The fall of Highwatch con-1 Read online

  Her distant foremother's brother. That made Lendri her uncle. Of sorts. Hweilan retrieved the hatchet and went back to work, considering the elf's words. Some of his tale she knew already. She knew her mother was not Damaran, not even fully human by the sharp curve of her ears and her slightly offset eyes. Her mother had been born among some 'barbarian" people to the east. Everyone in Highwatch knew that. Hweilan had even heard the name Vil Adanrath pass her mother's lips from time to time. But she had never known that she had family beyond her aunts, uncles, and grandsires-the Damarans. Now… the dead.

  "Why have I never heard of you?" she said. "Never seen you? My mother never-"

  "Merah put the ways of her people behind her," said Lendri. "Not without reason."

  "Then why are you here?" said Hweilan. It came out harsh. Accusing. But she didn't care. Her mother and her entire family lay dead in the ruins of their home, and this buckskin-clad brute whom she'd never met or even been told about sat across from her, calm as a summer morning, telling her that they were family while he whittled on a stick. "Why now?" she said. "Scith recognized you, and he didn't seem happy about it."

  Sadness passed over Lendri's face, and he set back to work on the stick. "I came. Once. Not too many years ago. But your mother would not have me. She honored her people, but her life was among the Damarans now. And I think she did not want me influencing you. She told me to leave. I honored her wishes."

  Hweilan attacked the fallen tree with sudden savagery, sending bits of wood flying. "Doesn't death release you from your oaths?"

  "I am not dead."

  "But Gyaidun. Your… rathla. And my mother-"

  "The oaths were mine," said Lendri. "Only my death will free me."

  "You said you heard my whistle-knife," she said. "But why were you here at all? The Vil Adanrath dwelled far to the east."

  "I am… looking for someone."

  "Who?"

  "I am… not sure yet."

  Hweilan stopped her work and stared. The elf was so damnably odd. "What does that mean?"

  "Later," said Lendri. "We see to Scith, then we must decide what to do with you. Now work."

  Once Lendri had finished, he set the uskeche tet carefully aside, then used his heavy knife to help Hweilan finish her work. Once it was done, they stood and looked down at the corpse. Ravens had begun circling overhead, and Hweilan could hear more off in the woods, already eating. Together she and Lendri stood over Scith. In the short time they had worked, his skin had taken on a grayish cast, and frost now caked him.

  "I can't do this," Hweilan whispered, more to herself than Lendri.

  "You must. I cannot lift him in by myself. Honor your friend. Would you leave him as carrion?"-1

  She did it. Hweilan cried the entire time, but she helped Lendri lift Scith into the shell they had hollowed out inside the tree. A heavy, completely dead weight. They covered him with the kindling.

  "It will never burn," said Hweilan. "Too wet."

  "Stand back," said Lendri. He peeled the glove off his right hand and curled it into a fist. A small ring, a dull yellow like brass, circled one finger. He pointed it at the log and said, "Lamathris!"

  The air round his fist ignited, and a gout of flame shot outward, striking the tree and enveloping it in bright orange fire. A hot gale swept over Hweilan as the fire heated and pushed back the air. Flames rose, tumbling over one another and sending up thick clouds of gray smoke. Somewhere out in the woods, Hechin howled.

  Lendri retrieved the stick he had spent so much time carving. He handed it to Hweilan. She examined it by the light of Scith's pyre. Into the pale wood, Lendri had etched many Dethek runes in a spiral down the length of the shaft, and within the carving he had rubbed some sort of resin. Turning the stick, she read them.

  MERAH INLE THEWARI

  SORAN OF HIGHWATCH

  VANDALAR OF HIGHWATCH

  SCITH OF THE VAR

  KNIGHTS OF ONDRAHAR

  PEOPLE OF HIGHWATCH

  "Your honored dead," said Lendri. "I will sing. Add your own prayers if you wish."

  Lendri sang. More of a whispered chant really, like a soft breeze through dry branches. At first he sang in his own tongue. Hweilan listened, understanding nothing but the names.

  "Sing with me," he said.

  "I… I don't know the words," said Hweilan.

  "We will sing them in the tongue of the Damarans."

