A Plague of Giants (Seven Kennings #1) - Kevin Hearne Page 0,99

we remained on the same track. Keeping my eyes half on the trail and half in the branches above us, I waited until I spied a likely looking stand of pines and cedars stretching uphill.

“Stop here,” I said, and they did and turned to me, wondering if I had given up. I took a few moments to catch my breath and explained. “They will track us via scent. We have established a trail already coming in from the pass. We need to let them think that we stayed on that trail so that they will keep going. But we will not stay on that trail. We are going higher into the Godsteeth, and we will lose them on the Leaf Road.” I pointed up at the mixed canopy above us, which currently had nothing like a Leaf Road.

Their eyes drifted up, confirmed that it was just a random tangle of wood and needles, and then dropped back to me, no doubt wondering if I had succumbed to dementia.

“Ben Sah, your pardon, but I don’t see a Leaf Road.”

“Of course not. I haven’t made it yet.”

I had them jog a bit farther along the trail to strengthen the scent, and then they came back to the tree I had chosen and climbed first. They ascended after me with hook and spike on the side opposite the trail so that their passage might go unnoticed by houndsmen passing by. They leapt as far off the trail as possible first in an effort to leave no trace.

Once again, I sent my shoots into the bark of a grand moss pine, but this time my efforts were not quite so demanding or taxing. I was strengthening and shaping what was already there, and communicating through roots, I coordinated with neighboring trees to form a narrow wooden bridge of branches between our tree and the next.

“Stealthily we go,” I whispered as the distant bark of hounds could be heard now, and the grassgliders engaged their kenning and we tiptoed across a narrow bridge, single file, from tree to tree. The grassglider in front of me and the one behind kept my noise to a minimum, and all the while I kept speaking to the trees through my silverbark so that a walkway formed in front of us and then the branches returned to their normal state after we had passed. In this way we walked uphill, yet above the hill, until we could go no higher: the trees stopped growing, and the bald, ever-snowy peaks of the Godsteeth rose above us, stark crags that might be passed but not without equipment that we didn’t have. As it was, we were very cold and would have to spend a night in it.

But the stratagem had worked. The barking of hounds never grew closer than distant, and they couldn’t follow our scent in the trees or even know where we had gone since we left no visible trail in the canopy. By the time we reached the tree line, it was near dusk and we were all exhausted. I found a place where four trees grew close together and asked them to form a platform of branches for us to rest on. We were only twelve feet off the ground and a houndsman could still reach us there, but I figured it wouldn’t matter—they’d never find us. The grassgliders dressed, pulling layers over their painted bodies. Since we had only enough water to drink, we ate dry rations, and as the sunlight faded, I caught a couple of uncertain glances in my direction as the grassgliders started to think about sleeping arrangements. We were all shivering and would need to huddle together for warmth, but the silverbark on my legs meant I couldn’t have anyone in front of me lest I damage the mushrooms on my legs. It would be best for me to settle the question before it could be asked, and there was no question in my mind who I wanted at my back: Nef.

He was efficient and skilled and possessed a calm charisma, and no, it didn’t hurt at all that I’d met few men as handsome. Dark hair and deep brown eyes and a pleasant curve to his lips. Once night fell, there was little else for us to do at that elevation except survive it, so I pulled a blanket out of my pack and motioned to Nef to grab his.

As I lay on my side, knees drawn up, Nef draped an