The Inheritance

by Nancy Varian Berberick

  Brand gestured them farther from the wagons, splitting them up—Lea to the far side of one, Keth to the far side of the other. A great silence seemed to creep out of the forest, a stillness even of the wind. Char’s blade pressed the soft flesh of her throat, too close. One thin warm line of blood ‘slid down her neck.

  "Dearest gods," she whispered, the muscles of her throat moving against the knife.

  "Ah, hush that," the dwarf said, but not roughly. "He’ll let y’ go if yer man is minded to play fair with us. Brand doesn't break his word for spite. Just for good reason."

  Brand jerked his chin at Keth. "Lead the teams forward, both."

  Keth shook his head. "I was told this is to be a fair exchange, the weapons for the princess." He didn't look past Brand. He kept his eyes on the outlaw. "Bring her down."

  "No. She stays where she is. Pretty much there's nothing you can do whether we hand her over or not, but if you hand off the ransom, I will hand off the woman. And don't bother asking how you can know if I will. You can't. I suppose you just have to trust me, don't you? Just like I trusted your master to have enough regard for his wife's life to send only two with the ransom."

  Keth and Lea said nothing.

  "Now," Brand said, his voice gone cold, "bring the wagons."

  Keth did as he was told, like any hostler taking horses from the stable. The prince put himself between the two teams and took hold of the cheek strap of each of the horses on the near side. He led them, talking stable-talk, the language of whisper and the click of tongue against teeth.

  The sound of a hawk screeched across the silence. The horses startled, and Arawn threw back his head a second time. His long dark hair was caught by a sudden breeze as he signaled the outlaws again. Like rocks come suddenly alive, they unveiled from their hiding places, coming out from behind boulders, rising up in their stone-colored clothing. Silent, they ran, men and two women used to the rough ground, leaping stones and rocks, making for the wagons.

  Without looking away from Keth, the elf he thought was a prince's lackey, Brand snapped, "Dell, take one wagon. Ley, get the other."

  All her muscles tense and aching, Elansa watched as Dell and Ley each took a team from Keth and climbed aboard a wagon. The clucking sounds they made to the teams, the rumble of wooden wheels on stony earth, shivered along Elansa’s nerves. Char’s hand tightened in her hair, but she felt the blade of his knife move a little away from the throat.

  "Up," he said, low in her ear. "No nonsense, just get up."

  She did, and as she rose his knife pressed against her side, tracing the tender space between two ribs to let her know where it was. "Organs in there, missy," he said. "Kidney or liver or spleen, eh? You don't want to risk those. Stand still."

  She did, still as stone, and the wagons began to move. On the road, Keth stood alone, between the outlaws and Lindenlea. He looked at Brand, who nodded.

  Char’s knife moved, withdrawing.

  Kethrenan took a step toward Elansa, and Brand took one to block his way. "No," said the outlaw. Behind his back, he gestured to Elansa: Come ahead. She stood a moment, trembling. Char pushed her, a hand in the small of her back.

  One step she took, another, and suddenly all her muscles tightened to run. She held herself to tame steps, knowing that if she moved too quickly her running might be misinterpreted.

  Keth lifted his head. His eyes met hers and held her gaze. She felt as though a tether stretched between them, a thin line to guide her home if only she went carefully and never let go.

  "Come, princess," he said, speaking as though he were the lackey the outlaws imagined him to be. Lindenlea moved, a small restless shifting from one foot to another. Keth held out his hand. "Come to me, my lady."

  Wagons rumbled on the road. Ley snapped long leather reins across the rump of one of the horses, and another of the team snorted. Eyes on her husband, Elansa walked, and all the while felt Brand's eyes on her. The skin between her shoulders itched. She wanted to turn and look at him, but she dared not. She felt it: He could snatch her back in an instant.

  In the silence, every rustle of clothing seemed loud as wind in the trees. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the forest. Home. Beyond the Notch lay all the dark shadows gathering. No light dappled on this cloud—thick day, and yet it seemed the shadows were not all of a tint. Neither were they as insubstantial as might be thought. A dull gleam betrayed a secret, the slide of pale light on an ill-concealed blade. Elansa’s heart jumped. Keth saw it.

  "Come," he said again, gesturing now with his hand. "We're soon home, my lady."

