Bloodfire Quest (The Dark Legacy of Shannara, #2)(44)

Afterward, safely off to one side as the cat things moved on, the Dwarf said, “Those aren’t anything I’ve ever heard of or seen, either. Not anywhere in the Four Lands.”

She was silent a moment. “I don’t think that’s where we are,” she answered quietly.

It took him aback. “What do you mean? Where else would we be?”

Her face began to change again, the wolfish side emerging. “Somewhere no one has ever been, maybe. Somewhere bad.”

He thought about it for a moment. They hadn’t crossed any large bodies of water, so they had to be still on the mainland. She was saying they were in a place within the Four Lands—or maybe just outside the known boundaries—that no one had been before. But even that didn’t feel right.

“Wherever we are,” he finished, climbing to his feet again, “we shouldn’t be there.”

They walked for the rest of that day and for two full days afterward and still didn’t reach the mountains. Time and again, they encountered new dangers, ones that neither had come across before. A huge lizard attacked Crace Coram, and it took all of Oriantha’s animal skills and strength to drive it away. A strange plant threw spikes at the shape-shifter, and the poison on the tips of the three that penetrated her animal hide would have killed her if the Dwarf hadn’t cut into her skin with his hunting knife and sucked it out. Twice more they encountered the cat things, and once they saw the dragon fly overhead, scouring the ground below for food.

It was becoming increasingly apparent that the chances were shrinking of finding their missing companions—if they were even still alive, which Crace Coram was beginning to doubt. Sooner or later, something bad was going to get one of them—or, more likely, both at once—and that would be the end. He kept his thoughts to himself, but they burned like live coals in the back of his mind.

Then, midway into the fifth day, Tesla Dart appeared.

They saw the small lizard first, a swift, momentary glimpse of it as it raced toward them and then away again. Because it was not threatening, they paid little attention. Even when it reappeared several hours later for a second look and a second quick disappearance, they barely gave it a thought. They were trudging along as before, trying to keep themselves alert enough to watch for predators, trying to stay focused in spite of the fact that their food had run out and their water was down to a single skin they had filled two days ago at a tiny stream where they saw other creatures drinking. They had ceased talking to each other except when it couldn’t be avoided, conserving their strength, knowing it was seeping away with each hour’s passing.

Oriantha was in the lead, as usual, reverted to her lupine shape, her attention riveted on the landscape and the things that lived there. They had gone all morning without a threatening encounter, and there was reason to think they might reach nightfall without having to endure one. This day was darker than those that had preceded it, and a misty rain had been falling since first light.

They had just crested a low rise, climbing through jagged rocks and loose stone, when they first saw Tesla. Neither knew who or even what this new creature was, and they stopped where they were. Tesla was sitting just ahead of them, back resting against a stump, watching them. Crace Coram had the distinct impression that Tesla had been waiting for them, but he could not imagine how that could be. Even so, his hand tightened on the iron mace as he made a quick survey of his surroundings.

The Ulk Bog rose and waved. “Greetings, friends of Straken Queen! Come speak with me.”

“Straken Queen?” the Dwarf muttered.

Oriantha had come loping back to him and was changing to her human self, her feral features fading as she stood upright once more. “Nothing hides here,” she said. “The girl is alone.”

“Girl?” He snorted. “How can you tell what that is?”

Oriantha gave him a look. “Who are you?” she called out to the creature. “Give us your name!”

“I am Tesla Dart! I am Ulk Bog. Like my uncle, Weka Dart? You know of him? Come here! I have searched for you for two days! What are you doing out here?”

The girl and the Dwarf walked over to her, and she rose to greet them—a mass of bristling black hair that seemed to grow in clumps, a gnarled body that was wiry and misshapen, and some very sharp teeth that revealed themselves when she attempted what appeared to be a smile.

“You are in dangerous country,” Tesla Dart advised, looking from one to the other. “You need to come with me.”

“Why were you searching for us?” Oriantha asked her. “How do you know of us at all?”

“The Straken Queen tells me you were lost. We looked for you, she and I and the others. For several days. But then I left them and went ahead to see if you were in a dragon’s lair. But you were not. So I know it is a different dragon that takes you away, even though I think it was this one. You can never be sure about dragons.”

“The Straken Queen?” Oriantha was suddenly animated. “You mean the Ard Rhys? Khyber Elessedil?”

Tesla Dart frowned. “She is the Straken Queen. She says not, but she is. These others, I don’t know of these names. But nothing matters now. They are all gone.”

Crace Coram exchanged a quick glance with Oriantha. “What do you mean?” he asked. “Gone where?”

The Ulk Bog wrung her hands in a peculiarly helpless fashion. “I tell them to wait for me. I tell them not to go anywhere until I come back. But the creatures that serve the Straken Lord come. His Catcher sees something that tells him they are close and is waiting for them. I wish to warn them, but I must hide until it is safe. But they do not wait as I say, and then they turn back. Tarwick is waiting. A trap.”