“Shouldn’t we get out from under this?” Winna asked, raising her voice above the approaching storm.
“Yah,” Aspar agreed. “The question is where? And the answer is, I don’t know. Unless there’s squatters hereabout I don’t know of, there’s no place to go.”
A chattering swarm of swallows blew overhead, almost indistinguishable from the leaves caught up in the furious air. A raindrop the size of a quail’s egg spattered against the ground.
Aspar searched the landscape. Two weeks on the greffyn’s trail had taken them deep into the low-lying fens surrounding the Slaghish River. The Slaghish had its headwaters to the south, in the Mountains of the Hare, which was where the storm was coming from. If they didn’t find high ground, they would soon have flood to add to the worry of lightning.
It had been a long time since he had been here, and even then he’d just been passing through. Which side of the valley rose most quickly? In his recollection, there was a ridge pretty near in one direction, but leagues away in the other. And he suddenly remembered something else, too. Something Jesp had told him, many, many years ago.
“Let’s try this way,” he shouted.
“The river?”
“It looks like we can ford it, here.”
“If you say so.”
The water was already muddy and rough. They dismounted and felt their way across, Aspar first. At midstream the water came to his chest and nearly to Winna’s neck. The current quickened noticeably in the crossing; they wouldn’t be going back over anytime soon.
Across the river they remounted and rode east across the low ground.
A short time later, the rain arrived in earnest. Dry ground became scarce as the streams feeding the Slaghish rose, and Aspar feared he had made a mistake. He worried that they would have to clamber up a tree and cut the horses loose to fend for themselves.
But then, at last, the land began to rise, and they started climbing out of the valley. The rain was pounding now, a relentless curtain of gray. Aspar was soaked to the bone, and Winna looked miserable. The storm grew more violent, and limbs and whole trees shattered by lightning or wind fell all around them.
If what Jesp told him was true—and if the years hadn’t dimmed his own memory too much—the ridge ought to be stony, full of caves and shelters. Even a small overhang would be welcome.
It was with some relief that he found the rocky back of the ridge. Jesp might have told him honest, then, which was always a pleasant surprise. He had loved the old witch, after all, and after her fashion she had loved him.
They followed along the ridge, as overhead the sky went one shade of storm gray to the next darker. Night was falling, and still the tempest gathered strength.
His reckoning was good, though. While there was still just enough light to see, he found a jutting ledge that overhung a shelter comfortably large for the two travelers and their mounts.
“Thank the saints,” Winna said. “I don’t think I could have taken another moment of that.”
She looked pale and chill. It wasn’t so cold outside, but it was cooler than a human body, and rain washed away all warmth. Aspar unwrapped a tarp proofed against water with resin, and drew out a dry blanket.
“Take off your wet things and wrap in this,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
“Where are you going?”
“For firewood.”
“You think you’ll find something in that that will burn?” Her teeth were chattering.
“Yah. Change.”
“Well, turn your back.”
“I’m going.”
It took a while to find what he was looking for—pine lighter knot, dry wood in the rainshadow of the rocks, other stuff that would fume but eventually light. When he had a good armload, and a haversack full of tinder, he returned to the cave.
By then it was near dark. The worst of the thunder had moved off, but the wind was still snapping trees. Winna watched him silently, tightly wrapped in her blanket, as he nursed flame from the damp wood. He noticed she had unsaddled the horses and brushed them down.
“Thanks for taking care of Ogre and Angel,” he said.
She nodded thoughtfully. “Will we lose the trail?” she asked.
He shook his head. “The thing about the greffyn’s trail is it gets easier to follow the farther we fall behind it. Gives things more time to die.”
“What about the men?”
He hesitated. “You noticed that, did you?”
“Asp, I’m no tracker, never even hunted, but I’m not a fool either. The horse tracks are plain enough, and I see there’s more than one. And boots, now and then.”
“Yah.”
“You think someone else is following the greffyn?”
“No. I think someone is traveling with it.” He reluctantly explained his theory about the bodies at the sedos, the ones clearly killed by men, adding Sir Symen’s stories of similar murders, as well.
“Fifteen days it takes you to tell me this?” she said.
“I wasn’t sure they were with it, at first. The paths cross, part, then come back together.”
“Anything else you aren’t telling me?”
“The Sefry think this is the work of the Briar King.”
She paled further. “Do you believe that?” she asked.
“I didn’t at first.”
“But now you do?”
He hesitated an instant too long. “No.”
“But that’s just you, isn’t it, Asp? That would make you gullible, wouldn’t it, to admit they might be right.”
“Maybe I should have told you this from the start,” he replied. “Maybe then I could have talked you out of coming.”
“No. There you’re wrong.” Her face was set bravely, but he noticed her chin was quivering. He suddenly had a nearly overpowering urge to go fold her into his arms, keep her warm, tell her he was sorry to be such a closemouthed bastard, tell her everything would be fine.
“How can you hate the Sefry so, Aspar? When they raised you? When you loved one.”
That broke something cold in him, spilled something harsh. “That’s none of your damned business, Winna,” he rasped out.
When he saw the hurt on her face, he couldn’t look at her anymore. He was almost relieved when she silently stood and moved to where the horses were. He thought at first she might be crying, but discounted that. She was tough, Winna, not weepy like some women. Nosy, yes, but not weepy.
He wished he hadn’t snapped, but it was too late now, and apologizing wouldn’t make it better, would it?
The sky was still leaden the next day, but the rain was gone, leaving only a fog in the valley below. As Aspar had expected, the lowlands were flooded and would take several days to drain. He decided to continue south along the ridge; the gref-fyn’s path had been going roughly in that direction anyway.
They came across the telltale trail of dead and dying vegetation before midday. Any trace of the monster’s human escorts was gone, but he had expected no less.
As usual, they followed alongside the poison trail, rather than on it.
“The Briar King,” Winna said, for the first time breaking the frosty silence. “When I lived in Glangaf, we used to have a Briar King every year—you know, for the spring festival. He broke open the beer casks and led the dance. He gave us kids sugar candy and presents. When Father moved us to Colbaely to take my uncle’s business, they didn’t do that. The old women build wickermen and burn chickens up inside of them. They make the sign of evil if anyone says his name.”
“Yah. Colbaely’s closer to the forest, and its folk are mostly from the old stock. Not Virgenyans from over the mountains or steaders from the west. For the old folk, the Briar King is no laughing matter.”
“What do the Sefry say about him?”
Aspar cleared his throat with some reluctance. “That he was once a prince among the old gods, the ones who made the world. That while they all died, he was cursed to live. That his only wish is to die, but the only way for him to die is to destroy the world itself. The Scaosen, who killed the old gods, managed to bind him to sleep, but every age or so he wakes …” He frowned. “There is a woman, I kann, and a thief who tried to steal from him who is now part of the curse. And a doomed knight of some sort. The usual silliness. I never paid much attention.”