The Ring Оf Fire. The Wolf Bell

THREE

Thorn glanced at the yellow ball of sun halfway up the sky. The day was beginning to grow warm. He had been skinning out two wolves; they hung red and naked from the eaves as he began to stretch their thick-furred hides across the hut wall. Behind him the mountain glinted. His stomach rumbled with hunger. He could smell the noon meal cooking; soon enough there would be fried goatmeat and mawzee cakes—his mother fed him up good when he’d been on the pastures all night.

When he finished stretching the hides, he began to strip the meat from the carcasses—they were no longer animals now, writhing in the pain of dying so that he gritted his teeth and felt their agony. He had killed them as quickly as he could. Now, with the skins off, he had taught himself to think of them only as hanks of meat. He stripped off the meat in long pieces, sliced it thin, and laid it across the drying rack. It would be salted and cured and mixed with fireberries and otter-herb to make the squares of mountain-meat that would bide the winter nights when he or his father stood watch in the pastures, would bide them all, perhaps, if the winter should be harsh, or if there should be need of food taken hurriedly, without cook fires. He turned to shift the drying rack and saw his father standing silently at the corner of the house examining the hides.

“You got that big dog-wolf!” Oak Dar said, fingering the wide black stripe that decorated the larger hide.

“And his mate, I think,” Thorn said sadly.

“Better to go together than parted.”

Thorn nodded, feeling warm toward his father. The wolves killed because it was their living, and neither Thorn or the Goatmaster felt animosity toward them. But the wolves killed their herds, and must be taken in turn, that was the way of it.

The Goatmaster examined the striped hide more carefully. “The bucks gored him good.”

“Yes. The old wolf put up a battle.”

“And you finished him through the neck,” he said, putting his finger through Thorn’s arrow hole.

Thorn nodded. The older man took out his knife and began to work on the other carcass. Swifter and neater than Thorn he was, taking the meat off the bones clean and quick. Thorn tried to settle to his work but began to think of Burgdeeth for no reason so the unease within him stirred and rose as it had done again and again since his last trip down, a strong bristling of concern, as if a yeast worked there in Burgdeeth and part of it clung to him when he came away.

The feeling had to do with the Kubalese apprentice to Shanner Eskar. Thorn grinned at the thought of Shanner’s bruised face, though he held him no enmity—just that he’d gotten his own back, that was all. Shanner was the best of the Burgdeeth lot, and Thorn had a liking for him. But the Kubalese, Kearb-Mattus, that was another matter. I wish I had the sight really, he thought, instead of these niggling itches. Then I’d know why the Kubalese is there. He turned the carcass and began to strip the other side; the stripping went faster with two working.

He glanced up at the edge of the village once, where the does were being milked, and when he looked back he saw that his father had stopped work and was watching him. Silent, with that studying look. His father’s eyes were a rusty brown, and his thatch of hair over that square face as dark as the stripe on the wolf’s pelt. His look was unwavering. “You are troubled, son, and I think you do not know why.”

“Yes father. Something . . . something . . .”

“Some trouble you carried up with you from Burgdeeth. Is it the Kubalese? Have you heard more about his reasons for being there?”

“Only the story that he was a smith in his own country, and came to Burgdeeth to increase his art.”

Oak Dar snorted, unbelieving. “Likely the townspeople of Burgdeeth know no more than that. They believe pretty well as they are bidden. But there is a piece of news. A trader came up the mountain last night, he is staying with Merden’s family. He brought news that, if you had not been herding, you would know by now. It is like the rumors that have come, but sounding as if there are more facts to it. The Kubalese are arming heavy, he says, and have stockpiled supplies on the borders. It is thought they plan to work their way silently into Urobb and Farr. If this is true, they will take those two countries as surely as night drowns the sun.”

“But that will mean—”

“That Aybil is next. And then Cloffi.”

“Will the trader take this word to Burgdeeth? But he has come from there. Did he stop with it?”

“He did not stop, he came through silently under darkness. It is said in Sibot Hill that the Kubalese smith is thick with the Landmaster of Burgdeeth, and the trader thought to warn us first and to seek our advice.”

“And that is?”

“He must go to the Landmaster, he can do no less. I fear for him, but there is no other way but the direct one. To spread the word secretly would only stir fear and leave the men of Burgdeeth open to ridicule, unable to organize anything without their mounts and weapons that are all in the Landmaster’s Set. The men of Cloffi are not bold enough, or willful enough, to plan a good deceit against the Landmaster. They do not value their freedom sufficiently.” Oak Dar scratched his head, puzzling. “What good would it do the Landmaster to court collusion with the Kubalese? He would only lose his reign. Four times in the past the Kubalese had begun so, secretly, and each time has ended in conquerings. I can’t understand the Landmaster’s view of the world if he does not take warning from that.

“Keep your ears open, maybe you’ll hear something of value. Market day is soon—meantime we must lay some plans. Our best weapon will be cleverness. Eresu knows the Landmaster would lift no hand to help us, and we are but a small band.” He gave Thorn a clear look. “If you had the runestone of Eresu the old man spoke of, would you have the sight?”

“I would have it,” Thorn said with sudden conviction.

“It would be a great help to Dunoon. Perhaps to many more.” Then Oak Dar grinned. “We would be stoned in Burgdeeth for such talk.”

“Stoned, and worse. I have hunted the mountain caves, the old ruins and grottoes for the runestone.” Thorn’s eyes searched Oak Dar’s. “If it is hidden in the north of Cloffi, and if the power is in me to use it, then I mean to have it somehow.”

Ever since the old man had spoken his prophecy, Thorn had spent every free moment in the caves of the ancient city Owdneet; he had discovered caves he had not known, had pressed into narrow crevices and seams and searched pools cold as winter. He had tried to send some unbridled sense of seeing out to touch the shard of jade; but such skill had not come on him, had left him as blind.

And while he searched, the runestone lay somewhere in darkness. Found by the light of one candle, the old man had said. Carried in a searching. Lost in terror. What did it mean? He knew not, but he sensed that the stone would be needed soon, felt it in the very core of his being.

Once, exploring along a cave’s high natural ledge, he had been startled to see a clear vision; though it had not to do with the stone. He saw two faces, young girls, very frightened. One of them was crying. He knew her, though not her name. The other, brown eyed, thin faced, was Zephy Eskar. They were kneeling before the winged statue in Burgdeeth; and he knew that this quick, unexplained glimpse was important to him, though he had no clue to help him understand it. It faded quickly, and his feeling of bereavement afterward was strange and powerful.