Marsheila Rockwell - Legacy of the Wolves

Andri didn’t respond, instead taking a deep breath and looking off towards the tents. She thought he might be counting to ten, as her mother had often done when either she or Javi tried her patience once too often in a day. Thinking of her mother and brother brought an unexpected rush of grief and she blinked back sudden tears. She knew d’Kundarak could help them with their investigation, and hiring him had been the right thing to do. If Andri didn’t agree, she was prepared to argue the point.

She didn’t have to. Andri appeared to make his decision and turned to hold his hand out to the dwarf.

“Good to have you along,” he said.

D’Kundarak shook the proffered hand. “Likewise.”

“Well. At least the guards had the courtesy to put us out the right gate,” Andri remarked as he hefted his trunk and began to drag it along the ground. Greddark picked up the other handle without prompting, sticking Irulan with leading the horse.

“Why do you say that?” the dwarf asked, the weight of the paladin’s trunk not fazing him.

“Because this was going to be our next stop, anyway.”

“The shifter camp?”

Andri nodded.

“More specifically, the tent of their leader, Ostra Farsight. Who has a lot of explaining to do.”

Zor, Therendor 26, 998 YK

Ostra did not look happy to see them. Possibly because they barged into his tent without waiting to be announced, possibly because Irulan had shifted and had him pinned to the ground, her long, thick claws at his throat.

“So. Would you like to explain why you sent Thorn ahead of us to lay a trap in the graveyard, or should I let Irulan try shaving you with her claws?” Andri realized it wasn’t the most politic of openings, but he didn’t care-the shifter leader had lied to him, making him ache for the fate of a girl who likely never existed, and nearly gotten him and Irulan killed in the process. Had gotten Thorn killed, though they hadn’t told the old shifter that yet.

“Please.” Ostra looked beseechingly at him. “Let me up, and I’ll explain everything.”

Irulan glanced at Andri, as if asking what the paladin wanted her to do. In that split second of distraction, the shifter leader rolled and threw her off him. But Greddark was there in an instant, the tip of his short sword forcing the old shifter back down and coming to rest on the jugular where Irulan’s claws had just been.

“I think not,” Andri said, his voice cold. “You can tell your story from there. But this time, if I sense even a hint of duplicity, I’ll let the dwarf slit your throat.”

“You’d never make it out of camp alive.”

Andri shrugged. “I’ll take that risk. Now, talk .”

The dwarf took his cue well, easing the point of his blade into the soft flesh of Ostra’s neck until a bright drop of blood appeared beneath his blade.

“All right. All right! I didn’t lie to you about Kelso-Skunk-and Kira. That really did happen. But it was at least twenty years ago, and no one has seen any sign of Skunk since he was driven from the camp. Some people believe he’s living wild in the Burnt Wood, but there have never been any reliable sightings. I’d heard about the white fur Irulan found from Javi when I went to visit him, and I figured it would be easy enough to make you think Skunk was the source of that fur. So I concocted the tale of travelers having seen a white-streaked shifter by Cairn Hill to lure you away, to buy us some time. Thorn’s trap was supposed to keep you there for a few days, but I see it wasn’t successful. Where is he? What have you done with him?”

Irulan looked too shocked by the mention of her brother to speak, so Andri answered.

“Thorn is dead,” he said, making no attempt to cushion his angry words. Thorn’s death could have been avoided if the camp leader had simply told the truth from the beginning. Another life lost unnecessarily in the pursuit of this killer. “What you didn’t realize when you made up your little tale of a vengeful shifter is that there was something evil haunting those cairns, just not something living. A wight, who killed and turned Thorn before we even got there. We were lucky to make it out alive.”

Ostra’s face blanched.

“Thorn is … dead?” He sagged against the floor and all the fight drained out of him. “He was my sister-son. I raised him from a youngling when she died. He would have been leader after me.” The old shifter closed his eyes against tears, which spilled out onto his cheeks to form tiny puddles of mud on the dirt floor.

Andri motioned to Irulan and Greddark to let the shifter leader up. He did not think the old shifter would lie this time. His grief was too strong to be feigned.

Ostra sat up, knuckling his eyes, a curiously childlike gesture. But when he looked up at Andri, there was nothing childish about his mute sorrow. He was just an old, tired shifter who had lost one too many loved ones.

“You said you were trying to buy time,” Andri prodded him gently. “For what? Or who?”

“Old Quillion. He’s a werewolf, laired up in the ruins of Shadukar, half-crazy from age and the things they did to him during the Purge. When the murders first started happening, we feared he might be to blame, especially since so many of them occurred on nights when several moons were full.”

Andri dropped into the nearest chair, stunned. There had been nothing about full moons in the files he’d gotten from the Bishop. Had Maellas even known? And even though Andri had himself worried a lycanthrope might be to blame, he hadn’t tried to track down an orrery to correlate the dates of the murders. Granted, he’d only been in Aruldusk for a few days and orreries weren’t that easy to come by, even with access to a Cardinal’s coffers, but he should have looked into it after questioning Irvallo. But he thought he would have more time and, if he were honest with himself, he hadn’t really wanted to know. He’d allowed his own personal fears to get in the way of the task the Keeper had given him. By the Flame, he’d been a fool!

Ostra continued, oblivious to Andri’s silent self-recrimination.

“We tried to hunt him down, even got close to snaring him once, but he vanished before my trackers could spring their trap. It was then that we realized he had some sort of teleportation device-a ring, we think-which of course made tracking him next to impossible. But even if he hadn’t had such a powerful item, Quillion lived in Shadukar for years before it was razed. We weren’t going to find him unless he wanted to be found. So we watched, and waited, and prayed that we were wrong. And then you showed up-Andri Aeyliros, son of the famous Alestair Aeyliros, Scourge of the Moontouched. Why else would the Keeper send you if she did not suspect a lycanthrope? So I sent you south, and runners north, to try one last time to find Quillion and determine his guilt or innocence before the Silver Flame got hold of him.”

“If you think he’s guilty, why in the name of the Flame are you trying to protect him?” Irulan asked, her disgust and outrage evident. “It’s only a matter of time before Maellas starts executing the shifters he’s imprisoned, and even less than that before the people of Aruldusk start lynching us in the streets! Is the life of some insane werewolf worth even one shifter’s death?”

Ostra looked at her sadly. “I know your clan has never believed that being descended from lycanthropes is a gift, Irulan, but they are our ancestors, and deserve our reverence. And aside from honoring our beginnings, we know what the Inquisitors did to him. Their brutality was unconscionable. Unspeakable. It was a miracle of the Host that Quillion survived at all, let alone escaped. If it hadn’t been for the Path of the Howl, he wouldn’t have. So even if he was responsible for the murders, there was no way we were going to put him through that again. A nice, clean death with a silver-tipped arrow through the heart. We owe him that much.”