By his own personal code he must wait for the Devastator to act first; how the warrior acted would decide his own reaction. Purposefully, then, Ulran turned his back on the huddled figure in the shadows, though not without a warning tingle that danced his suddenly exposed spine.
He pivoted round as the youngster shrieked the horde’s battle- and death-cry. His hide-clad forearm swung round, glancing off the thrust short-sword and the blade passed harmlessly. In the same instant Ulran saw that it was a young girl, her dark eyes and faultless skin corrupted with hate and blood-lust. The dirk left his belt and severed her jugular and was dry in its scabbard within the span of time it takes for a heart to beat – or to cease beating.
Gently, he caught the falling body and nodded, pleased, as the hate and venom vanished from the adolescent features: a serene peacefulness washed over her countenance. It was done, then.
He straightened up and whistled for Courdour Alomar to join him: the place would now be safe. Warrior-status was earned in solitude; there would be no others.
As Courdour stepped into the open, bow still drawn, Ulran glanced about him. The encampment probably comprised tannery freelancers. The far left wagon was a heap of ashes – obviously the bark had burned well.
When he had first suspected them of being tanners, he had wondered why they were so far off the track for the immense oak forests of Forshnorer. For that was the only authorised tannery forest for the next ten years – much to the chagrin of Forshnorer’s tree-house inhabitants. But now, seeing these poor wretches shackled, it was obvious.
The wagons had diverted to rendezvous with some illegal merchant caravan. It was common knowledge that slave labour was cheaper and less tedious to use in tannery operations. All he knew for certain was that these slaves had not left Lornwater in these wagons. The sentinels at the gates checked all covered conveyances: there were laws against over-crowding slaves and their hygiene was strictly monitored too. Small headway, indeed, those laws. The slave trade was so deeply entrenched – harking from Tarakanda – that it would take more than his strong sword-arm to free them all. Money talked too well.
Jumping to the ground, he saw Courdour kneeling by some dying ashes. In their midst was a severed head. He knew of only one horde that relished such treatment of human beings. He stooped and withdrew an arrow from a corpse, examined its flight. Nearby, a fallen sword with its special metalmark confirmed his thoughts. “The Baronculer horde!” he shouted across to Courdour.
“After all these years – they’re still unchanged.”
“It has always been their way; perhaps it always will be.” Ulran shrugged. “There’s nothing here for us. I see no point in bringing Cobrora –whose stomach’s not that strong at the best of times–”
“That’s true enough!” Courdour stepped closer, conspiratorially, and shouldered his bow. “Tell me, why did you bring him along in the first place?”
Ulran was not one to hesitate, especially after his training and his daily self-reappraisal; but now he hesitated. And then said, “It wasn’t for the want of company, Courdour Alomar.” He left it at that. Much as he admired the old warrior, he would not betray Cobrora’s trust in him nor countenance Courdour’s continual ill-temper towards the city-dweller. His tone tended to convey this.
Courdour simply shrugged, apparently content with the evasive answer.
***
Easily noticeable signs of the departing Baronculer horde showed them moving away from the Marron Marsh route. Ulran kept his report brief when Cobrora showered him with questions. “The Devastators massacred an itinerant tannery group. At least four orms ago they headed varteron. We’ll be safe tonight.”
It was well into the latter part of First Sapin when they topped a rise that overlooked a solitary housestead; it nestled in a shallow gully directly in their path. To one side was a small grove of mulberry bushes, though the soil hereabouts was not conducive to producing high-quality silk.
“We’ll be cautious,” declared Ulran. “I’ll go down first.”
“No,” countered Courdour. “I’ll go. I think I know this place. Friendly enough folk...” He lanced a sharp look at Cobrora.
