War in Tethyr (4 page)

Farlorn had emerged from behind the house on his dapple-fannied gray. He answered Zaranda's query-look with a shrug to indicate the man she'd struck was no longer an issue. Then he glanced up the rise, and a smile quirked his handsome lips.

"Our good father was always one for following instructions," he murmured.

"Who dares," the monstrous rider bellowed, "interfere with the servitors of Baron Pundar on their lawful business?"

"Zaranda Star dares that and more," Zaranda declared. "Especially since I happen to be Countess Morninggold. Father, this beast's misled you; this is still County Morninggold, and these men no more than looters-and murderers."

She tossed her head haughtily, making her namesake blaze flash in the sun. "Who dares to name that hedge-robber Pundar of Little Consequence 'baron'- and to prey upon
my
people?"

The morningstar man with the injured leg had circled round and now rode up to join his apparent leader. He stopped and turned back to the house. "Pundar is too a baron," he called through cupped hands. "He has a piece of paper from the capital that proves it!"

"The capital?" Zaranda said, half to herself. "Since when is there a capital in Tethyr?"

"Why, Zazesspur-
ow!"

The giant man had ridden a few steps forward and with a great backhanded clout knocked the morningstar man from the saddle.

"I do the talking here," he roared. "I am Togrev the Magnificent, lord high commander of the armed forces of Pundaria! We claim these lands by ancient right, as approved and attested by Zazesspur."

Zaranda and Farlorn had begun to ride forward. They could see the house's front now. Two of the footmen lay in unmoving lumps in the pigsty; the other four stood with hands up, looking nervously at Stillhawk, who stood covering them with an arrow nocked.

"By rights," Zaranda told Togrev, "we should hang the lot of you as the murderous bandit scum you are."

"You forget," the lord high commander said, and gestured with a black-nailed hand. A few feet from the captive cleric the little ass had its head down, cropping obliviously at the sweet spring grass. "I have your priest."

"For all the good that does you," Zaranda said. "It's poor practice to negotiate for hostages, and as a rule I won't do it."

Father Pelletyr squirmed his right arm free enough to touch himself four times on the breast in the sign of the rack on which Ilmater suffered. Then he crossed his hands before his breast as if they were bound and rolled his eyes heavenward, accepting. The cleric had a notable reluctance to face physical danger, but this was martyrdom, which made all the difference in the world.

"However," Zaranda said, stopping her horse twenty yards downslope from the huge man, "somebody needs to be left alive to tell that mound of ankheg droppings Pundar that if he troubles my people again he'll wake some fine spring night with a fireball in his lap."

"And who would cast such a fireball?" demanded Togrev in an avalanche rumble.

"I would."

The morningstar man had rolled over and was sitting in the grass and rubbing the back of his neck. "She's a witch, Togrev," he said. "She knows all kind of wild magics. Beware her spells."

"Listen to the man," Zaranda said.

The huge man frowned at her. His brows beetled impressively. "Half-ogre, by the smell of him," Goldie muttered as the wind backed. "Ick."

"What will you do, then?" Togrev demanded.

"Kill you in single combat."

"You want me to fight
that?"
Goldie demanded in a whisper, nodding at the gigantic plowhorse. "He's as clumsy as a barrel of boulders, but if he ever connects, sweet Sune preserve me!"

Togrev frowned more impressively still, as if there were something here he didn't quite get. "Why should I go along with that?" he asked after a few heartbeats.

"Because if you don't, we'll slaughter you and all your men, and I'll whistle up a wind elemental to drop your head in Pundar's pigsty with a note attached."

"When did you learn to summon elementals?" Farlorn hissed out the side of his mouth in elf-speech, which half-ogres as a rule didn't understand.

"Never," replied Zaranda in the same tongue, which she grasped well enough but could only speak in pidgin. "Now shut up." She swung down from Goldie and stepped to the side to stand facing the half-ogre, legs braced and hands on hips. The wind stroked her face and ruffled her hair. The springtime smell would have been quite refreshing except that Goldie was quite right about Togrev: he was a half-ogre, manifestly, and lived up to their usual standards of hygiene.

