skulls of one or two had been bashed in. And here, too, vapor rose from gaping wounds and spilled entrails steaming.
Arrow yet nocked, Tipperton came to the porch. Half on, half off the planking, another Ruck lay dead. And to the left and slumped against the door lay two bodies. The one on top was a Hlok-Rucklike but taller and with straighter limbs-pierced through by a sword, his body yet impaled by the blade; he still clutched a bloody tulwar in his dead hand. As to the other body, the one on the bottom, it -groaned -His heart leaping in alarm, Tipperton yanked his bow to the full and Wait! It's a man, a Human. Oh, Adon, look at the blood flowing.
Tipperton set his bow aside and, straining, dragged the dead Hlok from atop the Human.
Jostled, the man opened his eyes, then closed them again.
Got to get him inside. Tipperton lifted the door latch and pushed. It did not yield. Nitwit! It's barred!… Wait, the window! Swiftly, Tipperton stepped across the man and to the shattered jamb and broke out the remaining shards yet clinging to the frame. Then he clambered through, cutting a foot as he stepped on the glass fragments lying on the inside. Twice a nitwit!
Hobbling, he moved to the door and slid back the bar and raised the latch, the door swinging back as the weight of the man pushed it open and he slumped inward and lay half in, half out of the chamber. Struggling, Tipperton managed to drag the man the rest of the way inside. His heart yet racing, the buccan stepped back out and retrieved his bow and arrows, then scanned the landscape 'round- Nothing. He stepped back inside, closing the door after.
By the light of the lantern yet sitting on the hearth, Tipperton removed the man's helmet, revealing short- cropped dark hair, and he placed a pillow under the man's head. The man was slender but well built, and appeared to be in his mid-twenties-Though with a Human, I can never tell. Tipperton then ripped cloth to make bandages to bind the man's wounds, and he said aloud, 'Look, my friend, I'd get you out of those leathers to fix you up, but I'm afraid that more jostling will only make the bleeding worse, so in places I'll just slit them apart where they're already rent.' The man neither opened his eyes nor replied, and Tipperton thought him unconscious. The buccan then began swathing the man's cuts as well as he could-slicing open sleeves and pant legs, and unlacing the front of the leather vest and the jerkin beneath, all to get at the wounds to bind them-though crimson seeped through the wrappings even as he moved from one bleeding gash to the next.
Now the man opened his eyes, eyes such a pale blue as to seem nearly white. He looked at Tipperton and then whispered, 'Runner.'
'Wh-what?'
'Horse.'
'Oh.' Tipperton shifted to the next wound, then said, 'I'm sorry, but the horse is dead.'
The man sighed and closed his ghostly eyes.
Quickly, Tipperton bandaged the last of the man's cuts and covered him with blankets. Then he threw off his nightshirt, now soaked with blood, and began flinging on clothes. 'I've got to get you some help. A healer. There's one nearby.'
As the buccan stomped his cut foot into the other boot and then stood and drew on his cloak, the man opened his eyes once more and raised a hand and beckoned.
Tipperton crossed over and knelt down beside him.
Staring deep into Tipperton's jewellike sapphirine eyes, the man seemed to come to some conclusion, and he struggled to unbuckle his leather gorget. With Tipperton's help, he at last got the neck guard free, and from 'round his throat and over his head he lifted a token on a leather thong. 'East,' he whispered as he pressed the token-plain and dull grey, a coin with a hole in it-into the buccan's hand. 'Go east… warn all… take this to Agron.'
Tipperton frowned in confusion. 'Agron? Who-? No, wait. You can explain later.' He slipped the thong over his own head and tucked the coin down his shirt. 'Right now I'm going after a healer.'
' 'Ware, Waldan,' whispered the man, his pale eyes now closed. 'There's more… out there.'
Tipperton drew in a deep breath, then said, 'I'll take my bow.'
The man did not reply.
Tipperton stood up to his full three foot four inch height and momentarily looked down at the man. Then he snatched up his bow and quiver and blew out the lantern light-Don't want a beacon calling to Rucks-and slipped out the door, closing it behind. He slid to the right and paused in the shadows, his gaze searching for foe. Finding none, he glided upslope across the clearing and in among the trees, the buccan shunning the two-track wagon lane, seeking instead the shelter of the forest alongside. Then he began running, his black hair streaming out behind, his feet flying over the snow, Tipperton Thistledown racing in virtual silence, as only a Warrow can run.
Chapter 2
Thd! Thd!
'Beau! Beau! Wake up!'
Again came the hammering on the cottage door and a rattling of the latch-Thd-thmp-clk-clttr!-followed by another call: 'Beau! Blast it!' Thd-thd!
In the chill dark, Beau Darby groaned awake.
Thd!
'Ho-' croaked Beau, then, 'Hold it! Are you trying to wake the dead?' Striving to not touch the floor at all, the buccan-'Ow, oh'-gingerly tiptoed across the cold wood to the door.
Thd! 'Bea-!' the caller started to yell just as Beau clacked back the bar and flung open the portal. An icy waft of air drifted in. 'Oh, there you are, Beau. Get dressed; grab your satchel. There's trouble afoot. I've a wounded man at the mill.'
In the starlight and moonlight, Beau saw his friend of nearly two years-the only other Warrow living nigh Twoforks-standing on the doorstone of the cote, his bow in hand. They were nearly of the same age, these two, Tipperton a young buccan of twenty-three, Beau at twenty-two, though often in Twoforks they were treated as children simply because of their size.
'What is it, Tip?'
'I said, I've a wounded man at my mill.'
'Wounded?'
'Aye. Rucks and Hloks. He's bleeding badly.'
'Bleeding?'
'Yes, yes. That's what I said, bucco, bleeding.' Tipperton pushed past Beau and limped into the cottage and began searching for a lantern. 'They killed his horse. Tried to kill him, too. One even came at me. But he slew them all. Right there at the mill. Seven, eight Rucks and a Hlok.' Tipperton caught up a lantern and lit it.
In the soft yellow light Tipperton looked across at Beau, that Warrow yet standing dumbstruck, his mouth agape, as was the door.
'Well, come on, Beau. Time's wasting.'
Beau closed his mouth as well as the door and sprang across the room even as he pulled off his nightshirt. 'Rucks and such? Here? In the Wilderland? Near Twoforks? Fighting at the mill?' He threw the garment on the rumpled bed and looked at Tipperton, his amber eyes wide with wonder. 'What were they doing at the mill? And are you all right? I thought I saw you limping.'
'Cut my foot on a piece of glass. My own fault. You can look at it when we've seen to the man. And as to what they were doing at the mill, I haven't the slightest idea. Happenstance, I would suppose.'
Beau slipped into his breeks. 'Why would Rucks and such be after a man, I wonder?'
Tipperton shrugged. 'Who knows? And mayhap it was the other way about: him after them, I mean. But I'll tell you this: no matter the which of it, they're all dead and he's not… at least I don't think so. He was alive when I left him, but bleeding. Oh yes, bleeding. He took a lot of cuts, what with that mob and all. I bandaged him the best I could.'
Tipperton agitatedly paced the room as Beau pulled his jerkin over his shoulder-length brown hair and slipped his arms into the sleeves. 'Don't worry, Tip. I'm sure that if you bandaged him, we can save him.'
'But what if those Ruck blades were poisoned? I mean, I've heard that they slather some dark and deadly
