In The Shadow Of The Beast (12 page)

Veronique turned so that her husband might
cradle her weary head, and also so that he would not see the
troubling look upon her face, which would indicate to him that she
did indeed understand that deceit only too well.

CHAPTER 9

The wild man...

Something was suddenly amiss, the quiet
stillness of the forest had never been truly quiet at all. There
was always the distant chirruping of birds in the trees or the
sounds of insects scurrying about their business or buzzing through
the magnificent sunlight like embers from a wood fire floating on a
gentle breeze.

Now all of that delicate background noise
had seemed to disappear completely, even the gentle soughing of the
wind in the trees had evaporated entirely. In its place there was
an absolute silence, as if the surrounding forest was holding its
breath in anticipation of....something.

Sigourd looked about him for the
nightingale, but the bird had gone too, swallowed up by the
un-noise that permeated the old forest.

A sense of great foreboding crept upon
Sigourd.

Drawing his keen blade, its tapered length
glittering like a sun ray in the morning light, Sigourd settled
into a combat stance. His right foot planted before his left, his
weight settled evenly upon the balls of his feet should he need to
move quickly in either direction. He turned his body to present the
slightest possible target, rolling his torso so that his right
shoulder came to the fore, the sword held loosely in a hand over
hand grip, its lethal point angled up and out ahead of him.

The absolute silence of the forest was so
unnerving, and in such strange contrast to the peaceful vibrancy of
only moments before.

Long moments ticked by, their passage
seeming to take ten times as long to Sigourd who stood stock still,
tensed and ready to react to whatever it was that might be coming
his way.

Ahead of him the trees seemed to crowd in on
the dusty track he’d been following, leaning in like silent
sentinels to observe his disquiet from their great vantage
point.

And then it came, crashing through the
underbrush, parting the foliage ahead of him by only thirty or so
paces, the grasses and scrub along the densely crowded forest floor
disturbed in the wake of something moving toward him at great
speed.

Sigourd readied himself, his muscles tight
with the anticipation in spite of his best efforts to remain calm
and composed in the face of...whatever this was.

Twenty paces, fifteen, ten. The thing was so
close so quickly it would be upon Sigourd in a matter of seconds.
He held his breath, his knuckles white around the hilt of the sword
gripped now more firmly in his hands.

And then it exploded from the cover of the
foliage, squealing like a banshee in a pitch so high it could
almost have made Sigourd’s ears bleed.

A forest pig, some fifteen to twenty pounds,
its coarse matted hair caked with mud and other debris, its four
short stubby legs carrying it full pelt in his direction.

The creature hadn’t seen Sigourd until it
was almost upon him, and looking up to see the heir to the realm of
Atos looming before it, the pig squealed again in some surprise,
digging in its feet to arrest its headlong charge through the scrub
of the forest floor.

In an instant it broke to the right,
scrambling for purchase in the soft earth before finding its
footing again and darting around an astonished Sigourd and back
into cover.

He watched the the creature disappear from
sight as quickly as it had appeared, the foliage parting around its
charging bulk as it raced away.

Sigourd released a sigh of relief, laughing
to himself at the absurdity of the scenario.

But his good humor was short lived. The
forest still retained that eerie total silence, and something else
now bothered him. A strange insistent prickling along the back of
his neck, that quickly grew into something primal and instinctive
that warned him of peril as yet unrevealed.

The sensation was unlike anything he had
ever experienced, it was so immediate, like the tolling of a
warning bell deep in his being. Like a rush of adrenaline suddenly
released to course unchecked through his blood like a raging
torrent.

Sigourd instinctively knew the feeling for
what it was, a warning of impending danger that was far beyond the
normal sense perceptions of a mortal man.

It was that sixth sense that saved his
life.

Sigourd ducked as an arrow thumped into the
bole of a tree where his head had been only an instant before, his
momentum carrying him into a dive he tucked and rolled as the
ground rose to meet him.

