The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [158]
Aspar nodded and resumed packing.
A moment later he heard someone cough softly behind him. It was Emfrith.
Sceat, Aspar thought. And again.
“I don’t understand why we’re leaving,” the young man said. “This is the perfect place to keep Winna safe.”
“Keeps monsters out, not men, and we’ll never hold off five hundred.”
“It’s an army of the Church,” Emfrith said.
“That’s the same Church that has been hanging every other villager from here to Brogswell, yah?”
“They didn’t hang anyone in Haemeth,” Emfrith pointed out. “We follow the saints there.”
“Good for you. But we’ve had some experiences to make us skittish of anyone under saintly armor. Ask Winna. It’s not worth the chance. We’ve this one moment to escape, and here it is—werlic?”
“Raiht,” Emfrith agreed, sounding reluctant. Then he sighed. “Look, why don’t I just go talk to them? See what they want? If you’re right and they mean no good, we can still flee. But if you’re wrong, then we can stay here, where the monsters can’t get in, until Winna has the baby.”
“There’s not enough food for five months.”
“Me and my men can ride out and get some when it’s needed.”
“From where? The blight is moving outward.”
“Yes, but we’re riding straight into it.”
“I thought you weren’t going to question me anymore.”
“That was when I thought this was the safe place you meant.”
“There’s a safer one,” Aspar said.
“Is there?”
“Yes.”
“Very well,” he said after a moment. Then he walked away.
You really love her, don’t you? Aspar thought. Grim, but I wish I could speak my mind.
His leg was throbbing as he mounted the horse he’d begun calling Grimla in hopes that a stout name would make the beast stronger.
They started southwest, off the Old King’s Road, fording the shallows of the Little Moon River before the end of the first day, then starting up into the Walham foothills. He and Winna hadn’t come this way the last time, because they had been along the Slaghish River, following the trail of the first greffyn. That had led them to Rewn Aluth and the strange, possibly dead Sefry who called herself Mother Gastya. She had sent them into the Mountains of the Hare to find a hidden valley that Aspar knew for a fact couldn’t be there.
But as with so many things, he’d been wrong. The valley had been there, and the Briar King, and Fend, and for him and Winna it had all very nearly ended there, as well. But it hadn’t, and Stephen had had a large hand in that.
He tried not to wonder where Stephen was, and he didn’t like to talk to Winna about it, because the simple fact was that the boy was most probably dead. Even if the slinders hadn’t killed him, the woorm probably had, and if not the woorm, the explosion of monastery d’Ef or one of a thousand other things. Stephen was smart and a good fellow, but surviving on his own even before the world went mad was not exactly his strongest talent.
He’d done all he could to help Stephen, hadn’t he? Followed the slinders, chased the woorm. He’d found no sign whatever of the lad.
He shifted his gaze to Winna and Ehawk. At least Ehawk had found them again. It was good to know the Watau wasn’t a lonely ghost wandering in the Bairghs.
The foothills rose and fell in ever-sharper undulating folds and ridges. It had always been easy to get turned around in the Walhams, but now, without the usual reference points, it was more difficult than ever to keep a true path. He could see that there had been a lot of rain in the last several months and much flooding. The invading growth didn’t have the same deep roots as the natural flora, and many of the ways he knew were closed by massive mud slides. Most of the ridges had washed down to bedrock, and the valleys were filled with viscous muck.
But in those low-lying places the eldritch vegetation was very strong. It was starting to sicken, but it wasn’t nearly as far gone as what he’d seen back in the Lean Gables. They had to cut their way through it in places.
They progressed very slowly. Aspar reckoned that in three days they’d managed only five leagues