The Prodigal Troll Part 2

Claye clutched a fistful of leaves and shoved them at his mouth. "Ma-ma-ma-ma-mall, Xaragitte swept him up and held him. "Aren't you going to answer them?" she asked Yvon.

Now that she mentioned it, he heard the voice, someone shouting for them to come out. He'd lost track of the pursuers while he built the redoubt. He slid his sword free and spotted one of the scouts lurking in the distance. "If they want answers," he said, "let them come looking for them."

"Who're you?"

Yvon whirled at the new voice behind him, lunged at it with all his force, and dropped the point only just in time.

The boy-perhaps twelve summers old-hopped backward off the log, holding his shepherd's staff defensively. Yvon saw his mistake; from a distance, the proportions were the same as a man with a long spear. Yvon was doubly angry: at the boys for chasing them and at himself for not hearing the boy's approach, for thinking they were scouts. His ears still hadn't recovered. "I might ask you to name yourself first."

"I'm Bran, and that's my brother, Pwyl. Hey Pwyl-over here!" The boy looked them all over, but stared mostly at Yvon. "Why'd you run away?"

"We thought you were soldiers."

"Are you one of Lord Gruethrist's knights?"

The boy was too quick. "No."

"Hey, Pwyl, I told you so! He's not a knight."

Pwyl ran up, but stayed behind the brush piled up between the trees. Pwyl was the younger of the two, but not by much. He glanced at Yvon, openly disappointed. "He's got a sword."

Bran held up an empty hand. "Yeah, but he doesn't have a braid."

Yvon didn't like having one in front of him and one at his flank, even if they were boys. "Why did you chase us?"

"For news," Bran said. "You were coming from the south, where the siege is, and we hoped you had news."

"Farmer Rodrey," piped Pwyl, "our neighbor, he said the castle burned down three nights ago and everybody died."

"Farmer Rodrey said it was just five knights dead," Bran corrected him. "That hardly counts."

Yvon wondered which of his comrades had died, and whether they'd sacrificed themselves to protect another secret, just as the eunuch Kepit had. Yvon glanced at Claye, weighing his little life against all those deaths. "This Farmer Rodrey, did he say anything else?"

Bran wrinkled up his face. "That's about all."

"Don't forget Lady Gruethrist," Pwyl said. "She was taken with some illness."

Xaragitte started toward him. "What news of Lady Gruethrist?"

Pwyl stepped back. Bran said, "We don't know any more than that, ma'am. Farmer Rodrey heard she was sickly. Some woman's problem, he said. Why do you want to know?"

"That's just how women are," Yvon answered with a false laugh, before Xaragitte could speak and give them away. "They always want to know one another's matters, even if they don't know one another."

Pwyl smiled at this, but Bran's face didn't change expression. He was much too smart, that one. He hadn't taken his eyes off Yvon's sword once, or come close enough to strike.

Yvon sheathed his blade. "You don't know where we could find a boat?" he asked.

Bran made the warding sign. "No boats around here. The river's cursed with demons." He stepped backward. "Come on, Pwyl, we better be going, before Mother finds out we left her sheep untended."

"Awwww ..."

"Now! "

"I'm coming." Pwyl walked around to where his brother was standing and waved to Yvon. "Fare you well, whatever path you take. I say it three times. Fare well."

Only saying it twice, the proper way, so he wouldn't draw the third G.o.d's jealous eye. "And three times I bid you comfort in your home," Yvon replied. He did not repeat it because his status to theirs did not require it.

As the boys ran off, Yvon sagged against a tree and sunk slowly to the ground, a straw man without his prop. His stomach knotted itself again. Even the news traveled faster than they did. But then, the news didn't eat unripe crackleberries, soak itself in pestilential waters, or have its intestines magicked into knots. The news didn't spend two whole days crouched in the woods, too cramped to walk, c.r.a.pping its guts out.

Besides, he thought, bad news always travels fast.

Claye scooted over to Yvon, gripped Yvon's cloak, and pulled himself upright. He looked into Yvon's face.

"Ma! Ma!"

Yvon placed his hand on Claye but before he could tickle him, Xaragitte s.n.a.t.c.hed the baby away. She stepped back, resting the child on her hip and rubbing her heart as if it pained her. "Do you think the lady has truly taken ill?"

"Likely, she's fine." Yvon's best guess was that Baron Culufre had put out this rumor to explain away Lady Gruethrist's death should the Empress decide to have her killed. But he didn't wish to worry Xaragitte. "The best thing we can do is deliver her son safely to his grandmother, Lady Ambit."

