Sister of the Sword

2

Harak was a long way from home.

Not that he had a home, in the sense the people of Yala-tene did. Harak was a nomad and had always been a nomad, even before joining Zannian’s army. When he thought of home—which he rarely did—he thought of the wide, grassy plains where he’d been born. He was a long way from there now.

Sitting on a cold stone slab high in the mountains of Khar land, surrounded by hostile and suspicious ogres, was not a place Harak wanted to be. He’d undertaken this insane errand at the behest of Zannian’s mother, Nacris. Crazy woman, crazy mission.

Go to the mountains, she’d told him. Find the ogre tribe led by Ungrah-de. Promise them rich plunder if they will help us capture Arku-peli.

It sounded simple the way she put it, but Harak had no real idea just how dangerous his task would turn out to be. Unlike the relatively gentle mountains surrounding the Valley of the Falls, the ogre homeland was higher and colder than any place he’d ever been. By day, wind roared through the passes like a torrential river, blinding him and his horse with driven grit. The air was so frigid and dry it sucked all the warmth from his limbs and caused his exposed skin to crack like old leather. By night the wind died, but sunset brought on cold more pervasive than any he had ever felt before. Furs hardly sufficed to keep the deadly chill away.

Harak’s first night in the high pass was almost his last. He was well toward freezing to death when his horse, unhappy with the raw conditions, kicked him awake. Staggering to his knees, Harak managed to get a fire going before his eyes closed forever. The horse got a double ration of hay the next morning, as well a new name: Stone Toe.

Harak’s travails didn’t end with the cold or the desiccating wind. He had to convince the ogres he met not to kill and rob him on sight. Some would not be persuaded, and time and again he was forced to flee. Those ogres not bent on murdering him presented another problem: how to locate Ungrah-de.

Harak quickly discovered that “Ungrah” was a common name among ogres, and “Ungrah-de” merely meant “Big Ungrah.” Many of the creatures answered to that epithet. A great many.

In the end, he found the one he sought by means of a stratagem. He presented a minor chieftain with a bronze Silvanesti dagger and hinted he had a very special gift for the great chief known as Ungrah-de.

“Give gift to me,” said the lesser chief, who was named Garnt. “I’ll give it to Big Ungrah when next I see him.”

Harak had no doubt his life would end immediately once the ogre extracted whatever goods he had. On the other hand, resisting Garnt’s request was likely to be less than healthy, too.

Clapping his hands to his head, Harak howled, “Fierce One, have pity! I bear in my pack a blade cursed by the priests of the woodland elves. My master, the great chief Zannian, cannot wield this weapon himself, for the curse will strike down anyone who holds the blade, sending maggots to consume his flesh even down to the small bones! My chief seeks to rid both his people of this cursed blade and your mountains of the vile tyrant Ungrah-de. When the monster takes the weapon in his unworthy hand, the elf curse will infest him at once, and we shall be blessed by his death!”

Garnt digested this. Harak was gambling on his host hating Ungrah-de, who by reputation was the largest and fiercest ogre in the highlands.

Garnt asked to see the “cursed” Silvanesti weapon. Harak displayed a sword Nacris had sent along as part of the payment for the ogres’ aid. It was a fairly unremarkable bronze weapon with a ring of smoky garnets in its pommel. Harak made a great show of handling the Silvanesti blade with scraps of leather to keep from touching the bare metal.

Garnt studied the sword for a long time. Harak could almost hear the turnings of his slow brain.

“Such a gift must be delivered right away,” the ogre said at last. “One of my warriors will take you to Ungrah-de.”

Harak bowed low, deliberately letting the bronze blade slip from his grasp and fall at Garnt’s feet. The massive ogre shuffled backward to avoid the touch of the “cursed” weapon.

“You go now!” Garnt snapped, face paling. He sent an ogre named Ont to accompany Harak as guide and interpreter.

A day later Ont was leading Harak through a lofty crevice between two of the highest peaks in the range. The air was so thin that Stone Toe’s breath came in labored, deep-chested gasps. Harak took pity on the horse and dismounted, leading him by the reins.

Even Ont found the height difficult. He rested frequently, leaning a heavy arm against the unyielding mountain and breathing hard. During one of these breaks, Harak asked why the great chief lived so high.

