“I do not know. There are rumors that things have drifted from the east, that, with the death of Pagar's invaders here, such a great slaughter drew what had not been seen hereabouts before.”
“The east,” Tirtha repeated. “Out of Escore—the barrier being broke . . .”
She felt cold, but it was not the night air and the absence of her cloak that chilled her. It was the fragmented tales she had heard of that eastern land so long barred—by choice—to her blood, where death walked in the guise of monsters with unknown powers. Many of her kin had since returned there, engaging in a war being fought against the Shadow, it was said. Could that war—or at least some of its evil—be slipping westward? The barrier had been broken in Estcarp with the passing of men into Escore. Might it have been cracked here as well when the Witches of Estcarp had summoned all their Power to rive this country? Perhaps in that act they had also destroyed defenses they had not known existed.
Against men, against animals, Tirtha was willing to take her chances. That was the price of living in these darkened days. Only what could she do if faced with a Dark talent when she had none to raise in turn?
“It was not an animal,” she mused aloud, “and certainly not a man—not even Kolder-ridden—if such still exist. Yet it had Power of a sort.”
“Yes.” His answer was crisp. “The Power—always it is the Power!” There was anger in his voice as if he would deny the talent and yet could not.
They sat side by side, Tirtha drawing her cloak about her, waiting for the light. This had been a harsh warning against her journey, but one she could not heed. Nor had the Falconer said aught about turning back. Once having been given, his sword oath would hold him to the end of what she demanded from him.
The sky grayed, a few stars, showing through ragged rifts in the clouds, faded. She could see the ledge, the ponies, their gear piled by the sunken fire pit. However, Tirtha was more interested in what lay below. At first true light she must see what had crept upon them in the dark, learn the nature of this enemy.
It would appear her companion shared that need for he swung over the lip of the ledge, with her close beside him, down the scar of the attacker's slide. Protruding from the debris was something Tirtha first thought to be a broken branch of a winter-killed tree, then saw it for what it truly was—a hairy limb rising out of the mass of stone and gravel.
Working together they shifted the rocks until they laid bare most of the night hunter's body. Tirtha drew back with an exclamation of disgust. They had uncovered only the head, the upper limbs, and a wide portion of a distended paunch. In color those were near the same gray-white of the stones about them. The skin was matted over by a coarse growth of thick-fibered hair or fur.
From one of the large eyes protruded the end of a dart. The other had wept tears of mucous, oozing down to a mouth that formed the lower part of the face, if it could be termed a “face.” In that much her own action had succeeded in their night battle.
Though they did not bare the entire body, Tirtha believed the creature would stand equal in height to her, and she surmised that it had gone erect, two-footed, for the upper appendages ended, not in paws, but in handlike extensions possessing talons as thin and cruel as the Falconer's claw.
Tirtha had never seen or heard of its like before. But if such as this had spilled into the southern mountains, she wondered that even the hardiest or most desperate of outlaws would choose to shelter here.
The muzzle gaped open, but even closed, the fringe of teeth within must have interlocked outside, and those fangs were as long as her middle finger, sharp-pointed, able to tear any body those talon hands could drag down. Her companion knelt, hooking his claw about the butt of the dart he had aimed so well, to pluck it forth, following the sensible action of not wasting any of his small store of weapons. He flipped it away from him to lie in sand, and not touching it with his hand, rubbed it back and forth there to cleanse it.
But he did that mechanically, looking to her the while.
“You also fought,” he said abruptly. “How?”
Her hand sought the bag at her belt. “There are herbs of the fields which, when powdered and mixed by those who understand their essence, can blind a creature. I tried such—I think it”—she nodded to the body—“was a night hunter. Blind them and they are as easily brought down as a snagged hare.”
“To do that,” he commented, “you must be close, closer than a warrior would choose.”
She shrugged. “True enough. Yet one learns the use of many weapons within a lifetime. I have trudged the fields—and worked them also—there is much to be learned there. My sword”—she half drew that blade from its sheath to show him the too-often-honed length—“is not such as I would willingly use in battle, though it is mine as Holdruler. I have my bow and arrows.” She would not boast, considering her skill. “And I have no credit or favor to purchase a dart gun. Thus I must study other ways.”
He said nothing. Since he had resumed his helm, she could not read his expression unless there had been a small tightening of his lips. However, she thought she could guess his reaction, and she resolved not to allow that to anger her. To each his own—let him fight with steel and dart since that was what he was bred to do.
However, she well knew what had schooled and tempered her during the past years. She had her own code of honor and dishonor, and as Holdruler (though that was only a name and one she had never claimed) she held to it. Tirtha begged no bread, sought out no fancied kin for roof and shelter. Her two hands earned her that, and if she employed weapons that seemed to him beyond a warrior's code (for perhaps he looked upon her blinding dust as a kind of poison) then she would answer herself for such.
A gift from the earth was free to all. If a discovery was not used in a mean or dark way, then it was as true a defense as any steel forged five times over. If he wished to quarrel with her over that, let him say so now and they would break bargain.
Apparently he was not moved to do so. For, having run his befouled dart into the sandy ground several times over, he brought out a rag and wrapped it about, setting it into a loop of his shoulder belt. A scuttling noise aroused them both.
