Chapter 11 #2
The clearing we came to was ringed in low stones, the foliage cleared from the center.
A dirt arena. Khal slowed a little as he approached, made sure he was holding my hand.
There were more faces than had been here at dawn when Drazha’s horde moved into the basin, old people, children, mothers with babies suckling at the breast, warriors.
Though I guess I couldn't tell the difference between their mothers and their warriors, could I?
Their eyes were curious, their gaze brazen.
Khal stopped to greet people as we walked through, clasping arms, nodding respectfully to the elderly and listening to what they had to say. A child ran over, and he picked them up in one arm, kept talking. His one hand still clasped mine, like a promise.
A girl touched the embroidery on Zhana’s dress’s sleeve, said something to me that I didn’t understand.
A child, maybe one of them from the creekbank?
He ran over to a knot of adults and pointed at us, rattling something off in their language, and their faces changed, appraising.
I heard the murmur passing around, "—pthralhirgar.”
As the moon joined the sinking sun in the sky, Drazha arrived.
She still carried her weapons, but necklaces hung around her neck and over her shoulders, more tied at her belt.
I wondered if she had made them all, like Khal’s, or if they were trophies taken in battle.
Golden rings, carved bone, precious stones and polished glass… she was chaos, and she was power.
I found the place in my stomach, in my bones, where my own power pooled, and I pulled the slightest thread of it, tenuous, and found it was enough to understand her speech.
“My son has arrived,” her voice boomed, as if we had not been here first. “And he has brought with him one he wishes to make his wife. The princeling has become a warrior.”
A laugh rippled around the gathered horde, the waiting community here.
“But in doing so,” her voice was cold, “he has broken the tenets, and brought an enemy’s daughter into our sacred hold. I,” she raised her arm, “recuse myself from judgment. The other pillars may decide.” She lowered her arm, and stepped back.
A murmur rose but hushed as another woman, aged in appearance, stepped forward. I was getting better at conserving the energy now, didn’t focus on the rush of voices, held that narrow, small thread to fix on this new chieftain’s voice.
“Khal Drazha’s-son,” the elder intoned. “We see with our eyes that you have brought the girl here. Can you amend the severity of your crime?”
Khal stepped forward, his hand still on mine, his voice bell-clear. “I chose to join hands in alliance with the baron at Belnor. This is his daughter. I married her, by their ways, in their keep, so they could not break faith with us.”
Murmurs rippled again.
“But young one,” the old woman said. “We have heard tales. Have they not already broken faith with you?”
His jaw spasmed. “...they have, honored matron. The baron abandoned his flesh to one he would make an enemy with his betrayals.” The murmur rose, but his rose above them.
"—but she has not. My wife had no part in this. And no choice, in the matter of marrying me. We were deceived, but she has been as much wronged as we have.”
There were angry shouts from the crowd, and I fought not to shrink closer to him. I didn’t bother trying to understand them.
“Young one,” the honored matron’s face was grave. “You say you have brought this…abandoned daughter of your enemy, out of guilt. But pity does not grant her a place in the assembly of the people.”
“No. But I am a son of orcs. And Rowena is my wife. My oath makes her part.”
I didn’t need to translate to know they were shouting arguments. And it didn’t need to be all of them. It only took one in ten, screaming and yelling protest, to make this utterly horrific. What would they do? What were they asking her to do?
The honored matron rose her hands to quiet the throng. She looked so regretful. “Under ordinary circumstances, perhaps, young one. Exceptions to the ways have been made before. Notably.” She tried to smile, rueful. “But these are times of trouble, of treachery and blood.”
“She is the enemy of those who mean us harm,” he said.
Her wizened brow furrowed. I clung to her voice over the crowd’s. “Do you have some proof of this?”
“I do,” Khal said, and he dropped my hand.
He pulled the shirt off his back, to rising murmurs, and started unwinding, carefully, the bandaging around his upper arms. And as they dropped away, gasps sounded, a few shouts, and I kept my hands pressed over my mouth, so I wouldn’t make a sound.
Clear on each bicep and over one shoulder, the shapes of hands grasped in mottled pink and white, burned into his skin.