Ont’s knowledge of the plains tongue was limited, but he explained the mighty Ungrah-de, being much bigger than his fellow ogres, could breathe effectively at high altitude. It was clear Ont considered himself a mere youth in comparison to the great chieftain.

Harak he dismissed as a “bird,” the uncomplimentary epithet ogres used to describe any small and insignificant creature.

Harak assumed the ogre was exaggerating. Ont was two full spans taller than Harak’s own considerable height and much more heavily muscled than any human. However, when they reached Ungrah-de’s camp, situated on a plateau below the highest peak in the entire range, he realized his guide was only relating the truth. Ungrah-de proved to a towering creature, and the males of his tribe all topped Ont by at least a handspan.

With Ont interpreting, Harak greeted the celebrated Ungrah-de and offered him the gifts Nacris had sent. In addition to the Silvanesti sword, there were various other pretty items stolen by the raiders on their sweep across the plains.

Painted pots and leather goods did not interest the ogre chief. Ungrah-de kicked through the pile of gifts at his feet until he came upon a rare item—a bronze scale. Cunning Nacris had included it intentionally. It was the same scale Duranix had sent to Zannian as a warning to turn back from Yala-tene.

Ungrah-de picked up the scale in one hand, sniffed it, and said a single word to Ont.

The smaller ogre, translating, turned to Harak and asked, “Dragon?”

“Yes,” Harak said, “a scale from a bronze dragon.” Kneeling before this gargantuan ogre, he felt exactly as Ont had characterized him, like a bird, a sparrow in a ring of vultures.

Ungrah asked a question, and Ont relayed. “You take from dragon?”

A little embellishment never hurt a story. “No. My chief, the mighty Zannian, struck this off the dragon Duranix.”

“Where is dragon now?” the chief asked, through Ont.

Harak looked up at the hulking ogre. “Flown away, to the setting sun. The powerful Zannian chased him away.”

Ont translated this. Ungrah responded with a sharp-sounding query.

“He says, if your chief so strong, why need Ungrah-de?”

“Tell the dread chief my people are worn down from long days of fighting. The villagers have chosen to hide behind walls of stone and refuse to come out and fight, face to face, like men—ah, like ogres.”

Ont conveyed this reply. More of Ungrah-de’s warriors gathered around them. The chief thrust his jutting jaw forward, clacking his lower tusks against his upper fangs. He asked what was in the alliance for him.

“Plunder,” Harak said loudly, spreading his hands wide. “All the horses and oxen you can carry off. Cloth, furs, and anything else in the village.”

“Humans?” Ungrah asked slyly.

Though it made his stomach churn, Harak nodded. “Yes. As many as you can take.”

When Ont translated this, the ogres began talking all at once, bellowing, pointing, and gnashing their prominent teeth. Harak tried to interrupt but it was like whistling against thunder. Ungrah-de noticed the human trying to speak and roared for quiet.

Ogres are taciturn and slow to speak, but once they get going, they’re equally hard to silence. When his bellow failed, Ungrah snatched a club from his belt and laid about with this huge persuader, knocking some of his warriors out cold. Others retreated out of reach, nursing bloody noses or spitting out cracked teeth.

Ungrah shoved the end of the club in Harak’s face and roared a question. Ont, after shouldering his way out of the mob, translated.

“He says what else do you have for him?” Ont added in a low voice, “Give cursed blade now. I pick you up and run when Ungrah die!”

Harak nodded, feigning agreement, but he also noticed Ungrah watching them both warily. The chieftain, he was certain, had understood Ont’s words.

Harak opened his fur coat and drew out the wrapped bundle. As he pulled the leather away from the sword, ogres around him grunted. Lacking metal themselves, they greatly prized the few pieces they acquired by raiding or trading.

Obvious appreciation showed in Ungrah-de’s dark eyes, and one taloned paw moved as if to touch the blade. He hesitated.

“It’s all right. Ont thinks it’s cursed.” Harak pulled away the rest of the wrapping and held the sword in his naked hands. “But it’s not.”

Ont’s shaggy brows arched upward, and his wide mouth fell open in surprise. In the next instant, Ungrah took hold of the long sword (in his huge hands it resembled a dagger) and ran the keen point through Ont’s throat. Dark blood welled out of the wound. His knees folded and, gurgling, he toppled. Ungrah withdrew the blade smoothly. The treacherous ogre writhed on the icy turf until a pair of Ungrah’s troop finished him with their clubs.

