Story: Allies and Other Enemies
A story I wrote quite a while ago. Read it at your own risk
ALLIES AND OTHER ENEMIES
Eurybia slid tiredly off her horse's back. While the sturdy bay mare drank from the thin muddy stream, Eurybia poured a helmet full of tepid water over her head. She cursed the fates, and both the commanding generals, for deciding to battle in such an accursed place at the height of summer. Neither the Kimbri chief nor her own Thermiscrian commander were spared her scorn.
Eurybia poured another helmet full of lukewarm water over herself, reflecting on what caused her to be alone here. She was pursuing some fleeing Kimbri warriors with the rest of her cavalry wing, when the handful of fleeing cowards had suddenly stopped and stood their ground. Eurybia and her sisters joyfully scattered them once more, and in the melee Eurybia became separated from the others.
While Eurybia's thoughts ran along their course of cursing fates, leaders, the heat, and her own recklessness; her horse suddenly stopped drinking. The mare pulled up her head, whickered, and swung her ears forward. Seeing this, Eurybia tried to calm her horse.
"What is it, Cyme?" Eurybia stroked the mare's nose as she spoke. "What do you sense?" looking in the direction indicated by Cyme’s ears Eurybia saw only the tough bushes that grew stubbornly along the edge of the stream and out on the sun baked plains.
As she watched one of the bushes moved slightly in the direction opposite the wind was blowing. Eurybia pulled her bow from the case on her saddle and nocked an arrow.
"Come out!" Eurybia called as she drew back and aimed at the heart of the bush. The bush parted and a Kimbri warrior limped out with an arrow in his thigh. For a moment the Kimbri and Thermiscrian regarded one another from across the small stream.
After a few heart beats the Kimbri drew his lybrilum, that strange combination of axe and short spear the Kimbri used, from off his back. Swinging it down, he buried the bloodied head into the bank of the stream. He took off his helmet, placing it on the lybrilum's butt. He shrugged off the harness holding the lybrilum's sheath, and removed his ring-mail tunic. The Kimbri warrior then crossed the stream, sans armor and weapons, to stand calmly in front of Eurybia. Kneeling clumsily, he bowed his head in the manner Eurybia knew was the Kimbri way of surrender.
Eurybia wasn't sure what to do. All the Kimbri she had seen this day had either fought to the death, or cast aside their weapons and clung to a Thermiscrian thigh piteously pleading to have their lives spared. None had submitted in this dignified manner. She slowly released the tension on her bow.
"Speak!" Eurybia commanded in one of the few Kimbri words she knew. "How named?"
"I am Dyak," the Kimbri said without lifting his head, "and I submit to the better warrior." Eurybia was surprised he spoke her own language with only the faintest hint of an accent.
"I am Eurybia ni-Clonie," she said in the formal manner of the Thermiscrian surrender ceremony, "and I accept your surrender." Pausing for a moment she added, "You speak our language very well."
"It’s my duty, daughter of Clonie. Dyak slowly sat down and grasped the shaft of the arrow protruding from his thigh. "With your permission.
"By all means, Eurybia said as she put her bow back in its case. "Don't twist it; we barb our arrows." Opening her saddlebag Eurybia removed some bandages and a long coil of rope. She tossed the bandages to Dyak. "When we get back to camp the surgeons will dress your wounds properly."
As Eurybia watched, Dyak carefully spread open his wound with two fingers. Sucking his breath through clenched teeth he reached in with two fingers to grasp the head of the arrow. He took two more deep breaths and then held his breath as he yanked the arrow out. One barb caught and tore a bit of his flesh, but not too seriously.
By the time Eurybia had returned from retrieving Dyak's arms and armor, he had finished with his wound. He was sitting quietly, head down, hands by his side, and a bandage wound around his thigh.
"Can you travel?" Eurybia asked as she tied his weapons and armor to the back of her saddle. Dyak nodded and Eurybia retrieved her rope and a short length of halter strapping.
"Good. Hold out your hands." Dyak complied, his wrists together.
"I assure you I won't try to escape or harm you. You have my oath." Eurybia shrugged as she bound his wrists with the leather halter strap.
"I'm sure you're a man of your word." She tested the strength of the bindings around Dyak's wrists. "I just won't stake my life on it." Hauling Dyak to his feet, Eurybia attached one end of the rope to the leather strap and the other end to a ring on her saddle.
Eurybia swung into the saddle and turned Cyme back toward the Thermiscrian main camp. She kept Cyme at a slow trot so Dyak could keep up without too much strain. Eurybia wondered if this Kimbri could even fathom or appreciate the honor she was showing him.
"You’re unlike any other Kimbri I've met," Eurybia commented as they slowly progressed toward the main camp.
"How so?" Dyak asked as he limped next to Eurybia's horse. The pace was slow enough he could keep up without strain, but each step was still extremely painful.
"You speak our language for one thing. Your armor is much lighter than the others I have seen," Eurybia looked closely at Dyak, "and your hair and eyes are as dark as mine or any of my sisters. Every other Kimbri I've seen have red-gold hair and pale eyes."
"I was born in the lands that border your Sycarian allies. My mother was a member of one of the border patrols you regularly send. According to my father she returned to Thermiscria when I was five seasons old because I was male. My father insisted I keep my mother's native tongue so he could trade across the border without having to use a Sycarian to represent him." Dyak tried to shrug, but was pulled up short.
"As for the rest, I’m a scout of sorts. My job is to find the size and shape of the enemy. During battle I am to harry like the wolf."
They went on in silence for awhile, Eurybia watching the surrounding terrain. Dyak limped lost in his thoughts. "What is going to happen to me," he asked after a moment. "We’ve heard stories about what you Thermiscrians do to your prisoners."
