Jeffrey Lord - The Bronze Axe

His teeth glinted wolf-like in the moonlight as he held up the sword. "I think not, princess. Not while I am armed and can fight back. Try to have me whipped and there will be blood perhaps mine, certainly that of your friends."

His tone lightened. "Anyway it will not be necessary to whip me I do not mock you."

Taleen regarded him with something of caution, and a new respect. She smiled back. "Very well. We are friends again. You may hold me, Blade. I am freezing."

But before she came into his arms again they both heard it the sound of chanting voices coming from the deep black woods to the east. Taleen stared at Blade and made an odd gesture with her right hand across her breasts.

"Frigga protect us! It is the Drus. They are meeting tonight in the sacred glade. And now I know where I am, Blade. Come. We will circle around them and find the path to Sarum Vil." She extended a hand to Blade.

He stared into the depths of the wood, trying to locate the chanting. As he strained his eyes he gradually made out the flickering red stain of a fire, seen intermittently, now and then obscured by the great boles of the oaks and yews that lurked like mute giants in the tenebrific shadows. Blade felt an odd, uneasy and yet exciting, stirring in his blood and could not explain his atavistic response to the fire and the chanting. He only knew that he wanted to see, and understand, what was going on.

But when he made this plain to Taleen she recoiled from him in horror. She snatched away her hand and stared at him as though he had gone lunatic.

"No no! It is forbidden to spy on the Drus. Most especially forbidden to intrude on the Mysteries. If we are caught we will be killed. They will sacrifice us to the God of the Trees. That is what they are doing now preparing a sacrifice. If they catch us they will cut off our heads and our hands and our feet, and they will gut us like rabbits and cook us over a slow fire. Then they will eat us! No, Blade. We must circle far around them, and very carefully, too, because they always post sentries."

He watched her, his handsome face impassive. There was no doubt that she believed what she said, and that her fear was genuine. In the moonlight, ever growing stronger, her eyes were full of terror.

It only served to whet his curiosity. He reached and pulled her against his big chest once again. He stroked her hair and felt her trembling and knew the cold was not to blame this time.

"You have seen this with your own eyes?" His voice was gentle and he kept it low. She might be telling truth about the sentries. "You have seen these Drus make human sacrifices and eat them?"

Taleen shook her head and muttered against his chest. "No. I have not seen it. I would not dare. I am not a fool and do not wish to die. But I have heard the stories as has everyone in Alb and the stories are true. The Drus are very powerful and they are a law unto themselves. Everyone knows and understands that, Blade. And you, a stranger who may be forgiven for your ignorance, must understand it also."

She pulled away from him and looked into his face. "Unless you are really a fool, after all, and have a great wish to die. And until now I have not thought you a fool."

"I am not," said Blade, "and I do not wish for death more than any other man, but I would like to see these Drus with my own eyes. I will see them. Now. Tonight. At once."

It occurred to him that if the Drus were so powerful they must also be potential enemies. Blade had survived for so long by adhering to the creed "know thy enemy!" He did not know how long his enforced stay in Alb would last, or how long his memory of another life would sustain and give him an advantage. It would be wise to hedge against the future whatever it might bring and to make his position as secure as possible.

When he spoke again his tone was firm. "I am going to look into this matter, Princess Taleen. There is not much danger, for I am at home in the woods and brush, but you do not have to come with me. Remain here if you like. I will come back for you."

She sighed in resignation. He had expected another flare of anger.

"You are a fool, after all. You would never find me again. No I will go with you. If you are determined to be a fool then I must be one too. Only remember my warning when they are cutting off your head."

Blade grinned at her and patted her lightly on the behind. So anxious and unsure was she that the lese majesty went unnoticed.

"Follow closely," said Blade, "and do not be afraid. And try not to step on any dry sticks. Try to step exactly where I do. It will not take long. I want a glimpse of these Drus, nothing more. After that we will find your path and get on to the village of your cousin. It is a fact that I wish we had brought that dead dog along with us right now I think I could eat him raw."

Taleen made a scornful sound in her throat. "We will be the ones to be eaten, Blade. You will see."

All his life he had been a hunter, first of animals and then of men, and now he moved easily through the forest. It was not as dense as it appeared from the brookside, and the moonlight grew steadily. They made their way around the great trees festooned with vines and creepers. The ground beneath them, thickly padded with leaf mold, muffled their footsteps. Overhanging tendrils brushed their faces like tiny dank snakes.

Blade soon discovered that the forest, so formidable from afar, was really a series of interconnecting clearings. He made his way skillfully through the maze, pausing now and again to let the sullen and fearful girl catch up. Taleen, trying to follow exactly in his footsteps, did not always succeed. She caught her dress on the edge of a bramble thicket and Blade, impatiently, went back to free her. There was a long glistening red scratch on the inside of one tender thigh. He tore a small piece from her linen frock and wiped the blood away and felt her tremble. His own brawny naked body was scratched in a score of places.

For a moment they halted by the brambles, silent and unmoving. The chanting was very near now, a high pitched litany that was not melodic and yet bore a kernel of some dark and fearful tune. There was hand clapping, and a hint of contrapuntal values, and Blade began to make out individual voices. The fire it must be huge blazed through the black tree stalks like an ominous beacon.

The challenge, because it was spoken softly and without intonation, an arid voice devoid of color, was more frightening than if it had been screeched.

"Who comes? Who dares to defile the Mysteries, to invade the Sacred Grove? Speak!"

The voice came from behind a tree. It was ascetic, neuter, betraying no sex. Taleen gasped in terror and clung to Blade. He pushed her away, whispered "stay" and stalked toward the tree. He saw a glimmer of white in the gloom. He held the sword in readiness.

The voice, steady and dry and without fear, said: "Stop! Do not approach me. I am a Dru, of the Drus of Alb, and whoever disobeys me will suffer the abiding curse of all the Gods for all time. He will know eternal darkness and peace will elude him forever. Stop! I command it."

It was a formidable curse. Blade kept going. The voice, suddenly pitching up into panic, squealed, and the white thing moved around the bole of the huge tree to confront Blade.

"Die, then! You who will not listen to wisdom. Die!"

There was a flutter of white robes in the moonlight. A glint of golden dagger. The weapon struck at Blade, a powerful and well aimed blow. Hollow, fanatic eyes gleamed at him from the shadows of a deep cowl. "Die then. Die die die!" It was the larger chant made small and scored for one voice.

Blade parried the blow and finished matters with a vicious backhand stroke that bit into the Dru's throat just below the chin. Arterial blood, bright in the moonlight, spurted to drench the white robe. The Dru went to his knees, staring in astonishment at his bloody hands, words and blood burbling from the hole in his throat in a scarlet froth. Blade, afraid that the Dru would yet manage a cry of warning, struck again with the sword, this time from the side and below the ear. It was a near decapitating stroke. The Dru sank into the blood and twitched and died.