When the outer maw opened Grave led the horse and mule clear of the hedge and into the forest. The trail he chose through the dense woods headed west, a rough and twisting track, a path seldom travelled, narrowing in places to less than the width of the pack mule, the tall grasses and saplings lining the route repeatedly slapping against Cloak’s face and snagging on his blanket. Grave appeared unhurried, travelling less than three leagues before stopping.
Whilst the rain that had fallen heavily all morning had now stopped, it had left Cloak soaked, disheartened and miserable. The binding strap removed Grave made no attempt to ease his fall as he dropped from the mule onto the sodden ground. Dragged clear of the path and laid out head to head beside his mother guardian, Grave had again been threatened him with a kicking to the ribs if he uttered one word. Dolly remained unconscious and although her face was swollen and her lips dry and cracked, her breathing was deep and steady. The pale pink line of dribble that ran from the corner of her mouth down to her chin exposed the true reason behind her sleep, poppy, a drug induced slumber so deep that even the blast of a hunters horn would not wake her.
After tending to the beasts, Grave approached once more, the trapper stepping past Cloak to stand over Dolly. Grabbing hold of the leather strap that bound her ankles Grave lifted her legs clear of the ground and dragged her into the trees, her cocooned body leaving a clear trail as it parted the ferns and compressed the long wet grass. The trapper made no attempt to avoid the roots and hidden rocks that peppered the ground, carelessly bumping Dolly’s already lolling head before finally stopping some twenty paces away. Cloak tilted his head as far as he could and watched Grave from the corner of his eye. He had stopped on the side of a small hillock, the ground below part sheltered by the canopy of a small chestnut tree. Un-strapping her bindings, the tracker laugh nervously as he pulled aside the blanket and stared unblinking down at Dolly’s naked body. As the dastards purpose became clear, Cloak averted his gaze. Stripped of her dignity, her torso and thighs black with bruises, Grave fondled and pleasured himself with the unconscious woman, his urgent groans quickening before climaxing loudly and abruptly. Satisfied, he wound the blanket back into place, secured the bindings and dragged Dolly back towards the path, easily lifting her limp body over his shoulder before hastily dropping her back over the mules like a side of lamb.
Grave’s hood was down, his face still scarlet from his exertions. The ornately engraved silver charm that had been secured to the front of his crest was missing, the spine bright in the dull grey light………………One Button’s charm. The sight was a painful reminder, it was his choice that had decided their path and had sent him and his guardian mother into Grave’s snare. Cloak could hold his peace no longer. ‘Are you proud of yourself you shit eating rapist? Is your horn satisfied you filthy dastard?’
Standing at his side Grave leaned forward, cleared his throat and spat in Cloak’s face. Unable to avert his gaze in time, the glob of snotter and spit splattered onto the side of Cloak’s nose before running slowly towards the hollow of his eye, the gob of warm saliva forcing Cloak to turn his head aside in an attempt to divert the flow. As kick after kick battered his ribs and guts his pleas to stop went un-heard, indeed, if anything, they spurred Grave on, the trapper raining down more and more blows, the final kick to the head breaking Cloak’s nose and causing a fresh flow of blood to flow down into his mouth. The trapper was still laughing when finally he dumped Cloak’s battered body over the mule’s rump, taking pleasure in deliberately over tightened the straps, crushing Cloak’s already bruised ribs and making it hard for him to breathe.
‘Let me tell you boy, I do not know what gave me the most pleasure, fucking that cheap whore mother of yours or beating you senseless. Given a choice I would be hard pressed to choose which gave me the most satisfaction. Maybe, if you are stupid and give me enough of an excuse I might get to do both again.’ Grave gripped Cloak under the chin, hauling his head sharply upwards, forcing the short spines on his crest uncomfortably into his neck. ‘The man I take you to does not care a blue plum if you are bruised and bloodied. As long as you are alive I get paid. We still have a full day and more to travel, I suggest you spend your time in silent prayer as I doubt your ribs will take another kicking.’
