Hinterland

by James Clemens

  Behind her, Kytt spoke with exaggerated loudness. “I was just seeing to the cubbies. Making sure they had fresh milk and feed.”

  “A duty you won’t need much longer,” one of the guards said.

  Laughter followed Laurelle out to the stair.

  “Especially with the regent turning arse-end and running,” another said. “No need any longer for two cubbies.”

  “And Liannora definitely could use a warm muff to match her new cloak.”

  “Now that’s a muff I wouldn’t mind slippin’ a hand into,” one whispered.

  “Don’t let Sten hear you say that.”

  More rough laughter chased Laurelle round the stairs. She climbed, her heart thumping and a fire building in her chest.

  “Off with you, then,” the guards barked to Kytt. “Before that dog of yours shites all over our hall.”

  “Or he does!” his companion said. “Look at that nose on the boy. I wonder if trackers use it to sniff each other’s arses.”

  Kytt appeared below, rounding up with Barrin. His face blushed through his tanned skin. He quickly joined her and accepted his burden back. Together, they climbed the seven levels to the floor where Lorr kept his rooms.

  In short order, they had the cubbies behind doors and a fire burning in the cold hearth, and Barrin was again sprawled and already snoring.

  “I should be returning to my rooms.” Laurelle rose from where she had been scratching one of the whelpings on the belly.

  “They are calm with you,” Kytt said, nodding to the cubbie.

  She warmed more than she should have at his generous word. “Dribbling milk over my fingers for the past three mornings and nights was what truly won them over. We had a houndskeep back…back home in Weldon Springs. That’s off near Chagda Falls.”

  “I know where Weldon Springs lies,” he mumbled.

  “Of course you do.” She shook her head at herself. Kytt’s own realm, Idlewyld, lay on the opposite coast of the Fifth Land from Weldon.

  “Rich country,” he said. “Well-forested.”

  “My father owns a thousand tracks. He baited bears and boars with the hounds. I used to sneak off to play with their cubbies.”

  Laurelle shied away from that memory. She had mostly snuck off silently to the cubbies when her father had been beating her mother. Her family did not speak of such matters. Bruises and welts were hid under powder or behind lace.

  Laurelle brushed a hand through her hair. “I should find Delia. Real or not, she should know of the threat we overheard.”

  Kytt stepped to the door. “I will accompany you back to your floor.”

  “I know my way.”

  “Of course you do,” he said, mimicking back her own words from a moment ago.

  She glanced to him and noted a ghost of a smile. She returned the same. It was rare to hear any ribbing from the young man.

  “Best you have an escort.” He grumbled a bit, glancing away as shyness overcame him again. “Barrin can watch over the little ones.”

  “Thank you. I would appreciate that.”

  Laurelle gathered her things and the two set out. Lorr’s floor was only two above hers. The walk was shorter than she would have preferred. She even found her steps slowing. Too soon, they reached the level that housed Chrismferry’s Hands.

  The hall was empty, all locked away or about their own concerns. The diminutive Master Munchcryden, the regent’s Hand of yellow bile, had a preference for wagered games, whether played with die or board, while the shaven-headed twins, Master Tre and his sister Fairland, seldom left their rooms, preferring the company of books and private reflection.

  But such privacies were harder to come by now.

  The warden could not indulge an entire floor for the regent’s company any longer. Especially with Tylar fled. The vacant rooms had been filled with a goodly number of the masters who had been chased out of their subterranean levels. The halls now reeked of strange alchemies, and the occasional muffled blast would echo down the hall from some combination gone bad.

  Laurelle led the way. Her room was not far off the landing. It was a small blessing, as the deeper halls were clogged even heavier with alchemical vapors, but it meant stepping away from Kytt sooner than she would have liked.

  “I’ll see you at the seventh evening bell,” Laurelle said as they neared her door.

  “The whelpings always enjoy your visits.”

  “Just the whelpings?” She lifted an eyebrow.

  Kytt shuffled his feet—but he was saved from answering by a sharp outburst off by the stairs.

  “The skull is gone! Why do you harp so on the matter?”