Harak was still staring at the dying Ont when he felt the warm, sticky tip of the elven sword pressed against his jawbone. Without moving his head, he shifted his eyes to the wielder.

“Great, dread chief,” Harak said carefully, “surely you won’t kill me after I have gifted you with such a blade?”

“Why shouldn’t I?” Ungrah said, and Harak quickly realized his command of the plains language was far better than Ont’s had been. “Was this not a plot by little Garnt to murder me?”

“Yes and no, great chief. My story was true. I am here to persuade you to return with me to the Valley of the Falls to fight alongside my chief, Zannian.”

The sword moved forward a hair, breaking Harak’s skin. “What was this foolishness about the Silvanesti blade?”

Despite the debilitating cold, sweat formed on Harak’s brow and slowly trickled down behind his ear to sting the tiny cut the ogre had given him. With the blade still pricking his jaw, he explained how he had duped Ont’s chief into helping him find Ungrah-de.

“It’s good you slew Ont,” Harak finished. “If he had gone back and told Garnt you were not struck down by the curse, there might have been war between your bands.”

Ungrah took the sword away from Harak’s face. “As I am a wolf, they are rabbits,” he scoffed. “Garnt’s tribe is no threat. Someday I will eat them.”

Harak wondered queasily if that was a boast, or merely the simple truth.

The chieftain bellowed commands, and the ogres erupted into action. Harak thought they were breaking camp, preparing to march to Zannian’s aid, and he grew puzzled when they began piling up a great heap of broken tree trunks and dry brush in the center of the camp.

“Great chief, what’s happening?” he asked.

“We go to your fight, but first we punish ourselves.”

Harak’s questions were lost in a forest of giant, fur-clad bodies, dashing about the high, arid plateau in busy preparation. Though brutally strong, for their size the ogres were surprisingly agile and plainly inured to their harsh environs. He counted close to a hundred, of both sexes. They would be a powerful reinforcement for Zannian. Too powerful, perhaps. He wondered what would happen if the ogres decided to turn on their human allies.

Embers were brought from the recesses of the ogres’ cave to the enormous pile of wood and brush in the center of the camp. Driven by the incessant daytime wind, the woodpile rapidly caught fire. Harak wondered if the creatures planned to immolate members of their own band.

Pairs of female ogres appeared, carrying ox hides tied to poles. The skins had been sewn back together in the shape of their former owners, and they sloshed significantly.

Harak’s brown eyes widened. The ogres used whole ox hides as wineskins!

Wine proved to be too grand a description of the beverage that soon poured forth. The dark, brown brew smelled something like old ox hide and something like sour grain. They didn’t use drinking vessels but crowded around the skins, which were each held by a pair of females. The drinkers received a spray of brown brew in their gaping mouths. Harak learned an ogre’s prowess for drink was judged as much by the amount he could swallow in a single gulp as by how well he stood up to the wildly intoxicating effects.

A muscular hand thumped his back. Regaining his balance, he turned to find Ungrah-de glaring down at him.

“Man will have tsoong,” he rumbled, gesturing at the wineskins.

It was obviously a test, not of manners but of strength. Offering his most charming smile, Harak doffed his fur cap and said, “After you, great chief.”

Ungrah snorted; vapor streamed from his flat, leathery nostrils in the frigid air. He preceded Harak to one of the waiting ox hides, swatting warriors aside like so many pinecones.

The ogre females held the skin as high as they could to reach the chiefs gaping mouth. At a wave of his meaty hand, they pressed the sides of the hide together, directing a stream of tsoong into Ungrah’s mouth. The chieftain’s cheeks and throat ballooned as a river of brew flowed and flowed into his mouth. Harak’s own mouth hung open in shock. He was so amazed that he forgot to be disgusted.

The females drained half the hide into their chief, stopping only because they needed to adjust their grip in order to dispense more. Ungrah stepped back and wiped his tusks with the back of one hand. His warriors roared his name.

Whirling, the ogre chief took Harak roughly by the front of his fur cape. His pupils had shrunk to the size of jet beads.

“You next,” he said. His breath was indescribably foul.

