Interim III
The River Road: 58th of Spring
Something bad was coming.
The Wolver Grimly had sensed it all day in the prickling of his fur. He had seen it, too, in the animals he had passed—roe deer standing in tight knots in meadows by the River Road, wild cats wailing in the hills, field mice, snakes and even worms crawling out of their holes onto the road's surface.
He knew from the procession of ghost-walkers which had drifted past two nights ago that serious weirding was on the way. Worse, a really bad weirdingstrom could trigger earthquakes, the mere thought of which made the fur down his spine rise.
His mount jibbed, snatching for its bit as Grimly fumbled with the reins. Wolvers seldom rode, nor did any horse care to be ridden by them. Damn. There went a stirrup. He scrabbled for it, not realizing until the reins slipped through his paws that in his bone-deep fatigue he had reverted to wolver shape. The horse squealed, bounced sideways, and threw its rider in a convenient thorn bush. As Grimly extricated himself, swearing, it bolted back the way they had come. On foot again, dammit—falling behind, and he the only one on the right trail.
As far as anyone else knew, Torisen had simply disappeared after charging out of the courtyard in Kothifir.
"You don't see me," he had said to the guard at the gate, and the man hadn't. Quite possibly, he would never see anything again.
Simultaneously, a kind of selective blindness had raced through the entire encampment. Grimly hadn't understood how that could happen until he had heard shaken men comparing it to the effect of Ganth's madness on the Northern Host thirty-four years ago. That was something out of an old song to Grimly. He had never imagined that Ganth's son might also have such power over his followers, much less be ruthless enough to use it.
However, in the faces of Ardeth, Harn, and Burr (groggy, but recovering), he had seen that this was what they feared. They had decided to keep as much from the Highlord's enemies as possible, while they themselves set out to find him. Harn and Burr thought he had disappeared into the back streets of Kothifir. Ardeth was sure that he had fled into the Wastes, as he had done once before, and proposed to search for him there.
Listening, Grimly had realized that none of Torisen's friends expected to recover him sane. What chance did Tori stand against such a consensus? Far less than he deserved, the Wolver had thought, so he hadn't told them about Kin-Slayer or the distant, endangered sister. Instead, he had claimed that the upcoming Summer Eve rites required his presence at home in the Grimly Holt—which happened to be just over half way to the Riverland by the River Road. Harn and Burr hadn't thought much of him for that, but he told himself that he didn't care as long as it kept them looking for Tori in the wrong direction.
He had wondered if he himself might be wrong, though, when the first three post stations on the way to Hurlen reported that the Highlord hadn't passed them. Then again, no one had seen him ride out of the encampment in any direction whatsoever. At the fourth station, a hundred miles east of Kothifir, Kendar spoke of hearing someone gallop past, but not being able to see who it was. The fifth station recognized Storm; the sixth, finally, identified his rider.
Grimly had begun to worry about Storm. The quarter-blood Whinno-hir had unusual stamina, but this pace would eventually kill even him. Sleep-starved, fleeing nightmares, Torisen had ridden a horse to death once before, on his mad dash into the Wastes four years ago. It would upset him horribly if he did it again. Half way to the Cataracts, however, Grimly found the black stallion exhausted but safe at a post station. Torisen had gone on by post horse. Grimly couldn't run down a succession of fresh mounts so he too, reluctantly, had taken to the saddle.
That had been two days ago. Now it was dusk, the fifty-eighth of spring, and he was close enough to home to smell it.
The road rolled northward over gentle hills. To the left lay a wild meadow with nightjars skimming over it and luminous mist collecting in its hollows. To the right ran the Silver, swift and chuckling. Glowing witchweed bent in its margin. Grimly found himself trotting, eager despite his fatigue. From the top of the next rise, he would be able to see home. Here was the hill's crest. Ahead, the main road swung to the right, following the river's curve, while a spur of it ran straight on into the lowering shadows of the Grimly Holt.
Just short of the fork, a dark-clad figure trudged northward, leading a lame post horse. Grimly recognized the black coat, dusty and travel stained as it now was. He also caught the cold gleam of Kin-Slayer.
"Tori!"
The Highlord plodded on, unheeding. When the Wolver caught up with him, he blinked as if just waking and regarded his friend without surprise.
"Oh. Hello, Grimly. Going home for Summer Eve?"
Bloodshot eyes, disheveled hair, four days' growth of beard, and yet that unassuming elegance clung to the Highborn which Grimly thought he would probably still possess half way through his own cremation. What unnerved the Wolver, though, was that dead calm tone.
"Er . . . actually, Tori, I was trying to catch up with you."
"Really? That's kind, but I don't know what good you can do. Better, perhaps, that you should go home. That's it, isn't it, just ahead?"
"Yes," said Grimly.
He glanced surreptitiously at Torisen's nearest hand, his left, which held the post horse on a loose rein. It seemed to have nearly recovered from the cut which Kin-Slayer's cracked emblem had given it. Kencyr could shrug off much worse than that, he reminded himself. A Highborn, especially a Knorth, could look as haggard as a haunt and yet keep going days after a more sensible person would have dropped dead.
"Yes," he said again, more confidently. "That's the Grimly Holt."
"Good. When I blink, I see something so different—a huge fortress with seven, no, eight walled districts surrounding a tower on a high mound . . . Restormir? But that's ridiculous. I'm all muddled, Grimly."
"That's lack of sleep," said the Wolver, beginning to be frightened again.
Tori never spoke about such things. He was an intensely private person, whose secrets the Wolver had no wish to know. Now they might both have been caught in the same nightmare, where barriers fell and anything might happen.
Then he caught sight of Torisen's right hand, which still gripped Kin-Slayer's hilt. It was swollen, especially around the emerald signet ring which appeared to be almost sunken into the finger wearing it. Burst blisters showed around the edge of the white knuckled grip. Red lines radiated out from them. Only the worst neglect could have brought such infection to a Kencyr—such as clutching the hilt of that malignant sword constantly for four days?
"Tori, come home with me. Please. You can rest there. The whole pack will keep watch over you."
"And what will they protect me from, when I don't know myself? You see, that's what I'm going back to the Riverland to find out. Either my Shanir twin is doing this to me, as Father claims, or I've gone mad."
Father? Grimly thought, confused. Twin?
"All right," he said, trying to match his friend's calm. "We'll find out when we get there. In the meantime, though, why don't you at least sheathe the sword?"
"Oh, I can't do that. Not until it kills someone."
Grimly was staring at him, speechless, when crows swarmed above the Holt in a black, raucous mob. Their uproar masked the oncoming rumble until it was almost underfoot. Then the earth began to quiver like a piece of fresh-killed beef, making Torisen stagger and Grimly crouch low. The lame horse threw up its head, jerking free, and plunged off the road into a patch of mist. It didn't come out the other side.
"Oh no," said Grimly, as the rumble faded. "That's weirding. Tori, listen to me: the wolvers' keep will protect us if we can reach it before the weirdingstrom hits. You've got to come with me now, if you don't want to be swept all the way back to the Cataracts, if not beyond. Tori, please!"
Torisen blinked. "It looks so much like Restormir," he said in wonder. "Caldane will just have arrived home. We mustn't go there, Grimly."
"We won't," said the Wolver, taking his arm. "I promise. Now come along. We're almost home."