The Blood Knight - J. Gregory Keyes [141]
They forded the Then upstream of the woorm’s path just at dawn, with Ogre breaking the way through the thin sheen of ice. The ground was firmer beyond and quickly rose in low terraced hills thick in willow and sassafras. By the time the sun was far up, they were on rolling prairie broken up by pasture and fields, brilliant green in calf-high winter wheat. Trees were few and far between, and stands greater than half a dozen were rare indeed. Aspar didn’t like so much openness; it felt as if something might swoop up on him from the sky. Who knew, maybe it could happen? If there could be a snake half a league long, maybe there were eagles that big, too.
There were also too many people in the Midenlands, at least there had been. They didn’t build huge towns as they did toward either coast, but farmsteads were common—a house, a barn, a few smaller buildings—and every few leagues or so there was a market square with half a dozen buildings. Almost anything that looked like a hill had a castle on it, some in ruins, some puffing smoke to show they were still inhabited. That day they saw three from sunup to sundown. That seemed like a lot, seeing as how there weren’t many rises in the land that imagination might make a hill of.
But they didn’t actually see anyone, not that first day, because they were still pretty much along the woorm’s trail, and it seemed to have made a detour every time it came within sight of houses. They didn’t see any cows, sheep, goats, or horses, either. The thing had to eat, and considering its size, it probably had to eat a lot.
Early the next day, though, the monster’s trail turned more northerly than Aspar wanted to go, putting them at a crossroad. The time came to test his resolve. A glance at Winna kept his mind made up, and they went northeast, toward the Sarnwood.
Within a bell they came across some foraging cows and a couple of people with them. As they got closer, Aspar saw it was a boy and girl, neither one older than thirteen or so. They looked at first as if they might run, but they stood their ground until Aspar and his companions were fifty or so kingsyards away.
“Hello!” the girl shouted. “Who is that?”
Aspar held up empty hands. “I haet Aspar White,” he called back. “I’m the king’s holter. These are my friends. We mean you no harm.”
“What’s a holter?” the girl returned.
“I ward the forest,” he replied.
The girl scratched her head, then looked around as if searching for a forest. “Are you lost?” she asked.
“No,” Aspar replied. “But can I come closer? All this shoutin’ is wearing out my throat.”
The two looked at each other, than back at the trio. “I don’t know,” the girl said.
“We should dismount,” Winna said. “They’re frightened.”
“They’re scared of me,” Aspar said. “I’ll dismount. Winna, why don’t you go closer first. But stay on your horse, at least until you get there.”
“That’s a good idea,” she assented.
Aethlaud and her brother Aohsli were both fair-haired, pink-cheeked youths. She was thirteen, and he was ten. They had some bread and cheese, to which Aspar added a generous portion of the last day’s venison. He hadn’t had time to cure it properly, so what they hadn’t eaten would soon spoil, anyway. They sat on a gentle rise beneath a solitary persimmon tree and watched the cows.
“We’re taking ’em down to Haemeth,” Aethlaud explained, “to my uncle’s place. But we’re supposed to graze them on the way.”
“Where is that?” Aspar asked.
Her expression said that anyone who didn’t know where Haemeth was didn’t know much of anything.
“It’s about a league that way,” she said, pointing northeast. “On the Thaurp-Crenreff road.”
“We’re going that way,” Winna said. Aspar wanted to shush her before she offered to accompany them. He didn’t want to be kept to the speed of cows. But she looked so gaunt and brittle, it froze his voice.
“Are you sick?” Aohsli blurted.
“Yes,” Winna said. “We all are. But it isn’t catching.”
“No, it’s from the waurm, isn’t it?”
They were out of Oostish country, and her pronunciation was a little different, but there wasn’t any mistaking