At the Queen's Command (41 page)

“I am dead, Captain. I may not remember much, but that cannot be forgotten. The dead have nothing to offer the living.”

“Not so, Quarante-neuf, not so.” They stepped free of the largest drift—which had totally filled the trench—and made their way across the wind-scoured glacis. They forded another drift, then pushed on straight north, toward the looming hill from which he had first scouted du Malphias’ domain.

They paused in the lee of another drift. Quarante-neuf knelt with his back to the wind, providing Owen shelter. Snow caked the pack and his clothes, but he did not seem to notice. He did not shiver, he did not brush snow away. He remained untouched by the storm.

Then he grabbed Owen by the shoulders and hauled him to his feet. “Come, Captain, we must go.”

“Just a moment longer.”

“No. Every step away from here makes my master safer.” The
pasmorte
nodded. “And it brings happiness one step closer for your Bethany.”

Owen smiled and warmth coursed through him. “She is a good woman, kind and smart. You would like her. But I am bound for the reunion with my wife.”

“That does not mean your Bethany will not be pleased to see you. I shall get you to her.” Quarante-neuf dragged him through another drift, then they began the long, slow trek up a half-carved hill. They cut toward the lake halfway up and around into the forest, then started working down again.

Owen began to shiver. He tucked his hands up under his armpits, seeking some warmth, and feeling the lump that was Agaskan’s doll.
I have more friends to see when I am safe.

Already his nose and ears had begun to burn. He’d lost feeling in his cheeks for the most part. The wind whipping through the trees lost some of its intensity, but dumped snow from high branches that drifted down to coat his hair, melt, and freeze eyelashes together.

They crested the hill and Owen sagged against a tree. “Just a moment’s rest.”

“Be quiet, Captain.” Quarante-neuf shucked his pack and leaped to the right. Snow half-blinded Owen, but could not hide three forms looming from within the woods. Quarante-neuf pounced upon one and bones cracked. He lunged at another and vanished into the storm.

A
pasmorte
appeared at Owen’s side, reaching for him with boney fingers. The Norillian lurched forward. A branch lashed him across the face. He twisted, his knees buckled. He went down and began sliding across the frozen snow on the hill’s windswept face.

Owen could do nothing to slow himself. Snow sprayed into his face, then he barked a shin against a sapling. He spun and slammed his shoulder into another tree. Twisting forward and back, spinning helplessly, he caromed from one tree to another and finally, battered and aching, slid into a deep drift at the hill’s base.

He huddled there, his hands drawn in. His body ached from the collisions, but he forced that away. He listened, waiting for sounds of an enemy’s approach. He slipped one of the cloak-clasp nails into his right hand.
Crush the skull with a shackle or stab it with this nail. That has to work.

The snow and howling wing mocked him. He couldn’t have heard a cavalry charge above the wind. Anyone coming downhill for him would have the wind carrying away the sound of their approach. But if he moved he would give himself away. He shivered, despair seeping into him.

A hand grabbed his ankle.

He kicked at it, but it held tightly. “Captain Strake, I have found you.”

“Quarante-neuf?”

The
pasmorte
dragged him from the drift and rolled him over. “Are you hurt?”

“Banged and bruised. Ready to go on.” He looked to the north. “There has to be a canoe here. There
must
be.”

Quarante-neuf smiled. “There is, my friend. We will find them closer to the lake.”

Owen looked up at him. “You sound happy.”

The
pasmorte
’s gaze drew distant. “Happier, I think. I am free. Destroying the others I did because I wanted to, not because I was compelled to.”

“Good, my friend.” Owen nodded, fighting against dread.
How long will you remain free?
Owen could not forget the first
pasmorte
they had found, all curled up and chewed, the journal showing evidence of deterioration. Quarante-neuf might be free, but there would come a point where the magick would run out.

“Tell me you have some
vivalius
.”

“I chose not to steal any.”

“What? The Prince could re-create it from a sample. He could keep you alive.”

“Not possible, my friend, for I am dead.” Quarante-neuf helped him over a fallen log. “I shall not fail you. But I would not have anyone else know what I know. The emptiness. Memories that hover just beyond remembering. I feel as if I am waiting, always waiting, but for what I do not know.”

