Spiral: Book One of the Spiral in Time (22 page)

CHAPTER 14

K
ree-ee, Kree-ee,
screeched the hawk as it curved high above, head down, looking for low flying food. At the sparrowhawk’s cry, Lorc cù-luirg gave a sharp look at the sky. He narrowed his eyes.
Another hunter, just like me
. It was a killer of its own kind, preying on smaller birds.

If he could fly like that and see everywhere, the girl would be dead and this terrible hunt would be done. The
Gaesatae
warrior was a full day into his hunt and wanted it over. Angry that he had failed this morning, the mercenaries assigned to him did not help.

“
Dias
! Spread out!” he hissed at the ragged line of men in back of him. They were just like cattle, always lining up behind each other. Masterless, exiles, and dumb thieves, they had no thought of how to hunt together and constantly disobeyed orders, each hunting his own way.

And that’s why they were not with their own clans, he growled to himself—no one wanted to claim them. Warriors for hire disgusted Lorc, most of all because they had no honor.

His nerves were strung tight as he led this band through the woods. Lorc’s big body moved quietly on deerskin clad feet, his dark eyes constantly surveying, noting everything as they moved out of the trees toward a small stream. A hammered tin horn hung on a leather cord over one shoulder, and he bristled with weapons. The weight of the iron sword strapped on his back was familiar, comforting; he had missed it during his year of exile. A scabbard with hunting knife was secured on his belt, and one hand rested on the short sword at his waist. The other hand held a long spear, also familiar, and sorely missed. It was like another arm; he vowed they would not take away his spear again. He shook his head with a fierce finality.

Lorc liked the hunt, but the most gratifying part was the final kill. He had justly earned his
Gaesatae
warrior name, cù-luirg—bloodhound. He tracked like one of the Durotriges’ famed hunting dogs, and his killings were just as brutal, always taking the head of his victim and sometimes, a ritual drink of his enemy’s blood to show the dead spirit who ruled now. Even the dead were not safe from a
Gaesatae
.

Today, his anger threatened the hunt—anger at killing members of his own tribe, whom he knew and had made a sacred vow to defend. And, most of all, anger at the
geis
, the divine curse placed on him. For the girl and Maigrid he had no love. He had never even spoken words of friendship with them. Still, they were part of the tribe he had sworn a solemn oath to defend. On the king’s name he had vowed to be his warrior and defend
all
Durotriges. Lorc’s life was ruled by the
Gaesatae
Code
and certain sacred oaths; he always knew exactly what his clan and the tribe expected of him. Today, his honor was at stake. He shrugged his shoulders up, as though shaking something loose. His whole being resented having to break that covenant.

But ... there was the
geis.
It all rested on that.

He had just come from the burning farmhouse and knew the girl must be nearby—they found the dead mercenary. They had looked everywhere else; this was the only way left for her escape.
That Marne girl—now, she is getting away!

Stepping lightly for so big a man, he murmured words of power and strength taught long ago by his Druid teacher.

“Death is near, life is dear. Death is not the end.”

Something moved in the grass, and he jumped. A frightened hedgehog lumbered away. He was tense and jittery; too much was at stake.

His mind would not calm. He hated killing one of his own tribe. But with his honor and name gone, killing the Marne girl was the only way back to his true life.

“The battle is here, gods are near. Death is not the end.”

The warrior’s sacred verse, always chanted before a battle or hunt, let the gods hear they were needed. The words usually cleared his mind of all thoughts and focused his strength and purpose. The nearest mercenary, a young boy, glanced nervously at him as Lorc cù-luirg continued, matching each step to the words. Today, the words irritated him.

His quick temper had brought him this trouble. Now, his impulsive actions would keep him forever from what he most wanted: to be clan leader of the
Gaesatae—
the spearmen. Druid-trained warrior knights of the king, only the best, the bravest, and those most skilled in warfare were
Gaesatae
. But not now. He was in disgrace, expelled from the clan and tribe after his brutal slaying of an Atrebate noble, a prisoner of war. Caradoc, king of the Durotriges—Lorc’s own champion!—had ordered a powerful Druidic
geis
against him.

