There was a moment of pain, and horses began neighing in fright, kicking at the doors to their stalls, and Zell’a Cree found himself struggling up from the stable floor to his knees. The giant had taken a step to the middle of the room, and he pulled the sword from his back, stood gazing stupidly at the blade.
Zell’a Cree jumped up, rushed at him, but the giant bellowed loudly and took a step back. Zell’a Cree tried to pull the sword from the giant’s hand, and for one brief moment they struggled together, both of them fighting for the blade.
The short sword twisted from Zell’a Cree’s grip, and the giant made a weak stab. Zell’a Cree leapt backward as the sword slashed at his midriff.
The giant stood, panting as if from long exertion, holding the sword. He sagged to his knees after a minute, dropped the blade, then fell facedown into the straw.
The horses were all neighing frantically now at the smell of blood, and Zell’a Cree knew that the noise would draw attention. He had hoped to commit a nice quiet murder.
Instead, he grabbed the short sword, stabbed the giant in the back of the neck to sever his spinal cord, then rushed to the rear door of the stables and stood panting, trying to get some air.
He wondered whether anyone had heard the giant’s bellowing. He did not know if he should run now or set a trap for Gallen and the others.
Gallen had settled into his seat at the inn and ordered dinner. The place had few patrons, and they were all sitting up in front of a little puppeteer’s theater, where marvelously decorated puppets were used to play a tale about a greedy king who was being robbed by some highwaymen. Gallen could not hear all of the dialogue, but two of the highwaymen were speaking aside to one another, and it sounded as if they were the king’s own wife and daughter, robbing the man in the hopes of curing him of his greed.
Gallen had just asked his mantle to amplify the sounds of the room, hoping to hear the puppeteers, when he heard Fenorah cry out.
He jumped from his seat, seeing the surprised faces of Maggie and the others. He had been trying so hard for the past few days to seem normal that he did not want to cause them alarm. “Trouble!” Gallen said, then he went tearing out a back door, where two cooks stood looking toward the stable.
“I’m sure I heard yelling, back here!” one said, though neither seemed inclined to go see who had screamed.
Drawing his sword free from its scabbard, Gallen raced down to the stable, pulled the door open, and let his mantle magnify the light, show him the scene. Fenorah lay in the straw, facedown. Gallen rushed to him, found blood flowing all down the back of his neck, soaking into his tunic. Gallen could see no sign that he was breathing, and for a brief moment, stinging tears came to Gallen’s eyes. The giant had never harmed anyone, had sought to do only good. He’d shared his food, given of his time and wealth.
“Goodbye, my friend. The wheel turns without you for a while,” Gallen whispered into his ears, and realized that he had subconsciously chosen to voice a death farewell common to the people of Babel.
He bit his lip, tried to calm himself. He was afraid, for he could feel the weight of years on him. He felt that he was struggling to control the voices inside him-strong Amvik of the Immatar, a scholar and physician, wanted Gallen to check Fenorah more thoroughly for signs of life. “Turn him over. Try to revive him,” the doctor warned, but Gallen knew it was no use. Even if he managed to revive the giant for a few moments, he had lost far too much blood.
Gallen noticed that someone had stepped over the body, making bloody footprints in the straw, and had rushed out a back door, leaving it open.
The horses and the travel beast were standing quietly in their stalls, looking out. Gallen glanced upward to the haylofts and empty stalls where tack and fodder were stored. He listened closely for any sound of the murderer, then took one last look at Fenorah.
The Inhuman has done this, a voice whispered at the back of Gallen’s mind.
Gallen went to look out the rear door with a heavy heart. Suddenly he heard movement to his side, and his mantle warned him to duck. Gallen spun in time to see Zell’a Cree exploding out of a stall where hay had been piled high. The stocky man had been hiding under the hay, and he threw some at Gallen’s face.
Gallen almost did not see the blade of Zell’a Cree’s sword, arcing through the flying straw, but fortunately he had his own blade up high enough to parry the blow.
Zell’a Cree’s sword hit Gallen’s with such force that Gallen barely held on. The blow knocked Gallen back a pace, and Gallen spun away from Zell’a Cree’s charge, feigning a loss of balance as if he’d fallen, then he whirled as he fell and thrust his own blade up into Zell’a Cree’s chest, a brief, biting kiss that left the tip of Gallen’s sword bloodied.
Gallen rolled to his feet and sat, hunched low, his sword weaving slowly before Zell’a Cree’s eyes.
Zell’a Cree spotted the well-bloodied sword, and seemed to react more to it than he had to the touch of the steel. His free hand rose up to his chest, and his eyes grew wide in surprise at the severity of the wound.
“Damn your hide for that! I’ll split your belly and strangle you with your own guts!” he cried, and he kicked a bucket at Gallen. Gallen dodged it easily, and waited en garde. “Come, then,” Gallen hissed, “and find out why I’m a Lord Protector!”
Zell’a Cree almost rushed him, but instead halted, watched him warily. And in half a second he turned and fled out the back door, slamming it behind.
Gallen ran to give chase, but when he threw himself against the door, it wouldn’t budge. Zell’a Cree had bolted it from outside.
Gallen rushed back to the front, then circled the stable and stood gazing over the valley. Along a trail downhill were dozens of stone houses and buildings with white stucco exteriors, many with low courtyards where someone could easily leap a wall to hide. Bright stars pierced the indigo sky, and Tremonthin’s three small moons were rising all in a close knot, shining like molten brass over the countryside. Gallen could see far to the south, across a great valley where dark hills rose as forested islands from a moonlit sea of fog.
There was no one on or near the road, no sign of Zell’a Cree. But in infrared Gallen’s mantle detected hot points of light on the ground, splashes of blood.
He stooped low and ran, following the trail. A dog began barking far ahead, perhaps a kilometer off, and Gallen wondered if his quarry were getting away.
He raced onward couple hundred meters, responding to the voice of Fermoth, a great hunter who whispered that he should be quiet, refrain from alerting his quarry, and Gallen found a bright pool of blood on the ground on the far side of a stone well. Zell’a Cree had rested here momentarily, dripping blood over everything.
More bright flecks beckoned farther on, and Gallen began stalking through dark alleys, over a wall. His prey moved like a fox-backtracking and zigzagging, and Fermoth whispered to Gallen, Yes, yes, this is how I would do it. This is the direction I would go, till Gallen wondered if the shared experiences of the Inhuman might not be a disadvantage to his quarry.
Gallen reached the far end of town and began circling back along a hill, at which point even Fermoth wondered what the quarry was up to, and Gallen began to wonder if Zell’a Cree was Inhuman after all.
Yet it was obvious that Gallen’s quarry was failing. Perhaps he was no longer thinking clearly. The droplets of blood were getting brighter, warmer. The man was slowing, weakening, until Gallen felt sure he was near, and that he would be weak, and dying, when Gallen found him.
Gallen felt confused. He was beginning to understand the servants of the Inhuman. Indeed, he thought that they might be friends, or that at least they thought themselves good. None of the voices inside Gallen were evil. They had just been people who were concerned with living their own lives, people who wanted to continue living. And though Zell’a Cree had killed Fenorah and was an Inhuman, he was also someone like Gallen who had become infected against his will. Gallen recalled the Bock’s warning, in which he told Gallen that at times he would have to choose whether to kill an Inhuman or spare it. And as he hunted, Gallen’s resolve to kill Zell’a Cree weakened.