The Dog Master (50 page)

He lifted his spear, and that was when Dog lost control—though commanded to remain, this threat was simply too real. With a lunge that caught Mal by surprise, she was at the end of her leash, snarling and snapping with such fury that all three men stumbled backward. One of them fell and, inspired, Mal stepped forward and allowed Dog to move a little closer to the man who had tripped.

The Wolfen lay sprawled in the dirt, staring in mortal terror at the enormous wolf poised to rip out his throat. She was so close that a fleck of saliva from her white jaws flew at him, and he trembled, feeling her hot breath.

Mal kept a firm grip on the leash, letting the fallen man see how close he was to death. Dog snarled and snapped, enraged. The other two Wolfen had retreated and were standing up to their knees in the stream, their expressions desperate.

“Dog, remain,” Mal commanded. “Dog! Remain!”

“Please,” Silex called. “Do not hurt my son.”

Dog brought herself under control. She sat, but the fur was still raised on the back of her neck, and her lips were pulled back from her sharp fangs. Mal regarded her wonderingly. He had been thinking of her the wrong way, as his charge—almost as if she were a helpless child. He thought to protect her, but Dog, with her fangs and claws, could also protect
him.

“I ask again why you do this,” Mal said in a strong voice after a moment. “If you do not tell me, I will spear this one where he lies, and my wolf will pursue and kill you two as you try to run for the woods.”

*   *   *

Tripping over unseen obstacles, Lyra had run through the night, more afraid of the Cohort than any nocturnal predator. When the sun roused itself to do battle with the day, though, it was in the wrong place in the sky. She did not understand how that could be, nor did she comprehend where she was. To her woman's side should be rocks, trees and the stream, but instead all she saw were open grasses.

She tentatively struck out for where she knew the stream would be. When she found it, the waters would lead her to the Kindred summer quarters.

Here the unfamiliar terrain was rolling, low hills covered with sparse grass. She ate the last of her food as she walked, anxiously watching the sun climb higher. What might under other circumstances be a welcome stretch of warm weather seemed fraught with terrible threat, as dangerous as the night.

When Lyra topped a rise, she stopped, jolted with fear.

Across a wide, grassy field were the three men of the Cohort.

They were much, much closer.

 

FIFTY-EIGHT

Grat scouted ahead and came back nodding: the Cohort were still there. Once again, he held up four fingers.

Valid and Urs exchanged grim looks. This was like nothing they had ever attempted before. They were hunting men, now, not the lone Frightened. Armed humans.

The Kindred hunters clustered around their leader. Palloc regarded Grat with cold eyes. He knew that at the end of this day, somehow Grat would be heralded, though as stalker all he did was run around ahead of the Kindred looking for game. Palloc was a spearman—it would be up to him to kill one of the Cohort, which he would do without mercy, but he knew with a bitterness born of life experience that no one would notice his bravery.

They would attack as they would conduct any hunt: the spears would fly and then they would charge with clubs. Urs swallowed, wiping the sweat from his eyes. To do this, he had to picture his people being murdered by this same tribe. The rage helped; it kept hesitation at bay.

The men were waiting. Urs noticed how their eyes seemed larger than normal, how their skin shined with perspiration.

“Just over the rise,” Grat whispered, gesturing to the small hill in front of them. “They feed, no fire. Clubs, no spears.”

“Only four,” Valid pressed.

“Just four.” Grat nodded.

There were four Cohort, compared to a hunt of three hands' worth of men. “All is good,” Urs murmured.

They crawled to a place just before the lip of the small rise. Urs closed his eyes briefly, thinking of Bellu, heavy with his child. And then, as often happened, he thought of Calli. The girl of mists and shadows. The woman he should have married.

Valid's hand closed on his arm. Urs opened his eyes and nodded.

Now.

The men of the hunt boiled over the top of the hill and there were the four Cohort, sitting on their haunches less than forty paces away. They sprang up, staring with eyes white in their fiercely blackened faces.

It was too soon to loose spears, but they flew anyway, arcing through the air, thrown hard and true. “Not yet!” Urs hissed, but only Valid heard.

