The Woman Who Rides Like a Man

3 BAZHIR SHAMAN

FOR A MOMENT ALANNA STARED AT THE VOICE. Finally she tried a weak grin. “You’re joking, of course.”

“I have never been more serious.”

Alanna shook her head. “I think you had better explain it to me.”

“Certain tribes have been at war with the king in the North for two generations,” Mukhtab began. “The cost has been great for both sides. Among our people there is bitterness between those who accept your king and those who do not. And in the end, the Northern king must win.”

“How do you know?” Alanna wanted to know.

“A small Gift of prophecy is given to each Voice,” was the reply. “Your king will win if we continue to fight, because this time the Balance is weighed in his favor. Conquered, my people—our people, now—would be driven from the desert that is mother and father to us. All those things that enable us to make war against the king and against the hillmen who are our enemies would be taken away. The tribes would be scattered; we would be one people no more.

“But if Prince Jonathan were to become the Voice of the Tribes, he would be king one day—a Bazhir king. He would know us as we do ourselves. The tribes you call ‘renegade’ would make peace, for none may war against the Voice of the Tribes. They will make peace, and the Voice will bring them into Tortall without bloodshed.

“We must accept the king in the North; there is no other way. But we can do it so that we never forget who we are. Prince Jonathan is the key. With my passing, he will be the Voice, and my people will be safe.”

Alanna nibbled at her thumb, considering. “Maybe Jon won’t want to do it,” she said at last. “The position seems to carry a lot of heartache to me.”

Ali Mukhtab smiled. “Jonathan was born to rule, as you were born to make your own way. If there is any way he can better govern his people, he will take it. I have watched him for years. He will not turn his back on such power.” Reaching into his robe, he brought out a thick letter sealed with wax. “Will you send this and the history to him, and let him make the choice?”

Alanna took the letter. Muktab was right: Jon had to make this decision himself. “I’ll see that he gets it.”

Coram shook his head even as he pulled on his riding boots. “I don’t like leavin’ ye right now,” he protested for the twentieth time. “That Akhnan Ibn Nazzir would feed ye to the wolves as soon as look at ye, and ye’re sendin’ me back to Corus.”

“The sooner you ride to Corus, the sooner you’ll be back to look out for me,” Alanna said implacably. “This is important.”

“Keepin’ ye safe from that old buzzard isn’t?” Coram demanded. “Ye said that Mukhtab’s sendin’ a man with me?”

“He’s waiting with the packhorse now,” Alanna said, giving her friend an affectionate grin as they walked outside. “I’ll be all right. I have Faithful to look after me.”

Coram scowled at the black cat, who was trotting ahead. “Some protection,” he muttered. They halted, surprised to see Hakim Fahrar waiting with the horses. The tall Bazhir bowed.

“I am to ride with you,” he said in response to the question on their faces. “The Voice has said it.”

Alanna hugged Coram for a moment. “You’ll be back before you know it,” she said gruffly. “So leave!”

She watched the two men ride off, their packhorse trailing behind. Fingering the ember at her throat, she blinked her watering eyes.

You’re not alone, Faithful remarked. You have me still.

Alanna picked the cat up and hugged him tightly. She wasn’t crying simply because she felt lost without Coram: the gruff manservant would be with Jonathan soon, and she wouldn’t.

The Ordeal. She dropped through endless stretches of water, her lungs bursting for lack of air. She fought and fought, but she couldn’t find her way to the surface. She opened her mouth to scream—

She jerked awake, her mouth clamped shut so tightly that her jaws ached. She was forbidden to scream in the Chamber of the Ordeal!

Faithful fell to the ground from her chest. It had been his weight that made her sleeping mind remember that awful moment. About to yell her fury, she realized Faithful’s tail and fur were erect. Keeping silent for a moment, she heard a rustle of movement, the soft click of hard objects striking each other gently.

Carefully Alanna lifted her battle-axe from her weapons rack and—moving soundlessly—she slid out the back of the tent. With Faithful behind, she circled her home, a shadow among the camp’s other shadows.

A huddled figure was drawing designs before her door. She suddenly knew who it was, and could guess what he was up to. Hefting the axe, she hurled it into the sand at Akhnan Ibn Nazzir’s feet, then strode forward, the violet fire of her Gift turning the scene into purple daylight.