  It was Master Hesharian.

  Laurelle quickly freed her key and unlocked her door. Kytt stared back at the stairs. Once her door was open, she tugged the tracker inside with her. She leaned the door closed, but she kept a crack open to peer out.

  Master Hesharian entered the hall with his usual dog in tow, the milky-eyed ancient master.

  “Leave it go, Orquell,” the head of the Council groused. “My midmorning meal awaits, and I’d prefer my breads were still warm.”

  A reedy voice argued. “But I spoke with Master Rothkild. He related how he had cored samples from the skull. Even a tooth. He had them stored within glass flutes in alchemical baths.”

  “And I heard the same. He insists the mixtures had rendered any Grace down to dregs. Nothing that could prove useful.”

  “Master Rothkild does not have my experience with Dark Grace. There is much I can discern if I could retrieve those bits of bone.”

  “The warden will not allow another trip down to the Masterlevels. Whatever lurks below remains quiet, and he wisely does not wish to stir it anew. With the regent gone, there may be a chance the storm will blow away and afterward our levels could be cleansed with fire. Then you can collect those bits of skull.” Hesharian sniffed. “So let the matter die for now. I’ve my meal to attend and am near to famished.”

  The pair passed Laurelle’s room. Master Orquell glanced in their direction as he passed. She and Kytt pulled back. Neither wanted that gaze to discover them hiding and spying.

  “Then I’ll leave you to your meal,” Orquell said. “There is a matter I wish to attend anyway.”

  “Very good. You attend. I’ll see you in the fieldroom at the next bell.”

  They continued down the hall.

  Laurelle met Kytt’s eye. “Can you track that one?”

  “Who?”

  “Master Orquell. I’d like to see what he’s about when he’s not in Hesharian’s shadow. It is seldom the two are apart. This may be our only opportunity.”

  Kytt looked hesitant.

  Laurelle pulled her door wider. “It will not take long. You heard. No more than a bell. Then Orquell will need to return to the maps and plottings in the fieldroom, falling once again into Hesharian’s shadow. As privy as that new master is to what is discussed in that room, I’d like to see what matters he attends when alone.”

  Kytt nodded reluctantly.

  Laurelle waited until the two masters were out of sight, then led Kytt back into the hall. Together they headed off after their prey. With Kytt’s keen senses, they could keep well back. They passed Hesharian’s room. His voice carried out, haranguing some scullery about the state of his jam.

  They continued past.

  At a crossing of passageways, Kytt stopped and sniffed. Laurelle did the same, but all she smelled was burnt alchemies. They stung her nose, and she felt sorry for Kytt.

  But he did not complain—though his eyes watered slightly. He pointed the correct path, and they continued their hunt.

  Master Orquell’s pace was surprisingly fast for one of his age and thinness of limb. He led them on a crisscrossing trail into the dustier regions of the level. The ceiling lowered and bits of fractured stone littered the floor. As this level had been intended only for Tylar’s retinue, the underfolk had not cleared these back spaces very well.

  Laurelle began
to grow concerned as the path grew more abandoned. Rooms here were not habitable without the shoring of rafters. The path grew darker, lined by doors rotted and crooked-hinged. Off in corners, she caught glimpses of tiny red eyes and heard the telltale scurry of small claws.

  She began to wonder at the wisdom of this adventure. She had believed the warden had all of Tashijan ablaze, placing much security in the abundant flames. But now they had ventured beyond lamp and torch.

  Her feet slowed.

  Now it was Kytt’s determination that dragged her forward, their roles reversed. He straightened from examining a scuff in the dust and waved her to follow.

  Turning a corner, they saw flickering light, fiery and welcome.

  Kytt warned her to proceed cautiously. He pointed to his eyes, then down to his footprints in the dust. He wanted her to step where he stepped, so as not to alert their quarry.

  But as they slipped closer, it was plain that Master Orquell was lost to all but the flames he had stoked in a cold hearth in an empty room. From down the hallway, they caught glimpses of him through a broken door, limned in firelight, features aglow.

