Curse: The Dark God Book 2 (28 page)

“Serah?” he asked.

“It comes and goes,” she said. “It will pass. Matiga is reading her codices to see if there might be an herb to stop it.”

He knelt by Nettle and put his arm around him. Nettle trembled in his embrace. A few minutes later the trembling stopped. Argoth rocked with him. He thought back over the last weeks. Nettle
was
getting worse, just as that Divine of Nilliam said.

In the beginning, there had been flashes of the old Nettle. He would say something or do something, and Argoth would think that maybe he’d come back despite the soul he’d lost. But those flashes were coming less and less. Sometimes it seemed Nettle hardly even knew who Argoth was.

He looked at his family. He knew what would happen to them if Shim lost. A man had to take care of his family. They were his first duty. He had to take care of them in this life and the next.

Serah poked her bronze needle through a quilted tunic that soldiers wore under their armor and tugged a sturdy piece of thread through. She was pregnant, only a month away from delivering.

He said, “Will you talk to me?”

She glanced at him, then went back to her work in the candlelight. He took that as a yes. “Let’s say you had a choice. Perhaps you were in a capsized boat in a heaving sea. Or you were on the beach and saw a sleeper wave coming toward you. And you knew you could save our children, get them to safety, but not the children of your sisters. You know that if you try to save them all, you will all perish together. What would you do?”

“I have not forgiven you,” she said.

“I’m not talking about Nettle,” he said. “I’m asking you a question. How do you prioritize? I want to know.”

“Why do you even have to ask?” She tied a knot and then bit the thread off.

“What would you do?”

She sat up straight and felt her pregnant belly. Their child must have kicked. “You know what I would do,” she said and turned back to her work.

And he did. She would save her children. Then she would go back and perish trying to save the rest. Which was how it should be.

“I think I know how to heal Nettle,” he said. The moment he uttered the words, he regretted having said them. He didn’t know that Nilliam could restore his son. It was probably a lie. But what if it wasn’t? What if it could save Nettle from going into that world unprotected?

Serah stopped, bronze needle in one hand, thread in the other.

“Forget I said that.”

“Do you wish to torture me with false hopes?”

He wondered how much he should tell her. He had kept her in the dark for so many years. He’d thought keeping her in the dark would keep her close. In the end, it only led him to lose both her and Nettle. But he couldn’t tell her he was thinking of Nilliam’s offer. “It might be nothing. Just an old scrap of something I remember. I shouldn’t have mentioned it.”

Serah looked up at him. The anger and hurt were plain on her face. She knew he was lying. “You’ll never give it up,” she said referring to his secrets and lies, “will you?”

How could he bring her into his confidence on this matter? How could he not keep some secrets from her? If he told her what he was thinking, she would tell Matiga who would tell Shim and Eresh. They would watch him. And then this opportunity, if it was one, would be forever beyond his reach. Besides, he hadn’t committed to anything. He didn’t know yet if Loyal even spoke the truth.

He felt the pouch in his pocket with its bird weave. “We have information that might turn the upcoming battle before it even starts. I’ll know better tomorrow if it will work,” he said. “That may give me more time to focus on our son.” Then he finished his food and went out into the rain and across the bailey to Shim’s quarters.

30

Mission

SUGAR WAS RIDING back from her meeting with Withers. It was raining and, despite Urban’s riding cloak, she was soaked. Up ahead, yet another messenger galloped toward them from the direction of Rogum’s Defense. She and Urban moved their mounts off the muddy road for the third time.

The messenger rode up on the shoulder where the grass would provide more traction instead of down in the mud of the road, but the horse’s hooves still threw up soggy clumps of earth. Sugar recognized this Shimsman as he approached. She waved a small hello as he went by. He gave her a nod as he flew past, his face grim with determined purpose.

“Something’s up,” said Urban.

Sugar agreed, and they urged their horses into a trot. Not much later they arrived at the fortress. Despite the rain, it was buzzing with activity.

