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  Without warning the meie twisted her body up and around. Before the Tercel could move, she slammed her small boot into his groin.

  Bellowing with pain and rage, he dropped into a crouch, clutching at himself with his free hand. His other arm dropped until the meie was crouched beside him, her wrists still prisoned. She fought desperately to free herself, twisting and kicking, but she wasn’t strong enough. He held her. His meaty face still a grey-purple and shiny with sweat, his eyes glassy, he straightened a little and flung her away from him. She landed close to Dinafar, hitting hard enough for Dinafar to wince in sympathy. She hit and rolled to her feet in a single fluid movement—and stopped quite still, a saber-point in her face.

  “Sten, slit the bitch’s throat if she move.” The Tercel lowered himself to the grass and sat hunched over, glaring at the meie. He passed the back of his hand over his face. “Lere, tie her hands good. She get away, I have your skin.”

  Sweating, eyes narrowed, he watched closely as Sten made the meie sit while Lere tied her. When her hands were secured, he grunted onto his feet, stood swaying a minute, then waddled over to her.

  The meie lifted her head and stared at him out of a blank face. “How’d you find me?”

  He jerked a thumb up. Dinafar followed the movement and saw six black birds circling over the clearing. “Traxim saw the fire, bought us. Funny, though.” He scowled, nudged her leg with the toe of his boot. “Speaker-trax said there was just one here.” He ran his eyes over her, his tongue sliding over his fleshy lips. “Lybor and her Nor want you bad, bitch. You gonna be sorry your ma whelp you. I’m gonna watch that Nor make you talk. I’m gonna hear you scream, bitch. I’m gonna hear you beg him kill you and let be.”

  The meie smiled.

  The Tercel shook his head. “No, you get no chance to kill yourself. We take good care of you, not like you crazy friend.” The meie’s gasp brought a grunting laugh out of him. “Didn’t know? After you run off, t’other, she see the Nor coming at her, she pull out.…” His thumb jabbed at the grace blade still sheathed on the meie’s weaponbelt. “And …” He slapped his hand against the side of his neck. “Good-bye, meie. The Nor he kick her a couple times, mad as hell. Told us haul her outside the city and dump her.” He bent down, grunting an oath at the pain, jerked back on her hair, forcing her to look up. “See them? You gonna end up in them bellies like t’other one.” He straightened, wiped his hand on his dusty trousers, watching her intently, savoring her distress. Dinafar ached for her, angry at the guards because she was helpless, disgusted with herself because of her avid curiosity about the meie, but when the Tercel went on with his punish-tale, she cursed the meagerness of the information in his words. “We hauled that skinny tita out and left her by the place where they run the macai. Before we get back to the gates, the traxim are crawling over her, getting themselves a fine fresh meal.” He laughed at the anguish on the meie’s face, the moan these words tore from her. “When ol’ Nor’s done with you, bitch, I’m gonna stake you out there. Same spot. I’m gonna sit and watch them.…” He stabbed a forefinger at the sky. “Watch them chew on you, eat you alive.”

  The meie dropped her head onto her arms, her small body shuddering under the impact of emotions Dinafar could only guess at. The Tercel watched her with satisfaction, then beckoned to Sten and Lere. “Get titam in the saddle. Time we was going.”

  The meie was quiet as Sten threw her onto her macai. She caught hold of the saddle ledge with her bound hands and fumbled her feet into the stirrups. Dinafar could see that her eyes were closed and tears were slipping down her face. Then Lere’s hands moved over Dinafar’s body, tweaking her nipples, thrusting between her thighs. She stood quite still, wondering what he’d do if she vomited over him. At a roar from the Tercel, he hoisted her into the saddle, then pulled her skirt down. She refused to look at him. He left her after a final pat on the thigh and mounted the animal standing behind her.

  They moved out of the clearing, riding in single file, the Tercel first, hunched over in the saddle, cursing in a low steady monotone, then the meie, then Dinafar, then Lere, with Sten coming last. The ride rapidly turned to torment for Dinafar; she felt every overworked muscle from last night’s terrible effort. She hurt. All over. She hurt. It wasn’t like a Wound that concentrated the pain at a single spot. She was bone-deep sore everywhere. Riding downhill all the time didn’t help, though the slope was moderate. She glared at the Tercel’s broad back and hoped his pain was worse than hers.