"Are we close, then?"

Yvon picked up a branch and levered himself upright. He needed a leg more steady than his own. "If we push on hard this evening, we should arrive there tomorrow."

Her face fell, but their only choice was to push on hard. The baby fell asleep in his sling as they trudged on in exhausted silence. The river twisted in the distance, a long blue ribbon slowly changing color as the sun settled on the western hills. They could see it clearly through the trees, when they came to a small tributary. Yvon followed it upstream, looking for swift, shallow water.

"We'll have to wade across," he said.

The nursemaid bit her lip. "Isn't there a bridge?"

"The bridges are the first place the Baron's men will guard. Besides, the river demons prefer deeper water, and they're still sluggish with the spring." He didn't mention the demons' greater hunger after winter.

They found a likely ford with a smooth shale bottom, no more than a foot or two at the deepest. The water was clear and cold as ice. Yvon crossed first. He stood on the far side and beckoned Xaragitte. "See, it's safe."

The water purled through the gra.s.ses as she lifted her skirt and splashed into the ripples. Near midstream she faltered, gasped, and suddenly jerked stiff. Yvon staggered toward her, slipping waist-deep in the water. By the time he reached her, she was s.h.i.+vering violently, Claye wailing. Yvon thrashed his walking stick in the water to scare off anything that threatened her. She flinched from his outstretched hand, stumbled across, and climbed up the far bank alone.

He backed toward her, cracking his stick in the water, but he saw nothing-nothing! "What happened?"

She gasped for air. "I think m'lady's dead."

How-? "How do you know that?"

"We were bonded to one another-by m'lady's wizard-during her pregnancy." She staggered off balance, like a drunkard. "For Claye's sake. Just now, I had a sense-" Tears ran down her cheeks. "Something's gone. I can't explain it. I can still feel her, but she's not quite there."

"Can you tell how it happened?"

She shook her head, holding the crying child tight, kissing his face. "No, no, but we must reach Lady Ambit's castle and tell her."

Yvon agreed. "It's too late to reach it tonight. We'll make camp and leave at first light."

He went uphill, well away from the water's edge, to a sheltered glen where he built a makes.h.i.+ft barricade of fallen branches. Claye cried inconsolably until he fell asleep. Yvon stretched out on the cold, damp ground at once, but he was too sore to get comfortable, his mind too busy to rest. Xaragitte must have suffered similarly. When the wolves started howling, she gave up the pretense of sleep and sat up. He did the same, breaking branches and feeding them into the flame, and not only for protection. His clothes were still wet, and the air was frosty cold.

"They'll leave us alone," he promised as Xaragitte huddled close to the fire. She s.h.i.+vered, staring off into the dark.

But the wolves came prowling around. Their eyes glinted green beyond the barricade, appearing and disappearing at random. Growls and snarls sounded out in the darkness, and Xaragitte fed more branches into the fire. For the second time that day, Yvon loosened his sword in his sheath. He never did it three times without using it.

Xaragitte began to cry, silent shoulder-racking sobs. She covered her face and stopped as suddenly as she began.

Yvon tried not to notice. "Are you-?"

"Never mind me." She wiped her eyes. "I'm fine. It's only m'lady. I felt her spark again. It's there, and it isn't, at the same time. It hurts, like a pin stuck in my heart."

He wanted to say something, to let her know that he was there to help, but the only words that came to him were the ones that he'd rehea.r.s.ed. "Lord Gruethrist is much older, and the new Lady Gruethrist much younger. And he came from outside the empire originally, and she was born to it, but-"

"Please. I beg you not to speak of Lady Gruethrist now. It hurts too much."

Breath rushed out of him. "As you wish."

The wolves ran off. Something else out there had disturbed them. Yvon sat, vigilant and silent, until Xaragitte finally lay down again, feigning sleep, and after banking the fire, he did the same. Claye awoke, hungry, as the birds sang their first tentative farewell to night. By the time he had suckled, orange dawn spread over the dark sky like an egg cracked in an iron pan. Everything reminded Yvon of food.

"Today will be the last day of our journey," he told her.

"My feet are blistered," Xaragitte said. "I don't think I can walk much farther."

Claye sat on her arm, tugging at her hair. When Yvon walked by, Claye squealed and stretched out to grab him, spilling out of Xaragitte's grasp. Yvon reached out as Xaragitte caught Claye and pulled him back to her chest.

She smoothed the child's hair. "Thank you," she said.

