“Because the bond between us is so strong.”
“Yes. Love me, True, please.”
He did, slowly at first and with attention that neglected no part of her before fire consumed the both of them together, the act so beautiful that when they lay spent in one another’s arms, tears flooded Barta’s eyes.
She wondered again what miracle had brought him to her, this stranger come out of a dark night with no past and barely a promise of a future, but bearing so much in his graceful hands—strength, devotion, and loyalty only ever matched by one other being.
“Tell me,” she whispered as he lay still inside her in the most intimate of unions, his cheek pressed against hers. “Tell me from whence you came.”
“I cannot, Barta. Do not ask me.”
“Then tell me what you know of the future. Sometimes when we sit in council with the others making our plans, I catch a look in your eyes…”
“What look, Mistress?”
“As if you know how long we will have together.”
He hesitated a moment before he spoke. “I do not. I know only that I want to be with you, I am with you, and that is enough. Live in the moment, Barta, and be satisfied.”
“That has never been easy for me.”
“But you are strong enough to accomplish it, to accomplish anything.”
“I am not strong enough to survive losing you. Anything else, True.”
He drew a breath. “I always told you I may not have leave to stay. I warned you of that again and again, when we spoke of a child. You said—”
“I know what I said. But now winter is upon us, and I’m looking for eternity. I’m a selfish creature, after all. I want reassurance so I can face today and tomorrow, and all the days to come.”
“I cannot give you that assurance. Only my love. It will be yours always and forever—so long as my heart beats and even when it stills once more.”
“Once more?” She drew away far enough to look into his eyes. At such close quarters, with the shaggy hair falling across his brow, he barely looked like a man at all, but somehow familiar for all that. “What do you mean, once more?”
“Have we not all lived many times? Do our spirits not come and go like the seasons, donning new bodies like new tunics? So the gods do teach.”
“You think we knew each other before?” And would that explain the sense of familiarity that dogged her?
“I know it.”
“Ah.” She eased slightly. “But such partings come with age. Surely we will have many seasons.” She knew, given the lives they now lived, age could not be promised. But she voiced the wish like a prayer against the unknown.
“I will make you a promise, True—here and now I will: I lay aside all my selfishness, all my self-interest and my headstrong complaints—for your sake. You come first with me, best and last. And I will trade anything for your company. Do you think the gods are listening?”
“They are always listening.”
“Do you suppose they will, then, permit you to stay with me?”
“I cannot say.”
Earnestly she told him—and told the gods—“I will be a different woman, a better woman, for your sake.”
“I cannot imagine you being better than you are.”
“Oh, True.” The tears in her eyes spilled over. “Then I ask but one thing of you.”
“Anything, Barta.”
“Before the next raid, wed with me.”
Chapter Thirty
Among the Epidii, handfastings customarily took place at the beginning of winter. Then was the fighting done for the season; then were hearth fires bright. Folk turned their minds from survival to begetting the next generation.
As Barta stood beside True with her hand in his and all the remaining members of the tribe looking on, she wondered again whether she might already be carrying. Part of her hoped so—she longed for True’s child so much she ached. But such a state would lend her vulnerability in battle that she couldn’t afford. For they planned many more raids in the months to come.
One this very night.
She raised her eyes and studied the beloved faces that surrounded her. So very much had changed since True’s arrival. Her parents—gone, along with so many friends. Tally standing with a new gravity upon him. Brude aged so swiftly, hand in hand with Avinda, who wore a serious expression. Gant—but yes, Gant looked pleased for her, as did Pith, his face creased in a smile.
As for True—her intended husband, her lover, her very reason for drawing breath…
She turned to face him and placed her other hand in his. Their gazes met, and for an instant she lost all her breath. She felt as if her heart might burst.
How could it be that they’d been together only since the start of autumn? It must be as he’d said, they’d shared a past life, for everything about him spoke to her of comfort and familiarity so deep it sounded to her core. His bright eyes, full of devotion, never wavered from hers as she spoke.
“Now am I yours: wife, friend, and helpmate, from this moment to the end of my life.”
His fingers tightened on hers, and gladness lit him from within. He repeated the vow gravely, “Now am I yours, husband, friend, and helpmate, from this moment to the end of my life.”
“A heart gifted, a life sworn.”
“A heart gifted, a life sworn.”
Barta, who never bent to any man—had never expected to—bowed her head and lifted his hands one after the other to her lips. Love and devotion together flooded her in a wave so strong it nearly took her to her knees.
But no, for True was there to uplift her. The strength of his hands, still fast on hers, bore her upward, and a few cheers sounded from the crowd.
“Kiss her!” someone called—it might have been Gede. True drew Barta to him, and their lips met with exquisite tenderness there before the tribe, declaring them one.
Barta closed her eyes at the sheer pleasure of it, breaking contact with True’s gaze at last, and felt the fullness of their connection. From now on she lived for him—his needs, his well-being before her own.
For an instant, eyes still closed, she thought she felt a cold tear on her cheek. His? Hers? She opened her eyes to find snowflakes dancing all around them, keeping time with the music in her heart.
