The Schemes of Dragons

VI

THE SUNLIGHT HAD BARELY begun to filter through the trees when Toren and his captors broke camp. The rain had quit early the evening before, but its effects were still omnipresent. The leaves sparkled, heavy with moisture; the ground squished beneath the travellers' feet; and a chorus of frogs was loudly celebrating its good fortune.

Toren stared at the crumbling ash of their fire. The ring of hearthstones was the last evidence of Fhali presence he would be likely to see. His grandfather had placed some of those stones, though the memory was now lost with the totem. He whispered the ritual words spoken when taking leave of the dead, and turned his back to his tribe's land.

He walked for four days like a drugged man, taking no interest in his surroundings. Deena taught him a few words of her language each time they camped, but he memorized the lessons with some distant part of himself. He did not care which forks of the trail they took. Each morning when he was roused, he would already be longing for the night, when his weariness would pull him quickly off to sleep.

What would his son be thinking? He was due back at his village. As the days passed, would Rhi assume that he had been killed? Surely, after a month, he would.

Rhi would have to be adopted by his uncle, or his grandfather, and plan to receive their totem in place of Toren's. Toren wished there were a way to tell his son that he would be back in time. It would be many years before Rhi's manhood ceremony. Surely he would be back by then.

The voices of his ancestors sent no comforting words.

On the morning of the fourth day, something intruded into his fugue like a woodpecker battering at a weather-hardened tree. He stopped.

Geim barely avoided bumping into him. "What is it?"

Toren shook the dust out of his head. "I don't know," he said, but even as he spoke he felt a familiar, ethereal tug. In the past he had always interpreted the sensation as the speech of his ancestors. The signal pulled him past Ivayer, down the trail to a large boulder.

The top of the stone was flat. Bones had been placed there.

Toren pointed. Ivayer picked one up. It was a human ulna. There were also a few vertebrae, a section of a tibia, and several other smaller fragments difficult to identify. Each showed indentations left by filed teeth. The hair on the nape of Toren's neck began to rise.

"It's a border marker. We are entering the territory of the Amane," Toren told Geim.

"Amane? The cannibals?"

"Yes. I have a bad feeling."

Geim frowned, and translated Toren's comments. Ivayer ran a finger along the gnawed surface of the bone he held and answered in slow, thoughtful tones.

"How far is it around the Amane nation?" Geim asked.

Toren pointed east, then west. "Their range stretches all the way to the coast, and all the way to the Flat."

Ivayer seemed displeased with the news. Eventually he tossed down the bone and jerked his thumb at the trail. Geim translated his comments.

"We came through on the way south. In fact, it was near here that we first spotted your tracks."

"You were lucky," Toren responded. "By this time they may have discovered traces of your earlier visit. They will be more vigilant."

"Nevertheless, there doesn't seem to be a way around them. We will go on."

"Then give me my blowgun back so that I can give an accounting of myself before I am eaten."

Much to his surprise, Ivayer granted the request, though they made him place his pouch of darts on the rear of his belt, where it was in plain view of Geim and Deena. The latter, as usual, kept a nocked arrow in her bow.

Ivayer led the way. Toren kept his weapon in his hands. He drummed his nails against the hard reed tube. The premonition refused to fade.

The forest, contrary to his mood, was bright and fresh. Birds twittered through the branches, gathering material for nests. The moist humus and the recently washed leaves gave off a thick, fecund aroma. As they passed through occasional clearings, Achird's rays beat pleasantly on their shoulders, mitigating the late winter chill. The scene should have had a cheering effect.

Half a day's hike past the border marker, the sensation of danger suddenly overwhelmed Toren. He pitched forward into the mud. An arrow whistled over his head.

Ahead, Ivayer screamed, dropping to his knees, struck by another arrow squarely in the center of his chest. Toren rolled into the brush. He saw Geim dive for cover. Deena, however, stood her ground, her bowstring drawn back as far as she could pull, feathers at her chin, searching the brush. She fired. Someone screamed. Deena bolted for the protection of a fallen log. An arrow caught her in the forearm just as she ducked out of sight.

Toren turned back to Ivayer. His face was a rictus of pain. He clutched the shaft in his heart. He had a few seconds at most to live. Yet, to Toren's amazement, he sloughed the bracelet off his wrist and threw it to the modhiv.

As Ivayer collapsed, the woods filled with the sound of charging men, at least two coming down the trail, and others though the foliage at either side. "Run!" Geim shouted. As he called out, an arrow grazed his upper arm, ironically the one Toren had wounded days before.

