Chapter Five

Tarn nodded, brimming with a robust mixture of excitement and awe at what he had witnessed. Adrenaline surged through his veins, causing his hands to tremble while he came to terms with sudden and final death and watching his warrior father take down two enemies in as many seconds. Great waves of pride swarmed his senses when his Da ruffled his hair and shared a brief smile before pushing him toward the women and children. While Tarn severed the ropes, Connor calmly moved to the periphery of the light, flicked the blood from his sword blade, and inspected it for nicks.

Freed of her ropes, the woman who had called out to distract the guards moved to a corpse and removed the sword and scabbard. She secured the weapon across her back, and walked over to Connor who stood gazing into the night, head tilted to one side, listening.

"My name be Talena of the Green Butte clan. You have the sound of a cousin, but your dress is unfamiliar. Who is it I be indebted to?" Talena asked, standing tall and proud.

"I am Connor, son of Ecklan, of the White Steppe clan, but I have lived many winters in Atlantis with my wife and son. Not that Atlantis and my wife are no more, I have returned."

"Pray, tell," Talen urged. "We have time while the others attend to injuries and seek water."

Connor looked over his shoulder to discover Talena's words true. Those captives who suffered only minor injuries fetched the dead sentry's water skins and raided the food bag to be shared among themselves. Still, others stripped the clothing from the corpses with which to don outright and to cut into bandages. While this respite from cruelty continued, and the people readied themselves for travel, Connor recited his tale. He began with the great wave and concluded with sighting the slave band from the mountain ridge one day earlier.

"I know thy clan," began Talena when he had finished regaling them. "There were two women from the White Steppe village who married Green Butte Warriors. They died well beside their mates with steel in their fists and a song upon their lips. There will be a feast in Valhalla tonight."

"Aye. And the night is young," Connor intoned, eyes narrowing.

Death held little fright for Asgard women. Capturing them alive was no small task. Their courage made them valued slaves to those who revelled in breaking high spirits. Seldom were there living male captives. They fought and won, or they died in battle. Like their male counterparts, many a maiden chose a warrior's death over the slave collar. An Asgard warrior's honour was measured by how well he or she faced death, not by how many kills were accumulated. Kills were coincidental, a product of facing death with courage and strength, no matter the circumstance, no matter the odds.

It was a matter of national pride that no invading army had conquered them. The denizens of Asgard rarely ventured beyond their mountains and the craggy terrain discouraged traditional warfare. Though a clan seldom numbered over four hundred men, women, and children, too many clans to count easily inhabited the surrounding mountain chains. Despite the ever-present clan feuds, nothing united them quicker than an invading army or raiders. Although it remained a widespread practice for one clan to steal women from another, the theft was paid for in advance. Bride-theft existed as a time-honoured tradition among the clans. Valley raiders, on-the-other-hand, were hunted and slain like rabid game.

Talena boasted no more than twenty-six winters, yet her wrinkle-free eyes held a pearl of deeper wisdom. Connor appraised her firm, lithe figure openly. She met his gaze unabashed, letting her eyes take in the breadth of his chest and oak tree-sized limbs.

"My mate died in last season's raid. De ye know where the Green Butte clan winters?"

"Aye. I remember the place well."

"There be a prize awaiting if ye be worthy to capture it."

"Indeed," he replied, understanding the not-so-hidden offer. "The prize be great. Tonight I have seen a brave and worthy Green Butte woman, but I haven't anything of value and I'm a poor thief," he answered, offering the traditional reply of disinterest.

"Ye be welcome just the same should ye find thyself in need of food or shelter," she returned, undeterred by his response.

"Talena, do ye fathom which village the raiders be travelling to?"

"It be the Ironwood clan, lest they detour toward White Steppe and sweep around. But they don't have a large enough force to take both. We were to be herded to the eastern mountain pass, back the way they had come, where no villages remain to oppose our little troupe."

"Unless they have a second force that entered from the west passes. Tarn! Come. We depart. Fare thee well, Talena of the Green Butte clan," bid Connor and walked off with brisk steps.

"And ye too, Connor. Die well. And thee as well, little warrior."

Tarn gazed up at the fierce-looking woman. Cobalt blue eyes held his gaze without any hidden or cloaked feelings for what seemed like a long moment, and then the corners of her mouth turned upward. When Talena smiled, her pinched eyes opened, softening to become less fierce and more welcoming. Tarn grinned shyly and then ran after his father's receding figure.

"She was pretty and fierce," Tarn said when he walked at his father's side.

"Aye lad, so she was, as was your mother. One day soon I'll tell thee of the courageousness that attracted me to her." This was the closest he had come to admitting how deeply he longed for his wife. Tarn didn't understand what his father and Talena had spoken about, but he knew how much his father loved his mother. "We must move quickly boy, and just as silently. Do thee understand where we go?"

"Aye. Thee be going to kill the raiders," he answered, confident that his father could slay a hundred raiders by himself.

"To warn our village and others is more like it. First, we must catch up to them."

The raiders enjoyed a long head start but lacked Connor's knowledge of the land, and they needed to travel in full stealth. Not so Connor and Tarn, He sighted the tracks of the large group clearly in the moonlight heading along the common path.

Talena gathered the women and spoke quickly in hushed tones and then ran after the retreating pair. Connor let the approaching figure gain their company before he opened his mouth to speak disapproval, but Talena cut him off before the first syllable passed his lips.

"They killed my brother this season, and my mate last season. I claim Rite of Vengeance."

Connor grunted acknowledgement. For all his strength and warrior skills, he would not lightly challenge the mountain woman. Had it been his mate and sibling, he'd be claiming the same right. This was not a city-bred woman, but one as deadly and brave as any male in battle, and capable of travelling silently. She would not be a burden. Talena would have her vengeance or die fighting; she was a Green Butte mountain woman well knew her duty to self, family, and clan.

