descending into a pit. The trail was rocky and slick with damp,
and the green that had seemed so predominant in the previous
night’s uncertain light revealed itself now as nothing more than
small patches of beleaguered moss and grass crouched amid long
stretches of barren rock. Tendrils of steam laced with the stench
of sulfur rose skyward to blend with the vog, and pockets of
intense heat burned through the soles of their boots and seared
the skin of their faces. Stresa set a slow pace, picking his way
carefully, lumbering from side to side amid the rocks and their
islands of green. Several times he stopped and turned back again
altogether, choosing a different way. Wren could not tell what
it was that the Splinterscat saw; everything was invisible to her.
She felt bereft of her skills once more, a stranger in a hostile,
secretive world. She tried to relax herself. Ahead, Stresa’s bulky
form rolled with the motion of his walk, daggerlike quills rising
and falling rhythmically. Behind, Garth stalked as if at hunt,
dark face intense, unreadable, hard. How very alike they were,
she thought in surprise.
They had come down off a small rise into a stand of brush
when the thing attacked. It launched itself out of the haze with
a shriek, a bristling horror with claws and teeth bared, slashing
in a desperate frenzy. It had legs and a body and a head-there
was no time to tell more. It bypassed Stresa and came for Wren,
who barely managed to bring her arms up before it was upon
her. Instinctively she rolled, taking the weight of the thing as
she did and then thrusting it away. It slashed and bit, but the
heavy gloves and cloak protected her. She saw its eyes, yellow
and maddened; she felt its fetid breath. Shaking free, she scram-
bled to her feet, seeing the thing wheel back again out of the
corner of her eye.
Then Garth was there, short sword cutting. A glitter of iron
and the creature’s arm was gone. It fell, screaming, tearing at
the earth. Garth stepped in swiftly and severed its head, and it
went still.
Wren stood there shaking, still uncertain what the thing was.
A demon? Something else? She looked down at the bloodied,
shapeless husk. It had all happened so fast.
“Phfftt! Listen!” Stresa sharply hissed. “Others come!
Ssstttfttp. This way! Hurry!”
He lumbered swiftly off. Wren and Garth were quick to
follow, tunneling after him into the gloom.
Already they could hear the sounds of pursuit.
CHAPTER
8
THE CHASE BEGAN SLOWLY, gathering momentum as it
careened downward into the valley. Wren, Garth, and
the Splinterscat were alone at first, sought after but not
yet found, and their hunters were nothing more than
scattered bits of noise still distant and indistinct. They slipped
ahead swiftly, watchfully, without panic or fear. The landscape
about them was dreamlike, by turns barren and empty where
black lava had buried the foliage beneath its glistening rocky
carpet and lush where patches of acacia and heavy grass fought
from small islands within the wilderness to reclaim what had
been taken. Vog hung over everything, a vast, loosely woven
shroud, swirling and shifting, creating the illusion that every-
thing it touched was alive. Overhead, visible in small patches
through the haze, the skies were iron-gray and sunless.
Stresa chose a rambling, circuitous route, taking them first
one way and then the other, his thick quilled body rolling and
lurching so that it constantly seemed as if he were about to tip
over. He favored neither the open sweep of the lava rock nor
the canopied cover of the brush-grown forest, veering from one
to the other impartially, whether selecting his path from intu-
ition or experience, it was impossible to tell. Wren could hear
his heavy breathing, a growl in his throat that turned to a hiss
when he came across something he didn’t like. Once or twice
he looked back at them as if to make certain they were still
there. He did not speak, and they kept silent as well.
It was chance alone that led to their discovery. They had
come upon a stretch of open rock, and the creature was lying