Highlander's Love: Winter Solestice (Against All Odds Series 3)

by Veronica Wilson

  And yet, there was that picture on the wall of her mind, and as quickly as she took it down it mounted itself back up.

  "Rendar, you're right.," Tess said at last. "This is your planet. This is your culture, these are your ways, and as a visitor and an off-worlder I'm bound to respect them, especially in the interests of diplomacy. I apologize. I stepped out of line."

  The tribal leader allowed himself just a hint of a reassuring smile. "Thank you," he said. "No harm is done. I accept your apology."

  "But Rendar," she pressed gently. "Godan's wife was a casualty of war. In every war, both sides understand that there will be casualties. It's the tragedy of war, and it's why we use diplomacy to try to stop it from happening, or when that fails, stop it from happening again. When we lose someone we love in a war, we don't look for personal revenge against the one who cut them down. We look for ways to make any more wars unnecessary."

  "And yet," Rendar pointed out, "does not your planet have a history of punishing those who perpetrate crimes in time of war?"

  "Yes, we've prosecuted war criminals," Tess answered. "But we prosecuted them in courts of law where they faced juries and judges! We didn't call war criminals to battle! And anyway, you are not a criminal! Genocide and torture are crimes; what you did isn't!"

  "I know the truth of what you say," said Rendar. "Such has been true on Earth and such is true on many other planets. But Sarma is different. A tribal leader retains the right to seek personal satisfaction for losses in battle. Our descendants may change the custom. Future generations, with wise ones such as you to help them, may make things different. I hope they shall. But we must live in the reality of here and now, and I cannot refuse Godan's call to personal combat. To refuse would be to risk another war at a time when we need peace the most. It is for the peace that I do this."

  Tess could do nothing but look down and shake her head. With a sigh, she said, "Fighting for peace. My people used to tell themselves peace was something to fight for." She looked back up at him. "We learned better."

  Rendar allowed himself more of an open smile. "So shall we," he said.

  To Tess's surprise, he did something else then, something she did not expect, which made her have to suppress a gasp. He reached over to her and touched her, just on the shoulder, and squeezed it lightly. This time there was no mistaking the affection with which he did it. That was not only kindness and appreciation. She was sure of it. She told herself it was friendship, that if Rendar lived beyond this afternoon the two of them would grow to be great old friends.

  She smiled back at him, a smile that masked her fears and the dread of what she was about to witness. The last thing that a warrior going into battle needed to see, Tess knew, was fear on the face of someone that he might well be leaving behind.

  "Good luck, Rendar," Tess said.

  "I thank you, Tess—for everything," the handsome warrior replied.

  Resigned to what must be, Tess stepped away from Rendar and joined the other Sarmians who had accompanied him, obviously members of his tribe. Now that her attention was on something other than Rendar himself, she recognized many of them as Sarmians who worked in official capacities at the Capitol, or were responsible for hospitality for guests of the tribes. Some were relatives of the tribal leader; she waved at and exchanged greetings with cousins, aunts, and uncles Rendar had introduced during her stay. Rendar had no siblings. He had inherited his position from his father. He had no wife. Tess had learned, largely from conversations with the people around her now, that Rendar was very much what would on Earth be called a "playboy". He was one of the most eligible bachelors on Sarma, and the role he had made himself most eligible for was that of willing bedmate to any interested female. He never boasted of how prolific he was, but his reputation for seldom sleeping alone was universally known.

  Tess could only imagine how many women on this planet would be only too happy to take Rendar off the market, and each of them was more lean and toned and sinewy than the last. They were nothing like her. They were all fat-free entrees compared to the doughy dish that Tess presented. It was all the more reason for Tess to be sure that his wanting to kiss her was just an idle fantasy on her part.

