Magi'i of Cyador

XXXIV

IN THE HOT air of late summer, his third summer in Isahl, Lorn shifts his weight in the saddle. Then he blots the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand to keep it from running into his eyes. His hand comes away damp and slightly reddish from the road dust, and he is careful to wipe it on the square of cloth tied to his saddle. Even so, his cream uniform is streaked with pink from the dust, as are those of all the lancers in the Fifth Company.

To the west of the road that hugs the east side of the valley, the grasslands stretch almost four kays or more before another set of hills. The tips of the blades of grass, some of which would reach shoulder high on his mare, have already begun to brown.

Ahead to the north lies the Ram’s End Valley, and beyond that one of the valleys with an abandoned and burned-out holding, one that had never been re-inhabited, Lorn suspects, because there are no streams in the small valley and but one meager spring. He wonders, not for the first time, why the Grass Hills are drier now than in distant years past when the first holders were sent forth from Syadtar.

He cocks his head slightly to better catch the murmurs drifting forward from lancers in the first squad.

“ … better Captain’n most …”

“ … no great shakes … all we do is ride and get attacked … ride and get attacked ….”

you want to chase barbarians all over the Grass Hills?”

Lorn represses a frown, then beckons to his senior squad leader.

The square-bearded and craggy-faced Dubrez eases his mount toward Lorn. He has been senior squad leader for over a year, ever since Nytral lost a leg to a barbarian blade and hobbled back to his home in Summerdock.

“I’m thinking we need a pair of scouts to look two or three valleys ahead-way ahead.” Lorn turns in the saddle, as if to face Dubrez, and raises his voice so that it will carry back to the complaining lancers. “They might be able to find some barbarians so we don’t have to ride quite so far.”

“Yes, ser, Captain,” Dubrez replies, a slight twinkle in his eye.

Lorn unsheathes his cupridium sabre, lifts it, and then studies the razorlike edge that can drive through the best of the barbarian blades. “I’m still thinking. I heard some of the men saying it might be a good idea.”

The murmurs from the riders behind die away.

“Of course, we wouldn’t be close enough to support them, not unless they were very careful and could get a start on the raiders.” Lorn shrugs. “Wouldn’t want them to get their throats slit so some barbarian can claim a woman.”

“No, ser.” Dubrez nods.

Both turn in their saddles and ride silently for perhaps half a kay before Dubrez speaks. “There’s more complaining now.”

Lorn nods. “There will be more.”

“Not good, ser.”

“We both know that.”

The company remains still-or the murmurs low enough that Lorn cannot discern them even through his chaos senses-even after the lancers ride over the low pass and along the gentle ridge.

As the Fifth Company descends into the Ram’s End valley, Lorn turns his attention to the holding, far closer to the south end of the valley and the route back to Isahl than the majority of holdings in the lower part of the Grass Hills. Most holders set their steads somewhere close to the center of the valley. Not so Ram’s End.

Something bothers Lorn, and he keeps studying the holding as they near it. “What do you think, Dubrez?”

“Quiet … no one out, and it’s near mid-day.”

Lorn nods and keeps riding, watching.

Then, they reach the stream and the wide and shallow ford,Lorn sees hoofprints-more than a mere handful, and as he looks toward the sod walls of the holding, he can sense that all is less than well. The gate is off its straps-that he can see from nearly a half-kay away-and, though it is almost mid-day, the line of smoke from the cookhouse chimney is but a thin gray line, as if from a dying cook fire.

The single small herd of black-faced sheep to the southwest of the gate are unattended-something that Lorn has never seen in three years-except in the aftermath of a barbarian attack. Lorn sees two silent shapes sprawled in the grass-a herder … and a long-haired sharp-muzzled black herding dog. Dark splotches stain the green and brown of the grass.

“Lances ready!” he snaps.

Dubrez turns in his saddle and echoes the command, an echo amplified by the individual squad leaders.

