C. Cherryh - Chernevog

Lightning showed something glistening in their path, something black and moving, that turned and rose up and up.

“Well,” it said, higher and higher above their heads. Lightning flickered on a huge glistening head, gleaming teeth. “My old master and my young enemy. Where are we going, mmm?”

“Run!” Chernevog yelled, and Missy bunched her hindquarters and bolted. Hwiuur’s long body stretched across her path. She cleared it: Sasha caught himself on her neck and gasped for breath, Chernevog’s hands clenched on his coat. Missy’s next stride shook them both back, by luck or wishes, and Missy stopped for nothing.

“Get down,” Draga said, and Chernevog’s heart shrank at the sound of that voice, saying, No, don’t, don’t believe anything.

Then Eveshka said, out of the chaos that surrounded her voice, “Pyetr, it’s all right.”

He looked in that direction—willing to listen—almost, for a moment, forgetting why he had come here, except whatever ’Veshka wanted.

But wolves came from the shadows of the trees, wolves came like shadows and gathered about her skirts.

“The hell it’s all right,” he said, while Volkhi shivered and backed and fretted in the hold of wishes. “Have you noticed, wife, those aren’t dogs? You go running off with never a word, I hear from your old enemy you’re having a baby—”

“Pyetr.” She held out her hands to him.

He kicked Volkhi hard, but Volkhi could not move.

“Pyetr.” Wolves milled about her as she came up to Volkhi’s side, Volkhi protesting with a soft, unhappy sound. She looked up at him, and Chernevog’s heart turned to ice. “I can free you,” she said, but it was the snarling of the wolves that wound around her voice, it was their eyes that looked up at him from the ground. “Pyetr.”

Chernevog’s heart flinched at her touching his knee. She said, “Pyetr, get down,” and it kept echoing.

He shifted his weight, looked down at the wolves looking up at him, looked ’Veshka in the eyes, ignoring the voices that howled and wailed—it was her he wanted to find. He took her hand, said, while Chernevog’s heart shivered, “ ’Veshka, why don’t you climb up with me instead? Why don’t we just go home? That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

She hesitated, lips open, lightnings flickering on her eyes. She seemed incapable of speaking then.

He said, “I’m awfully sorry about the garden. But the god knows, the weeds are knee-high by now anyway.”

He saw the least flicker within her eyes. But she wanted him down. She wanted him down—

“If I do, will you give me a wish, ’Veshka? One wish?”

“What?”

He took a deep breath and slid down among the wolves. “You know what it is,” he said: it was her heart he wanted, he was sure she was listening to him thinking, and if she had no idea about that, she had no idea about anything.

“Don’t ask me that!” she cried. And: “Mama! No!”

He looked around of a sudden as Volkhi shied. He still had the reins. He held on, with an arm around ’Veshka, the other jerked so hard it took his breath.

He heard Sasha shouting something, aloud or in his head he had no idea. He held on, Volkhi swinging about to rear and fight, hauling him and ’Veshka up. Volkhi’s knee hit him, knocked the wind half out of him, before Volkhi came down again and his feet hit the ground.

Eveshka wished something then. Lightning cracked, blinding him. Volkhi shied, tore the reins from his hand, throwing him and her to the ground among the wolves.

Missy charged into the clearing, right for the middle of things- run! Sasha wished her, Chernevog felt it in his bones, and the mare fairly flew, arrow-straight between the wolves and the oncoming bear.

Draga knew he was there. Draga turned her attention his way, and Missy stalled and shied up. He felt lightnings gathering, yelled,”Do something!” at Sasha as he let go—slid off the mare and landed on his feet among the wolves, wanting Draga dead this time, seeing Brodyachi charging him…

Sasha had reined back, wanted his attention, was trying to get back to him.

So were the wolves.

Stop Eveshka! he wished Sasha, and turned his wishes on Brodyachi, wished up Hwiuur’s strength, and the river’s dark cold, wished age, and smothering, and Brodyachi’s other shape—the one Draga lent him at her pleasure.

Pyetr tried to move—the ground had come up hard, and he felt Eveshka wanting him well, wanting other things, dark and violent as the wolves about them. He got as far as his knees and one hand, saw Missy’s pale legs bearing down on them, and shoved himself for his feet as Sasha brought Missy to a stop and slid off. “Let him alone!” Sasha yelled at ’Veshka. “Stop them!” There was a terrible snarling and spitting, there was something in that knot of struggling beasts: Pyetr saw that, trying to stand up. Sasha shoved his sword into his hand and all he could do was lean on it, without an enemy to use it on. He felt the tingling of his skin, recoiled and saw the blade in his hand glow with unnatural fire-Heard Sasha say, shout, into the roaring wind, “Misighi! Misighi, wake up! For the god’s sake, wake up! We need you now!”

Pyetr felt terror slithering wildly inside him, felt doubt, felt hate, felt the claws and the cold. He yelled, “Dammit, Snake!” because he knew a fool was going to get killed where he was. He got a breath and ran, such as he could. Snake was carrying the whole damned fight by himself, up against the hill where Draga stood, a rolling dark tide of bodies sweeping over her—

Of a sudden all his hair was crackling and standing away from him—he stopped and looked up at the roiling sky with the awful feeling the next bolt was his.

But something went away from him then, so suddenly he felt a piece of him had gone—and the tingling stopped: the bolt hit, over on the hill, splitting the night and shattering the ground.

He could not see, men, he could not see at all, except the shadow image seared into his eyes, a swarming mass of beasts and a man with arms uplifted, calling the lightnings. He could not hear, except that crash still ringing in his ears, and that image drifted over and over again through his sight. If there were wolves left he had no way to know, no way to hear them or know whether anyone was still alive but himself.

“Sasha?” he called out, “’Veshka?” and started as someone touched him, as a hard hand closed on his arm and pulled him around, into a man’s arms. Then a much softer touch folded itself about him.

He hoped to the god he knew who had their arms about him. He put his hand on a woman’s back, felt thick braids. Felt the man’s hand, and it was smooth and strong. He said—he thought he said, he could not hear it himself: “I can’t see.” But that was a lie—he thought he would see that sight for the rest of his life.

Then the image began to fade. Sound came to him, the rush of wind, a horse whinnying, Eveshka sobbing, “God, god, Pyetr, —” He saw fire, the whole hill caved in and burning as if it had found a source of wood inside.

Sasha said, “They’re gone. Chernevog, Draga, both. They’re all dead.”

A thought leaped up at him, a nonsense thought, terrible as it was: he had no wishes to use at all, he knew he was innocent—but he said, on a ragged breath, hugging ’Veshka tight, “I wish to the god I’d never thought about a bear.”

He puzzled ’Veshka. He felt her wondering. But her wondering had only one voice now.

Sasha said, “We’re not finished yet,” and walked away from them, toward the fire, a figure like the one burned into his memory.

He asked fearfully, “What’s he doing? What in hell’s he doing? —’Veshka?”