Old Dark Things

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH

  Years from now, Eda would someday recall her childhood, and remember a carefree time. Days when running barefoot in snow, through woods bewintered never chilled her feet, nor ached her bones. There were mushrooms to collect for mother in spring, and beechnuts and blackberries in summer. But winter was her favourite season, for in early winter there were snowberries and nothing tasted quite as good as her Momma's snowberry pie.

  Today, Eda had a good half-basket of berries and only a handful of them were bird-pecked. She was idling away some time watching a wren sing his winter song on the south road when another note, a less natural note, caught her ear. The drab little bird flew away into the undergrowth, as this new, peculiar melody swelled, and grew, and drew nearer. A melody that was hard to follow, yet eerily difficult to ignore.

  Eda stood fixed in place, her eyes wide and watching, as a host of riders upon horses the colour of snow at midnight appeared some distance down the road. Banners of silver-trimmed green snapped in the air, spears glittered like icicles, and the bells that hung upon the harnesses tinkled with every canter. At their head, rode a man whose face was quite stern, like her father's when he'd been working in the fields all day. He wore a crown, like Princess Rosa's. Only prettier.

  It did not occur to Eda to do more than stand in the road clutching her basket in her two hands, and watch the riders advance. There were a great many of them. Many more than she imagined could live in the woods. When he spied Eda, the ice-crowned man, with his unhappy green-blue eyes, reined his horse to a stop, and held up his hand. The songs stopped. Eda tried to get on tiptoes to see the musicians, and wondered briefly if she might be allowed a ride on one of those beautiful horses.

  "Good even, little one."

  "Good evening," said Eda, for a moment forgetting her manners, she blushed, then curtsied. "Are you the king of the forest?"

  "That I am."

  "I thought so. Momma has told me stories about you."

  "Indeed? What manner of stories?"

  "Oh, you know, stories. With heroes, and ladies, and waldersprights."

  "Really. Well, would you like to come away with us, and play in my court? You could see the home of your Momma's tales with your own lovely eyes, and dance forever in my woods and waters wild. The world of mortals is no place for one as charming and young as you, I think. For it is a world too full of ageing, sickness and woe."

  Eda considered the offer, then shook her head. "Not today. Momma is making snowberry pie, and I must bring her the snowberries. She makes a very fine snowberry pie. If you would like a slice I am sure she'd not begrudge you."

  He smiled, but it wasn't a warm smile. There was something in that expression that made Eda remember the time when one of the town dogs began frothing at the mouth, and killed another dog. They had to kill that dog with a pig-sticker. There was something in the smile she did not like at all.

  "Well," said the king of the woods, "perhaps you should run along and tell everyone that we are coming then instead. For they should make ready to welcome us."

  Nodding, Eda clutched her basket a little tighter, and then ran off down the road. Her callused feet pattered on the stone of the bridge. Momma was near the gate of the Toren, talking with Meritha's mother.

  "Momma."

  "Not now, Eda. Put away the snowberries, and then you can help me with some chores. Have you gathered enough? It looks like you could fill the basket a little more."

  "But Momma..."

  "Really, Eda. We're talking. Not now."

  "Momma, please. There are waldersprights coming down the road. Their king told me to tell folks. They'll be here soon."

  "Really, Eda. Don't make up stories. It isn't nice to tell fibs."

  Just then Meritha's mother let out a startled sucking noise through her teeth, and pointed with a chubby finger. Beyond the little stone bridge, in the fields between, road, river and wood, were rising two minarets of soot-black smoke. It looked like farm houses were on fire. In the fields things moving now too. Glittering, silvery, white things. Like snow and ice come to life, and given grace.

  It was then that Eda heard the strange, wandering music.

  And a moment later that she heard the first of the cries and yells. Bells rung on the gates. Horns called. People were hollering and running. The whole world turned to chaos.

  -oOo-

  Rauthus was nervous. His tail flicked about, and he stepped lightly from foot to foot. Sigurd edged him forward a little, out of the shadow of Finold's Gate. The sunlight was warming, but the horse began flaring his nostrils, and throwing his head just slightly. There was a scent on the air he did not like. As if he were smelling wolves or the greasy musk of a bear.