Togrev rumbled deep in his cavernous chest and swung down from his massive mount. Goldie flared her nostrils and blew out a long breath. Zaranda fought to keep her own shoulders from sagging in relief.

"And when I beat you, pathetic woman-thing?" the bandit chief demanded.

"If you win, you and your men go free. If you lose, your men still go free. This is really a pretty good deal I'm offering."

"Are you sure this is wise?" asked Farlorn out loud.

"No," Zaranda said, "but it'll be very soothing to my anger, one way or another."

Togrev scratched his unshaven chin and pondered.

" 'Ware magic, Lord Commander!" the morningstar man exclaimed. "She's a witch, I tell you!"

"How is that fair?" the half-ogre asked in aggrieved tones. "You'll just cheat and use some witching tricks. You could never best me otherwise. I am Togrev the Magnificent!"

"Compared to what?" murmured Farlorn.

"If you agree to meet me alone, with no outside interference from either side, I shall forbear to use any magic against you. I'll forgo even the blessings of my priest. Does that satisfy you?"

For answer the half-ogre swung his great axe in a wild flourish that ended with it poised above his head. The passage of air through inlets cut through the head made it moan like a lost soul.

"Prepare to break!" he roared.

"Not so fast," Zaranda said with a firm shake of the head. "My priest."

Togrev glowered at her. Then he nodded. "Let the fat pig go." His men gaped at him "Do it!" he roared. They let go of Father Pelletyr and stepped away as if he'd grown hot in their grasp.

The priest brushed himself off. "I forgive you," he murmured to his erstwhile captors.

Stillhawk herded his captives up the rise. They joined the dismounted morningstar man and the four who had held the cleric on one side of the combat ground. The Dalesman-who was as sparing with words as any speaking ranger-looked rebellious when Zaranda signed him to put his nocked arrow back in its quiver. Her eyes met his and held them for a moment. He nodded and complied.

As Zaranda was turning her head to look at her opponent once again, he charged with speed surprising in one so huge. Which still wasn't very fast in absolute terms, but it had served him well in the past, taking enemies by surprise and stunning them into momentary-and fatal-inaction.

Zaranda was molded of different metal. Without hesitation, she threw Crackletongue up to meet the axe. She did not try to block the strike; had she done so, the weight of the axe and the man behind it would have broken her arm and its blade would have cloven her, regardless. Instead the flat of her saber struck the haft right behind the bit, guiding the monstrous moaning weapon past her as she pirouetted aside.

At the instant of meeting, her sword emitted a snarl and shower of blue sparks. Crackletongue did that on making contact with creatures consecrated to evil, thus confirming something Zaranda had already surmised.

With her help, the axe blade bit deep into the soft flesh of the hillside. Zaranda rolled her wrist and slashed forehand for the great corded neck. Togrev roared and threw his body back and to the side. Crackletongue's tip sparked as it bit, but it did no more than cut skin, cauterizing the slight wound as it left it.

Flash-fast, the half-ogre had wrenched free his axe, throwing out clods of earth, and whipped it into guard position before his metal-scaled breast. Zaranda sprang away to face him, half-crouched, Crackletongue held out before her, muttering and flickering with magic.

"Not bad," she said. "You're quick for such a wad of blubber."

An impressive paunch strained the seams of Togrev's hauberk, but he was by no means a wad of blubber. For some reason Zaranda had found the few ogres and half-ogres she'd had dealings with-none friendly-were one and all sensitive to suggestions that they were fat. An angry foe was seldom a clearheaded one. And if the brute's that agile, she thought, I need all the edge I can get.

He seemed to be right-handed. She circled that direction, clockwise around him. He began pivoting to face her, and at the same time edging toward her. Then he snapped the great axe up and back as if it were a jackstraw, cocking for a strike.

