And that was before they’d heard the men and dogs.
They stood now in the wet earth of a bare field, in silence. He was aware of the girl beside him, her steadying hand on the mule, keeping it quiet. Vargos was a shrouded shape a little ahead of them, with his staff. Crispin, on a thought, turned and carefully worked his sword free of the ropes on the mule’s back. He felt awkward holding it, a fool, and at the same time genuinely afraid. If anything at all turned on the swordplay of Caius Crispus of Varena . . . He expected Linon, on her thong about his neck, to say something caustic, but the bird had been silent from the moment they awoke this morning.
He had brought the sword at the last moment, an impulse, an afterthought, and only because it had been his father’s and he was leaving home and going far away. His mother had said nothing, but her arched eyebrows had been-as ever-infinitely expressive. She’d sent a servant for the heavy footsoldier’s blade Horius had carried when summoned to militia duty.
In the house where he’d grown up, Crispin had drawn it from its scabbard and noted with surprise that blade and sheath were oiled and cared for, even after a quarter of a century. He’d made no comment on that, merely raised his own eyebrows and then offered a few dramatic, self-mocking passes with the sword in his mother’s receiving room. He’d struck a martial pose, weapon levelled at a bowl of apples on the table.
Avita Crispina had winced to see it. She’d murmured drily, ‘Try not to hurt yourself, dear.’ Crispin had laughed, and sheathed the blade, claiming his wine with relief.
‘You are supposed to tell me to come home with it or upon it,’ he’d murmured indignantly.
‘That’s a shield, dear,’ his mother had said gently.
He had no shield, no real idea how to use the sword, and there were dogs here with the hunters. Would the fog impede them, or the water in the ditch by the road? Or would the hunting hounds simply follow the girl’s known scent right across the small bridge and lead the men right to them? The barking grew strident in that moment. Someone shouted, almost directly in front of them:
‘They’ve crossed to the field! Come on!’
One question answered, at any rate. Crispin took a breath and lifted his father’s blade. He did not pray. He thought of Ilandra, as he always did, but he did not pray. Vargos spread his feet wide and held his staff before him in both hands.
‘He’s here! ‘said Linon suddenly, in a tone Crispin had never heard from the bird. ‘Oh, lord of worlds, I knew it! Crispin, do not move! Don’t let the others move.’
‘Hold still!’ Crispin said sharply, instinctively, to Vargos and the girl.
In that moment several things seemed to happen at once. The accursed mule brayed stridently, legs gone rigid as tree trunks. The dogs’ triumphant barking went suddenly high with shrill, yelping panic. And the shouting man screamed in terror, the sound ripping through the fog.
The mist swirled about the road, parted for a moment.
And in that instant Crispin saw something impossible. A shape from tormented dream, from nightmare. His mind slammed down, desperately denying what his eyes had just told him. He heard Vargos croak something that must have been a prayer. Then the fog closed in again like a curtain. Sight was gone. There was still screaming, high-pitched, appalling, from the vanished road. The mule trembled in every stiffened limb. He heard the streaming sound of it urinating beside him. The dogs were whining like whipped puppies. They heard them fleeing, back to the west.
There came a rumbling sound, as of the earth itself, shaking beneath them. Crispin stopped breathing. Ahead of them, among the hunters, the first man’s scream went sharply, wildly higher, and then was cut off. The rumbling stopped. Crispin heard running footsteps, men screaming and the dogs’ yelping sounds receding swiftly back the way they had come. Vargos had now dropped to his knees in the cold, sodden field, the staff fallen from his fingers. The girl was clutching at the trembling mule, struggling to steady it. Crispin saw that his hand holding the sword was shaking helplessly.