Rhan waded after her, swiping the black greatsword in wide swaths before him, Hweilan back-stepping all the while. She suspected that when he’d driven her all the way back to the crowd, he’d either jab or bring the sword round in a vertical swipe. Both would be easy to avoid, despite the crowd, but Hweilan knew she had to end this quickly. Her heart was beating far faster than her exertions warranted. It wouldn’t be long now before the drakthna began to take effect. No more time to dance.
Every other blow came slightly lower than its predecessor. Rhan was right-handed, and his strikes showed it.
On her back-step, as the point of the black iron swept past, rather than continuing her step, Hweilan planted her back foot and bent the knee, coiling her muscles to strike.
Rhan saw it coming. His pleased smile tightened into a feral grimace, and he took a step back himself. Then he brought the sword point forward, stabbing for her stomach. Hweilan twisted in perfect timing, allowing the sharp point to slice through her shirt. Her twist continued, her torso rolling along the blade that sliced a fine line of blood along her skin. Her own blade, now held point down in her left hand, came forward at the same moment she leaped to give herself just the right amount of height. Rhan’s sword came with her, cutting deeper, but she ignored the pain and buried half her knife in the soft flesh where Rhan’s shoulder met his neck.
She twisted and tumbled away, Rhan’s blade tearing a deep gash down her back as she heard his surprised grunt.
Hweilan came round, crouched low, her blade up and ready even before the first gout of blood spouted like a geyser out of Rhan’s neck. Every hobgoblin surrounding them gasped at once, so strongly that Hweilan actually felt the change in air pressure along her skin. Blood, hot and wet, was coursing down her back, her accelerating heart rate pouring it out all the faster. For just a moment, the world wobbled before her, but she took in a deep breath, steadying herself.
Rhan roared in anger and desperation. He had a death wound and knew it, but it was not an instant kill. He clamped his left hand over the wound. It would buy him a few moments before he blacked out.
Now all Hweilan had to do was get that damned sword out of his hands.
Rhan charged, blade raised, heedless as a charging bull. For a moment, seeing the bloody wide-eyed hobgoblin coming for her, Hweilan was almost afraid.
But then she smiled and leaped for him, hoping to cause him to strike too soon.
It worked.
Rhan brought blade down, enough strength behind it to cut her in half.
Hweilan slid under it, raising her knife edge as she did so. The force of Rhan’s own blow made the steel cut deep, severing veins and tendons in his arm. Cut off from the cords giving them strength, the muscles of Rhan’s right hand spasmed, and the black sword flew from his grip.
Now! Hweilan urged Rhan in her mind.
Rhan proved himself a warrior to the end. Weaponless and dying, he refused to give in. He removed his left hand from the neck wound and brought it down in a clenched, bloody fist.
When Hweilan was thirteen years old, the horse of a visiting dignitary had broken its stall. Hweilan—whom horses seem to like as much as mice like cats—had unfortunately been standing in the way. In its desperation to get away, the war-horse had turned and kicked her.
This hurt worse.
The hobgoblin champion’s fist hit behind her left shoulder. She was quite sure that spectators fifty feet back probably heard her bones snap, but she couldn’t. A high screech filled her ears, and lights danced before her eyes.
Still, she managed to keep her feet and back away.
Which lost her the fight.
Rhan brought his fist around again.
Hweilan had just enough presence of mind to lean away. Still, she caught a great deal of the blow in her temple and went down.
The lights before her eyes faded as darkness swallowed them. The high-pitched screech died away, and through the roar of the crowd she heard two things—
Jaden screaming, “No! No! Sodding no!”
And Maaqua crying, “Kaad! Kaad you halfwit, bring the gunhin! Quick, damn you! Rhan’s—”
And then darkness and silence joined, becoming one, and swallowed Hweilan whole.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
RHAN HAD NO MATE. HIS LIFE WAS BATTLE AND blood. For the past four winters he had contemplated changing that. He was not getting younger, and in truth, a glorious death in battle was his dearest wish. Still, he did not want his blood to be gone from the world. It would be good to have children through whom his fury and prowess would haunt the mountains for generations to come—and if the gods blessed him, perhaps a strong son to wield the Greatsword of Impiltur when he was long gone. But he had done no more about it than contemplate. His cave was his alone.
