“You weren’t hoping for children, right?” Mat frowned at him. Behind them, Bryn could hear a few of the younger males coughing and mumbling about them, but he ignored them.
“Nah, just wasn’t expecting her to put it out there like that. One day, ya know? Years from now. We’re not even close to our middle years, so there’s time.” He shrugged. “She just seemed really concerned about goin’ into her fertile cycle. That’s…”
“Worrisome,” Mat finished. “I know. A lot of females are scared of it, though. It’s a reversal in the power dynamic and requires strong females to have to hide behind other females. Males suddenly become the enemy. It’s the way our people are.”
“I don’t want to be her enemy,” Bryn said sadly, staring into the woods around them as they hiked slowly down a deer trail. He picked a bit of fur off a plant and showed Mat. “Gryphon in the area right now.”
“Hm. Male by the color. That dark banding makes the browns look black from a distance. Probably sports rich colors for his feathers. Let’s hope we don’t run into him. I’m not in the mood for a gryphon tonight.”
“Good to know, though.” Bryn pocketed the fur. “We can come back this way for The Hunt.”
“I like that. She deserves something nice.” Mat thumped his shoulder.
“You two would test a gryphon just for your female? A large male gryphon can take on nearly six strong hunters,” one of the youngest males spoke up from the back. Bryn looked over his shoulder, raising an eyebrow. Mat only laughed.
“Aye. She’s a warrior, and this is our first year with her. Whatever we bring back from The Hunt should be worthy of her.”
“She’s killed at least one before on her own,” Mat added. “She knows how tough the fight is. She’s fought worse, even. Too bad there are no chimera in this part of the world.”
With that, their entire patrol started talking at once. “Those aren’t real!” “Stop fucking around!” “You aren’t that good!”
Bryn groaned as the young males all started talking at once, each with a different opinion.
“They are real. Rare and not from this continent and definitely not in Anden, but they are real. Saw one while I was in the Empire. They had shipped it in for a big event. Our wife killed it single-handedly. Took a bad hit from it, but she killed it.”
“I wish I could have seen that,” Bryn said, sighing again, dreamily. It should scare him, thinking of her taking on such a vicious and notorious beast from a place where it was rumored the gods once walked on mortal land. The reality was, the thought of seeing her in a fight like that just made him horny.
“And back on the gryphon, Rainev killed one on his own in the Colosseum as well. Even gave it a clean kill. Don’t discount the strength and tenacity of someone fighting for their life.” Mat crossed his arms, stopping as he turned to consider the young males following him. Bryn knew what this meant and had a touch of sympathy for the Andinna they worked with. “But if you all know everything, tell me, what kind of trail are we on?”
“An animal trail,” one said loudly. The others nodded.
“Half right. We’re on a deer trail, specifically. The gryphon is probably tracking a small herd. Like us, they can hunt from the air or the ground. However, when a gryphon is on the ground and down on the trails like this, it could be a sign it’s injured. We haven’t had a gryphon near the edge of the mountains in a few years. What does that tell you?” Mat’s foot began to tap.
None of the young males answered now, so Bryn was the one who told Mat what he wanted to hear.
“He was probably pushed out of his prime territory by a younger, stronger male. With spring comin’, males are getting more aggressive as they claim the lands they want, so they have prime choice of females. A male can build up to three nests to lure in different mates. There are no females this close to the edge of the mountains, though. This male was forced out of prime territory.”
“Or he’s young, and his mother just pushed him out as he reached adulthood. He’ll grow strong here with no competition and in a few years, go looking for the females.” Mat smiled at him. “Why is that distinction important?”
Crickets were the answer he got.
“We can hunt the old ones, but we leave the young ones to keep the population growin’. We don’t hunt females at all unless they’ve already been too injured to take care of themselves and their young.” Bryn gestured to the young males, giving them a look. “Ya all live here. Ya should know this. So, please don’t ever try to tell one of us we don’t know what we’re talkin’ about.”
With that lesson over, Bryn started walking again, shaking his head. When Mat fell into step beside him, he elbowed his partner.
“Let’s not make tonight a pain in the ass. I don’t want to spend all night arguing with ‘em.”
“Fine. I’m just tired of them. I don’t need a gallery of chattering males talking while I’m trying to have a real conversation with you about our lover.”
The conversation died. They walked for miles, climbing over rocks and searching known caves on mountainsides. They followed the trails, even catching a glimpse of the gryphon perched on a low cliff. It was an injured male, probably hitting his later years. Bryn knew the male’s end was coming soon. He and Mat would only speed up the process and put his parts to good use.
“Maybe Senri can carve her a bone flute,” he said softly as the gryphon noticed them and limped out of sight. The old male knew who the top predators were. A group of Andinna this large could easily turn the predator into the prey.
“He’s an old fighter. We’ll have to offer prayers to Krisanya when the time comes.”
“Ya should always offer her prayers for The Hunt,” Bryn reminded him softly.