  And his eyes, gone suddenly cool and stern, said, Come. Come ahead. Don't look around, just come to me. She did, never taking her eyes from his, not even when she was but a reach away from him. His fingers touched hers, and she drew a shaking breath. In his eyes she saw cool command turn to fury as he took in the signs of her captivity—the hunger, the pallor of her skin, bruises and cuts, her ripped and filthy clothing. He lifted his head, just that, but she knew the gesture. She knew what Prince Kethrenan looked like when he was surveying his choices, picking his ground.

  Home, she thought; I am going—

  Every nerve in her body leaped alive, screaming. In her bones—at the very marrow—she knew an agony, both phantom and real. A scream wound from the forest, terrible and high. Another followed, and out from the woods an elven voice filled with rage and fear shouted, "The wood is on fire!"

  In her heart, Elansa heard the agony of living trees as fire licked up their trunks, seared their barkish skins, and gnawed to the milky heart of each limb it grasped. In her woodshaper's soul she felt the anguished, burning echo. She had no voice to cry the pain, from her throat could come no sound that trees could make.

  Shadows at the forest’s edge sprang to life, full-voiced with elven war cries. Warriors armed with swords burst out of the wood, but they were only half of the prince's force. The others stayed behind, for they had expected to meet foemen in the borderland, but they had found enemies in the forest. Goblins, wielding fire and steel and shrieking like things from nightmare, fell upon the elves.

  Seeing the elven warriors, seeing the goblins, Brand shouted, "Bastard! You set goblins on us!" Almost in the same moment, Keth roared the same accusation. Neither heard the other. Elansa heard them both, their voices small amid the death cries of trees.

  "Arawn!" Brand roared.

  Lindenlea shouted, "Warriors! To your prince!"

  Battle-storm screamed around them. The howls of the goblins, the shrieks of the killed, and rage, rage. In one sudden moment of clarity Elansa saw that the goblins and the elven warriors were matched forces. She saw the outlaws and knew they would be crushed between them. She thought, Good! And she saw one of the bandits—Arawn it was, with his long dark hair blowing back—lift a sword to defend himself. He held Keth’s sword, and Elansa thought, Let the goblins kill him!

  Keth's hand tightened painfully on Elansa’s wrist. He yanked her toward him, got his arm around her, and looked for haven for her. The forest was no place to go, and they could not follow the wagons.

  Lindenlea shouted, "Keth!" and he let go of Elansa to snatch from the air the sword his cousin had flung. Not his good old sword, but a sword, lent by a warrior to a prince. Lindenlea laughed, a mad—minded war cry as she flourished her own borrowed weapon. She pointed north where four elven warriors broke from the rest, running to receive the princess.

  They ran to meet the sudden escort, Elansa and her husband. It wasn't a far distance, and no one came near who didn't taste Kethrenan’s borrowed blade. All around, elves let loose their war cries. Outlaws shouted curses; one screamed in death, another did, and a third. The stench of seared flesh mingled with the smoke of Qualinesti burning. The cries of elves and humans and goblins sounded like the cries of beasts in the slaughter pens. No one but Elansa heard the heartbreak of the forest, the death of trees.

  On the road, Ley cried commands to horses, again the snap of leather on broad rumps. Dell sho
uted curses, and Brand turned, his hostage forgotten. He bellowed, "Ley! Dell! Stay with the wagons! Get them out of here!"

  A pack of goblins came boiling out of the forest. No elves followed, no man or woman of the half of Kethrenan’s force that had stayed behind.

  The goblins ran, long eyes ablaze with killing lust. Orange hides and red hides, and sickly greeny-brown, all of them acted like a shield wall, swords high to protect the hobgoblin who ran in the middle of their pack "For Gnash!" they yowled. And when they fell, their bodies filled with elven arrows, with shafts from an outlaw’s quiver, others came and took up the cry. "For the Great Gnash!"

  Gnash brandished a staff, an old, crooked length of bleached cedarwood. Unadorned, it looked too dry to be considered even for kindling. The hob howled a word like a curse, and fire shot from the head of the staff, a great gout of flame shaped like a long arm reaching. It grew a hand, as broad as a goblin is high. Orange fingers of licking flame closed around two fighting, an elven warrior and an outlaw. They burst afire, screaming as the flames that killed one fed the fire that killed the other. The arm divided, two limbs ranged out from the staff, and the sound of the hob’s glee was the sound of madness as these reached out to grab elves and humans in fiery clasp.

