And thus it was that while all eyes were riveted upon the Man, a great snarling black shape hurtled through the open fore-barrier, racing to overhaul the herald. "Vulg!" cried Tarpy, snatching up his bow. Yet ere he could nock an arrow, the black beast was beyond range, but Tarpy sprang after.
"Close the barrier! More come!" shouted Patrel, and several leapt down to do so, while others spun to see three more hideous Vulgs speeding toward the barricade. Thuun! Hsss! Thuun! Ssss! Arrows were loosed at the creatures as the thorngate slammed to, walling them out.
Tuck, too, had snatched up his bow and raced after Tarpy, fumbling for an arrow as he ran. The Vulg was swift and closed upon the Kingsman with blinding speed.
" 'Ware!" shouted Tuck as he pounded onto the ice, five running strides behind Tarpy.
The herald turned in his saddle to see what was amiss just as the great black Vulg sprang for his throat, and but for Tuck's warning he would have been slain then and there. He threw up an arm to ward the beast, and the Vulg hurtled into him, knocking him from the saddle, though his left foot was caught in the stirrup. The Vulg rolled on the ice, and his claws scratched and clicked as he scrambled to his feet, and his baleful yellow eyes flashed evil. The horse screamed in terror and reared up and back, dragging the Kingsman under. Tarpy had reached the steed and grabbed at the reins, and Tuck slid to a stop over the Man as the Vulg bunched and leapt at Tarpy, snarling jaws aslaver. Thuun! Sssthwock! Tuck's arrow buried itself in the Vulg's chest, and the beast was dead as it smashed into the horse, knocking its feet from under. Squealing, the steed crashed down onto the ice. Rending cracks rived the surface, and a great jagged slab tilted up and over. Tuck, Tarpy, and the Man—each desperately clawing at the canting ice—the screaming, kicking horse, and the dead Vulg all slid down to be swept under by the swift current. And the slab slammed shut behind them like a great trapdoor.
The icy shock of the frigid water nearly caused Tuck to swoon, so cold it was that it burned. But ere he could faint, the racing current rammed him into a great rock, and the jolt brought him to. Up he frantically swam, to collide with the underside of the ice, and he all but screamed in terror. His fingers clawed at the hard undersurface in panic as the merciless torrent swept him along. He needed to breathe but couldn't, for the bitterly cold water was everywhere, though breath raced by only inches away. Numb he grew, and he knew he was dead, but he held on until he could last no more. Yet, lo! his face came into a narrow pocket of air trapped between hard ice and gushing water, and he gasped rapidly, his cheek pressed against the ice, his panting breath harsh in his ears. He clutched helplessly at the smooth frozen undersurface, trying to stay where he was, but there was nought to grasp and his fingers no longer did his bidding.
He was swept under again, dragged down away from the ice, his saturated clothes weighing him under. Again the frigid current whelmed him into a great rock, and he was slammed sideways into a crevice, jammed there by the surge at the riverbed, far below the surface. He reached down and numbly felt a river rock and forced his fingers to close, to grasp it up from the bottom, and he clawed his way up the crevice. He would try to hammer through the ice, though he had little hope of succeeding.
Up he inched, buffeted by the whelming surge, pressed into the cleft of the great rock, nearly pinned by the force. Up he struggled, straining every nerve, every sinew, his lungs screaming for air. Up, and his grip failed him and the rock plummeted, whirling away from his benumbed fingers, but the furious battle upward went on. Up he clawed, and against his will his lungs heaved, trying to breathe, to find air and draw it past clamped lips. He knew he could hold out no longer. No! his mind shouted in anger, and with all his might, all his energy, he gave one last desperate surge upward. He came into the sweet night air, and his lungs pumped like bellows, for he had come up in one of the dark gurging pools where ice had not yet formed.
With enormous effort he crawled up onto the great stone thrusting above the water and lay against the icy rock, gasping for air. He could no longer feel his hands, and uncontrollable shudders racked through his body. He was cold… so cold… so bitterly cold, and he knew that he was dying. Yet from the depths of his being he willed himself to get up, to stand, but he only managed to roll over onto his side. He lay there panting, with his cheek pressed against the cold, hard stone, and only his eyes moved at his will.