  Men and women, children, carts, barrels, livestock, all were flowing in a stream through Finold's gate, into the safety of high stone walls. There were frightened faces, some that looked stern and determined, some teary, but Sigurd had little attention to spare for them. His eyes were set on a lone rider clattering over the bridge. It was Mannard, a wiry man, with a good knack for horses, and coursing.

  Sigurd raised his hand and cried out, "Halloo, friend."

  Reining his sweat-flanked horse to a halt, Mannard leaned forward in his saddle, and fixed fever bright eyes on Sigurd. "The king of the forest's wrath must be sore upon us. A powerful host of unearthly things have swollen from the woods."

  "How many?"

  "Too many. Where is Alaric? I must speak with him."

  "He is giving orders to the archers and spear-guards. The household thanes are to ride out and keep the bridge."

  "We will be damned before this day is out, then. There are strange, ungodly things in the fields beyond the bridge." Mannard shook his head, and his neck apple bobbed with a thick swallow. "Ungodly creatures." Although, he then seemed to consider this a moment, and his voice grew more weary. A sigh issued from him. "Though, you know, Sigurd, truth be told--I'm not very unhappy that the Alder King's wrath has taken this particular turn."

  "How so?"

  "Well, we knew he was going to turn up here sooner or later. Talk is, we were all going to wake up turned into newts, or frogs or something ungodly ourselves... something cold and clammy. Talk was, that the Alder King's curse would come in the night." His voice quietened. "Invisible. Choking." A shrug followed. "But a host of those things in the fields--at least we can fight them. We can stand before them, and lower our spears, and shake our axes." He rubbed his grey-black beard with a scarred hand, "Least we've half-a-chance."

  Not able to dredge up anything really hopeful to say, Sigurd allowed himself to nod once in agreement. Finally, he managed to murmur some words. "If we are to meet them at the bridge, I must ride out soon. Go find the Mareshal Alaric."

  Mannard spurred his horse then, and the click and clatter of the hooves passed away from Sigurd, soon lost among the noise of the creaking cartwheels, unhappy babes and braying donkeys.

  Rauthus was happy enough to turn and trot back through the moss-flecked tunnel. He stopped sniffing the air so violently as soon as they were in the walled-in courtyard beyond.

  "Put archers on the outer gates. Are the thanes readied?" The Mareshal had come down from the battlements it seemed. He made for a proud sight in the morning light. His beard, ever so slightly more peppered with grey over the last few months, bristled about a grim-set mouth. A sword of iron, black and polished, served him for a rod of command.

  "Mannard?" The sword waved at the thane who was still in the saddle, still keen-eyed.

  "Yes, Alaric?"

  "How many then?"

  "A hundred, two hundred or more. I cannot say for sure. They move always and are hard to count."

  "Hm. Well, they will stop moving when hard cold iron is put through them. Sigurd, are you ready? You men are ready?"

  "Yes," said Sigurd. "Almost three score of thanes are ready to ride. More are mounting and arming in the yards."

  "No time to wait. No time. We should ride now. We must meet them with ir
on at the bridge." Mareshal Alaric gave one last order to the captain of the guard. "Sound the gate horn when all are within. And hurry the folk along. We cannot hold the bridge for long I suspect. Our best hope is to get everyone inside, then wear the faer down, or wait them out, by storm or by siege." Sheathing his sword, he put a foot up into the stirrup. His horse, Hamablack, arched his neck, and twitched his tail as Alaric settled himself in the saddle. The mareshal turned only briefly, enough to yell to the thanes arrayed in the courtyard, "I am told the faer folk do not bleed red as you and I. Their blood is silver. Let us be rich men." With a sweep of the hand he drew his weapon again, and brandished it above his head. "Onward then!"

  A rally of voices rose in a jumble of cheers, some heartfelt but none fearless.

  The confusion of carts, scrambling feet, reluctant goats, and oxen was still pressing through the gate. The parted only uncomfortably before the pounding column of riders. Out of the gate horses and riders flew, spreading onto the narrow sward that ran beside the lake and up to the one small bridge that leapt the icy river.

