Andrew R. Clark
Chapter 1
Light crept in through a small window, dawn’s pale fingers finding little to touch in the single room, furnished only with a sleeping pallet and a low table, both securely attached to the floor, the fireplace envious of anything to burn. On the pallet, beneath a tattered blanket, something stirred, groaning. The room was again quiet awhile, but before long a man sat up, rubbing his eyes. Lambswool covered his cheeks, but although still a youth, labor showed in his corded shoulders and hard hands. Rummaging the table’s contents, he lifted a cup to his nose, grimaced, and carefully set it back down. “Come, villka, we’ll go out for breakfast.” The forest cat looked up from its place beside the cold hearth.
A scant few rusty nails showed in a gap between the tilting staircase and the tenement wall. Gingerly, the man stepped out and descended to the alley below, the cat at his heals. He rapped his knuckles on a hatch set into the front of the building, and someone came to the portal, sliding it back. A wrinkled face peered out, white straw poking from under a needlework kerchief.
“Black eggs and a cup of goad, Grandmother. And do you have a fish head?”
“You have a fish head,” she muttered but then conceded, “There’s one saved for soup, but I can get another.” Snapping shut the hatch, a clatter of cupboard doors and stove pots came from within, and presently she was back with two wooden bowls and a mug. One bowl held boiled eggs rolled in salt, dried herbs, and a pinch of fine ash. The mug held a hot, bitter drink of steeped bark.
She accepted the offered coin but suddenly grasped his wrist. “You owe me rent, young man.” His server was also his landlady. “And haven’t I been reasonable? I’ve even extended courtesy beyond custom by letting you keep that animal. Would someone less benevolent have done so?” The old woman released his arm, her already creased face scrunching into a squint. “It would be a shame to see you beaten and thrown out.”
He said nothing in return but agreed with the sentiment.
“Now take yourself and your creature away. No one will come to my window with you two standing there.” As the northerner retreated down the street, she called after him, laughing, “Mind you return your utensils, or I’ll put a hex on you.”
Its nose in the air, following smells trailing from the bowls, the cat accompanied the man downhill toward the docks. Those who met the pair gave them as wide a berth as the cramp lanes allowed. The youth fit in well enough, dressed in waxed and weathered seal fur, but a short‑tailed cat the size of a dog was an uncommon sight. They stopped at the water’s edge, and the northerner set one of the bowls onto the gray planks of the pier.
Cruel scimitars stretched from their sheathes, but the prize wobbled and spun out from under them. The cat stared at the bowl a minute before it bent down, the ruff of hair at its throat pulling back, and pinched a gill between needle teeth. Extracted from its vessel, the fish head plopped onto the boards, pinned possessively under a wide paw.
Above, gulls sang a raucous chorus, hidden in the dense morning fog. As the companions dined, a rhythmic creaking sound became perceptible out in the bay—straining, dipping oars. A keen look came to the man’s eyes as a high‑prowed trader with oil‑blackened sides emerged from the diffusion.
The cat lapped up the last remaining juice from the bottom of the bowl.
#
Throughout the night a rodent had been gnawing beneath the floorboards, the intermittent rasp a thief of sleep. I covered my eyes, trying to ignore the barbarian tossing and turning on his bed. Convention often casts northern people as barbarians. It’s not for the man’s origins, however, but his personal habits that I use the appellation. One bathes daily when one can, or one begins to stink. That the den is small is more reason to make tidy.
He cast back his bedcovers and started upon that endless babble humans are always making. Though most of what comes out of his mouth must be superfluous, a few human words and phrases have caught my attention. One of these is breakfast.
True to his word, the man carried away food from the old woman’s window, and we headed down pungent, molder filled alleys. I was getting used to air so different from my home range, but though I constantly searched, there’d been no scent of my quarry since entering this hive of men. But the trail had unquestionably led here.
There are splendid fish in forest streams, but I have to admit, I’d acquired a liking for the salt in ocean swimmers. The minor difficulty experienced in extracting the head from its container only made sweeter the game when won. We returned to our shared accommodations, and I returned to my rug by the chimney. Come evening there would be work to do, but daylight is not my element.
Chapter 2
The cat didn’t rouse, curling tighter into a ball as the man prepared to leave the room. It was of little use trying to move the beast after it had eaten. The mist was clearing, and although early in the year, the day would be warm. Yet the young man pulled up the hood of his cloak. Staying clear of the waterfront, he spent the morning on streets with a view down to the bay, noting every boat and berth, amending the map in his mind. Eventually, he found what he was looking for.
The ship had been tied off and its sails furled. He could see men busy making right, but they hadn’t begun unloading cargo. Timber for building or belly would not be hoisted ashore before payment was secured. But it wouldn’t be long before the sailors got coin for their labor, and many would soon be drunk and undisciplined in the lower town’s dives. Most who go to sea yearn for home, and some find mitigation in harbor distractions. The sailors would have to wait until all accounts were balanced before receiving the traditional fraction owed them for risking their lives at sea, the portion due a widow.
A stout man came down the boardwalk and turned onto the wharf, master returning to vessel. It was Aage the Cunning, Aage Two Tongues, soon to be Aage Fish Food.
#
When at midday the barbarian returned and commenced his usual racket, I considered getting up and expressing my dissatisfaction. But I must have dozed off again. A fragrance reawakened me, blooming in the close confine. The man was hunched over the fireplace feeding it a stick, and a distinct sound attended the luscious smell coming from a pan on the grate—crackling, sizzling salt pork.
I got up and nudged the back of the man’s knee, encouraging his efforts. “So you’re awake now. You’ll have to wait a minute.” I circled around and bumped his other leg. “Alright. The hash isn’t done, but you probably don’t want potatoes and onions anyway.”
Guarding my cooling meal, having learned the hard way to wait before eating cooked food, a scrap of poetry popped into my head. Forest meat and blood is sweet with bones left for tomorrow. Why that dusty rhyme? When I was a cub, my mother schooled me to recite many a gory old stanza. She said we descend from an ancient and apparently bloodthirsty line and was accordingly nostalgic. This particular verse had long ago made its way into common idiom and was generally understood to mean that things from home are best, forgetting it came from a saga about fratricide.
The texture of seared edges and the wash of salty fat were intoxicating. When you remember home, isn’t it often food you miss? I don’t think I’ll ever stop craving the game I grew up on, the hens and rabbits and winter dead, but there is a kind of miracle in human food. That’s how I met the barbarian in the first place.
In unfamiliar country, the season having caught me in a blizzard, I’d located a fallen tree and taken refuge beneath it, resigned to wait out the night. A faint tickle bothered my nose, smoke that shouldn’t be in winter woods. I could have stayed beneath cover, but something in the smell drove me pushing up through the snow. I followed the allure step by step, slowly drawing near.
A glow revealed the source of the aroma, but it took a moment before I recognized the light as fire—not raging through treetops, not a black snake blazing through dry grass. The flicker seemed content to sit in a small pile, a figure near it under a bower of branches, a man. I drew no nearer.
The moon shone somewhere above, but only the faintest cast penetrated the storm. Confident of my concealment, I watched snow sift through the boughs, a faint tinkling carried in the wind. But when something plopped down in front of me, I jumped involuntarily.
“I see you out there, friend. I wouldn’t begrudge a fellow pilgrim something warm to eat on a night like this.” I caught none of the man’s words, but the chunk of roasted meat at my feet was clear enough gesture. If fellowship can be found in a brutish world, one doesn’t lightly forget food offered at need.
