"Winold was a crafty one, but he made one fatal error. He arranged a border atrocity, sending a large complement of soldiers to attack an isolated, small village in southern Ungardt, then arranged it to look like the leader of the western nobles, Duke Tykan, was the one that ordered the attack. The attackers carried out their mission, and did manage to convince the Ungardt that it was Tykan who was responsible, but they didn't count on the Ungardt response. Instead of punishing just Tykan, the Ungardt invaded the entire kingdom of Draconia. That was the War of Seven Roses, and it lasted only six months. It ended with the Ungardt invaders taking King Dawon back to Dusgaard in chains, dragged by a horse the entire way. The stories say that he even managed to live long enough to get to Dusgaard, where he was stoned to death in a public square by children. Dawon's heir was Elon."
"Elon the Sunderer?" Tarrin asked.
"That's how he's known, yes," Jarax said with a smile. "Elon wasn't a very smart man. He relied on Winold's counsel, not realizing that Winold only cared about putting Tykan in his place. Tykan and the western nobles had fought well in the war, but the western lands had been relatively untouched. The Ungardt had invaded from the north and east, ravaging the eastern duchies on their way to Draconis. Winold convinced Elon to raise the taxes and thithes even more on the western nobles, to equalize the suffering, so Elon had been told.
"Needless to say, Tykan and the western nobles went up in flames. Tykan demanded an audience with the king, which was denied. Tykan knew that it was Winold behind all the scheming, so he decided that he had to talk to the King without Winold's oily voice there to cloud the issues. When he tried to get into the king's bedroom to talk to him personally, Winold had him thrown in the dungeon. The western nobles, loyal to Tykan, attacked Dracon Keep in a surprise attack and freed Duke Tykan. They were careful not to hurt anyone, but their goal of just freeing the Duke wasn't really noticed. Tykan fled back to his duchy with Winold's private army on his tail, then they barred themselves in Tykar's Hold and endured a month-long siege. The armies of the west rose up and chased out the invaders.
"That was when Elon made a fateful mistake. He declared Tykan an outlaw, and levied fines on all the nobles of the west that had participated in the routing of Winold's army, so steep that they would never be able to pay them. The western nobles, in an absolute rage over the continual injustice, simply seceeded from Draconia as a block. They decided that wise Tykan would be their king, and named their new kingdom after him. The nobles of the central duchies were suddenly caught between two nations, and they declared their allegiances in a random order that left pockets of one kingdom inside another.
"By then, Elon had died under mysterious circumstances, and with no heir, Winold assumed the throne. His hatred of Tykan had totally consumed him, so he raised an army to march into the rebelling western lands and kill anything that moved. The western lords, already mobilized, marched east and met the hastily assembled army at Long Staff River, and totally crushed them. Winold pulled back and regrouped as Tykan rallied for support from Ungardt and Sulasia, his bordering neighbors. The Ungardt were still in a tiff over the war, and the Sulasians recognized their independence but wouldn't form any sort of military alliance. "And that was how the war started. Tykan controlled the commerce coming in from the western harbors and ports, but Winold controlled the iron mines in the mountains around the Petal Lakes. The two kingdoms started a war that still hasn't ended, to this day. The lands between Draconia and Tykarthia, once fertile farmland, are nothing but a barren wasteland now, the grass trampled into mud by hundreds of battles and all the towns and keeps crushed by one side or the other. The border changed by the day at the beginning of the war, but as time went by and more and more was destroyed by the boots of soldiers, the wheels of siege engines, and by fire. They're more or less separated now, and there are few if any major battles, but not a day goes by when one baron or earl rides across that wasteland to raid on the border of the other. They say that there are enough bones littering Elon's Waste to make a mountain."
"Wouldn't it have grown back by now?" Tiella asked.
"Yes, it has, but it's still called a wasteland because nobody can live there," Jarax replied. "Even the rudest hut is burned and all its inhabitants killed, because there are raiders from both sides prowling the no-man's land constantly. That brutal practice has actually helped to keep the two kingdoms separate."
