The Legions of Fire

by David Drake

  Maron turned his head to watch as she approached. He rose with a convulsive motion, using the strength of his shoulders; the sapling flexed but didn’t break.

  He grinned. “You saw it?” he demanded. “You saw me rip that furball? I ripped his guts out!”

  “Yes, you did,” Hedia said. Her voice was husky. “I saw you, and you ripped him like a cobweb!”

  The gore on the faun’s legs was drying, but there was a cut on his right biceps. He was spattered with bloody foam, not necessarily all from the wolf.

  He reeked of maleness. The odor was familiar to her, but Hedia had never smelled it so powerfully.

  “My beast,” she said. “My great, bloody beast.”

  She released her girdle and tossed it on the ground. She was dizzy with desire.

  “I cannot harm you!” Maron said in alarm. “I’m under compulsion never to harm you!”

  “Silly beast,” Hedia whispered, lifting her tunic over her head. “It’s never harmed me before.”

  She dropped the garment over the girdle and stepped toward the faun. His phallus was fully erect.

  “My beast,” Hedia said as she felt his mighty arms encircle her.

  CORYLUS FIGURED THE TRIBE must have seen him almost as quickly as he saw them. Faces, pale though too distant to have features, turned in his direction. He waved his left hand high, showing them it was empty.

  The closest thing Corylus had to a weapon was Odd’s obsidian knife. That bothered him emotionally, but the lucid part of his mind knew that he couldn’t fight that many opponents even if he were wearing full infantry kit. Looking friendly and harmless was his best chance of survival.

  The tribe was in the process of setting up camp on the rim of a vast grassy crater. Domed leather tents were rising on frames of willow saplings. There were nearly forty dwellings and, at a quick estimate, around two hundred folk all told. Presumably every head of house was a warrior, and there would be grown sons as well. No, this wasn’t a time when force was the best option for a lone stranger.

  Corylus still wished he had his staff with him. If I can get a message to Persica, perhaps she’ll send it on. He grinned at his silent joke.

  Three men started toward him, holding what looked like bundles of short spears. They stayed close together, which was actually good news: it meant they were concerned with mutual support if he attacked them. Had one moved out on either flank, they would be preparing to hunt him down if he ran.

  Before the trio got close, a fourth man called them back. Corylus heard the tone of command in the shout, though the meaning was only to be guessed.

  That will be Frothi. He was no taller than the others, but his beard was blond and spread like a flag across his chest.

  Corylus waved again. He was smiling. In part his determined good humor was a way to convince himself that everything was going to be fine.

  Two birds circled overhead. Anything at that height would look black against the pale sky, but the exceptionally deep wings meant Corylus was probably right in guessing they were ravens.

  That didn’t mean Wisdom and Memory were escorting him, however. They or two of their kin might simply be hoping for a meal.

  Corylus quickened his pace, the way any lone traveler might do when he sighted companionship ahead of him. Tribesmen came from their previous occupations, some of them running, but nobody pushed beyond the point where Frothi stood.

  They stood in a hierarchy of place: the sturdiest men were to the chieftain’s either side; older men were right and left of that central core; then boys; and finally the women with the children. All the men were armed, though their light javelins had heads of stone or sharpened bone.

  The tribesmen had no swords for lack of metal, but Corylus didn’t see stone axes or edged clubs either. These were hunters, not warriors. To be sure they could kill a man easily enough, but the question of intent was important.

  Their herd animals were squat deer whose antlers swept back over their necks. They seemed as tame as sheep, but they were spreading across the plain now that the herdsmen had gone to look at Corylus. The six hairy elephants, the mammoths as the tree nymph had named them, were grazing in a loose group. They’d been unloaded, but two still wore net harnesses of leather and grass rope in which the tents had been packed.

  The space immediately to the chief’s right had been empty. Nemastes stepped into it. He wore leather clothing, but nobody would have mistaken the tall, bald man for one of the tribesmen.

  The figure behind Nemastes was taller even than the wizard. It had a low forehead, a long jaw, and massive brow ridges that prevented Corylus from thinking of it as human even though it stood erect on two legs. What seemed at first glance to be a shaggy coat was the creature’s pelt. It smiled, showing powerful canine teeth in both the upper and lower jaws.

