Wolfsbane Winter

by Jane Fletcher

  Alana clearly did not find it funny, and an expression of irritation crossed her face. “No. I’ve told you that. But I can tell something is bothering you.”

  Deryn sighed and stood, looking around. “Nevin’s sister reckoned someone had stolen her sheep. I put it down to carelessness on her part. But I found footprints in the forest. Now this.” She pointed at the ground. “Maybe a farmer has started stealing livestock from the neighbors. It would explain why the cow wandered so far.”

  “Do you want to get your comrades?”

  “Who?”

  “Ross and Sergeant Nevin.”

  “Oh, them. Sorry. I didn’t recognize the description.” This time Deryn’s words did get a smile. Her stomach flipped at the sight and she looked away quickly. Making Alana smile was not safe or wise. Deryn ran a hand through her hair, trying to pretend she was thinking. “Um, no. Even if it is a thief at work, neither of those two will be any help at all. I’ve got my bow, and a dozen arrows. That should do.”

  Deryn rarely went anywhere without her bow, usually in hope of rabbit stew rather than battling thieves. Unfortunately, she had left her sword behind at the station. It had not occurred to her that it might be needed. She could return to collect it, but that would mean the long round trek to Neupor and back. The sword was never her best weapon, anyway.

  “We go on?” Alana asked.

  “I do. You can go back if you want.”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “Okay. It’s probably nothing to worry about. If his farm’s anything to go by, I wouldn’t be surprised if Alejo can’t afford a proper pair of boots and has a couple of his neighbors’ mismatched cast-offs.”

  Even so, Deryn strung her bow before moving on into the forest.

  *

  Why did I say I’d come? Alana repeatedly asked herself the question. A sudden impulse had struck her in the farmyard and she had volunteered without giving herself time to think. What had she been hoping for? That Deryn would have softened her attitude? That if they had time to talk they might reach some accord? Or was it just to spend a day with Deryn, watching her? In which case, why had she wanted this torture? Her hands still held the tactile memory of how Deryn’s body felt. Her lips still burned with their kiss. She wanted Deryn, and all she could do was look.

  Why she wanted Deryn so desperately was another hard question. Is it just that I’ve been alone too long? Or was there something special about the Iron Wolf? Maybe that was it. Deryn’s background was part of the picture. Alana’s previous lovers had all fitted into one of two molds: either smart and ambitious and therefore motivated as least as much by politics as love, or sweet and not too bright, like Reyna. Deryn was sharp, without having one eye on the Quintanilla family connection.

  The other part of the package lay in the way Deryn had latched a hold on Alana that first night with the heart-rending combination of the tough warrior exterior and the emotional vulnerability from her childhood tragedy. There were layers to Deryn. Alana wanted to peel them off, one by one, and heal the woman at the core. Oh yes, that’s me. A healer through and through.

  On Deryn’s part, the reaction was complex. Alana was sure that not all the sexual desire she felt was her own, but mostly what she sensed in Deryn was unease and irritation that increased whenever they spoke. Deryn would undoubtedly be happier with some other companion in the forest. You’re demon-spawn. What do you expect?

  While they walked, Alana studied Deryn’s back. Suppose I came straight out and said something like, “Give me one more kiss and I promise you won’t set eyes on me again.” Alana pouted. Of course, she would never have the nerve to say it, and Deryn was unlikely to agree, but it made a starting point for a nice fantasy to play with. Alana sighed. Maybe she should simply enjoy the view and stop tormenting herself.

  Midday was just past. For the last quarter mile, their route had run along the top of a cliff, with a sheer drop of fifty feet or more on their right and the forest on their left. The cliff top was fully exposed to the winter sunshine. Added to the exertion and her heavy clothes, Alana was feeling a little too warm. She toyed with the idea of stripping off her coat, but if she did, the trail would be sure to dive back into the shadow of the trees and she would be too cold again. A short rest would be nice, though.

  Deryn stopped to examine the ground, as she had been doing all morning, flicking a pinecone aside with her forefinger.