"I'm sure the stories you've heard are no worse than the ones we've heard about you." Eurybia turned in her saddle to look at Dyak. "After you’re treated by the surgeons, you'll go into the prisoner stockade. If you can't be ransomed immediately it's likely you'll either be given to me as a war prize, or sold. Either way you'll end up a slave." Eurybia could not help but notice the way Dyak's face fell when she mentioned slavery.
"Are they still spreading that tale about us castrating our slaves?" Dyak nodded, and Eurybia chuckled. "Why do you think we take male prisoners? It's the only way we can get enough men to keep our population up. We're not exactly overwhelmed by men willing to live by our rules." Dyak nodded but still didn't appear relieved.
Eurybia looked Dyak over very measuringly. "Broad chest, good shoulders, and as a bonus you look like one of us. I can definitely see potential." Turning forward, Eurybia spared Dyak the sight of her smile at his barely repressed shudder.
Eurybia became nervous the closer they came to the main camp. Frequently she reigned Cyme in, whistled loudly and waited a few long silent moments before kicking the mare forward again. The pickets that should have greeted them three long bow shots from the tents were no where to be found. As they neared the final hill before the camp, Eurybia became even more nervous. Over six score Thermiscrians and nearly three score horses should have filled the area with noise. There should have been the wine-and-fear-fueled loud talk and shouts of the survivors, the clang of the field smiths hastily repairing the tools of combat, and if nothing else the screams and groans of those being treated by the surgeons. Yet, she heard none of this. She only heard the breeze and the grunts of hogs in their pens.
They saw the first body, an unarmored Thermiscrian killed by arrows, as soon as they rounded the hill. She had been shot in the back and next to her body on a patch of dampened ground were the fragments of the water jars she had been carrying. As they rounded the hill more of the camp became visible. Everywhere Kimbri and Thermiscrian mixed in the commonality of death. Tents and stockades lay ruined and burning.
Eurybia and Dyak looked on as the vultures and other scavengers feasted on the corpses. Pigs, brought by both sides to serve as food, rooted around and ate the entrails of the dead. Eurybia, with Dyak stumbling after, rode silently into the charnel scene. It was too much for them to comprehend. They could only acknowledge the overall effect, their minds refusing for the moment to see the individual details.
Everywhere there were bodies. Some were hacked apart by pelekys, the heavy doubled headed axe favored by Thermescrian foot soldiers. Some were chopped and stabbed by Kimbri lybrilum. Many were pierced by arrows of both Kimbri and Thermiscrian fletching. It was evident that the wounded were not even spared; some had died in trails of their own blood and piss.
Suddenly they both heard a thin scream from somewhere before them. One of the Thermiscrians was trying to weakly fight off the hog that was eating her leg. Without a word Eurybia snatched up her bow, nocked an arrow, and shot the hog through the neck. She vaulted from Cyme and ran over to the fallen warrior. Unable to do anything, Dyak studied the bodies of the fallen nearest to him.
When Eurybia reached the fallen warrior she could see why the warrior had so much trouble with the pig. The warrior's side was pierced and her breath was leaving blood tinged bubbles on her lips.
"Sister," the warrior gasped out. She grabbed Eurybia's arm with terrifying strength. "They...attacked!"
"Shhh, save your strength." Eurybia tried to get the woman to lay back down, but she continued to fiercely grip Eurybia's arm.
"Don't....turn your...back!" The woman collapsed, gasping. "Don't let them have...me." She grabbed Eurybia's arm again staring into Eurybia's eyes. "Kill me! Kill...me...burn...me."
Eurybia nodded. There was nothing she could do for the woman, the surgeons were dead, and she knew nothing of healing. Eurybia drew out her dagger and loosed the other woman's breastplate.
The woman smiled slightly and lay back. "I am Aerope ni-Speio." She helped guide Eurybia's dagger so the point rested above her heart.
"I am Eurybia ni-Clonie." Eurybia said quietly as she placed a hand over Aerope's eyes. Aerope squeezed Eurybia's wrist once, then Eurybia leaned her weight on the dagger, plunging it into Aerope's heart. Aerope gasped, jerked once, then went still with a long exhalation.
Eurybia pulled the dagger out and wiped it clean on a nearby piece of cloth. She tried to ignore the burning in her eyes as she lay the dagger on Aerope's chest. Eurybia sat back on her heels, knuckling her eyes, and sniffing long and deep. She would not cry...now.
Eurybia sat there turning Aerope's words over in her mind. Who were "they," and why had they attacked so? She looked over toward Cyme and Dyak as she thought. As she watched Dyak pulled a hand axe out of the chest of a Kimbri corpse; then turning he buried it in the head of a fallen Thermiscrian warrior.
"Lying BASTARDS!!!" Snatching up the nearest weapon Eurybia charged toward Dyak. At her cry he looked up and froze as she bore down on him, pelekys raised high.
Rolling out of the way of her strike at the last moment, Dyak grabbed the shield of the Thermiscrian he had just buried the axe in. He was on his back, shield raised as Eurybia bashed again and again with the heavy axe.
"Coward!" Eurybia hissed chopping hard at the shield. Dyak lashed out with his good leg, catching Eurybia hard in the ankles. She stumbled back, tripping over a corpse, and fell-her helmet ringing as it struck a dead Thermiscrian's breastplate. Dyak scrambled over toward Eurybia as she lay there stunned. He threw himself on top of Eurybia pinning her beneath the shield.
"Look around you!" He screamed at her. She struggled, nearly pushing Dyak off. He leaned his weight against the shield and headbutted Eurybia sharply on the bridge of her nose. The sudden sharp pain caused her to stop struggling. "Most of the Kimbri died bound and hobbled."
Eurybia rolled her head to the side. She saw a huge Kimbri lying nearby. He had been hacked in the back of the legs, then his back had been laid open. His bound hands were stretched out before him, fingers clawing the dirt. His face was contorted in a look of fear and pain. Close by she could see three other Kimbri bodies all with their hands bound.
