The Iron Hound

by Tim Akers

  “No,” Gwen said. “There’s no point in it. Either we’ve found it or we haven’t. You’ll need to save your energy for the casting.” Cahl didn’t answer, but he grunted again and hobbled down the hill. Noel watched him go for a moment, then visibly gathered her will and followed.

  “What are we looking for?” Gwen asked as they entered the village. “Would it be the doma? The meeting hall? Somewhere in the surrounding fields?”

  “It doesn’t look as if this place rated a doma,” Noel said, glancing around. She was right. There were only a few buildings, chief among them a meeting hall of fitted staves, along with an empty silo and three other smaller structures, apparently houses. “If it’s not in one of the buildings, we’ll have to tromp around looking for the graveyard or something.”

  “We won’t have time for that,” Gwen said. She glanced back the way they had come. The fire was close and getting closer, crashing through the trees like a bull. Among the flames, the voice of the feral god echoed, and the sky was crowned in lightning that flickered between the ash clouds. She turned to Noel. “Can you do something about that? You’re of the tribe of fire, aren’t you?”

  “I’ve been wicking off the flame’s power since it started, but there’s only so much I can do,” Noel said.

  “Well…” Gwen grimaced, looking around the village. “…I’ve never fancied burning to death. If it gets to us, can you make it quick? I’d rather not smell my own flesh roasting.”

  “Yes, that is within my power,” Noel said. “You will feel nothing.”

  “Enough of that talk,” Cahl said. “Search.”

  They split up. Gwen went straight to the meeting hall, while the others searched the outbuildings. This place had been empty for a long time. The hall was empty, the stones of its fire pit scattered, the ashes blown across the floor, and the roof had leaked. But Gwen could find nothing of pagan gods or ancient power.

  She paused in the middle of the room and tried to clear her thoughts. She wasn’t sure how Cahl did it when he sensed the ley lines, so she just tried to think positive thoughts and let herself drift. She stretched her soul thin, to taste the air.

  Smoke. Smoke, and she was hungry, and whatever tiny part of her wasn’t hungry and choked with wood fire was angry at Folam and the pagans and Sophie Halverdt, and she missed her parents. And her brother, and all those dead Suhdrins who had done nothing but woken up in Greenhall on the day a god decided to tear their city apart.

  Before she knew it, Gwen was crying, great heaving gasps and shuddering tears that smeared down her face. She curled into a ball, balanced on her heels, arms wrapped around her knees and face buried. She cried and howled and retched out the smoke and bile that had been choking her heart ever since her parents died.

  There was so much pain.

  So much, and Gwen found it all.

  When she was done, when the pain had bled out onto the floor, not enough but as much as she could bear to let go of right now, Gwen stood and walked out of the meeting hall. Out into the inferno. Cahl was waiting for her.

  “We found it,” he said, then he looked closely. “Are you okay?”

  “Fucking great,” she said. “Show me.”

  Noel was in the silo. The wide doors had fallen off their rotten hinges. The walls were wood, but the pillars that held up the roof were stone. Stone, and roughly hewn, with a few wooden columns to complete the structure. Cahl ran a hand across the face of one of the stone pillars, wiping away decades of chaff. There were runes beneath.

  The smoke was so dense in the air that it resembled a thick, dark fog. Breathing became more difficult by the minute.

  “A place of the gods, in a silo of grain,” Gwen said. “Who would have thought?”

  “Whoever built this place knew what they were doing,” Cahl said. “Knew what they were hiding. If they kept it filled, the inquisition would never find what lay behind these walls.” He dusted off his hands, peering at the markings. “Maybe the villagers forgot, and thought nothing of their silo, and what it contained.”

  “Where does it go?” Gwen asked. “Will we be able to use it?”

  “Away. It goes away,” Noel said. “That’s all that matters now.”

  “Enough of the old bindings remained for me to be able to find it,” Cahl said. He went to the next pillar, and the next, cleaning them and reading the runes beneath. “We should be able to activate it.”

