I SHALL RETURN WITH WINTER

by CF WELBURN

  “The other one,” someone said, amused. “They'll make good earrings.”

  “Fuckers!” Oben roared, and the men froze.

  “What’s this? The rabbit speaks Talis?” There was genuine wonder in Ifor’s voice. If Oben had hoped this revelation would distract them from their task, he was wrong. Ifor sighed. “Carry on.”

  “I won’t try to escape again, I promise!” Oben sobbed unashamedly. He didn't care how they laughed or ridiculed him; he just wanted to keep his toes.

  Their momentary surprise at his Talis was short-lived. One of them seized his other foot. He screwed his eyes shut, anticipating the torment.

  Suddenly, another Tanda burst into the circle.

  “Torches! They must have heard him scream.”

  “Keep him quiet,” Ifor said.

  The fat man clamped a cold calloused hand over Oben's mouth. It was so large it covered his nostrils too. He struggled to breathe. He bit down, tasted blood. The man pulled his hand away punched him the face and clamped down again. Then a horn blast from their camp made everyone turn.

  Oben looked around and saw he was not the only one they had taken. Blin was there too, at the other side of the copse. Blood glistened wetly on her face, but she had managed to bring down a Tanda and sound his horn. The body of the man lay staring upwards, a gash across his throat.

  “Fuck!” someone shouted, “Stop her!”

  A large warrior rushed and tore the horn from Blin’s hand, punching her so that she went down. But the trees were already full of torches.

  “Do we fight?” the Tanda who had hit Blin asked.

  “Let’s kill us some Kazra!” the fat man sitting on Oben said.

  Ifor looked at the torches, their light flickering on his pensive face.

  “No. We must get back to Kai. Tell him what we have discovered. There’ll be time enough to kill these swine, and a whole lot of Ixna, too. Varg, grab him. We’re off.”

  The fat man that had been holding Oben down grunted and hauled him up.

  The rest of the Tanda did not look happy, but Varg hoisted Oben effortlessly over his shoulder and they made for the forest. As his head bounced on Varg’s back, Oben heard a thud and saw an axe sticking out of the fat Tanda’s back just below his own nose. Varg continued to run half a dozen paces and then crumpled to the ground. Oben rolled and lay gasping as one of Grinchell’s men ran up to reclaim his axe. It was Mako. Oben had never thought he’d be glad to see a Kazra.

  “You’re welcome,” Mako said, extending a hand. “Now, get your soft arse up—” Mako’s words were cut off as a blood-slick blade jutted from his throat. His eyes widened, and he fell to the ground, gurgling. Ifor stooped and jerked the long bloody knife from Mako's neck.

  “Come with us now and Kai will treat you fairly,” he said. “Stay, and when we come back for you, you’ll beg it’s just your other toe we take.”

  The torches circled around them.

  “Over here!” Oben roared.

  Ifor’s face tightened into a smile. “I’ll see you at Threlwich.”

  Then he twisted away between the dark trunks.

  Oben grasped his wounded foot and tried to stem the blood flow. Men hurtled passed him, leapt over him, screaming.

  Tre stopped to examine him, his smile fading when he saw Mako dead. He dropped to a knee and touched his friend’s face. When he looked up his jaw was tight with rage.

  “I’ll kill those bastard Tanda.” he said. Without sparing another glance for Oben, he raised his voice and shouted “Southerner’s here!” Then he ran into the trees.

  More Kazra gathered around him.

  “Get him back to camp.” Grinchell said, surveying the scene. "The girl, too, back there!” His eyes lingered on Mako and hardened. “Fuckers!”

  “They cut off his toe,” Brigal said, sneering.

  Grinchell's bearded face bent over him.

  “Move him, now.” he said, coldly. “He tries anything, take the rest of his toes.” Then he turned and raised his axe. “The first one who brings me a Tanda head gets rich!”

  He roared something unintelligible and disappeared into the trees.