Palloc did not throw, either: he was at the very back of the hunt, trailing, and did not yet have a clear shot.

The spears fell toward the Cohort, who astounded the Kindred by watching the weapons arc through the air, flinging themselves to the side just as it seemed the spears would land. Most of the spears fell short, but the rest the Cohort managed to evade simply by dodging out of the way.

The Cohort turned and, lifting their clubs, faced the charging Kindred.

Valid heaved his spear with such force that even though they dodged, a Cohort was clipped on the leg. The Kindred roared, raising their own clubs. Palloc stopped to throw but dared not because the hunt was nearly upon the Cohort savages.

The Cohort had spread themselves an arm's length apart and were waiting with their clubs ready. The Kindred jostled with one another as they closed the final few paces, literally falling over amongst themselves.

Urs, out front, swung his club, and the Cohort savage unexpectedly held up his own club with two hands, crossways and high before his chest so that it took Urs's mighty blow. The shock of the impact traveled down Urs's arm and his momentum carried him forward and the man from the Cohort Valley pivoted and slammed Urs viciously in the side.

Urs went down.

Valid had the same experience: the Cohort fighters somehow knew to block the club's descent and then to turn and strike, turn and strike. Valid took a blow to the hip and stumbled. A sharp pain bit his other leg and he rolled, staring at the spear splitting his calf.

Pex fell to the ground next to Valid, his head bouncing as it struck the earth. His eyes were glassy. “Pex!” Valid shouted, but the man was dead.

Valid looked up. One of the Cohort lay still, another was on his hands and knees. The other two fought on, but they were outnumbered and Mors hit one from behind and Palloc picked up a spear and ran it into the stomach of the other, and then it was over.

Men were groaning, including one of the Cohort. Valid looked over to Urs, who was writhing in the dirt. Mors turned and tried to grin at Valid, but there was blood running from where his teeth used to be.

Panting, Grat approached the Cohort who was on his hands and knees. With an intent look on his face, he lined up his shot and struck the man with sickening impact at the base of the skull.

The one Palloc had stabbed was lying on his back, and Grat dispatched him with so many blows to the face that Valid had to turn away.

The other two Cohort appeared dead, but Grat used his club on them, too, and then stood breathing through his mouth, his face flecked with Cohort blood.

Of the fifteen Kindred who had come over the hill, half were badly hurt, and five were dead. The Valley Cohort were
warriors.
Valid did not understand how so few of them could have inflicted such damage.

“Palloc,” Valid croaked. “Good work.”

Palloc blinked at him. It was obvious that Valid did not realize that the spear in his leg had been Palloc's, thrown recklessly into the battle at precisely the wrong moment. Instead, Valid only knew Palloc had picked up a spear and killed a Cohort.

“Grat,” Valid grunted, wanting to acknowledge Grat's efforts as well, but then the image of the club coming down into the face of the warrior on the ground stopped him. Valid did not know what to say to Grat.

“I am afraid Urs may be fatally wounded,” Grat replied after a moment.

They all looked to their leader, who lay writhing on the ground, clutching his rib cage.

*   *   *

The impasse with the Wolfen was, Mal reflected, as when two men met on a narrow path and neither would yield way to the other. He could not very well turn his back on the three men who had come to kill him, nor would it be prudent to allow the one lying at his feet to get up. The other two were still standing in the stream and still had their clubs. Yet they had no viable course of action, either.

Mal gave the one on the ground a look, raising his eyebrows. His question still hung in the air as if returned in an echo.
Why do you do this?

The Wolfen, sprawled in the dirt and utterly helpless, looked away from Dog's snarl and up into Mal's implacable face and swallowed hard. “We come because you have enslaved the wolf,” he ventured, his tremulous voice not at all matching Mal's composed demeanor.

“And you are Wolfen.” Mal nodded, putting it together. “So you feel you must set the wolf free.”

The two men in the water looked wordlessly at each other.

“What are your names?”

“I am Silex,” said the older one. “My son Cragg is before you, and this is my son Tok.”