  He sat on his knees, rocking back and forth.

  One arm reached out and sprinkled something across the flames. Sparks flew higher and a sound escaped with them, not unlike the flutter of a raven’s wings. Laurelle wrinkled her nose at the stench of the smoke in the hall. She caught a whiff of something rotted and foul behind the woodsmoke. Perhaps brimstone.

  Then Orquell’s voice reached her as he rocked.

  “Your will is my own, mistress. Show me what I must see.”

  Laurelle shifted. Orquell leaned near the flames, close enough that she was surprised the old man’s eyes didn’t boil in their sockets. He stared long—then a keening wail escaped his throat.

  “No…”

  She reached out and found Kytt’s hand. He clasped hers tight.

  Orquell finally rocked back away from the fire again, almost falling in a panicked scramble. He tossed a fistful of something at the fire, and the flames instantly doused.

  As darkness fell, a few last words were whispered.

  “I will do your bidding, mistress. I am in all ways your servant.”

  Kytt edged Laurelle back with him, still holding her hand. They retreated, stepping carefully. Now it was their turn to flee. Kytt guided them unerringly and swiftly. Once well enough away, certain they were out of earshot, Laurelle slowed him.

  “We must not let the master out of sight when he’s away from Hesharian. I’ll inform Delia. She’ll get word to the castellan.” Laurelle’s confidence grew as they returned to the well-lit passages. “We’ll have to dog his steps. Watch him after he leaves the fieldroom.”

  Kytt nodded.

  There was no need to argue.

  Both could guess the mistress to whom the master bowed as a servant.

  The witch below.

  Mirra.

  Kathryn faced the window with her sword. Behind the heavy drapery that closed off her balcony, the scratching had gone silent. She heard Gerrod strain, fighting his locked armor, its alchemies bled of Grace.

  “Go,” he said between gritted teeth. “Leave me here.”

  Cold permeated the entire room now, misting white her heated breath, freezing her cheeks. The hearth’s embers had gone black.

  Then glass tinkled, breaking and falling from paned frames. The drapes billowed toward her as a fierce gust swirled into the room through the broken window. Cold enough to make Kathryn gasp.

  Backing a step to guard Gerrod, she drank the shadows. Her cloak swept to either side, its edges blurring with the darkness. She wrapped the power through her, making the flow of time slow.

  Past the billow of the drapery, the balcony was shadowed by the towers that framed the courtyard. The sun had risen to a gray slate morning, casting enough light to reveal a dark shape outside her window.

  Then the drapes fell again.

  Behind them, wood cracked with a loud snap of latch and lintel. The bottom hem of the drapery stirred in the breezes, then flapped wide. Through the part, it crept into her chambers.

  It came low, naked, knuckling down on one arm, cocking one eye toward her, then the other. It bore wings like a bat, skeletal and sinewy. It was bare of any hair or fur, except for a thin mane trailing from crown down the spine of its back. Its manhood hung limp and hairless.

  “Wind wraith,” Gerrod said behind her.

  Except Kathryn knew this was no mere Grace-bred man. He had been ilked, too. More beast than man any longer. Drool seeped from its snarled lips. Nostrils pinched open and closed.

  Eyes found her buried in the shadows and fixed to her.

  In the gloom of her chambers, with all flames guttered, she recognized the glint of Grace, but not the purity to which she was accustomed, more an oily gleam.

  Kathryn prepared to dispatch the creature. How many more were out there? She had to keep Gerrod protected. But the wraith approached no closer. It hissed at her, still crouched low, in some bestial parody of a bow.

  Then it spoke—something she had believed was beyond the ilk-beast’s ability. Its voice trilled out its throat, mouth barely moving, sounds shaped from somewhere beyond lips and tongue.

  “Castellllan Vaillll…”

  She stiffened, sensing a dark intelligence in her presence.

  “Come. To parlllley. In town. Blllackhorse tavernhouse. In one belllll.”

  Kathryn found her own voice, ringing it clear. “Who requests this parley?”

  “Lord Ullllf willlls you to speak to him.” The creature shifted to its other knuckle, cocking its other eye toward her. “Onllly you. Come alllone.”