“Spread formation! Forward!” Lorn adds.

The Fifth Company reforms into a line abreast and rides toward the open hanging gate of the hold. The lancers cover but another hundred cubits before two sharp whistles pierce the noon air, and the sound of hoofs rises from within the sod walls of the hold. Then riders pour through the sundered gate, the first forming a rough wedge before the gate as if to allow those who follow to escape.

“Charge! Discharge at will!” Lorn orders. He spurs his mount, as do the Mirror Lancers behind him, trying to cut off the barbarians, or keep them trapped, against the sod wall.

A half-score of rough-clad riders gallop clear of the left flank of the Fifth Company, riding westward hard. The remaining twoscore raiders squeeze their mounts into a tight wedge that gallops toward the Fifth Company.

Hsst! Hssst! Two short bolts burst from Lorn’s lance. One strikes a barbarian, and then Lorn is using both firelance and sabre to parry one heavy iron blade, and then another, before the mare carries him past the edge of the barbarian wedge, and he turns his mount.

“First squad! Shofirg! Turn about!” Lorn’s orders rise above the flashing and hissing of the firelances. He followshis own orders and wheels the mare, charging toward the western flank of the barbarian wedge, guiding the mare past a grim-faced lancer, and then slashing his sabre left-handed across the neck of an unprepared barbarian who barely started to turn before the chaos-reinforced blade separates his head and torso.

Lorn swings away, more westerly, as perhaps a half score of the barbarians break through the Lancer’s line, but the first squad, following Lorn’s command, has already reformed.

Hssst! Hssst! After a last few flashes of chaos, the firelances are discharged and silent, and cupridium blades ring against dark iron.

Lorn slows the mare, eyes studying the swirl of bearded barbarians with dark blades, and cream-clad lancers with bright sabres, ready to lend his blade, as necessary. A wide-eyed barbarian breaks clear of the fray, and turns his mount westward, as if to escape.

Lorn raises the firelance, calmly. Hssst!

The barbarian slumps in the saddle, then slides downward, one boot still caught in a stirrup, his weight and length dragging the mount to a halt.

A second raider pulls clear of the fray, and Lorn again aims his lance, letting a short burst of personally-raised chaos burn through the man’s back.

Lorn waits, but no other raiders try to escape, and, as the last barbarian pitches out of his saddle, the clangor fades.

“To the hold!” snaps Lorn, moving the mare northward and through still-milling lancers. “The hold. Now!”

“The hold!” echoes Dubrez, and then Shofirg.

As Lorn rides in through the sagging gate, a bearded giant darts from the open door of the house, then lunges sideways and grabs a small figure-a dark-haired waif who, surprisingly, recalls Myryan to Lorn.

Lorn turns his mount and pulls the firelance from its holder, again-calling on the force beyond pure chaos, for he knows there is little of the stored chaos left in the weapon. He lets the mare walk slowly toward the barbarian.

There is blood on the trousers of the bearded man who holds the struggling girl before him, as a shield against what Lorn may do. “You lift that lance any more, demon, and I’ll kill her!”

A line of whiteness streaks from the silvridium tip of the lance, a line so thin it is almost invisible.

The barbarian convulses as his face blisters into charcoal, then vanishes. The knife wavers, then falls from dead fingers, leaving a slash across the small girl’s face, and the headless barbarian corpse pitches sideways.

The girl, suddenly released, staggers toward the still figure half-leaning, half-sprawled against the earth brick wall of the house.

“ … captain did it again …”

“ … hush …”

Lorn’s eyes flick across the area of the holding inside the sod walls. One dark-haired, slightly heavy-set, young woman-the one the girl clings to, sobbing-had been flung against the ceramic screen that shields the front door of the farm house. Her neck is at an angle that shows it has been broken. The second girl, scarcely ten, continues to sob loudly, clutching the dead woman, perhaps an older sister.