  And so they did, Lendri chanting one line, Hweilan following. Flames of this world, bear this flame to our ancestors Our family burned bright Our family…

  Lendri took the stick back from her. Holding one end with both hands, he stepped forward and thrust it into the middle of the fire, sending a great shower of sparks fluttering amid the smoke. He held it there as long as he could bear to be near the flames, then he stepped back. The end of the stick was black, but the resin pressed into the runes burned a hot red. Merah daughter of Thewari burned bright, Soran of Highwatch burned bright, Vandalar of Highwatch burned bright, Scith of the Var burned bright, The Knights of Ondrahar burned bright, The people of Highwatch burned bright. Their exile is ended, their rest assured.

  Lendri looked up to the sky and sang in his native tongue, but this time loud-more of a shout than a chant. Then he looked down at Hweilan. His eyes seemed hard, not with any sort of religious passion. More in expectation.

  "You still wish to bring justice to your family's murderers?" he said.

  "Yes." No hesitation.

  "Then do as I do. Take off your gloves."

  She did.

  He raised his right hand, long fingers outstretched, and he sang, "Our family burned bright. Those who robbed the world of their light will rest no more."

  She repeated his words, not singing but speaking them clearly.

  Lendri brought his open palm down on the top of the stick. Hweilan heard skin and flesh sizzle, a sharp intake of breath from Lendri, then he pulled his hand away. She looked at him with wide eyes.

  "Hurry," he said, "before the fire consumes the wood."

  She hesitated. What kind of fool put his naked hand on burning wood? But Lendri's gaze on her was fierce and unwavering. She raised her right hand. It trembled.

  "Do it, Hweilan!"

  In her mind, she saw Scith's last moments. She saw the last look her mother had given her, heard their last words, spoken in anger. She heard again her father's parting words to her on the day he'd ridden out of the fortress-Listen to your mother, Hweilan. She does what is best for you. Make me proud. The next time she'd seen him, his face had been pale and cold, more like lifeless stone than the always-quick-to-smile face of her father.

  Hweilan slapped her hand down and grabbed the stick. Pain seized her entire arm. She gasped and tried to let go, but the muscles in her hand convulsed, squeezing tighter. She could feel the skin of her palm and the insides of her fingers burning away, her flesh fusing to the wood.

  Control returned. She let go, flesh that did not want to come away from the hot wood tearing and peeling away. She stumbled back and landed hard on the icy ground. The world seemed to spin around her, going black, and she could hear nothing but a roar.

  When the world cleared again, she could see the great cloud of her breath mixing with Lendri's. The elf knelt over her, his brows creased in concern.

  "Can you hear me?" he asked.

  "Yes."

  "Foolish girl," he said, and it was then that Hweilan first noticed that he held her burned hand between his own. He was pressing snow into her palm. She couldn't feel the cold. Everything from her wrist down was only pain. "You were supposed to touch the stick, not grasp it. Why?"

  She smiled weakly. "It felt like a good idea at the time. My family…" Tears began to well in her eyes again.

  Lendri held her gaze a long time, then nodded. "Grieve for them, Hweilan. Honor them. But do not punish yourself. Punish those who killed them. I will help you."

  "When do we start?"

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Hweilan's hand
was still in agony, but the cold snow she held helped. Now that all of her attention was not focused on her arm, she felt a pounding headache coming on. Not like others she'd had in the past-pain behind her eyes or her forehead. This was a nagging pulse right at the base of her skull. Almost like a drumbeat.

  "Try to open it," said Lendri.

  Clenching her teeth against the pain, Hweilan opened her hand slowly. Pain shot up her forearm. She turned her palm down and dropped the snow. She could feel tiny tugs as bits of skin came away with the ice.

  "I have some salve," said Lendri. He gently turned her hand and opened his mouth as if to say more. He gasped and his grip tightened, pulling her closer.

  Hweilan winced and tried to pull away. "You're hurting me!"

  He let go and looked at her, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open.

  Hweilan looked down at her hand. Most of the skin was gone, the flesh beneath burned. But across her palm, three of the letters from the names that Lendri had carved into the stick were clearly visible, branded right into the flesh of her hand in raised, puffy red flesh:

  K

  A

  N

  "Kan?" said Hweilan.