Harak swallowed hard. “Thank you,” he said. He winked at the burly tsoong carriers, saying, “Ladies, be kind to a stranger and a human. Don’t drown me!”

Ungrah repeated his remarks in his own tongue, and the females giggled, a sound only somewhat lower than an ox’s grunting.

Harak offered a prayer to his ancestors, though he thought it highly unlikely any of that wayward crew could help him now. Opening his mouth, he shut his eyes and waited. A stream of brew hit him. The force of it drove him back a step. Gulping rapidly, he managed to keep up with the flow. Then it doubled.

Tsoong washed over his face and down his chin. He tried tilting his head back, but that just allowed the liquid to run up his nose. Choking, he swallowed what he could, then finally turned aside, face purpling.

The flavor was... well, awful didn’t even begin to describe it. Intensely bitter, tsoong had an aftertaste so sweet it made his jaw lock tight. And the smell! He was sure they must ferment it in the ox hides to get such a strong smell of putrid meat.

His stomach roiled. Tsoong threatened to climb back up his throat, but he held it down with a trick he’d learned in Zannian’s band—he rolled his tongue backward, blocking his throat. The intoxicating effects of the brew hit him and lightened his head. A fiery aura enveloped him, the first warmth he’d felt since coming to the high mountains. His nausea faded.

A powerful hand spun him around. The camp whirled about his head. The blurry visage of Ungrah-de swam before Harak’s eyes.

“You did not lose the tsoong!” the chieftain exclaimed with dawning respect. All around them grown ogre warriors were on their knees, retching. “You are a warrior indeed, little bird! Have you ogre blood in you?”

Shame on my ancestors if that’s true, Harak thought groggily, but was sober enough not to say it out loud.

“A spicy... drink, great chief, but I’ve had stronger,” Harak said. Anything stronger would have loosened his teeth.

Ungrah picked him up by the back of his cloak and shook him playfully. “I like you, man. What are you called again?”

“Harak, Nebu’s son.”

“The night is long and cold, Harak Nebu’s Son! You will tell me of your battles, of the enemies you have slain! Come, let us punish ourselves again, to make our spirits angry and our future battles sweet!”

It was a long night. Harak was obliged to drink more of the foul brew but was able to fool the drunken ogres into thinking he was keeping up with their excesses. Ungrah passed out near midnight, the last of the ogres to succumb. Hoarfrost was forming on the snoring ogres, so Harak crawled close to the dying bonfire before blessedly losing consciousness. When morning came at last, he well understood why they called their revels “punishment.” The aftereffects of tsoong proved to be even worse than the ordeal of swallowing it in the first place.

Beramun lay on her belly in the high grass. All around her, scouts from Karada’s band of nomads were likewise hidden. It was early afternoon and hot. No shade softened the glare of the sun on the open savanna. Sweat pooled in the small of her back, but she ignored it, as she ignored the fly buzzing around her face and the maddening itch on her ankle.

The rest of the band was half a league back, hidden in a dry wash. Since leaving their camp on the eastern plain, Karada’s people had covered better than fifteen leagues a day—an amazing distance considering a third of them were not horsed.

Continuing that pace would have brought them to Yala-tene in six and a half days, but just after dawn Karada halted everyone. Her scouts had come galloping back reporting fresh signs of strangers on horseback ahead.

“Could be Zannian’s men,” Beramun said, her heart racing.

Beside her, Karada was reflective. “Or Silvanesti. Were the tracks shod?” Elves put copper shoes on their horses’ hoofs. Humans rode unshod animals.

The scouts reported the horses were unshod, and Karada ordered the band to take cover in the dusty ravine. She placed her old comrade Pakito in charge of defending the children, old folks, and baggage, then picked two dozen riders to follow her forward to investigate the strangers. Beramun was included in the scouting party since she knew Zannian’s men on sight.

Before they rode away, a girl of eighteen summers dashed out from the line of baggage-bearing travois. Long auburn braid bouncing on her back, she ran to Karada and clutched the nomad chieftain’s leg.

“Take me!” the girl demanded. “I’m too old to remain with the children!”

Karada shook her leg, breaking the girl’s hold. “Get back, Mara,” she said sternly. “You’re not a warrior.”

“Neither is she!” The girl pointed to Beramun.

