22.

Riders TALEN SUSPECTED THE Mokaddians would be watching for him at Farmer's Gate. For that matter, they'd be watching for him at all the lesser gates on that side of the city. So he decided to use Gallow's gate on the far side.

When he and Nettle drove the wagon up to the gate, they found it manned by six men: a city guard to oversee the watch and a number of commoners performing their required three-day service. Moreover, Nettle knew the man eating slices of raw fish with his fingers. Nettle hailed him by name and the man waved them through with a "give Zu Argoth the compliments of the Lani family."

Nettle nodded, and they pa.s.sed through the gate. Talen expected someone to call them back, but he and Nettle rolled through the dry moat, over a slight rise, and continued on toward the river. A surge of relief washed over him as well as something he didn't expect-a sympathy for the hatchlings. Perhaps it was as Da said: perhaps what was wrong was that the world was full of Fabbises.

With every rod they traveled it seemed that Talen felt better and better. A great sense of energy and well-being washed over him. He felt like a spring day, one where the mud had dried and the leaves had begun to break their buds and color the world with a light green. It was odd. It was as if the earth itself had touched him and given him an extra portion of life. Perhaps he'd been more scared than he thought and so now felt a greater relief.

The wagon b.u.mped along and kicked up a haze of powdery dust. Not far down the road, along a bend of the river, rose a fat grove of cottonwoods.

A number of naked bodies hung on ropes from the ma.s.sive limbs of the trees. All had been found guilty of one crime or another. Of course, sleth would never hang here. Sleth were dealt with in an entirely different manner.

"I want to ask you something," said Nettle. "And I want a straight answer."

Talen looked at his cousin.

"When that hatchling girl kissed you, did you feel anything odd?"

"Besides being panicked out of my mind?"

"I've heard the lovemaking of sleth is feral."

"Goh," said Talen. "We weren't lovemaking. The armsmen were right outside. I think you need to get out more. Forget your parent's ban. Slip out and kiss a girl now and again. You have enough who are willing."

"Are you mad? You've think I've got a life of cake and pie, but my parents have got me so hemmed in and roped down I'm going crazy. Especially after the incident with the Fuller's maid."

"All the more reason."

Nettle shook his head. "Stop trying to divert the conversation. You said she put her tongue in your mouth. That's going a bit far for playacting, isn't it? Are you sure she didn't do something to you?"

She'd done nothing to him. Nothing he could feel. But Nettle wanted a story and it was clear he wouldn't be put off. Talen gave him an earnest look. "You won't tell anybody?"

Nettle's face lit with curiosity. He raised his hand in oath. "Silent as a mole."

Talen took a deep breath. "I was helpless."

"Helpless?"

"Yes, she took my arms and pressed them down so I couldn't do a thing. You wouldn't think a slip of a girl could do that. I wanted to tell her to get back, but the words wouldn't form. I was helpless before her. You cannot imagine what it felt like when she pressed in close to me."

Talen paused for effect and waited. He could almost feel the silence drawing Nettle's curiosity like a bow.

"So she pressed in?"

"Oh, snug as a glove. It wasn't proper. And that's the troubling thing. Despite all logic, despite my fears, I cannot deny the desire that rose in me."

"I see."

They were almost upon Gallow's Grove, and the stench of those twisting in the breeze made Talen bring his tunic up over his nose. About the whole grove crows and magpies squawked and fought.

These trees could hold a prodigious number of bodies. After last year's battles with the Bone Faces, a horde of prisoners had been executed. They'd hung along these limbs thick as candles on dipping rods. But those had been cut down. These here were criminals. The rumors of their deeds and hangings had spread quickly. Such news was always part of the talk in the houses of the ale-wives.

Talen motioned at the bloated and decayed bodies. "Look at that one. I bet he's that cattle thief from the Sinks." The man in question had obviously been drug behind a horse. His flesh was torn and open. He had no eyes. He had no hands for that matter. Those had been cut off. Wasps mixed with the flies in a cloud, all of them buzzing in to get their tiny bites.

Nettle pulled his tunic over his nose.

Some of the bodies here had been hanging for weeks. The first was withered, but it was clear he'd been emasculated. When they rode close to the second, a raven that had been tugging at the flesh of the man's face rose and flapped away, revealing a half-eaten, gruesome smile.

They pa.s.sed another. Talen stopped the wagon by the fourth and fifth, a man and a woman. The man was hung with a thick rope punched through the skin and threaded through his ribs. The woman's dark hair hung over her ruined face. She tilted slightly, twisting gently in the evening breeze, one arm sticking out as if she were reaching for them. Both had been in the trees long enough for the maggots to hatch.

"Killed her mother-in-law," said Talen. "They said she struggled and bucked for the better part of an hour."

"I don't need a history," said Nettle. "Move it along."

But Talen didn't want to move it along. He looked up at the bodies hanging about him. If anyone found out about the girl and boy at his house, his fate would be worse than those hanging here.

Why would Da risk something like that?

