House of Chains

  ‘Yes, that is likely.’ Karsa dismounted and approached her. ‘Now, lead me to your house.’

  She drew back. ‘The house of my husband? Warleader—no, please, let us choose another one—’

  ‘Your husband’s house,’ Karsa growled. ‘I am done talking and so are you.’

  An hour before dusk, and Karsa led the last of his prizes towards the house—the chief’s daughter. He and Bairoth and Delum had not needed the blood-oil, a testament, Bairoth claimed, to Uryd prowess, though Karsa suspected the true honour belonged to the zeal and desperate creativity of the women of the Rathyd, and even then, the last few for each of the warriors had been peremptory.

  As he drew the young woman into the gloomy house with its dying hearth, Karsa swung shut the door and dropped the latch. She turned to face him, a curious tilt to her chin.

  ‘Mother said you were surprisingly gentle.’

  He eyed her. She is as Dayliss, yet not. There is no dark streak within this one. That is . . . a difference. ‘Remove your clothes.’

  She quickly climbed out of the one-piece hide tunic. ‘Had I been first, Karsa Orlong, I would have made home for your seed. Such is this day in my wheel of time.’

  ‘You would have been proud?’

  She paused to give him a startled look, then shook her head. ‘You have slain all the children, all the elders. It will be centuries before our village recovers, and indeed it may not, for the anger of the warriors may turn them on each other, and on us women—should you escape.’

  ‘Escape? Lie down, there, where your mother did. Karsa Orlong is not interested in escape.’ He moved forward to stand over her. ‘Your warriors will not be returning. The life of this village is ended, and within many of you there shall be the seed of the Uryd. Go there, all of you, to live among my people. And you and your mother, go to the village where I was born. Await me. Raise your children, my children, as Uryd.’

  ‘You make bold claims, Karsa Orlong.’

  He began removing his leathers.

  ‘More than claims, I see,’ she observed. ‘No need, then, for blood-oil.’

  ‘We will save the blood-oil, you and I, for my return.’

  Her eyes widened and she leaned back as he moved down over her. In a small voice, she asked, ‘Do you not wish to know my name?’

  ‘No,’ he growled. ‘I will call you Dayliss.’

  And he saw nothing of the shame that filled her young, beautiful face. Nor did he sense the darkness his words clawed into her soul.

  Within her, as within her mother, Karsa Orlong’s seed found a home.

  A late storm had descended from the mountains, devouring the stars. Treetops thrashed to a wind that made no effort to reach lower, creating a roar of sound overhead and a strange calm among the boles. Lightning flickered, but the thunder’s voice was long in coming.

  They rode through an hour of darkness, then found an old campsite near the trail the hunt had left. The Rathyd warriors had been careless in their fury, leaving far too many signs of their passage. Delum judged that there were twelve adults and four youths on horseback in this particular party, perhaps a third of the village’s entire strength. The dogs had already been set loose to range in packs on their own, and none accompanied the group the Uryd now pursued.

  Karsa was well pleased. The hornets were out of the nest, yet flying blind.

  They ate once more of the ageing bear meat, then Bairoth once again unwrapped the bear skull and resumed winding straps, this time around the snout, pulling them taut between the teeth. The ends left dangling were long, an arm and a half in length. Karsa now understood what Bairoth was fashioning. Often, two or three wolf skulls were employed for this particular weapon—only a man of Bairoth’s strength and weight could manage the same with the skull of a grey bear. ‘Bairoth Gild, what you create shall make a bright thread in the legend we are weaving.’

  The man grunted. ‘I care nothing for legends, Warleader. But soon, we shall be facing Rathyd on destriers.’

  Karsa smiled in the darkness, said nothing.

  A soft wind flowed down from upslope.

  Delum lifted his head suddenly and rose in silence. ‘I smell wet fur,’ he said.

  There had been no rain as yet.

  Karsa removed his sword harness and laid the weapon down. ‘Bairoth,’ he whispered, ‘remain here. Delum, take with you your brace of knives—leave your sword.’ He rose and gestured. ‘Lead.’

  ‘Warleader,’ Delum murmured. ‘It is a pack, driven down from the high ground by the storm. They have no scent of us, yet their ears are sharp.’

