Child of a Dead God

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Leesil burst from the shelter but tripped on the tarp's corner. He stumbled to one knee outside. Flakes pelted him at a slant in the hard wind, and snow began collecting on his coat and hair. A blizzard had built while he slept.

Sgaile flew out behind him, looking about with his face twisted in wary fright. Wynn and Osha came last, gripping Magiere's coat. Leesil turned even colder inside at the sight of it.

Magiere was out in the storm wearing nothing but her hauberk and wool pullover.

Sgaile dashed farther out and peered toward the peaks.

"Can you see her?" Leesil shouted.

"No!"

Leesil turned to Wynn. "What did you see? Why would she run off?"

"Chap noticed first," she answered, looking toward the dog. Her expression went blank as if she were listening. "He says he lost her trail across a rocky slope above and came back to get us."

Leesil fastened his coat and took Magiere's from Osha. He ran upslope along the rock face of their cave, following Chap's tracks. He stopped where these faded to mere depressions in the deepening snow and looked down to the camp.

Leesil snarled under his breath. He should've had a grip on Magiere before he fell asleep. Her dreams had been worsening, coming more often the higher they climbed. He should've heard her or noticed when she stirred.

Sgaile came across the lower slope, back toward camp, and Leesil scrambled down as well. Wynn hastily relashed the blanket around Chap's torso.

"Did you see anything?" Sgaile demanded.

"The tracks fade," Leesil answered, knowing Sgaile would count this as another failure of his guardianship. "I don't know if she has a path in mind or if she's wandering half-asleep, but either way, it's not the easiest path."

"We must find her quickly," Sgaile said and spun around, looking in every direction.

Leesil didn't see many choices. Trudging blindly about in the dark was dangerous enough, but doing so in a blizzard was madness.

"Upward," Wynn said, fastening her hood. "I know that is not much, but it is the way she would head."

Leesil stepped farther out, surveying all upward paths, as Chap bounded upslope around stone outcrops rising through the snow. The dog came in and out of sight several times, and Leesil felt a small hand close on his arm.

Wynn clutched him, watching for Chap, and then pointed high above their camp.

"The path above our shelter leads to a rocky passage farther on," she said, "where Chap lost her trail. But the way beyond it splits in several directions. He cannot tell which way she went."

Osha peered curiously at Wynn and then at Chap.

Leesil had no time to explain how the sage knew what the dog had found. He studied the rock-face slope above, still uncertain if Magiere would take such a difficult route. He scanned the open slope for an easier way to scale to the same heights. Too many choices, and no sign of Magiere's passage.

The terrain broke and twisted everywhere in white paths between jagged stone crags and ridges rising in the dark. Chap came hopping back downslope, chunks of snow tumbling along in his path. He whined once, as if he, too, had no answer.

Leesil turned to Sgaile. "Take Osha up above our camp. Chap and I will try the open slope. Hopefully he can track her. We can cover more ground if we split up."

"I am coming with you," Wynn said.

"No!" Leesil snapped too harshly, and then calmed himself. "Someone has to stay in camp… in case Magiere comes to her senses and makes it back on her own."

This mountainside's maze of small ravines and gullies would slow him enough, and he had to move fast. Without waiting for Wynn's agreement, Leesil clambered upslope through shin-deep snow. Chap passed him, lunging up the white hillside.

"Chap!" Wynn called. "Leesil!"

She stood where they left her, watching them fade in the thickening snowfall. When she looked back toward the cave, Osha and Sgaile had already headed up along the rock face above it.

"Go back inside the shelter," Sgaile called.

His voice barely reached her above the blizzard, but she squinted into the storm after Leesil and Chap.

"No!" she shouted back, and headed upslope. "I am going with Leesil."

"Wynn!" Osha called out.

She ignored him, pushing on, though she sank knee-deep with each step. She finally glanced over her shoulder.

Osha was bounding toward her. Sgaile passed him with a growl.

"Valhachkasej'a!"

Wynn stepped away. "Go on-both of you-and stop wasting time! I am more use helping Leesil than sitting about."

She turned, trying to run as Osha shouted after her.

