The Shapeshifters (2 page)

‘
Do not
run!
’

I refused to obey,
stumbling blindly, thrusting my way through gnarled shrubs and
undergrowth—

‘
If you wish
to survive passed today you would be wise to come with us!’ the
voice commanded. ‘Your Hampton pursuers are almost upon
us.’

I stopped, holding myself
upright with the aid of rotting tree stumps that wriggled rampantly
with biting gnats and mites and slaters. Panting, I shook the
critters free of my fingers and turned and gazed back through the
scrub at the closest of the Bonekeepers.

The one who had spoken
was an elder by the looks, with grizzled tusks and sagging scales
around his lizard eyes. I had heard many stories about these
Bonekeepers. Many strange and wonderful tales.

It is said they deal in
bone. Drifting from land to land, realm to realm, collecting bones
from battlefields where the war dead lie rotting. Picking out bones
from the worm ridden flesh of trolls and ogres in caves and
grottos. Scouring seashores where the great sea beasts occasionally
wash up deceased.

It is said they enchant
their morbid skeletal collections, to cure illness, to wield them
as weapons, to spread disease, to yield crops. My father told me as
much about these people, how they would arrive in Palemoth in the
middle of the night, trading secretly by the light of the stars and
be gone again by morning. I saw them once when I was a young lass
of eight summers. When one of their caravans passed through my home
village of Raethgar, their mysterious train and their elegant
horses caught under the elf light of a full moon. And it was not
the bones that had captured my imagination but the stories of how
they could change their bodies at will. For they say Bonekeepers
are the last of the ancient Shapeshifters.

So, here they were. In
the Dread Forests; no Greeps threatening, no hint, nor sign, nor
sound, nor smell of the deadly Gookas or Gingerbreads or
Wraithbies. As if some magical enchantment, some greater force,
were keeping all critters of darkness at bay.

I knew the Bonekeepers
were no friends of the Hampton Barony. Father explained that the
authorities of Hampton had driven the Bonekeepers from the realm of
Palemoth two decades gone. Still, was I to trust them? And what
choice did I have. After all, my race was run. I had made swift
speed these past few days under a combination of natural agility
and Sacckin, the war broth of the Crones. And overnight my leg had
healed remarkably. (Crone magic never ceases to fascinate me.)
There was no weeping, gaping wound, no rancid infection. Just a
healed rounded nub.

But there was
no doubting my predicament. I would have much trouble walking from
these days on with but one foot. Running was out of the question. I
had more remedies if I needed. Namely the Ghostweed; black powdery
pods full of spores that would afford me a temporary limb, provided
I took them, breathed them into my lungs, sucked them directly into
my blood stream. I would be gifted the portion of my leg lost, one
foot and five toes that would respond
mostly
to my command. I say mostly
for although it would attach itself to me I would simply be its
custodian in this world, and temporarily. For, it would always
belong to the realm of spirits, the realm from where it would be
summoned, and it would consume a small part of me for its
trouble.

I gazed toward the
clearing where the Barony Hound had perched and howled yester
evening. Out there the cloudless blue sky was shrugging off the
heavy black rug of night. Somewhere on the plains beyond the
yipping wrens and squealing hawks the Lancers would be advancing
upon the sunrise, stealing ever closer to the Forests on these
desolate shores.

I had no choice. My
immediate fate now lay in the hands of the ’Keepers.

6

Their caravan
consisted of a train of five carriages. Three were sleeping
compartments and living quarters that contained a kitchen reeking
constantly with the not unpleasant odours of meats being smoked and
spiced; the soft flurries of fumes lifted dreamily into the
thickets of the thick dank wood as we rolled through that long
morning. A compartment on the fourth carriage was lined with chests
and racks filled with the stocks of their livelihood:
bones
.
Skulls
. Of all shapes
and sizes. Some I recognised as those of Gilgamoths, the lumbering
giants of the Heereveen Mountains. And stinking bundles of dried
out Ilicas people from the far distant Kitwei Wilds hung like
rattling mobiles.

