Across the Face of the World (47 page)

The proprietor rubbed his hands in satisfaction as the figures were added up. Quality was excellent, and the furs - beaver, ermine, mink - were eminently saleable in Stanlow. As was the way with these things, the storekeeper would make a greater profit from these bales than those who risked life and limb to collect them. 1 Ie frowned. Still, they had the life, travelling the wide open spaces, exploring new territory, undertaking deeds of great renown. He got to keep store. His reward, he reasoned, was only fair.

The whole party, it turned out, wanted lodging for the night. They really did appear all in; even the Fodhram seemed overcome with weariness.

The adding completed, the Warden merely nodded when the scrip was handed over. Normally he drove a hard bargain, but tonight he said nothing, prompting the storekeeper to shake his head. What kind of adventures had they been through? Something more than warranted by the season alone, he was sure. He shook his head again, gathered up his weights and measures and showed his guests to their rooms. Talk, if there was to be any, would have to wait for the morning.

'What now?'

Welcome sunlight streamed through the open window. The Company sat around a large table, still half asleep, trying to decide how to approach the nub of their task. Perdu's question hung in the air.

'We continue with our original plan,' Kurr responded. 'Remember? We make our way back down the Westway until we meet the Bhrudwans.'

'Then we hold a little discussion, persuade them to give up their captives, and ask one of them to accompany us to Instruere and tell the council all about their nasty plans.' Perdu was far from convinced.

'We'll have the advantage of surprise,' Farr contended. 'It's up to us to make the advantage pay!'

'An ambush is our best chance,' said the old farmer. 'Trouble is, how do we slay these Bhrudwans without hurting our friends? And how do we capture one of the warriors alive?'

'How do we avoid being killed ourselves?' Leith muttered. Beside him, Stella voiced her agreement.

'In your case, my lady, it will be easy. You'll be staying here in Vindstrop House. It won't help protesting, I've already discussed it with Leader, and he has found a place for you.'

'So you've asked Leader, have you?' Stella was incensed, and made no effort to hide it. 'What about asking me? Don't you think I might have an opinion? Or are you going to continue to treat me as you did when I walked in on Leith and Hal? Dragging me away when it suits, and leaving me behind when 1 get in the way?'

Nonplussed in the face of this onslaught, Kurr didn't know which charge to answer first. Stella gave him no chance, her argu¬ments carefully marshalled as though she had anticipated this.

'I want you to explain something to me,' she said, words tumbling over each other in their urgency to be heard. 'What would you be doing now if I hadn't been with you on the Roofed Road? Would they have killed you swiftly or slowly? Perhaps you might have had the chance to test your swimming talents against the Maelstrom!'

'I—'

'Do you think Wira would have surfaced yet if 1 had not been with you on the lake near Midrun Hut? Maybe his body might even now be washed up on some unreachable shore!'

'Perhaps—'

'We are a Company; we live or die together. You might as well kill me as leave me here to await your return. If you don't come back, where would I go?'

'She's right,' Wira said. 'We owe her our lives. Stella is the most courageous member of our party. Who are we to judge her?'

'But - it's not right to send women into battle!' Kurr could not understand the opposition mounting against him.

Hal spoke while Stella spluttered. 'It is not right to send anyone into battle, unless it is necessary. The fate of Faltha may depend on the upcoming conflict. Sheltering anyone from the battle now may expose them - and everyone else - to it later.'

Now Stella had regained her breath. 'Are you saying that I would be less a warrior than -

please forgive me - crippled Hal or old Kurr?' The farmer drew in his breath sharply. 'Do you mean to bring me here against my will and then leave me here against my will?'

Kurr was about to insist, but then glanced around the room and thought better of it. The risk of division within the Company was too great; he might lose more than he would gain.

'Very well, then,' he acquiesced. 'You may come with us, to die quickly and unpleasantly, most likely.'

Stella smiled grimly. 'I would have followed you anyway,' she said.

'So how are we going to best these warriors?' Perdu asked.

The Company had left Vindstrop House after breakfast that morning, having bade the Fodhram a final farewell.