Wynn knew she could not outdistance them, but Sgaile's anger at her would be quickly outweighed by his fear of losing Magiere. Soon their angry voices fell behind, and Wynn knew she was right. Leesil and Chap needed her, and she followed the muted depressions of their tracks.

The slope sharpened, and the pain in Wynn's right foot forced her to slow. She looked up, trying to spot where they had gone. But she had to turn away as snow peppered her face and caught in her eyelashes. Digging into her coat pocket, she pulled out the cold lamp crystal and tried to warm it with her hands.

"Chap!" she shouted. "Wait!"

The crystal glowed dully in her cold fingers, so she put it in her mouth as she trudged on. The incline decreased over a knoll's crest, and she parted her lips. A glimmer of light leaked out through her teeth. Wynn spit the crystal into her gloved hand and held it up.

It glowed at half-strength, and its light turned the falling snow into a white gauze curtain shifting all around her. But it was enough to navigate by, and she thought she glimpsed movement higher up to her right.

"Leesil?"

No answer, and the ache in Wynn's right foot seemed to spread to her left calf as well. She took a step, but when she looked down at the snow, Leesil and Chap's tracks had faded altogether.

Wynn turned about, looking down the long slope for the way back to camp.

Between black crags and snow turned pale gray in the dark, she saw at least three separate ways. But which one was correct? Even her own tracks were quickly filling with snowfall. Anger crept in, pushing back Wynn's fear.

She was always the one to fall behind. But it was safer to go on than get lost on the way back to camp. Leesil and Chap could not be far ahead, and she was more likely to meet someone if she pressed on.

"Leesil!" she called out, but the wind drowned his name.

Wynn stumbled on over another crest, into the next chute between high stone, and then around three bends as the broken mountainside forced her to weave in the dark. But still she found no tracks for Leesil or Chap.

She clambered through a saddle between two massive outcrops, jutting high like miniature peaks. When she looked back, only her last six steps showed clearly through the blizzard.

"Chap!" she shouted,

Only the moans and half-whistles of wind over stone answered her. Fear crept back in, eating away resolute anger.

She was alone-as lost as Magiere.

But if Magiere indeed wandered in some half-conscious state, she would travel upward, as she had done for so long. Leesil would continue his climb until he found her. And everyone else would be searching the heights.

The ache in Wynn's legs and feet dwindled. This was no relief-it was a bad sign. Cold seeped deeper through her clothing, and she pulled the coat closer, tugging the hood forward. At least she had her gloves, but she had forgotten her face wrap. If only she had eyes like Leesil or Osha, or even Magiere-some way to see clearly in the dark.

Or did she?

One night in the elven forest, Chap had bolted off after a pack of majay-hi. Wynn had tried to follow, but the forest toyed with her mind and left her lost. In desperation, she had willfully raised her sickening mantic sight, left from the taint of wild magic in her flesh. Chap became her beacon, glowing more brightly than any other life in the forest.

These frigid mountains were barren-and lifeless. If she raised her mantic sight once more, and saw the world's elemental Spirit layer, she could not miss him in this place.

But the notion was easier than the act.

She had only succeeded in the forest by sinking into memories of Chap. As if he were some mage's familiar who lived in her mind. And she had not been able to end the nauseating sight until she found him, a Fay in hound's flesh who could drive down the taint within her.

If she succeeded but could not find Chap…

Wynn dropped, her knees sinking into the snow, and closed her eyes.

She forced calm and quiet within herself, shutting out the cold and wind. She recalled all the sensations she had ever experienced in Chap's presence, from the feel of his musky fur to his breath on her face and the sound of his multitongued voice in her head. She conjured his presence in her mind's eye with images of him in her mantic sight…

Glistening as if he alone were the only "whole" thing she saw…

Or wrapped in white vaporous fire as he assaulted his own kin to save her…

Wynn sank into inner visions, until they blocked all else from her senses. Then her mind slipped into one past moment.

Chap sat before her in a room at Byrd's Inn, staring into her eyes. At the feel of his thick fur in her fingers, with her thoughts working upon what he was, her mantic sight overwhelmed her. The room had turned shadowy beneath an off-white mist just shy of blue.

It permeated everything, like ghosts overlaying her normal sight. These showed where the element of Spirit was strong or weak. Only Chap remained whole.

