Son of a Dark Wizard (12 page)

But the hut was empty. The lanterns and
sticks of incense had been extinguished. Sorren’s walking stick was
propped up against the bed, which looked as if it hadn’t been used
the night before, its blankets folded neatly on top. Not even the
young wizard’s raven was sitting around. Sage took the walking
stick with him and left the hut.

The men, women, and children of Owl’s Grave
were gathered in a wide clearing not far from where the bonfire had
been roaring the night before. They stood in small groups or sat on
long pine logs scattered throughout the clearing, hunched over
wooden bowls and plates, eating breakfast. Cloaked in their wild
furs, they all looked like strange beasts from ancient legends.

Sage scanned the small crowd until he spotted
Maewyn. Her blue and purple hair made her stand out. She sat next
to a small group of children, enthusiastically talking with them
about something. Sage approached her from behind. She turned as he
neared, as if she’d been expecting him. The children glanced up at
him.

“We have bread, porridge, sausage,” Maewyn
said, pointing to the side of the clearing where trays of food sat
on several tables. A wide steaming pot hung over a small fire,
where a young man stood ladling out something thick and creamy to
people holding out their bowls. “Help yourself,” Maewyn said,
smiling.

Sage held out Sorren’s walking stick. “Have
you seen So . . . um . . . Shadowvin?
He left his walking stick by his bed.”

“He left,” Maewyn said.

“Left?”

“He went with the hunt,” a boy sitting beside
Maewyn said. He looked to be around nine or ten years old, and wore
a hat that looked like it had once been a raccoon. Its tail hung
down the side of his face. “My brother’s on the hunt too.”

“The hunt?” Sage repeated.

“The final hunt of the season,” Maewyn said.
“It’s what we were preparing for last night. Your friend Shadowvin
insisted on joining the hunting team.”

“He said he was a great hunter,” the boy with
the raccoon hat said.

“Is he not?” Maewyn asked.

“It’s not something he ever bragged to me
about,” Sage said. He twisted the walking stick in his hand. “So
his leg is healed already?”

“It’s unlikely,” Maewyn said. “But he didn’t
seem to be in any pain.”

Sage leaned on the walking stick, wondering
how much pain Sorren was forcing himself through. “The hunt lasts a
week, right?”

“Usually,” Maewyn said. “It depends on how
much they catch, and how quickly. Why? Will Shadowvin slow the team
down? Did we make a mistake letting him go? He
is
quite
young.”

“Even younger than my brother,” the
raccoon-hat boy said.

Sage finally understood what Sorren was
doing. He was going to use his wizardry to help with the hunt and
speed things along. Then they’d get the tools they needed to repair
the airship. Sage only hoped Sorren wouldn’t reveal his identity in
the process. If any of these people discovered he was a wizard of
the Nyrish power . . .

“Is something wrong?” Maewyn asked.

Sage realized he was staring off into the
forest with a blank expression. He faked a smile and looked at
Maewyn and the children. “No,” he said. “Shadowvin will be fine.
He’ll do well on the hunt.” He jabbed the walking stick in the air,
mimicking a spear being driven into a wild animal. “He enjoys that
sort of thing.” He dug the bottom of the walking stick into the
dirt and left it sticking out of the ground like some sad
branchless tree. “I, on the other hand, enjoy a hot meal.” And he
walked off for some breakfast.

* * *

“And what’s the largest animal one could
catch?” Sorren asked as he followed the hunting team, trudging
through the forest’s thick underbrush. Every step sent icy pain
shooting up through his leg, but he ignored it.

The leader of the hunting team, Rozzom,
looked back over his shoulder. “That would be a rire,” he said. He
wore the same wolf skin he’d worn the night before, only now the
wolf’s head sat atop his own like a hat, giving him the appearance
that his face was being swallowed whole under the dead creature’s
long fangs.

There were thirteen members of the hunting
team. Most were older than thirty and they carried spears and
knives, crossbows and swords. Three were in their late teens or
early twenties. Sorren had made himself the fourteenth and youngest
member. For now, he walked behind the rest of the team, keeping in
stride with the second youngest member, a young man called Baylet.
He was clad in the white furs of what looked like some strange
giant mountain goat. A pair of sharp horns spiraled out of the fur
on Baylet’s head.