“These are the marks made by the hands of men who meant me dead,” his voice, in this language I couldn’t speak but could nonetheless understand, rang clear and bell-like in my head.
“Marks made as they died in flame. Flame that took down a wall of their fortress at Rowton. Flame that did not harm me, except where their flesh melted and rendered onto mine. My wife—" he spoke above the roar. "—is the stolen sorceress, a bloodline they never meant to let go. A power that turned on her own, taking their lives to save me. She is not their sorceress. She is their executioner.” He didn’t know that I could understand. He opened his arms wide, theater, challenge. The scars were blazing, jarring against the olive green of his skin. “I have never wanted war with my father’s kind. You know this. I have sought peace and understanding between our peoples at every turn. But do you want power? Rowena has power. Power to strike fear into their darkest hearts. So yes,” he said.
“I carried my bride, without permission, into our stronghold. But I was not carrying a captive. I was carrying my rescuer.”
The attitude of the crowd had shifted. The way they looked at me, there was distrust and fear and…
maybe respect, in their eyes. I tasted bile.
All it had taken was melting part of our ancient wall into the ground.
All it had taken was burning several of my kinfolk alive.
There was something else there, in the way they looked at me. A hunger.
Khal touched my back. He was looking down at me, had switched to the common tongue. “I told them I can vouch for you. You’re going to be safe. When she addresses you, just nod.”
I didn’t know how to reply.
The old woman called over the mayhem. “I will confer with the other chieftains.” She withdrew.
The child from earlier, they were narrating something, large gestures and animated tones. More of them were listening. My power snaked out- I shouldn’t waste it, but couldn’t help it- and I caught a few lines, "—in the fire! The pthralhirgar…to pieces! Khal’s girl, the magic killer—"
I yanked the magic away.
I needed to save this. I did not trust these people who either looked at me like I was a new rabid dog or a meal just out of reach. I trusted Khal, but I did not trust them. A face peered through the throngs, unsmiling, only watching. Sephar.
The old woman returned, behind her three others of varying ages, one tall, two of them male. The hubbub quieted a little, for her words. “Khal Drazha’s-son,” she said. “We have determined that your actions were pure. Your crime is absolved. We have determined you should stay among the kin.”
I felt the breath leak out of him beside me. He had acted so brave, but he had clearly feared.
“Sorceress.” The old orc-ess’s reedy voice carried past the crowd’s. “It is not our way to punish the children for their fathers. That punishment is in life. It is in the stains that carry. That is not our place to bestow, or to lift.”
It was an odd thing to say. I did not know if she informed me, or reminded others, those that still gazed on us with hateful eyes. I nodded, almost a bow.
“...you have preserved one of our own. One he says you call your own. You are worthy to take up the challenge.”
The hubbub, the voices, started up again. Some cried out in dissent. What was this? Why was she speaking of a challenge for me?
“I assume the boy fights for you?” Her eyes were pity.
The crowd was still shouting. I looked at Khal. He was waiting for me, nodding. Gesturing for me to nod. I didn’t.
“Why is she asking if you’ll fight for me?” I asked.
Khal’s eyebrows almost flew off his face. He recovered. “She is asking because someone needs to, if someone challenges whether you should be claimed as one of us.”
“They will.”
“Sephar will.”
“Did you lie to me?”
“I knew one of us would be challenged. I didn’t know which.”
“So you lied.”
“You’re not in a place to fight. You can barely stand.” He glanced over my head, at the mass of orcs. “And you will make no friends by burning one of them alive.”
He was right. He knew them better. He knew this better.
“You’re hurt.”
The side of his mouth curled up. “I’ve been hurt before.” He looked back at the elderly orc-matron. “Please, assent.”
I turned to her. Goddess, I was trembling. “Yes.” I nodded. “He’ll fight for me.” And though I spoke in the common tongue, the sound slithered out, with sorcery, and by the gasps it seemed she and all of them could understand.
She held out her hands. “Does anyone offer to challenge the marrying-in of Rowena, Sorceress, Khal’s intended?” She did not say wife.
Sephar stepped forwards. And at the same time, a clear, hard voice rang out. “I challenge.”
Drazha stepped into the circle.