Lawhead, Stephen R - Song of Albion 3 - The Endless Knot(1993) by The Endless Knot

Author:The Endless Knot
Language: bul
Format: epub

211

STEPHEN LAWHEAD

Before he could answer, someone shouted from the hillside below. We hurried at once to the place and found a second display just like the first: the body of a horse. Though, like the first, it scarcely resembled a horse any more.

The dead animal's hide was wet, as if covered with dew, the hair all bunched and spiky. An oddly colorless eye bulged from its socket, and a pale, puffy tongue protruded through the open mouth. But the remains were those of a creature starved to death whose corpse has collapsed inward upon itself-little more than skin stretched across a jumble of sharp-jutting bone.

The horse's ribs, shoulder blades, and haunches stood out starkly. Every tendon and sinew could be traced with ease. If we had starved the hapless beast and left it exposed on the hilltop all winter the sight would have been no more stark. Yet, as I knelt and placed my hand against the animal's bony throat, the sensation was so uncanny my hand jerked back as if my fingers had been burned.

“The carcass is still warm,” I said. “It is freshly killed.”

“But I see no blood,” Scatha observed, pulling her cloak high around her throat.

“Och, there is not a drop of blood left in the beast,” Cynan pointed out.

Appalled by the wizened appearance of the animals, it had not occurred to me to wonder why they looked that way. I considered it now. “It looks as though the blood has been drained from the carcass,” I said.

“Not blood only, I think,” Bran mused, answering my own thought. So saying, he lifted the point of his spear and sliced into the belly of the dead horse. There was no blood-no bodily fluid of any kind. The organs and muscle tissue were dry, with a stiff, woody appearance.

“Saeth du,” Cynan grunted, rubbing his neck. “Dry as dust.”

Tegid nodded grimly, and glanced around the long slope of hillside as if he expected to see a mysterious assailant escaping through the trees. There was little to be seen in the thin early morning light; the mist-draped trunks of trees, and a thick hoarfrost

212

SONG OF ALBION

covering grass and limbs and branches bled the color from the land until it looked like.., like the stiff and bloodless carcass before us.

The horse lay where it had fallen. Aside from a few strange, stick-like tracks around the head of the carcass, I could see no prints in the frosty grass. Nor were there any tracks leading away from the kill.

“Could an eagle do this?” I wondered aloud, knowing the notion absurd as the words left my lips. But nothing else suggested itself to me.

“No natural.born creature,” Bran said; he held his chin close to his chest. A good many others were unconsciously protecting their throats.

“Well?” I asked, looking to Tegid for an answer.

“Bran is right,” the bard replied slowly. “It was no natural creature.”

“What then?” demanded Cynan. “Mo anam, man! Will you yet tell us?”

Tegid frowned and lowered his head. “It was a stabur.” He uttered the word cautiously, as if it might hurt his tongue.

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