"I'm glad I don't live there," Walten said, shuddering.
"It's an unhappy place, all right," he said. "I've been there a few times. Children are taught that the people on the other side of the border are murderous animals and have to be completely exterminated. They live in cities behind walls, and the people out on the farms jump at every shadow. The funny thing is, they both worship the same God. They're the same people, but they're too busy hating each other to notice it."
"Eww," Tiella sounded. "I'm glad I don't live there too."
"Why does it go on?" Tarrin asked.
"Who knows?" Jarax shrugged. "I guess because by now, there's nothing left but hate. The minds of fanatics are hard to fathom. You'd be better off trying to walk to the sun." He scratched at his beard absently. "Now that we got the unpleasant story out of the way, how would you like to hear about the Islands of Amazar?"
"Where?" Tiella asked.
There was a gleam in Jarax's eye. "A wondrous place that I myself have visited. A place of women, where women rule, women fight, and women do all the things that men do here, and men are the property of the women."
"There's no such place," Walten scoffed. "My father told me that the tales about Amazar are a bunch of baloo. There's no Amazar, no Sha'Kari, and there's no such things as dragons."
"Sha'Kari, I don't know about," Jarax admitted, "but Amazar is a real enough place, thousands of leagues to the south of Shace. Amazar is actually a series of islands off the coast of the continent of Sharadar, home of that wondrous and ancient land of magic. The Wikuni visit it often, because the furs and silk the Amazons make are in high demand, and they are the only ones that go to the islands. I was there myself, so I know."
"If they don't let humans go there, how did you get there?" Tiella asked, a bit accusingly.
"Ah, that's a long tale," he said. "Let's just say that I was a young man with a wanderlust. It's not that humans aren't allowed. Women are free to come and go as they will, but any man that sets foot on the lands of Amazar becomes a woman's property, and he's not allowed to leave. I happened to Amazar quite by accident, and spent nearly a year there, owned by a tall, regal lady named Sulina Dar. She was quite a woman," he said, his eyes distant. Then he cleared his throat and continued. "I decided that being a slave wasn't all it was cracked up to be, and snuck onto a Wikuni galleon and returned to Sennadar. I even have something to remember it by," he said. He rolled up the sleeve of his tunic, displaying a strange tatoo. "This was the mark of my mistress," he told them. "That's how they know who owns which man."
"What happens when he's sold?" Tarrin asked.
"He's tatooed again underneath the first one. Some men have tatoos all the way down one arm and halfway down the other, but they're usually older men. Being sold too often hurts a man's reputation."
"Reputation?" Walten asked. "How can a slave have a reputation?"
"It's slavery, yes, but it's almost an institution now," he said. "Full-blooded Amazon men may be owned, but they're not exactly slaves either. They have to do what the woman tells them to do, but there's a certain amount of leeway in the matter. It's very difficult to explain."
"Kind of like marriage," Tiella injected.
"Something like that, yes, but not quite," Jarax agreed.
They could see the edge of the town of Marta's Ford, and Tarrin pulled up the hood a bit more to make sure of it, especially since there were children playing in the field off to one side of the road. Dolanna called the column to a stop, then turned her horse to face them. "Faalken and I are going ahead to secure passage on a ship. Daran, keep everyone together
and off the road, and perhaps this would be a good time to check the horses. We should be back soon."
The two of them trotted into the town as Daran and his men walked the horses to a small field by the road across from the playing children, then they all dismounted. Daran's men started checking over their horses, and Tarrin did the same, urging his horse to give him a hoof at a time, as he checked them to make sure the shoes were in good shape and there were no stones or bruises. All of the horses had more or less grown used to Tarrin's unusual smell, and he could pass among them like anyone else. They actually paid him no mind; although his smell was obviously one of a predator, they either understood or came to realize that he didn't eat horses, and that they were safe with him among them.
