Chapter 24 - Elen Starkwood.
The Merry Ploughman was full of its usual evening noise, and the tallow candles in their wall brackets lit the room.
At the corner table sat two big bearded men, hard-faced, though they both looked up at Selma with a warm smile when she set a bowl of hot soup in front of each of them.
"Thank you, Selma," one of them said.
She gave them a small smile, and once she had turned away it faded slowly from her face.
She stepped round the counter past Erik, who sat on the other side turning a wooden spoon between his fingers, the tip of it braced in the bottom of an empty soup bowl while he stared thoughtfully at nothing.
"Do you think they'll be back soon?" Erik asked.
Selma glanced at him, sighed and dropped her eyes to the countertop, where the vegetables lay half chopped.
"I don't know… but I hope so."
Erik went on turning the spoon between his fingers.
"Did Aren really say he only wanted some air?"
"Mm," Selma answered, and went on chopping without lifting her head.
The silence held for several seconds before Erik released the spoon into the bowl, arched back and raised his eyes to the ceiling with a breath drawn up from the bottom of his chest.
"Hell… what in hell is going on these last few days… First the slaughter in the forest, then that business at the tournament… now this… This isn't a festival any more, it's some kind of curse."
Selma's knife stopped in the middle of its stroke, and somewhere at the back of her mind pictures of Elen began to surface and crowd everything else out.
The first seconds after he was born, when she saw her child in a warm bundle and he cried out before he had even got his eyes open.
Then little Elen tearing round this same room on short legs, and his father beside him, who caught the boy every time he went down and laughed as he took him up by the arms.
Elen at about the age Leo was now, in the middle of the room with a wooden sword held over his head, shouting for the whole tavern to hear.
"I'm going to be a great warrior!"
Then Elen half grown, behind her in the same room after Waldruhm's victory over the beasts of the Cursed Forest, with his arms round her shoulders while she wept.
"Mum, I swear it… I'll be like my father. I'll be a hero. And I know he'll be proud of me. He's always with us. And he's always with you."
One more memory, from only days ago, rose sharper and more painful than any of the rest.
Elen on horseback at the southern gate on the first day of the hunt, never once lowering his eyes to her, with fear and resolve in them together.
"Mum. I have to. I'm bound to take part. Let me go."
And then the last memory of all, in which Aris slid down from Elen's horse at the city gates and her words in front of the queen carried over the noise of the crowd.
The knife slipped out of Selma's hand and struck the stone floor behind the counter with a clear ring.
Erik raised his head and straightened at once, because Selma stood frozen over the half-chopped carrots with her eyes fixed on nothing and full of pain.
He looked at her guiltily, his fingers tightening on the edge of the countertop on either side.
"Hell, Selma, forgive me… forgive me, I didn't mean it…"
He let go of the counter and put a hand to his forehead without looking up.
"Thick-headed idiot…"
The door behind him banged open, and the room filled with quick footsteps.
"I'm worried about him too, Bernard!" came Elara's voice.
"NO, ELARA, I'M GOING ALONE, AND YOU ARE STAYING HERE. THAT ISN'T UP FOR DISCUSSION," Bernard answered on his way up the stairs.
Erik and Selma stared, the same surprise on both their faces, while Elara went on arguing as she climbed after Bernard.
Leo shot past them and made for the stairs, but Erik caught him by the edge of his sleeve in time.
"Hey, what's going on?"
Leo answered without stopping, his whole body straining towards the stairs.
"Bernard's going into the Great Forest to save Aren!"
Erik's fingers opened of their own accord, and Leo tore free and flew up the stairs; Erik froze for a few seconds and then called after the boy.
"Wh-what?… Into the Great Forest?… What do you mean?…"
He turned slowly to Selma, their eyes met for a moment, and the two of them broke for the stairs together.
Bernard was digging through his own trunk and throwing the contents out onto the floor; behind him Elara hunted for the words to make one more argument, and Erik, Selma and Leo crowded into the doorway and watched in silence.
Bernard's hand found a small leather bag deep in the trunk, and the weight of coin came through his fingers.
He straightened, turned round, and when he saw them all in the doorway he stopped for a moment.
After one short look at Elara he breathed out through his nose and made for the door, where they all stood aside to let him past.
"Erik, keep an eye on them while I'm gone," Bernard said as he went.
Erik followed him at once and caught him by the wrist.
"HEY, HEY, hold on, big man. Are you seriously going into the Great Forest?! After everything that happened out there?!"
Bernard pulled his wrist out of the grip and met Erik's eyes.
"That knight. Sir William. He took Aren and carried him off into the Great Forest."