  Already, on the bridge stood three eerie creatures. Numberless others were mustering in the fields beyond. They moved like leaves caught on the wind. Their skin was a dapple of old silver and winter white, their hair was leaves and ferns, their eyes shimmered with uncanny light. The mareshal threw his sword forward, and yelled out a cry as he goaded his horse forward.

  The thanes trampled the grassy sward, mud and grass flew up in a rain, and the world swirled by them in a blur. It was as a wall of iron and hooves, that they crashed headlong into the first of the creatures. Swords of black iron bit pale flesh. Sigurd thrust and struck with his sword, and an arc of silver blood beaded the air. For him everything narrowed, and then slowed to a heart-pounding crawl.

  The first impact of the riders crushed and scattered the thin defense of the bridge. They had a respite then, but it could not last long. Other creatures, some more human looking, some more like beasts lumbered or sprinted down the slope of the fields towards them. The eldritch things closed on them and the press turned hot, choked and crowded. There was little room to move and a lot of the men were crushed into each other, or into one of the strange creatures.

  Sigurd had pulled towards the fore, which gave him a little more space to move, though still not much. His sword fell in sweeps. Unearthly blades sliced at his skin. Spears snickered out and left long, blistering, cold gashes in his flesh. He struck back, left and then right, and right, and left again. Gore purled in silver and red rivulets down his legs, and over the flanks of snorting, stamping Rauthus. The blood of mortal and immortal running together and turning grey.

  In the brief pauses when he gasped for breath between personal melees, and cast about for another creature to meet, he saw only carnage. Injured horses screamed and scrambled and found no purchase on stone and earth, wet with their own blood. Hergard was crawling over the earth clutching his innards. he saw Mannard on his back with his head split from his left eye to the neck. Young, always-joking Ermnit was on the ground, crying, bent to his knees, and clutching his neck, though the blood down his face was clogging his mouth and slurring the words.

  Sigurd threw himself back into the affray with renewed, cold, violence. He realised dimly that he was fighting harder and further into the throng than the others. The silvery, graceful host of Alraun were overwhelming the bridge now, but he was digging into them, allowing them to spread around him. Spears waved and glittered in the morning sun. He slashed and struck. Blades flashed red in the air. Faintly, remotely, he realised that there was perhaps a purpose to his maddened attacks. In one instance of clarity, he realised that he was acting like a man who didn't want to survive this fight.

  Life the keep had grown strange for him. It was harder and harder to watch Rosa grow more remote, more powerful, while everyone around her seemed to fall into a trance at the sound of her voice. Guilt about little Lilia go ate at him, but he knew the guilt would have been so much worse had he not let her go. He was tired of feeling like there was no way out of things.

  But then, he thought of what it would do to Rosa to hear he had been killed.

  He could not bear it. No, he could not let himself die here.

  Striking at one overbold faer creature, Sigurd put the point of his sword into its throat. The silver blood gushed down his arm. Dragging the blade free, he looked up to see the mareshal in the thick of a knot of white and silver and green.

  "Alaric!" Sigurd glanced back at his just-slain foe, but found only bare ground. The flesh and blood were evaporating before his eyes. Looking about frantically he glanced at his arm, found it spattered only with his own red now. Gripping the hilt tighter, and giving Rauthus a good kick, horse and rider waded towards the mareshal. "Alaric!"

  Struggle as he might, it was hopeless. The host was a tide washing between them--endless spears--countless swords--numberless shields.

  Though the air rung with the sound of it once, and again, and again, Sigurd only understood the meaning on the fourth trumpet.

  "The gate-horn. Alaric! The gate-horn calls us."

  "Then away with you." Between avoiding blows, the mareshal yelled, "ride, ride, rally to the Vaunt. Defend the Toren Vaunt!"

  As Sigurd dragged at Rauthus's reins he caught a glimpse of Alaric pressed up by attackers and thrashing crabbedly with his sword. A broken fragment of a shield hung on his left arm. Half his face was a smudge of scarlet. Alaric looked back with the one good eye that was left to him, furious. "Ride!"