She lunged. The half-ogre screamed like a wounded horse as Crackletongue's tip sank a handbreadth into the bulging triceps of his left arm. There was a sizzle and stink of burning flesh, and then Zaranda hurled herself past her foe, twisting her sword as she ripped it free, trying to do the maximum harm.

It wasn't enough to incapacitate the tree-trunk arm. With blood streaming black from a wound too large for Crackletongue's sparks to close, Togrev swung the axe in a howling horizontal arc. Once again his reaction time surprised Zaranda. She had no time to parry, could only jump backward with arms flung high to keep them from harm's way.

Father Pelletyr cried out in shared anguish as the axe blade kissed her flat belly. The marauder section of the audience stamped and hooted approval. Goldie whinnied alarm.

"I'm fine," gasped Zaranda. Her awareness of her own body was good, good enough that she needn't glance down to know that the axe had done no more than lay open skin. Which was good, because had she glanced at herself, she would have died.

With shocking speed the half-ogre brought the axe around and up and
down.
Zaranda had to throw herself into a shoulder roll to avoid being split in two as the axe plunged deep into the earth.

Togrev snatched it free again, hurled it high, and ran at his foe as she rolled up onto one knee. His face split in a jag-toothed grin. He had her now; she was in no position to shift left or right fast enough to escape him, nor could she run away. The axehead seemed to scream in triumph as it descended for the killing blow.

Zaranda dived for the monster. She ducked her head and somersaulted forward. As she and Togrev passed in opposite directions, Crackletongue licked out and caressed the back of one great knee.

Togrev vented a pain-squeal like that of a cracked organ pipe. He went crashing past her like a boulder down a Snowflake peak. His wounded leg simply folded beneath him when he put his weight upon it. Zaranda's blow had hamstrung him.

Once more he showed himself hateful-quick, slamming the butt of his axe-helve against the earth like a crutch, saving himself from rolling headlong. He got his uninjured right leg beneath him, came back upright, took three great hops away and pivoted, leaning on the great axe.

Zaranda got deliberately to her feet. The half-ogre stood snarling at her, his left leg booted in scarlet.

"Now," she said, "let's finish this." She started forward.

"Randi!"
Goldie screamed.

By reflex Zaranda dived forward. As she did, something struck the back of her head with jarring impact and clawing pain. She went sprawling on the grass.

Sparks fountained behind her eyes. Her head rang like a dwarven smith's forge. She blinked to clear her vision, saw Togrev looming over her like a colossus, great axe poised above his head. He had only to fall forward to cleave her in two.

Behind her she heard malicious laughter and the sliding song of a spiked morningstar head circling on its chain. Her right hand, miraculously, still held Crackletongue. She looked back at the marauder who had struck her from behind, flung her left arm toward him, forefinger pointed.

"Twenty feet and six!" she gasped. A light like an orange-glowing crossbow bolt flashed past the morningstar man's left hip.

He hooted shrill triumph through his nose. "Missed!" He swung the morningstar.

The light-bolt flew twenty feet away and six feet up, then exploded. Laughter turned to scream as the fireball's fringe engulfed the man with the morningstar.

Zaranda turned her head. Togrev was in the process of toppling toward her, his axe making the air itself scream pain. With all the power in her flat-muscled belly, Zaranda jackknifed, thrusting Crackletongue into his gut.

Her magic blade bit through the overlapped steel plates of his hauberk and the thick leather beneath, through sweaty, hairy skin and then fat to muscle bunched beneath. And there Crackletongue's magic and Zaranda's strength failed her. The saber would penetrate no farther.

Zaranda's presence of mind had not deserted her, though. She guided the butt of her basketed sword-hilt to the earth beside her, then rolled clear as Togrev's own momentum completed the task of spitting him.

For a while Zaranda just lay on her belly, tasting grass-flavored air and bits of dark, moist soil that had found their way into her mouth. They tasted good. Even the dirt.