His trepidation was shared. Trees rustled as squirrels went into hiding. Rabbits dashed here and there, their white tails bouncing. A boar, then a stag, crossed his path. Each broke into panicky flight after spying him.
“Better hide,” Gathrid muttered. He glanced round, ran after the stag. He needed a remote thicket or cave.
Proper thickets were scarce. He hadn’t the speed or wind to stay with the stag long enough to discover its hiding place. He did find a cave, but beat a hasty, ignominious retreat upon finding himself nose to nose with a she-bear and her cubs.
The horns sounded again. The hunters were getting close. Was he the quarry? That did not seem possible. They were coming from ahead, not from his backtrail. And even Ahlert hadn’t the arrogance to announce his coming to the Swordbearer.
Pure dumb luck was about to betray him.
He had to move fast. After a moment of dismay and indecision he flung himself at a post oak. He shimmied up and transferred to a larger beech, which he climbed till he could crawl out a branch and get into another oak. This was a many times grandfather of the first, and one of the largest trees he had ever seen. Sixty feet up he settled into a fork and watched a brook gurgle along a dozen yards from the tree’s base.
The horn again. He listened for hounds, heard no baying. A good sign, he thought. They would not stumble onto his trail.
The horn again. Then the quarry passed beneath him, exhausted, staggering toward the brook. “A girl,” he said softly. He leaned for a better look.
She was ragged, scratched and bruised, and hardly older than he. Though he considered himself a poor judge, she appeared reasonably attractive.
She paused to scoop water from the creek. She was in command of her wits. She turned downstream after drinking.
And slipped on a slimy stone. She fell with a little wail of despair and pain. She stayed down. Though she tried valiantly, weary muscles and a sprained ankle refused to be tortured further.
Gathrid started down even before the hunters arrived. He froze while they passed beneath him, exchanging quips about their prey. Having absorbed Ventimiglian from Daubendiek’s victims, he understood. The girl was an escaped sacrifice meant for a slow, painful death in rites that would give them command of a familiar spirit.
There were five of them. Behind each rode an esquire. They were cruel young men who inspired Gathrid’s loathing. They dismounted, surrounded the girl. They taunted her, laughed at her, kicked her down again when she tried to rise.
Gathrid crossed to the beech. One of the esquires turned, cocked his head then resumed watching his master’s sport.
Sometimes, Gathrid thought, you have to compromise a moral resolution to meet the demand of a greater obligation. He had been determined never to draw Daubendiek except in self-defense.
Rogala would have called him a fool for interfering.
He dropped the last dozen feet, landed quietly on the soft grass. The sharp-eared esquire turned again. Gathrid drew the Sword.
The esquire tried to shout, could only gobble.
Gathrid felt the familiar growing sensation, the eagerness of the blade, the momentary vertigo as Daubendiek drank a soul. The Ventimiglians froze when they sensed the surge of Power.
Gathrid raged among them, slaughtering all the esquires and two of the nobles before they could defend themselves. The others, after crossing the brook, began some hasty sorcery. Two moved toward Gathrid’s flanks while the third retreated. A red mist roiled in the pocket thus formed. Within that mist an anthropoid, a bow-legged, squat, long-armed, hairy and toothy thing, took shape. It looked at the girl and grinned.
Despite its origins it did not seem all that remarkable till Gathrid splashed across the creek and attacked it.
Daubendiek behaved like an ordinary blade swung into a hardwood post. It cut, but with no more effect than that ordinary blade would have affected that mortal oak.
Though Gathrid was startled, Daubendiek was not. It beat about the demon in an almost invisible storm. Chips of monster flew. The Sword clanged like a beaten gong.
The demon seemed astonished that it was vulnerable at all. Rocking with each blow, grin waning, it kept trying to reach Gathrid. The three who had summoned it kept yelling in amazement.
Gathrid remembered the field where his father and brothers had practiced with their horses and weapons. The demon began to take on the target-post’s well-hacked look.
