Methias took a long moment to collect himself, drew a deep breath, and walked on. Just as before, Mezofel fell into step at his side.
As they walked, he gathered what information he could. The hill in question was broad at its base, sloping gently upward. Its crown was utterly hidden by a dense ring of red—the trees, vines, and underbrush possessed by the Hollow Ones.
Yes, but also no. They may ring the hillside, but they don’t form a proper circle. Given how they march away from the dirt track I’m on, the hill must be … long. Can’t see how long from this vantage, but … long, yes. Still, he shook his head, stone in sky, there are so many trees! Whoever or whatever gathered the Hollow Ones was clearly more worried about defending this place than keeping it hidden.
Mezofel bent his head, shoving gently at Methias’s right arm and whickering softly.
“What about them?” He cocked his head to the side as if listening, then looked toward the looming hill again. “Ahhh, you’re right. There aren’t so many as all that, then.” He wondered how he’d missed it. The pines atop the hill clearly were, or had once been, ancient. They stretched well over a hundred feet in height. But the pines were forked near the base of their trunks.
Wise. He paused, considering before he continued their walk. Once the Hollow Ones took possession of vegetation, they only grew when they could find a sufficiency of meat. They didn’t need it to survive, but they did need it to grow or walk to a new location.
The amount of meat required to move that many would have been … massive. There are still a good deal more of them gathered here than nature would allow, mind. But you’re right. It’s not the multitudes I thought I’d seen. For all that, they were so closely packed that they reminded him of the great banyans that were said to have swallowed the ancient cities of the southern springs. He’d seen them only once as he’d fled northward, but they’d made an impact on him, not least because of the wealth of figs they’d provided to a starving boy.
That was before Traead… before Jannon found me. Before—The thought flared, then fled like summer lightning.
The base of the hill was still a few yards ahead, but he’d gotten close enough to make out several dashes of white and grey among the red grasses. Cobbles? Yes! A cobblestone path leading up to … stairs. If he’d had any doubts as to the import of this particular hill, this discovery removed it.
“Stay here.” Methias’s voice—not overly expressive at the best of times—had taken on a flat, dull tone. “I’ll be as quick as I can.”
Mezofel stomped a single time but otherwise made no noise. Still, it was clear he wasn’t happy with his master’s choice.
As he gained the first cobbles, Methias caught the strong smell of salt and iron. The Hollow Ones couldn’t be active due solely to him, could they? No. Certainly not. There must be someone or something beyond them—near at hand, though not close enough for the vines to catch.
He reached back beneath his cloak as he moved. He’d prepared for a fight. Only a fool came to the wilds any other way. But if he could avoid one...
Once he’d hauled his haversack around to rest on his right hip, he opened its main pocket. Fresh boar meat, he thought. Fresh boar meat from this afternoon’s hunt. Drawing and holding a modest breath, he allowed his hand to pass the pocket’s lip.
For an instant, he felt nothing. Oh, there was the mild temperature difference within the bag’s commodious main chamber. He could feel that even through his tight leather glove. His splayed fingers, however, found nothing solid. He closed his hand slowly and withdrew it. A thin smile crawled across his lips as he felt the sudden weight of the massive boar steak in his grasp.
Checking back over his shoulder to confirm Mezofel’s distance, he moved a few feet farther up the hill. The trees were positively shaking, though their windless movement was without doubt drawing away from him, toward the hill’s top. He looked up and addressed himself to the nearest two trees and their attendant shrubs. As he spoke, those same trees turned their leaves and vines toward him with sudden and vicious fervor.
Mezofel gave out a low warning that needed no bond to translate.
“I’d not taunt you. I wish to pass beyond you, up the hill, for which I will gladly pay the toll.” He waited a moment for Mezofel to deliver the message, then spoke on. “Will you let me pass?”
The trees shook hard enough to nearly uproot themselves. And if they’ve drawn in a sufficiency of blood… Methias felt his stomach turn to lead, his blood growing cold. No. If they’d had enough blood and meat to charge me, they wouldn’t give me warning. But they have been kept from slumber. Something must be close … and bleeding.
He eyed the way the trees had planted themselves. There’s a gap to the left I could’ve simply walked through, were they merely trees. If I’m quick…
Methias hurled the boar steak high. It would land, if it were allowed to land before the Hollow Ones grabbed it, on the right, farthest from the gap. He watched as the tree in question lashed out at its prize, nearly folding itself in half in the process.
He had a moment to feel a mixture of awe and outright horror, then leapt into motion. An awful, creaking groan sounded directly above him as he sprinted toward the widening gap. Another, heavier groan came from above and to his left.
There’s a whistling sound, too… like trees in a storm. No wind, just the Hollow Ones striving. That shriller sound’s getting louder. It’s familiar. It’s … pine song!
He skidded to a halt in the very nick. The ancient tree to the left of the gap—now bent at the nearest of its twin trunks—brought its massive weight down like a falling catapult stone. Methias had an instant to register that, had he not stopped when he did, the impact would have crushed him into jelly in that instant.
To his left, the tree began hauling its trunk back into its upright position. To his right, the Hollow One he’d distracted with the boar steak had apparently finished its main course and decided on Methias for afters. In its haste, its middle branches became momentarily entangled with its neighbor, and the two began to tussle.
Methias could only stare. Two hoary red giants—these massive trees with bifurcated trunks—wrestled mere feet away, and all he could do was stare. It was as much out of awe as it was horror. His perception of time slowed, stretching to a nightmarish crawl.
I’m a child … watching as the runaway cart hurtles toward me. Yet even recognizing this, he found it impossible to look away, let alone to move.
He felt a fierce pinching in the nerves behind his forehead—heard Mezofel’s shrill cry. That broke his torpor. Whether it was the note of obvious panic in his familiar’s throat or the painful pinch Mezofel had placed on Methias’s Eye of Night, he didn’t know.
Nor does it matter. They won’t focus on one another forever. If I mean to go…
He dragged iron-laced air into his lungs and bolted, jumping over undulating roots as they ripped out of the ground and the occasional lashing vine. He leapt the last yard, rolling on his dim-side shoulder. A bright brand of sudden pain caused him to snap his teeth together and growl. The sound was short-lived. His teeth had come together so suddenly that he’d managed to bite both sides of his tongue. He tasted blood, but never mind. He had other matters to contend with. A carmine-colored briar vine had wrapped around his leg, trying to pull him back. Its spines had managed to bite into the leather of his boot deeply enough that he could feel their sharp points in his flesh.
He turned to face the vine, staring. He knew he must look a sight, were there anyone to see him just sitting there, but…
Let go… Please! Let go! I don’t want to hurt you if I don’t have to. Hells, you’ve suffered enough.
It was no good. The Hollow One wanted him, and that was that. He may as well have wished for winter never to come.
He felt it begin to drag him, trying with maddening slowness to pull him back toward the trees. He squeezed his eyes shut, then raised his bright hand and pointed his little finger at the thorny red rope.
“Zeteek hecn berek ruulth.” His voice was low and cold beneath the tumult of the Hollow Ones. His face, however, made no effort to hide his sadness.
(Your blood burns now.)
At once, the vine stiffened, then lashed backward, releasing his leg. As it withdrew, its surface began to crack and darken—thin ribbons of crimson steam escaping into the open air. The accompanying sound was monstrous… a rising, ephemeral whistle, a fibrous tearing—the defiler’s hand as it rips open a victim’s bodice.
He refused to look away. His master had battered that instinct out of him early on. If you’d work the rite, you must own its end. The vine made it a few yards farther before it simply fell, listless, to the ground. As if in response to this, the trees stopped their warring with one another, though the world had not grown silent.