The Inquisitives [3] Legacy of the Wolves

by Rockwell, Marsheila

  Irulan raised her hands as she felt the tips of the male’s teeth beginning to puncture the skin of her cheeks, like the sharp sting of insects. But instead of trying to fend off the wolf’s bite, she grabbed the paw on her left shoulder. With one hand, she found the broken toe and grasped it, wrenching it out and away from the wolf’s foot. With the other, she found the tender area around the dewclaw and shoved her own claw deep into the soft flesh of the pad, feeling blood gush over her knuckles and down across her wrist.

  The wolf howled, the sound ringing in her ears, but he did not release his grip on her head. If anything, his jaws tightened, and she could feel the bones in her jaw beginning to break as blood coursed down her face and agony radiated through her skull.

  He wasn’t going to let go.

  Desperately, Irulan kicked out with one clawed foot, trying to gouge the dire wolf’s stomach as she had with Skaravojen, but he was too close and too big. She couldn’t get any leverage. The most she could do was slash her claws across his hind legs, which only made the wolf shift his weight forward onto her head and chest. She wondered idly if she would suffocate before he either broke her neck or tore her jaw off.

  She continued to drive her claw into the wolf’s foot, feeling it slide along bone and punch out on the other side, but even though it was a debilitating injury, one that the pack leader would not survive, she knew she would die long before he did.

  And then, abruptly, the fire that consumed the lower half of her face lessened, and the weakness and dizziness that had been tickling the edges of her consciousness disappeared. She was vaguely aware that the tenor of Andri’s prayer had changed, and that his voice was faltering, but she didn’t immediately connect the two events. Instead, she used the reprieve from pain to redouble her attack, pulling her claw out of the wolf’s foot and using both hands to twist the wounded appendage around as hard as she could until she heard a sharp, satisfying crack.

  The wolf released her face with a high-pitched yelp and dropped back. As his considerable weight landed on the now-broken ankle, it buckled, and the wolf went down, legs splayed out in front of him as if he were kneeling to her. Irulan stepped away from the tree and placed one foot on the wolf’s back, raising her head to loose a howl of victory. The leader flattened his ears against his head and whimpered in submission.

  It was over. She had won.

  Even though, by all rights, she should be dead.

  She lifted a hand up to touch her face gingerly. Though still slick with her own blood, the flesh was intact. It was like the wolf had never attacked her.

  There was a moan and a clatter of armor. Across the clearing, Andri collapsed. Though none of the wolves had made a move toward him, his face and tabard were covered in scarlet blood, as if her wounds had been transferred to him.

  And, with a gasp of shock, she realized that they had. The paladin had used the power of the Silver Flame to take her hurts upon himself, suffering in her stead so that she could remain strong enough to defeat the dire wolf.

  The dear, sweet fool.

  Though she wanted nothing more than to run to Andri’s side, she knew that doing so would endanger everything she had fought for, and make the paladin’s sacrifice meaningless. As calmly as she could, she instructed Greddark to tend to Andri’s wounds, hoping he had another healing potion secreted in that multi-pocketed coat of his.

  She turned her attention back to the wolf beneath her. Carefully removing her foot from his back, she crouched down next to the injured animal and held out her hand in front of his muzzle. Cautiously, the wolf moved his head toward her and began licking her hand, acknowledging his defeat. When the other wolves saw this, they gathered around Irulan, bowing their heads to her and licking the blood from her face and hands.

  They were hers to lead now.

  Certain of her safety, and that of her companions, she took the pack leader’s paw gently in her hands and spoke a spell of healing, easing the bone into its proper place and letting the magic knit the broken pieces back together. He would limp for a few days, but then the paw should be good as new.

  As she looked up and saw Greddark trying to force the last of a potion through the unconscious paladin’s ruined lips, she only hoped the same would be true for Andri.

  Chapter

  EIGHTEEN

  Zor, Eyre 5, 998 YK

  Something was licking his face.

  As Andri’s awareness returned, he realized he was lying on his back, and his head hurt—so much so that he didn’t want to open his eyes. He knew that he should, but he couldn’t remember why.

