He beamed around, and Kell, glancing up, continued to sharpen Ilanna. "Good. Get her killed and gutted and skinned; we can put some donkey hooves in the stew."
"Ha ha," said Saark, smile wooden.
Kell stopped his honing and stared. "I'm serious. We're at risk of starving out here. As I've always maintained in the past, there's good eating on a donkey."
Mary brayed, nostrils flaring.
"You jest, surely?" said Saark.
"Leave him be," said Myriam, moving to examine the animal. It was indeed Mary, donkey, beast of burden, and Saark's honourable equine friend. She nuzzled Myriam's hand in a friendly fashion. "Are there any supplies still left in the basket?"
Saark rummaged around, and triumphantly produced dried beef, salt, sugar, coffee, arrows and blankets. "See, Kell, no need to kill my special friend. She has brought us much needed supplies! What a brave donkey. Yes you are, a brave donkey." He rubbed her snout.
Kell grunted.
Nienna moved close, and stroked Mary's muzzle. "I can't believe she found her way back. All that way!"
"Ahh, well," Saark stroked his neat moustache, "a clever creature, is your average donkey. You may think they're stubborn, and a bit docile, but I guarantee they have more brains than the majority of idiots you find in any smalltown tavern." He gave a meaningful glance to Kell, who was studiously ignoring both Saark and the donkey.
"Still. An incredible journey for a donkey," said Nienna. "Admirable. And that she managed to find you in the woods? What a stroke of luck!"
"She could smell his awful perfume," muttered Kell.
"You be quiet, old man," snapped Saark, bottom lip quivering a little, "just because you don't have a donkey of your own."
Kell stood, and stretched his back. He stared at Saark, a broad smile on his rough, bearded features. "Well lad," he grinned, and rubbed at his beard, and ran a hand through his shaggy, grey-streaked hair, and knuckled at weary eyes, then winked, "at least you'll have something to keep you warm under your blankets tonight, eh?"
And with that, he sauntered into the woods for a piss.
CHAPTER 5
Dawn was bright and crisp and cold. Snow clung to bare, angular branches, and in the magenta glow of a new morning the trees did indeed appear to be cast from iron. Most were huge, gaunt, stark against a brittle sky. Saark yawned, stretching, and opened his eyes to see Nienna sat by the fire, to which she'd added fuel and stoked it into life.
Saark rolled from under his blanket and shivered. "By the gods, it's cold out here."
"Did you sleep well, Saark?" Nienna didn't look up, but continued to prod the fire. Her voice was soft, lilting, like a delivery of fine soothing birdsong. Saark swallowed, and breathed deep.
"Yes, my sweet," he said.
She looked up then, and their eyes met, and Kell's snore interrupted the moment like a burst of crossbow quarrels. Saark glanced over to the old warrior, who had turned over in his slumber, boots poking from beneath his blanket. It was as if he was mocking Saark, even in sleep. I am watching you, boy, the sleeping warrior seemed to say. Touch my granddaughter and I'll carve you a second arsehole.
Saark crossed and sat opposite Nienna. He watched her for a while, her delicate movements, and with a start he realised… On their long journey, she had changed – from child, to adult. From girl, to woman. She was harder, leaner, fitter. Her eyes were creased, and her face, on the one hand weary from endless travelling and the threat of being hunted, was also radiant with a new, inner strength. This was a woman who had stared into the Abyss, and come back from the brink.
"How are you feeling?" asked Saark.
Nienna tilted her head, giving a half shrug. "Tired. What I'd give for a hot bath."
"Me too." Saark coughed. "I mean, on my own, not, not with… you." He stumbled to a halt. Flames crackled. Wood spat. In the Iron Forest, snow fell from branches. Mary's hooves crunched snow.
"Am I so hard to look at?" said Nienna, suddenly, tears in her eyes. "Am I so ugly?"
"No! No, of course not." Saark moved around the fire, and placed his arm around her shoulders. He gave her a gentle squeeze. "You are beautiful," he said.
She looked up into his face. Tears stained her pink cheeks. "You mean that?"
"Of course!" said Saark. "It's just, well, Kell, and that axe, and, well…"
"You always say that," snapped Nienna, and rubbed viciously at her tears, heaving Saark's arm from her shoulders. "I think, for you Saark, it is a convenient excuse."
"That's not true," said Saark, and placed his arm back over Nienna's shoulder. "Come here, Little One. And before you bite off my head with that savage snapping tongue, it's a term of affection, not condescension." Saark hugged Nienna for a while, and rocked her, and she placed her head against his chest – so recently violated, now repaired with advanced vachine healing.
• • • •
Nienna could hear Saark's heartbeat. It was strong. Like him. And she could smell his natural scent, and it made her head spin and her mouth dry. She could see stars. She could look into heaven and taste the ambrosia of a distant, fleeting promise.
Kell coughed. "Sleep well, did you?"
Saark eased his arm from Nienna's shoulders. "Don't be getting any wrong ideas, old man."
Kell leered at him from the dawn gloom. "I wasn't," he said, almost cryptically, and disappeared into the woodland for a piss. Saark glanced at Nienna, as if to say, See? My guardian devil, but she was looking at him strangely and he didn't like that look. He knew exactly what that look meant. It was a look a thousand women had given him over the years, and Saark knew about such things, because he was a beautiful man. But worse. He was a beautiful man without morals.
He shivered, in anticipation, as a ghost walked over his soul…
They ate a swift breakfast of dried beef, and set off through the Iron Woods, Saark leading Mary by a short length of frayed rope. The walking was hard; sometimes there were narrow trails to follow, but more often than not these petered out and they had to travel crosscountry, Kell leading the way and cursing as he fought the clawed fingers of the trees and tramped heavy boots through snow and tangled dead undergrowth.
After a few hours of walking and cursing, they stopped for a break. Or in the case of Saark, for a moan.
"My feet are frozen! We should build a fire."
"We haven't got the time," said Kell, face sour.
"Yes, but if my toes freeze solid I won't be able to walk. Even worse, I saw one man once, used to work over near Moonlake when we had those real bad falls a few years back. He was stranded, out on the Iopian Plains, out there for days he was. His toes went black and fell off!"
"They fell off?" said Nienna, aghast.
"I've seen this also. In the army," said Kell, removing his own boots and rubbing his toes. "The trick," he gave Saark a full teeth-grin, "is to keep moving. Keep the hot blood flowing. When you languish on your arse like a drunken dandy, that's when you get into trouble."
Saark ignored the insult, and gazed around. "But it is pretty," he announced. "Reminds me of a poem…"
"Don't start," snapped Kell. "I fucking despise poets."
"But look, old man! Look at the beauty! Look at the majesty of Nature!"
"The majesty of Nature?" spluttered Kell, and his face turned dark. "Where we're headed, boy, there's little majesty and lots of death."
Saark considered this, as Mary nuzzled his hand. "And where is that?" he said, finally, when Kell ignored the hint to continue.
"Balaglass Lake," said Kell.
"You're insane," said Myriam. "We can't travel there; it's poisoned land!"