It was weirdly quiet, but for the first time in days, she felt safe. Nothing could get her here: neither tokoroths, nor Forest Horse hunters, nor the ash-haired menace. The fabled Magecraft of the Red Deer kept them at bay. And yet all she could see were a few tiny bark bundles tied to trees.
The young hunter led Torak to the lake to wash, and a woman beckoned Renn to a secluded bay. After some persuasion, she stripped and stood shivering while the woman used a cake of what appeared to be hard grey mud to scrub off her Deep Forest disguise. It was good to be herself again, but her skin stung. She asked what was in the grey cake.
The woman was surprised she didn’t know. ‘It’s ash. We burn green bracken, then mix it with water and bake it.’
Ash, thought Renn. Always ash.
‘Everyone in the Deep Forest uses it,’ said the woman. ‘It’s like soapwort, but better.’
Another woman brought clothes: leggings and jerkin of roe deer buckskin lined with hare fur, neat elkhide boots, and a supple, hooded cape which Renn mistook for wovenbark, but was told was nettlestem. Everything fitted, but she was upset to learn that apart from her clan-creature feathers, her Raven clothes had been burnt.
‘But ours are so much better,’ protested the women.
Better clothes, better washing, better everything, Renn thought crossly. Maybe we should all give up and imitate them.
To boost her spirits, she pretended she had to go to the midden, and when she was alone, she rolled up one legging, took the beaver-tooth knife the Otter Clan had given her, and tied it to her calf with her spare bowstring. There. Just in case.
When she got back, Torak was sitting by the fire, also in new clothes, and scrubbed of his disguise. It was a relief to see him looking himself again; but they’d taken away his headband, and he kept touching his outcast tattoo.
He made room for her beside him while the rest of the clan settled round the fire. ‘Stop scowling,’ he whispered, ‘they’re helping us. And smell that food!’
She snorted. ‘It’s bound to be so much better than ours.’ But she had to admit it was good. A huge wovenroot basket had been hung directly over the embers. It was full of a fragrant stew of chopped auroch meat, mushrooms and bracken tops, which was cooked when the basket was nearly burnt through. There were also delicious flatcakes of crushed hazelnuts and pine pollen, and a big pail of honey to ladle over everything, with steaming spruce-needle tea to wash it all down.
It was wonderful to roast by a fire again, but apart from a brief prayer to the Forest, the Red Deer ate in silence. Renn thought with a pang of the Ravens’ noisy nightmeals, with everyone swapping hunting stories.
As soon as they’d finished, Durrain began to question Torak. Surprisingly, she showed no interest in why they had come; she only wanted to know what it was like to spirit walk in a tree.
Torak struggled to explain. ‘I – I was a yew. Then I was in tree after tree. Too many voices . . . I couldn’t bear it.’
‘Ah,’ sighed the whole clan.
Even Durrain betrayed a flicker of emotion. ‘What you heard was the Voice of the Forest. All the trees that are, or have ever been. It’s too vast for men to bear. If you’d heard it for more than a heartbeat, your souls would have been torn apart. And yet – how I envy you.’
Torak swallowed. ‘My mother . . . You said you knew her. Tell me about her?’
Durrain dismissed that with a wave of her hand. ‘She chose to leave. I can tell you nothing.’
‘Nothing?’ Torak was aghast.
Renn felt angry for him. ‘Surely you tried to find her?’
Durrain gave her a chilly smile.
‘But – she and Torak’s father were fighting the Soul-Eaters. They needed your help.’
‘The Red Deer never fight,’ said Durrain. Her eyes were a vivid beechnut brown, and they pierced Renn’s souls. ‘I see that you have some small skill at Magecraft. In the Deep Forest you’re out of your depth. You are no Mage.’
She was right. It was Renn’s turn to be crushed.
Beside her, Torak stirred. ‘You don’t know anything about Renn. Last summer, her visions warned us of the flood. She saved whole clans.’
‘Indeed,’ said Durrain.
Torak lifted his chin. ‘We’re wasting time. You said our search is at an end. Do you know where the Oak Mage is?’
‘There is no Oak Mage in the Deep Forest,’ declared Durrain.
‘You’re wrong,’ said Torak. ‘We tracked him here. The trail leads south.’