A wooden ball came to a stop near Tarrin, and he froze at the sight of the two small children running across the road to fetch the toy. It was two little boys, both of them about eight years old, gangly but well fed, with the taller of the two having reddish hair and the shorter brown hair. Their features were similar; they were either brothers or cousins. Tarrin let the rear hoof of the horse down slowly as the two boys looked at him curiously. "Why do you have such big hands?" one of them asked boldly.
"And why are they all black?" the other one continued.
Tarrin put his hands inside his sleeves slowly as if it was something he was used to doing, not drawing any undue attention to them.
"They're just my hands," he said calmly. "Just like any other hands."
"My hands aren't black," one boy said, holding them out to show him.
"No, but you're not me either," Tarrin replied with a smile.
"You have funny eyes, mister," the other boy noticed.
"They're not funny to me," Tarrin told him. "I could say that your eyes are funny."
"You're one of those wi-koos, aren't you?" the taller boy asked. "Those animal-people that sail on the ships."
"No," Tarrin said, "but you can think of me as one of their cousins."
One of the boys across the road shouted for them to bring back the ball. "Well, we have to go. Goodbye, wi-koo cousin," the taller boy said.
"Bye," the other said, and they ran back across the road to rejoin their friends.
They hadn't shown any fear of him, even when it was obvious to them that he wasn't human. But then again, children were like that sometimes. He went around the horse and picked up the other rear hoof, checking it carefully for signs of injury or damage, noting that it would have to be trimmed down soon.
The horses all started fidgeting. Tarrin looked up and sniffed deeply at the air, then his hackles rose. He had no idea what that smell was, but it was not human, and it didn't smell very friendly either. Judging from the way the horses reacted to it, it could be said that it was definitely a bad smell. The wind was blowing from the north, from the trees and across the field on the other side of the road, and then to them. Whatever it was was up there in those trees past the field. Tarrin listened to his instincts for the first time, actively seeking them out and seeing how they reacted to that smell. The Cat didn't like that smell. And that was what he wanted to know.
"Jarax," Tarrin said calmly, peering over the children at the trees on the far side.
"What is it?" he asked.
"How quietly do you think you could get the attention of those kids and get them to move?" he asked in a quiet, intent voice. "There's a smell in the air that's upsetting the horses, and it doesn't smell friendly. Whatever it is, its in those trees on the far side of that field."
Jarax gave him a sober look. "I think I can get their attention," he said. "I'll get Orgal and Nyllin and we'll let them look at our swords. That always fascinates young boys."
"I'll drift up to the road over there," he said, pointing towards the town with a clawed finger. "If whatever it is sees that the kids are being watched, maybe it will give up and go away."
"What is it?"
"I don't know, but it has the smell of blood on it," Tarrin replied. "That means its a predator."
Jarax nodded, and he walked over to where Daran was talking to Orgal and a few other of his men. Daran looked at Tarrin curiously, who nodded and started to move, so he quietly issued a few orders to his men, and they all started to drift apart in seemingly random directions. Jarax, Orgal, and Nyllin, the second in command of the men, approached the boys with light voices and offers to let them hold their swords. That made the young boys instantly forget their game and rush over to where the men were standing, which was on Tarrin's side of the road. That drew the boys out from between Arren's men and whatever it was on the other side of the field.
Tarrin reached the road a few paces from the leading horse, ignoring the curious looks from Tiella and Walten. He looked back at Walten quickly, and made a drawing motion with his hands, then nudged at the far woods with a jerk of his head. Walten understood his action, then quickly pulled Tarrin's longbow out of his saddleskirt and started stringing it. Tiella pulled her leather sling out of her belt pouch and kept it wadded up in her hand, a bullet stone fitted into the sleeve, as she pulled out Walten's quiver of arrows for him. Tarrin untied the robe belt in front of him; the robe was too full, and he couldn't run very fast or very well while wearing it. He stood on the side of the road, seemingly with his head bowed, watching the edge of the woods from the edge of the hood.