Down between the great walls of thorn looming darkly upward he could see a ring of torchlight, perhaps one hundred yards away, at the ford. But one torch was much nearer, darting from place to place. Closer it came, held high. It was Danner! He came searching the pools! Tuck tried to speak, to call out, and his voice was but a feeble croak, lost in the churn. Again Tuck called, this time louder, though still faint. Danner jerked about and held up his torch to see the Warrow crumpled on the rock, and he darted to the pool, stopping at the edge of the ice.
"Tuck!" he cried, "I've found you! You're alive!" His voice sounded as if he were weeping. "Har! Yar!" he shouted at the others, his cry loud between the thorn walls. "This way! Hoy! Bring rope!" He turned back to Tuck. "We'll throw you a line and pull you out of there."
"I can't use my hands," Tuck managed to say. "They don't work anymore. I can't even sit up." And Tuck found that he was sobbing.
"Don't worry, bucco," Danner said, "I'll come and get you." Danner began stripping his clothes, muttering angrily to himself: "Witless fools! Trying to flip that slab back over." Other young buccen came pelting up, wondering in their eyes at the sight of Tuck. "I told you!" spat Danner. "Search the pools! Some now stay with me! The rest search for Tarpy… and the Man! Who has the rope?" They stood agape a moment until Patrel barked out orders, and four stayed with Patrel and Danner while the others began the search.
Danner tied the line to himself, and Patrel and the other four took a grip on it. Then the young buccan plunged into the water, crying out with the shock and pain of the cold, but swiftly he reached the rock, the current carrying him. Up onto the stone he clambered, shivering uncontrollably, his teeth achatter. Pulling in some slack, he sat Tuck up and looped the line over him, using a great slipknot. "All right, bucco," his voice diddered with the cold, "in we go now. The current will carry us out of here."
Tuck was of no help, but Danner managed to get the two of them into the bitter rush, and Tuck lost consciousness. With Patrel and two others anchoring the line, paying it out, Danner kept Tuck afloat while the swift current carried them onward to the downstream rim of the frigid pool, where waited Argo and Delber, who pulled first Tuck and then Danner up onto the ice. Hurriedly, his feet trailing behind, they half carried, half dragged Tuck back to the fire, where they stripped his clothes from him and warmed him and wrapped him in two blankets taken from the bedrolls behind the ponies' saddles. Danner, too, moaning with the cold, came to the fire, limping, with Arbin helping him. He, also, was first warmed, then wrapped in blankets by the fire. Tuck came partly awake, and hot tea was given to both, Patrel holding the cup to Tuck's mouth, urging the buccan to sip.
A time passed, and Tuck was now sitting. His hands were beginning to tingle needle-sharp when at last the other buccen returned from the search. Tuck looked up as Dilby came to the fire. "Tarpy?" Tuck asked, and he burst into tears when Dilby shook his head, no.
When Captain Darby and the healers came, sent for by Patrel, both Tuck and Danner were taken by pony-cart back to the Thornwalker campsite. Neither said much on the trip, and in the tent Tuck was given a sleeping draught for his painfully throbbing hands and fell into a deep, dreamless state. Yet Danner awoke after but a few hours of restless sleep to see Tuck awkwardly gripping a pencil and determinedly writing in his diary. He's putting it all down in his diary, you know, to get it out of his mind, muttered Danner to himself, and he fell once again into troubled slumber.
Tuck awoke to Danner shaking his arm. "Up, bucco. They've gone off without us, as if we were sick or something," said Danner. "Well, we've got to show em we're tougher than they think. How are your hands? It was m
y feet that nearly gave out on me."
Tuck flexed his fingers. "They feel just a bit strange, somewhat like they're swollen. But that's all." He looked up at Danner and their eyes met, and Tuck began to weep.
"Come on, bucco," said Danner, his own voice choking, "don't go into that now."
"I'm sorry, Danner, but I just can't help it." Tuck's voice was filled with misery, and his tear-laden eyes stared unseeing into a private horror. "I can't wrench my mind away from it—the Man, the horse, Tarpy, all trapped beneath the ice, struggling for air, beating at the frozen surface. Oh, Lor! Tarpy, Tarpy. I close my eyes and see his face under the ice, his hands clawing, but he cannot get out." Sobs racked Tuck's frame, and Danner, weeping too, threw an arm over Tuck's shoulders. "If only I hadn't shot the Vulg just then," Tuck sobbed, "it wouldn't have struck the horse and the ice wouldn't have broken and… and…" Tuck could not go on.
