As he walked on, he studied the box and noticed a worn spot on one corner. He pushed it. Nothing happened. He rubbed it, again without result. He tried sliding it, this way and that. He heard a tiny click from within. A sliver of wood moved aside, revealing a pin-sized hole beneath.
Raffalon had no pin, but he had the knife and a whole forest made of wood. He whittled a twig down to the right size, inserted it into the hole, and pushed. A plug of wood on the opposite side of the box popped out. When the thief applied pressure here and there, suddenly the carved side of the box slid sideways a small distance and revealed itself to be the top of the container that moved on a hidden hinge.
Inside was a lining of plush purple cloth, with a hollowed space in the middle in which rested a carved wooden figurine the size of his thumb. It had the likeness of a small, rotund personage, bald and probably male, with head inclined indulgently and mouth formed into an indulgent grin. Raffalon took the carving out, the better to examine it.
When his fingertips touched the smooth wood, a faint tingling passed along the digits, into his palm and through his arm, growing stronger as it progressed. Alarmed, he instinctively sought to fling the thing away from him but found that his fingers and arm refused to obey him. Meanwhile, the tingling sensation, now grown into a full-body tremor, reached its crescendo. For several moments, the thief stood, vibrating, in the middle of the forest road. His eyes rolled up into his head and his breathing stopped, his knees locked, and it seemed as if a strong wind passed through his skull from left to right.
Abruptly, the sensations ended and he had control of his body again—except when he tried once more to throw the carving from him. His arm obeyed him, but his hand did not. The treacherous extremity closed tightly around the smooth wood and all of Raffalon’s considerable will would not cause it to open.
Meanwhile, he heard a voice: We had better move. When the Vandaayo are ahunting, it does not do to lollygag.
Without much hope, the thief spun around. But there was no one there. The words had formed in his mind, without the involvement of his ears. His hand now opened and he addressed the object nestled comfortably in his palm. “What are you?”
It is a long story, said the voice that spoke in a place where he was accustomed to hear only his own. And I lack the energy to tell it.
Raffalon agreed with the sentiments about lollygagging. He set off again in the direction of Port Thayes, his gaze sweeping left and right as far up the forest track as he could see. But he had taken only two or three steps when his legs stopped, and he found himself turning around and returning the way he’d come.
The other way, said the voice. We have to rescue Fulferin. In Raffalon’s mind, an image appeared: a tall, lanky man in leather clothing, with a long-jawed face and eyes that seemed fixed on some faraway vista. The thief shook his head to drive the unwanted image away—rescuing mooncalves was not on his itinerary—but he struggled without success to regain control of his lower limbs.
The voice in his head said, You waste energy that you will need when we catch up to the Vandaayo. Another image blossomed on his inner screen: of half a dozen hunch-shouldered Vandaayo warriors, their heads bald, their ears and teeth equally pointed, their skins mottled in light and dark green. They jogged along a forest trail, two of them carrying a long, netted bundle slung between a pole.
He did not try to dispel the vision but examined it with some interest. He knew no one who had ever had an unobscured view of the Vandaayo; invariably, those who saw them clearly and up close—as opposed to a brief glimpse at a distance before the perceiver wisely turned tail and sped away—saw very little thereafter, except presumably the butcher’s slab set up next to the communal cauldron.
Raffalon knew what everyone knew: that they were a species created by Olverion the Epitome, an overweening thaumaturge of a bygone age who had meant the part-men to be a torment to his enemies. Unfortunately, the sorcerer had misjudged some element of the formative process, and his had been the first human flesh his creations had tasted.
Strenuous and repeated efforts by the surrounding communities had managed to confine the anthropophagi to the wild valley that had been Olverion’s domain. But all attempts to enter the deep-chasmed vale and eliminate the monsters once and forever had ended in bloody tatters: the thaumaturge had not stinted in instilling his creatures with a talent for warfare and an unalloyed genius for ambush.
Eventually, an undeclared truce established itself, the terms of which were that the local barons would not lead their levies into the valley so long as the Vandaayo left their towns and villages unmolested. The part-men could snatch their festive meat only from the road that passed through the forest on the west of the valley, and the trail that led over the mountains to the northeast. The locals knew the times of the year when the Vandaayo were on the prowl and avoided the thoroughfares in those seasons. Wanderers and drifters of the likes of Raffalon the thief and Fulferin the god’s man were welcome to take their chances.
The image of the anthropophagi faded from Raffalon’s mind as his legs marched him to the spot where the victim had been taken. Without pause, he turned away from the forest road and plunged through some bushes, almost immediately finding himself on a game trail. He saw deer scat but also the splay-footed tracks of the Vandaayo, instantly recognizable by the webbing and the pointed impression made in the soft earth by the downcurved talon on the great toe.
The tracks led toward Vandaayoland. Raffalon also saw droplets of blood on a bush beside the trail. No sooner had he registered these details than he was striding along in pursuit.
Within the confines of his skull, he said, “Wait! We must find a quiet place and discuss this business!”
His pace did not slacken, but the voice in his mind said, What is there to discuss?
“Whether it will succeed if you fail to gain my cooperation!”
The man had the sense that the deity was thinking about it. Fairly said. It would drain my energy less. Let us find a spot out of view.
The trail led them through a quiet glade bisected by a meandering stream. The thief saw a thick-strand willow, and said, “Here will do.” He ducked beneath the willow withes and sat on one of the gnarled roots, peered through the green screen until he was sure he was the clearing’s only occupant. Then he addressed the little piece of carved wood in his hand and repeated his original question: “What are you?”
Less than I was, less than I shall be.
Raffalon groaned. In his experience, entities that spoke in such a high-toned manner tended to have an acute regard for themselves that was inversely matched by a lack of concern for the comfort of those who minioned for them—indeed, even for their continued existence.
On the other hand, his captor’s determination to rescue the unfortunate Fulferin betokened some capacity for consideration of others’ needs. Perhaps terms could be negotiated. He put the proposition to the piece of wood.
I see no need for terms, said the voice, its tone maddeningly calm. Fulferin is in need of rescue. You are between engagements. One is a high imperative, the other mere vacancy.
“Who says I am between engagements?”