Egrin held his ground. “Whom do you seek?”
“Odovar of Juramona!”
As if summoned, Odovar came up behind the panther, saber in hand. Injured though he was, he severed the beast’s head in one stroke. Egrin let go of the spear, and the cat’s carcass fell in the grass, blood spurting from its neck in black jets.
“You found him,” said the marshal, spitting on the dead beast. “May your master be as lucky!”
Tol and the warriors gathered around the monster. As they looked on, the panther visibly shrank to half its original size. Black fur sloughed from its face and paws, revealing unsettlingly human features and fingers.
“This is the creature Lord Grane set to track you, my lord!” Tol blurted.
“A half-beast, serving as a blood-hunter,” Egrin said. “I’ve heard of them. Since men first walked the plains, they have lived among us, cleaving to the shadows. It’s said they were created by the curse of an elf mage two thousand years ago, condemned to live neither fully human nor fully animal. Lord Grane must be a powerful wizard to subjugate such a monster to his will!”
Odovar’s lip curled. “Foul beast. His head will decorate my hall. Bring it.” Manzo recovered his spear and put the severed head-not quite feline, not quite human-in a leather bag for his master.
The men remounted. Tol found Egrin cleaning dark blood from his spear with a twisted tuft of grass. The boy watched him silently. He was awed by the warrior, having seen him stand his ground against the monstrous cat, wavering not at all even as the claws closed in.
Egrin looked up at him. “What is it, boy?” he asked. “Speak. Dawn is coining while we wait.”
“Sir! Will we not camp and rest the night?”
“No time. Even now, Juramona may be under attack.”
Egrin swung onto his horse. He held out a hard hand to Tol. Astride again, the boy admired the breadth of Egrin’s shoulders and his cool, contained strength. How different he was from Tol’s father, a lean, leathery man, short tempered, and suspicious of everything new.
Although his legs ached and his head swam with the terrors of the day, Tol soon found himself falling asleep. As Luin sank below the hills, he dozed, head bumping Egrin’s back in time with the horse’s plodding gait.
Next Tol knew, they were cantering down a dusty lane, far from any place he’d been before. Tall cedar trees lined both sides of a road worn deep into the sandy soil. The company rode two abreast. Dawn had broken, and the new day washed the countryside in golden light. Tol marveled at that. Never in his life had he slept past sunrise.
He and Egrin were at the tail of the column. Lord Odovar was leading it. Riding next to the warden was Manzo. Although he was younger than Egrin-his face unlined-Manzo’s brown beard was prematurely streaked with gray. His wide-set brown eyes scanned the area alertly.
The group clattered up the lane to the crest of a slight hill. The marshal held up a hand to halt his men.
On both sides of the road, beyond the ornamental cedars, lay tilled fields of a size Tol had never imagined. Plowed land stretched to the horizon, north and south. The enormous tracts dwarfed the little garden patches Tol’s father had carved out of the wilderness. A bullock could toil all day in one of these fields, Tol thought, and never make a turn, just cut an endless furrow all the way to the where the sky and land met.
In between the plowed tracts were plots of fallow pasture, fenced with split rails and rubble stone. Strangely, no one was working the vast fields, and no herds grazed the pastures.
Lord Odovar signaled Egrin. The warden of Juramona brought his horse alongside the marshal’s.
“Half a league from home, and it looks like the wastes of Thorin,” said Odovar. “The Pakins doubled back on us, didn’t they?”
“Seems so, my lord.”
Odovar fingered the massive bruise over his left eye. “There’s nothing for it but to go ahead. If Juramona’s invested, we’ll have to break through.”
“With ten men, sir?”
Odovar glared. “Shall I ride away and leave my land to the bloody hands of Spannuth Grane?”
“If the manor is besieged, wouldn’t it be better to stay clear and raise a force to lift the siege?” Egrin said carefully.
His master snorted. “You’re too cautious, Egrin. Charge in boot to boot, shoulder to shoulder-that’s how to deal with these rebels.”
Tol could feel the tension in Egrin’s posture, but the loyal warden merely replied, “It will be as you command, my lord.”
“Form the men in a close column, and we’ll go on.”
Egrin passed the word to the others. Slinging their shields over their arms and couching their spears, they grinned at the prospect of battle. Only Egrin was solemn and silent.
“Troop, forward!” Odovar commanded. At a trot, they proceeded down the hill.
As they went, Tol noted signs of trouble. Hoes and rakes lay discarded in the fields, sharp edges and pointed tines facing the sky. Other items-a straw hat, a clay water bottle, a single shoe-were scattered about as though abandoned with extreme haste.
At the bottom of the hill, they crossed a stone bridge. Floating facedown in the stream was the body of a man, his back hacked and pierced many times. He was dressed in a homespun shirt and leather trews. The warriors glanced grimly at the body as they rode by.
Over the next rise they found more tokens of evil. A two-wheel cart was overturned, blocking the road. A dead ox still lay in the traces, and seed millet spilled out of the cart in a great drift. Black and purple hulls were trodden into the dust. Five bodies sprawled around the ruined cart, dead men in rough woolen cloaks and fleecy leggings. The hapless peasants, sent out with the seed for planting, had been sabered ruthlessly.
“This is what happens when cattle get in the way of warriors,” Odovar remarked coldly.
Tol, swallowing hard, looked away to the vista below. A wide, shallow valley spread out in front of them, covered with cultivation and pasture. In the center of this rich landscape a steep conical hill of earth rose twenty paces high. Atop this mound was a great log house, tiered to match the contour of the hill on which it sat. The house was roofed with sod and pierced with many windows. Atop its highest point was a tall, slender pole bearing the red banner of the Ackal dynasty.
Clustered thickly at the foot of the mound were huts and houses, so closely packed Tol could not distinguish where one ended and the next began. A stout wooden stockade surrounded the whole conglomeration. One gate was visible, facing them. The scene was shrouded in gray smoke, the outpourings of many hearths.
“The town gate is closed,” one warrior observed.
“I see armed men on the ramparts,” said another.
Lord Odovar steered his horse in a tight circle. “No sign of the Pakins,” he said. “There must have been a swift raid, then they ran away. We’ll enter Juramona.”
“My lord, I advise against it,” Egrin said firmly. “There’s a third of a league of open ground between here and the gate.”
“Do you see any enemies about?” Odovar retorted. He turned to the others and repeated the question even more loudly. The warriors could only shake their heads.
“Nor do I.” The marshal’s voice rose. “I tire of your weak-kneed caution, warden! This is not the time for idling about, poking under every bush for Pakins! I must resume my place and raise the Eastern Hundred in arms against the traitors! Why would you have me delay? Could it be you have Pakin sympathies?”
Egrin’s face flushed. “My lord knows I am his loyal man, and always shall be! “
“Then ride on!”
Odovar spurred his horse and rode wide around the wrecked cart. Jaw clenched, Egrin followed his master.
“Whatever happens, boy, stay on this horse,” Egrin said in a low voice. “If I should fall, grab on by the mane and hold on. Old Acorn will take you to safety.”
Eyes wide, Tol nodded.
Odovar cantered briskly down the road, straight for the sealed gate. His men followed in ragged order, pennants whipping at the ends of their spears. At first nothing seemed amiss, then the flat, wavering sound of horns filled the air. Odovar slowed, Egrin and the rest behind him.
