The log was more than an arm’s-length across and studded with the stumps of many branches. As the logs knocked against each other there was a constant lurching, rocking and tapping, and all the while the bank of the river slid past. Though one side of their log had caught on the branch stub, if it rolled the other way it would likely keep going until it turned upside down. If they slipped between the logs it would be impossible to get back to the surface and the water beneath would be deep.
“Pascolli! Pascolli!” She twisted her head about from side to side. No bludvoik. None. No sign or sound of it at all.
She unbuckled her plaited leather belt and wrenched it free before lashing it around and between the two branch stubs that locked the adjacent logs together.
Due to the haversack Pascolli’s head was kinked back at an acute angle but he was breathing easily. Blood fanned out across his face from a lump on his forehead.
“Pascolli!” she said it as loudly as she dared.
“Uh?”
“Try to keep yourself still. We’re on the river. On a log. You must not slip!”
He closed his eyes and nodded. She placed his hands on two of the branch stumps and picked apart the knot of his waist strap. Once she had each end tied to a stump on either side of him, she cautiously sat back on her heels and let out a sigh.
When it was dawn they would have to find a way back on to land. At least they had lost the bludvoik. Perhaps it didn’t like water. The tuskdog was also nowhere to be seen but then she didn’t understand why it had tracked them anyway.
Something squelched. She spun. The bludvoik was on the log behind them. Screaming, she threw herself backward and landed on Pascolli’s legs.
The creature stood and lurched toward them, swaying from side to side with the motion of the log. The wind blew its long fair hair back from its face. Beneath the stains, its clothes looked well made, richly embroidered. Moonlight glinted on gold buttons. But the eyes...the eyes were blank and white and blind, the mouth slowly moving as if chewing on something, real or imagined.
“Pascolli. Wake up. It’s back. Cut yourself loose!” What a waste of good knots. She fumbled at her belt – the dagger was still there. She slipped it free and handed it back, praying he could hear and understand her words. With a surge of relief she felt him take the dagger. She stuttered a thank you prayer to whatever god was watching over them. “I’m going to try rolling the log.”
Frantically she plucked at the tie on her belt. Wet leather...a nightmare to undo. “Blast!” She pulled and pulled. The bludvoik sighed moistly and clunked its jaw together. The knot loosened, pulled free...
It stepped onto their log. The movement beneath its feet seemed to disconcert it in some way. Another step. Another. She judged the moment. There was a spot where it would likely slip between the logs.
She threw her weight to the right then scrambled back, trying to make the roll happen as fast as possible. Branch stubs clacked against each other. She was thrown off balance herself and only Pascolli grabbing her saved her from rolling under. The bludvoik, flailing its arms, tumbled over, gave some sort of ugly grunting cry and vanished under the water.
“We got it,” she cried.
Pascolli grinned weakly at her. “Guess they can’t swim too good.” He put a hand to the lump on his head.
Water burst upward, spraying over them, and the bludvoik’s head popped up in a small gap between the logs.
Her heart flip-flopped. “Push it! We have to push it back under, before it gets its hands through!”
They stumbled down the log one after the other. She could hear scratching as it tried to get its arms out through the gap.
Ellinca stamped on its head, felt the slippery hair under her boot. Pascolli knelt and thumped and pushed. She jerked away in time to not stomp on him. How could he bear to touch it? The thing growled and gurgled at them, tried to bite Pascolli’s fingers. She flung herself down beside Pascolli, put her hands on the top of its head and leaned with all her weight, praying it wouldn’t grab her with those hands, only inches away in the water beneath the log. “Where’s the dagger?”
He shook his head.
“Gone?”
He nodded curtly.
She bit back a swear word.
“It’s no good! It’s not budging!” The hair and slimy flesh under her fingers were colder than the river. Every few seconds the head surged up then back down as the bludvoik struggled. She could hear its teeth grinding. It smelled of fresh-killed meat.