Tirtha saw a small brownish creature—it might have been scaled, certainly it moved on several pairs of legs. She guessed it to be a scavenger eager for such bounty as was seldom found in this barren land. They left the night hunter behind with no more words between them, climbing up to the ledge again, where they gave their ponies another limited measure of feed, watered them sparingly, ate their own cold rations, and moved on. Her companion was again to the fore, leading his mount, tracing a path where it took all her sharpness of eye to mark any trail at all.
They reached a ridge top by sun-up, and here there was indeed a narrow way, scored by old hoof prints, as well as the slot tracks of what must be the smaller-species of pronghorn which had withdrawn centuries ago to the heights. Those were wary game, but Tirtha kept her bow to hand, hoping to bring one down to replenish their stores.
The trail dropped from the heights before midmorning, ushering them into a cupped valley where greenery grew about a stream trickling from a spring. Snorting, the ponies made for the water, and Tirtha was content to linger there a space to give the beasts forage and thus conserve their supplies.
There were signs here, too, that they were not the first to find this campsite. A lean-to of piled rocks, roofed by poles overlaid with thick branches (their lengths and dried leaves weighted down with stones), stood there. Before its door, a fire pit had been dug. Tirtha hunted for wood, sweeping up any dried branches she could find. She was exploring what appeared to be the wreck of a mighty storm, for dead trees lay in a crisscross maze, when she chanced upon more recent evidence that they might not be alone.
Here a patch of soft earth held the impression of a boot—recent enough that the rain two days earlier had not washed it away. She squatted down to brush aside dried leaves, examining it carefully.
She herself wore the soft-sol
ed, calf-high, travel gear known in the border land—supple, with many layers of sole, the bottom one of which was made of saclizard hide, which wore as well as or even better than any thicker covering known in northern lands. They could grip and anchor on shifting ground, and in her pack she carried extra strips of the sole-hide for repairs.
This was plainly a northern boot and one, she thought, in excellent repair, which certainly meant that its wearer had not tramped for long among the rough mountain trails. She was still studying it when the Falconer joined her.
He stretched out his hand above the impression, being careful not to touch the earth.
“Man—perhaps a soldier—or a raider who has had some luck with loot. Perhaps yesterday morning . . .”
Tirtha looked back at the shelter, thought of her plans for resting the ponies. With such plain proof that they were not alone here, would it be wise to linger? She was beginning to weigh that when he spoke again. “He rode with trouble.”
She saw that his nostrils were expanded showing wider below the half-mask of his helm. Now he gestured to where a mass of half-buried bush leaned crookedly. She saw the flash of wings. Here again were scavengers—bloated flies that sought filth even in the lowlands. They clustered and fought over gouts of blackened blood that bespattered the withered leaves of the bush and formed an irregular splotch on the ground.
On his feet, dart gun in hand, the Falconer moved forward with that soundless border tread. Tirtha was in two minds over following him. Manifestly, someone wounded had come this way—an outlaw forced to lie up because of some weakening hurt might well shoot from ambush any who searched him out. Thus she wondered at her companion's instant attempt to trail. Or could he believe that this stranger might be one of his own kind, lost and needing aid?
Standing in the shadow of a larger mass of brush, Tirtha deliberately opened her mind. She had done this before on the road, seeking to make sure that she was not walking into danger, and it seemed to her that each time she used her small talent so, it grew stronger.
Only now she met with nothing.
She returned to where they had left the ponies hobbled and grazing. Swiftly she brought in the reluctant animals, resaddled them, and looped their reins well within hand reach. When that was done she studied the valley in which they had found this campsite. The water was hardly more than a small brook, spouting out of the ground between two rocks and then pouring along ice cold—perhaps snow-born—to run into a screen of green brush. The spring season touched here early.
There was a colored scattering of small flowers under the shelter of outstanding bushes, and she saw bees at work among them. This valley was a cup of renewed life amid the desolation of rock walls. She put aside her cloak to give freedom to her arms, strung her bow, and held her head high as might a pronghorn buck on herd sentry, listening.
The rippling of the water, the hum of bees, the crunching of the ponies who now pulled leaves from the bushes to satisfy their hunger—that was all her ears picked up. If the Falconer made any sound along the path he had taken, it was too slight to reach her ears. Nor did her other senses find anything to alert or warn.
Her companion appeared again abruptly. He still had his dart gun in hand, and what she could see of his weather-browned face was set and cold. She was beginning to know him perhaps as well as she ever could one of his race, and there radiated from him a chill anger such as she had not felt before.
“You have found . . . ?” She determined that he was not to consider her the less as was the manner of his kind toward women. What they shared here in this debatable country must be equally faced.
“Come—if you will then!” She believed there was still a tinge of contempt and suspicion in his voice, as if he thought that she was of no consequence, save that he needs must serve her whims for a space. Bow in hand, arrow to sting, follow she did.
