Some of the weight lifted off him, but something soft wrapped round his knife hand, tightened, and pulled. The angle was so precise, the right amount of strength applied just so by using Rhan’s own strength against him, that his arm twisted backward and his hand released the weapon. He half-expected to feel it fall beside him, but he didn’t.
Instead, his body hit the dirt and he tensed to try to throw off his attacker, but the feel of a sharp point of steel jabbing into his flesh, right where his jaw curved into his ear, changed his mind.
“Thank you for bringing my knife,” said a voice above him.
He recognized it at once. Hweilan.
He kept the look of fury on his face, but inside he was smiling. He braved a glance upward and saw that the cloak he had left over the other body was twisted around his arm. He knew he could free himself with little trouble-but probably not before Hweilan buried the knife in his skull. Sand still fell from the cloak, and he realized what had happened. The little fox had dug a shallow trench in the dirt, lay down, pulled the cloak over her, covered it all with sand, and then waited. Had it been full daylight, no doubt he would have been able to discern the disturbed soil, perhaps seen the bits of cloak she hadn’t been able to cover. But in the dark …
“Now,” she said, “here is what’s going to happen.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Scent came back to Hweilan first.She smelled cool, dry air, spring grass, flower petals, and … something else. Something hot and choking. Blood. Fresh blood. So strong that it filled her head like wine.
That is you, that smell.
She opened her eyes and saw wolves before her. A huge pack, two dozen or more, and in their midst the chief, a massive male with fur the color of new snow. The same wolf who had spoken in her dream the day before.
A plain stretched all around them. Not Narfell. The breeze on her cheeks felt too warm. In the grasses, too many shades of green mottled the brown, and there were no mountains to crack the horizon. Grass undulated into forever, rising and falling on shallow hills like sea swells.
The pack scattered, some running away and others merely receding before their lord. The chief wolf lowered his head and looked at her. His eyes …
Not like any wolf’s she had ever seen. They were too bright-the color of a clear winter sky. A gust of wind stirred his fur, and for just a moment Hweilan thought she saw him covered in uwethla, much like her own. She saw the blood there, pulsing in the skin, and for the briefest instant he was not a wolf at all. He stood on two legs, his white hair hanging well past his waist. Three scars marred his skin from scalp to cheek to chin, leaving empty tracks through his frosty eyebrows. But then the vision passed, and he was a wolf again.
“You know me,” she said, before she’d even thought the words.
Blood of my blood, said the wolf. A clever ruse. That old lizard by the lake taught you well. One drink to stop your heart-just for a time. Another to bring you back. And what if that hobgoblin had killed you anyway?
“I think he very nearly did,” she said.
The wolf padded up to her and licked at her face. His musky scent washed over her, and again she was struck by the familiarity of it. She almost had it … but something else was drowning it. Something hot and … metallic. Clouding her senses.
The wolf stepped away, then turned and sat, looking at her eye-to-eye. Broken bones are the least of your worries. You’re bleeding inside your skull. That’s your blood you smell. Only a little at the moment. But it only takes a little to kill you.
“Who are you?”
I am the father of your grandmother’s grandmother.
Hweilan struggled through her memories. They tasted red. But she reached through and found what she wanted.
“Ashiin, she told me of you. You are Haerul. She said you were the father of my grandfather’s grandfather.”
The wolf barked, and Hweilan heard the laugh there. Fox had no pack. She did not know a great many things. But I know you, girl. The Witness Cloud … we are always watching. Your mother’s father-
The wolf yipped in surprise and turned. Hweilan followed his gaze.
“What-?”
He turned and said something, but she could not hear the words. Lightning struck the plains, some so close she felt the burning air, and thunder drowned out all other sound.
The grasses burned away, and the sky split with a crack of lightning that pierced to the heart of the world.
When her vision cleared, the blue-eyed wolf was gone and an antlered figure stood before her. He held a black iron spear in his right hand, gripping it so hard that she heard the crack of his tendons. Blood dripped from his right hand. Green fire burned out of his mask of bone.
He looked down on her, and the ground and sky trembled at the sound of his voice.
“Fool! Time is running out.”
Hweilan could not respond, could not speak, could not … not …
Breathe!
The antlered man held his bloody hand over her, and as the sky let loose a torrent of rain, Nendawen’s hot blood showered down upon Hweilan, covering her face, filling her mouth and nose. She could not cry out, could not look away, could not draw air into her lungs, though everything in her screamed to-
Breathe!
Hweilan sat up, inhaling so strongly that it was an inward scream. Pain filled her head with such forcefulness that for a moment she feared the hobgoblins had buried her own knife in her head as a farewell gift.
She reached up. The entire left side of her face was swollen and sensitive to the touch. An area just under the edge of her scalp was soft as a half-full wineskin. She could feel the fluid gathering there under her skin, and just beneath it-
Her probing finger barely touched it, but it felt like an ice cold nail twisting through her skull, sending threads of agony down her neck, rattling her teeth, and causing her arms to spasm.
“Cracked my skull,” she said to herself, and only then realized her lips were swollen to twice their normal size. She could feel congealed blood clogging her inner cheek.
She tried to spit, but the pain in her head flared and the world tumbled around her and she had to reach out with both hands to catch herself before she fell.
Her left hand came down on something. Taking slow, careful breaths, she waited for her vision to clear and for the world to stop moving around her. But sight never came back to her left eye. All dark. And her head seemed to get fuller with every beat of her heart. Much more and she feared it might burst.
This was not good.
She picked up whatever her hand had found and held it before her right eye. The sun had set long ago, but the moon and brightest stars burned through the hazy sky just enough to reflect off the surrounding rocks. She couldn’t make out the thing in her hand. Her head …
But her fingers recognized what it was and sent the message to her brain.
A vial.
Bone, by the feel of it. Or horn, for it was pointed at the bottom. The other end had a piece of waxed felt as a plug. She considered prying it out with her teeth. But with the pain in her broken lips and head, she feared that might cause her to pass out. And then, she probably would not wake again.
Hweilan fumbled at the stopper with her other hand. Her fingers were cold, and it took her several tries to even get a grip. Then, a quick twist, and it came out.
The wet, loamy scent washed over her. Gunhin.
Kaad. He had been true to his word.
The vial didn’t hold nearly as much as he had given her before. But then, he had been healing the effects of poison, scalding, and whatever Maaqua’s magic arts had done to her.
Very carefully, so as not to spill a drop or cause her head any unnecessary movements, Hweilan brought the vial to her lips and dribbled in a few drops of the liquid. It hit her tongue like flaming spirits. The skin inside her cheeks and throat sizzled. Between one heartbeat and the next, every pore of her skin seemed to breathe outward, and Hweilan thought if she’d opened her eyes she might have seen steam coming out of her nose. The darkness in her left eye swirled and came back a blur, dark shadows mixed with slightly brighter shadows. But at least it was something.