  “Anything?” Alana asked.

  Deryn’s face was more pensive than normal. “The ground is too stony to be sure, but I’d say there’s been a lot of people through here for somewhere that everyone is so keen to avoid.”

  “It’s not just Alejo?”

  “Nope.”

  “So there is a thief?”

  “Can’t tell their occupation from their footprints, but there’s more than one of them, I’d say.” Deryn’s tone was calmly professional, but her underlying emotion was sharp, not with fear, but wariness, honed to a razor edge.

  “Any idea how many?”

  “No. The prints aren’t good enough to be sure. Could be two or three. Could be a whole gang.”

  “A gang? We can’t handle them on our own.”

  “Not if they’re outlaws.” Deryn stood, brushing the dirt off her hands. “It still might be a bunch of prospectors, but we can’t take the chance. We need to go back for support.”

  Alana faced out over the cliff face, preparing herself for the long walk back. The rocks below formed a flat-bottomed gorge—suspiciously flat, now that she stopped to look at it properly. The angle between floor and walls was geometrically precise. Then she spotted knots of rusted metal pipes and glittering spots that might be broken glass.

  “This isn’t a natural valley. Someone excavated it.”

  “Yes. I’d noticed.”

  “You didn’t mention it.”

  Deryn shrugged. “I didn’t think you’d be interested. You see lots of places like this on the Misery Trail.”

  “The demons made this valley?”

  “Maybe, or it might have been the Ancients in the Age of Wonders. They built roads like this. If you look, you’ll see patches of the black resin stuff they covered them with.”

  “People dug this out, just for a road?”

  “Yup. When a mountain got in the way they’d cut straight through it.”

  Alana was speechless. She had seen ruins of the Ancients before. Ellaye itself was built on the site of one such city, but nothing remained on the same scale as this. Suddenly, all the stories about the Age of Wonders, before the demons came, seemed less like fairy stories.

  Once humans had ruled the world, the Ancients. They had machines that could fly. They raised buildings so tall they scraped the sky. They sent messages around the world in an instant. No one was hungry. No one was cold.

  Then the demons came. Who knew from where or why? Nothing about them made sense. They destroyed human civilization, but was it war or a game to them?

  Alana’s ancestors had been the mortal face of the demons, avatars for their spirits, but had they been possessed humans, or were they like the windigos, the demons’ creations let loose? Not that it mattered now. The demons had gone, as suddenly and inexplicably as they had arrived, leaving a world in ruins. The demon-spawn descendants of their avatars were all that was left for the survivors to vent their anger on.

  Of course Deryn would not want anything to do with you. Can you blame her? Alana bit her lip. Maybe not, but neither is it fair for her to blame me.

  Alana turned away from the ancient roadway and started back down the trail, but after a couple of steps, she realized that Deryn was not following. She looked back. “What is it?”

  Deryn was standing close to the edge and staring up the valley, shading her eyes from the sun. “There’s something fluttering between two boulders up there. It looks like cloth. It’s certainly not part of the ruins.”

  “Do you want to check it out before we go?”

  “Why not? It’s only few
dozen yards. Won’t take long.”

  They reached the cliff top point directly above the object that Deryn had spotted and peered over the rim. Lying at the foot of the cliff was an elderly man. The only sign of movement was his cloak, scuffing in the breeze.

  “Does that look like Alejo to you?” Deryn asked.

  “Yes. Do you think he’s dead?”

  “Doesn’t look good, but we have to check, just in case. I’ll climb down.” Already Deryn was slipping off her backpack, then she turned and lowered herself over the edge.

  The cliff face was sheer but not smooth, offering plenty of handholds. After a moment of indecisiveness, Alana dropped her pack beside Deryn’s and followed. She agreed that Alejo’s chances were slim; even if he had survived the fall, three days lying out in the cold would surely be fatal, but as a healer, she was the one who should examine him.

  When she got to the bottom, Deryn was already crouched beside the motionless figure.

