“What are you doing?” he hissed.
The old man tugged to get free. He was surprisingly strong. “They’ll see us! We’ve got to get out of here!” he replied in a panicked whisper.
“They’ll only see us if you move!” Halt warned him, then let out a sharp cry of pain as the old man smacked down on his forearm with a rock he’d seized from the ground nearby. Inadvertently, Halt lost his grip on the skinny arm and Norman bolted out of cover, running crouched among the rocks.
One of the riders shouted, pointing after the shaggy figure scampering through the rocks. The ground was too broken for the horses, but there was a platoon of Wargals not far away and they reacted to the shout and the pointing arm. With a concerted snarl, they started after the figure who had eluded them for so long.
Halt crouched in hiding, trying to figure out his best course of action. There were at least thirty Wargals, and he had only a dozen arrows in his quiver. He looked again after Norman’s crouching figure as he flitted among the boulders and low trees, zigzagging furiously. The Wargals had spread out now among the rocks, forming a rough line, seeking to cut him off if he went either left or right. Halt’s hopes rose as he saw that Norman was gaining on his pursuers.
Then the old man made the classic mistake. He looked back at the Wargals who were chasing him.
As he did, his foot landed on a large, uneven rock, which turned under his weight and sent him sprawling. He was up almost immediately, but the fall had twisted his ankle and it wouldn’t bear his weight properly. It gave under him as he put his weight on it and he went sprawling again.
The Wargals snarled in triumph and redoubled their efforts. Halt could hear them barking and yipping like hounds as they closed in on the old man. Norman rose once more and hobbled away, trying to resume his flitting zigzag movement through the rocks. But the Wargals were closing in on him and he simply couldn’t move fast enough. He stumbled once more, going down on one knee.
The lead pair were only a few meters away from him when Halt rose out of cover and his bow twanged twice in rapid succession.
The heavy arrows slammed into the bestial creatures. One died instantly. The other was hurled sideways by the force of the arrow strike. It snarled in agony, clawing at the arrow where it protruded from its side. The broadhead had smashed through the leather-and-plate armor that the Wargal wore and was buried deep in its torso. Death was only a few minutes away, but the Wargal continued to try to rise and reach Norman, who was now hauling himself upright once more, clinging to a boulder for support.
“It’s a Ranger!” Halt heard the cry behind him and whirled about. One of the two riders was standing in his stirrups, pointing at him. He snapped off a shot and saw the man tumble from his saddle. The other immediately dropped to the ground, behind his horse.
Halt swung back to where Norman was now overwhelmed by the Wargal platoon. Halt heard the man’s thin shriek of fear and pain, then the furry black creatures hid him from sight, their swords and spears rising and falling in a killing frenzy. He realized there was nothing he could do for the old man. And he was in imminent danger of being cut off from the cliff face that led down from the Mountains of Rain and Night.
He ran.
14
NORMAN’S CRIES FELL SILENT AS HALT RACED THROUGH THE rocks for the cliff face and safety.
He could feel the uneven ground beneath his soft boots, felt rocks and stones turn underfoot, trying to bring him down. But somehow he retained his balance and ran, straining for more speed, careless of the uncertain footing and the risk of falling and injuring himself. He needed all the speed he could muster. He had to get past the Wargal line before they could cut him off from the cliff edge. He had his rope coiled round his shoulder and, if he could get a good enough lead and have time to tie it off in the rocks at the top of the cliff, he could make his escape by sliding down it.
Mentally, he took stock of how many arrows he had used so far. Two at the Wargals who had first reached the old man. And another to bring the rider down. That left nine arrows. And there were nearly thirty Wargals pursuing him.
Seeing a patch of clear ground ahead, he risked a quick glance over his shoulder to see where the Wargals were. He had gained on them. They were blundering clumsily through the rocks. They were not agile creatures and several had fallen and were limping in the rear, obviously injured.
He looked to his front again and just in time. There was a shallow gully some two meters across in front of him, filled with jagged, uneven rocks. He gathered himself and sprang over it, landing awkwardly and stumbling for a few paces. Momentarily, he was off balance, and he stretched his stride to regain his footing.
It was a mistake. By lengthening his stride, he threw himself further off balance, forcing him to increase his pace in an attempt to regain it. It was a vicious circle. The more he stretched, the faster he ran, the more he lost his balance. Finally, he could sustain it no longer. He went over. At the last moment, he let himself go and curled into a ball, rolling on one shoulder as he hit the ground, coming to his feet almost instantly. His shoulder throbbed with pain and there was a bloody graze on his cheek, but he ignored the injuries and ran, keeping a closer eye on the ground before him.
He needed to buy some time. It would take him several minutes to anchor his rope when he reached the cliff face. Making a decision, he slid to a stop, whirling to face his pursuers and whipping the bow from his shoulder.
His hands moved like lightning, plucking arrows from the quiver, nocking them and sending them on their way. In the space of ten seconds, he had dispatched six arrows and every one found its mark. The Wargals leading the charge after him went down, either dead or wounded. It was a devastating attack. The impact of the heavy arrows set them staggering before they fell. They screamed in anger and pain, or fell silently under the volley of shafts. In any other group, it would have caused panic and disruption, as the next in line saw that their turn was imminent and sought cover.
