2 Defiler of Tombs by William King Page A

turn back so soon, having made such a big show of setting off to find Olaf’s killer. Kormak fumbled in his pack for some dried beef and a handful of oats. He started a fire and began cooking some porridge.
    “You do that with the ease of long practise,” Brandon said.
    “Not all of us have cooks or manors or families,” said Kormak. “Some of us spend our lives on the road.”
    “It has not done you any harm to look at you. You’re still tough as the day we met. Look at the belly on me. I swear I’ve had to get the smith to adjust my armour half a dozen times in the last five years.”
    “You still remember how to swing a sword, don’t you?”
    “Not something you ever forget, Kormak. You just get a bit slower over the years but you make up for it with cunning.”
    The wolf came snuffling around. It did not look quite so hostile in the watery sunlight. It seemed to have gotten used to their presence. The horses did not like it though. Brandon looked at it as he was considering shooing it away but then thought the better of it. A head poked out from the inside of the wagon. It belonged to Aisha. She did not look sleepy.
    “I see you rise with the dawn, gentlemen,” she said. Once again her manners seemed courtly, not those of a Tinker woman. She clambered down off the back of the caravan. She strolled over to the horses and whispered something to each in turn that quieted them. She came over to the fire hunkered down beside it, warming her hands and staring into the flames as if she saw something there that they could not.
    “It’s a gift, being able to handle animals like that,” Brandon said dubiously. Clearly was suspicious of her magic. Aisha smiled at him.
    “It is. Like the gift for witchcraft.”
    “There are places where saying things like that could get you burned,” said Brandon.
    Aisha inclined her head towards Kormak. “That’s what I would have expected him to say.”
    Kormak held his peace. He was determined not to get into an argument. It was a pointless waste of energy. “You are a witch, aren’t you?” Brandon said.
    “Thinking of starting your own inquisition, are you?” Aisha asked. There was a humour in her tone that took the sting out of her mockery.
    Brandon chewed on the end of his moustache. “Just asking. We might have need of a healer soon.”
    Clearly, he had some forebodings about this trip whatever he said aloud. Aisha nodded as if she agreed. “I know how to patch wounds and use herbs and maybe a bit more. Your friend there can do the first two but I doubt he knows a healing spell.”
    “That’s true,” Kormak said.
    “And you’ll need a tracker if you’re hunting wizards in these hills.”
    “Are you volunteering?” Kormak asked.
    Aisha gestured to Shae. The wolf came over and laid its head on her lap. It watched Kormak with bright, too-intelligent eyes. The woman was not intending to do the tracking herself.
    “I am.”
    “Why?”
    “I am no more fond of tomb robbers than anyone else,” she said. She measured out ever word, as if saying them would cost her blood.
    “You don’t come from around here. These are not your hills. You can just turn around and go back.”
    “So can you, Guardian, but you won’t.”
    “I know why I am doing this. I want to know why I should let you come with me.”
    “Because I can help you and there is evil here which must be stopped. No one wants to see the old Lords of Kharon rise again. If they come from their graves who will oppose them now?”
    Her words made the air seem even more chilly. Kormak turned and stared back into the mists. It was all too easy to imagine shadowy shapes moving in it, but when he focused his gaze on them they seemed to vanish like wraiths. “I will,” Kormak said.
    “And who will help you, Champion of the Sun? Will you face them on your own?” He looked at her for a long time, wondering what her motive really was.
    “I would welcome your aid,” he said eventually.
    “Good. I will tell