Friend. Obviously, that was Cobrora’s lack, Ulran realised. Courdour’s earlier question niggled: no-one really knew why Cobrora had volunteered for the journey – Cobrora included, though the city-dweller had seemed somewhat more replete with a sense of purpose the night before the abortive teen crossing. Still, friendship was clearly something Cobrora longed for and felt acutely: a need to belong. And for someone of such sheltered upbringing and insular city-life, to aspire to friendship with the like of Courdour Alomar was pure wishful thinking.
He liked Cobrora for the laudable perseverance shown and was even amused at the superstitious antics, but as to regarding the city-dweller as a true friend, no, Cobrora just couldn’t qualify. True, friendship wasn’t something won or even passed as if in a qualifying examination: it happened. Then, no friendship had blossomed between them.
How strange we are, he thought, at our first meeting at The Inn I knew and Courdour knew that we would be more than friends – without any thought or effort on our part. And yet poor Cobrora, who tries desperately to win Alomar’s favour, is friendless.
But Ulran believed Cobrora was necessary for the trek to Arisa: so he determined to intercede should Courdour bait the youngster further. Perhaps they could not be friends in any real sense, but they could afford each other mutual respect at least. And, having guessed Cobrora’s secret, Ulran greatly respected the city-dweller and with a wry grin wondered when Alomar would find out.
Courdour emerged from the wooden housestead accompanied by two women and three men. His grin was broad and his moustache curled in the slight valley breeze.
Ulran and Cobrora gently urged their horses down the slope with the mule trailing behind them on a tight rein.
“Bashen Corl, the head of the housestead,” said Courdour, slapping the back of a sheepishly grinning grey little man. “He always makes a weary traveller welcome!”
Bashen Corl’s palms were coarse and his forearms were iron-hard sinews as he shook hands with all three travellers in turn. Then he introduced his family. “Yoan, my wife,” was a red-haired woman of ranmeron stock, pale in complexion and shapeless with child, though the gentle smile that revealed buck-teeth was truly welcoming. “My son, Dyr and his wife, Neran.” Both could have been brother and sister, dark of hair and eyes, tanned of skin and docile, mute in the company of strangers. “And my son, Slane.”
Ulran hastily introduced himself and Cobrora and they shook hands with the whole household.
Slane’s hand was fair, small and warm within Cobrora’s. He was wan, taking after his mother, but there the resemblance ended: his blue eyes sparkled with the life of a fountain, his fine muscular figure hugged the ochre breeches and his flaxen hair streaked with black set him completely apart from the others. Cobrora stammered when being introduced and it was only Courdour Alomar’s caustic cackle that brought any semblance of reality back and Cobrora abruptly let go of Slane’s hand.
Politely accepting Corl’s offer of food, Ulran, in return, unpacked the remains of the last skin of wine from their provisions plus a few delicacies from his own bag, which the Bashen family would never have tasted during their normally frugal daily repast.
“I’ll chop logs for you in the morning,” offered Courdour, now seated comfortably in a broad high wing-backed wooden chair in front of a roaring log fire.
Corl murmured his thanks and offered round his pouch of grass-weed, a sweet delicate blend of plains-grass that smoked delightfully.
Courdour, already prepared by previous visits to the housestead, fished out his ironwood pipe and scooped some of the blend into its bowl. “Where’s – Cobrora – got – to?” he asked idly, holding a lighted taper to the mixture and puffing.
Knowing full well where Cobrora was, Ulran shrugged. It seemed the revelation was imminent, he thought.
“I th
ink,” Corl grinned, “she took a liking to Slane – she’s helping with the dishes.”
The warrior almost choked on the smoke mushrooming from the bowl. “She?”
Ulran explained. “Cobrora’s been disguised as a young man since she came into the Red Tellar. She knew from her reading in the city library that women don’t go adventuring. She concealed her feminine aspects very well.”
“By the gods, that’s cheating. Deceitful! Typical of a woman, though. You can’t trust them!” Courdour Alomar seemed to calm down and added, “When did you find out?”
“After the orb-spider attack. Until, then, I hadn’t any idea. She was good.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“It wasn’t my secret to divulge. But since Corl saw through her straight away...”