"I see," Eurybia said warily. Dyak nodded, slid off her, and tossed the shield to the side. He reached down to help her up, and Eurybia noticed his hands were still bound.
"Why did you do that?" she pointed at the Thermiscrian with the hand axe buried in her head. Dyak showed Eurybia a Kimbri body on the other side of Cyme. This Kimbri was fully armored and armed. All around him were the bodies of Thermiscrians and bound Kimbri.
"I saw that man die, five bowshots from where I surrendered to you, clutching that arrow in his neck." A splintered arrow shaft protruded from the neck, and the front of the corpse's armor was stained rust with dried blood. The corpse's face was also split deeply by a cleaving stroke, but there was no blood below that wound. "There were no other wounds when I last saw him."
Dyak ran a finger through the face wound and held it up for Eurybia to see. "What kind of wound bleeds no blood?" He asked and then pointed to the Thermiscrian.
"A wound on a corpse," Eurybia finished quietly. She looked at Dyak and motioned for him to raise his arms up. He did so and Eurybia untied his hands.
"Help drag the bodies into the main tent," she said as she bent down to tie a loop around each of his ankles with the long strip between. "We will build a pyre in the morning."
"I won't try..." Dyak started to say, but Eurybia cut him off.
"Not right now."
It took the two of them the rest of the day to drag all the bodies into the main tent and strip them of their equipment. The Thermiscrian bodies were laid out neatly in rows inside the tent, the Kimbri were stacked like cordwood outside. The last was at Dyak's insistence; "They are nothing, treat them as such."
The sun was well down by the time they had used the last of the weapons and armor to create a makeshift fence. It would keep out all but the boldest scavengers. Eurybia stood silently staring at the bodies while Dyak shuffled over to the area they had cleared near the prisoner stockade and started a small fire to boil their food over.
They ate their meager meal in silence. Dyak finally cleared his throat then held his hands out toward Eurybia. She looked at his hands without comprehending.
"Now?" he asked. Eurybia thought for a moment and slowly shook her head from side to side. She tied Dyak's wrists together as she had before, then attached a piece of rope from his bindings to a ring set in the stockade wall.
Both awoke the next morning stiff and sore. They glumly looked around confirming that yesterday had indeed occurred. Eurybia released Dyak, but hobbled him once again.
"Not yet," was all she would say. Once again they ate silently, hardly looking at or tasting the food they shoveled into their mouths.
The sun was in the center of the sky by the time the pyre was built. Every scrap of wood, fabric, and every drop of oil was used to build a pyre large enough and hot enough to burn all the bodies. Every scrap save the main tent and what had been used in building the fence. Without even saying so they considered these off limits.
When the fire burned hot enough, Dyak and Eurybia turned to their task. They dismantled the fence and began dragging the Kimbri bodies to the fire and throwing them in. They tried to ignore the sounds as each body was thrown on the fire. They tied damp cloths around their nose and mouth to block out the stench of the bodies and the smell of the smoke from the fire. They didn't say a word to each other as they threw the score of Kimbri bodies on the pyre.
As soon as the last Kimbri body was tossed on to the pyre, Eurybia immediately returned to the tent. Dyak stood staring at the fire. Even though his people said the body was empty once the soul left, he still felt it wasn't proper to have them burn without at least one person paying some respect. He turned to see Eurybia standing at the opening to the tent. He limped up next to her. She just stood there shaking.
Without saying anything she pointed into the tent. Dyak looked in. The back of the tent had been ripped open, and in the neat rows of Thermiscrian fallen there were five empty spaces. Eurybia was staring at one space in particular. Dyak remembered they had put the warrior Eurybia had released from pain there.
"We must hurry before the pyre burns too low," Dyak said quietly. Eurybia didn't say anything; she just stepped forward, picked up a body, and slowly marched back toward the pyre. As she passed Dyak heard her mutter, "I failed a Final oath to a fallen sister."
It took well into the fall of night to put the five score Thermiscrians on the pyre. After the last body had been placed in the fire Eurybia stood staring into the flames, she was swaying slightly and hum/chanting under her breath. Dyak stood respectfully near her. Far enough not to seem to crowd her, but close enough to stop her should she try and join her comrades in the fire.
Suddenly she stooped, snatched a branch out of the fire, and in one smooth turning motion threw the burning brand onto the tent. As the tent began burning Eurybia turned back to the pyre and resumed her chanting. Dyak slowly shook his head; it seemed Thermiscrians were as destructive in death as they were in life.
Dyak woke up with a start, and squinted at the sun. He didn't remember falling asleep, just watching Eurybia swaying and chanting in front of the pyre. He struggled to sit up and found his hands bound. He didn't remember that either. Eurybia was sitting looking at the dying embers of the pyre. She turned at the sound of his struggles. Her eyes were reddened and hollowed by smoke and exhaustion.
"They come today," she said quietly. Dyak looked puzzled. "These were foot," Eurybia said as she indicated the pyre, "the cavalry comes today."
"Eurybia," Dyak said quietly. She didn't seem to comprehend him. She seemed to be staring at the ground near his foot.
"Eurybia!" he said sharply. She slowly looked him in the eyes. "It has been two days. They've seen the fires. Your cavalry carries little extra water, and no food. If they were coming, they would be here."
"We will wait till night fall," Eurybia said very slowly. "If they do not come, we will start toward the fortress in the morning." Dyak shut his mouth rather than argue. He struggled to his feet and began pacing the camp. Eurybia watched him for a moment then turned back to the embers of the pyre.
Dyak walked, muttering to himself. By surrendering to her, he had pledged before the gods that neither through his action, nor inaction would he allow any harm to come to Eurybia. She was supposed to be bound in the same manner to him, but what did Thermescrians know of such oaths.
