The Bonehunters

Not wolves. Gods below, the throats that loosed those howlsA sudden heavy gusting sound, to her right, too close. She twisted her head round, the motion involuntary, and cold seeped down through her paralysed body as if sinking roots into the hard ground. A wolf but not a wolf, padding down a steep slope to land silent on the same broad ledge Masan Gilani was lying on – a wolf, but huge, as big as a Dal Honese horse, deep grey or black – there was no way to be certain.

It paused, stood motionless for a moment in full profile, its attention clearly fixed on something ahead, down on the road.

Then the massive beast's head swung round, and Masan Gilani found herself staring into lambent, amber eyes, like twin pits into madness.

Her heart stopped in her chest. She could not draw breath, could not pull her gaze from that creature's deathly regard.

Then, a slow – so very slow – closing of those eyes, down to the thinnest slits – and the head swung back.

The beast padded towards the crest. Stared down for a time, then slipped down over the edge. And vanished from sight.

Sudden air flooded her lungs, thick with dust. She coughed – impossible not to – twisting round into a ball, hacking and gagging, spitting out gobs of gritty phlegm. Helpless, giving herself – giving everything – away. Still coughing, Masan Gilani waited for the beast to return, to pick her up in its huge jaws, to shake her once, hard, hard enough to snap her neck, her spine, to crunch down on her ribcage, crushing everything inside.

She slowly regained control of her breathing, still lying on sweatsoaked ground, shivers rippling through her.

From somewhere far overhead, in that dark sky, she heard birds, crying out. A thousand voices, ten thousand. She did not know that birds flew at night. Celestial voices, winging south as fast as unseen wings could take them.

Closer by… no sound at all.

Masan Gilani rolled onto her back, stared unseeing upward, feeling blood streaming down her slashed thigh. Wait till Saltlick and the rest hear about this one…

****

Dejim Nebrahl raced through the darkness, three beasts in full flight, a fourth limping in their wake, already far behind. Too weak, made mindless with hunger, all cunning lost, and now yet one more D'ivers kin was dead. Killed effortlessly by a mere human, who then crippled another with a lazy flick of that knife.

The T'rolbarahl needed to feed. The horse's blood had barely begun to slake a depthless thirst, yet with it came a whisper of strength, a return to sanity.

Dejim Nebrahl was being hunted. An outrage, that such a thing could be. The stench of the creatures rode the wind, seeming to gust in from all sides except directly ahead. Fierce, ancient life and deadly desire, bitter to the T'rolbarahl's senses. What manner of beasts were these?

The fourth kin, lagging half a league behind now, could feel the nearness of the pursuers, loping unseen, seemingly content to keep pace, almost uninterested in closing, in finishing off this wounded D' ivers. They had announced themselves with their howls, but since then, naught but silence, and the palpable nearness of their presence.

They were but toying with Dejim Nebrahl. A truth that infuriated the T'rolbarahl, that burned like acid through their thumping hearts. Were they fully healed, and seven once again rather than three and scant more, those creatures would know terror and pain. Even now, Dejim Nebrahl contemplated laying an ambush, using the wounded kin as bait.

But the risks were too great – there was no telling how many of these hunters were out there.

And so there was little choice. Flee, desperate as hares, helpless in this absurd game.

For the first three kin, the scent of the hunters had begun to fade.

It was true – few creatures could keep pace with Dejim Nebrahl for very long. It seemed, then, that they would content themselves with the crippled trailer, giving the D'ivers an opportunity to see them for the first time, to mark them for the others, until such time as vengeance could be exacted.

And yet, the mysterious beasts did not lunge into view, did not tear into the fourth kin. And even for that one, the scent was fading.

It made no sense.

Dejim Nebrahl slowed his flight, wondering, curious, and not yet in the least suspicious.

****
From cool relief to growing chill, the night descended among the trudging soldiers, raising a mutter of new complaints. A sleeping child in his arms, Fiddler walked two strides behind Kalam and Quick Ben, while in his wake strode Apsalar, her footfalls the barest of whispers.

Better than scorching sun and heat… but not much better. Burnt and blistered skin on shoulders now radiated away all the warmth the flesh could create. Among the worst afflicted, fever awoke like a child lost in the woods, filling shadows with apparitions. Twice in the past hundred paces one of the soldiers had cried out in fear – seeing great moving shapes out in the night. Lumbering, swaggering, with eyes flashing like embers the hue of murky blood. Or so Mayfly had said, surprising everyone with the poetic turn of phrase.