The Lord of the Plains (68 page)

The man was stunned. Riley wondered that she
had made sword fighting look so easy he’d thought he could just
pick up some weapons and be an instant expert. She handed the
weapons back.

‘Go on. Who wants to fight him?’ She had
barely got the words out of her mouth when another gemeng came
forward to try his luck.

Before the day was done she intended them
all to fight using her weapons. At least that should help remove
one problem they had with her.

While the two gemengs were fighting another
one called out to her.

‘I want to fight you unarmed. Let’s see how
good you are without your precious little toys! You have no fangs
no claws, nothing!’

Riley calmly invited the new heckler to come
forward.

Well, perhaps she’d have to fight the entire
tribe again too.

It was going to be a long night.

When the next day dawned Riley was
exhausted. Today was going to be much like yesterday. She wasn’t
looking forward to it, but what had that to do with anything?

Aerlid and Riley spent the morning at the
river camp. They had chores to do- cooking, cleaning, foraging and
so on, and so did the tribe. It wasn’t until the afternoon that
they strolled into the gemeng camp, much like they had yesterday.
This time however she didn’t need to threaten Gakra to gather the
tribe. Looking around at the grim, glowering faces, it almost
seemed like they had been waiting for her.

‘Are you just going to stand there?’ she
said curiously, letting her voice carry over the crowd. ‘You think
you’ll get less useless if you wait long enough? Go on, show me how
you fight each other!’

The crowd shifted and grumbled. Then someone
called, ‘get outta here slave! Stop wasting our time!’

And the mood shifted. The crowd began
yelling, ‘slave, slave, you’re soft and weak!’

‘Go back to slave land, slave!’

‘Go away!’

Riley was momentarily surprised. They had
never asked her to leave before. She noticed Aerlid was watching
her. She shook her head, ‘not yet. We’re not leaving yet.’

He sighed.

And then they began.

‘Aerlid,’ Riley said conversationally, ‘What
do you think would be an appropriate recompense for our wasted
time?’

‘They have nothing worth taking.’ Aerlid
said in disgust. ‘I suppose we could take some of the children,
perhaps they could be taught to do something useful.’

‘Very well, we’ll take five of them.
Hopefully at least one of them will be worth keeping alive. Go
choose some, I’d like to leave within the hour.’

And with that Riley turned and began
striding away from the gemengs, back towards the river camp. She’d
barely taken two steps before the gemengs started screaming
angrily.

Gakra was the only one to actually follow
her though. Was that an improvement? ‘What do you think you’re
doing?!’ he roared.

Riley raised an eyebrow at him. Despite the
fact that he was taller than her, she managed to give the distinct
impression she was looking down at him. (That was another look
borrowed from Aerlid, though he was taller than most people so he
didn’t often have to use it). ‘Leaving, as requested. You’re tribe
has wasted my time and I’m taking something to compensate. I hope
your children prove more capable than their parents.’

Gakra’s eyebrows twitched, as if he couldn’t
decide what expression to use- anger or disbelief. ‘You can’t take
our children.’

Riley had counted on that. The only time she
had seen anything other than violence in their eyes had been when
they were with their children. At least, before the children took
the Warrior’s Trial. Her mood darkened. ‘And how are you going to
stop me?’ she asked, giving him a dark frown. ‘What are you going
to do, foolish one? Your entire tribe cannot defeat me. Now stop
wasting my time.’

She didn’t wait for him to respond and
resumed her walk towards the river.

In less than an hour Riley and Aerlid and
five children were standing at the edge of the gemeng’s camp. The
children were sniffling quietly, but that was all. How Aerlid had
gotten all five of them to behave Riley didn’t know.

The gemengs were watching them. Well,
watching wasn’t quite the right word. It looked like they were
trying to set them on fire with their eyes. Worry had started to
worm its way into her heart. Would they really let them just walk
away with the children?

Not quite believing what was happening,
Riley turned. She began walking. Aerlid followed her lead, the
children following him.

One step. Two steps. Grass enveloping them.
Three steps.

A furious roar shattered the silence. Riley
sighed in relief. She turned to see a raging beast charging at
her.

One of the children cried, ‘daddy!’

Riley let the beast approach. When he got
close enough she hit him hard. Had to. The man went sprawling. He
didn’t get up. She hadn’t wanted him to.

