Book 2 - Shadows Linger by Glen Cook Page B

best general since the White Rose. She gave us a
terrible time before her Taking.
    The Rebel prophets were correct in their prophecies, except
about the last battle. They expected a reincarnated White Rose to
lead them. She did not. They did not find her in time.
    She was alive then. But she was living on our side of the
battleline, unaware of what she was. I learned who she was. It is
that knowledge which makes my life worthless should I be put to the
question.
    “Croaker!” the Captain snapped. “Wake
up!” Everybody looked at me, wondering how I could daydream
through whatever he’d said.
    “What?”
    “You didn’t hear me?”
    “No, sir.”
    He glowered his best bear glower. “Listen up, then. Be
ready to travel by carpet when the Taken arrive. Fifty pounds of
gear is your limit.”
    Carpet? Taken? What the hell? I looked around. Some of the men
grinned. Some pitied me. Carpet flight? “What for?”
    Patiently, the Captain explained, “The Lady wants ten men
sent to help Whisper and Feather in the Barrowland. Doing what I
don’t know. You’re one of the ones she
picked.”
    Flutter of fear. “Why me?” It was rough, back when I
was her pet.
    “Maybe she still loves you. After all these
years.”
    “Captain . . . ”
    “Because she said so, Croaker.”
    “I guess that’s good enough. Sure can’t argue
with it. Who else?”
    “Pay attention and you’d know these things. Worry
about it later. We have other fish to fry now.”
    Whisper came to Frost before the Limper. I found myself tossing
a pack aboard her flying carpet. Fifty pounds. The rest I had left
with One-Eye and Silent.
    The carpet was a carpet only by courtesy, because tradition
calls it that. Actually, it is a piece of heavy fabric stretched on
a wooden frame a foot high when grounded. My fellow passengers were
Elmo, who would command our team, and Kingpin. Kingpin is a lazy
bastard, but he swings a mean blade.
    Our gear, and another hundred pounds belonging to men who would
follow us later, rested at the center of the carpet. Shaking, Elmo
and Kingpin tied themselves in place at the carpet’s two rear
corners. My spot was the left front. Whisper sat at the right. We
were heavily bundled, almost to immobility. We would be flying fast
and high, Whisper said. The temperature upstairs would be low.
    I shook as much as Elmo and Kingpin, though I had been aboard
carpets before. I loved the view and dreaded the anticipation of
falling that came with flight. I also dreaded the Plain of Fear,
where strange, fell things cruise the upper air.
    Whisper queried, “You all use the latrine? It’s
going to be a long flight.” She did not mention us voiding
ourselves in fear, which some men do up there. Her voice was cool
and melodious, like those of the women who populate your last dream
before waking. Her appearance belied that voice. She looked every
bit the tough old campaigner she was. She eyed me, evidently
recalling our previous encounter in the Forest of Cloud.
    Raven and I had lain in wait where she was expected to meet the
Limper and lead him over to the Rebel side. The ambush was
successful. Raven took the Limper. I captured Whisper. Soulcatcher
and the Lady came and finished up. Whisper became the first new
Taken since the Domination.
    She winked.
    Taut fabric smacked my butt. We went up fast.
    Crossing the Plain of Fear was faster by air, but still
harrowing. Windwhales quartered across our path. We zipped around
them. They were too slow to keep pace. Turquoise manta things rose
from their backs, flapped clumsily, caught updrafts, rose above us,
then dived past like plunging eagles, challenging our presence in
their airspace. We could not outrun them, but outclimbed them
easily. However, we could not climb higher than the windwhales. So
high, and the air becomes too rare for human beings. The whales
could rise another mile, becoming diving platforms for the
mantas.
    There were other flying things, smaller and less dangerous,