The strange sound came again, this time from behind. Stacy spun instinctively, dagger in hand.
Something large and dark-furred leaped from the thick boughs of a tree. It happened in a blur, in the white swirl above their heads. One of the Valley soldiers screamed and tumbled to the ground with the creature swarming over him. Trevor drew his sword and raced to the stricken soldier’s side. Animal eyes glowered. He saw long fangs protruding from a baboon-like face. As Trevor raised his sword, the animal dodged and rolled. A strong gust of wind blew snow in his face; he lost his vision. He heard Cicero’s growl and caught a brief glimpse of the wolf springing at the now unseen attacker. Another grunt, low and evil, sounded from the opposite direction. Melinda drew her bow. She spun on her heels and loosed her arrow. An unearthly scream shrilled through the air. Another dark-furred animal bounded away, leaving behind a thin trail of blood in the fresh snow.
Shouts, calls, and Alryc raised his long sword. It cut against the trunk of a tree, missing another fiend set to strike. For the next few moments there was total confusion. Stacy crouched, wielding her dagger. A hulking form with a huge head and the muzzle of a dog dodged the point of her knife and scurried away into the underbrush. Then there was silence. Tense and forbidding silence.
The girl stood there, waiting breathlessly. Robin was shivering; Melinda bent low, lips parted and trembling. Trevor and Alryc had raced to the side of the first fallen soldier. Alryc cradled the lad’s head in his arms and gasped. The face had been slashed beyond recognition — deep gashes criss-crossing his entire face. His throat had been severed at the jugular; glassy eyes stared. Painfully the astronomer looked up to Trevor and shook his head. “He’s gone.”
Trevor came to his senses and called for a tight military defensive formation. They gathered in a small circle, covering one another’s backs.
“What were those things?” rasped Trevor.
At his side, Stacy shrugged. Her face was pale, her lips trembled. “Hel’s fire, I don’t know. I’ve never seen anything like that before.”
The soldier turned to the crouching wolf. “Cicero, what do you make of it?”
The mountain wolf shook his woolly head. “It’s not of the forest,” he growled, “nor of anywhere in our land. Such beasts I have never seen.”
“They’ll kill us all, Trevor,” said Stacy. “That must have been why the white wolves warned us. They knew these things were about.”
“We’ve got to get out of this place,” exhorted Alryc, stroking the hilt of his sword. His dark eyes scanned the white shrubs and thickets, and he knew that this fight had not yet ended. Whatever had attacked them would come again. And again. Until they were all dead.
“We’ll try to make it back to our camp,” said Trevor, also with an eye to the landscape. “Then we’ll make all speed and get back to the ridge and the ship. The things might come again at any moment.”
“We can’t make it back to the ship in this storm,” advised the girl. “We’ll be followed and tracked. We won’t have a chance.”
“Well, we can’t very well stay here,” snapped Trevor. “Fates above! Look about you, girl! We’ll be caught in a blizzard! Our only hope is to get away from this place as quickly as possible and find some shelter!”
Stacy glared at the swirling snow, now falling harder than ever. Just one glance confirmed her belief that they would never make it back. There was just too much distance to cover. And by night the things could be swarming all over them.
Nervously she looked to the closest of the never-ending series of snow-capped peaks. As rugged as they were, she knew they were a far better refuge than these open lands. At least up there, atop the ridges, they might find a cave for shelter. “Up there,” she said at last. “That’s our only chance.”
Trevor looked at her, astonished. “To the mountains? We can’t go up there,” he protested.
“We have to. It’s the safest place we’ll find. There’ll be caves.”
“Wolf dens, you mean. That’s white wolf territory. Are you suggesting we march blindly into it?”
Stacy’s eyes flashed angrily. “Can’t you see the danger down here? You saw those things, saw what they did. They’ll stalk us at will! It’s either take shelter up there, or die down here!”
“Khalea is right,” growled Cicero. “The mountains offer refuge. We must seek it.”
“Even if it means confronting white wolves? Invite them to attack us?”
