Thalgor's Witch

by Nancy Holland

  Batte’s hand went to his sword. “Explain yourself.”

  Thalgor glanced at those around them and wished for a quiet place where the two of them could talk alone, friend to friend.

  “Dara loves battle. Perhaps she should have been a man. As it is, she belongs to any man who can bring the thrill of battle to her.”

  “Liar!” Batte looked around at his men, but none of them met his eye. “Liar,” he repeated more frantically.

  He knows what she is, Thalgor realized sadly, and loves her still. A mad blindness to match Dara’s mad passion for battle. All love risked such madness. Even a son’s for his mother.

  “Go after her, if you will,” he told his friend with resignation. “But she cannot live free in my camp any longer. She must be guarded at all times.”

  Scorn curled Batte’s lip. “Why cost the camp you call yours a warrior to guard a woman?”

  “So she does no more harm to what is mine.”

  “Be careful, or you might find that nothing is yours.”

  “Do you wish to take Dara and turn renegade?” Thalgor looked at the hand that still rested on Batte’s sword. “Or do you wish to challenge me?”

  Batte dropped his hand. “We will finish this when I have found my woman and all can judge the truth of her story against the witch’s.”

  Thalgor nodded. Batte gave a few orders to Tynor, who headed back to the camp. Then Batte disappeared with the rest of his men in the direction Dara had fled.

  Thalgor turned to Erwyn. He gestured for her to go with him back to their tent.

  “Sometimes I still think you are more trouble than you are worth, witch,” he said with more force than he meant to.

  “You have no right to judge my worth. And you have not yet begun to see trouble.”

  In his heart, Thalgor feared she was right.

  *

  Rygar waited at the door of their tent, his face dark.

  “How bad?” Thalgor asked him.

  “Bad enough. Rumors fly as never before. The men are split. Some believe Erwyn; some believe it when Batte says Dara made an honest mistake. The women believe Erwyn, but if trouble comes too soon, they will not have time to convince their men.”

  “Gurdek?” Erwyn knew only she heard the pain behind the question.

  “Openly calls Batte a fool, as does Sett.”

  “Call a council.” Thalgor’s voice was less burdened now. “We must decide who will judge Dara, and how.” He held out the dead crow he still carried. “And find a safe place for this.”

  Rygar looked at the filthy bird and started to say something, but Erwyn caught his eye and gave a small shake of her head. Thalgor’s anger flowed too hot and too close to the surface for even his second to question him.

  Rygar grimaced and carried away the dead crow, muttering under his breath.

  To Erwyn’s relief and surprise, Thalgor chuckled as he went into the tent.

  She didn’t follow him. She knew he would not want her at this council. She went instead to the tent of a woman she’d helped through a hard birth the day before she was wounded. She hadn’t seen the child since and wanted to make sure it did well. She wanted, too, the assurance of her worth to Thalgor’s people, if not to Thalgor himself.

  By nightfall the whole camp was tense as it waited for Batte and Dara. Erwyn returned to the tent late, exhausted from another birth, her wounds sore, her spirit heavy with the danger that clouded everything around her.

  Thalgor sat alone at the table, a bowl of food beside him. He gestured for Erwyn to sit and pushed the bowl toward her. Wearily she shook her head.

  “Eat, witch. You are no use to me dead.”

  “And little use to you alive, to hear you tell it.”

  Her pride demanded the words, but all her traitorous heart wanted was to crawl into his arms and weep.

  “Eat.” He said it more gently this time, then added, “I will leave if you do not wish to eat with me.”

  She sighed, picked up the bowl, and sank to the nearest bench. “Don’t be a fool, Thalgor. I do not ever expect you to be other than you are.”

  She took a few bites and found the meaty stew eased her tiredness, if not the ache in her side.

  “And how am I?” he asked, one eyebrow raised.

  “Loyal to those you love. Loyal to me and distrustful of me. Unsure I deserve the respect you so grudgingly give me.”

  “You forgot unreliable.”

  She frowned and took another bite of stew.

