He struck the strings decisively, rippled his fingers across them, and with no other word they turned both of them on their heels and strode away, up the path, into the lengthening shadows. Their voices echoed across the valley, surprisingly strong and sure. But the simple song, mere repeated pairs of notes high and low, still had about it a rhythm of chanting mockery, and an undertow of icy warning that Alya felt he barely understood.
Songs of gods and songs of mortals!
Tales of terrors long ago,
Ballads brave and ballads bawdy,
Always make a moral show.
Any story we can tell you!
Stories in the telling grow.
Many a story has no ending,
Others spark but never glow.
Lovers joined may yet be sundered,
Others sundered reunite –
Which is tragic, which is happy?
Where the shadow, where the light?
Learn that no man sees all endings,
Learn that ill can conquer good,
Learn that no man wins forever,
Learn that love cannot stay blood.
Hear a tale, be slow to live it,
Steel your heart before you bend,
Matchless might and constant virtue
May not triumph in the end …
The chanting died away in the rustle of the screening trees. There was an instant of silence. Then the wind rose and reasserted itself once again, and the falling sun flashed a flickering streak of light across the vale.
Alya stood; and simply revelled in the sheer fact of existence. He raised his arms to the skies as if he might lift them off the foundation of the mountains, and lay bare the secrets of the universe.
He could hardly believe what it was to feel whole once again, and without the gnawing teeth of constant pain. His arms had grown strong, indeed; but now he had legs to match them. No more than his birthright, maybe, the body an austere and active life would have shaped. But there was more than that to it. He could feel the energy that flowed within him, the force of sheer life, swifter and stronger than the blood that carried it, a surge of pulsing, tingling fire.
He snatched up a great stone from the wall that had confined him, and hurled it hard, saw it whistle through the trees and out across the vale, to shatter against the opposite cliff in a shower of splinters. He tore up a stick and swished it through the air, so hard it hummed and snapped. He laughed; and a thought came to him, and then a rush of thoughts, one upon another, tumbling over and over in their implications. Still rejoicing in the ease and poise of movement, he stepped over the ruined wall and out along the path that led deep into the vale, to the Great House.
Then, with a wild rush of exultation, he began to run.
It was almost sundown, and the workers in the fields laid down their numbing activity, and turned wearily homeward. It was a fine evening, and already the consoling routine was reasserting itself. Many began to sing, the old work songs, and that in itself was so comforting that the others joined in. But as they came out of the trees and on to the deeply cut path that led down into the vale, they shuffled to a stop, and the words faltered upon their lips at the sight of the figure that stood there.
Some did not recognise him, and screamed, fearing the raiders had returned. Those at the front did, and cried out all the louder. Some fell to their knees, many because they feared it was a spirit awaiting them; but others less credulous were struck with fear, nonetheless. He did not look changed, save that he stood, his body full-fleshed and firm. His new strength did not show itself unnaturally. But his very stance spoke of power, his limbs were firm as young branches, and his eyes, no longer dimmed by pain, flashed and glittered. Health glowed in his very skin like sunlight, and he wore fine boots and garments that had once been the chieftain’s. Across his back was his fur-trimmed bow, that had long lain unstrung, and a hide bundle at his belt; and cradled in his arms was a shape of menacing darkness.
They knew it then, the ancient sword of Zvyataquar that had hung smoke-blackened among the rafters of the Great House; but none in their memory had ever drawn it. He paid them no apparent heed, but when he laid hand to hilt, it parted to reveal a glint of steel. Caked in soot and dust though it was, the old blade left the scabbard with an easy hiss, and its blade glittered greenish and strange in the failing light, its traceried characters rippling through the metal like dragons sporting among cloud. Some virtue was upon it, that sword, such as the mastersmiths of Brasayhal or Kerys could confer; and time had not touched it.
