they became afraid and ran. Their running became part of me, as the running of the aurochs is part, and the running of the deer. All the hunted are part of me, because how else can I be a hunter?
Only the hunter who knows the fear of the chase can feel the true, pure victory; only the hunter who pays for his prey with terror is washed clean of guilt. To feel what they feel; to run as they run; to die as they die is the only way. If you hunt without it, you too will die in turn, as the humans do.
It is not hard to kill. The hard part is to do so while feeling all that the prey feels, and yet keep the clarity of purpose that allows the killing stroke, the slash of the knife to the perfect spot which will cause the least pain.
I remember my first kill. Who does not? It was so long ago that the Forest itself was different. I remember the cycads and the ferns. I remember the big lizards, which were never hunted, because they did not fear as we did. Their feelings were so far from us that it was never clear if we were clean after, so the flock leader ordered us to leave them alone. To prey only on the warm-blooded ones, who were enough like us, social and grouping together and fearing sharply the rustle in the bushes which said the killer was hiding, waiting, watching . . .
Blood is good when it is warm. Just one sip is all we need. Blood is life and more than life — the knowledge of life, which is what the animals lack and we provide for the Forest. Only those who kill understand life completely; only those who witness the eyes as they dull know the value of what leaves the body with the last breath.
Predators are the cull: we keep the bloodlines clean, the herds healthy, the memories alive. All the memories. None we have killed is forgotten. None we have killed truly dies. Each of our hunts lives forever in the Forest, in the special places of remembrance. We live there, also, alive at once in a dozen times, alive only at the times of the hunt, feeling again each kill: the aurochs, the deer, the boar, the humans. The humans feel fear the most vividly and are hardest to encompass in the moment of death, but we can do it. We must. The Forest requires us to kill all those who see us, so we have learnt how to kill men.
I know how to kill humans, but not the Kill Reborn. She had no fear. In all the untold years I had never met prey that had no fear of me. It changed me, that moment. To look into a human’s eyes and see only calm, acceptance, interest — that is not what a hunter sees. But I had seen it. So what was I now? If I were not a hunter, did that mean I was a mortal, like her, subject to death as she was? I feared so. I knew I had to follow this Kill Reborn until I could taste her fear, until the Forest allowed her death. For all humans die. Then I would be a hunter again, and cleansed, and the memory of her death would join the other memories of my hunts.
Memories of death are eternal, kept in the Forest until the sun becomes ripe and is eaten by the gods. The Forest itself is smaller than it was; the places of remembrance fewer and busier than they were, with memories circling through them faster than in the past. This is due to the fair-haired men. But the Forest has withstood much in the past: fire and flood and ice. What is a thousand years? Nothing. Always it has recovered, and it will recover from this. Because we know, we hunters, that if necessary, we could take back the Forest land from the newcomers. I alone culled those first fair-haired men, and we could kill the others. We have had practice.
Although holding their fear and their pain would stretch us, we could do it, if we had to. If we were asked to. If the Forest woke.
Leof
WITH THISTLE UNDER him and seeming to have taken no hurt, Leof felt steadier, more competent. His clothes were mostly dry by now, which also helped. He followed the directions the horse detail had given him and found the road to Baluchston only ten minutes’ ride south. He swung onto it, joining the remnants of Thegan’s army, all of them looking bedraggled and quite a few still dazed.
Wherever he could as he passed, he identified sergeants and told them to organize the men into squads so that by sunset, as they approached the outskirts of the town and could see the Lake again on their left, he was at the head of a reasonably well-ordered force, although the men were marching slowly and showed the tell-tale signs of exhaustion, shuffling feet and hanging heads.
“Fire and food in camp,” he encouraged them and was as glad as they were to see the tents and campfires which marked their goal.
He coaxed a canter from Thistle and went ahead to alert the sergeants-at-arms who would be responsible for billeting the men. Several men hailed him boisterously as he entered camp, comrades from both Sendat and Cliffhold. He greeted them with a similar relief. Not all gone. Not all dead.
