Lord of the Mountain Roads

Chapter III: Stranger

...

It had begun snowing again. Setharai stumbled on, putting one foot in front of the other stubbornly, sinking deep into the snow. Her thoughts were dark, and her heart felt like a lump of ice-cold iron, but she forced herself to continue walking.

Umdar was dead. She had left the steed only after the animal had stopped breathing; sat with her under the shelter of a rock ledge, watching her black sides rising and falling rapidly, listening to the horrible wheezing sound that the mare made when the wounded lungs began to give up their work. Now the horse was just another shape under the shadow of the mountains, snow blown over her body by the wind making her seem another rock among many.

Setharai couldn't bring herself to cut meat from the steed's flanks. She knew it would have been sensible to do so, as her supplies of food were close to non-existent now. But her hand had shaken when she clutched the dagger in her hand, and she simply wasn't able to do it.

There was a storm gathering. Setharai's senses, adjusted to perceive more than what was visible to the eye, told her that the snow and the wind were but a mirror of what was happening in the unseen world of the magical winds.

She had never mentioned to anybody that she was able to feel the winds. Her talent for sorcery had never been discovered, a well hidden secret, often a reason for her success where other messengers had failed. She never wanted to become a sorceress, the idea of being locked in the Convent frightened her, threatened her love for freedom. But even with her magical senses untrained and unrefined, she was clairvoyant enough to see that the energies gathering here were doing so by more than mere coincidence. It was a part of a greater pattern, one that would draw all of Naggaroth, and maybe the entire world, towards a new direction.

The darkness was becoming less intense, and she knew that she had to hurry. The humans of the Chaos army that were sitting at their campfires or sleeping in their tents now would see better during the day, and losing her advantage might mean losing her life. She moved closer to the mountain's rocky wall, searching for a hidden spot where she could spend the day. Lucky for her, the ground was less barren now, with frozen vegetation under the snow, and black pines rising into the dark skies all around her. Still, she was not sure the pines would provide enough shelter against the eyes of the barbarians.

It was almost dawn when she finally found an entrance to a cave. She gritted her teeth, running towards it, and almost fell over a humanoid shape. Instantly wary, she looked around herself. The slope of the mountain was covered by bodies under a thin blanket of snow. Bolts protruded from their flesh, bolts looking suspiciously like those shot from a Druchii crossbow. For a moment, hope lighted her heart. Did she find the campsite of the Dark Elven hunters that she was sent to bring a message to at last?

A quick search scattered her hopes again. There were only dead barbarians here. But there were no Druchii corpses, meaning that whoever had killed the humans had survived and might be close by.

She made a decision and staggered towards the cave. She would stay here for the day. A chance to meet a Dark Elf was worth it. She didn't think that she would make it back to Clar Karond alone. And if the unknown Druchii was an enemy of the Chaos barbarians, she might find an ally in him.

It was dark inside, and not a bit warmer than outside. More corpses were lying on the floor. The men inside the cave seemed to have broken their skulls and spines on the rocky floor, thrown down by something; some of them had their throats slit. Carefully, she tip-toed her way into the darkness, looking for traps. At the wall on the opposite side from the entrance, she found a frozen well, a basin carved into stone, into which a rivulet of water must had flown in warmer days from a hole in the cavern's wall, the water now solid ice. She slumped down next to the basin and pulled her cloak around her. Maybe she would live another day.

...

Ruathac woke up with a start. Sun shone into his eyes, white and merciless, and the fire had turned into a few smoking coals. The pipe in his hand was long since cold. He considered pitching up the tent and going back to sleep. There was not much to do for today – he had repaired the breach in the tent's side with a new human hide a week ago, sharpened his sword and dagger yesterday, and he had enough herbs for his pipe and enough meat to keep him sated and calm for the next few days. It was more than enough time till dark, when he would leave to hunt the barbarians again.

Then it struck him. He had forgotten to retrieve the crossbow bolts. And he didn't cut any meat from the prey of yesterday's night. In fact, he had not much to eat here at all. He was becoming careless, the routine of his lonely days lulling him into a dangerous negligence.

