Before long Sparrow began to complain. "Are we unable to find the road?"
"There's no road to Berland." Sir Gavin's voice carried back. "This trail is narrow on purpose."
Achan breathed on his fingers, making them moist. "Then how does one travel to Berland?" Before they freeze?
"No outsider travels to Berland," Sir Gavin said. "They're brought there."
Sparrow's heavy sigh hissed from behind him. "But should Berlanders travel elsewhere, they must have a way home. Why can we not take their road?"
"This is their road. Berlanders train their horses for these narrow hunting trails. They don't want it widely known where their stronghold is located."
Achan shifted in his saddle, his bruised body aching and saddle sore. He guessed eleven days had passed since Mirrorstone. Three nights in Melas, and he'd walked two days to Barth, but the other six had been spent on horseback. What did Sir Gavin have in mind once they freed the men from IceIsland? A long stay in Tsaftown where Achan might court Lady Tara? The idea seized him with a thrill of excitement and fear.
They rode all day, ate lunch on horseback, and kept going. TherionForest made noises similar to those in NaharForest. Pecking, the occasional flutter of wings, snapping branches. Just as Achan was beginning to crave his bedroll, a loud click, click, click, click, click, click, click sounded from the trees above.
Achan tipped his head back to the blackness above. The sound was right above him.
Wump wump wump.
"Something's up there." A clump of soft snow fell in his eyes. He lowered his head and wiped the moisture away.
"Probably an animal," Sparrow said.
"That's what I'm afraid of." Achan pulled his hood tight. "Do you know what kinds of animals live around here? Do you know what a cham is?"
Sparrow tsked. "A cham would not make such a sound."
"How do you know what sound a cham would make? Have you seen one?" Achan really wanted to see a cham, but not in Darkness, though a fire would be nice.
Click, click, click, click, click, click, click.
"I think a cham would roar," Sparrow said. "And if he did, we would see his fire."
Chee wa. Cheeee wa. Chee wa. Cheeee wa.
Achan looked again to the blackness above, shielding his eyes with his hand. "Then what do you suppose that one was?"
Sparrow didn't answer.
Picka picka picka picka picka picka picka.
Click, click, click, click, click, click, click.
Shweeeeeeeee.
Balls of yellow light illuminated the forest around them. "Black knights?" Achan reached to draw his sword and found his scabbard empty. His stomach clenched. Had it fallen?
"Not black knights." Sir Gavin said, calming his horse. "Don't fight them. All will be well."
Achan twisted on his saddle, feeling for Eagan's Elk, squinting for the glint of the blade in the pale light. The multitude of strange sounds seemed to magnify.
Shweeeeeeeee.
A furry beast fell from the treetops, hovering to Achan's right. Achan cried out. Metal scraped over wood on his left. He swiveled in his saddle. A fur-clad man held Eagan's Elk to his throat. These weren't beasts. They were men in fur clothing.
Achan lifted his hands above his head. The chilled air snaked in the gap of his cloak and up his torso.
"Where you go to?" the man holding Eagan's Elk asked.
"We travel to Berland to seek the hospitality of Duke Orson," Sir Gavin yelled. "We are friends of Prince Oren. The young man behind me carries his ring."
The creature glided over the back of Achan's horse, somehow hanging mid-air. He grabbed Achan's hand and inspected Prince Oren's ring, then drew Achan's hands behind his back. Achan tried to jerk free, but the man holding Eagan's Elk pulled a burlap sack over Achan's head. Achan stood in his stirrups and tried to throw himself from Scout's back. Strong hands gripped his shoulders while another rope was threaded under his arms, bound around his chest. Achan's muscles tensed. What had Sir Gavin meant by "Don't fight them"?
A hand slapped Achan's back, a voice yelled, "Hay oh!" and his body zipped into the air. He screamed as he flew, feet swinging out behind, ripping past branches. He sucked in a breath and burlap filled his mouth. He spit it out, desperately wanting to grab something. Before he could think what to do, his flight slowed. Hands caught his arms, pulled him forward.
His feet landed on a wood plank. The rope around his chest tugged away, and he was ushered along a platform that swayed under his trembling steps. In the distance, Sparrow screamed. Achan couldn't help but smile. The little fox was flying.
His captors led him along the wooden bridge for some time, surrounded by the bedlam of clicking and drumming. His breathing heated up the bag on his head, moistening his face. Soon, voices rose above the percussion, chanting in low tones.
"Hey ya hey! Hey ya ho! Hey ya ha! Hey no no!"
Achan's guides stopped. His wrists were freed. The sack slipped from his head and cold air engulfed his sweaty face.
A man's hairy, familiar face looked down, framed by fat, black, frizzy braids and curly sideburns. A small bone ring looped through the top of his left ear.
Shung Noatak, a man Achan had fought at Esek's coming-of-age tournament, grinned and slung a cape of furs around Achan's shoulders, blanketing him in warmth. He held out Eagan's Elk. "Little Cham. We have been expecting you."
22
Achan gripped the log railing and took in the scene. An entire village lived in the trees, built on branches and platforms. Wattle and daub huts perched at a myriad of levels, connected by rickety split-log staircases and narrow bridges.
Two levels down, a wide, round platform had been built into a clearing of tree trunks. A log banister edged the platform, forming an outdoor great hall. In the center, a low, circular stone hearth held a bonfire. People dressed in fur and leather danced around it. Smoke curled up from the flames, drifting out of the clearing in the treetops above. In the surrounding trees, blazing glass balls of colored light in red, blue, green, and yellow dangled from branches, railings, or lampstands that stood along the bridges.
Achan pointed at the nearest glass ball. "What is that?"
"Come. Shung will show you."
He led Achan along the bridge, down a short staircase, and across another gangway to a blue ball that hung from a lamp stand on a chain like a lantern. It had a round opening that let out heat and smoke from a blue torchlight burning inside.
"We call luminaria. Pleasant, no?"
"Aye. Very."
"Let go of me!" Sparrow's voice carried from the trees across the platform. "I can walk myself!"
Shung chuckled. "The small one did not like lift."
Achan scanned the staircases and bridges but did not see the boy. Stop making so much noise, Sparrow. You'll call the chams.
These fur men nearly killed me, yanking me into the trees like a bag of meat. And those, those…singers are making more noise than I am. "I said, I can walk myself!"
Shung started back down the stairs. "Another little cham?"
Achan followed. "Naw. That one's a fox."
"I heard that!" Sparrow called out.
"Little Cham has come to Berland. Shung is glad."
Achan looked into Shung's dark eyes, recalling their sword match at Esek's tournament months ago. Shung had won, technically. He'd also promised if Achan ever came to Berland, he'd take him hunting. "Are we going to hunt a cham?"