Cry of the Ghost Wolf

CHAPTER FOUR

She’s waking.” Goblin tongue, the tone and accent different enough from the language Gleed had taught her that the words sounded strange to her ears, but she caught their general meaning. She had just enough time to think, Who-?

And then a pain so great hit her arm that for a moment all the world flashed white. She screamed and opened her eyes as she tried to move somewhere-anywhere-away from the pain. But something bit into her arms and torso and held her back.

Looking down, she saw-

Spiders! Dozens of them. Huge, hairy spiders covering her arms and shoulders. And for a moment Hweilan thought she was back in the lair of Kesh Naan, about to be devoured by the Grandmother’s children until their venom filled her with visions. But-

No. The spiders in Kesh Naan’s cavern had been tiny, sparkling with hundreds of colors, even … beautiful.

Then Hweilan’s vision cleared, and she saw that there were no spiders. It was only rope. Thick, hairy twine wrapped round and round her arms and chest, binding her to some sort of ironwood rack. She was sitting on a dirty stone floor, but her legs were also bound, and a thick splint of wood ran down one leg to keep her from bending her legs to kick.

The only light came from a hearth fire a yard or so beyond her feet. And the near walls were gritty stone just a shade lighter than black.

“Forgive the accommodations,” said a familiar voice from behind her, speaking Damaran. Maaqua. “But the sun is still high, and if your medicine drinks in even a hint of sunlight, it turns to the most deadly poison.”

“Medicine?” said Hweilan, and looked more closely at the source of her pain. Her right sleeve was gone-not cut away but torn, judging by the ragged bits of cloth remaining at the edge of her shirt. Just below her shoulder were several links of the rope, and even more bound her from elbow to wrist. But in the bit of skin between the twine was a dark paste, glistening in the firelight and giving off a thin steam. As her heartbeat began to slow and her breathing calmed, Hweilan could hear the muck sizzling against her skin.

“Hurts, yes?” said Maaqua.

Hweilan just clenched her jaw and glared at the old hobgoblin.

“Such a thing you did, tackling me with an arrow in your arm. Tore the muscle quite badly. Brave and stupid. You should know better, girl.”

Someone moved past her toward the fire. Another hobgoblin-a scrawny thing in tattered fur robes covering clothes that looked as if they’d be relegated to rags upon their next wash. He was completely bald on top, but the sides and back of his hair were still black as onyx and lay on his back in a tight braid.

“This is Kaad,” said Maaqua. “My slave. He excels in the healing arts, whereas my own strengths are … elsewhere.”

The hearth fire caught in the hobgoblin queen’s eyes, giving her a malevolent aspect. Kaad returned to the fire and stirred something in a cauldron.

Hweilan took a deep breath through her nose, trying to pick up the scent of the concoction pasted over her wound. Most of the air in the chamber was filled with the dank scent of stone and the acrid smoke from the dung fire. But the steam wafting out of the black muck was very close to her head, and when she took in the second draught of air, she caught the distinct aroma of thistle root, mountain sweet grass, figwort, and dried blood. No … not dried. Burnt. Whether her own or from someone else, she could not determine.

Maaqua saw what she was doing. “Don’t worry. I told you. Just medicine.”

Hweilan ground her teeth against the pain, and said, “What d-day is this?”

She heard Maaqua chuckle behind her. “Counting the days until the fat moon, eh?”

Hweilan wasn’t sure how long she had been unconscious. But at most the full moon was a tenday away. She took a deep breath and steadied herself so that her voice wouldn’t shake, then said, “You’re going to die.”

Maaqua laughed at that, then said, “A common failing of mortals, I’m afraid.”

“You should be.”

Maaqua ran her hand through Hweilan’s hair, ruffling it like a matron might do for a favorite grandchild. Then the old hobgoblin shuffled around so that she stood between Hweilan and Kaad, who was still stirring the cauldron. The ancient crone bent and leaned in close until her nose was only a few inches from Hweilan’s.