‘If there was a Soul-Eater in the Deep Forest, the Red Deer would know it.’
‘You didn’t before,’ said Renn. ‘The crippled wanderer lived with you for a whole summer and you never knew who he was.’
That drew angry murmurs from the others, and Durrain’s lips thinned. ‘Your search is at an end. Tonight we will pray. Tomorrow we’ll take you back to the Open Forest.’
‘No!’ cried Renn and Torak together.
‘You don’t understand what you’ve blundered into,’ said Durrain. ‘The Deep Forest is at war!’
‘But you never fight,’ retorted Renn, ‘so why should that affect you?’
‘It affects us all,’ said Durrain. ‘It keeps the World Spirit away, which blights the Forest. Surely even in the Open Forest you know of this?’
‘No, we’re much too ignorant,’ said Renn, ‘why don’t you enlighten us?’
Durrain flashed her an angry look. ‘In winter the World Spirit haunts the fells as a willow-haired woman. In summer it walks the deep woods as a tall man with the antlers of a stag. This much you know?’
Renn made a huge effort to hold onto her temper.
‘In spring, at the moment of turning, the Great Oak in the sacred grove bursts into leaf. Not this spring. The buds have been eaten by demons. The Spirit hasn’t come.’ She paused. ‘We’ve tried everything.’
‘The red branches,’ said Torak.
Durrain nodded. ‘Each clan beseeches the Spirit in its own way. The Aurochs paint branches. Lynx and Bat make sacrifices. The Forest Horses also paint branches, and their new Mage fasts alone in the sacred grove, seeking a sign.’
Renn felt Torak stiffen. ‘The Forest Horse Mage,’ he said. ‘Is that a man or a woman?’
‘A man,’ said Durrain.
Renn’s heart began to race. ‘What does he look like?’
‘No-one sees his face. At all times, he wears a mask of wood, to be one with the trees.’
‘Where is the sacred grove?’ said Torak.
‘In the valley of the horses,’ said Durrain.
‘Where’s that?’ said Renn.
‘We never tell outsiders.’
‘In whose range is it?’ said Torak, ‘Auroch or Forest Horse?’
‘The sacred grove is the heart of the Forest,’ said Durrain. ‘It belongs to no-one. All may go there, though only in greatest need. At least, this was the way until the Forest Horse Mage forbade it.’
Renn took a deep breath. ‘What if we told you that the Forest Horse Mage is Thiazzi in disguise?’
Durrain gave her a pitying stare, while the others smiled in disbelief.
‘But if we’re right,’ said Torak, ‘you’d help us? You’d help me, your bone kin, fight the Soul-Eater?’
‘The Red Deer never fight,’ repeated Durrain.
‘But you can’t do nothing!’ cried Renn.
‘We pray for the fighting to stop,’ retorted Durrain. ‘We pray for the World Spirit to come.’
‘That’s your answer?’ said Torak. ‘To pray?’
Durrain rose to her feet. ‘I’ll show you why we do not fight,’ she said, spitting out her words like pebbles. Seizing Torak and Renn by the wrist, she dragged them out of camp.
They headed uphill, and soon reached a small glade where the evening sun glowed in drifts of yellow hawkbit. There was no birdsong. The glade was eerily quiet. In the middle, Renn saw a tangle of bleached bones: the skeletons of two red deer stags.
It was horribly easy to guess wh
at had happened. Last autumn’s rut, and the stags had fought over females. Renn saw the great heads clashing, the antlers locking. The struggle to untangle themselves. They couldn’t. They were trapped.
‘This is the sign the Spirit sent,’ said Durrain. ‘See what befell our clan-creatures! They fought. They couldn’t get free. They starved to death. This is what happens when you fight. This is why the Red Deer will have none of it!’
FIFTEEN
As Durrain led them back to camp, Torak hung back, and Renn fell into step beside him. ‘Are you all right?’ she said.
‘Fine.’
She touched his hand. ‘I know you hoped for more from them.’
He forced a shrug. Because she was Renn, he didn’t mind her feeling sorry for him, but to stop her saying anything else he said, ‘I think they’re wrong about not fighting.’
‘Me too.’