We traveled together out of the forest and then to the sea, and I shared of my own kills as he shared with me. Although cautious at first of the man’s enslaved fire, I learned not to fear it and even to take comfort from its warmth. I learned also of woodcock stuffed with spring herbs and seared trout sprinkled with crumbs of dark sugar. In exchange for his cooking, I try to forgive the barbarian his failings in hygiene.
Chapter 3
He dressed and collected what he’d need for the night: his purse, his knife, his resolve. The cat sat by the door, chewing the hair between its toes. “I suppose you want to go out too.” He couldn’t very well leave the animal penned up in the room for hours. “Mind you stay out of sight,” he said, shaking his head. “Not that you understand a word I’m saying.”
This stretch of shoreline, barely shore at all, rose straight from the sea in tall escarpments. But long ago a stream began eroding the cliffs here, and now a steep‑shouldered valley overlooked a rocky bay. This is where the town took hold, its narrow lanes twisting up from beach to bluff, tendrils climbing from the sea. A district of wide, straight avenues and tall walls sat atop the cape, housing those rich from the sea’s commerce. The cat had slinked off unseen before the man reached his goal.
His uncle had not been held in high esteem by the village elders. They laughed behind his back and said he spent too much time in the “spirit” realm. But he fought when called upon and shared of his take and earned a measure of tolerance on account of it. As a boy they’d spent hours together ice fishing, and when the fish weren’t biting, his uncle would tell stories of his exploits. On one such occasion he leaned down, and in a conspiratorial tone, described a fool‑proof way to make money. “Approach a rich man and ask if he’d like someone killed.” His mother discouraged such talk but welcomed anyone willing to watch the boy for a few hours.
A knotted cord hung from a hole in a stout door set into the wall of a compound. When pulled it sounded a bell, which eventually brought an attendant carrying a lamp. The northerner said, “Is there anyone your master wants killed?”
The servant showed no sign of surprise at the inquiry. He went away, and after a time, an old man came to the grill. For a minute the hawk‑like face peered through the bars without speaking before a dry voice said, “Follow me.” The door was opened, and he was led into a small room off the kitchen, empty but for a table and two chairs. “You look too young to do a man’s work, but I might have some small task that would suit.”
The northerner stood at ease, thumbs tucked into his belt, one palm resting on the pommel of his knife. He hadn’t taken a chair, not having been asked to sit. “One may call a place home yet remain ignorant of its people.”
A thin smile compressed the old man’s lips. “Perhaps there’s real work in you after all. Please, my savage friend, have a seat. Boy, bring wine!”
Two clay cups were produced and put before the now‑seated pair. The northerner downed the sour draught in one gulp and thumped his cup on the table, as was customary. It was boast to serve wine, even poor wine, instead of northern yill. The hawk‑faced man didn’t drink but only continued his level gaze. “Do you have letters, northerner?”
“I know all the trader’s tongues.”
The grim steward chuckled at this non‑answer. Producing a square of parchment from his tunic and unfolding it, he laid it on the table. “Eliminate one of my master’s enemies, and you’ll be rewarded.”
The young man looked down at the slithering black script. “The price will be set now,” he replied. “Agree, and you’ll have death.”
“One silver piece in advance and one gold at completion of your task.”
“The price is two gold and two silver, half now and half at the end.”
With a dour nod, the factotum drew out his purse and set down one gold coin and one of silver. The name Aage filled the northerner’s mind as he pinned a line on the parchment with his finger. The steward retrieved the page and stood up, leaving the room without further acknowledgment.
Stars stood out brightly in the clear sky, and as more and more appeared, the young man asked his question at other side gates and backdoors. At some he was turned away, but where he was let in the procedure was much the same.
#
When a male cub begins to mature, when he first starts sensing the possibilities in himself, he is driven away, driven from family and den and home country, from all that is familiar. If you ever ponder nature’s cruelty, linger a moment there. But in the end, you make your own way.
Before winter had fallen, news came through the woods, a tale of upheaval and something lost. At first I paid little heed. I was busy enough fending off starvation and steering clear of clashes with hostile strangers. It seemed of no relevance to me. But one evening chance brought me upon a strange scene. There was a pit in the ground, scents lingering in the air, among them that of man. Humans seldom ventured this far into the forest, preferring to gnaw at its edges. I have no full explanation for it, but I began to follow the trail that led away from that trap.
This city of men is perilous, and I only tread the streets in daylight when accompanied by the barbarian. We were climbing a lane near our den, and he seemed intent on following it over the hill. But as the sun dipped behind the blufftop, I held back and took to the roofs. Travel is slower here, but the heights afford a realm of ambush natural to my kind.
In tall weeds lining a ditch, I thought I smelled something but it was lost again. Twice more that night, I briefly caught a familiar scent. I tried to imagine why they’d come here? What would be worth the risk? There was something I didn’t understand.
Crouching under an overhang, chill fog settling all around, I waited. Little activity occupied street or rooftop, save the commerce of rats, until a low form darted across the courtyard below. I crept around a partition, out onto a flat roof, following its progress. Well‑lit by the half moon, an uncomfortable feeling began creeping up my spine. Glancing over my shoulder, a silhouette stood outlined on the opposite rooftop before slipping from sight. I’d been drawn out and spotted.
Chapter 4
He dressed and collected what he’d need for the night: his purse, his knife, and his resolve to get drunk. Since returning to the city, he’d avoided the waterfront gathering spots. But he needed information, and tonight he’d risk being recognized. In fact he counted on it. Hunting usually calls for stealth and disguise, but some prey must be lured in with bait.
The dockside alleys were even narrower than the rest of town, buildings pushing each other for room atop posts driven into saltmarsh. Weaving across fog‑dampened boards, having already visited several taverns and having nearly forgotten his purpose for being there, an obstacle loomed up out of the mist, blocking his path. Recognition replaced confusion, and having successfully crossed bridges in the past, he reasoned he should be able to do so again. Wasn’t there a place on the other side of the canal that served a hot sausage floating in the grog? He was hungry.
At the crown of the span, he paused, leaning on the rail. Below, a line of small boats rested in the muck, tethered to poles allowing them to rise and fall with the tide. A call came from under the bridge, and a pulling boat glided into view, a lantern shining from its bow, a cloaked figure at its middle working the oars. The channel was passable a hundred rods farther inland before it met the bluff, and within that length watermen navigated the black maze of pilings, ladders, and trap doors.
The northerner turned back toward his goal and over the bridge. But at the bottom, the slick planks rejected his heel, and he found himself on his ass. After reflexively looking around to see if anyone had noticed, he picked himself up and strode, with what composure he could muster, toward a lighted doorway. Finding an open bench, he sat, gripping the edge of the table with one hand, trying his best not to fall down again.
His heavenly sausage floating in booze arrived, and he consumed both greedily. A woman squeezed in beside him. “Oh hi,” she said, as though surprised to find him there. “I just need to sit for a minute. You don’t mind, do you?” He shook his head but didn’t meet her eyes. Finding him unresponsive, she soon moved on to other customers.
After an interval lost to measure, there was again someone sitting at his elbow. He turned and regarded one of the people of the true north, who live as much on ice as they do on land. A crazy grin split the roundel face and words spilled forth in trader’s tongue. “Bruddah! Where you been?”
The blurred countenance resolved, and a name emerged from the fog. Tukuk, that was it, or the approximation used by those who couldn’t better pronounce it. “I see light dawning. Now you remember your buddy.” The little man smacked him on the back so hard the northerner lost his breath. “How about you get us two more of those?” Tukuk said, nodding at the empty cups sitting before them.
