First Lord's Fury

CHAPTER 28

“Crows take it,” Tavi muttered. He tried to mop the rain from his face with a corner of his sopping cloak. “We’ve got another thirty miles to make today.”

“It’s going to be darker than a Phrygian winter in another hour, Captain,” Maximus said. “The men will keep going. But I hate to think what might happen to us if the vord hit us while we’re setting up camp in the dark.”

Tavi looked back at the column behind them. It was a mixed and disorganized sight. The First Aleran and Free Aleran Legions were managing fairly well, especially given how long they’d been cooling their heels on ships in the last few months. They moved ahead at a loping run, their endurance and footsteps bolstered by the earth furies in the causeway. At normal pace, they would be moving as quickly as a man could sprint across open ground. Tavi had been forced to reduce their speed, in part because the men were out of practice. At least they maintained their spacing with acceptable discipline.

Behind them came a long double column of supply wagons, cargo wagons, farm carts, town carriages, rubbish carts, vegetable barrows, and every other form of wheeled conveyance imaginable. Phrygius Cyricus had, in under two hours, provided them with enough carts to bear more than two-thirds of the Canim infantry. The carts themselves were not being drawn by horses—the Legion simply did not have enough personnel to care for the army of beasts that would be needed, nor did they have enough cartage to haul their feed. Instead, the vehicles were being pulled by teams consisting largely of whichever legionares had most recently earned their centurion’s displeasure.

Canim warriors overflowed the carts in a fashion that was little short of comical. Those who couldn’t fit in the carts came behind them, galloping along swiftly enough to keep pace with the reduced speed of the Legions. They could only maintain that pace for two hours or so, then the entire force would halt and allow the rested Canim in the carts to exchange places with those who had been running, rotating between them in turns throughout the day. By this time, even the Canim who had been in the carts the longest looked hungry, miserable, and exhausted, though Tavi supposed that might largely be due to the way the rain was plastering their fur to their skin.

Behind them rode the cavalry. First came the mounted alae of the Legions, eight hundred horses and their riders, then the Canim cavalry. Composed almost entirely of Shuaran Canim riding the odd-looking Canean creature called a “taurg,” they each massed two or three times the weight of a legionare on a horse. The horned, hunchbacked taurga, each considerably larger than a healthy ox, kept pace with the column without difficulty, the muscles in their heavy haunches flexing like cables of steel. The taurga didn’t look tired. The taurga looked impatient and short-tempered and as though they were giving serious consideration to eating their riders or fellow herd members. Possibly both. Tavi had ridden a taurg for weeks in Canea, and in his judgment it would not be out of character for the war beasts.

He sighed and looked aside and up at Maximus, who was riding a particularly ugly, mottled taurg of his own. “Crows, Max. I thought you’d killed and eaten that thing.”

Max grinned. “Steaks and New Boots, Captain? I hate this critter like no other on Carna. Which is why I decided he could be miserable carrying me all this way in the rain instead of inflicting it on some perfectly decent horse.”

Tavi wrinkled up his nose. “It stinks, Max. Especially in the rain.”

“I have always found the odor of wet Aleran to be slightly unsavory,” Kitai said, from where she rode on Tavi’s right.

Tavi and Max both gave her an indignant look. “Hey,” Max said, “we don’t smell when we’re wet.”

Kitai arched an eyebrow at them. “Well, of course you don’t smell yourselves.” She lifted a hand and waved it daintily at the air by her nose, an affectation of gesture that Tavi thought she must have studied from some refined lady Citizen. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen.” She nudged her horse several paces to one side and let out a sigh of relief.

“She’s joking,” Max said. He frowned and looked at Tavi. “She’s joking.”

“Um,” Tavi said, “almost certainly.”

Kitai gave them an oblique look and said nothing.

There was a muffled roar of wind as Crassus came soaring down out of the rainy skies. He hit the water-slickened surface of the causeway with his shoulders parallel to the road, his legs spread solidly. A sheet of water sprayed up from his boots as he slid along the causeway for twenty yards before slowing to a couple of skipping steps, then came to a halt in front of Tavi’s horse. He threw Tavi a crisp salute and began running alongside the horse. “Captain. Looks like we’d better get used to the idea of getting rained on. There’s a fairly rocky patch about half a mile ahead. It won’t be comfortable, but I don’t think anyone will get sucked into the mud there.”

Tavi grunted and peered up at the weeping sky. He sighed. “All right. There’s no sense in pushing through in the dark. Thank you, Crassus. We’ll make camp there. Please spread the word to the Tribunes. Maximus, please inform the Warmaster that we’ll halt in half a mile.”

