North Dark | Chapter 10 of 21

Their faces are dirty, blackened with smoky tattoos and age. Those that do not carry crossbows carry large crude hooks on chains.

The thing in the trees was once a horse. Now it is eviscerated, hanging from wires on the tree branch, and rotating like some gruesome windchime. The blocks of muscle are frozen solid. Blackhawks chip at the ice. Two Crows stands in the snow, staring up at the frozen horse head and hooves hanging there like some bizarre and bloody constellation. He cannot guess the purpose or function of this art. He stares at it for a long moment, and then turns back to face his dogs, waiting on the trail.

Something happens. Some small event that he cannot exactly see or hear but he knows it is momentous and harbors a swift and coming badness for him. One of his dogs lowers, utters a gasping yelp, and the others notice. Some cower, others bark. The lead dog is dead; a stout crossbow bolt stands upright in his skull.

Two Crows draws his knife. He has left his fire iron and crossbow in the sled, too far ahead. He takes a fast step backward toward the tree and the squeaking mobile of horseparts. Four men emerge from the frozen trees ahead. They are each wrapped in furs and skins. They wear branches and dead leaves over their bodies in nets. Camouflage. Their faces are dirty, blackened with smoky tattoos and age. Those that do not carry crossbows carry large crude hooks on chains.

None speak. They only stare forward at Two Crows.

He reverses his hold on the knife, squares his shoulders, adopts a combat pose. The men huff and laugh at him.

His dogs take to barking, some try to run, others stand their ground and the conflicting motions jostle and overturn the sled. One of the roughnecks takes a knee and begins casually sorting through Two Crows’ gear.

“He don’t like you doing that,” one of them says. “I can see it in his eyes.”

“Let him speak up about it then.”

A man with a tobacco stained beard points his greasy lips at Two Crows. “What’s your name, kid?”

Two Crows raises his knife, narrows his eyes.

“Pah,” the man laughs him off, dismisses him, and joins his companion rooting through the upset sled pack.

Back away from my sled.

They ignore him, unroll his blankets, shake out his food, pocket his bullets by the handful.

“Untie the dogs,” one of them says.

Two Crows inhales. He calmly walks toward the men and they stop. One raises his crossbow at him and says, “Get yourself back.”

Two Crows walks right into the group, knifehand raised. The man fires and the crossbow bolt somehow passes high, trilling in the air as it slips past the hole in his head where his ear used to be. Two Crows stabs the shooter in the chest and all of the men shout out in alarm. He tries to pull the knife free but the man’s chest withholds and will not release it. One of the men takes to laughing. Another raises a heavy club and brings it down on Two Crows’ skull. It is a shattering blow that clouds his vision. Two Crows releases the buried knife and turns to face the man but someone else pulls him by his shoulders into the snow and dirt.

Heavy, vicious kicks follow. He is not allowed to return to his feet.

The knifed man falls to his knees holding the knifegrip with both hands. His breath is sharp and blasting, then it slows. The remaining men hoist Two Crows up and drag him into the woods. He wrestles away from them, drops to the snow and tries to stand again but someone boots his temple and that is the end of that. They raise up his light, limp body and carry him into the shadows.

---

What he senses first is motion. A swinging sickness in his stomach and nose. He comes to, snaps his head awake and registers the trembling, rocking sensation rising from the floorboards beneath him. His wrists are heavily chained. He is hooded and seated in the back of a cart. Others are grouped in here with him. He cannot grasp a sense of their number, only that the cabin is crowded, heavy with human bodies.

The pain in his jaw returns.

Until very recently, he had imagined that his appointment with Thrall would occur soon. Now, unless he can effect a quick escape, his revenge may have been stolen from him forever.

After a long, long time—probably a night and a day, he guesses—the wagon stops. The hooded prisoners all hush to listen to what this means for them. Horses breathe. Someone whimpers. A man’s boots crunch packed snow. Someone trudges around to the back of the carriage and manipulates a heavy iron lock, lowers a board and pulls a chain that rings out link by link as it is pulled through a hasp. A rough hand seizes Two Crows’ shoulder and swings him down from the wagon. He lands with a hard thump on the snow.

He is lifted by his triceps and stood on his feet. The hood is roughly drawn from his head.

A company of six men in furs, filthy armor and jewelry examine Two Crows by torchlight.

“You’ve stood up a corpse here,” a man in a thin white mustache says.

“You don’t want him to be pretty; you want him to be tough. This is that.”

“How much?”

“Fifty.”

“I’ll give you ten.”

“Funny joke.”

The mustached man shrugs and turns to walk off with his men.

“Twenty five.”

“Done.”

Two Crows is shoved forward. He stumbles on his cold, numb feet.

“Go stand by that tree,” the mustached man says.

Two Crows stands by a wide snowdraped pine tree and watches the slaver select another three people to buy: a short man and two Maunders.

---

The new slaves are rechained and walked behind a train of stout, aged horses through the snow into the woods. Two Crows has no idea where they are being led. They walk all night along a game trail. The slavers seem well used to the cold. At dawn they reach a camp of shell tents, men, and dogs on the talus of a mountainside. Two Crows does not know where he is. The slaves are directed to sit at a fire near a wall of stones. Two Crows sits like the others, chained hands between his knees. A line of leashed and battered dogs growl at them. The fire crackles and the smell of a red meat breakfast hangs in the air. One of the merchant men pours portions of some kind of cold gray meal onto the ground before each slave. Two Crows leans forward and scoops it up with his hands and painfully eats it, frozen dirt and all. The other slaves eat also. The merchant man ladles water from a bucket of melted snow into each slave’s mouth.

The slaves are given no further instructions and the slavers are not breaking their camp. There seems to be nothing for them to do, so one by one, the slaves curl on the ground and take to sleeping.

---

He wakes shivering by the dying fire. The camp is asleep, as are the other slaves. He sits up very slowly so as not to rattle his chains. He scans the camp and identifies every tent. A guard sits on a boulder by the fire, watching the captives. His head leans forward at an odd angle. Two Crows stares at him. The man is deeply asleep.

Two Crows stands slowly. One of the Maunder slaves lies on the ground, staring up at him with white eyes. He is awake. He nods to Two Crows. Go.

Two Crows leaves the camp, skulking as low and as quiet as he can manage. He does not bother searching the guard for a key to his chains, he will figure out how to remove the chains later, right now mere escape is the single priority.

There is no moon tonight. The woods are very dark and very cold as he tries to slip away.