‘By the blood of Missael!’ whispered Bodalen. The sheep had short, pointed fangs.
‘This valley is bewitched!’ said one of the men.
‘Be silent!’ roared Gracus, dismounting. He knelt by the carcass. ‘It looks as if it has been chewed by rats,’ he said. ‘The bite-marks are small.’ He stood and swung into the saddle.
Bodalen felt his unease growing. Everything in this valley seemed unnatural. Sweat rolled down his back. He glanced at Gracus, noting the beads of perspiration on his brow. ‘Is it just fear, or is it hotter here?’ he asked the warrior.
‘It’s hotter,’ answered Gracus. ‘But that’s often the way with mountain valleys.’
‘Not this hot, surely?’
‘Let’s get to the castle,’ said Gracus.
A horse screamed and reared, unseating the rider. Instantly a host of rat-like creatures swarmed from the long grass, leaping on the man, covering him in a blanket of grey striped fur. Blood spouted from a score of wounds. Gracus swore and kicked his horse into a gallop, Bodalen following him.
No one even looked back.
The ruined gates of the castle loomed before them and the ten remaining riders galloped into the courtyard beyond. This too was uneven, but showed no cracks, nor breaks in the marble. Bodalen swung down from the saddle and ran to a rampart stair, climbing swiftly to the crooked battlements. Out on the valley floor all was still, save for the writhing, grey fur mounds where once had been horse and man.
‘We can’t stay here!’ said Bodalen, as Gracus joined him at the battlements.
‘The master has ordered it. That is an end to the matter.’
‘What were those things?’
‘I don’t know. Some kind of small cat, perhaps.’
‘Cats don’t hunt like that,’ insisted Bodalen.
‘Rats! Cats! What difference does it make? The master says to hide here and kill Kesa Khan. That we will do.’
‘But what if there are creatures like that living below the castle? What then, Gracus?’
‘We will die,’ answered the warrior, with a grim smile. ‘So let us hope there are none.’
*
Waylander lay flat, he and Scar part-covered by his cloak, reversed now so that the sheepskin lining merged with the snow around him. His right arm was stretched out over the dog and he stroked the broad head. ‘Stay silent, boy,’ he whispered. ‘Our lives depend on it.’ No more than sixty paces back down the trail seven Sathuli warriojs were examining tracks in the snow. The gash in Waylander’s leg was healing fast, but the wound in his upper left arm nagged at him. They had almost surprised him two days before, laying an ambush in a narrow pass. Four Sathuli had died in the attack, a fifth left mortally wounded, his lifeblood gushing from a tear in the great artery at the groin. Scar had killed two, but had it not been for a sudden change in the direction of the wind which alerted the hound, Waylander would now be dead. As it was his arm ached, the wound constantly leaking blood. It was too far back for him to stitch the tear, and too close to the shoulder joint to bandage. A low rumbling growl began in Scar’s throat, but he patted the dog, whispering soothing words.
The seven Sathuli were trying to make sense of the tracks leading up the hill. Waylander knew what they were thinking. The human footprints were leading north, but the tracks of the hound went both up and down the hill. The Sathuli were confused. At the top of the slope the trail narrowed, a huge boulder by the trees making an ideal hiding-place. Not one of the warriors wanted to walk that slope, fearing a hidden crossbowman. Waylander could not hear their arguments, but he saw two of them gesticulating, pointing to the east. Waylander had taken a chance, moving carefully up the slope, then retracing his steps, walking backwards, placing his feet in the tracks he had made during the climb. Then he had lifted Scar, hurling the yelping hound into a snow drift to the left of the trail. A long branch overhung the slope here and Waylander had leapt to grasp it, moving hand over hand until he dropped to the ground by the trunk. Then, the huge hound beside him, he had hunkered down to wait for the Sathuli.