They moved as quickly as Tarn could manage. When Tarn tired, Connor hoisted him to his back and increased his pace. Tarn neither resisted, nor complained. He, too, was learning what his responsibilities were.

Connor followed no path discernible to the unknowing eye, but Talena knew they traversed a mountain-ram run until it veered away from their destination. After forty-five minutes of cross-country travelling, Connor called a halt with an upraised fist. Using common hand signals, he indicated the section of forest where the raiders gathered, as well as their numbers. Talena saw the faint outline of the village one hundred paces away.

Connor placed Tarn on the ground with instructions for him to stay hidden, then he and Talena moved toward the raiders. Once he had positioned them abreast of the raiders' position, he signalled Talena to go and alert the village. Anger flashed across her eyes until she realized the merit in his words. With obvious admiration telling in the expression, he watched Talena moved swiftly and silently toward the village, keeping out of sight of the raiders' vigilant eyes. No one would see or hear her unless she chose it to be so.

Movement interrupted his peripheral vision. Polished metal flashed in the moonlight. The raiding party was gathering itself into attack positions, separating themselves into various parties responsible for different quadrants of the village. All too soon they would launch their attack. Talena was yet too far from the village to warn them of the danger. Any hope he had once harboured about reversing the roles of attacker and victim were quickly disappearing. Without a second thought for his own safety, Connor ran toward the raiders' position.

When he came within an easy spear's throw, he cast his only spear, drew his broadsword, and loosed an ear-quivering icy-mountain war cry that was certain to wake the village to the danger at hand. Before the echo of his voice faded, his spear struck a man though the side of his chest to emerge out the other. Almost as one, each raider turned in the direction of Connor's siren.

Dumbfounded, they saw but a single mountain barbarian rushing their perimeter. By the time the first raider reacted, Connor entered the outside of their formation. His sword rose and fell twice, transitioning left to right and back again. Two raiders dropped to the ground, gushing blood. One dead and the second soon to join the first as he unsuccessfully tried to staunch the blood departing a bisected liver. Three more running strides and then Connor was among them.

No longer surprised, they struck defensive stances against the lone berserker who seemed to be everywhere at once, leaping and dodging among them like a madman, never staying in one location long enough to fully engage any opponent. Hit and move from one raider to the next let Connor take advantage of the disorganized jumble his surprise attack had caused. As one raider came at him with an axe, Connor dodged the wide head and cut cleanly through the axe-bearer's left leg. Ere the man hit the ground screaming, Connor feinted at another, then pivoted quickly on his right foot that put hit into a spin, and swung a mighty two-handed waist-high stroke at two men standing side by side, flat-footed. Finely honed Atlantean steel cut cleanly through the first man to lodge itself in the backbone of the other.

Connor ducked a blade that sought his neck, struggling to free his sword from bone. When he had dropped to the ground to avoid the sword stroke, Connor kicked the feet out from beneath his assailant. A mighty wrench freed his sword.

Ere he spun around to finish the raider whose fee he had kicked out, Tarn shouted, "Father, behind thee!"

And though Connor heeded the warning, his momentum was too great to enable him to change his trajectory sufficiently. A second attacker thrust a blade through his left side, puncturing a kidney and exiting his back. When the assailant pulled his weapon free for another thrust, Connor's blade swept upwards to decapitate him.

Somewhere in the deep recesses of Connor's mind, he knew that he suffered a grievous wound, but in his berserker rage, he felt no pain. Battle cries belonging to White Steppe warriors split the night a hundred times over as they ran to his aid and the protection of their village. Those jubilant intonations wed the night with battle joy. With the element of surprise lost, the raiders fled. Connor cut one fleeing knave down and turned to meet another. From behind a tree, a hidden back-stabber thrust his sword into Connor's shoulder, twisting the blade cruelly.

When the rogue withdrew it for another strike, Connor roared in pain and swung round to face his adversary. He blocked a high chopping stroke, and then brought the pommel of his sword down upon an unprotected head, puncturing it like a ripe melon. Exhaustion and weakness weighted his limbs. With each heartbeat, his great strength faded. Collapsing in slow motion first to his knees, he managed to turn his shoulder so that he lay flat upon his back where death called for him.

When Tarn witnessed his father take the sword thrust in the side, he forgot his instructions and sprinted across the sylvan abattoir dodging raiders without regard for his safety. Seconds later, he heard the agony in his father's voice and the sound of crunching skull bone as he dispatched the last raider. By the time Tarn gained his father's side, each laboured breath painted Connor's lips with blood.

Tarn lifted his head gently, saying, "Do not leave me, Da!"

"Nay son. Not yet, but soon," Connor rasped, coughing painfully.

"Thee are going to heal," Tarn said stubbornly as though his five-year-old will would be sufficient to make it so.

"Remember what I told thee about thy purpose lad. Make thy mother and me proud. Quest Kalen's sword. With it is the ― Song of Steel. I canna ― help ― thee now." Connor gasped; each word a labour of will to speak in a fading voice.

In his grief, Tarn failed to hear approaching feet. Talena knelt at Connor's other side. It was not necessary to inspect his wounds when she discerned his blood-flecked lips.

Clinging to a tenuous thread of life, Connor said in a rattling voice, "I go to join thy mother. Do not forget that which I have taught thee. Build a pyre to warn Vulcan that a warrior enters His hall. This be my parting gift." With his last ounce of strength, he pushed the pommel of his sword into tarn's small hands. After a weak, rasping cough, Connor smiled and closed his mortal eyes for all time.

"I'll no forget, Da," he vowed solemnly. "When I am a warrior, I will claim Rite of Vengeance and slay our foe with this sword; blood for blood."