He cursed the gods for making him bind himself to one made senseless by grief. He kicked his way through the ashes of the main tent looking for anything that might have survived and been useful. He found nothing save some lumps of molten precious metals. A couple of days ago he would have killed to possess them, now they were nothing. As he made his way to where the rear of the tent had been he made a discovery.
There in the dirt right where the rip had been in the back of the tent were tracks. He knelt down and studied the tracks closely. Two parallel ruts formed the border, in between were large cattle hoof marks. The wind was just beginning to dull the edges of the tracks and erase them.
"What interests you, Kimbri?" Eurybia called from her seat by the fire. She wondered what drew him so to that one spot.
"Tracks," Dyak called back. "An ox drawn cart was here."
"Those are from when we first set camp. They mean nothing." Eurybia lay her head between her arms, still rocking slightly as she sat. She was exhausted in body and spirit. She desperately wanted to wake up from this nightmare and find herself back in the tent with the rest of her Sisters. She would laugh with them about this crazy dream, and wash the taste of it out of her mouth with whatever good wine Anippe had managed to smuggle from the fortress.
The burning in her eyes returned. Eurybia knuckled her eyes again. It still wasn't time.
"You set this camp two days before the battle." Eurybia turned her head and looked at Dyak. Even though he couldn't read her expression too well at this distance he knew what it was.
"I was watching," he pointed to a nearby hill and the large clump of bushes on it's crest. "The winds have long erased those tracks. These are from the night before last." Eurybia struggled to her feet and walked over to Dyak. Her nightmare was deepening.
Dyak watched Eurybia as she staggered toward him. She was so exhausted a Kimbri child first picking up weapons could defeat her. There were enough weapons lying about, it would be nothing to cut his bonds and end his servitude in one quick slash across her throat or thrust through her heart. Dyak watched the sun glint slightly off the edge of a nearby lybrilum. He shook his head and resumed watching Eurybia's erratic approach. Coward men may call him, but the gods would never call him oath-breaker.
Eurybia kneeled and looked at the tracks herself. "Only jackals on two legs need a cart." She looked off in the direction the cart tracks pointed. "All that lies within easy distance that way is the holding of Garok."
"Garok?" Dyak said questioningly. He leaned down to help Eurybia to her feet. She seemed to stare at the bindings on his wrists, as if surprised they were still there.
"He is the Sycarian who holds these lands." Eurybia, with Dyak's help, rose unsteadily to her feet. "He warned us about your crossing the border."
As Eurybia watched she saw the change come over Dyak. His shoulders tightened and his eyes narrowed. She noticed the lybrilum near Dyak's hand but said nothing. If he wanted to kill her she could offer no resistance.
"It was a Sycarian who called us here," Dyak whispered. Eurybia saw the muscles in his jaw twitching slightly. "He said he held these lands and was tired of rule by women." Dyak looked in Eurybia's eyes as he finished, "his name was Garok."
Eurybia nodded slowly. She turned and began stumbling back to where their blankets lay. Dyak walked beside her, not touching her, but when Eurybia appeared to nearly fall his shoulder was somehow there for her to steady herself on.
"I wish to sleep," she said when they reached the blankets. Collapsing on them she looked up at Dyak. "Wake me when the sun is four hands from the end of his journey. That will give us enough time to reach Garok's before the moon begins her journey."
Dyak looked down at Eurybia as she made herself comfortable on the blankets. "You trust me."
"I couldn't stop you," Eurybia murmured as she drifted off to sleep.
Eurybia awoke to the gentle touch on her shoulder. "Anippe?" she murmured confused and disoriented.
"It’s time," a faintly accented male voice said from above her. Eurybia opened her eyes and saw Dyak's face. Eurybia was surprised to find herself among the living. Anippe was likely dead, living only in her rapidly fading dreams.
Dyak helped Eurybia to sit up and handed her a mug of vinegary wine. Eurybia drank it without comment. She rose to her feet, then bent down retrieving her armor.
"Armor and arm yourself," Eurybia said sliding the breastplate over her head and then cinching in the side straps. She picked up her pelekys and bow case. She could hear Dyak rummaging around. She turned to look to Cyme. To Eurybia's surprise, save for the saddle, Cyme was ready to go.
Eurybia turned back to face Dyak. He was standing next to her holding a large Thermiscrian shield and carrying a lybrilum. Eurybia noticed his hands were still bound close together. She pulled out a dagger and sawed through the leather thongs.
"Now you can put on armor," she said. Dyak looked at her, but didn't move.
"I can't jog beside your horse in armor."
"We ride double," Eurybia said as she swung a saddle onto Cyme's back. She stiffly leaned down and cinched in the belly strap.
"I won’t tax your horse with the weight," Dyak said as he slung both the shield and lybrilum across his back.
"You fear slavery that much," Eurybia murmured as she swung herself into the saddle. She leaned over to help Dyak up. Dyak swung up behind Eurybia. Eurybia turned Cyme toward the hills and began following the cart tracks.
Two hours into their journey, Eurybia and Dyak found the missing Thermiscrian cavalry. The stench of mass death reaching them as they crested a hill. In the valley below they saw the bodies of a score and seven Thermiscrian cavalry. Even their mounts had not been spared. Here and there among the bodies was the carcass of a horse who had tried to escape once its rider was cut down.
Cyme snorted, and tried dancing away from the stench, but Eurybia firmly pulled her head around and prodded the mare forward. Cyme began to descend into the valley, the whites of her eyes showing and twisting her head this way and that. Eurybia used nearly all her strength controlling the skitterish mare.
As they rode through the valley neither Eurybia nor Dyak looked about them. They no longer wanted to see scavengers at their feast. They did not want to see the expressions on the bloating corpses. As they rode through the slaughter Eurybia was muttering something under her breath. At first Dyak thought she was saying a prayer, until he listened closely and realized she was reciting the names of the dead.