Hweilan pushed her head back against the ironwood rack, not out of fear but because the old hobgoblin’s breath was absolutely foul.

“You listen good, girl,” said Maaqua. “I admire boldness. Even brashness I can forgive. But if you think I am going to swallow your disrespect, you are very much mistaken.”

Maaqua straightened, raised her free hand, and slapped Hweilan across the face. The blow itself wasn’t much, but one of the old hobgoblin’s nails raked a new gouge across Hweilan’s left cheek. Maaqua raised her hand again. Hweilan stared up through the hair that had fallen across her face and refused to flinch.

Maaqua slapped her again. She raised her hand for a third, but Kaad grabbed her wrist.

“Please, my queen,” he said. “I beg you. Don’t give me more scrapes to mend.”

Maaqua jerked her arm out of Kaad’s grip and shoved him away, then looked down at Hweilan. “You will speak to me with respect, and I’ll stop hitting you. What say you, eh?”

Hweilan smiled up at her, her gaze daring Maaqua to hit her again.

“Can’t speak with respect, so you won’t speak, eh? Eh?” Maaqua waited for a response. When none came, she said, “Very good. Better that way. If you want to get out of here alive, I talk. You listen.”

“Mistress?” said Kaad from behind Maaqua.

The old crone stepped to one side so that Kaad could kneel beside Hweilan. On his right hand he wore a thick rawhide glove, tattered and scorched, so that he could hold the steaming cauldron.

“This really would be better if she were asleep,” Kaad said to Maaqua in Goblin.

“Too late for that,” said Maaqua, then she looked down at Hweilan. “Just do it.”

Kaad removed something from his robe. Hweilan forced herself to look, half afraid it was going to be a razor or a long needle, but it was only a large spoon made from some reddish gold metal. Runes were etched along its length, but Hweilan couldn’t read them. They weren’t in Goblin or, for that matter, any language Hweilan had ever seen. Kaad held it vertically before his face, closed his eyes, and whispered an incantation. A shimmer of purple light ran down the length of the spoon, catching and sparkling in the runes. He dipped the spoon into the cauldron and removed another large dollop of the steaming muck.

“You might want to look away,” said Maaqua.

Hweilan didn’t.

With a half-apologetic glance, Kaad poured the contents of the spoon onto her wound.

The pain was worse than pouring hot oil on skin. Oil burned and slid away. This new muck reacted with the stuff already on her arm, sizzling and bubbling and burrowing into her wound. Hweilan felt her skin crisping away. She clenched her jaw shut and tears streamed down her cheeks, but she did not scream.

Instead, she looked up at Maaqua, staring at her through the blur of her tears. “Wh-where is my wolf? Where is my mother’s body? And th-those … Damaran … idiots?”

“Your damned wolf is gone. The monster got away. Turned tail and ran. Had two arrows in him last we saw, but no one has found a trace of him. Your mother’s body has been … taken care of.” A strange look flitted across Maaqua’s face at that. Hweilan thought the old queen almost looked annoyed.

“ ‘Taken care of?’ What do you mean my mother has been ‘taken care of?’ ”

“That isn’t your most grave concern at the moment,” said Maaqua. “Your three friends are still in their hole, though I had my soldiers throw some blankets down to them so that the scrawny one would stop his whining.”

Kaad returned to the fire and the cauldron. The end of the spoon was still glowing when he put it back in his robes.

What Maaqua’s brutes might have done to her mother’s body filled Hweilan with a cold rage, and she swore to herself that if she lived through this, every one of them would pay. But Maaqua’s words were not completely without merit. If Hweilan wanted a hope of seeing to her mother or raining bloody vengeance on anyone who had dishonored her, she had to get out of this first. Still, there was one more thing she had to know.

“A-and … Mandan?” said Hweilan.

Hweilan caught the careful glance Kaad gave his mistress.

“You mean the big one?” said Maaqua.

“That’s him.”

