The Bone Face cried out. His head lolled down with the pain. Blood mixed with saliva drooled out the corner of his mouth. He looked up, rage in his eyes.

Shim held the b.l.o.o.d.y tooth out for him to see. "I'm fully prepared to hold you prisoner for a future exchange. But it's going to cost you some information. I am not a man that will be delayed."

The translator relayed the message in that sour, Bone Face tongue.

The Bone Face replied.

The translator arched an eyebrow. "He says only a woman would think of taking a tooth."

Shim simply shook his head. "Perhaps we should cut off something more important to him." He pointed at the man's groin. "Tell him we'll take one, and if he still doesn't talk, we'll take the other."

The translator relayed the message.

Arogth looked at the second man. Shim's performance was having its intended effect upon him.

"Where is your ship?" asked Argoth.

The translator spoke.

At that moment, a messenger rode into the meadow at full gallop. He called out to two soldiers searching the saddle bags of a Bone Face horse for the location of the warlord. One pointed in Shim's direction. The messenger galloped through the tall gra.s.s to Shim and pulled up to a halt.

"What is it now?" Shim asked.

The messenger looked down at the prisoner. "My lord," he said. "May I suggest a more private place?"

Shim sighed. "Probably more council instructions. Very well." He turned to one of the men with him and pointed at the Bone Face who had lost a tooth. "Lay out all our tools for them to see. A little think should do them good."

"Forgive me, Lord," the messenger said. "But I was asked to give the message to Lord Bosser as well."

"Very well," said Shim. He turned to Bosser and Argoth. "Why don't you both come?"

They walked a number of yards away and stood in the gra.s.s.

"What is it then?" asked Shim. His voice was so dry it made Argoth thirsty.

"Sleth have attacked at the village of Plum," said the messenger.

Argoth tensed. That was where Purity, one of the members of the Order, lived. Had she been exposed? Lords, had she revealed the Order?

The messenger then related to the three of them how the territory lord of the Fir-Noy had organized a hunt, how the children of Sparrow the smith had escaped, and how a nightmare creature had killed one of the families in the village.

With every word Argoth's heart sank.

When the messenger finished, Shim told him to take a message to Lords of the Fir-Noy and dismissed the man. When the messenger rode off, Shim whistled through his teeth.

Bosser grunted and stroked his moustache the way he did when he was in deep thought.

"What do you think?" asked Shim. "Yet another Fir-Noy scheme to purge the Nine Clans of the Koramites, or have the Bone Faces begun to move their wizards?"

Bosser shook his head. "I do not trust the Fir-Noy, but even they wouldn't make something like this up." He spoke in the common Mokaddian, but his Vargon accent was still thick, rolling his r's and turning his v's into f's. He sighed. "Dreadmen with failing weaves, Koramite spies, sleth. We're a kingdom of dust. Perhaps it's time to flee these sh.o.r.es."

Shim's anger rose. "Flee? By all that's holy, I will stand my ground. I've spilt my blood here, sired children on these hills. I will triumph or die trying. I will hear no talk of flight."

"There are young ones with full lives ahead of them," said Bosser.

Argoth knew Bosser was thinking of his own children. The Bone Faces would make them chattel. They would rape the women and force those they thought were pretty into being concubines. And when they had finished, they would draw the Fire of the people to build their armies. They would levy taxes of Fire until people begin dropping like flies.

"Perhaps it isn't Bone Faces at all," said Bosser. "Maybe the Stone-wights have produced this."

Argoth wondered. The Stone-wight ruins had never been fully explored. When the first settlers had arrived in this land, they found a number of ridges and cliffs riddled with the ruins of extensive warrens. The Teeth, a six-mile ridge of limestone hills that looked from a distance like the maw of some fearsome fanged animals, was the biggest. These weren't nasty holes in the ground, but long pa.s.sages with many chambers. Over the years, many parts had eroded and fallen in. Pools of water stood in what once must have been grand halls. Bats littered the floors in many chambers with mounds of excrement. But what was left showed the mysterious race had carved with intelligence. For lack of any other name, the settlers called the vanished race Stone-wights.

n.o.body had seen a living stone-wight. The carvings and bones found in the warrens gave a good idea of what the creatures looked like. They walked upright, some with the long hair of a musk ox, but they were clearly not any breed of human. Their heads were too long for that, as were the short tusks found in a few of the skulls.

Some said the stone-wights were the same type of creature that inhabited the desolate solitudes in the lands of the Kish. The Kish called those creatures ungar. But Argoth had tracked one many years ago, back in his dark days. He'd never caught the creature, but he had glimpsed it, and it looked nothing like what was carved in the walls of the stone-wight caves. Some saw evidence the stone-wights had worshipped Regret and claimed the other Six Creators had obliterated them for their wickedness. This had led Koramite and Mokaddian parents to tell dreadful tales of stone-wights to their children to keep them obedient.