The fifth carriage was an
anomaly as far as I saw it. A prison cart if you will. A cell of
steel bars. Measuring several metres in length. It was this that
initially had me alarmed, believing once I accepted their offer I
would be bundled within and escorted back to Hampton. But it stayed
unoccupied. And its purpose remained a mystery.

We had been two or three
hours on the road, by which time the woods about us were laden with
foliage so thick barely a fleck of sunlight filtered through from
the sky beyond. Lanterns were lit. The inky brown reaches of the
woods filled with our dancing shadows. And the going was not swift
(which perturbed me) and I found it difficult to relax. The Hampton
Lancers ride fleet beasts: sleek horned cats. Cats with a keen
sense of smell. If they dared enter these woods they would be upon
us in no time.

The elder tried his best
to encourage and maintain my spirits. ‘Do not worry,’ he told me
softly. ‘On the plains before dawn we unloaded a trail of Oxuum
bones. It will turn their steeds away, disrupt their senses, turn
them weak with delirium. At least for long enough to get you
further afield. And our Bone-ravens will alert us of anyone
approaching long before we are spotted.’ He pointed above us and in
rare instances where the canopy thinned or parted I could see high
in the blue sky strange grey birds circling on the air above the
woods.

‘
And what of
the smoke from your kitchen?’ I asked. ‘These bones you left on the
plains may disrupt their steeds but I fear our location is
advertised all the same.’

My new friend smiled and
assured me the trees in these woods were a ravenous species, that
their appetites for swamp gas, goblin fires, and stove fumes would
eliminate any such threat.

7

The Bonekeepers proved to
be a quiet lot, keeping mostly to themselves. Except the elder, who
sat near me most of the way. I studied him and his kind, wondering
if this lizard appearance was their true form. For I was told that,
in essence, Shapeshifters look like the elves of Farethfeld. While
some believe they are hideous and shelled like the Crab folk from
the Hidden Sea.

‘
We know what
you did,’ the elder told me eventually without looking my way. ‘You
beheaded Lisbeth Danella Everard, fifteenth Baroness of Hampton.
They are calling it the work of a skilled assassin.’ That was about
the only time he scrutinised me. Perhaps hoping I would confirm or
deny such a report. As he spoke, I eyed the horses awash beneath
the swinging lamp light, majestic beasts from Strangeworld lugging
without fuss this hefty line of caravans. (You do not often see
such wonderful creatures in Skärradness. Only a handful of races
and people will use them, or even own them.) He went on. ‘They do
not know your identity but say they have an idea as to your
appearance. You were spotted by one of the guardswomen. Or so they
are claiming.’

8

Late morning the lanterns
were snubbed out as we skirted the south-eastern boarder of the
Dread Forests; a thick stench of salt drifted on the woodland
breeze. Directly south, through the trees, I eyed the black pebbled
beach and the frothing waves crashing against the gigantic
spiralling shells of Greeps. Waves bombed against the jagged
striated rock poking through the roiling green seas like the
serrated spines of Troolies.

To the east the shores
were replaced by low rocky hills covered in thick grasses. Out
there, ditched near a gully, twinkling in the sunlight, lay another
of those strange sky-machines the human traders had brought through
from Strangeworld five decades ago: a silver fuselage with coach
windows dotted along its sides. You’ll not see such relics anymore
back in the lands of Palemoth. Most of them stripped for scrap
metal.

We rolled quietly through
the woodland and I found my mind turning back to the Baroness’s
chamber, relieving her of her head. ‘The Baroness of Hampton
sentenced my family to death.’ That was all I could say at first, I
hung my chin. I recalled my father’s loving embrace, my mother’s
wise words, disclosing the whereabouts of her secret stores of
magic bugs and seeds she had somehow obtained from the Crones of
Coven City. Seeds that had helped me scale the Hampton castle like
a spider up a web, to move without sound, to kill with the strength
of a Behemoth. I remembered with tremendous sadness my younger
sisters, Marietta and Selena. Aged 21 and 18. Nothing but their
long happy lives ahead of them... Except that one dreadful morning
at dawn... all their wonderful dreams cut short.