Maaqua leaned on her staff and looked Hweilan directly in the eye. There was no anger there, but neither could Hweilan miss the steel in the old hobgoblin’s voice. “This … Mandan … killed two of my warriors and kept Kaad here quite busy healing five others. One of the warriors he killed had a mate. And children. Mandan will be bound to the Stone of Hoar, and the dead warrior’s family will … do as they will, until the big one is quite dead. His body will remain there. Food for crows. After ten tendays, anything that remains will be thrown in the midden pits.”

Kaad left the hearth and walked out of Hweilan’s sight. She looked at her wound again. The worst of the pain was over. Most of her right arm had gone numb. She could feel only a lingering warmth there, pulsing with her heartbeat. “You’re making a mistake,” she said.

“Let’s not start that again,” said Maaqua. “I know of your master, and I know it’s less than a tenday until the moon is fat. I have no desire to provoke the ire of Nendawen. But I served Soneillon. If you don’t know who that is, you can ask Kaad after I leave. Enough that you know I am not without means to defend myself, even against the Master of the Hunt. So if you persist in threatening me, I’ll cut off the middle two fingers of your right hand. See how well you wield a bow then.”

Kaad shuffled back into view. The mitt was gone, and he balanced a silver bowl in both hands. “Drink this,” he said, and lowered it to Hweilan’s face.

Hweilan pulled her head back. It had an earthy, wet scent, like sodden leaves.

“The medicine I put on your arm killed what was left of the poison in your flesh and blood,” said Kaad. “So you will not die, yes? This will heal the arm.”

“What else will it do?” Hweilan asked.

“Eh?”

“No more sleeping?”

Kaad smiled. “Ah. Nothing like that. Quite other, I fear-at least with our kind. This is gunhin. It restores the body to health. Those who take it sometimes cannot sleep for two or three days after. Very … invigorating.”

Hweilan could see he was trying to suppress a smile.

“You lie,” she said.

“No.”

“Out with it, Kaad,” said Maaqua. “Tell her what you mean by invigorating. Speak our tongue if you have to.”

Kaad bowed his head to his mistress before returning his gaze to Hweilan, and spoke in Goblin, “Understand that its effects upon a human may differ. But when hobgoblin warriors take this, it makes them not only very vigorous, but very … focused in their vigor. It is no accident that after a particularly fierce raid we heal many wounded-and have many little ones born the next season.”

“I wouldn’t let that worry you,” said Maaqua. “The three idiots are still in their hole, and the big brute is in no condition for loving. So unless you have a liking for hobgoblins, a roll in the snow should set you right. Or perhaps I’ll just keep you tied up until it wears off, eh?”

Kaad offered Hweilan the bowl again, and she drank. She forced it at first, because it tasted worse than the smell of rotting leaves, but then she gulped with more enthusiasm, for the effect was almost instantaneous. It reminded her of the kanishta root-a sort of slow warmth like strong spirits, only without the numbing of the mind. But soon there was a mix of sensations, like the ecstasy of a steaming hot bath on a cold winter’s night combined with the relief of a cool breeze on a summer’s day-only it was on the inside. Hweilan felt the tiniest fibers in her muscles trembling like plucked harpstrings, and for a moment she felt the roots of her hair sizzling.

All the pain of the past days-sore muscles, scrapes, even the gouge on her cheek from Maaqua’s fingernail-flared for just a moment in an exquisite pain that bordered on pleasure, then melted away.

“Better, yes?” said Kaad.

“Yes,” said Hweilan, and she blushed at the genuine pleasure in her voice. Her bindings suddenly itched worse than sand in her bed linens. She could feel every rough fiber in the twine, every crease in her skin where the bindings were too tight. Even her clothes and boots suddenly seemed constraining. Not being able to move became worse as slow fire spread through every limb, making her want to run, to punch out her frustrations on the nearest flesh, to sing out all the battle songs Scith had taught her. Worse still, a warmth spread through her torso and loins … a warmth she had not felt in a very long time, one that made her want another’s flesh in very different ways.

