He reached the knot of hacked and slaughtered Thaumaturgs even as the Warleader cleaved the last in a great sweep of his two-handed bastard sword. One wounded mage the man grasped by the throat in an armoured fist to raise up close to his face.
‘So perished your forebears,’ the Warleader snarled, his voice hoarse and quivering, almost inhuman.
The Thaumaturg’s eyes widened to huge circles of white all round and he gaped, choking. He raised a bloody shaking hand to point. ‘You …’ he half-gasped, half-mouthed. Then the fist closed with a popping of cartilage and tearing flesh and the mage spasmed, his body falling limp.
The Warleader’s gaze swung round straight into Jatal’s staring eyes. What Jatal caught for an instant in those unguarded depths froze him to the spot. Hot rapine and bloodshed blazed there, yes, but beneath this howled a hurricane of rage and a soul-destroying bottomless black despair. This mere glimpse sent him to his knees, almost faint. The Warleader closed over him, raising his gore-slick bastard sword as if he would strike — but hooves shook the ground announcing the arrival of lancers and the Warleader stepped away. His blazing eyes still lingered on Jatal, slit now in suspicion. Their weight seemed to rob him of the ability to speak.
‘The yakshaka fight on,’ announced Sher’ Tal, glowering down, his thick black beard braided now, and tied by leather lacing that hung like ribbons.
‘Destroy them,’ commanded the Warleader.
But Sher’ Tal ignored the order and the Warleader himself; he remained unmoving, his eyes on Jatal. Straightening, Jatal nodded. He drew a shuddering breath. ‘Yes. They must be destroyed.’
Sher’ Tal scowled but jerked a nod of assent. ‘Very well.’ He yanked his mount round, favoured the Warleader with one disapproving glare, then charged away.
The Warleader paced off a distance. He stooped to clean his blade on the robes of a dead Thaumaturg. ‘As you have no doubt guessed,’ he began, gesturing to the corpse, ‘they and I have had dealings in the past.’
‘Why conceal this?’
The Warleader straightened, turning, but would not meet his eye. ‘It was long ago — and I deem it my business.’
‘I should think it bears upon our contract.’
The foreigner — and now Jatal wondered, truly a foreigner? — waved a bloodied gauntleted hand in dismissal. ‘What care you? You shall have your conquered territory, while I shall have-’
‘Your revenge?’ Jatal suggested.
The Warleader was quiet for a time. Behind the iron-grey grizzled beard his mouth turned down as if in consideration. Sheathing his sword, he grunted his reluctant agreement. ‘Aye … my vengeance.’
It seemed to Jatal that he had just learned a fair bit about their mysterious Warleader. He would have to talk all this over-
He spun, searching the corpse-strewn battlefield. ‘Andanii!’
To his surprise, and deep annoyance, the Warleader also jerked as if stung. ‘This way,’ he said, and strode away. He led Jatal off the roadway. They stepped over the trampled fallen, some yet alive and cringing, towards the forest edge. Across the field two or three knots of remaining yakshaka still resisted the circling Adwami. All sported multiple shafts of shattered lances impaling torsos or limbs. Jatal could only wonder at their astounding vitality.
Ahead, a troop of Vehajarwi lancers stood guard in a tight group. Jatal recognized members of Andanii’s personal bodyguard. At their approach they parted, though a touch resentfully, at what they obviously judged an intrusion. Within, Andanii stood steadying herself with a hand tight on a horse’s tack. Ar-doard, an old family retainer and her general, knelt at her side busy wrapping her leg over her torn bloodied leathers.
Jatal almost lunged forward but managed to check himself. ‘Princess!’ he burst out, overly loud. ‘You are injured?’
Andanii laughed the comment aside and pushed the sweat-damp hair from her face, dragging a smear of blood across her cheek. ‘It is nothing.’
‘A fine charge,’ the Warleader announced, easing forward. ‘Bravely done.’
She inclined her head in pleased acknowledgement of the Warleader’s compliment. The man gestured to the saddle. ‘May I?’
‘Of course you may,’ she answered, her lips quirking up.
The Warleader took her into his arms and lifted her into the saddle with familiar ease. Something like an acid fist squeezed Jatal’s heart and his vision darkened for a moment; he took a step to steady himself.
‘I have studied alchemy and healing for many years, Princess,’ the Warleader said. ‘Perhaps I may be of assistance?’
Andanii slowly curled the leather reins round one fist. She inclined her head in agreement. ‘You may come to my tent.’ She gave Jatal a curt nod, ‘Prince,’ then urged her mount on.
Jatal watched her go. Around him the bodyguard scrambled to their mounts. It seemed to him that the Warleader might have cast him a sidelong glance but Jatal spared the man no attention. His eyes followed Andanii as she rode away. Look back, he urged her. You must. Send me a sign. A hint. Anything to grasp for I am a man drowning.
But she did not glance back and something broke in Jatal. Something that once broken can never be replaced.
So be it. The lines of an ancient Adwami poet came to him.
*
That night the Adwami celebrated their victory. Jatal thought it would be a subdued affair yet it proved far from it. The cheering and laughter among the gathered hetmen, chieftains and their picked lieutenants in the main tent was as heady as the wine. This had been their first real confrontation with the Thaumaturg forces and they had emerged victorious. Triumph in a few days’ time at the capital now seemed certain. Jatal joined in with the toasts but not the cheering and certainly not the laughter. A rigid polite smile was fixed at his lips and his eyes kept returning to two empty positions: neither Andanii nor the Warleader was in attendance. And who is this Warleader? An old vassal of the Thaumaturgs, obviously. Perhaps decades ago he led one of their countless expeditions into Ardata’s jungle abyss. Or perhaps as a dissatisfied general he rose in revolt against them. In any case, that mage certainly recognized him. Shouldn’t he share what he now knew with Andanii?
As the evening lengthened, Jatal could stand it no longer. He rose to his feet, waved off Ganell’s entreaties to remain, bowed to his closest allies among the Lesser families, and pushed aside the hanging flap to step out into the cool air of the night. A light rain now fell. A storm rumbled and muttered far off to the east. The tents cast shadows through the fading emerald glow of the Stranger as it arced, now frighteningly dragging its long tail after it.
He headed for Andanii’s tent. Long before he reached it, a massive fist took hold of his arm and pulled him aside. Jatal went for his sword. Another large hand pushed the blade back down into its sheath.
‘Cool your blood now, Prince,’ a low voice rumbled, muted.
Jatal squinted up at the concerned face of the Warleader’s second, Scarza. He dropped his gaze to the man’s hand at his arm. The hand was removed. ‘What is the meaning of this?’ he demanded.
‘I was thinking we could share a skin of wine and you could tell me all about the glorious victory which I was so negligent as to miss.’
Jatal peered past him to the alley between the tents leading off to the Vehajarwi encampment. Blinking, he squinted up at the half-Trell. ‘Where were you?’
‘Running and puffing along on my own two feet. I arrived after the battle. Convenient, wouldn’t you say?’
Jatal fought a smile, compressed his lips. ‘Another time, Scarza.’ He moved to pass but the big man interposed himself.