The Beasts of Grimheart

by Kieran Larwood

  But the bard has stopped, for the moment, and is smacking his lips in a very exaggerated manner. Right about now is when he usually gets presented with a flagon of mead or a mug of ale. A cup of tea at the very least.

  ‘Would you like something to drink?’ Sythica asks, finally taking the hint.

  ‘Oh yes, please,’ says the bard. ‘If you would be so kind.’

  The Mother Superior flicks an ear at one of the initiates, who scurries off and comes back with a glass of water. The bard holds it up to the light and looks at it, an eyebrow raised in disappointment.

  When it is clear he isn’t going to get anything better, he takes a few gulps then wipes his mouth with the back of his sleeve.

  ‘I take it this is the part of the story that the Golden Brook rabbits objected to?’ Sythica asks as the initiate takes the bard’s glass away from him.

  ‘Part of it, yes,’ says the bard. ‘Although it does get worse.’

  ‘And was this Vetch already the chieftain when you told the tale?’

  ‘No. No he wasn’t,’ says the bard. His jaw is clenched, as if to say that he would have been doing something else to Vetch, should he have seen him, rather than telling stories. Something involving a big stick and improvised dental work.

  ‘But obviously some rabbits descended from him,’ says Sythica. ‘To have taken it so personally.’

  ‘His great-nephew, I believe,’ says the bard. ‘The whole warren was living under the delusion that he was some kind of hero. “Vetch the Valorous” they called him.’

  ‘And you decided to set them straight.’

  ‘As I said to my apprentice just this morning,’ says the bard, ‘some stories are told to tell the truth. I thought they deserved to hear it.’

  ‘Of all the weapons known to rabbit,’ says Sythica, ‘the truth can be the most deadly. Is there much more of the tale to come?’

  For one horrible moment, Rue thinks she might tell the bard to finish right there. He almost jumps from his bench to object, but the bard is smiling his showman’s smile again.

  ‘Quite a bit,’ he says, bowing. ‘Including a guest appearance by members of your wonderful order. Are you not enjoying it?’

  Sythica blinks once or twice but the eyes behind the bone and silver mask don’t betray the slightest bit of emotion.

  ‘Oh yes,’ she says. ‘We are enjoying it immensely, aren’t we, sisters?’

  As one, the bonedancers nod their heads then resume their stone-like poses. Could have fooled me, thinks the bard, trying to remember a worse crowd. He finds he can’t, maybe because most other audiences haven’t listened with the express purpose of deciding whether or not to kill him.

  ‘In that case,’ he says, ‘I shall continue.’

  Rue untwists his ears and sits back, ready to enter the depths of Grimheart forest again.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Beast

  They ran though the dark forest, in and out of trees, paths forgotten.

  Roots trapped their feet, branches whipped at their ears. Trunks of pine and spruce loomed out of nowhere. They bounced and crashed off them, stumbling in the dark, going deeper and deeper into the wild, knotted core of Grimheart forest.

  All the while they could hear, beneath the rattling and panting of their own breath, the snapping branches and rustling leaves behind them. Vetch was still coming: desperate, furious. He had no choice now but to kill them and take the Gifts. Podkin and Paz both knew it. It was life or death and there was nobody around to help them.

  They stopped for a few seconds to rest their bruised legs and catch their breath. Pook was mewling and clinging tight to Paz’s neck. Carrying him while running had made her back muscles burn like fire. Podkin had sprinted so fast his head was spinning. His knees felt weak as melted butter and … what was that pitter-patter noise he kept hearing? Had it started to rain?

  ‘Podkin,’ Paz managed to speak in between gasps. ‘Podkin, you’re bleeding!’

  Bleeding what? Podkin thought, his mind feeling fuzzy. He put a hand to his tunic. He had been sweating so much that it was sticking to his skin.

  Except it wasn’t sweat.

  He pulled his paw away and looked at it. Black, he thought. Why am I covered in black paint?

  It smelt hot and coppery, like when Zarza was wounded by the spear. Just like that. Exactly like that. Oh dear, Podkin thought. It isn’t paint after all.

