Foxmask (54 page)

He watched. His hands ached to pick up the bow, to sink an arrow in the broad back of Skapti or the strong chest of Einar, who was assembling a small group of men beyond the rocks there. Keeper's gaze sharpened. This was a departure from the usual way of things for Asgrim's forces. They seemed to be organizing themselves, forming up into three parties, and at the same time there were men posted at strategic points, armed with bow or thrusting-spear. The look on their faces was different too. Keeper sensed danger in those set jaws, those fierce eyes. Danger and challenge. Where had that come from? No time to ponder; he must move, quickly and invisibly, following one or other of their small squads, whichever looked most threatening. They were leaving men to guard the boats; the big, blond fellow was among those staying behind. Creidhe had said he was a fisherman; that was his boat. Before, they had never set a watch on the shore.

The groups moved off, fanning out across the hillside. They went cautiously, some prodding the ground for traps, while others covered their comrades with shields and weapons facing outward. The shields were new; in earlier hunts, they had borne no more than two or three between them. Someone had been busy. Keeper watched; in a moment, he would follow. His eyes were on the red-haired man. Creidhe had said,
Thorvald is no warrior
. It was evident that Creidhe had got it wrong. Keeper could see that in an instant. It was Thorvald whom they followed, Thorvald to whom they glanced for direction. Keeper could guess who had planned this careful advance, this ordered defense. It was not Asgrim who had changed the expressions on their faces. Creidhe's friend was not only a warrior today, he was the battle leader. And the Ruler was not here.

Keeper moved. He went by cliff face and tunnel, by rock cleft and shingly slope, ducking, sprinting, clinging, dodging. Year by year, season by season he had practiced his shadow-swift navigation of the rocky, precipitous terrain. He passed over it like a ghost, like a breath of wind.

Skapti's party went around the northern side of the island, skirting the cliffs, looking in holes and fissures and caverns. Hogni's group set off to the southeast. Here the hillside offered a broad view of the isles where the Unspoken had their strange dwellings. And Thorvald's warriors, with Einar in the lead, went up the center, still under shields, still bearing their weapons as if, at long last, they had learned how to use them. They reached a ridge part way up the steep, grass-covered fells skirting the Old Woman. There they dropped behind the cover of a rocky outcrop, perhaps to plan their next move. The advance had been well executed, smooth and orderly. But Keeper had been quicker. He was poised, now, far above where they lay believing
themselves concealed. Here, in this cleft of the rocks, he had throwing spears and the darts he had coated with a poison gleaned from a certain rare shellfish. Those had been a gift; the island had provided him with its own forms of assistance. He judged the enemy would come on upward, taking their time, perhaps spreading out farther to check for possible hiding places. If they investigated the caves on the northern side they would find a few surprises. They would not reach the hidden chamber on the southern side, where his two precious ones were hidden. He had made quite sure of that.

They'd avoided the more obvious of his traps so far; that showed more intelligence than he'd expected. Clearly, this Thorvald thought he was clever. Keeper would let him go on deluding himself awhile. Then he would show the red-haired man what a fool he was to believe any man could outwit the Isle of Clouds.

“Stay down,” Thorvald hissed. “If they've got any sense, they'll wait until we're spread out as far as possible and then strike. What's the likelihood of sending a couple of men up the gully there and having them cover us with their bows from the top?”

“I'll go,” someone volunteered.

“I'll come with you,” said a second man.

“Go on then,” Thorvald whispered. “Slowly. When you get up there, crouch down behind the big rock and keep a sharp lookout. If anything moves, shoot it.”

“What if it's him?” someone asked. “Foxmask?” This was a young voice, with an uneasy note in it.

“That's hardly likely,” said Thorvald. “They'll have him under lock and key somewhere, chained up in a cave or bolted into a hut. Anything that moves is the enemy. Apart from us, of course. Now go.”

