'What…?' Gull could only clutch his bleeding biceps and stare.
The being seemed incredibly tall. The helmet made it taller, for it sported a plume made of, of all things, a red-dyed horsetail. The face was obscured by the enclosed helm. It and the breastplate were etched with sworls, then painted or enameled. The being wore wide armbands, and had been warpainted yesterday with handprints and runes, though now the paint was runny and smudged. The back half was roan, reddish brown, and shoulders and arms sported equally red, though sparser hair. War harness and packs were slung across the back. The deadly lance was longer than the creature's body. Feathers tied to the lance with rawhide were dyed purple and white, and tattered. The lance had seen hard use.
The centaur grunted as it jiggled slime off the lance, made a human pout of disgust. 'Sengir Vampire like elf. Just as bad. Travel alone, though. Fly into battlefields always. Have you seen my mate, Holleb? I am Helki.'
Now Gull understood why the voice sounded high. 'You're a-woman!'
'Yes.' The helmet bobbled. 'And you are man. So?'
So why are you so hairy? Gull wanted to ask, but didn't. The lance hung in the air like a thunderbolt. He tested his arm and found it had quit bleeding. He'd won more scars from two days of adventuring than some men gained in a lifetime.
'So… I haven't seen your mate. I'm searching for folk myself-' With a rush, memories of dead and missing crashed around Gull like surf, threatened to wash him away. 'I… we… our village is ruined.'
Oddly, the centaur nodded in sympathy. 'And our lives, I think. We should work together. Would be good.'
Anger stabbed Gull to his toe tips. Work with these, who'd helped destroy his home?
'But perhaps,' the centaur interrupted, 'neither of us have problem now.' She whinnied pure delight. Circling on dancing back legs, she flashed away around the hill of giant, paint-daubed tail flicking. Gull heard her call, 'You search a two-leg looks like you? Girl?'
'What?' Gull felt stupid and thick. Like him…?
Then he got it. Snatching his axe, he ran.
'Greensleeves!'
''The gods watch over drunks, children, and fools,'' Gull quoted.
Trotting across the meadow, dancing around craters and cracks, came the other centaur. This one was bigger and hairier, and undeniably male, to judge by the war club slung between its legs. This must be the mate, Holleb.
Seated on the centaur's back was Greensleeves.
She looked fine, with chaff in her hair, briars in her gown and shawl, dirt on her small feet. Light as a bird, she slid off the centaur's back, chattering. The centaur nodded absently. Probably he thought it some foreign language, not her own animal gibberish.
The centaur embraced his mate, breastplate to breastplate, then slid alongside to bang flanks. Both rattled in their own tongue, and Gull could tell it was love talk, for it floated like song.
He hugged his own sister, asked, 'Where were you?'
She chittered like a squirrel, then squeaked, pulled away, and went to the giant's side.
The monster-man had slumped again. One head lay in a puddle, lips white with pain. The other stared glass- eyed at the sky. The nearer head turned vaguely as Greensleeves touched a massive shoulder, caressed the bald creased head. She cooed in a way Gull recognized: soothing sounds his mother had made to a hurt child.
But his mother was dead. And it was partly this giant's fault.
Roughly, Gull jerked his sister away. Anger made his voice harsh. 'Leave him! Let him die!'
A patter of thumps sounded behind. He confronted the looming centaurs with their three-yard lances. Gull tucked Greensleeves behind him, balanced his axe.
The mare-woman nodded at the giant. 'We should help. He is a thinking being, in pain.'
Gull wanted to spit, he felt so bitter at himself and them. But like lancing a boil, he might as well get it over with.
'No. Better the sick die. And you that can leave, leave.'
The horse-folk shifted their feet. The female demanded, 'This is how two-legs show thank-yous?'
Words almost choking him, Gull rapped, 'I grant we owe you. You saved my life. He rescued my sister. But that scarce makes up for destroying our valley as your trade. A mercenary expects not thanks but blood money. So collect it and begone!'
The centaurs danced backward, as if to gain swinging room. The male barked at the female, snorting, whinnying, and she chirped back. Then she whirled on Gull, who raised his axe.
'Know you, two-leg rat-man,' she sneered, 'we are no merc-mercenaries who take money to fighting. We are forced labor, slaves to wizards, made to fight without our will. Would we could return home and stay, but no. But you know all, and not listen!'
With that pronouncement, they whirled in place. Tails flying like flags, they cantered off across the meadow for the woods.
Gull was left to ponder her words. Slaves to wizards?
That must be a lie. No one could be forced to war against their will, could they?
Yet he felt regretful as they pranced into the woods, ducking branches and parting brush with their lances. If it were true…
Greensleeves gurgled like a badger, plucked at his sleeve, dragging him toward the giant.
Gull protested. 'No, Greenie, no. I can't help him. Half a hundred of our own folk need help. And he's just a mercenary…'
It was no use. Despite having twice her weight, he was towed along. The giant's shorn stump stank of corruption. Probably he-or they-would die shortly anyway.
The giant's left head focused. Greensleeves patted the nose, long as Gull's forearm. Wracked with doubts, the woodcutter ventured, 'Can you speak?'
'Speak?' Big eyes blinked slowly. They were slanted, almond eyes. The skin had a yellow caste, too, Gull noted. The giant must come from far away-he'd heard there were men of different colors in the Domains. Judging from the wrinkles around eyes and mouth, this giant was also very old.
And slow. He finally answered. 'Yes. I talk. I hurt.'
Gull pressed. 'Did you come of your own free will to fight for the wizard?'
'Wi-zard?' More thinking. Having a giant brain should make one a genius, Gull thought, but this giant was thick as a child. 'Wi-zard make me come here, make me fight.'
'Does she pay you? Feed you?' Gull was feeling increasingly stupid. And guilty.
'Feed? I hunger.'
'Are you a slave to the wizard?' Gull insisted.
'Slave?' A long pause. 'I must do… as she asks.' 'Oh, my,' sighed the woodcutter. 'Greensleeves, I'm the simpleton.'
Not long after, Cowslip and Greensleeves had cleansed the giant's wound, found fresh manure (but where were the cattle?) and packed on a poultice. Gull had butchered the dead horse, and lacking bandages, had sliced raw horsehide to wrap around the giant's stump. The giant sat up and ate every scrap of horse-liver and lights and guts-but he was used to raw fish, he explained slowly.
Cowslip asked the giant questions, and slowly they learned that he lived by the sea, fished, had fashioned his patchwork smock from the sails of shipwrecks, and was named Liko. (The single name, they guessed, meant one identity, not two. One brain in two skulls, with a wide gap between.) The left head answered questions while the right stared into space, daydreaming.
Gradually, throughout the long day, the villagers picked up. It gave them little time to mourn, though they were quiet. Everywhere Gull looked was some reminder of a life lost forever. A tree in which his brothers and sisters had built a hut, a stone where his grandmother had basked in the sun and told her stories, a stone wall he'd rebuilt with his father.
Only Greensleeves seemed not to mourn. Perhaps she didn't understand what had happened. Cooing, she puttered as always, tended people and the giant, mixed water with dandelion and burdock roots and fennel leaves for a poultice, brought comfort with her touch.
Some survivors had propped up an intact roof and cleared out underneath, and under this pitiful shelter they