“Demon, I adjure thee, harm me not!” the old man screeched. “In the name of Mithros—”

“Be quiet!” Alanna snapped as people ran out of their tents, armed with swords and spears. “Now you’ve awakened everyone!”

Recognizing her at last, Ibn Nazzir gasped in fury. “I will cast you out!” he yelled. “I will cleanse our tribe of you and send you back into the Darkness where you belong!”

Examining the design the shaman had been working on, Alanna felt sick. It was called a Gate of Idramm: She had learned of it from Duke Roger, who had taught her and Jonathan sorcery when they were young.

“There are many kinds of creatures in our world,” the Duke of Conté had explained. “Call them demons, elementals, spirits—their variety is infinite. Some serve that force we call Good, some that called Evil. A Gate of Idramm summons all such entities within a certain range. The result—” He had shrugged his broad shoulders. “Is disastrous. Only fools construct a Gate without putting limits on it.”

This one was almost complete. Alanna shuddered. There were no limiting spells in the symbols of the design. “You stupid, ignorant, vicious old man!” she cried, scuffing it out with her bare foot. “You could have destroyed the entire village! Or didn’t you care as long as you took me with you?”

Ali Mukhtab had come to the fore of the watching people; she snapped at him, “He was doing a Gate of Idramm!”

The Voice turned white. “Are you mad?” he demanded of Akhnan Ibn Nazzir. “How dare you use sorcery you do not understand!”

“She is corrupting our people,” the shaman whined. “She has corrupted you, Ali Mukhtab. I wished only to rid the desert of her evil—”

“You would have rid the desert of us all!” hissed Mukhtab furiously. “Go to your tent, shaman! Remain there until I have chosen a fitting punishment for you!” As the old man fled, he turned to Alanna. “You have saved us all,” he told her.

Alanna pointed to Faithful, who blinked sleepily. “Thank my cat,” she said. “He woke me up.”

When she left her bed the next morning, Ishak, Kara, and Kourrem awaited her, vying for Faithful’s purrs. “You’ll spoil him,” Alanna said gruffly as she dressed. “And I’m the one who’ll have to live with a spoiled cat.”

“The men of the tribe do not believe he is a cat,” Ishak told her. “Some think he is a god. Some think he is a demon.”

“He’s neither,” Alanna informed him. She picked up Lightning. “Why doesn’t one of you show me where the blacksmith is?”

The blacksmith was Gammal, her large friend from Persopolis. He grinned at the chance to do her a service, scowled at the girls until they backed out of the way, and handed a bellows to Ishak. “Use it well, boy,” he advised as he turned to find his tongs.

Ishak looked at Alanna, terrified. “I’ve never done this,” he whispered.

When Gammal returned, Alanna was busily pumping the bellows, bringing the fire to a white heat. The large Bazhir shook his head and picked up the long portion of Lightning’s blade with his tongs, thrusting the metal into the fire until he judged it hot enough. Alanna thought she heard an ugly hum, but Gammal distracted her, booming, “Where did you learn to use the bellows, Woman Who Rides Like a Man?”

“From the king’s weapons-masters,” she shouted over the roar of the fire and the wheezing bellows. “We were at war with Tusaine. I was crippled with a wound, so I went to them to keep busy.”

“Could you mend the sword yourself?” the smith wanted to know. Even he had to raise his voice to be heard over the noise from the forge.

Alanna shook her head. “I could mend an ordinary sword,” she called, “but not one so well made.”

Gammal pulled the length of metal from the forge and she put up the bellows. Without the wheezing, she could clearly hear the humming sound from Lightning’s sheared-off blade. “Gammal, don’t—” she began, but the smith was striking. His hammer met the glowing metal; everyone was knocked down by the resulting explosion. When Alanna struggled to her feet, the fire was out, the anvil was cracked down the center, and Gammal was unconscious. She brought him around quickly with water fetched by Kourrem, and the Bazhir grinned.

That was a mistake, Faithful commented from a safe distance away. Look at the blade.

Lightning still lay on the anvil. After a moment Alanna touched it; the broken piece was as cold as the forge. “It was not meant to be struck by a hammer,” Ali Mukhtab’s voice said unexpectedly. Alanna spun, startled because she had not heard the Voice come up behind her. “You must find some other way to repair it, Alanna of Trebond.” He smiled suddenly, his white teeth flashing. “The people of this tribe lived very quietly before you came,” he commented, before turning and walking away.