The two men wriggled away, keeping low as they clambered up the cleft in the rocks. The others waited in silence. When the climbers were perhaps two thirds of the way up, there came a rattling, rolling sound from higher on the hill, and a shower of small pebbles cascaded down over Thorvald and Einar and the rest of their party. They put their shields up to cover their heads, or crouched with arms protecting skulls as the trickle of gravel became a shower of stones and then a thundering rain of rocks, from fist-sized pieces to great chunks heavy enough to crush a fellow's head. The noise was deafening; Thorvald thought he could hear a voice in it, a growling like a sleeping giant abruptly awoken:
Who dares set foot on my island?
And he
heard a cry of pain as well, from one of the two men caught in the gully. At least one of the missiles had found its mark.

The flood of stones dribbled to a halt; one or two small pebbles still rolled crazily down the hillside.

“Keep down,” Einar said in an undertone. “After that they'll expect us to back off. Egil, get up there fast and see who's hurt. Thorvald? What do you want to do?”

“Where do you think they are?” Thorvald ventured a quick look over the rocks that concealed them, turning his head to scan the hillside above. There were many vantage points up there, clumps of tortured bushes, grotesque rock piles, tricky undulations of the land. It was not possible to tell where the enemy was hiding, but one thing was certain: that had been no natural rock-slide.

“Einar?”

It was one of the younger men, Ranulf. His face was pale as milk and his voice shook.

“What?” Einar snapped, scowling.

“Didn't you hear it?” Ranulf whispered. “The voice?”

“Shut up,” said someone else testily. “Of course we heard it. If we let that stop us, we'd never get anywhere. You have to learn to shut your ears in this place, or you'd go crazy.”

A gust of wind passed over them, full of the smell of the sea. Above, birds circled, screaming. Whatever had silenced the gulls that morning as the boats had set out on their venture, it had not stilled this island's inhabitants, for the sky was alive with wings.

Egil crept back, expression grim. “Thorkel took a hit on the head; out cold, can't see what the damage is. I'll go back up and help get him down. Skolli's all right, just shaken. Looks like they're up yonder to the south, behind that outcrop, the one that looks like a fist. You'd never attack them there; they've got too big an advantage. Shall I go now?”

“Bring Thorkel down,” Einar said. “And be quick about it. You'll need to carry him back to the boats, we can't leave him here. Take him down, then get back up to us as fast as you can. Take young Ranulf with you, and watch out for traps on the way, they're everywhere. Skolli will stay with us; we're going on.” He glanced at Thorvald. “That's unless you want to change the plan?”

Thorvald shook his head. “No. But not straight up, in full view. Egil's right; that would be inviting attack. If I were the enemy, I'd plan to follow up with arrows, pick us off the instant we come into view. If Asgrim were here, what would you do next?”

“Retreat and regroup,” Einar said. “It makes sense. Moving up looks like suicide.”

“Mmm,” Thorvald said. “And retreating is just what the enemy expects us to do. Gather the men close. I have an idea . . .”

On the southern flank of the island, Hogni's men edged their way along a narrow path, trying hard not to look down. The coastline of the Isle of Clouds was, if anything, more hostile to intruders than their own Isle of Storms, which had its share of heart-stopping precipices and needle-sharp rock pinnacles. At one point Wieland went ahead to test a promising-looking path, broader and more level, which seemed to lead straight to the high vantage point that was their goal. He had taken one step, two steps onto the flat rocks of the ledge when his foot slipped oddly, his arms flailed for balance, and in an instant he had slid off the path and over the edge, plummeting toward the frothing waves far below. He shouted, and the sound echoed strangely around the crevices and crannies in the rocks, as if a whole chorus of unseen men screamed in alarm together. Hogni braced himself. The rope around his waist, joining him to Wieland, snapped violently taut. Behind Hogni, two other men sprang to support and steady him, to share the weight. They caught their breath shakily, then hauled as they had practiced on the cliffs by Asgrim's encampment. It was a quick, efficient job; soon enough, a white-faced Wieland emerged over the lip of the precipice to stand before them shaken and bruised but otherwise unhurt. The ledge had been slathered with some substance that rendered it slick as a weed-covered skerry yet could barely be detected by the eye.

“So, not that way,” Hogni remarked. “I wonder what they've got hidden up there? All right, we take the long route. It'll be ropes again at the end; looks like the only path to the top is straight up.”

