Honor and Blood

by James Galloway

  All the thoughts of Trolls seemed to draw them to him. Around midafternoon, they pulled up when Denai spotted a small group of them at the edge of the hazy heat distortion that limited distance vision in the desert. There had been four of them, and they were moving in the same direction as Tarrin was. Tarrin had to resist the urge to chase them down and kill them. Trolls were still dangerous, and four agianst one were not good odds, considering he had to keep an eye on Denai. He'd rather catch a Troll alone and kill it, let Denai get first-hand experience with their size and strength and speed before allowing her to fight them on her own.

  "They're not moving very fast," Denai said. "We'll catch up to them quickly."

  "There are four of them, Denai," Tarrin grunted. "That's bad odds right now."

  "You don't have to protect me," Denai flared, as if she could see right to the matter. "I'm an adult. I can fight one of these Trolls. And since there are only four of them, I say we kill them so they don't pose a threat to my brothers and sisters here."

  "She's got a point," Sarraya said to him. "There are only four. We can kill at least two of them before they realize they're under attack, and then you can show Denai how to kill a Troll with the survivors."

  Tarrin couldn't argue with her logic, and his hatred of Trolls, of all Goblinoids, was screaming for the blood. "Alright, but no glory seeking, Denai. This is a flat ambush, plain and simple. I want to kill them before they can become a threat."

  "The Selani know how to ambush," she said with a grin. "There's no dishonor in a good surprise attack. The dishonor is the victim's, for not paying attention."

  And so, they picked up the pace and set themselves in a roundabout course that would take them around the Trolls and allow them to get in front of them without being seen. The Trolls were moving at a very sluggish pace, probably because of the heat, and it only took them about half an hour to circle around the Trolls and set up in a nice spot where two large boulders were pushed against each other, providing the perfect cover. The heat had also made them less observant, for they came right over the rise and down the little hill without bothering to check for danger or keep watch on their surroundings. When they apporached, Tarrin got a nose full of their stench, and he also smelled blood all over them. Troll blood. As they came closer, he saw that all four of them had arrows broken off in them, or had dirty bandages wrapped around arms or legs. They'd been attacked by archers, and that intrigued Tarrin. The Selani disdained missle weapons other than what could be thrown, they didn't use bows. Who was out here in the desert shooting arrows into Trolls?

  "They're wounded," Tarrin whispered in a very low tone. "This should go quickly, but don't get overconfident."

  "I'll be careful," Denai whispered back.

  They waited for them to reach their position, then simply came over the boulder and attacked. And it was very effective. The Trolls were totally taken by surprise, and their weakened condition made their reaction that much more sluggish. Tarrin didn't even bother with a weapon, coming over the boulder with claws extended and murder all over his face, slashing the throat out of the nearest Troll before his feet even hit the ground. Denai came after him with an undulating cry, her sword seeking out Troll flesh and biting into the belly of the fellow beside the one Tarrin had just killed. Sarraya distracted the other two with a blinding flash of light generated by her Druidic magic, and that set them off balance enough for Tarrin to engage them as Denai stabbed her Troll right in the groin, making it squeal in a voice too high pitched for its great size.

  With his inhuman power, Tarrin slammed his shoulder into the nearest of the pair, bowling it off its feet, but his companion raised a very large, ugly-looking battle axe and took a swing at Tarrin's head. The Were-cat swatted the weapon aside almost contemptuously, then his paw closed around the wrist of the hand holding the axe and drove claws right into the bones. The Troll cried out, which turned into a whoomph when Tarrin's padded foot slammed into its belly and folding it over his foot. Tarrin grabbed the back of its head, getting a paw full of greasy, stringy green hair, then yanked it down as his other paw picked up the dropped axe. He held it up and pulled the Troll forward, getting it off balance, then planted the axe in the back of its neck. The Troll's thick bones prevented a decapitation, but the blow was still invariably fatal.