  ‘Do you not think,’ Karsa asked, ‘that they would have set to howling if they had heard us?’

  Bairoth snorted. ‘Delum, beneath this roar they have heard nothing.’

  But Delum shook his head. ‘There are high sounds and there are low sounds, Bairoth Gild, and they each travel their own stream.’ He swung to Karsa. ‘To your question, Warleader, this answer: possibly not, if they are unsure whether we are Uryd or Rathyd.’

  Karsa grinned. ‘Even better. Take me to them, Delum Thord. I have thought long on this matter of Rathyd dogs, the loosed packs. Take me to them, and keep your throwing knives close to hand.’

  Havok and the other two destriers had quietly flanked the warriors during the conversation, and now all faced upslope, ears pricked forward.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Delum shrugged and, crouching, set off into the woods. Karsa followed.

  The slope grew steeper after a score of paces. There was no path, and fallen tree trunks made traverse difficult and slow, though thick swaths of damp moss made the passage of the two Teblor warriors virtually noiseless. They reached a flatter shelf perhaps fifteen paces wide and ten deep, a high crack-riven cliff opposite. A few trees leaned against the rock, grey with death. Delum scanned the cliff side, then made to move towards a narrow, dirt-filled crevasse near the left end of the cliff that served as a game trail, but Karsa restrained him with a hand.

  He leaned close. ‘How far ahead?’

  ‘Fifty heartbeats. We’ve still time to make this climb—’

  ‘No. We position ourselves here. Take that ledge to the right and have your knives ready.’

  With baffled expression, Delum did as he was told. The ledge was halfway up the cliffside. Within moments he was in place.

  Karsa moved towards the game trail. A dead pine had fallen from above, taking the same path in its descent, coming to rest half a pace to the trail’s left. Karsa reached it and gave the trunk a nudge. The wood was still sound. He quickly climbed it, then, feet resting on branches, he twisted round until he faced the flat expanse of shelf, the game trail now almost within arm’s reach to his left, the bole and cliff at his back.

  Then he waited. He could not see Delum from his position unless he leaned forward, which might well pull the tree away from the cliffside, taking him with it in a loud, probably damaging fall. He would have to trust, therefore, that Delum would grasp what he intended, and act accordingly when the time came.

  A skitter of stones down the trail.

  The dogs had begun the descent.

  Karsa drew a slow, deep breath and held it.

  The pack’s leader would not be the first. Most likely the second, a safe beat or two behind the scout.

  The first dog scrambled past Karsa’s position in a scatter of stones, twigs and dirt, its momentum taking it a half-dozen paces out onto the flat shelf, where it paused, nose lifting to test the air. Hackles rising, it moved cautiously towards the shelf’s edge.

  Another dog came down the trail, a larger beast, this one kicking up more detritus than the first. As its scarred head and shoulders came into view, Karsa knew that he had found the pack’s leader.

  The animal reached the flat.

  Just as the scout began swinging his head around, Karsa leapt.

  His hands shot out to take the leader on the neck, driving the beast down, spinning it onto its back, his left hand closing on the throat,
his right gripping both flailing, kicking front legs just above the paws.

  The dog flew into a frenzy beneath him, but Karsa held firm.

  More dogs tumbled in a rush down the trail, then fanned out in sudden alarm and confusion.

  The leader’s snarls had turned to yelps.

  Savage teeth had ripped into Karsa’s wrist, until he managed to push his chokehold higher under the dog’s jaw. The animal writhed, but it had already lost and they both knew it.

  As did the rest of the pack.

  Karsa finally glanced up to study the dogs surrounding him. At his lifting of head they all backed away—all but one. A young, burly male, who ducked low as it crept forward.

  Two of Delum’s knives thudded into the animal, one in the throat and the other behind its right shoulder. The dog pitched to the ground with a strangled grunt, then lay still. The others of the pack retreated still further.

  The leader had gone motionless beneath Karsa. Baring his teeth, the warrior slowly lowered himself until his cheek lay alongside the dog’s jawline. Then he whispered into the animal’s ear. ‘You heard the deathcry, friend? That was your challenger. This should please you, yes? Now, you and your pack belong to me.’ As he spoke, his tone soft and reassuring he slowly loosened his grip on the dog’s throat. A moment later, he leaned back, shifted his weight to one side, withdrawing his arm’entirely, then releasing the dog’s forelimbs.

