Scorpion Mountain (7 page)

chapter
eleven

T
hey soon left the close-mown grass close to the castle for the wild, more unkempt area leading to the forest. The grass was knee-high and rougher here, and clouds of grasshoppers fled from them, skipping with whirring wings into the air at their approach, settling again, then taking flight once more as the party came closer.

Cassandra was examining one of Lydia's darts, turning the meter-long missile over in her hands, admiring the neat workmanship that bound the three vanes to the shaft, and the razor-sharp edges of the warhead.

“You make these yourself?”

“All except the broadheads,” Lydia said. “I have a smith make them. But I sharpen them and bind them into place. That way I can be sure that every dart will fly the same way.”

Cassandra nodded. She knew that Will and Halt made their own arrows and attended to the fletching themselves. The castle archers tended to let the armorers make their arrows for them. But the castle archers didn't approach the accuracy that the Rangers could achieve.

She tested the double-edged broadhead with her thumb. “Isn't this a bit . . . extreme for small game like rabbits?” she asked.

Lydia nodded immediately. “Oh yes. A dart like this would tear a bird or a rabbit to pieces. There wouldn't be enough left to eat. For smaller game I use one of these.” She drew another dart from the fleece-lined quiver and handed it over for Cassandra's inspection.

The princess examined it curiously. “There's no broadhead at all,” she said. And she was right. In the place of the leaf shaped iron broadhead was a bulbous length of hard blackwood, carefully shaped and polished.

“It's a blunt,” Lydia explained. “The blunt head knocks out the bird or animal without tearing up the carcass. And if I cast at a bird roosting in a tree, I don't lose my dart.”

There was a rueful sound to her voice and Cassandra looked up, smiling. “I take it that has happened to you?”

Lydia nodded. “At one stage the trees around my hometown were riddled with darts stuck in the trunks and branches, way out of reach.”

Cassandra weighed the two darts in her hands experimentally. “They're the same weight and balance,” she observed, handing them back to Lydia.

“I make sure of that. They all have to have the same flight characteristics. Of course, the blunts are a little slower because the head is bigger and there's more resistance as it flies through the air. But they're as close as I can get them.”

She carefully replaced the darts in her quiver.

“If you two ladies have finished nattering, Kloof seems to have spotted something,” Stig said quietly. The two girls looked up, startled. Kloof was standing rock steady, one forepaw raised from the ground, staring intently to their left. A low rumble sounded in her throat.

Following the direction of her intent gaze, Cassandra saw a large, fat hare in the long grass, staring fixedly at them.

“I think Kloof might have done this before,” Stig said quietly. Of course, nobody knew too much about Kloof's life prior to the time she had “discovered” Hal on the mountainside near Hallasholm. But it was apparent that she had been trained for hunting.

Lydia and Cassandra exchanged a glance, trying to decide who should shoot at the hare. Lydia made a “go ahead” gesture with her left hand.

“You're the princess,” she said and Cassandra didn't need a second invitation. Quickly, she fitted a shot into the pouch of her sling, made sure it was settled securely, then began to swing the weapon round her head at ever-increasing speed. The loaded pouch hummed softly in the air and she saw the hare tense suddenly as it became aware of the alien sound.

Quickly, she released, casting the shot at the small animal.

Too quickly, as it turned out. The shot was thirty centimeters high and off to the right. The
whiz
of its passage through the air finally alerted the hare of their presence, turning his nervous curiosity into panic as he skittered away, zigzagging wildly through the long grass.

“Hern's breath!” Cassandra said, invoking a most un-princessly curse. “That was terrible! I'm out of practice.”

Lydia shook her head reproachfully. “If you're going to use a missile weapon, you have to practice constantly,” she admonished.

Cassandra glared at her. She might be egalitarian and friendly, but no princess likes being lectured to—particularly by a younger woman. Her cheeks flushed with annoyance, then she forced herself to calm down. Lydia was simply stating the situation as she saw it, Cassandra realized. She wasn't lecturing or even criticizing. She was just stating a fact.

And of course, she was also right.

Cassandra took a deep breath, then said, “Sorry I spoiled that chance. You take the next one.”

But the next shot went to Stig, as it turned out. Lydia had wondered how he planned to hunt. He wasn't carrying a spear or a javelin. He was armed only with his saxe, and that was hardly suitable for hunting.

But earlier that morning, Stig had walked to the river and filled his pockets with smooth, round river rocks. He'd spent his boyhood years hunting rabbits and birds in the woods around Hallasholm and had developed an uncanny accuracy. Now, when a partridge broke cover twenty meters from them, he dropped Kloof's leash, whipped out a rock and sent it whizzing at the plump bird. The partridge fell to the ground, limp and lifeless.

Stig clicked his fingers at Kloof, who had remained motionless, and the giant dog took off at a run to retrieve the dead bird. Stig grinned at the two girls, patting Kloof on the head as he took the partridge and pushed it into his game bag.

“Good girl, Kloofy. Good dog.”

Thorn looked at the dog admiringly. “You're right. She has done this before,” he said. Then he added, “By the way, that was a great throw.”

Cassandra smiled at Stig. “I agree. No fancy equipment. Just a good arm and a dead eye.”

Lydia said nothing, but caught Stig's eye and nodded slowly in approval. He smiled, pleased with the praise, and pleased with himself.

Then Kloof barked sharply, three times.

The
Heron
crew members had heard her bark like that before. It was Kloof's danger signal. Kloof had stayed silent through the hunt, as her long-ago training must have taught her. But now she broke that silence and they sensed that she would only do so if danger were imminent. Instantly, they all scanned the surrounding countryside. They were close to the forest now where the shrubs and trees grew more thickly, with patches of deep shadow where an attacker might lurk.