  “Is he dead?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He must have tripped and fallen.” Alana looked up at the top of the cliff. The path along the edge had been wide enough, but if Alejo had been distracted, or trying to make his way at night, one false step would have been all it required.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Dead people don’t usually trip. He was dumped over the edge.”

  “Why do you—”

  Deryn shifted back, giving Alana her first clear view of the body. Alejo’s throat gaped open in an obscene parody of a smile. The straight line could only be the work of a blade, rather than an injury from his fall.

  “Not just thieves. Murderers.”

  Deryn’s tone was calmly matter-of-fact. Her revulsion and disgust were tightly controlled. But of course, the Iron Wolf would have seen violent death many times before. Alana could not muster the same composure. She clamped a hand over her mouth, trying to hold back the nausea.

  Deryn stood. “We need to get back.”

  “Yup.”

  Alana turned away, trying to force her eyes to focus on the rocks before her, but her hands were shaking. She needed to get a grip on herself before she started to climb, else she might be joining Alejo.

  “Be still.”

  In her tense state, the sharp tone was more than Alana could take. She barely restrained a scream. “Wha—”

  Deryn clamped a hand over her mouth. “Hush.”

  At first Alana could hear nothing over the blood roaring in her ears, but then the faint sound of voices drifted down, and the crunch of footsteps.

  “Shit.” Deryn’s whisper was more breath than sound.

  A shout echoed like a whip crack between the rock faces.

  Deryn pulled her hand from Alana’s mouth. “They’ve seen our stuff up there.”

  “What do we do?”

  “Run like fuck.”

  Deryn grabbed Alana’s hand, hauling her away. They sped along the valley’s flat bottom in a frantic slalom between the fallen boulders and ripped-up slabs that littered the ancient highway. A riot of shouts broke out above them on the cliff-top path, and then a sharp hiss. Alana flinched as an arrow struck the ground in front of her.

  “They’re shooting.”

  “Yeah. Save your breath for running.”

  Still Deryn led the headlong flight. A second arrow hummed by, close enough that Alana felt the draft on her neck. Deryn made a sharp break to the right, veering toward a narrow gap in the valley wall on the opposite side to the one they had climbed down. The entrance was no more than fifteen feet across. Even more than the main valley, this showed the signs of mechanical excavation. The sides were steeper and smoother.

  Alana spared one backward glance. Five figures were climbing down into the valley behind them.

  “They’re following us.”

  “Then run faster.”

  But Alana did not think she could. The morning’s hike over rough ground had tired her out. Now her lungs were burning and her legs were turning to rubber. The surge of adrenaline could not carry her much farther. If it had not been for Deryn towing her along, she would have been overtaken by the gang already.

  The man-made ravine took a sharp bend to the left and then the right. The way split. Without hesitation Deryn took the smaller side branch. The sounds of pursuit echoed through the narrow chasm, bouncing off the perpendicular stone walls.

  “We have…get to trees…hide. Too exposed…” Deryn gasped the words.

  Alana glanced up. The rock faces on either side showed no sign of getting lower or less sheer. If anything, they were smoother than before, devoid of handholds, impossible to climb.

  They sped around another right-angled bend and came up short. The ravine widened out into a square, fifty feet across, like a room with an open roof, carved into the mountain. The walls were sheer and unbroken on all sides except for the one facing the entrance, where twin stone doors were carved into the rock face. There was no other way out.

  Shouts and the pounding footsteps were getting louder. The gang was very close, but Alana did not need sound to tell her this. A rising furor of savage excitement was bearing down on her, wild bloodlust and aggression, and through it all ran a yet more terrifying thread, a cold hunger, utterly without mercy. She had felt this bestial emotion once before, Alana realized, walking home from Eldora’s farm. How long had the gang been watching the citizens and farmers of Neupor?

  Deryn was still not giving up. She grabbed a brass handle on the door and threw her whole weight into pulling it. “Help me.”

  The stone door started to move, but they were out of time.