'Goodbye, my friends,' Leader had said, embracing each of them in turn. He insisted on paying for their accommodation, provided them with food for their journey and gave them a small bag of money.

'What's this?' Kurr had asked.

'Part payment for your help in getting our furs to market!' the answer had come.

'So how much do we owe you for guiding us through Withwestwa Wood?' Kurr had pressed.

'Nothing,' was the reply. 'Either you are brought through by friends or you don't come at all.'

The kindness and good humour of the Fodhram had been an unlooked-for blessing on their road. Without their kindness, the journey might have ended at Roleystone Bridge. Who will help us now? Leith wondered.

The travellers waited for Kurr to answer Perdu, who had spoken for them all, but the old farmer said nothing.

Behind them the day drew to a close. The sun filtered through between tall pines, mottling the path ahead with uncertain shadows and picking out the occasional icy remnant of the previous week's snowfall. A shifting breeze flicked under the high boughs, giving the forest a feel very much like a spring evening in the woods north of Loulea. On such an afternoon of sleepy beauty Leith could not imagine danger and death approaching them, yet it was. He noted that Kurr still had not answered Perdu.

Without warning the track emerged at a cliff edge. The narrow path of the Westway wound down the side of the bluff, falling perhaps two hundred feet to a lower land. From the edge of the cliff Withwestwa spread out before them, a verdant carpet covering hilly ground, yet less folded than that further north. The muted rushing of waters filtered up from the forest below.

Some way ahead a solitary mountain rose from the plain, cutting the horizon. Thus the travellers had their first glimpse of Steffi, the tallest peak in the land of the Fodhram. Forest-clothed but with a bare head, Steffi towered three thousand feet above them, sinister and malevolent although still a long way off. Misty smoke draped the bushy valleys carved into its sides. If the stories told by the Fodhram were to believed (and that was by no means certain), Steffi had at times in the past spouted smoke and burned with fire. Mystery and fear clung to the mountain along with the mist.

Kurr stopped to contemplate the view. Somewhere out there, under the green canopy before them, the Bhrudwans marched, making for this spot. Could they be defeated? Were their captives still alive? He had not forgotten Perdu's question.

He turned to face the Company. 'I have nothing but hope to offer you, and not much of that.

For weeks now I have been aware that one day we would have to attack these warriors with nothing but sticks and rusty swords. I have come up with plan after plan, and have rejected them all.' He took a deep breath, and looked at each face in return. Dear hearts each one, he thought. Even Farr. Against his will he had grown to like this gruff, impatient man.

'We'll need to send a scout ahead who will watch out for the enemy, and return to us when he knows where they are. Obviously we must choose a place suitable for our ambush, settle in and then spring with swiftness upon them when they walk into our trap. Some of us should try to isolate one of the Bhrudwans and take him alive; the others must dispatch the two remaining warriors as quickly as possible. So we will divide into two ranks. Farr will lead one; I will lead the other.

'The first rank, which Farr will command, has the responsibility of taking care of two Bhrudwans, and ensuring the safety of their captives. One of their number should also act as scout. Perdu, Stella and Hal will form the first rank.

'I will command the second rank, made up of Leith and Wira. Our task is to capture one Bhrudwan, preferably without injuring him. Whichever rank accomplishes its task first should offer assis¬tance to the other.

'We'll make camp here tonight, with the first rank taking the first watch. These Bhrudwans could come at any time.'

'Not at night, surely?' Wira asked.

'Any time. We could pay for our assumptions with our lives.'

The Bhrudwans did not come that night. The next evening saw the Company making camp low on the southern slopes of Steffi, just off the Westway. Above and to their right the mountain loomed, its hooded peak and scarred flanks hidden by crusty snow which sent an invisible breath of cold air down into the valley. All around them newly returned birds chirped and cawed as they settled down to roost in their beloved northern lands. A musky scent rose from a bog somewhere nearby.