Even as he was rolling to his feet, his
sword coming around into the guard position, the as yet unseen
assailant was ululating a nerve shattering war cry that resonated
unendingly around the forest canopy high above.

Sigourd had spent most of his life on the
practice mats with his combat instructors, being schooled in the
arts of single combat.

Countless hours under Cal’s watchful eye,
drilling the proper blocks and ripostes, attacks and counters,
footwork and feinting that had turned Sigourd into a formidable
student.

Hour after exhausting hour learning how to
throw, to strike, to kill. Blades and staffs and knives and fists,
he’d been taught how to survive when faced with any number of
attack possibilities.

Cal had been an exacting tutor, demanding
that Sigourd master each and every aspect of his training, and
Sigourd had been a willing student, quick to learn and gifted with
a strength and grace that was uncommon to one of his young
years.

But that had been in practice, and drawing
his blade against a genuine threat was something that had, up to
this very moment, been only a theoretical experience for
Sigourd.

His blade came up instinctively to deflect
the sweeping arc of a long handled sword staff that sliced through
the air toward his exposed neck. The two weapons rang off each
other with a sound that cut the silence like a knife through
flesh.

Sigourd barely had time to recover his
senses and deflect the sudden follow up strike, and the next and
the next. That whirling sword staff was a blur of motion, its user
relentlessly pressing Sigourd into a defensive posture as he rained
mad blow after blow at the young lord, who was kept on the back
foot in a desperate attempt to keep from getting caught with cut or
thrust.

In a flash of desperate inspiration, Sigourd
managed to trap the blade of the sword staff behind the hilt of his
own sword, turning it with a flick of his wrist so that the two
weapons were locked together for the briefest of moments, and
allowing Sigourd to tug his would be killer off balance.

The maneuver had been a particular favorite
of Cal’s, and he’d made certain to impress its value upon a young
Sigourd.

The attacker was no slouch when it came to
blade work however, and was able to quickly regain his footing and
slip under Sigourd’s return blade stroke and hand spring out of
range of the next, where he came up ready in a fighting stance, the
tip of his long handled weapon aimed squarely at Sigourd to prevent
his further pressing that briefest of advantages.

The two men stood apart, weapons at the
ready and primed to resume the combat in the blink of an eye, both
of them panting hard with the exertion of their encounter.

For the first time Sigourd was able to get a
clear look at the person who had attacked him.

The man was a shaggy haired brute, large in
the back and shoulders with tough leathery skin that was no doubt
the product of a life spent living in the wilds. His face was
framed with a mane of dark knotted hair that for all the world
looked like it had never had the privilege of meeting a comb, and a
matted beard to match.

Pelts of leather and fur hung to lap his
shoulders and torso, and various offerings and trinkets of small
animal bones rattled about his neck and waist.

The long handled sword staff he carried
looked like something he might have found on the wastes of some
battlefield, procured in the wake of great slaughter by a chancer
picking through the remains of the dead. Its long blade curved
wickedly, and more trinkets of bones dangled from the leather
strapped handle.

His most striking feature was his dark eyes,
which glittered with a fierce primal intelligence from behind that
lank mane of filthy hair.

Sigourd puffed out his chest, tried to hide
the tremor of nerves that coursed through him from showing in his
voice, ‘I am Sigourd Fellhammer, on a mission of rescue into the
Eastern Fringes. I mean you no harm, so do me the courtesy of
standing aside and allowing me to pass.’

The wild man’s response was a low rumbling
snarl that built steadily until , without warning he pounced again,
his blade raised high to split Sigourd’s skull with a thunderous
down stroke that would have cleaved his adversary in two.

In a flash, Sigourd raised his own weapon to
deflect the blow and once more the two blades rang through the
quiet of a forest holding its breath.

The combatants were locked together, Sigourd
grunting with the effort of holding his larger opponent at bay,
before he allowed his sword arm to crumple so that he could slip
inside the guard of the other man, hugging him close in a bear hug
and kicking his legs out from under him.