  Corylus was within thirty feet. He’d expected that Frothi would address him, but the chief kept haughtily silent. The other men let their eyes shift from him to the stranger and back again, but Nemastes stared fixedly at Corylus. You’d almost expect him to have a membrane that flicked sideways across his eyes, the way a snake does.

  “Hail, Chief Frothi!” Corylus said, stopping where he was. He raised his left arm again, keeping his empty right hand ostentatiously in sight. “We are well met. And hail to you also, Nemastes.”

  Odd’s Vengeance had warned Corylus to expect Nemastes, but the ivory figurine hanging around the wizard’s neck from a thong was a surprise. It was the miniature head which Varus had worn since his public reading.

  Nemastes didn’t move, but the sudden stillness of his face was as good as another man’s shout of surprise. The creature behind him hunched and gave an angry “Hoo!” It bared its teeth, this time clearly as a threat: it had felt its master react.

  “Who are you?” Nemastes said. “And why have you come to us?”

  Corylus hadn’t heard him speak in Carce. His voice was high pitched and rough.

  “I’m Publius Corylus,” he said, sauntering forward. He held his hands at waist level, palms open and turned upward. “And I’m here as a friend.”

  As he approached, the tribe circled behind him. If there was going to be real trouble, it would be with Frothi and the men beside him. It still made Corylus uneasy to know that he was surrounded.

  More uneasy, I mean. He smiled to himself. The gods alone knew what the tribesmen made of the expression.

  “That’s Odd’s dagger,” a woman said in a harsh, accusatory voice. She was close enough to the left of Corylus to touch him. “And that’s his basket: I wove it myself.”

  “Yes,” said Corylus, turning to her. She was young and as trim as any of these folk; they were all on the stocky side. She wore a cape woven from the mammoths’ black guard hairs, picked out with geometric designs from the beast’s russet underfur. “I found Odd’s body in the river—”

  He gestured with his left hand, but didn’t turn away from the woman. So long as he faced her, he could keep Frothi and the wizard in the corner of his eyes.

  “—and buried him on the shore. Odd’s spirit came to me in the night and ordered me to tell his brother Frothi what had happened.”

  “Odd went seal hunting!” Frothi said, his voice rising. It was the first time he’d spoken to Corylus.

  “Odd went searching for wisdom!” said the young woman, wheeling to face the chief. “As you knew, Frothi!”

  “Shut your mouth, Sith,” Frothi said in a harsh, frightened whisper. “This is no business of yours.”

  “Odd went to the Isle of Dreams to search for wisdom,” Corylus said. He spoke directly at the chief and his wizard, but he pitched his voice so that most of the people crowding close about them could hear his words. “He found death instead. What can you tell us about your brother’s death, Frothi?”

  Frothi opened his mouth to snarl, then flinched. He was looking at Corylus, but there had been a flicker in the air between them. Maybe he saw something more clearly than I did.

  Nemastes lifte
d the ivory talisman in both hands and began chanting what sounded like nonsense syllables; his eyes glazed. The tribesmen to his right jumped back as though he had suddenly burst into flames, and even Frothi edged aside.

  Corylus tried to step forward. He couldn’t move. The atmosphere took on the faintly yellow-green hue of rotting urine, blurring the shapes of those watching.

  The figure of an ancient man clambered out of the talisman and swelled to full size. His features were those of the ivory carving. He started toward Corylus with a grim black smile.

  Corylus felt a sudden tingle. Sorba stood at his right side. She stepped between him and the spirit of the talisman.

  “Go back, Botrug,” said the nymph. “Go back or I’ll send you back.”

  “You know who I am, rowan,” Botrug said in a rasping voice. He sounded old and very tired, but also certain. “You know too that you can’t protect the youth against me. I’ll break you if I must.”

  This is the wizard who brought Nemastes and his brothers here, wherever here is, Corylus realized. If Botrug had been powerful enough to control the Band for any length of time, it didn’t seem probable that Sorba was going to stop him. Corylus strained, but his muscles simply wouldn’t move.

