Back at the Laughing Men village, the Horse Society had already bundled up its belongings, ready to depart. The intact return of their Hetman and their two passengers was greeted with poorly hidden relief. They decamped to the river shortly afterwards, with the Malikah and a party of her people coming to see them off.
‘Champion,’ the Malikah of the Laughing Men addressed him, as the Horse people loaded their canoes, ‘you must know, we hear much news of your nation here, by land and water.’
Asmander’s manner suggested this topic of conversation was no great matter to him. ‘Indeed?’
‘You are not the first guests we have entertained here. Some were not heading north,’ she murmured in his ear. ‘Some came solely to seek my attention.’
He shrugged. ‘No doubt you showed them the same good hospitality with which you have honoured us. Perhaps they were here to trade.’
‘In their own way. They sought to trade for the use of our spears. It is an odd thing, but the wind tells me that there is strange weather in the Sun River Nation since the old Kasra died.’
‘We are a complex people,’ he said. ‘Will you tell me of your response to them?’ They could not be Tecuman’s emissaries that had come to her, that much seemed plain. And if they had not come at the behest of Asmander’s friend, they were likely his enemies.
‘Will you tell me of your prince?’ Her breath was hot on his cheek, her voice scarcely more than a whisper.
‘He is a paragon of honour. From his youngest days he was marked to rule, by his own manner and by signs and portents noted by the priests. All who saw him knew him as he on whom the mask of the Kasra must surely fall,’ Asmander recited.
‘I think not,’ the Malikah said softly, ‘for if it were as you say, then I would not have visitors from the south seeking the spears of the Laughing Men to come to Atahlan.’
‘And what did you tell them, these visitors?’
Her yipping laugh was so loud and sudden in his ear that he started away from her with a curse, the Champion’s soul stirring briefly in him.
‘Champion, the Laughing Men do not take sides,’ the Malikah declared. ‘We wait, and we mark those who are weak, and those who have lived too long, and those whose time has come to pass on. Merely hope, then, that your prince is strong.’
Then she turned from him and gripped Venater by the arm, hard enough to make him bare his teeth. ‘You, you old Goat-Eater, you are a villain.’ But her look was fond. ‘If your young River Lord is too soft a master, come back here. There is always work for a man to do.’
He twisted his arm from her grasp and sent her such a look – that of a man who truly does not know how to take the measure of the woman before him. Despite the grim conversation he had just endured, Asmander summoned a laugh from somewhere.
Then the Horse were pushing their boats out into the water, and it was time to leave.
Just as Asmander swung himself over the side of the nearest vessel, another figure splashed out towards them. For a moment he thought it was the Malikah herself, but it was a different woman of the Laughing Men, much younger, a sack and two spears in one hand and a cloak of aurochs hide over her shoulders. The Horse Hetman made room for her in her own craft, with an ambiguous look towards the southerners.
‘Seems you impressed them too much,’ Venater said, staring at the woman with suspicion. ‘Looks like they want to keep an eye on you.’
Asmander had half expected as much, given what the Malikah had said. When he looked at the new arrival, he found her gaze on him already. She had her hair cropped close at the sides, with a tawny crest on top, and there were bars of red highlighting her cheekbones. Like so many of her fellows, she had a startlingly alive quality, a flame of the moment for which the weights of old history and future prospects that troubled Asmander’s people simply did not exist. It made her beautiful, as fire was beautiful even as it destroyed.
The Plains tribes were becoming aware of changes in their southern neighbour. Some would seek to profit from it; others might be dragged in despite themselves. And the Laughing Men would always be ready to pick over the bones.
Or these waters may yet grow calm, he reminded himself, not for the first time. There were no battle lines yet, no declarations of war, no accusations or claims. But Tecuman had gone to the fortress at Tsokawan that secured control of the estuary islands, whilst in the capital of Atahlan . . .
But nothing will happen before the new year’s floods. Surely nobody is so eager to shed blood and break down walls? They will talk and talk, and the Serpent’s priests will meet, and nobody will lift their hand in anger, not yet.