“I don’t think so,” replied Stacy. “If they wanted us killed, they wouldn’t have given us that warning. But in any case it’s better to face them than to confront those things again.”
“We can come down after the storm,” said Alryc. “In clear weather we’d have a fighting chance. But not now.”
Trevor sighed, and bit pensively at frozen lips. The snow was blowing worse every minute. A cave would be good shelter. Good protection, too. He peered at the mountains gloomily.
“We can’t lose time,” reminded Alryc. “We must start now, before the storm worsens.”
“Decide, Trevor,” said the girl. “Which way do we go?”
Reluctantly he said, “To the mountains.” He spun on his heels and faced his men. “Keep your weapons drawn,” he commanded. “We don’t know what we’ll face when we reach that peak. Melinda, you and Robin take rear guard. Stacy, Cicero and I will take the lead. Alryc, you take the center with the others.”
With hesitation they left the slain soldier lying in the snow. Alryc covered the limp body with the soldier’s cloak and offered a silent prayer to the Fates. Then they moved out onto fresh snow in the direction of the mountains. Cautiously they crested the hill and stared at the huge peak that loomed before them. The wind blew bitter cold. Scarves bundled about their faces, they moved on, single file, farther into the desolation.
A thick layer of ice covered a winding stream. Cicero had been this way before and knew that it led to a plateau nestled a thousand meters up the mountain. There they might find shelter, he believed. But he also knew that reaching the plateau would be extremely hazardous.
They climbed at the side of a craggy ridge beset by snow-covered thornbushes amid the thick pines and firs. The summit seemed insurmountable — so high that it was completely obscured by clouds and mist. Ridge and counterridge broke here and there to allow glimpses of the deep gorges below. The steep climb began in earnest. They fought their way through a deep gash in the mountain wall, wide and craggy, with jutting boulders at every turn. More than once someone stumbled and nearly fell to the frozen ice-lake below. High on the face of towering cliffs they saw the approach to the plateau, a narrow slash in the sheer rock wall. At best it would allow their passage one at a time. To the left, a sheer drop down, was a great V-shaped gorge of snow-covered black granite. To the right stood yet another rock wall, broken only by the slot of another gorge.
Weary and frightened, numb from the bitter wind, they climbed on. Cicero picked his way carefully. Then Snorri, then Stacy right behind. Her hands grappled with the small crevices in the walls, her feet kept a steady footing against treacherously thick ice only inches below the fresh snow.
At last she reached the plateau. Behind her the white silhouettes of the others moved at a crawl. She could see the lumbering figure of Alryc helping the Valley soldiers. Without him, she knew, the lads would never make it.
Moments later Trevor came over the top. He cupped his hands and blew frigid clouds of air into them. His dark eyes searched the ridge. It was desolate. Only an occasional boulder or the bent trunk of a tree blocked the path that led to a sheer smooth wall some hundred meters away. Low against the wall, near the edge of the ridge and overlooking the ice-lake, there was a dark crevice. Half the size of a man in height, it seemed mysterious and forbidding but as good a shelter as they were likely to find.
“Not much, is it?” sighed Trevor.
“It will do,” grunted the mountain wolf. “I’ll lead you.”
Trevor shook his head and wiped snow from
his eyes. “You stay here and wait for the others. Stacy and I will look together.”
Cicero looked warily at the girl.
She nodded. “It’s all right. We’ll be careful.”
Trevor nudged her elbow and pointed to a large drift before the mouth of the cave. “Careful, Stacy,” he whispered. “Better let me go first.”
The girl nodded and watched him slide forward one step at a time, testing the depth with each step. Suddenly there was a snap, and Trevor’s face contorted in a mask of pain.
“My leg! It’s my leg!” He groaned, trying to hold back a scream.
With careless abandon the girl gave up all thought of her own safety and dashed to his side. Taut features beaded in cold sweat, he held his right leg with both hands, moaning softly.
Stacy knelt down. “What is it?”
“I...don’t know...My leg...” He groaned again, ready to pass out.