Alanna scowled at the Voice’s retreating back, before she realized that Kara, Ishak, and Kourrem were giggling. “He is right,” Kara said. “But we are glad you came.”

With a sigh Alanna slid the broken length of sword back into its sheath, strapping the hilt into place once more. She would have to find some other way to repair it. Her lessons in sorcery had not included sword-smithing. And what was she to do for a sword until then? She felt unprepared without Lightning in her hand.

“Those three should be glad that you have come among us,” Gammal commented softly. Alanna looked sharply around for her attendants: They were some distance away, trying to interest Faithful in a brightly colored ball. “Before they had little status. Come into my tent, and my woman will give you something cool to drink,” he added. “The young ones can look after your cat, and each other, for now.”

Alanna followed the smith into his living quarters, gnawing thoughtfully at her thumb. Gammal’s wife served them, her eyes nervous over her veil. “Why?” Alanna finally asked. “They’re intelligent, alert, quick—I like them. Why would they have little status?”

Gammal lit a pipe, drawing on it thoughtfully before answering. “The boy Ishak claimed he saw pictures in the fire when he was only six,” he replied.

“Of course,” Alanna said, puzzled. “He told me himself he has the Gift. He hasn’t had much instruction for someone his age—”

Gammal waved this aside. “Balls of brightly colored fire hung over Kourrem’s bed, and she played with them. Kara throws things without touching them when she is angry. The shaman says they are cursed. Ishak’s family left their son to the teaching of his grandfather, but the families of the girls cast them out as soon as they could fend for themselves.”

Alanna could not believe she had heard correctly. “But—all those things are signs of the Gift—of magic,” she whispered. “And Ibn Nazzir said they were cursed?”

Gammal nodded. “Some in the tribe think the shaman has made a mistake. They look after the three, clothing them and feeding them. Halef Seif is one such.”

“I supposed you’re another,” Alanna guessed shrewdly.

Gammal ducked his head in acknowledgment as she turned her mind to another problem. “Does this mean the girls have never been trained? They don’t know how to use their power?” Gammal shook his head. “Great Merciful Mother,” Alanna breathed. “I’d rather live in a pit of snakes than in the same village with two girls who don’t know how to control their sorcery! Doesn’t anyone realize what could happen? They must have learned some control, or none of you would be here. But haven’t you noticed anything peculiar, when one of them is angry or sick?”

Gammal nodded, unperturbed. “Once lightning came out of the sky and almost struck the shaman,” he said. “And there are always great winds and strange storms. The shaman says we should kill them at such times, but Halef Seif will not permit it. The Voice will not permit it. And so they live here, until the Balance shifts in their favor.”

Soon after this Alanna took her leave. The Bazhir were very willing simply to let things happen, which was strange in such an energetic people. Didn’t they realize that the only way to change things was to act? She tried to express her confusion to Ali Mukhtab, to his amusement.

“We believe in the Great Balance,” he told her. “All will right itself in the end. The Balance shifts—it cannot be predicted. It is like the desert, you see. The sands drift always, yet the desert remains the same. Man cannot change the desert, and man cannot affect the Balance.”

Alanna shook her head with exasperation. “I don’t believe in waiting for things to just happen,” she growled. “If I waited for your Balance to right itself, I’d be some lord’s wife right now, not knowing anything more than my home and my lands.”

“And perhaps you are the instrument of the Balance,” Mukhtab suggested. “By your very presence, you cause the scales to shift.”

“Nonsense,” Alanna replied, fingering the ember-stone at her throat.

Her three friends were on Alanna’s mind for several days. They weren’t bitter or depressed about their lot, and their endless questions spoke for a willingness to learn. She would have tried to teach them herself, just for her own peace of mind, but Bazhir custom was very strict about such things. Instruction in magic was done by the shaman. Only in this tribe, where the shaman was uncertain of what little magic he did have, was no one instructed at all. Not even Ali Mukhtab would defend her if she broke all Bazhir customs.

The wistful look in Kourrem’s eyes tugged at Alanna’s heart. Ishak never stopped trying to show her his magic. And Kara was Kara, anxious, ready to please, expecting a curt word or a blow rather than Alanna’s gruff thanks. The knight had been something of an outcast since the day she had revealed her secret; she didn’t like that life for her young shadows. Although her southern exile was voluntary, she had few illusions about the welcome that would be hers if she returned to the palace too soon.