  Seeing nothing constructive in dwelling on fantasies when a very stark reality was about to play itself out before her, Tess turned her mind to the whys and wherefores of it all. Sarmian civilization had a structure at the top of which sat the king. As of now, that monarch was the newly ascended Dantar, whose assumption of the throne that had been in his family for generations ended the wars that had broken out when his father died. At that time, Dantar, the crown prince, had faced challenges to his ascent from the leaders of the many tribes that populated the planet. The tribes in turn had battled each other over possession of land and resources. Whoever held the greatest resources was in the best position to challenge the crown prince. The whole melee had cost Sarma years of turmoil and bloodshed, until Dantar rallied the support that he needed to hold the crown. With his triumph, weary of war, their homes in ruins and their resources depleted, the tribes fell into line. This was the state in which explorers from Earth had found Sarma at first contact.

  In this time of picking up the pieces and moving on, what remained of those conflicts was the settling of personal scores, grievances less dire than war but still potentially bloody. Laws older than any Sarmian now alive permitted this. As Tess turned her attention to the tableau of private retribution that this day held, she sent out a heartfelt hope to the universe that Rendar and his foe would simply wound each other to the point that neither of them could battle on, and that would be the end of it. Then, she resolved, she would remain on Sarma for however long it took to get those damnable laws thrown out or rewritten, so that no other beautiful Sarmian should ever have to face what awaited Rendar today.

  And with that, she glanced across the field to where the huddle of other Sarmians were parting to reveal the grim, dour figure of a man sitting on a rock, his countenance and the set of his body so hardened with anger that it seemed to Tess that he was carved from the very rock itself. She caught her breath at the sight of him: for this could be none other than Godan. He was attired in the same fashion as Rendar, but his appearance and Rendar's had little else in common. His body was of a similar build, but his skin was of a more darkly bronzed tan. The darkness of his complexion was far surpassed by the darkness of the look on his face. Glaring across the grass at Rendar, he frowned so deeply that it was as if he had never worn any other expression in his life. The thick goatee that wreathed his mouth and covered his chin only accentuated the look, and the baldness of his scalp suggested that his anger had actually burned off his hair. It was not at all difficult for Tess to imagine curls of smoke unfurling from his flaring nostrils.

  Off to one side of Godan, a youth—Tess supposed he was no more than sixteen Earth years of age—stood holding a double-bladed spear like Rendar’s. The slenderness of his body reflected his age, while the hard tautness of his musculature spoke of the warrior's life. The frown that he wore was an echo of the bigger, older man’s, and it too fell squarely on Rendar. Tess recognized the boy as Konel—Godan's son. She cast her eyes back to this end and observed Rendar facing them, calm and unafraid, holding his spear at the ready. Tess gave a hard swallow as Konel handed the matching spear to his father, and the lad and the rest of Godan's entourage stood aside. With spear in hand, Godan picked himself up from the rock and stood a full head taller than Rendar.

  In her time on this planet, Tess had never met a Sarmian that she did not like. But the sight of Godan at this moment might well have made him the first. Her mind rang with the awful thought, This man is going to murder Rendar right in front of me, and there's nothing I can do about it.

  Advancing across the turf, Godan said in a voice deep and husky with menace, "After today my children will grieve no more."

  Without a word, Rendar moved forward to meet Godan's challenge, and Tess could swear that she actually felt the color drain
from her skin as she felt her brow and palms grow clammy.

  To this point, Tess had never actually seen Rendar in action. She had seen him in social and diplomatic settings. She had been impressed with his ability to handle himself in speaking and in interactions that were neither physical nor life-threatening. Outside of inter-tribe negotiations, Rendar had entertained her with war games in which she had seen how formidable he was. The entire feeling of this tableau, and the way he presented himself now, was different from the feeling of a game. This time it was for real and he was making it feel real. She was astonished that a body so bulky with muscle could move with such speed and such grace. The sheer force with which he lunged and swung his blades and parried Godan's attacks came as no surprise, but the speed with which he attacked and blocked and the agility with which he evaded Godan's jabs and strikes and slices caught her unprepared. First she gasped and raised a hand to her mouth. Then she was hardly aware of anything but the whirlwind of muscular male bodies engaged in a deadly dance before her.

