The Dark Glory War (9 page)

“Really?” Leigh’s chin came up. “All I know is that it took you all long enough to do your parts.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Why, my dear Tarrant, I’m talking about shooting the thing.” He pointed at the dead temeryx. “You didn’t think I meant to try and kill the thing with my sword, did you? No, I only wanted to distract it from Nay long enough for you to shoot it.“

I narrowed my eyes. “I see. But, if you had managed to kill it with your sword, you never would have told us it was unintentional, would you?”

A sly smile grew on Leigh’s face, but he turned toward Nay instead of answering me. “You are unhurt?”

Nay nodded slowly. “Don’t know how to thank you. That creature, never been so close to death.”

Leigh dismissed Nay’s concern with a casual wave of his hand. “Think nothing of it, Naysmith. As Hawkins will confirm, I often act the ass, though I seldom realize it and less seldom admit it, even to myself. Despite how we met, you have shown you are a good man. It is my obligation as a Norrington to protect good men like you.” A smile grew on Leigh’s face. “And it is my pleasure to protect the life of a man I consider a friend.”

Nay’s brow furrowed as he considered Leigh’s words, then he nodded once, solidly. “A Norrington for a friend. More than anyone would expect from a Moon Month.”

“Oh, and you’ll have more. You’ll be featured in a poem I’ll compose, I think. You, too, Hawkins.” Leigh pressed his hands together. “I will call it, ‘How to Vex a Temeryx.’ Good, no?”

“I can’t wait.” I shook my head and splashed my way over to Sandes. “I shot something else, further downstream. I don’t know what it was, but I know it wasn’t right.”

“Let’s go.”

The two of us trudged down to where the creature bobbed in a shallow pool. The thing measured no more than four feet from crown to toes, but was more heavily muscled than a child of equivalent size. It had large eyes that were all black, a little bit of a muzzle with its nose a black triangle at the top, very much like a dog. Parts of its face, its palms, and feet were bare of fur, revealing flesh the color of a blood blister. It had sharp peg-teeth, with the lower canines being longer than the upper, and the hands were very human, though they lacked the littlest finger. The creature had big bat ears which folded back into the fur on the sides of its head.

It could easily have been described as a little boy in a baby bear costume, though it ran more to lean muscle than fat. What defied that description was the fact that it wore a beaded armband from which hung a half-dozen black temeryx feathers. Around its waist it also had a slender belt from which hung two pouches that contained herbs, rocks, and unidentifiable animal flesh in neat little packets.

Sandes dragged the thing to the shore, then squatted by its head. “I don’t know as how I’ve ever seen one of these before, and certainly not with dark fur like this.” He reached a hand down and parted the fur on its shoulder, then nodded. “White at the roots.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning the creature colored its fur to be able to move through the forests more easily.” He wiped his hand off on the leg of his trousers. “I think you’ve shot yourself a vylaen.”

A shiver shook me. “But they live in Aurolan, past the Black Marches and everything, way up north.”

“So do frostclaws. They’re both Chytrine’s pets, damn her black soul.” Sandes raised his huntsman’s horn to his lips and blew three quick blasts on it. He waited a moment, then blew three more. After a moment or two, the pattern of three and three came back at him from two different places in the forest.

Sandes toed the vylaen’s body. “Lord Norrington will know what to do.”

Lord Norrington and his party came riding in from along the temeryx backtrail. A couple of the horses had cuts on them, and at least one man had his shoulder bandaged after having been hit by an arrow. Strapped across the backs of a couple of horses being led by their former riders was one temeryx and three other bodies which I did not get a good look at initially.

Lord Norrington rode over to where Sandes and I stood. He dismounted, passing his stallion’s reins to Sandes, then he dropped to a knee beside the vylaen. Leigh’s father made a tiny clicking sound with his mouth as he thought, then stood abruptly and looked at me. “That’s your arrow, Hawkins?”

“Yes, my lord.” I turned and pointed back up at the hillock. “I was up there when it came through. I had no shot at the temeryces and I guessed that any creature running with them instead of from them just wasn’t right.”

