The War God's Own

size. Either of his legs alone would easily have outweighed Holderman, and the blade of the sword he carried ashore was at least a foot longer than the tallest halfling aboard, but he could fit into amazingly tight quarters when he had to. His companion Brandark was over a foot shorter than he, yet Bahzell had made himself much more quickly at ease aboard the schooner. Perhaps, Holderman mused, that was because Bahzell, at least, could swim. Brandark couldn't, and the first officer suspected that had made him more than a little tentative when it came to finding his sea legs.

Yet he'd found them in the end, and he'd learned much more about Wind Dancer than Bahzell had. Not that Bahzell had been disinterested or tried to avoid doing his share and a little to spare aboard ship. But the Horse Stealer saw the schooner mainly as a means of getting from one port to another, while Brandark saw deeper than that. Bahzell had learned to obey the orders of the skilled professionals about him; Brandark had learned why those orders were given.

Holderman watched the two hradani talk with their heads close together while water creamed up over the lee rails and raced at their feet. He couldn't hear them through the sound of wind and wave, the creak and groan of timbers, and the high-pitched song of the rigging, but he'd heard them chaffering often enough to have a shrewd notion of what they were saying, and he shook his own head.

Marfangers knew more than most people about hradani, for their homeland lay directly across the Wild Wash Channel from the hradani clans of the same name. Yet for all their fierceness in battle and predilection for carrying off anything not nailed to the earth, the Wild Wash clans' reputations were but shadows of those of the Horse Stealers or Brandark's native Bloody Swords. Wind Dancer's crew had heard all about their savagery and mutual hatred, despite their northern homelands' isolation, long before Bahzell and Brandark had come aboard. In fact, every Norfressan (with the possible exception of a few hermits among the desert-riding Wakuo nomads) had heard about the Horse Stealers and Bloody Swords, and no one wanted a thing to do with either of them.

And that was what puzzled Holderman whenever he looked at Wind Dancer's passengers. They should have gone for one another's throats on sight, which made their deep and obvious friendship confusing enough, but neither was remotely like their people's reputations in most other ways, either. That, Holderman reflected, might indicate that hradani reputation was as misleading as some of the wilder tales told about his own folk, but it didn't explain why these two differed so… profoundly from the stereotypes.

Brandark was bad enough. The kindest description of the Bloody Swords emphasized their contempt for the weakening influence of anything smacking of civilization, yet Brandark favored lace-fronted shirts and embroidered jerkins which would have done a Purple Lord proud. Worse, he was the best educated person aboard Wind Dancer, although he was entirely self-taught. And to top things off, he was a skilled musician, despite the loss of two fingers, who could play the bawdiest tune a seaman could name or spend hours staring into a lamp flame while he stroked soft, haunting beauty from his balalaika. His voice, unfortunately, was something else again. Not even his closest friend would call it beautiful, and Holderman was almost relieved that it was so. The notion of a hradani scholar and dandy was hard enough to cope with; he rather doubted he could have gotten his mind around the concept of a Bloody Sword bard.

On the other hand, even that idea might have been easier to adjust to than that of a Horse Stealer champion of Tomanak . Like the rest of Wind Dancer's company, Holderman had felt nothing but scorn when seven and a half feet of stark naked hradani had swum half way across Bortalik Bay, climbed over the rail, and calmly claimed to be one of the war god's chosen champions. The assertion had been preposterous and probably blasphemous, given the fact that there hadn't been a single hradani champion of any God of Light in the twelve centuries since the Fall of Kontovar. Besides, every Norfressan child knew the hradani had served as the Carnadosan traitors' shock troops in the war which had destroyed the empire which once ruled Orfressa's southern continent. That was why they were universally distrusted and shunned, if not actively hated. Well, that and the berserk, uncontrollable bloodlust Bahzell's people called 'the Rage.' No one, after all, wanted to get too friendly with a gigantic barbarian who might suddenly take it into his head to chop one into teeny, tiny pieces for no particular reason.

Holderman was prepared to admit that stereotypes tended to be exaggerated, yet he'd found it impossible to believe that Tomanak Orfro, Keeper of the Scales of Orr, the Sword of Light, God of Justice, and Captain-General of the Gods of Light as well as God of War, would pick a champion from such unpromising material. But Tomanak had done just that. The powers of the champion's blade Bahzell bore had proved it, and Bahzell's champion status, even more than the fury he'd waked among the Purple Lords whom Captain Pitchallow hated with every fiber of his being, explained the speed with which Wind Dancer's master had granted him and Brandark passage to Belhadan. Not that Pitchallow wouldn't have cheerfully rescued anyone who could infuriate the Purple Lords. Under most circumstances, however, he would at least have required them to pay their passages-he was a Marfang halfling, after all-and he'd flatly refused to take a copper kormak from Bahzell.

That hadn't kept him from insisting that they pull their weight aboard ship, but it was a sign of his high regard for the hradani, and he and Bahzell had spent many a late night with their heads together. No one else-aside, perhaps, from Brandark-had any idea precisely what the captain and Bahzell had found to discuss so earnestly, but Pitchallow's devotion to Korthrala, the sea god, was as well known as it was strong. And although even his own followers admitted that Korthrala wasn't overblessed with wisdom by divine standards, he was Tomanak's younger brother and firm ally, so perhaps it wasn't so very surprising that one of his churchmen should have a lot to say to a brand new champion of the war god. Especially one who needed advice as badly as Bahzell Bahnakson was likely to need it.

Now, as he watched the two hradani shade their eyes with their hands, gazing at the approaching mountains while they talked, Holderman said a small, sincere prayer of his own for them. He might be less devout than his captain, but given what Wind Dancer's two guests were likely to face when they set foot ashore in Belhadan, he reflected, even his prayers couldn't do any harm.

Chapter One

'So, Vaijon. Are you ready?'

The question came in a gently sardonic voice, and the golden-haired young man standing before the mirror in the chapter house's entry vestibule turned quickly. A faint flush touched his cheeks as he recognized the voice's teasing edge, but he bent his head in a small bow.

'I am, Sir Charrow.'

His reply was proper enough, but irritation lingered in his expression. Not overtly; it was more subtle than any scowl, little more than an extra bit of tension in his jaw, more sensed than seen, perhaps, with just the tiniest edge of challenge under his courteous words. Sir Charrow Malakhai, Knight-Captain of the Order of Tomanak and master of its Belhadan chapter, hid a sigh as he wondered if the youngster even realized that edge was there. Sir Charrow had seen other arrogant young sprouts-more of them, in fact, than he had any desire to contemplate- during his years with the Order. Fortunately, Tomanak's Order, as a rule, had a way of knocking that sort of attitude out of its brethren; unfortunately, the process seemed to have gone awry this time.

'Good, my son.' The knight-captain made his words a gentle reprimand and was rewarded by seeing the younger man's flush darken. Whatever else he might be, Vaijon wasn't stupid. He recognized a rebuke even when he truly failed to grasp the reason for it. 'This is a very important day for our chapter, Vaijon,' Charrow went on in a more normal voice. 'It is up to you to represent us-and Tomanak -properly.'

'Of course, Sir Charrow. I understand. And I'm honored by the trust which led you to select me for this duty.'

Vaijon went down on one knee and bent his head once more, and Charrow gazed down at him for a moment. Then he laid one scarred hand, blunt fingers still strong and calloused from regular practice with sword, bow, and lance, upon the gleaming gold hair.

'Go then with my blessing,' he said, 'and with that of the God. May his Shield go before you.'