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Silently, the scout led the way back through the pass to a field of more barrows—another forgotten cemetery. Mourdag and Bornon were there, impassively waiting. By them on the ground, bloody and bound, lay two filthy strangers dressed head to toe in black. Scattered around them, hemp cloths lay arrayed with gold and silver trinkets, masses of jewelry, a sword, arrowheads, horse tack and ornaments, heaps of clothing, drinking vessels and plates of silver, carpets, tapestries, and even a pile of bronze nails.
Behind the men, a wagon and two horses waited hitched and ready, but I doubted they were going anywhere just yet. A subtle trail had been worn in the side of the nearest barrow, trampling the hillside grass leading to the summit. There, an ancient warden tree grew, lone and gallant, bent low and gnarled by the incessant winds. Whatever watchful spirit dwelled within it had made good its promise of protection today.
Mourdag strode forward and spoke, pointing to the second largest of the hills. “We caught them emptying this barrow.”
Aric paced beside the cloths spread on the ground, surveying the loot from the tomb. Up and back he marched, studying but not touching any of the goods.
“These are Skythai you’ve robbed—my peoples’ ancestors you’ve desecrated,” he said to the thieves.
“We’re starving,” the bolder of them spoke up. “We’ve got mouths to feed. Any man’d do the same.”
They looked well-fed enough to me, and so did their horses. The man wore better boots than I did. His companion’s akinaka had a golden sheath.
“I know your kind.” Aric said. “Parasites. The Skythai are generous to the needy. You are simply greedy and favor feasting upon those who can’t fight you.”
The man moved to speak, but Aric raised his hand, and Stormai locked a massive forearm across his throat.
“We should replace these things,” I said to Aric. “They belong down there.” I glanced toward the barrow. I could see the way even kara eyes widened at the treasure. It would be easy enough for them to divide up what was before them. The sooner it was gone from sight, the better.
“I agree,” Aric said, “but it’s not right for us to enter the tomb.”
“Why not? We’re restoring things. They must know the difference.”
“We could just, you know, throw it down the hole and seal it up,” Mourdag suggested. They all nodded in agreement.
“I’ll go. Pass a rope down and lower the items to me. I’ll see all is made right.”
They glanced uneasily at one another, but no one moved. So I went and fetched a rope from the robbers’ gear.
“Absolutely not,” Aric insisted as he stood blocking my path up the summit, his hands up as if fending off invisible wraiths.
I shoved past him as he threw up his hands in exasperation and tied the rope to the tree atop the tomb. Rolling the jewelry—the most valuable items—into a hemp cloth, I prepared to descend into the shaft cut in the barrow’s roof by the grave robbers.
With his flint, dagger, and a twist of dry thatch, Aric lit one of the robbers’ tallow pots for me. “I don’t like this,” he said as he placed it grudgingly in my hands.
“I’m not afraid. Besides, who better to send into the realm of the dead than one who visits from time to time?” I asked, smiling wryly.
“Be careful. We’ll be near. Shout if you need anything. Tie the rope around your waist… in case. I’ll pull you up when you’re ready.”
He took hold of the rope in both hands, and the others joined him to help lower me through the narrow hole. Descending the shaft through the mound’s heaped turf, I was soon below ground level in a spacious chamber dug into the earth beneath.
Musty and thick with the scent of decay, the dark, timber-lined chamber was larger than I expected and cool like a cellar. I could stand easily without ducking my head. Above me was a timber ceiling of thick logs sturdy enough to support the earthen mound above. Whole trees propped the walls and doorways over passages, all now sealed. The homes of living Skythai were nowhere near this substantial. Yet, the white felt that lay crumpled on the floor must have once lined the wooden walls, as did the looted tapestries above, making it feel like a felt-house when arrayed. Beneath my feet, over the clay floor, stretched layers of reed mats. The carpets lay neatly rolled on the grass above my head as well. A couch stood to one side in the chamber and, in the center, a bed, probably too large to remove. But everything was remarkably well-preserved. Through the passage, I could see the shadow of a wagon wheel and smell the unmistakable odor of horses buried in the next chamber—sacrificed to accompany their dead owners. The far corner was filled with cauldrons, pots, huge kraters of wine, and masses of spoiled food.