He heard a slurred utterance emanate from his own mouth. “Is life so hard for a sailor new paid he begs drink in port?”
Tukuk’s head tipped back in barking laughter. “I am shamed! The first round is on me.”
When full cups were in place, Tukuk said in a softer tone, “Why did you disappear last season? You gave up your share. None of the boys knew how to reach you.”
He remembered more now; Tukuk had been there a year ago. “Oh that, a long‑forgotten misunderstanding.”
The small dark man looked away. “As you say.” They both filled the gap in conversation with a swallow of their drinks.
“Have you seen Koyval lately?” the northerner suddenly asked. “He still owes me the gold in his teeth and an old family recipe.”
“Ah yes, the dice cheat who once cut me loose from broken rigging pulling me overboard. We ran dried fish to Pharis together last fall and came back with lumber.” After draining his cup, thumping it down on the table as was customary, Tukuk lowered his head. “His wife is ill. He’s always gay, but it’s plain he fears to lose her.”
“Hmm.” The young man bowed his head as well.
When they were kicked out of the bar, a faint band of pink outlining the promontory, the northerner walked away glad to have been reacquainted with a good crewman. He was also glad of details about his ship, its schedule, the disposal of its cargo, and the likely movements of its captain, who he would soon kill. Being far from home, gossip is a sailor’s natural currency.
#
I spent the remainder of the night in feints and cutbacks, eluding unseen pursuit I nonetheless knew was there. First light found me in a wooded grotto higher upslope, perched among carved statues atop a neglected temple. Finally sure I’d lost my tail, I judged it best to hide and wait, less concerned now with the night’s sport than with being spotted by humans. If I were seen, alarm would be called. It was one thing to walk protected by the man. It would be different to be caught alone in daytime.
Lying on the cool tiles, I let my eyes rest but didn’t close my ears. Dreams mixed with street sounds as the sun climbed to apex and began rolling back down the sky’s arc. At the edge of the temple roof, gloom crouched behind each votive figure, the troop of shadows creeping along in slow unison, like me, avoiding curious eyes.
When sun passed over blufftop, evening brought a rush of chill off the bay. Filling a gap deserted by a fallen idol, streets sounds shifting from daylight’s rush to nighttime’s scuttle, I decided to try for my lair. Sneaking downhill, I made my way home. A hop from the lip of a gutter to a beam end the carpenter had neglected to trim brought me to the window ledge. Nudging open the pane, I leapt into ambush.
Chapter 5
He awoke on the landing, sticking halfway out the entrance. Even after crawling in and shutting the door with his foot, there was still far too much light. Managing to stand, he stripped off his cloak and hung it across the window, on two small nails put there by a previous occupant. Later, on the pallet, not remembering having gotten there, he was awakened by a crash.
Moonlight revealed a dark, writhing mass resembling an enraged bear, but the eruptions coming from it were the screeches of a wildcat. The ferocious ball bounced off the walls until his roommate finally extricated itself from his cloak. “There you are, wild brother,” the man said. “I hope your day was better than mine.”
Also not remembering having undressed, he rolled off the pallet naked, stumbled to the window, and relieved himself. A curse came up from the alley below, but he paid no mind. “We need food and water, and I need something for my head. But remember don’t poop at the beach, or someone will complain.”
The cat followed him out the door, down the rickety steps, and along winding streets leading to the waterfront. He approached a stall with a red bowl painted on its shutter. Just inside the opening, a girl sat on a stool. Seeing him approach she stood up and smiled. But then she focused her eyes closer, turned on her heels, and darted into the shop’s dark interior.
A man came to the window. “So it is you, back again.” Though a shopkeeper, he had the deep‑tanned skin of a sailor. One of his legs was twisted, broken, explaining his landlocked state.
“It’s been a while since I was to town. Your memory is good.”
“I’m no good with names, but faces I remember,” the man replied without humor.
“Could I have water, please?” the northerner asked.
In a minute the shopkeeper came back with a cup and a bowl and set them onto the board. “There’s remedy in that,” he said, nodding at the cup. “Drink up.” The young man lifted it to his lips and downed the bitter draught. “That’s mushrooms in pepper broth,” the shopkeeper continued, this time indicating the bowl. “Eat what you can.”
The northerner obeyed, and after a few minutes, tipped the last drops of soup into his mouth and belched. “That was good. I’m truly grateful.” A little life had begun infusing his pallor.
The shopkeeper said, “I can spot well enough a sailor with a hangover.”
“I have money.” The northerner showed a coin. “Please make up something for later.” The broken‑legged man withdrew to the back of the shop.
Draining the last gulp of bitter water, he set down the cup. The girl snatched it away, appearing as though from nowhere. She withdrew a step, lowering her gaze, but she mastered herself and raised her eyes back up. “I remember you.”
He studied her a moment then smiled. “And I remember you too, miss.” There had been a girl in his village, older than himself, who had disdained his boyish adoration of her. He’d never forgotten that rejection, and he recognized the girl’s shyness. “We talked before, when I was here last year.”
The girl lowered her eyes again, warmth in her cheeks. “This is for you,” she blurted out and slid something across the counter. Before he could ask any questions, she had spun around and was gone. He picked up the small box of polished wood and slipped it into his pocket.
The proprietor returned with a package. The northerner removed his purse and set down two coppers. “Finish your work,” the shopkeeper said, pushing the coins back across the shelf. “That will be payment enough.”
By the time they returned, the moon had passed behind a nearby building, and the room was dark. The man stumbled over something on the floor but stayed upright. Pushing aside debris, he set down the bundle and unknotted the cord binding it together.
A small stick, freed from the parcel’s wrapping, skittered across the table. It was a match, a rare commodity. The cat sat erect on its haunches, waiting for further movement. The man picked up the match and drew it’s end over the rough wood, a sharp stench filling the air, and lit a candle stub on the table. A clay jug with a leather cap was illuminated, fresh water for a while. There was also a jar of pickled vegetables, a loaf of dense, dark bread that had been slit and buttered, and some pieces of dried meat.
Remembering the small box the girl had given him, he pulled it from his coat, something clattering inside. The cat watched intently as the man slid open the box’s lid, pouring its contents into his palm. He raised a key into the candle’s light. It was oily black with three holes perforating its handle, like a mask, two eye sockets and a grinning mouth. He inspected it a moment longer before putting it back into his pocket.
The northerner uncapped the jug, located an empty bowl, and poured water into it. After drinking off half, he set the remainder on the floor for the cat, along with a portion of meat. The wrapping was a good scrap of sail cloth; he would keep it. He picked up the coiled line that had held the bundle together, but it slipped from his hand, unspooling across the table. A broad paw slapped down onto the rope, slowly pulling it over the edge.
Before the retreating end escaped, the northerner reached out and caught it. He gave the line a yank, and it slipped between the cat’s toes. Laughing, he flicked it out again. His opponent lunged onto the crowded table, lucky it was secured to the floor, and sat down on the rope, clamping it by weight. The man tossed his end at the cat’s head, but it jumped back down, somehow not scattering all. The cat rolled with the rope, kicking with hind claws until it wound itself up in a tangle.
The northerner laughed again, the sound booming through the thin walls of the tenement and out into the night. Someone in the room below pounded on the ceiling, but this only made him roar louder.
#
Though mere thoughtlessness may not be treachery, who is more dangerous, the cunning or the chaotic? I didn’t regret tearing the man’s garment—it was clearly his own fault—but I thought myself more the fool on realizing what had captured me. He suddenly lurched off his bed, stumbling toward the window, now stripped of its snare. I dodged out of the way, retreating to the opposite corner. At least he had sense enough not to piss in his own den.