‘You weren’t given permission to talk.’
Aerlid said coldly.

The child’s eyes went wide. It started
crying silently. It clamped its hands over its mouth. Seeing the
child’s tears, Riley had to remind herself why they were doing
this. Was it worth it? Before she could come up with an answer
there was another roar. It was so loud the world seemed to shake.
It made the previous cry seem like a squeak. She looked- the entire
tribe was coming at them! Inside, some part of her smiled. That
could be
challenging.
Especially if she did it with no
weapons. Aerlid calmly turned away from the spectacle and began
walking into the grass. ‘Come along.’ he told the children. ‘She
won’t take long.’ In seconds he and the children had disappeared
into the grasslands. Riley wasn’t paying attention to them. Her
eyes were on the tribe. Noting. Planning. Seconds had passed, yet
it felt like much longer. The gemengs came straight at her, they
didn’t try to pursue Aerlid. Why… well, that didn’t matter now. The
gemengs launched themselves at her. They came from all sides with a
raw ferocity unseen before. But some of them were still injured.
And she was Riley. The gaps in the melee were clear to her. Moving
into them and away from attacks was even easier. Mostly, she just
moved and enjoyed the sheer pleasure of it. And when they came into
her reach as she dodged and wove she hit them. Sharp, fast, she hit
exactly where she wanted to. She intended to incapacitate with one
hit and that is exactly what she did. But not kill. It was a shock
when she realised only one was left. She looked around. Forms
littered the ground. This time, children weren’t running forward.
She stared at the last one. Her breathing was slightly fast. But
not much. The creature returned her gaze. It was Gakra. She had
avoided him. It had been purposely done, and yet she had forgotten
while she was moving. And yet some part of her had remembered.

‘The children, please bring them back.’ It
was strange, hearing such a soft plea from Gakra, his face haggard
and drained.

‘I’m afraid I need some recompense for
wasting my time with you.’ she said coldly. So close. They were so
close to ending it.

His eyelids fluttered in confusion. ‘Perhaps
there is something we can do.’ he said hesitantly.

‘I’m afraid you aren’t much good to me as a
tribe, as you can see.’

He hesitated.

Internally Riley was begging him, he was so
close
. If she had too she could point it out but it would
work so much better if
he
suggested it.

‘We can be more useful. If you bring the
children back.’

Chapter 58

Walking through the camp made Riley feel
ill. The feeling towards her had changed.

Now
she
was the one creating
fear.

The name of the tribe had changed.

And this was the first step to eradicating
that fear.

She wished she’d known another way.

Chapter 59

If Riley thought she knew the extent and
type of violence that saturated gemeng society she was wrong. Her
ignorance was exposed by a mixture of simply spending more time
among them and the fact that she was no longer an object of
derision, but now a part of their society.

Once again Riley found herself tearing apart
a pair of gemengs that had decided the other needed to die. In the
background she was vaguely aware of laughter from another group of
gemengs. She heard: ‘you make the pigs smell nice, Dulag!’ and a
roar of laughter.

‘Why are you fighting?!’ Riley demanded of
the two gemengs she was currently focussing on.

‘He gave me a look.’ The one with more fangs
growled.

Riley turned to the other.

He bared his teeth and growled in
response.

Riley put on her stern face and looked down
at both of them (even though both were taller and bigger than her).
She was getting heartily sick of this. This was the fourth fight
today, and she hadn’t even had lunch yet!

She shoved the two gemengs away. ‘Listen
up!’ She demanded. Everyone turned their attention to her. It did
not give her any pleasure. ‘There is to be no more fighting. If you
want to fight, you’ll have to ask me for permission.’

The silence was stunned.

‘Do you understand?!’ she demanded. ‘No more
fighting! I’m sick of it. Since you clearly can’t be trusted to
decide when to kill each other, you’ll have to ask me first. Are we
clear?!’

There was mumbled, growly, surrender. Gemeng
leaders didn’t need to add threats when they gave an order.

The threat was implicit.

Riley turned to leave. She had not gone more
than three steps when another astonishing sight greeted her.

A large, female gemeng was dragging a
smaller male along the ground by the leg.

Fighting, Riley was used to. This?

What
was
this?