As I moved my circle of light to search the other corner of the chamber, I encountered the tomb’s occupants. A sudden, inexplicable pang of guilt washed over me. It was a couple—a man and woman. Torn from their resting place, they were stripped of their clothes for the gold sewn to them. Both bodies had been decapitated to more efficiently remove their necklaces. The lady of the tomb also had her hands and feet hacked off. All her jewelry was gone.
I’d no sense of how long ago they’d been laid to rest there. They’d been embalmed, both corpses hollowed out and filled with herbs and peat, then sewn up again and covered with wax. They were in otherwise fine condition. The man seemed to be middle-aged and was probably a warrior in his lifetime. Likely a chief. The woman was of a similar age, with greying hair and a humble, kind face. I laid the light, dry bodies side-by-side upon the bed and set their jewelry around them.
As the men above lowered more items to me, I replaced them where they seemed most fitting. These beloved things would not be as they had been, but they would remain where they belonged. I covered the naked bodies with one of the tapestries, laid the carpets on the floor, and set the dishes at their bedside.
The silhouette of a head appeared across the tomb’s opening, eclipsing the small circle of daylight. “You must hurry, Ana,” Aric’s voice rang down the shaft. “The day closes. We shouldn’t remain here after dark.”
“You’re blocking my light,” I shouted up to him. He worried too much. The dark silhouette slipped away, and the circle of deep blue sky reappeared overhead. “I’m nearly done.”
Another shadow passed in front of the aperture. A darkened face peered down at me. “The sword,” Bornon’s booming voice echoed through the chamber with an urgency unfamiliar to him. “Above all, you must replace the sword.”
“I’ll see to it,” I reassured him.
“Bless you,” he said, slowly withdrawing from the opening.
No others appeared though I saw now how the sky darkened overhead. I waited for someone to appear again or speak or make a sound to remind me that I was not alone, but no one did.
My lamp burned down almost to nothing. I rummaged through the various packs until I found the one bearing the sword. It couldn’t have been worth much to the robbers, rusted out as it was in its crumbling scabbard. But it must have been worth something to the dead man in his life. I laid it carefully at the warrior’s side.
The tapestries still lay in a heap on the floor. I wanted to hang them again, but my candle was nearly out, so I lay them flat, filling the empty vessels with the last arrowheads and nails. And as the flame sputtered and died, I said a small prayer for the couple. From the total darkness of the tomb, I breathed deep and called up to the men to pull me back to the surface. A small eternity passed between that call and the first tug I felt upon the rope. In the small window of the thieves’ tunnel, a silhouette appeared against the darkening sky, blotting it from view. I held fast to the rope and watched that shadow draw nearer until it became a face, then several, at the end of the short shaft. I closed my eyes against the loose soil and stones as they grasped my hands and pulled me back up into the last remaining light of day.
We sealed it as best we could with floor-planks from the wagon and earth, then rode our horses over it to conceal the entrance.
The tomb robbers were strangled by garrote and beheaded. I thought they would perhaps be drowned, their crimes being mainly ones of greed, but the Warband explained that in their transgression against the dead, their greater offense was spiritual, hence the noose. Stormai was charged with fixing their heads on stakes amid the cemetery as a warning to would-be robbers, the bodies flung at their base.
“You just leave the bodies in the open? Without burial?” I asked him as we turned away.
“They’ve not earned our help finding the next life,” Stormai informed me. “Let the gods be their final judges. On the steppe, it takes only days for the wolves and carrion birds to take a body to its bones.”