  Awhile later, though, she’d warmed up and exercise had loosened much of her stiffness. Feeling better, her curiosity roused, she looked around. They were passing through a small clearing in the trees. Overhead the great black birds sailed in lazy circles. As they rode on, she kept looking up. Whenever she could see a bit of the sky, the birds were there, following them. Dinafar shivered. Traxim. They ate the other meie. She warned me she was going into danger. What’s this all about? I wish I knew what’s going on. She scanned the little meie’s back, wondering how she was taking the presence of the birds. They mightn’t be the same ones; I hope they aren’t. She clamped her teeth into her lower lip, swallowed, swallowed again, until the urge to vomit went away.

  There was a slight breeze winding through the trees. Dinafar felt it lifting a few straying hairs, letting them fall, passing over her skin, cooling her. The meie’s sorrel curls flipped about under its tugging. Her head was up, turning a little from side to side. She looked back. Dinafar could see a faint pulsing in the green spot on the meie’s brow as she stared over her shoulder at the two guards behind Dinafar. Then she was looking ahead again. Dinafar swallowed. She’s getting ready to do something. Apprehensive and upset, she clutched at the saddle ledge waiting for the world to fall in on the guards. Nothing happened. They rode on and on and nothing happened.

  They wound through thick-standing brellim, the two-fingered leaves of the squat trees whispering in the wind over their heads, so many leaves that they shut out most of the sunlight until the procession was winding in heavy silence and humid twilight along a beast-run beaten deep in the spongy soil by years of trampling hooves. Here, Dinafar thought. Do something, meie. They can’t get at us here, those birds. Do something. Still nothing happened. She began to wonder if the meie had given up trying.

  After an hour in deep shadow the way ahead began to lighten. Gleams of the nooning sun broke through, a few beams dancing with dust motes reaching down to gild the ground. The Tercel broke into the sunlight, his massive form black against the dusty gold. When Dinafar rode into the clearing blinking and half-blinded by the light after so long in shadow, she saw the meie jerk erect and pull her macai to a stop.

  Behind Dinafar a macai shrieked, a high hoarse scream that merged with two others as the mounts of the three men reared, twisted in convulsive heaves, shaking their riders loose, throwing them to the ground. Screaming, prodded to a mindless fury, the beasts turned on their masters and tried to trample them. One caught the Tercel in the throat with a hind claw and ripped his head off, sending it bounding across the glade into the shadows on the far side. A second landed on Lere’s chest, stomping in his ribs, scraping loose long strips of cloth and flesh. Sten was agile enough to roll clear and scramble back onto his feet. He ran at Dinafar who sat gaping at the sudden carnage, too startled to move.

  Off to one side the meie was fumbling at her weaponbelt with her bound hands, trying to unsheathe the knife and cut herself free. She looked up, saw what was happening. “Dina, get out of there.”

  Waking to her danger, Dinafar kicked her heels into the macai’s side, but she was too late. Sten caught her skirt and wrenched her from the saddle. The breath knocked out of her when she hit the ground, she tried to claw his hands loose, but he was too quick for her blind fumbling attempt at self-defense. He held her down with his hand wrapped in her hair. She stopped struggling when she felt cold metal along her neck.

  “Come off that, meie.” Sten’s voice was hoarse; he was afraid and furious, so furious his
voice shook. “Knife. Belt. Drop them.”

  The meie slid off her mount. Her hands were free, the wisps of severed rope dropping away. She gazed down at the knife in her hand, then dropped it by her feet. Face empty, fingers shaking, she unbuckled the weaponbelt and stood in the broken circle, a haunted look in her eyes.

  “Come here. No more tricks. I see one of those beasts move.…” The saber slid across Dinafar’s shoulder, then down her arm to rest on her wrist. “I see anything funny and this girl got no more hand.”

  “I hear you,” the meie said dully.

  Sensing the little woman’s pain, guessing it had something to do with the dead meie her friend, tired of being a passenger and a burden—tired of this to the point of folly—Dinafar cried, “No!” Using the long muscles of her thighs, she forced her body up, jerking her hand from under the saber’s blade at the same time. Ignoring the pain in her head, she twisted around and drove her fingers at Sten’s eyes, clawing bloody tracks in his face. He loosened his grip on her hair and leaned back, cursing, his hand coming away with bloody strands of black hair clinging to it. As Dinafar scrambled away and stumbled to her feet, Sten rose from his crouch to stand lightly balanced, his saber ready. He smiled. “Come on, bitch; I’m waiting.”

