A Journey of the Heart (12 page)

Sparrow and I tried to make something edible out of the last of our barley and salted beef. Now that it was daylight, Vintel allowed us a small cooking fire. We soon had a watery soup simmering, and Sparrow found some wild onions to give it a little flavor. When it was ready, Vintel came over and squatted down by our campfire. She held out a bowl for me to fill.

"Do you hunt as well as you cook?" she asked me, when she had taken a sip of the broth.

"I'm not a hunter," I replied.

Vintel took another sip, then felt around in the bowl with her fingers to see if there might be any meat in it. There wasn't.

"Too bad," she said. "Hungry warriors can be unpleasant."

"Maara is a hunter."

Vintel pursed her lips. "Can't let her out of my sight, can I?"

"Why not?"

Vintel just looked at me, as if of all people I should know what she was thinking.

"She won't run away," I said. I tried not to sound as angry as I felt.

Vintel's lip curled. "And what would her mommy say if any harm should come to her?"

Then I knew that Vintel was trying to provoke me, for what reason other than her own amusement I couldn't imagine, and I refused to answer her.

Sparrow had fished a piece of meat out of the soup pot. She slipped it into Vintel's bowl. Vintel smiled at her, and I caught a glimpse of something I had never seen in her before. I saw genuine affection in Vintel's eyes. For a moment I thought a little better of her.

Then she said to me, "Take your bow, little hunter, and take any warrior you like to watch over you, but Maara stays here."

"Then Tamras stays here." Maara's voice came from behind us. Neither Vintel nor I had heard her approach. Together we turned and looked up at her.

Vintel set her bowl aside and stood up. "This is not the time to challenge my leadership."

"I am a warrior, yours to command," said Maara, "but Tamras is mine."

Vintel and Maara were beginning to draw a crowd.

"My warriors need meat," Vintel said.

"Then I'll do my best to bring them some."

"If you intend to run off again, it would suit me very well, but right this moment I dare not risk it. Until I know more about the situation here, you'll stay where I can keep an eye on you."

"Would I break my mother's heart?" said Maara.

It was well said. Those who heard her murmured their approval.

"Would you?" Vintel replied, and at once she knew she had made a mistake. Some things should never be called into question, and the love between mother and child is one of them.

Before the situation could go from bad to worse, Lorin stepped forward and said to Vintel, "I'll go along with Maara, if you like."

I was glad Lorin was with us. Ever since he had kept Maara and Vintel from fighting the day Vintel tried to take my brooch, he had been a friend to us. He was one of the warriors who sometimes sat with Maara in the great hall, and he always treated her with respect.

Vintel hesitated.

"As you say, we need meat," Lorin said. "This woman is a hunter, and right now we need her skill."

Vintel saw that she had no choice. "Take care she doesn't turn her bow on you," she said.

I would have liked to go with my warrior, but I knew better than to ask. Lorin waited while Maara took my bow out of its case and fastened my quiver to her belt, alongside her sword. Her shield was too cumbersome to carry. She set it down with the rest of our things.

As I draped her cloak around her shoulders, I whispered, "Take care."

She reached up to fasten it, and her hand brushed mine. It was trembling. I met her eyes. She didn't deny her fear or try to hide it from me.

"Why?" I whispered.

She shook her head. There was neither time nor opportunity for a private conversation.

"You take care too," she said.

As I watched them out of sight, cold fear lay in my chest like a stone.

Sparrow handed me a bowl of soup. "Vintel doesn't mean half of what she says."

"Why does she say it then?"

"It's just her way."

Her way. I knew other things that were Vintel's way. I knew of a prisoner, traveling under safe conduct, who had been taken from among his friends and murdered. If not for Namet's charge, would Vintel have tried to do the same to Maara? Or to me?

Late that afternoon two of our scouts returned with the news that they had found Laris. They reported to Vintel privately. Then Vintel called everyone together.

"Laris and her warriors arrived at our outpost six days ago," Vintel told us. "They found it occupied. A band of northerners was encamped there. They had at least a dozen of our cattle with them and a cart heaped high with grain."

