Bone Trail Page 14

  Cody slipped the scrimshaw medallion into his breeches pocket and concluded the deal with the two silver coins before climbing to his feet. It was the last of his hard-earned plains money, the two worn silver coins. The other four – gold pieces – he’d used to buy kit and provisions in a dusty little village, the last plains outpost before the badlands.

  His fingers traced the carving in his pocket. There was no going back. Not ever.

  He looked up at the next terrace. Eli was trading wyrmepelts for crossbow bolts with an armourer in a grease-stained apron and, judging by the man’s waving arms and shrugging shoulders, was getting the best of the deal. Ethan was standing next to him, trying to look knowledgeable and seasoned, holding up the pelts when Eli nodded to him. But his eyes were wary and his smile faltering. Like Cody, he was aware of the kith in the shadows watching their every move.

  Micah was further up the rising terraces, on his knees. He had traded the flameoil and wyrmeteeth for a new copper pot and a useful-looking rock-pick, and seemed pleased with his bargain, and Cody cursed under his breath. He was meant to be trading their dried goods for a flintbox, and a whetstone if there was one to be had, and he had allowed himself to get distracted by the ­trinkets of a scrimshaw pedlar.

  Still, the mistwyrme bones were his to do with as he liked – Eli had said as much. And the silver coins he’d earned himself through back-breaking toil back there on the plains.

  Cody looked around at the traders crouched down on the terraces in front of spread wyrmepelts, on which their wares were displayed. There was a distiller with small vials of green liquor, a herbalist with bunches of aromatic grasses and dark rockmoss, a knife-sharpener . . . And there on the wyrmepelt before him, a couple of whetstones. Cody smiled and made his way over, only to see Cara kneeling in front of an old kith woman who was trading weald medicine.

  Cara. Cody felt his chest tighten just looking at her.

  ‘Is that soap?’ she was asking.

  ‘Finest soap in all the weald,’ the old woman replied, her tone flatter than her words. She picked up a pale-green block, the size of a brick, and passed it to Cara, who raised it to her nose.

  ‘Myrtle,’ she said.

  ‘Finest myrtle,’ the woman agreed.

  Cara placed it down and inspected the other items spread out across the wyrmepelt. There was whiterot cream and leech salve, and various sticky ointments for cuts, burns and chilblains, together with rolls of cloth bandages. Cara surveyed them for a moment, then looked up at the woman. She opened her backpack and took out the pungent dried cudleaf they had gathered several weeks back on the steep banks of a mountain creek. There were five small bales, and Cody noted how the old woman’s eyes lit up at the sight of them.

  ‘I’ll take all you have,’ said Cara simply.

  It was a good trade and the old woman knew it. She reached out and shook Cara’s hand greedily.

  ‘You got yourself a deal,’ she cackled.

  Cody knelt down beside Cara and helped her put the medicines into her pack.

  ‘Seen a whetstone over there,’ he told her. ‘I’m fixing to trade our dried goods for it . . .’ he started to say, before stopping, his face draining of all colour.

  His eyes were fixed on the medallion that nestled against Cara’s sunblush skin at the base of her throat. It was a piece of scrimshaw work. Round. Ornately carved.

  Cara caught him staring and glanced down. She smiled, her nose crinkling up and freckles crowding together. ‘Pretty, isn’t it?’ she said.

  Cody nodded dumbly.

  ‘Micah gave it to me,’ Cara said and smiled. ‘Traded the black salsify roots for two flintboxes, and got this into the bargain.’

  Cody’s fingers closed crushtight round the medallion in his pocket till his fingers throbbed. ‘Mighty fine,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Give me the dried goods, Cody,’ came a voice. It was Eli. Ethan and Micah were standing beside him looking down at Cody and Cara. ‘There’s a whetstone over there,’ he said.

  ‘I know, I—’ Cody began, handing his pack to the cragclimber, only to be cut short.

  ‘No time for haggling,’ Eli muttered. ‘We need to get out of this place.’ He took Cody’s pack over to the knife-sharpener­ and tipped its contents out in front of him. There was a brief muttered exchange and Eli returned with the smaller of the two whetstones. ‘Let’s go,’ he said.