  Godan swung, his staff and blades whooshing furiously in the air. Rendar leapt back, never losing a bit of his footing, his body evacuating the space his enemy's blade passed through. Rendar took the offensive at once, jabbing the point of his own blade forward. Godan sidestepped to miss Rendar's jab, then swung his own staff down hard. It struck Rendar's staff with a harsh and bone-rattling crack. He leered at Rendar with clenched teeth, a look devoid of mercy. Rendar pulled back his weapon and braced for another assault, his eyes narrowed with absolute focus.

  Tess took it all in and tried to put herself in Rendar's place at this moment. In all her dealings with him, she had never seen him as a man capable of wrath, of vindictiveness or hatred. He had battled Godan's tribe not out of malice, but purely for the needs of his own clan. There had never been anything personal in his part against them. Even now, in the face of Godan's intention to cut him down in revenge, Tess knew that Rendar battled with no hate in his heart and that he would not murder Godan in wrath as Godan would surely do to him. If only these two men could talk. If only there were a chance for Rendar to tell Godan how he regretted the fate of Godan's wife, and how he wished for their tribes never to face each other to spill blood again. But from the unrelenting fury on Godan's face, she could see it was a forlorn hope. The only way this could end well would be for Rendar somehow to knock Godan unconscious, emerging as the clear victor. After a decisive but non-fatal victory, their battle would be over forever and both men could get on with their lives.

  Please, Rendar, Tess silently called out. Just knock him out. Just one quick, clean knock-out; that's all it will take. Please...

  The clash went on. Godan made a swing for Rendar's throat. Rendar lunged backward and swung upward, connecting with Godan's staff and knocking it to one side. Godan made a sound like an animal’s growl and looked for another opening. With no intention of giving him one, Rendar held his weapon in front of him.

  Tess tuned out everything else in her surroundings and did not see any of the other Sarmians. Their shouts and call-outs to the dueling foes became an incoherent buzz in her ears. Their shapes and the swinging of their arms and fists in reaction to the battle became a blur of colors at the edge of her sight. And so she did not see one figure, young and dark and limber, separating himself from the throng of Sarmians on Godan's side and circling away, his eyes as fixed on Tess as her eyes were fixed on Rendar and his foe.

  With neither one gaining a clear upper hand, Rendar and Godan circled each other, making feints and jabs, lunging forth and pulling back. This standoff, everyone knew and Tess feared, could not last forever. Something would have to break it. One or the other of them sooner or later must have a moment of weakness, of vulnerability, and then...

  Godan suddenly lunged and swung his blade broadly downward, aiming his weapon at Rendar's legs. Rendar responded with a leap upward. His foe's weapon sliced cruelly through the place where Rendar's legs had been. Rendar dropped back onto the turf, and in that same instant Godan's blade was at his face. Rendar hurled himself back, having to recover his footing and evade Godan's swing at once. His sudden momentum carried him down onto the grass and onto his back. And now Godan had him.

  Tess let out a scream to see Rendar lying prone and Godan leaping forward, his staff raised and aimed right at Rendar's chest. She was sure that death for Rendar was only a second away. As Godan towered over him, Rendar surprised him not with an upward jab of his blade but with a swift, hard kick right to Godan's midsection. With a howl of rage Godan went flying back onto the grass, landing with a muffled thud. Tess cried out again, this time in relief that Rendar's life was spared, if only for the moment. What would he do next?

  Godan at once sprang up to his knees, holding up his staff, ready to leap to his feet and have at Rendar again. Rendar pressed his advantage just as quickly. With a long stride forward and a might swing, he sliced his staff blindingly through the air—not at Godan himself, but at the long shaft of his weapon. With a fearsome clatter, Rendar's shaft connected with Godan’s—and knocked the bladed staff from his hands, sending it spinning away onto the grass a couple of meters away.

  Rendar now loomed over his weaponless foe. Godan grew as still as when Tess first saw him sitting on the rock. "Let's have an end to this," Rendar said. "I regret that I had to strike down your wife. I feel sorrow for what I did. It was war. Let it be over."

  Godan opened his mouth to speak—and the next seconds became a shocking frenzy. Tess suddenly felt hands grabbing her from behind, pulling her back, and her arms being pinned behind her. She felt a hot breath against her cheek—and the point of a dagger pressing itself coldly to her throat. From behind her a young male voice cried in her ear: "Father, no! Don't surrender! Make him surrender! Tell him he must submit—or I'll slay this human!"