She fretted over it for nearly a week as she learned about her new tribe: meeting its men with Halef Seif, discussing the constant war with the hillmen and the need for new forage for their many herds of sheep and goats; meeting a few women with Kara; hunting with the young men; discovering the rich history of the Bazhir with Ali Mukhtab.

Alanna was still considering what to do when she was summoned to the headman’s tent one night. The Voice of the Tribes was there, enthroned on pillows and smoking his long pipe. Halef Seif, looking stern, was at his side. Gammal and another man stood over two bound and kneeling strangers while other men of the tribe looked on.

Alanna hesitated in the doorway, resettling Faithful on her left shoulder. “You sent for me?” she asked Halef. Everyone but the two kneeling men had turned to stare at her.

The headman beckoned her forward. “These two came yesterday to our brothers in the Tribe of the Sleeping Lion,” he explained. “They tried to pass as desertmen, when it is plain they are northerners.”

Alanna walked forward, trying to see the captives’ faces. Both looked down. “Surely the men of the Sleeping Lion are able to look after spies,” she suggested, still not knowing why she had been called. “Unless they felt the Voice should see them?”

“These men asked questions about you, Alanna of Trebond,” replied Ali Mukhtab.

Faithful leaped from Alanna’s shoulder. Walking over to one of the kneeling men, the cat lazily butted against his face. Startled, the man looked up.

“’Fingers!” Alanna cried, startled. “What in the Name of the Mother are you doing here?”

The second man—one she had known only slightly from her days in the Court of the Rogue—looked up as well. The thief Alanna had known for years as “Lightfingers” grimaced.

“He said we weren’t t’let you know we was here,” he grumbled. “We was t’find out what’d happened to you, and if you was safe.”

“Doubtless you will explain in your own time, Alanna,” Halef remarked gently.

Red with embarrassment, Alanna faced him. “The master of these men is one of my oldest and greatest friends.”

“Who might their master be, that he sends spies to us rather than messengers who declare their intent openly?”

Alanna sighed. “He’s the master of the Court of the Rogue, the King of the Thieves in Tortall. If you knew him, you’d know he always sends spies rather than messengers.” She turned back to ’Fingers. “Why on earth is he looking for me? Surely he knows I’m all right.”

’Fingers shook his head. “I’m not the one t’question his Majesty,” he informed Alanna. “Not of late in particular, when he’s turned that testy. We knew we’d be caught, but—” He shrugged. “’Twas better far than stayin’ in Corus, when George is in a temper.”

Alanna smiled. “I’ve never seen George in a temper, but he’s formidable enough the rest of the time. Halef Seif, Ali Mukhtab, don’t hold these two responsible for their master’s orders. Disobeying George—the King of the Thieves—well, if you’re a thief it’s something you just don’t do.”

Removing his pipe from his mouth, Ali Mukhtab said, “I have heard of this George Cooper. As you say, he is a hard man to cross.”

“Surely these two haven’t seen anything the Bazhir wouldn’t want them to see,” Alanna pointed out.

“It is your will that they be released?” Halef Seif asked the Voice. Ali Mukhtab nodded, and Gammal knelt to cut the ropes binding the captives. “Listen to me,” Halef told them sternly. “You return to your King of Thieves unmarked and unharmed, but for a little rough handling. His next spies I will return to him with slit nostrils.” He nodded to Gammal. “Feed them and send them on their way. Make certain they are well on the road to the North before you return to us.”

“Tell George I’m well and content,” Alanna added as ’Fingers and his companion rose awkwardly. “I just need to live my own life for a while.”

Lightfingers nodded. “I’ll tell him, but I doubt he’ll like it.”

His companion looked around at the Bazhir. “He may have to,” he remarked dryly. They were hurried from the tent, the warriors following.

Alanna discovered Halef Seif and Ali Mukhtab were looking at her. At a gesture from the headman, she sat. Halef drew up his own pipe stand and sat as well, while a young tribesman who had stayed behind poured wine for each of them.

“Are there other such friends who will come seeking you, Alanna?” Ali Mukhtab wanted to know.

She shook her head. “George is a law to himself.”

“How did you come to know such a one?” The Voice gave Halef a light from his pipe.