  "Aye!" yelled Sigurd. "Ride! Ride! Retreat to the Toren!"

  The first inches were hard won. The next few paces he paid for with at a cost of two deep gashes. And then he broke free. Rauthus galloped as if the hounds of winter nipped his hocks.

  Two thanes were at the gate before Sigurd. Three more rode in shortly after him. As the gates ground down, Sigurd felt confusion and anger well in his gut. "Cowards! There are men out there. Leave the gates until the last thane rides in."

  "My pardon, thane Sigurd." The captain's face was drawn, stricken. "But there are no more. That was the last of you. Only the other folk are out there now."

  A cold shock moved in his gut, crawled up his skin, over his neck. That glimpse of Alaric was the last memory Sigurd would have of the man. And all the others of his friends too. He never saw Alaric fall. He never saw Brethar fall either. Nor Varulf. Nor Aleard. Nor many many others. He slumped out of the saddle and leaned into a cold stone wall, panting, trying to regain some breath. For a long time, he knew nothing at all except that of the thirty-some men who had ridden to the bridge there were now six, slouching exhausted in their saddles or on the ground, more or less whole. The six of them were wordless, and staring at one another's bloodied faces with unblinking eyes.

  And then the arrows came.

  -oOo-

  The sky turned dark with the feathers of the first shower. Arrows whispered and thudded as they struck stone and earth and flesh. Shields, held to the sky, were soon needled with shafts. Men and women cowered under the eves of the outbuildings, or in doorways, while archers on the gate returned a volley of twanging shots.

  The rain fell thicker. Bowmen slumped over the parapets, or fell limply to the earth, convulsing weakly were they lay.

  Sigurd sought shelter under the thatch of an outbuilding, but Rauthus could not fit through the small door. Despite the overhanging eaves, the horse was struck by two shafts. Struggling to control the gelding, Sigurd strained his feet to the earth, and cupping his hands close to Rauthus's ears he tried hushing the horse and comforting him. This helped little. Nostrils still flaring and eyes turning bloodshot, Rauthus became more frantic moment by passing moment. A hoof kicked out and nearly took a spear-guard by the chin.

  "Let that damned horse go."

  "He'll be struck dead," said Sigurd.

  "Then let him die." The man's eyes were cold. "Better that, than have my skull caved in."

  "I will not..." but Sigurd never finished the sente
nce. Rauthus kicked with his hind legs again. A scuffle, and a curse came from somewhere near those hooves, and a guard struck the horse with the tip of a spear. That was all the goading the gelding needed and Sigurd had no hope of controlling him now. It was either be dragged out into the open courtyard, or let go of the reins.

  Rauthus wheeled and kicked and bucked out into the open air of the yard. Two arrows struck his neck immediately. A third ploughed deep into his left shank and stood there. Sigurd tried to look away, but could not. He watched as the thick, dark horse blood pooled and ran over the road. He watched until Rauthus slipped to his knees, then his flank, then eventually, stopping kicking.

  "It had to be," said the spear-guard. "We couldn't all crowd in under here. Not with that beast."

  "Damn you. Damn..." Sigurd watched the arrows fall and felt himself in a trance. His world was crumbling a little-by-little with each singing volley.

  "They'll be on the walls soon," said a small, pot bellied man. "He ran the back of his meaty hand over his brow, and came away with more red than sweat. Once the arrows stop, they'll be here."

  Another man cut in. "Dear Lady of Brightness, but look." He was not pointing at the walls.

  There was column marching brazenly down the path that wound from the upper fortress yards above to the lower gate. Men in the oxblood livery of Vaunt, ranks of spears, shields rimmed in burnished copper. Their feet fell in a rhythmic drum on the stone. At their head, she strode looking like some warrior queen out of ages past. In her right hand she carried a footman's lance the colour of ivory. A war-harness of scarlet and gold enrobed her, a tall, crowned helm restrained straying blonde locks, and in her eyes was a glint of fire.

