Lord of Lies

moved just beyond the dark green curves of the next rise. The Sarni, from their vantage, could not see it. I barely could. I waited as it drew closer.

'Val, what are you looking at?' Maram said to me. He held his hand to the edge of his helmet along his forehead. Then he cried out, 'Oh, no! More Sarni! They've brought up reinforcements! This is the end!'

As my heart beat with an unbearable pain to the deeper rhythms of the earth, I made out a body of warriors on horses moving quickly toward us. I counted nearly a hundred conical helms; I caught glints of yellow hair against steel and black leather armor.

Now Baltasar and Lord Raasharu, Sunjay and Sar Kimball and all the other Guardians cast their gazes beyond the enemy at this new band of Sarni bearing down upon us. My knights made no complaint or utterance as had Maram. But their black, silent eyes filled with the darkness of death.

'What should we do, Val?' Maram said to me.

Baltasar looked at me as if to ask the same question. Sunjay looked at me, too, as did Sar Kimball and Sar larlath and alt the rest of the Guardians. Lord Raasharu's noble face fell ugly with wrath and a spreading hopelessness.

I shielded my eyes to gaze at this new company of Sarni. In the glare of the setting sun, their chiefs horse seemed almost red with fire. There was a white gleam about the chiefs face. Alkaladur gleamed brightly then, filling my eyes with its silver lightning, and my heart seemed to swell like the sun.

'We'll charge,' I said to Maram, and to the others. 'Lances ready!'

Maram, who thought he understood, spoke now with the resolve of a true Valari: 'Yes, better to die swinging our swords against this new enemy than stand here and be shot down one by one.'

I smiled at him and said. 'Take courage, Sar Maram. You're not going to die. These new Sarni are our friends.'

And with that I turned to issue my orders: 'First two lines, charge with me! Third line to follow in reserve! Hammer and anvil!'

I struck my sword's diamond pommel against my fist and nodded at Lord Noldru the Bold and Sar Shuradan, who were in command of the second and third lines. Then I pushed Altaru to a gallop. Our entire company, in three long lines, flew down the slope through the long grass. Hooves beat the ground like a thousand mallets striking drums. Our enemy watched us approach and began shooting arrows at us. One of these shafts lodged in Sar Avram's arm, but no one was killed. When we drew too close, Trahadak the Elder or some other chieftain gave the order for the Sarni's retreat. As I had said, they wouldn't engage us at close quarters again. And so they pointed their horses toward the rise behind them and raced away. They must have smiled to think that they were luring us to our doom out on the endless spaces of the steppe.

A few moments later, however, the new company of Sarni burst over the top of the rise shooting arrows into the faces of our enemy. They had the advantage of surprise, and many of their whining arrows found their marks. Our enemy's chieftain, a large man whose face was painted entirely blue, looked upon these new Sarni and their chief, and he cried out, 'Imakla, imakla!'

Seeing that his men were about to be caught between two forces, he veered sharply to the right, shouting at his men to follow him and to escape the hammer of my knights bearing down upon them. He and perhaps half his men managed to gallop off before I and my first line of knights closed with his brethren, driving them against the sabers and arrows of the new Sarni. What followed then, as steel cut at flesh and my knights cast their throwing lances into the bodies of our enemy, was a quick and terrible slaughter. Three of my men were killed with arrows. But all of our enemy who remained there on the field that day fought savagely and died. Their brethren left them to the fury of our long swords. And they disappeared into the darkening swells of earth to the west.

'Thus to the treacherous!' Baltasar cried out. He pointed his bloody kalama at the bodies of our fallen enemy. He was weeping because his friend, Sar Viku, lay among them. 'Let us follow and kill all the rest!'

But Baltasar's hot blood, as usual, clouded the reason of his brain. Our horses were nearly spent, as were we, and we could not have overtaken our enemies in any case. At least, it seemed, they were finally defeated.

Lord Raasharu rode up to me and raised his sword in salute He called out, 'Lord Valashu Elahad! Lord of Battles! Lord of Light!'

His son, Baltasar, picked up this cry, and so did Sar Jarlath and Sar Kimball and the other Ishkans. Then Sar Hannu of Anjo urged his horse closer and added his deep voice to the chant, as did Sar Varald, Lord Noldru the Bold and the Taroners. And then all at once, the Kaashans, Waashians, Atharians and Lagashuns joined in, and all the Guardians shouted as one: 'Lord of Battles! Lord of Light!'

And then old Sar Shuradan called out, 'Victory is ours! Valari forever! Valari! Valari!'

We all knew that the Valari hadn't fought together since the Tarshid an entire age before, and that battle had ended in terrible defeat.

'Valari! Valari! Valari!'

In truth, however, the victory was not ours — not ours alone. Across the field where the bodies of our enemy lay broken and bleeding on the grass, the new company of Sarni had halted facing us. Some wiped their bloody sabers; others gripped curved bows no different than the ones our enemy had turned on us. Their silence was deep and unnerving. But what shocked my men more than anything — Sar Jarlath and Sar ianashu, Baltasar and Tavar Amadan and all the rest — was that the faces of our saviors were smooth and unpainted and bore the softer, unmistakable lines of women.

'What's this — women dressed as warriors?' Sar Jarlath cried out. Then he gazed upon their efficient and violent work, and shook his head. 'No, woman warriors, truly. But who has ever heard of such a thing?'

As it happened, Lord Raasharu and Sar Shuradan had, and so had some of the other knights. Maram and Master Juwain knew of these terrible woman, as did I. They were of the Manslayer Society: Sarni women who lived apart from the rest of their tribe and trained at war as did men. They were fierce in battle, and they took vows to kill a hundred enemy men before marrying.

'Oh, Lord!' Maram said as his gaze fell upon these Manslayers' chief.

I, too, had eyes only for this woman. She sat tall and regal upon a great roan mare. A lionskin cloak draped from her shoulders. Her accouterments were those of the men that we had fought, and her hair was gold like the hoops encircling her bare upper arms. The golden torque protecting her neck was inlaid with the bluest of lapis. Her eyes would have picked up this bright color if it hadn't been falling dark — and if she hadn't been violently blinded. A white cloth was bound across her face just beneath her forehead. It was the glint of this cloth from across the steppe that had stirred my memory and ignited the fire of my heart. For this blind warrior, who had somehow found me in the middle of the Wendrush and saved my life, was Atara Ars Narmada, the woman I loved more than I did life itself.

Chapter 16

I wanted to race over to her, — to clasp hands with her and embrace her. I wanted to kiss her full lips and the cloth covering the hollows where her eyes used to be, I did not. I was the commander of nearly two hundred knights exhausted from battle. And she, it seemed was the chief of her sister warriors. They were Sarni, and we were Valari, and although we had fought the same enemy that day, there was yet no love between us. All gathered there beneath the darkening clouds stared at Atara and me as they waited to see what we would do. 'Atara!' I called out to her. 'Atara Ars Narmada!'

She shook her head slightly and called back to me: 'Here, I'm just 'Atara the Blind', Lord Valashu — Lard of Light.'

She smiled at me as she always had when playing with words or having fun. But beneath her welcome was a formality that I was unused to and a hint of coldness that immediately chilled my heart. 'How did you find us here?' I asked her. 'Why were we attacked?'

'Good questions, Lord Valashu. But why don't we answer them after? There's much to be done if you don't want to leave your fallen for the wolves.'

With night coming on, the rich greens of the steppe and the sky's patches of blue bled away into a solid gray