  Tarrin glanced back to see that Denai had killed off her opponent, and that left only one. The Troll he had bulled to the ground looked at him with terrified eyes, scrambling to its feet and grasping a crude club. This one was relatively uninjured, and that was the reason that Tarrin had chosen to make it the last one. Tarrin stalked in on it slowly, carefully, letting it realize that it had to fight in order to survive. When that revelation dawned in its small, piggish eyes, a snarl of fury twisted its ugly features and it raised its club to attack.

  Tarrin toyed with the Troll for a long time, letting it attack him, letting Denai see how fast a Troll could move when it wanted to do so. And the Troll was indeed fast, but nowhere near as fast or as nimble as its Were-cat foe. Tarrin simply snaked around its club, or blocked it by hitting the wrist or arm wielding it, or swatted it aside with his paws. The Troll got more and more desperate when it realized that it was fighting a foe much better at fighting than itself, and its attacks became more frenzied, faster, and more and more powerful. Tarrin still avoided the club with an eerie ease, as if he were dodging blows from a small child in a game. He kept doing that until he felt that Denai had seen enough, then he turned on his opponent with a suddenness that completely took the Troll by surprise. With one blow, he knocked the Troll's club wide, raking the inside of its arm with his long, deadly claws, sending blood and skin and bits of torn flesh flying in an arc as his claws slashed through tissue and muscle. The Troll howled in pain, but that turned into a faint gurgle as two of Tarrin's claws punctured its throat with surgical precision, driving them into the windpipe and the jugular. The Troll grabbed its neck with both hands as it sank to its knees, its lifeblood pouring out of its neck with shocking speed, even as that blood flowed into its windpipe and began drowning it in its own blood. But it bled to death long before it died of drowning, slumping to the side and then falling limply to the ground.

  "And that," Tarrin told her, wiping a spatter of that horrid-smelling blood from his face, "is how you kill a Troll."

  Denai laughed. "It certainly did put up a fight."

  "Trolls aren't cowards," Sarraya told her. "But they're stupid. That balances out."

  "I noticed. They don't even try to defend themselves, do they?"

  "No. They rely on strength and speed to kill their foe quickly. When facing someone that they can't kill with the first or second blow, they find themselves outclassed." He wrinkled his nose. "Let's get out of here. Trolls smell terrible, and their insides are worse than their outsides."

  "I don't smell anything."

  "You're not a Were-cat," Tarrin told her bluntly. "I need to wash this blood off of me. The smell is driving me crazy."

  After cleaning up, they found a secure place to camp for the night, in a relatively deep cave in the side of a rocks spire. Tarrin Conjured a leather sheet to hang over the entrance to block the light of the fire, and they spent the night taking turns watching. There were several fires visible to the north, several more to the south, and even a few to the east, which was the direction the cave mouth faced. They were probably fires for the Trolls to ward off the Sandmen, for he doubted there were that many Selani about with all of them at Gathering. He'd seen a few of them near the rock spire, or perhaps it was the same one two or three times, a ghostly bundle of drifting sand, sand that was whirling around inside some kind of invisible boundary. That was all a Sandman was, a blowing quantity of sand, and that was what made them dangerous. They attacked by enveloping and asphyxiating their victims, and since all there was to them was that sand, there was nothing to attack to fend them off. They only feared bright light, and retreated from it when it was presented to them.

  The night passed with
out incident, and they began again that morning, moving quickly yet carefully in a straight line to the west. They crossed over three separate trails left behind by Trolls that morning alone, as the huge brutes patrolled the desert during the cooler period of the morning. But they saw none of the Trolls that morning, nor during their brief stop to rest during the full midday heat.

  They did see Trolls during the afternoon, but they were already dead. Tarrin and Denai moved through a small battlefield carefully, a place littered with twelve dead Troll corpses. All of them had arrow sticking out of them, but they also showed signs of being killed with swords and spears. There were footprints that didn't belong to the Trolls on the battlefield, and Denai grinned at Tarrin knowingly when he realized that they were the soft-soled boots of the Selani.