  The beast scrambled to its feet.

  Karsa straightened, stepped close to the dog, smiling to see its tail droop.

  Delum climbed down from the ledge. ‘Warleader,’ he said as he approached, ‘I am witness to this.’ He retrieved his knives.

  ‘Delum Thord, you are both witness and participant, for I saw your knives and they were well timed.’

  ‘The leader’s rival saw his moment.’

  ‘And you understood that.’

  ‘We now have a pack that will fight for us.’

  ‘Aye, Delum Thord.’

  ‘I will go ahead of you back to Bairoth, then. The horses will need calming.’

  ‘We shall give you a few moments.’

  At the shelf’s edge, Delum paused and glanced back at Karsa. ‘I no longer fear the Rathyd, Karsa Orlong. Nor the Sunyd. I now believe that Urugal indeed walks with you on this journey.’

  ‘Then know this, Delum Thord. I am not content to be champion among the Uryd. One day, all the Teblor shall kneel to me. This, our journey to the outlands, is but a scouting of the enemy we shall one day face. Our people have slept for far too long.’

  ‘Karsa Orlong, I do not doubt you.’

  Karsa’s answering grin was cold. ‘Yet you once did.’ To that, Delum simply shrugged, then he swung about and set off down the slope.

  Karsa examined his chewed wrist, then looked down at the dog and laughed. ‘You’ve the taste of my blood in your mouth, beast. Urugal now races to clasp your heart, and so, you and I, we are joined. Come, walk at my side. I name you Gnaw.’

  There were eleven adult dogs in the pack and three not quite full-grown. They fell in step behind Karsa and Gnaw, leaving their lone fallen kin unchallenged ruler of the shelf beneath the cliff. Until the flies came.

  Towards midday, the three Uryd warriors and their pack descended into the middle of the three small valleys on their southeasterly course across Rathyd lands. The hunt they tracked had clearly been driven to desperation, to have travelled so far in their search. It was also evident that the warriors ahead had avoided contact with other villages in the area. Their lengthening failure had become a shame that haunted them.

  Karsa was mildly disappointed in that, but he consoled himself that the tale of their deeds would travel none the less, sufficient to make their return journey across Rathyd territory a deadlier and more interesting task.

  Delum judged that the hunt was barely a third of a day ahead. They had slowed their pace, sending outriders to either side in search of a trail that did not yet exist. Karsa would not permit himself a gloat concerning that, however; there were, after all, two other parties from the Rathyd village, these ones probably on foot and moving cautiously, leaving few signs of their stealthy passage. At any time, they might cross the Uryd trail.

  The pack of dogs remained close on the upwind side, loping effortlessly alongside the trotting horses. Bairoth had simply shaken his head at hearing Delum’s recount of Karsa’s exploits, though of Karsa’s ambitions, Delum curiously said nothing.

  They reached the valley floor, a place of tumbled stone amidst birch, black spruce, aspen and alder. The remnants of a river seeped through the moss and rotting stumps, forming black pools that hinted nothing of their depth. Many of these sinkholes were hidden among boulders and treefalls. Their pace slowed as they cautiously worked their way deeper into the forest.

  A short while later they came to the first of the mud-packed, wooden walkways the Rathyd of this valley had built long ago and still maintained, if only indifferently. Lush grasses filling the joins attested to this particular one’s disuse, but its direction suited the Uryd warriors, and so they dismounted and led their horses up onto the raised track.

  It creaked and swayed beneath the combined weight of horses, Teblor and dogs.

  ‘We’d best spread out and stay on foot,’ Bairoth said.

  Karsa crouched and studied the roughly dressed logs. ‘The wood is still sound,’ he observed.

  ‘But the stilts are seated in mud, Warleader.’

  ‘Not mud, Bairoth Gild. Peat.’

  ‘Karsa Orlong is right,’ Delum said, swinging himself back onto his destrier. ‘The way may pitch but the cross-struts underneath will keep it from twisting. We ride down the centre, in single file.’