  “No. You will reliably defend me because, as you say, I am yours. But each time you give me, and everyone else around us, reason to wonder if this is the one time you will turn on me.”

  “Strange. I always wonder if this will be the one time you turn on me. And I suppose the others do as well.”

  She wanted to say “I will never turn on you.” If she were simply a woman, it would be true. But a witch was not simply a woman, and her magic had laws even more binding than the oath she shared with Thalgor. Even more sacred than her love for him.

  “I believe some do not, but you may be right,” she told him with a shrug, as if it did not matter.

  “I must check the guards.” He stood and put on his sword.

  Erwyn nodded a farewell, then finished her meal alone.

  He woke her when he came to bed by kissing her wounds.

  “They still pain you?” he asked when she pulled away.

  “Yes,” she replied drowsily.

  “Shall I put salve on them?”

  Surprise brought her fully awake.

  “Please. I was too tired to do so before I slept.”

  He found the right jar in her bag and smoothed the fragrant ointment on her tender flesh.

  By the time he finished his hand trembled. She took it in her own and kissed the herb-scented fingers. He tipped her face up to his and kissed her lightly.

  “Your wounds…” he murmured against her lips.

  Beyond him, outside the tiny space of safety and calm they created between them, she saw the dark cloud of danger loom. And she felt his remorse.

  “You will be gentle enough.”

  Despite the need for oblivion she knew raged in him, he was.

  They were awakened at dawn, still in each other’s arms, by an uproar in the camp.

  Thalgor waited while Erwyn dressed so they could leave the tent together. She ached for the comfort of his hand in hers as they walked toward a danger she felt in her bones and could not yet see, but she knew better than to reach for him.

  They emerged from the tent to find what seemed to be the entire camp arrayed between them and Batte, who came toward them. In his arms was a bloodied body barely recognizable as Dara’s.

  The crushing grief on Batte’s face tore at Erwyn’s heart. She wished she had a potion that would show him how completely unworthy of his love the woman whose remains he carried was. But there was no magic, no words to convince him, any more than there were words or magic to ease the pain of Dara’s death for him, to ease the pain of wondering if he might have saved her.

  A murmur ran through the crowd. “A panther.”

  Felyn, who stood with Tya to one side of the tent door, gave a small cry when the word reached her and threw herself at Erwyn.

  Stunned, Erwyn knelt beside her. What she saw in the child’s eyes froze her to the core. And revealed a secret she knew she would carry to her death.

  She hugged the small, trembling body to her. Felyn seemed to find some comfort in the gesture because the tremors eased. With a sigh the child looked up at Thalgor, who towered over them. She gave a little nod and stepped back to grasp Tya’s hand fiercely in hers as Erwyn stood once more beside her man.

  She saw now the bloody, gaping throat on the corpse Batte carried, the missing arm. She closed her eyes against the terror the body screamed at her. They echoed in her own wounds, which throbbed and burned as if fresh. Dara’s revenge before the fact.

  The wave of agony passed. When she opened her eyes, Batte stoo
d before them. He dropped the body he had carried so gently at their feet.

  “This,” Batte said loudly enough for all to hear. “This is what your witch brings us, Thalgor.”

  Thalgor stepped between Erwyn and his lieutenant. “Do you challenge me, Batte?”

  “If that is what I must do to rid us of the witch.”

  The crowd around them froze for a moment with dread, then began to stir. The women slipped away and took their children with them. Tya and Felyn lingered but, at a nod from Thalgor, Rygar led them back into the tent. The old men stepped back from the confrontation. The warriors eyed each other, trying to gauge who was still friend, who was now foe.

  “Who stands with Batte?” Thalgor asked.

  Rygar, Gurdek and Sett came to stand at his side, blocking Erwyn’s view, but not before she saw the majority of the warriors step away from Batte.

  “I do not wish to divide the camp,” Batte said. “I only wish to free it of the witch.”

  “It seems you have failed to divide it, in any case,” Thalgor replied. “I offered you the chance to go renegade yesterday. I offer you and those who choose to follow you the freedom to become marauders today.”

