Shadowspawn (Thieves' World Book 4)

by Andrew J Offutt

  Oh, Packhorse, he thought, and ran across the enclosure to kick down a pole. Now all he had to do was herd or lead all seven horses out of here!

  He was charging back to get himself into a saddle, any saddle, when he saw the two men. Damned if the damned fools hadn’t gone and run in the direction opposite the onager’s noise! Straight toward Shink’s death-scream and Notable’s caterwauling!

  They weren’t supposed to do that, Hanse thought, if he thought at all, and slammed a knife at Quesh, and missed, and lost the knife into the dark woods beyond the oncoming Tejanit with the great big sword.

  For some reason, Hanse yanked out the Ilbarsi knife, almost sword-long, rather than another knife or throwing star.

  What am I do-ing, he thought, insofar as he thought at all, and half crouched to parry Quesh’s streaking cut at him with a loud skirling clash of steel blades. As if instinctively he sort of danced to one side, at the same time half swinging as if he’d been doing this all his life. He surprised himself still more by chopping into the other man’s upper leg.

  At the same instant another horripilatingly dreadful noise tore the air wide open. Poor Aksar’s scream came soon after, as a few too many pounds of ferocious cat hurtled through the air to impact his chest with all four paws and about eighty claws. From there it climbed swiftly and, even while twitching one hind leg impatiently against the fabric that entrapped one claw, began hungrily chewing away at Aksar’s chin. A howling Aksar let go his sword to flail at the cat. He also turned and started running. Notable remained where he was, chewing and disproving every savant who said that “domestic” cats could not growl. He did not let go until Aksar ran into one of the horizontal poles and doubled almost all the way over it with a great outgushing of breath.

  Notable dropped free, regathered himself, and pounced onto the man’s back. Relentlessly he gave the breathless Tejanit something else to think about.

  “Sorry Quesh,” Shadowspawn said to the man writhing on the ground. “Believe it or not, I never meant to hurt you. When you buy a wooden leg and new horse with my silver, you can decide whether stealing from Shadowspawn was worth it.

  “Notable! Come on, let’s get somewhere else, fast. We have no guarantee that four is all the Tejana there are!”

  Still nervous about all the noise, the horses were milling aimlessly. Hanse made sure that the one he mounted was Quesh’s grey. Quesh was the Tejana leader, and the other horses might be inclined to follow his. Horses tended to do that, anyhow. Like aimlessly milling and thought-free electorates, they were always anxious to find someone who would tell them just what to do while pretending he knew where he was taking them.

  He jiggled, kicked his heels, clicked, and whistled. The grey showed no particular inclination to head for the hole his rider had made in the enclosure. Then Hanse remembered the last word he had heard from Quesh, out on the desert.

  “Haiya!” he called.

  Only the saddle’s high cantle saved him from going right off the horse backward when the wiry animal dug in its haunches and bolted ahead. It charged toward the opening Hanse had made in the enclosure as if launched from a ballista or stung simultaneously on the hindquarters by a dozen hornets. Hanse hung on.

  The horse bucketed out of the enclosure and onto a trail there. It wound, but Hanse was too busy hanging on just then to give thought to the cleverness of Tejana planning; from its other end, a trail that wound among the trees would not reveal anything about its destination. Hanse was sure that he could hear hooves pounding along behind him but dared not look around. He was completely occupied with the business of hanging on. He hoped with sincerity that Notable wasn’t aground, or at least not in proximity to those twenty-four stomping hooves.

  Moving fast, the grey emerged from the trees onto the grassy area that lay between the junkgrass strip and the desert. Strong exertion on the part of Shadowspawn persuaded the animal to turn left, eastward.

  “You could slow down now, horse, damn it!”

  The grey didn’t know those words and apparently had an iron mouth and will to match. It kept right on challenging the wind. Making sure he had a good grip on reins and the saddle’s pommel, Hanse turned partway around. He smiled. The other horses were following! Saddled, bridled, manes and tails streaming in their own wind, they galumphed along as if in chase.

  He didn’t see the man over at the treeline to his left, but certainly heard the fellow bawl out something in the Tejana tongue. It must have been another command, because instantly the grey swerved that way, bearing Hanse at speed toward the kneeling man just at the edge of the trees. Twel was levelling his crossbow and sighting along the bolt as if he had all the time in the world. Apparently the shock of all the noise had not only awakened the fourth Tejanit, but sobered him as well.

