The Mornith War
“Strikingly original, The Mornith War continues the adventures of Elwood Pitch and his friend Drallah Wehr, a dog called Slukee and Booj the talking raven, companions from the land of Winnitok called to do battle with ancient spirits. This epic fantasy, beautifully written, draws the reader into a mythical realm populated by witches, truans, sorcerers, humans, immortals, spirit ancestors and deadly creatures. Combining strong characterization, lyrical prose and a well-crafted plot, Patrick Doud has constructed a rare and magical world.”
–Christine Brodien-Jones, author of The Owl Keeper
Three years and many adventures after the events of The Hunt for the Eye of Ogin, companions Elwood, Slukee, Drallah, and Booj are charged with a task beyond Winnitok’s northern edge. Arriving in the community of a charismatic prophet, they find that Granashon the Nohar has been attempting to settle a conflict between the prophet’s followers and a proud clan of wolf truans. But this threat to peace is overshadowed by another, as an unnatural scourge of spirits is burning the prophet’s fields with a ghostly green fire.
While Granashon leads Elwood, Slukee, and a small band of others to battle the source of the spirits in an ancient mountain fortress, Drallah and Booj stay behind to help protect the besieged prophet and her followers—including a girl with whom Elwood has begun a relationship the prophet has expressly forbidden.
The companions are caught up in an intense struggle to defend the lands of the prophet and the wolf truans, and to discover and defeat the power behind the spirits before they spread to Winnitok and beyond.
To be released Spring 2011
Excerpts from The Mornith War…
From Chapter 5: The Rock
Together the young dog and the old wolf truan walked slowly down the steep tunnel. Ida leaned on her cane, the red gem she had set in its crook lighting the passage. Slukee felt a thrill throughout her body that continued beyond her body, into the air and rock all around her—and into Ida, too. She had begun to feel it when she and the others first met Mogi and Mardun: a joyous expectancy, like she used to know when she heard Elwood’s school bus bringing home in the afternoon. But back then she had known what to expect; now she had no idea what was about to happen.
Finally the tunnel began to shrink, forcing Ida to crouch. The floor, walls, and ceiling began to expand and contract slightly, pulsing. The wolf truan turned to the dog and said, “The Gundom awaits you just ahead. Now go and see what you will see.” Then she turned and crept back up the tunnel.
Slukee watched the light from Ida’s cane fade and disappear. But she found she was not left in the dark; a faint glow lit the winding passage ahead. She trotted toward it.
The narrow way began to climb. After a bit the tunnel ended in a small bare cave, the only entrance the one she had come in by. The soft glowing light came from the cave itself. The sense of power in that place was a little like what she felt whenever she was near Granashon, but the Gundom was much bigger than Granashon. All the people she had met in the caves above were a part of it, and also long legs of living rock that reached through the earth in all directions.
As she sniffed about, a smooth hollow formed in the rock at Slukee’s feet. On impulse she stepped inside.
Lifting her head suddenly, Slukee found she was lying on a narrow crag, one forepaw dangling over the edge. The crag faced south, thrusting out from the side of a mountain, overlooking a forest of tall firs and maples far below. It was a clear morning, and the sun was rising in the east.
The landscape was new to her, but Slukee hardly noticed. Everything that met her eyes was throbbing with something she had never seen before; every rock, every tree, even the sun and sky, were so changed she was not even sure what she was looking at.
Wondering at the strange world before her eyes, she noticed a movement among the rocks below. Four wolf truans with glimmering fur were climbing up to her. Seeing Slukee they called out as if they knew her, though she had never seen them before. When they reached her they sat down on the crag and began to speak. How they did this and how she understood Slukee never remembered; when she and the wolf truans finally parted, she forgot them. But she hung on to a lot of what they told her, like the names of all the colors of the world that she was seeing for the first time. And there were other changes, gifts the dog would carry for years without knowing.
Later, Slukee and the four wolf truans climbed down from the crag. Together they roamed the woods under the mountain by night and day, hunting the fast deer and lapping cold water from streams that flowed down from the mountain. Virid summer came, and then ruddy fall. They wintered on a white plain, loping by starlight over blue ice and lifting their voices together under the moon.
But even as the seasons passed and returned and Slukee went on all but forgetting her former life, a memory from that time followed like a shadow on her thoughts. The wolf truans of the mountain had told her about the other Slukee, the one who stayed in the old world; and the one who did not stay remembered her often.