  Lendri closed his mouth and looked down at the brand again.

  "What?" said Hweilan. "What does it mean?"

  "Death…" he said, though his eyes were distant, and he seemed to be talking to himself. "She carries death in her right hand."

  "What are you talking about? Lendri?"

  He shook his head, almost as if waking from a dream. His haunted eyes focused on her, and he said, "That word… it means 'death' in our people's language."

  Hweilan studied the scar. "Maybe it is a good sign?" she said. "I swore to bring vengeance to those who killed my family. Now I have 'death' branded on my right hand. A sign?"

  "Perhaps." Lendri's looked away. "Rub some clean snow on it. I will put on some salve and a clean bandage. Then we must leave. Quickly."

  "Wait," said Hweilan. "Go? Go where?"

  Lendri pointed at the fire, and his upper lip curled over his teeth in a very wolflike snarl. "That smoke will draw any Nar within ten miles. You want to be here when they come for a look?"

  Hweilan looked away. The pounding in her skull was getting worse. She knelt and rubbed snow on her hand. "What makes you think I'm going anywhere with you? You come out of nowhere claiming-"

  A shrill sound cut the air, bringing a sharp pain to her ears. She looked up. Lendri was holding a kishkoman to his lips, much like her own, but brown with age.

  He dropped it back into his shirt and walked over to her. He loomed over her and said, "I am Vil Adanrath. I am blood to you, by oaths and birth." He crouched and leaned in close, his nose only inches from hers. "But if that is not enough, I am the only hope you have."

  They were getting close.

  Soran, riding out front, had set an unrelenting pace. Almost dangerously so, since the ground was not only uneven and rocky, but covered with snow and ice.

  Argalath had been forced to ensorcel all their horses before they would tolerate the Soran-thing's presence. But it had worked, and their "hound" never hesitated in his chosen path. He led, and they followed-Kadrigul and eight Nar behind him. He thought all were Creel, but it didn't matter to him. Nar were all alike.

  They crossed a slight rise-a thickly forested saddle between two hills-and Soran disappeared between the trees. Kadrigul reached for the amulet Argalath had given him and whispered the words to activate it. Through the cured leather of his glove, he felt the metal tingle.

  He followed the tracks through the snow and soon found Soran sitting on his horse, glaring at him. The Nar stopped their own horses well behind Kadrigul.

  Soran drew in a deep breath to speak. "She is close."

  They set off again, and when they next left the trees, Kadrigul could see a thick column of smoke in the near distance. A mile away or less.

  Soran spurred his horse, and Kadrigul followed.

  Lendri finished bandaging Hweilan's hand, then helped fit her glove back over it. The salve helped. The pain in her hand was already fading to a throbbing ache, but the pounding in her head was so bad that she thought she could feel her skull rattling.

  Scith's pyre still burned, but the flames had lessened considerably, and the smoke had gone from thick white plumes to wisps of gray. With almost no breeze, the pyre had filled the little valley with an eye-burning haze.

  "The pain is very bad?" said Lendri. He was studying her intently.

  "My head worse than my hand. Where will we go?" Hweilan asked.

  "North for now."

  "The people who killed my family are sitting in my home right now, at Highwatch. To the south."

  Lendri looked at her with that unnerving gaze of his. The ice blue right eye reminded her of the strange Sossrim who occasionally came to Highwatch to trade. But the green left eye… there was something unnatural about it. "Our oaths bind us, yes, but we need help."

  "What kind of help? Where?"

  "To answer that to your satisfaction will be a long tale. For now, we must run."

  "Why won't you tell me?"

  "I will tell you!" Lendri's lip curled over his teeth and she heard the beginning of a growl in his voice. She stepped back.

  Seeing her fear, Lendri's expression softened. "I'm sorry. I will tell you. I promise. I have… so much to tell you. But to explain everything will take time. Time we don't have now. We are still too close to Highwatch. Now, let's move."

  Hweilan turned and went the other way.

  "Where are you going?"

  She stopped and glared at him. "I left my father's bow up the hill. I'm not leaving without it."

  Lendri thought a moment, then nodded. "Be quick."