  Just as Paz reached for him, Podkin’s legs gave out and he stumbled to the mossy forest floor. The cut from Vetch’s knife was much deeper than he’d first thought. He’d been bleeding all this time, leaving a red trail through the forest. Maybe Crom can follow it when he comes to save me, Podkin thought, although Crom wouldn’t be waking up for hours yet (if at all). Pod’s thoughts had become woozy and dreamlike. The moss beneath him felt so soft and cosy, just right for a snooze …

  ‘Podkin, wake up!’ Paz whispered fiercely, pulling at his ear. She set Pook down next to him, who instantly started to wail when he saw the blood, and rummaged in her pack for her healing things. The sound of crashing branches was getting louder. She knew Vetch was coming closer … would be on them at any second.

  ‘Pook! Be quiet!’ she hissed, pulling out a wad of bandages and pressing them to the wound on Podkin’s throat. It was too dark to see how bad it was and she prayed to the Goddess that the sharp cook’s knife hadn’t nicked the jugular vein.

  ‘Got … you …’ a voice came from behind them. A breathless, wheezy, sly voice, full of sour smugness, despite the panting. Vetch had followed the trail of blood and found them.

  ‘Just let me bind his throat,’ Paz said. ‘You can have the Gifts in a minute. Just let me help my brother.’

  ‘No,’ said Vetch. ‘No more tricks. It doesn’t matter now, anyway.’

  It doesn’t matter because he’s going to kill us, Podkin thought. From where he lay, he could see past his sister to where Vetch was emerging from the trees, knife raised. Perhaps it was the loss of blood but Podkin felt strangely calm about it. I’m going to see Father again, he thought. Dying isn’t so bad after all.

  As Paz fumbled at his throat with the bandages, Podkin watched Vetch draw nearer. He really was feeling quite dizzy now, and had even started to imagine he was seeing things. Things moving amongst the trees. Was the forest coming alive? Was the darkness forming shapes and coming out to greet them?

  One particularly large blob of shadow was moving very close. It slipped from tree to tree until it reached a small patch of moonlight in between Vetch and his prey. Podkin stared as it emerged from the gloom, a paw at first, then a leg, a snout, eyes …

  A rumbling, snarling sound came from the living shadow. It stopped Vetch in his tracks, and Podkin realised the thing wasn’t just a figment of his imagination. It was something real and very, very solid.

  Both Paz and Vetch stopped dead and turned to face the source of the growling. They all froze, staring as the thing took another step, letting the moonlight flow over it, revealing itself in all its awesome glory.

  A wolf, Podkin thought. But it doesn’t look like any wolf I’ve ever seen. That amounted to a few pictures on tapestries and carvings, and a lone grey wolf they had spotted in the woods near Redwater warren one summer. That wolf had been enough to terrify them, but it was just a little cub compared to this thing.

  This wolf’s back was as tall as a fully grown rabbit, with thick dusky fur that was dappled with moon-shadow. Muscles bunched at its shoulders and neck. Its head hung low, ready to attack. It had a long nose, amber eyes that glowed from within and a mouth of such teeth …

  ‘Fangs …’ Podkin whispered. Paz was too frozen with fear to agree. The giant wolf had canine teeth that stretched down past either side of its lower jaw, twenty centimetres long at least. Teeth curved like deadly white sabres. This was no common grey or timber wolf from the forest’s edge. This was a whole different breed. Some timeless, ancient species of creature that had lived in the heart of the forest, hidden away from the rabbit wo
rld. A true creature of the woods: a child of Hern the Hunter himself.

  The four rabbits watched as the wolf took another step towards them. None of them could have moved a muscle, even if they wanted to.

  They stared as the beast sniffed the air in the children’s direction, then in Vetch’s. It lowered its nose to the ground, keeping its eyes fixed on them all the time. A splatter of Podkin’s blood was there, glinting in the moonlight. With sabre teeth brushing the moss, the wolf put out a long pink tongue and lapped it up.

  I hope I taste really horrible, Podkin thought. I hope it doesn’t want any more.

  The wolf raised its head again and looked from Vetch to the children, from the children to Vetch. It was quite obvious that the thing was making up its mind who to eat first.

