Without warning, Kurella shoved him into a nearby thicket. Scott went headlong toward the ground and, unable to catch his fall with his arms, fell on his left shoulder and rolled to his back. The wolf girl was upon him in the next instant, straddling his waist and clamping her hand over his mouth. She remained quiet for several minutes, staring straight ahead through the tangle of brush and sniffing occasionally at the air. Without much choice, Scott waited with her in confused silence. It was obvious she searched for something – or someone – but what? The thought left Scott’s mind completely when Kurella lay down upon him, keeping her hand over his mouth and looking straight ahead. Her lithe form writhed upon him as she tried for a better view through the thicket, and her firm breasts pressed full upon his chest. Then, apparently satisfied the danger was gone, she relaxed her defensive state.
“There are a large number of redcrests over the next rise,” she said finally. “They have moved farther away now, but we will have to circle around.”
She removed her hand and Scott said, “It makes no difference to me who we run in to. Their prisoner or yours, what’s the difference?” Although he could hardly confess such knowledge to Kurella, he could definitely feel a difference just then.
“Perhaps you do not care, but I do,” she replied curt. “The werewolves are a harsh people but our treatment of you pales in comparison to Azinon’s ways.” She hauled Scott to his feet with surprising ease by the front of his tunic. “Keep moving.”
For the next several hours Kurella directed Scott in a wide arc around the location she detected enemy activity. Scott thought this particularly odd. He was no woodsman, but he thought it a little extreme to travel such a great distance out of the way. So much so it gave him the sneaking suspicion the wolf girl was up to more than she was admitting.
They were walking side-by-side when Kurella caught him eyeing her again in the same peculiar manner he had maintained for the last two turns of the glass. “Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked.
“Like what?”
She seemed to search for the words, then she just shook her head and continued walking. A few minutes later, she spied it again. “Like that! Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Like this?” Scott asked, and he craned his neck toward her with his eyes wide and bulging.
Kurella laughed and just shook her head. Scott, for his part, considered himself lucky. He did not mean to stare—and certainly didn’t mean for her to catch him at it—so he forced himself to look straight ahead.
They walked onward in silence until the sun slipped low to the west, stopping only briefly along the way to eat of wild berries. It was during one such time the young wolf girl reached up and ran her fingers like a comb through her hair. Scott found the motion decidedly sensuous, the way she moved even in this simplest of gestures with a predator’s grace. Then, just as quickly, he stared straight ahead and the barest hint of a smile creased the corners of Kurella’s lips when she caught him admiring her.
Kurella held the march up well into the evening until finally finding a place suitable to spend the night; all the while Scott continued to flatter with the way he struggled with himself not to stare.
When she signaled a halt, Scott settled himself with his back against the base of a large tree, grateful for the respite. Looking around he noted somewhat approvingly he might actually get some sleep if his captor could refrain from hogtying him this time. The ground in this tiny clearing was soft and carpeted with plush grass, and the only sounds were those of the birds above and the occasional lap of a wave from the small lake they settled beside. Scott was tired, hungry, and dirty, but not quite as unhappy with his present company as before.
I’m sure she would have been a very nice girl, he thought, if not for being born to a litter.
“Where do you think you are going?” Kurella asked as he got up.
“I haven’t bathed in two days,” Scott replied. “I look like somebody’s welcome mat and I’d like to get somewhat clean again.” And, he added silently, the water might just loosen the bindings I’ve been working at all day.
“You cannot go into the pond with your hands tied behind your back.” For a moment Scott actually dared hope she meant to cut him free. “I will have to go with you,” she said. “I cannot have my slaves drowning themselves before I even get them home.”
“Ah, right,” he said disappointed. He walked over to the water’s edge and then stopped when he noticed Kurella did not follow. He turned and watched, shocked, as she stripped of her woven top and waistcloth, and then casually approached him as though nothing were out of the ordinary. Scott whirled back around, his cheeks flushing red. “Oh—sorry,” he stammered.
Kurella cast him a curious look. “For what?” “Oh, yes. I almost forgot.” She looked to her clothing she held in one hand and shrugged. “You humans are so much more modest about your bodies than my people. Well, if it bothers you…” She then took to slipping back into her garments.
“It’s not that it bothers me,” Scott said without turning. “I mean, it does bother me but not like you think. What I mean is—”
“Hush.” Kurella nudged him forward with a two-fingered push between the shoulder blades toward the lake. Scott stopped when the water reached his waist and then submerged himself momentarily to wet his entire body. When he came out Kurella reached beneath his tunic from behind and began rubbing her hands up and down his back. She giggled after a moment asking, “Why are you trembling?”
“Water’s cold,” he lied.
“I see.” Kurella finished washing his back and then placed her hands on his hips, pushing forward with her left and pulling with her right to turn him around. She reached up beneath the front of his tunic and did the same as before.
