Shadow Gate

11

Someone had to go back and find Jerad. So Nallo didn't wait. She pried Zianna off her body as the girl whimpered and clung, shoved her into Avisha's arms, and stumbled back the way they had come.

She'd recognized what those men were the instant she had seen them. What a fool she'd been! Avisha had stood there blubbering on the path, when they should have kept going despite the eagle. That was how those outlaws had walked up from behind without her hearing.

Eiya! She must watch, observe, keep her eye on the trail they'd tramped through the woodland so she could find her way back. She must listen, to make sure she didn't stagger out like a flailing drunk onto the road, an easy target. The rain gave her cover; the vegetation was damp enough that instead of snapping it merely bent, squooshed, sucked. She marked how the canopy altered where the path cut along the slope as it moved sidelong around the hill. She slowed down, grasped the slender trunk of a pine tree, trying to quiet the surging pound of her heart in her throat and ears.

She heard no sound of men talking. She heard no sound of footfalls, nor press of branches swept aside as they searched into the woodland for the runaways. She eased forward into the cover of a stand of pipe-brush. Her ears stung as the wind picked up. Still nothing. Crouching, she tipped to hands and knees and crawled through the muck to the shelter of a bush from which she could see the path.

Six bodies sprawled on the ground, limp and torn, several still twitching. She forced herself to scan the path.

The eagle chirped.

She slunk along the line of bushes until she could see where the path pushed onward. With wings spread and head raised, the eagle waited. A bundle of clothing had fallen to the ground beneath it.

It wasn't clothing. The eagle was standing over Jerad, cruel talons fixed on either side of the boy and its gaze pinioned on the dead men it had ravaged.

She found a stout stick on the ground, tested its heft. With this pathetic weapon, she walked onto the path.

'Jerad!'

The eagle flared its wings wider. She halted. Like the eagle she, too, was panting, angry, scared, injured in her own way. When it looked at her, she returned its fierce gaze without fear.

'We're friends, not enemies,' she said, a little testily.

Its mouth gaped, showing its tongue. Was that a good sign, or a bad one? She took another step and a third, by stages moving closer until she could see that Jerad was alive. The eagle was guarding him.

'You saved us,' she said, hoping to sooth it with her voice.

It swiveled its head, measuring her.

'N-Nallo?' His voice was so soft she barely heard it. 'I'm scared, Nallo. Did you see what it did to those men? Is it going to kill me?'

'Hush!'

At her agitated tone, the eagle flared again, and Nallo said, more harshly than she intended, 'Stop that! He's just frightened! You're scaring him.'

He sobbed, so she grasped the stick more tightly and held it a little above and across her head as if that flimsy stick could ward off the eagle should it strike. She walked at a measured pace right up to the huge eagle. Under its wings and the vicious-looking beak, she knelt beside Jerad and coaxed him to his knees.

'Come on, now, Jer! If the eagle meant to kill you, it would have done it already.'

'It's going to eat m-m-me.'

Really, the boy was impossible. 'No, it isn't. Get up.'

'They play with animals, and then eat them alive.'

'Get up!'

He clung to her as she dragged him away from the eagle and off the path. 'It tore that man's head off. It stuck that man right through the chest with its claws. Did you see?'

it protected you, Jerad.'

She shoved the boy down into a heap of sodden leaves ripe with

smells released by the rains. Turning, she examined the eagle. The heavy feathered brows made its stare more intense, and naturally the hooked bill with its pointed tip looked daunting. The top of its bill was colored a bright yellow, and yellow rimmed its mouth behind the bill. Its feathers had a golden sheen, shading darker along the wings and breast, patched with white. Its legs, too, were feathered, shaped like leggings. Its talons were skin and claw, big enough to enclose her chest.

As she watched, it began to clean blood and bits of flesh from its bill with one talon. It had a fussy touch, comical until you thought of what the eagle had just done.

Where had the outlaws come from? Were there more of them?

'Jerad, hide in the woods. Take this.' She picked up, and handed to him, the pouch she had dropped in the first steps of their panicked flight.

'It's too heavy.'

'Take it into the trees. I'm coming.'