It will not come to that. There will be bellowing and splashing and a showing of teeth, that is all. The Sun River Nation cannot war against itself.
That was his mission to the north, of course: the same that had sent other emissaries to the Laughing Men. He was going to fetch more teeth, better teeth. He was going to entice the Iron Wolves of the Crown of the World to come and stand by Tecuman’s side. Surely that would be enough.
He felt the gaze of the Hyena girl fixed on him keenly, as though she was waiting for him to die.
It was the same when they drew up to the bank to make camp. When he looked for her, she was busy setting out her own blanket away from the Horse Society and the rest, laying out the brightly striped cloth with an air of great ritual. She was still watching him, though: when he turned his head away, her eyes were like points of faint pain in his mind.
It was a game, he knew. She wanted to draw him to her. The Malikah had tasked her with learning about the southern travellers, perhaps, or at least about their quest in the north. Probably the two of them would fight at some future time, her mission and his reaching their distant crossing point from which only one would walk away.
So he smiled to himself and made a great point of ignoring her, and thus sought to draw her to him, to force the questions from her. It was an old game amongst the Patient Ones of the Riverlands. His father had played it like a master, using silence like a killing edge to savage his enemies – and his own family.
It was one of Asmander’s deepest-buried secrets, the thing about his father. He himself was the dutiful son, the paragon of his clan, the boy who did everything that was expected of him.
But the Champion’s soul did not like his father. It loved the prince Tecuman as Asmander did, but his father, no. That fierce, proud soul bucked against the man’s hand, bared its teeth at his orders. And who was Asmander to say that it was not right? It saw so many things more clearly than human eyes could.
And another smothered secret thought was just this: If I were not his son, would I like him? Or would I loathe him as a dangerous, ambitious creature?
Just as well I’m his son, then. And just as well he supports Tecuman, for I could not make that choice, not blood kin against bound brother.
‘She says she’s Shyri.’ Venater dropped down beside him heavily.
Asmander closed his eyes. The delicate game that had been coming together between him and the girl was abruptly in ruins, and one more source of entertainment on the journey north was gone. ‘You have no soul.’
‘I have a Blackteeth soul,’ Venater replied robustly. The Black-teeth were his tribe amongst the people of the Dragon, one of three equally vicious and disreputable clans of villains. To Asmander’s knowledge, he had abandoned any close loyalty to them long ago, but he was still proud of bearing the violent stigma of their blood.
‘So what is this Shyri and why do I care?’
‘I thought you were sweet on her, from the way you weren’t looking at her,’ Venater leered.
‘Oh, really?’
‘These things are known: Asman’s First Son has a reputation,’ the pirate goaded.
‘Not known this far into the Plains, I hope.’ Asmander managed a wan grin. ‘And no, not interested, save in what she wants from us.’
‘She says she’s the Malikah’s daughter,’ Venater stated. ‘Not sure if that’s act
ual daughter or just one of her tribe.’
‘Well, if she can bear your breath, she’s all yours,’ Asmander assured him.
Venater gave him a crooked look. ‘Not likely. Lay the mother, then the daughter? That’s inviting ill luck.’ His broad shoulders twitched. ‘Besides, one woman of the Laughing Men is quite enough. Enough for a lifetime.’
This time Asmander laughed outright. Glancing over at the Hyena girl, he caught her predatory stare, just for a moment. Sitting away from the fire, away from the dozen Horse Society travellers already sharing a skin of something and telling one of their circular and recursive stories, she seemed as estranged as he was, even though this was her land.
The attack came two days later. The mechanics of it were simple: two ropes strung across the course of the river at a narrow point, sagging low enough that two of the canoes had passed over the first without noticing it. Then the trap was sprung, and abruptly both lines were pulled tight, catching the lead pair of boats between them, and almost flipping the last craft over as the line sprang up beneath its bows. Then there were warriors leaping down from the east bank, brandishing spears and bows.