Then many villagers remembered cruel taunts and heedless slights, scornful regard, cold charity and grudging kindnesses, their failure to stop Vansha in his bullying, and most of all in that final fight. And they sank down, and wailed, and beat their foreheads on the stony path; for clearly here was one upon whom destiny had set its hand.
Only one man kept his feet: Vansha, forcing his way forward among them, looking as haunted as any, but chilling his pride to steady limb and voice.
‘Well, son of a Seer! You’re strangely healed. You may well take any vengeance you wish. But spare the rest, who have suffered enough. My father lies in his last sleep. So make good your wrongs upon my head, alone!’
Alya felt flame stir in him, but he held his hand. Only his voice lashed them, as they cringed. ‘Learn that after all the ancient Powers have not deserted you. Little as you deserve it! They have returned me to you as your champion, to lead you! To deliver those who were taken! That’s the only revenge I care about. This sword, that was left you for your defence, that you chose to forget – I claim it now, by right!’
There was silence in the little vale, save for those still whimpering. ‘Speak then!’ snapped Alya. ‘You see what has come upon me. Is that not a sign? You yourselves are broken now, far worse than ever I was. Yet you too may find healing, if you seek it. Speak then! Which among you will follow me?’
Silence hung upon his words, heavy with shame.
‘Say!’ barked Alya, unable to believe what he saw. ‘Who will come? Is not one among you man enough? And yet you dared, dared to call me half a man?’
Vansha’s face went pale beneath his red-brown skin. His voice held more than a hint of the old contempt. ‘If the Powers’d spared us all such a gift, now, that might’ve been different! We fought bravely enough without it, didn’t we? But what can we do now, for all this strength of yours? The raiders are a day away already, and we have few horses. The cause is lost, beyond hope, Alya. Even for her!’
Alya stared him hard in the face. ‘Does any true man or woman abandon … a good cause, merely because it’s lost? What remains, otherwise? To squat and scratch a living from a ruined land, in a Citadel you can no longer defend? Isn’t that a lost cause? Better to die resisting! Better to run up the spear that strikes you, and slay the wielder! Better by far!’
And it was as if his fires poured into Vansha’s cold cheeks, and he plunged through the clawing villagers. ‘A true word! For that, I am with you, and come all the rest!’
‘They’ll not trample you in the rush,’ observed Alya drily.
‘Then to the Ice with them all!’ shouted Vansha furiously. ‘To rescue Saviyal, or to death and damnation, without regret! I’ll not falter, though my strength’s my own and no more. But remember this, son of a Seer – I will not, not ever, follow you!’
Alya shrugged. ‘The weakest form of pride, as my father often said; but it will serve. Let us swear, and shame these fools who witness. To go forth to rescue Savi, and any others we can, and never turn aside. In full trust of one another, together. As brothers.’
‘As brothers!’ echoed Vansha, his voice fierce. ‘All quarrels forgotten, while our bond endures! Never to turn aside, never till we taste certain success or final failure!’
‘Till then, never!’ agreed Alya. ‘Sworn!’
They clasped hand to arm then, in the fashion of their folk. ‘Now let us go!’ said Alya, but Vansha shook his head.
‘Not so! Not on
foot, without preparation! We will take those fine mounts we captured, and food. But what will two accomplish, even with the strength of the Powers? We must fetch help!’
‘We’ll find little enough here!’ said Alya sourly. ‘Where else?’
‘Volmur!’ said Vansha. ‘They say our local king seeks men of valour. Why should we not seek aid from him, in the name of proving ourselves? At the least we might gather a few more men!’
Alya tossed his head impatiently. ‘But that capital of his is far off – a good week’s ride, I’ve heard! And to the southward!’
‘That would be too long!’ agreed Vansha, the two ignoring the villagers who gaped around them, many still on their knees. ‘But there is a shorter way – though perilous. I know it. Two days, three at most.’
Alya writhed. The very idea of delay clouded his mind.