Owen grabbed him by the shoulder. “But…”

“I will return you to your Prince and your Bethany.” The
pasmorte
smiled. “Then I shall return to the grave in peace.”

The wind’s shrieking and a blast of snow silenced any counter-argument Owen would have offered. As they struggled toward the lake, an emptiness grew in Owen. He did not want Quarante-neuf to die.
But if this is a fraction of what he feels, I understand.

After a short time, Quarante-neuf leaned against a tree, letting the storm rage around him. The
pasmorte
slipped down into a small depression and drove his hands into the snow. He grunted, then straightened, flipping over a canoe. Two paddles lay in the hollow beneath it.

“Come, Captain Strake, get the paddles.”

They put the canoe in the water. Owen got in the front. He knelt, sitting back on his haunches, which, oddly enough, quieted the lingering pain. Quarante-neuf launched the canoe, then waded out and climbed in.

The wind hit them immediately, driving them south toward the shore and the fortress. Owen had intended to go north and cut around the same route he’d taken to reach the fortress originally, but the wind made that impossible. They turned the canoe to the southeast and paddled hard. They heard nothing but the wind, which is why when the first cannon ball splashed beside them, it came as a complete surprise. Only after the second and third hit did a momentary lull in the wind let him hear a cannon’s dying roar. They had drifted perilously close to the fortress.

Du Malphias does have a way to track me
. His mind immediately flashed to the symbol du Malphias had cut into his shackle’s bronze bolts. It had not been to mark Owen as chattel. It had been to allow du Malphias to locate him.

Owen looked back over his shoulder. “We have to go out and get past the river. We have to do it now. He knows where we are.”

Quarante-neuf dug his paddle deep. The canoe surged forward. Another cannon ball sprayed water over them, but the
pasmorte
ignored the danger. Owen bent to the task of paddling, trying to match the
pasmorte
’s strength, but it took his utmost to keep the canoe headed deeper into the lake.

As the cannon balls splashed behind them, Owen surrendered a little to the wind and sent the canoe toward the southeast shore, just beyond the Roaring River outlet. The wind began to slacken, and Owen laughed aloud. “Just when we could use its push!”

Quarante-neuf laughed as well, for the very first time in Owen’s memory. An aborted sound, like a burp from a child who has realized that burping was not allowed in polite company. The
pasmorte
broke his paddling rhythm, then laughed again, a bit longer. Owen looked back, reading surprise and a hint of delight on his companion’s face.

“It’s a good laugh, my friend. Let it out.”

“I will. I remember laughing. I liked it.”

Suddenly the wind died. Clouds cracked enough to allow moonlight to ignite the snow. The fortress menaced from atop its hill. Owen swore he could see a tall, slender man pacing the walls, but something else urged him to paddle with renewed vigor.

Behind them, in two large, broad boats the Tharyngians called
batteaux
, two dozen soldiers pursued them. A man in the lead boat stood and shouted, then raised a musket and fired. He moved too easily to be a
pasmorte
, but the tireless repetition of the oarsmen’s strokes suggested they were.

“Make for shore. We need cover.”

The two of them paddled harder, fervently wishing the wind would rise again. It didn’t. Their hunters took turns shooting. As the two of them reached the shore, one ball skipped off the water and holed the canoe. Water gushed, but it didn’t matter. Quarante-neuf’s powerful strokes drove the canoe up onto the shore with such force that stones ripped the bottom out.

Another ball ricocheted off a rock as Owen scrambled to the treeline. Tharyngians shouted orders, looking for a place to beach their boats. Quarante-neuf shot past Owen, then grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him further into the woods. Keeping the lake on their left, they plunged into the forest, seeking hollows to work their way up and in while remaining hidden.

They fought through deep drifts. The sound of pursuit came quickly. “They must have snowshoes.” Quarante-neuf shoved Owen up to the crest of a small hill. “Go, I will delay them.”

“No, I can’t make it without you.” Owen stood and turned, then a musket barked. A ball caught him in the left flank, pitching him backward. He spun, slammed into a tree, then started tumbling down the hillside.

Owen reached the bottom, new pain rippling through him. The bullet had only caught flesh and maybe a little muscle, but smashing into the tree had stunned him. Stars evaporated from his eyes, but the forest took on an odd quality. The snow had tinges of green and hints of deep blue. Stones began to shift shape and trees began to part. To the south a whole avenue opened, welcoming him.

