Swinther’s words were lost in the rumble of shale. A few seconds later, they heard the impact and the now-familiar roar of an avalanche of loose rock.
Young Laska touched her bow and it went dark, so they could not see the column of stone-dust rise where Swinther fell. But they could taste its grim finality on their tongues and feel the grit of it in their eyes.
“And so another joins my happy band,” sang the voice in the darkness, now sounding as if he were far to the left, where there was nothing but empty air. The necromancer was throwing his voice, or utilizing some magic. “You will see him again, but I doubt he will be welcome.”
Ferin felt Young Laska touch her arm.
“We must move,” whispered the Borderer. “Crawl and feel the way ahead. Hurry!”
Ferin needed little encouragement. She crawled a dozen paces forward, as quickly as she could, pausing to drop the cookpot lid on one side before continuing. The makeshift shield was too heavy and awkward; and she was already tired and her foot was getting worse. Ferin hoped the necromancer’s keeper would not get close enough to be able to shoot with greater effect.
She felt Young Laska touch her heels, and could hear the crunch of shale. It was not too difficult to feel the path ahead, but she was already cut by the broken shale on her hands and knees, and now her fingers were also bleeding. The cuts were not serious in themselves, but fresh blood was a lure for the Dead. With the scratches from the Gore Crows, Ferin and Young Laska were like bait being dragged for hunting dogs.
Her ankle sent out more stabbing pains, a sure sign Astilaran’s spell was weakening. Ferin ignored this, as she ignored all the lesser pains from scratches, cuts, and bruises, and the pang she felt from Swinther’s death. Karrilke’s husband, father to six children, who had been so keen to help her.
Ferin was no stranger to death; the Athask people looked upon it with considerable fatalism, considering that death could come at any moment, unlooked for or otherwise. It was to be faced bravely, and if circumstances allowed, the dead were to be mourned and their lives celebrated.
If circumstances allowed. In battle, or on the hunt, any death was locked away in its moment, not to be considered until some later time permitted.
This Ferin tried to do, but she felt a great responsibility, knowing that she had brought this death to Swinther and to his family. For the first time, she wondered if her message really was so important. But it was only a fleeting thought, instantly banished as she refocused her mind on the path ahead.
The ridge began to slope up, suggesting they were nearing the peak. Before the light had completely gone, Ferin had gotten a look at High Kemmy ahead. It was also shale, of course, but it seemed to her the ridge rose and widened to make a large flat area, and then there were several ridgelines running down again from that. One of these would be the path that led to the valley and from there to the river tower. But without Swinther they did not know which one and in the dark they could not see . . .
The second path . . .
Ferin wondered what Swinther had tried to call out as he fell. Did he mean the second path they would meet upon the peak? Counting from where? Second on the left, second on the right? Or was he calling out something entirely different?
They could not choose the right path from his dying shout. They would have to do something else.
Ferin kept thinking about this as they crawled forward, her questing hands checking the path ahead. Several times she had to force herself to slow down, as she almost missed a slight turn or deviation that would have had her move off the ridge and begin a slide to certain death. Always she was aware of Young Laska at her heels, and somewhere behind her, there was the necromancer and his keeper, and who knew what Dead things the necromancer had dragged back into Life.
Ferin stopped and reached back behind her to pull on Young Laska’s hand, drawing the Borderer up close enough to hear a whisper.
“We have to try and kill the necromancer’s keeper,” said Ferin, very quietly. “Without the keeper, he will be free to make his own choices and may turn aside, go elsewhere, or even choose to let us go.”
“I doubt it,” said Young Laska. She hesitated. “But . . . I can think of nothing else. Have you an idea how we might do this?”
“Shoot lots of arrows at her,” said Ferin.
“That has the virtue of simplicity,” said Young Laska. “But in the dark—”
“I was hoping you could put one of your marks on the shale, so that when the necromancer or the keeper steps upon it, there will be light,” interrupted Ferin quickly. “We wait on the peak, and we shoot.”
“They will be very close behind, if we fail,” said Young Laska. “I think we should keep moving. There is always a chance we can stay far enough ahead, get down and to the tower—”
“Do you know which ridge to follow down?”
“No,” said Young Laska. But she too had noticed Swinther’s final words. “The second path, Swinther tried to tell us, didn’t he?”
“Perhaps,” said Ferin. “But can we be sure what he meant? And we’ll have to feel for it, in the dark. It will be very hard to find any path down.”
Young Laska did not answer for a full minute. Finally she spoke. “All right. We are fairly close to the peak. I will set the mark here.”
It took the Borderer a few minutes to place the Charter mark, tense minutes with Ferin staring back along the ridge behind her, trying to make out any slight changes in the darkness that might indicate movement, intently listening to every sound. She could hear the occasional crack of shale, the shuffle of displaced stone. From that she knew the necromancer and his keeper were still following, but it was very difficult to tell how far away they were. They were definitely getting closer.
Young Laska cupped her hands to hide the momentary spark of the mark’s appearance, before it sank into a lump of shale in the middle of the path. It would burst into bright light for several minutes when anyone trod on it, or passed nearby.
“Go on,” whispered Young Laska urgently. “It’s done.”
Ferin resumed her crawl. The ridge and the path upon it were climbing more steeply now, making the way more difficult. Ferin probed ahead with her fingers, feeling where the shale was in bigger pieces, piled higher on either side of the slight depression of the path.
She was reaching forward as usual when she noticed the sky was growing lighter. Ferin paused for a moment, and stared up. The dark clouds summoned by the necromancer’s wind-raising were beginning to split apart. There were stars shining through. In their faint light, Ferin could now see the ridgeline ahead and the dark silhouette of the peak, High Kemmy.
Looking behind, Ferin could also now just about see Young Laska’s face, or rather the reflection of starlight from her eyes, and the faintest suggestion of an outline for her head.
“The clouds are moving,” whispered Ferin. “The necromancer’s hold on the wind has weakened.”
“Or he uses his powers otherwise,” said Young Laska. “Hurry!”
Ferin resumed crawling. It was easier, now that she could see a little, and her heart was lifted by the presence of the stars above. But she had hardly gone on a dozen paces when that slight relief was entirely lost, as the necromancer behind them rang one of his sorcerous bells.
It was Mosrael’s voice they heard, though neither Ferin nor Young Laska knew this, or even knew it was a necromantic bell. To them it was simply a terrible, harsh sound that entirely filled their bodies with a sickening vibration, a sound that plucked at their bones as if it might draw them out of their flesh, force the teeth from their jaws, and explode their joints.
Mosrael was the Waker, the bell which brought Dead spirits back into the living world, back into whatever flesh might be found to house them.