  “Not while the witch lives to poison your mind and put the band I was born into at risk.”

  “Do not make me choose.”

  Erwyn heard the plea behind Thalgor’s threat. But she knew Batte did not.

  “A personal challenge, Thalgor.”

  Rygar, Gurdek and Sett stepped away. When Erwyn remained frozen to the spot with fear, Rygar pulled her to one side.

  Batte directed two of his men to pick up Dara’s body and carry it away, then pointed to the bloodstained dirt at Thalgor’s feet.

  “Your blood where hers fell.”

  Erwyn felt a pain inside Thalgor as if he had been split in two. Not between her and Batte, she realized with surprise. It was the band he saw threatened by his lieutenant’s defiance. And the band he defended when finally, with great reluctance, he said, “My blood, or yours.”

  Everything went still. Erwyn wanted to curse the already cursed Dara for the stupidity and blind deceit that led to this awful moment. How could Dara’s twisted desire so distort her view of the world she actually wanted this battle between two men who once trusted and loved each other like brothers? And for what? Her own pleasure? She was beyond any pleasure now.

  Erwyn shuddered at the how shallow the other woman’s evil had been.

  With characteristic bravado, Batte stepped back and drew his sword. The crowd of men drew farther away to make space for him.

  “Batte,” Thalgor said grimly, one last time.

  His lieutenant raised his sword and brought it down with a swift slash. But Thalgor’s shield blocked the blow. He pulled his sword and struck low, toward Batte’s legs.

  “Not to wound.” Batte’s voice mocked. “To kill.”

  He thrust fiercely at Thalgor’s midsection. The larger man stepped aside, but Batte’s sword sliced the flesh below his ribs.

  “First blood,” Batte said with relish, his eyes already dimmed by the battle lust.

  Thalgor brought his weapon down hard on the shoulder of the other man’s sword arm. It struck bone with such force that it bounced away again, but the wound wasn’t deep enough to stop Batte’s enraged attack.

  Erwyn watched with horror as the two men, matched in strength and trained in the same ways of battle, continued to hack away at each other’s bodies, glancing blow for glancing blow. Some struck home, so those who watched gasped, but none wounded enough to bring the fight to its inevitable bloody end.

  When Batte paused, panting, to re-grasp his sword, the hilt slick with his sweat and Thalgor’s blood, Thalgor asked, “Truce?”

  The other man’s only answer was to lunge expertly at his belly, a move Thalgor parried with his own sword. He turned on his attacker smoothly enough that his sword slipped under Batte’s, past his shield, and struck home upwards into his chest. The blood lust faded from Batte’s face, which took on an unearthly calm.

  “Well fought, Thalgor.”

  He smiled, then fell dead where Dara’s blood stained the ground.

  Thalgor stared down at his lieutenant’s inert form for a long time. No one else moved. Even the air seemed frozen in time.

  “A quick death, at least, old friend.”

  Erwyn wondered if only she saw the tears that fell to sink into the ground with the dead man’s blood.

  “Bury them together,” Thalgor told the grim-faced men who came to carry Batte’s body away.

  Slowly, solemnly the crowd dispersed. Finally Thalgor turned and went into the tent. Rygar and Gurdek followed him. Erwyn was the last to enter.

  Her mind was dark, not with the danger. That had died with Batte. The darkness came from what she sensed would follow.

  Thalgor sat at the far side of the table, as if at council.

  “This is your fault, witch.”

  She shook with the force of his words, but stood straight and met his eyes.

  “No, it is yours. You tolerated Batte’s challenges too long. You should have driven him out of the camp while Dara still lived.”

  “Your gift of sight is of little use after the fact.”

  “It took no gift to see what you needed to do. Only an unclouded eye.”

  “She speaks the truth,” Rygar ventured from the bench where he sat with Tya and Felyn.

  “Silence, archer. If she were not a witch, Batte could not have been turned against me so easily by Dara’s cunning words. If she were not a witch, none of my men would have been swayed by Batte. If she were not a witch, Dara would not have been exposed and fled into the woods.”