In her mantic sight, his fur glistened like a million threads of bristling white silk. And his eyes scintillated like crystals held before the sun.

Wynn clung to that memory as she opened her eyes.

Cold, wind, and snow assaulted her, and the world looked exactly as it had when she had closed them.

Perhaps she was too exhausted, too cold, too weak. As much as Wynn feared what the sight did to her, its absence toppled her into despair. And still, she struggled to her feet.

Leesil and Chap were out here, somewhere, and she had to find them.

Chap fought through the drifts, trying to track Magiere, but no odor lingered on the snow. His nose was useless unless Magiere stumbled directly into his path, upwind and close. He searched by sight between the crags, but the blizzard had covered any trace of her footsteps-if she had come this way at all.

"Magiere!" Leesil shouted.

Chap slowed, reaching out with his awareness to pick up Magiere by any rising memories. It was a worthless act of desperation, for he knew he needed a direct line of sight.

"Magiere!" Leesil shouted again.

Under the blanket across Chap's torso, his body heat was fading. Leesil would be suffering the same, but they had to keep trying.

Chap lunged onward-and a whiff of sweat stung his nose.

He halted, looking about, but the swirling wind twisted so much that the scent vanished before he could draw it deeper.

"What?" Leesil asked, his voice faint beneath the wind even from a few steps behind.

Shallow gullies led upward through varied breaks in the mountainside. If they took the wrong path, they might bypass Magiere, not even seeing her. Chap had to be certain.

He stood his ground and raised his face into the wind. Every time the wind shifted, so did he, turning into it as he paced in half-circles.

"Damn it, Chap!" Leesil shouted. "What are you doing?"

Chap snarled back. He could express nothing more without Wynn to speak for him. He paced into a rise between two outcrops.

Magiere's clear scent filled his nose.

Chap bolted into the wind with a howl, charging between the spires. Leesil pounded through the snow behind him. Chap's thoughts raced as well.

How could Magiere be sweating in this cold?

They struggled on, weaving through more outcrops and past stone spires. Then ahead in the darkness, the flat face of a gully's wall sprang up before them. Wind whipped around in the wide boxed space, making snowflakes twist like a slow-turning cyclone.

Chap pulled up short in anguish. They had reached a dead end.

But something was moving at the far wall's base.

It was barely more than a shadow against the dark stone beyond the whirling snow.

Chap threw up his head and howled. The wind drowned his voice, and the shadow in the dark space did not turn. Leesil came up beside him, looking ahead, and Chap bounded into the dead end. Only one person wandered these barren heights.

Leesil's shout chased Chap across the box gully's floor. "Magiere!"

And it was her, but Chap slowed to a stop as he closed in.

With her back turned, she was clawing so hard at the gully's sheer face that her fingers were marred with her own blood. Even in the turning air, Chap smelled a thick stench of sweat at close range. Thin traces of steam flowed around her head, as if she were breathing too hard and fast.

She did not even seem aware of him.

Leesil caught up, dropped Magiere's coat, and reached out to her.

"Magiere, we have to go back!" he called, and his grip settled on her shoulder.

Magiere lashed back with one hand.

Her arm struck his, knocking it away. She let out a snarl, more panicked than angry. Chap caught a glimpse of her profile.

She shuddered in the cold, yet beads of sweat had crystallized on her pale skin. Her black irises had expanded so much they nearly blocked out the whites of her eyes. She turned back to the sheer rock and tried to reach up.

"Magiere!" Leesil shouted. "Look at me! Wake up!"

Leesil tried to reach her again, and Chap shifted into his way.

Magiere was enwrapped in some delusion, and Chap worried she might not recognize even Leesil. He tried delving for her thoughts, hoping to catch any rising memory that might reveal what she saw inside her head.

He could not touch dreams any more than conscious thoughts. He only saw or experienced rising memories, triggered by whatever entered a person's awareness or where their conscious thoughts turned. But as Chap looked into Magiere's deluded mind, a barrage of flickering images flooded through him.

The castle from a distance, just for a moment…

The same dim and desolate winter wasteland he had seen in Magiere before, but no blizzard raged. The ancient fortress sat in pristine stillness, deceptively peaceful upon a white plain surrounded by distant peaks like black teeth.

