“But, Bili,” commented Komees Hari, “who else could have mustered the force to slay over a hundred men?”
“Perhaps that tribe the High Lord mentioned, the Muhkohee. They must be powerful if the Ahrmehnee fear them.”
“But, my lords,” said Vahrohnos Rai Graiuhm of Makintahsh, absently massaging the thick neck of his destrier, “according to the maps, we’re still two days’ march within the borders of the Soormehlvuhn Tribe.”
Bili nodded. “According to the maps, baron, but recall if you will what I said at our last meeting before inaugurating the raids. These maps, especially the western borders of them, are of questionable accuracy. Too, even if we are still within the lands of the Ahrmehnee, consider, the bulk of their warriors are long leagues to the northeast and we are not the only men who ever took it into their heads to raid the lands of folk we knew to be occupied with another foe.
“No, gentlemen, I think we had best assume that we could see action at any moment from here on. Accordingly, we’ll tighten the march order of the column, bringing the trains from the rear to the center. The cats will still scout our projected route and our extended flanks. But now, between them and the column, a stronger vanguard will ride and, where terrain will permit, flank riders, as well.
“Hari, as you’re an old hand at warring and, as you have at least minimal farspeak, you’ll command the van. Stay in touch with the cats and with me. If any ambush occurs or if you run into a force unexpectedly, don’t try playing the hero, just fight a sensible holding action until the main body gets up to you. Understand? Pick such men as you want. You’ve your choice of the squadron.”
Bili stood up in his stirrups and looked about him, then, raising his voice, called, “Taros? Taros Duhnbahr? Where are you, man?”
When young Komees Taros came up, his tall sorrel stallion strutting, Bili told him, “You’ll command the rearguards, Taros. I’ll assign a cat to pace you on each flank, but keep your eyes peeled. None of us want to end up well-minced buzzard bait. Agreed?”
Earlier that morning, away to the. northeast, Aldora and her kahtahfrahktoee had trotted through the nahkhahrah’s village, then eastward, headed for the gap and the Confederation castra beyond. Insisting upon’ bringing Vahrohneeskos Drehkos with her, Aldora joined Milo in the council house, where she was introduced to the nahkhahrah and the assembled dehrehbehee. While beer was being poured for the formal healths of welcome, the woman mindspoke Milo.
“Do any of these Ahrmehnee mindspeak?”
Silently, he replied, “The nahkhahrah does, I’m sure. And the old man has other powers, as well, powers I can’t begin to describe. I don’t think even he understands them. Why?
“I’ve never understood something about myself, Milo, or about Mara and you and that bastard Demetrios, my dear, departed first husband. At what age do the bodies of the undying stop aging? Do you know?”
Milo shrugged, beaming, “It varies, dear. You look to be about twenty-five, while Mara thinks she stopped at twenty-two or -three. In forty years, Demetrios never looked more than late twentyish, while I’ve always appeared between thirty and forty. Again, why?”
She smiled cryptically. “Do you think … would it be possible for someone to age more than you did and be an Undying? Without him even knowing it?”
“What’s all this leading up to, Aldora? Damn it, girl, you can be maddening sometimes. But, in answer, yes, I suppose it would be possible. No one, least of all me, knows enough about our kind to give a definitive answer. And as for not knowing, well, you didn’t know and neither did Demetrios, not at first.”
“Yes, but then I was a child, mentally, emotionally. As for Demetrios, he was … well, to be charitable, always somewhat dense. Could an intelligent man live fifty-odd years and not be aware of his differences?”
Mile’s glance shot to Drehkos Daiviz, where he sat sipping Ahrmehnee honeybeer and conversing in broken trade—Mehrikan with a dehrehbeh.
“Precisely,” Aldora mindspoke. Then she opened her mind to Milo.
From the very beginning to the bloody raid, it had seemed that Drehkos was actively seeking death in battle. He had insisted on commanding the van on marches, and there were few charges during which he was not at the very forefront. His former-rebel horsemen died in droves, but death seemed to flee from his grasp like a will-o’-the-wisp. Then had come that dreadful morning when a large force of screaming, bloodthirsty, vengeance-bent Ahrmehnee warriors had taken Aldora’s encampment by surprise.
Suddenly, they had just been there. Rawboned men on foot or on shaggy little ponies, armed with spears and darts, axes and nail-studded clubs, metal-shod targes and wide, straight-bladed, double-edged shortswords. From along the entire southern periphery of the camp they came, wave after yelling, screeching wave of them, grasping brands from the smoldering embers of watchfires and whirling them into full, flaming life, before hurling them into tents or horse lines or among knots of sleep-drugged troopers.
In the rain of darts which followed, many a man died before he even knew the camp to be invaded. Aldora, herself, had been sleeping soundly, but Drehkos had obviously been wakeful, for it was he who organized and led the first resistance. Half-clothed, barefoot, with only a helm and his broadsword, he and a scratch force of camp guards and cats, few of the men fully armed and fewer still mounted, had hurled themselves against three thousand shrieking Ahrmehnee.
While trumpets pealed and drums rolled, while frantic orders were roared and terrified horses screamed even more loudly than the wounded, burning men in the blazing tents, Drehkos and his pitiful few did yeoman service against more than twenty times then—numbers. Very few of them lived to see the rise of Sacred Sun, an hour later, and most of those were dead of their many and terrible wounds ere Sun set.
But their sacrifice had saved the camp. Aldora’s losses had “been heavy, all told, but more than a thousand Ahrmehnee had fallen within the encampment, slain or too badly wounded to flee, as had the bulk of the attackers when at last a sizable number of armed and ordered men confronted them.
There had been a few knots of resistance, though, a few suicide groups who had remained behind to slow pursuit. Bareback, Aldora and her bodyguards had set their horses toward one such, only to see Drehkos and a bare score of his survivors make first, bloody contact In the few seconds it took for the mounted contingent to reach the broil, half the score were down, lying still in death or gasping and kicking away their last moments of life. Of the rest, none was engaged against any less than three Ahrmehnee.
Even as Aldora had raised and whirled her steel, screaming the Clan Linszee warcry, she had seen Drehkos cut down an Ahrmehnee at the very moment another barbarian jammed a wolfspear into the nobleman’s back with such force that the knife-sharp blade emerged, dripping, from his chest. Ere the man could free his spear, Aldora had split his skull with her heavy saber.
When the last Ahrmehnee in camp were cut down, the fires were extinguished and losses were being assessed, Aldora had detailed several of her guardsmen to fetch the vahrohneeskos” body and prepare it for cremation. By this time, she was informed of her debt to Drehkos and was truly regretful of the cool formality with which she had rebuffed his overtures of friendship, first at Vawnpolis, then during the raiding campaign.
Guard Lieutenant Trehdhwai shortly rode back to her looking as if he had been clubbed. “My … lady, please … my lady, you must come and see. He … Lord Drehkos is not dead. He—”
“Damnit, Hehrbuht, of course he’s dead!” she had snapped peevishly. “Sun and Wind, man, I saw one of the swine jam a spear completely through him, back to front. That was over an hour ago. Even if he was not killed at that moment, he’s long since bled to death.”