Before the archer could reload, Toren sprinted down the trail toward Geim's position.

An arrow hummed past his side and ricochetted off a small rock.

Toren cursed. The latest missile had come from a new direction. An archer in a tree was cutting off their retreat.

Geim launched his net. It snared the archer. The man gave one spasmodic jerk and fell to a hard impact beside the trail.

From the original direction, four Amane warriors burst into view, bearing spears and shields.

Toren fired his blowgun. The dart caught in the thick hide of a shield. There was no time to reload. Toren jumped behind the log where Deena had taken refuge. Geim was already there. He had finally had time to pull his bow from behind his back and draw an arrow from his quiver.

The Amane lifted their shields and kept coming. Geim drew back and released. The arrow raced completely through the shield and sank deep in the lead warrior's body. The Amane staggered, jaws agape. The second Amane collided with the first.

Deena's wound made it impossible to use her sword. She drew it and shoved the hilt toward Toren. Geim eliminated the third Amane as he had the first, then the fight became too close for archery. Toren brandished the sword and the fourth man, perhaps daunted by the worsening odds, halted his charge. Neither he nor Toren would commit to a thrust or a throw. In the meantime, the second Amane recovered his footing.

Geim drew his sword. It was an almost instantaneous motion; one moment his hand was empty, the next it held the blade. "Out of the way!"

Toren barely managed to comply. Geim waded in, slashing. Both Amane stepped back, shields out. But the thick leather and wood were not equipped to thwart a steel edge. The first two cuts opened huge rents in the shield of one warrior, the next drove through that of the other man and sliced his arm.

The Amane reevaluated their position, turned, and ran away.

Geim tensed as if to rush after them, but Toren yanked him sideways. An arrow flew by. The remaining archer was still vigilant.

"Come on," Toren said. "The Amane like to patrol in bands of eleven. That means there are four we haven't seen yet."

Geim sheathed his sword, picked up his bow, and they retreated, keeping behind cover. On the way Geim recovered his magic net from the fallen archer's body. When they were sure they were out of the surviving bowman's line of fire, they straightened up and quickened their pace.

The entire ambush had taken about two minutes. Toren's head spun, thinking of all that had happened in that time. He scarcely noticed that he was loading a dart in his blowgun, but because of it he was the person most prepared when they rounded a massive tree and found themselves face to face with another pair of Amane.

The cannibals seemed equally surprised by the encounter. Toren aimed his weapon and blew with all the force his lungs possessed. His dart disappeared to the feathers in the gut of the closest man. The second one reacted instantly, driving toward Toren with his spear. Toren twisted, but it was not sufficient.

Geim drew his sword and cut downward in a single motion. The blade clipped off the spear head. The blunt shaft slammed into Toren's abdomen, knocking the air out of him. He and the Amane fell together to the ground. He stared straight into his enemy's glare, smelled the breath erupting between filed teeth. Geim followed through. The glare went dim. Deena pulled off the spasming body while Geim dealt with the man Toren had wounded.

Toren sat up. His upper abdomen throbbed. The spear haft had torn his skin open, badly bruising the muscles beneath. Finally he was able to inhale.

Geim kneeled down beside him. "Are you all right?"

"I will be shortly," Toren wheezed. "I am lucky you know how to use that sword so well."

Geim shook his head. "I am an amateur compared to the men who instructed me. I started too late in life."

Toren's attention was sucked in by the last feeble, waning movements of the Amane he had shot. Geim had wielded the deathblow, but poison so near the heart had guaranteed loss of life. A dose of antidote would not have worked in time. Toren had killed a man.

They heard no indication of pursuit, so Geim allowed Toren a few moments to recover, and went to Deena. She, due to their previous haste, still carried the arrow in her forearm. The shaft had travelled completely through so that it jutted out the far side. Geim broke off the point and drew it out. She bit her lip, tears welling, but made no outcry. Geim bound both entry and exit wounds.

That done, he picked up the discarded obsidian tip and examined it, frowning.

"The Amane do not use poison," Toren commented. "They believe it taints the meat."

Geim nodded, and tossed the point away. Deena said something emphatic to him. He glanced at the cut on his arm and grunted. Though superficial, because of his exertions during the battles it was bleeding badly. At Deena's insistence, they delayed even longer while Toren bound it.

They were ready to go. Geim glanced doubtfully to the right and left. "This time, you choose," he told Toren.

Toren picked a direction at random, and they set out.