  Dinafar pressed her hand against her mouth as she watched the meie circle slowly about Sten. She must have taken a saber from one of the bodies while Dinafar distracted Sten; she held one now—and looked like a child playing with its father’s arms, her short fingers barely able to circle the hilt, the weight and size of it looking too great for her thin arms to lift. Her face was intent as she concentrated on the man in front of her, staying just beyond his reach, watching, waiting. Like that first Kappra, Dinafar thought. Teasing him until he made the mistake that killed him. She’s going to kill this one too; he outreaches her, outweighs her, has to be three or four times as strong as she, but she’s going to kill him. Smoothing her hair back from her face with nervous hands, wincing at the pain of her torn scalp, she watched the death dance work out its slow wary patterns.

  Sten lunged, beating the meie’s saber aside with careless ease, the point of his blade cutting a small wound over her breast as she leaped back, a trickle of blood coming through the worn leather tunic. Her face didn’t change. Sten attacked again, using his strength to beat her down; she drifted back, not trying to fight him, only watching and retreating. He chased her about the glade, trying to close with her, but she was too fast, dancing away from him with taunting ease, avoiding the bodies of the dead guards and other obstacles as if she had eyes in her feet.

  Sten began favoring his right leg. He injured it, Dinafar thought, when he fell off the macai. She sank onto her knees staring at the circling duelers, absently brushing away the web of long hair blowing across her face. Sten faltered briefly; the meie twisted past his saber and cut at his arm, a small victory that cost her some blood as she flashed away. He began limping. Several times the meie managed to draw blood and get away unscathed, laughing each time, her mockery bringing the blood to his face, disrupting what rhythm he had left to his attacks, teasing him into attacking without thought The last time, she stopped close to the headless body of the Tercel, her back to it. “One little woman,” she taunted Sten. “Pretty mimkin, dance for me.”

  He lunged at her, forgetting the weakness of his leg, forgetting everything but the need to beat her down. She started to leap back, caught her heel on the Tercel’s knee, fell back over the body. Horrified, Dinafar held her breath, her fists clenched on her thighs.

  When she fell, Sten yelled his triumph, hopped another step, landing on his weakened leg. His right leg buckled as he put weight on it and he went down on one knee. Before he could move, the meie was back on her feet in a neatly executed roll. She leaped the Tercel, slashed at Sten as she flew past, her blow partly deflected by the saber he managed to bring up almost by instinct; then she was behind him, slashing again, the saber catching him in the neck, nearly cutting his head from his body. As he crumpled slowly over the Tercel’s legs, she flung the saber away and knelt beside him, chanting softly the blessing of the dead.

  Dinafar began to breathe again. The glade filled with peace. The macai were grazing placidly at the grass, the three men were flattened bodies bloodying the earth, the little meie murmuring over each the blessing of the dead. Dinafar wiped the sweat from her face, then looked up as she heard a soft hissing behind and above her. One of the traxim had dipped low and was gliding over her head. A moment later the black-furred wings were beating strongly as it circled up to rejoin the others. As she watched, a second trax folded its wings and dived toward the kneeling meie. “Above you,” Dinafar screamed. “The trax!”

  The meie looked up, rolled away just in time. The trax missed its strike, but the next one was coming, with another behind it. And another. She snatched up the discarded saber and flipped onto her feet with that beautiful controlled flexing of her body that Dinafar found hard to believe.

  When the second bird struck at her, the meie slashed at it with the saber, battering it aside, drawing blood from one of the stubby legs. With a wild shriek, the bird flapped wildly and rose out of reach. A third attacked.

  Dinafar looked about, saw the saber that Sten had used. She snatched it up and swung it awkwardly, trying to use point and edge as she saw the meie doing. The saber’s weight surprised her; she was so clumsy with it she came near weeping with frustration. Lowering the point till it rested on the grass, she wiped at her sweaty face. The birds were swooping down on the meie, battering at her, clawing for her face, snapping at her, screaming their harsh ugly challenges. Dinafar hefted the saber, gritted her teeth and ran toward the melee, intent on doing something, she didn’t know quite what.

