33
They rode in the shadow of the Hooded Hills, a solemn troop of four.
There was something sinister about this place. It had crept up on them over the last hour, a brooding menace suffusing the thick, misty air. The wind moaned and whined in strange plaintive voices, as though calling out in torment, and the trees seemed to shy at their passing, creaking and cowering away.
“It’s like the very land is afraid,” Harden said warily, riding beside Jonik on his weary old warhorse. It was the best that Lord Ghent could procure for them at the border, a stubborn old gelding whose best days were long behind him. Much like Harden, a man might say, but he kept on going like the old sellsword too. “Can the wind be in pain, do you think? The sounds here…”
“It’s just the lay of the land,” Jonik said. “The way the wind moves through the valleys and trees.”
“And this mist? It’s unnatural.”
A lot was unnatural these days. “It’s a thick morning fog, is all. Our minds are playing tricks on us.” He gave his piebald palfrey a rub on the neck. “If the horses aren’t worried, there’s no reason we should be.”
“You sure about that, lad?” Harden murmured, looking around. “These mists…Who knows what’s hiding behind the veil? Might be all sorts lurking just out of sight.”
“Nothing that I can hear,” Jonik said. He had his hand clutched to the grip of Mother’s Mercy, and had not let go for a long while. He had heard no growling, no low deep breathing, no skittering of feet, no crunch of twigs among the trees. Just that wailing wind, and its haunting laments. He wondered what the Rasalanians would make of it. They had lots of gods for the weather of the world. Gustas was their god of fierce winds, he knew, and Tish their goddess of the breeze. Did they have a deity for all this eerie keening? Some dead god, perhaps, who had perished in some foul way? If they did, Jonik hadn’t heard of it. “We’re just spooked because we know what happened here,” the former Shadowknight went on. “That’s all it is.”
The others were riding a little way up the slope, fading in and out of the fog, a dozen horse lengths away. Around them, the trees shivered in their clumps and thickets, shadows in this thick grey gloom, but every once in a while the mists cleared and the lands opened out, showing the distant shadow of the Hooded Hills to the east, the rolling grassy hills and wetlands around them, spreading far and wide.
They seemed to be thinning again now, those mists, waning as they made their way up the slope to the top of the rise. Jonik peered forward, to where Gerrin and Sir Owen were riding side by side, approaching the crest of the hill. The latter was sitting up stiff in the saddle, taut as a bowstring, staring forward. “We’re close,” Jonik said to Harden. “I can hear Sir Owen’s heartbeat getting faster. He recognises this place.”
Harden looked over at him. His haggard old face was twisted into a frown. “You can hear his heart from here?”
Jonik smiled. “You don’t believe me?”
“When you had the Nightblade, aye, maybe, but now…”
“The Nightblade didn’t enhance my hearing any more than regular godsteel. Or my sight. And if it did, it was marginal and I barely even noticed.” He looked forward again. “He’s anxious.” He could hear it when he focussed, that thud thud thud in Armdall’s chest, growing harder and stronger as they climbed. “This is the hill they fought on. It must be. We’ll see it when we reach the top.”
His own heart was starting to thump harder in anticipation, because he had heard from Sir Owen Armdall exactly what to expect. A land torn and broken, with steaming fissures and blackened trees melted down to stumps, where Drulgar the Dread, with Eldur the Eternal atop him, had fought a host of giants and a certain mad king with a Blade of Vandar in his grasp.
It had been a long week since the Oak of Armdall had told them that, since Gerrin had found him at the border. Jonik had been sleeping at the time, dozing beside Sir Lenard Borrington’s bedside when Gerrin stirred him awake. “Did you find out something about my grandfather?” Jonik had asked him, rubbing his eyes and clearing his throat.
“I found someone,” the old knight had responded. “Come, he’s waiting in the yard.”
He’d led Jonik down the spiral stair and through the keep, past the night guards and out into the yard of the Undercloak. There they had found him, sitting on a stump outside the stables, hunched forward in a sodden cloak, greenish grey and travel-stained. The knight had a cowl over his head, but at once Jonik saw the long tangle of beard, the matted hair, the glint of godsteel gorget about his neck. The knight looked up, hearing their approach, and then Jonik saw his eyes. They were the eyes of one haunted, eyes that had beheld things no man should ever perceive. His skin was mud-spattered, cheeks gone gaunt, and there were webs of wrinkles about his eyes. Jonik had heard it said that the Oak of Armdall was the model of chivalry, a dashing knight, beautiful and brilliant and young. What he saw was a broken thing, old before his time, a shadow of the man he was.
“Sir Owen,” Gerrin said. “This is him, the one I told you about.”
The sworn sword had stood and looked at Jonik for a long moment, as though searching for some resemblance. “The king’s grandson,” he said. “You don’t look like him.”
Jonik hadn’t cared to respond to that. He looked into the Oak’s haunted turquoise eyes. “Where is he? Is he dead?”
Sir Owen gave a forlorn nod. His voice was hollow, blunt. “He must be,” he said. “No one…no one could have survived that.”
“Survived what?” Jonik asked.
And that was when he told his tale.
Jonik had been speechless. He had stood for a long time in mute astonishment once Sir Owen was done. Then he had asked the only question that mattered. “Where is the Mistblade, Sir Owen?” Fear cut through him like a knife. “Did he take it? Eldur?”
“Not that I saw,” the Oak answered in a shaky voice. “The demon…he never left the back of the dragon. I wanted to help, to fight with him, your grandfather, I did, but…” He turned his eyes aside. “There was nothing I could do.”
“You’ve done enough bringing this news to us,” Jonik told him. “Did you try to search for him after?”
“After,” the knight nodded. “Once the dragon was gone, I…I tried. But there was no sign. He must have fallen…”
“Or left,” Gerrin had put in. “Could he not have faded to mist and given chase, Sir Owen? You said he had wanted this fight, against Eldur…”
“Against the demon, not the Dread. He never expected him.”
“Even so. If he survived…”
“He couldn’t have survived. Not that.” His eyes swam with the horror of it. “And he wouldn’t have left me. I was his faithful servant. His sworn sword.”
“Will you be mine?” Jonik asked him. The question took Sir Owen off guard. Even Jonik had not expected to utter it. “I have to find the Mistblade, Sir Owen. That is of vital importance. Will you swear me your sword and lead us to where they fought?”
The knight stared at him. “I don’t know if…I’m not sure I can go back. I tried to find him, as I said, but…”
“Four of us will have better luck,” Jonik said. “You’re coming with us, Sir Owen. It’s what my grandfather would have wanted.” He did not know why he said that or where it came from, but it seemed to work. He saw some measure of duty in the man’s gaze, a need to serve and help. “Will you swear me your sword?”
“I…yes, I…I will.”
“Then swear it,” Jonik had said, and shakily, Sir Owen Armdall went down to one knee…and their company took on a new member.
Harden, as ever, was not so happy about it. “You think we can trust him?” he asked now, as they rode behind, some thirty paces back. “Begging your pardons, Jonik, but your grandfather was a known loon, and Sir Owen his most loyal disciple. He might have some hidden plan up his sleeve.”