  Vetch must have had the same idea. Suddenly finding he could move again, he let out a squeak and turned to run back the way he had come. Probably hoping the wolf chooses us first, Podkin thought. A nice, easy meal that can’t run very far.

  But the wolf had other ideas. With a glance that said, ‘You’re pudding. I’ll get to you later,’ it loped off after Vetch, sliding in and out of the trees like a pike stalking minnows through the pond reeds.

  Podkin and Paz watched it go, then both let out the breath that had been frozen in their chests.

  ‘Do you think you can stand?’ Paz asked. ‘We need to get out of here before that … thing … comes back.’

  ‘Doggy!’ Pook cooed, looking back to where the creature had disappeared.

  ‘Wolf, Pook,’ Podkin started to say, but his voice was very shaky. Paz helped him to his feet and they started to stagger in the opposite direction from where Vetch and the wolf had gone.

  Leaning on his sister, Podkin hobbled along as best he could. They had no idea where they were going. They just knew they had to keep moving, hoping that somehow they could put enough distance between them and the wolf that it would not find them when it returned for its second course.

  Paz was clutching Pook with one arm and propping up the weakened Podkin with the other. Funny, thought Pod (although there was nothing amusing about it), this is how it all started, us running away, Paz holding me up because I couldn’t walk.

  In his fuddled mind, the event became mixed up with ancient memories of rabbitkind being chased and devoured by anything with teeth.

  ‘Everything always wants to eat us, Paz,’ he said, slurring the words.

  ‘I know,’ replied his sister through gritted teeth.

  *

  Paz’s arms soon started to burn and weaken, her shoulder joints feeling like they were about to pop, but still she struggled on.

  This deep in the forest, there were gigantic trees with low branches interlacing and hanging down to snag and tear ears and fur. The forest floor was a thick sponge of dead leaves and pine needles. Only a thin haze of moonlight managed to filter down from the sky above, leaving Paz to squint and weave her way through the shadows.

  ‘Podkin,’ she said at one point, thinking she couldn’t go on much further, ‘can’t you use the brooch? Jump us through the shadows?’

  ‘Not enough sky,’ Podkin muttered. ‘And I’m too weak.’ Jumping with the brooch used his energy and he had precious little left.

  Paz somehow found the strength to go further. There seemed to be a path in front of them, an opening at least, although she could have sworn it wasn’t there a moment ago.

  ‘What do you think has happened to Vetch?’ Podkin whispered.

  ‘I don’t know, Pod,’ Paz said. ‘I haven’t heard any screams. I expect he would have screamed when the wolf got him. Wouldn’t he?’

  As if in answer there came a snapping of branches from their left. The pine branches rustled. Something was following them through the trees.

  ‘Maybe that’s him,’ Podkin said. His hand pawed at the dagger on his belt.

  ‘Him or the wolf,’ said Paz, tears in her eyes. ‘Oh, Podkin, I can’t carry you any more. I’m sorry.’

  She set her two brothers down and knelt beside them, arms numb, pulling Ailfew from her belt. She raised it in front of her, trying to centre herself, reaching out for the roots and plants all around. If she could summon them, she could make some kind of a cage around them. Would that be enough to hold off what was in the trees? Probably not, but what else was there to do?

  Podkin watched his sister, her terrified face going in and out of focus. He managed to struggle to a sitting position and pulled Starclaw from his belt. There was no strength left in his little arms but he might be able to aim the blade. It would cut through anything, including the flesh and bone of a giant wolf.

  The rustling in the branches grew louder. They could hear a quiet snuffling and the crunch of heavy paws on the forest floor. In the dark between the trees, two points of light appeared, growing closer and closer.

  ‘Doggy?’ said Pook, holding out a chubby paw.

  The wolf stepped on to the pathway, emerging into the moonlight once more. Its curved fangs glowed white, framing its mouth. Pook would be gone in one bite. Those amber eyes watched them with the patient calm of a hunter, taking in the knife and sickle, calculating the best angle of attack …

  ‘Hult!’

  A voice came from somewhere on the path ahead. A deep rumbling voice that sounded like the forest itself talking.

  The wolf looked up at once, ears pricked, nose twitching. Recognising the scent, it lowered its mighty head and stepped silently back into the shadows.

