Bard's Oath (63 page)

But until then, she would do what she could for Kaeliss. Drawing her knife, Pod cut some sticks and smoothed them as much as she could. Using strips cut from the spare tunic from Fiarin’s pack, she quickly fashioned a rough splint and a sling. Then she found two long, sturdy sticks and began whittling one to a point.

“If he comes here, jab at him as best you can,” Pod said. “Until then, rest as much as you can. I’ll take first watch.”

Kaeliss silently nodded. Moving carefully, she lay down, head pillowed on her pack. Soon she was fast asleep.

Pod dropped the first stick next to Kaeliss and began work on the second. Pathetic as these “spears” were, at least they were weapons of a sort.

And something—anything!—is better than nothing,
she grimly told herself.
If only Kiga was here.
… Hot tears filled her eyes. She wiped them away; the last thing they needed was for her to slice her hand open because she couldn’t see straight.

With each stroke of the knife, with each sliver that fell away, Pod thought over and over,
Kiga, stop hunting and find me! Stop hunting and find me!

When she was done, she set the spear down next to her, then pulled up her knees, rested her head against them, and cried. Even as she realized that sitting still was a mistake, exhaustion swept over her and she fell asleep.

It was the rattle of leaves that woke her some time later. Pod lifted her head and rubbed her bleary eyes. “Kiga?” she whispered.

Kaeliss sat up. “Oh, thank the gods he’s back!”

“Yes, I am,” a soft voice said. Arlim’s face leered at them through the branches and he laughed, low and chilling.

Sixty

It seemed a lifetime, but
was likely less than a candlemark later that the worst of the storm passed. He listened as the thunder retreated, then slipped out from beneath the pine tree.

It was still raining, but he was running out of time. Remembering the “brightness” he’d felt earlier, Linden stretched out his senses. Everything else in this forest was tainted, but not that. Who could it be? Was it someone that could help him?

But to his disappointment, he felt nothing but the evil that seemed to permeate everything here. Sighing, he walked quickly to the center of the clearing. Turning his face up to the rain, he let himself flow into Change.

Moments later, a large, red dragon crouched in the clearing, hind legs tensed. A mighty leap, and Linden beat the air with his wings, fighting to clear the treetops. With the rain streaming from his wings, Linden once more began to search.

Candlemarks passed as Linden flew over a new part of the forest. It was far larger than he’d thought it would be and try as he might, he could not pinpoint the source of the evil. He was desperate now; he
had
to find that witch spruce. If his theory about the wood in Leet’s harp was correct, Raven had a chance. But without that proof, the younger Yerrin would hang, and time was running out.

And still nothing. Linden cursed and dug deeper—dangerously so—into the magic that bound the two halves of his soul together. Any more and he feared he would wake Rathan, the dragon half of his soul.

Just as he feared it was all for naught, he felt that elusive spark again. It came and went, first flaring brightly, then dwindling so that he feared to lose it. Whoever it was, it burned bright and pure, and like nothing he’d ever touched before.

Not knowing what else to do, Linden waited for one of the “flares” and sideslipped through the air toward it. To his frustration, it died down once more as he neared it. Then he found it again, but in a different place, as if whoever made it was moving through the forest. Once more he followed, losing it, finding it, losing it again as it zigged and zagged seemingly at random.

The sun slipped lower in the sky. He peered through breaks in the trees, but could see nothing of his quarry, and whoever it was avoided the few clearings below.

Once more it disappeared. Linden cursed long and hard in his mind; he wanted to howl his frustration, but didn’t want to terrify whoever was below. The roar of an angry dragon was a fearful thing to hear.

Then, just as he thought he’d lost it for good, the spark returned.

Who are you?
Linden asked, seeking the other’s mind.

What he found astonished him: no thoughts, no words, just a welter of swirling emotions and fierce, driving instincts.

An animal?
The realization so shocked him that for a moment he forgot he was supposed to be flying. An instant later he spread his wings once more, catching himself just in time.
What in Gifnu’s hells kind of animal could it be?