Maaqua sat down just beyond Hweilan’s feet, settled her robes around her knees, and laid her staff across her lap.

“Shall I have my warriors fetch the young prince?” Maaqua said, looking at Hweilan with a wicked grin.

“What?” said Hweilan as she felt her neck and face fill with blood.

“I didn’t think your taste would be for the old man,” said Maaqua. “And the scrawny one whines too much. But the princeling seems quite mountable as humans go, eh?”

Kaad grabbed another cauldron sitting in the far corner. For a moment, Hweilan thought she was in for some new torment, but it was only water. Kaad put it to good use scrubbing the muck from her arm with a large, hairy cloth that Hweilan suspected had been shorn from the back of one of the local rams.

“Why are you doing this?” said Hweilan.

“Eh?”

“Healing me.”

“Hm. Now that is a tangle.” Maaqua scratched at her chin while she gathered her thoughts.

Hweilan had no time for this. She had to get away. She’d been a fool to try to help Darric and the others. She knew this, but had always talked herself out of leaving. What a fool she’d been.

With new energy making her limbs quiver with strength, Hweilan struggled against her bonds. The ironwood rack to which she was tied gave the faintest cracking sound, but her bindings held.

Time is running out, the wolf had said. She hadn’t understood in the dream, but she thought she did now. Jagun Ghen and his ilk were far away, but she could still sense them, much as birds could sense the coming winter and knew to fly south. It was like an itch in the farthest part of her brain. Had her hands been free, they could have pointed straight at Highwatch. He was out there, and every passing moment allowed him to build his strength.

Hweilan remembered the words she had heard in the vision of Kesh Naan’s lair: In the Hunting Lands, Jagun Ghen almost conquered. Only hundreds of years of blood and sacrifice vanquished him. Here in this corrupt world beneath its cold stars, here Jagun Ghen could become a god.

“Why are we healing you?” asked Maaqua. “That depends on you, I’d say. You’ve presented me with quite a puzzle, girl. When you first appeared on my doorstep, with Menduarthis speaking for you, I had half a mind to help you. I have no love for you or your master, but there’s no denying what you’ve been doing in the mountains, killing those things out of Highwatch. Enemy of my enemy is … well, if not my friend, then at least someone worth helping, eh?”

Hweilan surreptitiously tested her bonds again. They didn’t budge. Much more pressure, and Hweilan knew she’d only tear her skin. The ironwood rack creaked louder.

Maaqua chuckled. “You’re strong, girl. But not that strong. Save your strength. I said I had half a mind to help you, but that was before that thing appeared at my fortress and took your friend Menduarthis right out from under my nose. I don’t take kindly to threats, even from Highwatch’s new master. However, faced with an army of those things coming here …”

“You’re no fool,” said Hweilan. “You know giving me up will buy you only a little time. No more.”

“True,” said Maaqua. “But a little time might be all I need to figure out how to deal with Highwatch’s new master myself.”

Hweilan hung her head and laughed, but there was no humor in it. “I take my words back. You are a fool.”

Maaqua’s staff came down with a thwack! on Hweilan’s thighs, but they were so wrapped in the thick rope that it didn’t hurt.

“Manners, pup,” said Maaqua. “Or you might make me change my mind again.”

Hweilan raised her head. “You’re letting me go?”

Maaqua gave her a wicked smile. “That depends on you. You asked a good question before. Why are we healing you? Well, I had hoped to bring you up out of your hole to discuss how we might help one another, but I fear your stupidity has robbed us of that chance.”

“Please get to the point.”

The knobby end of Maaqua’s staff came round again and hit Hweilan’s cheek with enough force to make lights flash in her vision. Through the pain in her face, Hweilan felt a warm trickle of blood coursing down her cheek.

“There you go with more stupid willfulness,” said Maaqua. “Just hold your tongue and listen. That big one with the black sword? Rhan? He is the champion of the Razor Heart. Among the warriors, he is second only to the warchief-though his pride is far pricklier. You did a most unwise thing kicking him down that hole. He has demanded the Blood Slake of you for the insult.”