“Very nice shot, Hawkins. And you’re correct about this vylaen being out of place and allied with the frostclaws. I’ll want Heslin to check, but I think the armlet there with the feathers linked the vylaen to them. Vylaens also have a very high-pitched voice—dogs can hear them, and frostclaws I suspect—so it may have been giving them orders including plans for attack on your position here.” He clapped me on the shoulders. “Shooting it probably saved you all.”

“Speaking of saved,” I said as I pointed upstream toward Leigh, “your son saved Nay from certain death.”

Lord Norrington cocked his head to the right. “Did he? Well, that will make for a good story tonight, I think, and one that will likely grow as time goes on.”

He turned to Sandes. “How many did you get?”

“Three temeryces, my lord. Archers took one clean, Master Carver took one on a spear, and your son held the third long enough for the archers to get arrows into it and me to stick it with a spear.” Sandes nodded his head toward the riders who had followed Lord Norrington in. “I see you got one.”

“We did, yes, Jempson, with a spear—from horseback. The others are three gibberkin.” Lord Norrington read the blank look on my face. “They’re akin to the vylaens, but bigger, more bestial, with mottled fur, bigger teeth and muzzles. Elves call themominirs, but the man-name comes from their constant gibbering and howling. These ones, it appears, were altered enough that they could only manage a bass whisper. One of them got an arrow into Swinbrook, but he’ll survive.”

“Yes, my lord.” Sandes patted the stallion’s neck. “What do you want me to do with the vylaen and the frostclaws?”

“Have your men dress them all out, including the gibberkin. Save the teeth, hands, and feet—we’ll need them. Burn the vylaen and gibberkin bodies. We’ll roast the frostclaws.”

I blinked. “We’re really going to eat them?”

“Become a warrior like your father and you’ll eat much worse in the field. Frostclaws actually taste fairly good, wouldn’t you say, Sandes?”

“I fix it the same way I would a hen, my lord.” Sandes pulled a coil of rope from the stallion’s saddle and tossed it to me. “Truss up his feet and we’ll drag him back to camp. Do a good job and I’ll see to it that you get a slice of the frostclaw liver fried up with some of the wild onions here. It’ll be a meal you won’t forget.”

Sandes was correct. The meal that night was one I’d never forget, but not just because of the liver and onions. While the food did taste good, the company made it better. We all regrouped at the campsite and everyone set about their various tasks, from fetching firewood to slaughtering the creatures and dressing various wounds on hunters and horses alike.

The third hunting group had brought in two more gibberkin and another temeryx, which accounted for six of the beasts. That matched the number of feathers on the vylaen’s armband, so I took that as a hopeful sign that we’d gotten all of them. I would have been more pleased if a full half-dozen gibberers had been brought in as well, but we had no evidence to suggest how many of them had been in the group to begin with. Someone even suggested that the sixth gibberer might have been fed to the frostclaws at some point to keep the others in line.

Heslin did confirm lingering traces of magick on the armband and suggested a simple solution for why the temeryces were out in the afternoon. As the two mounted hunting parties closed on their lair, the armlet might have allowed the vylaen to detect the magic being used to locate the temeryces. Given the local terrain, the easiest direction for them to head out was toward us, and we were undetected at first because we’d not moved close enough to the vylaen.

“If he had worked other magick to order the frostclaws about, he might not have detected you at all until much too late.” The mage pressed his lips together in a thin line. “This was not a casual hunting party. This was something more.”

“More to be discussed later, I think, Heslin.” Lord Norrington cut off that line of discussion rather quickly. “Perhaps back in Valsina you will be able to learn more about the vylaen’s magick.”

That the vylaen had left two temeryces and a handful of gibberkin to hold off the mounted hunters while escaping in our direction underscored the fact that no one had expected our little group to be in any danger that day. We’d been along on the hunt because, after all we’d been through, they couldn’t very well not bring us. Because of that, what we accomplished earned the respect of the assembled men.

Leigh and I had been out on hunts before and had been grouped around a campfire with huntsmen just as we were that night. Because we had been children in their eyes, wearing courtesy masks marked with our families’ crests, they had spun great tales for us. They told us of feather-trout, fish that lurk in trees and have to be shot with a bow and arrow, and stag-hares, which have a set of antlers and are so fierce they fight off wolves and bears. They would listen to our stories of shooting a deer or catching a fish as solemnly as if it were the first time they’d heard of such a thing, then dissolve into laughter.

