Tales of the Far Wanderers

by David Welch

  A voice shouted in the local language. Three archers stood on the wall, shooting at a stump they’d set up below. Maybe sixty feet away, it wasn’t a hard shot, but they were practicing for speed, pulling back on their greatbows again and again. She watched them loose ten arrows in a minute, each hitting home in the center of the stump. Their whole bodies flexed as they drew, their movements fluid from years of practice. She knew it only looked fluid. Bulky muscle powered the massive draws and set the arrows ripping through the air to their target.

  The men motioned her over.

  “Give it a try,” one called in Trade.

  She walked over. One of the men was staring at her hips as she walked, but she didn’t care. Her sword lay on her hip should any of them forget their manners. One handed her a bow.

  She pulled. Nothing happened.

  She pulled again, putting her back into it. The string came back an inch or so, then it flexed back.

  “Too bad,” the speaker continued. The others said nothing and smiled at her failure.

  An idea came to her. She politely excused herself and dashed towards the nearest ladder.

  Ten minutes later, the men on the walls saw a sleek brown horse tear through the northern gate. Kamith sat astride Dash, her recurve bow in hand. She lifted herself off the saddle, steering her mount with her knees. The horse churned through the snow, exhilarated to be out and running. She strung an arrow and fired at full sprint, hitting dead center. She pushed Dash into a series of S-turns, firing at the height of each curve, striking the stump again and again. Finally, she turned, sprinting away from the stump. She spun in her saddle and loosed an arrow over the horse’s rump, into the stump. Spinning back, she rested her bow on the pommel, took the reins, and cantered back to the wall. The archers watched, visibly impressed.

  “You can’t do that?” she asked in Trade.

  One laughed, and they all clapped. She nodded her head in acknowledgment and then turned towards the north gate.

  “And that, men, is why I love her!” a familiar voice roared.

  Not ten yards away, Gunnar and his men stood, having watched the whole ride. Kamith laughed, blew him a kiss, and headed back into the village. Shouts filled the cool winter air behind her.

  “Alright! Move! We got two more laps before we’re done today! Get going!”

  ***

  “Yes! Yes, my wolf! Yes!”

  Gunnar did his best to ignore Eugen’s cries of pleasure. Noke hadn’t been kidding about trying to make babies, and the years clearly hadn’t diminished the couple’s desire.

  He sat shirtless in front of the small, stone fireplace in their little room. Kamith, in the sleeveless leather slip dress she’d been wearing when he’d rescued her, knelt behind him. Her fingers kneaded at his back, breaking down knots born of long hours of training. She dipped her hands in a bowl of warm water then returned them to his back, rubbing it into his skin, but his muscles wouldn’t go easily. Bit by bit, they broke down and relaxed, but her fingers had to earn every inch.

  “Solstice was a month ago, and they’re still at it,” Gunnar remarked, hearing the thump of a bed through the wall.

  “You think we’ll be any different at that age?” Kamith asked.

  “Hard to say if we’ll live that long,” he said glumly.

  Her fingers paused for a long second then started again, moving towards his shoulders.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Just wondering if any of this will really make a difference.”

  “Well, I saw Aled with Maran in one of the hay bowers when I was out riding the other day,” Kamith said.

  That was something, Gunnar realized, in a town where archers were so venerated that most women didn’t look twice at a man who couldn’t shoot.

  “Great for him, but from what Thoam says, they’ll be facing real soldiers. Men in armor, with sword and shield,” Gunnar said.

  “You figured out how to make armor for them,” Kamith countered.

  “Not as good as the real stuff,” he replied. “I’m just getting negative, I guess.”

  He seemed to leave it for a while, but she could feel the tension in his shoulders.

  “You’ve grown attached to them,” she said.

  “Hard not to, when you lead men,” he said. “Strange that I won’t be there with them when it happens.”

  “You want to go into battle?” she asked, shocked.

  “No, well… Not many people want battle. But when you train alongside people, and you see enemies coming, you want to be there. You have to… it’s hard to explain.”