"I don't want to see him hurt."

"Nothing in the world matters more to me than this baby."

He nodded. "I understand. The sooner we reach Lady Ambit's castle, the safer he'll be."

But the sooner they arrived there, the less opportunity he'd have to speak to her again, and he hadn't yet said any of the things he wanted to say. That pressed like a burr on his thoughts as he led them out of the trees. Below them, wisps of dark, drifting fog obscured the valley along the river's bank.

A low rumble s.h.i.+vered up through Yvon's legs. He shook his head clear and looked closer.

It was no fog below them.

He pointed as he spoke to Xaragitte. "Wild oxen. A huge herd. When we first came into this valley, it took us a whole day to pa.s.s from one side of the herd to the other. We killed most of them, to eat, and to make room for farming." A herd this big could ruin a whole year's crop. "I didn't know there were this many left on the southern sh.o.r.e of the river."

"What are those?" She indicated several s.h.a.ggy giants moving among the oxen.

Yvon hadn't thought there were any of those left on this side of the Bealtefot River, not between the water and the mountains. "Tuskers. Mammuts. Have you ever seen one before?"

"Only the ivory." She lifted Claye, face toward the valley. "Do you see them, darling? Big old tuskers, with noses like snakes?" Bouncing him up and down in time with the words, she began to sing.

Yvon watched her, grinning at the old rhyme. She saw his expression and smiled back at him.

Maybe it could be all right between them after all.

"Are they the kind men train?" she asked.

"No," Yvon said, still smiling, looking at her as she lifted Claye toward the herd. "Those are the wood mammuts. Their tusks curve a lot more. Plains tuskers mix with wild oxen, but they're just too dangerous. You can't train them."

"Then why is there a man on the back of that one?"

Yvon spun-there was a man. Another climbed up on the back of a second mammut, and another. He gestured Xaragitte into the shelter of the trees. "Follow me. Quick."

"What's wrong?"

"That's no herd of wild beasts. Those are war mammuts. The oxen are food for the Baron's men. This is the supply train for his army."

"What can we do?"

"Pray to two G.o.ds they pa.s.s by quickly."

As they fled into the woods, the first horn sounded. Others responded, echoing across the valley as they called the order to march. It had been a long time since Yvon had heard that sound. He'd fought some hard battles against war mammuts that he'd rather not remember.

One horn sounded just behind them, on the hillside. Claye squealed at the noise, turning his head.

Long-legged oxen with wide, flaring horns crashed through the trees, driven by an ox-herder with his staff. Before Yvon could draw his sword, the tall man waved greetings to them.

"Blessings, blessings," the herder called to them in a high voice. Yvon took in the skirt, the rounded b.r.e.a.s.t.s: a eunuch, like Kepit. A she, not a he. The horn slung over her shoulder was set with emeralds and gold, and she wore a similar jewel-hilted knife. With her s...o...b..ack skin, and height, that made her a chief herder. A member, certainly, of some n.o.ble line. "Do not fear," the eunuch called cheerfully. "We shall soon pa.s.s out of your lands. Many, many pardons."

"Are you going to join the siege?" asked Yvon.

"The siege?" The eunuch laughed. "There is no more siege. Do you know nothing?"

"Truly, ma'am, we do not," Yvon said, but just one time.

"Two days ago the word came-Gruethrist's keep has fallen-so we crossed the Beautiful Waters at once. The demons fed well, I tell you, but we must allow for that."

"The castle has fallen?"

The herder stopped beside them and smiled, revealing pink gums. "Oh, yes. It burned to the ground, the Baron says. The Baron has ways of knowing."

"What of Lady Gruethrist?" asked Xaragitte.

"One hears sad tidings." She shrugged helplessly, smile all gone. "But her mother, Lady Ambit, gave us sanctuary in her keep, and the lady's consort swore an oath of loyalty to the Baron himself just yesterday. Perhaps all will be well. Ho!" This last she shouted at the oxen, who had started to wander again. "Many pardons, but I must go. You will come to Castle Gruethrist, yes? The Baron is a good lord, and he will need many men to serve him."

Yvon drew a breath. "Wait-if you take your herds across the river, and into the high vales, beware of the lions. They will come in the night and take your calves."

"Lions? Al! Last night we heard wolves. This land is all a wilderness. How do decent women live here?"

Xaragitte, who'd been rocking Claye, had gone very still.

"My apologies, Lady," the eunuch said at once. "No ill, no ill intended, but it is not what I expected. Al!"