“A rire?” Sorren repeated. He had heard of
the beasts, but had never actually seen one. He hadn’t realized
there were rires in these woods.

“Twice the size of a mountain bear,” Baylet
said. “They look like giant dogs. Long white fur with large patches
of color.”

I know what they look like
, Sorren
wanted to say.
I’m not a complete dolt
. But he held his
tongue.

“We only ever caught one before,” Baylet
said. “Well, Rozzom did.”

“With plenty of help,” Rozzom said, leading
the team up a steep incline. “Watch your step here.” He grabbed
hold of the dark mossy boulders protruding from the hill to pull
himself up. “It takes at least three men to take down a rire. Don’t
go after one on your own. They can be very aggressive. I doubt it
would even be worth our time trying to catch one, but if you see
one, fourth whistle. Oh, wait.” He paused halfway up the hill and
turned back to face Sorren. “You don’t have a whistle, Shadowvin,
do you?”

“No,” Sorren said.

“I completely forgot to bring extras,” Rozzom
said.

“I have an extra,” Baylet said, padding the
tools and equipment dangling from his belt. “Here,” he said,
holding out a narrow whistle, two hand-widths in length. “Used to
be my father’s.”

Sorren took the whistle. It seemed like a
delicate piece of artwork. Intricate designs were carved along its
sides, tiny images of men running through forests, swimming across
rivers, and staring up at the moons. They almost seemed to tell a
story.

As the team continued deeper into the
forests, Baylet taught Sorren how they used the whistles to send
different signals through the forest. “First whistle” meant game
had been spotted and to be quiet and alert until further notice.
“Second whistle” meant the game had escaped. “Third whistle” meant
game had been caught. “Fourth whistle” meant game had been spotted
and assistance was needed. “Fifth whistle” meant it was time to
gather for a break. Finally, “sixth whistle” was a distress signal,
a call for help.

Sorren practiced each signal as quietly as he
could until he was confident he remembered all of them.

“Oh, and we’re not allowed to kill any owls,”
Baylet said.

“Why not?” Sorren asked.

Baylet shrugged. “Bad luck I guess. Maewyn
says that they protect us. That this is their forest.”

“I haven’t even seen any owls yet,” Sorren
said.

“They do keep their distance.” Baylet glared
up at the branches above. “But they’re somewhere up there. A whole
army of them.”

Sorren thought about warning the team not to
kill any ravens either. He didn’t want Quove getting an arrow
through the heart. But he knew it wouldn’t be necessary. Quove
could take care of herself.

The hunting team walked more slowly now.
Sorren guessed by the light of the sky that it was two or three
hours until noon. It was odd being awake during daylight. It felt
as if the world belonged to different people. Sorren almost felt
abandoned without the Nyrish moon in the sky to draw power from.
Not that he needed to draw power from it every day. But it was
comforting to know it was up there among the stars.

An older man called Entackus approached
Sorren. He sported a short gray beard and was dressed in bear skin.
“You know how to work a crossbow, yes?” he asked, holding out a
well-used model of the weapon. Earlier that morning, Sorren had
insisted that he was a very experienced hunter, claiming he’d been
trained in the skill while training to be guard. Throwing knives at
a tree had convinced the leaders that his skills would be
useful.

Sorren didn’t take the crossbow, but instead
held out his silver-copper arm. “A spear.”

Entackus raised his eyebrows. In a growly
voice, he called out to a man in the distance. “Do you have an
extra spear?”

A moment later, a spear came soaring through
the air, its razor-sharp tip pointing straight at the short bearded
man. He stepped to the side and caught it firmly in his right hand
as if it were child’s play. He whirled the spear upright so that
its tip pointed skyward and held it out toward Sorren. “A spear,”
he said.

Sorren took it and tested its weight in his
grip. It was thin but sturdy, heavy, and almost twice his height.
The sharp stone arrow that formed its tip looked as if it had been
carved with as much care as the bone whistle, though it lacked any
ornamentation. Two long black and brown owl feathers were tied just
underneath the arrow, where the stone met the wood. Sorren flung
the spear upward, changing his grip on it, and pointed it at an
imaginary beast before him.

“Can you handle it?” the bearded man
asked.

