The Blackgod

“Come,” Karak grated, and the company started off as the host of the Huntress began to move, parting around them, opening their ranks so that the Raven and those who followed him could pass through. Only Ngangata remained with Perkar.

“You have to go with them,” Perkar said. “You are the only one I can trust to watch after Hezhi. Only you know enough about gods and Balat to guess what must be done.”

“That may be,” Ngangata said, “but I don't want you to die alone.”

“I have no intention of dying,” Perkar replied. “I've outgrown that. And I ride with the Huntress! What can stop us?”

“Then you will not mind me joining you,” Ngangata persisted.

Perkar laid his hand on his friend's shoulder. “I want you with me,” he admitted. ”I've never told you this, because I'm ashamed of the way I treated you at first. But there is no one I would rather have at my side than you, no friend or brother I could value more. But what I said was true. I fear for Hezhi, and I need you there, with her. Believe it or not, I somehow feel you will be in more danger there than here. I'm sorry. But I'm begging you to go with Hezhi.”

Ngangata's normally placid face twisted in frustration, and Perkar thought that the halfling was going to shout at him again, as he had done back on the plains. But instead he reached his hand out.

Perkar gripped it in his own. “Piraku with you, below you, about you,” he told his strange, pale friend.

Ngangata smiled thinly. “You know my kind accumulate no Piraku,” he replied.

“Then no one does,” Perkar said. “No one.”

The Huntress—far ahead now—sounded her horn, and Perkar released his grip on Ngangata's hand and turned T'esh to ride with the host.

“And afterward, you must take me to see the lands beyond Balat!” he shouted back. Ngangata raised his hand in salute, but he only nodded, and then he, too, turned and rode to join Hezhi and the rest.

Perkar urged T'esh to a gallop. Wolves paced him, great black beasts the size of horses, as did fierce packs of rutkirul, bear gods wearing the shapes of feral men. A few moments at full gallop brought him beside the Huntress, who was now mounted upon a dagger-toothed panther. She nodded imperiously and then grinned a fierce, delighted grin. Despite himself—despite all of his doubts and fears—Perkar felt a bit of her joy, and the boy in him—the boy he had thought to be dead—that boy wondered what songs might be sung of this, of riding with the Goddess of the Hunt.

And as the sounds of the foe drew nearer, he surrendered himself to a whoop to match the howls rising from all around him. They breasted one hill and then the next—and the air was suddenly thick with black Mang shafts. One glanced from his hauberk, and his belly clenched; but then he saw, in the fore of the vast array of Mang, the face of his enemy, the one who had slain his love, and a red veil descended over his eyes, fury washed away his doubts and most of his humanity.

For the second time, Perkar Kar Barku raised Harka against the creature who had once been called Ghe, and pounding hooves closed the gap between them.

XXXV Shamans

HEZHI clenched her saw as the horses hurtled madly down the hillside. The sounds behind them were lost—the Huntress and her Hunt, the Mang, and Perkar—swallowed by the forest and the gorge they were descending into. All that existed now were rocks skittering down sharp, sometimes vertical slopes as their mounts struggled to retain footing. Even as Dark recovered from a stumble, one of Sheldu's men shouted as his stallion fell, rolling over him twice before smashing into a tree. The rider, hopelessly tangled in his stirrups, cried out again, more weakly as he and his mount reached a steeper gradient and vanished down it.

“Tsem!” Hezhi called back over her shoulder. “You dismount and walk!” The Giant was well behind them, his overlarge beast clearly unwilling to negotiate the vertiginous path. Tsem nodded reluctantly and got off, stroking the mare's massive head. He reached to unstrap his packs.

“Leave them!” Sheldu shouted. “We are near enough now as to have no need of that!”

Tsem, looking relieved, pulled out his club, threw his shield onto his back, and started down the hillside, puffing and panting.

“How much farther?” Hezhi snapped at the strange man who had somehow—she failed to understand how—become the leader of her expedition. Mindful of Perkar's assertion about him, she watched him carefully.

“No distance at all, as the crow flies,” Sheldu replied bitterly. “On foot, however—it will take some little while. But when we reach the bottom of this gorge, we can ride more freely.”

“Tsem cannot.”

“He can keep up; we won't be able to run, and even if we could, the horses would never manage it.”

Hezhi nodded, but her heart sank; she knew how quickly Tsem's massive bulk tired him.

True to Sheldu's promise, however, they soon reached the narrow bottom of the gorge. A stream coursed swiftly down it, and the air itself seemed cool and wet, smelled of stream. It raised her spirits somewhat, and Tsem, though round-eyed with exertion, seemed able enough to keep up with them on the soft, level earth. Hezhi let Dark lag so that she could stay beside him.

“Will you make it?” she asked worriedly.

“I will,” Tsem vowed.

“If you can't—”

“I'm fine, Princess. I know what you think of me, but I'm done complaining about how useless I am.”

“You were never useless, Tsem.”

He shrugged. “It doesn't matter. Now I know that I can contribute to this battle. Even if my strength to run fails I can turn and defend you against any enemies that might follow us.”

“Tsem, Ghan is already dead.”

“You don't know that, Princess. It couldn't have been Ghan. It must have been someone who resembled him.”

“I'm going to find out. Do you recognize either of those two?” She gestured at the man and woman who rode beside Sheldu.

“Yes. The woman is named Qwen-something-or-other. The man is a minor lord, Bone Eel.”

“A lord and lady from Nhol, here. Then it was Ghan, wasn't it?”

Tsem nodded reluctantly, but they discussed it no further.

Not much later, Sheldu called a halt when another horse collapsed. They stopped and let the animals drink.

“Perkar and the Huntress are doing their work, I hope,” Sheldu said. “I don't hear any pursuit.”

“You won't,” Ngangata pointed out. “This gorge seals out sound from beyond itself. We won't hear them until almost they are upon us.”

“We have to rest, if just for a moment,” Brother Horse said. “Sheldu is right about that.”

Hezhi made certain that Tsem drank some water, and then she walked across the thick carpet of leaves to where Qwen Shen and Bone Eel sat against a tree bole.

When she approached, both quickly came to their feet and bowed.

“Princess,” Bone Eel said. “We are your humble servants. Forgive us for not introducing ourselves until now.”

“I have two questions, and no time for courtly protocol,” Hezhi snapped. “The first question is, why are you here?”

Qwen Shen bowed again. “Your father sent us, Princess, to save you from the agents of the priesthood.”

“My father? The priesthood?”

“Yes, Lady.”

Hezhi blew out a puff of air. “You can tell me more of that later. When you joined us, another man rode with you, a man who tumbled from his horse. Who was he?”

Bone Eel lowered his head. “I believe you knew him,” he said. “That was Ghan, the librarian. It was he who convinced the emperor of the need for our expedition. He was—we shall miss him. I'm sorry.”

Qwen Shen was nodding, and Hezhi thought she caught the sparkle of a tear in the woman's eye. She swallowed the tightness in her own throat.