“She’s a hunter, and she knows the enemy. Go back to Pakito.” When Mara showed no sign of moving, Karada pushed her away with her foot. “Do as I say! Go!”

The column of riders trotted away. Beramun looked back. Mara glared at her, tears staining her face, then whirled and walked back to the waiting band.

Beramun wanted to feel sorry for the girl. Her life, like Beramun’s, had been difficult. Captured and enslaved by Silvanesti, Mara had been freed by Karada. Beramun had suffered likewise at the hands of Zannian’s raiders. They had killed her family and forced her to labor in their camp, but she had escaped and made her way to Yala-tene. Though she could sympathize with what Mara had suffered, Beramun found it impossible to like her. The girl’s jealousy was all too plain.

Half a league west, they found the trail of the unshod horses. Karada examined the signs. Whoever they were, they rode in a double line, keeping precise intervals between each horse. Beramun felt the raiders were too wild to keep such order and wondered who this could be.

Karada, cinching her sword belt tightly around her waist, ordered Beramun and ten scouts to dismount and search westward on foot for fresh signs. She and the remaining mounted scouts strung their bows and followed at a distance.

Time passed. The sun climbed to its zenith then began its journey down to the west. Beramun walked slowly, constantly scanning the horizon for movement. Her thoughts wandered back to Yala-tene.

How many days had it been since she’d left—twelve, fourteen? Did the walls still stand? Did Karada’s kindly brother Amero still lead the village? Or had he and the rest already fallen to the raiders, never knowing she had reached her goal?

Unconscious of the gesture, Beramun rested her hand against a spot high on her chest. Beneath her fingers was the green mark placed there by Sthenn—a smooth, iridescent triangle, a bit larger than a human thumbprint. The mark had nearly been her undoing when she first arrived in Yala-tene. She had no memory of receiving it, but Duranix said it stamped her as Sthenn’s property and had urged her immediate death. Amero had defended her against his powerful friend. Had her long absence changed Amero’s mind? Perhaps the people of Yala-tene now believed her to be doing the evil dragon’s work.

Beramun kept the mark hidden from Karada and her people. She couldn’t bear the thought that the same hatred and loathing she’d seen in the bronze dragon’s eyes might bloom in Karada’s clear hazel gaze.

The nomad on her immediate right, a dark-skinned fellow named Bahco, suddenly dropped to one knee. All along the line the scouts followed suit. With the pronounced heat-shimmer in the air, Beramun and the others would be invisible behind tall grass so long as they remained still.

She glanced at Bahco. His ebony skin was sweat-sheened, like her own. By following the line of his gaze, she saw dark figures moving against the bright horizon. The objects grew larger as she watched. They were closing. She and the other scouts dropped to their stomachs. Bahco crawled back to warn Karada.

Raising her head slightly, Beramun could make out six figures on horseback and, between them, four people walking on foot. Each pair of walkers had a long pole on their shoulders. A butchered animal carcass swayed from each pole.

Beramun sighed and relaxed a little. They were probably not Zannian’s men. Such a hunting party would likely not be scouting for a force of raiders.

They were approaching from the northwest, heading southeast, which would bring them obliquely across Beramun’s hiding place from right to left. As they drew nearer, sunlight flashed off the metal they wore, and Beramun fretted anew. Hunters avoided wearing metal, as the glare and clatter of it scared away game. Who were these people?

Someone came sliding through grass behind her. A dry, callused hand touched her forearm. She turned and saw the nomad chieftain crouched behind her.

Karada held a finger to her lips. Her bow was in her other hand. Beramun looked a question at her, but Karada’s face was like a mask of seasoned wood. The marks on her face and neck, which had given her the name “Scarred One,” stood out whitely against her tan.

Faintly, the strangers’ voices could be heard. One of them laughed. The odor of freshly killed game was strong now. Beramun didn’t dare lift her head higher for a better view. Instead, she slowly parted the grass stems in front of her, trying to peer through the summer growth.

Her caution was for naught. Karada suddenly rose to her knees and in one swift motion, nocked an arrow and loosed it. Beramun heard the flint-tipped shaft strike flesh; the sound was unmistakable.

Shouts erupted, and the riders urged their horses to a gallop even as Beramun wondered why Karada had given them away by attacking. All around her, the nomads rose from hiding places and picked off the mounted strangers. It was over in a few heartbeats, all six riders slain.