The sun set on them, leaving them to trudge through the darkness. Out of habit, Bryn drew one of his daggers and pulled his scarf over the lower half of his face. Mat kept a hand on the pommel of his sword. The younger males were silent. Well, their mouths were closed. They walked too loud for him, but he wasn’t there to teach them how to prowl silently through the night. They would learn as they got older and scared their prey away too much on hunts. It wasn’t how Bryn learned, but he knew it was how Mat and so many other Andinna had.
“I smell smoke,” one of the young males whispered.
Bryn stopped, raising his chin to put his nose in the air. With a deep inhale, he caught it as well. Mat nodded in agreement beside him.
“Could be one of ours, so keep your swords away until I verify,” Bryn ordered. “Mat?”
“Go. I’ll stay here with them. You don’t need back up.”
He smiled dangerously at the other male and slipped away from the group, searching for the source of the smoke. It had the distinct smell of a well-tended campfire using dry wood that would have to have been brought because nothing was dry in the mountains during late winter. The snow was melting and made the world damp. The lack of visible smoke only gave him more evidence his assumption was correct. An Andinna hunter would be smart enough to take a couple of dry logs at the beginning of a hunt. The starting fire would dry out wood from around the area to use, but starting logs were important.
Only one thing worried him as he followed the smell as it grew stronger. Andinna didn’t hunt in the winter. It was a time-honored tradition, enforced by law. Winter was a time of reflection over death and the coming rebirth of the world. Any Andinna out hunting now would be poaching, a serious crime among their people.
He found the small camp and frowned. There was evidence of bedrolls, but they were gone, and the fire was dying, only small embers left. It hadn’t been attended for hours, and it didn’t seem like anyone was going to come back for it.
He swiftly made his way back to the unit and Matesh.
“No one is there. Fire is dyin’, which might be why the smell was so faint. Come on. Young ones, keep out of the campsite and let Matesh and me look for more information about it.” He was edgy. This wasn’t the first site they had found li
ke this. Every single time, further review of the abandoned campsites told them the same thing.
Elvasi were in the mountains. How many, he didn’t know, but he hated it.
When they arrived back at the campsite, Mat and Bryn got to work, picking threads from bushes, finding footprints to examine, and looking over scraps of food left behind.
“Definitely Elvasi. Damn the Skies,” Mat muttered softly to him. “How many? Four?”
“Aye. Senri said it’s common to find campsites like this, but I don’t like it.”
“We’ll take it to her again in the morning. I wonder if the other patrols have found any of these. She didn’t say last time we brought it up.” Mat rubbed his face. “I wish she would do something about this.”
Bryn did too, but he knew it wasn’t feasible.
“Like what? Sendin’ out patrols to hunt them down? From this spot, they’re probably out of the mountains already or out of the way. These Elvasi have had a thousand years testing our defenses in these mountains. They might leave too much evidence at their campsites, but they never use the same one twice, and we can never find where they go.” Bryn shook his head. “Can’t blame her for just making sure they don’t get too close. Plus, she tells everyone in the village what areas to avoid, and it works.” At last count, Senri only lost people to Elvasi when they ignored her advice. She was damn good at what she did for the village. It was why he didn’t give her any shit about her system. It was keeping the Andinna as safe as she could make them.
“I still want to talk to her when we get back,” Mat said softly. “Let’s keep moving. Someone kick the fire out so it doesn’t come back and get out-of-control.”
One of the young males jumped into action. Bryn decided he would use this campsite like they used all the others—as a teaching experience.
“What did we find that pointed to this being an Elvasi camp?” he asked as the group started walking again.
“You found a small bit of cloth. The color, weave, and texture the Elvasi use are different than ours.”
“Aye. What else?”
“The way the fire was built,” another offered, sounding insecure with his answer. “We build up, leaning logs against each other to keep air flowing through the fire. Air helps fire if the wind isn’t too strong. The logs were all just thrown on top of each other.”
“Good. Yer learnin’.”
“And what do we look for in tracks?” Mat asked.
“We wear lighter boots and leave a consistent footprint. They wear something with…soles? Is that what it’s called?”
“Aye. They have soles on the heels of their boots. Makes that part of their tracks deeper. The three of ya who answered can leave early. Mat and I will clean your gear for ya.” It was the best reward he could think of.
“Thank you, sir,” they all answered back.
Mat narrowed his eyes in the darkness. Bryn chuckled.
“They’re young, Mat. Ya have to reward them.”
“I know, but I was thinking of a different way to do that. Like taking them off a dining hall shift or something.”
“I’m not that nice.” Bryn shook his head.
“No, you’re just nice enough to give us more work to do before we go home to our female.”
“Fuck.” Bryn hadn’t thought about that.
That had all the young males behind them chuckling.
“You did this to us. Remember that when we’re both bitching about being tired and not curled up in our bed with her.”
Bryn groaned.
They walked all night, stopping for water at two different streams as they did every patrol. They covered a lot of ground, knowing the trails they took by heart. They had to fly across a large ravine toward the end of their patrol.
With the sun coming up, Bryn knew it was almost over. He and Mat didn’t talk much, both focused on what this meant. They had deserved this punishment from Alchan, but that didn’t make it easy. It was tiring, took them away from home, and put them with a group of males they could barely stand.