As he spoke, Grave squeezed Cloak’s chin harder and harder, digging his filthy fingernails into his throat. ‘You hate me, you see me only as the oaf and drunkard who hung around the lower harbour don’t you? But I am not stupid boy, nor am I without high talent. If you hold any hope that others will find you and rescue you give them up now, I am well able to mask my path and lay a false scent that would fool the best. Be assured, any who attempt to follow will be sent the wrong way.’ Grave twisted Cloak’s head from side to side, knowing full well the pain it caused him. ‘Give me an excuse boy, raise my blood or try to blow soot up my arse and I will make sure that you suffer. One word, one single sideway glance or even a careless cough and I’ll smash your nose flat and black your eyes.’ Grave released Cloak’s chin, pushing his face into the mules side before stepping away to mount up.
As they travelled deep into the night Cloak continued to weep silently, the pain in his bones and muscles never abating, caked blood blocking his swollen nose, the clots running back into his throat. The tracker remained on the same path all night, stopping only once to rest the beasts and draw water from a small stream. One Button had been right, the man was evil and was driven by some compelling force, there was no escape and his future looked bleak.
FOURTEEN: Shiver Cauldron
Despite the bitter cold night, Needle slept well and awoke refreshed. A new fire had been kindled and as he waited on the morning porridge to simmer he ventured out to scan the lands around No Marrow and gaze out over the vast expanse known as the Bear’s Maw.
The sky above was a piercing blue and cloudless, the air biting cold. The dark shadow that marked the entrance to the nest lay almost hidden. No more than a hundred paces away there was no clear paths to it, no debris or bones, nothing but the shadows camouflaging it from view. As Needle scanned the horizon, it soon became clear to him that No Marrow was a mountain, a solid piece of red rock five leagues across at the base and standing several thousand feet above the plain.
The entrance to the nest sat only a few hundred feet from the peak. Needle skirted the hole cautiously, climbing swiftly past the opening and up to the summit. The view from the top was both panoramic and breathtaking. The Bear’s Maw was a barren expanse, a clutter of giant boulders and long dead tree trunks. A land once full of life the maw was long rumoured to be lifeless, a sea of grey rock and silver stumps peppered with islands of rich red rock. Far to the north and the east in the haze of the horizon, two other such isolated mountains could be seen. Nests? Needle did not know, he had never walked this far north, a land where even in high summer, the cold never left the air. A land where trees now never grew, a land where floating spiders no bigger than a pinhead could fell a man with one bite, where the musk ox herds lumbered across the land in their tens of thousands and where grizzled wolves the size of ponies roamed in killing packs.
It was not difficult for him to envisage where he was, he had drawn more maps than he cared to remember and had studied those scratched out by others less proficient than himself but sufficiently accurate to give him a sense of scale and bearing. From high above the plain, the maw looked calm, near colourless, a bland land made up of shades of grey on grey interspersed in places with patches of watery purple and grey green where heathers clung for life between the rocks. His lofty viewpoint did little to change his view about the inhospitable lands below, these were the Troll Lands, lands where sensible folk did not wish or care to travel. Needle did not care to wonder how the giant Troll of the grey plain managed to survive in such inhospitable lands, all he cared about was the shimmering line that marked the course of the Old Prey, its milky waters fed by a glacier far, far to the north. The river widened markedly as it crossed the flatlands, slowing as it did
so before disappearing from view. Far to the south lay the rolling hills and high plateaus of The Heath and hidden beyond that, the slash known as the Blue Cut, a massive gorge running east west, sea to sea for nearly six hundred miles, its line broken only by three vast lakes, the So Cold, So Bleak and So Bitter.
