He glanced around uncomfortably, then leaned forward and spoke in a much-lowered voice. “Lord Drehkos, you done treated us better all along then any of the others’, so I’ll level with you. You cain’t hold Morguhnpolis! Them old walls ain’t near thick nor high enough, and mosta the engines whut wuz burnt up las’ night was took off of them walls, so Morguhnpolis ain’t nuthin’ now but a big ol’ rat trap. Don’t you git yourself caught in it, Lord Drehkos. You just keep on by. You don’t look like no Ehleen, so mebbe the mountain folks’ll take you in. This all’s just ‘tween you and me, you un-nerstan’.”
The skinny officer stood and extended his hand. Soberly, Drehkos arose and gripped the officer’s grubby, broken-nailed hand as if he had been an equal, saying, “I thank you, Hohguhn, I thank you for everything. Now, let me advise you, if I may. Your men may, of course, take anything left in the camps that strikes their fancy, but don’t linger too long, lest you be taken for a rearguard and attacked.”
From the top of the hill, the camps appeared deserted. Nonetheless, Bili rode with his visor down and his uncased axe laid ready across his wide-flaring pommel. While he had ridden through the dark, narrow passage to the gate, he had mindspoken his warhorse, Mahvros, reaffirming their brotherhood and telling him how much he regretted their enforced separation and how pleased he was to be once more able to ride into battle astride one on whom he could depend. Nor was any of it untrue, for Bili actually felt kinship with the devoted stallion, had felt his own wounds no more keenly than he had the horse’s at the embattled bridge where he and the High Lord and Vahrohneeskos Ahndee had stood off a score or more of mounted rebels. Had it only been less than a week since that affray? It seemed a lifetime—and he well knew how important to a warrior’s safety was the cooperation of a disciplined and courageous mount.
As for Mahvros, he all but purred! Once clear of the gate, he arched his steel-clad neck and lifted his white-stockinged feet high in his showiest parade strut, his powerful thews rolling under his glossy black hide. Mahvros loved nothing more than a good blood-spurting fight, and his brother had told him that soon there would be two-legs in plenty to savage and kick.
Bili spoke aloud, for though Chief Hwahltuh Sanderz, who rode at his right, could mindspeak, Captain Pawl Raikuh, on his left, could not.
“Captain, should I fall. Baron Spiros Morguhn will be acting duke until my brother, Tcharlee, can get here from Pitzburk. You are a brave and honorable man and you have served me well-serve them equally. Command of the present warband will devolve upon the Undying High Lord.
“Regarding the rebels, the only men I want taken alive are those damned priests and the treacherous nobles, but no man is to chance undue risks simply to capture them. I would like to have the bastards for public torture and execution, but none of them are worth the lives of any of your men, and I’ll settle for just their heads, if it comes to that
“As for the common scum, I want to see no living ones along our track. Understood?” At his companions’ grim nods, he went on.
“Save your darts and arrows for the unlikely event that someone persuades the pigs to make a stand, or for later, when the horses are too blown to run them down; for now, let’s have sword and axe and spear work. And, since our numbers be small, we’d best stay together until we’re certain there’s no organized rearguard to hack through. We-What’s this?”
A broadbeamed mindspeak from Chief Hwahltuh and a hand signal from Captain Raikuh brought troopers and clansmen into line of battle on the flanks of the three leaders. Then every eye was fixed upon the tall, broad form of the young thoheeks, awaiting his word or gesture to charge the small band which had emerged from a fold of ground and was now moving slowly up the hill.
Bili raised his visor for better visibility and kneed Mahvros forward a few yards, then a few yards more, until he could clearly see the approaching men. Only the leading six were mounted, though several others led limping horses or saddled mules. The foremost, a skinny man whose dented helmet bore the horsehair crest of a commoner officer, was gripping his sheathed sword by the tip and holding it high over his head. Noting Bill’s advanced position, the officer turned to halt his party, then spurred forward alone.
Bili unwound the thong from his wrist, grasped the central spike of his axe and waved the haft above his head.
“Now, what the hell is going on?” demanded the Sanderz of Raikuh.
His eyes still upon his young lord, the captain snapped, “Sword Truce. Those men must be Freefighters, probably part of Captain Manos’ two troops of dragoons. But keep your eyes peeled, lord chief, and your bow ready. Sword Truce is sacred to those of us who worship Steel, but others have been known to invoke it for purposes of unhallowed treachery.”
When but a yard separated the two riders, the lanky officer extended his weapon, hilt first, to Bili, who accepted it with one hand while proffering his axe with the other. Gravely, the officer raised the head of the upended axe to his lips and kissed the burnished metal. No less gravely, Bili partially drew the sword and reverently pressed his lips to the flat of the wide, well-honed blade, gently resheathed it, then returned it to its owner, accepting his axe in return. Moving up knee to knee, the men exchanged whispered words and a complicated handclasp.
Grinning, Bili laid his axe back across his pommel and relaxed against the high cantle of his warkak. “Well, Sword Brother, I hope that, if you and yours were a part of that sorry rabble just departed, you at least got paid.”
Lieutenant Hohguhn smiled ruefully. “Not for the last three moons, noble Sword Brother, but Lord Drehkos, he give us leave to loot the camp, after he ‘uz gone. ‘Course, we would’ve enyhow, pay or no pay, but she were a nice touch, having permission and all.”
“Well, what want you of me and the sacred Truce, Brother?” asked Bill, adding, “I must be brusque, for there is a day of bladework ahead.”
Hohguhn snorted. “Butcher’s work, it’ll be, and no mistaking, ‘less some o’ them Vawnee dig up enough gumption to stand and fight.”
An icy prickling crept under Bill’s backplate. “Vawnee, Sword Brother? Is Thoheeks Vawn involved, then, in this sorry affair?”
“If you’d a-lissuned to what all them Vawnee said, you’d of thought their Ehleen god’d done in the thoheeks and all his kin. But iffen you “uz raised in mountains, like me, you’d know what probly really happuned.”
“Thoheeks Vawn and his Kindred are then dead?” Bill’s voice was tight.
“Oh, aye, noble Sword Brother,” Hohguhn stated. “Seems as how him and his got drove up inta the mountains and holed up in a old Confederation fort and they ‘uz standing off the whole dang Ehleen force, then—and this here’s where them Vawnee gits all walleyed and sweaty—what I figger happened was a big ole thunderstorm come on and lightning struck their wall. I tell you, I seen the like happen, up near to Pahkuhzburk, where I ‘uz borned, Sword Brother. A hit like that, with a lotta thunder a-ratiling the rocks will real often set off a landslide, so when them Vawnee tolt me part o’ the fort slid down the mountain, I knowed didn’t no Ehleen god have nuthin to do with it.
“But, anyhow, five or six hundred of them Vawnee come a-riding in last night, fulla piss and vinegar and set to lick the whole Confederation. Leastways they wuz till all that ruckus got started. Half of ‘em wuz dead afore dawn. And that wuz a right fine piece of work, that sally. Did you lead her. Sword Brother?”
“No,” said Bili simply. “It was led by my birth brother, Djef, Tanist of Morguhn, now dead.”
Hohguhn clasped his cased sword in both hands, saying, “Honor of the Steel to his memory. Sword Brother.”