  "Selani, using bows?" Tarrin asked curiously. "I didn't think they'd do that."

  "It's not dishonorable to use bows," Denai told him. "My people adapt to the situation. These big monsters require wearing them down from a distance before closing in for the kill. A bow and arrow can do that."

  "I'm surprised they'd think of it. I'm surprised they had bows available."

  "We're close to the humans," Denai shrugged. "Maybe this clan trades with them, and has bows. Maybe they use bows often."

  "There's a hint of Druidic magic here," Sarraya announced. "I think a Druid is helping the Selani kill the Trolls."

  Tarrin opened his senses, and then he too felt it. A faint trace of what had been Druidic magic, clinging to one of the Troll corpses. It had been killed with that magic. "I'll bet that Druid Conjured the bows for the Selani," Tarrin agreed.

  "Our people honor the Watchers," Denai said. "If the Watcher told them to use bows, they would use bows."

  "That's a smart thing to do," Sarraya laughed. "If anyone knows how to kill a Troll, it's a Druid. Druids hate Goblinoids nearly as much as the Were-kin do."

  "It looks like my people are doing their best to make the Trolls feel as unwelcome as possible," Denai chuckled, standing up from her inspection of one of the corpses.

  "I'm glad they're doing that. Knowing the Selani, they're luring the Trolls into ambushes. They may not be quite so willing to chase us down if they spot us, fearing it to just be another trap."

  "We can hope," Sarraya said. "But if they see you, they're going to chase us down anyway," she told him.

  "That can't be helped," he told her with a slash of his arm. "I can't move as fast in human form, and I'm not going to sacrifice any time. It takes alot less time to kill Trolls than it does for me to move in human form."

  "I was just giving you options," Sarraya said.

  They left the scene of the Troll massacre behind, continuing west. The Selani had been doing such a good job of annoying the Trolls that they saw no more of them that day. Denai speculated that her cousins here had all gathered together with the Druid and were finding and killing the Troll patrols, and most likely driving crazy whoever was sent to command the dull-witted brutes when entire patrols didn't return to report. Tarrin had to admire the bravery of the Selani, willing to take on vastly superior numbers of physically superior opponents. But living in an environment with such beasts as inu and kajat had made the Selani fearless when challenging much larger, stronger foes. Odds were that the Selani had engaged the Trolls, had learned their lessons--probably at a cost of several lives--then had adjusted their tactics to most efficiently kill off the invaders. He had no doubt that they'd sent word back to Gathering about the invasion, and the clan that lived in this territory was coming to eject the invaders. Until then, the sentries left behind were amusing themselves by torturing the invading force.

  Sometimes he counted every lucky star there was that he'd been befriended by such a unique, formidable race.

  That evening, as they made camp in a shallow dell surrounded by irregular boulders, Tarrin took the precaution of Warding the camp. It was too dangerous now, too close to the Trolls, and they had no concealment. So he raised a Ward to keep out the Sandmen, then covered the outside of it with an Illusion that made the interior of the Ward look empty. He set the Illusion so it would be sustained by the Ward--not an easy feat--then wove the Ward so tightly that it would take it two days to unravel. After that was done, he sat down by a faint light that Sarraya had created with her magic, joining his two female companions in a dreary meal of Conjured fruits and berries. There would be no fire that night, nothing to draw the Trolls to them.

  But the night revealed to him the outline of the Sandshield, sitting on the western horizon. The end of the desert was now within sight, and it made him reflect on what had happened to him while within its boundaries. He had sank to the very depths of his own self-loathing out here in the desert, but had also risen to the very pinnacle of his magical power. He had climbed the unclimbable Cloud Spire and discovered the wonders that existed there, and had seen the incredible cost that power could exact in the shape of a wasted Aeradalla, enthralled by the power of a magical artifact. He had faced his own personal demons, and allowed the blowing sands of the desert to scour his shame and guilt away, leaving behind the trapped soul imprisoned within the dungeon of its own fear. A soul that had found its way to freedom.

