Chronicles of Ancient Darkness Part 27

'And I will,' said Fin-Kedinn. 'I will keep you safe. But put Dari down. Let him come to me. Let me take him to his mother.'

Oslak's face went slack.

'Put him down,' repeated Fin-Kedinn. 'It's time for his nightmeal . . .'

The power of his voice began to work. Slowly Oslak unwound the boy's arms from his neck and lowered him onto the wicker.

Dari gazed up at him as if seeking permission, then turned and crawled towards Fin-Kedinn.

Fin-Kedinn shifted onto one knee and reached for him.

The pine-cone auroch slipped from Dari's fist and into the water. With a squeal Dari grabbed for it. Fin-Kedinn caught him by the jerkin and swept him into his arms.

On the bank, the Ravens breathed out.

Torak's knees sagged. He watched the Raven Leader rise and edge sideways towards the bank. When he drew near, Thull grabbed Dari and held him tight.

On the walkway, Oslak stood like a stunned auroch. The rope slipped from his hand as he gazed at the churning water. Silently Fin-Kedinn went back for him and took him by the shoulders, speaking in words no-one else could hear.

Oslak's body slumped, and he let Fin-Kedinn lead him to the bank where men seized him and forced him down. He seemed puzzled, as if unsure how he'd got there.

Torak found his way to the shallows, dropped his spear in the sand, and began to shake.

'Are you all right?' said Renn. Her dark-red hair was wet with spray, her face so pale that her clan-tattoos were three dark stripes on her cheeks.

He nodded. But he knew she wasn't fooled.

Further up the bank, Fin-Kedinn was speaking to Saeunn, who'd climbed down from the Rock. 'What's wrong with him?' he said as the clan gathered around them.

The Raven Mage shook her head. 'His souls are fighting within him.'

'So it's some kind of madness,' said Fin-Kedinn.

'Maybe,' replied Saeunn. 'But not a kind I've ever seen.'

'I have,' said Torak. Quickly he told them about the Boar Clan hunter.

As the Mage listened, her face grew grim. She was the oldest in the clan by many winters. Age had blasted her, polishing her scalp to the colour of old bone, sharpening her features to something more raven than woman. 'I saw it in the bones,' she rasped. 'A message. "It is coming."'

'There's something else,' said Renn. 'When I was hunting, I met a party of Willow Clan. One of them was sick. Sores. Madness. Terrible fear.' Her eyes were dark as peat pools as she turned to Saeunn. 'The Willow Clan Mage sends you word. He too has been reading the bones, and for three days they've told him one thing, over and over. "It is coming."'

People made the sign of the hand to ward off evil. Others touched their clan-creature skins: the strips of glossy black feathers sewn to their jerkins.

Etan, an eager young hunter, stepped forwards, his face perplexed. 'I left Bera on the hill, checking the deadfalls. She had blisters on her hands. Like Oslak's. I did wrong to leave her, didn't I?'

Fin-Kedinn shook his head. His face was unreadable as he stroked his dark-red beard, but Torak sensed that his thoughts were racing.

Swiftly the Raven Leader gave orders. 'Thull, Etan. Get some men and build a shelter in the lime wood, out of sight of camp. Take Oslak there and keep him under guard. Vedna, you're not to go near him. I'm sorry, but there's no other way.' He turned to Saeunn, and his blue eyes blazed. 'Middle-night. A healing rite. Find out what's causing this.'

FOUR.

The Mage's apprentice took an auroch-horn ladle and scooped hot ash from the fire. She poured it, still smoking, into her naked palm.

Torak gasped.

The apprentice didn't even wince.

At her feet Oslak clawed the dust, but the bindings held fast. He was strapped to a horse-hide litter, awaiting the final charm. Bera had already undergone it, and was back in the sickness shelter: screaming, sicker than ever.

The Raven Mage and her apprentice had tried everything. The Mage had daubed the sick ones' tongues with earthblood to draw out the madness. She had tied fish-hooks to her fingers and gone into a trance to snare their drifting souls. She'd shrouded them in juniper smoke to chase away the worms of sickness. Nothing had worked.

Now a hush fell on the Ravens as she prepared for the final charm. Firelight flickered on their anxious faces.

It was a hot, clear night, with a gibbous moon riding high above the Forest. The wind had dropped, but the air was full of noises. The creak of the smoking-racks. The caws of the ravens in the gorge. The roar of the rapids.

The Mage stepped towards the litter, her bony arms reaching to the moon. In one hand she gripped her amulet; in the other, a red flint arrow.

Torak darted a glance at the Mage's apprentice, but her face was a blank mask of river clay. She didn't look like Renn any more.

'Fire to cleanse the name-soul,' chanted Saeunn, circling the litter.

Renn squatted beside Oslak and trickled hot ash onto his naked feet. He moaned, and bit his lips till they bled.

'Fire to cleanse the clan-soul . . .'

Renn poured ash over his heart.

'Fire to cleanse the world-soul.'

Renn smeared ash on his forehead.

'Burn, sickness, burn . . .'

Oslak screamed with fury, and spattered the Mage with b.l.o.o.d.y foam.

A ripple of dismay ran through the clan. The charm wasn't working.

Torak held his breath. Behind him the Forest stilled. Even the alders had ceased their fluttering to await the outcome.