  “But where does it go?” Gwen asked again. “I don’t want to surface in the middle of Heartsbridge or, gods forbid, the Fen Gate.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Cahl said, agreeing with Noel. “If we stay here we’ll be cinders by morning.” He threw off his cloak and started moving faster around the hidden henge, whispering to the stones and drawing in the dirt of the floor. “Noel, I will need whatever power you can provide. There is too little stone in this ground for me to act alone.”

  “Gwen should do it,” Noel said. “If she’s able. All I have is the flame, and if I draw it…”

  “Gwen doesn’t know how to control her spirit,” Cahl snapped. “It has to be you.”

  “But…”

  “I know what I’m asking, witch,” Cahl said calming. “Prepare yourself. I will let you know when I am ready.”

  Noel bowed her head, but drew her cloak tight around her shoulders and went to stand in the doorway, looking out. Cahl began working more frantically behind her. In the distance, the roar of the forest fire grew louder.

  “What can I do?” Gwen asked. They both ignored her, though, so she folded herself to the ground in the center of the room.

  “Cahl,” Noel called from the doorway. “Soon.”

  “Yes, soon.” The pillars were clear, and a steady hum vibrated through the ground. “I have only to…”

  “No,” Noel said. “I can not hold this any longer. It is here.” The witch flinched back, and the light outside grew much brighter, a stark red and black that reflected off of the thickening smoke and washed out all other color. “We must go now.”

  “It’s not quite ready,” Cahl said. “You must hold it for a moment longer.”

  “That will not happen,” Noel said. Gwen stood and went to stand beside her. The ridgeline they had crossed moments earlier was a wall of fire. The flames washed around the village, consuming the forest that surrounded them, but it had not yet found its way to the buildings. Noel glanced at Gwen. Her face was pinched tight, the stress clear on the witch’s face.

  “Cahl!” Gwen shouted. “She’s not kidding. This has to happen, now, or we’re dead.”

  “If we go without properly aligning…”

  “Now!” Noel howled. Sweat rolled down her face, and when she opened her mouth to speak, glowing red sparks danced along her teeth. She turned to look at Gwen, pleading, terror in her eyes. “I can not hold it. I can not!”

  Suddenly flame roared out of the witch’s mouth. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and a cloak of fire rose from her skin. Then Noel went limp. Like a windchime cut from the branch, she fell.

  Gwen grabbed her, not thinking about the spirit that flowed through her veins. The flames wrapped around her. The pain hesitated for a second, then came rushing through. She screamed, but dragged Noel inside the henge. Cahl shouted something, but Gwen couldn’t hear him over the blood thrumming through her head. She collapsed, and Noel rolled away from her.

  The meeting hall boomed as the forest fire consumed it. The thousand staves that made up its walls cracked and split, the roof erupting in a twisting lash of cinders and smoke. The first sparks danced across the interior walls. Bright light shone between the cracks in the roof. Smoke rolled through the door, crawling up the walls to form a billowing cloud above them. It was over. The spirit of storm and fire had caught up to them.

  Noel opened her mouth, and the tongue of flame speared out of her. It danced into the air, then bent and flowed gracefully to each of the five pillars of the henge. Cahl began chanting, weaving the fire’s power into the stones. Old runes began to g
low, the dust sizzling off the rock. Part of the silo wall collapsed, showering them in embers.

  Gwen’s clothes began to burn. The smoke stung her eyes and cut holes in her lungs with each painful breath. She covered her mouth and huddled next to Noel. The witch’s eyes and mouth were open, but she was breathing in short, sharp gasps that rattled her chest. Cahl stood among the flames, drawing them together, reaching out into the everic realm, seeking the path that would save them.

  The silo collapsed with a crash. The roof fell in, pouring hot cinders down on the henge. The stones cracked with the heat, and the sound was like a thunderclap. The mad god howled in the sky above, lightning wreathing his head, his voice shaking through flame and ember until it seemed to fill the whole world.

  45

  SORCHA AND THE priestess sat on a hill, their light mingling with the stars. The two had spent much time together since their flight from the Fen Gate. Heads bowed close, whispering, hands on the other’s arm as they turned away from the others. Malcolm watched from the pickets. Sir Doone approached him.

