The ground beneath seemed to undulate like the surface of a lake. Taking a ragged breath, Van gripped his knees and fought down nausea. The sensation of hard bone beneath his hands brought with it the relief of knowing that he’d returned to his body.
Van pressed a shaking hand to his forehead and raised his face to see Ohfan, drenched in sweat, bent over his father and frantically shouting as he pressed his hands against the old man’s arm.
“Father! Please! Come back! Father!”
The smell of blood filled Van’s nostrils. It poured from Kenoi’s arm.
One of the warriors ripped a strip of cloth from his shirt, slipped it under the Dog King’s arm and around his shoulder, and then tied it tightly.
An arrow was stuck in the ground beside them. Someone must have shot him. Assuming it was a Mukonian, Van peered through the trees toward the Mukonian forces and their Lafan allies. A fierce battle was underway. The torches borne by the Lafan lay scattered on the snow, and swords flashed in their weak light. A scream accompanied each flash.
Some of the Lafan archers must have escaped into the woods because arrows flew from the trees occasionally. Still, it was a losing battle for them. The Ahfal Oma warriors cut them down one by one.
Kenoi opened his eyes. Pushing Ohfan’s hand away, he struggled up to a sitting position and stared at Van. His eyes glittered beneath his disheveled white hair.
“Why?” he gasped, forcing the word from his throat.
Van stared back at him without answering. His mouth tasted bitter—a hideous aftertaste. While one with the beast, he’d been drunk on the ecstasy of biting, but now he was filled with self-loathing. A deep remorse scorched his breast. Van had let that thing nesting within him take control.
What will become of the young man I bit when my soul was fused with that dog?
He was surely infected with mittsual. No one could save him now.
Because of me…
Van groaned. However, it was too late for regret. Van had done the last thing he ever wished to.
That creature inside me is a monster. It clings to me and wears my face, but the words it mutters in my ear are not my thoughts. It summons the darkest urges that lurk in my heart, driving me insane.
Yet for all that, it filled him with relief—the reassurance that to merge with that rushing torrent was just fine. It convinced Van that relinquishing himself to the flow was natural.
Madness and grief filled the old man’s eyes. They demanded answers.
“I thought you understood,” they said wordlessly. “I thought you realized that all I want is to make amends; to give my people a future and let them return to the plains; to slake their burning thirst to see their homeland. That disease only kills Mukonians and Zolians. Isn’t it a fitting punishment for the greedy ones who took land that isn’t theirs and claimed it as their own?
“I thought you would replace this sick old man as the leader of the pack and guide us down the road to eternal peace, so that we could regain our homeland without even having to fight for it.
“Surely you, too, must long to reclaim the peaceful life wrenched from your grasp. So why?”
Van forced his breath out between clenched teeth.
He didn’t know how to voice the thoughts building within him. He recalled the face of the young Zolian warrior and the fear rising in his eyes.
He opened his mouth to speak, but his voice came out like a hoarse whisper. “To fight means to dirty your own hands. You should pick a battle that suits your size. One within reach of your own hands.”
The old man shook his head violently. Gripping his son’s arm, he yelled, “Stop—”
But he was interrupted by stocky warriors who burst into view, dragging a slim figure between them. As they came closer, Van saw that their captive was a woman.
They threw her at Ohfan’s feet. “We found her up a tree. She’s the one who shot Kenoi.”
She was barely conscious. Her eyelids fluttered, but all strength seemed to have fled her body, and she lay helpless on the ground. An ermine wrap like the sort worn by the Lafan as prayers for protection was around her neck.
Ohfan stared down at her, frowning. “So even the Lafan women are archers.”
One of his men stepped forward and bowed. He placed the tip of a blood-soaked blade against the woman’s throat. Before he could do any more, however, he cried out and clapped a hand to his eye.
Van, still crouched from slinging the stone, dashed forward, slipped an arm under the woman, and swung her across his shoulders. After that, only Kenoi was able to follow his movements.
With the woman still draped over his shoulders, Van kicked the warrior’s sword arm. It flew wide, and the blade came for Ohfan, who jumped back. The point still managed to graze his thigh, though.
“You!!” he shouted, but by then, Van had already disappeared into the woods. Van drew a deep breath and issued a shrill summons without slowing. Before the sound had faded into the darkness, Olaha bounded up in front of him.
“Kill him!” Ohfan roared. “Don’t let him get away!”
Bows twanged, and arrows whistled through the air, but they could not stop Van.
He threw the woman onto the pyuika’s back and swung himself up behind her. Hunching himself over her body, he pressed his thighs into Olaha’s flanks and urged him forward. The pyuika shot through the forest like the arrows lancing after them, flying over the ground, weaving among trees, and sailing through tangled shrubs and thickets.
The wind lashed Van’s cheeks. Sadness oozed from the pit of his stomach. He felt the despair in Kenoi’s eyes clinging to his back. He hadn’t wished to betray him like this. He would’ve preferred to talk more and seek a path toward mutual understanding.
Unfortunately, it was too late. He’d acted without thinking, and the dice had been cast. Van couldn’t suffer to watch them kill this woman. He’d decided that of his own accord.
Shoving down the thoughts that shook his being, Van shouted, “Run, Olaha!”