"Hold it!" exclaimed Danner, leaping up and facing Tuck, his sorrow turning to anger. "That's stupid! If you hadn't feathered that brute when you did, then it would have bitten Tarpy's head off! Don't blame your fool self for an accident of misfortune. You did the right thing, and I mean exactly the right thing. It could have been you drowned under the ice instead of Tarpy—or the Man. Any one or all three could have come up in a pool like you did. No, Tuck, chance alone slew our comrade, and chance alone saved you, so if you want to blame someone or something, blame chance!"
Tuck, shocked from his grief and guilt and self-pity by Danner's angry words, looked up at the other buccan. A moment passed, and the only sound was Danner's harsh breathing. And then Tuck spoke, his voice grim. "No, Danner, not chance. I'll not blame chance. Chance did not send that Vulg after the Kingsman. 'Twas Modru."
Captain Darby called the Thornwalker Fourth together at the Spindle Ford, and a service was said for Tarpy, and for the unnamed herald. And through it all, Tuck's eyes remained dry, although many others wept.
And then Captain Darby spoke to all the company: "Buccen, though we have lost a comrade, life goes on. The High King has called a muster at Challerain Keep, and some from the Bosky are duty-bound to answer. I will send couriers to start the word spreading, and others then will respond to the call. Yet some must go forth now and be foremost to answer. It has fallen our lot to be the first to choose, and these are the choices: to remain and ward the Bosky, or to answer the King's summons. I call upon each now to consider well and carefully and then give your answer. What will it be? Will you Walk the Thorns of the Seven Dells, or will you instead walk the ramparts of Challerain Keep?"
Silence descended upon the Thornwalkers as each considered his answer—silence, that is, except for one who had already made up his mind. Tuck stepped forward five paces until he stood alone on the ice. "Captain Darby," he called, and all heard him, "I will go to the High King, for Evil Modru has a great wrong to answer for. Nay! two wrongs: one lies atop the Rooks' Roost, the other sleeps 'neath this frozen river."
Danner strode forward to stand beside Tuck, and so, too, did Patrel. Arbin, Dilby, Delber, and Argo joined them, and so did all of Patrel's squad. Then came others, until a second squad had formed. More began to step forward, but Captain Darby cried, "Hold! No more now! We cannot leave the ford unguarded. Yet, heed this: when others come to join our company, then again will I give you the same choice. Until that time, though, these two squads will be first, and the High King could not ask for better.
"Hearken unto me, for this shall be the way of it. Patrel Rushlock, you are named Captain of this Company of the King, and your squad leaders are to be Danner Bramblethorn of the first squad and Tuckerby Underbank of the second. Captain Patrel, as more squads are formed, they shall be dispatched to your command. And this is the last order I shall give you: Lead well. And to the Company of the King, I say this: Walk in honor."
The next morning, forty-three grim-faced Boskydell Warrows rode forth from the Great Spindlethorn Barrier and into the Land of Rian. They came out along the road across the Spindle Ford, each armed with bow and arrows and cloaked in Thornwalker grey. Their destination was Challerain Keep, for they had been summoned.
CHAPTER 4
CHALLERAIN KEEP
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North, then east rode the young buccen, the Warrow Company of the King, along the Upland Way, the road into Rian. They were striking for the Post Road, some twenty-five miles hence, the main pike north to Challerain Keep. Tuck spent much of the time riding among the members of his new squad, getting acquainted. Some he knew from days past, others he did not. Quickly he found that they had come from all parts of Eastdell—from the villages of Bryn and Eastpoint, Downyville, Midwood, Raffin, Wigge, Greenfields, Leeks, and the like, or from farms nearby. Other than Tuck, no one else in his squad was from Woody Hollow or even from its nearby neighbor, Budgens, though one young buccan was from Brackenboro. Yet soon the Warrows were engaged in friendly chatter and no longer seemed to be strangers. Why, Finley Wick from Eastpoint even knew Tuck's cousins, the Bendels of Eastpoint Hall.
They rode through a snow-covered region that slowly rose up out of Spindle Valley to become a flat prairie with but few features. Behind, they could see the massive Barrier clutched unto the land, looming sapless and iron-hard in winter sleep, waiting for the caress of spring to send the life juices coursing through the great tangle, to set forth unto the Sun a green canopy of light-catching leaves, to send the great blind roots inexorably questing through the dark earth again. Immense it was, anchored from horizon to horizon and beyond, a great thorny wall. Yet as the Warrows rode, distance diminished it until it took on the aspect of a vast, remote hill, stretched past seeing. At last it sank below the horizon, and although Tuck rode in the company of friends, still he felt as if he had been abandoned. Yet whether it was because the loss of the Thornwall meant that he'd truly left the Bosky behind, or whether he felt exposed and vulnerable because he now rode upon an open plain, he could not say.
