Hero Born Page 22

  In a scene eerily reminiscent of Konall’s duel with the bear, Brann was left with half a spear, although in his case it was the heavy butt end, grasped tightly in his right hand. The force of the blow had knocked the half-spear down and to Brann’s right, and he continued the turn to spin in a complete circle, making sure to stay away from Konall, and using the momentum to add force to his swing as he smashed the wood against the side of the larger man’s head. The force of the blow almost knocked the shaft from Brann’s hand, but he managed to maintain his grip and, as the dazed man started to raise his sword, he drew back the shaft and thrust the sharp, splintered end two-handed through his attacker’s unkempt beard and deep into his throat. The man sank to his knees, and the life had drained from him before he came to rest on the ground.

  Brann grabbed the sword from the grubby, lifeless hand and turned to see how Konall was faring. The taller boy had despatched two of his opponents and was facing the remaining one, a wiry snarling man who looked as if he had more guile – even if it was in the form of animal cunning – than the others. He was watching Konall’s blade carefully as it moved rapidly (not so much flickering; it was too heavy a weapon for that, but Brann was nonetheless impressed with the speed and ease with which the boy handled the weapon). Brann moved to join Konall. He had no training in using a sword but, then again, he had never been taught how to use a spear in combat, so he reckoned he should at least be able to distract the man long enough to allow Konall an opening. It looked as if the ragged wretch would be lucky to measure his life in more than a few seconds. Their foe realised this, too, and his eyes and movements became more desperate.

  Without warning, there was a dull thud and Konall dropped to one knee, blood starting to stream from his temple. A fist-sized rock that had been hurled at him rolled to one side as he fought, one hand on the ground before him, to steady himself against unconsciousness. It was not a life-threatening wound in itself, but it was in its consequences: the boy was stunned enough to be unable to offer any defence. Brann stepped in front of him, holding the sword two-handed but – even without the three gibbering bandits who had broken from the other fight (one of whom had thrown the rock) – he knew that the initiative had swung lethally away from the two boys.

  In the blink of an eye, the single foe before them became four. As they fell upon them, Brann knew his time was short. He had taken on, and beaten, almost as many men just seconds beforehand, but now he was exhausted, wielding a sword that was too heavy for him, and without anyone to cover his back. He flailed wildly, knowing that he had no finesse to make use of and hoping that the wide scything movements may keep the others at bay for a few moments longer. It was only delaying the inevitable, and he felt what little strength remained in his limbs draining from him with each swing. The men laughed contemptuously and, within moments, Brann had been easily separated from Konall. The wiry man who had originally faced Konall stepped back to the boy. Standing over the noble as he groggily and desperately tried to regain his feet, he spat on him and swung back his sword in both hands for what would clearly be a decapitating swing. A blur from the nearby trees caught his attention and he stopped at the top of his movement. A figure flashed from the woods and passed in front of the man. Grakk’s momentum took him into the heart of the three men facing Brann as, behind him, blood – bright, shining crimson in the clear morning air – started to spurt from the throat of Konall’s would-be executioner. The sword dropped from his fingers and Grakk was already spinning and whirling high and low as his lifeless body crumpled to the ground, a large rusty knife a blur in his hands. Before they could comprehend that their comrade was dead so suddenly, one of the men had been hamstrung, another had had his throat cut and the third was twitching his last movements after a knife-thrust up under his ribs and into his heart. The crippled man groped desperately for his sword but, before he even came close to grasping it, Grakk had despatched him also.

  He turned to Brann, who was frozen in astonishment, and roughly shook the boy. ‘Help him,’ he said urgently, nodding at Konall. ‘We must get him back to his father.’

  ‘Yes,’ Brann gasped. ‘Yes, of course.’

  He ran to Konall, who was supporting himself with his sword, using it as a crutch as his legs buckled beneath him. They grabbed an arm each and half-dragged him towards the trees. An embankment sloped steeply down for around twice the height of a man just after the undergrowth started and Grakk grunted, ‘Here’, as he placed Konall down and started him sliding, feet first, down the snow. Brann started down after him but scrambled to a halt as Grakk turned back to the clearing.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he gasped. ‘Let’s go!’

  Grakk shook his head. ‘You take him. They must think I did that,’ he said, jerking his thumb towards the bodies behind them. ‘They will not follow you if they think I did it. If they find no one to blame, they will come looking. If this is not done, all three of us will die. Had not your fight with Boar ended when you did, all three on our bench would have died from his indiscriminate axe. You played your part then, and now I must play mine. When they leave, so do you.’

  Without a further word, he scrambled back into the open ground. Tears welled up in Brann’s eyes as he watched a man he had become close to in such a short time go to his death, even though he knew that Grakk was right. If Brann was the one to stay, the bandits would know that he could never have killed seven men single-handedly, and a hunt for the others would ensue. Grakk, however, appeared far more plausible as one who could have acted upon his own, so the bandits were more likely to end their work with him and assume that they had dealt with the entire party.