After the temeryx hunt, we were no longer seen as children. We had been with them when they faced some of the nastiest creatures in the world—and creatures that hadn’t been seen so far south in over a century. Sandes praised my prowess with a bow and other huntsmen said they’d never seen as much strength as Nay had shown in spearing his temeryx and dropping it to the side. What little chiding there was came good-naturedly, and was in line with the ribbing the other huntsmen, including Sandes, got for what they had done that day.

By far, though, Leigh earned the majority of the accolades handed out around the blazing bonfire that night. Every one of us who had been there shared our version of what he did. We had all been amazed as he put himself in the path of certain death. His bellowing back at the temeryx had heartened us all, and his pressing an attack surprised us, but also brought smiles to our faces. When he retreated, well, each of us knew we had to find a way to help him, to preserve the man who had displayed such faultless courage.

Leigh drank it all in and, just for a moment, appeared embarrassed by what was said. I think perhaps that, for the first time in his life, people were seeing him as Leigh, not Lord Norrington’s son. That night, by what he had done, he had emerged ever so slightly from his father’s shadow. I don’t think he’d particularly chafed to be there before, but dwelling in a shadow can be rather chilly. Coming out into the light on his own had to feel good.

At the end of our storytelling, Leigh himself got up and regaled us with what he had been thinking during the attack. “Well, there I was, wasn’t I? The damnable beast had just shrugged off the bolt I put into him and somehow overlooked that grievous wound from the arrow in his tail. He looked at Nay just lying there and must have thought he was seeing the biggest green trout ever to swim. Having had a long run, he was hungry and went for Nay, but I couldn’t have that, could I?

“So, leap forward I did, waving my sword about, trying to tell it that Nay wasn’t a trout at all, which I thought obvious because he had more arms and legs than a trout. Well, the beastie hissed at me, ‘Yes he is!’ I bellowed back, ‘No he’s not.’ Oh, didn’t know I spoke temeryx, did you? Well, it wasn’t until I’d advanced to drive my point home and it hissed at me again that I realized I didn’t speak temeryx either—or not his dialect anyway. So I backed up and quickly threw myself on my back in hopes of splashing up a trout the beastie could eat, and you fine fellows skewered him four ways to Mansday, didn’t you?”

Leigh accompanied his recital by dancing backward and forward. A short stick with a burning ember glowing red served as his sword and wove the point through a hypnotic series of nonsense sigils. We all laughed at the right places, and he played to our amusement. He even got a laugh or two from his father. He bowed at the end, and consigned his wooden sword to the fire before returning to his father’s side.

Lord Norrington stood and ruffled his son’s blond hair. “Gentlemen, it was a good day had by all. Finding these creatures here is an ill omen, no doubt about it, but a worse one would have been our having missed them altogether. I don’t know what the future will bring because of these discoveries, but today you were all heroic and your deeds will not be soon forgotten.”

During our return to Valsina I began to realize just how out of the ordinary what we had done really was. While with the hunting party we were all just part of a whole. The hunt had been our world and we’d all shared the same experience, so it didn’t seem that special. Our return to town brought us back in contact with people who did not have our perspective on the event.

Rounce’s return to the city had started the rumors of temeryces roaming the countryside, so farmers and herders seeing us pass came over to ask how the hunt had done. Lord Norrington remained stoic and polite, telling them he was well satisfied with how the situation had been handled. “Nothing at all to worry about now.”

At Valsina’s outskirts, people began to fill the edges of the streets to see us pass. There really was not that much to see, just a stately progression of huntsmen on horseback and several wagons. All of the skins and other relics had been packed away in one of the wagons, so no one got to ooh and ahh over grisly trophies. Even our injured men rode along without any visible bandages, so it appeared as if we’d gone out and dealt with our task with very little in the way of difficulty.

As we moved near Old Town, Lord Norrington sent Leigh, Nay, and me off to see our parents and let them know we had survived. The three of us had already agreed to go to Kedyn’s temple to offer thanks for our success, but Lord Norrington said that could wait until later. From the temple we planned to visit Rounce, but Lord Norrington noted that waiting until the evening or even tomorrow to visit him would be better, since he had been gravely injured and likely would take a long while to recover.