Tim Leach - A Winter War

And so they had followed him, retracing the secret paths taught by the mothers and aunts who had learned the secrets of that labyrinth, following cairns and totems that marked the way. Days spent sleepless, for to be still in that place was to die swallowed beneath the muck. Walking dismounted like shamed men, dragging fearful horses through the mire. Yet now they were on hard ground and beneath the open sky once more, and there would be no questioning his leadership. He had risen from the dead of the battlefield, had a horse save him in a duel, found a path where they thought none to be. He had earned his place through luck and omen.

Not for long. He had only to look back, to where Gaevani rode sullenly at the rearguard. Or forward, where Laimei rode, silent and white-faced with pain. One was bound by oath, the other by a cracked jaw. But one of them would speak a story soon, a story of Kai’s past. When they did, he would be captain no longer.

But that was for the future. At that moment he could feel the careful pride of one who rides at the head of a warband, of one who speaks and is obeyed. Unknowing what lay before them, certain of the death that rode close at their heels. But the sweetness still lingered, that particular sweetness of a life lived between strokes of the sword, each day a passing treasure. He could see their eyes that roamed restless across the horizon, searching for the curl of smoke from a cooking fire, the round shape of gathered huts, the gentle motion of a herd wandering across the grazing grounds. That longing to cast the spear upon the earth, and to see the sights of home.

He felt his horse stirring restlessly beneath him, a new steed taken from one of the men who had died along the way. They were still learning to trust one another, the patient courtship of horse and rider. It would not do for the captain to break ranks entirely, but he stirred his horse forward and moved up the line, giving it just a taste of the speed it longed for. He rode towards one horse in particular, careful to stay on the right-hand side of the company. For it was his sister’s one-eyed horse that he drew near, even more foul tempered now it had been reunited with its rider.

He had thought at first that it might be days before she could ride, that they would be waiting patiently by their fallen champion as Romans closed about them like a noose around a neck. But she rode the first day after the duel by the fire and made no sound of complaint. By the time they reached the marsh, she had strength enough to walk, leaning on the arm of one of the women left in the warband (she would take no aid from any of the men).

With her wounded jaw, she spoke only by sign and gesture – most frequently, with an impatient tipping gesture of her unwounded arm, calling for wine. A black and wordless rage hung over her, and always there was a gap around her in the ranks, the other riders staying well away. Always before had she been an omen of luck, and victory – in this new world it seemed they did not quite know what she meant.

He leaned over in his saddle to offer her a waterskin, and she shook her head, gave a little hiss of pain. There were no words at all for a time, just the gentle footfall of two horses side by side, syncopated like a drumbeat. He thought of days long ago when they had ridden together on the plains – children herding cattle, playing at war with branches and horsewhips, sleeping out under the stars that told stories and sharing secret stories of their own.

‘I thank you,’ he said at last. ‘For what you did in the duel.’

She snorted in response, and tapped her fingers on the neck of her mount.

‘I thank your horse, then, for saving my life twice that day.’ He studied her for a moment, as he had many times in the day since the battle, looking for the signs of fever and infection – the touch of fire at cheek and throat, a yellowish stain to the wrappings on her shoulder. He did not find them.

‘I shall not lead them for long,’ he said. ‘Back to our village. There will be an elder there to lead us, and tell us what will be done.’ He hesitated. ‘I know it shames you to ride under my command.’

She gave no gesture that he might read, offered only the cold eyes of a knife fighter.

‘But I welcome your counsel, if you would give it.’

A twitch of her lips that might have been the start of a smile, then a finger laid across her broken jaw.

‘I think you may find a way to say what you mean to say.’

She pointed back behind them, and when Kai turned he saw her finger levelled at the rearguard, at Gaevani. She clicked her fingers to draw his attention, and pointed to the sword on Kai’s belt.

Kai shook his head. ‘He swore an oath.’

She spat, bloody phlegm falling like rain upon the steppe.

‘He had won the duel against me. Then your horse defeated him. His life is not mine to take.’ Kai grinned, and pointed to the horse beneath her. ‘And it seems that he at least is inclined to mercy.’

Once more, there was murder in her eyes. Answering some invisible signal, her horse danced around to face him and half lifted a foreleg from the ground. But another sign was given, by a touch of the knees, a twitch of the reins, a thought from the mind, and the horse returned to its place.

She managed a word – her first since the battle. Low and hissed, for she could barely move her mouth. But he understood the word that she spoke.

‘Weak,’ she said.

Then a scream in the air – no warrior’s call, but a cry of terror from one of the boys that broke out across the plain. It was behind them, and Kai was turning, giving his horse the gift of speed, was at the back of the line in moments.

At first he thought it might be a false alarm. Xobas, the boy who called out, had barely spoken a word since the battle and screamed his way through each night. But it was no phantom of the mind that the boy had seen. For the mist had cleared, and there were shadows on the horizon, on the other side of waterlogged ground. A company of riders, the shapes melding into one another at such a distance. Half again as many as Kai led, perhaps more.

Kai heard a horn blow close by – Tamura, calling them into ranks, two lines forming behind him. Then she was at his side, skin grey and eyes darting.

‘My thanks,’ he said. He glanced at the cavalry, arrayed for battle, and could not help but smile. ‘Though I do not think we’ll be charging them across the swamp.’

Laughter then, from the others, Tamura’s cheeks flushing red, and at once Kai regretted his words.

‘Forgive me,’ she said. ‘I thought it best—’

‘A jest only, pay it no mind. How good are your eyes?’

‘Fair, I would say.’

‘That makes them better than mine. Who are they? Our people?’

Tamura leaned forward in the saddle, shaded her eyes against the sharp winter sun.

‘I cannot say,’ she said, after a moment.

Another voice, then: ‘I can.’

It was Gaevani who spoke, slouched sullenly on his horse. He was in the line beside the frightened boy, Xobas – he too had been given the rearguard, for he was thought unlucky.

‘What do you see?’ Kai said.

‘The man who leads them wears too much iron to be of our people. And there is a red crest on his helm.’

A change in the light, as the sun broke a little through the clouds, and Kai saw that man a little more clearly – the iron armour, the red crest that Gaevani had noted. And Kai even thought he saw the light upon the pale skin, the reddish gold of the beard. The colour of Roman kings, it was said.

The wound in Kai’s leg ached. For a moment the fear was rising like bile in his throat, his vision dancing before his eyes, his skin cold with shame. He blinked and breathed, and the sensation passed. ‘Romans, then. You think they are scouts?’