  Kamith sighed, leaning forward against her man, resting her head beside his.

  “You still want to leave, come spring?” she asked.

  “Do you?” he asked.

  “These people are nice, but yes. I do.”

  “Me too,” he replied, his voice distant. “Once the snow melts.”

  “What is it?” she asked, reading his tone perfectly.

  “Thoam. He said that, last year, they came when the snows were melting, in early spring,” he said. “And if we’re still here…”

  “You want to fight with the men,” she completed. He said nothing. “If you died, I would be alone,” she whispered.

  “These people would welcome you,” he said hesitantly. “Even if they had to move to another village, you could find another—”

  “Don’t say it!” she snapped, smacking him hard on the shoulder. “Don’t.”

  “Just preparing for the worst,” he whispered.

  “Well, don’t,” she said, kissing his neck. “We don’t even know if they’ll come. I don’t want you walking around thinking about me being in anyone’s arms but yours.”

  He pulled her mouth to his, kissing her fiercely. Ten minutes later, Eugen wasn’t the only one screaming out in passion.

  ***

  “Damnit, push!” Gunnar bellowed.

  He had his shoulder against his shield, heaving forwards. Opposing him was one of his men, also with his shoulder against his shield, pushing back with all of his might. The whole unit had paired off, and now they pushed against each other. Legs tensed and feet slid in the knee-deep snow. The cold of deep winter meant nothing today. Sweat dripped off hatless foreheads as the men battled against one another.

  “Rotate!” Gunnar roared.

  They moved down to the next man, and the press began again. Gunnar kept them at it for an hour, rotating every few minutes, getting the men used to pressing back against men both bigger and smaller.

  Then, he divided them into two groups, having each form a shield wall. They faced each other, separated by fifty yards of snow. Most of the town stood on the walls, watching the spectacle.

  “Advance, double-quick!” Gunnar roared.

  They moved forward at a trot, lifting their shields up to avoid the heavy snow. Gunnar snapped at those who lagged behind the line, sending them scurrying up to their fellows. The two lines neared, shields dropping into position. A deafening crack filled the air as the two shield walls slammed into each other, wood striking wood up and down the line. Shouts and roars arose as each side strained and fought to push forwards. The lines bowed in and out, the overlapping shields flexing under the press but holding together. Neither side would break.

  He let them press for ten minutes.

  “Pull back!” he roared.

  The lines reeled away from each other, backstepping as they went, their eyes and shields never leaving their opponents.

  “Form ranks, three deep!”

  The men rearranged, each team forming three rows of twenty or so men each.

  “Advance!”

  They went forward again, much shorter lines slamming hard into each other. The scrum moved back and forth, the men in the back using their shields to push the man in front of them forwards. Each side bulled towards the other, fueled by the muscles and grit of dozens of men.

  “Pull back!”

  They retreated back again, still facing their foes. A cheer went out fro
m the people on the wall. A few of the men looked up, smiling.

  “Heads forwards!” Gunnar shouted. “There is nobody on that wall! You hear me? The only people you see are the ones across that field. Forward!”

  With a shout, the two sides moved forwards again.

  ***

  Kamith trotted Dash out of the southern gate, a gust of wind washing over her and her compatriot. Warm winds from the south had met balmy clouds from the Freshwater Seas, creating a mild and moist day that ate into the packed snow.

  Spring had come. The snow had gone from windblown drifts to heavy, wet masses. It fell off the trees in clumps, revealing naked, budding branches and the shimmering needles of bow trees. The white woods were slowly melting back to verdant green, though some weeks remained before the snow vanished altogether.

  Thoam’s warnings had driven them to begin patrols, and Kamith was a better rider than any of the Duahr. She rode now, to the southeast. Ricarhl, a sandy-haired archer who’d seen thirty winters, rode with her. They trotted across the field, passing the spearmen and their endless sparring. She watched Aled battle with another man, one on one, darting forward and back to try and get a good angle so he could plunge home his blunted spear. The other man blocked furiously with his big shield, thrusting at Aled. Gunnar’s right-hand man shrugged off the blows then lunged, throwing his bodyweight behind the shield. He crashed into the opposing man’s shield, hurling him back to the snow.