  All eyes turned in Tess's direction to see her pinned by Konel, his dagger poised at her jugular.

  "Konel, no!" bellowed Godan.

  "Yes, father!" cried the boy. "Strike him down! Force him to give his life for this female. Avenge Mother!"

  In that moment, Tess saw pure horror fall over Rendar's face—and saw him forget the battle and start to lower his blade. If Godan seized this shocking initiative, all would be lost. Tess did not think. She only moved. The next seconds became another frenzy. Tess's booted foot came down hard on Konel's foot. The startled boy wailed in pain and pulled his dagger away. Tess wrenched herself free of his grasp and spun around. Konel recovered and slashed out with his knife. The blade sliced the sleeve of Tess's shirt and just penetrated her skin. In another instant without thought, Tess made a fist and slammed it forward into Konel's stomach. The youth toppled back, gasping, and doubled over on the grass while Tess picked up his knife.

  The shock of the moment spread to the battle scene. Godan, seeing what his son had done and likewise Tess's response, roared, "KONEL!" He seized the staff of the distracted Rendar, who whirled back around, suddenly weaponless, to face his foe. He leapt back—too late to miss the edge of one of his own blades slashing across his chest and making a dripping line of blood down his pecs.

  Rendar winced at the pain, even as he and Godan both heard Konel choke out a cry of, "Father!" Godan looked beyond Rendar to see his son trying to stagger to his feet near the dagger-wielding Tess. Fighting the pain, Rendar struck out, grabbing the shaft of his weapon and tearing it from Godan's hands. Godan made a sound of incoherent fury as Rendar, wincing, tossed the blade away.

  "You fool!" Godan roared, set to lunge for the fallen shaft. But Rendar was quicker in spite of his wound. In the middle of Godan's dive for the ground, Rendar brought his fist to meet Godan's face. Struck in the nose, blood flowing, Godan forgot everything but his hatred and rage. He hurled himself at Rendar with hands extended and seeking Rendar's throat. Rendar swung with his fist again, connecting with Godan's nose a second time. Godan sputtered and staggered back, and Rendar became a storm of flying fists, hitting the bigger Sarmian in the jaw, across the face, in the ri
bs and stomach.

  Under this barrage of punches, Godan refused to give in. He stumbled forward, intent as ever on pounding Rendar into the grass. With one more step... he fell with an ignominious thud at Rendar's feet.

  Rendar stood triumphant, but not savoring his victory. His world now was nothing but the throbbing pain of the wound across his chest and the pulsing ache in the fists that had won him the day—and his life. Everyone present at the duel, whether proudly or ruefully, would testify that when the combatants fell, it was Godan who fell first and did not rise again. When Rendar hit the turf, he went down as the clear and decisive winner.

  _______________

  Konel's rash actions could have cost his tribe dearly. He had interfered in personal combat meant to settle an intertribal dispute. His intervention had compromised his father's honor and the honor of his family and tribe. Rendar would have been within his rights to petition the Capitol for sanctions against Godan's tribe, which could have cost them territory and resources. But Rendar chose forbearance instead. There had been enough violence, enough bloodshed and wrath and rancor, to last many lifetimes. He had never wanted this battle at all. He only wanted an end to all of it. Rendar and Godan would never be friends. But an end to all of it was what Rendar finally got. Peace descended on the Lotar Valley at last.

  The injured Rendar's people returned him to his family's compound in the hills on their side of the valley. The family healers treated his wound with consummate skill, and Rendar was ordered to rest. It was during his recuperation from his battle with Godan that he received a particular visitor.

  Once again casually dressed and piloting a floater on her own, Tess made her way through the community of pueblo-like structures set into the hills. She was fascinated by the contrast between the building style, which she associated with desert dwellers in Earth's history, and the temperate, partly forested region where these people lived. This, and the level of technology of the Sarmians, which was a match for present-day Earth, was one of the things that made the Sarmians so interesting. She found it almost as fascinating as the man who occupied the upper floor of the largest building.