Bernard turned and went down the stairs; Erik stayed where he was as the others filed past him.
Elara caught up with him down in the tavern room and called after him from the bottom step.
"Bernard!"
"Elara, that's enough!" Bernard answered, turning back to her.
"LISTEN TO ME!" Elara shouted, without warning.
Bernard stopped dead, and with him, it seemed, the whole tavern, where not one guest could be heard breathing.
A short pause went by in which Elara looked at him in anger, and Bernard had never expected to see her like this.
"BE CAREFUL. WHATEVER HAPPENS OUT THERE… I'M BEGGING YOU… FIND AREN AND GET YOURSELVES OUT. BOTH OF YOU. COME BACK HERE, AND DON'T LET AREN PLAY THE HERO."
Bernard paused and looked into her eyes, which were full of hard resolve and of fear at the same time, and then he nodded.
A few moments later Elara went to him, put her arms hard round him and pushed her face into his chest.
"Please… be careful, both of you," she said into the cloth of his shirt.
Bernard held her just as hard in return and laid a hand on her head.
"Of course, little one. I may be a fighter no longer, but I'm still a warrior. And I'm not letting that tattooed idiot of ours pick up any bruises beyond the ones I'll give him myself once I've hauled his backside home."
Just then Leo ran up and put both arms round Bernard from the side.
Erik came down the stairs, stopped a couple of paces away and watched the scene without a word, and Bernard looked across at him over the top of Elara's head.
"I hope you're not about to start arguing and try to come with me?"
Erik gave an awkward laugh and straight away reached up to scratch the back of his head.
"No, I understand. Besides, what use is a fisherman who can't hold a sword."
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Bernard laughed back and lowered his eyes to Elara and Leo, who still had hold of him, then ran a palm over her head, and over his.
"Right, that's enough, you two. I need to go."
Elara let go of him unwillingly and looked up at him, her eyes red from crying.
Bernard had his hand on the handle of the front door when Selma's voice stopped him.
"Bernard…"
He turned back to her and found her standing with a hand pressed to her chest and her eyes straight on his.
"If you get the chance… please… find out… find out what happened to my son… find something, anything…" she said, weighing every word with visible effort.
Bernard let a short pause go by and then nodded without saying a word.
He turned to the door, stepped over the threshold and drew it to behind him; the room was left in a frozen silence.
In one of the smithy yards of the lower city, its gates thrown open, the heat of the forge stood in the air and the beat of the hammer went on; the smell of burnt coal and hot metal carried a few paces out into the street, mixed with smoke from the vent in the roof.
A bald smith with a short half-grey beard and a broad back stood at the anvil shaping a cart fitting with steady blows, while behind him a boy worked, golden-haired, his face and hands black with soot, his apron crammed full of tools and parts.
The smith spoke over his shoulder without lifting his head from the anvil.
"Ilian! Don't overdo the heat! I had trouble enough from you yesterday!"
The boy at the brazier bellows turned round with a grin.
"Don't you worry, Master Rogun! I'm far better at this than I used to be!"
Rogun set the hammer down and turned to the boy with a doubtful smirk.
"Better at it, is he… right. If you were better at it, you little sod, I wouldn't have had to melt down thirty-seven damned brackets on your account!"
At that moment a grown woman's voice came from the next room, the one that opened onto the shop counter, and its owner appeared in the doorway, of middle years, strongly built, with a face that said at once she was not to be argued with.
"Rogun! Stop laying into the boy! He's trying his hardest and all you want to do is tell him off!" she said, both hands on her hips.
"Keep out of it, woman! This is between a master and his apprentice! I know how to teach the little sod!"
The woman picked up the first piece of steel that came to hand.
"And who is it you're telling to keep quiet?! Feeling brave, are you?!"
The boy ducked behind the brazier on the instant, and Rogun's eyes went wide as he lifted an unfinished shield off the bench and put it up in front of him.
She went for him, and the smith backed round the anvil and fended her off with the shield, which took a fresh dent at every blow.
Rogun shouted with his face behind the shield as he gave ground one step at a time.
"ENOUGH! ENOUGH! YOU'RE GOING TO RUIN THAT SHIELD! I HAVEN'T FINISHED IT! STOP IT, VILVA!"
She came on, struck blow after blow and shouted at the top of her voice.
"AND WHO WAS IT YOU TOLD TO SHUT UP?! WELL?! FELT A BIT OF POWER OVER THE BOY AND DECIDED YOU COULD TALK TO ME LIKE THAT AS WELL?! I'LL SHOW YOU POWER!"
At the height of the scuffle a calm voice spoke from the doorway.
