Mickey Reichert - Flight of the Renshai

Imorelda stood on her hind legs and patted his cheek with a paw. She yowled.*Are you all right?* *I will be,* Tae managed to send.*After I get some sleep.*

Matrinka got the message, too. "Lie down, Tae. You're deadly tired." She lowered him to the mattress, released his hands, then rearranged her blankets over him. "I'm so sorry I burdened you before you…"

Tae was asleep before she finished.

Treysind whirled, sword banging against his leg. "Hero's goned."

Saviar only nodded. That had become apparent quite some time ago, but the little Erythanian had insisted on checking the entire battlefield.

"He cain't be goned. He wouldn't-" Treysind looked to Saviar for help, eyes glazed with building tears, but the Renshai could supply nothing.

Saviar could only imagine the boil of emotion: sorrow and anger, worry and uncertainty. He shared only one, a welling sense of betrayal that did not originate with Calistin's disappearance. The decision of his youngest brother to leave in silence only fueled his certainty that the gods had struck his entire family mad. You, too, Calistin?

"He sayed he talked ta… ta a god." Treysind's voice caught in sobs. "She tole him… he… dint got a… a soul."

Cut by Treysind's anguish, Saviar drew the boy close. "I've often thought he didn't have a heart. Sometimes I've wondered if he has a brain. But a soul…" Saviar rubbed Treysind's back instinctively as the boy sobbed into his tunic. "Everyone has a soul."

Treysind sniffled, voice muffled. "Tha's what I's tole him."

Abruptly, a memory popped into Saviar's head. He recalled a day from his early childhood when he overheard his parents talking about Calistin, spiders, and someone who lacked a soul. They seemed serious and intent, but they stopped talking as soon as they noticed him. At the time, he had discarded the discussion as boring parent-talk. Now, he tried to remember exactly what he had heard in detail, without success. Is it actually possible Calistin lacks a soul? It would explain so much. Then, the deeper realization struck Saviar. No soul, no Valhalla.

Treysind yanked himself free of Saviar's hold. "I's gotta find him." He threw his pack back onto his shoulder. It made him look smaller, more insignificant, if possible. "I's gotta." Without another word, he ran deeper into the woods.

Saviar did not attempt to stop Treysind. Wherever the boy went, whether or not he found Calistin, would be safer than remaining with the Renshai. Alone, he had a chance. With Renshai in a strange land hunted by enemies and without Calistin's protection, his life was measured in days. For several moments, Saviar stood in uncertainty. His loyalties had always lain with the Renshai and with his family, but those two things no longer went together. Every member of his family had chosen a different allegiance that had little or nothing to do with the ties that had always bound them.

Saviar stared at the dark heavens, the crescent of moon, and the spattering of stars, dim behind a curtain of clouds. "What do I do?" he asked the gods but received no answer. That came from within. For, as irritated as he felt toward his father and grandfather, the lessons he had learned from them in better, wiser times prevailed. Whatever paths the men of his family chose, he would continue to walk the line of responsibility.

Head low, feet shuffling through leaves and mold, Saviar headed toward the odor of smoke, where he knew he would find freshly kindled pyres and the rest of his tribe. There was no good way to deliver the news he carried, so he dawdled, concentrating on how the leaves parted in front of him, on the Northmen's bodies lying in grotesque poses, on the actual possibility that Calistin had spoken with a goddess. Under ordinary circumstances, he would consider such a thing insane.Yet, he still vividly remembered the Valkyrie at Kevral's death. Calistin had seen it, too, and it did not seem that far a stretch that he might have interacted with a goddess, too. Especially on a battlefield, where so many of the fallen Renshai had called upon Sif. The Northmen, too, he supposed shouted out for the strength, wrath, and favor of their most beloved deities.

All too soon, Saviar located the main clot of Renshai, tending pyres, and found Thialnir in the mix. Each living Renshai he found filled him with relief. They might have lost fifty, but they remained two hundred and fifty strong and would never be caught off guard. Those who had died were mostly the weakest: the elderly, children, the ill, the lesser fighters. With each consecutive battle, the Northmen would take more casualties for every one they inflicted.

Thialnir greeted Saviar with a tip of his head.

Saviar walked over, dreading what he needed to say. Nevertheless, he blurted it directly; Thialnir had no patience for sugarcoating or pussyfooting. "Calistin has left us." Even as he spoke, Saviar realized his words could be taken as a euphemism for death.

But, Thialnir knew exactly what he meant. He nodded thoughtfully. "I thought this might happen."

Startled, Saviar shut his mouth with a click of teeth.

"And it is how it should be."

"It… is?"

Thialnir watched sparks shoot up from a pyre in a line, the smoke winding toward the heavens. "He has unfinished business with the Northmen. That was his fight, not Kevral's."

Saviar had never thought of it quite that way. "Yes, but it violates our word, our honor."

Thialnir smiled but did not turn his head. "Our word, maybe. Honor… is a subjective thing."

No, it's not! Strong as it came to him, Saviar did not speak the thought aloud. At the moment he had no intention of causing more strife. Also, he thought it wise to consider Thialnir's words. For all of his apparent impetuousness, the leader of the Renshai often displayed a simple, underlying wisdom that most did not take the time to understand. It occurred to Saviar that honor might seem rigid to him because of his upbringing by a Knight of Erythane. Despite living among Renshai, he had picked up more than a few lessons from Ra-khir. "I should also tell you, sir, that Subikahn will not be able to help us negotiate a haven in the Eastlands."

"Oh?" Thialnir's single syllable begged answers that Saviar did not have.

"All I know is that father and son are estranged."

Thialnir made a thoughtful noise, finally looking at Saviar.

"I don't know if that will affect the Renshai's dealings with the kingdom."

"It may." Thialnir's massive hand massaged the hilt of his sword. "It depends on whether the king attributes the problem to Subikahn's Renshai training."

Saviar grimaced. He should have made Subikahn tell him at least that much, but he had become too concerned about knowing it all to think of that possibility.

"But King Tae Kahn is a fair ruler. No matter the reason, he will give us the opportunity to talk, to convince him of our value to the Eastlands."

Thialnir's calm approach to the matter soothed Saviar's tortured soul. If Thialnir could handle the loss of a sixth of their numbers, of their most skilled warrior, and of their only connection to the Eastlands with such grace; Saviar could weather the storm of his family as well.

"And you have my blessing to join either or both of your brothers, if you so choose."

Saviar could only stare. "How did you know Subikahn…?" Eager for the answer, he did not even bother to complete the question.

A smile cut Thialnir's grim, weathered features. He ran a hand through sweat-darkened silver-and-gold locks. "I didn't know. You just told me. How else could you have known about his problems with King Tae?"

"Well, yes, but…" Saviar hated revealing his twin, but he had had to let Thialnir know the danger. "You won't tell anyone, will you?"

"No. But it sounds like he might need you."

Alone, apparently. Subikahn's words returned to haunt Saviar. He expected me to join him, and I teased him instead. "I thought you needed me."