left shoulder, and he pitched instantly down and to his right. Wheeling his own sword around, arms extending as he fell. The edge swept above and past the warrior’s savage downstroke, cut through a pair of thick wrists, then tore through abdomen, from belly-button and across, between ribcage and point of hip, then bursting clear.
Still spinning as he toppled, he renewed the swing that had been staggered by bone and flesh, twisting his shoulders to follow the blade as it passed beneath him, then around to the other side. The slash cleared the ground at a level that took the last Rathyd’s left leg at the ankle. Then the ground hammered into Karsa’s right shoulder. Rolling away, his sword trailing crossways across his own body, deflecting but not quite defeating a downward blow-fire tearing into his right hip-then he was beyond the warrior’s reach-and the man was shrieking and stumbling an awkward retreat.
Karsa’s roll brought him upright once more, into a crouch that spurted blood down his right leg, that sent stinging stabs into his left side, his back beneath his right shoulder blade, and his left thigh where the knives were still buried.
He found himself facing the youth.
No more than forty, not yet at his full height, lean of limb as the Unready often were. Eyes filled with horror.
Karsa winked, then wheeled around to close on the one-footed warrior.
His shrieks had grown frenzied, and Karsa saw that Bairoth and Delum had reached him and had joined in the game, their blades taking the other foot and both hands. The Rathyd was on the ground between them, limbs jerking and spurting blood across the trampled grass.
Karsa glanced back to see the youth fleeing towards the woods. The warleader smiled.
Bairoth and Delum began chasing the floundering Rathyd warrior about, chopping pieces from his flailing limbs.
They were angry, Karsa knew. He had left them nothing. Ignoring his two companions and their brutal torture, he plucked the butchering knife from his thigh. Blood welled but did not spurt, telling him that no major artery or vein had been touched. The knife in his left side had skittered along ribs and lay embedded flat beneath skin and a few layers of muscle. He drew the weapon out and tossed it aside. The last knife, sunk deep into his back, was harder to reach and it took a few attempts before he managed to find a sure clasp of its smeared handle and then pull it out. A longer blade would have reached his heart. As it was, it would probably be the most irritating of the three minor wounds. The sword-cut into his hip and through part of a buttock was slightly more serious. It would have to be carefully sewn, and would make both riding and walking painful for a while.
Loss of blood or a fatal blow had silenced the dismembered Rathyd, and Karsa heard Bairoth’s heavy steps approach. Another scream announced Delum’s examination of the other fallen. ‘Warleader.’ Anger made the voice taut. Karsa slowly turned. ‘Bairoth Gild.’
The heavy warrior’s face was dark. ‘You let the youth escape. We must hunt him, now, and it will not be easy for these are his lands, not ours.’
‘He is meant to escape,’ Karsa replied. Bairoth scowled.
‘You’re the clever one,’ Karsa pointed out, ‘why should this baffle you so?’
‘He reaches his village.’
‘Aye.’
‘And tells of the attack. Three Uryd warriors. There is rage and frenzied preparations.’ Bairoth allowed himself a small nod as he continued. ‘A hunt sets out, seeking three Uryd warriors. Who are on foot. The youth is certain on this. Had the Uryd had horses, they would have used them, of course. Three against eight, to do otherwise is madness. So the hunt confines itself, in what it seeks, in its frame of thought, in all things. Three Uryd warriors, on foot.’
Delum had joined them, and now eyed Karsa without expression.
Karsa said, ‘Delum Thord would speak.’
‘I would, Warleader. The youth, you have placed an image in his mind. It will harden there, its colours will not fade, but sharpen. The echo of screams will become louder in his skull. Familiar faces, frozen eternal in expressions of pain. This youth, Karsa Orlong, will become an adult. And he will not be content to follow, he will lead. He
‘One day,’ Karsa said, ‘that Rathyd warleader shall kneel before me. This, I vow, here, on the blood of his kin, I so vow.’
The air was suddenly chill. Silence hung in the glade except for the muted buzz of flies.
Delum’s eyes were wide, his expression one of fear.
Bairoth turned away. ‘That vow shall destroy you, Karsa Orlong. No Rathyd kneels before an Uryd. Unless you prop his lifeless corpse against a tree stump. You now seek the impossible, and that is a path to madness.’
‘One vow among many I have made,’ Karsa said. ‘And each shall be kept. Witness, if you dare.’
Bairoth paused from studying the grey bear’s fur and defleshed skull-the Rathyd trophies-and glanced back at Karsa. ‘Do we have a choice?’
‘If you still breathe, then the answer is no, Bairoth Gild.’
‘Remind me to tell you one day, Karsa Orlong.’
‘Tell me of what?’
‘What life is like, for those of us in your shadow.’
Delum stepped close to Karsa. ‘You have wounds that need mending, Warleader.’
‘Aye, but for now, only the sword-cut. We must return to our horses and ride.’
‘Like a Lanyd arrow.’
‘Aye, just so, Delum Thord.’
Bairoth called out, ‘Karsa Orlong, I shall collect for you your trophies.’
‘Thank you, Bairoth Gild. We shall take that fur and skull, as well. You and Delum may keep those.’
Delum turned to face Bairoth. ‘Take them, brother. The grey bear better suits you than me.’
Bairoth nodded his thanks, then waved towards the dismembered warrior. ‘His ears and tongue are yours, Delum Thord.’
‘It is so, then.’
Among the Teblor, the Rathyd bred the fewest horses; despite this, there were plenty of wide runs from glade to glade down which Karsa and his companions could ride. In one of the clearings they had come upon an adult and two youths tending to six destriers. They had ridden them down, blades flashing, pausing only to collect trophies and gather up the horses, each taking two on a lead. An hour before darkness fell, they came to a forking of the trail, rode down the lower of the two for thirty paces, then released the leads and drove the Rathyd horses on. The three Uryd warriors then slipped a single, short rope around the necks of their own mounts, just above the collar bones, and with gentle, alternating tugs walked them backwards until they reached the fork, whereupon they proceeded onto the higher trail. Fifty paces ahead, Delum dismounted and backtracked to obscure their trail.
With the wheel taking shape overhead, they cut away from the rocky path and found a small clearing in which they made camp. Bairoth cut slices from the bear meat and they ate. Delum then rose to attend to the horses, using wet moss to wipe them down. The beasts were tired and left unhobbled to allow them to walk the clearing and stretch their necks.
Examining his wounds, Karsa noted that they had already begun to knit. So it was among the Teblor. Satisfied, he found his flask of blood-oil and set to repairing his weapon. Delum rejoined them and he and Bairoth followed suit.
‘Tomorrow,’ Karsa said, ‘we leave this trail.’
‘Down to the wider, easier ones in the valley?’ Bairoth asked.
‘If we are quick,’ Delum said, ‘we can pass through Rathyd land in a single day.’
‘No, we lead our horses higher, onto the goat and sheep trails,’ Karsa replied. ‘And we reverse our path for the length of the morning. Then we ride down into the valley once more. Bairoth Gild, with the hunt out, who will remain in the village?’
The heavy man drew out his new bear cloak and wrapped it about himself before answering. ‘Youths. Women. The old and the crippled.’
