Dave Duncan - Children of Chaos

Orlad wiped sweat from his eyes. He could not remember when he had last slept or sat down to eat. Life seemed to have been a single long torment of drill, practice, study, and exercise ever since Satrap Therek hung the chain collar on him, three sixdays ago, so that now he was simultaneously reeling from exhaustion and more keyed up than he had ever been in his life. He was runtleader and he should be out there leading, but the rules said that Vargin and Ranthr must go before him. Ranthr had sailed through the catechism and had made First Call successfully. He was now back kneeling with the rest, getting bloody from trying to grin while gnawing a meaty bone, which was the traditional award but obviously not something he craved.

Idiot Vargin was not doing as well. He was hesitating on every response, although Orlad had drilled him half the night on the catechism.

"What is blood?"

Brmmm!

" Blood is my .,. er ... blood is ..."

"Wrong!" Frath roared, raising the great sword.

At this point in the ritual, that move was merely the gesture of dismissal, but Vargin screamed in terror and hurled himself back, almost tumbling into the fire pit. By the time the sword descended on the place he had left—slowly, so as not to break the bronze—he was running full-tilt for the door, not fully upright yet, but still howling.

Orlad streaked. Two Heroes in the line of witnesses jumped aside to let him through and he caught Vargin in a flying tackle before he had pulled the heavy flap open. They crashed into the timber together, slamming it shut. Boom !

"Let me go!" Vargin howled, eyes rolling in terror. He tried to struggle free, but Orlad clung like lichen.

"You're not going anywhere! You have one more chance at First Call. You'll take it tonight and you'll pass!"

"No!" Still Vargin fought. He was larger than Orlad and slippery as an oiled eel. "Not tonight! Next sixday!"

Orlad hooked a foot behind the madman's ankle and flipped him hard against the door again, winding him; then pinned him there. "No! You're going up again tonight!" It was obvious that a sixday from now the man would have worried himself into complete idiocy. In the Heroes, "last chance" meant last chance.

"Leader?" said Waels. He, Snerfrik, and Charnarth had come to help. The runts were not supposed to go running around making a scene in the middle on this most solemn occasion.

"Hang on to him," Orlad said. "Stay here unless they order you back to the fire, and drill him, drill him, drill him! Make him give you the answer to every question the light asks—quietly, of course. He knows it, really. He's going up again tonight and he's going to pass !" He grabbed both of Vargin's ears and pulled the bigger man's head down so he could glare right in his eyes, nose-to-nose. "Shame me and I will rip your throat out! Understand?"

Vargin did not reply, but he looked as if he believed.

Orlad trotted back to kneel in his place. Frath had gone and two Heroes were adding logs to the fire and poking it with bronze rods to make it burn hotter. Ranthr had curled up on the floor and gone to sleep, a permissible reaction to the release of stress.

Brmmm !

Now came Orlad's turn at last. He was unafraid. He could recite the responses backward or sideways. All that really mattered, as Hostleader Heth had told them several times, was that a man must believe in the ways of Weru. The Heroes were the best of men, the manliest to rule all others.

Then a new examiner came marching forward, bearing the great sword. He stopped before the image and turned to call out Orlad's name—Heth himself! That was an unexpected honor, and a brief mutter of surprise from the witnesses suggested it was an unusual one. Orlad tried to keep his face solemn as he rose, bowed, dropped his pall, and walked around the fire to kneel on the far side, facing Heth and the god. Werists always stripped before changing.

He waited. The fire was going to take the skin off his back. Rivers of sweat ran from his armpits, his hair, everywhere, while the stone flags under his knees were cold and hard. Smoke nipped at his eyes.

"Who are you?" Heth asked. He gave no warning, but the drummers' warrior reflexes brought the thunder instantly: Brmmm !

" The footprint of the god !" Orlad screamed. Echoes rolled.

"What is terror?" Brmmm !

" Terror is my weapon !"

"What is blood?" Brmmm !

" Blood is life !" Louder yet.

"What is rage?" Brmmm !

" Rage is my friend !"

"What is life?" And so on. It was easy enough when a man really believed. Why had Vargin found it so hard? In what seemed no time at all he heard the last question:

"What is fear?" Brmmm !

" I do not know !"

Orlad was annoyed to hear a small cheer greet his success. The catechism was only the beginning.

"Rise."

Only the savagely crackling fire disturbed the silence. The drums spoke no more. Orlad stood, staring confidently, even happily, into Heth's eyes. How long he had longed for this moment!

"Who comes?"

Orlad reached for Heth's brass collar with his left hand. The metal was cool and damp. He waited, mind searching, for he must not give the next response until he was sure. Yes ! Yes, there was something new in the hall—a power, a presence between him and the mosaic on the wall... or perhaps behind him. Location did not matter, there was something. Huge. Dangerous. Dark? This Bright One was bright with the brightness of blood. Amazingly in that furnace, he shivered.

But he could speak in truth: "It is my god."

Heth nodded approvingly, a smile flitting over his lips. He raised his right hand. "Do this." His face reddened. Sweat beaded on it, trickled down into his stubble beard. Changing was easy enough in battle, when a man's life was at stake and all his friends were changing also. To convert one limb in cold blood was a vastly different prospect, requiring deliberate acceptance of pain. There were tales of guides losing control and changing completely, then turning on the novices who had caused their distress.

Even the stoic hostleader could not suppress a whimper as his hand began to swell. Fascinated, Orlad watched it grow to twice its normal size, and change—black pads on the underside, white fur on the back, and five great deadly talons on the edge. The bear's paw was the simplest of all transformations.

At the same time, Orlad felt the blessing of the god flowing through the man's collar. It was like no sensation he had ever encountered before, but it was there and somehow he grabbed it. And held on. Somehow. Power like a rope of lightning danced inside him.

"Concentrate on one finger," the instructors had told them. "All you have to do is make one fingernail grow and you have made a start. Many thirties of learning lie ahead of you yet. Just one nail will do to begin."

Whatever Ranthr had achieved had satisfied Frath but had not been visible to the watchers. Orlad was a better man than Ranthr and would die to prove it if he must. One miserable nail would not satisfy him.

But it would be a start. Orlad willed one nail to grow and all that grew was pain. Angry, he tried harder and soon felt as if he had plunged his finger into molten bronze. The nail stayed just as it was. Fury came to his aid: Rage is my friend . He pushed through the pain. Pain is an honor . Better-man-better-man ... Hungrily he sucked power from Heth's collar and thrust it at his finger. Change !

Grind. Burn. Orlad staggered as the ordeal surged stronger. More rage: he concentrated on the enemy, the Florengian traitors, false Heroes who had taken the god's blessing and then betrayed their lord. They were the foe, the subhumans, the snakes who had given all Florengians a reputation for treachery. Fury filled him. A red tide swam before his eyes.