But Rhan was no dotard. Gunhin affected him the same way it did anyone else. After he had felled the human girl in the arena—not even with the Greatsword of Impiltur but with his bare hands!—he managed to keep his feet. Barely. A loud whine had filled his ears, bringing the first hint of fear that Rhan had felt in a very long time. A thousand black spots were beginning to cloud his vision. Then that old meddler Kaad had rushed forward and upended a skin into his mouth.
Rhan drank down the bitter liquid eagerly, still swallowing even as he felt the first of its effects. Fire flooded his muscles and seemed to sizzle just under the pores of his skin. The whine in his ears faded, replaced by the ecstatic cheers of the crowd and cries of the few dozen fools who had dared bet against him. His vision cleared so that he actually had the clarity to watch the deep gash in his arm knit back together.
He threw back his head and roared. The crowd joined him.
Only then did he notice that Maaqua and Buureg had come forward with Kaad. The queen was beaming up at him, and the warchief kneeled beside the human, his fingers probing her neck, the back of his other hand held in front of her mouth and nose.
“Well?” said Maaqua.
Buureg stood and looked up at Rhan. “No breath. No beat to her veins.”
“She’s dead?” said Maaqua.
Buureg nodded.
Maaqua laughed, a short bark, then patted Rhan’s arm. “Well done, Champion of the Razor Heart. Killed the little chit with your bare hands.” She turned to the crowd and raised both fists over her head. “Killed her with his bare hands!”
The crowd roared, drowning out all other sound. Rhan saw a few fights breaking out here and there. A few of the losers in the wagering seemed to be reluctant to pay up.
Maaqua leaned in close to Buureg to be heard, but Rhan picked up her words.
“Have the Damarans thrown back into their hole until I make up my mind about how to deal with them.”
“And the condemned?” said Buureg.
Maaqua shrugged and laughed. “Condemned. To the Stone of Hoar with him.”
“And her?” Buureg pointed down at Hweilan’s body.
“A feast!” said Maaqua.
“No!” The nearest hobgoblins who were able to hear Rhan were stunned into silence by the vehemence in his tone.
Maaqua looked up at him, confused and angry. “Eh?”
Rhan pointed down at her with his newly healed hand. “She fought for her friend and fought with courage. She is the first warrior to strike me since I picked up the Greatsword. We will treat her as such.”
Maaqua scowled up at him. “You still insist on going through with that?”
“I do.”
She sighed and waved it away. “As you wish. Buureg, have her body placed with the other. Let Rhan finish his foolishness.”
Buureg did not follow Maaqua as she walked away, the crowd parting for her. The warchief held out a hand to Rhan. It held Hweilan’s knife.
“Yours now,” said Buureg.
Rhan took it with a nod of thanks. Even stained with his blood, it was a beautiful thing in its own way, if strange and inelegant. Not a princeling’s weapon. The runes along the blade had obviously come from a master craftsman, but the hilt
was bound in plain leather, well-worn and loved. A fine weapon. But no matter how he wiped at it, the steel never lost its look of being coated in fresh blood. He tucked it into his belt.
After that, Rhan was swallowed up in the accolades of the crowd. Someone slapped his empty scabbard into his hand. The Greatsword of Impiltur lay where it had fallen. All present knew that to touch it meant death at Rhan’s hands. He stopped long enough to retrieve the sword and slide it home into his scabbard, then he walked away.
The effects of the gunhin were boiling in him, and he waded through the crowd, searching for the comeliest female to take back to his cave. Never in his life had he come so close to dying. Perhaps it was time to take a mate after all.
Kaad saw to the disposition of Hweilan’s body. He was far too frail to carry her, but Buureg called Hratt over to help. It was a long walk to the high place, and Hratt had to stop and rest twice. Once, Kaad heard him muttering something about losing gold, but he looked away. A slave knew his place.