“We met when I first arrived in Corus, disguised as a boy,” she replied. “He became my friend—”

“So he could steal in the palace,” Halef suggested dryly.

“Not at all. I never would’ve helped him to steal. As it was, he taught me knife-fighting, how to climb walls without a ladder—” She grinned. “All manner of useful things. And he got Moonlight for me.”

The Voice’s eyes were sharp. “He must be close to you, this—”

“George Cooper,” she supplied. “He’s my best friend in the world, next to Prince Jonathan.”

“This friend goes to great risk, sending messengers south to find you.”

Alanna blushed. “George worries about me,” she mumbled.

George loves you, Faithful yowled.

“Hush,” she snapped, seeing the two men look at her cat. Sometimes people could understand Faithful; she didn’t want this to be one of those times. She rose, nearly tripping over her burnoose. “If that’s everything—”

“For now,” the headman nodded, barely hiding a smile behind his hand.

The incident was soon forgotten, and shortly afterward Alanna decided to approach Ibn Nazzir on behalf of Kara, Kourrem, and Ishak. She had not crossed verbal swords with the shaman in days, and she hoped his rage had cooled. Leaving her weapons and her cool burnoose behind, wearing a sleeveless tunic and breeches (so the old man could see clearly she was unarmed), Alanna went to beard him in his tent at noon.

As always Faithful accompanied her, a coal-black, complaining shadow. This is a fool’s errand, he warned her as they approached the shaman’s home. He will scream and call you names, and probably he’ll try some spell he knows nothing about.

“I have to try,” Alanna muttered as she stepped onto the wide bare spot before the tent that served the tribe as temple and the shaman’s home. She stood a discreet distance from the covered opening and spread her hands wide so all could see they were empty. “Akhnan Ibn Nazzir! I have come to you in peace, with open—”

The ground before her exploded, knocking her and Faithful down and showering them both with dirt and sand.

I told you so, Faithful remarked disgustedly as he began to wash.

Alanna got to her feet, brushing herself off as she fought to hold on to her temper. “That was stupid!” she yelled. “Someone might have been hurt, and it wouldn’t have been me! I came to you willing to make peace—”

“You will make nothing among us but war and famine!” came the muffled scream from the tent. “You corrupt Halef Seif with lust; your vile words have bewitched the Voice of the Tribes!”

“Men and women can be friends without lust!” Alanna yelled back. “The only person who’s bewitched around here is you, bewitched by your own jealousy and stupidity!” She stopped to wipe sweat off her forehead, trembling with anger. Her tolerance for fools had always been slight, and she was losing the little she had.

Still the old man refused to come out, although the exchange was drawing the rest of the village. “You carry the eye of a demon around your throat!”

Alanna put her hand to her throat and touched the ember-stone. “It is not the eye of a demon!” she cried with fury. “It is a token given me by the Great Mother Goddess, from Her own hand!” Those listening drew back, awed and frightened. The Mother was as well known and worshipped here as she was in the North; none of them would use Her name lightly. Those who followed the shaman began to wonder if they had made a very bad mistake.

“I want an apology for your insult to my Goddess!” she yelled, her voice getting hoarse. “I demand it right now! Come out and make it!”

There, she thought with satisfaction, balancing on the balls of her feet. That ought to settle the old coward.

Faithful was facing the shaman’s tent, his ears pricked forward. Suddenly his tail began to twitch. He’s not going to apologize, he warned as the tent flap stirred. He’s going to—

But Alanna could feel it as well as the cat. There was just time for her to throw up defensive walls as yellow flame roared from the tent, surrounding her and Faithful. She flinched as it struck, holding her mind fixed on her own spell. Angry—with Ibn Nazzir’s ignorance and lack of control, a bystander could have been hurt or killed—she seized the last bit of fire and threw it back. The tiny flame rushed into the shaman’s tent and chased the old man outside before vanishing.

Alanna glared at Ibn Nazzir, thinking rapidly. He was wearing the crystal sword; the sight of it sent cold fear down her back. Not only was she concerned about anything that reminded her of Roger of Conté, she knew the shaman had been a rider once. Doubtless he could use a sword. Unless she was mistaken, she was more than his match as a sorceress, but his fencing skills were a dangerous unknown, particularly since she was unarmed.