In fact, looking around he realized that the Lake had been remarkably merciful. There were far more men gathered here than he had expected. He had been stationed almost at the far end of the Lake, and his ragtag assortment of men were the last in. Although their numbers were much diminished, Leof reasoned that at least half the survivors were still on the other side of the Lake, the Cliff Domain side. If what he saw around him represented the other half, then they had not been as badly hurt as Hodge had suggested. Perhaps he and his men had, indeed, taken the worst beating.
He dismounted and handed Thistle’s reins to a young ostler with a nod of thanks.
“Where’s my lord?”
“In his tent,” the boy said. Leof was reminded for a moment of Broc, but put the thought aside. There were always casualties in battle.
He found Thegan’s tent easily enough. It was placed in the center of camp. It looked just as it always did on campaign, the brown canvas with gold ties at the corners both workmanlike and impressive, just like my lord Thegan. Leof hesitated at the door flap, then went through.
Thegan was seated at his map table, three of his officers behind him. Leof recognized them and was relieved to see them. They were older than he was, and sensible. He was sure they would see the folly of razing the town.
Thegan looked up as he entered and jumped to his feet.
“Leof!” He strode around the table and clasped Leof’s upper arms. “Gods be blessed!” He smiled with real pleasure and Leof smiled back, warmed and thankful in turn. This was the Thegan who had earned his loyalty.
Since that disastrous night when he had stopped Horst from shooting Bramble in the back, Thegan had been distant with him, particularly when he returned empty-handed after searching for her. He thrust down his guilt that he had in fact found her but let her go. That had been true disloyalty to his lord, and there was no arguing it away. He had wondered, uncomfortably, for weeks afterward, if he had acted merely to show her that he was not the killer for hire she thought. That her distrust of warlord’s men was unfounded. But he thought, bleakly, that it was more likely that he was just too soft to take a woman prisoner. Particularly Bramble, so wild and reckless. It would have wounded his heart to bind her hands and force her back to serve the warlord.
Well, if he couldn’t serve his lord by giving him Bramble, he would have to serve him some other way.
“My lord.”
“How many did you lose?”
“I think about half my squad,” Leof answered, sobered.
Thegan clicked his tongue and let go of his arms, moving back to the table and looking down at the map of the Lake that lay there.
“That’s the worst we’ve heard so far,” he said quietly.
“The wind was at our back, my lord,” Leof explained. “The Lake needed to make sure we were knocked out.”
Thegan looked at the other men, as though Leof’s words were significant.
“You think it was the Lake, then?”
“Well, of course… what else could it be?”
“The town wasn’t touched.” Thegan’s tone was grim.
“But, my lord, isn’t it known that the Baluchston people have an agreement with the Lake? That it leaves them alone?”
“We know that they, unlike every
one else who settled this Lake, live in safety. The Lake is dangerous, I grant you that. So is the sea, and the storm. But to plan and execute an attack like last night took intelligence, and I do not believe that the Lake has that. Anymore than the storm does.”
“Perhaps that is so,” Leof said slowly, wondering for the first time why he had assumed that the Lake was acting on its own behalf, without guidance. Was it just the voice he had heard, or was it all the stories that were told about the Lake, stretching back centuries? Stories about attacking forces befuddled, turned around in the middle of battle so that they were fighting their own side, or gone missing altogether only to turn up weeks later, swearing they had no memory of the time in between. Those stories were part of every child’s upbringing in the Domains, and so were stories about the mysterious Lake People, the only original inhabitants who had successfully resisted Acton’s forces. And still did.
“Why should it be the Baluchston people who planned it?” Leof said. “Why not the Lake People?”