The Antillan brothers both saluted, then left to follow their orders.

Tavi eyed Kitai, who continued to ride facing straight ahead, not looking at him. Her expression was unreadable. “You were joking, weren’t you?”

She lifted her chin, sniffed, and said nothing.

For the first time in history, Alerans and Canim pitched a camp together.

Tavi and Varg walked about the camp together as their respective country-men labored to set up the camp’s defenses after a hard day’s marching, in the rain, with night coming on rapidly.

“Should be interesting tonight,” Varg rumbled.

“I thought that the Free Aleran Legion had done this sort of thing many times,” Tavi said.

Varg growled in the negative. “Nasaug was already pushing the letter of the codes by training makers to fight. Bringing demons into a warrior camp? He would have been forced to kill some of his own officers to keep his place.” Varg squinted at a team of Aleran engineers who were using earthcrafting to soften the stone so that they could drive the posts of the palisade into it.

Tavi watched them for a moment, considering. “There was more to it than that.”

Varg inclined his head slightly. “Can’t just tell a soul it is free, Tavar. Freedom must be done for oneself. Important that the slaves created their own freedom. Nasaug gave them advisors. They did everything else on their own.”

Tavi glanced up at Varg. “Are you going to be forced to kill some of your officers tonight?”

Varg was silent for a moment. Then he shrugged. “Possible. But I think unlikely.”

“Why?”

“Because their opposition would be based upon tradition. Tradition needs a world to exist. And the world has been destroyed, Aleran. My world. Yours, too. Even if we could defeat the vord tomorrow, nothing would change that.”

Tavi frowned. “Do you really think that?”

Varg flicked his ears in the affirmative. “We are in uncharted waters, Tavar. And the storm has not yet abated. If we are still alive when it is over, we will find ourselves on unknown shores.”

Tavi sighed. “Yes. And then what?”

Varg shrugged. “We are enemies, Tavar. What do enemies do?”

Tavi thought about it for a moment. Then he said, “I only know what they did in the old world.”

Varg stopped in his tracks. He eyed Tavi for several seconds, then shook his ears and began walking again. “Wasted breath to talk about it now.”

Tavi nodded. “Survive today. Then face tomorrow.”

Varg flicked his ears in agreement. They had crossed into the Canim side of the camp as they spoke. Varg came to a halt outside a large, black tent. There was an odd smell of incense in the air, and the stench of rotting meat. From inside the tent, a deep-bellied drum kept a slow, reverberating cadence. Deep voices chanted in the snarling tongue of the wolf-warriors.

Varg stopped outside the tent and drew his sword in a long, slow rasp of steel on brass. Then he hurled it point down into the earth before the tent. It sank into the ground with a thump, and the bubbling whisper of its quivering went on for several seconds.

The chanting voices inside the tent stopped.

“I am here regarding the matter of the dead makers at Antillus,” Varg called.

There was a low murmur of voices. Then a dozen of them spoke in ragged concert. “Their blood cries out for justice.”

“Agreed,” said Varg in a very hard voice. “What wisdom have the bloodspeakers to give such justice a shape?”

Another swift and murmured conference followed. Then they answered together again. “Blood for blood, life for life, death for death.”

Varg flicked his tail impatiently. “And if I do not do this?”

This time they all answered at once. “Call to the makers, call to the warriors, call for strength to lead us.”

“Then let Master Khral come forth to see it done!”

There was a long silence from the tent.

Tavi arched an eyebrow and glanced at Varg. The big Cane looked intent.

“Master Khral speaks for the bloodspeakers, and for the makers! So he has assured me for many months! Let him come forth!”

Again, silence.

“Then let one of honor and experience come forth to witness it! Let Master Marok come forth!”

Almost before Varg was finished speaking, the opening of the tent parted, and a tall, weathered old Cane emerged. He wore a mantle constructed from sections of vord chitin, and a misshapen warrior-form’s chitinous skull served as his hood. More plates of chitin armored his torso and legs. His fur was, like Varg’s, midnight black, though both of his forearms were so heavily laden with layer upon layer of scars that almost no fur grew there at all. He wore a sling bag across his chest. The band had been woven from what looked like the legs of many wax spiders. The bag, too, was a black chitin skull from some vord form Tavi had never seen—but instead of carrying blood, it held multiple scrolls and what might have been some sort of flute carved from bone. The old Cane also had a pair of daggers stored side by side on his belt. Their bone handles looked old and worn.