The Wargals continued without hesitation, charging past the fallen bodies of their comrades or, in several cases, bounding over them and actually treading on them and rolling them out of the way. Halt felt a thrill of fear as he faced these implacable enemies. He had two arrows left and he knew they wouldn’t save him. Only speed could do that.
He turned and ran, redoubling his efforts, throwing caution to the winds and trusting to luck that he wouldn’t stumble and fall. If he did, it would mean a horrible death at the hands of these snarling, yipping creatures.
Rocks turned underfoot. He slipped and stumbled several times but somehow managed to maintain his footing as he raced across the plateau.
Behind him, he could hear the snarling of the Wargals, and the sound of heavy bodies rushing after him. Several times he heard snarls of pain, followed by the sound of a body hitting the ground. The Wargals, he realized, were having just as much trouble as he was with the uneven surface.
He looked up. The rim of the plateau was in sight. To his right, he could see a solid-looking stunted tree a few meters from the cliff edge. He angled toward it. Fortunately, the Wargals were off to his left, so the change of direction gave him an additional lead. He estimated that they were sixty to seventy meters behind him. They were slower moving across the rock-strewn surface and weaving their way through the haphazard arrangement of boulders than he was. In their frenzy to catch him, they were bumping into one another and shouldering each other out of the way. It all served to slow them down and give him a greater lead.
He was a few meters short of the tree now. He unwrapped the rope from around his shoulders and passed it round the trunk of the tree. Then he took the two ends and crossed them behind his back, finally stepping over the doubled rope and bringing it up between his legs. He took a turn and a half around his right arm to give him control, then hastily backed over the rim of the cliff, paying out the rope as he went and pushing his body out over the abyss so tha
t it was at right angles to the cliff face.
The Wargals were forty meters away when he pushed off from the cliff with his feet and allowed himself to drop eight meters or so, the rope burning as it passed around his right arm. He held it with his left hand to steady himself, then bounced out again, releasing more rope. He was now twenty meters down, with another twenty to go before he reached the wide ledge where he had rested on the way up. He glanced up and saw half a dozen brutish, snarling faces peering at him over the rim of the cliff. The rope shook as one of them grabbed it and tore at it with its fangs.
Halt let himself drop again. This time he went farther and faster, the rope burning even worse now on his arm, even through the thick sleeve of his jacket and his leather gauntlets, which protected him from the fast-sliding rope. A rock bounced off the cliff face to his right, just missing him. Then another.
He looked up again. The Wargal above had given up trying to bite through the rope. Instead, he had joined his companions in seizing rocks and stones and hurling them down the cliff at Halt.
If they had simply dropped the rocks, they would have had better luck. But their hands and arms were clumsy and their efforts at throwing were inaccurate. The rocks cascaded past him. He saw one coming directly at his head and skipped sideways, throwing up his left arm to protect himself. He winced as the rock hit his forearm. It was painful, but it would have been much worse had it hit him in the head or face.
He bounced out again, letting out more rope and falling even faster than before.
And grunted in surprise as his feet hit the ledge after he had fallen less than two meters.
His knees flexed to absorb the unexpected shock and for a moment he dangled, off balance, in danger of falling backward off the ledge. Then he recovered and pushed himself face-first into the rock wall, as another shower of rocks and stones thudded and bounced around him. Fortunately, there was a slight outcrop just above him and any rocks that were aimed straight were hitting it and bouncing out into space.
He unwrapped the rope and released one end, pulling rapidly on the other to release it from the tree overhead and praying that it wouldn’t snag. The Wargals were savage and fearless, but fortunately they were not terribly intelligent and they were slow to react to a change in the situation. Before they realized what was happening, the rope had snaked free and the end dropped over the cliff, falling down to where Halt crouched on the ledge. He gathered it in as it came, searching the rock face for one of the iron pins he had driven in on the way up the cliff. He spotted one to his right and ran to it, crouching as more rocks cascaded past him.
Then the shower of rocks ceased and he looked up to see that the Wargals had disappeared from the cliff edge. He heard their snarling and yipping fading away to his left and knew that they were heading for the top of Three Step Pass. They had realized that he had evaded them, and there was no chance now of catching him climbing down the cliff face.
Now their best course was to rush down Three Step Pass and cut him off on the ground below.
He had no idea how quickly they could make it down the pass, and he didn’t waste time wondering about it. Passing the doubled rope around the iron spike, he hastily repositioned it around his body, legs and arm and dropped off the ledge, sliding down the face of the cliff in a giant bound. The rope burned his arms and inner thighs once more as he fell fifteen meters before bringing himself to a stop, his feet against the cliff. Ignoring the pain, he pushed off again. But this time the rope was cutting into flesh that was already burned and injured, and he had to stop after ten meters. He glanced down. Ten meters to go. Only a few more seconds of pain. Gritting his teeth, he let himself fall again, shoving off with his feet so that he fell in a wide arc away from the cliff.