“The Lake People are nothing but Travelers who do not travel,” Thegan said impatiently. “Do you think if they had power like that they would skulk in the reeds like water rats? Do you think they would let Baluchston stand and the ferries run across their precious Lake?” He shook his head. “No, if the Lake People controlled the Lake they would have taken it back from Baluchston long since. As they haven’t, the control must reside in Baluchston.”
“But what would they gain from attacking us?” Leof asked. He wasn’t convinced, but he knew Thegan in this mood. No argument would change his mind.
“They hope to maintain their freedom.”
“They have freedom. They’re a free town.”
Thegan looked at him, an amused twist at the end of his mouth. “They had freedom. They are clever enough to realize that if I hold both Central and Cliff Domains, and cleared the Lake, their freedom would mean very little.”
Leof paused. The other men were carefully not reacting to that statement. Now was not the time to argue for the continued liberty of the free towns. Towns outside the warlords’ control had always been a sore point with Thegan, despite the fact that Acton had established them himself to encourage trade between the Domains. Better to cut to the core of the debate.
“My lord, what if no one controls the Lake? What if it is intelligent?”
There was silence in the tent for a long moment. Thegan seemed to think about it, but Leof realized with a shock that he was only pretending.
“If it is intelligent,” he said eventually, “then it will be pleased that we are ridding it of Baluchston. If it is not, then we will destroy those who control it. Each and every one of them.”
Leof felt forced to protest. “What if it was only a few, or just one enchanter working on his own?”
Thegan did pause at that, then shrugged. “We’ll give them a chance to surrender the enchanter and swear their loyalty. If they don’t, we fire the town.”
But if there is no enchanter, if the Lake is intelligent, then you have just invented the perfect reason to destroy a free town, Leof thought. He felt colder than he had when he woke that morning. Because he didn’t know if Thegan really believed what he was saying, or if he had just seized the chance to take control of a free town without protest from the other warlords.
“Come, you look like you need some food and a sleep,” Thegan said to him, once again the commander concerned for his men. “The men need a rest, too. Tomorrow will be soon enough to march on Baluchston.”
Saker
FOR THE FIRST few miles out of Carlion, Saker was surrounded by other carts, riders and people on foot. The roads, caught between dry-stone walls, were so clogged that the walkers were faster than the carts.
His disguise was perfect, except that he was traveling alone. So he stopped and offered a lift to an old couple carrying a baby. They accepted with relief. The old man climbed into the back of the cart with some help from Saker; the woman clambered up next to Saker with more agility. She carried the baby in a shawl tied around her chest. It was not a newborn. Its curly yellow hair waved in the breeze as it popped its head up out of the shawl and looked around. Saker hated it. It was the inheritor of Acton’s brutality. With hair like that, it would never be treated like an animal. Never be spat at, or cursed, or refused service. He set his heart against it.
Then he wondered, why were they alive? Had they run away so fast that the ghosts hadn’t got to them? He asked his passengers.
“Ghosts? No bloody ghosts, sir, they were demons from the cold hells! Ghosts can’t do what they did!” the man shouted over the noise of the wheels on the rough road.
“They killed our daughter’s husband, they did, right in front of us,” the woman confirmed.
“And your daughter?”
“Oh, she’s been dead these ten months, birthing this one,” she said, smoothing down the baby’s curls.
“They didn’t attack you?”
“It was strange, it was,” she said, thinking hard. “It was like we weren’t even there. Like they only saw him. As though Lady Death had sent them specially to get him.”
She sounded as though she didn’t mind that idea. Saker gathered that the baby’s father had been disliked. It worried him, though, that three blond people had been overlooked by the ghosts. Surely they couldn’t be Travelers in disguise, too? He thought of the red-headed woman. He would have sworn she was one of Acton’s people, but Owl had thrust her aside; protected her, until she threw her life away to protect the man. Useless sacrifice. But if she had old blood, if the blonds beside him had old blood, if so many of the inhabitants had that blood running in their veins… where did that leave his crusade?