  The little rabbits looked around, trying to catch a glimpse of who had saved them. The branches on the path ahead parted and a figure stepped out. Just a silhouette against the moonlight, but Podkin could see he was impossibly tall and broad, bigger than any rabbit he had ever seen. A pair of stag’s horns stretched up and out from his head. There was only one being with horns like that. Now Podkin was sure he was dreaming.

  ‘Hern,’ he whispered. ‘Hern the Hunter.’

  ‘No, Pod,’ Paz whispered back. ‘That’s not a god. Crom was wrong. It is real. The Beast. The Beast of Grimheart.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Beast

  The little rabbits all held their breath as the horned creature stepped closer. Branches cracked as it moved towards them, setting its heavy feet down on the path with solid thumps.

  They could see that it held a staff as thick as a young tree, and that it had rough shaggy hair covering its body. Rabbit or wild animal: which was it? Would it rip them apart now, or tie them up and drag them off to its larder?

  It took another step, then began to crouch. Podkin could hear the creature sniffing, like a wolf or bear. Paz raised the sickle, her paws shaking, as if it would do any good against this thing. Pod’s weak hand raised Starclaw. He felt it judder as it sensed his fear, even though he had no strength left to use it.

  The creature gave a hoot – a rumbling sound that made Podkin’s whiskers tremble. Slowly, gently it put down its staff, then moved its massive paw to its own chest. There was a fumbling, rustling noise. Was it scratching fleas? Did it have some horrible weapon hidden in its fur? Podkin and Paz blinked, fearing the worst but unable to do anything about it. Even Pook was silent for once.

  Then – a bloom of light. Blue light. It came from the creature’s hand, illuminating its face, the three little rabbits and the pine branches hanging low over their heads.

  Podkin stared. This wasn’t a god or, as Paz said, a beast. It was just a rabbit, although a giant one – bigger even than those he had seen in Boneroot – but nothing from a myth or monster story at all.

  In the blue glow he could see that the horns were part of a headdress, bound in place with twisted vines and decorated with pieces of carved bone. His face – and it must be a he, judging by the long, braided beard – had a thick brow, broad nose and deep-set brown eyes. The shaggy fur was a cloak of coarse wolfskin, complete with claws and snout, draped over the rabbit’s shoulders. Underneath he wore clothes of stitched leather and fur, with crossed straps over his chest. T
hese were covered with more carved bones, amulets, strings of wooden beads, animal skulls, polished stones, flint knives, arrow heads, pockets, flasks and pouches. One of these was now in his hand. It was filled with glowing blue moss of a type Podkin had never seen before.

  ‘Wund?’ the rabbit said. His voice was deep but gentle. Like a breeze blowing through a hollow oak tree. Podkin couldn’t understand the language, but he looked into his eyes and saw only kindness and concern there. With a relief that made him feel dizzy again, he realised they were safe.

  ‘Wund?’ the rabbit said again. He pointed at Podkin’s throat. In the light the blood could clearly be seen, spattered all over his cloak and tunic.

  ‘Yes,’ said Paz, also sensing the stranger meant them no harm. ‘He’s cut his neck. Look.’

  She carefully moved the bandages she had wadded in place there. Podkin felt the blood start to flow again and with it, another wash of weakness.

  The giant rabbit made a tutting sound and reached for more of his pouches. His thick fingers were surprisingly nimble, and they pulled out a selection of wooden pots, each one beautifully carved with picture-like runes. Arranging them on the floor, the rabbit popped off the lids and went to work. He gave Podkin a strip of bark to chew, which tasted bitter but instantly started to numb first his mouth, then the rest of his body. He used a pinch of spongy moss from another tub to clean the wound, and then scooped out some gooey cream from a third, which he smeared over Podkin’s cut. It felt cool and soothing, and Podkin imagined it gumming up the gash, sealing his blood inside.

  Finally, the stranger took a flask from his belt, popped out the stopper and held it to Podkin’s mouth. The little rabbit drank deeply and tasted the purest, freshest water that was somehow full of every scent and flavour of the forest itself. It washed away all his dizziness and calmed his frazzled nerves. The escape from Vetch, the chase through the forest, the wolf … it just seemed like a bad dream he’d woken from.