Something had seized her from behind.
Above the plains of Tare a black cloud wheeled and whispered. The old speckled blue
eagle, now watching from a vantage point under the roof of one of the watchtowers on the walls
of the city of Tare, shifted, ruffled its feathers, then opened his beak for a brief, low cry.
It did not like the cloud. During those hours of the day when the eagle had learned it was
safe to venture out, it had flown as close as it dared to the cloud.
And that was not very close, for that cloud was dangerous, very dangerous.
It was composed of hundreds of…bird-things. The eagle did not understand them. They
had the scent of the Icarii birdpeople about them, but that scent was somehow tarnished and
warped. They also carried the scent of hunting hawks, a scent the eagle was familiar with, for he
had spent many a cold winter‘s night huddled safe within a nobleman‘s hawk stable murmuring
love songs to unresponsive lady-hawks.
But as they were not quite Icarii, then they were also not quite hawks.
They behaved as a flock with one mind—yet that mind was not their‘s, for the eagle
sensed that the mind that controlled them was far distant.
These bird-things spent many hours of the day hunting and eating. They hunted anything
that moved, horses, cattle…people. When they had spotted a target, the bird-things swooped, and
tore it to pieces. Once they had fed—and they left nothing uneaten, not even a speck of
blood—they rose again as one, and recommenced their whispering patrol of the skies.
There was a brief movement on the streets below, and the eagle glanced down, distracted.
A group of three or four people, scurrying from one house to another, baskets of food under their
arms. The people of this land had been almost as quick as the eagle to realise that certain hours
of the day were…bad…to venture forth. Now they, like the eagle, spent the bad hours huddled
inside, or under whatever overhang provided shelter.
Many—thousands—had not been so wise. In his forays over Tencendor, the eagle had
seen bands of maniacal men and women, and groups of children, roving the land. Some had been
ravaged by despair, some by terror, others by disease; still others by internal tempest so severe
some extremities looked as though they had self-destructed.
And still others wandered, so hungry that they consumed everything in their path. For
several hours one day the eagle had roosted under a chimney stack, watching in absolute horror
as an aged man had literally eaten his way across a stony field. He had crawled on his hands and
knees, and everything he touched that could be picked up he stuffed into his mouth and
swallowed.
Stones, brambles, thorns, dried cattle dung—the man had even bitten off four of his own
fingers in his quest to assuage his hunger.
He had died, eventually, by the low stone wall that had bounded the field. His internal
organs had finally exploded with the weight of the rocks he carried within him. He‘d died
stuffing scraps of his bowel and liver into his mouth.
Sickened, the eagle had watched it all, and wondered if, eventually, he also would be
caught outside when the badness billowed abroad.
Now he sat safe under the watchtower roof. The black cloud swooped low over a band of
pigs that roamed savage and crazed to the west of Tare—yesterday, that band of pigs had caught
and devoured several people trying to scrabble among the fields for some scraps to eat—and then
rose into the sky again, and flew eastwards.
The eagle shuddered as their whispering sounded directly above him, and then slowly
relaxed as they continued to fly westwards.
Drago lurched forward as the donkey bucked and kicked, and tried to grab at her
brush-like mane.
But it was no good, and with a grunt of surprise, he slid to the ground.
He rolled to his feet immediately, grabbing his staff to use as a weapon—and then froze
in utter astonishment.
Faraday already had her hands to her mouth, stifling her laughter.
The donkey bucked and kicked in a small circle, trying to dislodge what appeared to be a
blue-feathered lizard that clutched at her tail trying with narrow-eyed determination to climb
onto the donkey‘s back.
Drago slowly rose to his feet, laid both staff and sack on the ground, and then cautiously
approached the aggrieved donkey, holding out one hand and murmuring soothing words.
The donkey gave one final buck—the lizard still gripping her tail—and halted, trembling,
allowing Drago to rub her cheek and neck.