  She pushed through the brush and made her way up the hill, finding the bow with little problem. She retrieved it, stood, and looked down into the camp. Lendri was rummaging through the supplies of the dead Nar, discarding most of what he found, but pocketing an item here or there.

  I could go…

  The thought hit her. She could turn, keep going up the hill. Lendri wasn't looking her way. She could be over the rise and be long gone before he suspected anything. Hweilan gripped her father's bow in a tight fist and turned uphill To come face to face with a wolf, standing on a ledge no more than a few paces away. Hechin. The huge gray wolf's yellow eyes, unblinking, fixed on her. He didn't snarl, didn't growl, did nothing whatsoever to threaten her. But his very stillness spoke volumes.

  "Hweilan?" Lendri called from below.

  "Coming."

  By the time Hweilan walked back into camp, Lendri had his supplies-two thick bundles, bound with leather cords-secured on his back. Ravens sat thick in the trees, and more were circling overhead, their cries a raucous counterpoint to the crackle of the pyre's dying flames. Only a shell remained of the log. Everything within was gray ash and red coals. Nothing left of Scith but what the gods had taken.

  Lendri walked over to Hweilan and held out a thick bundle. "Here. You'll need this in the coming days."

  It was a thick Creel cloak, make of swiftstag hide and rimmed with fur. Her head fit through the middle of it, and it flared in the front, covering her when needed but easily thrown back in case she needed to free her hands. It even had deep pockets along the inside.

  "Did you… did you find this in their packs or take it off…" Off a dead man? She couldn't speak the words. "Does it matter?" said Lendri.

  She shook her head and settled into the cloak. Hweilan looked at the Nar corpses. "What about them?"

  "A feast for the crows," said Lendri. "Let's leave them to it. Come."

  He set off, setting a brisk pace through the woods, following frost-covered deer trails along the bottom of a steep escarpment.

  But they made it no more than a quarter mile out of the camp before Hechin barked from behind them.

  Lendri stopped and raised a hand to signal quiet.

  The wolf bounded out of the thick brush. Even Hwei
lan, who had studied wolves only from a distance, could see that he was agitated. His ears lay flat against his head, and his tail pointed straight out.

  "What's wrong?" said Hweilan.

  "We're being followed," said Lendri. "Keep moving." Lendri shrugged out of his pack and handed it to her. "Here."

  "What? What do you mean?"

  "You keep going. I'm going back to see who it is."

  She set the bow on the ground so she could settle the packs on her back. "Probably other Nar, coming to investigate the smoke. Why not keep moving?"

  "You will."

  He fitted an arrow to his bowstring and headed back the way they'd come, Hechin at his heels. Hweilan watched them go, then watched a while longer. Finally, she turned her back and headed north, fast as she could. If the elf never came back… well, at least she had the supplies.

  Her trail led her away from the escarpment. The hills reared up into a wall before her, blocking the north, while the trail bent eastward. Hweilan knew of a pass several miles farther that way. With Lendri not there to tell her otherwise, she headed east.

  The ground soon smoothed out, becoming less rocky, and the tall woods gave way to a scrubland of thick brush and squat trees, their branches still winter bare.

  Hweilan fell into a steady jog, and her long legs ate up the ground. The pulse at the back of her head was still there, but it was no longer a hammering pain. More of a tingling just under her skin, an itch, a buzzing on the brain. Very much like the feeling of being watched she'd experienced on her way back to Highwatch the day before. But this feeling had an undertone of anger, sharp and hot. It didn't make her want to look around to see who might be watching. And even though there was a hint of danger, it didn't make her want to run or hide. It made her angry

  Hweilan suddenly found herself with the urge to hit something. To pound it again and again until it couldn't move any more. Standing here in the cold afternoon, Hweilan felt positively hot with fury.

  A wolf howled behind her, the sound beginning low, rising high, then dropping again to fade into something just shy of a growl. Brief silence, then the same howl. Hweilan had learned enough from Scith to guess at what it meant. Wolves howled for a reason. Usually to communicate with the pack over vast distances, and sometimes just for fun when the pack was gathered. But when one pack encroached on another's territory, the lead male would sometimes howl like the sound she'd just heard. It was meant to warn off the invaders.