The terrain here was rugged, the river grinding a canyon through the dry land that grew steeper the further north they travelled. The west bank rose in sheer cliffs, accessible only through occasional landslips or the odd path that had been painstakingly carved into the rock. The eastern shore was less severe, but still a ragged tumble of rock and scrub, sometimes rising to ten feet over the water, sometimes closer to twenty. The eroded, rocky ground offered plenty of hiding places, and in the first seconds of the attack Asmander felt that the whole bank was suddenly transformed into leaping, whooping men and women.
They were tall and long-limbed, some unarmoured and wearing only cloaks and tunics, others with cuirasses made from strips of thick grey hide. Most of the men amongst them sported headdresses of feathers, stiffened hair and grass that surrounded their faces, standing out in a ragged mane on all sides like the rays of the sun. Their faces were painted with white darts, like teeth.
The handful that had bows were already loosing arrows in shallow arcs over the water. One of the Horse men in Asmander’s boat was struck at once, the shaft piercing deep into his arm. Others were scrabbling for their own weapons or trying to shelter under the gunwales. The lead canoe had struck the forward rope and skewed off towards the bank, the eddy of the current taking it right towards the attackers, as had obviously been planned.
The Hyena girl, Shyri, was in that first boat, and Asmander saw her crouching there, one spear in her off hand, and one cocked back ready to throw.
‘Shall we?’ Asmander called to Venater.
The pirate nodded, his face gone hard as stone. A moment later he had Stepped, from human to a great lizard coiled within the boat. Lunging over the side, he almost upset it entirely. Then he had vanished into the water, nothing to be seen of him but a sinuous wake.
Some of the Horse were now sending back arrows, using their deceptively small recurved bows that were supposed to be the best in the world.
Asmander bunched himself and then dived over the side of the boat into the water, Stepping even as the cool river hit him, so that what moved beneath the surface with a powerful thrashing of its tail was Old Crocodile, the long, ridge-backed shape of the River Lords. Instantly he was alive with new senses, feeling the liquid medium pulse and surge around him with every movement, scenting blood and fear, and letting the tremors and currents inform him. His whole body rippled with muscular ease, surging him forwards with all the speed he could muster, mastering the current that was trying to drag him away. His eyes broke the surface, seeing the confusion of movement that was the attackers. More than one of them had gone in ankle-deep or more to snare the lead boat.
His lunge was perfect, wholly unsuspected, his great jaws thrusting from the breaking water to clamp across the calf of one of the warriors there, filling the hungry void of his mouth with blood. A spasmodic twist of his tail and his yelling victim was dragged into the deep water. Here was where Asmander’s mute brothers would hold the prey until it drowned, then tear it apart, working their jaws against each other’s. He had no such desire or luxury of time, and so he wrenched himself sideways, spinning his body as if he was trying to tear off a mouthful of flesh and making a horrible ruin of the warrior’s leg. A second later he had released his hold – fighting his Crocodile soul, which wanted only to slake its gluttony – and whipped himself back towards the shore. The river would finish what he had started with his prey.
This time he did not ambush from the water’s edge, but turned his burst of speed into a leap out of the bloody wash that had him Stepping straight into his Champion’s form, landing on two clawed feet with a shrill shriek of challenge.
The enemy nearest him had been about to cast a spear. She Stepped as she saw him, dropping into the heavy body of a lioness. Her amber eyes were wide and her ears flattened back, though, and she retreated from his stalking shape, swiping at him with a paw.
Asmander took a moment to take stock, despite the fierce need of his soul to seek battle. There was Venater’s long, black-scaled body locked in a murderous embrace with a young lion, his jaws closed on the beast’s throat, his hook-clawed feet sunk into its hide. On the other side, where the boat was, a handful of the Horse were fighting savagely with spears and long-handled dagger-axes. Two were down already, and then another Stepped, rearing up as a stallion and bringing bronze-hard hooves down on the heads of the attackers.
He heard a shrill cackle, and caught sight of Shyri, a hyena snapping and dancing as she led on a lion almost twice her size. She seemed terribly outmatched, and yet the bigger beast’s hide was bloodied, and she was always just outside its reach. Then she was a woman again, whipping her cloak across that great muzzle and then driving her spear towards it, bloodying the claws it put out to snare her.