  Hanse dragged at the reins while trying to make himself small atop the horse bearing him speedily toward disaster. “Right, damn it, turn right! Come on, horse! He can’t miss!”

  That was true. Twel could not miss. Hanse was dead. Except that it was then he discovered the true reason why Enas was necessary to this mission and its survival, and the survival of Shadowspawn. The onager broke from the trees and bushes in a blind charge that took him right over the top of Twel. Enas seemed not to notice and certainly didn’t curb his braying. Twel’s cry was lost amid that far louder noise.

  The crossbow discharged. Hanse heard the keening whissssh of the quarrel and gritted his teeth. He neither saw the bolt nor felt it; it had gone wild as Twel was pounded down. At that moment the grey horse under Hanse elected to pay attention to his rider’s sawing on the rightward rein. He turned away from the forest again and streaked eastward.

  “Enas! Good old Enas! Attaboy Dumb-ass! This way!” Hanse glanced back. “Be careful you don’t get run over by my herd of horses!”

  Enas came on the run, ears back and tail flowing. So came the other six horses. So did Notable. The cat’s speed was incredible. Near Enas well to Hanse’s left, he bounded in long crouch-and-launch leaps that resembled nothing more than a jungle cat of prey. He essayed a long leap onto the back of a grass-eater, too, but not as predator.

  Enas sucked in a loud indrawn whistle and blasted that breath out in a louder hawwww, when Notable landed on his back.

  Notable didn’t make a sound; he was too busy crouching to hang on. Hanse could only hope that what he was hanging onto were the blanket and the pad on the onager’s back, not Enas himself.

  *

  It occurred to Shadowspawn that he could probably stroll right into the Tejana camp and collect his stolen property and who knew what else, now. Of course that might not be wise; Twel might be capable of winding up for another shot, and Aksar might already have done so. Too, all the silver might well be on the person of Quesh. Chances were excellent that he would not fancy handing it over, and Hanse could not see himself killing the wounded man for it.

  Of course right now all of this thinking was pissin’ against the wind, as the saying had it back in the Maze that had been his home.

  The triumphant Shadowspawn had succeeded in gaining some control of the direction of his mount’s movement, but not of its velocity Nor did dear old Iron-mouth seem to have any intention of stopping this side of the edge of the world. Several minutes passed, and the Tejana horse continued to ignore strong tugs on the reins.

  “I wish I’d heard the Tejana word for stop or slow down,” Hanse muttered, worse than exasperated. “If this idiot just gallops until he tires, Mignue may be a hundred miles back! I guess I don’t dare say ‘mip,’ and surely it’s nothing so simple as ‘whoa!’”

  The grey dug in all four hooves. That arrested his momentum very effectively and almost instantly; the horse literally skidded to a stop. Nothing arrested his rider’s momentum until he hit the ground six or so feet in front of the skidding animal.

  “Hanse? Hanse? Is that you, darling? Hanse!”

  Hanse writhed, turned partway over, and looked up at a big equine chest, grey. “Nice stop,” he mu
ttered. “Now mip, damn it. Mignue? I — I’m all right, I think. I, ah, did some horse-trading.” He sat up, groaned as a vertebra or two reluctantly went back where vertebrae belonged, and blew out his breath. Then: “Mignue? What’re you doing way down here? Blast it woman — did you follow me after all?”

  She came hurrying toward him, out into the wan moonlight from the clump of blackberry bushes. “I did not! This is exactly where you left me, just hours ago! I’ve been worried just sick, too. I wanted to follow, believe me! You — oh! Look at all the horses!”

  The other animals were just arriving. Six horses and an onager. Wearing a cat on his back.

  Hanse thought about that, and what Mignureal had just said.

  “Mignue, we have just traded our silver for several horses, and that includes one faster than a streetgirl’s pick-up back in the Maze!”

  *

  Enas the onager was a hero. Enas would merely accompany them now, bearing no weight. Hanse arranged their packs on the broader back of a Tejana horse. Meanwhile, as Mignureal delightedly supervised the giving of a bowl of beer to the heroic Notable, Hanse did some thinking.

