Winter Warriors (42 page)

The ground was sloping upward now. He struggled to the top of a rise and stood, breathing heavily. Then he began to cough. He could feel warm liquid in his throat, choking him. He spewed it out, then gasped for air. Sufia pulled back in his arms and stared at him, her blue eyes wide and fearful. “Your mouth is bleeding,” she cried.

He could not remember being hit in the mouth. He coughed again. Blood dribbled to his chin. Dizziness swamped him. “They’re coming!” shouted the child. Bison swung around.

Two Krayakin in black armor were walking purposefully toward him, black swords in their hands. Holding firmly to the babe and the child, Bison pushed on. He had no idea where he was going. All he knew was that he had to carry the children to safety.

But where was safety?

Emerging from the tree line, he saw a towering cliff face and a narrow ledge winding along the face. Blinking sweat from his eyes, he struggled on.

“Where are we going?” asked Sufia. Bison did not answer.
He felt weak and disoriented, and his breath was coming now in short, painful gasps. I’ve been wounded before, he told himself. I always heal. I’ll heal again. Glancing back, he saw the Krayakin reach the top of the rise some seventy yards behind him. Where is Nogusta? he wondered. And Kebra?

They’ll be coming! Then I can rest for a while. Nogusta can stitch my wound. Blood was pooling in his boot, and his leggings were drenched. So much blood. He stumbled on. The ledge was narrow there, no more than three feet wide. He looked down over the edge. They were impossibly high. Below him Bison could see wispy clouds clinging to the side of the abyss, and through them he could just make out a tiny river flowing through the base of the canyon. “We are above the clouds,” he told Sufia. “Look!” But she clung to his shoulder, her head buried against his neck. “Above the clouds,” he said again. He swayed and almost fell. The baby began to cry. Bison focused his mind on movement and continued along the ledge.

Another coughing spasm shook him, and this time there was a rush of blood that exploded from his mouth in a crimson spray. Sufia was crying again. Bison stopped moving. The ledge ended here in a blank, gray wall of rock. Gently he laid the baby on the ledge, then pulled Sufia’s arms from around his neck.

“Old Bison needs a rest,” he said. “You … look after the baby for me.”

He was on his knees but could not remember falling. “There’s lots of blood,” wailed Sufia.

“Look … after the baby. There’s a good girl.” Bison crawled to the edge and gazed down again. “Never … been this high,” he told her.

“What about when you had wings?” she asked.

“Big … white … wings,” he said. He looked back along the ledge. The Krayakin must be close now, but he could not see them yet.

I don’t want to die! The thought was a terrible one and far too frightening to contemplate. I’m not going to die, he told himself. I’ll be fine. A few stitches. The sun was shining, but
it was cold here on this exposed face. The cold wind felt good. The wind had been cold back at Mellicane. It had been winter then, a hard, harsh winter. The rivers had frozen solid, and no one had expected an army to march through raging blizzards. But the Drenai had, crossing mountains, and lakes of ice. The Ventrian army had been surprised at Mellicane. That’s where I got my medal, he remembered. The medal he had sold for a night with a fat whore.

She was a good whore, though, he recalled.

He sat with his back to the cliff, a great wave of weariness covering him like a warm blanket. Sleep, that was what he needed. Healing sleep. When he woke up, the wound would be mending. That priestess, she can heal me. A few days rest and I’ll be good as new. Where is Nogusta? Why has he left me alone here?

The baby wailed. Bison thought it best to pick him up, but he did not seem to have the strength. Sufia screamed and pointed back along the ledge. The two Krayakin were in sight now, moving in single file along the narrow finger of rock.

Twisting around, Bison scrabbled at the rock face, dragging himself to his feet. So this is how it ends, he thought. And this time there was no fear. He glanced at Sufia. The child was terrified. Bison forced a smile. “Don’t you worry … little one,” he said. “No one’s going … to hurt you. You just … look after … the little prince until … Nogusta comes.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked him.

The Krayakin were closer now. The ledge had widened, and they were advancing together.

Bison pushed at the rock wall and stood blocking their way.

“Did you know,” he told them, “that I have wings? Big white wings? I fly … over … mountains.”

Suddenly he launched himself at them, spreading his arms wide. The Krayakin had nowhere to run. In desperation they stabbed at him, plunging their blades into his chest. With a last desperate lunge he hurled his weight forward into the cold metal that cleaved his heart. Dying, he clamped his huge arms to their armor and propelled them over the edge.

Sufia looked out and saw them spiraling away, down and
down, Bison with outstretched arms, falling into the white, wispy clouds.

Antikas Karios had arrived just in time to see them fall. He ran to Sufia and knelt beside her.

“He got his wings back,” she said, her eyes bright with wonder. “Big white wings.”

Little Sufia put her arms around Antikas Karios’ neck. Instinctively his arm curled around her. Then he looked down at the baby. This was the source of all their problems, this tiny package of flesh, soft bone, and tissue. It was crying still, thin piping wails that echoed from the rocks. It would be so easy to choke off that sound. The baby’s neck was so slender that Antikas could crush the life from it by merely pinching the flesh between his thumb and index finger.

The world would be safe from the demons. His hand reached down. As his finger touched the baby’s cheek, its head turned toward it, mouth open, seeking to suckle.

“Got to look after the baby,” Sufia whispered into his ear.

“What?”

“That’s what Bison said before he flew away.”