  “Good!” Gunnar shouted, strolling through the dueling pairs and up to Aled. “The shield is a weapon! It will bruise and crush. Use your shields, people!”

  He moved off towards a group practicing with real spears. They stabbed with eight-foot-long shafts. A metal spearhead the shape of an elm leaf adorned the front, a pointed spike the back. The butt-spikes were new, and the mayor had shouted and raved about having to use so much metal to make them, but the war chief had merely nodded his concurrence, and Gunnar had gotten his spikes.

  Her man worked his way around the bunch, coming up to her side.

  “Keep practicing!” he bellowed. “I wouldn’t put you up against dogs yet, much less soldiers!”

  That taken care of, he walked up to Kamith, resting a hand on her thigh.

  “You’re going out today?” he asked.

  She nodded, motioning to her bow in its slot on the saddle harness. Her sword rested at her hip.

  “Be careful,” he whispered.

  She leaned over and kissed him. They broke after a long moment, Gunnar nodding respectfully to Ricarhl then turning back to his men. Kamith spurred the horse on, hearing Gunnar’s shouts fade as she made her way through the band of farmland. Past that, in the pastures, cows pawed through the melting snow to get at the grass below. They moved through a clump of them, Ricarhl shouting a greeting to the cowherd; a fellow archer. Then, the forest came. Ricarhl knew Trade Tongue, but he wasn’t the most talkative fellow, which was a relief to Kamith, given the sheer force of personality that was Noke. They made their way past the bands of bow trees and into the wild forest of the north woods.

  About four miles into the towering pines, Kamith paused, sniffing the air. The wind blew from the south, and she could swear there was a whiff of smoke in it. Alert, she rode on.

  They rode across an open hillside, the trees burned away by wildfire only a few years earlier. On the far side of the clearing, the road widened enough for a wagon to move down.

  “Furthest they ever got,” Ricarhl informed her. “After Nekrador. Some skirmishes here.”

  “Good spot,” she said. “Clear shot.”

  Ricarhl agreed with a grunt, and they kept on. Above them, the sun moved from behind a cloud, nearly at its highest point. It vanished again as they reentered the forest.

  They travelled for an hour before entering another band of bow trees. Ricarhl’s body tightened in the saddle, tension evident on his face. The bow trees opened to abandoned pasture, which opened to abandoned farmland, which, in turn, revealed the charred remains of Nekrador.

  The ruined town sat on the shore of a vast lake, maybe ten miles long and half as wide. Smaller lakes dotted the cleared plain around it. Kamith had never seen so much water before coming here. You couldn’t shoot an arrow without it landing in some pool or pond.

  They approached the ruins slowly. All that truly remained was the earthen berm that had once held the palisade. Burned stumps of the logs that had once ringed the town jutted from the baked earth, jagged and useless. Inside sat piles of ash and char, none of the wooden buildings having survived the inferno. Just outside of the village, hundreds of wooden stakes, unburnt, lay upon the ground. Bones were scattered around them.

  Ricarhl scowled at the stakes and pushed his horse on. They rode south along the shore, pushing through the muddy fields. They crossed from farmland to pasture and had nearly reached the far forest when a man appeared. He sat on a tall, black horse and wore chain-mail and a helmet. A long sword, with a slight curve to it, similar to Kamith’s blade, hung on his back. He looked at them, they looked at him.

  Then he charged. His horse’s hooves tore up the muddy earth. He probably suspected them to be easy prey, she a woman and Ricarhl unable to fire his longbow from horseback. But the man didn’t see Kamith’s smaller horsebow. She drew it, nocked an arrow with practiced ease, and fired. The arrowhead ripped through the man’s neck, shredding his throat and lodging in his spine. He fell hard from his horse and lay still in the spring mud.

