Hugh Cook - The wizards and the warriors

Alone in the castle, Murmer, thumb and fist, bent fox-fur creature, stalked, killed:

– Ha! Have you, have at you, fork-meat. Shlust shroost! Dreams now, milk-warm, dreams. Saaa!

Valarkin woke in the night, and not because of the cold – he was already used to that. He was lying on tough swamp grass, but, after a long day in the saddle, he could have slept on a bed of nails.

He was awake because something was feeding on him.

Not lice, gnats, fleas, mosquitoes or leeches, but something bigger. It was hurting him; it almost covered his chest. Reaching out, Valarkin discovered something cold, pale and greasy. He tore it away from his flesh and hurled it into the darkness.

His body stung where the creature had been feeding. It glimmered in the starlight, sliding back for another try. Valarkin. hissing, pulled out his knife.

The creature flowed onto his leg. He slashed at it. His knife cut through its thin flesh, slicing into his own leg. The creature shot away with rapid, jerky movements. Valarkin tore a strip from his blanket, bandaged his wound, then sat on his pack, knife in hand, waiting in case the creature came back. He began to shiver uncontrollably.

The night was cloudless; the stars were hard, cold, intolerably distant. The lone star called Golem's Eye glowered with red malevolence. To the east lay the frozen starstorm of the galaxy called Maelstrom. And what awaited them in the east? Unlike some others, Valarkin doubted that Heenmor would be lingering in Trest waiting for his executioners.

By starlight, nothing betrayed their marshland campsite except a single fire, and a horse which snorted nearby, making Valarkin start – he was a little bit afraid of horses. He walked to the fire, treading cautiously lest he trample on some sleeping warrior. Blackwood was tending the fire; nearby, the wizards Phyphor, Garash and Miphon lay asleep.

As Valarkin settled himself by the fire, Blackwood put on some more wood. For a while they sat silent; the fire whispered and hissed, occasionally settling with a slight crack as charred timbers broke under their own weight. Elkor Alish had arranged for some horses to carry loads of firewood – otherwise they would have been short of fuel at this camp amid the swamps.

'You're hurt,' said Blackwood at length.

'There was a white thing – I slashed it.'

'Oh,' said Blackwood. 'A quiver.'

'Is that what it's called?'

'Yes. If you cut yourself again, come to me. I could bandage that better than you have.'

Valarkin took that in silence.

Blackwood poked the fire. Though everyone was asleep but for himself and Valarkin, the camp was safe enough; only a one-horse path led to this island of dry ground deep in the swamp, so enemies could scarcely surround them from all sides then attack.

Sitting there, Valarkin remembered the warmth of his father's hearth. He had never thought he would regret leaving the farm, but he did. He was not made for this life of hot sun, cold nights, mud, insects, rebellious horses and the company of coarse, brutish, dangerous men.

Caught in the throes of nightmare, the wizard Garash twisted in his sleep then groaned. Fire-stars glowed in the branches of a swamp-tree above him, flickered, then died away. Garash turned, settling deeper into sleep.

'What can be the matter with him?' said Valarkin. 'Pox doctors have their problems too, mister.' 'What are the wizards really like? You've been with them a lot, haven't you? Especially Miphon. Do they talk of… of power? Do they say where their power comes from?'

Blackwood remembered Miphon and Mystrel talking together about honey and garlic.

'If you're so interested, why don't you ask them?"

Valarkin did not reply, but sat thinking about the green bottle strung on Blackwood's belt. After two days in the field, Prince Comedo had had enough of the fresh air; using one of the two rings that commanded the bottle, he had retreated to the quarters prepared for him inside. Valarkin, who held the second ring, was to fetch the prince from the bottle when they reached the High Castle in Trest.

'Do you know the countryside well?' asked Valarkin.

'1 know my way,' said Blackwood.

'If men were hunting you, could you escape?'

'Yes, if I ran toward danger as well as away from it. North: they'd never find me there. Not in the mountains of the Penvash Peninsular… that's fearsome country.'

'The bottle you hold is very valuable,' said Valarkin. 'I hold the second ring which commands it.' He waited.

Blackwood poked at the fire again. Coals gleamed dragon-hot. All around were sleeping men whose lives were in his trust. In the green bottle at his belt, Prince Comedo lay sleeping: that was another trust.

'Mister, my fate takes me east,' said Blackwood.

That was the peasant in him speaking. His forefathers had bowed to feudal masters for so many generations that rebellion was now unthinkable. Valarkin knew this; he remembered how his own father, who scorned the castle and its people, found in that scorn only pride in his own way of life, where to own two milch cows was the height of ambition.

However, in the temple, Valarkin had learnt that men can control gods – even though, if the truth be known, the temple's god had only been a creature of the third hierarchy, which is to say, a common demon. Since men could control gods, they could certainly master the leaders foisted on them by tradition.

'There's wealth in the bottle.' said Valarkin. 'Including a whole room full of books. If we could learn to read them, they'd surely teach us magic'

'Or get us killed,' said Blackwood, dourly.

'Don't be afraid! Think… think of your wife.'

'There's no way for me to rescue her,' said Blackwood, who had been carried helplessly witless for a whole day till they got out of range of the mad-jewel.

'Look,' said Valarkin, holding out a thin chain. A charm gleamed on the end of it.

'Is that yours?'

'I've got another one. The prince gave me this one for safe keeping. Put it on.'

Blackwood took the charm, weighed it in his hand, then slowly put it on. Just then, one of the sleepers woke, and made his way to the edge of the swamp; returning to his bed, he disturbed half a dozen others, who cursed him sleepily. Valarkin waited for everyone to settle down before he spoke again: 'If we start now, we can outpace them to Castle Vaunting, rescue your wife and run for Penvash. They'll never catch us.'

'And the prince?'

'Settle his fate as you will. Are you with me?'

Blackwood hesitated. The common wisdom of Estar taught that each had his weird, and had to endure the doom he was fated to. He knew of only one tale in which a man of peasant stock had tried to take control of his own destiny. That was the tale of Loosehead Robert, who had gathered together a rag-tag army to make war against his prince. After a series of disasters, he had been driven into the hills.

There, in a cave, while thinking wild thoughts of triumph and revenge, Loosehead Robert had watched a spider build its web. Into the web had flown a fly. And how it had struggled! Five times it had almost broken free, but the spider had got it in the end. And Loosehead Robert, looking from the devouring spider to the mouth of the cave, had seen his prince's soldiers standing there, grinning at him. All mothers in Estar told their children the lessons Loosehead Robert learnt, first from the spider and then from his prince's shunting irons.

– But perhaps the story was not told quite right.

He had a charm to protect himself against the mad-jewel. And a companion to share his dangers. He would dare it. He would try.

'I'm with you,' said Blackwood.

Valarkin wanted to leave then and there, but Blackwood took the time to cut swatches of swamp grass and tie them round the hooves of four horses. With a change of horses and a head start, they should be able to outdistance their pursuers easily. Then he made sure that they packed all their gear and tied the packs to the horses. Only then did he agree to set out.