Chapter 4 The Shadow of the Spurs Edge
THE SHADOW OF THE SPURS EDGE
Jorne hadn’t lied—the wagon shook her teeth with every rut, a jarring passage that left her aching.
Yet Gessa was grateful for every lurch that carried her further south from Hillston.
She kept to herself, huddled in the back of the second wagon amidst bundles of hides that reeked of tannins and animal musk.
The stench was suffocating, just as promised, but along with her new, drab clothing and the choppy remnants of her hair, it helped her fade into the background.
Jorne, true to his word, asked no questions beyond her initial destination of Three Streams, and the two dour wagon drivers paid no mind to a lone, quiet woman.
For three days, she ate sparingly, observed, and allowed her throbbing ankle to rest, changing the comfrey poultice when she could manage it discreetly.
The hematite remained a constant pressure against her skin, a silent guardian.
At the muddy crossroads of Three Streams, larger and noisier than Hillston, Jorne’s caravan turned east. This was where Gessa had to part ways.
With a curt nod to the caravan master, she slipped away from the wagons, hoisting the strap of her bag higher on her shoulder.
The Spurs Edge foothills—her next daunting objective—lay to the south.
Here, the King’s writ ran thin. She was passing beyond the edge of the Concordium, into the wild margins where the maps were drawn in pencil, not ink.
Once clear of Three Streams, alone again with only the sigh of the wind in the tall grasses, a strange lightness unfurled in Gessa’s chest. The rigid vigilance of the settlements eased, shifting into the instinctual awareness of a creature returning to the wild.
Her ankle remained tender, twinging if she pushed too hard, but it finally bore her weight without the constant, sickening throb of injury.
The sun on her face, the scent of pine and damp earth, the untamed expanse of the rolling foothills—it was a balm.
Polan’s voice in her mind grew fainter here, silenced by the rustle of leaves or the call of an unfamiliar bird.
Hardships remained: nights were cold and food was scarce.
She scavenged, relying on the herbalism of her youth—knowledge she had possessed before the marriage, before he trapped her in a world of silk and silence.
She dug for tubers and identified bitter greens, her hands reclaiming the skills he had deemed beneath her station.
The track was often little more than a game trail, but these were honest hardships, clean and simple.
For the first time in years, moments of actual joy—sharp and unexpected as a winter berry—pierced her.
A sunrise painting the peaks of the Spurs Edge range in gold and rose; the startled flick of a deer’s white tail as it bounded away; the quiet, simple satisfaction of finding a clear spring to refill her waterskin.
This, she thought, her hand finding the hematite. This is freedom. And it is worth any price.
That fragile freedom sustained her for several more days as she pushed deeper into the Spurs Edge foothills.
The terrain grew wilder, the game trails harder to discern.
One sweltering afternoon, having marched beyond the last reliable line on her stolen map, dread began to gnaw at her.
She was hopelessly lost. Stumbling through a dense thicket of bush, half-convinced she would die there of thirst, she almost stepped into a loop of wire concealed in the grass.
A snare. Her heart slammed against her ribs. Someone lived here.
She followed the faint signs of passage, moving with a silent caution, until she emerged into a tiny, hidden clearing.
A low cabin of rough logs and river stone crouched against the rock face, nearly swallowed by the moss, smoke curling thinly from a chimney built into the cliff itself.
Before she could take another step, a low growl vibrated from the shadows near the door.
A massive grey wolf-dog detached itself from the gloom, yellow eyes fixed on her, lips peeling back to reveal white fangs.
Then, a woman stepped from the cabin’s doorway, moving with a silent grace that spoke of years in the wild.
She was lean and wiry, her face etched by sun and wind, her hair the color of weathered silver plaited tightly down her back.
She held a short, powerful bow with an arrow nocked, aimed at Gessa’s chest. Her eyes, the same piercing yellow-grey as her dog’s, were unwelcoming. This had to be Marta.
“State your purpose, stranger.” The woman’s voice was low, raspy as dry leaves, but carried the weight of authority. The dog remained frozen, waiting for a command.
Gessa’s mouth went dry. She raised her hands slowly, palms open, trying to look harmless.