Hratt laid Hweilan’s body next to the other one—after two days, the crows still would not touch it—and stood for a moment looking down on Hweilan. Kaad heard him mutter, “Damn it all,” shake his head, then walk away. The roar of the crowd could still be heard in the distance. It did not take much to give the Razor Heart reason to revel, and Kaad suspected they would be at it long into the night. With all the fights sure to break out, some of which would eventually draw steel as the strong spirits flowed, Kaad knew he would be kept busy most of the day.
He looked down at Hweilan’s body. The combination of the tattoos and the bruise from Rhan’s fist had turned the entire left half of Hweilan’s face black. Her lip had split and poured blood across one cheek. But not much. Her heart had stopped quickly. Her eyes were closed, which Kaad found strange. A blow like that, and one might expect her eyes to roll up in her head, certainly. But they were relaxed.
Kaad was about to turn away and follow Hratt back to the center of the fortress when he saw it. Her eyelid twitched, like a dreamer in deep sleep.
He stopped, wide-eyed and staring. It didn’t happen again, but he knew what he’d seen.
Kaad looked around to make sure Hratt was well and truly gone. Then he kneeled and placed his rough, calloused hand against Hweilan’s throat. No beat of her heart. Nothing. He looked at her chest. Not the slightest rise and fall of breath. Her skin was cool to the touch—but not cold. No. Despite the early spring chill, her body wasn’t cold.
There! Just as Kaad was about to remove his hand, he felt it. A pulse. Just once. But it was strong.
He looked down at her again. All the crowd had heard bone break when Rhan struck Hweilan’s back. Looking at her face, he suspected the last blow had cracked her skull as well. The old healer reached inside his robes, removed a vial made from goat horn, and placed it in Hweilan’s palm.
Then he chuckled the whole way back down into the fortress. He suspected it would be quite a night indeed.
The revelry went on all that morning, quieted some during midday meal time, then came back with a vengeance as the sun sank beneath the peaks. Dark came quickly, even as winter loosened its grip on the mountains, and fires sparked to life both inside and outside the fortress.
Years ago, this never would have happened. The knights out of Highwatch sometimes patrolled after dark, and the slightest fire would have revealed the location of the Razor Heart’s fortress. But the knights and their flying terrors were no more. Truth be told, the new horrors in Highwatch worried Maaqua far more, but they already knew where the fortress lay, and should they come again, it was better to have fire close at hand.
So, despite the drain it put on their winter stores, Maaqua encouraged the festivities to rouse the blood of the clan. She would need that for the days of struggle ahead of them. It had been a long time since the clan had reason to celebrate. Joy spread through the fortress like fresh flame on oil.
Except for two places.
The three Damarans lay in their hole, the iron bars firmly locked over their heads so that no warriors need be kept from the celebrations to guard them. Valsun sat, staring at the few stars far overhead. He was quite sure that once the feast was over—probably when the first warriors woke after their night of hard drinking—Maaqua would simply have one of the brutes pull the lever, drown the three of them, and be done with it. It was not the way he had hoped to leave this life, but he supposed it could be worse. Jaden, however, was quite sure they’d be tortured in the cruelest possible ways. He’d heard that fear sweetens the meat, and he was sure the hobgoblins would find every conceivable way to kill them with fire and sharp things. But when he shared this with his companions, they made no reply. And what Darric thought, he would not say.
The other place free of any celebration was on the northern edge of the fortress, within sight of the last guard post. There, a block of stone thrust up from the mountainside. One had to brave a steep trail to reach its height, occasionally clinging to iron-hard roots that broke through the mountain’s jagged hide. The stone itself had been shaped by eons of wind and rain into the vague shape of a hand. But the hobgoblins had improved upon it with hammer and chisel so that the stone now had the distinct shape of grasping fingers and the suggestion of a coin in the palm. This was the Stone of Hoar, Lord of Doom and Watcher of the Revenged.