Thorn saw him first. “There!” he shouted, pointing.

A figure was rising from behind a small shrub forty meters away. The shrub was so small that it seemed almost impossible for it to conceal a grown man. But it had. Now, with the dog's warning bark, as the man realized he had been discovered, he stood clear of its branches.

He was dressed in a light brown flowing robe over a white shirt and billowing white trousers. On his head, he wore a turban, the kind favored by the inhabitants of the hot, dry deserts of Arrida.

He held a short, single-handed crossbow, with thick, stubby limbs and a bolt in position ready to release. As he stood, he raised the bow, aiming it unwaveringly at the Araluen princess, steadying the hand that held the bow by clamping his other hand around the bow-hand's wrist.

There was an ugly
SMACK!
as the bow released, and the short, stubby quarrel flashed across the intervening space, straight at Cassandra. Frozen by the sudden turn of events, she stared, openmouthed, as she saw death bearing down on her.

Then Thorn threw his right hand up, into the path of the hissing messenger of death.

Thock!

The quarrel struck the hardwood of Thorn's wooden hook and stuck there, the force of the impact jerking his arm violently back. Thorn staggered a pace, and Cassandra went pale as she realized he had intercepted the deadly quarrel a bare meter from her face.

Then the little tableau, seemingly frozen in place for seconds, erupted into sudden movement. The would-be assassin, seeing his shot intercepted, turned and ran. Ulf and Wulf set off after him—a faint hope seeing that the man had a forty-meter start on them and was just a few meters from the forest proper. At the same moment, Stig released Kloof's leash and pointed at the fleeing figure.

“Get him, Kloof!” he ordered and the dog bounded away in pursuit.

But Lydia reacted fastest of all. She had whipped a shaft from her quiver, fitted the notched end into the atlatl, and cast. It was so smooth and practiced, it seemed like one continuous movement.

“Don't kill him!” Thorn shouted. “We need to—”

But it was too late, the dart was already on its way, closing the distance between Lydia and the fleeing assassin in seconds.

They heard the ugly smack as it hit him, saw him throw his hands in the air and fall face downward into the long grass.

Thorn turned a disgruntled look on Lydia. “We needed to question him,” he said, completing the sentence he had begun just as she cast her dart.

She returned his annoyed look, perfectly unperturbed. “He's not dead,” she replied calmly. “I used a blunt.”

Thorn had been about to unleash a torrent of abuse at her. Instead, he closed his mouth, opened it again, then looked at the prone figure in the grass. Kloof had just reached him and was standing over him, growling deep in her chest.

“A blunt,” he repeated, finally, and Lydia nodded.

“A blunt. He's unconscious. He'll have a massive headache when he wakes up.”

Stig grinned at the two of them. “He'll have a massive fright when he wakes up. How would you like to come to and have Kloof's jaws just a few centimeters from your face?”

“Not a pretty sight,” Thorn agreed. He gripped the crossbow quarrel close to the end that had penetrated his wooden hook and started slowly working it back and forth to release it. Finally, he jerked it clear and studied the broadhead. There was an ominous dark stain around the tip.

“Poisoned,” he said, glancing at Cassandra. “Just as well my timber hand got in the way.”

Cassandra was staring, wide-eyed, at the three of them. She had grown up around Rangers and warriors. But she had never seen faster reactions than the Herons had just shown. Thorn's feat in intercepting the quarrel was near miraculous. And Lydia's shot with the dart—easily fifty meters as the would-be assassin gathered speed—was exceptional.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, finally throwing off the shock that had frozen her. There had been a time, she thought regretfully, when she might have reacted as quickly as her companions. But she had spent too much time in the castle, attending to the duties that befell a royal princess, and too little time in the field. Like using a sling properly, she thought, it all required practice.

The three of them brushed aside her thanks.

“I don't suppose Kloof can fetch
that
piece of game back here,” Stig said cheerfully. “We'd best go and collect him.”

Ulf and Wulf were already standing by the figure of the assassin. He stirred, then rolled over onto his back. As he opened his eyes, his vision was filled with the sight of Kloof's slavering, snarling jaws. The man screamed in sudden fright and tried to rear back. But of course, he was lying on the ground and there was nowhere to rear back to. Then he shifted his vision to the twins, both angry and vengeful, both with saxes drawn and ready. He called out in alarm.

The others were hurrying across the grass to secure him.

Stig snorted. “Probably thinks he's seeing double after that crack on the head.”

“If he is,” Thorn put in, “he may well be seeing four of them.”

“What a terrible thought,” Lydia said.

Thorn smiled at her. “That was one heck of a shot,” he said. She looked at him suspiciously. Thorn's compliments were all too often barbed.

“And . . . ?” She waited for the sting in the tail.

Thorn shrugged innocently. “And nothing. It was a great shot.” However, he couldn't resist adding, “Just as well you accidentally pulled a blunt out of your quiver.”

Lydia threw her hands in the air. “I knew it!” she said. “You can't resist having a snipe at me, can you?”

Thorn turned away to hide his smile. He reached down and got hold of one of the man's arms. “Let's get this beauty back to the castle. Get away, Kloof.”

The dog reluctantly backed away, still growling deep in her chest as Thorn heaved the man to his feet. He swayed clumsily, rubbing his head where the dart had struck him.

Stig gestured to the back of the man's right hand. “Thorn, look.”

There was a tattoo on the man's hand—a depiction of a scorpion, with its stinger raised threateningly.

Thorn whistled softly. “Well, what do you know,” he said. The fierce sea wolf smiled at the semiconscious man. It wasn't a pleasant smile.

“Let's see what you can tell us about this Scorpion Mountain business,” he said.