Bell Mountain (The Bell Mountain Series) (17 page)

“Instead, we’ll cross the plain and go slowly up and up to the forests that cover the foothills; and then for most of the way we’ll have to find our own paths, or even make them. When we come out of those woods, we’ll be on the slopes of Bell Mountain. God help us.”

“My teacher back home said anyone would get killed who tried to climb the mountain,” Jack said. “He said you’d fall off, or freeze to death, or be crushed by falling rocks.”

“And there are evil spirits on some mountains,” Ellayne put in. “They can bring fog and make you get lost, and they come at night and drink your blood while you sleep.”

Obst threw a stern look at her. “If God has called you to the top of the mountain, He’ll see that you get there. But there’s danger enough in the world without a need for evil spirits. That’s just a lot of Heathen superstition.”

“Well, it was in my storybook,” Ellayne said.

Obst made no answer, but led them tirelessly across the plain, making for the green-clad hills in the far distance to the north and east.

“Do we have to go so fast?” Jack said.

“I’m always happier under cover of the trees,” Obst said. “It’s safer.”

“What can happen to us out here?”

“Enough. Slave-traders, robbers—and maybe beasts.”

“Please, Obst—where do the beasts come from?” Ellayne said. “Like the knuckle-bears and that horrible striped thing we saw in the woods. Do the Old Books have anything to say about them?”

They went on for another hundred yards before Obst began to answer.

“When the Children of Geb first set foot upon the mainland and history began,” he said, “there were many kinds of beasts that had to be subdued before the people could live in the land. Some we still have with us—the wolf and the bear, the wildcat and the catamount, and the wild boar. Others are no longer seen in Obann, but still inhabit other countries—the lion and the leopard, the wild dog, and the rhinoceros. And some are not to be found anywhere, unless it be far to the south or far to the north where no man ever goes. But men remember them—the dragon and the basilisk, the satyr and the gryphon, and the cockatrice with poison hotter than an adder’s.

“But there were still other beasts. Of some, nothing remains but an old name in an ancient language, a word that has no meaning anymore. We see these words in Scripture, but there are no descriptions to go with them. Mumheer, allabach, vehoma, kecharr—those are some of the names. And there were beasts whose names are not recorded.

“I have come to believe that God is bringing back those beasts that were lost. You’ve seen some of them, and I’ve seen more. To what end, who can say? Maybe to devour a wicked and rebellious people from off the face of the earth.”

Jack thought about that for some minutes, but Ellayne spoke first.

“But you said the knuckle-bears were harmless,” she said. “And Jack shot with his slingshot a little hoppy animal with big ears and a long nose, and we ate it for supper. Beasts like those wouldn’t devour anybody.”

“Do the Old Books say that God will bring back the beasts to kill off the people?” Jack asked.

Obst stopped walking, and suddenly grinned at him.

“My boy, you have the makings of a theologian!” he said. “No, the Scriptures say no such thing, neither in the Prophets nor the Songs. So I’d be wise to dismiss the thought! I don’t know why there are strange beasts in the land these days. I simply don’t know!”

But it was Martis who had the most perilous encounter with a beast, and this is how it happened.

Having been told by outlaws that Obst was going to Silvertown, but knowing that the children’s true goal was Bell Mountain, Martis wanted to catch up to them and follow closely. He doubted they’d go all the way to Silvertown: that was almost as far from the mountain as Ninneburky. It was the chief of all the mining towns; and if I were minding children, he thought, I certainly wouldn’t take them there. Every slaver and kidnapper in Obann passed through Silvertown. He was sure the hermit knew that, and had simply lied to Bort and Tumm.

Martis reasoned that the hermit would lead the children out of the forest on a course for Bell Mountain. If he knew the lay of the land as Martis knew it from maps, he would want to cross the plain where the forests of the foothills reached farthest south and west. It was on the plains that they’d be most vulnerable to human predators; the hermit would want to cross as quickly as possible.

Martis decided to travel along the fringe of the forest, where he could watch the plains. He could question anyone he met: an old man accompanied by two children would be conspicuous. He found a northerly trail and spurred his horse to a trot, expecting to break out of the forest by midday. What he didn’t expect was for his horse to fight him, shuddering under the saddle.

“What ails you, cousin?” he said, fighting for control with reins and spurs.

Right beside him, a wall of underbrush and saplings burst open with a roar, and Martis was unhorsed, hurled backward onto the trail. And the horse screamed.

But not for long. With a loud crack, a massive beak crushed the horse’s neck and cut off its scream. The beak belonged to a creature spawned in a madman’s fevered nightmare—a gigantic bird that had to bend down to seize a horse’s neck. Legs like scaly pillars, useless tiny wings that flapped excitedly, matted grey feathers shot with white and blue, a long powerful neck, staring yellow eyes as big as teacups, and a hooked beak as mighty as a pair of clashing millstones: that was what Martis saw. Before he could catch his breath, it killed his horse.

It shook once, then dropped the limp and lifeless body to the forest floor.

Then it spotted Martis.

At first he couldn’t move a muscle. The yellow eyes glared at him. He’d never seen or heard of such a thing in all his life. What could a man do against such a monster? A bird that might weigh as much as a big bear!

It glared at him, then opened that vast beak and cawed.

Martis scrambled backward into the foliage, somehow found his feet, and fled in a blind panic. He didn’t stop until he ran right into a fallen log and fell over it, landing face-first in a mire of wet, sticky, rotting leaves.

Only then did he realize that the bird had not pursued him. Why should it, when it had his horse to eat?

He rose to his knees, turned and looked back, clinging to the creeper-covered trunk of the fallen tree. It had been a very long time since Martis had experienced pure, overpowering fear. Now it drained out of him, leaving him exhausted but rational.