Daubendiek would strike for the creature’s neck, then go for a leg when it raised an arm protectively. The Sword fell into a rhythm of high and low, staying a move ahead, till one demon leg parted at the knee.
Daubendiek howled gleefully.
While the demon sat staring at its severed calf, Gathrid slew the nearest Ventimiglian and charged after the other two.
He caught one, but the last captured a horse before Gathrid overtook him. He escaped as a scream drew the youth’s attention back to the brook.
The demon was after the girl, stalking her on all fours, looking like some weird wolf spider awaiting the right instant to pounce. The girl kept scooting away. She seemed unable to take to her feet.
Swinging Daubendiek with both hands, Gathrid severed the demon’s head from its neck. It rolled down into the chill water. Its mouth broke the surface and began cursing in fractured Ventimiglian.
The decapitated body crawled round the slope, hands feeling for the missing head. When it encountered a stone of appropriate size, it tried settling that atop its shoulders.
Gathrid turned to the girl. She cowered away from him. She seemed more terrified of him than she was of the demon.
Though the Sword protested, Gathrid forced it into its scabbard. He offered the girl a hand. She accepted as if afraid refusal would bring reprisal. Gathrid did not know what to say, so said nothing. Ventimiglian words would not roll right on his tongue anyway. He helped her climb the bank, leaned her against a sapling while he rounded up horses and examined his enemies’ gear. He found their memories more interesting than their equipment. They knew the way to the Library. It was there that the Mindak had gifted them with their demon.
Said demon kept cursing in the streambed.
He was wasting time. He helped the girl onto a horse. Then, on impulse, he scrambled down and salvaged the talking head. He bound it to his saddle by its wiry hair. It chattered right along, telling him what it thought.
The girl spoke for the first time when Gathrid started to leave. “What about me? What am I supposed to do?”
He looked into her dark, frightened eyes. He shrugged. “Whatever you want. You’re free now.”
She understood despite his recalcitrant tongue. “No. I’ll never be free. I’ve been dedicated.” She indicated the head. “The thing’s masters will compel them. They can’t break their bargain with it. Nor it with them. The one who escaped. He’ll bring friends. Powerful men. The high sorcerers. The fathers of the ones you slew.”
Gathrid shrugged again. What could he say or do? He had not thought beyond her rescue. “Come on.” His plans had no room for companions, yet he could not abandon a responsibility once assumed.
She hesitated. She was afraid of him. She did not want to remain near a man so deadly. Yet he had saved her from the devils she knew.
Shortly after he shrugged a third time and started off, exchanging unpleasantries with the head, she called for him to wait.
Chapter Nine
Round Dedera
The girl’s name was Loida Huthsing. “Any relation to Franaker Huthsing?” Gathrid asked.
“My father.” She seemed startled because he knew the name.
The demon was Gacioch. The girl was seventeen, the demon ageless. Loida had been part of the plunder the Mindak had sent home from Grevening. Gacioch was the lackey of a demon-lord in the service of high Ventimiglian nobles.
The youths Gathrid had slain belonged to the Mindak’s own household. They had been sons of cousins and nephews. Loida told him to expect a cruel death. Gacioch gleefully confirmed
her contention.
The demon let up on the cussing and fussing. His game, now, was to describe at length, and in loving detail, the sophistication of the tortures to be found in the Mindak’s dungeons. Ahlert’s family was sacred, at least by their own decree.
“Don’t you ever shut up?” Gathrid demanded. “Right now Theis Rogala is looking good.”
The demon grinned and babbled on.
Gathrid shrugged off the threats. “Ahlert can’t want me any worse than before. Loida? Your father is really Franaker Huthsing? The infamous Sheriff of Rigdon?”
“Infamous? Look, friend... “
“He was infamous on our side of the border.” He had been afraid his identity would frighten the girl. She grew relaxed instead.
“Heck, we’re neighbors. Almost kin. What went on between our fathers doesn’t seem very important now, does it?”
“Not when you look at it from a forest in the heart of Ventimiglia, no.”
