The Fall Of The Tribes

by Philip Read

  “Its a pleasure to meet you,” Yami says happily. “I always like meeting interesting people, would you be interested in a light sparring session sometime later?”

  “Not the time.” I admonish and watch the grin that slowly spreads on the face of this new arrival. I’m trying to remember in what context I’ve heard the title of Ronin amongst the Hito but I’m coming up blank.

  “I’d love to spar with you sometime.” He says smoothly in perfect Common and indicates for Forester to continue.

  “We’ve been trying to gather our strength and prepare as soon as we heard but the Conclave has known for years I gather, which is why Malachi sent you and the other two gaikoku to learn some of our ways and acquire our greatest weapon.”

  “At the time I wasn’t aware of the Conclave’s mission either but I have since been made aware and am part of the team tasked with trying to safeguard and recruit from this part of the world,” I say to the obviously peeved half vampire before me. “I have been tasked with trying to work with the local kingdoms and governments on this continent in order to work together to prepare for the coming g threat as best we can.”

  The recent arrival, Hirohito with the uncannily silent presence nods before looking straight at me using a skill I can’t identify. “Well in that case in light of how closely we will be working together you should be aware of another threat looming over Gaia as we know it. Or should I say under Gaia?” He says as he takes his gaze away from me and outs it firmly on Yami, who frowns slightly.

  “The Underworld is open, the barrier separating it from the surface has been broken for years now but our people and others like us have been holding most of the monsters back. But we can no longer do so, expect creatures of darkness to stalk the nights on Gaia in the next few years.”

  That complicates things in the extreme, the Underworld creatures are said to prey primarily on intelligent beings and are said to be hard to kill without light or fire.

  “I will let my people know-”

  “Oh, they know. I informed Malachi several months ago and I’m sure he will get this information to you when you are in a more conveniently reachable location. Enough of this for the moment, come, let’s have tea and discuss the rules of our sparing match Yami wasn’t it?” I frown and Yami catches on as well.

  “I don’t recall giving you my name.” He says with a raised eyebrow.

  Hirohito just smiles, “I have my ways. One last this g, do you want the oath fully removed or should we kill him now?”

  “Remove it please, I think he is still redeemable and besides, we will need all the help we can get in the coming days.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Chapter 49

  Brandon

  My life is a mess and I don’t know what to do about it. Everything has gone downhill fast for me these last few years and I know who my friends really are. I may have gone overboard by killing Nasis like that I’m not even sure what came over me. But coming back from a stressful patrol to be sneered at and looked down upon by a noncombatant spoilt little bitch was just a ted bit too much even for me. And of course, there was the shock of hearing about Aaliyah…

  I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect when I was returned home for judgement but seeing mother reduced to prostrating herself on the dais begging for my life left a sour taste in my mouth that even now years later I can’t wash out. I was judged by the king, my father whom I had a private meeting with a few hours before passing judgment.

  I mean I can appreciate the sentiment and the predicament the man is in, he wasn’t supposed to be king his brother was and his brother had all the support and was loved by the nobles. And now here I am the son of the surprise king everyone had forgotten about to the extent that the assassins that tried to end the royal lol line and nearly succeeded forgot as well. And I come and I kill one of the grandchildren of the now dead but still beloved would be king.

  The Houses had to have their pound of flesh lest a royal think it could easily skate away from killing one of their own. And so the king was under pressure on all sides with an already tenuous relationship being built with the help of the Houses with the reclusive elves, the Stone Dwarves and the Maori to check the Barbarian threat. An alliance that has never before been even dreamt up in any royals wildest dreams but because they all wanted the same thing from the Tundra it was becoming a reality.

  And here I am upsetting the Houses who’s backs this whole alliance stands. When he explained everything in that way to me I was sure I was going to the headsman, and the more he explained the more sure I got that this is it for me. I started counting the many backup kids the man has, the many wives and potential for more kids. I started seeing how we aren’t even close, in fact, i barely know the man but still, he is my father h shouldn’t be telling me I will die over a chalice of whiskey by the fire in his private sitting room. But I was sure this was him building me up for the inevitable news of my looming death. Until he told me that I would have my arm cut off and be banished from the kingdom and my name struck from the royal annals.

  The first thing I took in was that I wasn’t going to die and I sighed a relieved sigh and took an big swallow of ash whiskey to cool my nerves. Then the actual sentence that would be passed down dawned on me and I looked up at the king in complete confusion.

  “Banished to where?” I had asked the man because Sandoria stretches out in all directions encompassing any map I have ever seen of the continent. He had no response for me either and so a few hours later my offending arm was shortened at the elbow and a geas was magically placed on me to never again set foot in the kingdom.

  Something I would only ever be able to unravel when I Awakened, if I ever Awakened or with the help of a stronger or smarter Awakened than the Royal Master Magician Zuesius. Not likely to be found anywhere nearby. Mother directed me to head to the highlands and find her people, she gave me maps, letters of introduction and everything. I could leave with everything I could carry on my person but that’s about it.