After ransacking his hoarded rubbish, the barbarian said a string of words containing food. He put on his coverings, crosswise slashes now venting his back, and made for the door. It mightn’t have been the best time to venture dockside, where I’d been spotted only the night before, but I was hungry and decided to take the risk. As he teetered downhill, I held back a few steps, wary he might stumble and step on me.
Hunting is as much habit as pursuit. Even when at other tasks, one may still flush prey, and a good stalker keeps some part of his nose always questing. An offshore breeze chased away the odor of the bay, the town’s final sewer, but no useful scent came on the freshening air. The man approached the lighted opening of a stall, and I retreated to nearby shadows. While he conversed with his own kind, I took advantage to slip off and do as is necessary, burying it in sand at the sea’s edge.
Back in the room, the man cleared a spot on the table and set down the package he’d been carrying. After unbundling it and lighting a wick from a sparking, noxious twig, he inspected its various parcels. Then searching his clothing, bringing forth a small object and prying at it with his fingertips until it squeaked, he held something up to the light. Though my nose was still full of the strange smoke, I could make out the smell of metal.
Next, he poured water from one of the containers into a bowl, and after drinking his share, set the remainder and some salted meat onto the floor. I blinked my thanks. He picked up the coiled sinew that had bound the bundle together, but it escaped his grasp and darted toward me. My claws sank into the shooting snake just behind its head, pinning it down. But maneuvering for a firmer purchase, I lost my grip, and it recoiled.
Braying like an ass, the barbarian flung the woven snake again, manipulating it to twitch and weave. When I pounced, its tail whipped back at me. But in abandoning the man, it made a crucial mistake, and I delivered a raking kick that would have been death to any real opponent.
Laying back on his pallet, he made his ass’s sound again and soon was snoring. I groomed my fur in contemplation—it wouldn’t do to die looking like a beggar—imagining the true fight yet to come. I had, perhaps, been hasty in my judgment of humans. It had been a good match, and I’d not imagined creatures so crude as men knew anything about battle training.
Chapter 6
After a period of denial, pillow over his head and covering his eyes, the young man abandoned hope of more sleep. He dressed and packed his bag before saying, “Come if you want.” The cat’s tufted ears lifted, and it rose in an arching shiver. This procedure complete, it followed him out the door.
Once on the street, the man turned upslope, the cat slinking at his heels. The winding climb brought them past stone and timber buildings—houses, shops, and workrooms all mixed together. It was not a great city as those in the South, but though a rough place in all, the town was not poor. Tucked away from the harshest winds, the last good hold before reaching the Freezing Sea, it was the crossroads and principal city of the region.
Here and there springs seeped from the hillside, feeding basins and spouts with a constant trickle. The cat stopped to lap beneath a carved caricature of a spitting frog, lifting its paws in a nervous jig as it tried to drink and also avoid being splashed. A townsman approached from around the corner but stopped, turning back the way he’d come.
“Let’s move along, brother. Some people fear wild folk.”
They crossed a bridge spanning a foul‑smelling channel, only ever fully flushed in heavy rains, and in a few minutes, encountered a pile of large boulders. Too inconvenient to move, the street had found its course around them. Later in the day, the mound would be home to scrambling children, but now it made a quiet refuge. The man sat down on a convenient rock and produced a cured deer shank from his bag. He laid it on the cobbles, and the cat set to without need of invitation.
They were finishing their breakfast when a commotion of voices preceded a knot of people into the square, a large old man in chain mail, using a pike as walking stick, leading the way. He came forward, the others hanging back. “Humph!” he didn’t quite begin. “Young man … that animal …” he said pointing.
The northerner looked down at the gnawing cat. “No doubt an animal.”
The old watchman huffed in vexation. “Yes, yes, but does it belong to you?”
The northerner considered the question. “We’ve been companions awhile, but he tends his own affairs.” He was standing now, his feet apart, hands on his hips. Turning toward the crowd, which had been steadily creeping forward, he said, “My friend is peaceable, but he wouldn’t need my help in a fight.” The words were spoken clearly but without passion, simply a statement.
The watchman seemed to deflate and in a more conciliatory tone said, “Young master, you needn’t be bold. These people only wonder if the beast has escaped from a menagerie on the hill. They have children and old ones to worry about.”
“I don’t know that word, the long one.”
The old guardian’s face set in puzzlement. “Oh, you mean menagerie. That’s a place where strange animals are kept. You’re a sailor by your looks, so perhaps you don’t know the upper town. They have creatures there in some of the estates. A sort of curiosity, I suppose, but not one without hazard. A mountain bear got loose last year and killed a keeper before we could net it.”
The northerner’s hands slid from his hips, resting at his sides. “None need fear who fear nothing.”
The old watchman chose to take this cryptic statement as a joke, and laughing and shrugging his shoulders, rejoined the others. Heated mumbles and gestures were exchanged, but the watchman waved his arms, herding them away.
“Come, villka. Stay close.”
They ducked into an alley, the deer bone still in the cat’s jaws. Before long their way dipped, confronting the valley’s founding stream. The street abutted here, not bridging the ravine, a footpath leading down one side and up the other.
Crouching in a thicket of brush, the northerner surveyed the rooftops of waterfront warehouses. A brick chimney squatted atop one near the canal. He could see down to where the path met the pilings, and counted the streets over. When he turned back up the path, he was alone, the cat having disappeared unnoticed.
#
I was awake, so when the barbarian got up and made ready to leave the room, I decided to accompany him. On our way, as we paused to refresh and dine, we were rudely interrupted by a rabble of townsfolk. I kept one eye on the commotion—the man didn’t appear in need of assistance—and the other eye on my deer joint. Wise is always wary of opportunistic scavengers.
When the interlopers dispersed, I followed the man into a maze of backways. Proceeding without further bother, we met the sound of running water, the cobbles ending at a gully, a footpath at its edge. The man descended, but I decided to follow a hunch and turned uphill.
Aspens lined the steep banks, and I climbed the stream’s fall, over boulders and up pebble‑filled rills. A shadow loomed ahead, the underside of a bridge. The path was blocked by a reed‑lined pond, and there was no way forward without either going up to the street or finding a way through the flooded underpass. I sat in the brush, listening, before stepping out into the clearing.
As I neared the water, I saw flat stones set into the pool’s surface, looking almost natural. But I recognized the work of man. Treading lightly onto the first, half expecting an arrow at any moment, I hopped from one rock to the next until I was across, the sound of wheels on the bridge overhead adding to my disquiet. Back in good cover on the upstream side, I soon reached the district of walled houses. While hiding on the temple roof the previous day, I’d caught the faintest wisp of scent coming off the bluff.
Spruce and pine rule the north but concede the shorelands to whatever can find root beside the sea. Without sheltering walls this windswept cape would grow only lichens and gorse, but for generations men had gathered gardens and imported sapling trees to buttress their walls. In the crook of a bough, at turns napping and watching, I waited for another sign.
Warm afternoon passed into cool evening. I was growing hungry and cramped and was near departing when, not far off, a mournful howl arose. I’ve seen where the land ends in ice, and I’ve seen where vast forest finally meets endless grass. I thought I knew all the world’s creatures, but beneath my branch a cart rattled by, trailing a smell proving me wrong. I climbed down from the tree and followed. A high‑walled compound circumscribed the next block, and a gate swung open emitting light onto the street. The cart passed inside.
