Sulla sat in silence, his one good eye straining in the dim light of the torch.
He had led a small army of fifty of his horsemen and a hundred foot soldiers down from Ice Mountain the day before, but his swift progress had been delayed by the lumbering weapons of the chaos dwarfs. It had taken them all day to catch up and Sulla had used the time to issue new edicts to his troops, dispatching messengers to his spies abroad as well as liaising with the sybil.
His master plan was coming together. Crown Prince Anlaf, in command of the substantial Imperial Guard, was of great concern, but the sybil had assured Sulla of the prince’s inaction. For months now she had sent terrible dreams that tormented him, making him fearful and paranoid. Without his capable command, the Imperial Guard would be unable to interfere.
Yet their neutrality was not enough for Sulla. He wanted them under his own banner, marching under his orders. The sybil, therefore, had changed her torments, offering the prince a solution.
“Zamorak,” she crooned in the night time. “You must embrace him! He alone can offer you release” The words had haunted the crown prince, she insisted. He had withdrawn into his private chambers in the mighty citadel that dominated the skyline of Burthorpe, refusing to take any food and turning away his worried valets.
Sulla opened the most recent missive from the sybil and as he read it, his eye glinted in wicked delight. Tormented for many months and driven to near madness, the crown prince had succumbed to Zamorak. He had even erected a small altar to the god of chaos, secreted in his castle and accessible by hidden passages that only he knew.
Folding the document, Sulla considered the other steps he had put into motion. Kinshra ambassadors had journeyed to the neighbouring kingdoms of Misthalin and Kandarin, to ensure that neither kingdom would become involved in the coming war. The campaign would not be one of conquest, the ambassadors assured their hosts, but one designed to secure religious freedom for all. They would end the dogmatic Saradominist viewpoint that the Knights of Falador had forced on the ordinary people of Asgarnia. This was no war of plunder and revenge, and any intervention from neighbouring countries would simply endanger more lives.
Of course, Sulla thought to himself, our ambassadors make no mention of the carefully recruited hordes of bandits and outlaws who bolster our numbers. Nor would they divulge his plan to press the goblin tribes into action, as slaves to help in his efforts.
A movement interrupted Sulla’s thoughts. The flap of his tent was pushed back by a black-clad guard.
“The dwarfs have caught up, Lord Sulla,” he announced. “They will be in a position to assault the monastery the night after tomorrow.”
Sulla said nothing for a long moment, his mind focusing on his new weapons and their one major drawback-they were entirely too slow.
“Very well” he said finally. “The night after tomorrow is good enough.”
He had travelled as swiftly as he was able, ignoring the pain in his stomach that burned continually as he ran.
The wound was healing well-the pain was a sign of that.
The hunters who had pursued him had long been left behind. He noticed how the air had changed as he travelled northward. The scents that betrayed the humanfolk, which were usually so easy to perceive, were fewer. The population was sparser. He was back in the land of isolated farmsteads and lone woodcutters, where he knew he should feel more confident, for he was the hunter once more.
With every step he took north he swore anew that he would make the girl pay dearly for what she had done to him. No agony would be too much for her and no injury too little. He would dedicate his life to destroying her.
But without warning, the thought of the girl with the blonde hair caused him suddenly to stop. He was scared of her. For the first time in his life a human had made him afraid.
He raised his hand to the afternoon sky. The absence of his two fingers taunted him under the grey clouds, and goaded him into a savage outburst.
“I will destroy her! She shall scream my name before she dies!”
The forest’s silence was the only response.
He put his head down, close to the earth, sniffing the currents that would betray any human nearby. The scent of men was present and he knew what type of men they were-barbarians. At once he realised he must have drifted farther east than he had intended, eager to be away from the men who pursued him. He recalled a map he had seen in the old lady’s home after he had killed her. He had studied the map with interest, tracing the route he had taken since crossing into Asgarnia from neighbouring Misthalin. Near the top right corner, a small collection of illustrated thatched huts surrounded by high pale fencing had marked the location of the tribesmen.
There he would find his prey. Their trail betrayed them. Both of them, Gar’rth and the girl.
“I am not finished just yet” he swore. “I have both of your scents now.”
He recognised the scent of the dwarf, as well, and of the squire, and it was the thought of revenge on all of them that gave him the strength he needed to overcome his pain.