“You insult the Goddess who shows me favor,” she said when she had his attention. “You attacked me twice without provocation and without fair warning. I’ve been more than patient with you. Tell me why I shouldn’t demand your life, as is my right as a member of this tribe.”

Akhnan Ibn Nazzir drew the crystal sword and rushed Alanna with a yell.

She dodged and circled away, deaf to the furious shouts from the tribesmen at the shaman’s disregard for honor. Ibn Nazzir, at the end of his sanity, was also deaf to them. His mouth set in a crazy grin, he rushed Alanna again, wielding that deadly blade with both hands.

The woman knight ducked away, moving easily on the packed dirt. She could feel the crystal sword humming each time it sliced past her. The sound made her slightly ill: It was as if Duke Roger were nearby, directing the sword in its quest for her life. Empty-handed, intent on the shaman’s moves, she wove and danced away as he slashed at her.

Ibn Nazzir was not the opponent Duke Roger had been. His swings were often wild; he was badly balanced and slow. It was the sword Alanna feared; she had a feeling the old man would not have been as good as he was now without it. Gripping the ember-stone, she whispered a wall-building spell.

Violet fire sprang into being, whirling to encircle Ibn Nazzir. He shrieked and swept the sword around him; the wall vanished. He charged; Alanna jumped, kicking him to the ground. With a roll she was on him, wrestling for the sword. The humming was louder, drowning out all other sound. Invisible fingers gripped her throat even as she saw the shaman start to turn gray.

“Stop it!” she yelled, trying to make herself heard. With a corner of her mind she gripped the magical fingers, holding them away from her. “You don’t have the strength; you’re using your own life-force!”

He knocked her onto her back. Alanna clung to the sword’s hilt; at this range he couldn’t miss once he got the blade free. They struggled, drops of sweat falling onto her face from him. He was turning grayer, and there were blue lines around his mouth and nostrils.

Everything went black. The cloud that suddenly enfolded Alanna cut off all air and feeling. She fought, drawing on reserves of strength that had been built up over years of work and subterfuge. Slowly her own violet fire shoved the blackness away, sparking and flaring where it touched the crystal blade. In the distance she heard a cry.

The blackness was gone. Akhnan Ibn Nazzir collapsed against her, his eyes wide and staring in death.

Gammal and Halef pulled the old man off her, and Ishak helped her to her feet. Alanna swayed with exhaustion; Kara and Kourrem hurried forward to support her on either side. Ali Mukhtab looked up from his examination of Ibn Nazzir’s body, his dark eyes puzzled. “There is no mark on him, yet he is dead. What caused it?”

Alanna rubbed her eyes. She had expended much of her strength, physical and magical. Just now she only wanted to go to her tent and lie down. “He was using power he didn’t have,” she rasped finally. “He wasn’t that good a sorcerer. He tapped his own life-force because he wanted me dead.” Looking at her right hand, she was stunned to realize she held the crystal sword. “If he could’ve lasted, maybe he would’ve won. But I lasted. I usually do,” she added bitterly. “I’m sorry I brought trouble to you.” She started to turn away.

“One moment.” Halef’s voice was kind but firm. She looked back to see him pointing at the shaman’s tent. “This is your home now.”

Alanna braced her free hand on Kourrem’s shoulder. “I don’t understand.”

Ali Mukhtab rose to stand beside the headman. “Halef Seif is right. You have slain the old shaman. You must now take his place until you teach a new shaman, or until one slays you.”

It was too much. “That’s crazy!” Alanna shouted, her voice cracking with weariness. “I’m not—I’m a knight! I’ve never taught sorcery—”

“Would you leave us defenseless against the shamans of the hillmen?” Halef asked quietly. Alanna closed her mouth, remembering the Bazhir tales of the hill-sorcerers. “That is the law. That is our custom.” He opened the door flap of the shaman’s tent. “This is your home now, Woman Who Rides Like a Man.”

For a moment Alanna’s violet eyes met those of the Voice and of the headman fiercely. She did not want to spend time bound to one place; she was searching for adventure! Another wave of exhaustion swept her, and she looked away. Faithful sat expectantly before the open door, waiting.

“I don’t care if it’s home or a grave-digger’s hut,” she sighed. “I just want a place to lie down.” With Kara and Kourrem supporting her, still clutching the crystal sword, she entered the shaman’s tent.