  "The hob!" Lea cried. "Get the hob!"

  Hearing her voice, Elansa turned even as she ran. She couldn't help the need to look. Turning, she stumbled, staggering into Keth. As though Lea’s cries were commands for the outlaws, one of Brand's men nocked an arrow to his bow and drew. He'd not got his elbow up before a goblin’s dagger took him in the throat. But others had heard the order. Elven arrows buzzed, black shafts against the fiery wall of the burning forest, taking down one goblin after another. As quickly as these fell, that quickly did others appear, and the arms of fire reached and ranged, groping for the archers.

  Keth dragged at her, pulling, and the four warriors waiting to receive her ran, swords out and ready. "Take her!" the prince ordered. "Keep her safe!"

  It was on the lips of one to say the prince could count on them, he could know his wife safe. Elansa saw the very words forming as a sharp whistle pierced the frenzy, and something low and swift came leaping. Char’s hound flung himself at Keth, eyes blazing. It sank its fangs into Keth’s leg, then darted away as Keth stumbled. Fang raced back and leaped again. Great jaws closed around Keth’s wrist, and Elansa smelled blood and the stench of the hound’s breath. Despite his will, Keth’s grip on his sword broke. Elansa stood alone between the hound and her husband who shouted, "Run! Elansa! Run!"

  Run! Run to the elven warriors—she didn't have to ask or wonder. She must run home. Running, Elansa saw a warrior’s eyes go wide, his mouth open to cry out a warning too late. The weight hit her hard from behind, the breath of the hound scorched her neck, its teeth grazed the flesh of her shoulder even as Brand's big hand grabbed her and dragged her to her feet. He yanked her hard around, cursing the dog, cursing her, cursing. Swift, a blade flashed, again a honed edge pressed against her throat. He did not shout Hold! as he had before. He needn't have. At the sight of his blade against her throat, the elven warrior fell still.

  He was Cressin Oaktrue. Elansa knew him and all his kin.

  His eyes on Cressin, Brand grabbed Elansa round the waist and pulled her hard to him. On her neck, his breath felt like the hound’s, steaming in the cold air and smelling of killing. Fang and his kindred loped across the stony road, the pack like five shadows gliding across the ground. From Fang’s muzzle blood dripped, one, two, and three small scarlet spots blossoming on stone, a prince's blood. This Elansa saw as Char whistled again, calling off the dog and taking its place at Brand's back.

  "Now you decide," Brand said, leaving Cressin to the dwarf and speaking to Kethrenan. "Prince, what do you want—the life of your little princess or the deaths of all of us?"

  Keth's eyes blazed with fury.

  Cressin cried, "Shame!"

  The rumble of wooden wagon wheels on the south-going road sounded like low growling. The weight they carried had increased: outlaws rode in the back of each. Outlaws ran jogging beside and behind. In this way the wagon filled with weapons rolled right out of the battle. If any elf or goblin saw it going from the battleground, none could do a thing about it, for they had engaged, the two forces, and would not disengage now.

  "Like it or don’t," Brand said, his voice filling with a dark kind of satisfaction, "we’ve got the weapons, prince, and we have a pretty shield to keep us safe while we take what's owed from the bargain."

  Brand pressed his blade against Elansa’s throat, better at it than Char had been. He drew no blood, but Elansa knew his knife-wielding habits. He'd slit her throat if he thought that would be satisfying.

  Kethrenan, who knew how to look into the eye of a foe and reckon him, understood what Elansa did. As soon as she saw her husband know the truth, she knew herself lost. Again.

  "Let him kill me," she moaned, the words hardly passing her lips, pressed back by the blade. "Don't let him take me, Keth!"

  Kethrenan’s eyes held hers, and it felt as if all the years of her life passed in that moment. He would not cause her death. He could not. Brand laughed, the sound of a gambler who has wagered well.

