“What do the lines on that glowing figure mean?” he asked pointing in Strybjorn’s direction. The Iron Priest turned to look at him, his features covered by his expressionless metal mask. He fingered one of the runes inscribed on the ingots of iron around his neck and stared at Ragnar as if considering whether to reveal one of the secret mysteries of his order. Ragnar noticed with a faint shock of recognition that the rune was the same as one of the runes inscribed on the sides of the Temple of Iron on the Islands of Fire. Was there a connection between the two orders, he wondered?
“The red areas on the holoshadow indicate places within the aspirant’s body where great changes to its internal chemistry are still taking place. The yellow areas are the ones which are either stabilising or beginning to change. The green areas are stable.”
Ragnar had no idea what the word “chemistry” meant but he saw that his general idea had been correct. He was surprised that the priest was telling him this too. In the past these servants of Russ had been terse and uncommunicative, but now perhaps a change seemed to be coming over them. This one still did not quite seem to regard him as an equal but at least now appeared to consider him to be someone of some small merit. A brief surge of excitement passed through Ragnar. Perhaps he could see how Ragnar’s change was going and whether the omens were favourable. Or perhaps it would be better not to know, to sink in ignorance into raving bestiality, if that was to be his fate. He decided to see if he could find out.
Once more the Iron Priest considered his question for a long time before responding in his slow cold voice. This time Ragnar was quite certain he recognised the accents of the Island of Fire in the man’s speech.
“Your transformation is proceeding slowly and in a controlled fashion,” he said eventually.
“Is that bad?” Ragnar asked, worry gripping his bowels.
“Negative. Generally it is a positive indicator. A body which adapts in a slow, steady fashion usually adapts to the genetic implants favourably. Normally it is when change occurs in rapid, uncontrolled spurts that we see unfortunate degradation in the subject.”
“So I’m going to survive.”
“We did not say that. There is always some room for error in these auguries. Sometimes an aspirant appears fine for months and appears to successfully complete the transformation, then devolves at the last second. Sometimes aspirants begin to degrade and then recover. Nothing is certain. All of it is chance and down to the will of Russ and the blood spirits.”
Ragnar shivered. He might have guessed how the priest’s answer was going to sound. It seemed there was still every possibility that he was going to fail.
Weeks passed. Ragnar felt a lot better now. He felt the same way he had when he recovered from the purple fever as a child. While he was sick it had seemed as if he were never going to feel well again. Now that he had recovered, he was profoundly grateful for the feeling of health and strength that he possessed. Everything looked brighter, more colourful. The air smelled sweeter. Food tasted better. The feeling of the strange fabric against his skin was no longer a torment but a pleasure.
Of course, he told himself, that too might not simply be to do with his feeling better. It might well be because of the changes wrought by drinking from the Cup of Wulfen. All of his senses seemed much keener now, and in terms of strength and fitness he felt better than he ever had. The Iron Priests had pronounced themselves well satisfied with his transformation, although they had, as ever, managed to add a few cryptic warnings, saying there was still a danger of something going wrong.
Ragnar did not need their warnings to tell him this. He could still sense the beast spirit waiting within himself, although to tell the truth every day he was becoming more comfortable with its presence. It was simply part of him now, a thing that would give him strength and ferocity when called on, and which enabled him to understand the information his altered senses gave him. He felt now like he was part man and part wolf, or perhaps something greater than either. Just from looking at the other Aspirants he could tell that not all of them felt the same way. Perhaps they were finding it more difficult to adapt.
Kjel looked haunted. There was a strange fey look in his eyes and his face was gaunt and strained. He constantly glared about him like a cornered beast. When he sensed Ragnar’s eyes upon him, he growled and spat as if sending a warning. Ragnar noticed that Kjel was beginning to sprout hair all over. It covered the backs of his hands and protruded from the collar and wristbands of his tunic. His posture had changed too. He hunched forward with his hands held low and his fingers hooked like claws. Ragnar found it hard to see the bright, cheery Kjel he had once been in this wild-looking creature. Kjel scratched at the bracelet on his wrist, clawing around it until he drew blood from his own flesh. There was something about him that reminded Ragnar of a wolf with a paw caught in a trap.
Sven, on the other hand, was less changed in appearance, perhaps because he had always been more savage to begin with. He grinned at Ragnar, showing his new fangs, and his eyes caught the light of the glowglobes, reflecting it eerily. If anything Sven had become even broader and more muscular. His arms were now the size of Ragnar’s thighs and his chest was round as a barrel. Ragnar sensed that Sven was enjoying the transformation now and almost at peace with the beast which undoubtedly raged within him.
Aware of a burning gaze upon himself, he turned to look at Strybjorn. Now there was a man who was not at all relaxed. The Grimskull was taut as a hawser drawn tight in the wind. There was something wild about him; a mad rage ran amok in his eyes, and it was evident in his posture too. Strybjorn looked as if he were ready to leap into action at any second, at the slightest provocation. Looking into his deep, cave-like eye sockets it was all too easy for Ragnar to perceive the beast lurking within.