Scott’s mind raced to find something else to think of besides the attractive woman rubbing her hands all over his body. He mentally flipped through his catalog of memories to find something – anything – to divert his attention. He thought of sitting in Mrs. Green’s health class, then changed to the sound of fingernails raking slowly down a chalkboard, and when that failed he tried—wait! Scott carefully worked the ropes holding his wrists and felt a slip in the knot, then another. His wrists only separated by an inch and a half, but it was room to move. With agile fingers, he worked at the knot, tugging, sliding and pulling. His heart leaped as one hand slipped free.
Scott looked down into the face of Kurella, and oddly, she smiled up at him. He wondered what he should do, how to get away. Should he strike her? Try to knock her out while her back was turned? That would surely buy him enough time to put some distance between them.
On the other side of the clearing something rustled the bushes and Kurella turned abruptly, listening.
This is it! he thought. He hated to think he might later regret the next few seconds, but he knew there was no other choice. With firm resolve, Scott brought his arms forward from behind his back.
Kurella gasped in surprise at the touch of his large hands upon her shoulders. She whirled to face him and Scott held his hands up to show he meant her no harm, before slowly dropping them to his sides. He looked into those gorgeous depths of her dark brown eyes, and slowly, the surprise left her. “Probably just a mouse,” he said, referring to the sound they had both heard.
Kurella did not respond, though she gently bit her lower lip. Finally, she offered, “You could have escaped me.”
Scott slowly shook his head as he whispered, “How?”
Their bodies moved closer together in the lake, with only the pale face of a partial moon watching over them.
Chapter XV
Steve yawned in spite of himself. He could not help it. Shortly after Gouroth’s departure from the general’s quarters he had set out to help bring the search party together that now accompanied him deep within the forested embrace of the Granar. The hasty gathering of trackers and soldiers, plus the rushed details involved in the plan to find Scott had kept him awake for what might a
s well have been the entire night. Now, at midday, his lack of sleep was catching up to him.
Sonya and Haldorum accompanied him on his left and right respectively, and to the old wizard he said, “Talk to me.”
“Talk to you?” Haldorum repeated.
“Yes. Talk to me about anything; I don’t care what. Talk about the plan to find Scott. I’m tired and I need something to focus on to help keep me awake.”
“No one ever said that leading men was altogether easy.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get used to it,” Steve affirmed.
“Yes, I suppose you will at that,” Haldorum agreed. “Well, there are three parties of one hundred men each – one roughly one league to the east and the other to the west. If any one of the parties discover something they’ll let us know by scout. How was that?”
Steve rolled his eyes. “Riveting.”
“As usual, Haldorum, you have an uncanny love for the concise,” Princess Vessla announced as she rode up. She guided her mount between the old wizard and Steve, forcing the wizard to the outside. “I think Steven was looking for something more along the lines of conversation.” To him she said, “Let us speak of that grand day when you and I shall be wed, hmm?”
“Please, Vessla, not now. I’m worried for my friend and it’s important we find him above all else.”
“I understand your concern, Steven,” she said, “but there is little to be done until some sign of him is found. So in the meantime we can discuss matters of the future. Now, have you anyone you wish to invite.”
Steve sighed. At times her persistence was cute, at others—like now—annoying. Reluctantly he offered, “I can’t very well bring my family, but I think Scott would make an excellent best man.”
“Best man?” Vessla remarked curiously. “The best man for what?”
“Your fiancé is an alien to this world, princess. The ceremony of marriage is different from what you know,” Haldorum explained.
“Oh, I see,” she replied, clearly not anticipating this wrinkle. “Well, Father will insist upon a traditional Jisetrian wedding, naturally.”
Steve sighed. “Naturally.”
The search proceeded with agonizing slowness, granting little more than a few scant clues to Scott’s fate. Though his spear was found early in the day, not far from where Haldorum had opened the portal, there was little to go on. As the hours passed and the sun began its gradual descent to the horizon, Sonya and Steve matched the growing darkness with increasing melancholia, as though a door were closing on their prospects to find their friend.
“I don’t like it,” Vessla was saying to Eegrin. “I am surprised he doesn’t fall over from exhaustion.”
Eegrin looked ahead to where Steve sat astride Kayliss, riding beside Sonya and Haldorum in the forefront. He had taken to riding the massive tiger in lieu of his horse earlier on, apparently not caring if it made the other mounts nervous or not.
“He has much reason to be concerned, Your Highness. Scott has been his friend for many years. Would you not feel the same if it were your father, my king, we searched for instead?”
“I suppose you have me there,” Vessla admitted. “But I do not like how Steven is pushing himself so. Still,” she said thoughtfully, twirling a fiery curl about her finger, “there is an air of excitement about it all.”
Haldorum raised a hand and the whole search party came to a halt. “We shall make camp here for the night,” he commanded. “Set watches to patrol the perimeter and send word to the other groups to make camp as well. I shall go to each to engage a spell of protection until morning.”
“What are you doing?” Steve demanded. “The sun hasn’t set yet.”
“I am sorry, Steven, but we have pushed this as far as we can today. We will lose daylight in less than half a turn and we will need those last rays to make camp. Besides, you have not slept in two days and look ready to collapse from exhaustion. There is nothing more we can do until morning.”