“Get down,” she said through her teeth. “I’m not letting you up!”
Pascolli tapped out words on her back. “W-a-i-t. Cut off head. That kills them.”
“What with? Our fingernails?”
Pascolli swayed suddenly. Alarmed, she looked at him. The head wound was no longer bleeding. Concussion? She couldn’t tell, couldn’t stop to help. Scum take this creature!
For five or ten minutes, or maybe more – it was difficult judging time – they struggled together but the bludvoik did not give up. There was nothing except their bare hands. She closed her eyes, panting, but didn’t risk lifting her hands. The dagger must have fallen into the water. Not that she would have been happy with trying to saw off the head of this thing.
Pascolli fell to one elbow and closed his eyes.
“Don’t give up!” Only one day since the whipping and now the head wound... “Pascolli?” He sank lower on his elbow. Thankfully he fell away from the bludvoik’s teeth, toward the side where the logs were locked together.
She would not give up. Not ever. She pressed down. The scratching of fingers beneath the log went on and on. Perhaps it could scratch its way through the timber. Dizzy, she felt her eyes closing, her ears buzzing, on the verge of fainting. No. Wake up. She gritted her teeth. If she had to sink her fingers into its brain to stop it...she would.
Her arms grew numb then gradually, the numbness spread to her fingers. What had this creature been before? They said that bludvoiks were created, people made almost-dead, held at the brink of life and death, and as near to indestructible as could be. Once upon a time – she giggled quietly, uncontrollably – this was a man who’d lived and laughed and loved and bled like any other. And, with that thought, like a hook upon which to hang a well-stitched garment, she found she could imagine him human again.
She was cold and wet, and her fingers throbbed with a horrible painful ache and she was so very tired. The movement under her stopped.
The growling subsided and, at last, there was quiet, and it was as though the world waited for something to happen.
Time dripped, leaked past, filled her mind with a liquid of blurred thoughts and dreams...and dreams. She knew her eyes were closed and that they should be open but couldn’t find the strength anywhere. A whispering began. Her mother sang a gentle lullaby, one that had sent her to sleep on many a night.
She floated on a vast warm ocean and the sound of small waves chuckled in her ears. Above circled a flock of black birds, their wings outstretched against the bright sun. She smiled. Something soft nudged, bumped, against her arm. She turned her head. A young man was there, also floating with his head back and his arms limp at his sides. He turned his head and looked at her with clear blue eyes. Tendrils of fair hair drifted about his head.
A stab of terror plucked at her heart. She wanted to swim away from him but nothing would move. Her fingers were aching and deadened. Her head pounded.
He opened his mouth and she heard his words both below the water and above. “What have you done to me?” Terror filled his eyes as well but with that her own fear leaked away to nothing and she saw the beauty in the man. He floated away then slowly sank beneath the surface.
The rocking of the waves continued. She would wait here, until she forgot the floating man. After an eternity of this rocking, the voice returned to sing the lullaby over and over and send her into sleep, into pleasant oblivion.
Chapter 7
An Excursion on the River
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��Ah!” Her eyes flew open. Ellinca sat up, looking around wildly.
The warmth of morning light found its way through the treetops to touch her skin. A cormorant, wet from a dive for a fish breakfast, sat on an overhanging branch with its wings spread out to dry like washing on a line. Water burbled softly to itself somewhere beneath her.
She wasn’t on a boat, though this must be what it felt like. She was still on the log with a thin blanket over her. One of her arms was numb from sleeping crooked. Pascolli sat next to her, arms round his knees.
She remembered a dream. There had been a man in it, not Pascolli, someone older. She shivered. The rest was lost to her.
“The bludvoik,” she blurted, half-sitting. The log shifted, but only a little, and she saw that Pascolli had retied her belt around the branch stubs. “Where?” Something odd had happened when she touched the bludvoik’s head.
“Gone,” he signed. “It sank under the water hours ago.”
