A loud scrape followed by a heavy thud, and cool dew-heavy air flowed into the chamber.
‘Smell that? It’s a damned forest.’
At Cafal’s words, Setoc joined them. She held up the lantern. Night, cool… cooler than the Awl’dan. ‘Trees,’ she said, peering at the ragged boles faintly visible in the light.
There was possibly a bog out there-she could hear frogs.
‘If it was night,’ Torrent wondered, ‘what were the bats doing inside here?’
‘Perhaps it was only nearing dusk when we arrived. Or dawn is but moments away.’ Cafal tugged at another stone. ‘Help me with this one,’ he said to Torrent. ‘It’s too heavy for one man-Setoc, please, stand back, give us room.’
As they dragged the huge stone free, other rough-hewn boulders tumbled down. A large lintel stone ground its way loose and both men leapt back as it crashed on to the rubble. Clouds of dust billowed and a terrible grating groan sounded from the barrow’s ceiling.
Coughing, Cafal waved at Setoc. ‘Quickly! Out!’
She scrambled over the stones, eyes stinging, and staggered outside. Three paces and then she turned about. She heard the thump of stones from the ceiling. The horse shrilled in pain. From the gaping entrance Cafal appeared, followed a moment later by Torrent, who had somehow brought his mount down on to its knees. He held the reins and with rapid twitches on them he urged his horse forward. Its head thrust into view, eyes flashing in the reflected lantern light.
Setoc had never before seen a horse crawl-she had not thought it even possible, but here this mare was lurching through the gap, sheathed in dust and streaks of sweat. More rocks tumbled behind the beast and she squealed in pain, lunging, forelimbs scrabbling as she lifted herself up from the front end.
Moments after the animal finally lumbered clear the moss-humped roof of the barrow collapsed in thunder and dust. Decades-old trees that had grown upon it toppled in a thrash of branches and leaves. Wood splintered.
Blood streamed from the mare’s haunches. Torrent had calmed the beast once more and was tending to the gashes. ‘Not so bad,’ he muttered. ‘Had she broken a hip…’
Setoc saw that the warrior was trembling. This bond he had forged with his hapless mare stood in place of all those ties that had been so cruelly severed from his young life, and it was fast becoming something monstrous. ‘If she must die, then I will die with her.’ Madness, Torrent. It’s a damned horse, a dumb beast with its spirit broken by bit and rein. If she’d a broken hip or leg, we’d eat well this day.
She watched Cafal observing the Awl for a time, before he turned away and scanned the forest surrounding them. Then he lifted his eyes to the heavens. ‘No moons,’ he said. ‘And the stars seem… hazy-there’s not enough of them. No constellations I recognize.’
‘There are no wolves here.’
He faced her.
‘Their ghosts, yes. But… none living. They last ran here centuries past. Centuries.’
‘Well, there’s deer scat and trails-so they didn’t starve to death.’
‘No. Hunted.’ She hugged herself. ‘Tell me the mind of those who would kill every last wolf, who would choose to never again hear their mournful howls, or to see-with a shiver-a pack standing proud on a rise. Great Warlock, explain this to me, for I do not understand.’
He shrugged. ‘We hate rivals, Setoc. We hate seeing the knowing burn in their eyes. You have not seen civilized lands. The animals go away. And they never return. They leave silence, and that silence is filled with the chatter of our kind. Given the ability, we kill even the night.’ His eyes fell to the lantern in her hand.
Scowling, she doused it.
In the sudden darkness, Torrent cursed. ‘That does not help, wolf-child. We light fires, but the darkness remains-in our minds. Cast light within and you will not like what you see.’
A part of her wanted to weep. For the ghosts. For herself. ‘We need to find a way home.’
Cafal sighed. ‘There is power here. Unfamiliar. Even so, perhaps I can make use of it. I sense it… fragmented, shredded. It has, I think, not been used in a long, long time.’ He looked round. ‘I must clear a space. Sanctify it.’
‘Even without Talamandas?’ Torrent asked.
‘He would have been of little help here,’ Cafal replied. ‘His bindings all severed.’ He glanced at Setoc. ‘You, wolf-child, can help.’
‘How?’
‘Summon the wolf ghosts.’
‘No.’ The thought made her feel wretched. ‘I can give them nothing in return.’
