him.
After being allowed in, the men had built up roaring fires to warm the long house and all had collapsed into exhausted slumber. He had even managed a few hours’ rest until he was awoken by Tinuva, who suggested that a scout should be sent back to the gorge, just to make sure that their pursuers had truly given up the chase for now and were not attempting to somehow get a party across so that the bridge could be rebuilt. So shortly after midnight Tinuva and Gregory had ridden back out. Unable to sleep, Dennis decided to keep watch until their return.
‘They’re all asleep in there, snoring and breaking wind,’ Wolfgar announced. ‘Gods’ how they are stinking up the place! A hundred men in there, a tight fit, with a dozen more wounded packed into the blacksmith’s shop. What in the name of Kahooli’s Loins am I to do with them all?’
‘Kicking us out now, I don’t think my men would go along with it.’
‘That Tsurani leader, Ass-you-gag.’
‘Asayaga.’
‘However you say the bastard’s name. How by Astalon’s Blood did you ever fall in with them?’
Dennis briefly recounted their tale and Wolfgar nodded appraisingly.
‘Shrewd move. When do you plan to kill him?’
‘Once this is over.’
‘When is that?’
‘I’m not sure now,’ Dennis said. ‘At first I figured it’d last a day at most. Now I just don’t know.’
‘Can you trust him not to stab you in the back?’
‘Trust a Tsurani?’ Dennis asked, incredulous.
The question had never been asked so directly since all this started. He realized he had been, in general, thinking minute by minute, always keeping a watchful eye for the first false move which had yet to come, but not seriously contemplating that this arrangement could go on for weeks, even months.
‘In their own way they’re honourable I guess,’ Dennis finally ventured. ‘They don’t torture prisoners, they kill the wounded cleanly as we do.’
‘That’s a mark on their side,’ Wolfgar said quietly.
‘He needs me more than I need him now.’
‘How’s that?’
‘I know the way back, he doesn’t.’
‘Do you? The bridge is down. Do you know the way back?’
Dennis looked at his old friend, and then at the surrounding peaks brushed with the first light of dawn. Even as he looked at them the light blurred and softened. The overarching clouds sweeping in from the west blanketed what little blue sky was left on the eastern horizon. The flurries began to thicken.
‘Like I said yesterday, a big storm coming,’ Wolfgar announced. ‘With luck it will close the last of the passes. Now answer my question, Hartraft. Do you know the way?’
Dennis shook his head. He had never ventured this far north before.
‘Then you know nothing more than the Tsurani. But you still haven’t answered the question, boy.’
‘I was a boy twenty years ago, Wolfgar,’ Dennis replied sharply.
Wolfgar threw back his head and cackled like a demented old bird. ‘At my age, anyone who can still remember to button his trousers after making water is a boy. Now answer me: can you trust him not to stab you and your men in the back?’
‘Yes, damn it,’ Dennis snapped. ‘They seem to have this thing, this code in how they fight duels. When the time comes he’ll shout some sort of challenge first, the others will back up, and we will fight. Once that’s settled I guess the general slaughter begins.’
‘Can you take him?’
‘In a fair fight?’
‘Like the one you described. Not in the woods, not in the night, but deliberate, out in the open, one on one with only blades.’
Dennis hesitated.
‘You’re not sure, are you?’
Dennis shook his head. ‘I’ve watched him,’ He said. ‘He’s as swift as a cat – he cut two goblins in the flash of an eye, the head of the first had yet to even hit the ground and the guts of the second were already spilling. He’s the fastest I’ve ever seen.’ Dennis hesitated. ‘Even Jurgen in his prime would have had a hard time taking him.’
‘That’s saying something,’ Wolfgar replied. ‘I bet on that old bastard more than once and won – bar-room brawl, duel of honour, nothing could touch him.’
‘Something finally did,’ Dennis said, his gaze distant.
‘What will you do?’ Wolfgar pressed.
‘Fight him when the time comes.’
‘That will be a show,’ Wolfgar snorted. ‘Tell me, do you want to beat him?’
‘What the hell kind of question is that?’
‘Some men, when they’ve lost too much become fey. They don’t know it, but already the gods of the dead have touched them. Their memories dwell so much with those who have crossed over that in their inner heart they wish to cross as well and therefore place themselves upon the path unknowingly. Dennis, have you become fey?’
Dennis shook his head. ‘That’s madness.’
Wolfgar laughed. ‘The whole world is mad right now. Not fifty miles south of here the Kingdom and the Tsurani are fighting over gods know what when I half suspect if the damn royals of both sides sat down and drained a keg together it’d soon be straightened out. Fifty miles north of here moredhel hack one another up for sport, and you sit here and talk about madness. Dennis, you haven’t answered me, do you want to win?’
‘Of course I want to win, to live. My men – if I’m killed in the opening move it might destroy their chance. I’m pledged to get my men back. I’ve done half a hundred patrols since the war started and always we get back.’
‘We. What about you, do you always come back? How much of you stays behind with each of these patrols of yours?’
‘You speak in riddles, Wolfgar.’
‘I’m a bard, that’s part of the trade at times. Do you like this Ass-you?’
‘Asayaga.’
‘Do you like him?’
Dennis looked at Wolfgar in surprise. ‘Your questions are addled.’ He regretted the word even as he said it.
Wolfgar, however, chuckled. Then, coughing, he leaned over, gasping until he finally caught his breath. ‘You respect the way they fight, I know that. I heard some of your men speak of it last night before they settled in – grudging praise for the Tsurani skill in battle.’
‘They’re