  And without flinching she led the men into the heart of the arrow storm. Into the heart of what ought have been their death. More than one face turned up to the sky with large eyes and a whispered prayer. But the arrows did not bite. What fell on the men and their sorcerous queen was a shower of thin ash. Tendrils of powdery white drifted out of the sky and stuck to clothing, and clogged eyelashes.

  She noticed him then, hiding under the thatch roof. "Sigurd." Her expression was marked with both delight and trepidation. "I feared for you."

  "Rosa," Sigurd held his tongue, and then whispered a word of prayer, before saying again "Rosa?"

  "Yes?"

  "The arrows."

  She looked up, showed an irritable frown, and said, "Yes. They are bothersome, the ash is so fine." She shrugged her shoulders uncomfortably. "It it get down the collar. I shall have to wash my hair later."

  Sigurd took a tentative step into the open. Grey dust wisped around his head. "I... I have never... never in my life..."

  But other men were not so timid. One held his hands up like a child catching snowflakes. "Queen Rosa," he called out, and others answered him in an echo of a hundred voices.

  "Queen Rosa!"

  "Come Sigurd," she said. "I would have you at my side."

  Falling into step beside her, together they climbed the creaking, wooden steps that led to the top of the gatehouse battlements. Guards and thanes filed up behind them, grinning, and laughing at the pale soot that dusted their skin. But Sigurd now had eyes only for the dead. They had not been dead long. Lying almost languidly, as if each were drunk with a the red liquor of intoxication seeping from their mouths.

  When they reached the top of the wall, he could see that gorecrows blackened the trees above the far fields now. They looked like dark, distended fruit on winterbare branches. On the flagstaff above the battlements perched one unusually large, and cunning-eyed raven. It had a finger in its beak, and studied the newly arrived living with suspicion. Had it swooped in as soon as the arrows had turned harmless?

  Rosa arranged herself at the heart of the battlement. She gripped the ivory spear lightly in her hand and narrowed her attention to the road below. Arrows from the field still rose in a flock, but came no closer than half an arc before dissolving into a grey haze.

  "Dear Goddesses both," whispered more than one voice, as eyes set upon the field. Rank upon rank of faer creatures were marching over the snowy grass. White and green banners drifted and snapped in the air.

  But Rosa's face expressed less awe, more anger. "Phantoms," she said, "illusions, and daydreams." Then she threw her head back and cried out for all the world to hear, "You besiege my lovely home with these shadows." She thrust taut fingers at the nearest column of archers. The score of creatures bleed together, before turning into weightless spectres that billowed away on the wind.

  "Not all my subjects will be so easily dispelled." His words rang clear, and set every tongue to silence. He sat on a horse that was whiter, more radiant and prouder than any earthly creature. Wearing no armour, he had on his head a crown of icy jewels trapped in a filigree of frost, a cloak of pine needles and snow around his collar, and in one hand a sword like a jagged icicle. His eyes did not merely glint, but shimmered with light.

  Rosa was breathing heavily, as if she'd just sprinted a hundred paces, and tiny flecks of spit were caking the corners of her mouth.

  "You!" spat Rosa. "You have done this?" She waved a hand over the fields of slaughter. "All this for the sake of mine sister."

  He looked for a moment puzzled but answered all the same. "I have."

  "You shall never have the Toren Vaunt. Not by war. Not by trickery. Not by marriage."

  "Think you so?" His eyes looked for a moment red, as if the blue-silver of the orbs were stained with blood.

  "Look at me forest spright. Look in my eyes, and tell me you are sure of victory."

  The Alder King paused, and his face lined with concerted thought. "Sorcery..." he pressed his lips together and scowled, before saying, "Sorcery of war seethes on your battlements."

  "I will blast this land barren to be rid of you."

  "You would wilt your own fields? Wither your own woods? Turn streams to dust, and reduce your earth to salt and waste?"

  "Look in my eyes, and tell me I will not."

  He paused for a moment then, considering this. "I will not retreat. I have sworn that I would march on the Veld. My folk cannot betray their word. We are bound by old laws."

  "Then we are at an impasse." Her delicate chin tilted back, and her eyes looked down on him with fine contempt.