But if the stone-wights had been so wicked, so dedicated to undoing the creation, then why had they delighted in carving so many beautiful things of the world above their lairs? Argoth had seen a people vacate a land because of pestilence or drought. Perhaps this same thing happened to these ancient inhabitants. Argoth suspected the woodikin, who inhabited the wild lands beyond the Gap, knew the true tale, for woodikin were recorded in at least one of the carvings. But humans had not been able to extend their borders much into the wild lands. But even if they could learn how to survive those places, there was too much hate between human and woodikin.

It was true what looked to be records had been found in the stone-wight caves, but n.o.body could interpret the language. It was as foreign as the tongue of fishes. The stone-wights were a race whose history had been swallowed up by time.

Yet something did live in the caves. The warrens were uncanny places. Odd lights were seen in some of the windows. It was said some pa.s.sageways whispered. But that did not deter the curious. A scattering of treasure was found along with the bones of odd beasts. But as the first settlers delved deeper, people began to enter and never return.

"Nothing has ever come out of the ruins but bats and snakes," said Shim.

"That's not true," said Bosser.

Shim waved off his objection. "If anything lives in those warrens, then it's had decades of opportunities to come out and feed. Someone would have seen it before. No, this is something else."

"Whatever it is," said Argoth, "it finds us in a precarious state of affairs. We can only hope for an emba.s.sy from Mokad."

"Mokad," said Shim in disgust. "Our Lords in Mokad will send nothing. The war with Nilliam has them on their hind legs. Any new Divine they might have raised has been sent to fight. If they were going to help us, they would have sent a Divine months ago. No, we cannot count on them." He rubbed a weathered hand across the stubble on his jaw in frustration. Then he paused. "But that doesn't mean we're lost. Sometimes extreme situations demand extreme measures." He put his hand on Argoth's shoulder.

"What measures?" demanded Bosser. "What have we left undone?"

Shim looked meaningfully at Argoth. "There are ways to combat both dreadmen and wizards, aren't there Captain? There are alliances that can be made."

"Alliances?" asked Bosser. "Mungo will not lend their wizards to help us."

"I'm not talking about that type of an alliance. If the events at the village of Plum were not the result of some Bone Face plot, then that means there are . . ." He paused to find the right words. "Other powers abroad."

Shim had come perilously close to speaking treason. But then Shim was always one to take risks. Shim's eyes glittered in his leather face. Argoth knew that look. He'd seen it a hundred times as he and Shim had fought and drank and laughed together.

Neither Bosser nor Argoth spoke.

"Such things would require great delicacy," Shim continued.

"What are you talking about?" Bosser asked. "Allying with sleth?"

Shim shrugged.

Bosser was indignant. "Lords, man. I'd rather die, rather run every member of my house with my own sword than join myself with abomination."

Shim said, "Our good captain here saved us last year with his seafire. Of course, the Bone Faces obviously have adjusted their tactics. Still, he might save us again. So I'm not talking about casting our lot with monsters"-he c.o.c.ked an eyebrow at Argoth-"or am I?"

A warning shot through Argoth like lightening. Shim knew. At the very least, he suspected. What was Shim doing? Talk like this would get Argoth killed.

Bosser turned to Argoth with a look of disbelief and indignation on his face. "What is he going on about?"

Argoth had done all he could to not reveal his lore, to make his fighting look like that of an unmultiplied man. He stroked his neck and felt the husk of the brilliant, blue beetle one of his daughters had found and made into a necklace for him. She and her sisters, his son, his courageous wife-they would bear the brunt of the violence that would be directed against him. Even if some individuals in the Clans trusted him, many more would fear him. And they would exercise their fears upon his children.

Argoth relaxed; looked as surprised as he could muster. "Lord Shim, I do not know what you suggest."

"Don't you?" asked Shim.

Arogth looked at his lord, his friend. Well, as much of a friend as one might have and still keep the kinds of secrets Argoth did. He bowed his head. "I am sorry, Lord. I truly wish I knew how to help."

11.

Hunters DA RETURNED IN the early evening and whistled Talen and the others in from the fields. Talen was more than happy to oblige. Most of the injuries from the villagers had receded to a dull throb. But one close to his kidney had not. It hurt every time he tried to stand straight.

They loaded the saws, axe, billhooks, hoggin, and bush knives into a push cart and began to walk back, Prince Conroy following behind. As they approached the yard, Conroy must have heard the new hens, for he let out a squawk, made an end run about the dogs, and raced to the yard.

Talen put away his tools and joined his father. Conroy stood on the handcart eying four golden hens in their baskets and vocalizing whatever thoughts roosters did to their new ladies.

"Only four?" asked Ke. "I thought we had enough for six. Has Mol raised his prices?"

