With a thuk! the shiruken came free and Aiko, yet holding her breath against the Troll stench, straightened up, her dark eyes wide with Arin's question. Then she shook her head and turned up her hands and said, "I do not know." She looked about. "Perhaps the mist does serve as dark water, and the monster as a one-eye; yet whether or no this fits your vision, I cannot say." She washed the star blade free of grume and dried it, then slipped it back into her belt next to the other. She glanced at Arin and then turned toward the Troll. "Should I cut out the eye of the kaibutsu so that we may take it with us?"
Take these with thee, no more… Arin scrunched her face into a squint of disgust, but turned up a hand and said, "If we find a one-eyed person in Morkfjord, we can always cast this one away. -'Ware the blood."
Aiko nodded and drew her dagger and bent down, but then straightened up and said, "Which eye should we take-the pierced one or the other?"
"Oh," said Arin. She pondered a moment. "The pierced one, I deem, for it is the one which makes him a one-eye."
"But then, Dara, does not the damaged orb make the other one the true one-eye?"
"Aye, it does at that. Yet redes are things of twists and turns, and oft depend on the unusual."
Aiko nodded. "And a pierced Troll's eye is unusual?"
"Indeed," replied Arin. "For had the Ogru but blinked, thy star would not have cloven through and we would now be the ones lying dead instead of the monstrous Troll. But this one lies slain, all because of a damaged eye, and that is what makes this Ogru different from others of its Kind."
And so, Aiko began hacking out the pierced orb, and where Troll's blood struck stone, it sizzled and popped, and threads of dark smoke rose up. Meanwhile Arin retrieved the goods from the slain pony and stripped it of salvageable tack, and laded all on Aiko's still skittish horse. They washed the blood from the damaged eye and wrapped it in the cloth of an empty grain sack and tied it up in another, then slung it with the other goods. Aiko washed and dried her dagger and sheathed it back in its scabbard. And then walking and leading the horse, they started down the mountain pass, going after Arin's runaway steed and the pony tethered after.
Down they went and down, leaving a dead horseling and a one-eyed slain Troll behind.
CHAPTER 31
Leading the horse, Ann and Aiko walked down the stony way, fog curling about them and swirling after as they passed through the mist-laden air. A mile they went and a mile more and onward, until in all they covered just over a league, and at last they came upon the runaway steeds, horse and pony nibbling on new spring grass at the foot of a modest slope of slow-melting snow banked against the north face of a great sheltering boulder. The animals looked at Arin and Aiko as if asking "where have you been?" Cooing softly, Arin gathered them in.
As the Dylvana fed the steeds each a cup of grain, Aiko transferred the salvaged goods from her horse to the pony. Shortly they continued onward, Arin and Aiko now mounted.
Down through the blowing mist they rode, the cloud thinning as they descended, until only vague tendrils grasped at them, and soon even these were gone. Another league they fared and the pass debouched onto wide grassy plains. They had at last ridden down from the clouds to come to the Steppes of Jord.
They set up camp in the lee of a hillside at the foot of Kaagor Pass. They had just built a fire to have some hot tea when the rain began to fall.
The next morning, thoroughly drenched, Arin and Aiko studied the map. They decided to follow an old road alongside the Grey River, then cross over to Arnsburg and rest awhile, after which they would push onward, fording the Judra into Naud where they would turn north and follow the banks of that river through Naud and Kath to Fjordland, where they would turn away easterly to ride to Morkfjord within, the entire route some six hundred miles altogether.
"If we press," said Arin, studying the way, "we should arrive within a month."
North they started, bearing slightly west, following the road down from Kaagor Pass as a thin dawn mist seeped up from the dank ground, and within two leagues, just this side of a thicket straight ahead, they sighted a fork in the road-one route turning westerly toward Jordkeep, the other bearing northward to Arnsburg. Yet as they came toward the split, a chariot drawn by four horses abreast rumbled out from the copse, two riders within, one driving, one bearing a spear and buckler. The two-wheeled war-wagon trundled to the junction, where it stopped and waited.
Arin glanced at Aiko. "What says thy tiger?"
"She whispers only caution, Dara."
"As I, too, thought," said the Dylvana.
Arin turned her attention back to the chariot and the warriors within. The wagon itself seemed made of wood and covered with a hide-armor of sorts. The wheels were large, the iron rims wide, the better to run over rough ground. A cluster of spears-perhaps ten or twelve in all-stood to the right side and rear, and Arin could see what she deemed was a readied bow racked on the right-side hand rail.
As they rode closer, Arin turned her attention to the warriors: they were women, tall and fair, fierce warrior maidens of Jord. Steel helms they wore, dark and glintless, one sporting a long, tailing gaud of horsehair, the other bearing wings flaring. Fleece vests covered chain-link shirts, and long cloaks draped from their shoulders to ward away the icy chill of the early morning mist.
They looked proud and hard, standing as they did, their weapons at the ready, their visages resolute and framed by coppery hair, their clear eyes flinty as these strangers came into the realm of the Vanadurin. And when Arin and Aiko reached the juncture…
"Stanse!" commanded the spear-wielding warrior, speaking in a tongue neither Arin nor Aiko knew, yet the meaning was clear and they halted their steeds.
"Hva heter Da? Hvor skal dufra? Hvor skal du hen?"
"We do not speak thy tongue," said Arin, casting back her hood.
The warrior maidens' eyes widened slightly at the sight of an Elf. The charioteer holding the four-in-hand said, "My Lady, these are suspicious times, for the realm of Jord is at war. Hence we need know your names and where you are from and where you are bound."
"At war?" asked Arin.
"Aye. With the Naudrons." The maiden waved a hand vaguely to the east.
Now Aiko cast back her own hood, and again the eyes of both maidens widened, for never had they seen a yellow-skinned person before.
"I am Dara Arin of Darda Erynian. My companion is Lady Aiko of Ryodo. We are bound for Fjordland."
The charioteer spoke rapidly, translating Arin's words to the other.
"Hvorledes kommen de til den Jordreich?" asked the warrior holding the spear.
The driver turned to Arin. "How did you come to the Jordreach? Surely not…" She glanced up the road at the col.
Arin turned and waved a hand toward the Grimwall. "Through Kaagor Pass."
"Umulig!" snorted the spear bearer.
"That cannot be!" declared the charioteer. "There is a vanskapnig-a monster-living there."
"The monster, the Troll, is dead," said Arin.
"Dod? The Troll is dod?”
"Aye," replied Arin. "We slew it: by five-bladed throwing-star and bow and arrow."
"Now it is I who will say impossible!" proclaimed the driver.
Aiko shifted in her saddle and her hands went to the hilts of her swords. Her voice came low, dangerous: "Call you my Lady a liar?"