One morning as she and the wolf truans were stalking deer in a hillside maze of hawthorn, Slukee heard a voice call her name. She looked up through the leaves and berries over her head; the voice seemed to come from up in the sky. The glimmering of the wolf truans’ fur merged into one light as they moved in close, and disappearing all around her said goodbye.
She was alone among the hawthorns, and still the voice was calling her.
“Slukee, come out,” it said. “The night has passed. Come out!”
She was back in the little glowing cave, the pulsing rose and purple hues of which she could now see, curled up in the same hollow she had stepped into many seasons ago—or last night. Ida was calling to her. Slukee rose, stretched, and ran down the tunnel to meet her.
Ida spoke just one word to Slukee as they performed the canine greeting ritual of smelling and touching.
“Welcome,” she said.
Elwood was waiting for Slukee at the top of the passage. He hunkered down as she ran up, and Slukee threw her forelegs over his shoulders. Pressing her nose to his ear she began to grunt softly, the same single sound over and over from deep in her chest.
Ida spoke to Elwood then, telling him how the spirit of the rock had given Slukee truanish gifts. All seven of her senses would grow, and her grasp of the words and thoughts of other kinds would grow with them. She would probably have more years to live, unless misfortune took her life sooner. If she ever mothered puppies, they would inherit some of her gifts.
“Just as the Gundom took Slukee in,” Ida said, “so the Ragim take her in. She is one of us, now.”
Elwood turned his gaze from Slukee, where it had been since the old wolf truan began to talk. The dog heard a sharp edge of apprehension in his voice as he asked, “What does that mean, she’s one of you?”
“It means as it sounds. Slukee is one of the Ragim. She has a home and a family here.” Ida stopped Elwood from speaking with a slight lift of a hand. “I know what you fear, Elwood Pitch. How little you understand Slukee if you think she will forget your friendship now, and no longer walk beside you.”
“It’s you I didn’t understand. I thought you were saying she would have to stay here.”
“What do you take home and family to mean? The Ragim do as they will. Everyone in Gunday is here because she chooses to be. So Slukee is welcome here, now and always.”
Slukee gently butted Elwood’s chest with the top of her head then; he rose, and together the dog and the boy followed Ida back to the Chamber of Narus.
From Chapter 8: The Bower
Drallah woke with a start. Voices were crying in the distance; the bell in the Prophet’s tower began to clang. In the barn below, the cows and horses were stamping. She heard Booj snap his wings in the rafters overhead.
Through the cracks between the boards, a fitful green light was seeping into the loft.
Springing to her feet, Drallah grabbed her weapons and made for the stairs. Elwood and Slukee were already on them; Booj grazed the top of her head as he shot past. Wordlessly they rushed down, through the barn doors, and into the night.
A green blaze was raging at the pasture’s western edge, blotting out the stars and throwing long shadows behind everything. Lights were springing up in windows, and Drallah glimpsed figures running scared among the farmers’ cottages.
“Our tree nursery!” one of them wailed. “The devil’s burning our pines!”
Next to her, Elwood staggered to a halt. Blocking out the sight of the green fire with an arm across his face, he swayed; then he fell to his hands and knees as though he were going to be sick. Slukee hovered and whined beside him, looking wildly back and forth between Elwood and the burning.
“You aren’t ready to face the fire again,” said Drallah, hauling him to his feet. Stooping to match his height she threw one of his arms over her shoulders and began to guide him back to the barn. “Don’t look at it!” she warned as Elwood’s head began to turn. He dropped his chin to his chest, breathing heavily.
Once they were in the shadow of the barn and out of sight of the fire, she sat Elwood down with his back against the wall. She commanded Slukee to stay with him while she and Booj tried to get a closer look.
As Drallah rounded the corner of the barn and came once again in sight of the pine nursery, the fire burned out. It did not die gradually like a natural fire, shrinking until finally nothing remained but embers; it vanished suddenly, like a snuffed candle.
She jogged cautiously across the pasture, Booj gliding over her head. As they were nearing the tree line she slowed and crouched, and the raven lit on the grass beside her. There was a faint light in the east; dawn was near. They could see several figures in the pasture off to their right who were also approaching the place of the fire with care. Drallah thought she recognized Landsor’s bearded face among them. When they came close to the edge of the burned trees, they all stopped to wait for more light.
Gradually Drallah made out the shapes of many young pines standing in straight rows. Their trunks were gray and shriveled, and their leaves of evergreen had all turned to brown. From her position at their edge, Drallah could not see one that had been spared. There was no other sign of the thing that had done it, no feeling of dread to hint that the Sending remained near.