After a quick breakfast of porridge and peas and a half cup of bitter Scout Tea, Smoke and Needle departed the shelter. Accompanied by Speck, all three bore large packs, each containing a thick blanket and as much dried fruit, lentils and oats as they could carry. The route down and across the mountainside was uneventful but the closer the small group got to the grey rock plain, the more complex the rocky landscape became. Needle’s knees and hips ached and despite the brisk warming pace set by Smoke, the constant breeze chilled his hands and chapped his lips.
‘Is there a path or are we wandering aimlessly eastwards over rough ground because you are lost?’ Smoke ignored the jibe. ‘I ask only because your route appears to have already doubled the distance we must travel to the river and it’s making me wonder whether you actually grasp the difference between east and west? Reassure me Smoke, you do know where you are going?’
‘There are many ways down the mountain old man, but the skill is in choosing the one that gets to the river without being bitten, stung, infected or infested.’
Walking behind Smoke, Needle made a crude gesture. It pleased him. His fingers a symbolic knife, a blade to Smoke’s back, a childish act but one that made him feel better. A further hundred paces on Smoke turned sharply south, the king’s assassin leading them to a large flat plate of rock, the little plateau offering the group a welcome resting point as well as a panoramic view. Beyond, the last drop to the plain below was steep, their course taking them further south around the curve of the mountain than they might wish.
‘Your barbed words do not penetrate my hide Master Cliff. Whilst I am silent, cool and secretive you are old, prone to heating and perpetually grumpy, features that have taken me years of exposure to tolerate. However, to answer your question, our route is convoluted because there is only one point on the mountain where a safe descent can be made. What you cannot see from up here is that the mountainside below is fissured and littered with deadwood and boulders. To a Troll, the boulders probably appear mere pebbles and the deadwood scattered across the way just twigs. The surface fissures are often no more than nine feet wide and six feet deep, a single bound for a Troll but to us, a head height trap full of blood thorns and blue backed scorpions. Even when we reach the foot of the mountain it is a tortured walk. Apart from avoiding the thorns and scorpions, we also have to avoid the Barb Tongued Spiders, if you drag a leg through a web, it will stick like glue to your clothes and the little beasts will be through your leggings and nipping your bean sack before you have a chance to wipe away the webs. There’s no ‘clear’ path, the webs that get torn by the passing of Troll or thrashed by the winds just get re-spun again that night. Trust me when I say our journey to the river will be the longest three miles you will ever walk. On one of your precious maps you might judge the distance could be covered in an hour, but it would be wrong, the measure inaccurate. Out here such a journey is never a straight line and what should take one hour will often take three and feel like four………lets go.’
Needle did little but nod, letting Smoke’s barbed comment about maps pass. He hated spiders at the best of times, hated the cold and felt naked without his talent. As he started walking again, the memory of his loss made him clench his fists and grind his teeth. A league, a hundred, a thousand could have been wish walked in a heartbeat. He hoped upon hope that the majic would find him again, the sooner the better, but, there was only one place on this planet he knew of where this could be achieved, a place he had not visited for over fifty years and a place he feared he might never be able to enter again.
When they finally reached the plain, Smoke relinquished the lead to Speck, the slave scouting ahead, brandishing a deadwood stave to entangle any webs and in doing so clearing a path for those that followed. Needle marked his path and flowed as quickly as he could but the constant stepping up, down around and over boulders soon wore him out and his pace slowed, forcing him on occasion to take a lazier route, pressing himself between the boulders rather than stepping high. As the morning began to pass and midday approached, the sky clouded over and the wind grew brisker, the ice cold northerly scraping their faces and forcing them all to raise their scarves and mask all but their eyes. Needle knew he had been bitten, once twice a dozen times, each one instantly becoming a red hot and itchy sore. He had been warned not to scratch, warned that the bite induced a compulsion to scratch and that by crushing or scratching at the tiny spiders he would only make matters worse, much worse. Try as he might to resist, Needle scratched, an action he regretted almost immediately as the combination of spider’s blood and venom blister the skin on his crotch, thighs and under his arms.
