10: Skin-Walker

Early the next morning, Leiyn led Isla back to where she'd intercepted the Gasts. Along the way, she caught her up on all she knew.

Isla shook her head in disbelief. "You'll never make it to being a gray-hair, Leiyn Firebrand. Shooting at Gasts alone… Who raised you, dryvans?"

"Firebrand." Leiyn snorted a laugh. "I was fine. I had the high ground and surprise on my side."

"Only you would think that's enough to kill two dozen on your own."

Leiyn only rolled her eyes.

They spoke little after that, riding in what would have been a companionable silence at any other time. But Leiyn couldn't help but brood over every brief interaction she'd had with the Jaguar chieftain. There were things she'd left out in her report to Isla—notably, that he had surprised her as she retrieved the writ of passage. Her friend already thought her rash and impulsive; no need to further degrade her opinion.

The sun was past its apex by the time they reached the meadow. Leiyn indicated where the scene had played out and which way the party had headed. Her friend nodded, then bent to examine the trampled grass. After several minutes, she gave a low whistle.

"You weren't lying; there were quite a few of them. I could almost believe two dozen."

Leiyn raised an eyebrow. "Thanks for taking me at my word."

Isla rose and turned her gaze southward. "Were they traveling quickly?"

"Not particularly."

"Then maybe we can catch them tomorrow."

Mounting again, they set off at a swift but manageable pace. Large as the Gast company had been, their trail was easy to follow, and draconions' clawed feet always left distinctive prints. Still, Leiyn could tell the pace was taking its toll on Steadfast, still worn from his rough treatment over the past few days. She leaned down and patted his great head as he trotted along.

"Just a few more days, old boy," she muttered. "Then you can have a proper rest."

Steadfast turned his head to roll an eye at her, as if he detected the lie in her words.

The afternoon light bled away, and evening fell. Isla had already twice suggested finding a good place to set up camp. Even Leiyn was ready to stop for the night when the tracks of the Gast party led to a wide, open meadow.

Leiyn halted in the trees, her guard instantly raised. She scanned the poplars bordering the meadow but saw nothing but gently stirring branches among the growing shadows. She lowered her gaze again. Signs of a camp were everywhere. Three firepits had been used, and though dirt had been kicked over them, it was clumsily done, the black ash and scorched earth still evident. The faint scent of smoke lingered in the air. The grass had been flattened from many shelters erected, and shallow footpaths had formed where humans had walked between them. The forest lay hushed around them, animals not having moved back after what must have been a recent intrusion.

Isla dismounted Gale, then slowly eased down in front of her. "Obviously, they camped here."

"There's more." Leiyn pointed to the flattened grass. "See the shape of the shelters?"

Her friend studied the ground for a moment, then frowned. "Square? But the tents I've seen Gasts use have always had triangular bases. Did they pick up some Ilberian shelters?"

Having no answer, Leiyn dismounted and, leaving Steadfast to graze, took up her longbow. An arrow nocked, she crept into the camp. The shelters' shapes weren't the only unusual signs. There was scuffing on trees where lines had been hung to dry clothes after the day's travel. A filled-in latrine, still stinking, had been dug in a small meadow just off the larger one. And pressed into the mud was the print of a horse's hoof.

"This was a Baltesian camp," Leiyn said, scarcely able to believe it. "And a military camp at that."

"Ilberian soldiers." Isla sounded as incredulous as Leiyn felt. "What would Suncoats be doing here? And how would we not be aware of it?"

"I don't know."

Leiyn padded across the camp, careful where she stepped, though the meadow was so disturbed it was impossible to pick out any distinct tracks. As she circled the camp, she found one path branching off and disappearing into the surrounding forest. Looking up, she saw Isla standing by another.

"The Gasts continued south," her friend said. "Southwest, really."

"The Suncoats, if they are Suncoats, went north."

They both knew what lay in that direction. The Lodge was the only thing worth trekking to north of Folly, the last settlement before the true Titan Wilds set in.

"Maybe they're deserters," Isla suggested softly.

"Or ex-soldiers finished in their service."

Or maybe they're here on the World King's orders. Though Leiyn was sure her friend had a similar thought, neither gave it voice. Suncoats hadn't ventured this far into the Titan Wilds since the war. If that had changed, it could be confirmation of their worst fears.

War had come to the Veiled Lands again.

"Whoever they are, this doesn't look good." Her fellow ranger looked north, then south. "The camp appears fresh. Did the Gasts meet them here?"

"I don't see how they didn't cross paths."

Isla's gaze met hers. "Maybe you're right this time. Even if that isn't a Gast war party, I doubt they're here innocently."

Leiyn shook her head, too perplexed and worried to be gratified at Isla's rare admittance. But as she turned back to fetch Steadfast, she stopped short.

A stranger stood in the middle of the camp.

Her first instinct was to raise and draw her bow. But seeing who it was—or rather, what it was—she fought against the urge. Violence wouldn't help them now.

From all she'd heard, dryvans weren't fond of being threatened.

