A Fortress of Grey Ice (Book 2) (32 page)

Dagro’s eyes had narrowed. A full minute passed, and then he grunted. “Aye. ’Tis well said, lad. Here. Take my knife. Cut you and your brother the hunter’s portion.”

Raif realized many things as he watched Dagro Blackhail watch Drey open the carcass. Dagro
knew
Drey had thrown the spear, and he also knew that Drey had shared the credit to prevent any punishment falling on his younger brother. Drey had won himself immunity from the terrible act of interfering with the chief’s hunt. But Raif had not. The full force of Dagro’s wrath would have fallen upon him if Drey had not protected him. And Dagro saw that act of protection and was moved by it.

The sow’s liver was the sweetest thing Raif had ever eaten. He could still taste it now; the taste of sugar and acorns and love.

Raif felt a prick of pain in the exact center of his spine. Hairs on his scalp rose as a voice said, “Hmm. Legmeat. I think I’ll have me some of that. Cut me a portion, boy, and cut it slow as your mam squatting for a leak.”

The voice was rough and soft, and it came with a breath foul with salt meat. The sun was in Raif’s face, and the man stood behind him so Raif didn’t have the benefit of a shadow to gauge his size. He had approached from behind, doubtless drawn by the smoke and scent of fresh meat roasting on the fire. Raif cursed himself for a fool. He’d been so caught up in thinking about Drey he’d lost himself in the past and forgotten that he was camping alone in a place on the farthest edge of clan. Even so, he had ears. And any man who could move along a dry gorge bed and draw a weapon without sound was dangerous.

Still looking dead ahead, Raif said, “Stranger, why don’t you put your weapon down and join me? I’d be glad to share my food.”

He felt the point of a sword touch his backbone a second time. “So the wee clansman would be glad to share, would he? After he’s taken down one of me own elk and scared the rest so witless that they won’t come back in a month. Well, excuse me while I piss myself with gratitude. Now cut, boy, before I get tired of holding my sword just so and decide to run you through instead.”

Raif leant forward slowly, his mind racing. The stranger had been watching him take down the elk. He sounded like a clansman. Almost. But no sane clansman would lay claim to a herd of elk; they ranged too widely and traveled too swiftly for anyone to own them.

At least he was alone.
I can’t let him master me.

“Not the sword, Clansman. Use your knife.”

Raif’s hand hovered above the rock-crystal pommel of his sword. “I don’t own a knife.”

“Well, that’s a pretty state of affairs. A fine cloak, a fine sword, and no knife. Why’s that, I wonder? Haven’t had a chance to steal one yet?”

“No. I lost it in a man’s throat.” With that Raif grabbed the sword and spun to standing. He found himself facing the ugliest man he had ever seen. Middle height, but grossly broad, with thick shoulders and a fat neck. His upper arms were so wide they stood out from his body like sacks of grain. He was dressed in armor cobbled together from metal pieces and once-living things. Turtle and oyster shells were mounted alongside steel discs and copper rings on a coat of boiled hide. His lower arms were squeezed like sausages into spiraling bullhorns, and his legs were clad in fleece pants beneath a fleece kilt.

But it was his face that made him who he was. He had very black hair, and it was shocking to see it growing in a line down the middle of his face. The tissue of his forehead, nose and left cheek was deeply folded, and scalp hair and lumps of flesh grew from the face-length cleft.

“What’s the matter, pretty boy? Never seen a Maimed Man before?” The man touched blades with him; a lightning-fast ring of steel that for some reason made him grin. “Oh. Oh. Oh,” he cried, stepping back. “You did steal that sword, I knew it! Damn! I should have put coin on it.” He parried forward effortlessly, matching Raif cut for cut.

Raif realized he’d made a mistake. The sword wasn’t his weapon of choice, and whilst Drey and his fellow yearman had spent hours every day on the practice court drilling with master-swordsman Shor Gormalin, Raif had only practiced for the bare minimum. Shor Gormalin had warned Raif that once he’d taken his yearman’s oath, he’d expect Raif to report to the drillcourt every morning at dawn. But Shor Gormalin was dead. And Raif Sevrance was a traitor to his oath.

The stranger mounted a series of rolling attacks, moving his blade in ever-decreasing circles around Raif’s sword. When Raif stepped back, dropping his sword against his body in readiness for a vertical cut, the stranger performed a dancelike move and was suddenly at Raif’s blade-side, slashing Raif’s knuckles and stealing the momentum from his attack. Angry, Raif struck wide. The stranger danced easily away, only to return with breathtaking quickness and apply his point to Raif’s chest.