Sugar had been excited to return. She’d walked for hours today. She’d beheld wonders, and couldn’t wait to tell Legs all about it, but then she saw the faces of the soldiers and knew something terrible had happened.

They received the news from the grooms at the stables. She and Urban hurried to the great hall and saw the dead men lying there. She had not known any of them well, but their deaths still struck her. She had nothing to give, but Urban opened his purse and placed a coin next to each of them. Off to the side, one of the men who’d been at Woolsom was telling the tale of the battle. She and Urban moved into the crowd of people about him. She listened with horror as he told of the Bone Face Kragow and the wraiths.

As the story progressed, Urban’s expression became more and more concerned. When the soldier finished telling the tale, Urban turned to her. “I need to talk to Argoth.”

She nodded, and they left the hall, him to speak with Argoth and her with Legs. Sugar found Legs sitting on a barrel under the eaves of the kitchen with group of men eating swamp. Flax sat next to him. He stood when Sugar arrived, smoothed both sides of his long blond moustache. “Just the person I’ve been waiting for. I was under strict command from the chief lady of the tub not to leave the boy’s sight.” He paused.

When she didn’t respond, he repeated, “not to leave the boy’s
sight
. . .”

“Ah,” she said and faked a laugh.

Some of the other men shook their heads at the joke.

Flax stood. “I dared not risk the wrath of that formidable woman. But now that you’re here, I deliver him to you and take my leave.” He turned to the other men. “Take heart, boys. The Bone Faces will pay.”

“Thank you,” Legs said to Flax.

Flax reached out and gave Legs’s hand a friendly squeeze. “You remember what I told you.”

“I will.”

Flax gave a sympathetic look to Sugar, then walked out toward the stables.

“He’s grand,” said Legs.

“He’s a foreigner,” one of the men said as if that trumped everything else.

“Foreigner or not,” another said, “he’s the one I want next to me when the fighting gets thick.”

Sugar put her hand on Legs’s shoulder.

“So?” he said to her.

She didn’t feel comfortable sharing everything that had happened today with these men. “Come with me,” she said. She took his hand, and he hopped off the barrel. Then she led him away. When they were in the privacy of their own cellar, she said, “Brother, you cannot imagine. You won’t believe the things I saw.” Two of the ferrets were awake in their cage, playing, wrestling with each other.

“Start from the beginning,” he said.

She did and told him everything from the moment she found the thread while working with the washerwomen to the goatherd and howlers. When she finished, she remembered the honeyed nuts. She withdrew the cloth from her pocket. “Here,” she said. “I saved these for you.”

She pressed them into his hands, but his face was cast down. “What’s wrong?”

“Do you think they made it?”

He was talking about Mother and Da. She put an arm around him. “If Mother can’t make it, nobody can. Remember, she went to find Da. I’m sure they’re safe as stone.”

But in her heart she wondered. Furthermore, after the tale of Woolsom, she realized how important Urban’s suggestion had been. She and Legs did need a plan should things fall apart, one for this world and the next. War was upon them, and soldiers died all the time. What if she and Legs were killed, and the ancestors didn’t come? What if the same happened to her friends here?

She thought about the skenning and blackspine and realized she might be the only thing standing between those she loved and the perils of the yellow world.

A few minutes later Urban darkened the doorway. “It’s begun,” he said. “The ferret is being sent to war.”

“Where?” she asked.

He looked at Legs, glanced behind him to make sure nobody was there. “Blue Towers.”

31

The Wilds

TALEN KEPT an eye out. They were in the Wilds proper now, and who knew what foul thing might attack them here? He held Scruff’s reins, leading him along the rocky crown of a ridge. River sat up in the saddle, every minute growing worse, looking like she was going fall off with the slightest nudge. In front of him, the maze of wooded hollows and hills that made up the Wilds stretched for as far as he could see. And Talen was about to see much less, for the thick clouds of the approaching storm were not far behind, blotting out the sky and moving fast in his direction.