“Well, Silex, this is Dog. If I let her free now, she might kill all of you,” Mal observed.
Especially if I spear one of you.
“But otherwise, she can leave at any time. I often untie her and let her run. She returns to me because I saved her and her mother from a lion, and so we are bonded. We share our meals and hunt together. Do you, the People of the Wolf, not give food to the wolf? Do you not follow the wolf on the hunt? That is what everyone says.”

“We do,” Silex conceded.

“How is what I do any different?”

“The rope,” Tok offered from the water.

“The rope.” Mal looked at Dog, who still sat, obeying the command to remain. Mal dropped the rope, smiling slightly as Cragg's eyes bulged. “There. You see? The rope helps restrain her from her impulses—such as wanting to kill the three of you. But I do not use it to keep her prisoner. Dog,” Mal said. Dog looked around at him. “To me.”

Dog obediently moved closer to Mal's side and sat, but she was panting, tense. He put a hand down and gave her a reassuring pat on the head.

Mal looked back at the men who had come to murder him. “Now what?” he asked finally, addressing Tok and Silex as they stood in the water. “If I let this one up, will you two in the river come at me with your clubs? One of you will be speared in the gut and all of you will feel my wolf's fangs rip the flesh from your bones and tear your organs to pieces. Is that what happens next?”

“I think perhaps we did not fully understand the situation,” Silex responded slowly.

Mal nodded. “I agree. Still, I do not see how we can prevent you three dying here today.”

“We could leave,” Tok volunteered shakily.

Mal shook his head. “No, if I allow you to run away you will just return with a better plan. You might bring spears for my wolf and do with your clubs what you originally intended.”

“No,” Cragg said, staring at Dog as if worried she might take offense. “We are Wolfen. We could never hurt a wolf.”

“Oh.” Mal nodded. It made sense. “So you would stalk us and spear me, instead. And then you would run. I have heard it said the Wolfen are faster than any other creed, so you would probably get several steps away before my wolf took each of you in revenge for my death. I imagine she would bring you down by seizing your legs in her jaws and crushing your bones, then she would go after the next man. Not until she had felled all three of you would she return to finish you one by one, the way we Kindred pursue reindeer we have speared and then kill them when we find them bleeding in the dirt.”

Silex nodded at the sense of Mal's words. “What if we do not try to harm you in any way?”

The two younger Wolfen were nodding furiously.

“Why would you abandon your plans?” Mal challenged.

“It is as we said before,” Silex replied. “We thought you were enslaving the wolf. Our only thought was to free her from that slavery.”

“Please, Kindred,” the youngest Wolfen begged from where he stood in the water.

Mal believed them. “So: if I do not kill you, you will not attempt to kill me,” he summarized. “When my wolf sees that we are not hostile, she will not kill you, either. Are we agreeing?”

Silex gave a tentative smile. “We are agreeing.”

“Good.” Mal sized up the would-be assassins. The Wolfen's garments were crude—basically hides with head holes and short fox-fur skirts. But otherwise they were men, just like him.

“The way you speak is somewhat odd to my ear,” Cragg observed. “The words are the same but your pronunciation differs.” He struggled to a sitting position but froze as Dog visibly reacted to the movement.

“All is good, Dog,” Mal said. “Yes, I believe it is true for all creeds, that our words sound different as they come from different mouths. You can stand up, Cragg. Dog, remain.”

Cragg cautiously rose to his feet. Mal stroked Dog's head reassuringly, while Silex and Tok waded back to the bank and climbed onto dry land. Once the three Wolfen were standing together, they seemed at a loss as to what to do next. How does one converse with someone who was supposed to be murdered?

“Would you like to touch my wolf?” Mal inquired politely.

*   *   *

Silex's hand shook as he extended it. “All is good, Dog,” Mal repeated softly as the wolf raised her head to sniff the outstretched palm.

Tears blurred Silex's vision. “I am touching a wolf,” he gasped reverently. “I never imagined such a thing could ever occur.” He stroked Dog's back, sinking his fingers into the luxurious pelage. “You have the handprint marking, Dog.”

“I did not understand you,” Mal said apologetically.