  They’d been in a forest, hunting … what?

  Wolves.

  And they’d found them, too, a pack of them, bigger than any wolves he’d ever seen before.

  Dire wolves.

  Had they fought? No … he remembered singing. Praying, as someone else battled the leader of the wolf pack.

  Irulan!

  Andri’s eyes snapped open, and he sat up so abruptly he knocked the shifter woman onto her rump, the wet cloth she’d been using to wipe blood from his face still clutched in one hand.

  Though his head was spinning, he lunged forward and grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her close. He examined her intently, his hands running over her hair and face as he touched her cheek, her jaw, her neck, looking for any sign of injury.

  There was nothing.

  Thank the Flame! His spell had worked.

  With a sigh, he sat back, releasing his grip on the startled shifter.

  “Well, looks like you’re feeling fine,” Greddark said from somewhere behind them.

  Andri turned his head—slowly, this time—to see the dwarf leading their horses into the clearing. The wolves were nowhere to be seen.

  “What happened?” he asked, turning back to Irulan. She moved into a kneeling position and filled him in as she continued to wash the blood from the new pink skin on his cheeks and jaw.

  “I was able to defeat the pack leader without killing him—thanks to you.” Her face was mere inches from his own, so close he could feel her breath on his skin and smell the heavy odor of wet dog that clung to her, no doubt from her struggle with the dire wolf. “What was that spell? I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  Andri pulled back from her, uncomfortable with the earnestness of her gratitude. He tried to shrug it away, as if what he’d done hadn’t almost cost him his own life.

  “It’s powerful, but not many learn it, because of the obvious risks.” Though if he’d known it when his mother had been attacked, he would have used it without hesitation. He didn’t say that part aloud, but by the look of sympathy that flashed across Irulan’s face, he knew he didn’t need to.

  “So where are the wolves now?” he asked. The throbbing in his head was starting to subside. In a moment, he would try to stand.

  “Off hunting. Except for the lead male. He’s going to guide us to the werewolves’ lair.”

  Andri climbed slowly to his feet, ignoring the steadying hand Irulan offered. He took a few experimental steps. When he was satisfied that the world was not going to tilt and send him reeling to the ground, he reached out for the reins that Greddark was offering him. Swinging himself up into the saddle, he looked down on his two compatriots.

  “Well, then,” he said, rubbing his still-aching jaw. “What are we waiting for?”

  At Irulan’s command, the dire wolf stayed downwind from them, and out of sight as much as possible, to avoid spooking the horses. The wolf led them along the creek, in some spots having to wade through the shallow water because the brush on either side was too high to traverse. As they moved deeper into the forest, the canopy thickened, screening out the sunlight and enfolding them in an unnatural twilight. The air became thick and humid, making Andri sweat beneath his armor, even though it was cooler here than it had been on the road.

  “How do we know the wolf isn’t leading us into a trap?” Greddark asked.

  Irulan, who was riding ahead of him and Andri, didn�
��t even bother to turn. “Because we’re part of the pack now. We’re family.”

  The dwarf grunted. “That only increases the likelihood of treachery,” he muttered, but he didn’t press the issue. Though Andri did notice that the inquisitive started riding with his sword half out of its sheath after that.

  They traveled that way for several hours, their journey silent save for twittering birdsong, the occasional splash of a frog in running water, or the rustle of a small animal darting through the undergrowth as it caught the wolf’s scent.

  As the gloom deepened from a twilit green-gray to the bluer shades of dusk, the trio found another small clearing to make camp in. Greddark started a fire and Irulan scouted for food, taking the dire wolf with her. Andri tended to the horses, as he did most evenings. He removed their tack and rubbed them down, then let them graze a bit before brushing each of them until their coats shone. He didn’t want to risk washing them this late. It was still cool enough at night that leaving them unstabled and wet was just inviting illness. But they could certainly have used a good bath, and they weren’t the only ones. Catching a whiff of himself, he wondered if Irulan was taking so long to return with food because game was that scarce, or because she needed the fresh air.

