Torak's head reeled. If not even fire could harm him . . . He couldn't do this. He couldn't do it.
He watched the Mage raise a fallen spruce tree as if it were a twig, and set it against the trunk of the Great Oak. The spruce was notched to make a ladder. The Mage ascended and hung the carcass from a bough. Descending, he took a sack from among the roots of the Great Oak and drew out a hawk.
Torak's belly turned over. The hawk was alive. It fluttered wildly as the Mage tied it by one leg to a stake.
Again the Mage began those harsh, panting breaths. But this time, as he raised the stake, his mantle fell away from his forearms, and Torak saw his three-fingered hand and his Oak Clan tattoo. The skin was scored with angry scabs. Torak thought of Bale, clawing his attacker as he fought for life. His souls hardened. It was time to fulfil his oath.
Wiping his palms on his leggings, he nocked the arrow to his bow. He would move away from the tree, into full view. He would shout the challenge, give Thiazzi a chance to seize his weapons. And then . . .
The Soul-Eater carried his fluttering burden into the fire, planted the stake and walked away.
Torak couldn't bear it. He took aim and let fly. The hawk hung dead, the arrow quivering in its breast.
Slowly, the Mage took off his mask and placed it on the ground. He turned, and Torak saw him at last. The russet mane, the thicket of beard. The face as hard as sun-cracked earth. The pitiless green eyes.
'So, Spirit Walker. You obeyed my summons.'
Torak stepped out from behind the tree. 'Take up your weapons, Thiazzi. You killed my kinsman. Now I'm going to kill you.'
EIGHTEEN.
Torak faced Thiazzi across ten paces of drifting smoke. 'You won't get away from me this time,' he said, nocking another arrow to his bow.
The Oak Mage threw back his head and laughed. 'I, get away from you? You're here because I want you here!' Flicking his mantle behind his shoulders, he brandished a whip in one hand, an axe in the other. The lash was coiled like a viper. The axe was the largest Torak had ever seen.
'I wondered who dared follow me from the islands,' said Thiazzi, slicing the air with deft twists of his wrist, 'so I sent my minion to find out. Since you entered my Forest, I've known every step you've taken, every breath you've drawn. Now it ends.'
'You won't find it that easy,' said Torak, edging sideways round the fire. 'I could have killed you in the Far North. Remember?'
The whip cracked, wrenching Torak's bow from his hand. 'My power is greater than yours!' spat Thiazzi, tossing the bow in the flames. 'See, even the fire obeys me!'
Smoke wafted across Torak's sight. When it cleared, Thiazzi stood no more than two paces from him.
'But since the World Spirit has delivered you into my hands,' the Oak Mage went on, 'I shall add your power to my own.'
Wrenching his axe from his belt, Torak put the fire between them once more. 'How can the World Spirit be on your side? Killing hunters? How can that please the Spirit?'
'To offer a hunter to the fire is to give it the noblest death of all. It is the Way.'
Again the whip cracked, Torak dodged, and the rawhide struck stone. 'It's not the clans' way,' he panted, 'and it's not your Forest.'
'I am the Master!' boomed Thiazzi. 'I have taken the Deep Forest for my own!' Foam flew from his lips, and his green eyes glittered.
As Torak stared at him, everything fell into place. 'The war between the clans. You started it. You set them against each other.'
Yellow teeth flashed in the russet beard.
'You planted the curse sticks,' said Torak, moving backwards, nearly losing his footing. 'You murdered the Forest Horse Mage and blamed it on the Aurochs. You made them fight.'
'They wanted to fight. They needed to fight!'
The whip bit Torak's wrist, and with a cry he dropped his axe. He lunged for it, but Thiazzi was faster, snatching it and throwing it on the fire. 'The clans are weak,' he snarled. 'They've forgotten the True Way, but I will unite them. That's why the World Spirit gave this land to me: to root out differences, to return the clans to the Way! No more clan guardians, no more clan Mages. One way. One Forest. One Leader!'