  If anything else, the realization that his fear did not rule him was the most important thing he would be taking from the Desert of Swirling Sands, ten times more important, more precious, than any amount of magical power. To know that he was not a prisoner of himself meant more to him than being the king of the world. The manacles on his wrists were a constant reminder of the cost of trust, but they had also imprisoned him within his own fear, a fear that fed off itself and grew stronger and stronger over time. He had become so afraid of losing his freedom that he did indeed lose it. But he didn't lose it to a stranger or a betrayer, he lost it to his own fear. And that had been worse than being collared, because they were chains that he almost could not break. Just as it had been done to Mist, Tarrin very nearly found himself being imprisoned by his own fear for centuries, but he thanked the Goddess that he had found the strength to save himself before his fear had come to completely dominate him. As it had done to Mist.

  Triana was right. Meeting Mist was probably the best thing that could have happened to him. It showed him what lay at the end of the road he'd been travelling, and it had given him the ability to turn himself around.

  Tarrin held up his arms, looking at the manacles. Realizing what they had done to him made him see them in a new light. They weren't only the reminders of the price he'd paid for trusting someone, they came to also represent the chains in which he had wrapped himself, chains every bit as powerful as the collar that had once controlled him, chains imprisoning him from within instead of without. It was only fitting that the manacles were just that, manacles, symbols of enslavement to the will of another.

  But reflection wasn't the only thing heavy on his mind that night. It was time to talk to Jenna. He just hoped that she would be ready. Sarraya took the first watch, and as Denai slept and the Faerie kept an eye on things, Tarrin sat down within a small strand and sent his consciousness out into the Weave.

  Finding himself within the endless boundaries of the Heart, Tarrin bent about the task before him with only a cursory genefluction and period of adoration for the brilliant light that was the Goddess. There would be time enough for proper adoration later, but at that moment he had a job to do. He cast out his senses into the thousands and thousands of stars that represented all the Sorcerers, seeking out the star that was his sister. And he found it easy to locate, for it was fundamentally different from all the other stars, outshining with a brilliance that made it unmistakable. Jenna's familiar sense of presence radiated from her star, proving to him that this was indeed hers. He sent his consciousness past the star, using it as a signpost to locate Jenna's physical presence in relation to the Weave. That too turned out to be easy, for Jenna's presence had a powerful effect on the Weave, the same effect he had. His very presence was enough to warp it, and that same w
arping effect made such a distinctive mark on the Weave that he sensed its location in a matter of minutes. Only two beings other than himself could have produced that kind of an effect, and he knew that it wasn't Spyder. It wasn't strong enough to be her.

  Weaving together an Illusion of himself, Tarrin cast it from the Weave, and then pushed his consciousness into the Illusion.

  He opened his spectral eyes to find himself in a very narrow, very cramped cabin, obviously a cabin on a ship. The low beams had tar splattered on them. There was nothing in the cabin but a small cot, a desk of sorts built into the wall beside it, a stool nailed to the deck before it, and Jenna herself, sitting on the bed reading a book by the light of a lanturn. His sister looked a little thin, and there was still a heavyness about her expression that told him that she hadn't completely recovered from her ordeal yet.

  "Jenna," Tarrin called. His dark-haired sister jumped in surprise, then looked up hastily. When she did, her surprised expression turned to joy and amazement.

  "Tarrin!" she cried, throwing the book aside and jumping to her feet. Tarrin held out his arms to stop her from trying to embrace him; he remembered what happened with Keritanima.

  "This is an Illusion, Jenna!" he warned quickly. "You can't touch me."

  "Tarrin, mother said you did this!" Jenna called happily. "Are you alright?"

  "What's more important is how you are," he countered.

  "I'm still a little tired, but I'm alright," she told him. "I've lost my powers. Mother said you said it was just temporary, but--"