The wind picked up, gusting into the trees with a heavy hand. Talen loped as fast as the terrain would allow, weaving his way along the rocky crown of the ridge in his bare feet, taking them both deeper into this forsaken wilderness.

He’d taken his weave off a few miles back. He needed all the might he could muster, not only to move faster, but also to defend himself and River should some abominable thing come at them through the trees. His Fire burned inside him, filling him with vigor.

The crows flew above, fighting to keep pace in the increasing winds. Behind him thunder boomed. A smattering of hail fell from the sky, bouncing on the ground. The brief hail stopped. Then a gust of wind brought another squall, the pellets stinging his face and arms. Then the winds picked up even more and the hail was replaced by a sweep of rain, a huge curtain of it hissing as the drops struck rock and tree.

The wind buffeted the two crows. They cawed, tried to stay aloft, but then dived out of sight.

Now was his chance. He dropped off the ridge, down the slope River had told him to take and into the trees. He made sure to wrap the reins tightly around his hand. Scruff was a calm horse, but the lightning could spook the best animals, and he didn’t want to throw River.

The leading edge of the rain crossed over and engulfed them in a gray torrent of water that soaked his hair and clothes. Then the thick rain and clouds folded them in, cutting visibility.

A few minutes later he struck out along a saddle and then climbed back up to the crest of another hill at a lower elevation. They were going to come to a vale with a lazy river. They would cross that, climb the slope on the far side, then drop down into a hollow, which would lead them along for a few miles. There was a cutoff, and a jutting rock that looked like a rabbit’s head, which was the marking that would tell him Harnock’s vale was close.

Talen led Scruff along the hill, trying to keep to the thinner parts of the wood because River seemed barely able to avoid the branches. After about fifteen minutes they came to the far side of the hill. Talen looked down the slope and saw a gentle valley below with the serpentine coils of a slow river.

“Is this it?” he asked.

She didn’t reply.

“River,” he said. Her cloak’s hood hung down over her face. He went to her and grabbed her hand. “Sister, is this where we go down?” He pushed the cowl of her hood back so she could see. Her eyes were rolling in her head.

Good lords, not here. Not now. He patted her hand and called her name again.

She slurred something.

“What?” he asked.

“Down,” she moaned. At least, that’s what he thought she said. Then she slumped to one side and almost fell off the horse.

Talen grabbed her and righted her in the saddle, and then he retrieved some rope from the saddle bags and lashed her feet in the stirrups and legs to the saddle flaps. With her securely tied in, he set off, descending the slope slantwise, hurrying through the trees and scrub.

Toward the bottom he jammed his toes on a fallen branch and stumbled. He cursed and proceeded on. When he broke from the trees onto the valley floor, he stopped.

Wurms were said to make their burrows in the valley bottoms. He scanned the tall meadow grass, then quickly realized there would be no burrows here—the whole valley bottom was a boggy marsh. He moved forward. As he proceeded, he sank to his thighs in the brackish water, the mud sucking at his legs. The good thing was that the rain kept the mosquitoes grounded. He was bound to pick up a few leeches before he made it to the other side, but that was far better than falling into the hands of what chased him.

The river in the middle of the valley was not fast, and he and Scruff were able to easily swim to the other side and climb up into slightly less boggy ground. When he reached the base of the far slope, he looked back across the valley. The slope he’d come down was shrouded in mist and rain. He thought he saw something brown flash through the trees, but when he looked closer, nothing was there. The hackles rose on his neck. The last thing he wanted to meet was woodikin. He waited, but whatever it was didn’t reveal itself again. It was probably just some animal—a deer or badger seeking cover.

He checked River’s lashings to make sure they were not too loose or tight, then climbed the hill on this side, crested, and dropped down into the hollow on the other side. When they reached the bottom, River pointed the direction they should go.

Talen didn’t think she had much time left, and he began to run along an animal trail under the drenched canopy of trees. The storm rumbled overhead, darkening the sky. The rain was falling hard, erasing any tracks they left. He thanked the Six for the cover, even if it was cold.

