“No adult males?”
“None I could see.”
“Why not? Where are they?”
“I can’t be sure, Jup, but I think this is a dispossessed camp.”
“I’m still learning your ways, remember. What does that mean?”
“When a male orc’s killed in military service, and his commander says it’s cowardice, the dead warrior’s mate and orphans are cast out. Some of the dispossessed band together.”
“The rule’s being rigidly applied since we came under Jennesta,” Coilla added.
“They’re left to fend for themselves?” Jup asked.
Stryke nodded. “It’s an orc’s lot.”
“What did you expect?” Coilla said, reading the dwarf’s expression. “A stipend and a tithed farm?”
Jup ignored the sarcasm. “Any idea what killed them, Captain?”
“Not yet. Mass suicide’s not impossible, though. It’s been known. Or maybe they —”
“Stryke!”
Haskeer was standing by the smallest hut, waving him over. Stryke went to him. Coilla, Jup and some of the others followed.
“One of ’em’s still alive in there.” Haskeer jerked his thumb at the entrance.
Stryke peered into the gloom. “Get Alfray. And bring a torch!” He entered.
There was just one prone figure, lying on a bed of filthy straw. Stryke approached, and heard strained breathing. He stooped. In the poor light he could just make out the features of an old orc female. Her eyes were closed and her face glistened under a film of perspiration.
A murmur at Stryke’s back heralded Alfray’s arrival.
“Is she wounded?”
“Can’t tell. Where’s that torch?”
“Haskeer’s bringing it.”
The aged orc’s eyes opened. Her lips trembled, as though she were trying to say something. Alfray bent to listen. There was a final outrush of breath, like a sigh, and the distinctive sound of the death rattle.
Haskeer came in with a burning brand.
“Give it here.” Alfray took the torch and held it over the dead female.
“Gods!”
He quickly pulled away from her, nearly colliding with Stryke.
“What is it?”
“Look.” Alfray stretched the torch at arm’s length, bathing the corpse in light.
Stryke saw.
“Get out,” he said. “Both of you.
Now!
”
Haskeer and Alfray scrambled to exit, Stryke in their wake.
Outside, the rest of the band had gathered.
“Did you touch her?” Stryke demanded of Haskeer.
“Me? No . . . no, I didn’t.”
“Or any of the other dead?”
“No.”
Stryke turned to the Wolverines. “Did
any
of you touch the corpses?”
They shook their heads.
“What’s going on, Stryke?” Coilla asked.
“Red spot.”
Several of the band stepped back on reflex. Exclamations and curses ran through the ranks. Grunts began covering their mouths and noses with kerchiefs.
Jup hissed, “
Bastard
humans.”
“The horses can’t get it,” Stryke said. “We’ll take them. I want us out of here fast. And burn everything!”
He snatched the torch from Alfray and hurled it into the hut. The straw caught immediately. In seconds the interior was an inferno.
The band dispersed to spread the fire.
Delorran’s boot crunched against something. Looking down, he found he’d trodden on a broken slab of wood displaying part of a neatly painted word.
It read:
Homef
He kicked it aside and returned his attention to the burnt-out human settlement. His troopers were sifting through the ruins, rummaging in debris, upending charred planks, disturbing clouds of ash dust.
The search had begun before dawn. Now it was early afternoon and they were no nearer finding anything of importance, least of all the cylinder. Nor was there any sign of what had happened to the Wolverines. That much had been obvious from shortly after they arrived, and Delorran had sent out parties to scour the surrounding area for clues. None had yet returned.
He paced the compound. An unseasonable wind was gusting in from the north, picking up bite as it funnelled over the chalky line of far-off glaciers. The Captain puffed into his cupped hands.
One of his sergeants came away from the search and trotted toward him. He shook his head as he approached.
“Nothing?” Delorran said.
“No, sir. Neither the item nor any orc bones in the ashes. Only human.”
“And we know none of the scavengers reported collecting Wolverine corpses for their pyres after the battle, except possibly a couple of grunts. Stryke and most of his officers are well enough known to be recognised, so we can take that as true.”