  13

  THE INSUFFERABLE GUEST

  It was light. The soft kind, filled with subtle shadows, and warm, fuzzy textures. Oben’s head was sunken into a pillow.

  Something was not right. Hadn’t he been…? With a rush, many things came back. He blinked with the wooziness of a drunk awoken in a stranger’s house.

  His head hurt, his throat was dry, but the throb in his invisible toe conquered all.

  Someone was in the room with him. He turned his head with a wince. A tall woman stood before a large oval window, the light at her back rendering her a silhouette. He shielded his eyes until she stepped away.

  Her eyes were piercing and grey. Her golden hair was threaded with metal rings and dark feathers. She did not smile. He felt wretched before her scrutiny, scarred, burned, deformed, dirty, hungry, lost, tired, weak. He had lost so much blood.

  “They tell me you speak Talis.” she said, her lip curled. “Is this true?”

  “You’re Gulmorgon,” he asked, lamely.

  “Yes.”

  “We’re in Threlwich?”

  She nodded.

  “I wanted to see what nonsense Seri had come up with now.”

  “You don’t believe her?” he asked, trying to keep the anxiety from his voice. Grinchell had done his job. He had delivered him in one piece, albeit slightly reduced. All this shit could easily end here.

  “She’s old. Talented, once… but old. And that makes her desperate. Grasping. You have no right to be here, farmer. It’s an affront.” She turned to look out the window. After a pause, she turned and walked slowly across the room. “And yet, here you are. And remarkably, still breathing. I’ve heard what Seri has to say, seen your scar, been told of what happened in Eisalhelm. I’ll let this run its course.”

  Oben listened, gazing at the white skin of her arms and neck. She turned and caught him. She must have been in her early-thirties, but acted with such surety she seemed older.

  “Careful rabbit. Men have lost eyes for less.”

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I just always believed you to be a man.”

  “A man could not unite the Taliskans. Fire and iron are useful, necessary. But Taliskar needed something… colder.”

  Oben did not feel like fire and iron. Wind and wheat, perhaps. He winced, struggled up onto one elbow.

  “Kai seems to think otherwise.”

  Gulmorgon shot him a scathing look.

  “You know of Kai, you killed Mascal, and you thought me a man… Did you come north to kill me too, little rabbit?”

  It was a straight question. He gave a straight answer.

  “Yes.”

  “Hm. So, you do have a backbone. Of course, I could have you flayed. And I might… Tell me, who else did you come to kill?”

  “Grinchell.”

  “Ah. No doubt our names echo in the screams on Penn.” Her jaw tightened. Oben decided it best not to speak. “Grinchell’s a mountain; Kai’s a sea. And then there was Mascal. He was a storm. I’ll not deny my curiosity regarding how such a sorry piece of shit could have killed him. But I’ll not waste my time on you until you have proven yourself.”

  “How? I can barely walk.”

  “What do you know of the prophecy?” she asked, standing over him now. He looked at the knife on her belt. Then tried not to look at it. “Of Ishral and of Ethra?”

  “Not much really. Seri spoke little of it.”

  “Good. The less you know, the better. But the true Conduit will face three trials here in Skaligar. Only through surviving them, will they be ready for their ultimate purpose.”

  Oben shifted on to both elbows, shuffled himself up and met her gaze.

  “To help you conquer Edale.”

  “So, she did tell you something. Yet you don’t believe it.”

  “I came north for revenge. I will never b
etray my people.”

  “We shall see.”

  “I’d see these prophecies for myself. Show me, that I might know what is expected. That I might prepare.”

  She dismissed his request with a wave of her pale hand. “You’ll recover here, then be kept under guard. Should you show promise, we will speak again, though I suspect this will be our first and final conversation.”

  “And my companions?”

  “The prisoners have their part to play. You are bound, all five of you. Your life to theirs, theirs to yours. The doomed disciples, if this is more than mummery.”

  “Five? There were three other prisoners with me. Who is the fifth? And doomed, how?”

  She smiled, a cold slit on her pale face.