"Holy Goddess…"
Vilva stopped with the steel raised, and Rogun put his head out from behind the shield.
"Bernard?… Is that you?" Rogun said.
Vilva used the moment to crack her fist down on the smith's bald crown, then walked away from him with an indignant snort and turned to Bernard, and the sight of him lit her face up with delight at once.
"BERNAAARD, precious, it's so good to see you!"
She stopped right in front of him and looked him over with open pleasure.
"Good heavens. You've filled out! And look at that beard, how neat it is! Anyone can see Dara has done a fine job of it! Feeding you and looking after you! And I told you she'd make a wonderful wife!"
"We aren't married yet, but yes, she takes good care of me," Bernard answered with a restrained smirk.
Vilva breathed out and raised an eyebrow at him.
"Don't drag your heels, Bernard. Don't be like that… slowcoach."
She tipped her head slightly towards Rogun without turning to him, while he sat on the floor rubbing his crown, and Ilian stood beside him with no idea how to help his master.
Bernard smiled and dropped his gaze to the smith on the floor.
"Hello, teacher. I see you're in good health. And you've taken on a new apprentice already?"
Rogun grunted, muttered something under his breath, then got up off the floor and crossed to Bernard.
"Teacher… right… all these years and you still call me that, you pup."
Vilva turned on him at once with a sharp look.
"Pup? Take a look at him! If anyone here is a pup it's you! He's a grown wolf now!"
Bernard smirked, his eyes staying on Vilva a moment.
"No wolf for a long time now, Vilva. Remember? I left the fighters."
Vilva said nothing, and her face grew awkward for a moment.
Rogun stepped out into the middle of the workshop and spoke with the same grumble as before.
"Well, what have you come for? If it's mending or forging you need, you can do it yourself. I made a decent enough smith out of you. And I'm not taking on apprentices any more, sorry. This little sod is quite enough for me."
Vilva rounded on him again with a furious look, and Rogun stepped aside on the instant.
Bernard said nothing, and then his face set hard.
"I need armour. And an axe. For a couple of days."
The woman and the smith exchanged a look of mild surprise, and several seconds went by before Vilva spoke.
"And you said you'd left the fighters…"
Some time later Bernard stood in the middle of the smithy in a steel plate on his chest, pauldrons, vambraces and guards over his thighs and knees, with the rest of him still in leather, and in his right hand he held a steel axe.
He looked himself over and nodded once; Vilva and Rogun stood by and took in the sight of him with silent satisfaction.
Bernard reached into his pouch and held out a small leather bag of coin to them; they both looked first at the bag, then at each other with the same smirk.
Vilva faced Bernard first and spoke with put-on severity.
"Are you serious? You'd better put that away before I give you the same as I gave that old fool."
Rogun pulled an outraged face, but held his tongue.
Bernard's brows went up and he looked down at the bag in his hand, and Rogun spoke up at once.
"If you need all that to save the lad, then go and save him. But when you bring the armour and the weapon back, you'll sharpen and polish them yourself."
Bernard waited a moment, then smiled warmly, put the bag back in his pouch and gave them a parting nod.
Later, in the southern quarter of Ockhaven, the townsfolk crowded both sides of the main street, their eyes on the middle of it.
Queen Edith sat on a dark chestnut horse with Sir Alistair to her right, and behind them four troops of seven knights each were drawn up, heavy cavalry standing motionless.
Among the townsfolk, in the front ranks, stood Elara, Leo, Selma and Erik, who looked out over the heads ahead of them with worry.
Bernard rode up to Edith from the other side on his own horse, the one that had drawn their cart from Golden Flow, took his place at the queen's left, and the three of them exchanged a look without a word.
Edith brought her eyes to the guards at the southern gate and gave a short nod, and they set to work, so that the heavy doors drew apart with a long booming sound.
Then the whole company broke into a gallop and rode out through hills and open country straight for the Great Forest.
On the roof of one of the corner houses stood Lieutenant Schtance with her arms folded, and she watched the procession below in silence.
Meanwhile, in the shadow of someone's balcony a little way off, Aurey stood, motionless and soundless, and did not take his eyes off Schtance's figure.
After the riders had gone out through the gates of Ockhaven, deep in the belly of the Great Forest silence stood between the giant trunks, broken only by branches cracking underfoot.
Light did not reach the mossy floor at all; the half-dark between the crowns pressed down from above and thickened towards the ground.
It was here, jumping the roots that rose from the earth and ducking the low branches, that Aren ran beside Sir William Grant, his breath hoarse and out of rhythm.
On the move, without slowing, he got the words out to William ahead of him.
"Sir William!… What are we running from?!"