  ‘There is little point,’ Karsa said to Bairoth, ‘in taking this path if we then creep along it like snails.’

  ‘The risk, Warleader, is that we become far more visible.’

  ‘Best we move along it quickly, then.’

  Bairoth grimaced. ‘As you say, Karsa Orlong.’

  Delum in the lead, they rode at a slow canter down the centre of the walkway. The pack followed. To either side, the only trees that reached to the eye level of the mounted warriors were dead birch, their leafless, black branches wrapped, in the web of caterpillar nests. The living trees—aspen and alder and elm—reached no higher than chest height with their fluttering canopy of dusty-green leaves. Taller black spruce was visible in the distance. Most of these looked to be dead or dying.

  ‘The old river is returning,’ Delum commented. ‘This forest slowly drowns.’

  Karsa grunted, then said, ‘This valley runs into others that all lead northward, all the way to the Buryd Fissure. Pahlk was among the Teblor elders who gathered there sixty years ago. The river of ice filling the Fissure had died, suddenly, and had begun to melt.’

  Behind Karsa, Bairoth spoke. ‘We never learned what the elders of all the tribes discovered up there, nor if they had found whatever it was they were seeking.’

  ‘I did not know they were seeking anything in particular,’ Delum muttered. ‘The death of the ice river was heard in a hundred valleys, including our own. Did they not travel to the Fissure simply to discover what had happened?’

  Karsa shrugged. ‘Pahlk told me of countless beasts that had been frozen within the ice for numberless centuries, becoming visible amidst the shattered blocks. Fur and flesh thawing, the ground and sky alive with crows and mountain vultures. There was ivory, but most of it was too badly crushed to be of any worth. The river had a black heart, or so its death revealed, but whatever lay within that heart was either gone or destroyed. Even so, there were signs of an ancient battle in that place. The bones of children. Weapons of stone, all broken.’

  ‘This is more than I have ever—’ Bairoth began, then stopped. The walkway, which had been reverberating to their passage, had suddenly acquired a deeper, syncopating thunder. The walkway ahead made a bend, forty paces distant, to the left, disappearing behind trees. The pack of dogs began snapp
ing their jaws in voiceless warning. Karsa twisted round, and saw, two hundred paces behind them on the walkway, a dozen Rathyd warriors on foot. Weapons were lifted in silent promise.

  Yet the sound of hoofs—Karsa swung forward again, to see six riders pitch around the bend. Warcries rang in the air.

  ‘Clear a space!’ Bairoth bellowed, driving his horse past Karsa, and then Delum. The bear skull sprang into the air, snapping as it reached the length of the straps, and Bairoth began whirling the massive, bound skull over his and his horse’s head, using both hands, his knees high on his destrier’s shoulders. The whirling skull made a deep, droning sound. His horse loped forward.

  The Rathyd riders were at full charge. They rode two abreast, the edge of the walkway less than half an arm’s length away on either side.

  They had closed to within twenty paces of Bairoth when he released the bear skull.

  When two or three wolf skulls were used in this fashion, it was to bind or break legs. But Bairoth’s target was higher. The skull struck the destrier on the left with a force that shattered the horse’s chest. Blood sprayed from the animal’s nose and mouth. Crashing down, it fouled the beast beside it—no more than the crack of a single hoof against its shoulder, but sufficient to make it veer wildly, and plunge down off the walkway. Legs snapped. The Rathyd warrior flew over his horse’s head.

  The rider of the first horse landed with bone-breaking impact on the walkway, at the very hoofs of Bairoth’s destrier. Those hoofs punched down on the man’s head in quick succession, leaving a shattered mess.

  The charge floundered. Another horse went down, stumbling with a scream over the wildly kicking beast that now blocked the walkway.

  Loosing the Uryd warcry, Bairoth drove his mount forward. A surging leap carried them over the first downed destrier. The Rathyd warrior from the other fallen horse was just clambering clear and had time to look up to see Bairoth’s sword-blade reach the bridge of his nose.

  Delum was suddenly behind his comrade. Two knives darted through the air, passing Bairoth on his right. There was a sharp report as a Rathyd’s heavy sword-blade slashed across to block one of the knives, then a wet gasp as the second knife found the man’s throat.