****
“This raid,” Tally announced, “will be our most important yet.” He stood straight and tall at the center of the warriors ready to set out into the night. The snow that had whirled down so playfully when True and Barta stood plighting their devotion—a thing True had no real need to profess—now made a small blizzard through which they would have to travel to reach the Gaels’ encampment, formerly their own.
He narrowed his eyes and focused on young Master Tally, his attention still more than half centered on the woman beside him. The bond between them had strengthened to a level of constant awareness. He knew when she breathed, when she thought of him.
He could feel her love, and it colored his world.
But Tally—when had the boy grown to his sister’s height? From whence had he gained such poise?
“We have them nearly flighted, chased from our ancestral lands. Only a few ponies left, many injured warriors. They will not expect us to hit them out of this storm. But”—Tally drew himself up still farther—“we are of this land—and so part of the wind and the very snow.”
Those listening, a band some half score strong that included Gant, Gede, and Brude, nodded.
Tally went on, “A powerful magic accompanies us this night. May your spears be sharp, your blades keen. Slay all you may. You take the means for fire with you—put the rest to flame. May the god and goddess watch over us all.”
Many in the band repeated the last words, a charm for safety and a blessing, before they began to move off.
Tally called, “Sister, a word before you go.”
Barta paused and True, perforce, with her. Tally stepped up, and True saw that in truth the lad nearly topped his sister.
; “What is it, Brother? We must leave at once if we are to hit them in the depths of the night.”
“Yes, but I wished to say—I have Seen this is to be a pivotal battle. I did not want to tell the others and so color their expectations, but if we can win this, we can chase them. Then we will raise a grand round tower on the site where our ancestors lie. A fortress.”
Barta stared at him in amazement. “Are you certain of this?”
“I am.” Tally, his eyes troubled, drew a breath. “That being said, there is danger also—sharp as a whetted blade.” His gaze moved to True and back again. “You do not have to take part in this foray. It is your wedding night—”
“And,” Barta told him swiftly, “I am a woman changed—transformed by my husband’s love. Surely, Brother, you understand that.”
“I do. Yet the peril is deep, especially for the two of you.”
“And if we do not participate, if we stay here all warm and safe in our bed, Tally, the Epidii may not prove victorious.”
“That is so. But perhaps, Sister, you should consult with your husband before you make this decision for him.”
True spoke before Barta could. “I go whence she goes, Master Tally. That I know you above all others understand.”
Tally merely bit his lip and nodded. To True’s surprise, the boy stepped forward and embraced him, arms clutching hard before he turned to his sister and hugged her also, most fiercely.
“The gods go with you on your way.”
“What did you mean by that?” Barta asked True as they walked off.
“By what, Wife?”
“That Tally, above all others, should understand why you accompany me.”
True shook his head. “Mere words, Barta. You know how difficult they are for me.”
****
It seemed Tally had been wrong after all when he gave them warning. All went far too well; the snow swirling dense and dizzying held the Gaels’ camp in its fist and screened the Epidii’s approach perfectly. The guards neither saw nor heard them; taken out silently, they fell one by one, the last to Barta’s own blade. Not until they went to free the remaining ponies did the first part of their plan go awry; the beasts, confined and huddled against the weather, stood where they were and refused to be chased off.
Then Brude and Gede had trouble striking a light to fire the chariots. By the time Barta, with True at her side, ran to help them, the alarm had been given. Gaels streamed from their shelters on every hand. The battle became fierce and personal.
Opponents seemed to appear and disappear through the snow—a blade here, a contorted visage there—and shouts rang through the frigid air.
Barta stood back-to-back with True, a fighting stance the Epidii often employed so no opponent could attack from behind. So close were they she could feel the muscles of his shoulders flex, could almost sense his flash of victory when he took his opponents down. But they seemed isolated in the night, with the shrieking, hollering Gaels coming at them from every side. Where were the rest of the Epidii? Barta could hear them fighting not far off but could catch no glimpse.
Then she saw flames flare as someone succeeded in setting the chariots alight, no doubt with the help of the grease they’d brought. Victory flared in her heart, and she edged around, her back still to True’s, to face her next opponent. They would finish this thing now, chase these vermin from Epidii soil—she would avenge her parents this night.
She bared her teeth and hauled up her blade. Before her eyes appeared a countenance she recognized—fiercely twisted and surrounded by flying yellow hair.
The leader of the Gaels—he who had directed this campaign against them, stolen their lands, moved against her friends…
Who had murdered Loyal.
She screamed with hatred and glee—here then stood her chance for revenge and victory all in one, to be seized at a blow. Before her stood their enemies’ heart.
He’d been wounded in one of their past encounters, perhaps the same one that had seen Loyal fall. Now he fixed his gaze on Barta as if he saw nothing else and raised a blade already stained with blood.
Whose blood? She had time to wonder nothing more before he launched himself at her and she embarked on the fight of her life.