Except for the lancers of the Fifth Company, nothing moves.

Is there sobbing from within the house?

“Dubrez … have someone watch the little girl … and check on anyone else here. No liberties with her! Or anyone else. None!” Lorn’s voice cuts like the sabre at his side, and he gestures at the four nearest lancers. “You four! Follow me!”

He turns his mount westward, riding back out through the gate and turning westward to follow the barbarians who have ridden away from the road, and toward the nearest hill.

Two hundred cubits or so beyond the sod wall, he glances at the lancers who follow. The leading rider, the youngest, is white-faced.

Lorn smiles and returns his attention to the faint track of chaos that he follows through the high and browning grass.More sweat drips from under the brow of the lightweight and white summer garrison cap, sweat that he blots away as they continue riding westward.

The lancers cover a kay through the browning late summer grass, then two kays. Lorn can sense that, as they reach the slightest of inclines leading toward a thin stream marked by young willows, the barbarians are not that far away, and he lets the mare slow her walk.

The half score of barbarians have watered their mounts and watch from their saddles as Lorn and the four Lancers ride toward them.

“Blades ready,” Lorn says quietly. He knows the firelances of the four are without chaos charges. His fingers touch his lance, but do not grasp it, as he continues to ride forward.

“You will die, white demon,” announces the broad-shouldered giant in the center of the ten barbarians. The man is doubtless two heads taller than Lorn, and four stones heavier, without a finger’s worth of fat anywhere.

“Why do you kill the holders? They don’t attack you.” Lorn’s voice is level, as he continues to let the mare walk slowly toward the barbarians.

“These lands were our lands in the time of our grandsires’ grandsires. They will be ours again.” The language is the guttural barbarian tongue only loosely related to Cyadoran or the Anglorian from which it came.

“Why did you kill the girl?” asks the captain.

“Women serve men. She would not serve us. Besides, she was white-spawn.” The man laughs, mockingly.

Lorn lazily raises the light lance, seemingly without pointing it, then concentrates, as he sweeps it sideways. The thin line of chaos bisects the six barbarians in the center of the group-and their mounts-one after the other. The giant is still clutching for his immense blade as his upper torso crashes into the tall grass.

“ … dung-frig …” hisses a lancer behind Lorn.

The pairs untouched-two men at each end-look almost blankly as mounts scream and riders fall. Without pausing, Lorn turns the lance to the two at the south side.

Hsst! Hsst! With two almost-delicate bolts of chaos, two more barbarians fall.

After sheathing the firelance, almost automatically, Lorn turns his head to the remaining two raiders. “Go!” He forces the words out, fighting against dizziness, and a headache that threatens to cleave his skull in twain. “Tell your clan what happens to those who kill girls and women.”

The two raiders glance at the slender Mirror Lancer captain and the four lancers who flank him.

“Tell them!” Lorn forces a cold laugh. “Brave warriors, tell them.”

“Never!” The younger warrior raises his blade, order-death edged iron, and charges toward Lorn.

Despite the dizziness, Lorn draws his own shimmering cupridium blade, then spurs the mare, leaning forward, focusing into the blade that chaos he can draw from the air and land around him, and from the dead and dying.

Reddish white light flickers from the cupridium, seemingly lengthening the blade, until it is almost a lance.

The young barbarian’s eyes widen. He tries to lever the bar-like greatsword toward Lorn more quickly, but he is too late, and the light fades from his eyes as the chaos lance flicks past the death-ordered iron. He spews from his saddle.

The older barbarian warrior has turned his mount and gallops northward.

Lorn clutches his saddle with his knees, barely hanging onto his sabre. His head rings as though it were a bell struck with an iron mallet, and knives of white pain lance through his eyes.

Slowly, ever so slowly, he eases the cupridium sabre back into its scabbard. Then his fingers close around the water bottle. Each movement is slow, deliberate, as he lifts the bottle to his lips and drinks.

