Pathfinder Tales: Skinwalkers Read online

  Pathfinder Tales: Skinwalkers

  Number XIX of Pathfinder Tales

  Wendy N. Wagner

  Paizo Publishing, LLC (2014)

  * * *

  Rating: ★★★★★

  * * *

  As a young woman, Jendara left the cold northern isles of the Ironbound Archipelago to find her fortune. Now, many years later, she's forsaken her buccaneer ways and returned home in search of a simpler life, where she can raise her young son, Kran, in peace. When a strange clan of shapeshifting raiders pillages her home, however, there's no choice for Jendara but to take up her axes once again to help the islanders defend all that they hold dear.

  From author Wendy N. Wagner comes a new adventure of vikings, lycanthropes, and the ties of motherhood, set in the world of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

  The battering ram had caught in the remains of the wall, its bearers exposed. She plunged to the right side of it, her sword driving into one man's chest. She didn't bother wrenching it free. She kept running, spearing the next man. He screamed. She twisted sideways as the battering ram, no longer supported on the right side, crashed down.

  With a crunch, the massive log shattered the still-screaming man's legs. Jendara's breath caught in her throat a second. That could have been her under that log. Her mind faltered, but her arm knew what to do. It was already pulling her sword free of the two skewered men.

  But she wasn't ready for the shield that smashed into her face. She toppled backward, tripped over a snapped timber, and fell into the mud. Her nose throbbed with agony. She grabbed it and squeezed it back into alignment, ignoring the streaming blood. She could feel her face swelling as she pulled herself to her feet.

  A Kalvaman pushed past her, knocking her aside with an elbow. The runners carried torches beneath their shields, protecting the flames with their bodies. They were headed straight for the meetinghouse.

  Jendara swayed on her feet. Her head spun and she had to spit blood to keep from choking on it. Her sword fell from her aching fingers...

  She lashed out with her toe and kicked up the hilt. She caught it in her left hand. Despite hours of practice using her left hand, the weapon didn't feel right. But nothing felt right. Her body resisted her every attempt to spur it forward.

  "To me!" she managed to croak. "To me!"

  The Pathfinder Tales Library

  Novels

  Prince of Wolves by Dave Gross

  Winter Witch by Elaine Cunningham

  Plague of Shadows by Howard Andrew Jones

  The Worldwound Gambit by Robin D. Laws

  Master of Devils by Dave Gross

  Death's Heretic by James L. Sutter

  Song of the Serpent by Hugh Mattews

  City of the Fallen Sky by Tim Pratt

  Nightglass by Liane Merciel

  Blood of the City by Robin D. Laws

  Queen of Thorns by Dave Gross

  Called to Darkness by Richard Lee Byers

  Liar's Blade by Tim Pratt

  King of Chaos by Dave Gross

  Stalking the Beast by Howard Andrew Jones

  The Dagger of Trust by Chris Willrich

  Skinwalkers by Wendy N. Wagner

  The Redemption Engine by James L. Sutter

  The Crusader Road by Michael A. Stackpole

  Journals

  The Compass Stone: The Collected Journals of Eando Kline edited by James L. Sutter