Then, approaching massive iron gates, Chap felt the overwhelming urge to pass through, to press his hands against the gates' scrollwork, push them wide, and rush for the steps to the doors…

Hands? No, this was Magiere's memory-not his.

Chap struggled free before her obsession swallowed him.

He called up her past memories, one after another, of Miiska and warm nights in the Sea Lion Tavern. He dug in her mind for anything he could use to break this waking dream or make her stop and question where she was… and what she was doing.

Magiere kept trying to climb, her boots scraping for footholds.

Chap pulled from her mind and lunged. He clamped his teeth on the leg of her breeches and jerked back.

Magiere snapped her leg out, kicking him squarely in the chest, and he tumbled away in the snow.

Chap righted himself as Leesil shouted, "Magiere, stop it!"

Large flakes of snow powdered her black hair. Her half-closed eyelids fluttered as the pupils rolled up in her head. Magiere's slack lips trembled as if she were whispering, but Chap heard no words. And before Chap could move, Leesil charged.

He wrapped his arms around Magiere, locking his hands across her upper torso to pin down her arms.

Magiere screeched like an animal and shoved off the wall with her foot. They both stumbled back, and Leesil's grip broke. Magiere instantly turned on him, drawing back one hand with fingers hooked like talons.

Chap snarled and lunged in.

Magiere faltered, staring at Leesil in sudden silence. Her hand began to drop, fingers shaking, as fear spread across her pale features.

Chap halted, watching her closely. More than once, Leesil's presence had cut through her fury and brought her back to reason.

Magiere's eyelids fluttered again.

Her black pupils rolled up, leaving nothing but white. She swung as Leesil's amber eyes widened.

Leesil sidestepped, catching her forearm in both hands, but his legs buckled under her force, driving him to his knees.

Chap rushed in and clamped his teeth around her boot top. He ground his jaws closed on her shin. Magiere cried out as he dug in with his paws and yanked, pulling the leg from under her.

Magiere twisted on one foot and toppled, and Chap released his grip. He wheeled away, but she fell straight into Leesil. They both slammed down in freshly fallen snow. Leesil threw his arms around Magiere lying faceup against his chest.

Chap scrambled to get at Magiere before she turned on Leesil. The instant his paw ground upon her chest, he snarled into her face.

Magiere's black eyes opened wide. Instead of answering him in kind, she shrank from his bared teeth.

She began shaking with true cold. She rolled her head, looking about as if not knowing where she was.

Chap backed up, pulling his paw from Magiere's chest. The dhampir had receded, leaving only Magiere. Leesil pinned her tightly against himself, not allowing her to move.

"Shhhhhhh," he murmured in her ear. "It's me."

Magiere's eyes finally cleared, and Chap watched her black pupils shrink and fade to dark brown. She looked directly at him.

"Where…?" she whispered but never finished, and then heaved a panicked breath.

She curled to one side, covering her face with bloodied fingers.

Chap sagged in exhausted relief. They had found her, and she was herself again-for the moment. He barked twice to gain Leesil's attention, then rushed toward the gully's opening to stand and wait. They must get back to camp, and fast.

Leesil struggled to his feet, pulling Magiere up. He managed to get her into her coat and then stumbled out of the gully, half-dragging her. Chap paused, gazing up the sheer wall at the back of the gully.

There was no way Magiere could have climbed it. But in half-consciousness, driven by instinct, she had chosen a precise direction to reach that castle in her mind.

"Can you find our way back?" Leesil called.

Chap turned out of the gully and struggled into the lead. Their tracks in the snow were all but gone. He quickly traced any remnants, but soon there were none left.

Leesil followed him, half-dragging and half-carrying Magiere. Chap plowed through the unblemished drifts, searching for a way to their camp.

Leesil was merely cold at first, but even in his coat, he began having trouble breathing. His leg muscles burned as his skin chilled, but he kept hauling Magiere through the snow and wind, trying to shield her with his body.

"Not far," he whispered to her over and over. "Almost there."

In truth, he didn't know where he was and only put one foot before the other, blindly following Chap-then the dog halted and barked. Leesil lifted his head.