Drallah rose slowly from the grass. As she took a step forward a strong dawn wind picked up, and blowing across the pasture from the east passed through the wasted pines. Their brown needles fell in a whispering shower, leaving the dead trees utterly bare.
From Chapter 11: The Island
More than a dozen yugs were milling and squatting around the burning shell of a cabin in a clearing. The fire burned fiercely despite the rain; as Elwood watched, he saw yugs throw fuel of various kinds—the possessions of the person who had lived there, clearly—into the open doorway. The yugs seemed taller and straighter than those he had encountered before, in the Burnt Hills or anywhere else, and their skin was a darker green. He realized this was true of the yug Tornonk had just run through; in the heat of the moment he simply had not noticed the difference. Weapons, helmets, and other war gear were scattered on the ground. They’re not expecting a fight, he realized.
Checking behind him and to either side, Elwood saw the tree where Tornonk and Nemoor had hidden themselves. He could see the tip of the fox truan’s muzzle, nothing more. Still there was no sign of Mogi and Mardun; Elwood wondered if Tornonk would wait for them to make the first move, or make it himself.
The answer came quickly. Hearing an awful roar in the clearing, Elwood turned to see the fire had transformed. Coal black pits like eyes had formed above the open entry, which, like a huge mouth, stretched and snapped, slavering sparks. The outer flames had become many arms, swinging and grasping at the yugs.
It was terrifying even to Elwood, who knew the monster of fire was merely an illusion created by Nemoor. But the yugs did not react as he expected: they withdrew from it, crying out in dismay, some falling as they tried to avoid the lashing arms of fire—but they did not run away, overwhelmed by fear, like normal yugs would. Instead they grabbed their weapons and stood their ground.
Tornonk did not hesitate. He barked once, and at this signal Elwood saw the fox truan’s bow rise from the fir branches. Before Elwood could take aim with his own bow, one of the yugs in the clearing fell with an arrow in the back of his neck.
Choosing a yug that had in his grasp a broad-bladed tomahawk, Elwood shot him in the chest. The wetness of the string had lessened the power of his bow, and the arrow did not go deep. Staggering, the yug tripped and fell backwards, head and shoulders landing in the fire. He jumped up again with shriek, his face smoking and charred, as Elwood turned his attention to another target.
The fiery illusion faded quickly away as the yugs, realizing they were under attack from outside the clearing, turned from the burning cabin. Another went down, pierced by one of Tornonk’s arrows. As Elwood delayed shooting a second arrow until his next target gave him a clear shot, a pair of howling battle cries rose up over the island.
Charging into the clearing, Mogi and Mardun’s spears flashed everywhere at once. Crossing and recrossing the open space around the fire, they thrust and leaped and dove, rolling and spinning among the yugs. The speed and chaos of their attack forced Elwood to hold his second arrow, afraid he might hit one of the wolf truans by mistake.
Still standing their ground, the yugs moved to encircle and contain the wolf truans. Elwood was amazed and alarmed by the way the yugs fought back: Mogi and Mardun had only killed two, and now it was they who were on the defensive. The brothers stood back to back, using their spears to parry a steady rain of blows.
Out of the corner of his eye, Elwood saw a blur of red and green cross the distance to the fight in a flash. Tornonk swung his sword, and one of the yugs fell. As some of the rest turned to face the fox truan, Mogi and Mardun seized the chance to break the circle.
It all happened very fast, so fast that Elwood never saw how Mogi lost his spear, or how two big yugs got hold of him, one by each arm. Mardun had succeeded in getting out of the yugs’ ring, and was yanking his weapon from a green corpse at his feet. He and Tornonk realized Mogi’s danger at the same moment, but too late: the yugs were hauling him by his arms toward the fire.
Writhing and biting, Mogi fought viciously to break free. The yugs tried to swing him into the burning mouth of the fire, but Mogi was too heavy and strong; unable to get him off the ground, they simply dragged him to the flames. Mardun and Tornonk struggled wildly to reach him, but the yugs blocking their way were determined and did not let them through. As Elwood was watching in vain for a clear shot at the yugs holding Mogi, he heard Nemoor cry out as she broke cover. But the witch only ran a few paces and stopped, unable to help the wolf truan now.
The yugs had pushed Mogi into the burning entry of the cabin. Flames rising around him, he caught himself with his arms on either side of the doorway, his entire mouthful of teeth showing in his agony.
As a yug raised a leg to kick Mogi, to cast him completely into the fire, Elwood’s arrow drove into the green skin of his skull just below the rim of his helmet.