“Gone? You saw this?” She frowned. What a great warrior she had been, going to sleep. At least Pascolli had a good excuse for fainting.
“It stopped moving. I took a chance and pried your fingers off it. They were sort of hooked into its flesh.” He grimaced. “One big shove with my foot and it sank. It’s back there somewhere. Dead, or whatever it is that bludvoiks do when they stop being. No sign that it came up. And I’ve been watching really, really carefully.”
She examined her fingers, turning them over to check under the nails. She half-expected them to be covered in gore, but apart from the numbness, from the pins and needles that went all the way along her right arm to her elbow they were no more than dirty. She scrubbed her hands on her jerkin.
“Ellinca, these logs...” He waved at them. Like a carpet made of timber, they covered the river from the near bank to the far bank which was at least a hundred yards away. “They must be going to the sawmill at Hull. We should get off the river before then. If what Mr. Jubb said was right they’ll be looking for us by now.”
They exchanged glances. “Yes. They must be.” She pushed back the blanket, ready to rise to her feet, when she stopped herself. “Wait.”
“Something wrong?”
She looked around, at the quiet scene on the river. Everything was as it should be – if she discounted that somewhere someone had chopped down an awful lot of forest to produce all these logs. The warmth, the clear sunshine, the animals going about their activities – cormorants, hovering dragonflies, bees...She let her muscles relax and took a long, sweet breath.
Last night was a long time ago, a different world.
“I’m not rushing anymore.”
“What?”
“We’re going to plan our next step. And, right now, we are going to enjoy this morning, because it is glorious.”
“What?” Then he too looked at everything around them, and he slowly smiled. “I see what you mean. Yes. It is beautiful... Well, how about this for planning? I know this river well. My family...we used to follow the roads from Hull, east to hereabouts. The farmers here were richer back then. No cross-border raids by the Grakks. No war. I’ve fished this river many, many times. The logging men will be walking the logs at the front when we get closer to Hull.” He pointed ahead, downriver.
“And there are none there yet?”
“No. You would hear their shouting if they were near. They make sure the logs go where they want them to go. So we have plenty of time, maybe hours? We can have breakfast. We still have the haversacks. And here, I found your dagger.”
She took it from him and sheathed it. “I feel awfully bold sitting out here on the river in daylight. Should we breakfast on the river bank?”
He puffed out his cheeks. “Not many locals come out to this part of the river. Besides, you want to go back in there? After last night?”
She blinked. He was right, and she considered the alternative, which was to make their way to the far bank across the logs, and decided that was too much to attempt on an empty stomach.
Both packs were hooked over branch stubs. Pascolli had been careful to keep the weight to the side where the log was locked inextricably to the next log. An alarming thought occurred to her.
“Pascolli. If the river widens these logs might loosen. We’ll have to be ready to move quickly if that happens.”
He stopped rummaging in his haversack to nod before pulling out a greasy sausage and some flat bread.
“Ew. For breakfast? Find me an apple.” She eyed his forehead.”Um. How’s that bump feel?”
He rolled his eyes. “I’m okay. I washed it. My back hurts more. Here’s an apple but it’s half-squashed.”
Carefully she shifted along the log to Pascolli. A few curled strands of his black fringe were stuck to the lump above his left eye. She sucked in her breath as she unstuck them. “That must hurt!”
“Only...” he signed emphatically and he pulled back. “When you prod it. I’d rather you didn’t.”
“Hmph! Well, okay. It is very clean.” She smirked. Why had Pascolli just flinched more than someone in a little pain? “Who but you would run into a tree?”
“I was drawing my sword. That thing was close.”
She grunted. “That reminds me. The sword went past my ear. It might have stuck itself in one of these logs. Have you looked for it?”
“Yes, I have looked. No, I didn’t find it.”
“I should check your back.”
He gave her an odd look.
“Well?”
“I guess so.”
Slowly he shifted about then lifted the back of his shirt.