She was painfully aware of her disheveled state and her strange, chopped hair.
The story she had prepared felt flimsy under that unwavering gaze.
“I… I am a pilgrim,” Gessa began, her voice hoarse.
“My name is… Aenya. I seek the Shrine of the Whispering Bells, said to lie deep within the Spurs Edge Foothills. I… I fear I have lost my way.”
Marta’s expression didn’t change. Her eyes flicked down to Gessa’s ruined ankle, then back to her face. “Pilgrim, you say? You look more like a hunted doe. What god demands such a penance in these wild parts, so far from any known shrine?”
Gessa swallowed, forcing herself to meet that penetrating stare. “A private vow, for… for a family lost to sickness. The shrine is said to offer solace.” She tried to feign a weary piety.
For a long moment, Marta said nothing. She simply studied her, the silence broken only by the low rumble in the wolf-dog’s chest. Gessa could feel the sweat trickling down her back. This woman was no fool; she lived by her wits. Finally, Marta gave a slight nod, her bow lowering a fraction.
“Never heard of your shrine, ‘Anya’,” she said, her tone still skeptical but a shade less hostile.
“This is no place for lost pilgrims. The Spurs Edge will swallow you whole, and the Dragon… the Spine doesn’t forgive mistakes.
” She paused. “But you look half-dead on your feet. And that dog of mine hasn’t decided to tear your throat out yet, which is something. ”
Marta jerked her chin toward a rough bench outside the cabin. “Sit. Drink. Then you’ll tell me true, or as true as you’re able, which way you were blundering when you stumbled onto my cookpot.”
The relief was so intense Gessa nearly sagged.
Marta offered her water from a wooden dipper—cool, clean, the best Gessa had ever tasted—and a piece of tough, smoked meat that she devoured despite its strong, gamy flavor.
Gessa stuck to her story, embellishing it slightly with details of a journey from a distant village, avoiding anything that might hint at Polan.
Marta listened, still wary, occasionally asking a probing question that Gessa deflected as best she could.
Though Marta never fully dropped her guard, and Gessa certainly never revealed her truth, a grudging sort of understanding seemed to pass between them.
Perhaps Marta saw the desperation, the genuine fear that no amount of storytelling could entirely conceal.
Or perhaps she simply had a flicker of pity for a lone woman clearly out of her depth.
After Gessa had rested a short while, Marta unrolled a worn piece of hide on which she’d scratched a crude but effective map of the surrounding ridges and valleys.
“No bells up there I know of, girl,” she repeated, her finger tracing a path.
“Only wind and rock. But if you’re set on breakin’ your neck in the Spine, follow that game trail up past the scarred oak, you’ll know it by the lightning strike.
Then look for the twin peaks that look like a wolf’s fangs.
The Blackwater River cuts through the valley between ‘em. It’s a wicked crossing, mind.
Cross it, and keep the sun on your left shoulder in the mornings.
That’ll take you deeper than sense allows.
And it’s the way you claim you want to go.
” She fixed Gessa with a final, knowing look.
“Best hope what you’re truly seeking is worth the finding, and that what’s chasing you ain’t worse than these mountains. ”
With that, and a small bundle containing a bit more dried meat and some edible roots, Marta sent her on her way, the wolf-dog watching silently until Gessa was out of the clearing.
She found the lightning-struck oak just where Marta promised, and the twin peaks guided her true.
But the Blackwater River, when Gessa finally reached it after two more days of grueling travel, was more than a valley stream; it was a churning, slate-grey torrent, wide and fast, its banks steep and slick with mud.
The roar of it filled the air. There was no bridge, no obvious ford.
For a full day, she scouted up and down its length, her earlier optimism dimming into a grim resolve.
Finally, she found a spot where a massive, ancient pine had fallen, its trunk spanning most of the roiling water.
The tip of the tree had snapped off in the current, leaving a churning, three-foot gap between the splintered wood and a jumble of slick boulders on the far side.
Securing her bag tightly, whispering a prayer to any god that might listen to a runaway wife, she started across.
Every step on the mossy, uneven trunk was a battle for balance.