Friends (2013) - Adams, Robert

In the darkness of her tent, she listened to the quiet voices of her troopers around the fire and thought of Tim, who would be sitting with his own men somewhere to the west. She missed him with something close to desperation, and it did not help that Aldora, beautiful, arrogant, sensual Aldora, rode at his side. Oh, it made great sense for Aldora to accompany him. She was as good a commander as the best of Milo’s generals, and she and Tim made an excellent team, his hard-earned caution balancing her natural recklessness. If Aldora had been a different sort of woman, one who did not want to come between pledged lovers, then Giliahna would not have worried—but she knew that not all women shared her sense of honor where a handsome man was concerned. She closed her eyes and tried not to think of Tim locked in Aldora’s arms.

Oh, she was not so idealistic as to expect anyone to stay faithful on a long summer’s campaign. But Aldora, who hated her, who had hated her from the moment they had met, was different. Mara, Milo’s intelligent, sophisticated wife, had tried to explain Aldora’s behavior to her. “It is not you she hates, but your happiness and your ability to love,” Mara had told her. “Aldora has never been content with any man for long. If only Bili had been Undying ...” Like Mara, Giliahna had taken to avoiding Aldora whenever possible.

She woke early, before the men, and dressed hastily. By the time she emerged from the tent in the pale-gray light of dawn, her troopers were up and beginning to strike the camp. They were on their way before the full force of the sun broke through the clouds.

The attack came without warning. Twenty bandits poured out of the trees lining the road, backed by archers. Giliahna wished she had her bow; she was a better archer then most men, and at least she would have been some use. Her men formed a protective circle around her, but three against one was not good odds. She drew her dagger and used it when the opportunity arose, but the next few minutes were a chaos of sword against sword, screams of wounded animals and shouted oaths, and she was in the middle of it all. The tide was not turning in their favor.

She turned to the curly-haired trooper near her, a young man named Barnes, and said, “Whatever happens, Bili must know about the attacks on the farms-—the ones Grant told us about. Fight your way out and ride to him!”

“But, my lady—”

“Ride, man. You can do no good here.”

She turned back to the fighting as one of the bandits fought his way through to her. She raised her dagger to parry his swordcut, tried to bring it down into his armpit, and took a cut herself in the process. There was no longer time to think at all, just to react and try to stay alive. And then there was a sudden jolting pain and she knew nothing more.

Stefanohs Penglees had been making his way through the forest on foot when he ran across the bandits’ trail. The Reverend Father had ordered him to check out the truth of recent rumors that one of the High Lords of the Confederation was en route with only a small entourage. If it was true, and one of the hated heretic leaders could be taken hostage, it might provide the Faithful with a bargaining point, and even if the Confederation would not give in, the death of one of those who had caused such humiliation to true Ehleenee would be a major cause for rejoicing. Stefanohs was pleased that the Father had placed enough trust in him to allow him to handle such a delicate task. True, he was the best tracker and spy they had in Stronghold, but he was not a full member of the Swords of the Lord, and normally an assignment of such importance would have been given to one of the sacred warriors who had dedicated their lives to wiping out the scourge of the Confederation.

He followed at a safe distance behind the bandits, watching from hiding as they attacked the small party. It wasn’t a long fight, over in a matter of minutes. The bandits stripped their conquests of anything worth looting, slit the throat of any survivors, then headed off again. It was all very matter-of-fact. There was none of the savage joy he had seen in the faces of the sacred warriors as they slew the ungodly—but then this was not the sacrament of death, only murder. Still, he could not help noticing that he did not feel the need to fight back nausea as he did when he rode with the Swords of the Lord. Clean death was something he could bear; mutilation and torture, even if done in the name of the Lord, went against some basic instinct. But he was weak in faith, unfit for the service of the Lord, as the Reverend Father had told him often enough.

When he knew the bandits were gone for good, he stepped out from the trees and crossed to the road where the bodies lay. He needed to verify that this was not the group he was looking foi\ One by one he stopped at each body and examined it. Typical Confederation troops, a mixture of Ehleenee and Kindred—mongrels, the Reverend Father would have called them, as Stefanohs himself was, a fact he cursed each day along with his unknown sire. The bandits had carried off weaponry and armor and purses, and in some cases jerkins and boots, if not too bloodstained to be sold.

Now who had these men been defending? They had formed a protective wall around someone important enough to die for. The object of their loyalty lay among them, a small lad in a richly embroidered leather jerkin which had only been spared the bandits’ looting because it was covered with blood from the wound which had taken the young man’s life.

Or had it?

As Stefanohs came toward the boy, he saw the slightest movement of the boy’s chest, as he breathed shallowly. How could he have survived a blow like that? From the position of the rip in the jerkin, it had to have pierced his heart, and even if it hadn’t killed him immediately, he would have bled to death in minutes once the knife was withdrawn. Stefanohs tore open the jerkin, to see how bad the damage was, and got the surprise of his life.

One full breast peeked through the gaping hole in the linen shirt. The survivor the others had given their lives to protect was a woman. And the Undying he had been seeking was rumored to be the High Lady Giliahna.

Perhaps his efforts hadn’t been in vain after all.

He ripped strips off the shirt of one of the slain troopers and returned to the woman’s side, just as her eyes fluttered open.

“Quiet, lady. You’re in no condition to make any sudden moves. You’ve lost a lot of blood. Lie still and let me bandage your wounds.” With his knifeblade he slit open her shirt and cut away the blood-soaked breast bindings, to reveal a wound that was already beginning to close. He had found what he sought.

“1 would not move, Lady Giliahna. My dagger is inches from your throat, and 1 could behead you in a moment. That is one way to kill you Undying monsters, or so I have heard.”

Giliahna woke to a dull pain under her breast, and knew that her body was beginning to heal itself. She also knew that the agony in her chest bespoke a major injury and massive blood loss, which meant she would be weak for several hours. Her body might repair itself rapidly, but it still took time to replace a large amount of blood. Slowly, carefully, she opened her eyes to see a man bending over her. A dagger in his hand, he spoke softly threatening words in a dialect of Ehleenee. Through the haze of pain it penetrated that he knew who she was.

“Stretch your hands above your head, lady. You can move them. The wound was in your chest, not your shoulder.”