  He was at once proud of what he had accomplished and nervous about what he had done. He was even more nervous about the possibility of the discovery of those deeds by other Tejana. The main group or tribe or whatever it was, for instance.

  Suppose they found the raided camp, found one Tejanit dead and three damaged, and all the horses gone; stolen by a foreigner or unbeliever or whatever they might term anyone un-Tejanish. A body of them might be hearing out a painfully gasping Quesh right now, ready to track the horses east, swords ready in strong sun-darkened hands…

  Still quivery with adrenaline and full of the elation of triumph besides, Hanse felt no weariness. If Mignureal did, she did not mention it when he told her they had better move, right now.

  “Where?”

  Along the road that led through the forest, he told her, busy linking horses with long lead-lines formed by straightening their bridles. To hell with Blackie. Hanse would ride the faster than fast grey. He knew how to make him go; the horse responded to rein-signals for directional guidance; and now Hanse had proven he could make the beast stop, too.

  Mignureal found their saddlebag. It was hanging from one of the beaded Tejana saddles. In the dark and his haste, Hanse had not even noticed.

  “Hanse! It moved!”

  “Get away from it!” he snapped, hurrying to her with the Ilbarsi blade in his hand. Then he saw that it was securely closed. He took up a ready stance. “All right — take it off the saddle and throw it on the ground. Then stand away, Mignue. I’m going to put this blade through it!”

  She detached the cracked old bag from the saddle of a wiry brown horse. She also hung onto it until she persuaded Hanse to let her open it, with great care, while he stood ready. Reluctantly and with misgivings, he gave in. Then he saw it move.

  “Sorcery,” he muttered, as forlornly as darkly. Hopefully he added, “Or maybe only a deadly serpent.” He stood ready, long blade poised. “Mignue! Be careful. Stand a little to the left. There. All right. Slowly, now…”

  As Mignureal opened the bag it distinctly said “mew,” in a tiny voice. Then the flap was back and Mignureal was laughing.

  “Oh Hanse look! No sorcery — just a darling ‘draggled little kitty.” As she spoke she drew it forth: a truly bedraggled, homely, scrawny she-cat whose coat contained no fewer than six colours and hues. “A S’danzo kitty!” Mignureal laughed in true merriment, holding the little cat up in both hands and nuzzling it with her cheek.

  An embarrassed black-clad hero sheathed his weapon. He raised his eyebrows when he noticed Notable. The red cat stood at Mignureal’s feet, gazing fascinatedly up at her find. His tail wasn’t lashing; it was drawing lazy pictures in the air.

  Shaking his head in incomprehension, Hanse bent to pick up the bag and sling it into the blackberry bushes. He arrested the movement when he heard the clink of silver against silver. Eagerly he peered within.

  “Hmp. Hardly a fair trade! The Tejana made off with fifty or eighty pieces of silver and left us that pitiful excuse for a cat and eleven coins.”

  “It’s better than none at all — and we have our horses and theirs too, my hero! But oh Hanse, don’t talk bad about her; you know kitties are sensitive!”

  “Cats?” He stared at her. “Sensitive?”

  “Mraowrr.”

  “Oh. Right. True, Notable old friend, but you’re different. That’s just a mangy-looking little beastie with a rumply coat.”

  “Hanse!” Mignureal said in an accusing tone. “They just haven’t fed her decently! You’ll see how she fills out when we’ve fed her and — ”

  “Oh, Ils’ beard, no! You mean to adopt that mangy beast? Mignue…we’re starting to resemble a troupe of traveling performers!”

  She looked at him, her eyes all wide and innocent. “Well, I don’t agree, but even if it’s true, what’s wrong with that? We can’t just leave her, Hanse. She’ll — she’ll die! All alone, with that forest full of who knows what beasts and monsters!”

  Hanse looked into the darkness of the woods. “Will you stop that? We’re about to ride into that forest! Come to think, we’d better be about it, too. Mignue: onto your horse. All right all right, I’ll hold it. Just get into that saddle!”

  “Her.” She set the cat on the ground and stepped into Hanse’s hands. “Her, darling. Not it.”