  He turned and strode off down the terraced steps towards the cavern entrance. The others followed.

  Outside, Eli paused in the shade of the jutting log roof and his eyes narrowed against the late afternoon dazzle beyond. Three men were there.

  One was sitting on the low drystone wall of an empty wyrmepen, his hands on his thighs; the other two were leaning up against the wall on either side of him. They each wore broad-brimmed wyrmeskin hats, waistcoats and breeches, and had dyed homespun kerchiefs knotted around their necks. And they were armed.

  Eli noted their holstered spitbolts, the knives at their belts. As he stepped slowly out from the shadow, he glanced up to see Fletcher Crow reclining in a simple wooden rocking chair that was set atop the log roof. The scrimshaw den owner shrugged as if to say this was none of his business – though Eli suspected it not to be the case.

  The three men stared back at them like carrionwyrmes waiting to feast. Then a fourth man emerged from behind the back of one of the tarpaulin covered shacks, a large knife at his belt and a heavy sidewinder slung over his shoulder that glinted in the sunlight. He eyed Eli up and down with something akin to insolence.

  ‘All done with your trading?’ he said, and though his voice was amiable enough there was menace in the way he blocked the cragclimber’s path.

  Eli tipped his hat down till the shadow from the brim lay across his narrowed eyes. ‘Happen we have, friend,’ he said.

  His own voice was measured, and sounded amiable enough, but Micah noticed how the cragclimber’s hand moved closer to the handle of his own holstered spitbolt. Micah did the same.

  ‘Well, that is sure a pity,’ said the man, blacknail fingers scratching at his chin. He turned to the others. ‘Ain’t it, boys?’

  ‘Sure is,’ they drawled back, and they ambled over to flank him, two on one side, one on the other.

  The man turned back to Eli. ‘See, the thing is,’ he said, ‘you got something that we’d be interested in trading you for.’ His eyes creased at the corners as his face broke into a yellow-toothed smile. ‘More than ­interested.’

  He reached into his back pocket and pulled a hip-flask from it, which he tossed to Eli, who caught it auto­matically. ‘Fair exchange.’

  Eli glanced at the hipflask. It was silver. Half full by the feel of it. He looked up.

  ‘Fair exchange for what?’ he said.

  The man jerked his head forward. ‘The girl,’ he said, and Micah’s stomach lurched.

  Cara flushed crimson.

  On the rooftop, Fletcher Crow kept on rocking but did not look down. His narrowed gaze was fixed on the far horizon.

  ‘She ain’t for trade,’ said Eli levelly.

  The man’s grin grew broader. ‘I don’t believe you have a choice in the matter,’ he said, a soft lilt to his voice.

  Eli’s pale eyes darkened. He opened his hand and the hipflask fell to the ground with a clatter. He kicked it back over the dust toward the man.

  ‘Take your liquor and let us pass, friend,’ he said.

  The man stared back at him, the smile fading from his face. ‘You ain’t no friend of mine.’

  All at once, and with no warning, he swung the heavy primed sidewinder from his shoulder and took aim – only for the cragclimber to beat him to it. The spitbolt jumped in Eli’s hand as he squeezed the trigger.

  The man fell to the ground, screaming with pain and clutching at the top of his thigh. Beside him, the three others leaped forward, the first lan
ding on Eli and bringing him crashing to the ground, the second firing a spitbolt at Micah, and the third knocking Cody and Ethan to one side. A bolt hummed past Micah’s head and struck a wooden crossbeam behind him as he fumbled with his own spitbolt, raising it to his eyes, firing it, hoping for the best.

  The bolt buried itself in the kith’s chest. The man dropped to his knees before toppling forwards and landing face down in the dust.

  ‘Micah!’

  Cara’s voice cut through the air, shrill, fear-filled. Eli was grappling with the kith who had brought him down. Cody and Ethan were scrambling to their feet, white-faced and staring.

  The third kith had grabbed Cara and was backing away, a muscular arm wrapped tightly round her neck and a broad-blade knife in his hand.

  ‘Don’t do anything stupid,’ he hissed. ‘The girl’s coming with me.’

