Roger Taylor - The Return of the Sword

With his recent experience still vividly in his mind, Vredech moved very slowly, peering intently ahead and placing every step with exaggerated care. Occasionally, an exchange of high-pitched cries would well up to let them know that the riders were still nearby and, presumably, still searching for them. Each time this happened, they stopped, momentarily paralysed by the sounds, but now they had decided on a course of action, however futile it might prove to be, Vredech found that he was greeting the cries of their pursuers with a growing defiance. Gradually, however, and as he had feared, the slope became steeper and the choice of ways down more problematical, forcing them to move with increasing caution. Though the sides of the mountain were covered with sheets of tumbled rocks and boulders, these were sharp-edged and viciously spiked like miniatures of the peaks towering above them, a clamouring family scrabbling at the knees of their parents. And, too, it was not easy to see in the blue light, nor breathe easily in the clinging unpleasantness of the sour air.

They halted in the lee of a large rock to catch their breath.

‘We don’t seem to be any nearer the bottom,’ Pinnatte said unhappily as he looked first up, then down the slope.

‘We’ve come quite a way,’ Vredech reassured him. ‘It’s just that mountains are bigger than you think. You tend to lose your sense of size and distance. What seems to be no more than an hour or so’s walk away takes half a day.’

‘Well, at least we’ll all be on foot,’ Pinnatte said, gazing round. ‘I mightn’t know much about mountains, but no horse I’ve ever seen could walk across this. It’s hard enough with two good feet and two good hands.’ As he looked down at his hands he turned over the one that the Sierwolf had crushed and began examining it closely. ‘Your wife thought she could bring some use back to this, didn’t she?’ he said, softly, as though to himself. ‘I’d like that. She’s got a way with her, your wife.’

Pinnatte’s harsh city accent gave the compliment an edge that prompted Vredech to give him a sidelong look despite their circumstances. Pinnatte caught it. He stammered. ‘I meant… she’s kind… clever. Atelon saved my life when this thing was festering – burning me up – but I don’t think he even thought about how it could be made to work again.’

He leaned forward and took Vredech’s arm in a powerful grip. ‘If we get out of here – get back to the camp – and my head’s choked up with… cobwebs… again, tell her, “Thank you”. Tell her, yes, I want my hand back, if she can do it. I’ll do whatever she says. Tell her – tell all of them…’ He tapped his head. ‘I’m in here. I’m listening. I’m learning. And I’m grateful.’

Vredech was taken aback by this passionate outburst. ‘I will,’ he managed to say, but Pinnatte had not finished. He bared his teeth. ‘And tell them I’m angry, too. Angry at what those foul crystal meddlers did to me. I might have been precious little use to anyone as a street thief, but I didn’t deserve that. And I don’t deserve this either. I…’

Vredech reached out and put his hand over Pinnatte’s mouth gently.

‘I understand,’ he said urgently. ‘I understand. And I’ll make sure everyone else does when we get back. And it is “when” we get back, not “if”. Do you understand?’

Pinnatte’s nodded reply was interrupted by a paean of triumphant shrieking high above them. Both men started violently, so abrupt and awful was the noise. Instinctively they flattened themselves against the sheltering rock. Vredech’s defiance faltered as his protestation about their ultimate destination felt empty and futile in his suddenly dry throat.

‘How did they get above us?’ Pinnatte whispered.

‘As you said, this is their place,’ Vredech replied as he struggled to recover from the shock. Though, even as he spoke, he realized he could not properly answer Pinnatte’s question. It did not seem possible that anything could have clambered up this slope so quickly.

‘More to the point is why do they sound like that? As if they’ve found something they’ve been searching for.’

‘Perhaps because they have,’ Pinnatte replied tersely. ‘Perhaps they weren’t after us at all.’

Vredech looked at him unhappily. There was logic in what he was saying, but every part of him denied it. The riders were searching for them, and the triumph in their calls did not bode well.

‘Do we stay or do we run?’ he asked.

‘Run,’ Pinnatte said without a pause.

Not that anything approaching running seemed possible, but they immediately moved away from the sheltering rock and continued their painstaking descent.

The shrieking above them continued, first one voice, then another, rising and falling. A debate was being held. A leisurely debate, Vredech thought. Just as they had moved across the plain, so the pursuers were moving towards their prey quite unhurriedly. Though nothing in their cries was intelligible, their general tenor was unequivocal: there was nowhere for Vredech and Pinnatte to go, nowhere to hide, nowhere in this entire terrible place.

As if giving a blessing to this conclusion, a low, moaning cry of satisfaction folded around them.

They stopped and turned at the same time.

Above them, on the rock they had been sheltering under, black against the dark blue sky, and still mounted, stood the three figures.

Both Pinnatte and Vredech looked around, but flight still did not seem possible across this vicious terrain. Vredech became aware of Pinnatte slowly reaching into his pocket.

‘Talk first,’ he reminded him, quietly but urgently.

Pinnatte stopped moving but his hand remained in his pocket.

Not that Vredech had much confidence that talking would make any impression on the new arrivals. Though they were motionless, the three figures had a powerful and menacing presence and there was an aura about them which more than confirmed Pinnatte’s remark that this was their place.

Then they were moving, and a further fearful quality was added to the scene. For though their mounts appeared to be horses, there were differences that transformed them into obscene caricatures; a subtle harshness to their lines; malevolent, almost glowing eyes; hooves that looked like claws; too-long heads on too-long necks that swayed unpleasantly as if to some sound only they could hear. It brought back to Vredech, with chilling vividness, the impression he had formed as he had watched their futile assault on the strange light that they had conjured up. Serpentine. And the way they stepped over the jagged rocks further marked their strangeness, for they moved with the silent, untroubled sureness of great cats.

The riders halted, side by side. The heads of the mounts continued to sway hypnotically while their cruel, hunting eyes remained fixed on Vredech and Pinnatte. Their rasping breath filled the silence. Vredech forced himself to stand straight. With an effort he tore his gaze from the watching mounts and looked at their riders.

Not that his inspection told him a great deal, for, like so much in this place, they were difficult to see – an unsettling patchwork of blueness and shadows that should not be shadows shifted in and out of focus. Yet they were all too real. There was no doubting that. And a frightening sight. Was that armour they were wearing? Black and glistening? Spiked and protected like the whole of this landscape? And what lay behind those visored helms? Vredech tried to still his imagination as he struggled to retain some semblance of calm under the silent scrutiny of the three figures and their mounts. He was about to speak when the central rider leaned forward suddenly. Vredech felt the intensity of its inspection increase almost to the point of tangibility. It was all he could do not to step backwards under its force.