Indomitus Est (The Fovean Chronicles) (37 page)

    
When we ran through the waving grass, no sick girl glowered at me with guilt and self-pity.  When the horse beat the ground and defied the wind, he ran free and I ran free with him.

D’gattis had pitched a fit when we told him we were leaving the transport of our gold up to him and Drekk and Ancenon, but that made logical sense and he knew it.  Arath claimed to be familiar enough with the area to get us someplace permanent.  Drekk would
scout out the city for us (we needed him to, actually, and he did that sort of thing alone) and the two Uman-Chi were better suited to the more cerebral pursuits of negotiating, investing, and transporting our gold.

    
Genna had to be transported and had made it very clear that she didn’t want me doing it. In fact, she wanted me away from her.

    
I had felt a little twinge of suspicion about leaving them alone but everyone assured me that the fire bond would keep the lot of us honest, myself included.  Adriam would painfully destroy the one who violated so serious an oath, administered by one of His chosen.  Still – He had marked me with the color black.  If not before, I felt sure that War’s purpose had been revealed both to Him and to Ancenon.

    
Yet Ancenon had approached me in the hold of his ship.  Whatever he had learned, he wanted to be a part of it.

    
Genna remained too sick to join the bond and too sick to do anything to betray us.  She had sworn that she would enter the bond when she could.

    
I turned the stallion to the left and galloped toward Nantar and Thorn.  Both sat their horses and watched me coming, parting the field of hay like a ship through the sea.  It was then that I noticed men on horseback watching us in the distance.  Blizzard moved fast enough to make my eyes sting, which sometimes used to blind me until I had finally learned that I could turn my head forty-five degrees and squint one eye, looking through my lashes.  Blizzard could be trusted to avoid gopher holes and keep the course with only mild adjustment when we ran on the plains like this.

    
It took me only moments to regain Thorn and Nantar and stand Blizzard by their side.  By then, the men who had been watching us closed in and were following me.  They wanted the huge stallion tired, knowing that we would have a harder time breaking for the city.  Little did they know!  Blizzard might be lathered, but he could keep this pace up all day and had before.

    
Thorn pointed behind me as I approached, and Nantar unsheathed his sword, laying it across the pommel of his saddle.  Their mounts were exhausted, but Thorn came from here.  We might be outnumbered but I didn’t worry – at least, not yet.

    
There were ten of them in all, though I guessed that more waited where I couldn’t see them.  They were Men like Thorn - burned by the sun, light brown and black hair, dark eyes and suspicious faces.       Their leader had long mustachios almost a foot past his chin and long black hair pulled back over his shoulders.  He wore a tooled leather armor that looked more decorative than functional, and sat his horse with confidence, as if he were an extension of it, and it of him. 

    
“That’s a big horse,” he said, indicating Blizzard with a tilt of his jaw.  The stallion snorted as if to answer.  I nodded but said nothing, waiting.

    
“I don’t recognize your armor,” he said further, looking me in the eye.  His were brown; his hands sat the pommel of his saddle, idly holding the reins.  I could see the hilt of a sword over his shoulder.  All of his men had bows already strung at their sides.  Together they formed a semi-circle around us.  If we broke and ran, we would have to turn our horses or go right through them, and either way they would be ready.

    
“Be surprised if you did,” I said.

    
“What will you take for that stallion?” he finally asked me.

    
“Not for sale,” I said flatly, still holding his eyes with mine.

    
“Didn’t ask if he was for sale,” the leader countered.  He hadn’t bothered to introduce himself.  I hadn’t bothered to ask.

    
“I asked what you would take for him.”

    
“Your life,” I said.  I heard Thorn mumble, but I grew tired of this.  “And the lives of as many of your men as the three of us can, if they get involved.”

    
The other man drew his sword and I drew mine.  His carried a scimitar: a blade that curved like a tongue of fire.  Curving the weapon like that made it stronger and, although shorter than a normal sword for the same weight, did more damage at close range.  That gave him advantages in close fighting but cost him at a distance.

    
He stared at the Sword of War, then narrowed his eyes.  Blizzard stomped and bobbed his head, clearly not very exhausted. 

    
“Fight to first blood,” he said, starting to dismount.

    
“Fight to the death,” I countered.  He stopped and sat straight up on his horse.  His men shifted.

    
“And why would you want to do that?” he asked.

    
Hell, I don’t know why I wanted to do that – I was just posturing like him!  I had it in my mind that he wanted to say “first blood” because he didn’t know if he could take me in my heavier armor, but felt like it might make me slow enough for him to pink me.  Even then, there would be no shame in him losing that way, while backing down might cost him a few points in his men’s eyes.

    
“Not leaving here without my horse,” I said, finally.  “Starting to think I don’t want to leave here without yours, either.”

    
Thorn urged his mount up next to mine and intervened, just as the other Andaran opened his mouth to say something that I doubt we both could have lived with.

    
“You are Long Manes?” he asked.

    
The other nodded.