In the dark, a narrow slope ran along a sheer rock face. He almost groaned but didn't want Magiere to hear. They had wandered in a circle, returning to the narrow alley into the boxed gully.

Chap lunged straight for the rock wall and turned down the slope.

Leesil thought the dog had lost his wits. He managed a last burst of strength to follow, but when he neared the slope's bottom, he didn't see the gully's far wall. The corner of a cold-hardened canvas tapped against the stone in the wind. He stepped around the rock face's gradual turn.

The canvas was staked across the opening of the depression. Leesil's last few steps into the shelter were the hardest of all.

He crouched to drag Magiere inside and settle her against the side wall. For a moment, all he could do was catch his breath as Chap wriggled by to the shelter's rear. The dog came to him, dragging the bag of droppings in his teeth.

"Yes," Leesil breathed.

He took the bag and turned back to the fire's smoldering remains. He wished he could get word to Sgaile, but he could barely walk, and he wouldn't ask Chap to go. They were both spent.

Magiere slid along the wall and slumped on the floor, watching him as he blew on the embers, trying to coax a flame.

"What happened?" she whispered, barely loud enough to hear.

"I don't know," he answered.

Chap pricked his ears. He ducked around behind Leesil and out through the canvas.

Leesil heard the dog bark loudly, and Chap returned before he could peek out.

Sgaile followed an instant later. Panting, he held aside the canvas for Osha, who immediately crawled to the depression's back and collapsed. All of Leesil's exhaustion was mirrored in Sgaile's relief as the elf dropped to his knees at the sight of Magiere. Leesil glanced at the closed canvas and then looked at Osha.

"Where's Wynn?"

Sgaile stiffened and lifted his head. "With you… she insisted on going with you."

"When I didn't find her here, I thought she'd gone with you." Leesil shook his head in disbelief. "I told her to stay… You were standing right above her, Sgaile!"

Chap snarled at both of them and bolted out of the shelter.

Leesil started to follow, but his legs were so cold he couldn't get to his feet.

"You not see her come for you?" Osha demanded. "She run behind you!"

"No!" Leesil growled back.

Magiere weakly pushed up on one elbow. "What's going on?"

Frozen canvas crackled sharply as Chap burst in. He raised one silver paw and hit the floor over and over. He barked twice, paused, and barked twice again.

Leesil didn't like what he heard. Chap had found no tracks but still intended to search. The dog was the only one still on his feet.

"You can't… not alone," Leesil whispered.

Chap wheeled about, and before Leesil could grab him, the dog rushed out.

Leesil jerked the canvas aside, peering into the empty night. Then he felt Magiere's hand close on his arm.

"Where's Wynn?"

Her pale face was windburned, and worse, she wasn't demanding or angry, as in any other crisis. She just sounded lost.

Leesil didn't know how to answer her. He stared out into the blizzard. Snowfall was already burying Chap's tracks.

Hkuan'duv took second watch, but A'harhk'nis did not retire.

"I will check upon the other camp," he said, "and make certain they remained at the cave. It is doubtful they pressed on in this blizzard, but I would have difficulty tracking them if they did."

"Yes," Hkuan'duv agreed. "Be quick, and then return to rest."

A'harhk'nis vanished, and Hkuan'duv settled against the tent, trying to stay out of the wind's worst force. After a while, he looked in on the others.

Danvarfij seemed fast asleep, and Kurhkage breathed easily, wrapped in his cloak and blanket. Hkuan'duv returned to scanning the mountainside.

Snowfall thickened as the wind picked up. Fortunately they had found rock formations to shield their tent, but he hoped they neared the end of their purpose. The prospect of facing Sgailsheilleache, when the time came to seize the artifact and eliminate Magiere, was still discomforting.

Hkuan'duv would do it, regardless of the costs-he would protect his people, as always. But he had never before been placed in conflict of purpose with a member of his own caste. Until the recent gathering of the clan elders, he had never even heard of such an occurrence.

Hkuan'duv was startled from his pondering as A'harhk'nis hopped over the rocks and landed before him-with a wild glitter in his eyes.

"Wake the others!" A'harhk'nis urged. "Something is happening in Sgailsheilleache's camp."