Inexorably, Marna and Farnor’s search carried them back in the direction of the castle, though, in con-science, they were diligent in their duties, scanning the ground for signs of the passage of the predator. It was, however, with mixed feelings that Farnor noticed some flattened ferns at the edge of an overgrown area bounding the grassy slope up which he and Marna were walking.
He bent down to examine the damaged fronds. They were bloodstained.
‘I’ll call the others,’ Marna said and, putting two fingers in her mouth, she gave a piercing whistle.
‘Don’t touch it,’ she said. ‘The dogs might be able to pick up a scent.’
They did. But instead of a chorus of excited barking rising to greet this find, an oppressive silence fell on the group as each dog in its turn sniffed the ferns and then started back, ears flattened and tail curled deep between its legs. Some whimpered.
‘Leash them,’ Gryss said softly. ‘It looks like we’ll have to finish this without them.’
The dogs’ unease, though, had spread to the hunters and such enthusiasm as they still had waned markedly as they tied up their dogs.
‘So it’s big,’ Garren said, speaking the silent concern. ‘We knew that. We’ve got staves and axes enough for any dog, haven’t we, for pity’s sake? Do you really want to come back up here on night watches? Come on. Let’s find the damn thing and kill it.’ And without waiting for any debate, he plunged off through the ferns. Rather shamefacedly the others followed, some of them raising their spirits by roundly swearing at their dogs.
After his initial rush Garren soon slowed down for, large though it might have been, the animal had left little in the way of clear signs to follow: a broken stem here, long grass trampled there.
Then some fur snagged on a bush.
Garren untangled it and rubbed it pensively between his fingers. It was a mixture of black and dark brown and unusually coarse. He offered it to one of the dogs, but again the ears went back and the tail drooped, and the dog looked reproachfully at its master.
Garren pulled a rueful face as he straightened up and threw the fur away. ‘Well, at least with this colour it should be easy enough to spot,’ he said.
Farnor bent and picked up the fur as the group set off again. It had a peculiarly unpleasant feel to it, and he felt his skin crawling again just as it had when he had heard the rumble of the rock slide earlier.
He rubbed his right arm to still the sensation but his touch felt odd, as if both hand and arm were someone else’s, someone in a different place, at once near and far away. He glanced down, momentarily fearful. His arm and his hand looked as they felt, near yet distant; his, yet not his. Only the dark fur of the strange, slaughter-ing animal held in the familiar, alien fingers seemed to be truly real and present. Indeed, it was vividly present, as if it alone belonged here.
Something somewhere began to form the idea that he was light-headed with the sun and the walking and the excitement of events that day, but it faded into the background as, abruptly, a dreadful malevolence seemed to possess him.
That it was the spirit of the creature they were hunt-ing he knew as surely as he knew his father and Gryss and the others about him, pressing forward through the ferns in their own distant world.
He heard the breath being drawn from him at the horror of the sensation, while at the same time he felt two responses rise within him like ill-matched horses drawing a wagon. Sword-swinging rage to destroy this abomination and all its ilk for ever. And pity for this creation, into which so much wilful evil had been nurtured.
Part of him reached out…
Following a path of his own, Rannick faltered as the presence about him momentarily vanished, then returned, heightened tenfold and full of bloodlust and desire. Desire for vengeance.
With a gasp, Farnor fell headlong forward.
Chapter 5
Many sounds filled the swimming darkness that was another place. Sounds and sensations. Clamouring, pushing. Unfocused and incoherent.
Confusion, bewilderment, concern. And, too, anger; human anger. And a different anger; a demented anger; an unfettered animal anger full of awful intent. The two were mingled in an unholy union.
Then they were gone, snatched away brutally. In their wake was a strange void that gradually filled with a myriad voices whispering and calling softly. There was a sense of a vast… family? filled with surprise and inquiry; and some disbelieving alarm. How could it have come here?
But that too drifted away… softer… and softer.
And then he was many people, staring, talking, anx-ious for the downed young man.
Mostly anxious.
And finally there was only confusion. Eddying to and fro, slipping tantalizingly into coherence then slipping away before it could be grasped. Until, slowly, a rhythm made its way through the swirling din and demanded attention. Drawing all to it like mountain streams to a valley lake.
‘Farnor. Farnor.’
Light entered the darkness, painfully bright.
And blue.
‘Farnor. Son.’
And he was back; the focus of a ring of worried faces centred by Gryss, head cocked on one side, and his father and Marna gazing down at him. The heavy scent of crushed ferns filling his nostrils.
He held up his hand and stared at it curiously. It was there, and solid, and, beyond debate, his. He felt unexpectedly relieved at the revelation.
‘Are you all right?’ His father’s voice impinged on his reverie.
Farnor looked up at him and smiled. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘What happened?’
‘You tell me what happened,’ Gryss replied, almost indignantly. ‘You fell over. You’ve been unconscious for a good few minutes.’
Farnor made to sit up but Gryss restrained him. ‘Give yourself a moment,’ he said. ‘It’s probably the heat. When did you eat last?’
Farnor scowled. A surge of rebellion stirred in him. He wouldn’t be treated like some sticky child out on his first round-up. The humiliation!
But a quieter part of him set the indignation aside.
He looked again at the watching faces. People he had known all his life. Down-to-earth people. Some he liked, some he respected, some made him laugh, some were just friends.
He wanted to tell them that in some way he had touched the creature that they were hunting. Touched it and other things also. He wanted to tell them that the creature was profoundly evil and that if it were caught – and that would be no light task – then it would wreak appalling destruction on its captors.
There was no doubt about his new-gained knowl-edge of the creature, though how it had come to him he could not begin to fathom – it was just there. But they would not understand. Not even his own father. Gryss, perhaps. But still…
‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘Truly. I must have snagged my foot and tumbled. Winded myself. Or banged my head on the ground.’
Garren looked at him closely and then stood up, relieved normality closing about him. He made a small pantomime of searching for damage to the ground as he gave his son’s shoulder a squeeze. ‘I can’t see a dent,’ he said. There was some laughter from the spectators at this antic, and several hands helped Farnor to his feet. As he stood he caught Gryss’s eye; the eye of old Gryss, the healer, from whom little could be kept.
Farnor shrugged.
‘Watch where you’re putting your feet then, young Farnor,’ Gryss said significantly. ‘I doubt anyone here’s anxious to be carrying you back home.’
And the hunt set off again.
Farnor was relieved to have avoided further interro-gation by Gryss, but sensed that this was only a postponement.
‘Are you all right? What happened?’ The questions this time came softly from Marna.
‘I told you, I tripped,’ Farnor replied irritably, though equally softly.
‘You didn’t,’ Marna hissed. ‘You were looking at the fur, then you went down like a log. I saw you.’