  “By Weniho!” Ricarhl declared. “That was a good shot.”

  She smiled, but then she saw a half-dozen horsemen emerge from the woods. Neither needed to say another word; they turned their horses and sprinted for home. The horsemen followed, pounding hooves giving chase, then turned off. The scouting party returned to the woods, no doubt to tell the main force that they’d been discovered. Kamith glanced over her shoulder and saw them leave, but she did not slow. She pushed Dash hard all the way back to Aguaiadain.

  ***

  They stood and waited. Thoam had marched them to the small clearing on the hill where Kamith had paused the day before. The hill itself was small, maybe eighty feet taller than the surrounding forest. The slopes were mostly clear. The past wildfire had burned down the southern slope, along the road the patrols had been riding. For a quarter mile or so, a streak had been burned clear, starting at a few feet in width then broadening to ninety or so at the bottom of the hill. Blackened trunks of bow trees that had survived the blaze surrounded them.

  Gunnar had to give the war chief credit. It was a perfect spot. The narrow clearings at the bottom of the hill would concentrate the enemy, and the broad meadows on the hill gave the archers plenty of space to form up ranks, while the hill would allow them to pour fire down on their enemy. All but two dozen of the town’s archers had come; some three hundred men, all with greatbows and a dozen quivers apiece. The men had stuck their arrows into the earth so they could get at them quicker. Fifty archers and half as many spearmen had come from the next village up. Those archers formed with Thoam’s men.

  The neighboring village’s spearmen, untrained and raw, stood behind Gunnar in a sloppy line. Gunnar had a dozen of his own men with him, forming a small reserve to plug any gaps in the line. Aled stood beside him with a blowing horn, shaped from the horns of the cattle they raised.

  In front of him stood his wolves. Over a hundred of them stood at the bottom of the hill, stretched across the clearing in a shield wall that was three men deep. They had their spears and big shields at rest, as there was no use tiring them out before the enemy showed. And Thoam had assured him they would show. This was the only road to Aguaiadain from the south; the only place an army could march with any semblance of order.

  Kamith rode Dash down the hill, pulling up beside him. She jumped off the horse, her eyes heavy with the gravity of what was to happen.

  “It’s all yours,” Gunnar said. “The money, the horses, all of it. If I—”

  “You think I’m going to let you die?” she
asked, motioning towards her bow. “These arrows will fell anybody who gets too close to my man.”

  “Your arrows won’t go through heavy armor; you don’t have a greatbow,” Gunnar said.

  “From twenty yards, I can shoot out their eyes,” Kamith replied. “You know this.”

  Gunnar sighed and nodded. Her weapon may have been smaller, but his lover was every bit the archer the Duahr were.

  “Just promise me that, if we lose, you won’t try and fight to the bitter end,” he said. “Ride back to town, take everything, and go.”

  She said nothing, staring at him for a long moment. Finally, she blinked and looked to her feet, a silent acquiescence. Gunnar lifted her chin and kissed her passionately. She broke reluctantly and then jumped back on her horse. She rode a few yards up the hill then dismounted, sticking the arrows of her quiver into the ground like the men around her.

  Gunnar noticed his men were looking at him, smirking.

  “Eyes forward! Gods Above, like you’ve never seen a woman who fights before!” he roared.

  The men laughed but returned to their vigil. They stayed that way for a good twenty minutes, listening. In the distance, they heard the faint thwock of arrows leaping from bows, followed by a thud when those arrows hit wooden shields. Some of these were followed by screams and yelps as distant soldiers fell.

  All this ended when ten archers broke from the forest in front of them. Thoam had sent them out at dawn to harass and snipe the enemy from the woods as best they could without the heavy forest cover of the warmer months. The archers darted around the shield wall and took up positions with the rows of bowmen behind. Gunnar frowned as the ten men took their spots; Thoam had sent out twelve.