"That must be the cart that made the track we saw," Sparrow whispered in my ear.

"Laris thought it better not to challenge them until we joined her," Vintel said. "She sent one of her warriors to give us warning. Clearly he never found us."

"Who was it?" asked one of the men.

"Only one man alone?" said another.

"She had fewer than a dozen warriors in her party," said Vintel. "She could hardly spare the one. She sent Breda. He's young and strong, well able to take care of himself. We'll send scouts out after him tomorrow. Or maybe he'll have the sense to know he's missed us and come back."

"Where has Laris been?" Sparrow asked her.

"She took her band to the cliffs."

I hoped I would remember to ask Sparrow later where the cliffs were.

"Are the northerners gone home then?" someone asked.

"Some have," Vintel replied, "but Laris sent out scouts to watch them, and she says more have come. There may be as many as half a hundred altogether. They have separated into raiding parties, but before they take their booty home, they will all meet somewhere. We should deal with them now, before they gather their strength together."

It took me a moment to understand that Vintel intended to confront these northerners. I hoped that we might have the luck never to encounter them. Then I was ashamed of myself for being such a coward. What else were we doing there but trying to keep our enemies from taking what was ours? If their bands were camping in the open on our borders, and even in our outposts, they needed to be taught a lesson. Otherwise they would only become bolder.

Several murmured conversations had started among the warriors. Vintel hushed them. "We'll keep a watch on the approaches to our outpost, as well as on the trails leading north into the wilderness. Tomorrow Laris will join us here." She grinned. "When the northerners return from their raiding, they will find a surprise waiting for them."

It was past midnight when Lorin returned with Breda's body. Sparrow and the other apprentices had been long asleep. The warriors were sleeping too, all but the sentries. Sparrow had tried to get me to go to bed, but I insisted on waiting up for Maara. I was becoming more and more afraid for her.

I must have been dozing a little. I didn't hear the sentry's challenge or Lorin's answer. I looked up to see Lorin carrying something over his shoulder. At first I thought it was a deer.

Gently Lorin set Breda down.

"Where is he hurt?" I asked.

I reached for my pack, where I kept my remedies.

Lorin shook his head. "He's past healing."

I looked down at Breda's peaceful face. He wore his old tattered cloak. I wondered if he had ever found a new one. He wouldn't need it now.

Lorin sat down wearily and stretched his hands out to the fire. I peered into the darkness, looking for Maara.

Lorin saw my fear for her.

"She's right behind me," he said. "She'll be here in a few minutes."

When I heard her coming, I went to meet her. She was carrying the carcass of a small deer.

"Go and wake Vintel," she said.

When I returned with Vintel, Maara had joined Lorin by the fire and was busy butchering the deer.

Vintel knelt down beside Breda's body. "How did this happen?"

"We found him not far from here," said Lorin. "Maara thought we might have better luck in open country, where we could see the game, if there was any, so we went north, back into the wilderness. We finally found a small herd of deer, and Maara brought one down, as you can see."

Lorin rubbed his eyes. He looked exhausted.

Maara didn't look much better. I knelt down beside her and took the knife from her hand. She sat down across the fire from Lorin, while I cut thin strips of the tenderest meat and laid them on the hot coals.

My stomach began to rumble in anticipation.

"On our way back," said Lorin, "we followed the same trail we traveled yesterday. Soon after sunset we came across Breda's body. I can't imagine what he was doing there."

Vintel told again the story we had heard from Laris. Then she pulled Breda's cloak aside and examined his body for wounds.

"Someone put a knife in his back," Lorin said. He helped Vintel turn Breda over. Blood had soaked the back of Breda's tunic.

"Where are his weapons?" Vintel asked.

"Gone," said Lorin. "They're with whoever killed him."

"And where are they?"