Ragnar still found it odd, almost uncomfortable how he seemed able to sense the others’ moods and perhaps glean something of their thoughts. Perhaps that was another effect of the transformation. Perhaps they were becoming more like wolves in a pack, able to understand each other by means other than words and gesture. Perhaps he was reading things in his fellow aspirants posture and scent. That was partly it, Ragnar realised. He felt as if he could almost smell their moods. Kjel’s strangeness had an odd acrid odour. The smell of Strybjorn’s restrained wrath reminded him of smouldering wood. Sven’s cheeriness of the scent of ale. He knew these were imprecise ways of describing the things even to himself, but he did not have the words to do otherwise. There was nothing in his language to express the ideas, to describe the smells or to distinguish the million subtle alterations in the scents which Ragnar now knew happened with every heartbeat.
Ragnar looked around at the others and his heart fell. So few remained. Nils was still there, and a stranger called Mikal. There was no sign of any of the others. He had no idea what had happened to them. Somewhere in the fever-dream madness that were the memories of his transformation, he thought he could discern images of the Iron Priests entering and carrying away aspirants who had become slinking monsters or who had descended into gibbering madness, but he was not sure. He knew that for as long as he lived he would never be entirely certain of what had happened during this period of his life, and in a way he was glad. He was sure there were actions in there that he would rather not recall.
The metal door swished open magically, parting into two distinct sections. Ranek stood there in his full mystical regalia. He surveyed them for a moment and then smiled grimly. What he said next sent a shiver of fear to Ragnar’s core.
“Not many now,” Ranek said. “Not many at all. And soon there may be less. It is time for the ultimate test.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
The Ultimate Test
Ragnar shivered. It was cold and it was dark and he was alone. He looked out across the chill landscape and the titanic peaks and realised that he could quite easily die here. For the first time in months, he was really and truly on his own. There was no one around for a hundred leagues. Already the Thunderhawk wa
s receding into the distance, vanishing into the heavy grey clouds in the direction of the Fang. He had been the last to be dropped into the snow. The others had been set down already somewhere off in the far distance among the isolated peaks. Ragnar had not realised that there were quite so many aspirants until he had seen them all troop aboard the gunship. All told, he had counted over a score of them on the Thunderhawk. Obviously, Ragnar thought, Space Wolf candidates were brought in from places other than Russvik and kept in many separate areas of the Fang. He had no idea why this was, he just knew it must be so. It was the only explanation he could think of. Swiftly he dismissed the thought as irrelevant to the matter at hand. He had his survival to think of.
Ragnar glanced around him at the bleak and dreary landscape. Huge boulders had tumbled into the valley and obscured much of it from view. Some of the massive rocks were covered in lichen, which showed that it was at least possible for plant life to survive in this barren wilderness. Many of the boulders were already partially covered in snow. Large flakes were starting to fall, slowly, softly but inexorably. After a moment or two contemplating the dismal scene before him, Ragnar shook his head to clear his befuddled thoughts, took a breath of the chill air and took stock of his situation.
All he wore was the grey tunic of an aspirant and the leather belt that held his scabbard and dagger. That was it. He had no supplies of any sort. Nothing else to help him survive in this deadly place. Ragnar knew that at first glance, his task might seem a simple one: he had to return to the Fang and present himself to the Space Wolves. If he survived, he would be initiated as a true Space Marine. If he failed, he would most likely be dead. It was as simple as that.
Things were not so bad, Ragnar told himself. It could be worse. At least his aspirant’s tunic, woven as it was from some strange grey material, was uncannily warm. And he had his knife. It did not sound like much even to Ragnar, standing alone in the darkness in the snowy wastes high in the mountains of Asaheim. However, at least the Fang was easy to find. It towered above every other peak in the range and was visible on the horizon. But even as he thought this, another part of his mind whispered that he was doomed. There was so much that could go wrong. Warm though his tunic was, he doubted that it would prove warm enough if the winds really started to blow and the temperature began dropping. And there was always the possibility of it being ripped and torn as he travelled. Ragnar wondered whether it could maintain its miraculous warming qualities then.
Yes, the Fang was visible, but from his time in the far lesser mountains around Russvik, Ragnar knew that clouds and freezing fog could descend at any time, reducing visibility to zero. These valleys were most likely a maze and it would be all too easy to get lost if that happened. And what was he going to do for food? This landscape was as stark and bare as the plains of hell. He doubted that he would find anything edible here. And if he did, it would perhaps find him just as edible.
There might well be packs of the great iron grey wolves at large in these peaks, or trolls, or nightgangers or cannibal tribesmen or, worst of all, there could easily be wulfen. Not even his knowledge of how wulfen were born could shake him of his fear of the monsters.
Well, Ragnar thought, there would be time enough to worry about these things when or if he encountered them. Right now, he had better start moving. Perhaps he could find a cave before it really got dark.
Ahead of him was a stunted tree. Ragnar was strangely reassured and cheered by the plucky tree. It was small and warped, but at least it was growing, clinging to the hillside with its roots. It was defying the mountain, and it showed that living things could survive here. More, if he were clever, it would help him survive. He knew that soon, if he continued to descend, he would see other trees. He had been among mountains long enough to know now that there was a line above which trees did not grow, and that the highest ridges and peaks were bare of all vegetation except moss.