"Not what, who!… That thing may have seen us! That's why we have to hurry!"
Aren kept running and did his best not to fall behind William's long stride.
A branch cracked overhead and brought Aren's eyes up, and a Cortex came down at him off the high boughs with its forelegs spread, letting go of them at the last moment.
Aren went to the ground the next instant and rolled with the animal's weight on him, until he got his feet into it and shoved it off to the side.
Another one went for William at that instant, while Aren got quickly to his feet as the Cortex rose as well.
Another branch cracked behind him, and Aren swerved at the last possible moment as one more Cortex flew past him and bounced off a tree.
Aren and William came together back to back, with five of the animals drawn into a tight ring around them.
William turned his head one way and the other, trying to keep track of every one of them as they growled and closed the ring by slow degrees.
"What the hell?! Cortexes don't hunt in packs! They're fucking loners!"
"What am I supposed to do?! I don't have a weapon!" Aren shouted.
In that second two of them sprang from opposite sides, and Aren and William both rolled clear at once, so the pair met chest to chest with a heavy impact.
The remaining three went for them straight away, one at William and two at Aren.
Running from them, Aren jumped behind the nearest root and dodged by a hair's breadth as a Cortex leapt at his back, so that it flew past and went over in a tumble.
He had not seen the second animal coming after him, and when he straightened out of cover it hit him in the back and took him down.
On his back, Aren held the animal off by the neck and the muzzle with everything he had, keeping it from his throat, until it sank its teeth into his forearm almost clean through and a scream tore out of him across the whole forest.
All three Cortexes pressing William turned their heads at that scream, swung about towards Aren and rushed him.
William looked back, to where Aren was fighting, and then ahead.
"To hell with all of it," he said, then he ran and left Aren behind him.
The Cortex worked its head back and forth, tore at Aren's arm and tried to take the forearm off at the elbow, while Aren punched at its skull again and again and the ring of the others closed slowly in at the edges of his sight.
His perception narrowed, and every movement the animals made reached him slower than it should have.
Through the pain and the roar in his ears an understanding settled in his head.
This is the end. That's it… I'm going to die now. I'll die without ever finding out who I am. I'll die as nobody. I'll die like a piece of meat torn apart by wild animals.
His whole life in Golden Flow ran past his eyes, one warm memory giving way to the next.
Then the voices came, one after another.
"You're not alone!" Bernard said.
"Watch… watch this, you're about to see my device conquer the sky!" Leo said.
"With faith, we can do anything our heart wants," Elara said.
Time stopped for a moment; then Aren pulled in a sharp breath and, instead of another punch, drove his fingers straight into the animal's eyes, so that it let go of him with a wild piercing shriek as the rest of the beasts came at him.
Shield.
Two of them slammed into the dome of energy that rose around Aren and set to tearing at it with their claws, and the magical barrier held them off.
Aren lay under it with his left hand raised, and the right barely moved for the wounds.
Holding on to consciousness by a thread, he watched the dome begin to craze and his own hand shake harder and harder.
Then came the shrieking of animals from outside, someone's angry shouts and the sound of metal, and every one of the Cortexes left the dome and made off towards the fighting.
His hand dropped to the ground and the dome went out, and everything in front of his eyes blurred.
"Armund! Quickly!" a voice came, over hurried footsteps.
Two fighters ran to Aren, and one of them raised his head and poured liquid from a small flask into his mouth, and a pale green glow closed over Aren's body.
Aren tried to focus through the blur and made out a fair-haired youth whose face was strikingly familiar.
"Y… you…" Aren got out hoarsely.
"Elen. I'm Elen Starkwood. It's going to be all right! Hold on! We're getting you out!"
Aren looked at him with his eyelids growing heavy, until the darkness covered him completely.
A third fighter came up to them, looked around and then down at Aren.
"Quiet for now, but we need to be gone. How is he?" he asked.
"Looks like we got here just in time. We'll have to carry him," Elen answered without raising his eyes, still holding Aren's head.
The man nodded and gave a short whistle to the other two of their party.
"Ray, Askir! Pick him up and we're going back!"
The five of them lifted Aren and carried him into the western part of the Great Forest, where the trees gave way by degrees to the rocky foothills of the ridge.
At that same time, a few hundred metres to the north-east, Sir William Grant was running through the undergrowth with one of the animals after him, his eyes wide and full of terror, his breathing in shreds.
At the last instant a huge snarling bulk caught him from the other side.
"NO! NO, PLEASE! I DID EVERYTHING I WAS SUPPOSED TO! I'M BEGGING YOU, DON'T—" was all he managed to shout before a giant paw came down on him and snuffed out his last words.