“Stand up, Beramun, and see who we’ve found.”

The nomad chieftain bent over the one she’d shot, turning his lifeless face to the sun and pulling off his helmet. A shock of pale hair was revealed—and sharply pointed ears.

“Elves,” Beramun breathed. “How did you know, Karada?”

The four bearers on foot had thrown down the deer carcasses they carried and stood in a huddle. They were elves too, dark-haired and more sunburned than their mounted comrades. When they heard the name of their captor, they fell to their knees in the trampled grass.

“Spare us, terrible Karada!” one cried. “We are not soldiers. We bear no arms!”

“You’re elves,” she replied coldly. “Why should I spare any of you?”

“We’re poor folk from the south woods,” said another, “hired to work for the great lord. Spare our lives, great chieftain! We will leave your land and never return!”

“What lord?” Karada asked. “Who leads you?”

“Lord Balif.”

Bahco, leaning on his bow, was startled. “Out here? Why would the commander of Silvanos’s host stray so far from home?”

“A hunting expedition, sir. Lord Balif delights in the hunt.”

“Don’t I know it.” Karada prodded the nearest elf with her bow. “How many soldiers are with him?”

He shook his head, exchanging a frightened look with the others. “I don’t know the number, lady.”

“More than what you see here?”

He looked around at the watching nomads, then said, “Yes. Twice this many, could be.”

Karada’s eyes shone. “So Balif goes hunting with fewer than a hundred retainers?” She punched a fist in the air. “I’ll have him! I’ll hang his head from my tent post!”

“But what about Amero and Yala-tene?” Beramun cried.

“What about them?” Karada said coolly.

Beramun was stunned by her indifference. “We have to help them. Now!”

Karada tossed her bow to Bahco and folded her tanned arms. “Amero can hold out a half day longer. I’ve waited too many years to get Balif at sword point!”

Beramun tried to argue, but the rising color in the nomad chiefs face told her it was useless. Love for her brother had given way to a dream of vengeance, a dream Karada would not deny herself.

From the bearers, they learned Balif’s camp was two leagues southeast. Karada sent riders to tell Pakito to bring the rest of the band forward. Her plan was to wait for nightfall, then surround the elves’ camp and take them while they slept. Beramun’s worry that it might be a trap was dismissed outright, reasoning the Silvanesti had no way of knowing the nomads had come so far west.

“As far as they know,” Karada said, smiling a bit, “we’re still in the foothills of Strar, where you found us. Everyone has been chased out of this region, right down to Miteera and his centaurs.” Her smile widened into a fierce grin. “Balif thinks he’s safe!”

The nomads rounded up the slain Silvanesti’s horses and prepared to join up with Pakito. Beramun was relieved when Karada ordered the captives bound rather than killed, and the woodland elves were led away by rawhide halters looped around their necks.

“I ought to burn them, as their masters tried to burn us on Mount Ibal,” Karada muttered. Her hazel eyes narrowed. “But I won’t. I’ve learned many things from the Silvanesti, but they are not my teachers in war.”

Beramun was relieved, then startled as Karada’s demeanor lightened abruptly. “I’ll have him at last! Balif will fall to me!” the nomad chief exclaimed. “It’s you, Beramun. You’re my good luck. Your coming has been a portent.”

Beramun shook her head sadly. “I did not come, I was sent.”

Unmoved, Karada turned her attention to the elves’ game. “Someone pick up that meat! Balif’s hunters went to the trouble to kill those deer. The least we can do is eat them!”

They found Balif’s camp just where the bearers said they would, by a small tributary of the Thon-Tanjan. A palisade of sharpened stakes surrounded the tents, and a few mounted warriors stood guard, but the eighty-odd elves in camp were sleeping as Karada closed in around them.

Beramun had never seen bows used at night before. The effect was terrifying. With no more sound than the snap of the bowstring, lethal arrows came flying out of the darkness. Highlighted by the campfires behind them, the mounted guards had no chance. They quickly went down, and Karada sent ten nomads forward to break a hole in the hedge of stakes. Only a small gap in the palisade was opened before the nomads were seen. The rattle of bronze gongs roused the Silvanesti from their slumber.