  Father gave me a ring of holding which is still useless to me until I am able to Awaken, but I know it is a great treasure. The things were practically myths until soldiers started looting them from dead barbarians. I tried connecting with my underworld friends to help me get restarted but apparently without an arm and without being a royal any longer I was useless to them, that’s what it means to be removed from the annals, I was a nobody.

  Some of my old thief friends showed their sympathy when they saw more but most just laughed or sneered at my misfortune. Its safe to say I never made it to the highlands but I did run across a group of bandits after spending 7 months in the Wilds. One of the 7 unclaimed unconquered territories within the Kingdom of Sandoria. Those months were the worst in my life and I was reduced to foraging and digging up toots like an animal, begging when I encountered hunters that were lucky enough to survive the forest and come out with their prey.

  For some reason, the beasts left me alone but that’s only the intelligent ones, I had to quickly learn to outsmart the rest which is really harder that anyone would think. Those bandits saved me from eventually finding myself in some creatures stomach and thankfully by the time they did I was dirty and grimy so no one thought to search me. I had gold and platinum buried away but money had very little value to be by that point.

  I stayed with them for three years, being their servant, cleaning washing pots, covering the latrine pits when they moved to different locations. Holding their shields or swords as they raped or their horses as they robbed. I hated it but its what I’d been reduced to. They never actually entered Sandoria so no one really organised a force to hunt them out of the forests but eventually I made friends even amongst them. It’s crazy the shit a person gets used to and rape and murder became almost a norm, like just a thing that was done on Tuesday before lunch.

  Then the barbarians came through and I knew immediately who and what they were and I warned the few in the Band I actually liked but no one listened to me. “
There are 250 of us and along 100 of them,” Kwezi said with that dirty mirthful grin on his face.

  259 rode off to ambush the barbarians and only 70 of them came back, not a single barbarian casualty throughout the brief but epic fight. Its actually beautiful to watch those fuckers slaughter people. There was one with a hammer that was especially devastating and a crazy woman with a long-armed axe that just cut a swath through the Band. I had to follow them after that, I wanted what they had. I didn’t want to be whatever the fuck I was anymore, a one-armed bandit flunky who got raped by one of the bandits but is too ashamed to tell anyone. After all, it was a fucking Tuesday and that when they do that shit before lunch!

  I followed the barbarians for days, occasionally loosing them and panicking when I fall asleep but eventually finding a trail and running with it with all my might. Living in the bush had thought me a lot of previously useless skill, like identifying trails. Their trail was always sparse which meant most of them were woodsmen but its still difficult for a 100 people to pass through the bush without leaving one.

  When they reached the coast I was sure they would board a ship and I’d be dead, I could hardly stand. But some of them came to me, they asked me questions, I didn’t even lie. None where impressed with my parentage at all which baffled me at first. But they fed me, let me enjoy the warmth of their fire and spoke in their strange rough language and laughed amongst themselves, a lot like the Band actually.

  But the the next day beautiful women with spears and javelins immerged from the water and spoke to some of them before we were all led on a boat to a strange rocky isle where tunnels under the isle lead to tunnels under the water. This is not something I had ever heard of before but here it was, a passageway to other lands far from Sandoria the mild continent, as the Undines called it.

  It was an adventure from there and though no one babied me or took care of me I felt looked after. They woke me when it was time to eat or leave, the gave me a sleeping math and sometimes even spoke in Sandersonian for my benefit. I sometimes seeped when I had some privacy for the u fairness of life and though I know they heard, none bothered me or even asked about it. Months later when we immerge from the water tunnel and took another boat to a different continent all together it was a new start for me.

  There we met these strange people in this training camp, and I’ve been training in espionage and strategy ever since.

  “Hey Brand?”

  “Yea?” I respond already turning around.

  “You didn’t see the fight?” Sachs asks giving me a look.

  “Nea, I was busy. What’s up?”

  “I have to go see Master Dragon with Volvox in another 30 minutes, any more info on the weird sibling and their trainer?”

  “All I know is what I already told you, their weapon types and that their grandfather is one of the 20 founders, sorry that couldn’t help with your matches,” I say with a shrug.

  “No worries, we gave you short notice anyway thanks for trying.” He says and slips away.

  My life is taking a completely different route now, oh and my arm is being regrown.

  Chapter 50

  Om

  I don’t take my life for granted, I don’t take anything for granted since my brother died some seven to eight years ago, I can hardly believe its been that long since that long and fateful day when we woke Sachi up to accompany us witch hunting.

  Since then I take absolutely nothing I have for granted for I know it will all be taken from me some day, its an inevitable truth that Ive noticed a lot of people seem not to understand.

  They build and build and build and then are shocked when that child they raised dies, or that job they had mastered is no longer profitable or when they get older and start getting slower, losing that deadly edge they had as a young warrior. Everything is taken away from you and after you’ve watch everything else be taken it’s your very life that is taken last this side of the void.

  That is why I take nothing in my life for granted and I enjoy whatever I do have as much as I possibly could while I still have it. I enjoy my mother, my friends, my mate and our relationship. I enjoy the sunrise, the night, hunting, making things with my bare hands, I enjoy training and amassing power. Power necessary for when the time that the world wants to take something from me I’m not ready to part with, that I be able to struggle and fight even if it’s against Gaia herself for no Barbarian takes death lying down.