I’ll need my pack! he thought. My tinderbox, my map, my money, my credentials—I’ve got to get them back. He would have to wait until the bird had eaten its fill and moved on.

When he felt strong enough, he got up and crept back the way he’d come. Broken bushes and gouges in the leaf-litter marked his trail like signposts. It was not as long a trail as he thought. He stopped when he heard the bird ripping flesh from bone and noisily gulping it down: stopped and hid behind a stout oak tree until the noise stopped.

After what he deemed a long enough wait, he crept a little closer, silently. He peered through a screen of brush. The great bird was gone.

It had eaten half his horse, tossing the head aside, gobbling up the neck—bones and all—and tearing the meat and hide off the rest of the carcass. It must have devoured several hundred pounds of flesh in a few minutes.

Martis found his pack a few yards from the horse. Now he had everything he needed—except a weapon with which he could hope to defend himself, should he meet the bird again. It wouldn’t leave much of a man’s body uneaten. But then what weapon would avail against a creature that attacked from ambush?

He shouldered his pack, wrapped the leather thong of his mace around his wrist, and marched. The mire he’d fallen into stained his clothes, his hands, and his face, and it stank. Maybe it would protect him from beasts that hunted by scent.

By noontime he was out of the thick of the forest, in sight of the plains, and hot and winded from the hard pace he’d set himself. He rested against a tree, embracing the trunk, and then began to tremble all over from head to toe, and couldn’t stop.

A bit later Helki came upon what was left of Martis’ horse, and marveled. He’d never seen the giant bird, but he’d seen its tracks before, and he saw them again, here.

“Look at that!” he said to himself. “Well, where there’s a horse, there’s a man. Let’s see what’s left of the rider.”

He read the marks: man thrown clear of horse, bolts into underbrush, and then returns, has a look-round, and resumes his journey. That didn’t sound like any man Helki knew. An outlaw would’ve fled back the way he’d come, and wouldn’t have come back.

Helki decided to follow him: he wanted to meet that man. If nothing else, the rider could describe the creature that had killed his horse.

Latt Squint-eye insisted on dues being paid to him by every man in his part of Lintum Forest, but there was one thing he valued even more: news. For that reason, Bort interrupted his dues-collecting to hurry back to Squint-eye’s camp with his news.

The self-styled King of the Forest might have been a beautiful baby once, but now he was a hideous man. His left eye squinted. His right eye goggled, and around it was tattooed a blue serpent that writhed when he spoke. A ghastly white scar ran diagonally across his forehead; but the man who’d given him that was dead. He missed a few teeth, and the one eyetooth that remained on the right side of his jaw, he’d filed to a sharp point. He braided his grey hair and beard into many braids, and sometimes stuck slow-burning fuses into his beard to accentuate an already daunting appearance. But of course the most daunting thing about him was that he’d murdered a great many men to gain his position, and was willing to murder many more to keep it.

“So!” he growled, when he’d heard Bort’s news. “The Temple sends out a real killer, all this way from Obann, just to visit a harmless balmy hermit. And they think I’m fool enough to believe it!

“You’ve never lived in the City, Bort; you don’t know the presters like I know them. Holy men—bah! They’re worse thieves that we could ever be. Like as not they’ve found out there’s money to be made in Lintum Forest, provided they stretch a few necks first, beginning with mine and yours. Then the free men can pay their dues to the Temple instead of to the likes of us.

“Well, I’ll tell you what to do. Take ten men and find that popinjay from the Temple, and bring him back to me. Able to talk, mind you! I’ve got a few questions I’d like to ask him. And then we’ll see whose neck gets stretched.”

Bort lost no time in choosing nine of the most accomplished manslayers in the camp, including two or three adept at tracking and leading them in pursuit of the killer from the Temple.

Martis hiked eastward along the fringe of the forest, pushing himself at a brisk pace. He felt exposed and vulnerable without his horse—absurd, he chided himself, considering what had happened to the horse. But he was not used to being afraid, and the fear had worked itself down into a deep place in his soul where he couldn’t fight it.

He discovered now that he’d been inwardly sneering at his patron, Lord Reesh, for being afraid of a dream. Reesh, of all men, giving in to religious superstition! Martis had always admired his master’s ability to rule the Temple without believing in any of the medieval mummery it stood for. For a little thing like a dream to shake his unbelief was unworthy of him. But now that he himself was shaken, Martis sympathized with his master.

It’ll pass, he promised himself. I’ll carry on with the mission; I’ll follow those moonstruck children up the mountain—if they get there!—and see nothing happen when they ring the bell, if there is a bell. And by the time it’s all over, I’ll be myself again.

It’s all tripe and superstition, he told himself. A lot of foolishness left over from ancient times, cobwebs and all. Even if some fanatic, thousands of years ago, had managed to erect a bell atop Mount Yul, and the bell were still there today, you could ring it until your arms fell off and nothing would come of it. God wouldn’t hear it because there is no God. The ancients believed in God, and where were they? It was all superstition—albeit useful superstition, because the Temple was a device to hold the nation together. By all that was reasonable and sane, the God of the Scriptures would have blasted the Temple ten times over if He knew but half of what the Temple did in His name! Including any number of assassinations performed by Martis himself in the service of the Temple.

By such arguments, and by pushing himself as hard as his legs would tolerate, Martis came near to calming himself. But from time to time the vision of that terrible bird crushing the horse’s neck in its beak rushed back to him and made him shiver, and wrung his stomach into a knot, and oppressed his heart.

“There are no birds like that!” he would mutter to himself. “It was a thing that should not be!”

But the fact that he was walking now, instead of riding, argued otherwise.