By the dead, grunted Dogman, mouth watering like he was about to puke. How can you think about eating now?
Dow gave a toothy grin. Us going hungry aint going to help Ninefingers any. Nothing is. Thats the point of a duel, aint it? All about one man. He poked at the meat with his knife and made the blood run sizzling into the fire. Then he sat back, thoughtful. You reckon he can do it? Really? You remember that thing? Dogman felt a ghost of the sick fear hed had in the mist, and he shuddered to his boots. He werent likely ever to forget the sight of that giant coming through the murk, the sight of his painted fist rising, the sound of it crunching into Threetrees ribs and crushing the life out of him.
If anyone can do it, he growled through his gritted teeth, I reckon Logen can.
Uh, grunted Grim.
Aye, but do you think he will? Thats my question. That, and what happens if he dont? It was a question that Dogman could hardly bear to think up an answer to. Logen would be dead, for a first thing. Then thered be no siege of Carleon anymore. Dogman had too few men left after the mountains to keep a piss-pot surrounded, let alone the best walled city in the North. Bethod could do as he pleasedseek out help, and find new friends, and set to fighting again. There was no one tougher in a tight corner.
Logen can do it, he whispered, bunching his fists and feeling the long cut down his arm burning. He has to.
He nearly fell in the fire when a great fat hand thumped him on the back. By the dead but I never seen such a fire-full o long faces! Dogman winced. The crazy hillman was hardly what he needed to lift his mood, grinning out of the night with his children behind him, great big weapons over their shoulders.
Crummock was down to just the two now, since one of his sons got killed up in the mountains, but he didnt seem so upset about it. Hed lost his spear too, snapped off in some Easterner, as he was fond of saying, so he still didnt have to carry aught himself. Neither one of the children had said much since the battle, or not in the Dogmans hearing, anyway. No more talk about how many men folk mightve killed. The seeing of it close up could be a woeful drain on your enthusiasm for the business of war. Dogman knew well enough how that went.
But Crummock himself had no trouble keeping cheerful. Wheres Ninefingers got himself off to?
Gone off on his own. Always liked to do that, before a duel.
Mmm. Crummock stroked at the fingerbones round his neck. Speaking to the moon, Ill be bound.
Shitting himself is closer to it, I reckon.
Well, as long as you get the shitting done before the fight, I dont reckon anyone could grumble. He grinned all across his face. No ones loved of the moon like the Bloody-Nine, I tell you! No one in all the wide Circle of the World. Hes got some kind of chance at winning a fair fight, and thats the best a man could hope for against that devil-thing. Theres only one problem.
Just one?
Therell be no fair fight as long as that damn witch is alive.
The Dogman felt his shoulders slump even further. How dyou mean?
Crummock spun one of the wooden signs on his necklace round and around. I cant see her letting Bethod lose, and herself along with him, can you? A witch as clever as that one? Theres all kinds of magic she could mix. All kinds of blessings and curses. All kinds of ways that bitch could tilt the outcome, as though the chances werent tilted enough already.
Eh?
My point is this. Someone needs to stop her.
Dogman hadnt thought he could feel any lower. Now he knew better. Good luck with that, he muttered.
Ha ha, my lad, ha ha. Id love to do it, too, but theyve got an awful stretch of walls down there, and Im not much for climbing over em. Crummock slapped one fat hand against his fat belly. Twice too much meat for that. No, what we need for this task is a small man, but with great big fruits on him. No doubt we do, and the moon knows it. A man with a talent for creeping about, sharp-eyed and sure-footed. We need someone with a quick hand and a quick mind. He looked at the Dogman, and he grinned. Now where is it that wed find a man like that, do you reckon?
You know what? Dogman put his face in his hands. Ive no fucking idea.
Logen lifted the battered flask to his lips and took a mouthful. He felt the sharp liquor tingling on his tongue, tickling at his throat, that old need to swallow. He leaned forward, pursed his lips, and blew it out in a fine spray. A gout of fire went up into the cold night. He peered into the darkness, saw nothing but the black outlines of tree-trunks, the shifting black shadows that his fire cast between them.
He shook the flask back and forth, heard the last measure sloshing inside. He shrugged his shoulders, put it to his mouth and tipped it all the way, felt it burn down to his stomach. The spirits could share with him tonight. Chances were good that, after tomorrow, he wouldnt be calling on them again.
Ninefingers. The voice rustled at him like the leaves falling.
One spirit slid out from the shadows, came up into the light from the fire. There was no trace of recognition about it, and Logen found he was relieved. There was no accusation either, no fear and no distrust. It didnt care what he was, or what hed done.
Logen tossed the empty flask down beside him. On your own?
Yes.
Well, youre never alone if you bring laughter with you. The spirit said nothing. Reckon laughters a thing for men, not for spirits.
Yes.
Dont speak much, do you?
I did not call on you.
True. Logen stared into the fire. I have to fight a man tomorrow. A man called Fenris the Feared.
He is not a man.
You know of him, then?
He is old.
By your reckoning?
Nothing is old by my reckoning, but he goes back to the Old Time and beyond. He had another master, then.
What master?
Glustrod.
The name was like a knife in the ear. No name couldve been less expected, or less welcome. The wind blew cold through the trees, and memories of the towering ruins of Aulcus crowded in on Logen, and made his back shiver. No chance its some different Glustrod than the one came close to destroying half the world?
There is no other. He it was that wrote the signs upon the Feareds skin. Signs in the Old Tongue, the language of devils, across his left side. That flesh is of the world below. Where the word of Glustrod is written, the Feared cannot be harmed.
Cannot be harmed? Not at all? Logen thought about it a moment. Why not write on both sides?
Ask Glustrod.
I dont think thats likely.
No. A long pause. What will you do, Ninefingers?
Logen peered off sideways into the trees. The notion of setting off running, and never looking back, seemed a pretty one, right then. Sometimes it can be better to live with the fear of it, than to die doing it, whatever Logens father had told him.
I ran before, he muttered, and I only ran a circle. For me, Bethods at the end of every path.
Then that is all our talk. The spirit stood up from the fire.
Perhaps Ill see you again.
I do not think so. The magic leaks from the world, and my kind sleep. I do not think so. Even if you beat the Feared, and I do not think you will.
Message o hope then, eh? Logen snorted. Luck go with you.
The spirit faded back into the darkness, and was gone. It did not wish Logen luck. It did not care.