They followed the folds of the hills and hollows, twisting and turning, and he soon realized why people entered this place and never found their way out again. He counted the cutoffs and then couldn’t remember if he’d counted five or six. Or was he at seven? Had he missed the cutoff entirely? Then he saw a break in the trees up one rocky slope and the large formation that looked like a rabbit’s head.

This was it. “We’re almost there,” He said. “Hold on.” He turned up the hollow. A creek ran noisily down the middle. Talen hurried along a thin trail that ran alongside it.

The rain lessened and then stopped, even though water still dropped from the leaves. He led Scruff along a trail at the bottom of a hollow that ended in a bowl. Harnock’s vale was just on the other side of one of the slopes, but without the sun, he couldn’t tell his directions. But even if he could, he’d forgotten which way River had said to go.

“River,” he said. He turned and found her leaning back, her arms limp at her side. Her hood had fallen back, exposing her face to the sky. She sat like someone petitioning the clouds, her face upturned, her open mouth collecting the rain.

“River!” he repeated and grabbed her hand.

She did not respond.

Scruff blew out in weariness and shifted his weight. River sagged to one side and would have fallen if not for his lashings.

“Lords, no,” he said, and righted her. He patted her hand, slapped her face. No response. He felt for a pulse in her hand and found only the faintest beat.

Which direction had she told him to go? Had she said left? He couldn’t see any sign of a trail that might tell him which slope to choose. He dithered for a moment, then decided it didn’t matter which slope he chose. If necessary, he would try them all.

The low cloud ceiling was beginning to rise, and he knew he had to find Harnock before those crows began to fly. He followed an animal path up a slope, scrabbled over the ridge at the top, and found a narrow hollow below, but River had said Harnock lived in a wide vale.

He didn’t panic. Instead, he stayed on top of the ridge and circled around, trying to keep the low branches from whipping River. When he’d gone a good way around, the trees parted and revealed a wide meadow in the vale below.

This had to be Harnock’s. He knew there was a place where he was supposed to stand and call out his desire to visit, but had no idea where that was and knew River couldn’t wait. So he skirted a cliff and descended the slope, calling Harnock’s name as he went. When he got to the bottom, he began to alternate the calls with loud whistles.

He broke from the trees into the meadow he’d seen from above. A well worn path cut through the waist-high grass and his spirits soared. This had to be the right vale, which meant Harnock’s house would be somewhere up ahead.

“Harnock!” he called and entered the path. The grass here was lush, perfect for grazing livestock. Harnock’s home was probably down the vale a bit, maybe behind the trees a few hundred yards ahead.

Still holding the reins, Talen picked up his speed. Scruff broke into a fast trot behind him. River didn’t sit the bouncing well, but his lashes held her on.

He followed the smooth trail for a hundred yards, running with the speed of his Fire. Then the trail took a tight turn, and Talen stumbled into a burrow six feet across. Scruff stumbled in after him and knocked him flat on his face partway down the gaping hole.

Scruff nickered and climbed out, River sagging to one side in the saddle. Talen raised up on his hands and knees and wiped mud from his face.

The burrow’s run was well-worn and smooth, angling gently downward into blackness. Whatever lived here was large. Fear washed over him. An odd odor rose from the depths. It was sharp, almost like vinegar, almost—

Wurm scent! He’d stumbled into a wurm hole.

He scrambled out of the hole in a panic. Two paths led away from this burrow. Another smaller burrow sank into the ground only a half dozen yards away.Beyond it was another, and another.

Wurms lived in colonies. He hadn’t run out into a grazing meadow, but a wurm field. Furthermore, he wasn’t at its edge. He was inside the outer ring.

A deer or wild goat would see the grass of this meadow and be unable to resist coming down to take a bite. And when enough had come, the wurms would rise and devour them. It was said that wurms waited underground, listening. And all this time he’d been whistling and hollering with Scruff clomping behind. His mouth went dry.