“Form on me!” Karada called, placing herself at the head of a close column of riders.

“Do we give quarter?” asked Pakito, a giant on a mammoth horse.

The chiefs wheat-colored horse reared as her hands tightened on the reins. “Spare all who lay down their arms!” Karada shouted. “Now, at them!”

Three abreast, the mounted nomads charged through the gap made in the line of stakes. At first there was little resistance. Hastily donning what armor was at hand, the Silvanesti hung back around a central cluster of tents. Several javelins flew at the nomads, emptying a few saddles, but Karada was too canny to ride straight into the center of an aroused enemy camp. She sent half her warriors off to the left, circling just inside the palisade, while she led the rest to the right. A second wave of nomads, headed by Pakito, brought in torches and set fire to the outer ring of tents.

Fire blazed up, revealing the confusing scene. Beramun, armed with an unfamiliar sword, tried to keep pace with Karada. She did not strike a single blow, for the elves had done her no harm, but Silvanesti on foot around her did not realize this. A half-clad elf threw a spear at her. It seemed to leave his hand slowly, then gain frightening speed as it plunged at her face. She brought up her sword to deflect it, but a heedless, howling nomad rode in front of her and took the Silvanesti javelin in the ribs.

Shaking off her battle lethargy, Beramun rode through a gap in the churning crowd toward Karada. The Silvanesti adopted an interesting way of fighting their mounted foes. Instead of trying to make a line, they grouped into small knots of four to six warriors each, presenting a circle of sharp points all around them. They might have held off Karada’s band with this tactic but for the nomads’ bows. Whenever a knot of Silvanesti proved too tough to break, bows were called for and the defending elves picked off.

Between the two biggest campfires, a large contingent of elves had collected, led by a tall, fair-haired Silvanesti clad in a white shift stained with blood. Shouting in unison, the elves charged their mounted enemies and drove them back.

Karada shouldered through the melee. “Balif! It’s Karada! Yield or perish!” she cried.

The fighting continued, however, so the nomad chief called on the archers beside her, ordering them to spare the tall elf leader.

A quick thrum of arrows cut down several Silvanesti standing beside Balif. When he saw his companions felled, the pale-haired elf snapped an order. Within moments, the remaining Silvanesti grounded their arms. A few on the far side of the camp did not hear the command or would not obey it. They fought on until they were overcome, and more died.

By midnight, the fighting was over. Half the elves and a score of Karada’s warriors had been slain. The surviving elves were plainly shocked by the swift battle, and they sat disconsolately on the ground, lords and commoners alike.

Balif, slightly wounded, surrendered his sword to Pakito, who presented the elf lord to Karada.

Looking down on Balif from horseback, she relished the ironic change of fortune that had brought him into her hands.

“So, your life is mine now,” she said. “What do you say to that?”

Balif mopped sweat and blood from his high forehead. “I say I am wiser than even I knew,” he answered in a subdued voice.

She frowned, plainly at a loss. “What do you mean?”

“Years ago I spared you after the battle of the riverbend. Had I killed you, the leader of your band of nomads now might have no reason to spare my life.”

Some of the nomads laughed at this surprising reasoning, but Beramun was still puzzled. “If you’d killed Karada back then, this whole battle might not have happened,” she pointed out.

The elf lord turned to her, and she was struck by the strangeness of his eyes. They were like a cloudless sky, or watered rock crystal....

“Do I know you?” Balif said, pale brows rising. Even in defeat his manner was winning. She gave her name. “Well, Beramun, consider this: felling a single tree does not bring down an entire forest.”

The nomads laughed again, but Beramun was as mixed-up as ever, both by his subtle words and by his demeanor.

“You still talk too much,” Karada said harshly. “Stand where you are and keep silent!”

The captured elves were bound hand and foot and their camp thoroughly looted. Stores of fine bronze weapons, helmets, and breastplates were distributed to nomads who had distinguished themselves in the fight. Karada offered a long, yellow dagger to Beramun, but the girl declined.

“I’d rather learn the bow,” she said.

“Then you shall.” Karada tossed the dagger to Mara. “Put that in my baggage.” Mara slipped into the crowd, the bronze dagger clutched in her fist.

When Balif was separated from the rest and led away, it became obvious not all the nomads were in favor of sparing him. A man named Kepra, whose face bore the old marks of severe burns, argued forcefully for the elf’s death.

