Lord of Snow and Ice. Heather Massey

very elements about them seemed to favor the fair-haired one of Belleressort. And now for the real test. Lionel glanced ahead at the maze of tangled growth. Let’s see you beat me now! I’ll have that stag in my stable yet.

      Before he could relish his victory further, an anguished screech rendered all else mute.

      Lionel brought his horse up too quickly and it reared. Edward, advancing rapidly behind him, banked sharply in avoidance. The other riders slowed and grouped around them haphazardly.

      “What in high blazes was that?” cried Edward.

      Lionel cursed, fighting to regain control of his spooked steed. “It came from the woods ahead,” he announced through gritted teeth. “Confound it, horse! Stop flouncing about like a skittish cat!” His agitated tone did little to assuage the frightened animal beneath him.

      The men stared ahead into the enveloping darkness of branch and leaf, their mouths agape. “Something must have happened to the stag,” said one finally.

      “Probably a wolf,” added another. “Or a mountain lion.”

      A weighted silence poured from the forest. Lionel peered toward the edge. His breathing sounded unnaturally loud, as did the panting of his companions. When he spoke, his words came out flat in the still air. “No mountain lion could capture that stag.” He looked solemnly at his cousin.

      “Maybe the scream was a tactic to scare us off,” said Edward. His voice, too, lacked normal resonance.

      Then Lionel realized what was missing–every single ambient sound. How bizarre. “Well, should we enter here,” he said, gesturing to the uneven path before them, “or split up and–wait, did you hear that?” His right hand immediately shot up, a signal for absolute silence.

      The sound of splintering tree limbs cracked the air.

      Then again.

      And again.

      A heavy thumping sound soon followed. Edward motioned for the men to regroup. Without hesitation, they formed a line. Shallow ruts developed as the horses, nostrils flaring, dug into the grass with their hooves.

      Some of the trees shook, scattering their leaves like flies in a maelstrom.

      Then…nothing.

      Lionel waited with his men, hardly daring to breathe. Finally…

      He blew out a breath. “Oh, it’s nothing but an earth tremor. Let’s continue, shall we?”

      Edward threw up his hands. “It wouldn’t kill you to wait another minute.”

      “Perhaps for you, but my minutes are very precious.” Lionel urged his horse forward at a trot, but it took some doing as the animal didn’t share his confidence.

      He had just reached the shadow of the nearest branch when a particularly loud crunch shattered the air about him. A tremendous growl followed. Low at first–guttural. This was followed by mile-deep intonations, the bass of which seemed to shake the very earth around him. Lionel stiffened. As his horse eased slowly back, he did not move to stop it.

      He made a quarter turn, attempting to keep one eye on the forest. “I…think we may have something here.”

      A colossal, bloated creature advanced from between two trunks. It rose up on two massive chunks of hind legs. Viscid slabs of flesh ringed them from hips to paws. Bits of leaves and twigs clung to darkened flesh that perhaps once had sprouted fur. Oozing red sores as wide as a man’s chest spotted the creature, which was now moving considerably faster as it neared the clearing.

      Lionel’s gloved hand flew to his face. A preposterously foul odor preceded the animal. It smelled worse than a sop barrel. Worse even than the entrails of a freshly slaughtered animal. Lionel wondered where he had encountered the scent before. Then he remembered.

      It smelled like death.

      But despite the unmistakable odor and loathsome hide, the creature lived. Its mucus-coated eyes fixated on Lionel and his horse.

      “Run, Lionel!” urged one of his men.

      Lionel risked a quick look back. His companions stared at the monster with a mixture of fascination and disgust–here was a creature unknown to any of them. But Lionel only allowed his horse to retreat several feet. Such an abomination, he thought. An animal this horrid must be destroyed. With slow urgency, he drew his sword.

      “Steady,” he whispered. But the horse, an intelligent creature now convinced more than ever who had the better sense, inched timidly back.

      The hideous beast growled again. Its putrid breath washed over Lionel like a wet, suffocating blanket. The animal’s heavy jowls flopped back and forth while a blackened snout peeled back to reveal what was left of its large white fangs.

      With a snarl, it attacked.

      Lionel roared and hoisted his sword, but he was too late. Lumbering forward, the beast raised one of its filthy paws and swiped away, knocking him from his horse. The ground rushed toward him at a ridiculous velocity. He bounced upon landing and heard a sickening pop as his right arm bore the full force of the impact. Intense pain racked his body within moments.

      The earth shook beneath him. Raising his head, he watched in a daze as the beast singled him out and began to accelerate.

      “Bloody sword, where are you?” he mumbled. Consciousness threatened to slip away. Vaguely, he heard Edward shouting something and was aware the men were regrouping. Did they mean to save him? “You’ll never make it in time,” he said hoarsely. “Just get away!”

      The air about the beast began to sing. Arrows filled the sky, but it was all for naught, ineffectual. Shooting the creature seemed much like shooting into a pile of mud. The arrows merely glanced off, or hung loosely in the beast’s thick hide. The creature might as well have wandered into a cluster of windborne dandelion seed. Rocks and other sharp objects launched from slingshots were none the better. Nothing slowed its advance, nothing.

      Lionel groaned. The bloated monster seemed intent on plunging its decomposing gums into his neck for sure. He tried to crawl away, but his arm had lost all motivation to cooperate. He thought back to the red-haired wench. She’d believed him to be “quite striking–breathtakingly so.” Was this to be his epitaph?

      Then seemingly out of nowhere, another rider appeared, dark as shadow. Lionel watched groggily while a black horse leaped into the gap between him and the monstrous beast. The mystery rider drew and fired a number of arrows in quick succession, succeeding in piercing the hide in several places where Lionel’s men had not. The creature halted, bellowing out its pain and swatting clumsily at the points of contact.

      Astride his horse, the stranger glanced over his shoulder at Lionel. His head was ringed with the hazy aura of the afternoon sun, and the effect obscured his features. “Now would be a good time to run,” he urged.

      Even through the fog of pain, Lionel discerned the confident, resonant tone of the man’s voice. Who in the Five Lands are you? A bout of snarls and barks erupted on his right. Lionel stared in amazement as a large white wolf joined the fray, its face twisted into a menacing grimace. Fur stood on end as it slowly circled the mutant animal like some sort of perimeter guard.

      Calmly, as if it would be a sin to rush, the mystery man pulled an object from a well-worn sack and affixed it to an arrow tip. He raised his bow, then fired. The arrow landed in the center of the creature’s gaping maw.

      The animal stopped. It advanced toward the stranger a few feet and then stopped again. Confusion plagued its movements. The monstrosity began to sway. Its angry wail ripped through the air, one filled with the haunted, choking gasps of a being meeting its mortality. Lionel watched in fascination as the creature cascaded to the ground in one stinking, sordid heap.

      The beast that smelled like death was no more.

      Three sets of eager hands clutched at Lionel and dragged him back a good twenty feet