  "It seems so."

  For a time then, the faer host withdrew out of the range of bows, and the squall of arrows ceased. Men milled uneasily on the battlements. Barrels, planks and wagons were set against the gates. Rauthus's corpse was butchered for the horseflesh. It might be a long siege.

  Sigurd was looking out over the stone of the battlements, at the weird creatures making a vast camp. "What shall become of us?" he said.

  Rosa was standing stiffly, her eyes distant, her face just slightly taunt with concentration. "I can go a night without sleep. Perhaps two. No more."

  "And then they will be on us?"

  "Perhaps. Perhaps I can raise walls of sorcery to guard against the faer king's petty phantoms. Perhaps. But he is right. He has other creatures in his host--more substantial creatures--and no weaving of spells will keep those things out."

  "I fear for us, all of us," said Sigurd, and he reached out a hand to gently caress Rosa's. "And I fear for you."

  Her gaze, when it rounded on him was at once bewildered and a touch gentler. "Do not fear for me Sigurd. I am beyond fear. Beyond hope. Whatever you do, do not waste fear on me."

  A heavy silence hung between them for a while, before Sigurd, searching for something to say looked up again at the flagstaff. "That damned raven," said Sigurd. "It just sits there watching us, hoping we'll soon be dead. I feel as if it's decided my eyes are tasty enough to wait for."

  Rosa arched an eyebrow, but said only. "Loose an arrow at it."

  "No." He breathed a sigh. "No. I will not kill any more this day. No more than I must."

  "Then loose an arrow at it tomorrow."

  He looked up. The raven's bright, beady eyes of gold blinked
once, and then thought, hungrily. The finger was gone. "I just might, you know. I just might."

  It ruffled its feathers and croaked as if it were laughing.

  The sun sank hour by hour into a bed of scarlet haze. Sigurd smiled when he saw the first star of evening. Not for the coming night, but because it reminded him of making greedy wishes on the sight of the dusk's first star in happier, milder days. It was nice to reflect for a moment, to lose oneself in dreaming thoughts.

  "Sigurd?" Her voice was plaintive, a rustle in the night.

  "Yes?"

  "Sigurd, I need you."

  He reached out to take her hand, but she shook her head.

  "No. Your council. If I were to give you a task? An important task, in which the lives of many might depend?"

  "Without question. Without pause."

  "It might be the death of you."

  He nodded. "To the ends of the whole of this Clay-o-the-Green."

  "Of course. I didn't need to ask, but still, somehow I needed to hear you say it." She cleared her throat, and without taking her eyes off the bright, wide gleam of white that was the faer host, she said, "Sound the gate horn."

  One long, profound note rolled out over the land, fading at last to a handful of distant echoes.

  "Alraun! King of the Sprights. I would speak with you. Under banner of peace and parley. I vow it."

  In short time, a pool of starry light blazed to life before the gates. Though no torch or lantern was obvious, Alraun stood alone upon the sward, cleanly bathed in the brilliance.

  "My Lady? A surrender?"

  "No."

  "Then you waste my time."

  "Perhaps. Perhaps not. I propose that the old and binding laws you spoke of may avail us yet. There are... promises that can be made. Oaths that can be sworn. Deeds that can be done. Wagers that can be made."

  "You speak of wagers and oaths but what can you wager that I could possibly want?"

  "That which we both want."

  "The crown and lordship?"

  She nodded. "At stake, the Veld."

  "That would satisfy my vow. A battle of two champions, mayhap? That is an ancient settler of wroth."

  "No. You would outmatch my champion with a creature out of a nightmare dream. I have in mind something more," she licked her lips, "testing. It is said, in ages past, that Feold the first Eorl of Vaunt took this land from the rule of a cruel worm."

  "I recall," and he smiled darkly.

  "Then recall that Eorl Feold is entombed with other pagan Eorls in a cave deep in your woods. Centuries have passed since my line sent its dead to be buried there. The Bright Goddess now rises above our graves, but, they say, dark spirits still haunt the pagan dead. Spirits that neither you, nor I could master. So it is said."

  "I am master of all between..."