Bryn was happy it was so close to being over. Shortly after dawn, Mat said the fucking magic words.
“Let’s head home, everyone.” He jumped up, slower than he had at the beginning of the night. Bryn followed, also feeling sluggish. They hovered in the air, waiting for everyone to get airborne. They flew straight for the village, landing at the same guardhouse where they started.
Bryn took the armor of the ones he promised a reward, Mat taking their weapons.
“Get out of here,” Bryn said softly, waving away one who was hovering.
“Sir, I just wanted to say…I know we haven’t been the easiest for you to work with. While most of them don’t agree, I just wanted to say, it’s been an honor.”
Bryn looked up and nodded once at the young male.
“Have a good day. If ya stay focused and practice, ye’ll be just as good as us. It just takes dedication.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” He backed away and jumped, flying off.
Bryn snorted. “Well, that was something.”
“Yeah, I had one do the same to me,” Mat told him, leaning on the side of the guardhouse. “Let’s get this over with. Senri and Alchan should be on their way to release us from this.”
“Oh, fuck, I forgot about that.” Bryn collapsed on a bench, beginning the tedious work of cleaning armor. He’d done it countless times and never had a problem with his own, but when he had to do several sets, it always drove him mad.
“And there they are!” Matesh laughed. “Over here, you two!”
“You’re so casual with our king. You know, Alchan, if that annoys you, I’m more than willing to keep them for another season. Or a year.” Senri grinned at Alchan as they walked to the guardhouse. Alchan sighed, shaking his head.
“I can’t. I’m willing to loan them to you to help train your guards, but you can’t keep them. I have their female to worry about.”
“Ah, yeah. She would blame you and not me. Like she already does for them being gone so often. One day, she’ll understand, sometimes the males going away is a good thing.”
“Don’t give her any ideas,” Mat said, leaning down to kiss Senri on the cheek when she was close enough.
Bryn jumped up and did the same, knowing better than to ignore her to get his work done. Alchan stood a step behind, not unusual to those in the Company, but it didn’t fit his position. No one ever called him out on it, but a king was supposed to walk in the front, Senri a step behind.
But Alchan did nothing like normal royalty.
“Well, you two, have you learned your lesson?” he asked, crossing his arms.
“Not to argue with you? Of course.” Bryn could hear the smile Mat was probably giving Alchan, the humor evident. “Until next time, of course.”
“You know, I asked you to put them with males who would teach them how aggravating it is to be questioned and argued with all the time.” Alchan narrowed his eyes on Senri, turning his body, so all his attention was on her. Bryn knew it would make every other village female quake with fear, but Senri just patted his chest.
“I did, and these two had all sorts of problems, thanks to my younger males. I can’t change the fact that you let them treat you like an equal more often than not.”
“Curse my life,” Alchan muttered. Bryn resisted a smile.
“Before this breaks up and Bryn and I head home…We found another Elvasi campsite,” Mat said quickly. With just that, the mood of the entire group changed.
“It’s not out of the ordinary,” Senri reminded him. She was different. A moment before she was joking, but now she appeared to be the very leader everyone knew. “I don’t need you growing paranoid and getting the village worried. Winter is always a hot time because they know we aren’t out there hunting.”
“I’m just…” Mat shook his head. “The village needs to do more to deter them from testing the defenses.”
“There’s nothing more we can do,” Senri snapped. “I on
ly have males on the patrols. There’s only so many I can use for that, or we would have no one hunting, no one farming, no one taking care of the actual village. I’m also not going to send anyone out on wild goose chases for every single Elvasi camp spotted. The rules of engagement stand. If you find one of them, kill them, but don’t go chasing them. I’ll remind you, that’s how I’ve had three young males taken or killed.”
“Mat,” Alchan warned softly. “It’s an arrangement Senri, Jesvena, and I agreed on years ago. It works. It’s a sound plan. The only thing you need to be watching for is making sure they don’t come close to the village.”
“Fine.” Mat turned and walked away, heading into the guardhouse and away from them.
Alchan looked down at Bryn. All he could do was shake his head, trying to answer the silent question from his commander. He didn’t know why Mat was riding this topic so hard. He had to think it was some paranoia the male wasn’t willing to admit, but he didn’t pry, not when it was a sensitive topic. It would be years before Mat began to feel comfortable again. Being recently freed from slavery left a mark. Mat’s real trauma was finally starting to peek through his veneer of confidence.
“Keep an eye on him,” Alchan ordered softly. “Rain’s dealing with problems too.”
“Mave had a flashback a little while back,” Senri added. “It happens. Rain can’t deal with being touched. Mave has all sorts of secret problems, ones I’m just scratching the surface of.” She nodded to the guardhouse, keeping her voice down. “Paranoia?”
“Seems like,” Bryn mumbled. “Think about it. He and Rain were captured because we were followin’ the plan. Rain was downed too fast to shift. They were overwhelmed. We couldn’t get ‘em out in time. I think he’s seein’ bigger issues than are really there.”
“Other than his obsession with this, he’s proven himself capable of leading the young males. He’s hard on them. He gets others involved to make sure he trained them as best he could.” Senri sighed.
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