She found the washtub where Avisha had dropped it. When had that happened? The series of events blurred in her mind: the washtub tumbling down the slope and spilling its contents every which way; Avisha hauling it up again. The eagle had come, and then the outlaws, and she realized that the eagle had surely come because it had seen armed men moving up behind them. It had deliberately saved them.

It lifted its head, looking past her. She heard men tramping up the path, moving in haste. She lugged the washtub off the road, and just in time she and Jerad dropped behind a stand of pipe-brush. She left the washtub beside the boy and shimmied forward on her belly through the brush until she could look over the path. The wind was rising again, rippling in the clothing of the dead men as if the cloth had woken and meant to abandon the mutilated husks.

Two men trotted into view. They wore the same leather coats and molded leather helmets she'd seen on the armed men who had marched into her village. One of the men carried a red banner marked with three black waves enclosed in a black circle, similar in cut to the banner she had seen that terrible day, although the banner those men carried had had four stripes.

The soldiers scented death before they saw it. They moved

hesitantly forward, then spotted the dead men and, last, the waiting eagle. Backing up hastily, they called to unseen companions. One man hoisted his bow and, hands shaking, fitted an arrow.

Fly. Fly.

As if it heard her thoughts, the eagle spread its wings, thrust, and beat hard. It rose agonizingly slowly, and the archer loosed an arrow. But the shaft went wide, and the eagle was aloft, out of range, as Nallo sucked in a breath, dizzied, her pulse thundering in her ears.

The men shook fists at the sky, then split up to investigate the scene of the battle. As they prodded the corpses, another dozen men came up behind, a straggling, undisciplined line that collapsed into commotion with a lot of shouting and cursing.

'Get on! Get on!' they cried, hurrying forward as if something more dreadful than an eagle was chasing them.

She and Jerad hid as the afternoon wore on, while groups of men passed at erratic intervals, fleeing northeast into the Soha Hills. Those who staggered into sight panting and exhausted found strength to move on when they spotted the dead. She grinned. They were beaten, whipped, frightened and disoriented, a beast without a head to lead the way.

'Did you see Captain Mani? He was burned alive. I saw the bones in his face while he was still screaming…'

'Captain Mani's dead? Then who's in charge?'

'We have to reach Walshow. There'll be captains there to tell us what to do…'

'We've not going fast enough. If they catch us, they'll kill us. They're demons.'

'Is the lord dead? Can he be dead?'

'Did you see the tent burning? The fire stuck to it. Water wouldn't put it out. No one could escape such sorcery.'

'They promised us! Said nothing would stand in our way'

'Neh. This was a test. Those who didn't truly trust the lords' power, died. But we survived, didn't we?'

'Heh, so we did. We spoke the proper prayers and offered the proper sacrifices, not like the others. We'll be admitted to the real army-'

'Aui! Look! Eagles!'

Three eagles swooped past. Shouting, the men ran. The eagles rose higher into the sky with an eerie glide, wings not beating. These eagles carried reeves slung into harnesses that dangled beneath, leaving their arms free to hold weapons. Trapped in the brush, she lost sight of them, but she heard the hammer of hooves as a company of horsemen approached at speed.

'Run! Run!' the men cried.

It was too late.

Up the path swept a score of horsemen, black wolves on the hunt. They harvested the fleeing soldiers with swift strokes. Half rode on, up the path, while others spread into the woodland on the trail of men who bolted into the trees. She dared not move; she scarcely breathed. Men screamed as they were cut down. The mounted soldiers called to one another with calm shouts. One dismounted to survey the corpses killed by the eagle. He was an older man, somewhat older than her husband, although it was difficult to tell his age. He had an outlander's look, with a broad face and pronounced cheekbones, a mustache but no beard, and noble eyes that flicked restlessly over the scene. She held her breath as his gaze passed over the pipe brush, but he looked away. He walked to the spot where the eagle had stood guard over Jerad. He knelt, touched the ground as if the ground could speak to him, then rose. Briskly, he walked directly to the stand of pipe-brush, halted, and spoke.

'Come out.' His words were strangely accented and a little difficult to understand.

She didn't move.

He sighed. 'Come out. You are in there. With you is another one.'

Maybe he was only guessing.

He hacked through the pipe-brush above her head, shearing it off. Leaves showered her. Stalks rattled onto her body. He stepped back and waited.

He might still go away.