Chapter 7
An amber orb revealed stacked barrels and bails but not the building’s farthest corners. Pushing their chairs back from a crate serving as table, ledgers and tide books crowding the ship’s lamp at its center, men stretched and sat back more comfortably. A servant emerged from the shadows and poured drinks. “Now that business is concluded, lets address more interesting ventures.” The speaker raised his glass, and the others followed suit.
It was well dark when the meeting broke up, and Aage was one of the last to leave. He and another man lingered at the door a minute before parting, one turning inland and the other to the docks. The captain bobbed along the boardwalk, humming a familiar sailor’s tune, when the northerner stepped out of a doorway, breaking his tempo.
Accosted so in the street, Aage didn’t flinch or step back. “Begone, thief!” he shouted. “You’ll find death if you tangle with the likes of me.” The northerner didn’t move aside. “I say begone!”
The captain drew his rigging knife and lunged toward his assailant’s guts. A sidestep and a shove sent the big, drunken man bouncing heavily off the timbers. Before hitting the back of his head with a rock he’d carried up from the beach for the purpose, the northerner pinned Aage down with a knee and leaned close. “A thief takes what doesn’t belong to him.”
The lamp on the crate again lit the warehouse, its wick retracted, the modest glow kept company by low moaning. Becoming more fully conscious, Aage jerked and strained his bound limbs. He thrashed his body but only managed to tip over the chair he was tied to. On the floor, frantically casting his eyes around the gloom, he tried to speak, but the gag in his mouth muffled his voice. Out of sight, footsteps began treading the floor. He tried to turn but couldn’t face that direction. Finally, a figure stepped into the light. The captain stared and after a moment lurched and flailed again but still couldn’t break loose.
The northerner drew his blade and knelt down. “I see you recognize your old crewman now.” He cut the gag from Aage’s mouth.
“I remember you,” the captive spat out the words in an angry croak. “You abandoned your post. Your share was forfeit. If you think you’ll get it now, that only proves you’re a fool. Release me and maybe you’ll live.”
The lamp flickered, its oil running low. “Is it possible? Do you really not remember the boy came with me?”
White showing around his eyes, the tied man screamed, “You’ll be hunted down, you fucking scum! Release me or you’ll hang!”
The northerner again brought out his sailor’s knife, cutting the straps holding one of the captain’s arms.
“That’s better,” the big man said gruffly. “Get me loose, and we might even find a few pennies to cover your embarrassment.”
He grasped Aage’s freed hand, and flattening it to the floor, cut off a finger.
The shriek of a trapped animal echoed through the warehouse. “What do you want?!”
Pulling a square of sailcloth from his vest, he ripped a strip from it, and despite a struggle, managed to bandage the captain’s hand. “You remember the boy now, Captain Aage? Fair hair … by the time we reached Bekkol, he was almost doing his job. His name was Jahan.”
Silence filled the warehouse. “I remember the boy.”
“That’s good, let’s reminisce together.” The northerner pulled up a chair beside the captain and seated himself. “We came down to port last year, before the spring melt. It had been decided my sister’s son would come with me. ‘Don’t spend all your money,’ she said at our last parting. She never said watch over my boy and keep him safe, but she couldn’t keep it from her eyes.”
The fire had gone out of the man on the floor. He whispered, as though trying not to be overheard, “You were gone. I thought you’d abandoned him. It wouldn’t have been the first time I’d seen it.”
The northerner sat quietly a minute then rose from his chair and knelt at the tied man’s side. He picked up the severed finger, and with bone nib and blood ink scratched a red figure onto the floor.
“Yes!” Aage bawled. “That’s the house that made the highest bid.”
The young man cast down his crude pen and strode toward the door.
“This isn’t over.” The captain’s words squeezed out between clenched teeth, his anger returning.
The northerner stopped. “Don’t think I do you favor by letting you live. My people will see your hand and see the sign and know you for what you are, a slave trader. I wouldn’t sail these waters again if I were you.”
#
The man departed at dusk, but I chose to slumber a while longer. When I awoke again, I leaped up to the sill and pried open the window. The night was calm, a breath of winter lingering in the air, auguring frost by morning. The moon had risen by the time I reached the top of the bluff and the walled estates.
The streets here were too wide to leap over, so I was forced to ground. Noisome revelry came from within one of the compounds on my path, humans taking feast and making sport. I skirted around it. There was little cover beyond shadow, but at least there weren’t many people outside their walls. Although passage is riskier at street level, smelling is better, and finally, after days lost to count, I caught a strong scent. What previously had only been atoms and scraps was now a straight line. The trail ended at large gates, a portal I’d seen before.
I carefully circled the walled perimeter, looking for an opening or climb. If my nose can tell, one corner harbored the stables and one a garden, the next enclosing the house and the last kitchens. A swath of verge provided access to the kitchen roof. Taking to the wall top would have the advantage of staying out of territory I had only a general sense of—I didn’t relish the thought of going down into the compound—but scouting from atop it would risk being seen in silhouette. Wanting of a decision, I waited, surveying the yard.
A boy walked between kitchen and house, bearing a basket, humming like a wandering bee. On the opposite side of the square, a lamp lit the stable bay, another at the gate of an adjacent enclosure, walls within the greater wall. At the end of the stable roof, what I’d first thought to be an ornament rocked forward, lifting its head, hooting a challenge to any owl within hearing. Launching from the roof, its broad wings sounding but a whisper, it was gone.
Having measured my options, I settled on the wall. Creeping around a finial, pressed down as tightly as I could manage, I gained a spot near the stables, affording a good view down into the enclosure next to it. There was little to be seen at its empty center, but a confusion of scents rose up to me.
Not far off, clattering wheels approached on the street. A man sat on a horse cart, his feet dangling off the front. Behind him, in a large canvas‑covered box, was proof I’d been right. I could smell her clearly, held within.
Chapter 8
The sigil carved above the gate matched the one worked into the handle of the key, the same grinning, empty‑eyed skull he’d drawn for Aage on the warehouse floor. He walked around to the back of the villa, where a stout door was set into the wall. A knotted cord rang a bell, which eventually brought the attendant. “I’ve come for payment. Tell your master.” The servant nodded and went away. Returning a few minutes later, he slid back the door’s heavy bar, and the northerner was again escorted into the small room next to the kitchen.
The hawk‑faced steward already occupied one of the chairs. “Sit, barbarian. I’m told you seek remuneration.”
“As you say, I’m an ignorant savage,” the young man replied evenly, taking the empty chair, “and I don’t know all your civilized words. But I come for what is owed.”
The steward drew out the list from his pocket and made show of scrutinizing it. “Is this the name we agreed on?” He set the parchment down on the table and pointed at a line of script. “Or was it this one? But I don’t suppose you can read, can you? So perhaps that explains why no word has reached me of tragedy befalling any of my master’s enemies.”
“Yet, death is come.”
“Wait here.” The steward rose from his chair and went out into the hallway. He returned with three others, two men in stable livery and one in fine dress. “This is the master of the house. Stand up.” The northerner complied.
“Please, sit again. No need for formality.” The master took the chair his steward had vacated. A servant came from the kitchen and poured dark crimson into clear glass goblets. “Drink up, young man. You may never have tasted wine from the South before, and you should not miss the opportunity.”
The northerner sipped the blood‑colored liquid. He had to admit, the flavor was unlike any he’d ever known. “Good, good, you see what I mean.” The master set down his cup, smiling, then in a cooler tone said, “My man says you seek payment from me, but it can’t be for any agreement we made. He says you may have a different sort of tally in mind.”
The steward nodded, and the two liverymen sprang forward, pinning the northerner’s arms. “Secrets are brought to me from across the sea. Do you suppose I don’t know my own city? A shabby sailor comes to town asking questions … Do you think me so dull I don’t know you for exactly what you are?”