Dashing the sweat from his eyes, Torak pulled his knife from its sheath.
Again, Thiazzi's yellow grin flashed. 'I cannot be hurt!' He pointed to the mistletoe at his breast. 'The deathless heart of the oak shields me from harm! I am invincible!'
Torak's knife trembled in his hand.
'But come,' taunted the Oak Mage, 'try your luck. Let's see if you can break me. Or shall I break you, as easily as I broke your mother and your father?'
The red mist descended. Torak saw him through a haze of blood.
' . . . As I broke your kinsman,' boasted the Oak Mage. 'As I threw him over the Crag and spattered his brains across the rocks . . . '
Torak roared and launched himself at Thiazzi.
Wolf stalked the not-aurochs upwind, which he would never normally do. But this time, he wanted them to smell him.
A cow caught his scent and swung round. Wolf lowered his head to tell her he was hunting. The cow gave a nervous snort and pawed the earth. Wolf came on. She charged. Wolf dodged her nimbly and ran off to worry a bull. The bull rounded on him. Wolf leapt clear of his horns by a whisker and bounded away. He was enjoying this.
Now the whole herd was anxious. It stopped munching willowherb and started lumbering up the slope. Wolf prowled behind a cluster of young cows who were huffing and showing the whites of their eyes. He chose the edgiest and snapped at her fetlock. The cow squealed, jerked up her tail and fled. Panicked, the rest of the herd followed.
Up the ridge they went, with Wolf racing after them, loping this way and that, so they'd think they were hunted by many hungry wolves. Rocks fell and branches snapped as they crashed into the next valley, down towards Tall Tailless and the Bitten One.
The earth shook as Wolf drove them on, and his heart leapt. This was what one wolf could do!
NINETEEN.
At first, Torak thought it was a rockfall.
The earth shook as if the Mountains were falling. He froze, knife in hand. The thunder swelled to a roar. A bison crashed into the grove. Torak ran for his life.
He reached the hollies, threw himself at the nearest branch, and swung himself up as the grove was engulfed by a heaving torrent of hoof and horn.
Like a flash flood, the bison swept through, and Torak clung to the shuddering tree. The din pounded through him. It was never going to end.
It did. The silence after it had gone was deafening. A pall of smoke and dust hung in the air, with the musky smell of bison. The Great Oak and the Great Yew towered above it: inviolate, their branches pricking the night sky.
As the dust settled, Torak saw sparks from the trampled fire scattered like stars over the ground. He dropped to earth and ran to search the grove. Thiazzi was gone.
In disbelief, Torak stumbled about in the gloom, searching the stony slopes. Nothing. The pounding hooves had obliterated all hope of a trail. Thiazzi had vanished like smoke.
'No!' shouted Torak. The echoes died. Pebbles fell like a rattle of stony laughter.
He slumped onto a boulder. He'd lost his chance for vengeance.
Wolf bounded out of the darkness and pounced on him joyously. His fur was full of burrs, and fluffed up with excitement. Torak had no idea why.
Much prey, Torak told Wolf wearily. Nearly trampled. Good you weren't here.
To Torak's bemusement, Wolf dropped his ears, gave an embarassed yawn, and rolled onto his back, saying sorry.
Torak asked him if the Bitten One was close.
Gone, was all Wolf would say.
Torak rubbed a hand over his face. He'd achieved nothing. The only thing to do now was make the long trudge back to the Red Deer camp, and try to persuade them that the Forest Horse Mage was indeed Thiazzi. And start all over again.
A great weariness swept over him. He missed Renn. She would be furious with him for leaving her; but whatever she said couldn't be as bad as what he was saying to himself.
By moonset, he'd reached the end of the valley of the horses and could go no further. He found a fallen tree a few paces above the Windriver and made it into an inadequate shelter with branches and mouldy bracken. He'd left his sleeping-sack with the Red Deer, but he was too tired to care; he would drag in more bracken for bedding. After chewing a slip of dried horse meat and tucking the last of it in a birch tree for the Forest, he wrapped his nettlestem mantle about him and fell asleep.