“Then you reckon they’re still alive, sir?”
“I never really doubted it. I couldn’t see a quality band losing out to the kind of opposition they met here. The real mystery is what’s happened to them.”
The sergeant, a stolid veteran, his tattoos of rank fading, was better suited to combat than solving riddles. The best he could do was remind Delorran of another puzzle. “What about the empty cellar in the barn, Captain? You think that’s anything to do with it?”
“I don’t know. But a cleaned-out silo, not even a grain, at a time when you’d expect to find corn down there seems odd. I’d wager the humans were using it to store
something
.”
“Loot?”
“Could be. What it comes to is that the Wolverines aren’t dead, they’re gone; and it looks like they’ve taken at least one valuable with them.”
Delorran’s rivalry with the Wolverines’ leader and his belief that he, not Stryke, should have been given command of the band were widely known. As was the long-standing animosity between their respective clans. Aware of the possibility that Delorran might have his own reasons for questioning Stryke’s honesty, and the shoals of inter-clan politics, the sergeant made no comment. He kept to a neutral “Permission to resume duties, sir.”
The Captain waved him away.
Well beyond midpoint, the arching sun continued its inexorable journey across the sky. Half his allotted time used up, Delorran’s apprehension was growing. He should be heading back for Cairnbarrow in the next couple of hours to meet the deadline. And quite possibly his death.
A rapid decision had to be made.
There were three options. Finding the cylinder here and returning home in triumph seemed less likely by the minute. That left going back without it and facing Jennesta’s wrath, or disobeying orders and continuing to look for the Wolverines.
Cursing the Queen’s impatience, he agonised about what to do.
His deliberations were interrupted by the appearance of two of the scouts he’d sent out earlier.
They reined in their lathering horses beside him. One rider was a lowly grunt, the other a corporal. The latter dismounted.
“Pack four reporting, sir!”
Delorran gave him a curt nod.
“I think our group’s come up with something, sir. We’ve found signs of a fight south of here, in a small valley.”
A fragile hope stirred in the Captain’s breast. “Go on.”
“The place is littered with dead kobolds, kirgizils and horses.”
“Kobolds?”
“From the lizard tracks down the valley sides it looks like they ambushed somebody.”
“Doesn’t mean it was the Wolverines. Unless you found any of their bodies.”
“No, sir. But we came across discarded rations, standard orc issue. And this.” The corporal dug into his belt pouch and retrieved the find. He dropped it on to Delorran’s outstretched palm.
It was a necklace of three snow-leopard fangs, its strand broken.
Delorran stared at it, absently fingering the five identical trophies looped around his own throat. Orcs were the only race that wore these particular emblems of their mettle, and they were a prerequisite of the officer class.
He made his decision.
“You’ve done well.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Your group will lead us to this valley. Meanwhile, I want you to find yourself a fresh horse and carry out a special mission.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Congratulations, Corporal. You’re going to get home earlier than the rest of us. I need you to carry a message to Cairn-barrow with all speed. For the Queen.”
“Sir.” This time there was a slight hesitancy in the corporal’s response.
“You’re to deliver the message to General Kysthan personally. No one else. Is that understood?”
“Sir.”
“The General is to tell Jennesta that I have a lead on where the Wolverines have gone and am in hot pursuit. I’m sure I can catch them and return the item the Queen desires. I beg more time, and will send further messages. Repeat that.”
The corporal paled a little as he recited it. He didn’t doubt it wasn’t what Jennesta would want to hear. But he was disciplined enough, or fearful enough, to obey orders without question.
“Good,” Delorran said. He handed back the necklace. “Give this to the General and explain how it was found. Best pick a couple of troopers to go with you, and burn hell for leather. Dismissed.”
Gloomy-faced, the corporal remounted and made off, the silent grunt in his wake.
Delorran was giving Jennesta no choice. It was a dangerous ploy, and his only chance of surviving it lay in recovering the artifact. But he couldn’t see another way.
He consoled himself with the thought that she had to be amenable to reason, notwithstanding her dreadful reputation.
Jennesta finished eviscerating the sacrifice and laid down her tools.