  “I can protect this youth, Botrug,” the nymph said. “His mother was one of us.”

  Nemastes and the members of the tribe had faded from Corylus’s vision, but he saw twelve other figures watching avidly from the edge of the yellow-green haze. They were tall and thin, and their features were indistinguishable from those of Nemastes.

  “Even so,” Botrug said. He raised his right arm toward Corylus.

  Sorba slapped him like the crash of lightning. Botrug’s head spun sideways; he stumbled to one knee. “This youth,” she repeated in a voice like a silver flute.

  Botrug looked up. Without sound or warning, his form dissolved into a net of sparks. They flowed back into the talisman in Nemastes’ hands.

  Sorba had stepped into the blow. Now she shifted onto her heels again, rubbing the fingers of her right hand with her left.

  She glared at the watching Twelve. She hadn’t changed in any way Corylus could describe, but only with effort could he remember the giggling nymph he’d met in the rowan grove.

  “Do you want to try?” Sorba shrilled to the wizards. “Do you?”

  The circle of wizards vanished as swiftly and imperceptibly as rainbows fade. The haze of foul light disappeared and Sorba with it.

  Corylus stumbled with the effort of moments before, now released. He felt light-headed.

  The present came back to him in a rush. His eyes focused on Nemastes, staring at his talisman with a stunned expression. The wizard looked at Corylus. He gave a harsh croak like a heron, turned, and collided with his even taller servant. Nemastes swung around the giant as if it were an awkwardly planted tree; he ran into the encampment.

  Corylus stumbled again. He’d been off-balance from his paralysis, and he hadn’t had the presence of mind to plant himself firmly before he tried to chase the wizard.

  Many people were shouting. Corylus got to his feet. The tall servant was shambling after his master, occasionally looking over his shoulder. It moved gracelessly, but it covered ground quickly because its legs were so long. Corylus started after it.

  “Stop,” said Sith, trotting at his elbow. “You can’t fight the Stolo, Publius Corylus. You can hardly stand upright!”

  “Get out of my way, fool!” Corylus said.

  Sith wasn’t in his way. And if Nemastes’ seven-foot-tall servant was the Stolo, she was right that Corylus couldn’t fight it. Couldn’t fight it and win, anyway. So why was he chasing Nemastes when he knew he couldn’t reach the wizard without getting through the Stolo first?

  Corylus tripped on a tent peg. He would have sprawled onto his face if Sith hadn’t taken his weight.

  He let himself relax. His vision was clearing. “I’m sorry,” he said to Sith. “I was being foolish.”

  “You’re exhausted,” the woman said. He was squarely on his own feet again, but she continued to touch his arm. “You need to rest. How far have you come?”

  Sith had proved unexpectedly strong, but her face was smooth and girlish. Corylus wondered how old she really was. Her clothing was decorated with designs made by working splinters of dyed bone through the leather.

  Corylus rubbed his eyes and looked around. They were in the middle of the encampment. Nemastes—and his Stolo—had vanished, but the rest of the tribe was watching him.

  Everybody gave Nemastes a wide berth when he started working magic, Corylus thought. He managed a slight grin. I wish I could have kept clear too; though thanks to Sorba, it turned out all right.

  “I’m not tired,” he said. He spoke to Sith, but he kept his eyes on Frothi and the three or four men who appeared to be accompanying him. “Not my body, that is. Nemastes did something that left me feeling as though I’d had a fever, but I’ve shaken it off now.”

  He cleared his throat. “I really do apologize, Sith,” he said. “I was delirious, I guess. I knew what I was saying—but I shouldn’t have been saying it.”

  “Nemastes is a great wizard,” Sith said. She spoke loudly, challenging Frothi. “You’re a greater wizard yet, Corylus. You defeated Nemastes and made him flee!”

  “I’m not a wizard,” Corylus said. He wasn’t sure what—or how much—he should say. “But I have friends.”