Blooded twice. What am I doing?
Raif turned a jolting attack, both blades touching at their sweet points to produce a strange moaning sound and a handful of sparks.

“Nice blade,” commented the stranger, showing no sign of strain. “I think I’ll take it in payment for the elk.” Exploding into motion, he executed a double turn that drove him sideways and backward into Raif’s unprotected left side, striking Raif with enough force to take the wind from his lungs and drop him to one knee. As Raif rolled back for a counterattack, the stranger drove forward with his sword, opening a hairline cut in Raif’s arm and smashing his sword’s basket guard into Raif’s elegant and unprotected crosshilt. The momentum of the strike sent Raif’s blade flying from his grip.

Shor would kill me for losing my weapon.

Before Raif could make a grab for the blade, the stranger hooked the tip with his sword edge and sent it skittering over the rocks. Raif looked wildly around in the free second this gave him. A chunk of unburned log protruded from the firepit. One leap and his hand was upon it. The wood was hot enough to make him wince, and it ignited pain in the old frostbite scars on his palm. The far end of the log was red and smoking, and the stranger looked less happy to see it than if it had been just another blade.

The two circled each other. Raif felt light-headed from lack of sleep, and he could smell the elk blood on him, making him stink like something already dead. When the stranger struck, Raif was ready, barreling forward with no finesse whatsoever, trusting that the man’s fear of fire and scorching would force him into stepping back. He was right. Sort of. The stranger did step away . . . but sideways, managing to score a glancing touch on Raif’s shoulder as he danced past the smoldering log. Stung with pain and frustration, Raif resisted the urge to lash out.
Think of the elk.

His gaze met and held the stranger’s. The man’s eyes were hazel, fine and clear as two drops of rain; it was unnerving to see them in such a face. Deliberately, Raif dropped his gaze, skimming past the strange growths on the man’s forehead and cheek, down along his throat . . . to the heart.

The strength of the man’s life-force was staggering. Raif felt it hit him like a blow to the gut, forcing him to fling out an arm to steady himself.

He’d forgotten what it was to heart-kill a man.

Metallic saliva squirted across his tongue. Things became known to him, strange things that he could barely understand. The scar on the stranger’s face was just the start. Organs and blood vessels were warped and displaced, the lungs mismatched and the spleen elongated like a fish. The heart was large and beating strongly, but it was scarred above the valve, as if an old wound had healed over. And it bulged gently to one side.

Raif calmed himself. However misshapen, the heart was his. Settling the smoldering log in a two-handed grip, he charged. He saw the stranger’s eyes widen, saw him raise his basket-hilt sword in defense. An instant passed when Raif smelled scorching leather and he knew he had him, but bright pain exploded in his head, and then he knew nothing but diminishing circles of light as he fell.

Raif awoke retching, and turned his head to vomit. The sight of regurgitated pieces of liver made him vomit again. His head throbbed, and his eyesight was strangely slow to react; he could feel muscles in his irises working to focus his gaze. It was sunset, and the cook fire he’d built earlier was still burning, but now there was nothing but a gnawed bone upon it.

“Don’t make me feel bad now,” came the voice of the stranger. “You’re hardly in a fit state to eat.”

Raif blinked. He couldn’t understand why one of them wasn’t dead.

“I did save a splash of the berry tea. Even took it upon myself to improve it with a bit of hard liquor.” The stranger moved into Raif’s line of sight. He was holding Raif’s sword up to the firelight, inspecting the edge for dents. “It’s over there if you want it. ’Course, it’s a coin toss whether you should drink it or rub it on that lump. I’d sod it if I were you. Drink the whole damn lot and find myself a hat.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “One of those furry ones made from beaver, with the tail still attached.”

Raif felt too queasy to speak. The stranger’s face looked hideous in the firelight, the deep cleft swallowing shadows and bristling with coarse black hairs. Raif looked away. He put all his strength into levering himself into a sitting position. Muscles that had lain upon cold stone for several hours were stiff and unresponsive, and his left calf threw a violent cramp.

The stranger did not seem displeased by Raif’s pain. Nor did he offer to help. The pot containing the tea was well within his reach, yet he made no effort to pass it. “Nasty things, blows to the head. I’ve seen men walk about as frisky as spring lambs right after them, only to keel over and die the next day.”