He tilted his head, rubbed his chin, and took another step back. She heard crashing in the brush, male laughter, and – like a stab in the heart – a woman's sobs. Two black-clad riders emerged onto the path within her line of sight. Using their spears as prods, they were driving Avisha in front of them. She had Zi clutched to her chest.

Her eyes were red from weeping, her hair tangled in disarray. She shivered with terror as the men looked her over.

'Pretty girl,' said the older man, measuring her.

Nallo rose and pushed through the brush, splintering stalks in her haste to get to the path before they could do anything awful to Avisha. She flung herself to her knees before the older man. 'Don't kill us, I pray you. We've done you no harm. Don't kill us. Take me if you must, but leave the girl alone.'

The laughing soldiers fell silent. The older man pulled off his helmet. He had a pleasant face, even if he did look and talk like a foreigner.

'The pretty girl, she is your sister? You not look alike.'

'She's my husband's daughter.'

'Your husband, where is he?'

'He is dead.'

She cursed herself silently the moment she said it, but the man nodded as he looked from her to Avisha and Zianna, then past them. Jerad came running, and he flung himself at Avisha and hid his face against the fabric of her tunic.

'You are walking from your house to your kinfolk, maybe?'

'That's right. They're expecting us.'

He rubbed his chin again, looked over at the younger soldiers where they guarded the children. 'Maybe they are dead, also.'

Three soldiers appeared on the path above and studied the scene, grinning as they spoke to their companions. Farther away, a man's shriek cut off abruptly.

'Please don't hurt us.' Her mouth formed soundless prayers.

He shifted his sword to the same hand that was also holding his helmet, and with his free hand wiped sweat and maybe blood from his eyes, careful as he cleaned his brows, rather like the eagle in his fastidiousness. One of the younger men spoke in rapid words she could not understand, and the older man laughed and, with a friendly smile – or perhaps a mocking one – turned back to her.

' My young comrade wants to know if you and the pretty girl are looking for husbands. We are looking for wives.'

Why had they to suffer all this, and now more besides? Anger boiled over, and words spilled out. 'We can't stop you from doing what you want. But don't mock us by calling us "wives"!'

He laughed, face crinkling. 'Whew! My ears are burning. You remind me of my wife, may she find peace.'

'Then if you have a wife, you can't be looking for a wife.'

'She's dead many years. I am not mocking you.' He offered an affable grin. 'Maybe I am having a little fun. We could rape you and kill you. This is true. But that gives pleasure for a moment, and not much pleasure when you come to think of it afterward. Maybe we are wanting something different. We are new to this country. We intend to settle in lands west and north of Olossi. So, if you are looking for husbands, I know where some can be found.' He indicated the five mounted men.

Startled by this speech, she really examined the soldiers. They looked different from Hundred folk in having broad cheekbones and scant beards, but she could tell them apart even with the helmets covering their hair: one had a long, dour face and small eyes, and another a big grin and two missing teeth. One had pox scars and a thoughtful gaze, while the one with the roundest face had a markedly reddish-brown complexion. The one with pretty eyes and regular features kept glancing at Avisha in the way men had when they were thinking more of their strut than their manners. Not that these men need have manners. They carried weapons.

'Are you hunting down the outlaws?' she asked.

'Yes. We hunt them and we kill them.'

'Good!'

'Perhaps these are the ones who kill your husband?'

Grief caught her unexpectedly. Tears blurred her vision. 'Or ones like them.'

Three eagles glided past, and one turned in a great loop that took it out of sight over the trees before it dropped back and came to earth with a thump on the path, just where the eagle that had saved them had first landed. A reeve unfastened from the harness and picked his way down the muddy path. He looked over Nallo, Avisha, and the children, shaking his head as he halted beside the soldier.

'What have you found, Tohon?' he asked.

'Maybe these strong young women will agree to be wives to the Qin soldiers.'

'It seems you saved them from a gruesome fate. That might persuade them, if your charms can't.' The reeve was a good-looking

man, with handsome features and a sympathetic expression as he nodded by way of acknowledging her. 'I'm called Joss. I'm a reeve out of Argent Hall. You and your sister and the little ones look like you've been traveling for a while. That can't be good, not in these days.'

'It was an eagle killed most of those soldiers, not these men,' said Nallo irritably. 'I'd think that you being a reeve, you'd have seen it at once.'