Perhaps he could refine the spell. Set the barrier higher, so that only those with enough old blood would be protected. But how much was enough?
All day, he pretended to be a kind young stonecaster who had been caught in Carlion unawares. He delivered the old couple and the baby to the woman’s brother’s cottage in a village on the boundary of Three Rivers Domain, left amidst their effusive thanks, and found a room for the night at the local inn.
He sat in a corner of the common room and listened to the talk around him. It ranged from disbelieving to hysterical, from terrified to belligerent. No one spoke of anything but the stories from Carlion. They didn’t realize where he had come from and he kept silent rather than be deluged with questions. Halfway through the evening the door opened to let in a family: parents and two young girls, just out of childhood, both with light brown hair like their father. They were carrying bundles of cloths, with oddments sticking out of them: a candlestick, a tinderbox, an empty waterskin. He knew instantly that they were from Carlion, and as soon as the innkeeper realized it, too, she bustled them off into the corner next to him and interrogated the parents.
“We don’t know what happened,” the man said. “We were sleeping, and then the door banged back and these… these things, like ghosts but real, burst in on us. They had swords, just like warlords’ men!”
“I screamed,” one girl said.
“It was like they didn’t see us,” the mother added. “They looked us over but they didn’t see us. Thank the gods!” She began to cry, taking off her headscarf to mop up her tears and revealing, not the black hair Saker had expected, but pure gold. “They killed our neighbors. Both sides. Just slaughtered them in their beds. Half the town’s dead!”
The older girl started to cry, too, but the younger set her mouth and sat closer to her father.
“We’re not going back there!” the mother said wildly, and the younger girl nodded decisive agreement.
“It’s shagging cursed,” the girl said. The mother immediately scolded her for swearing. Saker saw the satisfaction on the girl’s face and realized she had planned it that way, to stop her mother crying. She was of Traveler blood through her father, he was sure, even if her mother wasn’t. But then why did the ghosts ignore the mother? He would have to smooth out any inconsistencies
in the spell next time.
He wondered where to go next. He wasn’t ready for Turvite. He would be, soon, but not yet. For Turvite, his army needed better weapons. Mostly they had scythes and sickles. They needed swords. He wouldn’t find those in a free town. Inevitably, he thought about a warlord’s fort. Fighting a warlord’s force would garner many weapons. His army wasn’t big enough to do that yet. But if he moved through Central Domain, gathering bones, he could take his force against Sendat, and get all the weapons he wanted.
Saker nodded, forgetting for the moment the red-headed woman who had betrayed her blood. Central Domain. He would stay here and aim for Sendat before autumn.
Then Turvite. He would succeed where the old enchanter had failed. He laughed to himself in the inn chamber. No one had ever been as powerful. His head swam. Loss of blood, he thought. Yes, a time quietly collecting bones would be good for him as well as for his plan. When they attacked Sendat, he would need lots of blood to raise his army.
Bramble
ONCE THEY CROSSED the stream, the horses splashing through the shallow water, the Forest changed to a mix of trees, elm and oak and beech. Now, Bramble felt, she was moving in the Great Forest of her imaginings, the complex, vivid forest alive with bird calls and insect humming and the rustle of small animals and lizards. The trees were giants, particularly the beeches, a kind she had never seen before reaching huge arms to the sky. It could take minutes to move from one side of their canopy to the other. Here, the leaf fall from last winter was soft under the horses’ hooves, and the heady, fragrant scent of damp spring earth was enough to make her light-headed.
As they went further along the track, there were more oaks and fewer other trees. Eventually they were riding through a forest entirely made up of oaks — vast, ancient trees that shaded the forest floor almost as thoroughly as the pine trees had. But this part of the Forest wasn’t gloomy. The green of the oak leaves and the way they shifted in the breeze let little pockets of light dance across the ground between the trees, which meant there was grass and small plants covering the ground. There were snowdrops, primroses and daffodils.
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