There was a movement at the edge of the woods. It was just too high up. Tarrin looked up and saw a face, nearly fifteen spans off the ground, impossibly wide. Tarrin gave a gape at the face that materialized in the greenish cast of the woods, probably invisible to any eyes but his, then he saw the yellowed tusks at the edges of its mouth. It was a Troll! He'd never seen one, but he'd heard enough about them from his father. Trolls were the largest of the Goblin races, twice as big as a man and ten times meaner. They ate humans whenever they got the chance. The Cat in him welled up loudly when he recognized that face; obviously the Cat had no love for Trolls either. It wanted to kill it, and Tarrin found himself in agreement. Trolls this close to human lands were only there for one reason, and that was to catch someone to eat. But he wouldn't go running after it. The smell of it was too strange to him to discern if there was more than one, and he wasn't about to run into a snake pit. Too strange, and too horrid. Now that the smell was clearer, he decided that he'd never smelled anything so vile in his life. Not even the city-smell that hung about Torrian was that bad. It smelled like rotting flesh floating in a month-old cesspool. Tarrin made a motion to Daran, who approached him casually. "It's a Troll," Tarrin told him.
"You're sure?"
Tarrin nodded. "I saw it. The face was about fifteen spans off the ground, and it had tusks."
"That was a Troll, alright," he said grimly. "How many?"
"I'm not sure," Tarrin said quietly. "I don't know their scent well enough to figure out if there's more than one. Besides, the smell is so awful I doubt I could if I tried," he said, wrinkling his nose.
"We can't let a Troll run around loose," Daran said. "It will kill someone."
"Walten may be able to put an arrow into it," Tarrin said. "It's right at the edge of bow range."
"No, then it'll just get mad," Daran said, thinking. "We have to lure it out, so we can kill it."
"Trolls may not be smart, but they aren't stupid," Tarrin said, falling back on what his father had taught him about them. "It's not going to come out here when it can see twenty armed men."
"We can have some of the men trot off," Daran said to himself."
Tarrin looked up, seeing more disturbances in the foliage. "I don't think that it's going to matter," Tarrin said quickly. Tarrin could see another Troll, and then another, and one more, gathering at the edge of the trees. "I see four of them now."
"They'll attack with that many," Daran told him, turning around and putting a hand on his sword. "I can see them," he said.
The Trolls hovered at the edge of the clearing, then they simply turned and walked away. Tarrin could smell their scents getting fainter; a s
mell that pungent was easy to keep track of. "They're leaving," Tarrin said. The taste of disappointment was hot in his mouth, and he had to quell the Cat's desire to go chase them down. Now he was glad that he hadn't chased off after that thing in the first place. He'd have had a nasty shock by the time he got there.
"That's not like them," Daran said curiously. "Twenty to four are odds that Trolls would have accepted, and it's not like a Troll to give up on a fight. They like killing as much as they like eating."
"All in all, with those children here, I'm glad we didn't have to fight," Tarrin said, tying his robe belt again and trying to calm down from the adrenaline-rushed high he'd worked himself up to in preparation for the fight.
"It may not be over yet," Daran said. "They may have decided to turn around, or maybe even try to come at us from another direction. We're moving into town, and we're bringing the children in with us," he announced. "I don't want to be left out in the open like this with four Trolls prowling the woods."
"Good idea," he agreed.
They all got into a loose formation around the children, who were lured into coming with them by Jarax's easy manner and promise that they could sit on the horses, then walked into town. Marta's Ford was a large village, with no outer wall, and it was surprisingly clean by the standards of Tarrin's nose. The buildings were vaguely similar to the ones of Aldreth, except for the thatched roofs where Aldreth used slate tiles, but they were laid out in rectangular patterns following the streets instead of facing the village green. This town didn't have a green. The masts of three or four ships were visible over the rooftops, near the large warehouse buildings. It was that commerce that made Marta's Ford larger than Aldreth, for much of the city seemed to revolve around its modest docks and the goods that were loaded onto and off of the ships. Daran sent Nyllin to find the mayor and warn him of the Trolls lurking in the surrounding woods, and the rest of them stood in a vacant lot between two houses near the road leading towards Torrian.
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