‘If you demand it, brother,’ persisted Vansha, ‘I will ride with you right into the raiders’ camp! Or steal in by night, if you can bear even that much delay! What then? Can even two strong arms stand against the forty or fifty we saw? And they may well be part of some larger band. At most we’ll give Savi the joy of seeing us cut to pieces! Whereas with twenty or thirty – ten, even – there might be a very good chance! If we ride now, no matter how perilous the way!’
Alya looked keenly at him. For all Vansha’s oath, he was being tried here, tested once again. But then he would also be testing Vansha, and that did not displease him.
‘Some chance,’ he said, grimly. ‘They ride west and north … We could cut across the plains from – what’s the name? Volaghkh? Volaghkhan? Pick up their trail in maybe two days …’
The thought of what might have happened to Savi, what might be happening even now, was a sickening pain in itself. Alya had dreamed of rushing headlong to her rescue, but this made sense. Three days at least … but better that, than waste his gift. Perhaps that had been the warning in the song, or part of it.
‘Very well, then – brother! Choose us the best of the horses. The women will bring us food.’ Alya said it as a calm certainty; and when he clapped his hands, with a frightening crack, the women rose and scurried to fetch all they might want. The men slunk after them. Alya watched them go, and snapped the great sword back into its scabbard. ‘And when that is done, nothing need hold us here any longer. Nothing at all, now.’
CHAPTER 4
Into the Night
EVEN as Alya, in fear and dread, turned his thoughts to her, Savi’s, for all the terror and discomfort around her, were no less upon him. The bullock cart, clumsy and ill-made, was jolting her this way and that, against the girls on either side, and they back against her. Bound in a line as they were, they could not avoid it.
‘Peasant’ panted the girl on her right, a stranger, for the hundredth time that day – the only thing she had said. The plump girl on her other side sat hunched into her own misery, saying nothing even when Savi tried to talk to her. She knew her well enough – Kaqual, from the Citadel, as were many others in the cart.
There had been more. Only the young women were here, no older ones, no children; what had become of them all Savi hardly dared to think. What had happened to these girls here was bad enough, and what might yet happen.
They had been torn away during the fighting, stunned or otherwise subdued. Savi, brandishing a rusty old weaving-staff, had fought with the fury that often surprises peaceable people when they are threatened. Her father, with no surviving son, had taught her a little of handling weapons. She had held her own, even snatched a proper sword from a dead raider and dealt a wound or two, until the crush grew too great and the villagers’ line gave back. She remembered little enough then, but she could still feel the bruise at her midriff where a heavy fist had struck the wind from her. They’d dragged her away, sword still in hand, as if she were no threat worth considering. They seemed bored, almost, as if their brutalities were normal behaviour, without excitement.
All the women taken were swiftly gathered at the feet of a snake-eyed chieftain, who had painted some marks on their foreheads with an ink-brush. Different marks, it seemed; though she did not know what her own was. Then they were roped together at throat and waist; and it was only then they finally took away her sword, as an afterthought. That rankled with her, foolish though it felt, almost as much as the liberal dose of kicks and flicks of the lash with which they’d driven the string of wailing women out through the trampled fields, out of their old life. Forever, Savi knew; for she had seen her father fall, her home ravaged, herself torn out of it. Come well or ill, nothing would ever be the same.
And Alya – what would have happened to Alya? That was her endless torment. If these fiends came upon him, they would surely have slain him where he sat. The thought stabbed at her, bitterly. He might have been fortunate. Apart from the rest, unable to come out and fight, they might have missed him. But would he think that any kind of good fortune?
He who had had so little would now have less. Even if he did live, who would care for him now? She felt a dreadful helpless emptiness. More likely he was dead. She should accept that, and end that one of her worries, at least. She was uprooted, and must find new sources of strength.
Yet, somehow, she could not shake off the concern, although she herself had enough to fear.