He took up another handful of snow and stuffed it in his mouth. At least he would not die of thirst as long as it lay on the ground. From the things Hakon had told them back at Russvik he knew it was possible that disease spirits might lurk in the unpurified water but right now he did not care. Thirst was a far more real and imminent danger, and he had no way yet of making fire nor any pot to boil water.
The snow froze his gums and chilled his tongue, but it melted and he gulped it down. In his hand Ragnar held a chunk of flint which he had picked up amongst the treacherous banks of shale and scree on the mountainside. He wished he had a pouch to carry it in, but he did not, so holding it in a clenched fist was his only option. The rock would serve two purposes, Ragnar hoped. The first was that he could throw it at any marauding beasts. And with his newfound sheer muscle power, Ragnar was utterly confident that he could throw a sharp stone very hard indeed. The thought brought a wolfish smile to his face. The second use for the flint was that he could strike it with his knife to create sparks, and thus make a fire.
Some hope, Ragnar thought, strength draining out of him as he looked at the damp bark of the tree. Now he had wood aplenty, but it was wet and cold, and Ragnar knew that there was no chance of getting it to catch fire under these conditions.
Ragnar shivered again, and briefly wondered how the others were doing. Had their past few days been as hard as his, a long weary trudge through the snow and cold, trying to follow the valley paths and to always keep the great peak of the Fang visible ahead of them? Had they shivered at the wind’s chill blast as they passed along narrow and slippery ledges which hung out over awful rock strewn gorges? Had they kept their ears peeled for the calls of the great beast, the wulfen which they all feared so? Had they watched in awe as a mighty rock eagle passed overhead scanning the bleak landscape for prey with eyes keen enough to spot a mouse moving from a thousand feet up? Had they too survived by chewing edible moss, and eating eggs stolen from the nests of mountain birds?
Ragnar shivered. It was possible that the others were already dead. He had seen so many ways to die on his march so far, and he was only a few days in. In the storm-wracked mountains, there was the constant possibility of avalanche and rock falls. There was the strength-sapping chill all around that made you just want to lie down and die. There were the narrow paths where a single misstep would cast the careless down into a great abyss. Perhaps they had been eaten by beasts. Perhaps they had gone mad. Perhaps the delayed effects of the transformation had taken them and they had become monsters themselves, even now hunting for Ragnar to rend him limb from limb.
Of all the possible fates which preyed on his mind, this was the one that affected Ragnar the most. He knew that there was still the possibility that something might go wrong even now. The Iron Priests had told him that no aspirant was safe for at least a month after the transformation and possibly not even then. The beast that lay deep in his mind might still leap forth to devour his soul. Perhaps this wild place was all it needed to leap out and possess him utterly. It was not a reassuring thought.
Ragnar forced himself to put one foot in front of the other, knowing that soon he would have to find a place to rest for the night once more. Even with his newly altered eyes, travelling in darkness in these mountains would most likely prove suicidal. There was always the possibility of missing something, of stepping on a patch of scree and tumbling downslope, of stumbling into an unseen pit. Besides, at night the temperature would soon drop even further and he had no wish to test the heat-retaining abilities of his tunic any more than he had to. One thing Ragnar had learned during his time at Russvik was that survival in these circumstances was mostly a matter of doing nothing to provoke the Fates. Rather like playing a game of chance, the trick was to keep as many of the odds in your favour as you could. This meant not taking risks unless you had to. Even if you were strong and capable and confident, as Ragnar most certainly was with his new found strength and combat skills, a slight mishap would be enough to end your life under these harsh conditions. Even a minor accident, a sprained ankle, a twisted limb, a minor ailment
could be enough. Ragnar knew that such an accident would bring weariness, numbing the mind, sapping the strength, making the toughest warrior easy prey to other dangers. Over time such minor scrapes or injuries could grow gradually worse until eventually they immobilised even the strongest amongst the Space Wolves. Ragnar resolved that the trick, then, was not to fall victim to the slightest avoidable mishap in the first place. Easier said than done, he thought.
He looked around for a place to rest and saw that near the tree there was a small indentation with an overhanging ledge which protected the hollow from the worst of the wind and falling snow. Ragnar decided that this was as good a shelter as he was likely to find this night. He began to hack at the tree, collecting twigs and needles and cones for firewood and a long heavy branch that would serve as both club and walking stick. After some effort, he even managed to cut off a longer, straighter, narrower branch which Ragnar hoped he might be able to sharpen and use as a spear.
It took Ragnar some time to collect his booty and return to his resting place. It took him a longer time yet to give up trying to get a fire started using sparks from his knife and flint over a pile of needles and cones. The needles were damp and in no condition to catch light. At least such activity kept him awake, and Ragnar thought that this was probably a good thing in this frozen and desolate landscape. Eventually, chilled and weary, he made a carpet of needles to provide some insulation from the cold rock and then lay down and fell asleep. His last thought was to wonder whether he would ever awaken.