"Do you wish to stop?" Dyak asked quietly. He felt Eurybia stiffen as she warred within herself between necessity and cultural beliefs. To the Thermiscrians, the soul of the departed was trapped in the body until released by the flames of a pyre.
"No," Eurybia whispered hoarsely. "We will honor them when we return." Dyak stayed silent and did not voice the thought that crossed his mind as she spoke.
The bright crescent moon had just begun it's journey across the night sky when Eurybia and Dyak arrived near Garok's holding. It was a simple two story squarish mud brick and rock building, like most of the other small holdings in Sycaria. It sat in a rocky cut between two hills, with the fencing and out buildings for livestock just visible. Few lights showed in the main building's small square windows. As the breeze blew toward them, Dyak and Eurybia smelled cattle-and decaying flesh.
Eurybia reigned Cyme to a halt. The mare's ears were laying back and she was snorting. Eurybia reached over and rubbed Cyme's neck.
"We’ll have to leave her here," Eurybia said over her shoulder.
Dyak had just opened his mouth to answer when he thought he caught a sudden movement directly in front of them. At that moment Cyme screamed and reared back. Dyak, his grip loosened, tumbled off the back of the rearing mare landing hard on the rocky ground. Cyme continued to rear and kick while Eurybia struggled to control her. There was a crunching thud and the figure in front of the plunging horse fell away. Once Eurybia regained control of the mare, she dismounted to check Dyak. He was slowly regaining his feet and groaning.
"Can you fight?" Eurybia asked as she helped Dyak regain his feet. He spat something dark into the dirt of the path and nodded. Together then went over to the wreck of the figure that had risen to block their way. While Dyak knelt to take a closer look, Eurybia glance was enough to see that the corpse was a woman wearing armor and what Cyme's flailing hooves had done to the woman's head. Eurybia turned away, she had no desire to see another of her sisters dead. She busied herself calming Cyme and hobbling the mare.
"She was not one of your sisters, daughter of Clonie," Dyak said quietly after some moments. "She was one of mine." Eurybia was caught by the formality of his phrasing, an inferior addressing a superior, and the flatness of his voice. She turned to look at Dyak as he kneeled near the body. As she took a longer look at the body she noticed the armor was the same heavy scale favored by Kimbri warriors. She also saw a long braid of red-gold colored hair now tied to Dyak's belt.
Eurybia looked to the steading. She could see more lights now in the building and two figures, backlit by the lights from the steading, making their way toward her and Dyak. She drew her pelekys as she spoke to Dyak. "Kill all that we find. I will take Garok's head to decorate a spear at the fortress."
Dyak nodded and stood. He drew his lybrilum and turned toward the figures that were approaching from the steading. The figures were those of a pair of Sycarian servants. Both were older men armed only with long knives and loud voices. They did not even see the warrior pair until too late. Dyak slammed his shield into the face of the one on the right. As the older man stumbled back and fell stunned, Dyak chopped across his throat with the lybrilum. Any cry the man may have made was lost in the red bubbling ruin of his neck.
Eurybia swung her pelekys in a whistling side arm stroke and buried it deeply into the side and chest of the man on the left. He started to look down in shock at his side, then crumpled to the ground with Eurybia's pelekys still buried deep in his torso. Stepping down hard on the dying man's neck, Eurybia wrenched her weapon free from between his broken ribs.
Eurybia and Dyak forced their way into the main building. They began going from room to room and anyone foolish enough to bar their way, or too slow to flee, soon died under a Thermiscrian pelekys or a Kimbri lybrilum. The pair quickly made their way to the second story, Eurybia leading as they were rounding a corner came face to face with one of Garok's special guards.
In the hallway stood a Thermiscrian warrior. Her right arm hung useless, a cleaving blow had opened her shoulder deep enough to show the bones within. The woman's legs were stained a rusty red from a similar blow across her abdomen. The blood in and around both horrific wounds was the dark brownish red of blood long dried in the sun, and from the warrior came the stench of death three days old. Clutching her pelekys awkwardly in her left hand, the Thermiscrian advanced clumsily toward Eurybia and slowly drew the heavy double bladed axe back for the strike.
Eurybia could easily strike before the other. The movements of the corpse made animate were slow, hesitant and ponderous. Even as the other's pelekys reached the end of the draw back, Eurybia knew she would neither strike the corpse nor dodge the coming blow. She had looked into the black eyes of the other and thought she saw the faintest spark. Even to save herself Eurybia could not, would not, strike one of her sisters. She closed her eyes waiting for the blow.
There was a sharp blow on her upper arm, a splintering crack, and Eurybia was forced hard into the wall. She could hear a sharp cry then a muffled ringing thunk. Dyak had stilled the one who had felled her. Eurybia opened her eyes and looked at her arm. Instead of the ruin she expected there was only the angry red line of a bruise.
She looked over at Dyak who was struggling on the floor with the Thermiscrian, methodically striking with the hand axe he had pulled off the other's belt. Nearby she could see the shield he had picked up at the camp lying shattered near the broken haft of his lybrilum and the severed arm of the Thermiscrian still clutching her pelekys. With a final thunk the form stilled and Dyak leaned back. He cursed, yanked a long jagged wood splinter out of his leg, and looked over at Eurybia.
"Do you want to die?!" When Eurybia did not respond Dyak leaned over, grabbed something and threw it at her. The head of the Thermiscrian bounced off Eurybia's breastplate and landed in her lap. The two familiar dark eyes staring up at her. "That is you. You will decorate Garok's home."
Eurybia looked down into the Thermiscrian's eyes. Even now she thought she could detect a glint or spark deep in those black staring eyes. She slowly closed those eyes and gently set the head on the ground. Eurybia rose, walked over to Dyak and roughly pulled him to his feet.
"Do that again, Kimbri, and you’ll go next to Garok." She reached down, wrenched the pelekys from the dead hand and gave it to Dyak. "Do not break this."