  The shifter still had not returned by the time he finished with the horses, so Andri joined Greddark by the fire.

  “You’re good with horses. Why don’t you have one of your own? Don’t most paladins?”

  Andri blinked at the question. “Most paladins aren’t guilty of parricide.”

  Though his superiors in the Order and even the Keeper had told him that was not why he had yet to receive a holy mount, Andri knew in his heart they were wrong. Why would the Silver Flame grace him with such a gift, and what celestial steed would deign to serve a murderer?

  The dwarf grunted. “I suppose that’s true,” he said, then went back to throwing tiny twigs on to the fire as he watched the woods with a suspicious eye. Greddark was clearly uncomfortable in the forest, a fact that perplexed Andri. He imagined the omnipresent press of greenery was not so different from the rocky caverns of the Mror Holds—or even from the marble walls of Flamekeep, for that matter. They all cut you off from the sky, bearing down on you with a weight so much greater than that of mere wood and stone, carrying the burden of age, tradition, expectation. It was a wonder neither one of them had run off to join the halflings and the Valenar elves on the open plains.

  Andri’s stomach rumbled, and he was tempted to dig into their dwindling store of dried meat, but he knew they had to make it last. There was no telling when they would get to a city again to restock. A few days? A few weeks? The thought only made his stomach protest more loudly.

  “That you or the wolf?” Greddark asked, his eyes darting nervously from tree to tree.

  “Me,” Andri replied, but then he wondered. His stomach was no longer gurgling, but he could still hear a faint growl. Greddark heard it at the same time, and both men jumped up, swords in hand, expecting to see the dire wolf.

  Something dove at them from the high branches of the canopy overhead, and Andri’s blade arced up to meet it, blazing a trail of argent fire in the settling darkness. As his sword clanged against their foe, Greddark cried out, “No! Wait!”

  But it was too late. Andri’s magical blade met little resistance, cleaving the airborne assailant neatly in two. As both halves of what Andri now realized was some sort of mechanical construct fell to the ground with twin thumps, Greddark let out a low groan.

  “Wonderful. You just broke my messenger bird. Do you have any idea how much that thing cost to make?”

  Andri extinguished his blade and sheathed it as Greddark hurried over to the remains of his metal bird, fussing over it as if it had been a real pet. When Andri got closer, he saw it wasn’t the construct itself the dwarf was worrying about, but what it had been carrying—a piece of parchment that was miraculously still intact, and the shattered remnants of a glass vial that had contained what looked like silverburn.

  “What is it?” Andri asked.

  Greddark scanned the parchment before responding. “Remember that bit of paper found at one of the crime scenes, with what looked like a partial list of spell components? My wizard friend in Sigilstar thinks it’s a sort of nondetection spell, one customized specifically for lycanthropes.”

  That would explain why even Flamekeep’s top wizards had been unable to locate the source of the fur Irulan had found.

  “But this is odd,” the dwarf continued, rubbing some of the silver dust thoughtfully between his fingers.

  “What is?”

  “The smudge on the paper was from silverburn, as you suggested, but with a rather unique composition. It seems it’s not made of silver at all, but of plat—”

  The inquisitive was interrupted by a noise from the underbrush. They turned to see a shifter step into the clearing. It was Irulan, returning from her hunt at last.

  And though the dire wolf was not with her, she was not alone.

  “Well met, Sir Paladin, Master Dwarf,” Ostra Farsight said, nodding to each of them in turn. As the shifter leader shoved Irulan to the ground before him, belying his polite greeting, Andri could just make out the chain that led from her bound wrists to the older shifter’s belt. Andri reached for his sword, but several other shifters moved out of the trees, long bows and crossbows trained on him and Greddark.

  They were surrounded.

  Ostra smiled unpleasantly, his teeth flashing white in the gloom.

  “On behalf of Pater and the Silver Circle, I bid you welcome.”