  Hell's Pawns by Dave Gross

  Dark Tapestry by Elaine Cunnningham

  Prodigal Sons edited by James L. Sutter

  Plague of Light by Robin D. Laws

  Guilty Blood by F. Wesley Schneider

  Husks by Dave Gross

  The Treasure of Far Thallai by Robin D. Laws

  Light of a Distant Star by Bill Ward

  Short Stories

  "The Lost Pathfinder" by Dave Gross

  "Certainty" by Liane Merciel

  "The Swamp Warden" by Amber E. Scott

  "Noble Sacrifice" by Richard Ford

  "Blood Crimes" by J. C. Hay

  "The Secret of the Rose and Glove by Kevin Andrew Murphy

  "Lord of Penance" by Richard Lee Byers

  "Guns of Alkenstar" by Ed Greenwod

  "The Ghosts of Broken Blades" by Monte Cook

  "The Walkers from the Crypt" by Howard Andrew Jones

  "A Lesson in Taxonomy" by Dave Gross

  "The Illusionist" by Elaine Cunningham

  "Two Pieces of Tarnished Silver by Erik Mona

  "The Ironroot Deception" by Robin D. Laws

  "Plow and Sword" by Robert E. Vardeman

  "A Passage to Absalom" by Dave Gross

  "The Seventh Execution" by Amber E. Scott

  "The Box" by Bill Ward

  "Blood and Money by Steven Savile

  "Faithful Servants" by James L. Sutter

  "Fingers of Death—No, Doom!" by Lucien Soulban

  "The Perfumer's Apprentice" by Kevin Andrew Murphy

  "Krunzle the Quick" by Hugh Matthews

  "Mother Bears" by Wendy N. Wagner

  "Hell or High Water" by Ari Marmell

  "A Tomb of Winter's Plunder" by Tim Pratt

  "Misery's Mirror" by Liane Merciel

  "The Twelve-Hour Statue" by Michael Kortes

  "In the Event of My Untimely Demise" by Robin D. Laws

  "Shattered Steel" by F. Wesley Schneider

  "Proper Villains" by Erik Scott de Bie

  "Killing Time" by Dave Gross

  "Thieves Vinegar" by Kevin Andrew Murphy

  "In Red Rune Canyon" by Richard Lee Byers

  "The Fate of Falling Stars" by Andrew Penn Romine

  "Bastard, Sword" by Tim Pratt

  "The Irregulars" by Neal F. Litherland

  Skinwalkers © 2014 Paizo Publishing, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means digital, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or conveyed via the Internet or a website without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles and reviews.

  Paizo, Paizo Publishing, LLC, the Paizo golem logo, Pathfinder, the Pathfinder logo, Pathfinder Society, and GameMastery are registered trademarks of Paizo Publishing, LLC; Pathfinder Accessories, Pathfinder Adventure Card Game, Pathfinder Adventure Path, Pathfinder Campaign Setting, Pathfinder Cards, Pathfinder Flip-Mat, Pathfinder Map Pack, Pathfinder Module, Pathfinder Pawns, Pathfinder Player Companion, Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, Pathfinder Tales, and Rise of the Runelords are trademarks of Paizo Publishing, LLC.

  Cover art by Michal Ivan.

  Cover design by Emily Crowell.

  Map by Crystal Frasier.

  Paizo Publishing, LLC

  7120 185th Ave NE, Ste 120

  Redmond, WA 98052

  paizo.com

  ISBN 978-1-60125-616-4 (mass market paperback)

  ISBN 978-1-60125-617-1 (ebook)

  Publisher’s Cataloging-In-Publication Data

  (Prepared by The Donohue Group, Inc.)

  Wagner, Wendy N., 1978-

  Skinwalkers / Wendy N. Wagner.

  pages : map ; cm. — (Pathfinder tales)

  Set in the world of the role-playing game, Pathfinder.

  Issued also as an ebook.

  ISBN: 978-1-60125-616-4

  1. Vikings--Fiction. 2. Cannibalism--Fiction. 3. Mothers--Fiction. 4. Good and evil--Fiction. 5. Pathfinder (Game)--Fiction. 6. Fantasy fiction. 7. Adventure stories. I. Title. II. Series: Pathfinder tales library.

  P3623.A3564 S55 2014

  813/.6

  First printing February 2014.

  Printed in th
e United States of America.

  For Fiona,

  my Kran and fellow word-hunter.

  paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas , Aug 10, 2014

  Chapter One

  Pig-Sticking

  Jendara dropped to a knee, studying the crushed undergrowth. She pushed back a snapped bilberry branch and smiled at the splash of red the greenery had hidden. Vorrin's spear must have gone deep if the boar was still bleeding. It would be weak when she found it.

  She got to her feet, picking through the brush in near silence. The narrow game trail opened up into a pocket meadow, warm with late summer sunshine. The air smelled of rich, sweet bilberries. In the distance, a bird called.

  Jendara turned in a slow circle, listening hard. There should be more sounds than this. The rest of the hunters should have caught up by now, their footsteps thudding softly on the loam, their gear rustling. Small noises, but distinct ones. They must have lost her trail.