The wild man’s immediate reaction was to
snatch a hold of Sigourd’s belt as he toppled in an attempt to
regain his footing, his heavy frame dragging them both over the
edge of an embankment that they had dallied too close to as they
struggled.

In an instant both men disappeared from the
path, through the thicket and scrub that had blinded them to the
presence of the steep drop.

Over and over they crashed through bush and
branch, snapping wood and scattering the loose leaves of plants
that were splintered beneath their headlong tumble.

Sigourd hit the ground at the bottom of the
embankment with a painful thud, his breath knocked out of him by
the sudden impact.

He rolled over and scrabbled to his feet,
knowing that he only had moments to recover his position. His sword
was long gone now, lost somewhere amongst the scrub during their
jarring tumble. Of the wild man, there was no sign whatsoever.

The forest was once more settled to its
natural quiet, the insects buzzing here and there as the gentle
wind took up the low hanging boughs of trees that listed to drape
themselves over a forest floor once more set in a disquieting
serenity.

Sigourd was alert in spite of the calm, he
knew that the wild man was out there watching him, awaiting the
time to strike again.

Sigourd had no idea why this creature had
decided to attack him. The only thought that occurred was that he
had unwittingly traveled through a part of the old forest that the
wild man deemed to belong to him. Either way it seemed apparent
that Sigourd was not going to be able to talk his way out of this
testing situation, and would be called upon to utilize every
fighting skill he had at his disposal. Thanks to the demanding
stewardship of Cal, he had many.

Then it came again, that strange and
overwhelming sensation, as if Sigourd could feel the very blood
rushing in his veins. His head swam with the unfamiliar sensation,
flushing hot like the blast from an open furnace. He became aware
of a strange noise as of tiny feet pattering across dry ground, and
searched about him for the source of the sound.The pattering became
louder and clearer to Sigourd the more he strained to hear it.

Then another sound came to his ears, like
the buzzing of the tiny insects zipping about in the shafts of
sunlight. But more than a quiet buzz this time it was a definite
hum, and Sigourd realized with stunned fascination that he was
hearing the wing beats of those tiny insects as if they were a
hundred times their actual size.

He looked to the ground, and knew without
doubt that the sound of scraping, pattering feet was the sound of
small beetles scattered about the ground, going about their own
strange routine amongst the dry leaves bedding the forest
floor.

Sigourd marveled at how this could be, at
how he was hearing things that no ordinary person would be able to
her with a clarity that defied comprehension. Was he going mad?

The sudden sound of rushing water flooded
his senses, and he looked up terrified that he was about to be
crushed by an inexplicable deluge falling from the heavens, but
there was nothing there but the leaves of the trees stirred by a
gentle breeze. He understood that this too was the innocent noise
of the forest around him, amplified to a level he’d never dreamed
possible.

Sigourd had almost forgotten about the peril
he was in, so complete was his amazement.

And then another strange sound, a constant
and insistent thump. Over and over again, rhythmically like the
steady double beat of a war drum...or a heart.

It was impossible, but Sigourd knew without
doubt that he was listening to the heart beat of something out
beyond the wall of green that was the forest line. The pounding
heart of a creature on the hunt, the wild man. The resonant thump,
thump, thump of lifeblood hammering in his chest.

Sigourd was able to discern the direction of
the sound, and knew that the wild man had circled around behind him
to launch another surprise attack from the cover of the heavy
foliage.

The young lord pushed aside all wonder at
the bizarre happening that was taking place within him, turning
instead so that he could present his back to the hiding wild man. A
target he knew would be too tempting to resist.

He strained to listen to that heartbeat,
which would have been as loud and clear to him as the sound of the
absent nightingale, if it were not for the distraction of his own
racing heart. What Sigourd planned was as risky a gambit as anyone
had ever chanced to undertake, and against an opponent as
formidable as the one he now faced, he risked nothing short of his
own life.