“I am not more than a day behind them,” he growled to himself, moving ever toward the mountain. His mouth watered in anticipation.
As their journey stretched into the next day, Ebenezer rode in silence. He ignored Castimir’s jesting, which normally would have drawn him into a bout of good-humoured arguing. He had no doubt that the others knew something was weighing heavily on his mind.
But he didn’t tell any of them what it was he had seen in the night, as they had slept. When Ebenezer had taken his turn at the watch, his gaze had fallen on Gar’rth, and the youth had looked more peaceful than he could ever recall, his hand resting gently in Kara’s palm. The image disturbed the alchemist.
Gar’rth was suffering, growing from a boy into a man, and as such Ebenezer was certain that whatever natural instincts the werewolf race possessed, they would likely be far stronger than usual. The temptation to resign himself to his bestial nature would be near overwhelming.
And if he did, the alchemist thought sadly, would even Kara be able to destroy him? Stabbing a murderer in Falador was one thing, but he doubted that she could bring herself to destroy a friend and ally.
These dark thoughts consumed the alchemist until they reached the foothills of Ice Mountain, where the paths were seldom trodden by any folk of good will. Rarely did the barbarian peoples ever wander so far. The trees were wild and overgrown, frequently tearing at the travellers as they made their way in a north-westerly direction. Many times they dismounted to guide their steeds carefully through the long shadows of the forest, and many times they started at the sounds of creatures they could not see.
Once, a low moan echoed through the wooden boughs under which they walked and even Gar’rth paused, his eyes shining feverishly yet intelligently under the cowl that he kept permanently pulled over his head.
No one moved, and no one spoke for long, tense moments. Finally it was Castimir who broke the silence.
“What was that noise?” he asked in little more than a whisper. “Even the white wolves with their dreadful cries were not so chilling. I have never heard so unearthly a sound.”
Arisha looked fearfully at the trees.
“My kin tell stories of the people who live in the trees, spirits that guard the forests and take any traveller they enslave into their magical world to serve them forever in a sleepless nightmare.”
Doric grunted.
“Stories! Tales to frighten children.” Nonetheless, his hand gripped his axe-haft as tightly as ever.
“Would you not have said the same about werewolves a few days ago, my old friend?” Ebenezer whispered.
No one responded.
They heard no sound like it for the rest of the day, but as the light faded, so did their mood. No one talked as they travelled, for under the trees it seemed as if the voices of men and women were unwelcome, barely tolerated by the dark gods of the woods whom men had long forgotten.
Arisha finally stopped them as the darkness became too dense for them to continue safely. When they made their camp, Theodore volunteered to take the first guard. Kara joined him, for Arisha advised that a single guard was not enough.
And to Ebenezer, who watched the two youngsters take up their positions on opposite sides of their encampment, it was obvious the relationship between them was heavily strained.
Something was wrong with Theodore. Of that, Kara was certain.
He deliberately kept himself away from her, pretending to maintain a sharp vigilance over their friends rather than let himself be drawn close enough to talk. She suspected it was only a ploy that gave him an excuse to avoid her, and after a few minutes she turned away from him, her face flushed with anger and hurt.
I will not let him see me like this, she thought as she stood at the opposite perimeter of the camp. I have no reason to feel ashamed-his order deliberately endangered me. But she knew her angry thoughts were just excuses. A gulf had widened between Theodore and her since their last days in Falador, a gulf built up of distrust and suspicion fuelled by his superiors’ deliberate attempt to expose the traitor.
She knew Theodore had been powerless in their machinations and she wanted him to know that. But if he wasn’t willing to listen, then he would have to wait a while longer before she told him.
The moment he had caught up with her in the barbarian hall, Theodore had known instantly that there was something between her and Gar’rth. As a result, he found himself resenting the cursed youth. Kara had stood between them, and even threatened to fight him for Gar’rth’s life.
The squire couldn’t understand it.
Yet while he was growing envious and wary of Gar’rth, he also harboured a deep sympathy for him. He knew it wasn’t his fault that he had been born of a race that had behaved so wickedly and with such avarice that legend said they had become wolves. He recalled with sadness how happy Gar’rth had been, after he had thanked him when they had first met in Taverley.
So much had happened since then.
No, it wasn’t Gar’rth’s fault, nor was it truly Kara’s. But in his current mood, Theodore had no wish to be the first to breach the gulf between them, which all the time grew wider.