Lorin shrugged. "We tried to read the signs, but it was too dark to make out much. Breda lay a dozen yards from the trail, and the bracken was trampled all around him. I'm of the opinion that those who killed him were going north, but Maara believes my judgment has been clouded by wishful thinking." He looked over at Maara and grinned.

"What is your opinion?" Vintel asked my warrior.

Maara looked up at her. "He was traveling south. So were his killers. They came upon him from behind. He knew they were there, and he was running from them. He ran for a long time, but at last they ran him down. All afternoon I had seen signs of many feet, running easily at a steady pace. Not long before we found Breda's body, they were running hard."

Vintel turned to Lorin. "Did you see these signs?"

"I wasn't paying much attention to the ground," Lorin said. "I was keeping an eye out for trouble."

The smell of food brought everyone out of their sound sleep. I fed Maara and Lorin first, then shared the rest of the meat out among the warriors. The apprentices waited until the warriors were fed before crowding around the fire.

While they waited for their turn to eat, Sparrow and a few others attended to Breda's body. They bound him up in his tattered cloak, a warrior's shroud, and set his body a little apart from the living. I wondered if we would bury Breda here on the frontier or if someone would take him home.

Sparrow knelt beside me and took the knife from my hand.

"Go and see to your warrior," she said. "I'll finish here."

I found Maara already sleeping. Now that their hunger was satisfied, many of the warriors had settled themselves around the rekindled campfires and were talking quietly together. While I was curious to hear what they were saying, I was too tired to stay up and listen. I lay down beside Maara, spoke a word of thanks to the Mother for her safe return, and slept.

Early the next afternoon, Laris and her band joined us. Donal and Kenit were among them, as well as Taia, Laris's apprentice. When Laris heard that yet another band of northerners had come, she tried to persuade Vintel to return to the safety of the cliffs, but Vintel was reluctant to camp so far from the trails the raiding parties would take when they came north again.

I had remembered to ask Sparrow where the cliffs were. Not far west of us, along an ancient streambed, they rose steeply on either side, and high in the cliff walls were caves. The narrow trails that led to them could be defended by a very few. It was a good refuge when such a thing was needed, but a poor place from which to launch an attack against a raiding party.

In the end we camped another night where we were, because the cart with our supplies didn't arrive until long after dark. I think Vintel would have let the oxen take the cart home by themselves and buried Breda where he lay, but Laris insisted that Breda's apprentice use the cart to bear Breda's body home to Merin's house before returning it to the farmer it had been borrowed from.

That night Laris sat up late by her campfire, mourning her dead warrior. Maara watched from a distance as others approached her and offered her their sympathy. When Laris was alone again, Maara went to sit with her. They talked together for a little while. Then Maara returned to our fire.

"What were you talking about?" I asked her.

"We talked about Vintel," she said in a low voice. "About what Vintel intends to do. Laris disagrees with her. She fears the northerners are too many for us and that we should send for help before we commit ourselves to a fight."

"Help from the farmers, or help from Merin's house?"

"A day's travel to the east there is another outpost. If we had time to send for them, we might add another two dozen warriors to our number, provided they aren't busy with troubles of their own. But if we wait for them, the northerners may again gather their strength together, so Vintel may be wise not to wait."

"You mean Vintel is right?"

"I think she's right about that. What concerns me is how she plans to deal with them. If there are as many as Laris thinks there are, we might consider them a war party. Laris says it's something they do in times of hardship, and it's something we will often overlook, because they're willing to fight for what they need. But this time is different."

"Because they killed Breda?"

She nodded. "Vintel won't take it lightly. She shouldn't take it lightly, but I fear she may go too far."

"Go too far? How?"

"Breda is dead. That is beyond changing. Others are alive tonight who will put their lives at risk tomorrow. If more are to die, we must be certain that their blood buys something worthy of them."

"What could be worthy of their lives?" I asked her.

"A time of peace," she said.

Maara took up a stick to prod the fire. Tonight her hand was steady. I remembered that the day before I had felt it tremble.

"Have we anything to fear?" I asked her.

"We have a great deal to fear."

"From Vintel?"