And so Merroc had let it slide. She would grow up eventually, he was advised. But still he remembered the age-old belief that his line was cursed. He feared that the line of his forefathers would end with him. After two years of her eligibility had passed and she had not borne him grandchildren, Merroc finally took the decision to remarry.
With only a little pressure from his daughter, he had considered and eventually accepted the young woman Kata into his hearth. She and Valkia had remained friends for many years, something that both of them found difficult at times. Where Valkia was feisty and masculine, Kata was quiet, subservient and as feminine as the hardships of life amongst the Schwarzvolf allowed her to be.
She had borne him two more children in the past six years, both girls and was presently heavily pregnant with a third. Merroc had grown to love Kata deeply and was relieved that Valkia was so friendly with her. But his eldest daughter gave him cause for concern. She encouraged the two little girls, her half-sisters, to run wild around the camp in much the way she had done herself.
They argued frequently over such unbecoming behaviour. Such arguments always ended the same way: Valkia would sneer at her father and stalk from their yurt to join the young warriors of the tribe in their training. More than once she had also joined them in their drinking contests and could match them drink for drink.
She was a problem child, but in time Merroc accepted her for who she was. It was difficult not to when she proved herself on the field of battle over and over again. Wherever the fighting was at its thickest, there she would be. Valkia had no fear of death and indeed was more inclined to court its dark embrace than that of any of the young men of the tribe.
The Schwarzvolf scraped out a harsh existence in the winter months, living off what little game could be hunted in the frozen forests and vast open tracts of snow and ice. They supplemented this meagre diet with dried meat taken from kills in the spring and summer months. They ate dried fruit, and the milk of their goats was the only thing that kept most of them, particularly the young, from death by malnutrition. Although a hardy people, disease still reared its head on occasion. Theirs was a hard life, but with the turning of winter to spring came the annual journey and a cause for celebration.
Every year, when the melt came, the Schwarzvolf would break camp, dismantling their yurts with great care. They would be put onto the back of handcarts ready for transportation to the Vale.
Valkia had always loved the journey to the Vale, demonstrating a surprising love of natural aesthetic and an eye for nature that had startled her father the first time he had realised it. To see his overly-masculine daughter making a sidetrack from the main road to pick flowers and herbs was surprisingly satisfying. He learned in time that Valkia had taken it upon herself to learn the ways of the tribe’s healers.
This year, the journey was different. This year, Merroc had cause for great joy. Kata had borne him his first son. Edan had been born on the night before the Schwarzvolf began the trip to the Vale and the Godspeaker had waxed lyrical about the auspicious nature of such timing.
Kata was a strong woman and there was no call to delay the journey, but Merroc insisted that she travel in one of the carts until she was strong enough to walk by herself. She had borne him three fine children and was still young enough to bear him more. He dared to believe that perhaps the Trickster had tired of his curse and given him the reward that he had worked so hard to achieve.
It was not the first foolish thought that the chieftain had entertained in his thirty-two years of life, and it would not be the last.
For her part, Valkia was indifferent to the arrival of a brother in her life. Whilst the people of the Schwarzvolf celebrated late into the night, she set herself apart from them, a brooding expression on her exquisite face. A brother meant that the line of succession was assured. It also meant that she would be passed over in favour of Edan. Conflicting emotions raged within her. He was her brother; a part of her in a way she could never hope to explain. He was Kata’s son and over the years, Valkia had come to love Kata as the mother she had never known.
He was just a baby. It would not take much to snuff out the weak, guttering flame of his existence. The thought came unbidden from nowhere and Valkia squeezed her eyes shut, deeply ashamed of it.
But yet...
‘No!’ She spoke the word aloud and pinched the skin on the back of her arm until it hurt. It had always been her preferred method of regaining her senses; a trick taught to her on the battlefield by the long-dead Ammon. The previous Warspeaker had fallen in battle five years ago during a skirmish that had come unannounced.
‘Are you speaking to yourself again?’
The voice came from behind her and she started. Radek, the gods damn him, could walk silently when he so chose. Of all the young men in the tribe who had courted her affections, Radek had been conspicuous by his absence. It had almost infuriated Valkia. Did he think her so ugly and unimportant that he would not do as the others had done? Did he not yearn to lay his heart at her feet?
‘It is none of your business, Warspeaker.’ He had taken the position with Merroc’s blessing following Ammon’s death and although Valkia had outwardly shown displeasure at the decision, she knew that Radek had been the perfect choice. More, Radek had taken it upon himself to offer her training with the bow, generally the weapon of choice for hunting. In times of war, the tribe preferred closer combat. He also gave her expert tuition in the use of the short, stabbing javelin sometimes wielded by the more experienced shield maidens. The bow had not suited her, but she had become extraordinarily proficient with the spear.
‘We are not in council, Valkia. I have a name.’
‘Then it is still none of your business, Radek.’ She pulled her long legs into her chest and turned her face away from him. Any other man would have read that as his cue to leave, but Radek remained. The hint of a smile played at the corners of his mouth. He was only five years older than she was and had grown into a fine warrior. With the onset of adulthood, his wiry frame had become more muscled and his physique had developed until his days as a scout were behind him.