He watched Saeunn touch the arrow to Oslak's chest, tracing a spiral. 'Come, sickness,' she croaked. 'Out of the marrow into the bone. Out of the bone into the flesh . . .'

Suddenly Torak clutched his belly in pain. As the Mage chanted the words, something sharp had twisted inside him.

Slowly she drew the spiral over Oslak's heart. 'Out of the flesh into the skin. Out of the skin into the arrow . . .'

Again that pain, as if her words were tugging at his insides . . . Is this the sickness? he thought. Is this how it starts?

A firm hand gripped his shoulder. Fin-Kedinn stood beside him, watching the Mage.

'Out of the arrow -' cried Saeunn, rising to her feet '- and into the fire!' She plunged the arrow into the embers.

Green flames shot skywards.

Oslak screamed.

The Ravens hissed.

Saeunn's arms dropped to her sides.

The spell had failed.

Torak clutched his belly and fought waves of blackness.

Suddenly, a dark shape flew into the firelight. It was the clan guardian, heading straight for him. He tried to duck, but Fin-Kedinn held him steady. Just in time, the raven swerved. It was angry: its clan was under attack. Torak had no idea why it had flown at him.

He tried to catch Renn's eye, but she was kneeling by Oslak, peering at the marks he'd clawed in the dust.

Twisting out of Fin-Kedinn's grip, Torak ran between the watchers, out of the camp, and into the Forest.

He reached a moonlit glade and collapsed against an ash tree. The giddiness came again. He doubled up and began to retch.

An owl hooted.

Torak raised his head and stared at the cold stars glinting through the black leaves of the ash tree. He slid to the ground with his head in his hands.

The dizziness had subsided, but he was still shaking. He felt frightened and alone. He couldn't even tell Renn about this. She was his friend, but she was also the Mage's apprentice. She mustn't know. No-one must know. If he was sick, he'd rather die alone in the Forest than strapped to a litter.

Then a terrible suspicion took hold of him. They are eating my souls, Oslak had said. Was that the rambling of a madman, or did it hide a kernel of truth?

Shutting his eyes, he tried to lose himself in the night sounds. The warble of a blackbird. The wheezy cries of the fledgling robins in the undergrowth.

All his life, Torak had roamed the hills and valleys with his father, keeping separate from the clans. The creatures of the Forest had been his companions. He hadn't missed people. It was hard, living with the Ravens. So many faces. So little time alone. He didn't belong. Their ways were too different from how he'd lived with Fa.

And he missed Wolf so much.

It had been after Fa was killed that he'd found the cub. For two moons they'd hunted together in the Forest, and faced terrible dangers. At times Wolf had been like any other cub, getting in the way, and poking his muzzle into everything. At others he was the guide, with a mysterious certainty in his amber eyes. But always he was a pack-brother. Being without him hurt.

Often, Torak had thought about going in search of him; but deep down he knew he'd never find the Mountain again. As Renn had said with her usual bluntness, 'Last winter was different. But now? No, Torak, I don't think so.'

'I know that,' he'd replied, 'but if I keep howling, maybe Wolf will find me.'

In six moons, Wolf had not found him. Torak had tried telling himself that that was a good sign: it meant Wolf must be happy with his new pack. But somehow, that hurt most of all. Had Wolf forgotten him?

Faint and far away, voices floated on the wind.

Torak sat up.

It was a wolf pack. Howling to celebrate a kill.

Torak forgot his dizziness forgot everything as the wolf song flowed over him like a river.

He made out the deep, strong voices of the lead wolves; the lighter howls of the rest of the pack, weaving respectfully around them; the cubs' wobbly yowls as they tried to join in. But the one voice that he longed to hear was not among them.

He had known that it would not be. Wolf his Wolf ran with a pack far to the north. The wolves he heard now were in the east, in the hills bordering the Deep Forest.

But he still had to try. Shutting his eyes, he cupped his hands to his mouth and howled a greeting.

Instantly the wolves' voices tightened.

Where do you hunt, lone wolf? howled the lead female. Sharp. Commanding.

Many lopes from you, Torak replied. Tell me. Is there sickness in your range?

He wasn't certain he'd got that right, and sure enough, the wolves didn't seem to understand.

Our range is a good range! they howled, offended. The best range in the Forest!

He hadn't really expected them to grasp his meaning. His knowledge of wolf talk was not precise, his ability to express himself even less so. And yet, he thought with a pang, Wolf would have understood.

Abruptly, the wolf song ceased.

Torak opened his eyes. He was back in the moonlit glade among the dark ferns and the ghostly meadowsweet. He felt as if he'd woken from a dream.

A shallow thrumming of wingbeats, and he turned to see a cuckoo on a snag, staring at him with a yellow-ringed eye.

He remembered Oslak's sneer. You're not one of us! You're a cuckoo! The rambling of a madman, but with a kernel of truth. The cuckoo gave a squawk and flew off. Something had startled it.

Noiselessly Torak rose to his feet. His hand crept to his knife.

In the bright moonlight, the glade seemed empty.

A short way to the east, a stream flowed into the Widewater. Quietly he searched the bank for tracks. He found none; nor any hairs caught on twigs, or subtly displaced branches.

But someone was here. He could feel it.

He raised his head and stared into the beech tree above him.

A creature glared down at him. Small. Malevolent. Hair like dead gra.s.s, and a face of leaves.

He saw it for an instant. Then a gust of wind stirred the branches and it was gone.