“Master Marok,” Varg rumbled. He bared his throat very slightly, the Canim version of a bow. Marok returned the gesture only a shade more deeply, acknowledging Varg’s leadership without quite recognizing his superiority.

“Varg,” Marok replied. “Has no one killed you yet?”

“You are welcome to try your luck,” Varg replied. “The bloodspeakers allowed you to speak for them?”

“They’re all afraid that if one of them steps up to the head of the pack, Khral will have them killed when he returns.”

“Khral,” Varg said, amusement in his voice.

“Or someone.” Marok eyed Tavi. “This is the demon Tavar?”

Varg’s ears flicked affirmation. “Gadara, this is Marok. I respect him.”

Tavi lifted his eyebrows and gave Marok a Canim bow, which was returned in precisely equal measure. The old Cane watched him through narrowed eyes.

“You killed two of my people,” Marok said.

“I’ve killed more than that,” Tavi replied. “But if you mean the two false messengers who attacked me in my tent, then yes. I killed one, and a soldier under my command killed another.”

“The tent was the Tavar’s,” Varg said. “He did not seek the makers out for murder. They trespassed upon his range.”

Marok growled. “The code calls for a blood answer when an outsider kills one of us, regardless of the circumstances.”

“An outsider,” Varg growled. “He is gadara.”

Marok stopped to eye Varg thoughtfully. In a much quieter, quite calm voice, he muttered, “That might work. If we can make it stick.”

Tavi took his cue from Marok and lowered his voice as well. “Varg. If Lararl had done what I did, what would be the proper reply?”

Varg growled. “My people on his range? Simple defense of his territory. They would be in the wrong, not Lararl. Though I would consider it clumsy and wasteful, under the circumstances, since Lararl could quite likely have rendered them helpless without killing either of them.”

Tavi grimaced. “That wasn’t what I wanted. There were only two of us. Each of us was trying to dispose of his opponent so that he could help the other. I would much rather have had them alive and answering questions about who sent them.”

Marok grunted. He looked at Varg. “You believe him?”

“Gadara, Marok.”

The old Cane tilted his head slightly to the side in acknowledgment. “Khral’s pack of scavengers are going to raise a whirlwind of howls if you give one of the demons status as a member of the people. Naming him gadara is a warrior concern, and your rightful prerogative. Establishing a demon as one of our people under the codes is another matter entirely.”

Varg growled. “Without this demon, there would be no people for the codes to guide.”

“A fact that does not escape me,” Marok replied. “But it does not alter the codes.”

“Then there must be a blood answer,” Varg said.

“Yes.”

Varg flicked his ears in thoughtful agreement and turned to Tavi. “Would you be willing to trade two Aleran lives for those you took?”

“Never,” Tavi said quietly.

Marok made a rumble of approval in his chest.

“The poor dead fools,” Varg growled. “This was a blade well sunk. Give Khral credit for that much.”

“Blood,” Tavi said abruptly.

The two Canim eyed him.

“What if I pay a blood price for the two dead makers? Their weight of blood?”

Marok narrowed his eyes again. “Interesting.”

Varg grunted. “A Cane has twice the weight in blood of an Aleran, gadara. We could bleed you to a husk, and you would have paid back only a quarter.”

“What if it were done slowly?” Tavi replied. “A little at a time? And the blood entrusted to, say, Master Marok here, to use for the protection and benefit of the families of the two dead makers?”

“Interesting,” Marok said again.

Varg mused for a moment. “I can think of nothing in the codes to hold against it.”

“Nothing in the codes,” Marok said. “But it sets a dangerous precedent. Others might use it to kill as well and escape the consequences in this fashion.”

Tavi showed his teeth. “Not if the party who has been wronged does the bloodletting.”

Marok huffed out a harsh bark of Canim-style laughter.

Varg’s jaws lolled open in a smile. “Aye. That would stand up to usage.” He tilted his head and eyed Tavi. “You would trust me with the blade, gadara?”

“If anything happened to me, your people would be finished,” Tavi said soberly. “We would kill them all. Or the vord would kill them all. And there would never again be such an opportunity for us to build mutual respect.”

Varg watched Marok as Tavi spoke. Then he spread one paw-hand open, as though he had just proved something to the older Cane.

Marok nodded slowly. “As the observer sent by the bloodspeakers, I will consider this payment an offering of honor and restitution—and I will see to it that the makers know that it has been concluded according to the codes. Wait here.”

Marok went back into the black tent. When he returned, he held what would be a rather small vial, for a Cane, made of some kind of ivory. To Tavi, it looked nearly the size of a canteen. Marok handed the container to Varg.

