David Weber - Oath of Swords

They were also much darker than most Sothōii . . . and smaller. The tallest was shorter than Brandark and barely chest-high on Bahzell, and the Horse Stealer’s ears twitched with derisive amusement as he saw them absorb that fact and draw into a tighter array.

An officer stepped to the fore, his brightly worked rank insignia gleaming, and raised an imperious hand at the two hradani.

“State your business!” His badly accented Navahkan held an edge of truculence and an even sharper one of nervousness, for in addition to their own horses, Bahzell and Brandark led no less than four more with war saddles. Two were laden with bloodstained arms and armor whose original owners no longer required them, and two badly wounded, semiconscious guardsmen were strapped into the saddles of the other two.

“Certainly.” Brandark’s calm Esganian was far better than the officer’s Navahkan. “My companion and I wish to cross the border and travel to Esgfalas in hopes of hiring on as caravan guards.”

“Caravan guards?” Even Bahzell, whose Esganian was limited at best, recognized the officer’s incredulity. The man’s eyes flitted back over their plunder and Churnazh’s two wounded guardsmen, and he cleared his throat. “You seem a bit, ah, well-equipped for caravan guards, friend.”

“We do?” Brandark turned in his saddle to run his own eyes back over the cavalcade. “I suppose we do, Captain, but it’s all come by honestly.” The officer made a strangled sound, and Brandark grinned. “We had a slight misunderstanding a few miles back, but when my companion and I were set upon without cause, we had no choice but to defend ourselves.”

“Without cause?” the officer repeated politely, with a significant glance at the wounded guardsmen’s livery, and Brandark shrugged.

“Well, it seemed that way to us , Captain. At any rate, we claim their arms and horses as lawful plunder.”

“I see.” The officer rubbed his chin, then shrugged. Manifestly, the reasons for which hradani chose to slaughter one another meant nothing to him, as long as they did it on their own side of the border. “May I ask your names?”

“My name is Brandark, until recently of Navahk,” Brandark replied cheerfully. “The tall fellow yonder is Bahzell Bahnakson, Prince of Hurgrum. Perhaps you’ve heard of him?”

“Ah, yes,” the officer said. “As a matter of fact I have. Something about broken hostage bond and rape, I believe.” Bahzell stiffened, but the Esganian went on in an unhurried tone. “Since, however, the tale came from an officer of Prince Churnazh’s Guard-I believe that’s his surcoat there, on the second horse-I saw no particular reason to believe the rape charges. As for the hostage bond, that would be between your friend, Prince Churnazh, and Hurgrum, and no concern of Esgan’s. But-” he darted sharp eyes back to Brandark “-no one mentioned anything about you .”

“I’m afraid Churnazh wasn’t aware of my own travel plans when he sent word ahead,” Brandark said smoothly.

“I see.” The officer studied the road under his boots for several moments. “Well, under the circumstances, I see no reason to deny you entry, as long-” he looked back up “-as you’re on your way through Esgan.”

Bahzell’s eyes narrowed, but Brandark only nodded.

“We are, Captain.”

“Good.” The officer returned a crisp nod, then glanced back at the two wounded guardsmen. “Ah, may I ask exactly what you intend to do with those two?” His tone implied that it would only be polite to take them back out of sight-and onto Navahkan soil-before cutting their throats.

“Aye, Captain, you may,” Bahzell said in slow, careful Esganian. “It’s grateful we’d be if you’d see to their wounds till they can ride again, then send them back to Navahk.”

The officer gawked at him, then shot a stunned look up at Brandark.

“As I said, Captain, I’m sure it was all a misunderstanding,” the Bloody Sword said blandly. “Under the circumstances, the least we can do is send them home to explain it to Prince Churnazh.”

The Esganian officer winced, then nodded with grudging respect and spared the two guardsmen a much more sympathetic look.

“I think we can do that,” he said slowly, “assuming you can pay their housing and healer’s bills.”

“That seems reasonable.” Brandark extended a handful of silver to the officer. “Would this take care of it?”

The officer glanced down and nodded, and Brandark smiled.

“In that case, Captain, we’ll leave them-and their horses-with you and be on our way, if you don’t mind. We wouldn’t want any of their friends to turn up and have another misunderstanding right on your doorstep.”

Esgan was both disturbingly like and unlike Bahzell’s homeland, but it was very unlike Navahk. The road was almost as well maintained as Prince Bahnak’s military roads, and the stone walls of the fields they passed were neatly laid and kept. Herds grazed contentedly, crops ripened as the northern summer drowsed into early fall, and there was as much traffic as he would have seen in a normal day in Hurgrum. That was a relief after the wasteland to which Churnazh had reduced his own lands, but there was a marked difference in the way these people acted. Heavy farm wagons rumbled along with the first of the harvest, but most of the traffic was afoot . . . and as wary as the farmer on muleback who paused to gawk at them, then dug in his heels and hurried along before the hradani could do anything more than glance back.

And that, Bahzell thought, was the disturbing thing. He’d always known the other Races of Man feared his people, and he knew enough history to realize they had reason to. Yet this was the first time he’d ever encountered such sullen hostility from total strangers. Brandark seemed unaffected as he rode along at his friend’s shoulder, but something inside Bahzell tightened in disgust-or perhaps it was dismay-when pedestrians shrank back against the far side of the road to avoid them and mothers actually snatched children up and turned protectively away on sight.

The hot hostility in other eyes did more than dismay, and he felt his hand steal towards his sword more than once as his hackles rose in response. Wariness, even fear, he could understand, little though he might like it; hatred and contempt were something very different.

“I told you hradani were unpopular,” Brandark murmured quietly as a farmhand gestured the evil eye at them and hopped across a pasture wall rather than share the road with them, and Bahzell glanced at him in surprise. Brandark had seemed totally unaware of the Esganians’ hostility, but now the Bloody Sword’s twisted smile gave that appearance the lie.

“Aye, so you did, and it was in my mind I knew what you were meaning,” Bahzell replied. “But this-” He waved a disgusted hand after the retreating farmhand, and Brandark’s smile twisted a bit further.

“Well, it’s hard to blame them,” he said judiciously. “They don’t know what shining, stalwart people Horse Stealers are. All they know are nasty, plundering Bloody Swords like your humble servant.”

“Like Churnazh’s scum, you mean,” Bahzell growled.

“Ah, but those are the only hradani they know at all, and, that being the case, then all hradani are scum. After all, we’re all the same, aren’t we?”

Bahzell spat into the dust, and Brandark chuckled.

“If you think it’s bad now, my friend, wait till we reach a town!” He shook his head and brushed at his tattered, dirty shirtsleeve. “Do try to remember we’re visitors-and not welcome ones-if you should feel moved to reason with anyone. I suspect lynching a pair of murdering hradani would be a whole year’s entertainment for some of these folk. Why-” Brandark’s eyes gleamed at Bahzell’s snarl “-it might be almost as entertaining for them as cutting Churnazh into rib roasts would be for you!”