“What the hells are you doing?” Sasha heard Koenyg's rider yell above the noise. “The king orders you to fall back in line!”
“Isfayen tire of marching in line,” Markan said cheerfully. “We shall return shortly.”
“You shall return at once!” yelled the rider.
Markan's stare informed the rider that if there had been any chance the Great Lord of Isfayen could be persuaded to turn around, it was now gone. The rider slowed up in frustration, and the Isfayen thundered on.
Soon the pace slowed, and they rode across fields between small farmhouses. Tall hills rose in the near distance, with sheer, dark cliffs that reminded Sasha of Lenayin. Further along the hillside rise there perched a village, emerging above trees and orchards that covered the hills. As they came closer up the road, Sasha saw why the scout had found the town curious-there were larger buildings here than the typical little cottages. One was a temple, with grand spires. Several others appeared to be clustered together, and boasted ornamental spires or crenellations.
The approaching road wound through orchards as it climbed, and finally arrived at the gates of the town walls. As they rode within, Sasha began to recognise the buildings. “These are like the Tol'rhen in Tracato,” she said. On the walls were friezes of men building things and consulting maps. And on plinths within the walls, statues of learned men, and a woman. The woman was Maldereld, the serrin general who had led Saalshen's conquest of these lands two centuries before, and ordered the construction of these great institutions of learning. “Only far smaller than Tracato.”
Soldiers had been here. The statue of Maldereld was faceless, stonework smashed with deliberate effort.
“What manner of place?” asked an Isfayen, frowning up at the high walls as they rode.
“A place of learning,” Sasha replied. “Students come here from across the lands, to learn skills for their people. Medicines, building, farming, languages, history.”
“Fighting?” asked another man.
“Yes, these are Nasi-Keth,” said Sasha. “They learn to fight like me.” And the men of Isfayen looked far more impressed to learn that, and considered the walls with renewed respect.
A search of the buildings' echoing halls revealed signs of fast departure, and no sign of life. But an Isfayen lord's intrusion in the temple revealed signs of recent activity.
“There is blood on the paving,” he said grimly. “Pews have been overturned, and rear rooms searched. There are wagon tracks outside and hoofmarks. There was food left in the temple, and blankets…I think perhaps someone was using it as a refuge.”
He handed Markan a wooden doll, with a head of long horses' hair intricately embedded in the wood. A child's toy.
“Someone did not leave fast enough,” Yasmyn said solemnly. Sasha looked away, biting her lip. Like stone, she told herself. Be like stone. Yasmyn tucked the doll into a pouch at her belt.
“The tracks lead away, quite fresh,” said the lord who had discovered it. “We can catch whoever made them, I'm sure.”
“Interesting,” said Markan with a nod. “I should like to see this latest conquest of our grand allies, against a ferocious, doll-wielding foe.”
Some of the men smiled or laughed at that. Sasha did not. Nor, with a concerned look her way, did Yasmyn.
The road from town led them toward the looming cliffs seen earlier. These odd tombs of rock seemed incongruous with the surrounding green landscape of gentle hills. The Isfayen scout followed the trail easily enough, and soon informed them all that a wagon party lay ahead.
They came to it on a rutted trail by a stream. There were four wagons, accompanied by ten men on horse. All wore the colour and armour of Bacosh warriors, and peering now behind them at the Isfayen's approach, they seemed relieved but wary.
“We thought you might be serrin!” one horseman shouted back at them in Torovan, which Sasha, Markan, and Yasmyn alone of their group understood. “We're making double time to reach the column, don't want to be caught out here past nightfall!”
Markan rode forward. Sasha could see men with crossbows peering from the rear flaps of the wagons. The Bacosh horsemen seemed wary too, of this big man with slanted eyes and flowing hair, clad in patterned leather, chain armour, and steel-studded gloves. The curved sword drew many looks to his side. One did not need to talk to an Isfayen warrior to know his nature, one needed only look.
“You come from the town back there?” Markan asked, pointing back the way they'd ridden.
The horseman nodded. “Weird place, yes? Too many damn weird places in this land, I'll be happy to get home to Meraine, myself.” He looked at them with some suspicion. “I bet you Lenays don't find it so weird, though? Men say you folks don't mind the serrin?”
“In Isfayen we've had little to do with them,” said Markan.
“Ah,” said the horseman. “Isfayen.” Clearly he had no idea where that was. In most of the lowlands, a Lenay barbarian was a Lenay barbarian, no matter what region.
“What manner of soldiers are you?” Markan asked, with clear disdain.
“Men-at-arms,” came the reply. “Tasked with foraging.”
“Foraging what?” Sasha asked.
The horseman stared at her, only now seeming to notice her presence. He blinked rapidly, perhaps realising who she was.
“Things,” he said defensively. “Food. Supplies.”
“Mind if I look?” Sasha asked.
“It's ours!” scowled the horseman. He backed up his horse, clearly worried. His reaction made her cold. If he recognised her, Sasha reckoned, he no doubt knew something of her conflicted allegiances.
Like stone, she told herself. Like the hard granite of the looming cliffs.
The crossbowmen in the back of the wagon were readying their weapons, as horsemen along the column grasped at the hilts of their blades.
“There are a handful of you,” Markan said contemptuously. “There are many of us. We are the Isfayen, the bloodwarriors of the western mountains, and all Lenayin has feared us since we first walked in the world. I think it best that you let us look.”
The horseman thought about it. A nervous shifting passed along the wagon column. Then the horseman backed up, and crossbowmen leaped from the back of the wagon.
“There was a bounty,” the horseman explained nervously. “A gold piece each. We just wanted to bring something back to our families.”
Sasha dismounted, strode to the back of the wagon, and threw open the rear flap.
The wagon was filled with small bodies. Little shapes, arms and legs askew, entangled in dreadful heaps. She saw little faces, and widened eyes. Saw a flash of inhuman colour, the gleam of serrin sight. Crossbred children. Part human, part serrin, like her good friend Aisha. Like she and Errollyn would have had, given the chance, and the assurance that their offspring would not end up like this, piled in some forager's cart like…
The wagon floor was awash with blood. The smell was dreadful.
Sasha did not know how she hit the ground, but suddenly her knees were gone, and she was curled against the wagon wheel, her body torn with sobs. From the Isfayen behind her, there was consternation. Markan dismounted and peered into the wagon. And cursed in shock.
Then Yasmyn, who said nothing when she looked, but her grip on Sasha's arm when she crouched at her side was painfully tight. Other Isfayen lords came to look, now guessing the wagon's contents, but horrified all the same.
“Sasha,” said Yasmyn, perhaps as distressed to see the great Synnich-ahn curled and sobbing like a child as she was at the wagon itself. She put a hand to Sasha's face, eyes pleading her to stop. Sasha barely noticed. She had tried to make herself like stone, but stone was not her nature. She was water, free and wild, and she could not bear this weight.
She could not be a party to this. Her land and her people were all she had that remained, and she marched with them into the very gates of Loth…but she could not be a party to this. She would rather die. She had to die. She had no other choices left.