Ranna remembered when she first saw the young, fair Karran who had accompanied his father on a trading trip. When she saw the color of sky in the boy’s eyes, she was amazed, and she asked her mother how it could be. Her mother told her there were many tribes who had strange features and spoke a different language, but none of them as great as the Kobani.
Even as a young girl, Ranna was precocious and approached the Karran traders as they laid out their goods, taking interest in their strange looks and impossible language, as well as a keen interest in their goods. She got used to the traders winking at her as she visited their displays. The first time it happened, she had been frightened and raced back to her mother. Kobani did not wink, and it was a bizarre experience, but she soon learned it was all in good fun, and as she got older she would laugh or smile and wink back.
On a spring day, Ranna approached the trader’s young son. The day was warm and the sky clear with a soft breeze off the Grasslands that smelled like fresh hay. The three Karran—two men and the boy—had unloaded their wagons at the edge of the village and laid out on blankets some of their goods to be traded. The Karran men had learned some Kobani words over the years, and Ranna’s father had learned a few Karran words and, with hand signs and shaking or nodding of heads, they worked out their agreements. The Karran traders were not allowed to enter into the village, nor were they served food or drink, and all proceedings were kept strictly formal—sometimes even hostile—on the part of the Kobani who gathered to study the trade goods.
On this day, the traders had spread out cookware, knives, bowls, pots and rolls of dyed cloth, in addition to weapons. Kobani women crowded in front of the displays quietly discussing and pointing, asking to handle the items.
Ranna soon found herself standing next to the young blond boy. She stared at him openly, without any shyness. “What is your name?” she asked.
He looked startled for a moment and then answered in heavily accented Kobani. “Orlan. What is your name?”
“Ranna. Why is your hair so white?”
“Why is your hair so black?” he replied.
Ranna thought about this and smiled and then laughed.
Orlan laughed, too, his white teeth flashing in a tanned face. Orlan thought Ranna was a pretty girl for a Kobani, though the tattoo across her forehead was not the most attractive feature. But he liked her ready smile, and he kept his eye on her as she followed her mother, stopping in front of each blanket and studying the items there.
A Kobani leader who had not been able to reach an agreement with Orlan’s father over an array of weapons returned leading a fine bay mare. Orlan’s father looked over the horse, checking its teeth, running his hands over the legs, and finally, smiling broadly, he nodded.
Piles of fine hides accumulated, along with worked leather items, saddles, bridles, and crafted silver pieces. By late afternoon, the Karran trade goods were almost all gone and replaced with Kobani items, which Orlan loaded into the wagons while his father and the other trader completed the last transactions. The Kobani crowd thinned out, and only a few lingered to haggle over the remaining items or to try to tempt one of the traders with an undesirable object.
As Orlan’s father watched approvingly, Ranna’s mother traded several jars of salve known to heal wounds and a finely crafted silver bracelet to Orlan for a collection of metal bowls and a heavy cook pot. As she gathered up her new wares and hurried away, Ranna stood there pretending to look at the last items no one wanted. But really she was studying Orlan.
Orlan’s father ordered him to pack up. He picked up the remaining items from the blankets and placed them in baskets, folded the blankets, and carried them to the wagon, where he found space to load them. He turned around, and there was Ranna looking over his shoulder. She smiled awkwardly as if caught doing something she should not have. She started to back away.
Orlan held up his finger for her to wait and went to the wagon. After rooting around, he returned and held out his hand to Ranna. She opened her hand, and he placed in her palm a gold bead engraved on all sides with a leaping flame. She was stunned and at the same time overwhelmed by the beautiful gift. The Kobani prized gold. She looked at Orlan, knowing she had nothing to give him in return. He knew what she was thinking and waved at her. “I will see you when I come here again, Ranna,” he said.
“I will see you, Orlan,” she replied.
