‘We all do what our nature calls us to,’ Marweh repeated, closer behind now. ‘I like that. We do what we must.’
Something in her voice, almost sad and resigned, made him start to turn once more.
He never did set eyes on her. There was only the blur of movement and the ferocious impact across his temple. Then points of light tumbling across his vision. A spike of pain punching deep into his head. Darkness. Falling.
As he fell, he heard the flock of doves rising from the far side of the pool. Erupting in a clattering of wings.
Then nothing.
VI
Someone threw water in his face and Brennan blinked. Sharp light hurt his eyes. He winced. All he could see was Manadar grinning down at him.
‘She hit you with a stick,’ Manadar told him merrily. ‘You want to see it? It’s still got some of your blood on it.’
‘Go sit on your sword, you bastard,’ Brennan groaned. He could barely believe what was happening. What had happened.
‘Take a look. I think this might be some of your hair just here.’
‘I’d piss on you if I could stand up.’
‘He’s fine,’ Manadar called over his shoulder.
Brennan sat up stiffly. His head throbbed. He felt, gingerly, with his fingertips and there was dried blood caked there at his temple. Manadar hauled him to his feet and Brennan could not help groaning. It was not just his head that ached. His whole body was unready for this.
‘Where is she?’ he asked, squeezing his eyes shut against the pounding pain.
‘Not here,’ Lorin said from a short distance away.
Brennan let a little bit of the piercing light in again. Lorin was crouched over the bare earth, a dozen or so paces around the edge of the pool.
‘She leaves a plain enough trail,’ he said. ‘Looks to me like she’s in a hurry to get back to her family.’
‘She can’t be far,’ Brennan muttered, realising even as he said it that he had no clear idea how long he had been gone from the world for. Though there was a faint, hot tingle in the skin of his face that suggested he might have lain unmoving beneath the hard sun long enough for a burn to begin.
‘Might be a bit further than you imagine,’ said Manadar. ‘She’s business for later though. There’s bigger trouble brewing. That’s why we came to find the two of you.’
‘Bigger trouble?’ Brennan echoed. He felt dull and befuddled. Dim-witted as a fool.
‘Orphanidons,’ Lorin said, rising to his feet. He strode past Brennan without looking at him.
‘Careless, idiot boy,’ he muttered as he went.
And that wounded Brennan more deeply than Marweh’s makeshift club had done. The more so because it was richly deserved. Not that the blow to the head had been exactly unearned if the currency of the moment was carelessness.
But there were more immediate problems than the disappointment of those whose opinions Brennan valued. Orphanidons. Even in his soft-headed state he knew that was-just as Manadar said-a much bigger kind of trouble.
Manadar had to support him now and again as they walked back to the camp. Brennan’s legs were slow to respond to his mental commands. It was not the first time he had been knocked unconscious, so he was not too concerned about that. Not yet. His body should remember itself in an hour or two. Hopefully the dull throb in his head and the faint nausea in his gut would subside by then too.
The rest of the Free were waiting for them. Or waiting for something at least. As Brennan and the other two came slowly back towards the little camp, they received little attention. Hamdan-he and Yulan and Rudran were sitting on their horses side by side-glanced at them and gave a faint, wry smile when he saw Brennan’s stumbling condition. The archer nudged Rudran. When the big man looked round and saw them coming, he scowled. Rudran was not much given to smiles of any sort.
The rest-Yulan himself, and Wren and Kerig and all the others-were looking elsewhere. Up on the low, rocky ridge above the campsite was a distant mounted figure. One that glinted and gleamed in the sunlight. Another, just the same, was riding very slowly down across the slope towards them. That second horseman was close enough for all to see that it was metal that caught the light and shone with its reflection. Armour.
Brennan and Lorin and Manadar stood beside Wren and Kerig. The two Clevers were close but not quite touching. Brennan was always just a touch wary of talking to any of the Free’s Clevers. By rights, they were no different from him. Just more companions on the hard road the company followed. But of course they were a little different. They did things Brennan could not understand, and never would. They lived in a slightly different world.
Wren was the most approachable of them all to his way of thinking. Much of the time, it was possible to forget who and what she was. Kerig was another matter. Him Brennan found decidedly intimidating. There was always a faint tension in the man. A sense that saying the wrong thing might have unfortunate consequences. As a result, Brennan tended to say as little as possible in the Clever’s presence.
Manadar had no such inhibitions.
‘Just one of them coming down?’ he whispered to Kerig. ‘That’s a man short on fear and sense.’
Kerig glanced at the warrior and was clearly unimpressed.
‘You short on them yourself? Might be we just lost this whole contract, now the Orphanidons have found us. And if that’s all we lose, we’ll be doing well.’
‘Let him be,’ Wren whispered, touching her lover’s arm. ‘We’ll all know which way this is heading soon enough.’
Rudran was muttering quietly to Yulan. His voice was too low for Brennan to hear the words, but the general sense was not hard to gather. The lancer-clad in his own armour, which had never in its existence shone the way the Orphanidons’ did-was hefting a hammer, giving it a little shake now and again to emphasise some point.
It was a nasty weapon, with a heavy blunt head backed by a long, sharp spike. Made, Brennan knew well enough, more or less specifically to kill Orphanidons. To break armoured bones by sheer weight of impact; or, if turned in the hand, to punch through metal into flesh. Brennan had seen Rudran and his horsemen training with them often enough. As far as he was aware, the Free had not had to fight Orphanidons for many, many years. But the possibility was always there, and it was in the nature of both the Free as a whole and Yulan as their Captain to prepare for that possibility. The Orphanidons were the kind of threat that, without a planned answer to the question they posed, was liable to ride right over you and trample you into the dirt.
Yulan was shaking his head. Rudran would not get the chance to test his answer today. The lancer lowered his hammer. He looked disappointed.
Yulan and Hamdan and Rudran advanced a short way to meet this uninvited guest. And the lone Orphanidon ignored them. He did not so much as glance in their direction as he rode, very slowly, past them and on into the very camp of the Free, where their bedrolls were still on the ground and spears and sacks lay all about. Yulan and the other two had to turn their horses about and follow him.
He was like no man Brennan had ever seen, this one. His horse was magnificent, a hand taller at the shoulder than anything the Free rode. He wore a chest-plate and helm of polished, silvery metal. He had greaves at his shins of the same metal, engraved with swirling patterns. His gauntlets were overlaid with plates of gleaming bronze. Ribbons of many colours were tied about his upper arm.
He had a tall spear in one hand, held perfectly erect with its butt resting beside his foot in a stirrup. A round shield was strapped across his back, and a long sword was at his waist. He was bright and fearsome and proud.