Raif could think of nothing to say to that. He looked around. His pack had been rifled through and the contents scattered. The Listener’s arrow had been unpacked, handled, judged unworthy, and thrown on the lumber pile ready to be burned. Raif’s sealskin blanket was currently unrolled by the fire, and it had the rumpled look of recent use. The stranger’s own pack stood close to the fire, and a weapon stand containing a bewildering array of cloth-bound shapes stood beyond it. A stout hill pony was pin-hobbled to a cleft in a boulder, and was contentedly browsing on mash. Overhead, the sky was rapidly darkening and the first stars were coming to life. The wind was restless with coming night, channeling along the gorge in sudden bursts only to die as quickly as it came. The gorge itself glowed red, revealing layers of ocher and blood marble deposited within its walls.

Raif said suddenly, “What did you do to me?”

The stranger grinned, showing surprisingly even teeth. “That’s for me to know and you to bribe from me. Though as I already own your most valuable possession I don’t think you’ve got much to work with. ’Course, I could take that fancy cloak. But I’ll have to insist on you washing it first. A great dirty blood-stain tends to spoil the look.” He continued to study Raif’s sword. “I’ll have to say, though, you’re pretty fierce with a burning log. God-awful with a sword, but a real demon with raw timber. What are you? The last living member of some clannish woodsmen’s cult? As you’re no knight, that’s for sure.”

“How come you’re so sure I’m clan?”

“Can smell it on you, boy. Clan turned sour. Stinks like all the hells I went through as a bairn.”

“So you’re clan, too?”

The stranger raised an eyebrow, and for just one moment Raif found himself forgetting about the scars. “There you go again. Asking when you should be bribing.” Abruptly, he turned the sword point down and thrust its tip into his pack. “Does it have a name?”

“The sword? No.”

“Good. That means I can give it one.” His eyes narrowed as he ran his fingers across the hilt, looking for inspiration. After a moment he glanced thoughtfully at Raif. “I think I’ll call it Finger.”

Raif found his temper coming back as his queasiness subsided. “What makes you so certain you can keep it?”

“I’m not,” said the stranger softly. “I saw what you did to that cow. A man capable of such a thing can certainly manage to win back a sword when he has a mind to. The game is seeing when and how.”

The stranger sat, the cobbled armor of plate and turtle shells chinking softly as he bent at the waist. He retrieved the little iron pot containing the fortified tea, and drank deeply. He did not pass it to Raif when he was done. “So,” he said, wiping his mouth. “Let’s see if I can guess your story. Orrlsman, by the look of that cloak—though I wouldn’t put it past you to have killed and robbed one. As we’ve seen today you’re no swordsman, and you ain’t got the arms of a hatchetman, so I’d say by the look of those callused fingers you’re a bowman good and true.”

The stranger looked to Raif for confirmation, but didn’t seem in the least put out when all Raif did was frown. “So, bowman. Now, you’ll excuse me for saying so but you look soddin’ rough. Oh, you’re pretty enough under that beard and muck, but you ain’t had the attentions of a good clanwife in quite a while, I can tell.”

“You don’t look too good yourself.”

The stranger put a palm to his chest. “Me? Not look good? So I take it the love charm hasn’t worked. Sod it! That witch swore I’d attract half the young maids in the clanholds. Or was it half the men? I forget.”

“I hope for both our sakes it’s the maids.”

The stranger laughed, throwing back his head in delight. Raif saw evidence of a second band of misshapen flesh, curling down his neck and disappearing beneath his collar. Something white and pearly like a tooth grew just below his ear. Raif shivered. The stranger saw this and his smile ended.

“Oh, you’re clan all right. Never seen nothing that wasn’t perfect before, eh? Everyone pretty as girls and whole. Gods forbid that a bairn like me could be born amongst you. Little evil troll must have fucked my mother, for no fine clansmen could have fathered me.”

Raif dropped his head. Nothing was happening how it should. This man before him should be dead, not shaming him. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. The world’s a hard place, and not once in my life have I known it to be fair. Only thing that’s even between men is death; we all get our share of that in the end. Me, I’m lucky to be alive, lucky that this god-ugly face inspired guilt as well as revulsion in me mam. Guilt saved me when me father would not. He was all for setting me on a rock and letting the vultures peck me, yet me mam wouldn’t let him. Oh, she wanted to, make no mistake about that. She wanted her teats to dry up quick so she could make another bairn and forget the first one ever existed. But she was gutless when it came to it. Didn’t want the stain on her conscience. She would have been glad if me father had stolen me from my crib in the dead of night and murdered me, but he chose to make her party to the deal. And that she couldn’t have. Sent me out to the woods to be fostered. Right from one hell into another.”