The hunter risked another glance over the boulder. The men were still grouped together, trying vainly to light a fire.
Valorian curled his lip. The fools were going about it all wrong, and from the appearance of their haggard faces and dirty tunics, things had been going wrong for them for a long while.
Valorian loosed a sigh and looked back up the hill to where his stallion stood out of sight in a copse of trees. On the horse’s back was Valorian’s prize, the result of four days of difficult tracking and nearly fruitless hunting: one thin, field-dressed deer. The deer would mean fresh meat for his family for the first time in many days.
And yet perhaps those men in the valley had a greater prize, a prize worth the danger of facing the soldiers alone and unarmed. Information.
Valorian believed the XIIth Legion was garrisoned at the Tarnish stronghold of Ab-Chakan, to the east, on the other side of the Darkhorn Mountains, in a tantalizing land Valorian knew only by the tales he had heard. The land was named the Ramtharin Plains and was described as a vast, empty realm of grass and endlessly rolling hills—a land perfectly suited for his nomadic people and their horses. Unfortunately the Tarnish Empire had extended its hold over the plains as far as the Sea of Tannis nearly seventy years ago and still held it in the name of the emperor.
Now, however, the empire was beginning to lose its grip on its far-flung provinces. Enemies were plaguing its borders, several tribes far to the west were rebelling, forcing the emperor to send thinly stretched legions to quell the uprisings, and three years of bad weather had played havoc with the crops that fed the great capital city of Tarnow. The Tarns themselves were growing unmanageable. To make matters worse, the old emperor, who had doubled the size of his empire and struck terror in the ranks of his enemies, had died, leaving his throne in the hands of his weaker, less capable son. In just eighteen short years, the empire had lost a fourth of its outlying provinces and had been forced to abandon many of its fortresses. Ab-Chakan was the last Tarnish garrison on the eastern side of the Darkhorn Mountains and the only one left on the Ramtharin Plains.
Perhaps those soldiers down in the chilly, wet clearing knew some news that would be useful. There had to be an important reason for them to be so far from their garrison, and there was nothing like. a hot meal and a warm fire to loosen a man’s reluctance to talk.
All of these thoughts passed through Valorian’s mind while he debated his decision. Then, with a curse of resignation, he slipped out of his hiding place and made his way quickly uphill toward his horse. The meat would help his family temporarily, but the information he might gain could help his entire Clan for a long time to come.
The stallion, Hunnul, standing quietly in the gathering shadows of night, nickered softly to the man when he entered the copse. Valorian paused to run his hands down the horse’s powerful black shoulder. The clansman smiled a rueful grimace.
“After all that work, Hunnul, we’re going to give our prize away to some Tarnish soldiers.”
The big stallion snorted. His dark, liquid eyes watched his master with unusual intelligence and affection.
“Perhaps I’m crazy,” Valorian muttered, “but they’re from the Ramtharin Plains! I’ve been trying to learn more about that land for a long time.” With brusque movements, the hunter packed his bow and short sword out of sight in his gear, keeping only his hunting knife in his belt. Then he mounted Hunnul’s saddle in front of the wrapped body of the deer and drew a deep breath to help still the faint trembling of his cold hands. “Let’s go,” he said to the horse. “We have Tarns to feed.”
Obediently the stallion walked out of the trees and began to pick his way down the rock-strewn hillside. Twilight was settling heavily into the valley under a gloomy shroud of drizzle and mist, enabling Valorian to ride almost to the edge of the soldiers’ camp before one man saw him and shouted a warning.
The others whirled in surprise. Dirty and disheveled they might be, but Valorian immediately saw the soldiers still maintained the strict training of the crack XIIth Legion. In a blink, the five men had drawn their swords and stood back-to-back in a tight circle, their faces grim and their weapons ready.
“Well met!” Valorian called as cheerfully as he could muster. He slouched his tall frame to look as innocuous as possible and pushed back the hood of his cloak. Hunnul stopped at the edge of the clearing.
The five soldiers didn’t move, staring balefully at him.
“Identify yourself,” one man ordered.
In answer, Valorian untied the deer from the back of his saddle and dumped it on the ground in front of Hunnul. He allowed the hungry men a moment to eye the meat before he slowly dismounted. The soldiers didn’t budge from their defensive positions.
“I am called Valorian,” the hunter told them, opening his cloak so they could see he wasn’t armed.
The men in front of him studied his iron-bound leather helmet, his long wool cloak, his sheepskin vest, and his tattered tunic and leggings. They didn’t bother to look past the grime and the patches to the long, lean man with the face hollowed by days of hunger and the quick flash of intelligence in his deep-set eyes. “A clansman,” one soldier snorted derisively. The five Tarns visibly relaxed.
Valorian stifled a surge of anger at their disdain and tried to smile. The effort was thin at best. He knew the Tarnish Empire and the Chadarians held his people in low esteem.
The clanspeople of Fearral were regarded as slovenly, weak, cowardly, and of little account. The only useful thing they could do, and the only thing that kept them out of slavery in the emperor’s galleys or salt mines, was breed and train horses. Valorian had anticipated the soldiers’ reaction to his origins, but that didn’t mean he had to like their attitude.
What really galled him was there was too much truth behind their scorn.
The Tarn who had spoken stepped out of the circle and thrust his sword point toward Valorian’s chest.
The hunter didn’t flinch, but stood still as the point came to a stop a hairbreadth away from his ribs. He forced his eyes to widen in fear and his mouth to hang open.
The soldier eyed the clansman suspiciously from helm to boot. He was a big man, as tall as Valorian himself, with a strength and brutality forged from many battles. His hard, craggy face was clean-shaven, and his uniform and weapons were well cared for despite the obvious wear of long travel.
Valorian recognized the insignia on the man’s shoulder as the rank of a sarturian, a leader of usually eight to ten men within a legion. Gritting his teeth, Valorian swallowed his humiliation and bowed his head to the soldier. “I have a deer I thought to share, General.”
“I’m no general, you stupid dog!” the man snarled. The tip of his sword slowly dropped away from Valorian’s chest.
“Share, hah!” a short, bandy-legged soldier snapped. “Just kill him. That’ll leave more for the rest of us.”
The sarturian cast a speculative glance at the clansman to see his reaction.
Valorian shrugged, his eyes still downcast. “You could kill me, but then who would you have to light the fire and roast the meat?”
“Good point,” a dark-haired Tarn said. “We’re not having much luck with the fire.”
The circle of soldiers began to break apart as they edged around to stare hungrily at the deer.
“Let him cook it, Sarturian. Then we can kill him,” the short Tarn urged.
Their leader made an irritated sound and slammed his sword back in the scabbard. “Enough! The Twelfth Legion doesn’t deal in treachery. You and your deer may join us, clansman. ”