Darkwell - Douglas Niles [5]
And there was the scroll. Grunnarch wondered why that lone treasure, scribed in a symbology he could not read, should figure so prominently in his thoughts about the trove.
The lord mayor of Lodi stood before him, outlined by the blazing framework of his blockhouse. The man met his gaze without fear, but Grunnarch could see defeat in his eyes. The Red King, his bloody axe in his hands, watched the mayor with interest.
"I offer you our greatest treasure. In return, I ask only that you spare the children."
Grunnarch took the ivory tube, surprised at its lightness. He had expected the container to hold platinum, or at least gold, in quantity. Curious, he pulled the cap off and saw that it held but four small sheets of parchment.
"Treasure?" he said menacingly. "This is worthless!"
But the mayor did not flinch. "You are wrong. You have probably never held such worth in your hands!"
Grunnarch paused. The man's plea meant little – northmen did not slay children, so the town's youth had never been in danger. Truly the Red King had no use for a scroll. Yet, as he held it, he began to sense that it was indeed an object of rare worth.
A strange feeling came over him as he examined the exterior of the scroll case. He saw a picture of a beautiful young woman, sensual and rounded, and yet his reaction was a wish to protect her. Other pictures – a vast field of grain, a smooth lake, and a cozy fire in a hearth of stone – all beckoned him with sensations of warmth and comfort.
Disquieted, he took the scrolls gruffly. He turned on his heel and ordered his surprised crews back to their vessels, leaving Lodi almost unscathed. They took no other plunder but instead put straight to sea under the harsh urging of the Red King.
And so came the scrolls with him to the Moonshaes.
This season of plunder had dragged on for Grunnarch, for he lacked the fiery battle lust that had once made him relish the strike of steel against steel, the striving of man against man. Now battle was merely another tiresome task that faced him all too often.
After the raid on Lodi, the Red King had lost heart for battle altogether. Rationalizing that the season was late, he had ordered the two ships homeward, ignoring the surprised reactions of his crew. After two weeks upon the Trackless Sea, they had returned once again to the Moonshaes. Now they slipped between two kingdoms of the Ffolk, headed toward his own lands to the north.
And still that feeling of foreboding remained with him, perched upon his broad shoulders like some unnatural apparition.
* * * * *
A great brown bear shuffled across the dead land, pausing to turn over a log with his broad forepaw or to snuffle under a stump with his nose. Once again, the spoor of even a tiny maggot or grub eluded him. Grunt huffed in frustration, too weak to take even a halfhearted swing at the offending stump.
There was no food here.
Grunt stumbled on, sensing that to stop was to die. Long gashes covered his shaggy flanks, now crusted with dried blood. One of the cuts lay freshly opened, a victim of some scrape against a looming trunk.
Even in the depths of his fatigue, Grunt moved with pride and purpose. His head held high, his posture was a challenge to any lesser creature that might cross his path. But his footsteps were unsteady, and the great brown eyes grew dull. There were no creatures to cross his path and behold his prideful agony.
This was land Grunt had known all of his life, yet he did not know it now. The grove of his mistress, Genna Moonsinger, the Great Druid of the isle, now festered and decayed. Many were the animals that had lived here, amid a lush blanket of greenery. Now there was no creature. Now there was nothing green.
Grunt growled, the sound rumbling low in his chest. He blinked, peering around as if trying to clear the nightmare vision from his eyes. Then he lumbered