Leiyn had only seen one other sach'aan before, and this dryvan looked radically different from the previous one. Her body appeared female, with the semblance of breasts and a woman's curves, and her shape was vaguely human. But there, the resemblances ceased. Instead of hair, vines sprouted from her head, thick and old-growth green. From off-shooting tendrils, pink blossoms opened with cheery color. Her face and body had the woodiness of an acorn's shell. Ivy draped over her, its leaves a mockery of clothes. Her eyes were the green of newborn leaves, interrupted by a rectangular black pupil shaped like a goat's. Her hands were hooked like a hawk's talons, and white and brown feathers sprouted along her arms and shoulders. Her feet were similarly clawed, though membranous webbing grew between the elongated toes.

From the corner of her eye, Leiyn saw Isla freeze as well as she stared at the skin-walker. 

The silence yawned, a pit she dared not venture into. Sweat trickled down Leiyn's brow, but she didn't take her hand away from her bow. Dryvans weren't known for attacking travelers, but she doubted anyone unfortunate enough to be their prey would survive. They revealed themselves occasionally, sometimes even helping people in trouble. But where they came from and how their minds worked, no one could claim to know.

And in the Titan Wilds, what a woman didn't understand might spell her end.

The dryvan broke the silence before either ranger found their voice. Her eyes flickered toward Isla, but her gaze settled on Leiyn as she spoke. "Did you feel it too, Hidden One?"

Her voice was like dancing leaves in a squall, gentle and a delight to listen to. Leiyn shook her head free of the fancy and gripped her bow tighter. An aura about the forest creature set her senses skittering, her gaze drifting, her mind inventing sounds and smells. Yet she could ill afford laxness.

She realized several more moments of silence had passed while she found her voice. "I don't know what you mean."

The dryvan cocked her head in a manner rather like a bird's. "Perhaps if you did not close yourself to the world's essence, you would."

Leiyn had an uncomfortable feeling she knew what the forest witch referred to. She had to stifle the urge to glance at Isla, to see if she understood, but saw no sign either way.

Knowing she had to stop the dryvan from revealing more, she asked, "Who are you?"

"Who am I?" The skin-walker's lipless mouth widened in a simulacrum of a smile. "I am many things with many names. But you may call me… Hawkvine, let's say."

"Hawkvine," Leiyn acquiesced, though, from the dryvan's hesitation, she doubted it was her actual name. "What drew you here?"

Hawkvine closed her eyes. "I felt a gathering of your kind such as this forest has rarely seen. I felt the snuffing of fires, one by one, crawling toward the land's spine. I felt a joining of purpose from two disparate peoples." 

Her eyes still closed, the dryvan drifted closer, her clawed toes carrying her effortlessly across the dirt as they scuttled like a spider's legs. The unnatural movement sent shudders up Leiyn's spine as much as the sach'aan's ominous words.

"There is more," the dryvan whispered. "I felt the forest's hush before violence falls."

Leiyn's skin erupted into chills. But from her fear, anger took root and drew strength.

"What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded. "What do you know?" It was damned foolish to interrogate a dryvan, but the foreboding in the creature's cryptic words had worn her patience thin.

Hawkvine smiled again, then lifted a clawed hand, one talon pointing toward Leiyn's feet. "You might know if you fully opened yourself to all the world offers."

Leiyn followed her gesture and her breath caught. Around her shoes, the grass had darkened and withered as if before a winter frost. Only then did she realize the walls around her cursed mahia had drifted lower, crumbled by the force of her anger. 

With effort, she slammed up the walls again, cutting off the warmth of life surrounding her. Cold fear swiftly replaced it. 

The dryvan laughed, but the sound was as parched of joy as a riverbed run dry. "Must humans always learn lessons the hard way?"

Leiyn turned her head aside and drew Isla's wide eyes to hers. "We're wasting time. We need to pursue them."

Isla's gaze flickered to and from Hawkvine, then to the grass at Leiyn's feet. Her look made Leiyn's stomach clench, yet by the guilelessness of her friend's expression, Leiyn doubted she suspected the truth.

She thinks the forest witch killed the grass. It was a misunderstanding for which Leiyn was pathetically grateful.

Slowly, Isla nodded. "Pardon us," she said meekly to the dryvan, bowing her head as she did. "We must be leaving."

The skin-walker gave no sign of farewell but stared as they crossed the camp to their horses. Leiyn mounted and took her warbow in hand. Shooting from atop a horse in the dark was far from ideal, but she had a bad feeling it might soon be necessary.

She cast a final glance back at the dryvan, mostly to make sure it hadn't crept up on them. Though her gaze was averted, Leiyn had a prickling feeling that the woodland creature could sense her in a way Isla never could, her touch a tap against her walls.

Damming them tighter, Leiyn turned Steadfast down the path that their latest intruders had taken. With the night pressing closer, she and Isla set down it at a canter.

Select the next chapter to keep reading the sample, or pick up the full book through Amazon or Kickstarter.