There was no sort of animal he’d ever heard of that felt so … intelligent, was the best he could think of.
So very aware of itself.
Linden made one last effort to reach it, extending his magic to the limit, opening his mind as far as he could.

He touched the mind below him and held the contact; at the same time, he “heard” in his mind faint words, as if of a far-off echo.

Stop hunting! Come to me!
The fear and longing and desolation behind those words tore at him.

Once more the spark below flared, this time so bright that Linden caught his breath at it. A love so pure that it could put many a truehuman to shame, a desperation to stand once more by the side of …

Of its person,
Linden realized.
Gods have mercy, I think that’s a brother-in-fur down there.

At once the spark ceased its random wanderings and raced, arrow-straight, through the forest. Somehow, when he’d stretched his mind to the animal below, he must have acted as a link between a familiar and its Beast Healer.

What, by all the gods, is a Beast Healer doing
here
?
he wondered.
And why is his familiar so far away that he couldn’t call it back?
All Linden could think was that the Beast Healer was injured or ill.

He turned in the air to follow. As much as he needed to help Raven, this might be a matter of life or death to another. Perhaps the Beast Healer was no more than lost, but he would not leave someone in this forest of evil.

The trees were still too thick for him to see what he followed, but he had no difficulty now, the spark burned so steadily and bright. Whatever it was, judging by the speed it made, it was certainly larger than a cat. It wasn’t, he thought, a horse. There was too much underbrush for something so large to move so quickly, and he was certain that if it had been near that size, he would have seen it through gaps in the branches.

Then he remembered the fierceness of the mind he’d touched. No, this was no eater of grass. A dog or a wolf was his best guess.

From his vantage point, Linden saw that his invisible guide was leading him toward the ruins of Worton and the section of the forest he’d deemed unlikely to hold Gull’s remains.
Once this is done, I’ll work out from there to continue searching,
he thought with resignation, certain now that he’d never find the witch spruce in time, but refusing to give in to despair. He’d search until the last moment.

Ahead of him he could see two small clearings; although they weren’t close to each other, they lay in a line along the course his guide was running. Unless his quarry changed its course, it would pass through the first clearing in a few moments. Linden winged ahead so that he could see the animal when it broke from the cover of the trees.

Linden caught the barest glimpse of a brown shape as it burst from the trees, hurtled across the little glade, and disappeared once more. He snorted in surprise, smoke curling from his nostrils. What on earth had
that
been?

No dog or wolf; that he was certain of. Its shape and long fur, and the way it moved, were wrong. He would have said small bear, but not with a tail that long.

He cursed when he finally identified the creature: a
ghulon,
one of the fierce, solitary predators that made their home in deep woods. He hadn’t been chasing a brother-in-fur; he’d been wasting time following a wild animal.

You fool. You’re so desperate to help someone, anyone, your mind’s playing tricks on you. There’s no Beast Healer out here.

He tilted on the breeze and turned away from the futile chase.

Sixty-one

The two young women jumped
up and ran, Kaeliss grunting with pain at every step as she cradled her arm against herself. They grabbed their packs, but only Pod thought to grab her sharpened stick.

This time the branches and thorns let them pass, but only along one path.
Like a giant funnel spider’s web.
Pod knew they were being herded, yet they had no choice. Ahead lay hope, however faint it might be. Behind them …

They came out into the clearing with the wide stump once more. Pod pushed Kaeliss around to the other side of it. Arlim sauntered out of the underbrush like a man who had all the time in the world.

“Should we try to run through the woods?” Kaeliss whispered.

“No. I’m certain the woods will hold us here,” Pod whispered back. “Then he’d catch us for certain. This way … maybe he’ll make a mistake.”

She wished he would try to jump up onto the stump; perhaps she could stab him with her spear as he scrambled across.

Instead he sidled around. Pod and Kaeliss matched him step for step, always keeping the stump between themselves and the madman.