Farther down the hall they could hear the slow step of another walking corpse. They could also see the door to a room nearby. As they watched a man stuck his head out, saw them and screamed some word in Sycarian. As he did the steps quickened.
"I’ll stop this one," Dyak nodded toward the figure just coming into view.
Eurybia took two long steps toward the door and roughly shouldered it aside. It slammed open with a clang and she charged into the room. It was a large bedroom area and in the center of the room was an older Sycarian man. Eurybia strode forward, drawing her pelekys back. Before she could strike she was suddenly struck hard from behind and to her side, causing her to slam to the floor.
"Stupid woman," the Sycarian cackled. "Kill her!" Eurybia rolled to her feet and turned to face her attacker. She could expect no help from Dyak. Not only could she hear his combat, but the door to the room was now closed. Aerope stood before her.
Eurybia could taste blood in her mouth and her side ached whenever she took a deep breath. She shifted her grip on her pelekys. Garok had to given Aerope weapons, but not armor. Eurybia could see the wound just under the left breast.
"I will not fail a second time," she said quietly.
Dyak found Eurybia sitting next to the body of the first Thermiscrian they had encountered. Eurybia had moved the corpse from the stairs and into the first downstairs room. As he watched Eurybia gently placed the severed head on the fallen woman's chest. Dyak could see that Eurybia was shaking. Next to her was the head of an older Sycarian man. From the way the head's eyes bulged and tongue lolled out, Dyak could see that Garok had died by Eurybia's hand, but not her steel.
Dyak laid the pelekys on the ground next to its previous owner. He gently tapped Eurybia on the shoulder. She looked up at him, long streaks ran though the dust and blood that covered her face. He held his arms out to her, wrists together.
"It’s time," Eurybia said quietly. She pushed Dyak's arms away and slowly stood. She looked down at the fallen Thermiscrian again, then turned to face Dyak.
"Leave, Kimbri. We are equals and I’ll not carry you into slavery." She reached down and picked up Garok's head by its hair. She turned and walked away from Dyak, moving slowly and favoring her right leg.
Dyak caught up with Eurybia again as she slowly walked back toward the steading, a torch in her hand. "If I have a daughter, I will name her Eurybia in your honor."
Eurybia threw the torch in the doorway and watched the flames begin to grow in the room beyond. "When you have a daughter, Dyak, you will name her Anippe." She watched the flames grow before she spoke again. "That will honor me."
-FINIS-
ALLIES AND OTHER ENEMIES
Eurybia slid tiredly off her horse's back. While the sturdy bay mare drank from the thin muddy stream, Eurybia poured a helmet full of tepid water over her head. She cursed the fates, and both the commanding generals, for deciding to battle in such an accursed place at the height of summer. Neither the Kimbri chief nor her own Thermiscrian commander were spared her scorn.
Eurybia poured another helmet full of lukewarm water over herself, reflecting on what caused her to be alone here. She was pursuing some fleeing Kimbri warriors with the rest of her cavalry wing, when the handful of fleeing cowards had suddenly stopped and stood their ground. Eurybia and her sisters joyfully scattered them once more, and in the melee Eurybia became separated from the others.
While Eurybia's thoughts ran along their course of cursing fates, leaders, the heat, and her own recklessness; her horse suddenly stopped drinking. The mare pulled up her head, whickered, and swung her ears forward. Seeing this, Eurybia tried to calm her horse.
"What is it, Cyme?" Eurybia stroked the mare's nose as she spoke. "What do you sense?" looking in the direction indicated by Cyme’s ears Eurybia saw only the tough bushes that grew stubbornly along the edge of the stream and out on the sun baked plains.
As she watched one of the bushes moved slightly in the direction opposite the wind was blowing. Eurybia pulled her bow from the case on her saddle and nocked an arrow.
"Come out!" Eurybia called as she drew back and aimed at the heart of the bush. The bush parted and a Kimbri warrior limped out with an arrow in his thigh. For a moment the Kimbri and Thermiscrian regarded one another from across the small stream.
After a few heart beats the Kimbri drew his lybrilum, that strange combination of axe and short spear the Kimbri used, from off his back. Swinging it down, he buried the bloodied head into the bank of the stream. He took off his helmet, placing it on the lybrilum's butt. He shrugged off the harness holding the lybrilum's sheath, and removed his ring-mail tunic. The Kimbri warrior then crossed the stream, sans armor and weapons, to stand calmly in front of Eurybia. Kneeling clumsily, he bowed his head in the manner Eurybia knew was the Kimbri way of surrender.
Eurybia wasn't sure what to do. All the Kimbri she had seen this day had either fought to the death, or cast aside their weapons and clung to a Thermiscrian thigh piteously pleading to have their lives spared. None had submitted in this dignified manner. She slowly released the tension on her bow.
"Speak!" Eurybia commanded in one of the few Kimbri words she knew. "How named?"
"I am Dyak," the Kimbri said without lifting his head, "and I submit to the better warrior." Eurybia was surprised he spoke her own language with only the faintest hint of an accent.
"I am Eurybia ni-Clonie," she said in the formal manner of the Thermiscrian surrender ceremony, "and I accept your surrender." Pausing for a moment she added, "You speak our language very well."
"It’s my duty, daughter of Clonie. Dyak slowly sat down and grasped the shaft of the arrow protruding from his thigh. "With your permission.
"By all means, Eurybia said as she put her bow back in its case. "Don't twist it; we barb our arrows." Opening her saddlebag Eurybia removed some bandages and a long coil of rope. She tossed the bandages to Dyak. "When we get back to camp the surgeons will dress your wounds properly."
As Eurybia watched, Dyak carefully spread open his wound with two fingers. Sucking his breath through clenched teeth he reached in with two fingers to grasp the head of the arrow. He took two more deep breaths and then held his breath as he yanked the arrow out. One barb caught and tore a bit of his flesh, but not too seriously.