Despite the cold, I needed to wash in the creek before I could return home. I asked the men to wait for me while I went down to the water.
“Wash with this,” Aric said, lifting a clay beaker from the grass and extending it to me. I peered inside, catching a whiff of urine, and recoiled.
“Is this a joke? Fuck off.”
“It should be bull’s urine, but without a bull, we make do with what we have,” he said with mock contrition.
“I’m not bathing in your piss! Which one of you did this?” I demanded, scanning their faces. “Or was it all of you?”
“We waited for one of the horses, my lady,” Bornon said, and I glared at him for taking part in such sport.
“You must purify yourself after contact with the dead,” Aric said, proffering the beaker once more. “It is no joke. The priests and priestesses all do the same.” His expression was earnest, his tone grave—desperate even. He was not asking.
I eyed the foul beaker in revulsion. They were serious. “What must I do?” I asked skeptically.
“You must bathe the skin and hair with it after handling the dead. Then rub the skin with fine earth and wash with pure water.”
“I am not putting urine, sacred or otherwise, in my hair. Only my hands touched the dead, so only my hands need to be purified.” I raised my brows at him, daring him to challenge me.
Aric’s face relaxed into relief as he nodded his agreement, and I removed my caftan, rolled up my tunic sleeves, and let Aric decontaminate my hands with cold, cloudy horse piss, making a show of rubbing them together well for the men. He poured a double handful of fine silt over them, which I rubbed in well, producing a filthy brown sludge. Then at his nod, I got on my knees upon the creek bank and immersed them in the running waters, glad to be cleansed of all of it.
I was still covered head to toe in dust and grime from the tomb. The men were eager to get home, but Aric and Stormai agreed to stay behind with me while I bathed. I believe they both wanted to wash the day from their faces and hands as well. Aric said as long as we crossed the creek before sunset, we should be all right.
As the sky darkened, we took up separate posts along the banks of the creek, close enough for safety as evening fell but far enough for discretion. We undressed and waded into the calm flow of the stream. I gave myself a hard scrub in the bracing current.
I rushed to the bank and dressed before the men were done bathing. Wiping myself dry, I hurried into my clothes just as they climbed ashore.
Stormai dressed with his back to me, at some distance, but as he pulled his tunic over his head, I noticed the strange tattoos on his arms—rows of thick blue-black bands. Although he was Aric’s cousin, his tattoos were utterly unlike the spiraling and twisted mythical beasts and symbols the other Skythai wore. I knew I’d seen bands like his before, but I couldn’t place them.
His caftan on and sleeves pulled down to his wrists, Stormai went to gather his horse. “I’m ready for my dinner and a good drink,” he said, smiling broadly.
“I’m with you,” Aric said, joining us. “This day has dragged on long enough. Are you ready, Ana?”
“For a drink? Always.” As the sun prepared to set, we mounted and crossed the creek toward camp. Stormai, eager to be home, rode on ahead.
“I’ve been wondering something, though…” I said to Aric.
“Hmm?”
“Of all the gods by whom to swear, why Vayu and Ari—Wind and Sword. Why not Goetosura or Eraman or Thagimasad even?"
“Ah, the Skythai would tell you that, among the elements, fire is the most sacred, as it consumes our sacrifices. Water is purest. Earth strongest. But Wind is the noblest. The hidden world within a man is no different from the hidden world within the earth, the sea, the sky. What is a man but damp earth, quickened from within by some feeble fire? If my flame flickers out, I waste away; if the water seeps from these veins, I return to clay. And what would it matter, to see so cheap an earthen vessel smashed? But the same spirit which stirs waves on the sea, moves clouds across the sky, and howls from the cool depths of the earth to shake loose the clouds and sway the grasses also swells within man. Without the breath of wind in this body, I sing no verses, speak no truths, swear no oaths. I am nothing. So, make dust of these bones and ash of this flesh, so long as Vayu is with me.”
“And the Sword?”