Arlim tittered. “Such a charming dance, pretty girls. How long can you keep it up?” He held up his knife and turned it this way and that, making the light flash on the blade. “It would be easier, so much easier, to come to me now. So, so much easier…”

His voice was soothing as he droned on and on. Pod blinked; to her horror, it was akin to the “voice” that Beast Healers used to calm fractious animals. And now she thought she could hear a melody in it.

Beside her, Kaeliss came to a stop. Pod told herself she had to fight whatever Arlim was doing. Instead the spear drooped in her hand, then fell from her nerveless fingers.

With a triumphant howl, Arlim leaped onto the face of the stump, his knife held high. Pod screamed, knowing she’d never reach her spear in time.

But before Arlim could take that final step and fall upon her, a tremendous roar split the sky above the clearing. She fell to her knees, as did Kaeliss and Arlim, covered her ears, and looked up.

A red dragon glared down at them, its wings beating furiously to hold it in place. Its head turned so that one glittering eye was fixed on Arlim. It roared once more and Pod cowered from the fury in its voice. Then the dragon tucked in its neck and tail and, to her amazement, folded its wings. It dropped straight down like a stone.

A red mist enveloped the falling dragon, shrank, and became a man. Pod clapped a hand to her mouth; could even a Dragonlord survive a fall from that height without harm?

He landed heavily, close to the stump, falling to his hands and knees and shaking his head as if dazed. A long, blond Yerrin clan braid slipped over his shoulder.

Arlim launched himself from the stump, landing on the Dragonlord before he could stand. They went down together in a tangle, rolling over and over. Pod saw Arlim’s knife flash as he struck at the Dragonlord.

A moment later Arlim flew through the air as the Dragonlord heaved him off. He fled into the woods.

The Dragonlord staggered to his feet and turned to where she stood wide-eyed with Kaeliss. She saw that he favored one leg and that a sleeve of his tunic was slashed.

As soon as she saw the wine-colored birthmark that spread across his right temple to his eyelid, Pod knew who he was. “Linden Rathan,” she cried out in joy.

“Pod, you and your friend need to stay here while—” He broke off, staring at the stump. “Oh dear gods—the one place you
can’t
stay.”

He cursed under his breath. “Stay here, but as far away from that thing as you can while I hunt—”

A shrill scream from the woods cut him off. A second scream died in a torrent of snarls. In their turn, the snarls faded into an awful silence.

Linden Rathan ran a hand through his hair. “It’s over,” he said wearily. “Kiga found him.”

“Kiga?” Pod asked, hardly daring to believe him.

“Yes, Kiga. You have him to thank for leading me here. I remembered at the last moment what Conor had told me about your brother-in-fur. I’d thought I’d wasted time following a wild animal.”

A movement in the underbrush caught Pod’s eye. The branches parted to reveal wild, fury-filled eyes above a snarling, bloodstained muzzle. But the instant that terrifying gaze fell upon her, the rage vanished. Kiga burst from the undergrowth and threw himself at her feet.

She fell to her knees beside him and hugged him. Burying her face in his filthy, matted fur, she cried with joy. For his part, Kiga whuffled and whimpered as he tried to fit his bulk into her lap.

At last she looked up at Linden Rathan. “Did Conor send you to look for us, Your Grace? How did he know we were in trouble?”

Linden Rathan shook his head. “I had no idea you were here or in danger. That I found you was a gift from the gods. I came searching for this,” he said, and pointed to the stump.

Kaeliss joined them now. “A stump? But why, Your Grace? What is it?”

“It was,” Linden Rathan answered slowly, “a witch spruce.” He passed his hand over his eyes. “The witch spruce that was planted over Gull the Blood Drinker to trap his soul.”

Sixty-two

Suddenly weary beyond belief, Linden
looked around the glade. A splash of color caught his eye: red flowers scattered across a trail of crushed mushrooms.

Kiga squirmed off of Pod’s lap and loped across to him. Then the
ghulon
rolled over onto his foot, begging to have its stomach rubbed. Without thinking, Linden bent to indulge it. The movement made his arm throb.

“We need to leave here. Now,” he said as he stood up. “There’s another clearing, a large one near here. We’ll go there.”