The Dancer at the Feast

Chapter 4

1 StormsTHE STORM SWEPT SUDDENLY from the north, from the mountains. Great, grey bulwarks of cloud trailing tattered banners of snow and hail. The land darkened, the shadow dipped, long, dark waters stirred and fretted under the gales funnelling down between the crags that hemmed them in. Howling storm-breath tore at a lake beneath the precipices, hunting its craft to the shore and the jetties of the high-backed island rearing from the swell. It seemed the city-crowned mass would break loose from the bridge that tethered it to the lakeside to founder on the southern shore. In the city beneath the storm, the burnished walls grew dim, gold sank to grey, and shrieks were swallowed in the thunder’s maw. Almost to the pinnacles of the great coruscated towers came the black bending clouds, racing over and throwing their lightning-spears stabbing and blazing along the streets. Banners strained, tore and swirled away, the glimmer of a golden roof faded and died, and the sunlight fled to the south. The island-city and its lake, and all the life of man that lay beyond fell swiftly under the shadow.

Speeding south for many miles, the tempest lashed towns, roads, and pastures until it bore down upon a little figure who stood watching the grey curtain close over his green land. The lad gave a delighted shout, like a fighter accepting a challenge, and ran towards his sunlit valley. Leap of breath under his ribs, the stretch-pull, stretch-pull of muscles in his legs, the strength of bone and will that drove the earth under his feet. For the sheer delight of it, he whooped as he outran the storm.

He mapped out his route: a few hundred yards to the field’s edge, jump the wall, scramble down the dip through the trees to the healer’s house—there, the smoke swirling in the gust, the healer Wyrdha waved him on towards shelter.

The runner paused breathless in his wind-whipped field, glanced behind, then laughed again as he threw his lean body back into the unequal race. He saw others outside. Not far away on his left was a man running and stumbling, shouting and waving, his black cloak caught in the gale. He glimpsed a bearded face before the howling gloom surged over them and rain fell like stones. Near the wall, the healer was trying to move someone who stood with his hands spread out to the fury in the sky as if he was welcoming it. The bearded man had run out to help, and the pair manhandled the fellow down to the house before the youth could reach the wall. Their charge staggered like a dazed man and almost fell as he was hauled inside.

The lad flung himself over the wall and half-slid down the little slope through the trees to the healer’s home. Instead of rushing inside he braced himself against a tree, drenched, breathless, and thrilled by his own awe at the wrath and power of the storm. Light and dark made war above the green slopes and the sun was in rout. The vast, grim, overwhelming cloud swallowed the green and gold, sinking everything into twilight. Trees blurred and faded into each other, the highest hills merged with the cloud, and the sun, despite brilliant stabs through the roiling armour, retreated down the valley. There were still small, bright fields and the flash of a silver river, but the vale below was sunk in night. It was like standing on the bed of some shadowed lake on whose surface a vast ship slid by; the hills were no longer hills but the backs of sea-monsters against faraway blue and white. Snow and hail and bitter rain streamed from the swirling sky, their long lashes, white and grey, flailed at the valley as trees leapt and thrashed. And over all moved the juggernaut of cloud, the belly of a huge, cold dragon whose wings shadowed all the world.

The worst fury over, he heard a voice above the wind.

“Tyr-shan? Tyr-shan, are you there? If you’re not washed away, get inside!” The healer flattened himself against his house wall, pulling his coat around himself.

“I’m up here, Wyrdha! Don’t wet y’self!”

The storm dragged its rain-curtain along the valley. It made a long, ragged shape like claws mauling the hills. For one superb instant, a line of white fire struck down before the voice of the thunder roared in. The boy ran over to the sparse shelter under the eaves of the house and stood leaning on Wyrdha’s shoulder, drenched, staring down the valley in the hope of another lightning flash, but the great violence had left only gloom and rain behind.

“I would have thought,” said Wyrdha tersely, “that wetting oneself was rather beside the point at the moment.”

“Aye, very funny. Did y’ see that?” gasped the lad. He punched Wyrdha’s arm. “Do y’ think it hit anybody?”

“It could have hit you, and no more than you deserve. Why didn’t you come inside? You’ll be ill!”

“Y’re a healer, y’ would cure me! Y’ needn’t be angry.”

“I am not angry.”

“Y’ are that. Y’ called me Tyr-shan and y’ always say Tyr, so y’re angry. Dead giveaway.”