He had to get out. There was no way to muffle the thuds of Scruff’s hooves. They were going to have to run for it. He turned to flee back the way he’d come, but a dark figure on horseback emerged at the edge of the woods there. A black and brown dog was with him. It padded forward to sniff about the edge of the tall grass. A hooded crow flew low over the field and cawed. Then it turned and swooped over to light on the man’s shoulder.

The man wore high leather riding boots, a dark padded tunic, and a sword. His hair was cropped short. His face had a long scar running down one side. Moments later riders filtered out of the trees behind him.

Talen looked at the Mokaddian dreadmen. How had they found him? The rain had been so intense it would have quickly covered any tracks they would have made. Then he looked at that dog. His mind shot back to the shape he’d seen on the slope behind him after he’d crossed the marsh and lazy river. It had been the dog flashing through the trees, not some woodikin or badger.

“Holy One,” the lead dreadman called across the meadow. “It’s useless to run.”

Maybe, but if these greasy whoresons wanted him, they would have to catch him. He grabbed the saddle and swung up behind River. It was awkward, holding the reins from behind.

“Holy One, come out of there.”

“Better the wurms than you!” Talen called back and dug his heels into Scruff’s flanks. The stallion surged forward, springing past the large wurm burrow and deeper into the field.

From his height atop Scruff, the crisscrossed wurm trails were now easy to see. What a fool he’d been. He urged Scruff faster.

Behind him the lead dreadman kicked his horse and galloped forward. The crow sprang to the air. The dog barked and shot out ahead. Some of the dreadmen skirted the meadow on the near side. The rest followed their leader into the tall grass.

The wurms would be listening below. And what they’d hear was one lone horse running out front and a number behind. Talen hoped they were greedy.

Scruff leapt over a wurm burrow and just about unseated Talen, but he righted himself and tightened his grip with his thighs. They galloped for a number of yards, but a thick clump of burrows lay up ahead. So Talen pulled the reins and turned Scruff off the path into the grass. He pointed Scruff for the far side of the meadow.

River, unable to support herself, bounced to the side. Talen tried to hold onto her and the reins and keep himself from falling off, but it was a mad juggle, and he had to slow to right her. He glanced back.The lead dreadmen was closing the distance, his face hard as stone.

Suddenly a low sound began to rise about the meadow. Low like the wind, moaning through the trees, except there were no trees out here. He turned his head; the sound was coming from in front of him. He changed course. A few moments later the sound rose in front of him again.

His first impulse was to turn yet again, but perhaps that’s exactly what the wurms wanted. It was said that wurms liked to confuse and surround their prey. Maybe this was how they tricked their prey into running around in circles. He held his course, urged Scruff on, straight toward the sound.

Off to Talen’s right, something large moved through the tall grass. Ahead lay a cluster of three wurm holes. The grass around them had been beaten low. If he could get past them, he’d have a clear shot to the edge of the meadow.

The odd moaning of the wind about the field grew. “Come on,” Talen said and urged Scruff faster. But then Scruff’s ears pricked forward and to the side, and he balked. Came to a complete halt.

A moment later a wurm shot out of a hole in front of them and rose twelve feet into the air, the rest of its long length disappearing down its hole. The wurm was as thick as Talen’s leg with wrinkled gray skin. The head was shaggy, not with hair, but odd growths of skin. Its eyes were small and ugly like a salamander’s.

Scruff whinnied in fright, jerked to the side, throwing Talen. He landed with a thud in the grass just a few feet in front of the wurm. Talen scrambled to his feet, the sharp tang of the creature filling his nostrils.

The wurm pulled back to strike, opened its mouth full of short sharp teeth.

Scruff ran wildly toward the edge of the field, River jerking on his back. Talen, filled with Fire, shot out after them.

But the wurm was surprisingly fast. It struck, slamming him with the side of its head, and knocked him down. Talen rolled away, sprang to his feet, shot forward. The wurm slammed him again, this time with much more force, disorienting him. Talen sprawled to the ground, stunned.