By the time Eurybia had returned from retrieving Dyak's arms and armor, he had finished with his wound. He was sitting quietly, head down, hands by his side, and a bandage wound around his thigh.
"Can you travel?" Eurybia asked as she tied his weapons and armor to the back of her saddle. Dyak nodded and Eurybia retrieved her rope and a short length of halter strapping.
"Good. Hold out your hands." Dyak complied, his wrists together.
"I assure you I won't try to escape or harm you. You have my oath." Eurybia shrugged as she bound his wrists with the leather halter strap.
"I'm sure you're a man of your word." She tested the strength of the bindings around Dyak's wrists. "I just won't stake my life on it." Hauling Dyak to his feet, Eurybia attached one end of the rope to the leather strap and the other end to a ring on her saddle.
Eurybia swung into the saddle and turned Cyme back toward the Thermiscrian main camp. She kept Cyme at a slow trot so Dyak could keep up without too much strain. Eurybia wondered if this Kimbri could even fathom or appreciate the honor she was showing him.
"You’re unlike any other Kimbri I've met," Eurybia commented as they slowly progressed toward the main camp.
"How so?" Dyak asked as he limped next to Eurybia's horse. The pace was slow enough he could keep up without strain, but each step was still extremely painful.
"You speak our language for one thing. Your armor is much lighter than the others I have seen," Eurybia looked closely at Dyak, "and your hair and eyes are as dark as mine or any of my sisters. Every other Kimbri I've seen have red-gold hair and pale eyes."
"I was born in the lands that border your Sycarian allies. My mother was a member of one of the border patrols you regularly send. According to my father she returned to Thermiscria when I was five seasons old because I was male. My father insisted I keep my mother's native tongue so he could trade across the border without having to use a Sycarian to represent him." Dyak tried to shrug, but was pulled up short.
"As for the rest, I’m a scout of sorts. My job is to find the size and shape of the enemy. During battle I am to harry like the wolf."
They went on in silence for awhile, Eurybia watching the surrounding terrain. Dyak limped lost in his thoughts. "What is going to happen to me," he asked after a moment. "We’ve heard stories about what you Thermiscrians do to your prisoners."
"I'm sure the stories you've heard are no worse than the ones we've heard about you." Eurybia turned in her saddle to look at Dyak. "After you’re treated by the surgeons, you'll go into the prisoner stockade. If you can't be ransomed immediately it's likely you'll either be given to me as a war prize, or sold. Either way you'll end up a slave." Eurybia could not help but notice the way Dyak's face fell when she mentioned slavery.
"Are they still spreading that tale about us castrating our slaves?" Dyak nodded, and Eurybia chuckled. "Why do you think we take male prisoners? It's the only way we can get enough men to keep our population up. We're not exactly overwhelmed by men willing to live by our rules." Dyak nodded but still didn't appear relieved.
Eurybia looked Dyak over very measuringly. "Broad chest, good shoulders, and as a bonus you look like one of us. I can definitely see potential." Turning forward, Eurybia spared Dyak the sight of her smile at his barely repressed shudder.
Eurybia became nervous the closer they came to the main camp. Frequently she reigned Cyme in, whistled loudly and waited a few long silent moments before kicking the mare forward again. The pickets that should have greeted them three long bow shots from the tents were no where to be found. As they neared the final hill before the camp, Eurybia became even more nervous. Over six score Thermiscrians and nearly three score horses should have filled the area with noise. There should have been the wine-and-fear-fueled loud talk and shouts of the survivors, the clang of the field smiths hastily repairing the tools of combat, and if nothing else the screams and groans of those being treated by the surgeons. Yet, she heard none of this. She only heard the breeze and the grunts of hogs in their pens.
They saw the first body, an unarmored Thermiscrian killed by arrows, as soon as they rounded the hill. She had been shot in the back and next to her body on a patch of dampened ground were the fragments of the water jars she had been carrying. As they rounded the hill more of the camp became visible. Everywhere Kimbri and Thermiscrian mixed in the commonality of death. Tents and stockades lay ruined and burning.
Eurybia and Dyak looked on as the vultures and other scavengers feasted on the corpses. Pigs, brought by both sides to serve as food, rooted around and ate the entrails of the dead. Eurybia, with Dyak stumbling after, rode silently into the charnel scene. It was too much for them to comprehend. They could only acknowledge the overall effect, their minds refusing for the moment to see the individual details.
Everywhere there were bodies. Some were hacked apart by pelekys, the heavy doubled headed axe favored by Thermescrian foot soldiers. Some were chopped and stabbed by Kimbri lybrilum. Many were pierced by arrows of both Kimbri and Thermiscrian fletching. It was evident that the wounded were not even spared; some had died in trails of their own blood and piss.
Suddenly they both heard a thin scream from somewhere before them. One of the Thermiscrians was trying to weakly fight off the hog that was eating her leg. Without a word Eurybia snatched up her bow, nocked an arrow, and shot the hog through the neck. She vaulted from Cyme and ran over to the fallen warrior. Unable to do anything, Dyak studied the bodies of the fallen nearest to him.
When Eurybia reached the fallen warrior she could see why the warrior had so much trouble with the pig. The warrior's side was pierced and her breath was leaving blood tinged bubbles on her lips.
"Sister," the warrior gasped out. She grabbed Eurybia's arm with terrifying strength. "They...attacked!"
"Shhh, save your strength." Eurybia tried to get the woman to lay back down, but she continued to fiercely grip Eurybia's arm.
"Don't....turn your...back!" The woman collapsed, gasping. "Don't let them have...me." She grabbed Eurybia's arm again staring into Eurybia's eyes. "Kill me! Kill...me...burn...me."