Her work had left a sizeable opening in the cadaver’s chest, and entrails dangled wetly from his excavated abdomen. But her skill was such that only one or two tiny crimson flecks stained her diaphanous white shift.
She went to the altar and used the flame of a black candle to light another bundle of incense sticks. The heady fug already perfuming the chamber grew thicker.
A pair of her orc bodyguards were moving back and forth clutching heavy buckets in both hands. One of them spilled a dribble of the contents, leaving a thin trail on the flagstones.
“Don’t waste that!” she snapped irritably. “Unless you want to replace it yourselves!”
The guards exchanged furtive looks, but exercised more care as they lugged their pails to a large round tub and emptied them into it. The tub was built like a barrel, with seasoned wooden uprights sealed at the joins and embraced by metal hasps. It differed from a barrel in having much lower sides, and in being big enough to comfortably hold a reclining dray horse, should Jennesta choose to use it for such a purpose. Which as far as her orc attendants were concerned was not beyond the bounds of possibility.
She walked over to the vessel and contemplated its interior. The orcs returned, the muscles on their arms standing out as they hauled four more buckets. Jennesta watched as they tipped in the load.
“That’ll do,” she said. “Leave me.”
They bowed, demonstrating a peculiarly orcish form of inelegance. The echoing thump of the weighty door marked their departure.
Jennesta turned back to the tub of fresh blood.
She knelt and breathed deep of its unique aroma. Then she swished her fingertips through the viscous liquid. It was warm, not far short of body temperature, which made it a better medium. As an agent of the ritual it would intensify the power that had once come naturally but these days had to be nourished.
Her cat sashayed into range, meowing.
Jennesta stroked her between the ears, light fingers softly massaging the animal’s furry crown. “Not now, my love, I have to concentrate.”
Sapphire purred and slunk away.
Jennesta focused on her meditations. Brow furrowed, she began reciting an incantation in the old tongue. The strange concatenation of guttural and singsong phrases rose from a near whisper to something resembling a shriek. Then it fell and climbed again.
The candles and torches scattered around the chamber billowed in an unseen wind. Somehow the very atmosphere seemed to compress, to converge and bear down on the tub’s scarlet cargo. The blood rippled and churned. It sloshed about disgustingly. Bubbles appeared and burst, sluggishly, releasing wisps of foul-smelling rust-coloured vapour.
Then the surface settled and rapidly coagulated. A crust formed. It took on a different aspect, a rainbow effect, like oil on water.
Beads of perspiration dotted Jennesta’s forehead and lank strands of hair were plastered to it. As she looked on, the clotted gore gently shimmered as though lit by an inner radiance. A wavering image started to form slowly on the lustre.
A face.
The eyes were its most striking feature. Dark, flinty, cruel. Not unlike Jennesta’s own. But overall the face was much less human than hers.
In a voice that might have been coming from the depths of a fathomless ocean, the phantasm spoke.
“What do you want, Jennesta?”
There was no element of surprise in the imperious, disdainful tone.
“I thought it was time we talked.”
“Ah, the great champion of the incomers’ cause deigns to speak to me.”
“I do
not
champion humans, Adpar. I simply support certain elements for my own benefit. And for the benefit of others.”
That was greeted by a mocking laugh.
“Self-deceiving as ever. You could at least be honest about your motives.”
“And follow
your
example?” Jennesta retorted. “Pull your head from the sand and join with me. Then perhaps we’d stand a better chance of preserving the old ways.”
“We
live
the old ways here, without stooping to consort with humans, or asking their permission. You’ll come to regret allying yourself with them.”
“Mother might have taken a different view on that.”
“The blessed Vermegram was great in many ways, but her judgement was not perfect in all respects,”
the apparition replied frostily.
“But we cover old ground. I don’t suppose it was your intention to engage in small talk. Why are you troubling me?”
“I want to ask you about something I’ve lost.”
“And what might that be? A hoard of gems, perhaps? A prized grimoire? Your virginity?”
Jennesta clenched her fists and held her building irritation in check. “The object is an artifact.”