Asmander could hold himself back no longer. Three steps and a leap took him into the midst of the band that was pressing in on the Horse men, ripping a claw down one woman’s ribs and bowling over a couple more. Instantly he was surrounded by lions, snarling and baring fangs, but the Horse took their chance, driving at their enemy with their long weapons, cutting themselves space.
Asmander had fought the Lion before and knew them well. A big male cat was heavier and stronger than his Champion form, but nowhere near as swift. More, the Lion were always courageous on the attack, far less so when forced to defend themselves. They liked easy conquests and were too wise to fight against the odds. With that in mind, Asmander unleashed a flurry of strikes, nothing that would kill or raise more than a scar, but he got a claw into all three of the beasts close to him and they sprang away, hurt and startled.
By then he had the Horse backing him, and Shyri slunk in on one side with her teeth grinning red, whilst Venater was approaching along the waterline with a slow, insolent, tail-dragging pace.
The Lion raiders reformed partway up the bank, some as humans, some as beasts. They still outnumbered the travellers by more than two to one, but the presence of Shyri and the two southerners was plainly an unwanted complication.
Then one of them stepped forth: a man bigger than his fellows, his chest bare and gleaming like copper, hatched with scars and painted with thick white dagger-blades. He wore no mane of grass, and his face seemed misshapen, heavy-jawed and brutish. He had a short-hafted axe in each hand, the blades of chipped flint.
A pair of the Horse were getting their wounded on the boat as calmly as possible, making no sudden moves. Asmander Stepped abruptly to human, to draw the Lions’ attention.
Shyri followed him. ‘He’s—’ she started, but Asmander cut her off with a sharp nod. A Lion Champion this, no doubt of it. He could feel the presence of the man like a tangible thing, something more than the mere bulk of him could account for.
It was an unlooked-for prize, to pit his soul against this man’s. Asmander squared his shoulders, feeling within him that thrill of ant
icipation that was both his and not his.
Then Venater had unfolded into his human shape as well. ‘This one’s mine.’
Asmander glanced at him. The pirate was grinning, just a little, showing his brown and yellow teeth. He was shorter than his opponent, broader at the shoulder but surely more than ten years older.
‘You’re sure?’
For answer, Venater stepped forwards, pointing the stone blade of his meret at the Lion Champion. ‘Hey, fat boy!’
Shyri yelped in amusement, sitting back on her haunches.
In an instant the Lion had dropped to all fours and Stepped, undergoing a monstrous shift as his bulk bloated out and forwards. His cat shape was stub-tailed, heavy-shouldered. He was half again the size of the largest lion Asmander had seen, fangs like swords curving from his upper jaw. Every line of him demanded fear and awe. Here was a monster that lived only within the soul of the Lion; no beast like this walked the earth.
The Champion roared, the sound rolling across the rocks like thunder. Everyone else held motionless as he padded forwards, his steps almost delicate. Venater stood waiting, still as stone.
He had his tricks, though, did the old pirate. The first was that sudden shift of stature, from big man to the low-slung bulk of a lizard. Venater was moving even as the Champion increased his pace and, when his enemy pounced, he was ducking, lunging forwards into his reptile form as though he was a thrown spear. The whip of his tail raised a welt across the Champion’s ribs, and then they were both turning, the Lion faster, Venater just fast enough. The Champion smacked out with a paw, the claws skidding off his opponent’s pebbly hide to leave a smear of blood. Venater’s sharkskin coat lent a thousand tiny blades to his lizard scales. Then the Lion’s terrible jaws were gaping wide, insanely wide, about to drive those killing teeth down into him. Venater writhed aside, taking a gash across the shoulder that peeled even his tough skin, and dragged his own regiment of fangs across the Lion’s foreleg just as he twisted away.
Then the two of them were circling, or at least the Champion was circling and Venater was mostly staying still, just shuffling round to keep facing his enemy. Blood welled sluggishly from his opened shoulder.
The Tiger and the Wolf (Echoes of the Fall Book 1) Page 10