  A cry rose in Elansa’s breast, right to her throat, past the steel blade pressing. She let it die, unvoiced. To fling back her head and scream would have been to slice her own throat. She could not do it, for all she'd asked Kethrenan to let it happen. Neither could she whimper or plead. She was an elf. She was a princess.

  And so the outlaw took her away. Brand of the stonelands had the princess once more. A cry did sound for her, though, against the rage of battle, the war cries and the death screams of elves and goblins, long and loud and filled with terrible rage. It followed her, winding through the barren land, the sound of Kethrenan cursing.

  Chapter 7

  Now began the season of lost things in the west part of Ansalon.

  The seas lost their ships, all but those few brave craft that hugged the coasts of the New Sea and the Strait of Algoni, mostly fishermen and ferrymen. The winds of winter blew hard and swift from Ice Mountain Bay and around to the top of the world. Even those who lived in the warmer parts of Krynn, away north where there was naught but the mysterious Dragon Isles between them and no one knew what, complained of the cold. This cold blowing went on from H’rarmont and right through the beginning of winter, into the middle months, and looked to blow most cruelly in Rannmont. Out from Tarsis drifted terrible tales of people who went mad from the moan of the wind, the groaning and the unceasing sob.

  It was said, at least by Rumor, that those mad ones did all manner of unspeakable things, and the least awful of the tales spoke of the man who murdered his family, insane and thinking they were ghosts come to steal away his soul.

  "I have heard them moan! " he screamed, standing in their blood. "They were coming for me…."

  So often was that tale repeated, up and down from Tarsis to Palanthas, that people could be forgiven for thinking the whole poor city in the desert had been changed into a lunatic asylum.

  All over, old people in all places, humans and elves and dwarves and even a few goblins proclaimed that there had never been such as winter, and that they didn't think they cared to imagine how much colder could get.

  Abanasinia and Solamnia lost the grassland green in the last month of autumn, all the tall waving grass gone brown and flat, and it crunched underfoot with as much voice as it has after a hard frost has lain upon it. In the woodlands near Xak Tsaroth and across the New Sea in Lemish, not much of gold or bronze or scarlet replaced the woodland green that year. It seemed that all in a night the canopy looked a bit thin, as it does when autumn is coming, and then refused to shine but fell, all the leaves as brown as oaks, whether the trees they flew from were oak or not. There had been no warning of this, so noted the folk in the mountains around Thorbardin. The birds had not flown away earlier, the hares and badgers and foxes did not go dressed in thicker coats than
usual, and no one out calling his pigs from the forest claimed to have seen the squirrels and chipmunks any busier at the gathering of nuts than in years gone. It might be that a sign of the crashing winter could be the absence of goblins in the foothills of the Kharolis Mountains, both on the windward side and the lee. The great gathering of goblins to the hob Gnash had caused no end of woe to the little villages clinging to the foothills and the skirts of the Qualinesti forest. In winter, the raiding and the burning and the killing stopped. The humans did not pray much. They had no use for vanished gods, but they knew about gratitude, and though the winter dealt harshly with them, it did keep the goblins from the door.

  They did not know that the winter silence of goblins meant that the hob Gnash had time to sit in his headquarters, that stinking pile that used to be a fine inn, and consider his possibilities. He did not count his losses to the elves in the abortive raid to steal a ransom. He used his goblins as though they were water from an ever-renewing spring. Almost, they were. The deaths of a half-hundred or more were nothing to him. He didn't even much care about the outlaw Brand. That was an old feud and not really his. Perching atop his treasure hoard or carrying out the occasional execution for the edification of his army and his amusement, he thought about how fine it was to wield fine. He thought about the finding of his fire-staff, and he began to wonder whether grander and better things were to be discovered that would make him not just lord of the borderland, but king of this part of the world.

  They didn't know, the humans who lived in the borderland—or, for that matter, the elves of Qualinesti— that in Goblintown on the east side of the Forest-Around-Hammer-Rock-But-Not-Too-Close the hob Gnash was weaving plans.

  In the season of lost things, Elansa Sungold lived beneath the ground. She saw again the cave beneath Hammer Rock where she'd watched the elf Ley slit a goblin's throat and hack off his head. She saw more caves than that—Brand and his outlaws knew more hiding places in the riddled earth than Elansa had imagined existed. They knew secret ways in and out.