She brushed aside loose snow and dug around the mound in which he had fallen. Cicero bounded to them. The girl’s nimble fingers worked quickly; she exposed a circular piece of rusting metal. On either side were small springs, and latched to the springs were two large bars of iron, with jagged teeth. The teeth had cut deeply into the leather boot and had taken a firm hold on Trevor’s flesh.
Alryc came at a run, carrying a thick branch in his hand.
“It’s a wolf trap, Alryc,” panted the girl. “Old One told me about them. They’re used to catch white wolves.”
The astronomer grimaced. “This time they’ve caught a man,” he said grimly. Bending down, he forced the branch between the soldier’s leg and the metal jaw and slowly began to pry it open. Trevor howled in pain, then fainted. “Hold him, Stacy! Hold him firm!” The girl nodded and cradled his head in her lap. She took both of his trembling hands and held them fast. Alryc pried with all his might, loosened the teeth and yanked hard. The boot slipped out and the jaws sprang shut with an echoing roar that made Stacy shudder.
Alryc wiped his brow and drew a deep breath. It had been close. A split second more and the trap would have sprung around the leg once again and pierced it to the bone.
“He’s in a bad way, Stacy,” he murmured worriedly.
“I know. What can we do? Have you anything in your pouch?” Stacy looked at him hopefully.
The astronomer frowned. “Only a few herbs and spices. He needs proper care. If that leg becomes infected, we’ll have to cut it off.”
Stacy put her hand to her mouth and gasped. The very thought made her tremble. Trevor would rather be dead than live like that, she knew, but what else could they do? She could not let him die.
“Maybe it won’t come to that,” said Alryc, seeing her anguish. “Let’s get to the cave. At least there we can take off the boot and dress the wound.”
Two soldiers ran over at Alryc’s command. Together they lifted the wounded commander and brought him into the depths of the black grotto. Stacy waited outside until Robin, Melinda and the last soldier had entered. Then she got down on her knees and crawled inside as well. Then a sudden rush of warm air startled her. And she saw that, inside, the cave was far larger than any of them had dared hope. About three or four meters from the mouth the ceiling rose to great unexpected heights. There was more than enough room to stand fully erect. The walls seemed to be limestone and sparkled wetly with dull hues of brown and deep reds and purples. From some crevice or other she heard the constant drip-drip of seeping water. The ground was hard near the mouth, but farther back, close to the spot where the light stopped, it seemed to soften considerably. She even saw small weeds growing against the jagged walls and what looked like a narrow tunnel leading down into a shaft of some kind. But these matters could be looked into later. The long night had begun to set in and the snow showed no sign of letting up, so the first order of business was to make certain that Trevor was being cared for and then see that the rest of them did not freeze to death before the blizzard ended.
“How is he?” she asked, standing beside pensive Melinda and peering down at the straining Alryc. Already the astronomer had carefully taken off the torn boot and was washing the swollen gaping wounds with a handful of fresh snow. Then he reached inside a small pouch at his waist and withdrew a soft, clean bandage. Before wrapping the oozing wound, he pressed a small herb tightly against it. “This should help,” he mumbled. “I’m not a physician, but the healing arts are familiar to me. This herb is one used by hunters in the Free Lands. They say it works well on wounds like this.”
Stacy bit her lip. “But that’s not just a wound.”
Alryc nodded. “It’s a deep gash. Almost straight to the bone. I fear that even if the wound does heal he’ll never walk properly again.”
A cripple! The words slashed at her like thrown knives. She had let him walk first and test the drifts by himself. She should have known better. It was her fault that he was hurt.
“Well?”
She snapped out of her thought to see Alryc looking at her questioningly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “What did you say?”
“I asked if you thought we could find enough dry wood in here to make ourselves a small fire. I have flints.”
The girl looked about, caught sight of the weeds again and noticed bits and pieces of dried wood strewn about. “There’ll be enough. If not, we can gather some from outside.”
“Good. Then why don’t you get to that? Leave Trevor to me. There’s nothing you can do for him, anyway.”