Varg took it with another, deeper bow, this time reversing the roles of accorded respect with Marok. The old Cane said, “From the left arm.”

Tavi steeled himself as he pushed the arm of his tunic up past his elbow and extended it to Varg.

The Warmaster drew his dagger, an Aleran gladius that had once belonged to Tavi. Varg carried it for use when he needed a keen-edged knife. Moving with quick, sure motions, he laid a long, shallow cut across Tavi’s forearm, along a diagonal. Tavi gritted his teeth but made no other reaction to the pain of the injury. He lowered his arm to his side, and Varg bent to place the vial beneath his fingertips, catching the blood as it spilled. It slowly began to fill.

The entrance to the black tent flew open again, and a burly Cane in a pale leather mantle strode out, his fangs bared, his ears laid back. “Marok,” the Cane snarled. “You will cease this trafficking with the enemy!”

“Nhar,” Marok said. “Go back in the tent.”

Nhar surged toward Marok, seething. “You cannot do this! You cannot so bind us to these creatures! You cannot so dishonor the lives of the fallen!”

Marok eyed the other ritualist for a moment, and said, “What were their names, Nhar?”

The other Cane drew up short. “What?”

“Their names,” Marok said in that same, gentle voice. “Surely you know the names of these makers whose lives you defend so passionately.”

Nhar stood there, gnashing his teeth. “You,” he sputtered. “You.”

“Ahmark and Chag,” Master Marok said. And without warning one of his hands lashed out and delivered a backhanded blow to the end of Nhar’s muzzle. The other Cane recoiled in sheer surprise as much as pain, and fell to the ground. The blood in the pouch at his side sloshed back and forth, some of it splashing out.

“Go back into the tent, Nhar,” Marok said gently.

Nhar snarled and plunged one hand into the blood pouch.

Marok moved even more quickly. One of the knives sprang off his belt into his hand and whipped across his own left forearm.

Nhar screamed something, and a cloud of blue-grey mist formed in front of him, coalescing into some kind of solid shape in response. But before it could fully form, Marok flicked several drops of his own blood onto the other Cane. Then the old master closed his eyes and made a calm, beckoning gesture.

Nhar convulsed. At first Tavi thought that the Cane was vomiting, but as more and more substance poured out of Nhar’s mouth, it only took a few seconds for Tavi to realize what was really happening.

Nhar’s belly and guts had just been ejected from his body, as if an unseen hand had reached down his throat and pulled them out.

Nhar made a number of hideous sounds, but within seconds he was silent and still.

Marok eyed the tent, and said, “Brothers, would anyone else care to dispute my arbitration?”

A Cane’s hand appeared from the black tent—but only long enough to pull the entrance flap closed again.

Varg let out a chuckling growl.

Marok reached into his own pouch and drew out a roll of fine cloth. He wrapped it around his arm with the ease of long, long practice, tearing it off with his teeth when he’d used enough. He then offered the roll of cloth to Tavi.

Tavi inclined his head to the master ritualist and accepted the cloth. When Varg nodded to him, he bent his arm and began to wind the cloth over it, though he did not do it nearly so smoothly as Marok.

Varg capped the vial and offered it back to Marok with another bow. Marok accepted the vial, and said, “This will continue when you are recovered, Tavar. I will keep the accounting. It will be accurate.”

“It was an honor to meet you, sir,” Tavi replied.

They exchanged parting bows, and Tavi and Varg continued their rounds of the camp. He stumbled twice, before Varg said, “You will return to your tent now.”

“I’m fine.”

Varg snorted. “You will return to your tent now, or I will take you there. Your mate expressed to me in very clear terms her strong desire to see you back safely.”

Tavi smiled tiredly. “I do feel a bit less than myself, I suppose. Will this end our trouble with the ritualists?”

“No,” Varg said. “They will embrace some new idiocy tomorrow. Or next week. Or next moon. But there is no escaping that.”

“But for today, we’re quit of them?”

Varg flicked his ears in assent. “Marok will keep them off-balance for months after today.”

Tavi nodded. “I’m sorry. About the makers who died. I wish I hadn’t had to do that.”

“I wish that, too,” Varg said. He looked at Tavi. “I respect you, Tavar. But my people are more important to me than you are. I have used you to help remove a deadly threat to them—Khral and his idiocy. Should you become a threat to them, I will deal with you.”

“I would expect nothing less,” Tavi said. “I will see you in the morning.”

Varg growled assent. “Aye. And may all of our enemies be in front of us.”