For nearly ten years, Orlan came to trade with the Kobani, and each spring he and Ranna would greet each other. Over the years she would ask him to bring her items not regularly brought to trade. She became a young holy woman and healer, taught by her mother, and she told Orlan what medicines were good for which ailments. And each year Orlan brought her a gold bead for her hair.
Kobani girls were never forced into marriage, although many married young. That was not the case with Ranna. The fact was she was too busy being taught the healing ways by her mother, and she had little time for young men. More than a few tried to approach her, some encouraged by her father. But to no avail. She was not interested in young warriors who talked about nothing except fighting or, to break the monotony, horses and cattle.
The fragile once-a-year friendship between Orlan and Ranna lasted until the Great War between the Maggan and the Karran, which drew Orlan into the army to fight against the night people and interrupted trading with the Kobani. Growing population pressures among the Kobani led to an interest in expanding their territory, and when the men of the Great Grasslands were off fighting the Maggan, the Kobani began encroaching into the Grasslands, raiding farms and villages, and running off cattle and horses.
At the conclusion of the Great War, the men of the Grasslands returned home to find the Kobani roaming the southern Grasslands in raiding parties, having burned out a number of villages and farms and killed many Grasslanders. Under the leadership of Orlan, the Grasslanders struck back, and so began a protracted war of raids by both parties for control of the Grasslands.
In the meantime, Orlan and his father settled at the ferry and built the sprawling whitewashed cottage with a gray slate roof that now stood on the hill overlooking the river.
There were no women in the home, Orlan’s mother having passed on to the world of dreams due to a fever some years before.
Several times the Kobani tried to approach the ferry from the south with large raiding parties, but they were always intercepted by alert Grasslanders, who often posted lone lookouts in the remote areas of the Grasslands to spot incursions, slipping away unnoticed to give warning. It was an uncertain and dangerous time in the Grasslands. The Kobani were accomplished warriors who could travel without being detected and attack an unsuspecting village with a suddenness and fierceness that resulted in a town being wiped out. They were equally adept at lying in wait in order to ambush and destroy Grasslander war parties intent on driving them out of the Grasslands.
In the raging skirmishes following the Great War, Orlan led forces that surprised the Kobani more than a few times, and his name became known as a fearsome warrior. It was on one of these raids that Orlan’s father was killed. In the dawn clash between Grasslander and Kobani raiding parties just outside the village of Elan, Orlan ambushed the invaders. In the thunder of horses’ hooves, the war cries and shouts of fury and pain, an enemy’s arrow found Orlan’s father. There was no time for grieving. Orlan swallowed his sorrow and carried his father’s body on the back of his horse down a lonely trail to the ferry where he buried him on the hill above the river.
On a hot summer night, Orlan’s scouts spotted a large Kobani raiding party swinging wide to the east through a less inhabited part of the Grasslands, and he surmised that they were planning to sweep around the flank of the Grasslanders and come in from the east, where they weren’t expected, to strike deep into the Grasslands at a prosperous village that supported large herds of cattle and horses as well as many farms.
With cooperation from the residents, Orlan had the h
erds of animals driven far to the north, removed the farmers and the people of the village to a place of safety, kept the fires burning in the fireplaces at night, and lay in wait on the high ground of a low valley the Kobani would take on their return home from the raid. He deliberately let the Kobani burn the entire village.
The Kobani were confused and perplexed when they discovered there were no villagers or farmers in the area and little livestock, but they guessed that the people had been warned. After confiscating loot from the farms and the village houses and buildings, the Kobani burned everything and then began the trek back, heavily burdened and slowed by wagons they had captured.
At dawn the next day, with the Kobani camped, exhausted, and sleeping, Orlan and his forces swooped down into the valley and into their camp, first driving off their horses and then encircling them and cutting them down. Few Kobani escaped alive, and the few who did described the biggest single humiliating defeat for the Kobani in memory. Ranna held in her grief as best she could, as did the many women and family members who lost loved ones at the hands of the Grasslanders on the ill-fated raid. She had felt uneasy about the attacks into Karran lands and had suggested several times to the elders that it was unwise, but she was ignored by the warlike factions.