Steve opened his mouth to protest but Sonya cut him off. “He’s right, Steve.” She looked almost ashamed to admit it. “I hate to say it, but he’s right.” She glanced once around and added, “All these men would only be stumbling around in the dark.”
Kayliss groaned at him in assent and Steve finally relented, though cross. Haldorum only nodded in thanks to Sonya and then rode off to find a center point for his spell.
When he was gone Sonya asked, “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” Steve replied terse. “I guess I’m just a little tired, is all.” Kayliss growled with an almost human-like nod. “And I don’t need any help from you, thank you,” Steve added with a pat on the big cat’s neck.
Sonya allowed herself a small laugh. “Come on. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”
Steve let his head rest on his forearms, knees drawn up to his chest, while the fire before him hissed and crackled energetically, spitting red-hot members at odd intervals high into the night sky. He sat within the curve of Kayliss’s lounging form, the big cat resting contentedly before the heat of the flames. All around him the soldiers camped before their own fires, drinking of the ale rationed them and telling tales of heroics so old and exaggerated few held any element of truth in them anymore. And although Steve could hear them, their words floated past him like the sound of ocean waves, a white noise heard but unfocused upon. The only two things he could think about—even in his exhausted state—was the riddle of the prophecy and his missing friend, Scott. The two subjects jumped back and forth in his mind as though taking turns, never allowing him a moment’s ease.
“You seem awfully withdrawn,” Sonya said as she stepped into the firelight.
“Hmm?” Steve said raising his eyes. “Oh… just thinking.”
She sat down beside him within the crescent of Kayliss’s massive form. “You do that a lot. So what is it about this time?”
“The same things,” he replied with a helpless raise of his brow. “Always the same things.”
“You know, you’re going to fry a brain cell at this rate. Maybe you should try getting some rest. You’re not doing anybody any good staying up with the rest of these night owls.”
“Thanks, but there is a lot I haven’t figured out. I keep thinking there has to be something I’ve overlooked. Some important detail I’m just not seeing.”
“And what about Scott?”
Steve sighed. “All I can do is pray he’s okay.” He glanced in the general direction of the old wizard, knowing he was out there somewhere, and then back again. “I can understand why Haldorum is so worried about all of this. We’ve got to find Scott as soon as possible.” His tone held a note of barely constrained urgency.
Sonya nodded but did not press him for further details.
“Do you miss home?” Steve asked suddenly.
Sonya hesitated at first, but then shook her head. “I guess I do a little bit. But it’s not all that bad. I mean, I have you here, and we’ll get Scott back, and we have our other friends. It’s not as though we’re alone.”
“But you do want to go home.”
She smiled and patted his knee. “I know you’ll do everything you can for Scott and me, and all these people who are counting on you.”
“I’ll get you two home the minute it’s safe,” he promised her.
Sonya nodded. She climbed to her feet with a yawn and then said, “I think I’ll turn in. It wouldn’t be such a bad idea for you to do the same.”
“I will in a bit.”
“You better,” Sonya chastised with a playful grin. “Good night.”
“Good night.” Steve watched her go as she left the circle of his fire and made her way through the semi-darkness to her bedroll. He watched her, flirting with ideas he knew could never be.
When at last he looked away he did so with a deep breath of preparation. Kayliss turned his head in question, sensing his intentions across the link they shared, but Steve kept his concentration on the task at hand. With steady, rhythmic breaths, he clos
ed his eyes and focused his will. The crystal shined like a star about his neck as the magic answered him like a forest fire suddenly and instantly brought to life.
Steve breathed, constraining the wildness of his power, channeling it, willing it to pierce the veil of time and show him…the future.
There was the resounding rush of power, like a rising tidal wave, welling up within Steve and guided by his will with practiced effort. Although he could not hear or see it, the crystal around his neck sang its shard song triumphantly, shining like a pinhole to the sun. Steve took one last deep breath and, with its slow release, he could feel his soul slipping free of his body with a sound like the steady roll of thunder. He fought to control the energies of his power even as it tempted that dark part of himself. At the same time, he suppressed his fear of that terrible consequence and used it to tighten his resolve. With hands no longer flesh he reached out as the expected sensation of movement took him fully. Faster and faster he flew, through an endless void of nothingness lacking both color and substance. He pushed farther into a waiting darkness more whole and complete than even the void itself, but his second sight led him true and he found the path he sought. Then there was silence, and slowing, and then light.
He stood within an open space within the grounds of the Imperial Palace now, recognizing it from the many paintings decorating the walls of General Corbett’s quarters. He stood in a courtyard, huge and expansive. All around him men stood watch with black hoods so long they reached well past their shoulders. Priests, these men; all armed with long daggers and, aside from their hoods, wore only black loincloths about their waists. A wide half-circle of them stood before an altar with a skull-topped pole mounted to either side. Dipped in some flammable resin, the skulls burned blue and tainted the air with an incongruous herbal scent.
Steve started as one of the black hooded figures appeared suddenly before him, walking through his whispery form as easily as air. With a hand he could not see, Steve wiped his brow in relief. For a moment he had forgotten he was both invisible and intangible to the physical world around him.
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