Only then does he turn the mare back toward the wide-eyed and silent lancers who have ridden with him.

“Darkness, ser! Never seen a light lance do that,” blurts the youngest.

Lorn offers a lazy smile over the anger boiling inside him,a smile forced despite the dizziness and agony that he must fight to stay mounted. “Do what?”

“ … ah … what you did, ser.”

The shrug is an effort, but Lorn makes it seem effortless. “I killed some barbarians. That’s what we’re here for. Gather the good mounts and follow me.” Ignoring the moans from one bearded figure lying on flattened grass, a man who will die shortly, Lorn turns his mount back eastward, back toward the raided holding.

After a time, he can hear the mounts of his lancers as they hurry to catch up with him. He does not look back until the youngest lancer draws nearly abreast.

“Only got two mounts. One other lame-you killed the others, ser.”

“Two will be fine, Yubner.” Lorn’s voice is professional, neither warm nor cold.

“Yes, ser.”

Yubner drops back, and the murmurs begin, voices low enough not to be heard, except by a lancer officer trained in chaos use.

“ … ever see that …”

“ … more’n once, Yubbie … more’n once, and you’d not be saying a thing outside the squad. Understand?”

“ … just … killed’em … doesn’t matter which hand holds sabre ….”

“ … they’d do that to you, boy … done it to a lot of lancers … see those girls? Why you think we’re out here?”

“But …”

“ … not a word … See how many a’ us come back … look at the other companies … Captain Jostyn …’member that?”

The murmurs die away as Lorn and the four near the gate to the holding.

From his saddle, Dubrez studies Lorn as the five ride slowly through the broken holding gate. The last two lancers following Lorn each lead a barbarian mount. The senior squad leader rides toward the captain, then reins up as Lorn does.

Dubrez nods slowly, then announces, “Lost seven lancers, ser. Took down near-on two score, maybe more.”

“There were ten who tried to get away. We killed nine,” Lorn says flatly.

“Your lancers didn’t have any chaos charges left in their lances,” Dubrez murmurs quietly. “None of us did. They aren’t charging the lances as much as they used to.”

“That’s why one got away,” Lorn lies. “I didn’t want to risk our men, and we did get all but him.”

“Nine out of ten … can’t outwager that.” Dubrez laughs, once, harshly.

“Who survived among the holders?” Lorn asks.

“Two older women, two boys, one woman, and the girl. That’s all, ser.”

“They’ll have to ride back with us, at least to some other holding, if not to Isahl.”

Dubrez glances at the dead raider by the house, the one whose head Lorn had burned off. “We must have killed close to three score … and they’ll be back in an eightday or a season-who knows-and we’ll have to fight with less chaos in our lances.”

“Maybe …” Lorn offers. “Can you get a few of those barbarian mounts for the holders? They can’t stay here, and we might as well head back. Not much more that we can do here.”

“True, ser.” Dubrez’s smile is grim. “Should be able to find six good mounts.” He turns his mount. “Stynnet! You and Forlgyt get six gentle mounts. Holders’ll ride out with us. We’re headed back to Isahl, captain says.”

“Yes, ser.”

Dubrez nods to Lorn, then rides toward the stock barn, to let the animals out so that they will not starve until they can be claimed-or slaughtered by another barbarian band.

“ … three score, and he killed a score of’em hisself …”

Lorn can only remember killing slightly more than a half score, but there is little point in protesting such. He has long since lost count of the barbarians he has killed. He slowlystudies the holding, as if to note the details for the report he will have to write when he returns.

The girl Lorn saved freezes as his eyes sweep across her. Then she begins to tremble.

The Lancer captain maintains a cool smile and lets his eyes travel past the girl and back toward Dubrez. “Let me know when we’re ready.”

“Yes, ser.”

Lorn unfastens his water bottle and takes a deep and long swallow, still ignoring the headache, the intermittent double vision, and the unseen hammer blows to his skull.