“Ari, the Great Sword, was formed from the ores of the earth by Papahio to serve gods and men in the upholding of justice. To swear by Him is to invoke His wrath should the oath-taker fail his pledge. The oath-taker petitions his sword to turn against him—to dull its blade; to fall from his hands; to pierce the very one who wields it—should ever he break his sworn word.” He glanced my way as if to gauge my comprehension: had I wavered in the face of such dire repercussions? I met his gaze steadily and without reservation.
“The sword—not the man—has this power?”
“Who, when they behold a sword, does not perceive that it is suffused with a divine spirit? Nothing so wrought is an accident of men’s designs alone. To this, each noble warrior binds his own spirit when gifted a mighty sword to do the work of the gods. The hands of men are tender things, barely capable of bruising a ripe fruit. Put a sword into them, and that man becomes like a god, with the power to punish the unjust and mete out life and death. To take up this instrument and assume this charge is the greatest gift and the cruelest curse that can be bestowed upon a man. Any hunter can make himself a spear. A better man can make a bow and learn to aim it. Fewer will possess and learn the swordsman’s skills—possess the temper to bear this duty. And the sword judges his every deed. Not all warriors will be granted the gift of a sword to wield in this life. And the gods will direct his hand and his blade against him should he fall short of his purpose—a blade, like a horse, will play a man false should he abuse its sacred trust.”
I hoped what he said was true, but I had my doubts, knowing horses to obey both fools and bullies, and blades to blaze in the hands of outlaws. Perhaps even the wisest of horses and swords were fooled—or cowed—by tyrants. It wasn’t a kind thought. I preferred to believe that a sharp eye and a steady hand guided my arrows rather than the whims of the gods. But if the gods chose to make my eye sharp and my hand steady, then I was grateful all the same. If it was some defensible order they sought, I’d do my part in its keeping.
I thought about the weapon at my own side: all the arts that had been consolidated in its making. It must be for some greater purpose. If it was true, its creation had imbued it with a spirit of righteous power, and its use infused in its atoms some of Aric’s youthful temper, then all these combined to make a thing that I was not yet equipped to handle. I was given such a gift without the means to honor it. I had not deserved it—not yet.
An archer loves his bow. It makes him equal to all the beasts of Nature, both predator and prey. Whether a bird in the sky or a swift animal of the plain, it cannot outrun an archer’s arrow. And no man stands before him taller, faster, or stronger than a well-aimed dart. To the Skythai, the bow betokens one’s merit and mettle; the sinews of its bowstring are as the sinews of his body. He might achieve all life’s necessities through its use—hunt game, hold land, keep cattle. Thereby, honor comes to him before the members of his tribe, and he carries on their tradition so long as he has the strength to draw its string.
A duel of swords is something very different. Two men faced equally with nothing but their blades and skills have nothing but themselves and perhaps the gods’ favor to answer for them. An intimate dread manifests in this liability to one’s limbs. The contest of swords is the contest of raw fates, and some dim recess of men’s souls craves it, stripped of all the trappings of law, daring themselves like beasts in the wild to know the truth of their final worth upon this earth. It is Nature’s most potent urge, its most integral impulse, preceding all others.
“Bornon,” I said, “was very eager that the dead chief should have his sword back.”
“Rightly so. Some men gift their swords—along with their luck—to their progeny, some take them to their graves, and others—others sacrifice them. But let no man take it from him by force. Such swords are cursed.”
“I imagine so.”
“Should I fall, I bid you cast my sword into the sea.”
“Me?” It seemed impossible he should ever fall. And if he did, I would surely not be far behind. But what was one more promise between us today?
“I entrust this task to you. The sea, or into the shining waters of a river that flows to the sea.”
“Why the sea?”
“I have no one to bequeath my sword to. And I would not have the kara fight over its possession. Or see my tomb plundered and have it fall into the hands of the undeserving, used in the service of evil deeds. May it never be taken up by my enemies and used against my own people.”