  Im not enjoying myself now in Master Kuoyi’s class about strategy when fighting and in facing life in general though. The lesson itself isn’t the problem, its a stimulating and fascinating class that affirms a lot of things I’ve been doing through instinct without the logic behind them. I’m not enjoying the class because I don’t like the partner I’ve been matched with within the Volvocine siblings. Chlamidomonus I could have probably gotten along with, or even his brother or one of the triplets, but instead I get Volvox.

  He was Sachi’s opponent during the sparing match and I would expect them to be matched together to work out their shit ‘cause its obvious neither are satisfied with the outcome of that fight. But instead Sachi is matched with Pleodorina and I am matched with this arrogant mean spirited little shit. I’ve grown larger in the years and I now stand at nearly 7 feet tall with wide shoulders, a broad back, and powerful legs but I’m also quite lean. I’m not the biggest tribesman in our group but I’m a close second after Onimorē the Tall, or at least that what we call him.

  Every remaining barbarian that survived the war is now named. Sachi the Blade, Victor the Magnificent, Dustin the Brave, Om the Mountain. I don’t even know where these names come from, it isn’t like there is a ceremony where these things are acknowledged. It just slowly starts to permeate the tribe that you’re now named and you eventually hear yourself referred to as ‘the Mountain’, like your supposed to know that their talking to you.

  “Choosing a weapon is like playing a game of rock paper scissors. Rock counters scissors, paper counters rock, scissors counters paper in a loop where you can’t get one that defeats all, like so with weapons.

  “Spears usually beat daggers in an open field, daggers beat spears or polearms in enclosed spaces, swords beat hammer depending on range and wielder, armour beats swords depending on the sword and the armour, hammer beats armour of nearly all types et cetera, et cetera. You get the point I hope but we will be looking into how to best counter specific weapons at a later date in a few days.

  “Are you all still following, Om, are you and your friend following this topic closely?” Kuoyi asks to sniggers from most everyone here.

  Volvox is lying on the grass besides me on his back with those stupid contraptions that shade your eyes on his face. I grunt in response and ignore the comments around me. Volvox has already had these classes or something very similar years ago but the partners we are matched with we have to take with us everywhere all the time. I don’t know if its a form of punishment or they are supposed to be spying on us to determine our trustworthiness but I literary mean everywhere.

  We’ve had to change bunks so that we be closer to our partners, if one goes to the latrines the other needs to be right outside the door. Sparring is done with no one else but the selected partner, and the hammer and the sword aren’t well matched as Master Kuoyi just pointed out. I focus my undivided attention on the lesson as more strategy in fighting is delved into.

  *

  “You know what, I’m sick of beating the crap out of you how about you grab a sword and I teach you how to use a bladed weapon.” Volvox says patronizingly after giving me a good bruise on the cheek with the edge of his practice sword.

  I spit out some blood and get ready to face him again with the practice medium length shafted war hammer at the ready. Without a shield ,the hammer is an inferior weapon to a sword in many cases, which is why sparing with Volvox like this is the only time I look forward to spending with him. And I do learn a lot from our spars, he sighs as I ignore him and we go again, clashing into each other
as I work on my defense.

  *

  It’s at the end of the practice an hour later when I’m bruised and bartered and Volvox is lightly sweating that I think to accept that earlier challenge.

  “Still want to go sword against sword?” I ask looking at him enquiringly.

  “You must be a looking to punish yourself for something but I will indulge you, after all I am a benevolent man. I take great pride in teaching you barbarians some fighting techniques, look closely hold the sword like this. Ah… I see you are familiar with the weapon, and I thought you were all brawn and no class.” He says as I grab a practice long sword and gauge its balance quickly.

  “Tell me Volvox,” I say cooly while getting into a stance, to his utter surprise. “Have you never wondered why Barbarians are never associated with a single weapon? We are never swordsmen or spearmen or axemen, but we are referred to as ‘warriors’ by those that know us best. Look closely I’ll teach you in a moment.” and I attack.

  The start of our exchange surprises him as my skill and experience come to bear, we exchange blows and parries a few times as he gauges my pace and level of skill. I’ve seen that look of concentration and evaluation before, that’s the look I get when sparing with one of the younger tribesmen while gauging their skill.

  Volvox is now doing the same to me as he is clearly the more skilled swordsman dodging my cuts and stabs at the last second or by mere cm. He is enjoying himself, his moody and patronizing attitudes gone as he does what he enjoys. He loves sword fighting, genuinely loves it like a child loves playing outside. We move across the mats firmly embedded into the floor, our footwork and movements long and adventurous.

  He defends as I give him my all, all my sword fighting skills or little tricks I learnt growing up, all the experience I have from the field, all the training I received my six months within the Hidden Valley. I use my superior reach as much as I can trying to overwhelm him with combinations. He takes all I give him even as I start to shout out with every blow using the Hito techniques to increase the power behind a blow by using your ribs and lungs as a conduit.