He was one of us,’ someone else called out, ‘and he built Dun Seren. That’s where I want to be, not Drassil.’
Murmurs rippled through the young warriors.
‘I’ve heard there’s wolven-hounds at Dun Seren,’ another voice called out, ‘big packs of them.’ Fen gave a deep-rumbling growl, as if agreeing.
‘And me,’ Rab squawked, making Kushiel blink. ‘Rab from Dun Seren, too.’
Sig twisted in her saddle, looking back at them all.
‘Are any of you for Drassil? Speak now, there’s no shame or insult in it. I’ll think no worse of you, but it’s better to know now, than hold it in.’
A long silence, serious faces looking back at her. All could meet Sig’s gaze, none looking away, which held stronger weight to Sig’s mind than any spoken word.
Sig nodded to herself and turned back to the Ben-Elim.
‘There you are, then,’ Sig said to Kushiel. ‘You’ve had your answer.’ She sat straight in her saddle. ‘Now get out of my way.’
Kushiel hovered in front of Sig a long moment, then his wings beat and he was rising to the battlements.
‘Israfil will hear of this,’ he said to Nara, then winged higher, joining his kin, and with great beats of their white-feathered wings they were flying away from Uthandun, blurring into the rain-soaked sky.
Sig looked up at Nara and dipped her head to the Queen of Ardain. Then she lifted a fist and uttered a command, Hammer lumbering forwards.
‘To Dun Seren,’ she called out as she passed through the gates of Uthandun, her voice echoing and booming, and it felt good to hear those words out loud. Cullen and Keld rode either side of her, their small band of would-be warriors cantering in a ragged double column behind them. Sig rode down the long slope towards the Darkwood and onto the wide bridge that crossed the Afren, Fen loping ahead of her and merging with the shadows and murk of the Darkwood. Rab was clinging on to Cullen’s saddle as if his life depended upon it, bobbing and swaying with the rhythm of it, wings ruffled and pointing in all directions.
Sig felt her spirits lift at the thought of returning home, but there was a shadow over her soul, the sense of terrors unseen growing ever stronger.
So, the Kadoshim are moving, and now I discover that the Ben-Elim are enforcing a tithe of flesh. Asking for volunteers is one thing, but this! They are enslaving those within their borders to a life of military servitude. This is something else that Byrne must hear about, if she does not know already. How can Ethlinn and Balur One-Eye condone this?
She heard Hammer grumbling beneath her, sensing her mood, and patted her shoulder.
‘Dark days ahead, my bad-tempered friend,’ she said, ‘but we’ll face them together.’
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CHAPTER TWENTY
DREM
Drem walked back from the paddocks, boots crunching on the fresh snow in his yard, up the steps of his cabin, where he stamped his feet and then into the warmth of home. Heat from the hearth washed his face as he shed his cloak and pulled gloves off with cold-stiff and clumsy hands.
His head felt as if it were packed with wool, so much had happened.
It was highsun now, though the sun wasn’t too clear in the sky outside, lurking somewhere behind thickening snow cloud that was rolling down from the north. It had taken almost half a day to deal with Calder’s corpse. Drem had taken Fritha and her hound back to their hold, the hound still breathing, last he’d seen it. Hask, Fritha’s grandfather, had started squawking at her like an old crow the moment Fritha set foot inside, remonstrating her for leaving without making his porridge.
‘Your granddaughter needs some looking after, herself,’ Drem had said to the old man. ‘She’s been through a hard morning. Could do with some care.’
‘What have you done to Surl!’ Hask had yelled at Drem, as the hound was in his arms at the time, Drem carrying it into their home and laying it upon a fur that Fritha ran and fetched.
‘Feed him up: red meat, milk, cheese,’ Drem had said to Fritha, choosing to ignore the barrage of abuse and accusations that frothed from Hask’s mouth. ‘He’s a strong animal, got heart to take off into the Wild like he did. And don’t listen to him,’ Drem had added quietly, a nod at her grandfather.
Sometimes age doesn’t mellow and soften, sometimes it twists and toughens, squeezing all the kindness out of a soul.
‘He’s not always like this,’ Fritha had said. ‘Worse in