trail.
They were very near where the trail came out on a low ridge overlooking the valley.
Kaede spoke for a moment with Jelindra, words Khallayne couldn’t hear, and then left her holding the horses. “Shell be all right,” Kaede assured Jyrbian.
Crouched low, hidden by scrubby plants and rough, sharp-edged boulders, Jyrbian and Kaede edged through the sparse woods, out to the ridge overlooking the valley. Khallayne followed.
Just clear of the shadows of the forest, where the trail ran along a rocky ridge that circled the valley below, Jyrbian paused, lay down on his belly, and crept to the edge of the crest, keeping his head low.
A troop of Ogres was camped in the curve of a gurgling stream. The camp was orderly. Bedrolls of four to five warriors were laid out neatly around campfires that ringed the field tent. The Ogres were busy cooking. They stood out in the green field, wearing the red-and-white silks of Clan Dalle.
Jyrbian made a sound of disgust. They might as well be painted with targets.
Kaede sidled up beside him, shushed him, and pointed toward the slope to their left.
There, among the thin forest that marched down the hillside, was flitting movement!
Silent shadows weaved in and out among the trees, working their way down to hiding places among the shrubs at the water’s edge.
Whoever commanded the company, whoever had chosen such a vulnerable place to camp, deserved to die, to be gutted and left for carrion birds! Unless the approaching humans made noise, they would be upon the guards on two sides of the camp before an alarm was raised.
Kaede tensed, ready to rise and warn her compatriots of the approaching danger. Her sword was already half drawn when Jyrbian grabbed her.
She yanked free of his grasp. “They’ll be slaughtered!”
“Wait! Think!” He held her arm. “If you shout now, the humans will melt back into the forest. And we’ll be alone up here with them.”
“So what do we do?”
Jyrbian grinned, a crooked, thin-lipped expression that made his eyes look as hard as granite. “We go down.”
Before she could question him, stop him, he melted back into the shadows.
A moment later, he came crashing past, mounted.
Kaede stared up at him as if he were crazy, then leapt to her feet and followed. Khallayne hesitated a moment.
As Jyrbian reached the edge of the ridge, he drew his sword and held it high over his head. The blade threw out glinting red highlights from the evening sun as he forced his horse to leap down the slope.
The ground was a mixture of dark soil and creek-side sand, cut through with gullies of rainwater. The slope was steep, and his horse went down at an angle, sliding, running, falling.
As he reached the level ground, Jyrbian tugged viciously at the reins and sent his horse careening along the edge of the stream, toward the tree line. As he flew past, he noted dark-skinned faces with silver eyes open wide with surprise.
“Humans on your flank!” he shouted. He tore into the woods, into the nearest concentration of humans, and flailed about with his sword. He hit one on the side of the head with the flat of his blade and felt another taste its sharp edge.
The humans had to stand and fight, exposing their positions to the Ogre company.
Jyrbian wheeled his horse among the trees, slashed at a human with a wooden pike, then wheeled back to meet another with a sword. His steel blade sang against inferior metal. He felt as near to ecstasy as could be.
He realized the overwhelming numbers, saw his own death if the sluggish company of Ogres did not respond, then raised his voice in the first, terrible notes of a battle song, a death song.
His foot landed squarely on the chest of a human woman and echoed with a thud and crack. The human emitted a gurgle and fell back. His sword made a welcome whir in the air as he wheeled to meet the next attacker.
Then Kaede was coming to his aid, leading Jelin-dra into the battle, their horses sending up a spray of sand and pebbles. Her cry of attack made the hair on the back of his neck stand on edge. At last, the Ogres responded to Kaede’s battle cry, ran for their weapons, and rushed across the stream to join in the attack.
Jyrbian allowed the first of them to sweep by him, then met the next handful of charging warriors, blocking their path. “That way,” he commanded, pointing with his bloody sword. “Into the woods. Flank them.”
If there was any hesitation on their part to follow the orders of a complete stranger, he didn’t see it. Swords waving, they raced up the hill as he had directed, meeting further waves of humans in the woods.
Quickly, he dispatched others, five here, ten there, any he could commandeer, until the enemy was engaged in a melee all along the stream and through the woods. The Ogre troops might have been slow to respond, but they were making up for it with ferocity.
Three humans fell for every Ogre overcome. Leaping free of his horse, Jyrbian rejoined the fighting for the pure joy of making the odds even heavier. Every human whose throat he slashed, whose belly he stabbed, bore Eadamm’s face. He fought and fought harder, mind lost to battle lust.
Finally, he wheeled, sword held before him, and wheeled again, disappointed to find no remaining opponents. Nearby a young female with a short sword was battling a human male with two daggers. Jyrbian stepped into the fray and plunged his sword into the man’s chest. As the man slid free of the blade, leaving it coated with his blood, Jyrbian lunged cruelly and cut his throat as well, from ear to ear.
The blood was like an intoxicant. He raised his sword to strike at the body even as it lay, already dead, then Kaede stepped in front of him.
She laid a hand on his trembling arm. “He’s dead, Jyrbian. They’re all dead. Or running.”
For a moment, he stared at her blankly, then the words penetrated. He looked around. The woods, the shores of the stream, were littered with bodies. The water ran red. It seemed the sky darkened with blood. A heavy, rhythmic wind poured through the clouds, a pounding echoed off the mountainside.
“Let the rest go,” Kaede insisted, holding his arm.
Slowly he became aware that his fingers were knotted with pain from gripping his sword, that the heavy, bellowslike sound was not coming from the sky, but from his own lungs. The pounding was the beating of his heart, blood pulsing in his veins.
“Let them go,” she repeated in a softer tone, easing the weight of her hand on his arm. “There are troops in the woods who will hunt them.”
“Indeed?” said a grating voice behind them. “And I should like to know who thinks himself high enough to order my troops around during battle.”
When Jyrbian turned, he automatically adopted a fighting stance.
Several of the Ogres who had surrounded Jyrbian in the heat of the fighting also followed Kaede’s example and stepped away from the building confrontation.
The Ogre who faced Jyrbian was obviously the captain of the company. He was tall, though not as tall as Lyrralt, and so slender that he was almost gangly. He wore a fancy version of the red-and-white Dalle uniform, the front so ornamented with citations and ribbons that the cloth barely kept its shape. He had “dandy” written all over him, a soft, pampered member of the high nobility who had probably never set foot away from the court before this life-or-death excursion.
“Ahh.” With an exaggerated courtesy, Jyrbian straightened, bringing his booted heels together with a tap. Though he affected a bow, he never took his eyes from the slender Ogre. “And I should like to know who so stupidly risked the lives of these fine warriors by bivouacking in a place that invites ambush.” His voice was like steel and ice.
Anger flared in the captain’s eyes. He turned purple with rage. His hand flew to the jeweled hilt of his sword, slid the clean, unbloodied blade from its scabbard.
Jyrbian attacked before the Ogre had a chance to act, but the other parried well. Their blades met high overhead, then lower, at waist level, and locked as the hilts slammed into each other.
With muscles hardened by months of riding and grueling work, Jyrbian was bound to win any test of strength.
Indeed, the captain fell back. One step, two, three, and the growing crowd around them, strangely watchful
