Eventually, the donkeys drew close to the postern gate. It was bolted shut, and heavy
beams were propped against the door as further protection against invasion.
One of the donkeys stepped forward and nudged one of the beams gently with her nose. It
fell soundlessly to the ground, and the two other beams toppled with it.
The other donkey nudged the bolt, and it slid soundlessly into its carriage.
The gate opened and the donkeys walked through. It swung shut behind them and the bolt
slid home.
The donkeys ambled forth placidly into the night.
Askam had not moved his party since the previous evening. The badger was coming from
the east, and would not ford the Nordra until the next morning.
And so Askam sat and waited. His maniacal command sat with him, forming concentric
circles that rippled out in the night, at their edges hemmed in by their horses standing legs
akimbo, heads down, drool roping from slack jaws to the ground.
In the centre of the circles lay Leagh, her eyes wide, staring at something no-one else
could see. Her limbs moved slowly and purposelessly, her hands alternatively scrabbling at the
dirt she lay in and picking at invisible scabs on her belly.
She was completely naked.
None among this mad company cared, or were even aroused by the sight.
Their minds communed with that of the brown and cream badger, dreaming of the day
when all in this land lay under the sway of the Demons.
The hours passed.
Dawn filtered from the eastern sky, and Mot‘s hunger ravaged the land. Some of the men
who sat with Askam absently carried handfuls of dirt to their mouths, chewing happily on the
dry, crumbly earth, their teeth cracking and shattering on the rocks within the soil. They
swallowed this breakfast without apparent effort. Again and again they lifted their hands to their
mouths, stuffing their bodies with so much earth they eventually groaned and fell over, writhing
silently as their stomachs and then guts burst with the pressure of the rocks and soil.
Eventually blood trickled from their mouths and they lay still, although their bellies
continued to swell with the fluids and gases created by the internal destruction. Some one or two,
their internal build-up so extreme, looked like ghastly parodies of women who had died in the
extremities of childbirth.
Askam paid the swelling corpses no heed. The badger was only a few hours away, and
soon Askam would be reanimated with its purpose.
Everyone save Leagh, who still writhed under the weight of her own internal agonies, sat
completely still. Likewise, the horses stood motionless on their skewed legs.
Waiting.
Something else found them before the badger did.
The donkeys had trotted through the night, unerringly headed straight for the spot where
Askam and his demented force waited. As they drew to within a quarter of a league of their
quarry the donkeys broke into a canter, and their heads snaked forth before them.
The donkeys‘ bony spines padded out and their flanks thickened. Their hooves grew
larger and flattened into platesized paws, wicked talons curving outwards in the anticipation of
dealing death. Their heads, snaking ever lower to the ground, broadened and shrunk back
towards shoulders that had attained the bulkiness of bears.
Icebears.
One of them opened her massive jaws and snarled, and her sister replied with a
full-throated roar.
Far, far to the north, Urbeth raised her head from where it lay on her paws before the fire.
If she had been any less drowsy, she would have smiled, but as it was, she only listened, then let
her head drop back to her paws and sleep. She dreamed of the time, fifteen thousand years
earlier, when she had walked the Underworld on two legs, and with the man who had once been
her husband.
Noah.
Then, Urbeth‘s mouth had spent a great deal of its time curved in laughter and hardly any
of her nights in sleep at all.
The icebears burst through the outer ranks of horses and men with the full fury of a
winter storm on the Icebear Coast.
Men and horses scattered, bowled aside by a combination of the bears‘ weight and the
force of their huge paws.
Those not directly affected by the bears‘ intrusion leapt to their feet, hands reaching for
swords or stones, their faces contorted with howls of hate.
Who was this, come to destroy their contemplation?
Askam himself jumped up, jerking about to see what it was that caused such a
commotion.
Even in his preoccupied madness, his face slackened in momentary disbelief before he
grabbed his sword.
Askam ordered the compliant Leagh to her feet, swinging her body around so that it
covered his, and he placed the sword against her throat.
She did not protest, nor move away.
One of the bears stopped several paces away, her head moving slowly from side to side,
deep growls rumbling through her throat.
The fur of her neck and chest was stained bright red, but Askam was way beyond fear.
His sword tightened against Leagh‘s throat so that a trickle of blood crept down to circle one
breast. Still she did not move, nor give any sign that she knew a great icebear stood before her.
―Go away,‖ Askam said to the icebear, ―or she dies.‖
The icebear sat down with a thud, and tilted her head to one side. ―I can eat her dead or
alive,‖ she said, ―as I can you.‖
―Why do you not listen to the badger?‖ Askam asked, the first hint of puzzlement
infusing his voice.
The icebear grinned. ―Oh, but it is the badger who has sent me.‖
―It is?‖ Askam asked hopefully. His arm slackened slightly and the sword point drooped.
―The badger of death,‖ the icebear said, and laughed.
Askam frowned, and his arm twitched as if he meant to lift the sword, but in the heartbeat
before he did so, the other sister slunk silently up behind him and seized his head in her jaws.
Askam screamed—the sound horribly muffled—and dropped the sword as he desperately
grabbed at the slavering mouth that encased his head.
It was useless.
With three quick movements the icebear savaged Askam‘s head from his shoulders, and
then dropped his corpse.
She bent down and snuffled Leagh lying unperturbed on the ground.
―I like this not,‖ she said to her sister.
―Nevertheless,‖ said the other icebear, ambling over, ―she will make a lily yet.‖
And then she grinned, and looked about at the slaughter that surrounded them. ―The hunt
was a good one, sister. Shall we feed before we go back?‖
The badger stood and surveyed the scene of carnage.
What had happened?
He snorted and nuzzled the remains of a soldier. There was not much left.
What to do now?
He raised his head and gazed southwards. He could just make out the rising walls and
spires of Carlon—the stone maze where the two-legs hid.
Many two legs…more two-legs than his mind could grasp. All hiding from his masters‘
hunger.
He looked back over his shoulder. Several thousand creatures of all varieties stood
waiting his instructions.
His eyes swivelled forwards again, and the Demons spoke in his mind.
Carlon! Carlon!
The brown and cream badger grunted, and started forward.
Behind him his force followed in blind, obedient madness.
At noon that day a shout from one of the guards brought Zared rushing from palace to
gates.
Outside stood the two white donkeys, Leagh‘s still form draped across one of them.
In the ensuing rush no-one had time to even think about how it was that the two donkeys
had not only escaped Carlon in the middle of the night, but now stood here in the noon chill with Leagh. Zared broke several fingernails in his desperate attempts to get the bolts drawn back from
the gates, and had hauled Leagh from the donkey‘s back with no other thought than to get her
inside.
No questions asked.
No thanks given.
No-one even remembered the donkeys who stood watching with great sad, dark eyes as
the gates slammed and bolted shut again in their faces. They sighed, and wished Zared luck with
what was left of his wife.
After a moment they turned and trotted north, their duty done.
Theod stood with Zared, surrounded by Herme, Gustus and several other captains and
anxious servants, staring at the closed door to the bedchamber.
Nothing had been said as Zared carried Leagh back to their rooms—save for a shout for
the palace physician—and there were few words to be said now.
And so they waited in silence, all eyes on the closed bedchamber door. Zared had wanted
to go inside with the physician, and the five soldiers he‘d needed for safety, but both Herme and
Theod had held him back.
Now they stood, and watched, and waited.
The door opened, and the physician emerged. His face was grey, and marked as if
scratched. His eyes searched for Zared, then he walked over and dropped to one knee before his