  Somehow the meie saw her and knew her intent. Gasping out the words in bursts between saber slashes, she called, “Dina … behind me … don’t try … to cut … hold saber … point … up … Uh! Keep … em off … my back!”

  Three of the birds were down, flapping about, attacking legs with their needle-toothed beaks. Dinafar first tried to ignore them, then kicked at them as they chittered about her. She did what the meie had said, held the saber up, steadying it, trying to concentrate on this as she’d seen the meie concentrating, drawing out of herself strength she hadn’t known she had. Teeth began gnawing at her ankle once more. She cried out, kicked, couldn’t dislodge the bird. The meie cut off the leg of an attacker, glanced around, exclaimed with disgust, cut through the bird’s neck with a single vicious slash of the bloody blade, then was back fighting off the others. Dinafar kicked away the severed head and lifted her saber higher, trying to fight down her nausea as the black body at her feet boiled and shivered, dissolving into goo and stinking black vapors.

  After a weary interval of noisy, smelly struggle, the last two traxim broke off the attack and flew up to circle overhead. The meie watched them, her face grim. She kicked away a grounded bird, dispatched it with a weary jerk of her arm, jabbed the saber point into the earth and leaned on it, breathing hard, blinking sweat from her eyes, frowning at the pools of goo where the birds had been. With an exclamation of disgust, she straightened and limped to her weaponbelt. When it was buckled around her again, she closed the fingers of one hand about the small sack dangling at one side, her head tilted back as she watched the circling birds.

  Dinafar kicked at a wounded trax snapping viciously at her ankles. Clumsily, she brought the saber down on the stringy naked neck. The trax squawked and hopped away, head wobbling, neck bleeding. “Can’t kill the blessed things,” she groaned, lifted the saber again and chased the fluttering squawking bird across the clearing, hacking ineptly at that tough neck. She finally managed to bring the saber down straight enough to slice through the rubbery flesh. Looking at the bloody blade with disgust, she dropped it and limped back to the middle of the clearing.

  The meie was still gazing at the sky. Overhead the remaining traxim were chittering and floundering, obviously disturbed about something.
As Dinafar gaped at them, they circled the clearing a final time, then arrowed off toward the north. “Why’d they do that?”

  The meie relaxed, wiped the film of sweat off her face. “They can’t see me anymore.”

  “Oh.” Dinafar frowned. “Huh?”

  “Later.” She stretched and groaned, rubbed at the back of her neck. “Want one of those tabards to cover you?”

  Dinafar looked down at her naked front and blushed. Hastily she stripped Sten’s tabard off, disgusted by the flaccid, flopping body, pulled it over her head, shuddering at the patches of blood on it. The meie smiled wearily. “We’ll have some clean things for you by tonight.” She yawned. “Maiden bless, I’m tired. Still, we can’t stay here. Help me strip these macai.”

  They left the bodies sprawled on the grass and rode back into the shelter of the trees. Talking quietly at times about little things, unimportant things, nothing personal, at times silent and withdrawn, the meie led Dinafar along the winding beast-runs in the growing heat and humidity of the advancing day. By midafternoon they’d left the trees and crossed into brush-covered hill country. An hour later they came on a wide stream of clear cold water. They stopped to drink and wash away layers of dust—the macain stirred up clouds of red dust that settled into every crevice. The meie sank into a heavy silence; Dinafar concentrated on hoarding her strength. Both women rode on only because there was no place to halt.

  Near sundown the meie pulled her mount to a stop and leaned forward, listening intently. After a moment Dinafar could hear a muted roar ahead; the stream beside her was rushing over a cliff somewhere not far in front of them.

  They stopped again at the rim of a shallow cliff, the stream leaping out over it in a short fall, dissolving into mist at the base then winding through a boulder-strewn bed toward the Stenda forthouse and outbuildings tucked into one point of the green and lovely valley spread in a broad triangle below them. Most of the corrals attached to the barns were empty except for dust-devils and blowing straw; in one a macai was standing at a water-trough, one foot held protectively off the ground, a foal nudging against her. The house itself was shuttered and still. The meie glanced anxiously at the sun, then began riding along the cliff, looking for a way down into the valley. Dinafar followed, hoping that the house meant rest and food.