‘Have no fear old man, the wee dastards will not kill you. Your loins and pits will burn like they have been branded but when we get to the river I’ll give you a Yellow Moth Wing to chew, it tastes like peppered piss but it will kill the eggs in your blood and stop you shitting maggots out your arse for the next month. I don’t have anything handy for the itch but Speck has some unguent in his pack to rub on the bites. In fact, I’m sure if you asked nicely he would do it for you.’ Smoke laughed.
Needle could barely walk by the time the river finally came into sight, his crotch and thighs on fire, the exposed skin on his face and hands frozen. The sight of the smooth milky white river raised his spirits, countered by Smoke’s suppressed laughing at his waddling walk. Smoke had followed Needle all the way, never letting the old man fall too far behind. The pair of eyes that watched them from the far rocks were Troll, of that he had no doubt. The lichen covered boulder of the plain were as close a match for Troll skin as you could get but how such a large creature could follow unseen over such open was perhaps more a testament to their majic than a natural talent for tracking. Smoke stayed alert, keeping his breathing in check, slowing his heart and dousing the senses that caused a body to smell of fear.
Some twenty paces ahead Speck froze when a huge mottled rock rose from the ground directly in front of him. A bull Troll, antler sword in hand, his giant blade arcing up and across, the honed edge catching Speck cleanly under the chin. The force of the blow removed the old servant’s head, his collapsing torso spraying the Troll’s chest with hot blood. As Speck’s body slumped to the ground like a raggedy doll, his head spun through the air, landing with a sickening thud no more than a pace from Needle’s feet.
Smoke’s short blades were already too hand as he raced forward, taking up a defensive stance in front of Needle. The Troll stood his ground and did not advance, his sword remaining point down on the ground. The great bull was much larger than Push Blind, his skin a mottled grey and every inch crisscrossed with finely penned glyphs and charms. One eye was missing, the skin above pulled tightly over the socket and stitched with a leather thong. Needle scanned the mightily beast, his eyes dwelling and returning to the necklace worn around his neck, an iron ring from which hung a long steel dagger.............a very familiar dagger.
‘Master Dog Death, I speak to you in your own tongue since your Troll grates on my ears. I am on a mission for my nest brother, his dog ally the Lord of the Northern Lands and your old master King Soar. My nest brother is Boulder Spine, mighty first bull of Black Stain, a nest which lies in the high cold mountains, deep in the lands of the white bear where the three mighty rivers sleep in the ice.’ The Troll lifted his antler sword and pointed the huge weapon at Smoke. ‘Put down your daggers Master Black Dog. My head and my blood are cool and my hand is obedient to my brother. I have been given knowledge for you both.’
‘You expect me to trust anything you say Troll? You may be obedient to your god and lord but if I recall, the last time we met blades drawn, you were bested.’
‘As I recall, you were the one who stepped i
nto the shadows to evade my wrath. I seek satisfaction and with each beat of my heart my sword craves me to disobey my brother. I suggest you give me no excuse to exact revenge.’
‘Do you wish to lose the other eye Troll? I will oblige you............’
Shiver pointed at the sky. ‘You have no shadow to skulk in today Master of Murder. I would kill you easily, you have nowhere to run and hide and the old wrinkled dog you travel with cannot help you, he has no inner light and cannot walk. When you robbed him of his majic your master cried and pleaded for aid in the presence of the Northern Lord and the Troll elder council. My kin agreed to aid him......for a price. Your king foresaw that when we next met you would wish to heat my blood and war with me again. He was right, I see the lust it in your eyes Black Dog.’
Smoke pointed his dagger at the Troll’s neck. ‘I see you carry a reminder of our last encounter Troll. It makes a fine pendant, a daily reminder of your loss no doubt. I would however have preferred it if you had left it be in the socket with the point projecting from the back of your skull.’
CLOAK - Lost Son of the Crested Folk Page 21