The exchange of identities occurred during their second day together, while they paused at the forest’s edge and Gathrid quietly debated going afoot once more. Before, Loida had tagged along in silence while Gacioch had done the chattering. For his part, Gathrid had been too preoccupied to worry about the girl or demon.
By now an alarm would have spread throughout Ventimiglia’s ruling class. The hunt would be up. Could he reach the Library before the pursuit overtook him?
The city Dedera was the obstacle. Daubendiek should see him through the countryside. Out here, sheer distance would keep the enemy from gathering in number. But the city, with its quarter-million people, could throw an army across his path.
He saw no way, now, to conceal his presence and destination. He decided to retain the horses and try for speed.
A dozen riders passed through a field a quarter-mile away, boredly watching the wood. To Gathrid’s surprise, Gacioch kept his mouth shut while they were within hearing.
“Why didn’t you yell?” Gathrid demanded.
“I like you, boy. I’ve gotten attached to you.”
“Liar.”
“Goodie! You noticed. That’ll be a plus mark on my record when I come up for promotion.” He snickered evilly. “Actually, I’m just lazy. When they do catch you, they’ll catch me, too. Means I’ll have to go back to work. You should only know how rare vacations are in my corner of Hell.”
Gathrid gave the head an uncertain look. It was hard to tell when the demon meant what he said, or was just joking. Then he laughed.
It was the first time he had done so since the Mindak’s invasion of Gudermuth. “Then your wickednesses include sloth?”
“My strong point.” Gacioch spoke sourly. He had lost interest in conversation.
Gathrid turned to Loida. “It’s going to get rough. I’m going to try to outrun them.”
Her fear and awe were evaporating. “I can keep up with any Gudermuther.”
“Is that the kind of crack I’m going to have to live with from now on? Maybe I should’ve left you where I found you. Let’s go.”
They had ridden less than a mile when they encountered another patrol. Though armed and aware that they had found their quarry, the Ventimiglians refused combat. They drifted off into a field while Gathrid passed.
“Why did they do that?” Loida asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t like it.” He watched the patrol return to the road a respectful distance behind them. “They’re showing too much good sense.” They were, his more experienced memories assured him, acting according to some prearrangement. There would be big trouble nearer Dedera. “I may have made a mistake.”
Gacioch broke into laughter. “That you did, boy. When you were dumb enough to interfere with the girl hunt.”
Gathrid glanced at the sun. It was a long way from setting. He had miscalculated. He should have stayed hidden till nightfall. If they guessed his destination... They would waste no time chasing him. They would wait at the Library.
He recalled the flight from Gudermuth to Bilgoraj. Theis had done all the thinking.... He was on his own now. The Ventimiglians were in no hurry this time. They were confident. Because he no longer had the dwarf to help outwit them?
He hated admitting it. He missed Rogala.
He would do without! He wasn’t stupid. And he had scores of advisers perched on the shoulders of his mind. He had the dead to guide him. He was a necromancer who divined within himself.
His Toal chuckled.
The party trailing him grew stronger. Dust clouds rose on roads paralleling his own. Several times he saw men in dark armor waiting off the highway, forewarned and ready to join his escort. How long before they felt strong enough to close in?
Their plans did not seem to include immediate engagement. The party behind closed up as darkness gathered, but made no threatening move. Gathrid estimated their number at two hundred.
A tidbit of stolen memory bobbed up in his mind. The Hudyma River lay only a few miles ahead. It was one of Ventimiglia’s greatest rivers. This road would span it on a narrow, fortified bridge. The fortification would make a good anvil against which to hammer him.
But there was a tributary to be crossed first, a mile this side of the Hudyma.
It was thoroughly dark when they reached the first stream. Gathrid had galloped ahead of the Ventimiglians. Now he swung off his mount, helped Loida descend, grabbed Daubendiek and Gacioch. He slapped the horses back into action. He knew they would not run far. They were exhausted. But even a quarter-mile would be a help.
They concealed themselves beneath the bridge. The horsemen who poured overhead seemed to form an endless stream. Gacioch again held his tongue.
Gathrid knew he had very little time. Clutching Loida’s hand, he ran downstream. “Come on. Hurry.”
