Jim Butcher - Furies of Calderon

"And that's all there is to it?" Fidelias asked.

"No." Aldrick didn't elaborate. After a moment of silence, he said, "How are your feet?"

"Let's go," Fidelias said. He started back up the hill again, though the pain made him wince with every step.

Perhaps ten yards short of the summit of the hill, a pair of Marat warriors, male and female, rose out of the shadows around the base of the stones at the top of the hill. They came down toward them, through the snow, the man holding an axe of Aleran manufacture, the woman, a dark dagger of chipped stone.

Fidelias stopped short of them and held up his empty hands. "Peace. I have come to speak to Atsurak."

The man stepped up close to him, his eyes narrowed. He had the dark, heavy feathers of a herdbane braided through his pale hair. "I will not permit you to speak to Atsurak, outsider, while he is at the horto. You will wait until-"

Fidelias's temper flashed, and it was with a flicker of annoyance that he reached down into the earth to borrow strength from Vamma and dealt the axe-wielding warrior a blow that lifted the Marat's feet up off the ground and stretched him out senseless in the snow.

Without pausing, Fidelias stepped over the silent form of the fallen Marat. He limped up to the lean female warrior and said in exactly the same tone, "Peace. I have come to speak to Atsurak."

The Marat's amber-colored eyes flicked up and down Fidelias, bright

beneath heavy, pale brows. Her lips lifted from her teeth, showing canine fangs, and she said, "I will take you to Atsurak."

Fidelias followed her up the rest of the hill and to the great stones there. The smoke from the torches, heavy and dark along the ground, held a curious odor, and Fidelias found his head feeling a bit light as he stepped into it. He glanced back at Aldrick, and the swordsman nodded, nostrils flared.

Seven stones, smooth and round, their surfaces protruding above the heavy smoke, sat around a pool of water, somehow unfrozen despite the cold. The smoke seemed to sink into it and swirl beneath its surface, leaving it shining and dull, reflecting back the light of fires and the dull night glow of snow and ice.

Scattered around the pool were perhaps a hundred other Marat, their hair plaited with herdbane feathers, or else showing the shagginess of what Fidelias assumed to be the Wolf Clan. Male and female, they ate, or drank from brightly painted gourds, or mated in the sultry, dizzying smoke with animal abandon. In the shadows stood the tall, silent shapes of the herd-bane warbirds and crouched the low, swift shapes of wolves.

On one of the stones lounged Atsurak, his bruises all but gone already, the cuts bound in strips of hide and plaited grass. Aquitaine's dagger rode through a strap at his waist, the blade contained within a rawhide sheath and positioned to be clearly on display. On either side of him curled a female Marat warrior, of the heavy-browed and fanged variety. Both were naked, young, lithe.

The mouths of all three were smeared with fresh, scarlet blood. And bound over the stone beside them was the shivering form of a young Aleran woman, still wearing the shreds of a farm wife's skirts and apron, and still very much alive.

Aldrick's mouth twisted with disgust. "Savages," he murmured.

"Yes," Fidelias said. "We call them that because they're savage, Aldrick."

The swordsman growled in his throat. "They have moved too soon. There aren't any Aleran settlements on this side of the Valley."

"Obviously." Fidelias stepped forward and said, "Atsurak of Clan Herdbane. I understood that our attack was to begin two dawns from now. Was my understanding in error?"

Atsurak looked up, focusing on Fidelias, as an older woman, also showing the signs of Clan Wolf, rose from the smoke at the base of one of the stones, coated liberally in blood, and crossed to him. She folded her arms

casually over his shoulders, amber eyes on Fidelias. Atsurak lifted his hand to touch the woman's, without looking at her, and said, "We celebrate our victory, Aleran." He smiled, and his teeth were stained scarlet. "Have you come to partake?"

"You celebrate a victory you do not yet have."

Atsurak waved a hand. "For many of my warriors, there will be no chance to celebrate, after."

"So you broke our agreement?" Fidelias asked. "You struck early?"

The Marat lowered his brows. "A raiding party struck first, as is our custom. We know many ways in and out of the bridge valley, Aleran. Not ways for an army, but for a scouting party, a raiding party, yes." He gestured toward the bound girl. "Her people fought well against us. Died well. Now we partake of their strength."

"You're eating them alive?" demanded Aldrick.

"Pure," corrected Atsurak. "Untouched by fire or water or blade. As they are before The One."

As he spoke, a pair of Herdbane warriors rose to their feet and moved to the prisoner. With casual, almost disinterested efficiency, they drew her up, tore the clothes from her, and bound her back down over the stone again, belly up to the stars, arms and legs spread.

Atsurak looked over at the captive and mused through bloody lips, "We take more strength in this way. I do not expect you to understand, Aleran."

The girl looked around, frantic, her eyes red with tears, body shaking in the cold, her lips blue. "Please," she gasped, toward Fidelias. "Please, sir. Please help me."

Fidelias met her eyes. Then walked over toward the stone upon which she was bound. "Matters have changed. We must change the plans to suit them."

Atsurak followed him with his eyes, expression growing wary. "What change, Aleran?"

"Sir," the girl whispered up at him, her expression desperate, ugly with tears and terror. "Sir, please."

"Shhhh," Fidelias said. He rested his hand on her hair, and she broke down into quiet, subdued sobs. "We have to move forward now. The troops at Garrison may be warned of our coming."

"Let them know," Atsurak said, lazily leaning against one of the women at his side. "We will tear out their weak bellies regardless."

"You are wrong," Fidelias said. He raised his voice, enough that all of the Marat around the pool would hear. "You are mistaken, Atsurak. We must strike at once. At dawn."

Silence fell over the hilltop, abrupt, deep, almost as though the Marat were afraid to breathe. All eyes went from Fidelias to Atsurak.

"You call me mistaken," Atsurak said, the words low, soft.

"The younger of your people listen to the elder, headman of Clan Herdbane. Is that not true?"

"It is."

"Then you, young hordemaster, listen to me. I was there when last the Alerans fought your people. There was no glory in it. There was no honor. There was hardly any battle. The rocks rose against them, and the very grass beneath them bound their feet. Fire was laid on the ground, and fire swept over them and destroyed them. There was no contest, no trial of blood. They died like stupid animals in a trap because they grew too confident." He twisted his lips into a sneer. "Their bellies too full."

"You dishonor the memory of brave warriors-"

"Who died because they did not use what they had to fullest advantage," snarled Fidelias. "Lead your people to death if that is your wish, Atsurak, but I will be no party to it. I will not waste the lives of my Knights in an attempt to neutralize the Knights of a forewarned and prepared garrison."

Another Marat, a Herdbane, rose and snarled, "He speaks the words of an Aleran. The words of a coward."

"I speak the truth," Fidelias said. "If you are wise, young man, you will listen to the older."

Atsurak stared at him for several moments in silence. Then he exhaled and said, "The Alerans fight as cowards. Let us force them to the trial of blood before they can prepare their spirits to hide behind. We will attack at dawn."