Blood Slake. Guush ukh in the Goblin tongue. It was not a concept Gleed had taught her. “What is that?”

“The right to restore his honor. Put simply, you shamed him. A little girl like you kicking him arse over ears into a hole. He has made the demand of the warchief, me, the whole damned War Council. We cannot refuse him. So we’re obligated to heal you so that you’ll be at your full strength to fight him before all the Razor Heart. To the death.”

“And what do you say to this?”

Maaqua shrugged. “I have no desire to see you dead. Contrary to what you seem to think, I could handle your master. It is simply a complication I do not need, considering all the other problems we face right now. But neither do I wish to lose my champion.”

“Then command him,” said Hweilan. “You’re the queen.”

Both Maaqua and Kaad chuckled. The queen said, “Things are not that simple with our kind, girl. I could command him, and he might obey. But Rhan is a proud one. If he defied me … well, then I’d be forced to deal with him myself. That would win me no friends among the clan. And if he obeyed me, his shame would remain. I can’t have that, either.”

“So?”

“So that’s why you’re here,” said Kaad. The healer wrung out the cloth on the floor, dipped it back in the basin, and resumed scrubbing the muck and blood from her arm.

“I have an idea,” Maaqua said. “One that satisfies everyone.”

“I’m listening.”

“You escape. Once I leave, Kaad will fray the ropes under your legs. I’ll have a guard bring you food later. I’ll tell him to untie your arms so that you may eat. I’m sure you can take care of the rest.”

“And the Damarans?”

“Why do you care?” said Maaqua.

Now that it came to it, she did care. Getting involved with them had been foolish and had landed her in this predicament. But Darric had risked everything to help her, and Valsun and Mandan’s devotion to him were admirable.

At the same time, Hweilan knew what Jagun Ghen would do. Kesh Naan had showed her. She had seen through the eyes of her ancestors the suffering he would bring to thousands if she did not stop him. Were four men really worth that? No. As much as it pained Hweilan, she had to admit that nothing could justify saving four lives while putting thousands at risk. Everything she had been brought up to believe by her parents, her grandfather, her Uncle Soran, and everything she had learned from Gleed, Kesh Naan, Ashiin, and even the Master himself … no. She would desecrate all of that if she let Jagun Ghen win in order to save these four men.

And so in her mind, she let them go. She had no doubt the guilt would nag her till the end of her days. But if she didn’t deal with the real enemy, the end of all their days would come too soon.

Kaad’s scrubbing stopped again. “That is interesting,” he muttered.

“Eh? What?” said Maaqua, then in Goblin-“What is interesting? Speak!”

Hweilan looked down at her arm and immediately saw what he meant. Below her shoulder she had a large patch of brand new skin, completely smooth and hairless, and pale as goose down. The dark inks of the tattoos on her arm ended at the healed wound, but the pattern continued across the new skin, not in black but in a deep red. Like blood.

“These were not made with normal inks, were they?” said Kaad, touching them cautiously with one finger.

“No,” said Hweilan. She remembered all too clearly the searing pain as Gleed carved them into her flesh with the glowing metal rod.

Kaad looked at her and raised his brows questioningly.

Hweilan raised hers in mockery.

Maaqua didn’t seem impressed. “The girl is marked. You know what she is.”

Kaad shrugged, then stood and returned the water cauldron to its place, tossing the sodden goatskin onto the floor.

Hweilan returned her attention to Maaqua. “You’ll let me go? Just like that? What do you want in return?”

Maaqua sat back and put the staff back in her lap. But by the tightness of her jaw and narrowed eyes, Hweilan knew the queen was holding on to her anger very carefully. “These … things coming out of Highwatch. They have become a problem. Rhan killed one, but only after it killed several of our warriors.”