It took but a short while. Melinda and Robin helped search the lighted part of the cave and soon there was more than enough tinder for the fire. Cicero and Snorri kept a careful eye on the mouth of the grotto, watching for signs of either white wolves or the dreaded things that had attacked below. Save for the constant fall of the blinding snow they saw nothing.
The fire was lit and brought instant warmth. The walls of the cave came alive in splashes of bright colors. The flames flickered and danced, sending eerie shadows racing above their heads across the concave ceiling. The three Valley soldiers look out their pouches and passed around the few rations they had. Everyone ate somberly, without speaking. Every few moments Trevor would moan in an uneasy sleep and Stacy would turn to him with distraught eyes. He sometimes smiled as she comforted him by running her fingers lightly through his hair or kissing him softly on his brow, tenderly reassuring him.
At last, when the meal was done, when everyone sat huddled together and tried to sleep, Alryc and Stacy slipped away by themselves. The astronomer greeted her with a worried look when they were alone.
“The snows could last for days,” he whispered in a husky tone. “And our cave won’t make a good shelter for much longer.”
Stacy sat with her back against the wall, sifting the soft dirt through her fingers. “That’s what I’ve been thinking. We’ll starve up here. We’re going to have to go below after all.”
“To face the things again? No, my lady. In any case, the snows will be too heavy for us to negotiate the tricky path down. Better then to stay up here and take our chances.”
“But we can’t! What will we eat? And what about Trevor? He needs help. If we can get back to the ship...”
Alryc looked at her kindly but with an awareness in his eyes that told her he knew she was speaking from her heart and not from her forest-sense. “We cannot carry him, Stacy. Perhaps in several days’ time, if the wound is better, we can make a splint. Then maybe he can struggle on his own. But not by tomorrow.”
The girl sighed. She knew full well that everything Alryc had said was true. There was no way they could leave this place even if Trevor had not been so badly hurt. “What do you suggest, then?”
“That we comb the cave. Go deep into the passageways. I’ve heard that creatures dwell in places such as this. Lizards, mice.” He shrugged. “When you’re about to starve, even they’ll look good enough to eat. And besides, you’ve heard the dripping water. There must be underground springs somewhere down there. That will mean some kind of vegetation for us to
eat.”
Stacy glanced down the narrow passageway and saw that it seemed to wind and twist on an ever downward spiral right into the bowels of the mountain. “How far below might that tunnel lead?”
Alryc shrugged. “Who knows? But what does it matter. We can make torches. We’ll mark our path with stones and follow the water. With luck that underground lake or stream will lead us out of here. What do you say, Stacy? Shall we explore?”
She felt taken aback at the way the question was asked. “Why do you say that, Alryc? Am I suddenly in command?”
The astronomer smiled kindly with soft eyes and took her hand in his own. “Ah, my lady. Don’t you know it yet? You’ve been the one to lead ever since the day we reached this strange land. We look to you, not to Trevor or Elias. The Rangers realized it first; your wolves knew it all along. You are the leader of this band. You may not realize or accept it yet, but you are.”
Stacy sat quietly for a long while. She had always thought of herself as one among the many. Perhaps as a leader of the wolves, or even the Rangers, now that Sandra was gone. But of everyone? On the sea it was Elias they had looked to. Here, on the shores of this wild land, it was supposed to be Trevor. She glanced at the injured soldier and suddenly realized that whether she wanted the job or not, it was forced upon her. There was no one else. She would have to be strong for all their sakes.
“All right, Alryc, tomorrow we’ll begin our search of the passageway. Make torches for us and leave one of the soldiers behind with Trevor. The wolves will come with us; we’ll be needing their help.”
Alryc readily agreed. He took her hand again and squeezed it tightly until Stacy winced. She tried to pull away, but he kept the grip firm, locking his wizened eyes into hers. “This is meant to be, Stacy,” he told her. “I have always known it — and I think you knew it, too.”
Stacy looked away. “It frightens me, Alryc. I don’t know if I’m ready to lead. I don’t know if the others behind, at the ship, will want it.” She shivered, suddenly feeling the cold as never before.
Lady of the Haven (Empire Princess Book 1) Page 23