The narrow, bowl-shaped gully was lined with crudely cut blocks of native stone. The stones were set in horizontal rows along the ravine’s sides, and these benches were crowded with tribesmen. Hundreds of the Dom-shu, all garbed and masked like Egrin’s captors, sat and stared at a ceremony taking place on the floor of the ravine.
Their attention was focused on two concentric circles of foresters. The outermost ring was made up of drummers, beating a regular one-two rhythm on pairs of skin-covered drums. Within arm’s reach in front of them was a circle of flame, a ring of wood stacked waist-high. Inside this marched a circle of tribesmen wearing tiny breechcloths and a thick coating of ash and grease. They moved in single file. Following the east-to-west motion of the sun, they lifted their knees high and drove their heels hard into the cindered soil. Each dancer whirled a length of cord over his head. At the end of each cord was a slat of wood. This whirling slat was the source of the weird humming Egrin had heard. This close, the sound was deeply affecting. Not just the sheer volume of it, but the quality of the noise. The bass note seemed to penetrate the chest and make the bones shiver.
In the center of these circles, a lone figure squatted. Alone of all the tribesmen present, he was not covered in ash, nor masked. He was naked, his long gray hair falling past his shoulders. Skin browned by years of forest life stretched tautly over his sinewy frame. On his back, scars stood out white as paint.
“Makaralonga,” said White Face, though Egrin already had deduced as much.
The Place of Birthing, the Karad-shu had called it. Egrin understood a little better what the forester had meant. The chief wasn’t witnessing the birth of a child or grandchild; it was Makaralonga himself who was being reborn.
At some unseen signal, the seated onlookers rose in a body and shouted. White Face lifted a hand. Egrin dropped his gaze to the ground, covering his eyes with his hands for good measure. The shout resolved into a chant. Only four words, the chant was repeated again and again. Egrin felt the hair on his neck prickle. Sweat beaded on his brow.
“Do not look, if you value living.” White Face punctuated his words with the point of a metal dagger in Egrin’s ribs.
By regulating the whirling of their sticks, the dancers produced a concerted pulse, matching it to the machine-like regularity of the drummers. To Egrin’s surprise, he felt his own heartbeat quicken to match the rhythm. The blood pounded through the great vein in his neck, as though he was engaged in strenuous exercise. Even more astonishing, he realized he could feel White Face’s heartbeat as well, transmitted through the blade of the dagger he still held to Egrin’s side. The forester’s pulse matched Egrin’s own. He had no doubt the heart of every soul present was hammering now in perfect unison.
Gradually, the dancers allowed their music to slow to a less frenzied tempo. The drummers changed their rhythm as well. White Face’s dagger was withdrawn.
Given leave by the forester, Egrin looked up. Makaralonga stood in the ravine below, donning a deerskin robe. Pale wisps of fog drifted around him.
The flaming ring of wood was no more than glowing embers, and the scene was washed in the ruddy light of the setting sun. Egrin was puzzled. He was certain only one mark had passed since his capture, yet if sunset had come, half a day must have elapsed.
White Face guided him away from the Place of Birthing. They followed a wide, well-marked path eastward, deeper into the Great Green. Scores of masked Dom-shu trod silently on either side. It wasn’t until they reached the foresters’ village that the masks were removed and the foresters began to speak among themselves.
Egrin was taken to a sod hut of considerable size, with a steeply pitched thatched roof. The top of a boulder by the door had been hollowed out to serve as a lamp, the hollow filled with burning animal fat.
A boy came out of the hut. About seven years old, he had curly dark hair, a high forehead, and skin paler than most Dom-shu.
Nodding toward Egrin, the boy asked, “Who’s the old grasslander?”
“Mind your tongue, Eli!” White Face snapped. “He is an Ergothian warrior of great renown.”
The boy’s face showed skepticism, but before he could say more, White Face removed his fearsome headgear and Egrin’s mouth fell open in shock.
“Kiya!”
Eldest daughter of Makaralonga and a warrior of the Dom-shu, Kiya had been given to Tol years ago as hostage and wife, along with her younger sister Miya. The formidable pair had never been wives in the usual sense, but looked after Tol, his household, and his affairs. When Ackal V drove Tol into exile, Kiya and Miya were the only ones who dared go with him.
Egrin’s head was reeling. “By all the gods, Kiya!” he exclaimed. “I never suspected it was you in that getup!”
Kiya pulled her long horse-tail of blonde hair from the neck of her tunic, where it had been concealed. She and the old marshal clasped arms, warrior fashion.
“I could not reveal myself until now,” she explained. “You entered a sacred area at a most critical time. If I hadn’t come along, you might be dead in the greenwood now. Why do you seek my father?”
“To ask his help in finding Tol.” He gripped her shoulder. “Where is he, Kiya? Where’s Tol?”
In answer, she held up the leather door flap and gestured for him to enter the sod hut. The boy Eli scampered in ahead of them.
The long narrow room within was smoky and ill lit by a fire burning fitfully on the rock hearth in its center. Egrin scoured the shadows, looking for the face he so longed to see, but it was Miya who emerged from the rear of the hut.
“Egrin!” she cried. “You look older than dirt!”
“He is older than dirt.”
The comment came from a blanket-draped figure stirring by the hearth. Egrin saw brown eyes gleaming through a long shock of dark brown hair.
“Egrin Raemel’s son,” Tol said and extended a broad hand.
Abandoning restraint for once in his life, Egrin sank to his knees with a glad cry and embraced his friend.
Chapter 2
Tol sat silently by the fire in the sod house, listening to Egrin’s recital of the grim events engulfing Ergoth. This deep in the Great Green, news of the outside world was scarce. A refugee talked to a traveler, who exchanged news with a roving hunter, who brought information to the land of the Dom-shu. Not even this hearsay reached Tol’s ears. He had only superficial interactions with those outside his family circle. The Dom-shu respected him, but even after six years among them, he was still an outsider.
Miya passed around more food, a simple meal served in gourd bowls, as Egrin related the bakali’s defeat of the First Fifty Hordes at the bend of the Solvin River.
Swallowing a mouthful of smoked venison, Tol asked, “Was Relfas killed?”
“I’m certain he will be,” was Egrin’s grim reply. Relfas and a handful of his warlords had survived the battle and returned to Daltigoth to report on bakali strength and tactics. Egrin expected they would not long outlive their men. Two centuries before, Ackal Dermount had created a law stating that no warlord could live if his horde was defeated. Seldom applied back then, the harsh decree suited the current wearer of the Iron Crown. Ackal V had employed it before, and there was little hope he’d be inclined to leniency after such a stunning defeat.
“Your emperor had best take care, or he’ll run out of generals,” Miya said. Motherhood and village life had rounded her face and figure, but her brown eyes were as penetrating as ever.