Corl grinned. “I couldn’t mistake the look that passed between them. Slane recognised the woman in her as well, I warrant.”
***
While the three men talked round the fire, Yoan sat out of earshot with her small contribution to the land’s silk production, sewing a garment.
The scene presented to Cobrora Fhord through the serving hatch as she dried dishes looked like a typical family get-together. Yet the weird and powerful aura about Ulran and Courdour could not be completely dispelled even in these homely surroundings.
She turned back to the dishes and smiled to herself. The secret was out – and Ulran had already guessed. Well, it was for the best, after all. She didn’t like deceit. She hadn’t felt so at ease since the journey began – in fact, she’d never felt like this before. She blushed, recalling how Dyr and his spouse had excused themselves after the meal to retire.
Now she accidentally brushed her hand against Slane’s – smooth, wet and soapy, and she didn’t draw it away. Her heart pounding, she raised her eyes.
Faintly, as though issuing from another world, laughter and raised voices could be heard as Courdour recounted a few tales to Bashen Corl’s amusement.
Instinctively, or perhaps because she had studied Ulran for over a quarter already, she attempted hiding her true feelings. “They’re talk – talking about war – battles – that’s not me, I abhor violence–”
“Me too. I’m a land-worker, not a fighter!” He chuckled. “They’re mentioning women, also,” he added, a mischievous smile playing on his lips.
She flushed. “I’ve – I’ve never done those things that the warrior talks of –” Why did she say that? Normally, she would skirt round the subject of passion and love. She was an outsider even in the city, respected for her intellect but not really liked or loved.
His hand gripped hers tenderly and she felt a strange warm current suffuse her being at his touch.
“I’m sorry, I was teasing – shouldn’t have.”
The smile she offered could forgive him anything. The dishes seemed forgotten, in the other-world.
“You’re no warrior – but why should you be?” he said in recompense.
“I’ve proved that well enough already!” she said bitterly.
“What happened to make you hate yourself so?”
She faltered, only a moment. “Do you believe in the gods, Slane?”
He smiled and her heart somersaulted. She caused that smile!
“Only the good ones,” he said.
Coldly, objectively, she looked down at her waistband clogged with effigies of good and bad, white and black, to be accorded affection or anger according to their lights. “I’m afraid my faith’s not as great as yours.”
As he lifted her chin she saw pain in his eyes. “Why forsake respect in yourself, Fhord?” he asked and the halting inflection seemed to be from his very heart.
Again, those mesmerising eyes, so questing, searching out the truth. And the truth was obvious to her now, though there seemed little she could do to right matters. She had inwardly felt more and more inferior in the presence of Ulran and Courdour as the journey progressed.
Her belief in the amulets and other superstitious trinkets hadn’t impressed Courdour at all: that warrior believed only in the might of his sword-arm! And whilst Ulran had been kind and considerate beyond any normal man’s patience, she had of late intuitively detected a subtle hint of resignation in the innman, as though both were suffering her stoically, grudgingly.
Again and again, she asked herself the same question: in that case, then, why did they let her come along or even stay? And what would their attitude have been if they had known she was deceiving them?
The words rushed out, telling Slane all her inmost fears, some of which hadn’t properly formed until now, and she left little unsaid.
Her chest visibly expanded as she related her efforts in the mist-shrouded Oquar II Forest, acting as the group’s eyes when the famed red tellar could not.
Slane seemed to share in her low moments, and now he enjoyed her evident pride. Impulsively, he leaned over and kissed her.
It began as an impetuous, joyful kiss, but that first touch was enough to change everything for them; the kiss lingered and their hearts were soon hammering together.
“Slane!” Yoan’s strident voice sliced them apart. “What are you two doing in there?”
It was Slane’s turn to blush; he gathered the dried dishes together. “Just finishing!” he called.
Evading his eyes, Fhord helped to stack the crockery away.