  “Stop calling me darling when you’re correcting me and talking me into something I don’t want to do. There. Now what do we do with it — her, her! Put ‘er back in the saddlebag?”

  “I can carry her while I ride…”

  “No.”

  Mignureal caught the tone of that. Besides, she had already realized that her proposal was not a good idea. “Yes. Back into that nasty old bag, then, and hand it here. I’ll keep it right here in front of me.”

  Hanse transferred four coins from the saddlebag into his own belt-pouch. He handed Mignureal four others: “Here, slip these into your bosom.”

  Her voice was plaintive: “I’m full of coins there already, Hanse!”

  Staring darkly, he continued to proffer the four silver pieces. Mignureal sighed and stowed them away in her treasure chest. Hanse turned to the packhorse and slipped the remaining three into the first of their packs that came to hand. Battening it, he pushed the sorry excuse for a calico cat into the leathern bag. It emitted a tiny-voiced kitten-sound as he handed it up to Mignureal.

  There’s something odd about those eleven coins, Hanse was thinking even as he dragged himself up into the saddle of the big grey.

  “All right, horse, let’s go.” He loosened and jiggled the reins at the same time as he twitched his heels into the beast’s lean sides.

  Old Iron-mouth did not move.

  Oh, damn it. If I say ‘Haiya’ we go off like an arrow from a bow. How do I persuade this motherless son to go at a walk?

  Tail high, Notable paced around to face the grey horse. Looking quite small now in contrast, the red cat stared. The horse looked down. He tugged at the rein. Swallowing nervously, Hanse eased his grip. The grey lowered its head. He and Notable stared at each other, then touched noses. The horse lifted its head. Notable paced leisurely around, looked up at Hanse, and crouched.

  Oh, no. “Notable, no, don’t do th — ”

  The moment Notable had pounced up behind Hanse, their mount moved forward at a sedate walk, heading for the road leading into the forest.

  There’s something odd about that cat, Hanse thought, even as he glanced back to be sure that Mignureal and the longish coffle of horses were following. They were following. The cavalcade paced into the woods.

  As they rode among the trees Shadowspawn strove to remain alert and wary and succeeded only in being weary. Sunset was hours in the past. Midnight had come and gone. He’d had a full day and a fuller night. It had caught up to him now, even while he wanted to be on the alert for more Tejana or whatever
animals the inky forest might harbour. Excitement and adrenaline had worn off, to leave him drooping.

  At the same time, it was hard to set his mind to anything besides the genuine strangeness of the old saddlebag and its new contents. A diminutive, pitiful looking cat and eleven coins! A small calico cat and eleven pieces of silver.

  How?

  Why?

  Was there something strange about the coins, stamped with the head of the Emperor of Ranke?

  For the matter of that, even in his haste how could he have overlooked the bag swinging from the saddle he had picked up, carried, thrown over a horse, and cinched in place?

  Obviously it was inexplicable and so not worth thinking about. And so of course both he and Mignureal thought about little else. They rode in silence along a wide path of a “road” that barely accommodated two horses abreast, with any comfort. They other animals strung out behind them.

  More hours passed and they heard nothing untoward. Nor did they see anything at all except trees and bushes and shadows, all grey or black. It was not in Hanse’s nature, but at last he was compelled to say it:

  “Mignue…I can’t ride anymore. I’ve heard of sleeping in the saddle, and it sounds good. But I keep jerking awake just as I’m starting to fall off this horse! We’d better stop for some rest and assume the horses will wake us if — if we need to wake.”

  “We just passed that clear area on the right,” she said, thinking that he must have been drowsing and had missed it. “Just a few paces back. Let’s call that home for the rest of the night.” And day; she added mentally.

  They did. Somehow Hanse dragged himself around the semi-circular clearing, staying awake to do what had to be done. They removed their packs from that horse and made sure he and the others were tethered but had some freedom of movement. When that was done, Mignureal asked him if he wanted something to eat. Receiving no answer, she turned to see what was the matter. She did not have to examine him at any length to discover that he was asleep.

  She smiled down at him, putting her head on one side as she gazed at the sprawled Shadowspawn, still in his working clothes. She wanted to do something for him, but knew he needed no cover. At last she lay down beside him in her clothing, on the grass.