Throwing himself from the fire, Mogi rolled on the ground, fur and tunic in flames. At last breaking through to him, with bare hands Mardun slapped at the fire burning his brother’s back.
Tornonk could not hold the five remaining yugs alone. Immediately Elwood nocked another arrow and took aim; Nemoor moved her hands in patterns before her, preparing magic. But before either could act, another entered the clearing at a run.
Long black hair streaming behind her, she made directly for the yugs. Astounded, two of them fell under her feathered spear before she had even slowed. Finally daunted, the rest of the yugs turned and fled into the trees, the tall, spear-wielding figure following after.
Breathing out the words, “Granashon at last,” Elwood ran to the spot where Mogi had fallen.
From Chapter 26: Freed
As Elwood reached the lane a cry went up in the woods. An unbroken succession of howls, each one louder and full of more voices than the last, gathered and grew in force until the air shook with the noise. The ranks of yugs advancing on Mary Tammer’s house hesitated, looking to the surrounding woods in doubt; but Elwood pressed on.
He glimpsed Slukee’s red fur flying as she ran along the edge of the dead pine nursery, but lost sight of her among a mass of wolves and wolf truans that burst from the pines and loped swiftly over the blackened grass toward Mary Tammer’s house. On the other side of the pasture, another force emerged from the trees’ edge: Elwood saw at least a dozen humans with long hunting bows making for positions among the burned cottages, and a pair of huge black bear truans lumbering behind. From a point in the woods opposite the springhouse came a second, larger wave of wolves led by wolf truans with long straight swords, their battle howl deafening even at that distance.
Ida had sent her people; the Ragim had come.
Though they had tightened the ring around Mary Tammer’s house and many of them had entered, almost the entire yug army remained outside. Turning their backs on the house, they raised their blades and shouted their own harsh battle cries as they waited for the forerunners of the assault. The yug archers seemed scattered, and though a few let fly with arrows, the attack was too sudden and they did little. The yugs had not expected this, Elwood saw, but also guessed they were not worried about the outcome. Unless there were more waiting in the woods, the yugs outnumbered the Ragim and their friends at least three to one.
On the house’s western side, the four-legged wolves reached the yugs first, raking deep into their midst like claws through loose dirt. They bounded over the heads of the first line of defense, or dodged past their legs, so that many yugs suddenly found themselves with foes in front and behind. But Elwood saw many wolves fall before they had a chance to close with a yug, hewn in mid-leap by vicious tomahawk- and sword-strokes, or impaled on the blades of javelins. But the onslaught disordered the yugs, and when the warriors of the Ragim fell upon them they died by the dozen.
Now Elwood reached the bottom of the slope, where most of his view of the battleground was blocked by the black remains of cottages. Cursing himself and his broken leg he hopped onward, deciding to join the bowmen shooting at the yugs from the last of the cottages up ahead. As Elwood neared one of the farmer’s burned out houses where they had taken cover, a bear truan, apparently there to protect the bowmen, noticed him coming. Elwood saw the enormous black creature square her shoulders to charge.
“I’m with you!” Elwood called hastily. “My friends are inside that house.”
The bear truan squinted at him then grunted and bobbed her great head, motioning Elwood to take a place among the others. Picking his way on one leg through the ashes, he sat down in a place where he could shoot over the remains of an outer wall. Sitting was not good for shooting, but minus a leg he could do no better. He lifted his bow from his back and set an arrow to the string.
Now that he had a view of the battle again, he saw the wolves and wolf truans on the west side of the house were being beaten back. On the east side, nearer Elwood’s position, the yugs were in disarray; there were more wolf truans there, and someone inside the house was raining pots on the heads of the yugs below. Many yugs on the south side of the house were jostling around the front doors; it appeared something within was blocking the way. But most were facing out toward the human bowmen, whose arrows had begun to fall among their ranks.
Sighting a yug who was shouting orders on the army’s outer edge, Elwood took aim and shot. The arrow bounced harmlessly off the yug’s armored chest. Elwood swore and nocked another arrow, aiming slightly higher and taking a little more time. Watching for his moment, Elwood realized the yug was ordering an attack. The yugs gathered across the front of Mary Tammer’s house began to whoop and roar; scores of purple eyes glared at Elwood and those around him. A horn was blown. As Elwood let his second arrow fly they charged, and the thunder of their boots was the only sound in the world. The charge of the yugs filled Elwood’s vision, so that he never saw whether his arrow hit or not.