Wyrdha’s heavy, frowning brows and thick beard made him look even more serious than usual. Conquered, he gave a slow, deep laugh. “Ah, you’ll never be ill, Tyr. Your mother put too much life in you.” He slapped the boy’s shoulder. “But remember, I gave up thrills for a quiet life.” His eyes smiled into far distances of the rain-pummelled valley.

Thinking about his travels? wondered Tyr. Has he remembered something? Never tells us much.

“It was a wild thing, though, wasn’t it?” said Wyrdha suddenly.

“Oh, aye. It were like… alive,” breathed Tyr. “It were—it were just…” He searched for a word and found none. He settled for a snorting puff of amazement and pulled the hanks of dark, wet hair from his face and shrugged them behind him. “You ever seen a storm like that? Y’ got about a bit.”

“Sometimes,” said Wyrdha, peering into the greyness. “Sometimes.”

Tyr squeezed water from his hair, or tried to. “Mam says Arna whips up storms like that and it means things. Y’ can tell the future and that.”

“That may be, Tyr—”

“Gizhurthra says that kind of thing’s a por—wha’s name? — por-tint, or somethin’. Says there’s bad spirits that ride in the storm clouds and drop on the towns with the rain. He’ll be goin’ round for ages sayin’ spells now, daft bugger.”

“I do not listen to Gizhurthra,” said Wyrdha in a hard voice, but he could not suppress a smile.

“Ey, that’s good,” said Tyr. “Folk like it when y’ smile.”

A laugh escaped Wyrdha. “Well, I’m not a complete stranger to excitement, you know. Never lose your sense of wonder, Tyr. Too many people—” He struck Tyr so hard he knocked him to the ground. A clatter of metal as something glanced off the house-wall where Tyr had been standing.

“Leave!” cried a coarse voice. Wyrdha froze as he stooped for the fallen dagger. A man stepped out from the trees, crossbow raised. The man who had flung the dagger was beside him, arm still stretched from the throw. A third emerged from the shadows under the leaves, slowly and carefully like a stalking cat, a long hunting knife held ready. All three were tense and deadly. Tyr tired to get to his feet, slipping in mud.

“Stay in dirt, valley-boy!” hissed the man with the crossbow, watching Wyrdha. “One of you move, I shoot.”

While the others advanced cautiously, the knife-man ran to Tyr, dropped his weapon, then knelt on him, hauled his arms behind his back, and bound his wrists cruelly tight with a thong from his belt. He tugged the thong round Tyr’s neck. The lad cried out as the man wrenched his arms up and his throat pressed tight. Still, he was alert, sharply aware: there was no room in him for fear. The rain hissed and whispered as if to soothe him as the predators advanced. They must have been waiting for them in the thickets. It was all so real, these men picked out in needle sharpness, so vivid, so strangely enthralling. He watched the men as he would a swaying snake.

The leader gripped his crossbow tighter, spoke sharply in a guttural tongue to the others and jerked his head towards the closed door. This could only be an instruction to burst in on the men inside. Tyr gritted his teeth. A call of warning from either himself or Wyrdha would see a crossbow bolt tearing through one of them.

The leader’s companion unslung a round wooden shield from his back. Leather-covered, with bronze studs, it bore in red and white a crude ox-horn emblem. Harrak Plainsmen grabbing what they could from better folk to take back to their tribe. Those who sank to brigandry were merciless.

Their broad, heavy faces burned into Tyr’s memory: the leader’s scar, a white channel for the rain; the low, straight brows and broken teeth of the man staring over his shield; wide-set eyes and twisted mouth of the one who had bound him. They meant to loot the house and, later perhaps, make an offering of part of their spoils to their grotesque ox-god. It was hopeless.

The crossbow wavered.

“You stop,” grunted the leader. “What you do? Stop!”

“What do you mean?” asked Wyrdha cautiously. “Stop what?”

“Black curse, you do something to me. Stop, or this in your throat.”

Wyrdha said nothing. The men stared at their leader, terrified now.

“Sorcerer,” said the man with the twisted mouth. He snatched up his knife. “Spirit-man, vraakhin. The eye is on you.”

“Don’t look,” said the leader. “Go inside, I watch him.” They hesitated, fearful.

“V’karra stronger,” said the other man, but his voice shook.

“V’karra not here, curse him. You go in, kill if you must,” the leader snapped.