The war went on for over a year after the calamitous raid, and the Kobani sought revenge at every opportunity. The Grasslands became a dangerous place, and both Grasslanders and Kobani who lived near the borders were constantly fearful.
Ranna’s village had never been raided by the Grasslanders; it was one of the largest in the north of the Kobani lands but far enough from the reach of the Grasslander raiding parties to be safe—or so the elders believed. Ranna was much sought after for her healing abilities, especially by the wounded. Her parents were old and had moved south to be with relatives. But she had close family members in this village and was comfortable.
The Grasslander horse soldiers struck at dawn thundering into the sleeping Kobani village with flaming torches, arrows, and sudden death. In retaliation for the massacre of an entire Karran town three weeks earlier by the Kobani, Orlan led a force of angry mounted men in the early hour as daylight opened up in the sky over the grassy plain. The dogs began barking, and then the villagers felt the faint vibration in the ground.
Ranna sat up in her bed, trying to awaken and gather her thoughts in the dark. Soon came the sound of pounding horses’ hooves, the smell of fire, the screams of women and children, and the shouts of men. She scrambled out of her blankets and rushed outside into the chaos of houses burning and smoking, dashing horses, and people running in every direction to escape. A great roar of voices cascaded across the village as if everyone were shouting at the top of their lungs at once. Blue-clad bowmen rode through the village, shooting their arrows into anyone who appeared in the dim light of early morning. Peering through the smoke, Ranna saw the line of horses galloping shoulder to shoulder, men astride with their deadly lances pointed inward, charging through the village. Grasslanders! Karran! A great roar burst from the throats of the Grasslanders as they streamed around the houses impaling people as they ran. Some Kobani warriors and women stood firing arrows into the incoming ranks, but they were soon overridden.
Ranna looked desperately for somewhere to hide. A spooked horse streaked by, and she tried unsuccessfully to catch the reins. She ran back into her house, but it was now ablaze and filled with smoke. She grabbed a large, silver-handled knife and darted back outside. The air everywhere was blanketed in smoke, and it was difficult to see where she could run to escape. Her house was set close to a low hill, so she ran through the smoke dodging riders and slipping around other burning houses until she felt the ground rise upward. She ran hard, her lungs full of choking smoke, the cries of dying people behind her, and the roar of the burning houses fueled now by a breeze off the plains. Suddenly two Grasslanders appeared before her on horseback. She turned away from them, not breaking stride as one fitted an arrow into his bow, aimed, and shot, the arrow burying itself in her back.
The impact knocked her down, but she was quickly up and running again. The second rider kicked his horse into action and within a few strides was upon her. She saw him over her shoulder and turned to face him, drawing her knife. The lance drove into her, and she collapsed as the rider pulled his lance out of her body and then turned his horse and rode down the hill into the boiling fray.
Orlan dismounted from his horse on a hill overlooking the burning village. The wind cleared the smoke from the burned-out skin houses, and the sun jumped up into the sky, as it can in the plains. He could see far off to one side his riders gathering up the horse herd. He knew the cattle herd would be farther out, and a small force would be sent to round it up for the drive back to Karran land. He had sent scouts out in every direction to protect against a surprise attack.
Horses were hitched to Kobani wagons, and weapons and other items of use were being loaded onto them. Orlan knew this village as the one he had come to trade in with his father for many years, and it saddened him that it had all come to this. Someone called his name from below, and he walked toward the caller, cupping his hand behind his ear to hear better over the dim.
He waved his approval, having heard the request, and kept walking along the high ground. There were few bodies on this hill. He skirted one, and as he did, he glanced down and saw that it was a woman. As he was about to lift his eyes away, he saw gold beads intertwined in braids that lay across the face of the downed woman, who was curled on her side. They glistened in the sunlight as if beckoning him, but he mentally shrugged off the memory of something he couldn’t quite recall. He took another step and then turned back and bent down on one knee beside the woman and brushed the fallen hair from her face. He looked at the beads in her hair. Could it be? he wondered.