Valkia admired Radek, although she would never have openly said so. In the secret, put-away part of her psyche, she would even have admitted that she found him attractive, despite the fact that the Warspeaker was far from physically desirable.
He had left the fresh-faced boy behind after injuries sustained in battle had more or less removed the right-hand side of his face. A mass of scar tissue decorated his cheek and neck, drawing his face into a perpetual scowl. But he was strong and fearless and these were desirable qualities in a mate. His patience with her as she had learned the art of warfare had been seemingly endless and he encouraged her to wilder and wilder acts of daring and courage.
‘Your welfare is always my business, chieftain’s daughter,’ said the Warspeaker and he dropped down onto the grass beside her. She sniffed as haughtily as she could manage and shuffled herself further down the bank. ‘Congratulations on the birth of your little brother.’
‘I had nothing to do with it,’ she replied archly. ‘All the hard work was done by Kata. I believe my father may have had something to do with it for a few seconds several months ago.’ She shrugged one slender shoulder in indifference and turned her head to glance at Radek. Her eyes were as dark as her hair; so deep green that they were almost black and her pupils were large. Some people found Valkia’s dark eyes unsettling, but the Warspeaker found them fascinating. There was so much going on inside the head of this young woman. From time to time, there would be a crack in their mirror-like surface, allowing him the briefest of glimpses to the heart that beat beneath the cool exterior. But they were rare and if he felt compelled to act on those moments of opportunity, he never did so.
For all their savagery and barbaric methods in war, the Schwarzvolf were respectful to one another, and Radek would never have considered suggesting any sort of feelings for Valkia if he did not expect it to be returned in kind. They h
ad an awkward kind of friendship that was remarkably one-sided on his part and for now, at least, he was content with that arrangement.
‘He will become chieftain when my father dies,’ she observed and there was a note of ice in her tone. Radek noted it and frowned.
‘Jealousy, Valkia? You know that is the way it must be.’
‘My father is old.’ She turned her head away from him again. ‘He will die soon.’ Matter of fact though it may have been, Radek had to concede that there was a certain truth in her words. Merroc was not as fit as he had used to be, and of late he had shown signs of slowing down. If age and infirmity did not take him, then he would be too slow on the battlefield. ‘Edan is just a baby. He cannot lead our people in that event. You know that it should be me, Radek.’
‘Is this what is bothering you, Valkia? Are you still clinging to this dream of leading the Schwarzvolf? I thought you gave that ambition up long ago. You are a warrior of your people now and none dispute your ability. But you are not and never will be a leader of men.’
‘Do not presume to speak to me of such things, Warspeaker. What do you know of my dreams?’ She turned around then and the full impact of her beauty struck Radek in a way it never had before. A fine-boned, almost elfin, face in which those dark eyes were the drawing feature, he had somehow missed the moment when little Valkia had become a woman. Her wild tangle of dark curls fell loosely down her back, coming to a tapered point at her narrow waist. She wore a simple tunic and leather breeches, belted in the middle; it did nothing at all to hide her all-too-feminine curves.
She was both desirable and untouchable. The two were a heady concoction that set Radek’s senses to spinning.
‘I only know of your dreams what you tell me and what I can work out for myself,’ he replied, his eyes not leaving hers. He caught his breath as she smiled slowly.
‘Tell me what you believe my dreams are, Radek. I am interested in what you think you know about me.’
If he was ever going to get an open invitation to explore more of the woman behind the warrior, this was his chance. But Radek determined then and there that he would not risk their friendship by putting his heart on the line. What he was not to know was that Valkia had already set hers at his feet. It would be the only time in her entire life that she would know what it was to truly love another person.
He considered her for a few moments, then lay back on the grass, staring up into the night sky. Winter had not yet truly fled, but the warmth of spring was in the air and he breathed it in, relishing its pure freshness. The constellations in the heavens above were simply indistinguishable patterns as the sky rearranged itself for the coming season. Everything was in flux at this moment, on this portent-laden night, and Radek felt the weight of future events on his shoulders.
‘You yearn to lead the Schwarzvolf,’ he said in time and she said nothing, merely watching him closely. ‘You know that everyone in the tribe will be set against you from the moment you formally stake your claim.’
‘Everyone? Even you, Warspeaker? And there I was thinking you were my friend and my ally.’
He turned his head sideways to consider her. ‘I am both of those things, Lille Venn,’ he said, absently using the pet name that her father had long since stopped using. It brought a bloom of red to her cheeks, a maidenly flush that was both becoming and extraordinarily out of place on a face that was usually only reddened by the visceral stains of war. ‘But you ask too much to expect me to support you in this.’
‘If Edan were to die...’ Radek opened his mouth to forestall her comment, but she ploughed on regardless. ‘If he were to be taken by illness, or captured by enemy warriors, then the line of succession would have to pass back to me.’
Radek felt a cold chill run through him. He believed that Valkia was not so cruel that she would slaughter an innocent child. At least until she had spoken of such a thing in that strangely indifferent tone, he had thought so. His eyes were held by her gaze and he could not look away. He, the Warspeaker of the Schwarzvolf, a man who had faced countless terrors, could not turn his head away from a woman.
