“I shall accept it gladly, Jalav,” said she, happily eager, and then did the eyes which looked upward toward me widen with sudden distress. “When have you returned?” she echoed, truly hearing the words I had spoken. “You cannot mean to remain longer among these males?”
“You, warrior, have only to consider your own path!” I returned with some sharpness, my annoyance growing greater at the tone Ilvin had used. Surely did it seem that the Hitta warrior was again prepared for disobedience, a thing I would not again allow. “Where your war leader rides is a matter to be considered only by her and Mida.”
“And me,” said Chaldrin, who now stood behind my left shoulder. “Where you ride, wench, there is where I shall be, prepared to stand or fall with you. Not again shall I be left behind.”
“A male, to stand with the war leader?” demanded Ilvin in outrage as I began to turn to Chaldrin to rebuke him. “Where stands Jalav, there stands Ilvin, for whom no male has yet proven a match!”
“You have been commanded to return to your own, girl,” grumbled Chaldrin with calm as I turned again toward Ilvin. “Best you obey and leave swordwork for those possessing skill.”
“For a male to speak of skill is like unto a sednet speaking of flight,” returned Ilvin disdainfully. She stood before Chaldrin with head high and left hand resting upon sword hilt, taking no note of the manner in which he folded his arms across his chest, hiding sight of his leather-wrapped wrists. “Should the war leader require one to stand with her,” said Ilvin, “she will require more than the presence of a male. Should she require none to stand with her, then would the presence of a male be fitting.”
Chaldrin seemed greatly annoyed, but I did not want to remain and hear what his reply to Ilvin would be. I thought that two difficulties might easily be left to see to one another, therefore did I step within the cavern shadows as a prelude to departing without. the notice of all those who so fervently wished to ride with me. Perhaps Mida knew how all those offering assistance might be easily avoided, yet I did not.
“Hosta war leader.” The words, softly spoken, came from the shadows I had entered, and then was the dark-haired Summa warrior before me, her light-haired sister at her right shoulder. “It pleased us to find it Mida’s will that we escape the capture of those males,” said the dark-haired Summa, her eyes continuing to rest upon me. “I am Wedin, and my sister is Dotil. We have no need to be told that you are Jalav, war leader of the Hosta, for we know you. We had not known, however, that you had become war leader to all of your clans, for never before has such a happening occurred. Our clans were taken with great surprise when it was discovered that all of our enemy sisters had left their lands, and we would know where they have gone. It was you, as war leader, who led them from their home tents, was it not?”
“Not precisely,” said I, feeling a sigh take me. I had not known it was to begin so quickly, yet must there always, in every undertaking, be a beginning. “Our clans of the Midanna were led to the lands of males by Relis, our Keeper, who was directed by Mida in a dream. I, who was elsewhere, was sent by Mida to join them, and then did I become war leader of all of the clans. With all of our warriors fighting as a single clan, we were able to take and hold a city of males.”
“You took a city?” asked Dotil, she of the light hair, her voice and face filled with delight. “Ah, Mida! Would that I had been there! The battle must truly have been glorious!”
“I see a thing more glorious still,” said Wedin, her dark eyes soberly upon me as I smiled at the words of Dotil. “It was Mida herself who commanded the attack against the males? Mida who speaks to your clans as she does not to ours? Are we, also, to be sent as one clan against the males? Are we, also, to be spoken to?”
“Your clans have already been spoken to,” said I, attempting to soothe the anxiety of the Summa. “I am the chosen of the goddess and have been directed to go to your clans and summon them to the great battle which approaches. All Midanna warriors are to fight as sisters, and I—I am to lead you.”
“Mida preserve us all,” muttered Wedin with a sigh, both comments fitting companions to Dotil’s look of pain. “I mean no offense, Hosta, yet do I anticipate the response of my clan and our sister clans to the tidings that we are to follow a Hosta and call her war leader. Though Dotil and I are aware of the willing assistance given us by you, the others of our sisters were not bound beside us. They heard naught of the manner in which you called Hitta and Summa to battle, and will believe that you sought to aid the Hitta alone—or that you thought us Hitta as well. Wisest would be to see one of our own as leader to us.”
“I have been given little choice in the matter,” said I with a shrug, continuing to meet her concern-filled eyes. “It is I who has been named war leader of all Midanna, and so it must come to be. I shall visit each clan and each war leader and, with Mida’s aid, win each of them over. The first will surely be most difficult, and yet I will thereafter have a . . .”
“Jalav, it cannot be!” said Dotil, interrupting my words in sudden upset, her light eyes wide. “The visiting! It was nearly the time for the visiting when we fell to capture! Should we depart for Midanna lands upon the moment, it will surely be in the midst of the visiting when we arrive!”
Wedin voiced a groan of memory suddenly recalled, and I, too, felt a great urge to give sound to the pain of understanding. Once each kalod do the various clans come together to a place of meeting, to greet sisters long unseen, to speak of the various battles each has fought in since the last meeting, to greet and give congratulations to new war leaders and newly blooded warriors, to look upon what males now followed those who allowed it. Each clan was bound to bring two newly learned things to share with its sister clans, things such as battle strategies, and hunting techniques, and insights in gando-breaking and handling, and weapons usage. At much the same time of the kalod do our two groups meet, each upon lands of their own clans, a truce of sorts existing at that time. Neither seeks out the meeting place of the other, and had my sister clans not ridden to take a city of males, they too would have been in the midst of visiting among their own. The two Summa continued to look upon me in upset, yet no alternate choice was possible to me.
“There is naught for it save that I face all nine clans at once,” said I, drawing and releasing a long, deep breath. “Surely do I give thanks that Mida’s shield stands before me, and surely shall I give even greater thanks if it continues to remain so. It seems clear I shall have need of it.”
I raised my cup of falar to my lips and drank, finding that my mind already grappled with the problem I would face, and then another thought came to me. Much had I believed that my efforts in freeing Ilvin and the two Summa had caused anger in Mida, yet now it seemed more than likely that it was meant that I do so. Had I ridden on and left them to their capture, I would have found no single clan in its home tents, the locations of which I knew only a very few, nor would I have been able to easily discover the place of visiting. Much precious time would have been lost in search, easily more than that which had passed since I had left the city of the Sigurri. The lands of the Midanna are vast, and not easily searched through; with the Summa to guide me, however, the problem would no longer be of concern.