Rain shook her head, trying to make sense of this. There was only one wizard in her group. Yet she suspected that he was right. The wyrmlings were looking for them. There were two wizards in Draken’s family, and that was so rare that Rain had never heard the like. “How could the wyrmlings know that we were coming?”
We told no one, she wanted to say.
But the young man simply said, “How do they do anything? Their leaders can talk to each other even though they are a thousand miles apart. They have wrapped all of Rofehavan beneath a swirling cloud of darkness, and they send blights to destroy our crops. They know things . . . things that they shouldn’t.” He peered about nervously, obviously distraught at being here. “We will have to keep our heads down.”
“For how long?” Rain asked. She desperately wanted to get back to Myrrima.
“As long as it takes—hours at least. The wyrmlings—”
The clanking of bone armor sounded outside the stable, and for a moment the two fell completely silent. A wyrmling trudged inside, and the horses neighed and stamped nervously at the smell of blood.
Rain didn’t dare move. She held her breath, heart pounding as if it might burst, and pleaded with the Powers that the wyrmling might leave.
But the monster plodded through the stable for a moment, then stood below them, sniffing at the loft.
He’s taken endowments of scent, Rain realized. She trembled all over. She wished that she’d thought to pull some hay over her, perhaps mask the smell of her sweat.
Shouting arose down the street, a man roaring a battle challenge. “You killed her!” he cried at some wyrmling. “Damn you for that!”
At the sound of clanging metal, ax on ax, the wyrmling rushed from the stables.
The young man leapt up and grabbed a beam, pulled himself higher, then peeked out the open window. Stealthily, he peered down one street, then back into the market.
He let out a sigh of relief, but there was sadness in his voice. “That man buys our lives with his own.” He jumped back down into the hay, nodded toward the market. “Your giant killed two wyrmlings, but they did not take off his head. They always take the heads of those that they kill. . . . Unless I miss my guess, he’s still alive. We must do what we can to save him. But we cannot make a move until the wyrmlings have cleared from the streets.”
Rain shook her head in wonder. Eight weeks ago, she’d wished the man dead. Now she was to be his savior?
The young man waited for a long moment, then whispered, “My name is Wulfgaard.”
“That is not a name I have ever heard before,” Rain said. The young man was handsome in his way. He looked to be no more than twenty or so. She wondered if he had been watching her on the street a few minutes ago, but realized that she had seen him: a young man who walked with a hunched back, pulling a game leg, as he hurried to keep up at Aaath Ulber’s back. She’d worried at his motive. She’d thought him perhaps to be a simpleton, awed at the sight of the giant, but she’d also worried that he might have darker designs.
“It is not the name I was born with. I took it when I joined the Brotherhood of the Wolf.”
Rain knew of such men, sworn to fight evil no matter how great it might be or where it might rear its ugly head. She knew that he would protect her with his life, if necessary.
“You were following Aaath Ulber,” she said. “I saw you.”
“I knew that he was the one,” Wulfgaard admitted in a whisper. He strained to listen for a moment, as the clacking of armor drew close again. The sounds of battle down the street had gone still. “I knew him as soon as I saw him.” Wulfgaard’s voice became husky with emotion. “I need . . . we all need his help.”
19
The Interrogation
Hope nourishes courage the way that food nourishes the body. Never give your enemy cause to hope, lest he grow the courage to resist you.
Not all of Crull-maldor’s troops had wyrms in them. Only a dozen of her captains were evil enough to earn the parasites that fed upon their souls.
So she had strategically stationed these captains across the island. One of them was in Ox Port, and thus he could speak to her across the miles. The captain’s name was Azuk-Tri.
His mind touched hers but lightly, and she heard his voice as if it was a distant shout. We found him. We found the one!
Crull-maldor was in the Room of Whispers, attending her daily duties. She was ever vigilant, worried that at any moment an uprising might occur. The humans were restless.
She whirled at the call, and sent her consciousness across the miles, seizing the captain’s mind.
Suddenly she saw what he saw, knew what he knew.
His men were dragging a limp body through the streets by the feet. The man was a giant for a human—a giant with red hair and small nubs of horns upon his plated brow. He was from Caer Luciare, a “true man” as they called themselves.
Blood covered the man’s face. An ear had been torn off, and both eyes were swollen. He had puncture wounds in his leg from a meat hook, and he struggled mightily to breathe.
You’ve nearly killed him, Crull-maldor whispered to her captain’s soul.
He fought like a madman, the captain whispered. He has the berserker’s rage. Never have I seen such a warrior. He killed two of my troops. Even when we had him down, even after we thought him subdued, he rose up and killed our men.
Crull-maldor was impressed. The emperor would want the berserker’s head.
But Crull-maldor did not want to give the human to her enemy—yet.
The berserker has fought well, Crull-maldor mused. And now he was in enemy hands. His deeds are the kind that makes a man a legend.
Yikkarga will hear of him, Crull-maldor suspected.
Crull-maldor knew that Yikkarga had bribed some of her troops to be spies. She couldn’t hide the berserker for long.
She wasn’t sure that she wanted to. Much was at stake. Lord Despair had promised a great deal for Crull-maldor’s service, and she did not want to jeopardize her future.
But Crull-maldor had her own spies, and she knew that the emperor was still plotting her demise, seeking some way to sabotage her, and eventually replace her. A feud that had lasted centuries was not likely to be set aside now. Indeed, the emperor had more to lose than ever before, and even his servant Yikkarga recognized how high the stakes had become.
Over the past three weeks, Crull-maldor had learned a great deal about Yikkarga—and the power that preserved him.
Lord Despair had “chosen” the wyrmling, and in the City of the Dead, Crull-maldor had sought diligently to understand just what that meant.
She knew now that there was some kind of link between Yikkarga and Lord Despair, a link that warned him when death drew near.
So she could not kill the wyrmling. She could not take his life directly. But there were things that she could do to sabotage his efforts, and Crull-maldor had the beginnings of a plan.
So she rode the mind of Azuk-Tri as her wyrmlings dragged the berserker for nearly a mile, until at last they reached their makeshift fortress—a long house, confiscated from the humans. It was set upon a hill, and made of logs from giant fir trees. Because the previous own ers had been rich, the logs were bound in copper, to keep them from taking fire, and the roof was made from fine slate and imported copper shingles that had turned green with age.
Enormous logs framed the door, and all along the top, antlers of caribou spread wide. At the very center, the antlers of a giant bog elk spread, some twenty feet across. It was an impressive trophy.
The wyrmlings dragged the human into the house, which was open and spacious. A hearth was banked with huge slabs of carved basalt, taller than a man, while rows of sturdy benches and a table made from slabs of wood filled the great room.