“I’m tired,” she complained, then saved her breath for flight.
They were lucky. Gathrid stumbled onto a boat not far downstream. It was well-hidden and guarded by a quiet but savage dog. “The owner of this thing can’t be no solid citizen,” Gacioch observed. “A fisherman would keep his boat pulled up by his hut.”
The dog growled till it got wind of Gathrid. Then it slunk silently away. Gathrid pushed Loida into the boat and shoved off as the Ventimiglians returned to the bridge.
The current kept Gathrid ahead of the pursuit. He reached the sluggish Hudyma within an hour. Clumsily, he started rowing for the far bank.
“I knew it was too good to last,” Loida grumbled as he beached the craft. “I was hoping we’d drift for a while. This river is headed home.”
“I’m not going home.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
“If I might make a suggestion,” Gacioch interjected as Gathrid started up the bank. “They won’t get onto your trail as fast if you shove the boat back out into the current.”
Gathrid looked to the east. A procession of torches was snaking across the fortified bridge. He did not have the adventurer’s mentality, he concluded. It seemed cruel to waste a man’s boat. Stealing it had been bad enough.
“Do it!” Loida snapped.
“All right, already!”
“This isn’t my first escape,” the girl said.
“Don’t put too much faith in her experience,” Gacioch rumbled. “She’s never gotten away.”
Gathrid spent a moment watching the boat slide off into the darkness. What was the demon’s game? Gacioch was doing his best to avoid his masters. Why?
He had to move. The torches were approaching. Perhaps his underminds could resolve his questions while he concentrated on escape.
He did not expect the Ventimiglians to remain out of touch long. Locating Gacioch and the Sword should present no problem for a sorcerer. Both would strain the fabric of this plane.
Gathrid tramped along head down, silent. He missed Rogala. He told himself that was because he would find the dwarf’s perception of distant events useful.
The voices down inside him chuckled. They always did when he lied to himself.
Gacioch kept up an abrasive commentary. It made Rogala’s reticence appear ever more attractive. Gathrid suffered through all the latest gossip from the courts of Ventimiglia and Hell. Then the demon offered to do his scouting. All he had to do, Gacioch claimed, was decorporealize him. Any fool could manage the necessary spell.
Alarm bells clamored in the depths of the youth’s mind. “No. I don’t need any help. Thank you.”
A ghostly, merry tinkle of Toal merriment assured him that the offer had been a trap.
Rogala remained in his thoughts. What had become of Theis? He no longer had that feeling of being followed from a distance.
If he wanted to reach the Library, he had to start thinking like the dwarf. Eschew mercy. Make the goal everything. Don’t let anything else matter. Be willing to sacrifice anyone and anything.... His stomach knotted. His thoughts disgusted him.
Near midnight they came upon a manor. Gathrid found himself feeling an inexplicable homesickness. Ah. Some of his souls belonged to men who had begun their lives here. Their emotions were bubbling. He drew their memories to his forebrain.
Using their knowledge, he traveled westward till he reached a manor famous for the horses it bred. He stole two. He rode away wondering how soon their loss would be noted, and if it would be connected with him.
After a time he turned northward again. He planned to make a grand swing, west and north, around Dedera. That should be less predictable than his former, more direct route.
Fate, luck or the masking hand of Suchara herself, served him well. Even by day no one challenged his party, though they passed manor after manor and hundreds of people glanced at them incuriously.
He pushed hard all day. Loida became too tired to complain. Late in the afternoon he started following roads tending eastward again. By dusk he and Loida were directly north of Dedera. The peaks of the Chromogas looked like bloody teeth in a horizon-spanning jaw as the setting sun illuminated their snowy peaks. Gathrid kept pushing.
Then a Toal appeared on their backtrail.
Whence it came Gathrid had no idea. He glanced back and there it was, gleaming black astride its black stallion, keeping a respectful distance. It had not been there minutes earlier. He thought it was the one he had dueled near the Bilgoraji border. It had the same feel, and the lance it bore blazed against the gathering darkness.