  Brann pulled himself back up to the top of the slope, and peered over the edge and through the bushes. If his friend was going to die for him, he would at least watch his passing so his heroics could be recounted in full when they returned to safety. The combination of the undergrowth and the relative gloom of the trees compared with the snow-enhanced glare of the clearing, now that dawn had broken during their fight, would make him invisible to their enemies. Or so he hoped.

  Scrabbling noises behind him made him jump, until he remembered that Konall was with him.

  ‘Help me up,’ the older boy hissed. ‘This man saved my life. If he is to die a hero to save me another time, I would do him the honour of witnessing his glory so his valour will not be lost in anonymity, but remembered in tales for generations to come.’

  My thoughts exactly. But put a little more grandiosely.

  Any tinge of humour, however, vanished as he dragged Konall up beside him and they peered into a scene of horror. Grakk had been spotted as he reached the scene of their fight, and almost the entire group had turned to confront him. The three remaining warriors who had been their escort lay dead, their multiple and dreadful injuries attesting to the fight they had put up. Two ragged bandits held Gerens and Konall’s page, still apparently alive, face down in trampled snow while the rest, fanning out, ran howling towards the solitary figure of Grakk. Brann was able, for the first time, to look more closely at their enemy. Their appearance was as uncared for, dirty and dishevelled as he had imagined lawless bandits to be, from their matted tangled hair, ragged clothes and their skin darkened and toughened by weather and grime, to their haphazard collection of weapons, some with military origins, some once farm implements, some self-made and all rusty, pitted and ragged-edged.

  The lack of quality in their clothes and weapons was compensated by – and, in some ways, added to – the fear induced by their behaviour. More akin to wild beasts than men, they howled, snarled, roared and laughed as they marauded towards Grakk.

  Grakk glanced around, but his only line of possible escape was back towards the boys hiding in the woods. He had no option but to stand and fight for as long as he could and hope to find, or create, a gap in the crowd to make a break for another side of the clearing. Brann knew the likelihood of that chance materialising, and choked back a sob. Konall’s sword was lying across in front of him,
and the noble boy’s grip tightened on the hilt. Brann grabbed his shoulder, and held him down.

  ‘Stop,’ he hissed. ‘I know what you are thinking. Stay down.

  Konall grabbed his wrist. ‘Get your hand off me, boy,’ he growled. ‘My head has cleared. I cannot lie here and watch this happen.’

  Brann’s eyes blazed. ‘How do you think I feel? That man is my friend. He is going to give up his life purely to let you get back to your father. If you decide to die beside him, you will waste his sacrifice. We may as well all have run and taken our chances while being hunted. And do not call me boy. If I was good enough to fight back-to-back with you out there, I am good enough to be treated with more respect than that.’

  Konall stared at him for a long second, then turned back to the scene as the bandits closed with Grakk. The tattooed barbarian had stripped to the waist despite the cold, and had grabbed the lightest sword he could find from the corpses around him, transferring the knife to his left hand.

  Again he fought, arms and legs whirling, but this time the emphasis was less on speed and more on tactics, dealing with the closest threat in the most effective fashion. The sheer numbers facing him indicated only one result, however.

  A burly bandit, indistinguishable from the rest other but for the fact that they listened when he spoke, strode up behind the mêlée and barked out an order, which he emphasised with hefty slaps with the flat of his sword on the backs of those nearest to him. Brann glanced at Konall. With the clamour from the fighting, his words were unintelligible.

  Konall did not turn around, but sensed his questioning glance. ‘I cannot make it out either. Suffice to say that I would guess they were ordered to take him alive from his manner of speaking.’

  ‘Oh, gods, I hope you are right,’ Brann sighed, the despair lifting from him as his hope soared.

  Konall grunted. ‘That depends on what they intend to do with him.’

  With the objective clear, the result of the fight was no less certain: it merely involved more casualties among the bandits. Life seemed cheap among the attackers, however, adding to the numerical advantage they already held.

  Grakk was inevitably overwhelmed, a club blow to the back of his bald head rendering him unconscious. The speed with which they bound him and the thoroughness of the binding attested to their view of Grakk’s fighting ability.

  As Grakk was being secured, the remainder had unfinished business – or pleasure, as it turned out. Roaring with glee, they capered back towards the bodies of the three warriors. Brann’s stomach heaved as the corpses were torn apart, not only by knives or axes, but mainly by fingers and teeth. Two of the fiends impaled one of the warriors on a short spear and raised his lifeless form aloft, cavorting around the group and jerking him so that his limbs flailed in a macabre dance of death as the other bandits howled with laughter and danced about the grotesque trio. The corpse eventually fell from the spear and was torn asunder like the others, body parts being waved triumphantly and organs held aloft as if they were the spoils of war. In the basest of senses, Brann supposed that was exactly what they were.

  Horrified and stunned, yet unable to tear his eyes from the grotesque scene, Brann felt fear grip him at the thought that such people could exist. The revolting actions were bad enough, but the pervasive primeval terror that swamped him was born from the sounds they were making – not the howls or cackles of the mad, but the laughter and cries of triumph and excitement that could be heard from groups of men engaged in any number of normal pursuits, from sporting contests to sharing a flagon of ale around a roaring hearth. These were not insane mountain barbarians; they were men who knew exactly what they were doing, and were revelling, even exulting in it. He was witnessing unadulterated evil.

