Part 14 (1/2)

”Stop,” Mika said with a groan, turning his head to avoid the wet endearment Mika loved his wolf as much as the next man, but he drew the line at sobry kisses

There was so on somewhere close The noise echoed and thundered in his ears and he put a hand to his aching head To his surprise, it came away sticky with blood

Mika stared at his hand stupidly and tried to re ca the slope with the princess and the giant, but his e fuzziness as though he had been sick

His ripped it, but still he couldn't see that would account for his presence under the tree What was he doing here? Who had hit him and why?

It hurt to think Mika would have liked to lie down, to rest But there was all that noise A man couldn't possibly rest with all that racket Sounded like fighting

Mika groaned Maybe he had better go and see as happening He struggled to his feet, fighting the waves of dizziness and nausea that washed over him He planted one foot resolutely in front of the other and staggered uphill, gripping the trunks of trees and overhanging branches to pull hiiving little leaps, trying to lick Mika's face

”Down, Ta off the wolf ”Go see what all that noise is about and leave nored his orders, his concern for Mika far greater than his interest in outside events

As Mika dragged himself up the rocky, tree-covered slope, there was a terrible pain-filled shriek and then there was silence Muttering to hi head, Mika tottered into the s and stopped in open-mouthed amazerey stood tethered to tree li on the tender tips of branches

To the left of the horses, lying on the downhill edge of the clearing was the giant, Recknass, flat on his back, his skull a bloody ruin

Mika gawked at Recknass in total disbelief, his headache totally forgotten Soe brute! Mika could scarcely comprehend it His h so would dawn if he only looked long enough

But nothing changed and understanding did not dawn, no ulped, and then gazed on the rest of the strange scene

Sprawled on the ground next to the giant was the princess, her pink silk gown in disarray, exposing her slender, delicate legs fro her beautiful face with clouds of shi+ black curls that cascaded down her chest,her bosom, which rose and fell in a most provocative er, and closer for that matter, but she appeared to be alive and well, albeit still asleep, so he reluctantly turned his eyes toward the third figure in the strange tableaux

Lying on the ground furthest from Mika, on the far side of the princess, was Hary, who lay with his ar up at the sky, unseeing, glazed with that terrible vague opacity that belongs only to death A long-handled knife, which Mika easily identified as belonging to the giant, was buried to the hilt in the center of his chest Clutched in his right hand was a heavy tree liore

It was too much to take in Especially for a ot Mika's knees wobbled and he put a shaky hand out and sat down on the ground, staring at the bizarre trio, still trying to make some sense out of the situation

”Well, they must have killed each other,” he said, slowly ”That h thinking that even he could have deduced as ht? I thought they were friends The only one they disliked was me! I don't understand this at all I don't even knohat happened to roaned Mika

Suddenly a series of sharp yapping barks burst on thenolls!

So wrapped up had he been in the pain of his head and then the terrible discovery of the bodies, that he had actually forgotten why they were alone on the ridge and what they were supposed to be doing

Sounds carried well in the cold clear air, and he sat there on the dank ground and hugged his knees as he listened in sick horror to the ravening cries of hyenas and gnolls running their luckless prey to earth

There was a clash of steel on steel, a short fight, then desperate screams, both huhting over the scraps of flesh

There was no way of telling how close the creatures were, but it was obvious that they were on the mountainside

”Close, Tae over We'd better get out of here before they find us, too” And all the while he wondered who the gnolls had gotten, whether it was Hornsbuck or one of the others he had known and liked

It hurt his head to bend over, but fear of the gnolls drove him on He leaned over and slid his arhtened up and the princess hung from his arms like a sack of stones A pretty sack of stones

”By the Great She Wolf, she's heavy,” grunted Mika as he began dragging the princess over to the horses He tried to lift her up onto the roan, but she hung from his arms limply, without any stiffness in her backbone

He took a deep breath and tried to heave her up over the saddle She slid back down and lay in a heap at his feet

Muttering ot down on his hands and knees and positioned the princess until she was sitting on his shoulder He grabbed her wrists and held on tight Then, slowly, he got to his knees with the princess wobbling on his shoulder like a drunken parrot A heavy drunken parrot He got to his feet and stood up slowly Slowly, slowly, he allowed the princess to fall over the saddle He placed a hand on her back to hold her steady Then, just as he was reaching for his belt to tie her in place, she began to slide Forward

Mika h his fingers like wind through trees and the princess slid over the saddle and landed on the ground on the far side of the horse with a oing to have a headache,” he said to Tam ”She certainly will, too, if she ever wakes up She's pretty, all right, but is she worth all this fuss? da inspirationalhis belt, he lashed the princess's wrists together and then tied Hary's scarf around the belt Positioning himself on one side of the horse and the princess on the other side, he laboriously hauled her over the saddle and then, passing the scarf under the horse's belly, tied it round her ankles

Mika stepped back, breathing hard, and examined his handiwork The princess was secure, even if she did look like a pink silk sack of wheat Taan to whine nervously, his ears twitched forward, and he danced from one foot to the other

”Gnolls, eh?” Mika asked, looking down the flank of the hill, following the direction of Ta,” he said as he leaped onto the grey ”We've been lucky to escape the At least these till buy us some time”

The horses were nervous too The whites of their eyes rolled and their ears were pasted flat to their heads The grey tried to rear and, showing so his head around and tried to bite Mika's leg Mika yanked the reins hard, sawing the grey's head in the other direction He slashed hi his heels into the horse's ribs and the grey bounded forward as though shot by an arrow

Mika held the roan's reins in his hand, forcing it to follow his lead Together they plunged up the steep hill, into the shadow of the trees, and with the cries of gnolls and hyenas echoing in their ears, raced for safety

Chapter 15

THE SLOPES RANG with the screeching yowls of the gnolls and the horrible yapping of the hyenas Mika could tell when they succeeded in cornering and ulti down some hapless human by the terrible cries of the victims Wolf howls cascaded down the slopes periodically before they too ended abruptly, and Mika knew that wolves and no

He tried to close his ears to the horrible cries, knowing that people he knew and cared about were being killed He said a prayer to the Great Wolf Mother that Hornsbuck was not a his own course

Several tirey up hard, on the point of turning and riding to help, only to realize that it was useless There was no way of telling where the battle was being fought, and by the tiuided chivalry would only serve to endanger the princess, as well as hiri froh it sheltered the enenolls were closing in on hi him on either side

Now the earth rose steeply on Mika's right, forcing hie Mika knew that it would be death should they descend farther, and he pushed the horses on, fighting thee across dangerous slopes they would never have atteht

The moon, tiny sliver that it was, rose over a cruel landscape The trees were below them now, and a cold wind keened harshly across a barren vista of sharp rocks and sheer drops

They rode along a narrow path, no real trail, but an eroded watercourse that flowed from the crest of the peak The land was steeply pitched on either side, bare stone that caused the horses' hooves to clatter loudly, reverberating in the confines of the narrow defile