“Stand him up!” the steward ordered. The stablemen yanked the northerner to his feet. “You won’t be needing this.” The hawk‑faced man removed the northerner’s knife from its sheath, slipping it into his own belt. The master also had risen, and the steward went to his side, whispering something. A chortle and a nod signaled the idea suited the master’s fancy. “Bring him along, boys.”
#
Below me the heavy gates swung open, and a covered cart rolled into the stable yard. It continued around the end of the barn and halted beside the enclosure. After the horse was unhitched and led away, the driver and a stableboy rolled back a door in the stockade and pushed the cart inside. They pulled away canvas, revealing a cage, empty but for loose straw. Backing the cart up to one of a row of pens, they slid open matching panels, one in the cage and one set into the side of the pen. Nothing happened.
The driver went to a corner where two poles leaned, brought them back, and handed one to the boy. They began jabbing at the straw, and something bolted from the cart, pulsing back and forth in the gloom of the larger confinement. The man carefully shut the sliding grate, and he and the boy withdrew the cart and rolled it out of the compound, back toward the stable.
Crouching on the wall, I waited. When the commotion of arrival had quieted, I hopped onto the stable and edged down the incline, keeping close into the corner where roof met outer wall. A slight slip on my landing spoiled some of the effect as I jumped into the prison.
An ice bear snorted at me from behind bars but didn’t raise its massive head. Unfamiliar birds chattered and screeched, flapping up to the highest perches of their wire pens. The smell of something unknown to me was there too; I didn’t approach that cage. And from a cell so recently filled, pacing back and forth in angry captivity, the princess of all the boreal realm glared at me.
“Who are you?” she hissed.
I groomed back my ears, weighing my response. “Forgive me if I speak too boldly, but even in this retched place, you are more beautiful than any have described.”
Her transit slowed. “Sweet tongue may seek to deceive yet is not in itself a fault.” She had stopped and was sitting, regarding me directly. “As you say, my predicament is hateful. Why do you come, only to mock?”
“Some find me ready enough. But the puzzle is how to free you? I imagine you’ve given thought to the question. What do you command?”
Some of the fury left her body. “I hope you’re wiser than me. I’ve wracked my brain but haven’t found an answer.”
“I’ve been stalked in this city. Have your enemies followed you here?”
“False faith baited the trap. I was told my brother had escaped, but in the place I was brought to men had dug into the ground and covered over a hole. My guides must have known it. Those two are my cousins.”
“Leave it to me,” I said, striving for a cheerful note. Trapped in her cage, the princess offered no response. Judging it time for my exit, I soon again hunkered atop the outer wall, chewing on how to free her. Although finally near my goal, substantial obstacles remained. I would simply have to find a way.
Shuffling steps told me I wasn’t alone. From both sides indistinct figures advanced, and in a moment, I was under attack. I leaped and heard the thump of heads colliding behind me. Unfortunately, I again missed my landing and began sliding down the stable roof, my claws of little use on steep‑pitched slates.
There’ve been only a few times in my life when I’ve really fallen, when there was nothing under me but a great length of air, and those times had been in the forest. The cobbles of the stable yard had much less give than pine needles. Striving to recover my breath, I assessed my situation. There was no sound of further pursuit from above, so I held still, hoping no one had noticed my plummet.
I’d landed near the gate. A light hung beside a stable door, and I pulled back into the shadowed corner where building met wall. All was quiet a minute, but the door swung open, and a man stepped out and lifted the lantern off its hook. And I smelled dogs.
I couldn’t scale the stone walls, nor could I wait in hope the gates might open. The only way out I could think of was where I’d come in, near the kitchen, on the other side of the compound. I lunged from the corner, past the bewildered man. Directly, several dogs came tumbling through the doorway, a few jumps to my rear.
I had only a rough understanding of the compound’s layout, but I charged in what I thought must be the right direction. A low shed stood near the kitchen, across an open patch of dirt, and I vaulted through fence rails to reach it. A great thumping blow struck my side, casting me to the ground, stunned. Two large goats sprang over me, breaking through the fence.
There were people coming from all around, and men, dogs, and panicked goats all converged at the center of the yard. I took this as my cue. A low box stood against the wall of the shed, a rout up. But when I sprang to its edge, it was slippery, and I plunged into water. By the time I caught hold of the slimy trough and pulled myself out, trying not to think of goat spit, men had gathered about the corral.
One dog died, and one man would not walk again without remembering me, but in the end, with tooth and staff and net, I was subdued.
Chapter 9
The northerner was marched into the night, across the courtyard, and pushed inside a stockade. “Leave us,” the steward said to the two liverymen, and they departed, sliding shut the gate.
“Come see my treasures,” the master said in mock comradery. “This is the famous white bear, but that’s nothing unusual to you.” They continued around the cloister to another cage, the steward steering the northerner by bound wrists. “This is different. I bet you’ve never seen a real lion before.” A tawny mound occupied the back of the cage, a low, hostile rumble in its chest.
“Ah, this is the one you’re interested in.” The three men stood before an empty cage. “This is where that stupid boy died. He bit me—see?” The master pulled back his sleeve in proof. “He might have come to like his place here, but that little cunt bit me. He was learning a lesson.”
“It was cold that night,” the steward added.
“Yes, it was cold. No one regrets the loss more than me.”
“His body washed up on the beach. Crabs had been at it,” the northerner said, his voice a whisper, “but marks on his skin showed how he spent his last day.” The master turned and struck his face, knocking him to the ground.
“The boy was paid for, and misfortune finds us all. But you come here, into my house, and for what, revenge? You’ll make law as you see fit? You need a lesson, like that boy did. Put him in.”
#
“So you’re back. It eludes me, though, how this improves the situation.”
When I came to, she was standing over me, a scowl on her face. Hard stone beneath me, sturdy‑looking planks above, three walls of iron bars and one of brick—not a good start at rescue. I rolled off my back as gracefully as bruises allowed, my ears ringing quite like summer crickets. “Forgive me, lady, but you find me somewhat confounded.”
An unexpected sound rang through the chill air, the princess’s laughter. “You’re soaking wet.” She stepped back, sniffing. “What did you fall into?”
It’s discomforting at any time to be seen with one’s fur bedraggled, let alone when it’s a princess.
“Don’t shake yourself!” she yelped. “Roll in the clean straw by the wall.”
I did as commanded. Dryer but now tangled, I began combing out my coat.
With a sharp sting, she parted fur at the back of my head. “You’ll live,” she said, examining the cut.
I was surprised again, this time not by her laughter but by her tongue. Soon the wound was clean. “You honor me, lady.”
“We’re in the same cage,” she replied simply.
In the corner nearest the grate, in the already foul straw, I did as one must.
“I haven’t seen you at court,” she said. “Where are you from?”
“I grew up in the Stone Hills. My mother claims to be of some antique lineage, but her range is humble.”
“Old blood lines do run north. Perhaps your mother is right.”
“Perhaps, but most consider us rustics. What’s been the routine of your day?” I asked, coming back to immediate problems. “Will they bring fresh straw? Does food appear?”
“I’ve found it’s best to think of other things. Sometimes there’s meat, sometimes just water. As you see yourself, the housekeeping is perfunctory.”
“Then let’s plot our escape and ultimate victory,” I responded, with what spirit I could muster. “Is the man‑sized door in this cage ever opened? Forgive me, but I’ve already seen how the smaller gate is used.”