Lorc cù-luirg’s hand clenched tight in a fist, remembering.

Held for ransom, the young noble was saved as a useful negotiating tool with his powerful tribe: he was the son of the chief. He kept trying to escape, so they tied him to a post and set Lorc as his guard. The Atrebate was defenseless, but knew how to use his voice, and his words cut more deeply than any sword.

“How dare you even touch me, a true Atrebate, you bitch- dog slave of the Durots. They found you in a field, wallowing in the mud, put a spear in your hand, and called you a
Gaesatae
.” The noble taunted Lorc, thinking he was safe as a high-ranking hostage.

“No family, no clan, and a whore for a mother.” He spat on Lorc.

The last insult had penetrated all of Lorc cù-luirg’s personal defenses, for the warrior’s lies distorted the truth. Blind anger overwhelmed him. In a red rage, he lost all control. His sword ripped through the Atrebate’s leather tunic from the neck to the groin, and blood flowed down the prisoner’s chest. Lorc’s arm swung high—slashing, chopping, and finally, cutting off the prisoner’s head.

It was the worst thing he could have done. It expelled him from the warrior clan and brought a powerful curse upon him. Lorc vowed to learn from that rash act. He wanted to have his life back the way it was.

I must be careful. This hunt is too important for anything to ruin it.
He slowed his pace. The mercenaries were still strung out behind him. It was time to stop and regroup.

“
Stad
.” He held up his hand and signaled a halt. There was no sign of the girl up ahead, and he wanted to check their equipment after this morning’s fight.
Nothing
was to go wrong with this hunt.

The hired killers were all different. A few of the mercenaries were from Hieryo across the western sea; they were the most brutal. Many spoke Dumnonii and were probably outcasts from their tribes. One wore a padded, heavy leather vest, stolen no doubt. A few had helmets with nose shields, and wore the rough clothes of farmers. Their spears were the best weapons, made from sturdy ash and some other wood he did not recognize. All the mercenaries had short hunting bows slung over their chests, and each carried a long sword that hung from a clever band attached on the side of a metal belt around the waist, so he could run and fight without the sword getting in the way.

Lorc carried his sword on his back. He could always draw it faster, reaching one hand back over his shoulder. But what he liked to use most was his spear—a true
Gaesatae.
Last night, when he met the mercenaries at the fort near the river Tamar, he looked at their arrows and saw they were no good. Many had warped shafts, and the arrowheads were either too light or too heavy. He snorted disgust at having to rely on such poor weapons.

Lorc wiped a bloodstained hand across his brow. He would fight with his spear and long sword any day and not rely on arrows like those.

They had not needed much today, just the swords. Everyone at the farm was caught asleep and unarmed. Only a few fought back with anything they could grab that was close at hand. One grabbed a cutting scythe; another, a long hoe for digging with an antler tied on the end. The smith had fought long and hard with his iron sword. Though in the end—surrounded—there were too many for one person to fight, and his arms were hacked off before they strung up his slashed body to the beam with the others.

They were all thirsty now, gulping water from the stream, before crossing the big meadow ahead. Lorc stood back, out of their way, and could not stop thinking about the
geis.
This past year, it was always in his thoughts. He remembered it all: the curse, the shaming before the tribe, when even his name was taken away. Overnight, he became part of the chalk hills and marshy farms, something no longer human. When eyes accidentally met his, they looked through him or swiftly turned away. Lorc cù-luirg was dead to them, like a ghost from the Otherworld. The pain of being outside the warrior clan was sharpest and most terrifying, for they were his only family. Everything he valued came from the
Gaesatae.
The
geis
destroyed it all.

He had been a little over six winters old when Caradoc sent him to the clan of warrior knights. A hunting party, led by Caradoc himself, had found him alone, in a crude hut in the furthest reaches of the Durotriges’ lands. Naked, but for an amulet around his neck and a small hunting knife tied to a band on his waist, he wildly tried to stick the knife in Caradoc’s hand. He drew a little blood and much laughter from the hunters and warriors protecting the king.

“I am fierce,” he screamed. “I am fierce.”