There were other patches of blood, about which the carrion flies crawled. Then they reached the other side of the brush wall. Before them spread a wider strip of meadowlike open land. At the far side of that was a horse, bridled and saddled, with such trappings as she had seen lowlanders use. This was no mountain pony, but instead a Torgian—one of those beprized mounts that might cost a holdkeeper near a year's crop in price. They were not large or imposing as to looks, but their staunchness, their speed and endurance, made them the choice of any who could raise such payment.
It stood above a body lying in the trampled grass, and when they came into view the horse drew back its lips, baring wicked teeth as it moved from side to side as if planning to charge. Some of its breed, Tirtha had heard, were battle-trained, specially shod on forefeet to cut down a dismounted enemy.
She strove to beam toward it such soothing as she would have used with the less intelligent ponies she knew and believed that the Falconer also was trying to so reach the uneasy and angry beast. For there was anger in it, more than fear—the radiation of that emotion was easily detected.
It lowered his head twice to nose at the body in the grass. Then, with a lightning swift swerve about that limp bundle, it made to charge. That she had not reached it mentally surprised and alarmed Tirtha. The mount might have been truly enraged past sanity. She did not want to shoot the horse—and she was sure that her companion had no idea of loosing a dart to bring it down.
Into her attempt to touch the beast's mind Tirtha poured all her strength. The Torgian swerved again, not stampeding directly at them, rather turning to run back and forth across their path, keeping them from the fallen rider. They stood where they were, concentrating, striving to project that they meant no harm, either to it or the one it defended.
Its run became a pacing, then it stood, snorting, a ragged lock of its mane falling forward to half cover white-rimmed eyes, while with one forefoot it pawed up chunks of turf that flew into the air.
Though neither spoke to the other, it would seem that Tirtha and the Falconer could communicate after all, for at the same moment they walked toward the aroused horse, shoulder to shoulder. The Falconer's arm had dropped, his dart gun pointed barrel to the ground. She did not put aside her bow, but neither did she tighten the cord.
The Torgian snorted again, beginning to back away. Its anger was becoming uncertainty. They had passed the crucial moment when it might charge them blindly.
Step by step, always striving to keep to the fore of their minds their good will, the two advanced while the horse retreated. It moved to one side at last, letting them reach the man who lay face down in blood-soaked grass. He wore the riding leather of a lowlander and over it a mail shirt, which had been mended by slightly larger rings, but was still plainly better than most one could find in any market these days. His head was bare, for his helm had rolled to one side. Still they could not see his face, only the tangle of his black hair, for he had fallen belly down.
There was a crush of blood along one leg, and more had flowed from his neck across the shoulder. The Falconer knelt and turned him over, and the body obeyed in one stiff movement as if frozen.
The face was that of youth—as the Old Race knew it—and it was pain-twisted from what must have been the agony of death. Only it was what was fastened heart-high on the breast of that mail shirt which caught Tirtha—stopped her and brought a gasp from her lips. The dead man did not surprise her. She had viewed death often and in more than one ugly guise—many worse than this.
But none of those bodies had worn a metal badge fashioned like a device from a coat of high ceremony. She was looking down at the open-beaked hawk which was her own single hold on the past. Hawkholme—she was Hawkholme! Who was this stranger who dared sport a badge that was all she had to claim in the way of heritage?
She leaned forward to study it, hoping to note some small difference. But the Hold badges were the proud and cherished possessions of each clan, and to copy or wear one that was not blood-sealed was so unheard of as to be an impossibility past all reckoning.
“Your kin?” The Falconer's tone was cold, measuri
ng.
Tirtha shook her head. There was no denying that badge. Could it be that some refugee out of Karsten had brought it, then had it stolen, looted, had even given it away? A Hold badge with the hawk's head never would be given away! That was not to be even thought of!
“I have no kin,” she returned, and she hoped that her voice was as cool and level as that of her companion. “I do not know this man, nor why he should wear what he has no right to. That is no kinsman's mark—it is a holdmaster's.” She was sure of that. “And though there is no hold now in Karsten, yet I alone am of the Blood!”
She lifted her eyes from that unexplainable symbol and stared straight into the yellow-sparked ones of the Falconer. Perhaps he and his fellows believed all women liars and worse. She might not be able to prove the truth of what she said. Let him go then. But she was Hawkholme, and she could prove it when the time came.
4
THEY had searched the dead man. There was nothing about him that could not have been worn or carried by any blank shield riding out of Estcarp on some private errand. His wounds, the Falconer declared, were not from steel or edged weapons but were caused by tooth and talon. To Tirtha's surprise, the dead man had no weapons. There was a sword belt, to be sure, but the scabbard it supported was empty, as were all dart clip loops. He certainly had not ventured into this high, dangerous land bare-handed. Had he been stripped after death? If so, how had the looter passed the Torgian? And what enemy had traveled with a fanged and clawed hunter?
The mount snorted and pawed the turf at intervals, even though it kept its distance. Attached to its light saddle hung a pair of travel bags. It was to those Tirtha turned her attention next. If the Torgian would allow her to free them, they might just learn more of the dead.
He had lain there for some time, the Falconer averred, judging from the post-death stiffness of the corpse. Oddly enough, except for the clouds of flies, he had not been preyed upon by any scavengers, such as gathered elsewhere, no doubt because of the Torgian.