“There will never be a need,” I said hollowly. But then Aric fixed me in one of his humorless looks that told me he was not making idle chatter or flattering me with false confidences. He was resolute on the matter. I swallowed and nodded to him in earnest. “I swear it. Yet this,” I said, curling my fingers around the gold pommel at my side, “has fallen into undeserving hands. What would you have me do with it when I must depart this place? Will you receive it back from me?”
“It belongs now in your keeping. Do with it what you will. May you continue its story in fairhandedness—do it justice, and may it lend you fortune and speak of you in honor.”
We rode in silence the rest of the way home now that night had fallen, slowly catching up to Stormai’s lead. And it was then I remembered where I saw the strange tattoos like his: on the arms of Agathyrsi warriors captured in battle against my people.
My eyes flickered open in the near dark of the tent. Something was wrong. Heart thumping, ears straining, I realized Aric was struggling.
Someone whispered, shhh.
I turned to find Antisthenes sitting up beside me, his finger pressed to his lips.
“We should wake him,” I whispered.
“Too dangerous.”
“How so?”
“You want to startle him?”
He had a point. I’d not like to be anywhere near Aric when he was alarmed or frightened, especially not as he emerged from whatever nightmare haunted him just now. But it seemed worse not to do something. “What have you done in the past?”
“This has never happened before.”
Suddenly Aric screamed, harsh and loud, and the shock seemed to rouse him. He lurched upright and searched the dim tent, bewildered.
“Are you all right?” I asked, lightly resting a hand on his arm and examining his face in the dark for the cause of his terror—but finding no clues.
Before he could answer, hurried footsteps were approaching, and voices outside calling to ask what was the matter.
“Everything’s fine,” I called out. I wadded up my blanket and poked my head through the door flap. If Aric wanted to share his disturbed dreams with the camp, he could do it by the light of day, in his own good time. For now, we all just needed some peace.
Their tent nearest, Olgas and Bornon stood outside, half-dressed, disheveled, and bleary-eyed, clutching their scabbards and their hands on their sword-hilts.
“It’s my fault.” I flashed a sheepish grin. “I foolishly left my blanket too close to the hearth, and it caught fire. No one hurt. But,” I smirked, “I’m sure I won’t hear the end of it. I regret the disturbance. Please, go back to sleep.”
After some grumbles, some laughs, and sighs of relief, they dispersed, and Antisthenes scrambled back onto his pallet without another word. I lay down in the dark tent and spread my blanket over myself. Aric still breathed shallow and fast. He offered no explanation, and we asked for none. His dreams were his own province, and I’d not trespass there. But my assurance was quietly shaken. He lay back, and I stared at the grey, smoke-stained ceiling of the tent, mute. By the way his arms remained stiffly at his sides, I knew he was not asleep. Slowly, I turned my face toward him, unsure if I would try to speak. He spoke first.
“I don’t want you to lie for me,” he whispered without shifting his stare from the ceiling.
“You lie for me,” I whispered back.
He squeezed his eye shut and exhaled slowly.
A knowing silence stretched between us. The kind of silence where resentments were born, enmities were nursed, hatreds were reared. But we would never birth such strife—not if I could strangle it now. What would we gain by dwelling on the wrongs we’d done, or might yet do, while our words were lofty, but our world remained base?
Drawing a measured breath, I slid my hand under the blanket, pausing at the sword, and lay my hand over his. I held my breath and waited. He didn’t flinch or pull away. And then, he twined his fingers up through mine, locking them tight to his sweating hand. He sighed and soon drifted off again to an uneventful sleep. I held to wakefulness as long as I could, standing a futile watch against an unknown threat, my fingers bloodless and numb.
In the morning, when I awoke, he was gone.
Chapter Thirty: Gutless
I can’t find the words to express how much I like your writing. Wonderful chapter. So much life and character.