A Fading Sun by Stephen Leigh

Author:Stephen Leigh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DAW
Published: 2017-05-16T09:46:23+00:00

The draoi had been invited to Greum Red-Hand’s conference with the Cateni war leaders, but Voada knew she was expected simply to listen and remain silent. She huddled in a corner of the stone-walled room, a blanket wrapped around her, as Greum paced the room’s perimeter, accompanied by his anamacha. Her moon-time was on her heavily, and she wanted little more than to be alone and to drink some of Ceiteag’s willow bark tea. Tomorrow it will be better; the day after, it will be nearly gone . . .

“The Mundoa left hands upon hands of their dead sprawled before the two forts they took,” Greum said. “We slew four of them for every one of our warriors now receiving his or her reward in Tirnanog. They’ll spend time tending their wounds and burning their dead before they move again. We’ll keep chipping away at them; we’ll make them miserable and wet, and every time they try to move toward Bàn Cill, we’ll take more of their men until only a few hands of them survive to run back to Albann Deas. Bàn Cill and Onglse have never been taken, and I promise you they never will be, not while any of us still live.”

There was a cheer at that statement, led by Maol Iosa, though Voada thought some of the affirmations felt halfhearted. So stupid. They don’t see what’s in front of them . . .

“The Mundoa’s next move must be to drive their forces inland,” Ceannàrd Iosa declared, stepping forward into the center of the room. The scar on his face was now joined by the deep, puckered, angry red cut on his chest, which an archiater had sewn together, as well as wounds along each arm. If they bothered the warrior, it didn’t show in his easy movements. He cocked his head, long, braided black hair swinging with the motion. “Greum Red-Hand and I are in agreement about that. Strategically, it makes no sense for Savas to continue to spread out his forces along the outer perimeter. His goal is Bàn Cill, both for its symbolic value and because he knows that we will defend it to the death. From here, he will try to punch through into the second wall of forts, but the land between here and the second wall is our ally. We know it. We know its twists and turns and folds. They don’t. If we killed four to one here, we can kill two hands for every man of ours out there. They won’t meet us champion to champion, so we’ll use the land as our shield and shower them with arrows, descend on them like an avalanche from the heights, and have our draoi send death down upon them in the valleys.” The warrior looked at each of the men in the room, then lowered his voice, which pulled everyone forward to listen. “I tell you this: they will leave their bones here. All of them.”

With that, he stamped his foot on the stone flags as cheers erupted around him.

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