Extraordinary Zoology (12 page)

Edrea liked Horgash’s choice of a campsite. They were perched on a bluff with one sheer fifteen-foot face looking west over a creek. The trees here were farther apart, but they were among the biggest she’d seen yet, giants whose canopy arched densely overhead, starving the forest floor for light.

Horgash and Pendrake walked the perimeter, gathering additional deadfall for a fire, earnestly discussing approaches and retreats in the event of trouble. Pendrake speared a sturdy stick into the sandy face of the bluff and hung a lantern there, ensuring they’d be able to see the mounts come nightfall.

While Lynus and Kinik made camp and laid out dinner, Edrea walked Greta, Oathammer, and Aeshnyrr down to the creek where they could drink and munch on the lush growth. Aeshnyrr had picked up a deep scratch in her run through the underbrush, which Edrea treated and wrapped.

Poor Codex
, she thought. Such a noble creature. And such an ignoble end.

Edrea gave Aeshnyrr a loving pat and climbed back up onto the bluff.

“Again, it is dinner. And again, I do not smell bacon,” said Horgash, eyeing the spread of canned beans, corned beef, and hardtack.

“You’d eat bacon at every meal, and then we’d have none to coax us out of bed come breakfast,” Lynus said.

“Someone should have thought of that when provisioning this trip,” Horgash said. “A square five meals of bacon would, I am quite certain, help the healing along.” He made a show of rubbing the leg where he’d been wounded by Lynus’ misfire.

“Is that still hurting?” Edrea asked. She treated Lynus to a conspiratorial wink. “I just treated Aeshnyrr with some ointment from the stables. It smells lovely.”

Lynus grinned at Edrea and blushed. She liked his smile when he blushed.

Horgash laughed. “No ointment! I already smell enough like a horse, and I’m not even riding one! I certainly don’t need to wear their perfume.” Everyone laughed at that. Horgash’s voice might be ruined, but he still had the skills of an entertainer.

Lynus passed tins around and the conversation stopped as mouths filled with food. Horgash aptly demonstrated the legendary trollkin appetite, eating more than five times as much as Edrea, and then casting about in search of something else to consume. Even Kinik, a head taller and at least eighty pounds heavier, looked impressed. Or perhaps distressed.

“I’m happy to take the third watch,” Pendrake offered. “I rise well enough in the morning, but at my age an interrupted night’s sleep just won’t do.”

“This bullet hole,” said Horgash, rubbing the mended spot on his leggings, “should be all healed up tomorrow, assuming I get a full night’s sleep on this belly full of it-still-isn’t-bacon.” He cocked his heavy brow and looked across the waning firelight at Lynus. “I volunteer Lynus for the second watch.”

Lynus sighed and shrugged. “Sure.” This would be his third night in a row on second watch.

“I can watch first?” asked Kinik.

Pendrake scratched his chin, appearing to consider her offer. Edrea knew him well enough to guess at his unspoken line of thought. Kinik was new, but she had proven herself well during the last three days.

“The first watch is yours, Pupil Helegroth.” Pendrake continued formally, in Molgur-Og.
“
I entrust my life and the lives of my friends to you and to the long arm of your blade this night.”

Kinik beamed, and Edrea took pleasure at having guessed the outcome, even if she hadn’t expected Pendrake to apply his knowledge of ogrun culture so effectively.

Edrea stirred the coals and laid additional fuel near the fire for the night’s watches as Pendrake, Horgash, and Lynus settled themselves into their bedrolls. Then she stepped quietly over to Kinik, who was already facing away from the campsite, adjusting her eyes.

“Kinik, may I beg a favor?”

Kinik bowed. “It honors me.”

“Wake me for the second watch. Lynus needs the sleep.”

“I will.”

“Thank you.” Edrea slipped back to the rest of the group and into her bedroll.

The night had a damp chill to it, but there was no wind. Kinik had gone back to bed several minutes ago, and her breathing had now settled into that deep almost-snore common to ogrun.

Edrea squatted at the edge of the bluff, feet flat, knees wide—a pose she could hold for hours. She scanned the ring of dark shadow surrounding this clearing. The fire was quite low, embers only, and no starlight could hope to pierce the blackness of these woods. The mists below the bluff had thickened during the night, and even with the glow of the lantern the creek was lost under a river of fog.

She breathed deeply and slowly, and felt for the weave of energy above, below, behind. She closed her eyes to clear her mind of the illusion that her eyes were of any real use in this darkness.

She opened her eyes to the weave and inhaled breath and power. She traced
vossyl
. The sigil glowed brightly but gave no useful light. She exhaled, and the runes scattered into bits of glowing script, which Edrea twisted about her wrist with a tracing of
liumyn
.

The deep blackness that had been all her natural sight could discern of the Widower’s Wood resolved into trees, clearly outlined in shades of grey. The creek was visible too, the obscuring mists transparent.

Countless small, glowing forms appeared amid the undergrowth, in the trees, and high above in the canopy, their silhouettes easily identified. Hawk. Vole. Snake. Owl. She turned slowly, scanning the bluff they were camped on, the creek bed below, and the trees on the other side. The three mounts stood asleep. Her companions were safe in their bedrolls, each outlined in a steady amber glow. Lynus was not a short man, but he was slender, and compared to the others he looked almost like a child as he slept curled in his bag.

Edrea relaxed into the spell. After a few minutes the sensation was similar to that of her eyes having adjusted to a change in the light, and she was able to maintain it with no more effort than continued breathing, with no repeat of the headaches from this morning. It helped that she was sitting on her heels, not running or swinging a rifle like a club. Or trying to do both at the same time. That had been harrowing.