  “They should come in soon,” she said. “If nothing else, that light will draw attention.”

  “I will speak to them,” Malcolm said. He took a step, but Doone grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

  “No,” she said. “No. Let me. The lady…”

  “Is still my wife,” Malcolm said, but he made no move. Doone waited a heartbeat then shook her head.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Doone said. “They’ve made their own way down.”

  The priestess led the way, Lady Sorcha trailing just behind, their fingers entwined. Sorcha smiled at Malcolm as she approached the picket.

  “Husband,” she said. “You look concerned.”

  “It worries me when you go unguarded,” he said. “These lands are no longer friendly to Tenerran blood.”

  “The guards are for you, Malcolm. For your peace of mind. I am safe enough without them,” Sorcha said. “Have I not proven that by now?”

  “The less you draw on that spirit, the more of you that remains,” Malcolm said. “Let my steel protect you, when steel is all that is needed.”

  Sorcha smiled. “You are very determined, Houndhallow. It’s admirable.” She patted Malcolm on the cheek, then slipped by, nodding to Doone as she passed. The knight muttered her farewell to Malcolm and followed Sorcha into the camp. He watched them go, frowning.

  “She is the same woman, Houndhallow,” Catrin said, as if reading his mind. “Nothing about her has changed.”

  “Nothing?” Malcolm asked. “You are wrong, priestess. I remember the girl I married, the mother to my children, the wife of my heart. That girl did not glow beneath her skin, or summon the gods of water, or kill a column of Suhdrin knights.”

  “Nor did she have wrinkles around her eyes, or hands that ached in the rain, and her hair was golden, not gray. Or had you not noticed those changes, my lord?”

  “I… that’s not…”

  “And still you love her. Or has that love waned because age has touched her skin, and bent her hands?” Catrin asked. “Is the girl you married still behind those wrinkled eyes?”

  Malcolm sighed. “That is different. Of course she’s the same woman, but those things are natural. They’re expected.”

  “You speak as if you’re the same man she married. Should the girl who fell in love with the hero of Bassing’s Ferry find another, when the boy she married becomes a grumpy old man, more concerned with his title than he is with his son?” Catrin took Malcolm’s hand. His knuckles were knotted with age, the skin of his palms as rough as a saddle, scarred, ruined. “These are not the hands that slipped against hers on her wedding night. Why should the man be any better?”

  Malcolm snatched his hand free. “You should watch what you say, child. You have no place.”

  “Don’t I? You are cold to her, not because of age or reason, but because you fear she has offended the church. Not by her actions, but because of what she is. Well,” Catrin took his hand again, clasping it in both of her own, “I speak for the church, or for a part of it, and I say that she is the same woman. She is still your wife. Just as you are still her husband.”

  “You speak as though we have changed equally, she and I. Time changes us, yes,” Malcolm said sharply. “And war, and hatred, and love, but the god inside her… that is nothing to do with me. That is different. That is something I can not overcome with memories and pleasant thoughts.”

  Catrin drew back, dropping Malcolm’s hand. Her face grew stern.

  “You are right, Malcolm,” she said. “There is no god in you. And there won’t be, as long as you hold on to that difference.”

  * * *

  Without tents and proper supplies, the Tenerran camp was little more than a circle of beaten down grass and dying fires. Malcolm lay near the center, hands folded on his chest, staring up at the stars. Catrin’s words tumbled through his head.

  “Should the girl who fell in love with the hero of Bassing’s Ferry find another, when the boy she married becomes a grumpy old man?”

  They didn’t understand. That was the problem. Sorcha and Ian and the priestess, they didn’t understand what it took to be lord of a duchy. Not just a duke, but the duke most trusted in both Suhdra and Tener, the man who had joined the countries together against the Reavers, hero of countless battles and true servant of the celestial church. The pressures he faced, the standard to which he was held, both by his fellow lords but also by the priests, the inquisition, the gods themselves… they could never understand.

  Catrin especially. A child, that one. She was just a child. How could she know anything about him?