Heat came into her eyes. “The thing they call a wagon brought me here, and I’ve been forced back into it and conducted other places and displayed, apparently for amusement. There are always sticks.”
“How is the food and water delivered?”
“They use the sliding grate for all, the wagon, the pan of water, and when it comes, the meat.”
“And the man door?”
“That’s never opened since I arrived.”
Mingling with becalmed air, wood smoke accompanied morning noises drifting over the wall—a squeaking door, horses talking in the barn, water being drawn from a well. I could see into the rest of the cages now, perhaps as many as my claws.
“When do the men come?”
“Two men at midday.”
“Never more? Never less?”
“Always two.”
“They use a rake for the straw?”
“Yes, when they condescend to clean.”
“Suppose the rake is in the pen, blocking open the hatch. If one of us grasped it, the other might escape. If the attendants were well enough occupied outside, the one remaining would have a way out.”
“But who would go and who would stay, holding a shitty rake and trapped if the first simply flees?”
“I follow or lead as you command.”
“Again, sweet tongue is not in itself a fault, but only deeds prove.”
“Truer words were never spoken. Let us judge each other accordingly.”
“A commoner, even one from an old family, doesn’t usually judge a princess.”
“As your cell mate, lady, I’m willing to make allowances.”
Chapter 10
The steward walked up to the cage, patting his pockets. “I’m sorry, Master, I seem to have misplaced my key. Just a moment, I have an idea.” He went back to the northerner and began searching him, but the captive’s bound arms blocked access to his sides. The steward pulled the northerner’s knife from his own belt and cut the prisoner’s bindings. “Here, hold this.” He handed it to the young man and finished searching him. “There it is.”
Taking something from the northerner’s clothing, he strode back to the cage. He slipped the key into the lock, swung open the barred door, and returned to where the other two were standing. “Well?” he said, gesturing at the knife in the northerner’s unbound hand. “Do what you came for.” But then he held up a finger. “Better yet, I have another idea. What do you say we give the keepers a hand?” No one came to investigate the screams, assuming it was the master at play.
When things calmed down inside the bear cage, the steward said, “Once when I was young, my father told me if you’re ever in desperate need of money, offer your services to a rich man. I should never have listened.
“My mother is Fox Clan. She’s old and I’d like to see her again before she dies, but I couldn’t return home with blood trailing behind me. For what part I had in it, I accept your judgment.”
In one corner a broom leaned against the wall, and the young man went and retrieved it. Hefting it, judging its weight, he swung and broke the handle across the steward’s head. After pulling the hard old man to his feet, the northerner took back the key and helped him over to the empty cage. “They’ll want to know I overpowered you.”
#
The remainder of the morning was uneventful, and I contented myself with a game of guessing smells coming from the kitchen. Breakfast was sausages and apples fried in butter, served with fresh bread and honey. Then a stock pot was filled with water, ox meat, and vegetables, seasoned with salt and birch leaves—though across the yard and out of sight, I knew. Eating man food had seemed without price before, but now I regretted knowledge of it. As the day warmed, the aroma coming from the pot taunted my empty belly.
Finally, just after the sun had passed its highest point, the stockade gate slid back and two men came in pushing a hand cart. They began work nearby, and it wasn’t long before they were in front of our bars.
“So this is last night’s excitement?” the older one said, leaning against the cart. “They’re coming for the bitch.”
“A female cat’s called a molly.”
“What? You have wax in your head. Anyway, that’s what the toms are here for. They’ve been skulking around ever since she came.”
The men approached with their implements. The older one said, “I don’t like the look of these two. Putting him in the cage has likely got her riled up again. Just push some hay through the bars. And watch your fingers! We’ll give them a day or two before opening the grill.”
“What about feeding them? I won’t tell the stable master I was afraid to do what I was told.”
“You’ll do as told now and grab that straw.”
One man menaced us with a stick as the other shoved dry grass through the bars. The older man returned to the cart, rummaged through its contents, and came up with long metal pinchers. “Grab a few bits of meat from the bucket and push them through.” Again, one handled the stick as the other did as he was told.
Afternoon passed with little to do, so when I tired of napping, I attempted conversation with the other inmates. What I could now see was a large brown cat didn’t respond, and I was secretly relieved. But never having met one before, I was unsure if he even understood me. The ice bear was grumpy but then apologized—she was just so hungry it made her disagreeable. A goshawk stared at me until I stopped asking questions, then resumed preening. A grim old wolf recited a long list of his pack affiliations without my having asked. None of them could add much insight as to why they’d become captives except to agree that men were cruel animals.
Night fell, and the moon climbed over the top of the wall, silhouetting two ghouls. “They often keep watch, my cousins, awaiting my death I presume.”
“What will you do with them after we get out of here?” I won from her a brief smile.
“My hope of escape has waned with the days, but I welcome your confidence. Revenge brings naught back, and they aren’t smart enough to do anything but follow orders. Exile will be sufficient.”
Chapter 11
After locking the steward into the empty cage, the northerner retraced his steps and found what he was looking for. “Wild brother, imagine my surprise when I saw you here. And you have a friend.” Four golden eyes stared back at him. “You’d best find your own way. Getting out of here might prove the tricky part.” He unlocked the door, and the two cats lunged away without further encouragement. A water barrel stood next to the wall. One after the other, the cats hopped onto its rim then the roof’s edge and were gone.
Before making his own escape, the northerner returned to the caged man and said, “My mother’s clan is Thief Bird, but I haven’t been home since it happened. When we made port last year, I left the boy on the boat and went drinking and whoring. When I sobered up, the boat had sailed, and he was dead. I fear to meet my sister’s eyes.”
The young man took out his knife, pulled back his hair, and slowly drew the blade across his forehead. From the cage the old man recited, “Atonement comes by my own hand.”
The northerner met no resistance while leaving the estate. The one stableman he encountered turned on his heals and fled at the sight of his blood‑streaked face.
#
When the young man I’d been traveling with was brought into the courtyard, I was dumbfounded. How had we both come to be here? Two others accompanied him, I should say escorted, he was the only one bound. They made a circuit of the enclosure, ending up in front of an empty cage.
After some back and forth, one of them cut the barbarian’s hands free. My friend went up to the third man and punched him in the stomach, causing him to crumple over. Then they all decamped to the cage of the grumpy ice bear. The princess must have been as confused by the spectacle as I, but what we witnessed next was an amazement. The bear’s hunger was truly pitiful, but to feed one of your own to a prisoner is uncommon grace.
It was curious, though, that when the remaining two went back to the empty cage, one allowed the other to beat him without resistance. After shutting the old man up, the barbarian came to us and opened our door. The princess and I fled, making clear of the walls.
Chapter 12
When the northerner returned to the rented room, he found it occupied. “You brought your friend. Let’s celebrate our liberation with a feast.” He was able to find a late‑night chandler and purchased a few handfuls of charcoal and cubes of pickled whale meat. The woman at the counter, brown as a polished nut, showed no sign of alarm though the young man had not yet washed his face.
The cats kept their distance while he lit a fire, but when meat began to sear they drew closer. He put some in a dish, set it on the floor, and finished the rest himself. With more cubes sizzling in the pan, he flipped one into the air. Unsure which cat won the toss, he kept up the game until all were satisfied.
He’d slept well in this room, intent on his task, but now that it was done he tossed and turned. In the morning there would be nothing left to do but the hardest part. It was time to go home.
#
Once out of the cage and over the wall, we ran for the relative safety of the middle town’s roofs. I’ll admit to having been winded by the time we reached them. Squeezing between two chimneys, we stopped, listening for signs of pursuit.