  The huts were low. Corylus was a few inches taller than the tribesmen, but even they would have to hunch if they tried to stand in the domes. Some of the deer were used as pack animals, carrying light loads. Paired satchels lay where they’d been dropped at the stranger’s approach, but there were no obvious weapons among them.

  A meat-drying rack had been partially assembled between the huts nearest Corylus. The staves of the frame were hardwood, six feet long and an inch in diameter. One of those would do ….

  Frothi stopped well short of Corylus. He said, “Sith, go to your hut!”

  “Yes,” the woman said in a clear voice. “We owe hospitality to a stranger. I will feed Corylus in my hut.”

  The man to Frothi’s left barked a surprised laugh, then bent his head away from the chief and pretended to be coughing. Corylus took a deep breath. He thought he was fully recovered from the wizard’s spell. I’d better be.

  “Sith, you’re my wife!” Frothi shouted.

  “Third wife,” a woman called. The men of the tribe formed an arc behind the chief and his three henchmen, but the women and children crowded close behind them.

  “Aye,” said another in a feigned aside to her neighbor. “Maybe he should have stopped at two, do you think, Fiolswitha?”

  “I sewed the case for Odd’s knife myself,” Sith said, touching the scabbard. Like her garments, it was decorated with a pattern in bone needles dyed rose and saffron. “It’s right that it return to the dwelling where I made it!”

  “Slut!” said the chief. Like most of the men, he carried a spear thrower and three light javelins in his right hand. He lunged toward Sith, raising the bundle to flog her with.

  Corylus picked up the staff and stepped between them. It was hornbeam, strong and supple. When as well cured as this, it became hard enough to dull iron tools quickly.

  “No,” he said. He didn’t raise his voice, but it rasped like the growl of a stiff-legged dog.

  Frothi jumped back. “Bearn!” he said, looking at the men with him. “Todinn, Gram—hold this insolent puppy!”

  The men looked away. Somebody back in the crowd sniggered.

  Frothi grabbed the man on his right and shouted, “Bearn, didn’t you hear me?”

  Bearn had been slouching, looking at the ground. He straightened and met the chief’s angry glare. He said, “I guess I figure a man’s wives are his own business, Frothi.”

  “Sure,” called someone behind them. “But that’s if he’s a man.”

  For a moment, Corylus thought that Frothi was going to come for him after all. Instead the c
hief turned on his heel and strode back through the spectators. A young boy didn’t get out of the way in time; Frothi batted him wailing to the ground with the sheaf of javelins.

  “It looks to me,” said a woman archly to no one in particular, “that maybe Odd isn’t dead after all.”

  There was general laughter. Even Frothi’s henchmen smiled, though their expressions turned back to concern when they eyed Corylus again.

  “Come,” said Sith, taking Corylus by the left wrist. “My hut is the one with the stars woven into it.”

  She tugged; she was very strong. Besides, Corylus couldn’t see any reason not to do as Sith directed.

  CHAPTER XIV

  Varus paused, staring at the new world. The woman took a few steps farther, then stopped and looked back at him. She said, “You said you wanted to gather fruit from the First Tree. Have you changed your mind?”

  “I’m just looking around,” Varus said defensively. “I’ve never seen a place like this.”

  The woman laughed. “Stay as long as you like,” she said. “I have only time.”

  They stood in a rolling meadow. The fog and escarpment had vanished. The ankle-high vegetation seemed sun-drenched, but there was no sun in the bright sky to cast the illumination. A single tree with drooping branches stood silhouetted against the horizon.

  Varus squatted to examine the ground cover. It wasn’t grass or ivy. In fact it seemed to be—

  He stood up abruptly. “Sigyn!” he said. “These are trees—little trees. Where are we?”

  The woman shrugged. “On another world than that from which you came,” she said. “From another world than mine as well. We are not part of this place, though we exist in it for the present. Does that matter to you, wizard?”

  Varus considered the question. He suspected that it did matter, though he wasn’t sure how.

  So far as Sigyn was concerned, all that mattered were the things that affected his present quest. He had a life beyond the quest, or he hoped he did. It would be pointless to ask the woman questions which she couldn’t understand, let alone answer.