  He turned angrily, curling up on his shoulder. Sorcha lay across from him, close, yet far enough away to be distant. She rested so peacefully. Light crawled through her veins like quicksilver, a slow brilliance that was almost beautiful. No. It was beautiful. She was beautiful.

  What had he done, pushing her away? Malcolm told himself that it was best, that the church would not tolerate a duchess of Tener twisted up with pagan magic. He had hidden her away to protect her from the inquisition.

  But had he? Had he made a mistake with her?

  Had he made a mistake with Ian?

  As he looked over his wife’s face, with the gentle glow of her blood leaking up like mist off a morning pond, he noticed another radiance. Subtle at first, it mingled with her light, but the colors were somehow… different. Strange, Malcolm thought. Then he heard a shout from the other side of the camp, and sat bolt upright.

  Suddenly the forest beyond the camp was shot through with brilliant light. It looked like sunrise seen through stained glass, beams of rainbow reflected off of twisting fog. The trees shivered and the ground shook. Malcolm jumped up. Without thinking, he put himself between Sorcha and the light.

  “You nearly stepped on me,” Sorcha said from underfoot.

  “Apologies, my love,” Malcolm said.

  She stood and looked around, not just at the light but at their camp, the sky, the dark forest that surrounded them. She put a hand on Malcolm’s shoulder.

  “Get the priestess,” she said, “and then run.”

  Then she was gone, calling to the knights of Malcolm’s company. They were slow to respond, sluggish to answer her call to arms. Those who had served as Sorcha’s guard formed a loose circle around her. Frair Catrin stood beside her, and the two women spoke quickly in low tones.

  “Everyone, form up,” Malcolm snapped. The dim light of the remaining campfires could not compete with the new illumination. His knights squinted and peered into the distance, trying to track whatever threat might have appeared. “Stop staring and arm up, you idiots!” he bellowed. “The Hound! The hallow!”

  That roused them. A column formed at his side, most of them unarmored, a few still rubbing sleep from their eyes. It was an embarrassment.

  “Oh, there,” Sir Harrow said. “I see it now. It’s quite pretty.”

  “Stop admiring and prepare to fight,�
�� Malcolm said.

  “There will be no fight,” Sorcha called to him. “The calendar is wrong. We approach the low point of Lady Strife’s power.”

  “We should run,” Catrin said to her. “I can do nothing to protect you. Even if I were trained as a vow knight, which I am not.”

  “And you, wife?” Malcolm asked.

  “Not enough,” she said. “It is not of the river. It is… gods know what this thing is, but it does not answer to my call.”

  “Then stop calling it,” Malcolm said. “Before you catch its attention. Everyone, gather your things and make for the horses. Make sure you save the waterskins, and whatever food remains. Gods know how long we’ll be in the saddle.” Better to be prepared for a long pursuit. “But be quick about it. If it notices us…”

  “It already has,” Catrin said urgently. “We should go now.”

  There was motion in the distance, among the trees. Along the road to the north the forest rose up and knit itself together, forming into a dome. While they watched a spinning, crystalline light coalesced over the dome, then dove inside. Brilliant colors beamed out of it—reds and blues and an amber glow that rivaled the finest gems. It was like an explosion of jewelry in the murky night.

  The dome wrinkled and started to move, making and unmaking itself as it walked, caterpillar slow, toward them. It seemed to absorb the forest as it came, leaving the shivering remains of trees in its wake.

  It sped up until it was moving fast. Crossing the road it turned, and started to roll like a ball along the forest’s verge in their direction. Malcolm grabbed his pack and a few provisions, then ran to the horses. His mount was unsaddled, but there was no time. He threw his leg up, twisted his fingers into the beast’s mane, and gave her spurs.

  He nearly tumbled off the back as the destrier bolted forward. After a few terrifying moments of bouncing, the animal slowed and Malcolm was able to look around. Most of the company rode beside him, with Catrin and Sorcha leading the way. Sorcha looked completely comfortable on her unsaddled mount, but the rest of the riders swayed alarmingly, hanging on for dear life.