The Sable Moon Read Online Free PDF Page B

behind them. Still the wolves lunged to the attack like mindless things, and still the bright sword drew their life’s blood. Then the leader barked, and they stopped, forming a ring just at the rim of the firelight. The big wolf sat behind them, grinning with long white teeth.
    Trevyn blazed into thoughtless fury at this thing he feared and did not understand. He threw his sword to the earth at his feet. “Come out, you!” he shouted. “Fight like other things of flesh! Rend me though you will, I will wrestle you to the ground and break your foul neck with my unaided hands!”
    The wolf raised his head and laughed, a high, sinister sound. “Not yet, Princeling,” he cried gaily. “Let us play yet a while. The time for us to meet will come soon enough, and it will be sweet, so sweet.…”
    Then they were gone, and the sound of weird wolfish laughter floated on the Forest air. Behind the fire, Arundel trembled and huddled against the sheltering rock.
    â€œSo!” Meg softly exclaimed. “Ye’re the Prince of Laueroc.”
    Sunk to earth and trembling in his turn, he couldn’t answer her. She tore strips from her muddy skirt, kneeled beside him, bound his hurts as best as she could before she spoke again. “I should’ve known it long since. But I never dreamed yer folks’d let ye go gadding about alone.”
    â€œThey don’t, as a rule,” he muttered. “Are you all right, Meg?”
    â€œTo be sure, I’m fine!” She smiled tightly. “They didn’t want me , those wolves.”
    He glanced up at her, wincing. “Is that what made you guess?”
    â€œEverything. Yer outlandish talk, yer lovely horse, yer lovely self …” She teased him, not being willing to say that she had seen his eyes blaze like green fire. But he did not seem able to smile.
    â€œYou saved my life,” he mumbled. “Meg, I’m sorry.…”
    â€œWhat?” she protested. “Ye’d rather be dead?”
    â€œNay, nay!” He had to laugh at her, though the movement brought tears of pain to his eyes. “Sorry I didn’t tell you more truth.… It’s hard.”
    â€œI can imagine,” she said wryly.
    The wolves still sang, sending echoes scudding like shadows between the trees. Trevyn could not talk anymore. He sat by the fire till dawn, shivering in spite of the warmth of the flames, and Meg kept him silent company. The wolves made the whole Forest wail, but they did not return.
    At daybreak, Meg and Trevyn quitted their comfortless campsite. The girl lived just beyond the Forest’s edge, near Lee. They headed that way, both on Arundel, with Molly trailing along behind. Trevyn felt tense, almost too shaky to ride. He wished that they could speed out of the Forest, but they had to travel slowly because of the cow. He found himself jerking to attention at every sound or stir. But before midday he smiled and sighed with relief. A search party thundered toward them, a dozen grim, armed men, headed by Rafe, the fiery lord of Lee. The troop hurtled up to them and pulled to a jarring halt. Rafe grabbed at Trevyn and missed. He nearly fell from his horse in his excitement.
    â€œTrevyn! Are you all right?” he shouted, and gave the youth no chance to answer. “By thunder, is that Meg?” He peered at the grimy girl. “Your father’s been bellowing for you since yesterday, lass. Trev, you young rascal, what have you been up to? Rescuing fair maidens?”
    Meg snorted; she had never felt less fair. Trevyn scarcely heard. “Wolves,” he muttered, and felt horror ripple through him, the horror of a nightmare not his own, the horror of a shadow not understood. Wolf and stag were both in Aene, he had been taught, like hawk and hare, water and fire, and all of these part of the old order that only man sometimes leaves—so how could the wolves turn against him? They had attacked him