He stood up, treading from one leg to another, trying to shake away the numb feeling in his limbs that came from having slept while sitting cross-legged. He piled snow over the coals till no more smoke rose from them, hid his possessions under at the edge of the plateau, pulled his shawl over mouth and nose and began his descend from the mountain.

He was lucky – the corpses were untouched, neither by animals, nor by their human comrades. Ruathac hid between rocks for some time, making sure there was no one here, and then leapt from stone to stone till he reached the first of the dead. The bolt had been frozen in the blood that had poured out of the wound in the man's throat, and the Druchii had to shake it back and forth and apply force to pull it out; it came free with a cracking sound, but didn't break.

Walking from one dead barbarian to another, he collected all his bolts, even those that were not usable anymore, iron point sshattered against armor or bent on a stone when the enemies fell, wood splintered by a bone – he didn't want the bolts to betray him to the humans, to make it clear that it was a Druchii who had killed their kind here. He was alone, and he preferred his silent war to stay silent; he felt no need to become the hunted one.

After a while, he was done with the corpses outside the cave and stepped inside. Most of the barbarians here were not killed by bolts, and he was sure he would quickly retrieve the last ones.

And that was when he heard faint breathing.

He aimed his crossbow at the sound, freezing in mid-step.

The breathing continued, its rhythm unchanged. Whoever was here was not afraid – or hadn't noticed him yet. Ruathac stepped closer, peering into the darkness.

There was the frozen fountain, the small well where Ruathac's clan used to get clean water during the summer when the snow in these lower regions of the mountains was scarce and dirtied by the animals populating the rocky terrain. A dark shape was curled up at the wall next to it.

It took Ruathac only seconds to realize that he was looking at a Druchii, not at one of the square-shouldered, heavy humans. Most of the slender, almost fragile looking figure was concealed by a black cloak, but he saw a leather vambrace and a boot with a spur; the style of the clothing showed that this was a city-dweller and not an Autarii. A hood obscured most of the face of the elf; what Ruathac saw of the skin was pale, paler than Dark Elven skin would usually be.

He suddenly understood that the paleness was caused by the cold, just like the slow, hardly audible sound of the elf's breath. This foolish Druchii had fallen asleep without being used to the cold air of the Blackspines, without a fire to keep him warm, and dressed much too lightly. Whoever this was, he was freezing to death. He wouldn't wake up if Ruathac left him here.

Ruathac's first instinct was to simply go and let the unknown elf die. But loneliness and curiosity won against habit, and instead he walked over to the lying shape and pulled away the cloak to look at the other elf more closely.

He recognized the type of leather armor. It was the light black armor consisting of small plates of cooked leather, shaped to the wearer's body, armor that he had seen on Dark Riders when they were riding through Naggaroth as messengers and not going to war. The spurs, which were much too small and delicate to be used on the thick hide of a nauglir, were another clue, and a messenger bag slung over the shoulder of the elf – the stranger was pressing the bag to his chest with both arms, as if it was his most precious possession – a third. Ruathac wondered where the elf's horse was and why he had gone to sleep here, among the corpses. From what he knew, Dark Riders didn't sleep much on their missions anyway.

He crouched down and, still aiming the crossbow at the stranger with his right hand, tugged on the belt of the bag with his left. The elf didn't resist when Ruathac pulled the bag away to take a look into it, already too deep in the fatal slumber of someone freezing to death.

There was only a cylindrical wooden case in the bag, like the ones often used to transport rolled up parchments; and a few scraps of dried meat wrapped in a piece of linen.

The Shade looked back at the sleeping elf. Now that the arms that were holding the bag were out of the way, he saw by the shape of the armor that the Dark Rider was a female.

If he just left now, he thought, she would become another frozen shape; frozen like his wife in the glacier.

If he left, he might never hear a word of Druhir from a mouth other than his own. No one would ever call him by his name again.

He stood up, undecided what to do, staring at the black-clad elf on the floor for another minute. Why did she come here now? Why was he here just in time to be able to save her? Why hadn't he been here years ago, when he could have saved his clan? The sinister thoughts made his heart bitter, and he was once again tempted by the idea to leave her here and go his own way.

Then he realized that every moment he waited now could be a moment too late for the stranger to survive. He sighed, picked her up and carried her out of the cave.