Age of Myth (The Legends of the First Empire #1)

Two swords! Grand Mother of All, who are these men?

“Well, Mal-colm,” Sackett said. “You must be hard of hearing, so I’ll say it again. This is a private matter and none of your concern.”

“You, sir, are a coward, preying on the weak. You’re not particularly handsome, either. I’d go so far as to say you’re genuinely ugly. Now, let me tell you what I think about your mother. She’s—”

Sackett took a splashing step through the pool separating them and jabbed out with his weapon. Malcolm stepped back, knocking the spear aside with his own. Sackett advanced, shuffling his way across the cascade, fighting the thrust of water as he sought to close the distance, but Malcolm backed up just as quickly.

The man wearing the Dureya-patterned leigh mor rushed forward, donning his shield and pulling the sword from his belt.

Sackett raised his shield, expecting a strike that didn’t come. The Dureyan didn’t swing. Instead, he stepped in front of Malcolm and planted his feet on firm ground. Malcolm moved aside, choosing to watch the fight he’d started.

“Who are you?” Sackett asked, looking nervously at the metal blade.

The big man said nothing and stood in a slight crouch, shield up, sword back.

“This doesn’t concern you,” Sackett repeated once more.

“Didn’t say it did,” the Dureyan replied.

“Then go away!”

“So you can murder these women?” Malcolm asked. “I think not. Perhaps it’s you who ought to go away.”

“Be careful,” Persephone said, having regained her feet. “He’s skilled with a spear.”

Sackett sneered at her, then lunged toward the Dureyan.

The big man blocked the thrust and brought the sword across his body. The blade caught the end of the spear and cut through the wooden shaft. The sharpened stone tip clattered onto the rocks.

Sackett leapt back in fear. “Hegner, get around behind—” he started to say, but stopped after seeing what the rest had already noticed. Hegner was climbing down and was already close to the bottom of the cascade. “Tetlin’s Witch! You lousy cul!” Sackett shouted after him.

Throwing the remainder of his spear at the Dureyan, Sackett turned and started his own retreat. Behind him, Minna growled menacingly. Perhaps he thought the wolf was about to leap or maybe that Malcolm would throw his spear. Either way, Sackett rushed his descent over the slime-covered rocks.

Persephone cringed even before he fell.

Sackett slipped and dropped more than five feet, hitting his back on one edge and then another. His body continued its way down the water-sprayed staircase, falling four times. He grunted with each slap against the rocks. The third ledge caught his right foot and spun him, making the last fall headfirst. His skull didn’t crack like Adler’s, but the blow bent his neck sharply.

Sackett lay in the froth of the stream, groaning and shaking his head in agony. His eyes were squeezed shut and his mouth pulled into a grimace, showing teeth. He didn’t try to get up. Except for his head, he didn’t move at all.

“Help!” he cried as the force of the water pushed his body, inching it toward another drop. “I can’t move! I can’t move!”

Persephone took a step down. Bent over, she used her hands as well as her feet. Where the water flowed over the rocks, they were slick as ice. She inched down knowing she’d be too late. In the back of her mind, she wondered how the death trap of a cascade had seemed so beautiful on the way up. She descended only three ledges before Sackett screamed. The ceaseless flow of water had pushed him down one more ledge. He didn’t fall far, but he ended up in a good-sized pool.

Landing on his back, Sackett couldn’t lift his face far enough above the water to breathe. Only his forehead and eyes breached the surface. Persephone moved faster, scrambling over the rocks. Then, like Sackett, she, too, slipped. Her foot came off a stone, and Persephone fell on her back. Her elbow and hip took the worst of it, sending jolts of pain through her side. Slipping farther and hurried along by the push of the stream, she cried out, desperately clawing at the slick stones for a nonexistent hold.

A hand grabbed her wrist. She felt fingers latch on. A moment later she was dangling by one arm. Persephone came off the rocks, pulled upward. Her feet continued to scramble for traction. It didn’t matter. The arm lifting her wasn’t letting go and had no trouble drawing her up. Another arm wrapped her waist. Pulled tight, Persephone was pressed against the soft kiss of white-and-black checkered wool.

Below them, Sackett peered back like a terrified pond frog. His head jerked once, then twice, and slowly his eyes closed and his head disappeared below the surface.

—

At the top of the slope, Persephone sat in the fingered roots of a huge tree. Wet from the fall, her black dress stuck to her skin. The big man had offered his checkered leigh mor, and she wrapped it around her shoulders. The wool was rough, nothing like the plush cloth Sarah wove. But it was warm, warmer than expected, and she held it close. She continued to look down the course of the cascade that sprayed below. Persephone thought she could still see Adler’s body lying across the rocks, a dark form causing the water to froth. Adler was dead, probably had been from the moment his head hit the rock. Hegner was gone.

What just happened? It was a thought repeated more than once while she sat there.

Persephone was still trying to puzzle it out, still trying to make sense of insanity. Sackett, Adler One-Eye, and Hegner—whom Persephone no longer had any trouble thinking of as The Stump—had tried to kill her. Although she wouldn’t describe any of them as friends, they certainly weren’t enemies. They were neighbors and clan members, which meant they were family. If it had been only one, she could have reasoned he’d gone crazy. But they had been working together.

Since the attack, no one had said much, except Suri, who had coaxed everyone to follow her up the ridge. Persephone hadn’t needed much prompting. She wanted to move, to get off those deadly rocks. By the time they reached the top, she was shaking so badly she needed to sit down.

I almost died, was almost murdered!

The idea took a long time to root in her mind. Once it had, the realization stole the strength from her legs. Bruised, wet, confused, and frightened she hugged herself, shivering. The Dureyan must have thought she was cold, because that was when he had given her his cloth.

“You’re all right, then?” the big man asked.

She nodded, clutching herself. “I don’t know why they did that. They attacked for no reason. Do you think Hegner will come back?”

“No. He looked pretty scared. That’s probably the last you’ll see of him.”

Persephone let out a breath. “You’re right. In all likelihood, he’s on his way to Warric. He’d never show his face again in Rhen. Konniger would cut his head off.”

“Your husband?”

“No,” she told him. “Konniger is the chieftain of Dahl Rhen.”

“I thought his name was Reglan.”

“Reglan was the chieftain, and my husband, but he died and Konniger rules now.”

The big man nodded, then crouched on one knee to scratch behind Minna’s ears. As he did, she noticed a circular bronze medal dangling from his neck. Bronze was the metal of the gods; she’d never seen a man with any, and this was finely engraved with the image of interwoven vines or branches. So far the Dureyan hadn’t offered his name, but Persephone was convinced she knew who he was.

“Thank you. I…” She looked at the mystic. “We owe you our lives. I’m Persephone. This is Suri, and you are…?”

“Men who value our privacy,” the Dureyan said quickly, and shot a stern glance at his companion. “Just wayfarers on our way south.”

It has to be him.

“Traveling a bit light, aren’t you?” she asked. Between them, they had only one blanket and a small sack that couldn’t hold much food. What they lacked in supplies they made up for in weapons. Over the big man’s shoulder was an extra sword—a copper sword.

It’s definitely him!