“Have you forgotten this?” he hissed, gesturing at his own face. “My mate and children burned to death at Mount Ibal in the fire his soldiers started!”

“Those Silvanesti were commanded by Tamanithas, not Balif,” Pakito said.

The elf general Tamanithas had long pursued Karada with fanatical fury. His soldiers had set fire to the dry grass on the slopes of Mount Ibal, killing over half her band eight years ago. Tamanithas did not long enjoy his victory. He perished in personal combat with Karada, two years to the day after the fiery destruction he’d inflicted.

“Balif is no better!” Kepra insisted, his voice rising. “Cut off his head, I say! You’ve spoken of doing just that many times!”

During the debate, Balif had sat quietly at the center of the emotional nomads. He now asked if he could speak, and Karada gave him leave.

“In the plan of life it matters little whether you kill me or not. The Throne of the Stars will continue, and Speaker Silvanos will find a new servant to carry out his will.”

The humans around him muttered and swore.

“That said, I must admit I do not want to die.”

His declaration was followed by loud suggestions the elf lord be mutilated or blinded. Beramun noticed that for all his seeming calm, Balif’s pallid face grew even whiter as he listened.

Karada let her people rant a while, then said, “A hunter does not injure an animal on purpose. She kills it or lets it go. There is no third way.”

“I could be ransomed,” Balif said. The word meant nothing to the nomads, so he explained. “Send word to Silvanost of my capture, and demand payment in exchange for my freedom. I’m certain the Speaker will barter for me, if the price is not too high.”

Nomads greeted the notion with enthusiasm. Once more there was much noisy wrangling, this time over what to ask for. It wasn’t lost on Balif that Kepra and a good number of other nomads remained silent, staring at him with unconcealed hatred.

Karada called again for silence. “As I am chief of this band, so your life belongs to me,” she said to the elf lord. “Eight years ago I was in your place, and you spared my life—”

“No!” many nomads shouted, interrupting her. “Kill him!”

“Ransom! Ransom!” chanted others.

The tumult died down, and Karada’s gaze bored into Balif s. “You won’t know the day you’re meant to die. That will be my choosing. Until then, we shall see if your great lord Silvanos values you as much as you say he does.”

Balif nodded solemnly.

“Take any four of the well-born captives,” Karada told Pakito. “Give them clothes to cover their backsides, a skin of water each, and a strip of jerky. Tell them to return to Silvanost with this message: Lord Balif will live only if I receive five hundred bronze swords, five hundred fleet horses—mares and stallions in equal number—and five hundred pounds of purest bronze.”

Gasps arose at the huge price named. None of them had ever seen so much metal, and the band had never had five hundred horses at one time before.

“Will they be able to pay it?” asked Bahco, awed.

“They will pay or receive Balif’s head in a pot of salt,” said Karada flatly. Her bloodthirsty remarks did not seem to worry Balif as much as the silent anger of Kepra and those who sided with him. In fact, the elf lord smiled at Karada. She turned brusquely away.

“It’ll take time to gather such wealth,” Pakito said. “We’re riding west. How will we ever get the ransom, if the great elf chief agrees?”

Karada pondered for a moment. Her eye fell on Kepra, scarred inside and out by fire.

“We will give them one year’s time,” she said. “Let the Silvanesti meet us then on the south slope of Mount Ibal. There the ransom will be given over... if Balif still lives.”

The last four words were added in a mutter, but the elf lord agreed with surprisingly little rancor. Four noble elves were cut loose to deliver the message. At first they were reluctant to present such shameful words to the Speaker of the Stars, but Balif convinced them. They were given their meager supplies and sent off. The hoof-beats of their mounts faded quickly into the night.

The nomads dispersed to make preparations for night camp. Soon Karada and Beramun were alone with the captive elf lord.

Balif sat down on the ground. “Congratulations, Karada,” he said.

“For what?”

“You are treating with the mightiest ruler in the world,” he said, almost bemused. He looked past the nomad chieftain standing over him, focusing his gaze on the starry sky. “By doing so, you and your people cease to be a band of scavengers and vagabonds. Now you are a nation, like mine.”

“Like yours?” she said, spitting the words. “Spirits preserve us from such a fate.”