‘How can you not fight Soul-Eaters? If nobody fought them they’d take over the Forest.’
‘Although,’ she said, mimicking Durrain’s lofty tones, ‘who are we to question the ways of the Red Deer?’
He grinned. ‘Especially not you, you ignorant Raven.’
She jabbed her elbow in his ribs and he yelped, earning a disapproving glance from Durrain.
As they neared the camp, Torak said in a low voice, ‘But they have told us something important.’
Renn nodded. ‘We need to find the sacred grove.’
Dusk was falling, and most of the Red Deer had gone into the shelter. Durrain was waiting for them. ‘We pray till dawn,’ she announced. ‘You will pray with us.’
Renn tried to look obedient, and Torak bowed, although he had no intention of praying. He wasn’t going to be distracted any longer.
A woman emerged from an adjoining trail, spotted Durrain, and dithered, as if wondering where to hide.
Durrain heaved a sigh. ‘Where have you been?’
‘I – I took an offering to the horses,’ stammered the woman.
‘You should have told me first.’
‘Yes, Mage,’ the woman said humbly.
Torak caught Renn’s eye. The horses.
To give him a chance to tackle the woman, she asked Durrain to explain how the Red Deer went into a trance. The Mage gave her a look, and took her into the shelter.
‘We should go in,’ bleated the woman. She had flaky skin which reminded Torak of dried reindeer meat, and she kept blinking as if anticipating a blow. Her bark head-binding was filthy and needed replacing.
To set her at ease, he asked whom she mourned.
‘M-my child,’ she mumbled. ‘We should go in.’
‘And you make offerings to the horses? In their valley?’
‘The Windriver, yes.’ She gestured behind her, then clapped her hand to her mouth. ‘We should go in!’
Simmering with excitement, Torak left his axe and bow where he could find them, and followed her in. It was almost too easy.
Inside, it was as dim as the Forest at Midsummer. From the cross-beams, thousands of nettle fibres hung to dry: they brushed his face like long green hair. Men and women sat on opposite sides with Durrain in the middle, cradling a pair of deer-hoof rattles. There was no fire. The only warmth was the dank heat of breath.
Torak made out Renn, who gave him a conspiratorial smile. He felt guilty, because she wasn’t coming with him. He couldn’t have said why; he just knew that when he confronted Thiazzi, she mustn’t be there to see it.
Making his way to the men’s side, he found a place in front of one of the doorways.
The last Red Deer crawled in and set a bowl and a platter before Durrain. She lifted the bowl and drank. ‘Rain from the tracks of the tree-headed guardian,’ she intoned. ‘Drink the wisdom of the Forest.’ She handed on the bowl.
From the platter she took a piece of flatcake. ‘Bark of the ever-watchful pine. Eat the wisdom of the Forest.’
When it was Torak’s turn, he hid the flatcake up his sleeve and only pretended to sip from the bowl. Surreptitiously, he put out his hand, and felt cool air beneath the hide flap.
Durrain’s gaze raked the throng.
He froze.
Durrain began shaking the rattles in a steady, cantering rhythm. ‘Forest,’ she chanted, ‘You see all. You know all. Not a swallow falls, not a bat breathes, but you know it. Hear us.’
‘Hear us,’ echoed the others.
‘End the strife between the clans. Bring the stag-headed Spirit back to your sacred valleys.’
On and on went the chanting and the galloping hooves, and still Durrain watched her people. Middle-night came and went. Torak had almost given up hope, when, without breaking rhythm, she cast her hood over her face – and the others did the same.
As the Red Deer chanted themselves deeper into the trance, Torak backed closer to the flap. The men flanking him were lost in their wovenstem darkness. They didn’t see him escape.
Grabbing his weapons, he headed up the trail.
He hadn’t gone far when Rip and Rek swooped and gave him a welcoming caw. Where have you been?
Wolf appeared like a grey shadow and ran at his side. Bitten One. Not far.
The half-eaten moon was setting, dawn was not far off. Torak quickened his pace. The thrill of the chase fizzed in his blood. He felt swift and invincible, a hunter closing on his prey. This was meant to be.
The boy escapes. This was meant to be.