Then they were walking into the room, bathed in a light that to them existed far and beyond the paltry luminescence of the log-flames.
Silence and mocking or curious eyes met them: but neither felt any cause for embarrassment now.
***
Bashen Corl had obligingly cleared out the lean-to fixed at the back of the house. It was dusty and looked disused, awaiting the autumn when crops would be stockpiled for the winter. Now the stone storage cubicles were bare save for cobwebs. To one side was a large box containing trays of brush and silkworms.
The three travellers agreed to keep watch in turns, just in case a wandering montar of Devastators came by.
For what seemed like ages Cobrora couldn’t sleep then, mental exhaustion overtaking her, she dozed fitfully, her dreaming moments filled with a weird ancient city, once regal and splendid, now cold and drab. And then the city would be bathed in a funereal pyre of suffocating smoke, as though the earth had gaped wide beneath the city’s foundations.
Turning restlessly, she was unable to wake up, trapped by the haunting images. And in the flames she could see herself, smiling. A man was with her; for a while his features were indistinct: then, as if a shroud had been pulled away, she saw him – Slane. But their flesh wasn’t burning, nor peeling off and bubbling. No, they were whole, happily bathing in the blaze as though it were but a waterfall.
She had no way of knowing in her dream, but she believed the tongues of fire were friends, like Slane – of Osasor’s ilk.
When she finally woke she was lathered in sweat and Ulran was waiting for her to take her turn at lookout.
Shivering uncontrollably in the cold morning air outside, she wrapped her cloak about herself and paced round the lean-to and the house.
Towards the end of her first circuit she noticed an oblong of light on the ground: one of the ground-floor windows was still lit up, its blackout curtain drawn back.
She jerked her head up at the brow over which they’d come, its shape dimly silhouetted against the lesser darkness of the night sky. Plains-dogs howled far off.
Her heart beating in anxiety, she rushed to the window. Like killer-moths, the Devastators would be attracted to the light.
She cleared her throat noisily outside the window, and was about to tap a warning on the wooden shutters – for the family could ill-afford glass – when Slane’s head poked out.
“Hello, Fhord,” he said tenderly.
At the sight of him her heart lifted and her anxiety trebled. She grimaced. “The light–! The Devastators might see it, investigate.”
“Oh, I forgot.” Leaning upon the sill, he
kissed her.
Utterly disarmed, she couldn’t withstand him. A delicate fragrance wafted to her nostrils and unconsciously she dropped her sword – so ineffectual in any event in her custody – and sat upon the window ledge beside him. Without a second thought she folded her arms around his firm strong body clothed in a flannel night-robe.
Gently, he pulled away, placing a finger to her lips. “Come in,” he whispered, a nervous tremble in his voice. “I’ll blow out the light.”
Fhord needed no further urging: to be with him was all she asked of the gods; the morning chill was forgotten in his presence, and he too seemed not to feel it.
She was glad of the shadows, the room only faintly illuminated by the thin scythe of silver moon-glow.
The pulse and heartbeat within her body quickened and she felt so inept and tongue-tied: she had never lain with a man before. She sat upon the edge of the bed, hands feeling the luxurious softness of the duck-down mattress. It seemed years since she’d had a decent bed.
He stood close, silhouetted in the window-frame, the contours of his body clearly distinguishable beneath the robe.
She swallowed, unsure of her threshing emotions as she saw his garment lifted above his head and discarded.
As she stood there, expectant, she blushed and felt a deep-seated anger burning in her stomach: she was utterly helpless! She didn’t know what to do!
He stepped a pace closer and she could hear his breathing.
The thing to do was to undress, she told herself stupidly; from the book Elements and Mechanics of Conjoining by Lehun Dess she knew the cold physical aspects of lovemaking, but this was different. Knees quaking, conscious of the effigies and amulets jingling at her belt, she slipped out of her jacket and lowered it to the floor.
Slane moved closer still, just out of reach.
Floreskand_Wings Page 13