They went on. In every man's mind, though nobody said it, was the knowledge that it had been Thorvald who had insisted on the ropes. But for that, Wieland would be dead, and Jofrid would have neither babes nor husband at her hearth. One of the men was whistling under his breath, a furtive sound that was part defiant victory song and part the expression of a body trembling with nervous tension.

“Shut up,” hissed Hogni, and they moved forward in silence, each step cautious, every eye intent on the hillside above, the track before and behind, scouring the bare landscape for any sign of the enemy. It was clear their opponents had expected them to pass this way; it could be assumed, then, that
warriors were waiting up ahead. Their own party was vulnerable here in single file, where well-aimed arrows could take them one by one. The ropes, then, would be something of a disadvantage.

“Quick as you can,” Hogni said. “As far as that rock that looks like an old crone with a big nose. That's where we start to climb. Einar's team will be well up the hill by now; we want to reach that upper ridge when they do, and check who's seen what. Step lively.”

Skapti's men took the northern route, avoiding the cliff paths, for on that side of the island they were scarcely navigable; it was considered less of a risk to make a way on open ground, sprinting from cover to cover and hoping all the time that the enemy was somewhere else. They made good progress, though the climb was taking its toll; their legs ached, and the farther they went with no sign of their adversary, the more jittery the men became. They had been ordered not to speak, and they followed their orders; only a fool would go out of his way to attract attention here. But a man could not silence his thoughts, and all of their thoughts were the same:
It was there, by that patch of scree, we lost Kolbein last year. Over there where the bushes curl under the wind's blast, we saw Havard die of a poison dart. That way lie the cliffs where four men fell to their deaths in the second hunt
. Skapti saw what was in their eyes and was powerless to change it, for the same images tormented him: so many comrades lost, so many good men slain, and all for nothing. Beneath that litany of losses, for Skapti, another tune played: a song of blind obedience, of terrible guilt, of deeds done and lies told that weighed heavy on him. He blinked and set his jaw. He was a warrior, and today he was a leader. He had no time for this.

“Forward, men,” he hissed, and they moved on up the stark hillside. In this part of the island, the contours dipped into pockets here and there, places well shielded by rocks, where reasonable shelter might be found. There were remnants of stone walls and crumbling, derelict huts. They stopped in one such small refuge to catch their breath, leaving a man on watch outside; this might be a snug hiding place, but it was also an ideal spot to be cornered. The back door, if you could call it that, opened onto a sheer drop down a bird-thronged cliff to raging waters below. Skapti looked around for signs of the enemy; such a good bolthole would surely bear some clues, some evidence of tenancy. He performed a cursory search, but could see nothing. They sat a brief while, resting their legs, sharing the contents of a water skin, checking their weapons, whispering what words of reassurance
they could find for one another. All agreed that, given the choice between this unsettling advance through a landscape which seemed, not deserted, but watching, breathing, waiting, and an open onslaught by armed warriors, they'd take the attack any day.

Time to move on. Skapti opened his mouth to give the order, then paused. One of the younger men, Hjort, was twiddling something between his fingers, a tiny scrap of cord or thread, which only caught Skapti's attention because of its bright, unusual hue, a rich red-violet. Such an item seemed greatly out of place in this landscape of dun and gray and green.

“What's that?” Skapti asked curtly. “Hjort?”

“Bit of wool, that's all.”

“Give me a look.” Skapti took the little thread from the other man and held it up, feeling the softness and the regularity of the yarn. Sewing wool: a women's thing, and dyed fine as any lady's best. “Where'd you get this?”

Hjort was looking guilty now; he had no idea what had sparked this sudden interest. “It was just lying around. On the rocks over there.”

Skapti strode across the small shelter, peering at the rock shelves, searching for more clues, but there was nothing to be found. After a little, he said, “All right, not a lot here. We'd best be off if we're to reach the top when the others do. Follow me.” He slipped the little scrap of wool into his pouch and, spear at the ready, walked out of the refuge, calm-faced. But inside, Skapti was less than calm. Guilt clawed at him, regret and confusion worried at his heart. This was something he could never show to Thorvald. It was a message from the gods, for him alone, to remind him of the evil he had done. For he had seen what the other men had not noticed, or had not understood: a single, long thread of hair twisted around the flower-bright wool, hair that was as fair as ripe wheat in sunlight.