Roger Taylor - Caddoran

This brought an indignant denial from Adren, which Endryk brushed aside with a curt, ‘You will when you’re hungry.’

Reaching the head of the valley they found themselves overlooking another; wider and less intimidating than the one they had just travelled. Its floor and lower slopes were verdant and lightly wooded, and in the distance they could just make out the glint of a lake.

‘Quite a contrast,’ Hyrald said, glancing back.

Endryk nodded then looked at Thyrn. ‘Which way do you want to go?’ he asked.

After a moment, as if it were being lifted by some external force, Thyrn’s right arm slowly rose. ‘Along this side,’ he said.

‘South-west,’ Endryk confirmed, looking at the pale disc of the sun trying to make its way through the clouds.

Then Thyrn’s arm stiffened. ‘There,’ he said. He was pointing to a distant peak rising solitary above its neighbours. ‘Yes, there, definitely.’

‘We’re not going to reach that today,’ Endryk said. ‘If tomorrow.’ He frowned.

‘What’s the matter?’ Rhavvan asked.

‘Oh, nothing,’ Endryk replied with a shrug. ‘It’s just a sour-looking thing. Grey, dead. Quite different to all the other peaks around here. It reminds me of something but I can’t think what.’

They set off at a leisurely pace. At Endryk’s suggestion they moved down for a while on to the lusher valley floor where they were able to replenish their supplies. Apart from a great many grasses and plant leaves and roots, they also brought down several plump birds, Thyrn actually killing one with his sling, albeit not the one he was aiming at. The others confined themselves to their bows, the Wardens in particular vying strongly with one another for the position of best archer, a competition that Endryk emphatically refused to adjudicate on except in so far as their clamour scattered their prey.

The strange events of the previous day behind them and their immediate destination agreed upon, their mood was good, though, just as the watery sky occasionally darkened and threatened rain, the underlying grimness of their position was never far away from their thoughts.

‘What if we run into more valleys that are like the last one?’ Adren asked edgily. ‘No vegetation, no animals – just rocks.’

Endryk was matter-of-fact. ‘When we’re in places like this, we gather what we can, store it as well as we can, and then we live on it for as long as we can. If we come on hard times, we ration ourselves, then we go short, then we go hungry. But throughout, we keep putting one foot in front of the other. And we don’t burden the present with an unknowable future.’

‘I was only thinking ahead,’ Adren protested indignantly.

‘No, you weren’t. You were beginning to mither, as my mother used to say.’

‘Mither?’

‘Fret, fuss, fume, bite your nails, for nothing.’ This caused Hyrald and Rhavvan some amusement but Adren’s eyes narrowed dangerously.

‘If you’re going to think ahead, then plan properly,’ Endryk continued. ‘Don’t forget, this range isn’t that wide, and a fit, determined person can last a long time without any food at all.’ He turned, and seeing her expression, gave her a provocative look. ‘And, of course, we’ve always got…’ He patted his horse.

‘Stop that!’

It was a command and a menacing finger that had deterred more than one Arvenshelm miscreant from continuing with his misdeeds. Catching the full force of it, Endryk laughed and held up his hands in insincere surrender.

When they stopped to eat, however, Thyrn was unusually sombre. After a few mouthfuls of his meal, he stood up and with an, ‘Excuse me,’ he took a sword from one of the horses, unsheathed it and began performing a basic cutting exercise that, following Endryk’s teaching, Adren had shown him.

The others watched him in silence for some time, their anxiety growing in proportion to his intensity. Eventually, in response to a silent appeal from Nordath, Endryk went over to him. Thyrn turned to face him, the sword in a guard position.

‘What’s wrong?’ Endryk asked.

Thyrn frowned, then said, ‘My distance. If I want to cut you, I’m too close. If I want to lunge, I’m a little too far away.’

Amusement broke through Endryk’s concerned expression, and, chuckling, he shook his head. ‘That’s not what I meant, but you’re quite right – well observed.’ He took a pace back and said, ‘Cut!’ bouncing his hand off the centre of his forehead to indicate the target.

Thyrn craned forward a little, as if not understanding the instruction. Endryk repeated it. ‘Cut, now. Quickly.’

‘But…’

‘Do it! Now!’ Endryk clapped his hands loudly and stamped his foot with a movement that made him seem to be advancing. Thyrn’s sword shot up and, his face screwed into an apologetic and fearful rictus, he stepped forward and swung the sword down alarmingly towards Endryk’s head.

Without any apparent haste, Endryk stepped quietly to one side of the descending blade, looped an arm around Thyrn’s shoulder and placed his other hand on the now lowered sword hilt. As Thyrn made to snatch the sword back, Endryk made a slight movement which arched Thyrn backwards and slipped the sword from his hand. The whole movement was so seemingly casual that it drew spontaneous approval from the bemused watchers.

With the same ease that he had disturbed Thyrn’s balance, Endryk restored it and returned the sword to him.

‘Not bad,’ he said, leading him back towards the others. He looked at him seriously. ‘I’ll teach you what you need to know from now. But remember what we agreed. Don’t keep anything to yourself. What’s the matter? Why this sudden need to put sword practice before food?’ He handed Thyrn his plate and motioned him to sit.

‘I don’t know,’ Thyrn said, picking at his food. ‘It’s very strange. I hadn’t really noticed it until we sat down but there’s something about this call I can feel that is making me think that I’m walking towards a fight of some kind.’ He looked at Endryk. ‘Where would I get a feeling like that from? I’ve never been in a fight in my life.’

‘I wouldn’t hazard a guess,’ Endryk replied. ‘But there’s a high risk that this entire venture will come to blows before it’s finished, you know that. That’s why we’ve been preparing ourselves.’

Thyrn rejected this suggestion unequivocally. ‘No. That, I understood. This is different. It’s as though a part of me I never knew about has suddenly appeared. Something that’s just said, “No – no further”, and has planted its feet in the ground in defiance. It’s there whenever I think about last night. And when I sense this call inside me.’

Endryk looked to Nordath for guidance but received none. Thyrn abruptly seized his arm.

‘Teach me how to fight,’ he said desperately. ‘Teach me what I need to know to be a warrior like you. Please.’

Endryk made a half-hearted effort to free his arm but to no avail. For the first time since they had met him, he seemed to be violently disturbed.

‘I can’t,’ he said, finally freeing himself. ‘Not just like that, in a few days. It takes years. Besides, I’m no warrior. I’d have probably been a saddler like my father if…’ He faltered again. ‘I’m just someone who’s been taught how to fight should he need to. We all were. It was the way of my people – the tradition. We were taught fighting skills and many other things. Not to fight – we had no enemies, as we thought – but to be self-sufficient, independent, self-disciplined, yet still part of an ordered and peaceful society.’

‘Odd way to go about things,’ Adren remarked, almost sneering. ‘Teaching people to fight to keep order on the streets.’