  Micah froze. So did Eli. The kith he’d been wrestling with slumped over onto his side, Eli’s knife in his throat and dark blood staining the ground round his head like a black halo.

  The man grinned unpleasantly as he pulled Cara backwards, the blade of his knife softly caressing the side of the girl’s cheek. Up and down. Up and down. Cara trembled. Up and down . . .

  With a long low animal-like bellow, Cody erupted from the shade beneath the log roof and barrelled into the man bullhard, his right shoulder crunching into the man’s ribs and head cracking his chin as he tore Cara from his grasp. The kith fell backwards, winded, blind with pain. Cara landed heavily in a heap. The kith slammed down on his back and Cody was upon him. He bunched his fist and punched him repeatedly in the face.

  Blood spurted from a shattered nose. Teeth broke and bone crunched as he kept on punching. Hard brutal blows, without respite, that turned the man’s face to a bloody pulp.

  ‘Cody, Cody.’ It was Ethan. He was tugging at his brother’s collar. ‘Cody, enough!’

  Cody let go of the kith and fell back. He was panting and his eyes were glazed. He was somewhere else. Back on the plains, protecting his brother from another attack in the only way he knew how. Sobs racked his body as he raised his bloodied hands to cover his face.

  Micah helped Cara to her feet. The sleeve of her blouse was torn and there was a thin cut on her cheek from the kith’s knife. Micah reached out to wipe away the blood, but she broke away from him and knelt down beside Cody. She took him in her arms and cradled his head, whispering to him soothingly until, at last, he fell still.

  The surviving kith was still rolling around in the dust, clutching his leg and moaning softly.

  ‘Come on,’ Eli said to the others. ‘Let’s hit the trail.’

  Micah nodded numbly, retrieved his rucksack and slung it back onto his shoulders. Ethan did the same. Cara helped Cody to his feet, handed him his backpack and Cody returned the favour. Eli adjusted the straps of his own pack before reloading his spitbolt and levelling it at Fletcher Crow up on the log roof.

  The denkeeper’s wall-eyed stare widened. The rocking chair came to a halt. Eli shifted the spitbolt to the right and sent the bolt thudding into the dead pine.

  ‘I find you here next time I come this way,’ he said, his voice gruff with threat and promise, ‘and I swear you’re gonna end up deader than that tree.’

  Twenty-Nine

  The moon shone down on the sharp tips of the rock ridges, on scrubby pale-leafed bushes and glossy ­succulents, and on the small band camped beneath a high outcrop. The cragclimber and the boy. And the three others.

  The keld mistress turned to the rest of the valley keld crouched down in the shadows: Cutter Daniel, Blue Slake and the eel-mother. Behind them were their keld fighters, their coldfire eyes glinting behind wyrmebone masks. The bone armour they wore was spattered with dried bloodspray and soot and, as well as the bone-hammers, rockspikes, sidewinders and knives they bore, each of them had a heavily laden forage sack at his side.

  The scrimshaw den had been too tempting a target to pass up, the keld mistress acknowledged. The blood feud with the man, Eli Halfwinter, and the boy, Micah, was one thing, but a scrimshaw den, poorly defended and vulnerable out here on the fringes of kith habitation, was quite another.

  The valley keld had moved in at nightfall after the keld mistress had sent a pair of scouts to keep track of Halfwinter and his band. They would deal with them soon enough.

  What they found at the scrimshaw den had intrigued the keld mistress. There had been a fight the day before. It had left three kith dead and one badly wounded, and the den owner himself shaken and distracted. The keld mistress had allowed Cutter Daniel to roast him slowly over a fire while her keld dispatched the other den traders and filled their forage sacks.

  It was a decent haul. What was more, between his pleadings for mercy and agonized oaths, the keld ­mistress learned some interesting things from Fletcher Crow – before she had finally put him out of his misery.

  Once again Halfwinter and the boy had left a ­familiar trail of bloodshed in their wake. Just like the winter caller and the Deephome keld before him, Crow had underestimated these two, and paid the price. The keld mistress vowed not to make the same mistake . . .

  But that was not all Fletcher Crow had had to say. He’d babbled on about some great journey being undertaken. It seemed that thousands of plainsfolk were gathering in the badlands, at a place they called the new stockade, with the intention of setting out for the high country in a vast wyrme-drawn wagontrain.