"No," said Da. "Mol's in a bad way. So I advanced him a payment for a load of goose down and a few hat feathers."

"Did you see anything in the woods?" asked Talen.

"In fact, I did." Da paused and took on an air of one about to tell a harrowing story. "Trees. There were lots of trees."

Ke laughed. Talen shook his head and sighed.

"Of course, there was that one hatchling swinging about on a vine. But he wasn't bothering anybody."

Da's joking in the face of danger had worked when Talen was younger, but this wasn't funny. Talen had almost been brained into oblivion this morning, a monster was running about, and people had died.

"Your trees are nothing," said Ke and pointed at Talen. "The mighty hunter here saw one in the yard."

"Did you now?" asked Da.

"Oh, yes," said Ke. "He got a fine view of its leg and wicked b.u.m."

Talen folded his arms. "I also found a spoon wet with fresh porridge."

"I wondered where that had fallen," said Da. "I got to the barn this morning with my bowl, but no spoon. And I knew I'd put one in."

So much for the spoon. "I saw somebody," Talen said.

"I'm sure you did," said Da.

But Talen could see he was going to give him the same lecture River had, and so he decided not to push it. Still, something odd was going on; if they didn't want to take him seriously, fine. He'd follow the evidence and find the truth of it on his own. "Come on, Nettle," he said. "Let's go check the weirs."

Nettle handed his hay fork to Ke with a smile and followed Talen down to the river. The river ran so low this time of year that the gravel bars stood high and dry. Frogs croaked back and forth to each other from the edges of the slower pools. There were a number of fish caught in the weirs. Talen fetched eight pan-sized trout out, and then he and Nettle took the fish back to the house. They filleted them, throwing the bones and guts into a bucket for the garden.

Talen looked over the meadow where they kept their mule. That person he'd seen today, if it was a hatchling, could be out there in the shadows of the forest line right now looking at him, and he'd never know it. And the dogs were clearly not going to be any help.

Talen said to Nettle, "I've been working this through. I'm thinking a snare is the way to go. We have a bunch of hunters working the whole district. Let them beat the bushes. We'll sit back and let the hatchlings walk right into their own doom."

"If it was a hatchling today," Nettle said, "I don't know that a snare will hold them for long."

"We'll have to be ready," Talen said. "Have to have our bows at hand and shoot first. There can be no hesitation."

Nettle nodded.

They went in the house and laid the fish fillets on the table. Ke sat in his chair mending a tear in his tunic. He looked up at the fish. "You've got to make it hard for me, don't you?" he said.

Ke was beginning yet another fast to purify his heart. He'd started fasting after the battles last year where one of his best friends had fallen and been taken by the Bone Faces. The Bone Faces hadn't removed his finger and enthralled him. Nor had they fed him to their G.o.ds. Instead, they put out his eyes, shredded his ears, broke his feet so he'd be lame the rest of his life, and cut off his manhood. Then they left him by the side of the road to die or tell his tale.

Ke had killed with a ferocious rage after that. And even though there was something new in Ke's eye that scared him, Talen had still wished he could be like his brother. And then Ke began to fast and ruined it. At first, his fasts consisted of pa.s.sing up red meat. Now he would go without food or water for a day, sometimes two.

Talen didn't understand all the fuss. It was right and good to defend home and hearth. It was right to take pleasure in the death of an enemy.

When he'd brought this obvious fact up to Ke, his brother had said, "Yes, but what happens when you begin to relish it like a roasted apple? What happens when you cannot slake the hate?" And so Ke fasted. But the fasting didn't appear to give Ke any new insight. The only thing it produced, as far as Talen could see, was a loud stomach and a short temper. Besides, Da had killed, and he didn't fast.

Talen jiggled the basket of fish a bit. "They're going to be tasty," he said. "Are you sure you can't wait? Given what's happened, I would feel more comfortable with you at full strength."

"You've got to get the weeds when they're small," said Ke.

Talen grunted. There were things about Ke he just couldn't understand. He went back out to the well to wash up. Da had picked up this Mokaddian washing habit from Mother. Talen wondered if Da demanded they clean themselves because he truly believed in cleanliness or because it was his way of remembering her. Either way, Talen wouldn't eat until he'd scrubbed with soap.

A large basin sat on a table next to the well. Da had lined the ground around the well with bricks. He'd also laid a brick path from the well to the house. Another was half-built from the house to the privy, all to keep the boarded floor of their house clean.

Talen took his shirt off and scrubbed his arms, neck, and chest. He dumped a bucket of cold water over his head, and that's when he saw the footprint in the soft dirt at the edge of the bricks.

He walked to the edge of the bricks and looked down. There were three foot prints heading away from the well toward the old sod house. The prints weren't deep. In fact, you had to be standing just right to see them, but they were most a.s.suredly there.

"Nettle," he said.

Nettle was slick with soap.