  The snow around the carnage had been churned into a crimson slush as the hideous revels continued, and Brann felt his gorge rise, starting to cough and retch at the same time. Konall’s hand clamped across his mouth.

  ‘Cough, and they could hear you,’ he hissed. ‘Puke and they could smell it. Either way, it is not good for us.’

  Brann nodded and swallowed. ‘They are worse than animals. How are men capable of this?’

  Konall’s face was a cold mask. ‘My people will make them pay. I will see to that.’ Brann often found Konall’s form of speech to be blustering but, this time, he believed him.

  The bandit who seemed to be in charge called over to a group of the men who were standing slightly back from the butchery, not taking part but enjoying the spectacle with hearty laughter and shouts of encouragement and praise, apparently more senior members of the party. The men moved further away and towards the two boys. Brann’s breathing caught in his throat and he made ready to fly, but Konall’s hand steadied him, the older boy having discerned that the men were merely seeking to move to a spot where their leader could address them above the noise of the others.

  The commander started to shout, his voice having to be raised despite them moving to this spot, and his words carrying easily to the boys hidden in the trees.

  Brann found the accent too strong to understand, but Konall’s eyes narrowed. ‘The more he speaks, the more I can pick up,’ he breathed, cupping his hands around Brann’s ear to mask even his soft whisper. ‘They are taking the prisoners to their base, or home. Your tattooed slave seems to be the subject of some curiosity, and they think their leader would find him of interest. In what way, I do not know. And I do not think I want to know.

  ‘The two boys, they are unsure about. No, wait: they think one of them is me. This was no random attack. They knew I was hunting here, and they wanted me. He is congratulating them on dealing with the entire hunting party – so at least they believe they have got us all – and he is extolling their skills in battle.’ He snorted in derision. ‘Now he is saying something along the lines of one of the boys being me, but they just don’t know which one. He is saying that, until they determine which one is me, neither boy should be harmed.’

  They watched as the leader drew his long knife and, without warning, sliced it across the throat of the man beside him.

  ‘He is saying,’ Konall continued, ‘that death, as they see before them, will instantly visit any who harm the prisoners, and I think he has made his point quite effectively. Now he is saying that, once they have discovered the identity of, well, me, then they are free to have their sport with the other.’ He shook his head, his long hair trailing in the snow. ‘Hell awaits them both before death. I hope the gods are kind to them after it. He is stressing again that they are not to be harmed, and that they need not be impatient for their fun because the right boy will be identified when…’

  He stiffened, his fingers tightening so hard on his sword hilt that the blade shook.

  ‘What is it?’ Brann hissed. ‘What did he say?’

  ‘It is of no import to you, but there is no reason for you not to know,’ Konall said, his voice, although still a whisper, clearly suffused with suppressed rage. ‘He mentioned a name. He said the right boy would be identified when Loku arrives.’ He paused, as if saying the name had almost caused him to lose control of his fury. He took a breath, and steadied himself. ‘Loku is the ambassador from the court of Lord Bekan, a neighbouring warlord to our lands. He is a powerful and, at the moment, peaceful lord as far as we are concerned. Loku, as his representative, has been welcomed as an honoured guest at my uncle’s court, where he spends most of his time, but also during his frequent visits to our hall – where he is right now. It turns my stomach to think that a man who has shared my father’s table is in league with these vermin.’

  He slid down the slope. ‘Come. We must return with haste.’

  Brann joined him. ‘Of course. We must prevent him from leaving, so he cannot reveal that neither of the boys is you. Then there will be more of a chance of your father rescuing them and Grakk.’

  Konall started into a loping run that Brann struggled to match. ‘The lives of a page and two slaves are now of secondary importance. It is the futur
e of my people that must be addressed. We must see that Loku is captured to enable him to be interrogated. If he returns to them and discovers that I have slipped their net, he will know that it is too much of a risk for him to return in case I have discovered the truth about him, and we will have lost our chance.

  ‘Now save your breath and run.’

  Chapter 8

  He cursed.

  Plotting schemes, crafting intrigues, had been second nature to him; now it was toil. The fatigue in his mind was a reminder of the years that had been and gone.

  Still, it was toil he relished, an escape from the endless monotony of existing. Now he lived again.

  Nevertheless, while it invigorated his mind’s interest, still it drained his mind’s energy. He found his attention wandering to images of times past, of times so very different.

  They had knelt to him once.

  He saw himself on a seat, high-backed, carved from gleaming ivory to depict victories won, key battles that had built an empire; images that reminded all who gazed upon them of the crushing force that had created harmonious union, and the crushing force that would maintain it. Carved from gleaming ivory and set with the most precious of gems, five stones of the deepest hues of blood, leaf, sky, sun and, most entrancing all, of water; five stones, each the size of a fist, set around the top of the arching back of the seat; five stones to display to all who gazed upon them the visible trappings of all that power brings. Power over wealth. Power over the five elements. Power over man.

  Power.