Dezra's Quest

8

Dezra felt like death on a platter.

She'd still been drunk at dawn, when she stole her gear and rode out on Trephas's back. That was long past now, and sobriety wasn't being friendly. Her stomach kept trying to climb up her throat; her head wanted to hatch. Trephas wasn't being very considerate, either. He kept at a canter along the winding Haven Road, bouncing her mercilessly with every step.

Finally, as the sun began to wester, she could take no more. "Stop," she moaned. "Now."

Trephas glanced at her, then halted and knelt in the road. She slid off his back and stumbled over to lean, wheezing, against a mossy boulder. Trephas pulled some flat bread and black olives from his pack and ate. He chuckled. "Ah, yes," he said. "I've heard thy kind get terrible sick from too much drink. A… hangover, is that word?"

Last night, his arrogance had seemed charming; now it rankled her. Blithely, he pulled out a wineskin and took a long swig. "I wouldn't know the feeling," he said. "It's never happened to me before."

That, Dezra thought as she rubbed her throbbing temples, was not fair.

She looked around blearily. The Haven Road was busy most spring days, but this was the day after a festival. There were no travelers to be seen. Ahead on the left loomed a tall mountain, its cleft top shaped like a pair of giant, beseeching hands.

"There's Prayer's Eye Peak," she said. "There should be a path to it up ahead."

"There is." Trephas clenched his jaw, pawing the ground. "We shan't use it, though."

"What?" Dezra returned. "Prayer's Eye Peak's the only pass into Darken Wood around here. If we don't take it, we'll have to go miles out of the way."

The centaur's eyes narrowed, lingering on the cleft mountain. "Even so," he said.

Dezra shook her head. "You're going to have to say more than that. I don't know how it is with your people, but I'm not some… filly you can order around without-"

"Whist!" Trephas hissed, holding up a hand.

"Whist?" Dezra exclaimed. "Who uses words like 'whist' any more?"

"Be still!"

The centaur's sharp tone silenced her. She touched her sword as he reached over his shoulder and pulled out his bow. He slid an arrow out of his quiver and notched it on the string. It tapped nervously against the bow-stave.

Dezra glanced about, searching for whatever trouble Trephas sensed. For a moment all was silent, save the moan of the wind and the soft tap-tap-tap of the centaur's arrow. Then, faintly, she heard something ahead: the thud of hoofbeats, the rattle of harnesses.

Trephas's tail twitched edgily. "Mount up," he hissed. "We must ride before the trap is set."

Dezra caught her breath, then lunged toward the centaur and climbed onto his back. She almost slid off the other side, then caught her arms about his waist to right herself.

Trephas's reflexes were quicker than any horse's. One moment he was standing still, the next he was halfway to a gallop and gaming speed. Startled, Dezra nearly lost her grip, and clutched him even tighter. Her heels pounded his flanks, spurring him on.

"Stop kicking me!" he barked. "And loosen thy grasp. I can't breathe with thee squeezing me so!"

Reluctantly, she obeyed. Trephas surged down the path, mane flying, dust billowing behind him. Dezra considered drawing her sword, but only for a moment: it was hard enough to stay on the centaur's back with two hands. She didn't want to risk one.

The path curved ahead. It was a sharp turn, after which, Dezra knew, it descended into a gully where an old trail led to Prayer's Eye Peak. That was where the approaching hoof-beats were coming from. She didn't know who would get to the crossroads first.

"Hang on," Trephas warned.

She gripped with arms and knees as Trephas flew around the turn. They charged downhill, at a pace that promised broken bones, or worse, if either of them fell. Dezra craned her neck, brushing aside his mane to peer ahead. The path to Prayer's Eye Peak was a narrow game trail, bristling with grass and leafy weeds. It cut through the mountains toward the cleft crag, barely wide enough for a lone rider to negotiate. So, instead of coming two or three abreast, the ambushers had to move single file.

They were centaurs, Dezra saw. But something was wrong with them.