  Erwyn stepped between him and Rygar. This was a battle she must win for herself.

  “If I were not a witch, Dara would have poisoned us all. If I were not a witch, you would have been defeated in battle how many times, Thalgor? If I were not a witch, Rygar would be long dead. If I were not a witch, you would not have wanted me for your woman.”

  “That would have been best. Leave my sight, witch.”

  Pride froze the tears in her throat. “I will do more. I will leave your tent.”

  “Good,” Thalgor roared. “And take that accursed child with you. The two of you have brought me only grief.”

  “And you have brought us only pain.”

  Erwyn swept out of the tent. Her heart drummed and her knees trembled as she walked. To her surprise, Felyn, face wet with tears, ran to her side and left with her.

  Where would they go now?

  The answer came from Rygar. While Tya packed their few things and gathered Erwyn’s herbs and potions, Thalgor’s second ordered the tent that had been Gee’s set up near Tya’s family.

  He led Erwyn and Felyn there, grim-faced, and helped them settle before he hurried off to post his men on guard duty.

  Felyn didn’t ask why she was uprooted once again. She said nothing, as completely silent as when they were first captured.

  Other than that, she and Erwyn acted as if nothing were out of the ordinary. Erwyn chattered cheerfully as they arranged their things in their new home. As evening fell, she built a fire, and they went to get water in the one large jar and one small one Tya had given them.

  Silence greeted them as they walked through the camp, but after they passed whispers hissed and crackled behind them like green wood burning.

  When they returned to their new home, Rygar appeared to light the fire and leave food. He said little, clearly torn between his loyalty to Thalgor and his friendship with Erwyn.

  And his fondness for Felyn, who clambered into his lap the moment he sat down on the single bench that stood next to the narrow table on one side of the small tent.

  He stayed and held the child while Erwyn cooked their meal, then left to eat in the warriors’ mess, perhaps still simmering with too much anger on their behalf to eat in Thalgor’s tent.

  Erwyn had gone through the motions of the day as if in a dream. Her body s
till worked, but her heart was numb with shock.

  Once Felyn slept, Erwyn sat alone in the unfamiliar tent, lit by a single torch, warmed by a single brazier. She let the tears stream silently down her face and wrapped her arms around her knees to stifle sobs that might wake the child.

  She’d been torn in two, as Thalgor had been earlier, right through the center of her being. It amazed her that she yet lived, that blood didn’t gush from the wound, that she still breathed, although at times even that seemed almost more than she could manage.

  And tomorrow would be another day exactly like this. Tomorrow another night without Thalgor by her side. An endless life of empty days and lonely nights stretched out before her.

  She gave one low sob, in spite of herself. And why?

  She sniffed and wiped her face on the sleeve of her gown. Because, she reminded herself, she could no longer live with Thalgor’s uncertain temper. His distrust of what she was. His failure to respect her magic. She refused to be blamed for everything that went wrong in his life. Better to suffer one clean, deep wound than to die slowly from a lifetime of small ones.

  Have you no magic…? A voice inside her asked, but she silenced the thought unfinished.

  There were legends of witches who used magic to win a man. But, even if based on truth, such stories only proved they were not true witches, not the kind of witch she was raised to be. Not the kind of witch who could ever win Thalgor’s respect.

  Not that there was any hope of that now.

  She forced herself to lie down beside Felyn and pulled a blanket around her, then summoned up a half-forgotten spell to put herself to sleep.

  The second day was easier because she expected it to be harder. Rygar brought food again and stayed with Felyn when Erwyn was called to help with a difficult birth.

  The third day was worse. Anguish came with every breath. Felyn was silent and sulky. There wasn’t even a glimpse of Rygar. Erwyn suspected that Thalgor had found some pretext to keep his second away, perhaps to protect him from her, perhaps to hurt her. She didn’t know which was the more painful possibility.

  Tya appeared the fourth morning, eyes red from crying.

  To her shame, Erwyn welcomed the chance to focus on someone else’s sorrow.