For three days and nights the Chosen One has watched the unbelievers, as the Master willed. The girl drains the power from a curse stick as easily as pouring water from a pail. The boy summons ravens from the sky and speaks with the great grey wolf – and his spirit walks.
The boy believes he is cunning, tracking the Master to the sacred grove. No-one tracks the Master. The Master summons, and others obey. Even the fire obeys the Master.
The will of the Master must be done.
SIXTEEN
Dawn had broken, and neither the Red Deer nor Renn came after him. Torak almost wished they would. Soon, nothing would stand between him and his vengeance.
As the day wore on, he followed the trail up the Windriver, although this swift brown torrent bore scant resemblance to the mighty river it would become in the Open Forest.
Wolf padded at his side with drooping tail and lowered head. Even the ravens had stopped swooping after butterflies. The thrill of the hunt had given way to apprehension.
The valley narrowed to a gorge and the river became a rushing stream. A dry south wind had been blowing all day, but now it dropped to a whisper. Torak felt a tingling in his spine. They were entering the foothills of the High Mountains.
Wolf sniffed a clod of earth that had been kicked up by a horse’s hoof. Torak stooped for a long black tail-hair. Above him, the new leaves of beech and birch glowed a brilliant green. Blackthorn blossom glittered like snow. The air was fresh with the scent of spruce, and alive with birdsong: chaffinch, warbler, thrush, wren. Even the speedwell on the trail was a preternatural blue, like flowers in a dream. He had reached the valley of the horses.
Wolf raised his head. Do we go on?
I must, Torak told him. Not you. Dangerous.
If you must, I must.
They walked on in the flickering shade.
The trail, Torak noticed, had been trodden by many hooves and paws, but no boots. The prey showed no fear of him, and he guessed that here, people were forbidden to hunt. A black woodpecker hopped backwards along a branch, probing for ants. It was so close that Torak glimpsed its long grey tongue. A roe buck munched deadnettle. He could have touched its coarse brown fur. He came upon a boar snuffling for roots; she watched him pass without raising her snout.
The valley narrowed to a gorge, and birch gave way to mossy spruce. The breeze died. The birds fell silent. Torak’s footfalls sounded loud. He touched his shoulder, where his clan-creature skin used to be. A knot of dread tightened under his heart.
Ever since Bale’s death, his whole purpose had been to find Thiazzi. He hadn’t thou
ght about what came after. He did now. He had to kill the strongest man in the Forest.
He had to kill a man.
Perhaps this was why he’d left Renn behind: because he didn’t want her to see him do it. But he missed her.
A murmur of wings behind him and he turned, hoping it was Rip and Rek. It was a sparrowhawk on a stump, plucking the breast of a headless thrush.
Maybe, thought Torak, the ravens have gone because they know what I’m going to do.
But Wolf was still with him. He was gazing at Torak, and his amber eyes held the pure, steady light of the guide. Do not go on.
I must, Torak replied.
This is bad.
I know. I must.
The sun sank lower and the trees closed in. The river disappeared, but Torak heard it echoing underground. Finally, its voice fell to nothing.
A stone clattered behind him. When it came to rest, the stillness surged back like something alive.
The trail rounded a bend and the Mountains reared before him, startlingly close. The valley walls leaned in, shutting out the dying light. Ahead, the tallest holly trees he’d ever seen warded him back. Beyond them, he knew, lay the sacred grove: the heart of the Forest.
Some places hold an echo of events; others possess their own spirit. Torak sensed the spirit of this place as a soundless humming in his bones. From his pouch, he drew his mother’s medicine horn. He shook earthblood into his palm and daubed some on his cheeks and brow. The horn seemed to vibrate, like the humming in his marrow.
Wolf nosed his hand. His ears were flat against his skull. He was no longer the guide. He was Torak’s pack-brother, and frightened.
Torak knelt and blew gently on his muzzle, feeling the tickle of his whiskers and breathing his sweet, clean smell.
He couldn’t let Wolf come any further. It was too dangerous. He had to do this alone. Hating the confusion he would cause, he told Wolf to go.
Wolf refused.
Torak repeated the command.
Wolf ran in a circle. You must not hunt the Bitten One!
Go, Torak replied.
Chronicles of Ancient Darkness Page 89