Before the men could move, the house door opened and a man lurched out. The leader swung the crossbow round, but his men blocked his aim. He swore at them and stepped to the side. There was a sound like a sharp breath: a rapid shape shot from the trees opposite and the man screamed as his fingers clenched and the bolt flew. The man in the doorway cried and fell back while the Harrak leader fell to his knees, clawing at an arrow in his side. Wyrdha gripped Tyr and dragged him away as more arrows flew.

Crashing from the trees came a swift swordsman, blade sweeping. He brought his blade down on the ox-shield and shattered it into the mud. The Harrak tried to swipe with a short sword but slipped and fell. Another stroke swept away his blade and fingers. With two of his group down, the other man panicked and fought badly. He ended up pressed against the wall of the house with a forearm gashed and a sword-point under his chin. With a feral howl, the leader lurched to his feet and pulled out a sword of his own. One of the hidden archers stepped out from the trees, crossbow over his shoulder and sword in hand. He easily dodged the Harrak leader's mad swings and lunges, knocked his guard aside and with an upward thrust sliced under his ribs. The leader fell, jerking and gasping in the mud like a fish on land. Blood welled up and spattered from his mouth, his limbs spasmed, and the clash was over.

The soldiers bound the surviving plainsmen hand and foot. Archers came from behind the trees on the far side of the house to retrieve their arrows. They shared relieved smiles and congratulations, along with tasteless jokes as they eased their helmets off. Someone laughed.

It shocked Tyr to realise that he had been joyfully running over the pastures not even ten minutes ago. He had since skirted death, seen a man killed, and two more had lost their freedom. And now here he sat, plastered with mud, and leaning against the house wall amid a wet, muddy anti-climax.

A tall soldier walked over to Tyr and cut his bonds. “All right, son?” the tall soldier asked.

“Aye, course I am,” answered Tyr. He heaved himself to his feet, before realising he was very far from all right.

“Always shake like that then, do you?”

Tyr suddenly found himself seated again, this time on the bench attached to the outer wall of Wyrdha's house.

The soldier smiled and examined the marks flaring on Tyr’s wrists. “Sod them ox-kissers,” he said, and spat. “Don’t care who they hurt.” He shook his head and rubbed Tyr’s wrists, the skin sore from the belt that had bound him.

Tyr glanced over at the brigands as an involuntary precaution. The man who had taken a blade to the hand crouched in the mud beside his dead leader. The corpse lay with limbs splayed out and eyes glaring up. A gout of blood was thickening in the beard, and the mouth was open. The captured plainsman swayed back and forth on his haunches, staring at the ugly thing and moaning to himself as he held his coat where his fingers had been. It was grotesque, dismal. Tyr looked away to find Wyrdha kneeling by his doorway. The healer's fingers were bloody, a crossbow bolt protruding from his visitor's leg. The man moaned. Wyrdha looked up as a soldier laid a hand on his shoulder; the healer made a gesture of thanks and Tyr noticed the bearded youth he'd seen while running ahead of the storm was crouching in the doorway too, bundling his black cloak under the wounded man's head.

“Could’ve got me,” Tyr gasped to himself.

The sky’s magnificent wrath was plain grey drizzle now, with a flush of brighter sunlight appearing. The tempest had swept to the south and the deadlier storm that had broken in a lightning of swords was also spent: the world was dull again.

The tall soldier was stooping over him, leaning on his knees. “Well, you’ll live,” he said. He jerked his head towards the captives. “Real animals we’ve got there. You’re lucky, son, you really are.” He patted Tyr’s shoulder and leaned close, mock-confidential. “Mind you, they never had a chance: not against me and me stout lads here. Not a hope.” Tyr smiled and trembled a little less, warming to the easy smile and quiet brown eyes. The man had seen about twenty-five summers; they all seemed to have been good ones. Another slap on the shoulder. “Come on then, let’s be having you.” He hauled Tyr to his feet. “You managing?”

“Think so,” said Tyr, holding onto the wall and the soldier’s arm. “What was they doin’?”

“Bit of business, I’d say. They’d get a nice little bag of silver bits for you in Archraad, my lad.”

“Silver bits? Ey! Y’ mean sell me?”

“Aye. All quiet like, of course. You'd be chucked in a wagon with two dozen other poor sods and whipped off down to Burdaz or somewhere. They like northerners down there.”