He pondered what to do. If he killed the baby, then he would have to kill Sufia, too. He could toss them both from the ledge and say he had arrived too late to help them. His thoughts turned to Bison. The grotesque old man had run for almost half a mile with a wound that should have killed him instantly. Then he had carried two Krayakin to their deaths. He had shown enormous courage, and in that moment Antikas realized that if he were now to kill the child, it would sully the memory of Bison’s deed. Gathering up the baby, he walked back along the ledge and down the slope to the campsite. Kebra and the queen were still unconscious, and Conalin and Pharis were sitting by the fire, hand in hand. The girl looked up as Antikas walked into the camp. Her thin face broke into a wide smile. Surging to her feet, she ran to him, lifting Sufia clear. The little girl immediately began to tell her of Bison’s wings.

Ulmenetha was sitting beside Nogusta. Antikas walked
over to them. Nogusta was looking twenty years older, a gray sheen covering the ebony of his features. His pale blue eyes were tired beyond description. The black sword still jutted from his shoulder.

“Can you remove the sword?” Ulmenetha asked Antikas.

Laying the baby on the grass, he took hold of the hilt. Nogusta gritted his teeth.

“Brace yourself,” said Antikas, setting his boot against Nogusta’s chest. With one savage wrench he dragged the blade clear. Nogusta cried out, then sagged against Ulmenetha. Holding her hands over the entry and exit wounds, she began to chant.

Antikas moved away from them to where Kebra lay. Kneeling beside him, he felt for the man’s pulse. It was firm and strong.

Conalin appeared alongside him. “He is just sleeping,” said the boy. “Ulmenetha has already prayed over him.”

“Good,” said Antikas.

“Did you see Bison’s wings?” asked Conalin.

“No.” He gazed up at the boy, angry now. “There were no wings,” he snapped. “Such stories are for children who cannot deal with the harsh realities of life. A brave man gave his life to save others. He fell thousands of feet, and his dead body was smashed upon the rocks below.”

“Why did he do it?”

“Why indeed? Go away and leave me, boy.”

Conalin walked back to the fire and the waiting Pharis. Antikas pushed himself to his feet and made his way to the water’s edge, where he drank deeply.

The death of Bison had moved him in a way he had difficulty understanding. The man had been an animal, ill bred and uncultured, uncouth and coarse. Yet when the Krayakin had attacked, he had been the first to tackle them and had without doubt saved the children. He had gone willingly to his death. All his life Antikas had been taught that nobility lay in the bloodline. Nobles and peasants, thinking beings and near animals. Only the nobility were said to understand the finer points of honor and chivalry.

The manner of Bison’s sacrifice was unsettling. Axiana was a Ventrian princess, her child the son of the man who had spurned Bison’s services. Bison owed them nothing but gave them everything.

It was more than unsettling. It was galling.

In Ventrian history heroes had always been noblemen, full of courage and virtue. They were never belching, groin-scratching simpletons. A thought struck him, and he smiled. Maybe they were. Conalin had asked him if Bison had grown wings. If they survived this quest, the story would grow. Antikas would tell it. Sufia would tell it. And the story to be believed would be the child’s. And why? Because it was more satisfying to believe that heroes never die, that somehow they live on to return in another age. In a hundred years the real Bison would be remembered not at all. He would become golden-haired and handsome, perhaps the bastard son of a Ventrian noble. Antikas glanced at the sleeping queen. Most likely he would also in future legends become Axiana’s lover and the father of the babe he had saved.

Antikas returned to the camp. Nogusta was sleeping now. Axiana was awake and feeding the child.

Ulmenetha signaled for Antikas to join her. “The wound is a bad one,” she said. “I have done what I can, but he is very weak and may still die.”

“I would lay large odds against that, lady. The man is a fighter.”

“And an old man devastated not just by a wound but by grief. Bison was his friend, and he knew his friend was to die.”

Antikas nodded. “I know this. What would you have me do?” “You must lead us to Lem.”

“What is so vital about the ghost city? What is it we seek among the ruins?”

“Get us there and you will see,” said Ulmenetha. “We can wait another hour, then I will wake the sleepers.”

As she turned her head, he saw the angry, swollen bruise on her temple and remembered the knife hilt laying her low. “That was a nasty blow,” he said. “How are you feeling?”

She smiled wearily. “I feel a little nauseous, but I will live, Antikas Karios. I have the maps here. Perhaps you would like to study them.” He took them from her and unrolled the first. Ulmenetha leaned in. “The Ventrian army is moving from here,” she said, stabbing her finger at the map, “and they have swept out in a sickle formation, expecting us to make for the sea. Within the next two days they will have secured all the roads leading to Lem.”

“There is no proper scale to this map,” he said. “I cannot tell how far we are from the ruins.”

“Less than forty miles,” she told him. “South and west.”

“I will think on a route,” he said. He glanced at Axiana, who was sitting just out of earshot. “It would have been better for the world had Bison jumped with the babe,” he said softly.

“Not so,” she told him. “The demon lord has already begun the great spell. The child’s death will complete it with or without a sacrifice.”

Antikas felt suddenly chilly. He looked away and remembered his fingers reaching for the babe’s throat.

“Well,” he said at last, “that at least adds a golden sheen to the old man’s death.”

“Such a deed needs no sheen,” she told him.

“Perhaps not,” he agreed. He left her then and moved to the fire. Little Sufia was sitting quietly with Conalin and Pharis. She scampered over to Antikas. “Will he fly back to us?” she asked him. “I keep looking in the sky.”

Antikas took a deep breath, and he looked at Conalin.

“He will fly back one day,” he told the child, “when he is most needed.”

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