  “You ask too many questions. You are mistaken if you think you are welcome here. I shall be glad to see you dead. My rule here is gathering momentum, and this is a distraction. Gather what small strength you possess and get on with it. I shall be watching.”

  She bowed her head, turned on her heel and left. He called out for her, but she did not heed him. He was not even sure what he would have said.

  * * *

  Two days later a huge guard called Lief took him from the warm recovery chamber. Oben’s limbs were stiff, and his mutilated foot leant him an awkward limp. Lief guided him at spear point across a snowy square, down a street lined with wooden buildings and into a sparse cell. During the brief journey he realised that escape would not be easy. Everyone had watched him from the windows, the alleyways, and the rooftops, where archers knelt poised to shoot. He had no view of the city's outskirts. He was a fly in the centre of web.

  14

  HARVESTING THE SHADOW FIELDS

  On the third day, Lief and another guard came for him. Resting had done little to improve his strength and, if anything, the chill of the cell had made old wounds ache with renewed vigour.

  There was little ritual about the trials. Just like with the Thunder-Blade, he was expected to get on with it, as though all of it would just make sense. Which of course, it didn’t. Nothing did anymore.

  He waited in a small room, a bright noon light entering the window and finding its way through the gaps in the wood walls. Apart from a fire which had almost burnt out and a bench on which he sat, the room was quite bare. He listened to a standoffish man by the name of Griz garble and spit. His wolf-skin lapels and impeccable beard hinted that he was likely a courtier.

  “You’re to go to the Shadow Fields.”

  “Where?”

  “Do not interrupt. You’ll be taken there shortly. The Black Swan auguries state that food for a hundred will be harvested come dawn. This has never been done. Some think the interpretation is wrong. You will not succeed, and I am late for lunch.” Griz stood, gesturing the door.

  “Wait… is that it?”

  “Was there something else?” Griz asked, impatiently.

  “Well, yes. Nothing you just said made sense.”

  “You being here doesn’t make sense. Me being here doesn’t make sense. Just do what you’re told.”

  “But when am I supposed to do this?”

  “Tonight. And you’ll have the help of the other prisoners.”

  “That’s something, I suppose, but—”

  “Enough. I’ve told you all you need to know.” He signalled to Lief who had been waiting outside.

  “Wait—” Oben began as the big Ixna took him by the elbow and escorted him out.

  But Griz simply nodded to Lief and shut the door behind him.

  * * *

  It wasn’t just Griz’s lack of enthusiasm, nor Oben’s insufficient Taliskan that made for his scant understanding. The task itself was so convoluted that even had it been spelled out in plain Edalian, he would have struggled to understand it.

  He wrung his hands. It felt as if they had simply invented something impossible to get rid of him. No crop could be harvested in a single night, less so here where the earth was rock-riddled and frozen.

  As he was ushered out of the north gate with nought but a sack of seeds and a bundle of crude tools wrapped in leather, even the sight of his old companions did not bring him joy.

  Rak, Blin and Ortho waited just outside the eastern gate. Lief and three other guards accompanied them and several archers looked down from the wooden ramparts. Oben had been unconscious when he had entered Threlwich, and for the first time could see how well defended its twenty-foot wooden walls made it. The afternoon was beginning to wane, and the pointed staked walls cast long shadows.

  “Shit on it. I thought you were done making my life miserable.” Rak said by way of greeting.

  “Hope you can limp faster than that, if you need to.” Blin said, scowling.

  “Any sign of trouble and it’s you who gets it first,” agreed Ortho.

  “I’m with him on that,” Rak said. “Now, you gonna tell us what we’re doing out here?”

  “I’d hoped you knew,” Oben said, shoulders sagging.

  “I’m—we’re—to harvest food for a hundred. Or so Griz said.”

  “He was having you on, right?” Blin said. Her face was still bruised from the beating she had taken at the camp, but it worked well with her painted eyes.

  “He seemed quite serious,” Oben said.

  “Food, out here?” Rak growled. “Won’t even be able to eat your own leg by dawn without breaking your teeth. Know how it drops?”