‘Indulge me, Radek.’
‘I suppose... yes. That would be the case,’ he acknowledged. ‘But your father will stop at nothing to protect your brother.’ He hoped to inject a warning into that sentence, hoped that Valkia would not do anything foolish. ‘At nothing, Valkia. Do you understand me?’
‘Of course I understand you, I am not some simpleton.’ She sniffed haughtily. ‘Of course, I would not wish any harm on the infant, but these are things that need to be considered.’
Was she speaking the truth with those glib words? Radek could not tell. She tipped her head to one side and wound a lock of dark hair around one finger. She smiled coquettishly at Radek and in that moment he was hopelessly, irrevocably hers. When she spoke again, she did so with such charm and guile that he would have sacrificed the other side of his face just to hear her speak to him in that tone again.
‘You would be by my side if I had to fight for my rightful leadership of the tribe, wouldn’t you, Radek?’ She lowered her eyes demurely and peeked out at him from beneath long, sooty lashes. And he was lost.
Of course he would be by her side. He was a fool to have ever thought otherwise. A strange sense of wonder came over him as he allowed the young woman to manipulate him. For her part, she had no idea that she had already mastered the art of engaging her feminine charms to achieve her own ends.
‘I pledge myself to serve you heart and soul, Valkia,’ he said, drawing himself up to kneel before her. The way he had given himself over to her so wholly, just with a flutter of her eyelashes sent a thrill of power through her. She had a unique gift to bring to the potential problem of her future birthright, and she swore to herself there and then that she would never be afraid to use it. ‘When your call comes, I will be there.’
‘Yes,’ she said and absently reached over to pat his cheek. ‘Yes. I believe you will be.’
The trip to the Vale was singularly uneventful. In years gone by, the Schwarzvolf had frequently encountered other tribes; some hostile, others benign. There had even been occasions when the smaller tribes, struck down by illness or hunger, had turned themselves over to Merroc’s keeping. The Schwarzvolf was now the largest tribe in the north and growing all the time.
At times, the power this gave Merroc was a curse as well as a blessing. He was a man of action, not of administration. It was not his place to consider the allocation of provisions across the people. For the most part, the people of the Schwarzvolf were left to fend for themselves and this in itself led to scuffles and disagreements.
But this year, the land had provided well. There were barrels of pickled fish and plenty of dried meat. The spring brought forth an abundance of new life in the forests and fresh game was easy to acquire. Valkia joined with the hunters daily, enjoying the thrill of the chase and engaging in games of one-upmanship with the other warriors of the tribe to see whose haul was the greatest, or who had penned down the largest deer. Everything was good for the Schwarzvolf. Everything was too good.
Despite his joy at the birth of his first son, Merroc heeded the words carried to him by the Godspeaker, whose dour prediction ultimately bore fruit.
The gods, he had said, give with one hand and take with the other.
From time to time, infants were born with physical defects. Sometimes these were minor and barely noticeable. Perhaps one ear was slightly smaller than the other or skin bore unsightly birthmarks. The majority of these babies were accepted into the tribe without question and though they had to bear bullying as they grew up, they thrived. Some bore the mark of the gods on their flesh however, twisted, mewling things with bestial faces and thrashing limbs.
It was the way of the Schwarzvolf to abandon these children to their fate in the woodlands. They were never slaughtered, as to murder a child of the god-touched was to invite the wrath of the divine. Alone in the wilderness they would either die, exposed to the elements or
attacked by wild animals, or they would live; foundlings who were raised amongst one of the lesser tribes. Whatever became of them, it was no longer the problem of the Schwarzvolf.
More and more babies were being stillborn or stricken down with crippling defects and whilst some mothers tried their hardest to conceal a club foot, or additional digits, some mutations were harder to hide. By the time they reached the Vale, ten children had been born into the tribe – including Merroc’s own son – and seven had been left behind. Two of the mothers, prime breeding stock, had died from the rigours of difficult childbirth and four more died during pregnancy. A sombre trail of funeral pyres marked the Schwarzvolf’s passage across the plains, taking with them most of their spare wood, trailing greasy smoke into the clear spring skies.
It did little to ease Merroc’s eternal conviction that he was somehow cursed and he sat and bemoaned his poor luck to his wife. Kata, an eternally practical woman who juggled the demands of two small children and a baby without so much as batting an eyelid, simply sat and let her husband pour out his heart. Her response at the end of his diatribe startled him.
‘You say all this, my husband, and yet what is it that you do to change your stars?’
‘A man cannot interfere with the path laid out before him by the gods.’
‘Of course he can!’ Kata shifted Edan who was nursing peacefully at her breast and fixed Merroc with a steady gaze. ‘When you walk through the forests and there is a fallen tree in your path, do you stop walking and turn around?’
He did not answer at first. Her words were sensible and he felt irritated at her pragmatism. Eventually he grudgingly admitted that no, he would not turn around.
Valkia the Bloody Page 3