'Would you? Aui! I am found out as a man with little wit and less observational skills.' But his smile took the sting out of the words, and anyway he seemed at ease laughing at himself. He seemed at ease, despite the brutal nature of his task, scouting for soldiers on the hunt for outlaws so they could kill them. If she hadn't recognized the men who were on the run as similar in dress and look to those who had overrun the village, she wouldn't have known who to distrust most. 'Listen, verea. We haven't much time, for as you can see we've urgent work at hand hunting down this army of outlaws. We can leave you on the road and let you go your way, or we can direct you to a sheltered spot where you can wait for the Olo'osson militia to escort you to a place of safety.'

'Does that include the offer of marriage?'

He looked at Tohon and laughed again. 'Are you making that offer to every woman you meet on the road?'

'No harm in asking,' said the other man. 'The young men will want wives. A man isn't complete without a woman. Nor can he fill his tent with children, and what is a man after all without children?'

'He might be something like me,' said the reeve without heat, 'so I think your point is well taken. What will it be, verea?'

Belatedly, Nallo realized that Reeve Joss was surely only a little younger than her husband, only he did not seem old as her husband always did. She said, 'I'm called Nallo. This is my husband's daughter, Avisha, and her brother and sister. My husband's dead.'

'Yes, I suppose he is. I'm sorry to hear it. Where are you from?'

'I'm born and raised in the Soha Hills. But the village where we lived lies along West Track, or it did, anyway, before it was burned down and half the folk murdered.'

None of these words surprised him. 'I've heard this tale too often.'

'Best we be moving.' Tohon sheathed his sword and gave Nallo a wink. 'These are good young men. They have discipline. They will treat you in the proper manner, with respect.' He fastened his helmet on his head, mounted, and called the advance. The young man with the pretty eyes raised a hand, in a parting gesture to Avisha, then followed the others up the path on the trail of the fleeing army.

'What do you mean to do?' asked the reeve.

'I would marry,' said Avisha suddenly. 'If they meant it. If they would take the little ones in, and raise them as their own. What other hope do I have?'

'Eiya! Don't go leaping before you've looked.'

'Are you saying they're not looking for wives?' asked Avisha desperately. 'Maybe they need a marriage portion. No matter what Nallo says, we have nothing and no hope for anything except to walk until we're starving and willing to sell ourselves into slavery. Or until we're caught on the road and raped and cut open and left like refuse in the brush.'

'It doesn't have to end that way. They're as good men as any others. Tohon meant what he said. There's two hundred or more, all looking for wives. They're far from home and hoping to make new homes here in the Hundred. Just… you're a pretty girl, and you're still young. If you'll trust me, and wait in the shelter I've promised, I'll see you get escorted to Olossi. There, you can see what the Qin will offer you to make a marriage with one of them. Just don't go making a bargain before you've seen the goods.'

Avisha began to cry. Nallo fumed, thinking of how the girl had boxed them in with her thoughtless words. To say differently now would sound heartless, not that she didn't have a lot of experience with being called heartless. The hells! Avisha was right. They had no better prospects in Sohayil or Sund, if they could even walk that far with outlaws everywhere.

'How long have you been on the road?' the reeve asked Nallo.

'I don't know. Fifteen or twenty days.'

He sighed. 'We're not just hunting outlaw soldiers. We also have a commission from the temple of Ushara by Olossi. We're looking for a man and a woman, a brother and sister as it happens, who cheated the temple. We're hoping to bring them back to face the I Iieros.'

She examined her dirty feet, caked with wet slop over dried mud over dirt, layers on layers, like deceit. She owed those two nothing. Then she happened to look over to see Avisha staring at her, lips pressed together to urge her to keep her mouth shut.

Nallo had never felt much allegiance to the gods because the gods had never been particularly kind to her, and because most of their priests were buffoons. Even the Thunderer's ordinands she'd spent her year's apprenticeship with had been self-important imbeciles, or tiresome bullies, or bored slackards going through the motions. Only the Merciless One had shown her kindness. She'd been welcomed into the arms of Ushara, the Merciless One, at her temple in Old Cross. Many a youth went there at the age of choosing, wearing a necklace of flowers, and was sweetly introduced to the embrace of the goddess. She held those tender memories close. She owed a debt to the Merciless One.