It had taken four Razor Heart warriors to bring the naked Damaran up the hill. His hands and elbows were bound behind his back and cinched to his waist with the finest leather rope. A small length of cord bound him at knees and ankles to keep him from running or kicking. And they’d even muzzled him, just in case he became riled enough to try his teeth. Kaad’s ministrations from the previous night had seemed to revive him, and he remembered every hurt. He’d growled and cursed the whole way up the height, and the warriors had dragged and beaten him. Finally, at the most treacherous parts of the trail, they’d clubbed him senseless and lifted him by the leash tied round his arms.
Once they reached the stone, two of the warriors stood with spears only inches from the Damaran’s throat while their two companions bound him to the stone. Leather ropes bound his wrists to two of the stone’s middle fingers. They sat his rump in the palm, then bound one thigh to the thumb and the other to the smallest finger, spreading both legs. Since the Damaran had killed Duur, Ruuket’s mate, when she came for her vengeance, it was very likely that his manhood would be the first thing to go.
Then they locked a shackle around each ankle, from each of which dangled less than a foot of chain bound to a three-stone weight of iron. A big one like this might be able to lift his lower legs, but he wouldn’t be able to kick. Satisfied that he was well and truly secure, the warriors slapped him—once each, just hard enough to dribble blood from his lip—then tromped back to the celebration.
While the rest of the Razor Heart reveled, Ruuket climbed to the Stone of Hoar. Her face was bloody from the grief gouges she had raked into both cheeks with her own hands.
That Mandan could have faced with warrior’s pride. But she also brought her children with her. The oldest was only a year or two away from his warrior’s growth. Two others walked beside her, and she carried a babe in the cloth sling on her back. They stood before the bloodied Damaran.
He looked up at them and said, “Do your worst.”
The oldest child stepped forward, the knife in his hand already coming up.
But his mother’s hand grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back. He bared his teeth in a growl, but he obeyed his mother.
“I am Ruuket,” she said in hesitant Damaran. “You killed Duur. My mate. These are his children.”
The Damaran held her gaze a long while, then seemed to tear away with great difficulty to stare at the younglings, each in turn. His eyes hardened as he fixed upon the eldest son, his knife in hand. He glanced quickly over the other male child, only a head shorter than his brother. But when he saw the little one clinging to his mother’s left leg—another son, only five summers old—something chan
ged in Mandan’s countenance. His eyes closed once in a slow blink, and when they opened again, they glistened with moisture.
He looked away, staring at the ground.
“Your … mate,” he said. “I … I did not mean to kill him.” But as soon as the words left his mouth, he realized he didn’t believe them; even he could smell the lie there. When the fury was upon him, little else mattered but satisfying the bloodlust inside him. Not only had he meant to kill those hobgoblin warriors, he had enjoyed it. Now, though … seeing Duur’s children before him …
Would they be fed through the winter?
Would their mother be able to care for them?
Would she have to take another mate into her bed, and would he care for the children? Or would they be cast out into the snow?
He didn’t know. He had heard awful tales of the hobgoblin tribes and their ways, but he did not know the truth of them. If they were true, then not only was the death of a warrior on his soul but that of his family.
“He was trying to kill me,” he said, knowing that he was doing his best to convince himself as much as them. “I was only defending myself and my companions, as any knight should.”
“Tonight,” said Ruuket, “you think on that. Tonight, my children and I will chant Duur’s soul to the Fire of the High Chieftain. We will feast. When the sun comes, we will sleep. When the sun goes, we will come back. For you. Think on that.”
She turned and left, taking her children with her.
Rhan had not slept. He spent the day in his chamber with Ghir of Orlung’s brood. She had proved herself most exertive, and after their third bout, he was giving serious consideration to taking her as a mate. She was beautiful, and all her older sisters had borne strong children—except for Vuurl and Gorueg, who had sworn off the cave in favor of wielding steel in battle. Once the gunhin wore off, if nothing else happened to change his mind, he would ask her and prepare the proper price to Orlung.
His ears occasionally still caught the sound of revelry. None had dared to come down the tunnel to his chamber, but at least some of the celebration had made its way to the outer halls. Rhan felt no desire to join them. They would press food and drink into his hand and slap his arms, congratulating him on his victory over the Hand.
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