Her blade—also red—met his in a grating grind she felt in her clenched teeth. His sword had greater length than her long knife and more power behind it. Yet he could not drive her back because True, behind her and also fighting, stood like a rock.
One blow, two—she fended off the Gaels’ leader and wondered how she was to best him. Another three crashing strikes from his blade and she feared she was in danger—Tally’s warning flashed through her mind and dissipated in her desperation. She felt…
True’s entire body reacted as he suffered a blow. Horror suffused her and fear far more intense than that for her own safety. He was struck! Ah, goddess, no—it could not happen.
Not again.
The horror gave her strength enough to launch herself at her opponent and momentarily throw him over.
She turned, as did True, he having apparently vanquished his enemy. She saw his pain-wracked face, wide eyes, and lower, the terrible slash that ran in a diagonal across his chest, opening his tunic and the skin beneath. Blood already welled there, but he spared it no heed. Instead he leaped to her with a fierce growl.
Just as the Gaelic leader seized Barta from behind and yanked her against him, his blade at her throat.
Chapter Thirty-One
True, still panting hard from the fight just behind him, squinted and strove desperately to see through the swirling snow. No mistaking the scene—a tall man with a wild mop of yellow hair and a face contorted by hate held Barta fast against him, the stained blade of his sword hard at her vulnerable throat.
For an instant reality wavered; True flashed back to a similar scene, another place. The same man’s face and fierce demeanor—this person had swung his blade at Barta then also. Loyal had leaped in front of her and knocked her down. The blade had taken him, Loyal, instead. He’d fallen and covered Barta’s body with his own. The last thing he’d seen had been this man’s face as he drew Loyal’s head back to cut his throat, making sure he would rise no more.
Yet he’d arisen—with the help of the goddess—and had a chance for revenge. A chance he could not take if it endangered Barta. And it would.
Ignoring the wound slashed across his chest, he snarled again and met the gaze of the Gael who held Barta in a fierce grip. At that moment it seemed only the three of them existed. The snow still swirled down, and at a distance True could hear the cries of the dying, the victorious whoops from the Epidii tribe’s men. But what good a victory if Barta—the ruling star of True’s life—should be slain? One wrong move on his part and her life would end as had Loyal’s, by the same blade.
Tearing his gaze from the Gael’s, he looked into Barta’s eyes. He would gladly trade his life for hers again. He did not know how.
The Gael, wordless in his intentions, drew her more brutally against him. Then he threw back his head and emitted a shocking sound—a piercing whistle that cut through the storm.
At first there seemed no response; then, out of the darkness exploded a pony, one that must have refused to run. Shaggy gray it was, with a wild eye.
True spun to face it even as it tossed its head, dancing with alarm. The Gael spoke to it—called to it—in his own tongue, and despite its distress it came to him.
True edged closer, looking for a way to take advantage and get Barta free, but her captor shouted at him also and made a gesture with his sword that had Barta grimacing in pain.
True’s heart swelled with agony. His every muscle and sinew wanted to leap. Instinct bade him to caution. He could not risk Barta’s life.
The Gael hollered at him again before edging himself and Barta against the pony. In an incredible show of strength the man leaped onto the pony’s naked back, dragging Barta with him.
“No!” The protest came from True in a bark. T
his happened too swiftly; his choices were too few. Even as he leaped toward them the Gael, commanding the pony with his knees, bounded away. True had time to meet Barta’s panicked gaze—no more—before they charged off into the swirling snow westward.
With a snarl he threw down his long knife—he’d already broken his spear some time during the fight. He had still his dirk thrust into the loop on the side of his boot, and that would have to suffice.
Once he caught them.
The other ponies had scattered, and he had more faith, anyhow, in his own limbs. He scented the air, knowing he would need to rely on every sense in order to follow, and found Gant at his side.
“Victorious! We are victorious!” Gant’s face, sweaty despite the chill, shone. “Where is Barta?”
“Gone. The Gael leader took her.” Words very nearly deserted True in his rage. “Must follow.”
“Wait—we will all come. Let me rally the others.”
“They are on horseback. Dare not lose them.”
“But, man”—Gant seized True’s arm and his gaze dropped to True’s chest—“you’re sore wounded.”
“Let me go.” They were the last words True wasted. He shook free from Gant’s grasp and pelted off in the direction Barta and her captor had ridden, only Gant’s cry of protest following behind.
****
Barta’s captor stank. Or perhaps it was the reek of her own fear that flooded her nostrils—with the two of them pressed together so tightly, she could barely tell. She knew her body had been drenched with sweat that dried quickly as they rode into the cold dark.
She could smell other things as well—the sharp fragrance of the fire behind them, the scent of the pony. And blood.
Was her captor wounded? Was she? She tried to take stock of her physical condition and failed. She could feel only her heart beating suffocatingly up in her throat and what might be a trickle of moisture from the place where the Gael had previously pressed his blade.
She could see only the expression in True’s eyes as she’d been hauled up onto the pony. She’d seen that same look before—she knew she had. The circumstances—danger and pain—had been very nearly the same. But…
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