Tyr shuddered, appalled by the vision of what he had escaped. He seldom thought of life beyond his own valley, far less about remote kingdoms. Being taken there by force, alone… He shook himself and looked up at the soldier. “I thank y’,” he said formally. “I’m Tyr.” He made as good a bow as he could manage, making his rescuer smile broadly.

“I’m Tharval,” the man replied. “Captain Tharval to you. It’s my pleasure.” He laughed as Tyr flopped back onto the bench.

“Y’ve got the red on,” said Tyr, acting as if he'd meant to sit down again. “Are y’ the city Guard?”

Tharval sat down on the bench. He pulled off his helmet causing sandy-coloured hair to fall about his shoulders in the northern fashion. He smoothed his deep red uniform. “That’s us. We’re a bit far from home down here. Been following them ox-kissing sods three days. They tried stealing a little girl at Braldhar—”

“They never! Dirty buggers!”

“They are that. Nice, sweet, little place is Braldhar. Got a well in the middle. We got on their trail there. That storm was brilliant though. Let us sneak round and meet them. They never seen nor heard us coming.” Tharval glanced round at the plainsmen, Tyr tried not to. “Right then, let’s find out how your mate is.”

“He’s not me mate,” said Tyr. “Dunno who he is. He were up in the fields, and that other feller brought him down here. He stumbled out and gave them all a shock. Then you came.”

“Aye, he gave us our chance,” said Tharval. “We could have come at them quicker, but your friend might’ve got the bolt in him.”

Wyrdha glanced up briefly after finishing an impromptu dressing. “The hip,” he said. “Not so bad as it might have been, but bad enough. I’ve removed the bolt.”

Tharval peered at the injured man and grimaced.

Wyrdha sat next to Tyr and gripped his hand. “Thank the Lady,” he said. “Thank the Lady. Let me see your wrists. And neck. Ah, all’s well. Stretch a bit if you can.” He put a strong arm round his friend and held him tightly against his side. “Now,” he said, “get inside: get washed, get dried, lie down.” He withdrew his arm and Tyr stood up and shuffled toward the door. Wyrdha crouched back down over his unexpected patient. “We’re going to move you, my friend. Are you ready?”

“Eh? What’s happened? What you doin’ to me?”

Tyr looked down at the fellow’s face as he stepped over him. He was a few years older than himself, with large wild eyes and a tangle of yellow hair. Terror and utter confusion filled his expression.

“I just come down to see Master’s Mount. I was goin’ to say rituals in the cave. I even brought a little figure of the Lady me Mam gave me.”

“I was going there myself. A very sacred place, the cave,” said the young man in the black robe. “Azhur va-Kherzir, at your service.”

“My pleasure to meet you Azhur,” said Wyrdha. He turned to the injured man. “I’m a healer. Your leg has been hurt by a crossbow. We’re taking you into my house.”

The injured youth raised himself up on his elbows, looking wildly about, speaking through rapid gasps. “Where’d. They. Go?”

“Quite safe now,” said Wyrdha. “Lie back, please.”

The fellow slumped flat and stared up at Azhur kneeling at his head. “What’d I do? I never did nothin’ to them. Like wolves!”

Azhur gripped the fellow’s hand in both of his. “Not your fault,” he said. “An accident. You were just in the way of what they wanted.”

The patient looked at Wyrdha. “I’m cold,” he said faintly. “Am I goin’ to die?”

“You certainly are not. Why, that wound could have been far worse.”

“Wound?”

“You’ll be all right,” said Azhur. “Just lie still.” But he failed to reassure.

“Here, you takin’ my leg off? Oh, don’t, please. I heard how they do that!”

“Your leg will remain firmly attached,” said Wyrdha. “I will bandage it, but I will not add it to my collection.”

“Collection?”

“My attempt at humour, your pardon. Captain? Will you assist me?”

“Pleasure’, said Tharval. “Here! Think I know you, mate!”

“Don’t expect an answer,” said Wyrdha. “Shock, and I gave him something.”

“Wait, I do know him. His step-dad has the Golden Carp at Lukar. Yauva’s his name, harmless sort of feller. Knew his actual dad when I was a lad.” Tharval shook his head. “Arna’s wings! Fancy him getting shot by Harrak!”

“Well, I prefer to close my door at night,” said Wyrdha, “so inside he goes. Now, if we support him at waist and leg, Captain, and you do the same at the shoulders, master priest.”

“Priest? Ey!” exclaimed Tyr from the fireside within, but Yauva of the Golden Carp cried out as the three men lifted him and no-one heard him.