  Her fingers tightened on her spear and she forced herself to relax. An arm that's tight, throws not right, her father always said. And also: a closed hand holds nothing. He had a nugget of old-time wisdom for every occasion. Somehow they were always right.

  Jendara cocked her head. Was that a sound? A small crunching, maybe, like a branch snapping behind her. The breeze shifted and blew a strand of her hair free of its braid. It tickled her cheek.

  The crunching grew louder. The wind change had given the beast her scent. The boar should be running away from her, but something had spurred it back her way. Maybe the rest of the hunting party had circled around. They were going to miss out on all of the fun. Jendara's heart quickened, but her breathing stayed smooth and controlled.

  Blood on the ferns at the edge of the clearing caught her eye. A big smear of dark red blood.

  The boar burst out of the brush, leaping over its own bloodstain, its voice shrieking pure, hot rage. Jendara twisted aside, setting her spear as she moved. The boar hit with a horrible crunch.

  The solid ash shaft snapped off in her hand, the base slamming into her right wrist. She knew she'd hit the boar's ribs, maybe cracked them, but had missed the heart. She drew her sword, but the blade slipped out of fingers numbed from the wrist blow. Good thing she had plenty of smaller weapons.

  The boar growled, the sound rumbling up in its chest and rising into a screeching roar. Hate and anger powered the beast now. She eyed her sword, now out of reach, and bared her teeth at the boar. She freed her handaxe from her belt. She could throw left-handed just as well as she could right.

  With a snort, the creature charged again, but Jendara had already launched the axe. There was a hollow thud as the axe buried itself in the boar's eye. The creature stumbled. Jendara snatched up her sword and rammed it through the boar's throat.

  Blood burbled over her hands, hot and bright. The boar collapsed.

  The sun beat on Jendara's neck as she lowered her eyes to the stricken creature. It would have been better if it had died in her first spear-thrust. She preferred a clean hunt. But she'd been alone, after all. The thing could have killed her.

  She reached for her handaxe. The iron and ash wood in the weapon was older than her, an heirloom of her father's, the leather bindings replaced time and again over the years. Even over the smell of boar's blood and bilberries, she could smell the linseed oil she rubbed into the bindings to protect them from sweat and sun and rain. The axe was the most precious thing she owned. She'd lost count of the times it had saved her life.

  She tugged on the handle, but the boar's skull held it fast. Another yank failed to loosen it. She hesitated, then braced her foot on the boar's cheek.

  "I mean no disrespect," she murmured, and wrenched the axe free with a squelch.

  She couldn't help remembering the first time she'd gripped the axe's handle, prying it free from the swollen, blackened hand it had pinned to the wall of her father's house. The hand had fallen free with a wet plop. It dropped into a clotted spray of blood beside the broken spade her father must have used to lop off his immobilized attacker's head, and Jendara had hugged the axe to herself as she vomited up her breakfast beside her father's corpse.

  Jendara shook her head. This corpse was just the carcass of a boar. And her father had been dead for many long years, buried and well mourned. She wiped the axe's blade on a handful of ferns and slung it from her belt.

  But the past clung to her like a hungry tick, even as she reached for her sword. The boar's slit throat looked so like much her father's, split wide as a second mouth while he hung from a stake.

  Jendara closed her hands into fists, watching the tattooed skulls and crossbones of the pirate goddess stretch across her tendons. Her old life was truly behind her now. After that visit home, she'd buried herself in piracy to forget. Yet even the thrill of the hunt had lost its flavor after her husband, Ikran, died.

  She squeezed her fist tight. The rest of her hunting party had better show up soon to help her dress this carcass.

  Twigs crackled and weaponry jingled. Jendara unfurled her fists. Her friends had circled around. Perhaps they had flushed the boar ahead of them, and that was the reason for its strange, maddened charge at her.

  "You know, most people save their swords for battle, Dara." A low chuckle accompanied the words. "Pig-sticking works better with a spear."

  "Pig-sticking is usually done with dogs, too, Morul." She aimed a smile at the three men picking their way through the heavy underbrush. "How's the hound?"

  "He'll live." Morul nudged the boar's body with his boot. The big, orange-bearded man shook his head. "No thanks to this beast. Dog got lucky."

  Vorrin put his hand on Jendara's shoulder. "Are you all right? You look pale." His dark eyes studied her face.