The raiders were disciplined. No man did worse than paw or strike the women, according to his humour. But their whole manner was gloating, menacing; and their drive relentless. In the hours that followed, the women were herded along swiftly by anxious-looking raiders, as if they feared some rescue bid. But none came. The women were goaded and lashed to a stumbling half-run, a dreadful pace. One older woman, her face puffy and bruised, fell, dragging on the rope. Whether through rough handling or exhaustion, she was barely alive. The guards simply cut her loose and flung her by the wayside, and drove the others on into the gathering twilight. Wolves were howling on the road, and Savi realised they were following, drawn by the smell of blood.
No more than a few miles further off, there were horse-carts waiting, rough, miserable things tilted upon two wheels and draped with patchwork coverings of cloth and hide. The women were split up, and chivvied into these, on to their bare board beds, and lashed crudely to the sides by their ropes at hand and waist. And the moment the last knot was secure, commands were howled, whips cracked the air, and away the carts lurched.
Westward and northward they went still, over marsh and mire by many trails, but always keeping up a pace that punished beast and man alike, and jolted the women unbearably. That night they made hardly a stop, though the horses were staggering. At last, upon the next day’s dawn, the ground grew more level and the rumble of the carts changed. The air seemed warm, still, but unusually moist, dark and heavy and suffocating to someone used to drier air. They were following an old road, she guessed, across barren brownish-green heaths, the stones booming hollowly beneath the iron-shod wheels, and it soon brought them out into what looked like a great flat land, crossed by dark, sluggish rivers.
The raiders and their catch made only brief halts to drink at streams, until late that evening, when the carts thundered across a great stone bridge, though its causeway was as rough and grassy as the road on either side, and as briar-riven. On its far side they came upon a larger camp of the same folk, set up in a hollow, with strong pickets posted against any pursuit. What then became of the women in the other carts she never saw; but those from hers, the youngest, were taken to a row of slightly larger carts laden with baggage and some booty, and, roped to a couple of these, another line of women captives. The newcomers were simply strung on to it. Their necks were freed, and they were given food; but that night, as they found what sleep they could, huddled beneath the carts, some were attacked. Some, not others; and Savi soon realised that no woman with a particular forehead mark was being harmed. She had had to watch Kaqual brutally raped, twice, next to her. But when she had done her best to kick and buffet the young men doing it, they pinned her down and threatened her horri
bly; but nothing more.
Shortly before dawn, deep straw had been piled into the cart, and all the women herded into it, still roped together. Even as the last knots were tied, the whole caravan, with fresh horses now, went clattering off. The straw was a lot more comfortable, but few of the captives seemed to notice or care. Kaqual, once plump and laughing, sat speechless and locked into herself. Her nose bled often, but she simply let the blood trickle down her chin. Savi had tried to put an arm around her, but she shrank away. Some of the other women sobbed helplessly and incessantly; most seemed sunk in dead-eyed resignation. Only the tall girl beside her, the pretty but haughty one from somewhere else entirely, seemed at all alive. She bore the protecting mark, some days old and smeared now; and by the look of her she too had not been touched. She seemed a few years older than Savi, and the fine clothes that hung in rags about her, and her cold disdain, suggested wealthy origins. Whenever Savi tried to speak, she only flashed her eyes contemptuously, and sniffed.
Savi fumed. ‘You may think yourself a cut above the rest of us,’ she said sharply, at yet another rebuff. ‘But, my fine madam, you are in the same cart and on the same rope, and facing much the same fate as any of us, perhaps. It might become you to be less standoffish with those you may be needing, soon enough.’
The woman looked down her long nose. ‘That I doubt. I am a princess of the Chaquan line, from the kingdoms far to the west of this barren place – as these uncouth creatures have doubtless recognised, by according me better treatment. Not that it will help them, when my uncle’s troops catch them up! I could hardly address you on equal terms.’ She unbent slightly. ‘But if it is my help and protection you supplicate, when we reach our destination, you or any of you are welcome to it.’
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