  They traveled for another day and a half into the heart of the Burnt Wood. Ostra and his shifters led them through the dense forest, chained to one another like prisoners in the iron mines, their horses—loaded with their equipment, including their weapons—being pulled along behind. They weren’t allowed to speak to one another. Irulan had gotten cuffed across the mouth when she tried to tell them how the shifters had ambushed her. But Andri was able to piece together some of what had happened from snatches of conversation between their captors that he caught along the way. Apparently, Ostra had sent another reachrunner to Shadukar ahead of them. He had just been meant to observe and report, but after they had confronted Quillion, he’d followed them and watched long enough to see they were heading into the woods. When he had returned to pay his respects to Quillion, he’d found the old werewolf’s body defiled—the fingers on both hands were missing, cut off cleanly with a sharp blade. The teleportation ring was still there, however, and the shifter had used it to travel to Ostra. The camp leader and his men—the so-called “Silver Circle”—had not been at Aruldusk, as the shifter had expected, but at the werewolves’ lair. Once Ostra’s men knew they were coming, it was a simple matter for the shifters to find them in the forest, and to overpower both Irulan and their dire wolf guide. Now they were taking the trio back to the lair where Pater, the leader of the werewolves, would “deal” with them.

  Andri was dismayed to hear what had happened to Quillion’s body, but surely the shifter was mistaken. Irulan had expected the rats would come to claim the werewolf for their own—perhaps they had conquered their fear and begun their feast with his fingers, only to be frightened away by the shifter’s return before they could finish the job.

  And why had Ostra been with the werewolves and not in the shifter encampment? Surely he couldn’t have known Quillion’s ramblings would lead them to the Burnt Wood? Even the reachrunner had been surprised to find him there, though Andri had heard something about a schedule being “moved up.” The shifter leader must have had some other reason for being there, then, one that had nothing to do with them. But what? Obviously, he was in league with the werewolves, but what did that mean, exactly? Was he helping to harbor the murderer, or simply trying to protect them from discovery and persecution, as he had claimed to be doing for Quillion?

  But that line of thinking left Andri with even more disturbing questions. Andri’s father had been infected
by a werewolf from the Burnt Wood. It stood to reason that the lycanthrope was a member of Pater’s pack. So if Ostra was helping the werewolves and had been for some time, how much did the shifter really know about what had happened to Alestair Aeyliros? Ostra had called him “child of the moontouched,” yet the true tale of what had transpired that night in Flamekeep was not widely known. Either the old shifter had a spy network to rival the Queen’s, or he had gotten his information from the only other party to Alestair’s infection—the werewolf that had doomed him and Chardice to death.

  Which meant the werewolf had survived his encounter with Andri’s father and might still be alive.

  The possibility stunned Andri. His father had been sure of the lycanthrope’s demise—Andri wore the thing’s claws around his neck, for Tira’s sake—and the paladin had never had any cause to doubt Alestair’s certainty. He had never even contemplated seeking revenge for the deaths of his parents, because he’d believed the one who had cursed his father—and, ultimately, his entire family—was already dead.

  And now, it seemed, he might have been wrong.

  Andri tried to marshal his thoughts as he stumbled along behind Irulan and Greddark. The Keeper had sent him to find a killer and prevent potential genocide, not to pursue a personal vendetta. He had to focus on his duty, not vengeance.

  But the opportunity to make someone else pay for taking his parents from him … the thought of it was heady and sweet, like fine Aundairian wine.

  Too sweet.

  He knew temptation when it reared its vile head, and he would not be lured by its empty promises. He was here to apprehend a murderer, not slay a demon from his own past.

  But, Flame help him … what if they were one and the same?

  It was nearing evening on the second day of their capture when Andri began to notice subtle changes in the forest around them. As he followed Irulan and Greddark along a game trail, pulled along by the chains that bound them at the wrists and ankles, he realized that it wasn’t as humid as it had been, or as warm. Though he wasn’t a ranger by any stretch, the trees seemed different to him—taller, perhaps, with thicker trunks and darker foliage. The animal life seemed more abundant—birdsong trilled overhead and the leaves all about rustled with unseen activity. It was as if they had entered some primal place in the woods, an area ancient and undisturbed by even the faintest vestiges of civilization. Andri found it both peaceful and profoundly unsettling.