Ahead, the girl with the boy had given up trying to climb the fan of sand and gravel, and had instead dropped down and to the right, vanishing into a crevasse. A moment later the other girl darted in after her sister.
The whole thing had been an act. A trap. So clever, weren’t they?
Mind blackening with fury, he bolted after them.
Setoc was tugging at his arms. ‘Cafal! Get up!’
It was too late. He was seeing all there was to see. Cursed by his own gods. Could he close hands about their necks, one by one, and choke the life from them, he vowed he would.
His beloved sister-he had screamed as the hatchet chopped down. He had fallen to his knees when Krin stepped up to her, and now he sought to claw out his own eyes-although the visions behind them proved indifferent to the damage done to them. Blood ran with tears-he would dig and dig until never again would he look upon the world-but it seemed that blindness would for ever elude him.
He watched Krin rape his bloodkin. He heard the exhortations from the hundreds of warriors gathered round. He saw Bakal, gaunt and his eyes luminous, stumble into view, saw the man’s horror as all the blood left his face, saw as the great slayer of Onos Toolan twisted round and fled, as if the Warleader’s ghostly hand was reaching for him. But it was just the rape of a hobbled woman-not even considered rape, in fact. Just… using.
And Sathand Gril, whom he had hunted beside in years past, was now hunting Stavi and Storii, and Absi who flailed in Stavi’s arms as if in full awareness that this new world he had found was crumbling around him, that death was coming to take him before he could as much as taste it. And the boy was outraged, indignant, defiant. Confused. Terrified.
Too much. No heart could withstand such visions.
Setoc tugged at his arms, fought to keep his hands from his face. ‘We must keep going! The wolves-’
‘Hood take the wolves!’
‘But he won’t, you fool! He won’t-but someone will! We must hurry, Cafal-’
His hand lashed out, caught her flush on the side of her head. The way her neck twisted round as she fell horrified him. Crying out, he crawled to her.
The wolves were ghosts no longer. Blood clouded his eyes, dripped down in a mockery of tears. ‘Setoc!’ She was still a child, still so young, so thin-
The wolves howled, a chorus that deafened him, that drove him face-first into the frozen dirt. Gods, my head! Stop! Stop, I beg you! If he screamed, he could not hear it. The beasts surged on all sides, closing in and in-they wanted him.
They wanted his blood.
From somewhere sounded a hunter’s horn.
Cafal leapt to his feet and ran. Ran from the world.
When her sister passed the wailing boy over, Stavi clutched him to her chest. Storii moved past her as they emerged from the fissure, grasping handfuls of tawny grasses to pull her way up the slope. This range of broken hills was narrow, an island of scoured limestone, and beyond it the land levelled out, flat, with nowhere to hide. She struggled up the tattered slope, gasping, the boy beating at her face with his tiny fists.
They were going to die. She knew that now. Their life in all its loose joy, its perfect security, was suddenly gone. She longed for yesterday, she longed for the solid presence that was her adopted father. Once more the sight of his face, a face wide and weathered, with every feature exaggerated, oversized, his soft eyes that had only ever looked upon his children with love-against the twins, it had seemed anger was impossible. Even disapproval wavered in a heartbeat. They had worked him like river clay, but they had known that beneath that clay there was a thing of iron, a thing of great power. He was a truth, resolute, unbreakable. They worked him because they knew that truth.
Where was he now? What had happened to their mother? Why was Sathand Gril hunting them? Why was he going to kill them?
Storii ran ahead, darting like a hare seeking cover, but there was none to be found. Ghoulish light painted the plain as the Slashes etched the night. A cruel wind cut into their faces, and the mass of storm clouds blotted out the north sky. The sight of her sister’s panic was like a knife in Stavi’s chest-the world was as broken as the hills behind them, as broken as the vicious look in Sathand’s eyes. She could have dropped that rock on his skull-she should have-but the thought of hurting him that much had horrified her. A part of her had wanted to believe that if she could manage to break his shoulder, he would give up, he would return to the camp. She knew now, bleak with despair, that such faith-that all of this could be so easily righted-was ridiculous. Her error in judgement was going to see them all killed.
Hearing Sathand climb out of the fissure, Stavi cried out, running as fast as her legs could carry her. All at once the boy she held went quiet, and his arms wrapped tight round her neck, hands clutching her hair.