His knees buckled as he hit the ground and he fell onto the soft grass. Abelard was watching him from a few meters away, ears pricked and alert. He lurched to his feet and staggered toward the horse. His knees felt weak and unsteady—a result of the tension of the last ten minutes. He fell against the horse, clinging to the saddle to keep himself on his feet.
He had left Abelard saddled but with the cinch loosened. He realized his mistake now as he had to waste precious minutes tightening the girth strap. Had he unsaddled him, he could have simply mounted and ridden away bareback. Then, he thought, he had never realized that he’d come sliding down the cliff face, burning his hand and thighs on the rope and with Wargals hurling rocks down on him from above.
The little horse stood steady as he tightened the straps, then Halt placed his foot in the stirrup to swing up into the saddle.
“Nothing clever to say?” he asked.
Abelard twitched his ear twice. You never listen anyway.
Then Halt was in the saddle and he urged the horse through the trees before he had set his right foot in the stirrup. They burst out of the grove of trees at a full gallop and he swung Abelard’s head toward the northeast, and the road home.
Only to see dark figures erupting from the entrance to the pass, bounding and leaping to bar the way. Now the yipping and snarling had ceased, and the silence was somehow ominous. He realized that he had lost the race. They were across the path he needed to take.
For a moment, he hesitated, reining Abelard to a stop. The wise course was to turn away and head southwest. But somehow he knew the Wargals would pursue him if he did, driving him farther and farther away from Castle Araluen. And he had information that the King needed. If he ran, there was no telling how long or how far the Wargals would pursue him. He knew that once set on a course, they tended to carry it out. And they seemed inexhaustible.
He considered heading toward the company of soldiers set to watch the pass. But there were only twenty of them and he sensed they would be no match for the thirty powerful Wargals who were pursuing him. He was loath to sacrifice those men for his own safety. He already felt a sense of guilt over Norman’s death, although, realistically, he could have done nothing to prevent it.
The thought of Norman reminded him of something the old hermit had said. Wargals had an irrational fear of horses, a fear that Morgarath was trying to eradicate.
He swung Abelard to face the line of dark, scrambling figures, then kicked in his heels and set the little horse to a gallop. They pounded across the grass and he drew his two remaining arrows from the quiver and let fly at the nearest Wargals. Two of the creatures went down, but there were still more than twenty of them and he was now virtually unarmed. He discounted his saxe and throwing knife. In a close combat with these evil beasts, he wouldn’t stand a chance. The Wargals seemed oblivious to the fate of their companions. They formed a line to stop him, raising their weapons and snarling defiance and hate at him.
Then as he drew closer to the waiting beasts, they seemed to hesitate. Several of them faltered and backed away from the line facing him. Abelard’s hooves continued to pound the grass beneath them, sending clods of dirt and grass flying.
Halt leaned forward over the horse’s neck and urged him on to greater speed. Abelard responded immediately, his ears pinning back and his nostrils flaring with great breaths.
I hope you know what you’re doing.
“Trust me,” Halt said.
And then it happened. They were barely ten meters away from the Wargals when the massive brutes panicked and broke ranks, scattering to either side with hoarse cries of terror, leaving the way clear for the pounding horse to break through their line.
Most of them ran, desperate to escape the terrifying sight of the horse bearing down on them. A few of them threw spears. But as Halt had noticed, their clumsy hands and long claws affected their throwing skills and the projectiles went wide.
Then they were free and clear, and Halt let Abelard ease up a little, cantering smoothly toward the path that led through the forest and to Castle Araluen. He glanced back over his shoulder. The panicked Wargals were still scattered, still running headlong to escape
their nemesis. Norman had been right.
“How very interesting,” he said.
Oh, I don’t know. I can be quite terrifying when I set my mind to it.
15
WOLDON ABBEY WAS A COMFORTABLE-LOOKING TWO-STORY building, built from honey-colored sandstone blocks. Around its upper floor, an open verandah ran, allowing patients to sit out and relax in the open air and enjoy the view. Doors leading to the numerous bedrooms lined the verandah.
The abbey was set among the trees a little way back from a small river. To one side, clouds of vapor rose from the hot spring that gave the abbey its reason for being. The water there was rich with minerals and heated by underground thermal activity. It ran out through a fissure in an outcrop of rocks, filled a pool at the base, then ran away, cooling rapidly, to join the waters of the river.
There was a level grassed section, with carefully tended flower beds, at the front of the abbey. Crowley directed the coachman to bring the carriage up to the low staircase leading to the entrance and halt there.
Three of the sisters who staffed the abbey hurried out and down the steps to meet the carriage and their royal guests. The sisters were a nursing order, not a religious one. The Mother Abbess was a tall, grave-faced woman who gave a shallow curtsy as she reached the carriage and one of the footmen opened the nearside door. Her action was enough to show deference to the new arrival, but not so much as to reduce the Abbess’s own sense of authority.
“Welcome to Woldon Abbey, your majesty. I am Abbess Margrit,” she said.
The Queen was awake. She had slept for the past few hours, and her color was good and her eyes bright. As the footmen reached in to lift the stretcher out of the coach, she waved them away.