The lizard gave a hiss of triumph, and then, with almost lightning speed, scrabbled up the
donkey‘s tail and onto her back.
Drago looked at it, looked at Faraday—who had quietened herself—and then ran his hand
down the donkey‘s neck and across her withers towards the lizard. He hesitated, then gently
touched the lizard‘s emerald and scarlet feathers just behind its head.
They were as soft as silk.
The lizard‘s crest rose up and down as Drago scratched.
―What is it?‖ he asked, raising his eyes to Faraday.
―It is one of the fey creatures of Minstrelsea,‖ Faraday said. She explained how, when
she‘d planted the last tree for the forest, the borders between the forest and the Sacred Grove had
opened, and Minstrelsea had been flooded with the strange creatures of the Groves. ―I think it
likes you.‖
Drago grinned and ran his hand down the lizard‘s blue back. ―It‘s beautiful,‖ he said,
watching the shafts of light glint from its talons. ―Entrancing…‖
The lizard twisted a little, and grabbed at his hand with its mouth—and then began to
wash the back of Drago‘s hand with its bright pink tongue.
The donkey, grown bored, sighed and shifted her weight from one hind leg to another.
The lizard slipped, and Drago instinctively caught it up into his arms.
―What am I supposed to do with it?‖ he asked helplessly.
―I think it wants to come with us,‖ Faraday said. ―And as to what you are supposed to do
with it…well, I think it expects you to love it.‖
For the rest of that day, and all the next, they travelled further south through the Woods.
The lizard travelled with Drago, curled up in front of him on the donkey, the crystal talons of its
fore-claws gripping the donkey‘s mane for purchase.
The donkey put up with it with some bad grace, her floppy ears laid back along her skull,
and she snapped whenever the lizard slipped. But at night she did not seem to mind when the
lizard curled up beside her for warmth.
On the morning of the third day they neared Cauldron Lake, descending through
thickening trees, and Faraday indicated they should dismount and walk the final fifteen or twenty
paces to the edge of the trees.
The lizard, silent and watchful, crawled a pace behind them, careful of its footing on the
slope.
―There,‖ Faraday murmured as they stopped within the gloom of the line of trees.
―Cauldron Lake.‖
Drago‘s breath caught in his throat. As with so many of the wonders of Tencendor, he‘d
heard tales of this Lake, but had never seen it previously.
It lay in an almost perfectly circular depression, the entire forest sloping down towards it
on all sides. To their left, perhaps some two hundred paces about the Lake‘s edge, stood a
circular Keep, built of pale yellow stone. Its door and all its windows were bolted tight.
But it was the water of the Lake that caught Drago‘s attention. It shone a soft, gentle gold
in the early-morning sun.
Without warning, a vicious hand clenched in his stomach, and Drago gagged.
Faraday grabbed his arm and dragged him behind a tree.
―Look,‖ she mouthed, and pointed across the Lake.
On the far shore a blackness had coalesced, and spread like a stain. It took Drago a few
minutes to realise that it consisted of seven black and vaguely horse-like creatures.
And the Demons and StarLaughter.
9
Cauldron Lake
―Curse them!‖ Faraday cried softly. ―Gods! I‘d hoped we could get here before them!‖
―Should we—‖
―No,‖ Faraday said. ―If we try to get to Noah now they will see us.‖
Drago sank down to the ground. He felt physically ill this close to the Demons, and he
wondered again at the bond that existed between them.
―Will Noah survive them?‖ he asked.
―He‘ll have to,‖ Faraday replied.
She sat down next to Drago and regarded him with concerned eyes. ―Are you all right?‖
He nodded, briefly closing his eyes, then he managed a small smile for her. ―I am sick
with frustration, no more. All I want to do is to see this friend of yours, and find out what it is I
must do to help this land. Yet here the Demons have arrived before us, and so we must sit, and
wait, and hope there is still a Noah to speak to once they have done.‖