Fremur hesitated for a moment. He owed nothing to Tunzdan, one of Odrig’s chief allies, but these were still his clansmen: how could he hold his head up as a man if he abandoned them to these land-stealing farmers? He spurred toward the angry mob. Before he could reach them, though, a great shadow swept past him like the Grass Thunderer himself.
It was Unver on his black horse Deofol, the curve of his sword a red crescent against the sky. The tall man crashed into the rear of the settlers and several of them collapsed immediately, shoulders or necks fountaining blood. Others shouted in terrified surprise as their hunt of the clansmen fell into fatal disorder. It all happened so quickly that Fremur slowed to watch as the cornered Cranes, heartened by their enemies’ confusion, now plunged forward into the mass of settlers. The first to fall were the armored guards, and moments later the rest of the settlers were fleeing for their lives while the Thrithings-men, changed from quarry back to hunters in mere moments, shouted and sang with joy at their rescue and rode the stragglers down.
Unver stood in his stirrups and pointed with his sword toward the center of the town. “There!” he shouted at the clansmen. “Find your brothers there!”
And in that moment, with the leaping red blaze silhouetting him against the night sky, illuminating Unver’s sharp features and flapping cloak so that he seemed half-man, half raven, Fremur felt something squeeze at his heart, a strange mix of admiration and terror. Surely this wasn’t Unver any longer, but Tasdar the Anvil Smasher himself, one of the powerful spirits worshipped by all the grassland clans.
“What are you staring at, you fool?” the godlike figure shouted at him. “It is almost time to ride home.”
Fremur realized with a start that Unver was right—even Odrig would not wait much longer before retreating, not when they were so greatly outnumbered by the settlers. After all, this was not a killing mission but a plundering mission. He also realized with a sinking heart that he was going to be returning from the raid empty-handed. He knew what Odrig and his cronies would say about that, and it would not be kind.
Fremur followed Unver as they rode toward the middle of the settlement, passing other clansmen driving the settlement’s animals in small groups toward the gate—here a Crane with a half dozen bleating sheep, there a pair of Cranes with several eye-rolling cattle. One of Bordelm’s cousins clutched the harnesses of two heavy plow-horses, which would never do as war-beasts but would serve admirably to pull a Thrithings wagon.
As Unver and Fremur burst into the open center of the village, through screeching, heedless settlers and clansmen now eager to escape with their prizes, Fremur saw that the paddock fences had been thrown down, broken into splinters in places, and that all but a few of the valuable animals were already gone. As he spurred after a squawking goose, which hurried just ahead of him with its wings spread, he saw Unver dismount and then vanish into the shadowy doorway of a burning barn. He came out leading a huge bull, a magnificent creature with a rope hanging from its ringed nose. Unver’s usually grim face wore a lopsided smile.
“Even late to the feast, look what I’ve found!” the tall man said. “And he was just about to overcook, too!”
Fremur had never seen Unver look outright happy—not that he could remember. It was a strange sight, but even as he wondered at it, an arrow whizzed past his head and buried itself in a timber of the blazing barn. Some of the settlers still meant to fight back.
Unver swung his long body back into the saddle in an instant, then he and Fremur led the bull toward the front gate. Many of the settlers were fighting back in earnest now with stones and the occasional bow and arrow, emboldened by the Thrithings-men’s retreat and hoping to pick off a few as they rode by. Fremur and Unver were not struck, but Fremur saw one of Tunzdan’s riders fall from his horse just a short distance away, an arrow in his leg; before he could regain his saddle he was dragged away into the shadows between houses by a mob of settlers.
“Don’t,” Unver said as Fremur hesitated. “It’s too late for him. Ride now.”
Fremur didn’t have to be told twice. He and Unver were among the last to flee the settlement; any moment now the gates would close and they would be trapped inside. Clansmen captured on raids were usually burned to death, and sometimes that was the most merciful part of their treatment. Fremur laid his head against his horse’s neck to offer a smaller target to any bowmen.
Finally he saw the sagging gate before them. They went through at a trot, slowed by the trailing bull, and within moments the settlement began to fall away behind them, the smoke and flames and screams growing fainter with each hoofbeat, like a dream disappearing with morning light.
“A good evening’s work,” said Unver, hunched low in his saddle, one hand still clutching the rope. The captive bull was being forced along at a pace far faster than it liked, lowing and snorting with discomfort. Unver was grinning, and again Fremur was struck by the strangeness of seeing the man happy. “A good evening!”
They had reached the first rise, the walls of the settlement only a stone’s-throw behind them, when something struck Fremur in the head like a lightning bolt. For a moment he had no idea of what up was or down, or of anything except that the night was full of bursting white stars, then something like a giant hand stretched out and slapped him so hard the blazing white turned to solid black.
When Fremur could think again, he was lying on his back and could still see the flaming walls. His horse was gone, Unver was gone, and he was helpless. He tried to roll onto his stomach, but could only get halfway there. Blood—it must be blood, he thought, because it was wet and dark—dripped from his scalp, pooling on his hands and making the dark grass even darker. He lifted his head, which felt as though someone was beating it like a drum, and saw three figures running toward him from the settlement gate.
They shot me, was all he could think. They shot me in the head with an arrow. He reached back. His helmet was gone somewhere, but although the back of his head was slick with blood and complicated with tattered, stinging flesh, he could not find the arrow he had been certain must be sticking into his skull.
The settlers were getting closer, half-running in their excitement at having brought down one of the hated raiders. Fremur could see they were Nabban-men, their upper lips shaved, their eyes bright with the excitement of revenge. One was already nocking a new arrow, while the other two carried billhooks.
They’re going to cut me up like a spring lamb, Fremur thought, and it was almost funny, except that his head hurt so badly. But I’m not a lamb, I’m a man.
Then something dark leaped over him, all but flicking his face as it went, with a rumble and roar of air like a thundercloud punishing the earth. It was a horse, rider low on its neck, but now the rider rose in his stirrups and lifted his curved blade, bright and deadly as a lightning-flash.
Then it all faded and Fremur could no longer see anything, though he could hear men’s voices, shouting, some screams. Darkness was returning. Was he dying? Had some of the other clansmen come to help him? Fremur didn’t know, but he could not imagine that any of it mattered very much.
? ? ?
For a long time after the sun rose he couldn’t get off his bedroll. Instead he lay with eyes closed and listened to the strange sounds of the living world, the living world that he seemed still to be a part of. Birds—so many birds! Warbling, whistling, chirping, fluting, their noise seemed deafening. Had it always been this way? Why had he never noticed?
Something touched his arm. Fremur flinched and tried to roll over, but the sudden movement made his head hurt so badly that he groaned and gave up.
Another touch, then a light stroke across his forehead.
“Fre? Are you awake?” The voice was like a breeze, cooling him.
“Kulva?” He opened his eyes, but just a little. The light was fierce, like knives.
“I brought you water,” his sister said. “How is your head?”
“Like a broken pot. I thought I was a dead man.”
“Don’t say that! The spirits who saved you will be angry.”
The light was a little less sharp now, so he decided to sit up—very slowly. “It wasn’t the spirits who saved me, it was Unver Long Legs.” He could see it now, Unver and Deofol leaping over him where he lay wounded, sweeping down on the settlers to savage them like a wolf among chickens. “It was Unver. He must have given up his bull to come back for me.” Fremur managed to prop himself on his elbows, which was as far as he could get before a wave of pain sloshed through his skull. Kulva’s worried face hung over him like a midday moon.