Two more gunshots and Quarante-neuf crashed down beside him. “How bad, Captain?”

“I will live. Did they hit you?”

“Once, in the stomach.” The
pasmorte
spasmed, as if to vomit, then spat the bullet into his hand. “It is nothing.”

“We have to go.” Owen struggled to get up. “South, there, can you see it?”

The
pasmorte
nodded. “The winding path. It will kill us.”

“But it will not return us to du Malphias.”

Quarante-neuf pulled Owen up. “Then the winding path it is.”

Chapter Forty-Two

October 15, 1763

Anvil Lake, New Tharyngia

N
athaniel would have laughed had the situation not been dire. With snowshoes strapped to his feet, Makepeace sailed down the hillside, taking huge long steps and leaps. His bear robe, which he’d peeled down to the waist, had sleeves flopping, making the man look like a four-armed nightmare creature.

Kamiskwa and Nathaniel followed quickly in his wake. The Altashee cut left well above the spot where Makepeace had stopped, and Nathaniel turned to the west two steps later. In parallel, they filed through the woods, coming on through the shore zone.

More guns fired before them, closer this time, and the trio broke into a run. They caught voices distantly, the words unintelligible, but recognized the cadence as Tharyngian. Then, as they came around a hill, three shots fired in volley. The muzzle-flashes revealed an infantry squad in blue jackets tearing up a hill, and over a dozen ragged
pasmortes
coming on through the snow.

Nathaniel raised his rifle, sighted, and pulsed magick into the firestone. Forty yards, at night, even with the moonlight, would be a tricky shot, but the Tharyngian soldiers silhouetted themselves against the snow. His rifle spat fire and metal. A man halfway up the hill, calmly reloading his musket, grunted and collapsed, snow dusting his corpse.

From his right and left his companions also fired. One man screamed and kept screaming. Two men shot back, one shot hitting the tree behind which Nathaniel had taken cover. The shot hit high. The Ryngians were shooting blindly. Then someone shouted orders and the Ryngian regulars returned no more fire.

Nathaniel ignored the bluebacks and crouched. He worked the lever, cleared the breech, reloaded and levered the assembly back into place. He peered out, saw two silhouettes still on the slope, and
pasmortes
on their way.

“Remember, the Prince wants one of them things.”

Makepeace laughed. “I’ll try to save him a piece, anyway.”

Nathaniel tracked and shot. One
pasmorte
was loping forward on all fours. The bullet caught it high in the chest as it rose to spring ahead. It nearly stood like a man again, then flopped over onto its back, arms and legs spasmodically clawing at the sky.

A single gunshot answered him, chipping bark from the tree. “Careful. One has a gun.”

“By the rock.” Kamiskwa pointed due west, then raised his musket and shot. Another
pasmorte
went down, raising a cloud of snow. The Altashee ducked back, but didn’t bother to reload his gun. Instead he unlimbered his warclub.

Makepeace shot. Nathaniel, just finishing a quick reload himself, didn’t see if the big man hit anything or not. He came up, sighted the rock and, when he saw movement, fired. Whatever had been moving stopped, but that didn’t matter much.

The
pasmortes
had reached them.

Kamiskwa screeched at the top of his lungs and lunged from behind the tree, his warclub held high. His first blow crushed a skull and the second caught a
pasmorte
in the chest. Ribs snapped and the creature flew off into the underbrush. The Altashee stalked forward, his club whirling, not waiting for them to close.

Makepeace similarly waded into battle, clubbing his musket. He brought it down sharply, bashing a skull in, then levered the body aside. Two more came at him, more by happenstance than planning. He smashed one with the rifle, but the other lunged and bit him on the thigh. Makepeace roared, dropped his rifle and ripped the thing away from his leg. “Back to Hell with you!” The very avatar of wrath, he hoisted the thing aloft, then slammed it down, snapping its spine over his knee.

Two of them had come for Nathaniel, but a snowdrift slowed them. Nathaniel buried his tomahawk in one’s skull, then sidestepped the other. He smacked it in the head with his rifle’s butt and it dropped, but only for a moment. It kept clawing at the snow. He hit it again, crushing the skull.