  She patted his hand. Vorrin was a good man, her best friend. But she couldn't tell him about the crunch and pop the axe had made when it pulled out of the boar's eye, how its dark flesh had reminded her so much of that dead hand out of her past. He'd known her a long time, but not even long friendship could make it easy to speak of the things that had been done to her family—things that she should have been there to fight against. She shook her head and hoped she looked nonchalant.

  "Are you sure?" He squeezed her shoulder.

  "I'm fine. Just thinking about hunting with my dad. And maybe feeling a bit winded. Look." She inclined her head. "That thing broke my spear."

  "What a beast," Morul said. "It's pushing six feet long. Gonna be heavy." He knelt beside the big pig and pulled a coil of rope from his bag. He tied a slipknot and caught the boar's feet up in it, then tossed the end of the rope over the nearest tree limb.

  His brother, Yul, helped him hoist the pig up off the ground, then tied the rope off. "He's got plenty of lard on him. A real good 'un." He folded his arms across his chest. "Ayuh, this would have been a good hunt for Kran. Seeing a beast like this fighting for his life would have taught him some respect for his dinner. He'd have been proud to see his mother beat it, too."

  Jendara crossed her own arms. "No. Not a boar hunt. He's just a boy. He's not ready to hunt dangerous animals."

  "I was hunting with my father once I passed my eighth winter. Morul was out there when he was only seven. A boy belongs at his father's side."

  Jendara leaned forward. "Yul, you're a good friend, and I hold dear the way you've treated Kran, letting him stay with you these past few summers. You're the best foster father a boy could ask for. But you are not his father."

  "Neither are you," the big man argued. "You don't know what it means to be a man of the islands. You smother him. He should be out here learning to be a man!"

  "He's a child!" Jendara sliced her hand through the air.

  "You treat him like a baby because of what's wrong with him."

  "Stop," she warned.

  "I'm telling you there's nothing wrong with Kran. Not being able to talk doesn't make him different from other boys." Yul's face flushed, his blond beard standing out like snow on red clay.
<
br />   Vorrin stepped between the two. "Hey, stop it. We're all friends here. We all want what's best for Kran." He pushed them back from each other, his face turning from one to the other. "I do, too. I promised my brother I'd look out for his boy, and I meant it.

  "Yul, we need to trust Jendara here. She has a right to worry about her son, and she knows him better than anyone. The lad grew up on a ship, not in the forest. He's healthy and strong, but maybe another summer might be good for him to get some woodcraft under his belt."

  He wagged his finger at Jendara as she was opening her mouth. "And Jendara, you need to trust Yul. He's more objective than we are. If he says Kran is ready to try hunting, he obviously believes in what the boy can do."

  She hooked her thumbs on her sword belt and set her jaw. "Fine."

  Yul checked the point of his spear with his thumb. "Fine."

  "Now, shake hands. This is stupid."

  Jendara and Yul rolled their eyes. Vorrin waved his hands as if to push them together, and Jendara had to suppress a grin. He looked so earnest, and so out of place among all these hulking Ulfen islanders. His dark hair, a few strands of silver catching the late morning sunshine, had pulled out of its binding and now swung around his face, a chartreuse bit of lichen caught in it. Yul and Morul both had wives to stitch their yellow braids tight with yarn, just like Jendara had sewn her own. She should have helped Vorrin, she realized. Perhaps he would have felt more like the other men that way.

  The unexpected thought softened her. She took Yul's hand. "I'm sorry, Yul. Perhaps you're right. I'll talk about this with my son."

  Surprise showed on Yul's face, but he replied with diplomacy, "Thank you for considering my words."

  Diplomacy was a fine art on the Ironbound Archipelago. No one could value more highly the skills of negotiation, trade, and sharing. Life on the mainland had taught Jendara that most people believed Ulfen—and especially island folk—to be uncivilized raiders, fur-clad barbarians with nothing better than fine ships and good swords. And to be sure, raiding neighbors was a fine art cultivated in every island soul. Jendara had crewed a few raiding trips in her youth before her turn to true piracy. But no islander depended solely on raiding. Life was too hard on these cold scraps of rock to survive like that for long.