  “Freeze.”

  Alana tried to stand still, but her legs gave out and she sank to her knees, gasping. She twisted her head toward the entrance. Five outlaws had entered the rock chamber, four men and a woman. Two held drawn bows. The others had swords. They also were breathing heavily from the exertion. Their clothes were one step up from rags. Clearly they had been living rough for a while, yet the man in the center carried himself with an arrogant confidence that marked him as leader.

  He was tall and broad shouldered. His graying hair would once have been jet black. His face had crooked nose and an even more crooked smile. He was the center of the inhuman malice that Alana could sense. His followers were fired up with the excitement of the chase. Without doubt, they were dangerous criminals, but the leader was the one who would kill without guilt, motive, or hesitation, and enjoy doing it.

  His aura added to the sight of the bows pointing at them, turning Alana’s guts to water. The arrowheads drew her gaze, mesmerizing her with fear. For all the tales of battles and adventure she had heard, she had never realized quite how menacing it would feel. At her side, Deryn had released the brass handle and stood motionless, both palms pressed flat against the stone door. Alana could feel her mood, bitter, defiant, but also despairing. She realized the Iron Wolf did not have much hope for their chances. Deryn took another deep breath, then raised her hands in surrender and turned around.

  Shock ripped through Deryn, as sharp as it was unexpected. Alana was still dealing with the surprise when, without warning, Deryn dropped, lunging left. Alana saw Deryn’s hand brush her calf as she rolled. Bowstrings twanged, but the archers were too slow and the arrows ricocheted off the stone door, missing their target. Deryn’s momentum took her over in a roll and then up onto one knee. Her hand shot out and Alana caught the flash of metal. She turned her head, following the trajectory.

  The gang leader was also moving, diving sideways. A metal object hit the wall behind where he had been standing and clattered to the ground. A dagger. Meanwhile, one of the gang was fumbling for another arrow, and the other three were charging forward, toward Deryn. They arrived in a storm of blows, knocking her down.

  The gang leader had landed on the ground. His malice and self-assurance had been blown away by the wave of alarm, but now they slithered back into place as, grinning, he hoisted himself to his feet.The
fighting was over, while Alana was still trying to catch up with what had happened and how it started.

  No. Not quite over. Deryn was the focus of a frenzied attack. Three outlaws were laying into her with their feet, stamping and kicking. Deryn was curled on the ground, arms wrapped around her head. Alana was still on her knees, a yard or more away. Without bothering to rise, she threw herself forward, desperate to help. The ankle of one outlaw was just beyond her grasp, but if she could trip him—

  “Hold on, there.” The gang leader’s voice was not loud, but it held the surety of someone who does not need to shout to be confident of obedience.

  All movement stopped, apart from the woman with the bow, who completed the action of nocking a new arrow on the string. In the sudden calm, the leader strolled forward, dusting grit from the seat of his pants. At his nod, his followers reached down and dragged Deryn to her feet. She looked dazed. Blood tricked down the side of her face and a raw graze marked her chin.

  “You know, I don’t like people throwing knives at me.” The leader’s voice was quietly conversational. Then he drew back his fist and slammed it into Deryn’s stomach, twice. His next blow backhanded her across the face.

  Alana started to scramble to her feet, but a movement from the archer stopped her. The arrow was aimed straight at her heart and Alana did not have the speed to avoid it. All she could do was watch.

  The feral excitement from the gang was monstrous, sickening. Each grunt and gasp from Deryn added a fresh surge of satisfaction. Never had Alana wanted so much to block out the emotions of others.

  At last the leader stepped back. The outlaws holding Deryn released her, and she collapsed senseless to the ground, still and silent.

  “Say, boss, isn’t she the one who tracked us onto the mountain before? The one we got with the rockfall?”

  “Could be. We’ll have to make sure she doesn’t interrupt our lamb barbecue again.” The leader turned to the stone door while nonchalantly rubbing his knuckles. “Right, now. What have we here?”

  “We gonna open it, boss?”