Jon Sprunk - Shadow's master

They broke their fast and got back on the trail. Caim went first, jolts of pain shooting through his lower back with every step of his horse. Without Egil, he wanted to keep an eye on the way ahead, and he wanted to stay clear of Shikari. He also avoided Malig and Dray, who had woken up in bad moods and looking like they hadn't slept much.

Time passed slowly as their pace ate up the miles. As he rode, Caim considered the wastes in all their vastness and imagined leaving the others behind. Not to be bothered by their talk and their suspicious looks. Where in the hells was Kit? Her disappearing act was wearing thin. The next time she turned up he would tell her not to bother. He didn't need her either. He didn't need anyone.

What's wrong with me?

Caim shook himself out of the melancholy. He missed Kit. He wanted her back. And the clansmen were his responsibility. As for the others, he wasn't sure yet. With a deep sigh, he let his gaze wander over a rise in the distance, a low hill perhaps. There was another to the east of it, and grim black humps along the horizon that hinted at more beyond. He was tracing a route toward them when he saw the pile of stones.

Malig cursed out loud when they got close enough for the lantern to shine on the altar. It was much like the one they had seen before, a stack of flat rocks set on top of each other, but this fane had been used recently. The trophies stuck on spears around the site weren't moldy skulls, but full heads with flesh still attached, although their eyeballs were gone. At least one had belonged to a woman. Caim would have expected carrion birds nearby, and swarms of flies, but there were none. Then a shadow oozed from an eye socket and down the face of one of the heads. All of a sudden he felt exposed, like there were a thousand invisible eyes watching him.

“A sad but common sight in the wastes,” Shikari said. “The tribes believe that the corpses of their enemies are pleasing to their gods, and so they display them at shrines like this. These poor souls were likely captured alive, tortured over the course of several days, and then finally beheaded in the culmination of a ritual that includes the consuming of flesh and-”

“Why don't you shut the fuck up!” Dray shouted at her.

Hoek swiveled like a weathervane and stalked in Dray's direction. There was no malice on the big man's face, but his huge hands were closed into fists. Caim reached for his seax knife, but Shikari shouted before he could draw it. “Halt!”

Hoek stopped, but continued to stare at Dray with a blank gaze. Dray lifted his spear, but Caim spurred his horse between them. “Dray, go take the lead.”

With a dark look at Hoek, Dray put heels to horseflesh and galloped ahead. Hoek returned to Shikari's side, standing with his arms at his sides like nothing had happened. She, however, glared at Dray's departing back.

Caim turned his mount around. “Let's go.”

Animals snorted and leather creaked, but the others remained quiet as they filed behind him. Malig complained about wanting a stout drink, a hot meal, and a friendly woman, preferably in that order. Caim empathized, but he didn't think they'd be getting any of those things any time soon.

The land rose before them, in broken ridges and craggy ravines, steadily toward the line of hills hunched against the horizon. As the miles passed, Caim let his chin fall to this chest. He was resting his eyes when a familiar voice tickled his ear.

“Wake up, sleepyhead.”

Caim opened one eye to glance at Kit. She floated beside him, smiling like nothing had happened. For a moment, he considered whether or not that was a good thing. He looked around, but Malig and Dray were riding together a hundred paces ahead, and Shikari and her bodyguard trailed even farther behind. They were as alone as they were likely going to be. “You have a nice holiday?”

“Actually, I've been taking some time for myself. And I've decided to forgive you.”

He started to argue that she'd left him. He was the one who had been wronged. Then he remembered his words to her on the hill and closed his mouth. “I'm sorry,” he mumbled.

She drifted closer and planted an electric kiss on his nose. “I know. You haven't been able to sleep since I left.”

His ire returned. “How long have you been watching us?”

“Not long.” She alighted on his lap. “I know how you can make it up to me.”

He wasn't sure he wanted to know, but he asked, “Yeah? How's that?”

“Turn around.”

He squinted at her. “Why? What's happened?”

“Nothing yet.” She leaned closer until they were eye to eye. “But you're about to-”

“Caim!”

He looked past Kit. Dray stood up in his stirrups, peering ahead.

“Don't,” Kit said.

But Caim kicked his heels and rode through her. After a few strides he felt bad and looked back, but all he saw were Hoek and Shikari hiking through the gloom. Kit was gone. Again. Caim gritted his teeth and tried to put her out of his mind.

As he pulled up to the Eregoths, Caim spotted a blanket of tiny lights in the distance, directly in their path. It looked to be a village, or a small town. Caim considered the landscape, and how long it would take them to go around. But we're down to the last of our rations, and we've got no idea where we are.

“Well? Malig asked.

“We'll check it out,” Caim replied.

“Is that wise?” Shikari asked as she and her companion caught up to them. “Perhaps stealth would be the better choice of action.”

“I'm sick of sneaking about.” Dray peeled something off the point of his spear and flung it to the ground. “I want to see what's ahead.”

“Fucking right,” Malig echoed.

Caim kneed his horse to a canter in the direction of the lights. He was ready, too. Their increased pace, with the wind in his face, quickened his blood and dragged him out of the lethargy. He half expected a legion of Northmen to descend upon them at any moment, but the snowy countryside was quiet. After a couple miles, the outlines of rooftops appeared in the gloom. Rectangular and blocky, they looked like tenements or the government buildings in Othir's forum, but without any of the finer architectural details. The roofs were broad-beamed like longhouses with shallow peaks.

Caim reined up beside a post driven into the earth, capped by a massive bleached skull. By its shape, he guessed it had come from a bear, but the size of it was incredible. In life, the beast must have stood more than twelve feet tall. A true monster.

“Bear tribe,” Dray said.

“Seems so.” Caim curled his fingers into fists inside his gloves. “We'll get what we need and be gone.”

For once, the Eregoths didn't argue. Shikari listened without comment, her gaze on the hills to the north. That's where he needed to go, but he was worn out from the road. They all were.

Rusty shackles hung from a wooden archway that appeared to mark the town's entry. The chains rattled in the wind as Caim and his crew passed under. The settlement had no burg or outlying structures, not even a palisade. The streets were a morass of mud and slush flanked by tall buildings. They were all built of the same grainy, blue-black stone. The construction was crude, with rough edges and ill-fitting joints. Wooden cages lined some of the streets, with lean faces pressed between the slats. Some were almost empty, others packed so tight their occupants couldn't sit down. Burning torches on tall iron poles shone upon bodies encrusted with grime. Northmen prowled the cages with truncheons in hand.

“Maybe this was a bad idea,” Malig said.

Caim looked for public buildings, but the places they passed had no signs or placards. Besides the slaves and their keepers, there were few people in the street. No merchants or peddlers, no whores lingering in the alleys, no children playing. Caim wondered how Shikari and Hoek would hold up back in the company of their enslavers, but Hoek's expression could have been carved from marble for all the emotion it showed, and Shikari looked merely curious. He supposed there was little chance they would be seen by anyone who knew them.