Valour

CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

CORALEN

Coralen prodded her sword into the back of a prisoner, making him increase his pace.

The battle had been won, but she had not stopped to celebrate, or rest. Rath had sent her with a band of others back into the foothills to patrol for stragglers or surprise attacks.

‘Just because we did it last night, doesn’t mean they can’t do the same to us,’ the old warrior had said. Coralen didn’t mind, anyway. She’d rather keep busy — less time to brood about all that Corban had told her of Conall.

Horses appeared out of the gloom as she approached their makeshift camp. She handed over the man — a blacksmith by the look of his scarred and pitted features — she had found creeping through the undergrowth to Baird. Without a word, she slipped back into the woodland, heading for the slopes that led down to the giants’ road. That would be where deserters or raiders would appear, climbing up from the camps below.

She moved silently through the woodland, gliding from tree to tree, using the shadows, a lifetime’s worth of training just habit now, an automatic response bypassing conscious thought, like fighting. Without realizing, she found Conall hovering in her mind’s eye, the expression on his face a mixture of insolence and humour, daring the world to throw all it could at him. She felt a physical pain at the thought of him, a knife twisting in her gut. Con, betraying Halion. One thing she knew about Halion: he would do the right thing, or at least what he considered to be the right thing, no matter how hard it was to see it through. And he was a peacemaker. He would not have driven any dispute with Conall. No matter how she looked at it, she came back to the same conclusion. Corban had told her the truth.

And I am grateful for that. He had treated her like an equal, not a bairn, which was what Halion had done. She knew now that Halion had kept the truth from her out of an effort to spare her pain and to save Conall’s name, his reputation, but she’d rather have the truth, no matter how unpleasant.

Corban. Regarding her with his dark, serious eyes. Waiting for a kiss. Why did I ask him that? What an idiot I am. She liked him, she was coming to realize. He was certainly good to have around in a scrap, him and his wolven and Gar. Between them they could put the fear of Asroth into most that faced them, and she respected that. But it was more than that. She liked the way he spoke to her. Open, genuine, nothing hidden.

Something caught her eye and she paused, squatting. She was close to the edge of the woodland now, where the slope suddenly dropped down to the camps far below.

Spoor, scattered about, as if it had been kicked to hide it. From a big animal, not big enough for a wolven, but not deer or anything else she would expect to see up here. She lifted it and broke some off, sniffing.

Hounds. No question. And more than one. But what are hounds doing up here, and where are they now? It was drying, but still moist at its centre. Half a day old, no more.

There was a rustling to her left. She dropped the spoor and moved closer to a tree, merging with its shadow.

A figure appeared, climbing the slope, breathing heavily. He staggered upright, looking about. A young man, fair haired, a warrior.

She stepped out of the shadows.

He stumbled back a pace, reaching for his sword hilt, then paused.

‘You’re only a girl,’ he said.

Your first and last mistake. Do, don’t think.

She exploded forwards, swatting a hand away, one hand grabbing his collar, the other pressing her knife to his gut.

‘I am,’ she said, ‘and if you don’t walk where I tell you, I’ll slit you from belly to throat.’

He licked his lips. ‘Think I’ll choose the walking.’