  Despite the terror of the moment and the twisted messenger, Kathryn could not keep a spark of curiosity from flaring. Still, she was no fool.

  As if sensing her hesitation, the creature bowed its head. “No harm willll come.” It sank away, pushing back through drape and broken glass.

  Then was gone.

  The drapes fluttered as it took wing from her balcony.

  She waited a full breath in the dark, cold room. Finally she straightened, but she did not sheath her blade. She swung to her door, sidestepping Gerrod.

  “No, Kathryn,” he moaned in his frozen suit, his voice echoing in his helmet.

  “I must go,” she said, both apologetic and certain. “I will send word to Master Fayle. To replenish the air in your alchemies. It won’t be long.”

  She pulled her door open and slid out. She considered the rashness of her decision, but she did not dismiss it. She had waited for days, been cast aside by Argent, and bided her time while the tower dallied with its defenses. Something more needed to be done. Even if it meant putting one’s own neck on the block.

  “Kathryn!” Gerrod called to her, hollow and angry. “It’s a—”

  She snapped the door closed, but not before hearing his last word. Though it failed to sway her, she did not doubt it.

  “—trap!”

  16

  A TWISTED ROOT

  HORRORS SURROUNDED THEM.

  Brant did not know where to look. The mists had risen into an arched roof overhead, lit from below by the fiery flippercraft. Some alchemy in the oiled arrows had sped the conflagration. The flames had already burned through the outer hull and exposed the inner ribbings. Smoke choked upward, darkening the mists further. Heat chased Brant and the others up the slope of the hollow.

  Everywhere stakes sprouted from the weedy ground. Skewered upon their fire-blackened points were the heads of hundreds of his fellow people. The poles seemed to shiver in the flickering glow of the flaming flippercraft.

  Brant shied from looking too closely at the faces, but they were inescapable. He caught glimpses of mouths stretched open in silent screams, of gouged eyes and bloated tongues, of seeping wound and sloughing skin. Black flies rose in silent swirls as the fires stirred the air.

  He did not resent their feast. It was the great turn of the forest, the returning to
the loam of all that had risen from it. It was the Way taught to all in Saysh Mal.

  Only here was no mere decay of leaf or a gutted beast’s entrails left to feed the forest—nor even a loved one’s body gently interred beneath root and rock.

  This was slaughter and cruelty, a mockery of the Way.

  “Many children here,” Rogger muttered, sickened. “Babes, from the look of a few.”

  “And elders,” Tylar said.

  Krevan followed with Calla. “Culling the weak,” he grunted.

  “But why?” Dart asked. She walked in Malthumalbaen’s shadow, the giant’s arm over her shoulder, hugged near his thigh.

  “There is no why here,” Lorr said sourly. “Only madness.”

  Brant risked a glance at a few of the stakes. He saw the others were right about the dead. A gray-bearded head was impaled to the left, and the next two stakes bore smaller skulls, a boy and a girl, a brother and sister perhaps.

  As he turned away, he realized he knew the graybeard. The man had been the great-father to a fellow hunter. He was recognizable by the pair of brass coins braided into his beard. The elder had come occasionally to Brant’s home, his beard jingling merrily, to share some pear wine with his father, swapping stories well into the night. Brant knew little else about him, not even his name. Somehow that made it even worse. A death with no name, only a memory.

  The group slowed near a mossy boulder that shouldered out of the slope. The stakes thinned here, and the travelers were far enough away from the burning conflagration to escape the worst of the blistering heat. Still they could not escape the stench.

  Brant glanced below and saw that a few of the stakes closest to the flippercraft had caught fire, burning like torches, fueled by wood and the fat of flesh. Shuddering, he turned his back on the sight and stared up toward the lip of the hollow.

  The forest waited, dark, tall, and cool. It stared back at him, neither grieving nor caring. It was the face of the Huntress. Brant felt a fury to match the flames below. He wished the fire would spread to the woods, to cleanse and purify the horror, to scorch it down to the roots of the mountains.