At first glance, they looked like they were kin to Trephas, but something was different. They moved with unnatural fluidity, plucking arrows from their quivers and nocking them on their bowstrings. Every now and then, they twitched and jerked, like a man stung by a wasp. They were shaped oddly, too. One was so thin as to be skeletal; others were masses of corded muscle; another still was disgustingly obese. Some had lost patches of hair, others were too hairy by half. Their legs were too long, or of mismatched lengths; arms too short; ears like horses' instead of men's. None of them had tails. Their eyes had no whites, but were all dull, empty pupil: blank, dark, devoid of feeling.

Dezra shuddered as she met their cold, empty gaze. Branchala bite me, she thought. What are these?

Now they were a hundred paces away. One, a hulking, bay brute whose upper half resembled an ogre more than a man, raised his bow and loosed a shot. The arrow soared high, then dove to shatter before Trephas's flashing hooves.

Sixty paces.

"Thenidor," Trephas snorted as the bay readied another arrow. "I should have guessed." Keeping up the charge, he brought up his bow, pulled back the string. The misshapen horsefolk did the same, arrowheads glinting in the sun. Dezra clenched her teeth.

Forty paces. Trephas's bowstring thrummed. To the bay's left, a gray, hunchbacked centaur dropped, its breast pierced. It thrashed on the ground, limbs flailing.

It saved them.

The bay, Thenidor, stumbled sideways as the dying gray kicked at him. He fired, but his aim was ruined. The shot soared away uselessly. Beside him, a wiry black centaur lowered his weapon and leapt aside. At the end of the row, a shaggy brown whose long face had at least as much horse as man to it launched his own shot. Dezra ducked as the arrow streaked straight toward them. Trephas swerved, and she heard a hum as the shaft flashed past.

Twenty paces.

She peeked over Trephas's shoulder. Ahead, the misshapen centaurs milled about in confusion. Thenidor dropped his bow and pulled a halberd from his war harness.

Ten.

Dezra ducked behind Trephas, squeezing her eyes shut and gripping him tightly.

There was shouting all around, and the clatter of hooves. Trephas struck something hard, glanced off, and kept running. A low whistle split the air-Thenidor's halberd-then the commotion was behind them: horseshoes ringing on stone, snarled curses, creaking bows.

She opened her eyes and glanced about. Trephas was bleeding from a gash across his flank, but he kept up his desperate, galloping pace. The road ahead was dear. She twisted, glancing back, and saw their would-be ambushers in disarray. The gray was no longer moving. Awkwardly, the other centaurs wheeled around. Thenidor still gripped his halberd, but the wiry black and the shaggy brown raised their bows and fired. One shot fell to Trephas's right, splintering against the stones; the other grazed the tip of his tail before clattering to the ground.

"We made it!" Dezra whooped, pounding his back.

Trephas ignored her, plunging on without slowing. Soon, Dezra saw why: The misshapen horse-men leapt into motion. She counted their pursuers-six, it looked like-before Trephas crested the rise and rounded another bend in the road. Then they were gone from sight, though she still could hear their thundering hooves.

"So much for Prayer's Eye Peak," Dezra said, watching the mountain drop away behind them. "What in the Abyss were those… things?"

Trephas didn't answer. He lowered his head, charging along the winding Haven Road into the heart of the Sentinel Peaks. Their pursuers' hoofbeats kept pace.

"Hey!" Dezra yelled. "Aren't you listen-"

"I can run," Trephas snarled, "or I can talk. I haven't the wind for both." He drew a ragged breath, as if to emphasize the point.

Dezra scowled. "All right. Don't be so damn touchy."

Trephas grunted and galloped onward, mane and tail streaming. Dezra held on, her hangover forgotten.

They rode hard and fast, for what seemed like hours. When they slow'ed again at last, Dezra was exhausted. Every bone in her body throbbed from the centaur's jarring gait. Lathered with sweat, Trephas eased into a trot and glanced back.

They'd seen their pursuers only twice since Prayer's Eye Peak, and then only for a few moments. The misshapen centaurs had loosed a few shots, which Trephas had evaded nimbly. Now, however, there was no one behind them.

"Are they gone?" Dezra asked.