Ahead, here and there, lone barren trees or winter-stripped thickets occasionally appeared, but they, too, were slowly left behind on the snow-swept prairie. A thin, chill wind sprang up, gnawing at their backs, and soon all cloak hoods were up and talk dwindled to infrequent phrases and grunts. On they went, stopping once to feed the ponies some grain and to take a sparse meal. At times they walked, leading the steeds, giving the animals some respite.
On one of these "strolls in the snow," as Finley called them, Tuck found himself trudging between Patrel and Danner. "I hope this blasted cold wind whistling up my cloak is gone by the time we make camp," said Danner. "I don't fancy sleeping in the open in the wind."
"I don't think we'll be in the open, Danner," said Patrel, "if we reach the point where the Upland Way meets the Post Road, as planned, for that's at the western edge of the Battle Downs. We should be able to find the lee of a hillside there, out of the wind, and make the best of things."
Tuck nodded. "I hope so, but if we don't and if the wind doesn't die down, it doesn't give us much to make the best of, does it now?"
Patrel shook his head, and Danner looked at the sky. The wind mouthed at the edges of their hoods, and the ponies patiently plodded beside them. "Say," asked Danner, "how long will it take us to reach the Keep?"
"Well," answered Patrel, "let me see. One day to the Battle Downs, and then six more along the Post Road north to Challerain Keep. If the weather holds— by that I mean, if it doesn't snow—we'll be seven days on the journey. But, with snow, it could be… longer."
"Seven days," mused Tuck. "Perhaps that'll give me enough time to get skilled with my new bow— if I practice every morning before we set out and every evening before bedding down." Tuck's bow had been swept away, lost under the ice of the Spindle River when the Kingsman's horse had crashed through and Tuck had been dragged down by the whelming current. Another bow had been drawn from stores, one that most nearly matched Tuck's old one in length and pull. Yet Tuck would need practice to get the feel of it and regain his pinpoint accuracy.
"
Look, Tuck," said Patrel, "I've been meaning to tell you something, but I just haven't been able to muster my courage to the point where I could. But it's just this. I'm dreadfully sorry about Tarpy's death, and I know how close he was to you. He was a bright spirit in this time of gloom, a spirit we will sorely miss in the dark days to come. But I just want you to know that I'll try with all my being to make up for the horrible mistake I made, the mistake that got Tarpy slain."
"What?" cried Tuck, dumbfounded. "What are you saying? If any is to blame, it is I. I shot the Vulg. The horse would not have fallen but for that. Had I only acted quicker, the Vulg would have been slain ere he sprang."
"Ah, but you forget," answered Patrel, "had I but ordered the gate shut immediately after the Kings-man rode through, then that Vulg would have been slain outside the barricade as were the three beasts that raced but Vulg strides behind."
"Nay!" protested Tuck, " 'Twas not your fault. If I had—"
"Ar!" interrupted Danner, scowling, his voice harsh. "If this and if that, and who's to blame. If I'd only ordered the gate shut; if I'd only listened to the Man's warning; if I'd only watched the road instead of the Man; if I'd only seen the Vulgs sooner; if I'd only shot sooner. If! If! If! Those are just a few of the it's I've heard, and without a glimmering doubt there's many a more where those came from. Tuck, you had the right of it yesterday, though you seem to have lost it already, so I'll remind you: the only one to blame is Modru! Remember that, the both of you! It is Modru's hand that slew Tarpy, none other, just as he slew Hob." With that, Danner leapt upon his pony's back and spurred forward to the head of the column, shouting, "Mount up! We've a ways to go and little time to do it in!" And so went all the Company, eastward along the Upland Way.
The Sun had lipped the horizon when the Warrows came into the margins of the hill country called the Battle Downs, a name from the time of the Great War. They made camp on the lee of a hill in a pine grove and supped on a meal of dried venison and crue, a tasteless but nourishing waybread, and they took their meal with hearty hot tea. After supper, Tuck cut some pine boughs and lashed them together in a large target bundle, and long into the evening, by flickering firelight, the pop of the fire and the sigh of the wind were punctuated by the sounds of bow and arrow.
The Dark Tide Page 8