  "Yes." Her smile was vixenish, "Then it would be no great feat for you to send a champion to fetch the crown of Feold?"

  His eyes narrowed. He opened his mouth to answer but became reticent, only nodding briefly.

  "So," she let her voice honey with allure, "is this too easy a task? Then this I propose too. We avow that no more blood be spilt twixt your folk and mine. That the lordship of the Veld, the folk, and the land will fall to whomsoever stands first on the village green, bearing the crown of Feold." He was about to raise a word as she cut him off. "And! And no man, woman or creature but a single appointed champion of a claimant to the throne may fetch, and then present that crown. Think you this too easy?"

  "It will be," he pulled his lip back in a sneer, "but a small thing, for such as I." The boast sounded fragile despite his efforts to keep his calm.

  "Then also this I put to you. That we, in seeking lordship may also put upon the road of the champions one," she lowered her voice, "danger. You have your charms, and I have mine. Let it be a danger of no earthly sort, or none at all."

  "Of no earthly sort?" It was more a mull of consideration than a question.

  "These are words from the songs of the oldest laws. Do you deny their truth?"

  "The bargain is well spoken," he admitted.

  "Well?"

  "It is an old bargain. A fair bargain." His voice still sounded uncertain.

  "Do you avow to abide by the ancient oaths? That he--or she--who first holds the crown of Feold int he village sward shall rule unchallenged over all usurpers?"

  Men held their breath on the battlements, all men but Sigurd. He found himself breathing shallow, and quickly.

  Alraun paused for a moment. His brown creased with a frown. "Very well. To this, so swear I."

  "To this, so swear I." Rosa let herself smile. "I have already chosen mine champion." His hand fell lightly on Sigurd's shoulder. "Now, choose yours."

  -oOo-

  The word went round the Vaunt quicker than a whirlwind, and collected more debris. By the time Sigurd was stepping into the fire-lit glow of the keep's ante-hall, crowds were gathering, whispering, and pointing.

  "They say you are to fight a worm," said one kitchen scullion whose face was glossed by a small burn. He pointed at the bas relief crouched in the arch of the farthest wall. "For the right to rule the Veld." The twining worm, and the proud horseback archer never looked so starkly real to Sigurd.

  "No, not a worm. There are no worms left int he Veld, boy." He tried to smile. "Thanes slew them all long time passing, else there'd not be so many stories of worm-slaying, I think."

  "Yes, Thane Sigurd," conceded the lad.

  Talk hushed to whispers as he passed. He walked dreamlike through the crowd, but stopped before the graven worm and grey, staring-eyed warlord. Rosa still sentried herself on the battlements, "to ensure Alraun keeps his word, and to make some last arrangements" she had said, "and conjure up an obstacle for his champion. For I've more magic than Alraun suspects, and I've been hunting through the cellars of my mind, and Snoro's book for a sorcery this evening long. Think you that I would be so foolish as to make such a bargain before having decided that I knew already for certain how to do away with any wood-spright that Alraun may put to the task?"

  The memory shook free of his mind and left Sigurd with a cold shiver.

  "I have precious little time," said Sigurd while catching a random young guard by the shoulder. "Fetch for me clean, oiled armour. Send for food, a good day's worth," he swallowed and said the next words quickly, "and ready a horse. A good courser, with swift hooves."

  "As you command." The guard stood caught in a moment of indecision, his brow twitching, perhaps wondering what to see to first.

  "With haste," said Sigurd again. Though he was gentle in tone, not just the guard, but four others who were in earshot, jumped and then took off in various directions. All of them were calling ahead of them, Thane Sigurd needs this, Thane Sigurd needs that, and so on.

  Sigurd stood where he was and waited. To distract himself, he counted his breaths. Counted to nine... ten... eleven. At twelve he wondered briefly how many he might have left, and kept counting.

  -oOo-

  The night had an edge of cold to it so sharp it deadened the skin. Sigurd looked up. There was a good show of stars. A hundred thousand points of distant light were strewn through the skies. It was so odd. The ride with Rosa to the appointed place wherefrom the champions would depart was almost pleasant.