“While it remains dark, I’m not overly concerned about men. But what of your cousins?”
“I’m afraid I can’t offer much insight. I’ve seen little here beyond my bars.”
“You said they’ve been keeping watch, so they probably have a hole somewhere near where we were held. I encountered them once before, near the docks, but I’d wager I know that part of town better than they do. Let’s make for my den.”
“Why not break for open country?”
“We should assume they’re hunting us and that they have an advantage in the upper town. They’ll have scouted the ways out, and can we say for certain it’s just the two of them? I think it’s better to make for my lair. I know that ground, and I have a weapon there.”
The princess was quiet a moment in thought. “Lead on.”
I stepped out onto the slates, the princess leaving some distance between us before following, a good huntress. The gap over a wide avenue seemed excessive, so we were compelled onto the street. The few humans we encountered went along oblivious. It was sufficient to stop and wait in a shadow. But then a man approached, coming uphill, a dog at his side.
We retreated into an alley, and crouching behind a pile of rubbish, watched the threat pass by. Before taking to the roofs again, we risked stopping at a spring‑fed basin, thirst overcoming caution. It was deepnight when we drew near the dockland. Under the eve of a gable, we kept watch awhile, the rooftops empty.
“I think we can safely hide.”
The princess easily navigated the hops and ridge walks down to the ledge outside my den. I bumped open the window. “Forgive me, lady, for not mentioning it earlier,” I said before leaping down to the floor, “but I have a roommate, and I swear I’m blameless for the disorder … and the smell.”
Chapter 13
Looking out the little window, the northerner saw clear sky. He gathered up what mattered and packed it into his bag, and the two large gray cats followed him out the door. Halfway up the slope, where water trickles from a big pile of boulders, he stopped to fill his flask. There wasn’t much food left, but once they were clear of the town they could hunt and forage.
The cats lapped at a runnel snaking across the pavers, the male keeping close but the female skittish. Without conscious thought, the young man lurched back from the fountain, something flashing past the corner of his eye. It seemed a rock must have fallen from the pile, but before he could regain his feet the street erupted in furious screams. Two wildcats tumbled into the open as two others hugged the mound, all four producing an astounding clamor.
Pedestrians stopped, and people came out of doorways. Upright again but with no notion what to do, the northerner observed the melee. The old watchman stepped up beside him. “Friends of yours?” he asked over the din, leaning on his pike. The engagement resolved as one of the cats in the street drew back, limping. It took to heel and was quickly joined by its comrade, and they made for a stairway at the side of a nearby building.
“Please, Grandfather, may I borrow this a moment?” The northerner grabbed the old man’s spear and launched it into the air before the watchman could react.
“Nice toss, young man,” he muttered. But remembering himself he shouted, “That’s city property! You can’t just make as you please!”
Retreating uphill, the northerner called back over his shoulder, “You should have the pelt for your trouble. Wasn’t it your weapon that slew the beast? A fine winter cap and mittens too.”
The district of walled estates could not be avoided, and as they passed through, it was all he could do to keep from breaking into a run. Hood up and head down, the young man thought of trying to collect on contracts he’d made with other houses—the dead man must have been on many lists. But as they approached the edge of town, buildings and walls nearly left behind, he decided against it. But he also decided it wasn’t stealing to keep the money he’d been given in advance.
Cart roads became foot paths and soon trails. The weather was kind, in a spell of spring warmth, and travel was dry. A few days earlier, skirting the edge of the great forest, he saw the female cat for the last time. Now, purple hills rising in the distance, it was just the two friends.
The wild cat slowed and stopped. Turning back, the man asked, “Is it time?” The powerful hunter closed the distance between them. The man knelt, stretching out his hand, and rubbed the beast’s chin. They remained a moment longer together before the cat stepped off the trail.
His course began slanting downward, out of the coastal hills and toward the shore of the Freezing Sea. Outsiders, if they claim to know anything of it at all, never fail to disparage this country. They say the wind‑scoured rocks look like the earth’s flesh has been stripped and torn away, leaving only bones.
There is disagreement among the elders as to how people first arrived here. Some say they came as explorers. Some say they were exiled. Those who believe the old religion say humans are but pieces in a game played by the gods, fulfilling ambitions beyond comprehension. All anyone from this harsh land knows for certain is that it was meant for its people and they for it.
#
I’d made it this far, at some personal risk and considerable discomfort I might add, and now all I had to do was get the princess safely home, a hundred thousand paces or more. We needed to move. I crept up to the barbarian’s pallet and sniffed his nostrils. He sat up, swatting at his face. We would be leaving this messy lair for the last time, and for just a moment, a wave of nostalgia washed over me. But cats don’t like getting wet.
Wisps of morning fog ushered us uphill. Where a spring emerges from a mound of stones, we stopped to break our thirst. The princess would not condescend being too close to the barbarian, but I’d learned there was safety at his side. My feeling was as much exasperation as surprise when the princess’s cousins attacked. It did at least answer the question of whether we were opposed by only two. If there were more, all would have come to the ambush.
Taking recent events as inspiration, I launched myself at the point where the one who had jumped from the top of the rocks would land. His feet were extended for impact with the ground, and like a goat, I rammed him directly in the side with my head. Gasping for air, he rolled into the bushes edging the boulders. To my rear I could hear the princess engaging his brother, and I pitied that one more. At a shriek of pain from the square, I let my opponent break past.
Seeming to have reassessed their situation, the cousins started up a stairway, one limping and falling behind. I didn’t see the javelin launched, but I saw it pin the straggler to the wall. Without need of conference, the barbarian, the princess, and I took our exit. Briskly progressing uphill, we soon gained the blufftop. I relied on the man to guide us through the canyonland of walled estates.
The first few days on the road, the princess was quiet. We discussed possible threats we might encounter and how to deal with them, but her responses, though always polite, were brief, and she held back from further conversation. The weather remained mild, rodents were in plenty, and the journey fell into a comfortable rhythm. One morning, rolling in damp grass together, we both broke into laughter. As we washed, we recounted every disgusting detail of the cell we’d shared. But she soon again reverted to introspection.
The trail met a stream, its sides dense with willow stems, and we turned inland. By the next morning, the edge of the great forest loomed up before us. The princess and I were roaming ahead when a cough sounded from a nearby thicket, a challenge. She stopped and sat down on the path.
New‑sprouted leaves cast fluttering shadows in the pool of sunlight where she rested, making her appear like a fish suspended in shallow water. “You’ve been a faithful knight,” she said, “but tell me one thing. How was it you came to my aid in the first place?”
“I hope you’ll forgive me, lady, if I admit to no high aim. I wasn’t welcome at home, and I simply wanted something to do.”
“Reports of my return are spreading, my guard awaits me, and I must go. If I succeed, the pretender will be routed before high summer.” She was quiet a moment before seeming to come to a decision. “Do families from the North still remember old custom?” asked the Princess of All the Woods. “My mating festival will be held at Midwinter. Come to the contest. Let your deeds be measured against other suit.” Her whiskers curled in a mischievous grin. “I’ll try to rig the outcome.” With that, she disappeared into the trees.
The barbarian and I kept company together a while longer. Travel was pleasant, and we were merry. One day, the Stone Hills visible on the horizon, I stopped on the trail, lost in thought. “Is it time?” the young man asked. He knelt down, and we nuzzled as brothers do.
Snowmelt collects below this long ridgeline, the last barrier before the sea. A stranger would become lost in these bogs and never be seen again, but I was entering the land of my birth. My mother used to say these hills were our family’s place long before time began, before the first memory. But in the past, that never meant much to me.