  Crow had seen the greed glinting in the keld ­mistress’s eyes, and perhaps hoped the embellishing of his story might buy him his life.

  A grizzled kith by the name of Garth Temple was behind this great enterprise, he’d told her, and explained how Temple had recruited the harpoon gangs of the East Ridges to trap the greywyrmes for him.

  Certainly the keld mistress had heard the rumours of sackloads of harnesses and tethers being made in the gutting tarns and scrimshaw dens. She had wondered about it at the time. Now it was making some sort of sense.

  There was an opportunity here, the keld mistress conceded as she unsheathed her knife of polished ­obsidian and slit the den owner’s throat. Settlers from the plains would be easy prey compared to the seasoned kith the keld usually dealt with – and there were ­thousands of them into the bargain.

  Naturally, the skull keld to the south and the west-dwelling­ deep-cavern keld would want their cut, but it seemed the valley keld had the chance to steal a march on them. The keld mistress turned, her ice-white face pinched with determination, and gave the signal to her keld.

  But first, Halfwinter and the boy . . .

  Thirty

  Kesh ate greedily, tearing at the soft succulent flesh of the rustfly larva with sharp teeth. His wyrme Azura breathed out. Fragrant white smoke billowed from her parted jaws and enfolded the crouching youth beside her. Her yellow eyes glowed. She enjoyed watching him eat – the fierce concentration he had as he tore at the food; biting, chewing, swallowing, in swift convulsive ­movements.

  Just like a wyrme.

  When she had found him, Kesh had been two years old, maybe less. He was crouched over his dead mother, beating her with small hard fists, screeching at her to wake up. A rockfall had crushed her legs and pinned her there at the foot of the steep gulley where, from the ­agonized look on her sunken face, she had taken her time to die.

  Azura had seen plenty of dead kith like this one. Their bodies were strewn throughout the valley country – victims of disease, mishap and hunger. And when they died, they left their young; tiny and fragile and defenceless in the harshness of the weald. The whitewyrme had felt the intense pang of kinship twice in her long life. Once with Kale, and she had shared many fullwinters with him until a kith bolt had robbed him of his life.

  And now with Kesh.

  Where Kale had been quiet and watchful, hesitant in his thoughts and actions, no matter how much encourage­ment Azura gave him, Kesh was impul
sive, almost reckless. There was a savage anger in him that had grown more keen with each season. And Azura had taken care to nourish it. Kesh was too skilful, too agile, too clever to fall victim to the kith the way Kale had done. He knew how to track and hunt them, how to lay in wait and how to attack – and, most important of all, how to prolong the distress and agony of the two-hides he caught.

  Slowdeath. At that, Kesh had shown real talent.

  Azura knew this cruelty appalled the others. Avaar, Aakhen, Amir, Aluris. And their kin. But it thrilled her – thrilled her more than she liked to admit. Kesh was her weapon, merciless and intractable. When they flew together, the long years of mourning Kale seemed to melt away and she felt young again.

  It had been painful leaving the others back there in the grasslands, but Azura hadn’t hesitated for a moment. She had felt Kesh’s anger and his humiliation in front of the wyrme, Aseel, and his kin, Thrace. They had denied him his kill and Azura understood that Kesh could never accept this. He was proud, wilful, driven. He would not rest until he had taken the lives of these kith.

  So they had left the other wyrmekin and set out, back to the east, to lie in wait for the band of kith whose deaths belonged to them.

  For weeks they had tracked them – the man, the girl, the three youths – through the grasslands, into the peaks and further east, heading back to the edge of the valley country. And they had bided their time.

  Kesh wanted to take them all in one strike, and that was difficult when they were strung out along the trail. He might catch two, three if he was lucky, but the others would escape. And that would be a shame, for Kesh intended that they should watch each other die.

  Slowly.

  Nighttime had proved no easier to launch an assault, for when they rested up the man was skilful at choosing defensive, hard-to-attack places. The previous week, Kesh and Azura had been about to strike when a violent lightning storm had broken and the kith had found shelter in a crevice deep in the rock. A couple of days after that, they had set out foraging in twos and threes.