  "I have a pendant for you." Rosa's voice was velvet, and sounded self-assured. Sigurd only fixed a dutiful expression all the tighter on his face. "It is all I could scavenge together in so few hours, but it should see you through Alraun's attacks, whatever they may be." She held out to him a talisman, wrought of a serpent and man in burnished iron. It spun on its cord as Sigurd gazed at it. "Take it. As a token, if nothing else."

  Reaching out a hand, Sigurd caught the amulet in his palm. It was heavier, and warmer than he had expected. Fumbling with one cold-numbed hand to fasten a pendant is not the easiest thing to do while riding, and in the end they had to stop so that Rosa could tie it about his neck. "There," she said. "Better." He
r hands brushed his cold skin, and transferred some of her flush of warmth to him. It was one of the most strangely intimate experiences Sigurd could recall.

  "No, I am worried about you. I have asked too much," said Rosa without warning. "Always asked too much, but you are then always there for me."

  Sigurd looked at her, traced his gaze over her starlit eyes, the curved mouth, the sad lines of the otherwise smooth face.

  "No," he said. "You could never ask too much of me, no matter what is ever asked. And this is what must be done. There was no other way, I think."

  "There may have been. I worry that I was too hasty." Her brief glance at him was cheerless. "Come back to me, Sigurd. I care not for anything else. Do not spill your blood for this rotten joyless keep and fortress. Come back to me, and then, even if we no longer may have the Veld, we will have one another. We can wander through the lands. A lady and her champion. We could visit distant lords. Partake of feasts, and friendly contests of arms. I think I would like that."

  A smile touched Sigurd's eyes. He felt it creep to his mouth. "I would like that, too."

  Rosa suddenly seemed to remember where they were, and she drew herself up a little stiffer. "We must make haste and talk carefully now. We are nearly at the appointed place."

  They came to a glade embraced by a few old trees near the south end of the town fields. This was the last open and airy glen before the road turned into a tunnel, roofed with bare branches, and floored with thin snow.

  Alraun was already here, flanked by two of his eldritch creatures. They stood a few paces back, and their silver-green eyes narrowed intently as they watched Rosa and Sigurd ride closer.

  "You have chosen your champion, King of Sprights?" More than a little brusqueness suffused her words. "Is it one of these two?"

  A prideful smile chased over Alraun's face. "My champion is chosen. You know him, for you have met my herald afore. The Hunter of the Hollows presented himself to your hall."

  Rosa frowned. "He is late."

  Alraun's smile broke into a wide, and indulgent grin. "No, not late. Early. He is already in the woods. Galloping towards the cave of your ancient dead."

  "That was not in our agreement." Rosa's face twisted into a pale mask of anger. "We agreed..."

  "That we, that you and I, would meet here to formally begin the challenge. There was no agreement that the champions would accompany us, or that they would begin together. Mine has chosen to take his leave early. I hope you have had time to set you own, how did you put it? You danger on the road?"

  "I have."

  If the Alder King was disappointed he hid it well. His smile danced in his eyes, and his poise remained prideful and unruffled.

  "Sigurd, I am sorry. I did not foresee this."

  "Then I shall but ride only all the faster."

  She reached out for him, perhaps meaning to give him a kiss, or at least take his hand, but he pretended not to see. Digging the spurs a little too hard into the horse's flanks, he took off at a canter. Past Alraun's smug face, past his two guards, and into the woods.

  Moonlight lanced the canopy, and limned everything with shades of black-silver-grey. Horse sweat steamed and warmed the air a little. Familiar smells rolled against him. Old leather. Horses and stable. Damp wood and earth. For the first time in days, Sigurd's shoulders relaxed. As he crested one small rise, he reined his mount to a stop, and looked back down, to the vale below. Over it all towered the Toren Vaunt, its spires and walls lit with a hundred fiery coloured slits. A black shadow snaked along the road. Rosa was riding back. Her head was bowed, the pace of her mount was slow.

  With one last cast of his eyes back over the whole scene, Sigurd urged the horse on, into the shadows, upon a path that led to darkness.