“So it was only necessary to show resolution after all,” Cordelia said, smiling.
“True resolution,” Quicksilver insisted. “I was quite ready to set upon it with my sword, no matter the sharpness of those glowing teeth—and I trust you were just as willing to turn it back into the lump of fungus from which it was made!”
“Be sure of it.” Cordelia shook her head as she turned to ride on. “I wish that all threats could be banished so easily.”
“Most need a bit more persuading.” Quicksilver kicked her mount into a walk beside Cordelia’s. “Life has taught me that I must always be ready to fight. I can only rejoice that, with your brother, it is rarely necessary.”
So they rode off into the night, discussing the young men they pursued—but Allouette rode behind them in silence, unable to rid herself of a nagging dread. If the barguest only predicted death, after all, banishing it would not prevent that death. She felt a chill that reminded her of her own mortality and hoped that the deadly forecast was not for herself or her companions, but only for their enemies.
Several hours later, they rode bleary-eyed and nodding into a clearing. Cordelia looked up at the stars and sighed. “The constellations have turned toward midnight, ladies. The men must be considerably farther ahead than we thought.”
“They could be only a hundred yards from us,” Quicksilver grumbled, “and we would never know it in the gloom under these trees.”
“What other night-walkers might lurk among the leaves not even fifty feet away?” Allouette asked with a shudder.
“Well said.” Cordelia dismounted and began to untie her tent and bedroll. “One haunting is enough for the night. By your leave, damsels, I’d rather sleep till dawn than wander.” She paused to look up at her companions. “That’s not to say, of course, that I shall not take first watch.”
“No, I claim that privilege,” Allouette said instantly. “I have learned Gregory’s way of meditating in a trance that keeps him aware of the world about him, but gives as much rest as sleep. I shall take the first three hours.”
Cordelia and Quicksilver exchanged a glance that quite clearly asked if they dared trust their former enemy to guard their slumber. Then, reluctantly, Quicksilver nodded, though her hand rested on her dagger-hilt as she turned toward her future kinswoman. “Thank you for the kind offer. I will accept it, for truthfully, I know not if I could keep my eyes open for even one more hour. Nay, do you take the watch with my thanks, lady.”
“And mine,” Cordelia seconded. Then she hauled the tent off her horse’s rump. Before she started to set it up, though, she unsaddled and unbridled her horse and tied it to a tree on a long rein. She stroked the mare’s neck, saying, “Do you graze now, my lovely, and sleep when you are filled.” She knew she really should curry the poor thing but was too weary. With leaden limbs, she turned to help Allouette pitch the tent while Quicksilver laid the fire. “How far ahead are the men, think you?”
“An inch is as good a guess as a mile,” Quicksilver said, exasperated. “Since they shield their thoughts, there is no way of telling.”
Allouette pondered their reason for shielding and trembled with a shiver that was not due to the night’s chill.
As sunset gave way to twilight and the men pitched camp, Alain asked, “Can you not cease shielding my thoughts now, Gregory? It must be wearying for you, and neither you nor Geoffrey has had any hint of a mind-reading monster near to us.”
“It takes little more effort for me to blanket all three of us, than myself alone,” Gregory said, “but perhaps you have the right of it. We certainly have had no hint of pook, hobgoblin, or spirk.” He turned to Geoffrey. “What say you, brother?”
Geoffrey shrugged. “Why not chance it? If our thoughts bring forth monsters that lurk in ambush, so much the better; I had rather face them openly than wonder whether or not they await us.”
Gregory nodded and let down his shields. Then he knelt, staring at the teepee of kindling and sticks, speeding up the vibrations of the molecules until a tendril of smoke arose. Seconds later, small flames began to lick through the gaps between sticks, and Gregory relaxed.
“Company,” Geoffrey snapped.
Gregory and Alain looked up, startled to see a man lurking in the shadows at the edge of their clearing—but a most strange man indeed. He wore a green tunic and brown hose, like any forest dweller—but his hips tapered down on both sides into a single leg, massive and powerful.
Gregory rose slowly, tensed for fight or flight, even as he heard his companions’ swords rasp loose from their scabbards.
“I think we had best shield our thoughts after all,” Geoffrey said.
“My ward is in place already,” Gregory told him, “and covers Alain’s mind too.”
The prince frowned at the apparition. “Who are you, and wherefore come you here?”
The stranger opened his mouth, but instead of words, he gave vent to a woeful wailing cry. It seemed to pierce right through the men’s heads; they clapped their hands over their ears.
“Avaunt thee!” Gregory cried. “Get thee hence!”
He reinforced the command with a mental stab. The creature’s shriek soared up the scale, hovering for a moment on the edge of the human hearing range and piercing even through their hands, waking pain from ear to ear. Then the pitch shot even higher and the men could hear nothing, even though its mouth was open—but in the distant woods, wolves began to howl.
“Cease, I bade thee!” Gregory snapped, eyes narrowing as his face reddened.
The strange creature winced with the pain of Gregory’s mental stab and did close his mouth this time. Geoffrey and Alain advanced from opposite sides, blades on guard. The creature took the sensible course and turned to hop away into the recesses of the forest shadows.
Gregory stood, chest heaving, glaring after the apparition. As Geoffrey and Alain turned back to him, staring, he said, “We must be vigilant tonight. That monster will come back and will bring with him the wolves he has called.”
“We shall meet them with the steel they deserve.” But Alain was staring at Gregory as though he were himself something strange and weird. “Never before this night have I seen you angry, Gregory—and now twice in twelve hours!”
“Never before have I felt so pure a wave of malice as that creature wafted toward me,” Gregory returned. “It thought to paralyze us with its wail and kill us easily.” He glanced at Alain, abashed, then glanced away. “Forgive me, but I do grow wroth when I see an esper use its gifts for such fell purpose, upon those who cannot resist.”
“Unluckily for him, he now found those who could resist,” Alain said, “and luckily for me, I traveled with them. What would have happened if I had sojourned in this wood without your protection?”
“Why, it would have slain you,” Geoffrey said. “I have read what Gregory did—that the creature kills for the malicious pleasure of the deed.” He turned to his younger brother. “Nay, I pray it does come back—to meet our blades!”
“What was the hideous thing?” Alain asked.
“Ask the scholar.” Geoffrey seemed nettled by having to pass the question. “Such creatures are rare enough that I have never seen one, let alone heard them spoken of.”
“ ’Tis called a Biasd Bheulach, Alain, and if we see it again, it will doubtless assume another guise,” Gregory said.
Geoffrey looked up with a wolfish grin. “What guise does it favor?”
“It may appear as a beast of any kind, prowling about our campsite,” Gregory told him, “though it favors the form of a greyhound more than any other. Its most dangerous appearance, though, is that of a very ordinary mortal man.”