“I told you already,” said Hweilan, “Rhan did not kill it. He may have destroyed the flesh it wore, but the spirit inside survived and went to find a new host.”

“I believe you,” said Maaqua, and Hweilan could sense no deceit in her tone. “I’m older and wiser than you are, girl. I have not sat idle while these vermin infested my homeland. I have learned a thing or two. But …”

“But you still don’t know how to kill them,” said Hweilan.

Maaqua smiled. “And you do.”

“So now we come to it.”

“I’ve changed my mind. You teach me how to kill these things, and I’ll let you go. You’ll keep your life. You don’t teach me … and I’ll make your pretty Damaran boy watch while I flay you alive.”

Hweilan held Maaqua’s gaze for a long time. Hweilan was no fool. Once Maaqua got what she wanted, she had no reason to let Hweilan live. What the queen was asking, however … Hweilan couldn’t have given it even if she wanted to. But as soon as the queen believed that, she would have no reason to let Hweilan go, much less keep her alive. Menduarthis taken by Jagun Ghen. The Damarans captured. Uncle gone. Hweilan’s only hope was the full moon, still days away. Her one strategy-keep Maaqua hungry. A trick every hunter knew: no matter how smart your prey was, get it hungry enough, and it will eventually snatch the bait.

So Hweilan let it out. It wasn’t hard. Perhaps it was the gunhin still coursing through her system. Or the desperation of her situation. After all she’d gone through, to meet her end at the hands of a viper like Maaqua … it was funny in a way. Hweilan threw her head back against the ironwood and laughed until tears streamed down her cheeks.

Maaqua pushed herself to her feet and raised her staff.

“My queen, please!” said Kaad.

But the queen ignored him. She struck Hweilan across the face with her staff, then again on the crown of her head with the backstroke.

Kaad stepped forward and tried to grab the staff, but Maaqua turned it on him. One sharp crack across his temple, and the scrawny healer collapsed. The hobgoblin queen stared down at Hweilan, her eyes narrowed to angry slits, her upper lip curled over her yellow teeth.

Hweilan laughed harder.

That only stoked Maaqua’s fury. She took a step back, raised the staff, and spoke the beginning of an incantation. Purple light sparked around her staff, each syllable she spoke bringing another, each stronger than the last.

“Stop!” said Hweilan, trying to stifle her laughter. “No need for that. You want to know how to deal with the baazuled? I’ll tell you that for nothing.”

Maaqua blinked. The arcane light gathering around her staff fizzled out. “Eh? What’s that? You’ll what?”

“You want to know how to kill them?”

“Yes!” said Maaqua, a manic light in her eye.

“First, you have to taste the venom of a thousand spiders, until their poison so fills your brain that only the mercy of the spiders’ god keeps you alive, filling you with visions. You’ll live a thousand lives. Die a thousand deaths. Joys, sorrows, triumphs, losses … you will know them all. And then spend your days being beaten senseless by the Fox, until you learn to fight back. Until the Fox becomes your sister. And then you’ll watch her die and drink the blood of her killer. I have done all that and more, you greedy, flea-bitten rat. So if you think your petty threats frighten me in the least, then go ahead. Kill me. On the next full moon, I’ll meet you in the Hells and teach you different.”

The queen stared down at Hweilan a long time, and Hweilan was beginning to think she’d gone too far. Finally, the old hobgoblin put her staff on the ground, leaned upon it, and looked down on her.

“Have it your way, you ungrateful little nit. But know this. I’ll find a way to deal with Highwatch. I have your weapons. It’s only a matter of time before I decipher all those symbols you’ve burned and scratched into them. If I can’t find the answers, I know those who can, be they gods or demons or devils. And when your horn-headed master comes-if he dares-I’ll throw your skin at him and spit. Meet you in the Hells? Heh. I’ve been there. And back.”

Maaqua nudged Kaad with her toe. The healer stirred and looked up at her, but made no move to get up.

“Get her ready,” said Maaqua. “I’ve decided to let Rhan kill the bitch.”