    
Thorn indicated me with a jerk of his thumb.  “This is his first time here.  I am Thorn, a Hunter, and I can say of this man that he has left a trail that is long, wide and red from the Wild Horse Plains to here.”

    
“So that
is
a stallion from the Wild Horse Plains,” one of the Long Manes said.

    
Thorn nodded.  “No man would take a horse from there and not be willing to kill or die for it.”

    
The Long Manes all nodded.  It occurred to me that, for a supposedly untamable horse, from a place where no one went to, the Andarans could certainly spot one from a mile away.  Their leader still squinted at me, chewing the end of his moustache.

    
We waited, they waited.  Seconds dragged on and warriors on both sides fidgeted.  Finally, their leader of the Long Manes flinched.

    
“I am Kills With a Glance,” he said, finally.  “And I am rude.  I will have you to my camp for dinner, and we will talk.”

    
Thorn accepted before I could say, “No, thanks.”  Good thing too, because I would have had to fight all ten of them.  Instead, as we rode, Thorn urged me up next to Kills’ horse, and I let Blizzard take his lead, pulling him back when we got more than a yard or so ahead of the other horse.  It worked, and Kills seemed impressed.  These people based their entire culture on their horses; I then set myself above other men.  Kills’ warriors turned their mounts and we rode for the better part of an hour this way before we finally came to a herd of horses numbering roughly three hundred head – an equally large herd of cattle to one side.  Between the cattle and the mares were teepee-style dwellings, conical tents of leather with long poles inside, entered and exited by a triangular flap.  A monstrous fire pit sat between that and us, to one side of a circle of stones where the grass had been cleared and the earth stamped down.  Young men and children ringed that place as two other men, in breach clouts and sandals laced up their shins, fought bare-fisted.  Their upper bodies shown with sweat and their long, black hair flew as they battled.

    
Home, home on the range
, I mused.

    
Mare’s milk can be fermented into an alcoholic brew that men can get drunk on.  The Mongols of my world drank it with blood before and after battles.  Having tasted it, I had no doubt in my mind why the rest of the world feared them.  Frankly, if I had to choose between drinking that and sucking the perspiration from my socks to stay alive, I would take a long, hard look at my socks.

    
I gagged on the first draught, as did Nantar, though less so.  Thorn seemed to like the stuff, and the rest of the men laughed at me.

    
There were hundreds of warriors in the tribe, the Long Manes.  We saw a whole army of kids as well.  I counted five stallions kept apart from the herd of mares, and two bulls that each had an equal number of cows around them.  Thorn managed to remark to me that this must be a very wealthy tribe.

    
They gave us their drink when we got there, leaving a sour milk taste in my mouth.  Men and women both crowded around Nantar and Blizzard and me.  The huge stallion reacted by stomping his metal-shod feet in warning, tossing his head and neighing until all but the least timid stepped back.  One older man who claimed to be an expert horse-trainer got bit and another had his foot stepped on before they all decided to admire from a distance.

    
The kids swarmed Nantar like he was Santa. They tugged at his beard and squealed in delight as he lifted them by twos and threes with one hand.  The dark warrior in red seemed in his element, that much seemed obvious. 

    
I had to remind myself what this man could do with a sword.

    
Next came a trial at arms.  I would have avoided it if I could have, but Thorn warned me both that anyone who could tame a horse like Blizzard must be an expert warrior, and then the men would expect to test themselves against him.  Some of the longhaired bucks looking to prove themselves had already queued up at the stone circle as Kills lead me there. 

    
We fought with swords first, and I kept on my armor. We fought to first blood – never mind that the Sword of War could cut a man in half.  One fellow got a few scars that had to be stitched and another who kicked sand into my face received a scratch down his ribs, right through his leather breastplate, when he stepped in too soon after the maneuver.  After that they all poked and prodded at the Dwarven armor but no one wanted to fight with swords anymore.

    
Then came fist fighting, my first love.  I stripped off my armor with Nantar’s help as a huge buck with black hair down to his waist stepped into the circle with me, grimacing and flexing and smiling to the women.  He stood almost as tall and almost as heavy as I, his brown eyes flashing and his nose almost hawk-like.  I could tell without asking that this had to be Kills’ son.

    
“I
will
defeat you, white wolf,” he told me.  I smiled, both at the name he called me and at his confidence.  I had to admire the man, much as I planned to
really
hurt him so that I wouldn’t have to fight any more.

    
“You are weak like a girl,” I told him.  “You carry yourself like a man who has only known other men.  It is embarrassing to fight you.”

    
The startled look on his face told me that the warriors didn’t insult one another here before a fight – at least, not the son of the chief.  He literally seethed with rage as he leapt toward me, hands like talons reaching for my throat.  I dodged to the right and caught him in the stomach with my left fist as he passed me, his unprepared muscles yielding to the unexpected southpaw.  He rolled over in midair, away from me, and landed on his back.  Up on his feet a second later and just as angry, he approached me from the right side.