'We saw them down at Candra Crossing.'

'Nallo! How could you!'

He glanced at Avisha, curious at her outburst.

Nallo continued. 'They did us a good turn, helped us across the ford with the little ones. Otherwise we might not have made it. We didn't realize they were runaway slaves until after we had crossed.'

'How did you find out?'

'I overheard them talking. So they went their way, and we went ours. They must be days ahead of us. They had horses.'

'Many refugees walk the roads in troubled times.'

'He had the debt mark by his eye. Her name was Zubaidit.'

His eyes flared. Then he smiled. 'That's right. They were traveling on this track?'

'They walked the road out of Candra Crossing that leads into the Soha Hills. We walked that road for a few days, but I thought it would be safer to stay away from the main road.'

'You were right to do so. These outlaws are running scared. They've attacked villages and done worse.'

'Then we'd be foolish to keep traveling rather than taking an offer of shelter. The outlanders you're hunting with, they can't possibly kill all the outlaws, can they?'

'No.'

No decision she made now could possibly be a good decision, only the least bad decision. Although the reeve glanced now and again at the sky, and at his eagle, he otherwise showed no sign he was impatient to go. 'How do we know we can trust you?'

He winced, just a little, and laughed, just a little. 'Once, you would have trusted me simply because I was a reeve. But we no longer live in those days, do we? You must know that Tohon and his company could have done what they wished to you. I have an eagle at my back and companions aloft, watching for trouble. So either we are telling the truth, or we are more deceitful than you have yet imagined, devising a sport in which we lure you into trusting us only to abuse you later.'

He twisted to take a long look at his eagle, a watchful bird with a noticeable scar. Then he walked down the path and made a quick circuit of the corpses, pausing to study the sprawl of limbs, the trajectory of blood as it had spattered, the cuts and gouges, the manner in which each man had met his death. Circling back, he halted in front of Nallo. With his gaze narrowed, he looked much less friendly. She stood her ground.

'How do you know an eagle killed these men?'

'Aui!' That was an easy question. 'We saw it.'

'You saw it?'

'Yes. The outlaws were coming right up behind us. They would have caught us and killed us, but an eagle attacked them.'

'An eagle? With a reeve?'

'No, just an eagle. One of its wings seemed injured.'

The scarred eagle chirped.

'The hells!' He looked into the sky.

It was as if her words were a summoning. Her eagle – she thought of it as hers, in a funny way – glided down, hitched up as it overshot his eagle, and thumped hard on the path below them. It raised its big head, and chirped.

The reeve stared at the eagle, looked at Nallo, looked back at the eagle, and then again at Nallo. 'The hells. Do you know what this means?'

Whatever she had seen in him before – geniality, charm, a gaze that made you feel he was looking at you alone with no thought for anyone or anything else – vanished as he thought through some

deep conundrum, as he frowned and made a move as though to grasp her arm, then withdrew his hand and fixed it awkwardly in the straps of the harness he wore around his torso.

'You have to come with us now.'

'The hells I do! Why?'

'No need to snap at me.' He flared. He wasn't one bit cowed by her temper. 'Didn't you wonder why that eagle dropped down right here, right then, only to aid you?'

'The gods fashioned the eagles to seek justice.'

'So they did, but a lone eagle without a reeve flies to the mountains and lives in solitude, in their ancient hunting territories. Only with a reeve does an eagle seek justice. And you'll note that particular eagle carries no reevee.'

She didn't like the probing way he examined her. She wiped her dirty chin with the back of a hand. 'I'm not blind!'

'I know that eagle,' he continued, ignoring her outburst. 'Her name is Tumna. Her reeve is dead. I thought she'd flown to the mountains, to mark the passing as eagles usually do, but I see she's already chosen a new reeve.'

Nallo looked at Tumna, at her ragged unkempt feathers, her injured wing, her angry, impatient gaze. Here was an eagle who was irritated that her reeve was dead and she had so much to do and no partner with whom to accomplish all those tasks. How annoying people are! Why can't things fall out without so much trouble and incompetence muddying the waters?

'Who?'

He took hold of her hand, gently, as would a relative when offering condolences.

'You, Nallo. This eagle has chosen you to be its reeve.'