‘
Baroness
Everard declared that all those who had failed to pay her increased
taxes would be made examples of. But I do not believe that was the
full reason. My parents had been continually harassed, accused
firstly of housing Crones. Then Baroness Everard declared my mother
a Crone of the Western Witchlands. I was at the market when the
Lancers arrived to arrest my family.’ A tear spilled from my eye. I
turned away. ‘I hid. But I witnessed their execution. Everard
herself oversaw it personally. Lighting the pyre on which they were
trussed. Burning each of them alive. If I’d had more time I would
have despatched the great Baroness in the same manner. Alas, I did
what time permitted.’

He nodded and smiled and
reached over and touched my hand.

‘
Assassin,
murderer,’ he said. ‘That may be what they call you today in the
Barony. But in these circles, friend,’ he waved his arm across his
caravan and his people, ‘we call you our
Varrën
. Our saviour, our hero. You
are to be revered.’

9

We took lunch as we
trailed the path along the fringe of the woodlands (both male and
female Bonekeepers preparing and serving dishes of frog and
vegetable and bug). I was grateful for the sustenance but watched
again as smoke flurried into the treetops, hoping that these trees
would indeed mop up such stuff. The caravan never halted while we
ate, while they cooked and served.

Beyond the edge of the
forest the view remained wonderful. We were at an elevated point.
We had left the coast behind and a long valley swept away; endless
fields broken by woodlands in the far distance. Beyond those woods
lay the beginning of the Great Marshes. My destination.

The sight relieved me
somewhat. ‘Thank you,’ I said to the old one as I ate heartily.
‘For your hospitality and aid. I am in your debt.’

He waved his scaled,
clawed hand, as if to suggest my thanks was unnecessary.

‘
No, I want
it to be clear,’ I stressed. ‘
Gladly
I am indebted to you. I owe
you much.’

He ate and watched me. ‘I
would ask then only one thing.’

‘
Anything, if
it not be too grand, for other than what I carry, my homely
possessions lie far behind me now.’

‘
All I ask is
the name of our guest,’ he said. ‘So that I may address her more
respectfully.’

Instead of offering an
immediate answer I scoured the winding leaf laden path stretching
out behind us into the woods. For always on the lookout for my
Hampton pursuers I was. So far, it ran empty save for our cart
tracks and the leaves fluttering down. If the Lancers braved the
woods then unfortunately we had left much evidence of our course. I
tried to ignore this. Told myself the Lancers may skirt the woods
and await our exit but they would never dare venture
within.

‘
Arrabel of
Raethgar,’ I told him eventually. ‘Eldest daughter of Lanson Grean
the pigger.’

He sat back then as if
finally satisfied. ‘Ah, as I suspected, you are no assassin. You
are of the Greans, a family line of generous hearted folk. I am
most pleased to meet you. My name is Hillod.’

I watched him curious,
intrigued. ‘Do you profess to know many Greans?’ I squinted at him
with one eye shut. Recalling those long ago nights peering through
the window at my father beyond the garden fence as he chatted with
peculiar folk who had lizard eyes and rough skin and a long caravan
of mysterious coaches parked in the lane under the pale glow of the
moon.

‘
I have met
many folk on my travels, young Arrabel.
Many
of the Greans of Raethgar. I
may have even met your kin. Although I cannot say that I recall
such a specific encounter if I did. But our days passing through
the town of Palemoth, well the Greans of Raethgar I recall with
great fondness. For always did they welcome us warmly and always
went beyond themselves to extend their hospitality.’

The sun filtered through
the trees and swam warm against my face, the soft breeze drifting
up from the fields below in the valley lifting my long dark hair.
‘Would you answer a curiosity I have? If you think my question not
too rude?’