Leith lay back on his sleeping roll, his head nestling on his pack. This could be my fast night, he thought. For so long we have tried to find these Bhrudwans, and now we are near them, I wish we were not. Well, whatever happens, I will see my mother and father again. He sighed, and a deep fear of the pain of the sword blade and the coldness of death settled on him. From his pack he pulled a birch bark carving and held it close to his chest. Father! Please help me! I know you need all the courage you have, but lend me some for tonight! A few cold tears fell on to the unfinished face of the carved figure.

Stella could see Leith on the far side of the clearing, his features distorted by the heat from the flickering fire. He's beginning to show the strain, she thought. Still, he's only a boy. Her thoughts turned to Wira and the words they had exchanged that afternoon. I'm sorry I never told you, he had said, and she had felt her anger melting as he smiled at her. I know 1 should have said something. He had explained how he would never drink again, how not a drop had passed his lips since that night on the lake, how she could help him... and she had found herself telling him about her brother and the heartache his drinking had brought into her family, how they had tried talking to him, punishing him, locking him away, but always he had found more drink, and now he was an addled idiot, a shame to them all... Tears came to Wira's eyes, and he said that he didn't know, he could see how much he had hurt her, and would she forgive him? She had said yes too quickly, but she could not hold her feelings for him in check. They had embraced right there in the forest as the rest of the Company marched on ahead, and she wondered at a man brave enough to admit he was wrong, to face his weakness and to still have the courage to love her. She could see it in his eyes: he loved her.

And these feelings she had - were they love? At least they were not the revulsion she felt whenever she thought of Druin and the fate that awaited her if ever she should return home.

Anything but that.

Wira lay alone in the shadows, some distance away from the others. To his left Stella sat, staring into the fire. What is she thinking? Does she believe me? If it comes to that, do I believe myself? What he had said about not touching the drink was not strictly true; he had found some on a shelf in the store at Vindstrop House, and had left some money as payment.

Still, it was not strong drink, and it had not lasted into the second day. He felt dry, so dry, and his hands shook as he lay there hoping that no one - that she -would not see. He thought of her embrace, so tender, so young, so beautiful. I'll give it up for you, Stella, 1 will.

Kurr and Perdu sat together by the fire, their older bones appre¬ciating the heat. It's all right for the young ones to sleep in the shadows. The sap flows vigorously in their veins, Kurr thought enviously, casting a glance at where Wira lay. Too vigorously. But does it run true?

Until the night on the ice he had been certain which of the Storrsen brothers he preferred, but now he wasn't so sure. At least I know what I am getting with the older brother. And what of this friendship — call it friendship for now - between Wira and Stella? Was this what Kroptur feared? The whole thing made him uneasy.

Perdu was immersed in thoughts of his own. Haldemar! And my boys! Are they well? For that matter, how are the Fenni faring up on Myrvidda? The auguries had suggested a lean winter and a late spring on the high moors and, as much as he enjoyed the compan¬ionship of his countrymen by birth. Perdu found he was now irrev¬ocably Fenni, and wished he was back home with his family and his clan. He sighed. Not until I have witnessed the Bhrudwans'

deaths, he thought. Or not until I have died myself. Either way, soon now 1 will be back on the vidda, watching over my family. May the gods be with us!

Farr got up and added fuel to the fire. How will the old men fight? he wondered. Better than the youngsters, most likely. Kurr would put up a brave showing, of that he had no doubt. Farr had a grudging respect for the feisty old farmer who had put aside his stick and his sorrow, and now looked years younger than when they had first met. And Perdu? He remembered his father's cousin only vaguely, but knew he had been a hunter, not a fighter. Still, perhaps being with the Fenni had toughened him up. He certainly carried a lethal-looking sword. No, it is the young ones who are the worry. Well, perhaps not the girl, he admitted. She is ferocious!

Better Wira than l! But the Mahnumsens - best not to expect anything from them. There was no doubting the older boy's courage, but he was too crippled to be effective in battle, notwithstanding the lucky blow he had landed in the Valley of Respite. And the younger?

Unreliable. Consumed by his own fears. He should have been left at home.

Ah, but I'm missing the Fodhram, Farr thought sadly. The forest here is still beautiful, but I miss the laughter, the passion. Maybe I'll seek them out when this is over; maybe I'll stay here a while.