  Ortho remained silent. He seemed grim and contemplative.

  “What’s wrong?” Oben asked him.

  “I think these be the Shadow Fields.” The name brought a deeper chill to the gloaming.

  “That’s what Griz called them. You’ve heard of them?”

  “My pa told me about ‘em. Barren place where nothing grows. Nothing living, at least. At night hungry shades walk abroad.”

  “A barren place, where nothing grows.” Blin repeated. “You know we’re in Skaligar, don’t you?”

  “This is different,” Ortho said, a sheen to his brow. “We can’t do this. We should try to get away.”

  Another large Ixna walked through the gate and said something to the four guards, then he strode over.

  “I’m Gadziel.” he said. “Gulmorgon’s second in command. You’ve already met Lief. From now on, you do what the fuck we say, when we say it.” Gadziel was huge, blond-haired, handsome apart from a burn down one-side of his face. He thrust his axe towards the north. “That way. Now!” he shouted, gesturing past a snowy stand of pine-trees. Nothing but a white uneven tundra seemed to await them.

  They walked silently for a few minutes. Snow began to fall. Not thick flakes, but the sort that looked like it was never going to stop. They still wore their dirty furs, but even they might not be enough if the temperature continued to drop. Oben remembered Seri had called this land cursed, that they had only come because of the Swan.

  “Well, you’re a farmer, aren’t you?” Blin said. “If anyone can grow shit, then it must be you.”

  “Erm, that’s not how farming works. Nothing grows in one night.”

  “Did you not hear me?” Ortho said, his forehead lined with worry. “Even if turnip boy here could grow anything, it would be unnatural. It would bring the shadows.”

  Oben shrugged.

  “I don’t like it either, but it’s our task. Got any other ideas?” he asked, nodding back over his shoulder to where Gadziel, Lief and the three other guards followed, laughing among themselves at some joke.

  “I owe you nothing.” Ortho said.

  “Gulmorgon says we are bound. If you help, perhaps she will show you lenience. You will be helping the Conduit, at least.”

  “Not that crap again,” Ortho said. “You think I believe a word of it?”

  “You don’t have to. But they believe it! At least, they haven’t ruled it out,” Oben said. “Worst comes to the worst, we run for it. It’s your choice.”

  Blin laughed. “If it were my choice I’d be drunk by now. And possibly naked. Don’t ’spose you
’ve got any drink in that there bag?”

  “No," Oben said, shaking his head. "Just tools and seeds.”

  “You’re not much good, are you?" Blin said, smiling. "Tools and seeds? That how you greet old friends in the South.”

  Oben ignored her.

  “That’s far enough!” Gadziel said, approaching. He was smoking and rubbing his hands. “You’re on your own from here. Fields are just up there.” He nodded to a steep incline a hundred feet away. “And don’t think about running. I’ll be waiting here, and we have guards elsewhere.” It was almost completely dark by now, the landscape having changed little, save for Threlwich disappearing behind a hill to their south. Gadziel returned and passed the pipe to Lief.

  Rak grabbed the bag from Oben and shook out its contents. “We’re not going to grow anything here, except colder. Shall we get to it?”

  He pulled a trowel from the leather bundle, scowled at it. Blin rolled her eyes, grabbed another, tested the edge of it with her thumb.

  Ortho looked from one companion to the next, back over his shoulder, and finally down at the tools Rak had spilled on the ground. He sighed and picked up a fork.

  “Watch each other’s backs.” Rak said, once they were all armed with seeds and tools. “First sign of anything strange stab whatever it is and get the fuck out of there.”

  * * *

  It was night by the time they came to the Shadow Fields.

  Oben had been surprised several times since he'd crossed the Weaver, but he was still a pragmatic man. Just as he knew this whole Conduit business was rubbish, so too did he assume these fields were nothing more than snow and rock. His blackened hands and mismatched feet were frozen, the earth hard and full of stones, and any chance of sowing seeds was as likely as stumbling across mammoths having a picnic.