She curled back the bandage on his back that went all the way around his chest. “Ouch. I can see why it hurts. That stitched spot...whatever the sergeant used has finally worked. It’s healed but it looks a tad infected.” The skin was bright red and swollen. Beneath the surface was something black and curled like a small worm. She pursed her lips. Should she reopen the wound? Cut it open? She pressed either side of the lesion, felt the heat. The black worm moved. Her vision swam as if she’d dived underwater, just like it had when she touched the tuskdog. She sank back onto her heels.
When her mother had died, on that awful long, cold night, she had seen death coming. The illness was as fast as a forest fire. There were buboes – huge red lumps – at her neck and armpit and the back of her knee where the skin was thin, bright pink and ready to burst. There had been no one to help her decide what to do. Her father was away playing at war, her uncle lived miles to the south.
Her mother had lain on the bed, sunken eyes closed, each breath shuddering and painful. Ellinca had prayed to all the gods she could think of, demanded of them their help and, finally, she had gripped her mother’s hand and kissed it and taken up the hot knife and cut every one of those ugly things open. She’d bent all her willpower to the task of making her be well. There’d been no screaming for her mother was too ill to feel the blade. Let out the morbid pus, the books said. She’d done it but it hadn’t helped, not at all, and her mother had died.
It had been hours before she could rise to her feet. Her mother had died...
But she couldn’t remember any problem with her sight. No blurring, none at all.
“Pascolli...” And she told him of her mother’s death, the tuskdog and of the strange blurring of her vision.
“I’m sorry, about your mother. You hadn’t said.”
“Thank you. Um. It was some time ago, and I’m okay now. Do you...no, what do you want me to do? There might be some risk, to you, and you should decide.”
“You think that just touching could start something? That’s what I am afraid of.” Hesitantly, he put out his hand and touched her palm with his long fingers, then he drew away and looked at her, measuring her, as if seeing her for the first time.
Ellinca could still feel the warmth of his fingers. This wasn’t the time or place. She cleared her throat. “Look. Your wound needs opening up, cleaning out the bad stuff. I’m telling you because I think you should d
ecide. I don’t really know how this all works...”
Something changed in his eyes. He nodded slowly. “Yes. What happens if we leave it?”
“Um. I don’t know. The infection might spread, or – ”
“Or it might not.” He shifted his gaze and seemed to take some comfort in the simple beauty of the river and its surrounds. “I feel okay. Let’s keep an eye on it, if it gets worse.” He shrugged. “I’ll think again. I’d rather not have you use this gift of yours.”
“Okay. I’m okay with that.” But she wasn’t. Oddly, it made her feel rejected. Not that she would tell him that.
Instead she applied some more salve with a spoon, settled the bandage back as well as she was able and rinsed her hands. They settled down to eat their somewhat unusual breakfast.
The complete disappearance of the tuskdog worried Pascolli. He couldn’t seem to get out of his mind the idea that it might go on some angry rampage. What concerned her more was why it had followed them in the first place.
Where they should head for was discussed. Possibilities were tossed about between them like a rotten bone neither of them wanted to handle for long. Now Ellinca knew for certain there was no safe home for them with the tagalong traders or anywhere else she might be tracked to. She was simply lost. There was nobody she could trust enough to turn to for help apart from Pascolli.
Any land ruled by the Imperator had declared wild mages to be abominations to be rooted out and destroyed whenever and wherever they were found. The reach of the Imperator was long and, with each year and each victory of his armies, more of the known world had become part of the Burgla’le Empire.
There were rumors that in Fresnan, Hertokan and Wurtgard, far to the west, where civilization and the study of magience was in its infancy, mages were tolerated if they stayed within the law. To reach Fresnan, the nearest of those countries, would be difficult – perhaps months of travel. She wasn’t sure – geography not being her strong point.
To the near north there were the Grakkurds, the mountain tribespeople. Ellinca shuddered to think of going there. The Grakks were primitives and, it was said, eaters of human flesh, or souls – something like that. Neither was good.
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