The laughter continued even as the king tried to calm him. Caradoc looked hard at the brave child. “I think you are a warrior. I will name you Lorc. It means son of a warrior.” Caradoc took the wild boy back to Mai Dun and a new life.

He never knew who his mother was. Years later, one of the hunters told Lorc they had found a badly mangled woman’s body some distance from the boy’s shelter, but there was nothing left to tell who she might have been. The hunters thought feral dogs caused her death, many were about, and buzzards were feasting on the corpse.

Cathbad, seeing a strong, pliable mind, sent Lorc to school for several years at Àrd-Saoghal, where all the
Gaesatae
and young nobles studied and learned the arts of memory and verse, law and astronomy, and, for some, the Druid ways of magic and prophecy. When he had not met certain expectations—quarrelling, disrupting classes, and showing, even then, his violent, frightening nature—they returned him to the warrior knights with equal amounts of regret and relief. Now twenty years old, Lorc had been a warrior all his life and knew no other way.

Today, his exile ended. One simple stroke of his sharp sword and the girl’s head in a sack. That was the price. He had been promised a release from the
geis
.

He would take it at any cost.

A few pale gold butterflies drifted in the warm currents of air rising from the meadow. The sky was light blue, soft with clouds. It was so peaceful. The fire-lit, red sky of this morning, the burning fields, and the slaughter at the farm might never have happened.
They were members of his own tribe!
Soft, brown grasses, as tall as Lorc’s waist, made no sound as the ragged band moved slowly across the big meadow. The air was perfectly calm; even the flying insects looked undisturbed, their patterns of flight orderly.

He wondered if the girl might have run another way, maybe up towards the other end. He was ready to turn around and go back when a
coo-coo-oo
and the soft rustle of wings caught his ear. Then another answering
coo-coo-oo
came, farther off, across the meadow. A dove flew up. Lorc swung his body around.

“Look over there,” he whispered to the nearest man. “There, by that tree, where that dove just flew up.”

A tall oak, with heavy, drooping limbs, stood at the far end of the meadow. He crouched in the grass, squinting against the sun and waited. One finger tapped impatiently on his short sword. As they watched, another dove fluttered into the sky. His finger stopped moving. He could not see the girl, but she was there. He pointed at the tree.

“That’s where she is. Spread out slowly in a line to those far trees at the end as I move closer to the river. Move slow. I want no quick motions to scare her off.”

A smile crossed his face. The end of his year as an outcast was coming to a close. He leaned on his spear and waited as the mercenaries moved slowly into place.

Dias,
he thought. First the
geis
. Then Caradoc died and his brother, Cathbad, became the tribe’s ruler until the girl was old enough. When he left for some emergency at Mons, it left the old Druid Ramach as the most powerful person in Mai Dun—and the most feared.

Four nights ago, Ramach came to Lorc’s makeshift hut, far outside the rampart of Mai Dun. Lorc had been frightened. What more could Ramach take away? He had nothing left but his life. Ramach had answered that question; kill Maigrid, her family, and the girl Sabrann, daughter and heir of the now dead king. And leave no survivors. He must return the girl’s head to Ramach as proof.

No
Gaesatae
warriors either. Mercenaries awaited Lorc at a hillfort near the river Tamar. Ramach showed him Caradoc’s great amber ring. Only the power of the king’s clan, the Durots, could demand such an execution, and he was a
Gaesatae
, sworn to obey the king. Ramach had mentioned no names, but there was only one person who could have issued that order.

For all this, Ramach promised to lift the
geis,
and Lorc would be free to go back to his life with the clan, where his heart longed to be. Lorc wanted to forget that Caradoc was dead from a small hunting wound that poisoned his body. Grief flowed at that thought.
My king, who saved me and named me his warrior. I will always love and honor him like a father.

And who would he serve now—Cathbad? Or another member of the powerful Durot clan? Whoever wore the heavy gold torc of the king had to be both leader and warrior. And the girl was neither.

He eyed his men. Most had done their job well this morning, only a few hung back, as Lorc expected. They were only mercenaries, not
Gaesatae
. No code guided them, no honor. Some should not even be here, like the one next to him who was too young. Lorc narrowed his eyes. The boy mercenary watched him warily, out of the corner of his eye.