Trephas cocked an ear, sucking his teeth, then nodded. "I reckon so. They kept us from the Wood, which was their aim-though I'm sure Thenidor's fuming that he didn't kill us. Now," he added, coming to a halt, "I must rest. Get off."

Dezra slumped off his back and sat on a tree stump by the roadside. She winced as her legs tried to cramp up, took a nip from the flask of dwarf spirits she'd purloined, and looked about, getting her bearings.

They had come a long way. The vallenwoods of Solace Vale had given way to swaying pines and spruces. They were almost to the Sentinel Gap, where the Haven Road turned south, toward Shadow Canyon and the lowlands beyond. The sun almost touched the mountaintops ahead.

"So," she asked, glancing back. The road remained deserted. "Now that we've lost your friends back there, would you mind telling me what that was about?"

When Trephas didn't answer, she glanced at him in irritation. The centaur had dozed off on his feet, as a horse might do. His head drooped, his short beard mingling with the hairs on his chest. His flanks moved in and out, dark with perspiration.

"Oh, no you don't," Dezra muttered.

She tossed a pebble at him, striking him on the shoulder. He looked up with a snort, fumbling with his bow. "What-"

"Answers," Dezra said. "You said we'd talk when you stopped running."

He set down his weapon, his brows lowering, and rubbed his aching shoulders. "What wouldst thou know?"

"Well, to start, why did a bunch of your people try to fill us with arrows back there?"

"They aren't my people." Trephas tossed his head. "They gave up any kinship to me long ago."

"I see." Dezra regarded the centaur levelly. "Who's Thenidor?"

"He's Lord Chrethon's man," Trephas replied. "Though once he was loyal to Lord Menelachos, before he Crossed and threw in against the Circle."

"Ah. So he's one of those renegades you've been talking about," Dezra said. "Who are the others? Chrethon and Menelachos?"

He regarded her carefully, then shook his head, amazed at her ignorance. "The Circle of Four rule over the centaurs of Darken Wood-those who haven't turned to darkness, at least. Lord Menelachos is High Chief; my father, Nemeredes the Elder, is another of their number. So was Lord Chrethon, until he turned oath-breaker and renounced them. For that, they cast him out-would that they'd cut his throat instead of his tail! But he lived, and vowed revenge. That was a decade ago. We've been at war ever since."

Dezra caught her breath. "War?" she echoed furiously. "I thought you said there were only a few rebels!"

Trephas glanced away, his mane fluttering in the wind. "I was going to tell thee the truth, before we entered the Wood," he said. "I didn't think we'd run afoul of Thenidor. I meant to go the long way around, through Shadow Canyon, and enter the forest from the west-that part of Darken Wood doesn't belong to the Skorenoi yet."

"Skorenoi?"

"The Fallen Ones," Trephas explained. "Those who've given themselves to Lord Chrethon."

"Oh," Dezra said. "Like Thenidor."

Trephas spat on the ground. "Just so. I didn't think they'd be bold enough to waylay us on the open road."

Dezra studied Trephas's handsome, ruddy face as he stared into the distance, then she slapped her hands on her knees and pushed to her feet. "So what happens now?"

"That's thy choice to make," Trephas said. "I lied to thee- if thou dost not wish go on into Darken Wood, I shall understand. I'll take thee to Haven, and seek other help there."

"Oh, I'll go on," Dezra declared. "But my price for riding into a war is higher than we agreed on. Another hundred pieces of steel."

Trephas pondered, stroking his beard, then nodded. "Very well."

Dezra smiled. "Good. Now, we should get moving again. The sun's going to go down, and there's still a long-"

She broke off, a shiver running up her back. She'd heard something-something that wasn't the wind or a far-off rock-fall. Presently it rose again, echoing among the peaks: hoof-beats. They were still distant, but there they were, behind them and coming closer.

"Sharp stones and ,loose shoes," Trephas swore.

Muttering a curse Of her own, Dezra peered back down the path. She could see them now, in the distance: three of them. One was small and wiry, another fat, the third massively muscular.

Trephas had an arrow nocked, and was tapping it against his bow. "Thou had best climb on my back again," he ventured. "Our flight isn't over yet, it seems."