The eyes opened, glazed in pain, and tried to focus on Orlan’s face. Orlan could see fear pass through them and then resignation. A groan escaped her lips, and Orlan could see the arrow in her back and a great pool of blood on the front of her where her hands were clasped.
“Ranna?”
“Orlan.”
He reached in and pulled her blood-soaked tunic away from the wound and saw a deep puncture into her shoulder above the heart where the lance had entered. He saw the broken arrow shaft protruding from her back. He pulled a scarf from around his neck and placed it against the wound. She closed her eyes.
He ran down the hill to where a wagon was being loaded, commandeered it, leaped up into the seat, and drove the horses up the hill to where Ranna lay. Clearing a place in the wagon, he piled skins and blankets up as a cushion. He then hurried to Ranna and lifted her and carried her to the wagon, where he placed her gently in the bed he had made. He covered her with skins, hiding her from the eyes of his soldiers, for he knew they would kill her if they knew she was there.
He notified his officers that he was returning home to the ferry for a rest and gave orders for the soldiers to return to their homes, confident that the Kobani would not attack again for some time after such a disastrous defeat. Several tried to argue with him. They couldn’t understand why he suddenly had to leave for home.
He drove the wagon up a rough trail that followed the river north toward the ferry, leaving the Kobani village behind, along with some perplexed Grasslanders. His horse was tied to the back of the wagon and trailed along behind. A band of soldiers rode with him for several hours and then broke off and headed northeast.
A short distance further and certain he was alone at last, he pulled the horses up and tended to Ranna. The arrow wound was painful but had not penetrated past the ribs in her back. Ranna fainted as he removed the arrow and cleansed the wound. He then opened her shirt and cleansed the deeper wound from the javelin that had cut into her shoulder. He covered the wound in a salve and wrapped it in clean cloth. Ranna was running a high fever, and he cooled her forehead and made her drink water. Though the wagon trip was uncomfortable
, he feared being caught out in the open not only by marauding Kobani but by Grasslander soldiers, who would not hesitate to kill Ranna. He gave the horses little rest, traveling day and night and stopping only when he judged the horses could go no further without foundering. After several days, he finally came in sight of the ferry and his house on the hill. The ferry had been shut down in his absence and the house shuttered up tightly. It had not been disturbed.
Orlan carried Ranna into the house and put her in his bed. He attended to his exhausted horses and returned to treat the wounds and prepare soup for Ranna. Ranna was near death, but by the fourth day, her fever broke, and she slept, exhausted. He spoon-fed her a chicken broth made from one of the chickens running wild outside the house, and she smiled at him and slipped back to sleep. As the days progressed, she improved dramatically and gave him instructions on preparing salves for her wounds, which were now healing. Soon she was up and moving about the house with stiffness and caution, but she was alert. Her appetite returned, and Orlan prepared foods to strengthen her, including fresh fish from the river and vegetables from the garden, which had become overrun with weeds.
Orlan checked his ferry and prepared it for travelers, but none came because of the fighting. Several times each day he climbed a nearby rise and scanned the Grasslands for some sign of Kobani or any riders, but none appeared. It was not until a week later that two of his soldiers rode in to check on him. He hid Ranna in the bedroom and took their reports. The Kobani had signaled that they wanted to talk, and one of the other Grassland leaders had met with them, and a truce was now in effect. According to the soldiers, the Kobani agreed not to raid the Karran Grasslands and to stay within their own traditional territory. The Grasslanders agreed not to send punitive raids into Kobani country. A meeting was to be scheduled to reach a final treaty. The war, at least for now, was over.
The soldiers were anxious to get home, and they did not tarry long, but fed and watered their horses, ate a quick meal fixed by Orlan, and with fond farewells rode back into the Grasslands to the east.
Die for the Flame Page 22