The movements in the forest fascinated her. Some creatures foraged or scavenged amid the duff and scrub, stealthily scurrying or sliding from cover to cover. Others hunted, typically perched in branches just below the thick braid of the canopy proper. Occasionally, there was a flurry of movement, a collision of the glowing forms, usually followed by the extinguishing of one of the amber silhouettes.

These patterns were comforting. If something large and dangerous should approach from beyond the range of this sight, these smaller creatures would scatter or freeze. Their dance of predation was a sure sign that, for now at least, all was well.

At long last, Edrea heard Professor Pendrake stirring. She was seeing the woods in a way he never could. She consulted her pocket watch, an elegant yet durable Ordic piece. Two hours until dawn. She had maintained this sight for nearly 140 minutes.

She looked over to Pendrake and watched him wake himself. His army service, decades past, had provided him with some internal bugler to sound the changing of the night watch, rousing him in time for his shift.

Pendrake sat up and looked to the bedroll where Lynus soundlessly slept. He then scanned the camp, and, squinting, looked over to where Edrea still squatted, flat on her feet.

“I asked Kinik to wake me instead of Lynus,” she said softly, anticipating his question.

“Ah.” Pendrake rubbed his eyes, and then with the precision of a long-practiced ritual, removed his glasses from their case on his knapsack and perched them on his nose. “A kindness the lad merits, and which speaks well of you.”

“The forest is calm, if not exactly peaceful,” she said with a wave of her arm that Pendrake probably could not see. “Small creatures hiding, hunting, eating, or being eaten. To my sight, nothing stalks us.”

“Acting on my counsel to practice that spell, then?” The professor smiled.

Pendrake’s tone frustrated her. Especially since he was right.

“I have maintained it for the duration of my watch, Professor. And yes, after our midday misadventures it seemed prudent to build a bit more endurance.”

“A capital accomplishment. I’ve fought alongside arcanists before and found their help invaluable. Indispensable, in point of fact.” He stood and stretched. “But only the most practiced among them were as dependable as, say, a properly maintained firearm. So keep up that practice.”

Edrea bit her tongue. Properly maintained firearm, indeed. A bit of mud in the wrong place and Lynus’ rifle had exploded. She had maintained
vossyl liumyn
for two and a half hours now, and was quite tired, but there was no risk whatsoever of her eyes exploding and wounding someone.

She pushed her hair behind her ear, took a deep breath, and brushed her anger aside. It helped nothing, and couldn’t be helped. Besides, moments like this, where ignorance manifested, were part of her private studies, a secret she kept all to herself. Humans did not lead particularly long lives but had nevertheless forged vibrant civilizations and acquired huge bodies of knowledge. Professor Viktor Pendrake was one of the most accomplished learners and teachers among living humans, yet he was almost a century younger than those of comparable merit among the great Iosan houses.

How did he do it with so little time in which to work?

Maintaining the sight, she stood and walked a bit to the east, her legs only now complaining about two hours of squatting. She was suddenly quite tired, and the ache was distracting. She rubbed her temple as the beginnings of a new headache formed. She regretted thinking about how absurd it would be for her eyes to explode.

And then the patterns in the forest shifted. Creatures ducked into burrows. Birds took wing. Something big was coming this way.

“Professor?” she said. “Throw something on the fire and wake the others.”

“What do you see?” asked Pendrake. Edrea could feel a flash of heat as he kindled the flames high for light.

“Nothing yet, but the little things are making way for something lar . . . oh my.”

The outline was, to Edrea’s sight, similar in size to a dire troll, but this shape was different, like a giant bipedal boar, with hooves on its hind legs and fingered hands on its forelegs. It wore armor, too—spiked bracers and pauldrons, and a half helmet. Like a big farrow.

A dire farrow?

After a moment, another figure came into view, a hundred paces or so behind the first. This was a farrow of the usual scale, clearly following the first. The big one rooted hungrily every so often. Hunting.

“I’m up,” Lynus said. “What is it?”

“Shhh,” said Pendrake. “Edrea’s still trying to make that out for us.”

“Two farrow, Professor.”

“We’re getting close to Groth’s home, and the village he serves.”

“Mmm-hmmm,” Edrea said. “One of these is really big. I’ve never seen a farrow this big. Are there dire farrow?”

“Morrow, I hope not,” said Lynus.

“There will need to be another book,” said Kinik.

“They’re following the creek. They can’t miss us, and the big one is hungry.”

“I’ll teach it a thing or two about hungry,” Horgash rasped wearily. “I was dreaming of bacon.”

The big farrow paused and snorted heavily. It turned from the creek and looked directly up at Edrea and the others. Their scent or their firelight had finally penetrated the mist. The beast chuffed and stamped, as if preparing to charge. Then it whimpered and looked back over its shoulder at the smaller farrow.

“I think the little farrow is controlling the big one,” she said.

“Similar, perhaps, to the bonds among trollkin and the full trolls?” said Pendrake.

“Hrrmph,” Horgash grunted.

“We should make ourselves look bigger?” Kinik said. “Open coats, arms wide, stand tall?”

“Bigger might not help,” Edrea said. “The big one is half again the size of Greta.”

“We’re not bigger, but we do have numbers,” said Pendrake. She heard the creak as he strung his bow, followed closely by the snap-clank of Horgash’s Vislovski, readied for firing. She thought to reach for her own rifle and felt foolish when she remembered it was leaning against a tree, far out of reach.