Nettle reached forward and shook the reins to start Iron Boy again. When they put enough distance between themselves and the grove to erase the stink, Talen pulled his tunic from his nose. Nettle did the same.

They were both quiet for a time, and then Nettle produced another half loaf of bread pudding and took a big bite. Where he'd been hiding it, Talen had no idea.

Talen groaned. "I don't understand how you can eat that. The stink of the grove is still in my nose."

Nettle shrugged, chewed a few more times then said, "So?"

"So what?"

"So, what did she do after she slid in?"

Good old Nettle, Talen thought. Not even death hanging about in the trees could sway him from girls or his gut.

"I was fearing for my soul," said Talen. "But not minding it either. The hunters were outside, and yet I could not think of them. Only the creature on my lap." Talen shook his head. "She took my hand and pressed it to her."

"Her side?"

"Oh, no," said Talen. And he gave Nettle a look that said she'd done nothing as innocent as that.

Nettle's eyebrows rose, and Talen fought to suppress his smile.

"You mean?" said Nettle.

Talen nodded. "I tell you: I was paralyzed; my brain was cider muzzy. Her with a wicked gleam in her eyes, and me thinking to myself that she's done this before, that these were experienced hands. I am only thankful she exposed herself when armsmen were about. Who knows what she would have forced me to do. As it is, I fear I've been touched."

"It is said that they make sounds."

"Sounds?"

"The beast in their natures takes over."

"There was no sound," said Talen. "But she did indeed bite."

Nettle narrowed his eyes. Talen could see he'd pushed the tale a bit too far.

"You're such a liar," said Nettle.

Talen pulled his collar down to show Nettle his neck. "Look for yourself."

"I don't see anything. Why I ever listen to you I'll never know."

"Look," Talen said and pointed.

Nettle leaned in close. "There's nothing here."

Talen clopped him on the side of the head. "Of course, there isn't. No glamour, no petting, no grunts, or l.u.s.tful moans. No wicked babies conceived. I told you. It was like kissing the wall." Except that wasn't entirely true.

Nettle shook his head dubiously.

"Look," said Talen. "If she's there when we get back, you can have a go. Tell her to not forget the tongue."

"She wasn't that bad looking," said Nettle, as if considering the idea. "Better than most."

"Who cares?" said Talen. "She's a hatchling."

"You yourself said nothing happened."

Nettle was considering it. "You can't be serious," said Talen.

"Gotcha," said Nettle and grinned.

Talen pointed at him. "You can't fool me. You were actually considering it."

"If it makes you happy to think that, go right ahead and think it."

Talen refused to rise to his bait, instead he fetched one of the last of his sweet almond small cakes and plopped it in his mouth.

A moment later they entered the trees on the hill that lay beyond Gallow's Grove. Talen turned in his seat to see if there was any sign of pursuit and his heart fell. About a mile back, well before Gallow's Grove, a group of mounted men followed the road. He watched them disappear behind a small hill. Talen cursed. "You think they're looking for us?"

"I think we'd better act as if they are," said Nettle Talen urged Iron Boy on, scanning the woods ahead for a hiding place, knowing there was no way two boys in a wagon could outrun mounted men.

The men behind appeared again at the crest of the hill and began to trot their horses.

23.

Scent HUNGER LOST THE scent of the Koramite and his son. At first, it didn't bother him. He watched the people and animals come and go, but toward late afternoon it occurred to him that the Koramite and his son might not have gone to the city at all. They might have simply ridden on by.

This gave him pause. What if they weren't coming back this way? What if they weren't coming back at all? Argoth might hold lands in that other direction. They might be gone visiting; they might be gone for a week-long hunt for all he knew.

He shouldn't have let them go. No, he'd made a miscalculation. He should have given them chase.

But then he calmed himself. They were either in the city or they were beyond it. The wind was blowing in from the sea. All he needed to do was walk the edge of the forest in a line running toward the city.

If the Koramite and his boy were in the city or going to travel back, he'd pick up their scent. And if they weren't, well, then they had a start on him, but that shouldn't prevent him from catching up.

Hunger would find them. Of that he had no doubt. He'd been a great hunter in his time. At least, one of those he'd eaten had been.

Hunger stood and began making his way down the hill. Below him on the road, three boys in red hats herded a large flock of sheep. Their long-haired, black and white dogs barked to keep the sheep from straying too far from the road.

Hunger stepped out of the brush into the middle of the flock and sent the sheep running. The second boy, walking perhaps only a dozen feet ahead, turned and looked back. His expression of curiosity turned to horror.

Hunger paused. He could smell them, taste them on the wind. He could eat them all.

No, he told himself. He would not. If he did, he wouldn't be able to stop himself the next time.

One of the dogs began barking.

Something drifted to him on the breeze. He opened his mouth and tasted the burning boy. The scent was faint but unmistakable.

This time, Hunger thought, you won't get away. He turned from the shepherd and his sheep and crossed the road. Behind him the dog came to the edge of the brush, barking.

Up on the road, the young man found his voice and yelled a warning. But another three steps and Hunger was well into the wood, the sounds of the shepherds and their dogs receding behind him.

24.