This time, he knows he is dreaming. He is lying on his back in the shelter, but above him the sky is a blizzard of stars. He is in a cold sweat of terror, but he cannot move. A shadow darkens the stars as something leans over him. Wet hair slithers over his face. He hears the soft creak of mouldering seal hide. His flesh shrinks from icy breath.
It's lonely at the bottom of the Sea . . . Fish eat my flesh. The Sea Mother rolls my bones. It's cold. So cold.
Torak tries to speak. His lips won't move.
Why didn't you come to me on the Crag? I was lonely, waiting for you. I'm lonelier now. And so cold . . .
Torak woke with a start.
Dawn had not yet come. He hadn't slept long. Wolf was gone, but Rip and Rek were hopping about outside the shelter, cawing. Wake up, wake up!
Torak dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. 'I'm sorry, kinsman. I missed my chance. But I'll find him again, I swear. I will avenge you.'
The ravens would watch over Tall Tailless, and Wolf would not go far. But he couldn't ignore those howls.
He had heard them in his sleep. Darkfur had come down from the Mountain, she was trying to find him! Then he'd woken up, and disappointment had crushed him. She was in the other Now, not this one.
But he'd heard her again. Very faint and far away, but it was her. He would know her howl anywhere.
Panting with eagerness, he loped through the Forest. As the Light came, he leapt a little Fast Wet, and splashed through a bigger one. Tall Tailless would be all right with the ravens. And Wolf would not be away for long.
The ravens flew from tree to tree, fluffing up their head-feathers and making stony chuk-chuk warning calls.
Warning of what? wondered Torak.
Dawn was breaking as he left the Windriver and headed north, towards the Red Deer camp. The wind was gusting, the trees moaning. His misgivings grew: a tightness in the chest that made it hard to breathe.
Others felt it too. Birds fled across the sky jays, magpies, crows. Reindeer cantered past, scarcely swerving to avoid him, as if escaping a greater threat. Torak thought of Renn and quickened his pace.
Ahead, a figure emerged from behind a rowan, and he recognized the Red Deer woman with the bark-bound head. She dithered, then overcame her shyness and ran down to him. 'At last!' she said with a timid smile. 'We've been looking for you everywhere!'
'What's wrong?' he said brusquely. 'Is Renn all right?'
'She's safe with the others, it's you we were worried about. We didn't know where you'd gone.'
They headed up the trail, the woman lagging behind, Torak running ahead. He heard a distant growl of thunder. The first drops of rain pattered on the leaves, and he put up his hood. Something grabbed his ankle and yanked him high into the air.
The earth swung sickeningly. As the dizziness cleared, he realized that he was hanging by one leg from a young rowan tree which, moments before, had been bent double.
You fool, he berated himself. A simple spring trap, and you blunder right into it!
His knife wasn't in its sheath. It lay where it had fallen in a clump of goosefoot, out of reach. Furious, he shouted at the woman to come and cut him down.
She came running up the trail. 'You're caught in a trap,' she said.
'Well, obviously!' he snapped. 'Cut me down!'
Her arms hung limp at her sides.
Were her wits completely gone? Snarling with frustration, Torak made a grab for the rope, which was drawn tight around his left ankle. He fell back with a growl. 'Cut me down!'
'No,' said the woman.
'What?' The rope creaked. Rain pattered on the leaves.
Only it isn't rain, he realized. It's ash. Flakes of ash, swirling like dirty snow. And that glow in the sky, it's in the wrong place for dawn. Not east, but west. 'Fire,' he said. 'There's a fire in the Forest.'
'Yes,' said the woman in an altered voice.
Upside-down, Torak saw her pull off the bark which covered her head and shake out her long, ash-grey hair.
'The fire has escaped,' she said. 'It is eating the Forest. The Chosen One has set it free.'
TWENTY.