“It’ll work,” Sorren said, setting the spear
by his side, leaning on it a bit to relieve some of the pain in his
leg.

The bearded man took a step back and looked
Sorren up and down as if he wasn’t sure what to make of him. “Good
luck.”

Sorren nodded in return and the two continued
following the rest of the team through the brush.

* * *

A half-hour later, Rozzom instructed the
hunters to split into pairs and pointed them in the directions they
were to explore. Some of the older men carried bags of tools,
strands of ropes, bundles of nets, rolls of blankets, and some sort
of beast hide. Rather than hunting, they would no doubt be setting
traps and pitching camp. After all, they were expecting the hunt to
last a week. Sorren intended to end it much sooner than that.

Sorren was not surprised to be paired with
Baylet. Apparently Rozzom thought Sorren would make a great tutor
for Baylet. Sorren didn’t want a student, much less a hunting
partner, but he had to go along with Rozzom’s commands, at least
for now. It wouldn’t do any good to argue here.

Sorren let Baylet lead the way, and they
walked what seemed like a mile from the other hunters before
stopping to rest. Baylet spread a thin length of bear skin under a
half-dead pine tree, covering the layer of dead needles that
blanketed the ground. Sorren propped his spear up against the tree
and slowly sat, adjusting his long dark coat to cover his leg,
where bandages still hid his wound.

As Baylet sat beside Sorren, he kept a
crossbow clutched in his hands as if it were as precious as a
newborn infant.

“You’ve fired it before, haven’t you?” Sorren
asked.

Baylet gently put the crossbow at his side
and dug into a small satchel under his goat-skin coat. “Are you
hungry?” he asked.

“What do you have?” Sorren said.

“Bread, fruit, nuts. Just snacks.” He pulled
out a pair of thin copper flasks and tossed one to Sorren. “Water.
If you’re thirsty.”

Sorren twisted the cap off and took a few
sips.

“Apple?” Baylet asked.

Sorren held out a hand and took it. It had
been a long time since he’d had an apple. He didn’t like them. Too
crunchy. But he wasn’t Sorren right now. He was Shadowvin. If
Shadowvin could down that disgusting stew last night without making
faces and vomiting, he could accept an apple. He casually bit into
it.

Swallowing, Sorren pointed at the crossbow.
“You’ve used it before?” he asked again.

Baylet nodded and swallowed a mouthful of
bread. He opened his mouth, but didn’t say anything.

Sorren noticed Quove not far away, sitting on
a thin branch in the tree ahead of them, pecking at insects.

“I’m good with a crossbow,” Baylet finally
said. “There’s a secret to it.”

“A secret?”

“To hunting in general.” Baylet held up a
hand and wriggled his fingers. “You have to master aiming,
triggering. Holding your weapon. The physical side of it. But
there’s more to it.” He took another bite of his biscuit and tapped
his forehead. “You have think the right thing,” he said, his mouth
half full.

“You have to focus,” Sorren said.

Baylet shook his head, swallowing. “No. I
mean . . . yes, but there’s more. You have
to . . .” Baylet grew silent and still, his eyes
fixed on the crossbow at his side, between him and Sorren. Then he
put his half eaten biscuit down and put his fingers to his chest.
“It might sound silly but . . . You have to fill
your heart with something.”

Sorren made no response. He took another bite
of his apple and watched Quove on her branch. She had her head
stretched backward, preening the feathers on her back.

“Do you know what I fill my heart with?”
Baylet said. “Do you know what puts me in the right mindset?”

Sorren turned to face him.

“The Wizard King who killed my brother.”
Baylet’s eyes seemed to darken as he said it. “Vonlock. I see him
in the teeth of the all the creatures I kill. It helps me aim,
helps me pull the trigger. And then I can hunt. And then I
want
to hunt. Because if it weren’t for him, I’d know my
brother.” The young man put a hand on the crossbow. “So I think
about the dark wizard and the brother I never met. And then I don’t
miss. That’s what I mean by filling your heart with something.” He
looked up at Sorren. “Do you have something like that? Something
you can fill your heart with? Something you can see in the
animals?”

Sorren rolled the apple from his
flesh-and-blood hand into his mechanical hand and held it tightly,
almost crushing it. He slowly turned his hand this way and that,
examining how his silver fingers clutched the fruit.