Chris Pierson - Dezra's Quest

The centaur's ruddy skin had grown suddenly pale, and his nostrils were flared wide. He bowed his head, his mane spilling over his face.

"Trephas?" Dezra asked.

He was silent a moment, then drew a deep breath and blew it out. "I'll find us supper," he said. He moved away, to the forest's edge.

The others watched him go. Dezra chewed her lip, then turned to her father. "You should see to the fire."

Nodding, Caramon set up the firewood on a patch of bare earth and ringed it with stones. Satisfied, he picked up a rock and struck it against his dagger. Nothing happened. He struck them again and again, to no avail.

"Come on, you bastard," he muttered. "Light."

Sighing, Dezra strode over and crouched beside him. She scraped another stone against her own dirk, and made a bright spark that fell into the firewood. The tinder caught quickly, issuing a curl of smoke that she coaxed into a crackling fire.

Caramon looked from the flames to Dezra, raising an eyebrow. She shrugged, her mouth curling into a lopsided grin as she slapped her dagger back into its sheath.

The sound of plucked strings rang across the sward: Borlos was playing his lute. He strummed a few chords, tightened a string, then began a sweet, wistful ballad. He sang in a quiet tenor:

The silver moon shines down on me,

And on my lady fair-oh,

It glows within her eyes of green,

And in her golden hair-oh.

In years gone by, the moon has heard

Our laughter and our tears-oh,

It listened as we shared our love,

Our hopes and wants and fears-oh.

Its light has seen our limbs entwined,

Her body clasped to mine-oh,

It breathed the perfume of her breath-

"She stank of fish and wine-oh," Dezra interrupted.

Borlos's lute twanged discordantly. He glared at her. "I'd rather you didn't interrupt," he said.

She laughed. "And I'd rather you didn't play. Honestly, Bor, that song was so maudlin-"

"Hush," Caramon said suddenly.

The sharpness in his tone checked Dezra's tongue. She rose, touching her sword. Uwen reached for his axe. Borlos set down his lute and cast about, trying to remember where he'd put his mace.

"Stay," Caramon said. "We're not in danger."

"Oh, for the love of Reorx," Dezra snapped. "What, then?"

His brow furrowed. "I'm not sure. A feeling-like someone was in pain. It came from that way… ." He pointed toward the dark forest.

He expected Dezra to laugh. Instead, she stared at the trees, her face pale. "I think I felt it too, just now," she murmured. "It was like… like…"

"Like the forest itself was suffering."

They nearly leapt out of their skins. Concentrating on the forest, they hadn't seen Trephas approaching. The centaur stepped into the firelight. Slung over his shoulder were three coneys.

"It happens sometimes," he said, his face troubled. "It isn't very strong here. Still, not long ago, we wouldn't have been able to feel it at all, this far away."

"Far away from what?" Borlos asked.

Trephas hesitated, stricken, then lowered his gaze. "No. I've already said too much. Thou must wait until we reach Ithax."

"The hell we must," Caramon said. He walked toward the centaur, folding his arms. "There's more than just a war going on in there," he said, pointing at the trees. "Tell us."

The strange, disquieting feeling had passed. The night was still, save for the murmur of the leaves. The fire crackled, sending a storm of embers roiling skyward. Trephas looked from Dezra to Caramon, then sighed and tossed the coneys to the ground.

"Very well," he said. "But first, let us eat. Thou wilt have little appetite, I fear, after the tale is told."

"It began ten years ago, when the Knights of Takhisis held these lands," Trephas began. He knelt by the fire, staring at the embers. The others gathered around, sucking meat from the last of the coneys' bones. They watched the centaur intently, glancing now and then at the looming shadow of Darken Wood.

"I've told thee of Lord Chrethon," Trephas murmured. "I haven't said why he rebelled against the Circle. It wasn't for any terrible crime, not as two-legged folk reckon it. He was exiled for fighting the Dark Knights. His tribe slew a company of them, so the Circle cast them out."

"What?" Dezra exclaimed. "But they were evil! It was right to fight them."

"That was what Chrethon believed. He wasn't alone." Trephas paused, then shook his head. "But the Forestmaster bade us not to enter the war-and in those days, the Forestmaster spoke for Chislev herself."

"And the gods chose for darkness to win the war," Borlos added. "Chaos was too much a threat for Good and Evil to quarrel, and at the time, Evil was stronger. So the gods-all the gods-let the Knights triumph, so they could fight the greater danger."

Trephas nodded. "Just so. But Lord Chrethon felt he knew better. The Circle was loath to slay him for it, however, and instead took his tail, marking him as a traitor and exiling his tribe.

"For two years after the Chaos War, we heard nothing of his people. They'd gone east and disappeared. Some believed they'd perished, or left Darken Wood. Then, one spring, one of the Circle, Lord Thymmiar, went hunting in the east. Without warning, Chrethon and his minions attacked his party, and slaughtered them all-save one, Xagander, whom Chrethon allowed to go free. First, though, Chrethon gelded him."

The meadow was still. Caramon and Borlos exchanged grim glances. Uwen went white, dropping his hands into his lap.

"That was the war's beginning," Trephas continued. "Xagander returned to Ithax, bearing Lord Thymmiar's head and the tale of the attack. Chrethon, he said, had gone mad, yearning for revenge against those who had punished him.

"Chrethon's followers had changed in other ways, too. Out of loyalty to their lord, they had docked their own tails-but that wasn't all. They were deformed now, Xagander said, twisted and foul. They looked and moved like no centaur."

"Like the ones at Prayer's Eye," Dezra murmured.

Trephas nodded. "At first, the Circle didn't believe Xagander. He was mad himself after his ordeal, and soon took his own life. But that summer, Chrethon and his minions struck again-another ambush, this time aimed at Lord Pleuron. Unlike Thymmiar, however, Pleuron survived, though he lost an arm in the fighting, as well as his son, Acraton. He returned to Ithax and confirmed Xagander's tale. The Keening Wind tribe had indeed changed-or Crossed, as we call it now. They'd become Skorenoi."

"But it would take powerful magic to do such a thing," Caramon ventured. "How could it happen?"

"That was a mystery," Trephas said. "My people never practiced sorcery, even before magic disappeared. The Circle tried to learn the answer, but to no avail. The Skorenoi's attacks became more and more vicious. By the next year they were razing whole villages. They slew scores of my people, and took even more as prisoners. What's worse, within a week, those prisoners had also Crossed, and fought beside the Skorenoi, their tails shorn and their bodies changed.

"So our enemy grew, and we weakened. We fled lands we'd walked for centuries. Even in the places we thought safest, we found danger from within. Our own kin deserted us, gave themselves into Chrethon's service."

Dezra stared in disbelief. "But why?"

"What reasons are there ever for betrayal?" Trephas replied. "Many warriors sympathized with Lord Chrethon. They went over to his side. Thenidor and his fellows were the first to do so. Once they did, others followed-young stallions, mostly.

"Others did it simply for power," he added, and spat in the fire. "They saw Chrethon was winning, and changed sides. The worst happened two summers ago. One of the chieftains, Leodippos of the Leaping Hart, renounced the Circle and took most of his tribe to Sangelior, the Skorenoi's stronghold. Now Leodippos is Chrethon's right hand, leading many of the attacks himself. And every time, he drives us back even farther.