Eurybia nodded. There was nothing she could do for the woman, the surgeons were dead, and she knew nothing of healing. Eurybia drew out her dagger and loosed the other woman's breastplate.
The woman smiled slightly and lay back. "I am Aerope ni-Speio." She helped guide Eurybia's dagger so the point rested above her heart.
"I am Eurybia ni-Clonie." Eurybia said quietly as she placed a hand over Aerope's eyes. Aerope squeezed Eurybia's wrist once, then Eurybia leaned her weight on the dagger, plunging it into Aerope's heart. Aerope gasped, jerked once, then went still with a long exhalation.
Eurybia pulled the dagger out and wiped it clean on a nearby piece of cloth. She tried to ignore the burning in her eyes as she lay the dagger on Aerope's chest. Eurybia sat back on her heels, knuckling her eyes, and sniffing long and deep. She would not cry...now.
Eurybia sat there turning Aerope's words over in her mind. Who were "they," and why had they attacked so? She looked over toward Cyme and Dyak as she thought. As she watched Dyak pulled a hand axe out of the chest of a Kimbri corpse; then turning he buried it in the head of a fallen Thermiscrian warrior.
"Lying BASTARDS!!!" Snatching up the nearest weapon Eurybia charged toward Dyak. At her cry he looked up and froze as she bore down on him, pelekys raised high.
Rolling out of the way of her strike at the last moment, Dyak grabbed the shield of the Thermiscrian he had just buried the axe in. He was on his back, shield raised as Eurybia bashed again and again with the heavy axe.
"Coward!" Eurybia hissed chopping hard at the shield. Dyak lashed out with his good leg, catching Eurybia hard in the ankles. She stumbled back, tripping over a corpse, and fell-her helmet ringing as it struck a dead Thermiscrian's breastplate. Dyak scrambled over toward Eurybia as she lay there stunned. He threw himself on top of Eurybia pinning her beneath the shield.
"Look around you!" He screamed at her. She struggled, nearly pushing Dyak off. He leaned his weight against the shield and headbutted Eurybia sharply on the bridge of her nose. The sudden sharp pain caused her to stop struggling. "Most of the Kimbri died bound and hobbled."
Eurybia rolled her head to the side. She saw a huge Kimbri lying nearby. He had been hacked in the back of the legs, then his back had been laid open. His bound hands were stretched out before him, fingers clawing the dirt. His face was contorted in a look of fear and pain. Close by she could see three other Kimbri bodies all with their hands bound.
"I see," Eurybia said warily. Dyak nodded, slid off her, and tossed the shield to the side. He reached down to help her up, and Eurybia noticed his hands were still bound.
"Why did you do that?" she pointed at the Thermiscrian with the hand axe buried in her head. Dyak showed Eurybia a Kimbri body on the other side of Cyme. This Kimbri was fully armored and armed. All around him were the bodies of Thermiscrians and bound Kimbri.
"I saw that man die, five bowshots from where I surrendered to you, clutching that arrow in his neck." A splintered arrow shaft protruded from the neck, and the front of the corpse's armor was stained rust with dried blood. The corpse's face was also split deeply by a cleaving stroke, but there was no blood below that wound. "There were no other wounds when I last saw him."
Dyak ran a finger through the face wound and held it up for Eurybia to see. "What kind of wound bleeds no blood?" He asked and then pointed to the Thermiscrian.
"A wound on a corpse," Eurybia finished quietly. She looked at Dyak and motioned for him to raise his arms up. He did so and Eurybia untied his hands.
"Help drag the bodies into the main tent," she said as she bent down to tie a loop around each of his ankles with the long strip between. "We will build a pyre in the morning."
"I won't try..." Dyak started to say, but Eurybia cut him off.
"Not right now."
It took the two of them the rest of the day to drag all the bodies into the main tent and strip them of their equipment. The Thermiscrian bodies were laid out neatly in rows inside the tent, the Kimbri were stacked like cordwood outside. The last was at Dyak's insistence; "They are nothing, treat them as such."
The sun was well down by the time they had used the last of the weapons and armor to create a makeshift fence. It would keep out all but the boldest scavengers. Eurybia stood silently staring at the bodies while Dyak shuffled over to the area they had cleared near the prisoner stockade and started a small fire to boil their food over.
They ate their meager meal in silence. Dyak finally cleared his throat then held his hands out toward Eurybia. She looked at his hands without comprehending.
"Now?" he asked. Eurybia thought for a moment and slowly shook her head from side to side. She tied Dyak's wrists together as she had before, then attached a piece of rope from his bindings to a ring set in the stockade wall.
Both awoke the next morning stiff and sore. They glumly looked around confirming that yesterday had indeed occurred. Eurybia released Dyak, but hobbled him once again.
"Not yet," was all she would say. Once again they ate silently, hardly looking at or tasting the food they shoveled into their mouths.
The sun was in the center of the sky by the time the pyre was built. Every scrap of wood, fabric, and every drop of oil was used to build a pyre large enough and hot enough to burn all the bodies. Every scrap save the main tent and what had been used in building the fence. Without even saying so they considered these off limits.
When the fire burned hot enough, Dyak and Eurybia turned to their task. They dismantled the fence and began dragging the Kimbri bodies to the fire and throwing them in. They tried to ignore the sounds as each body was thrown on the fire. They tied damp cloths around their nose and mouth to block out the stench of the bodies and the smell of the smoke from the fire. They didn't say a word to each other as they threw the score of Kimbri bodies on the pyre.
As soon as the last Kimbri body was tossed on to the pyre, Eurybia immediately returned to the tent. Dyak stood staring at the fire. Even though his people said the body was empty once the soul left, he still felt it wasn't proper to have them burn without at least one person paying some respect. He turned to see Eurybia standing at the opening to the tent. He limped up next to her. She just stood there shaking.
Without saying anything she pointed into the tent. Dyak looked in. The back of the tent had been ripped open, and in the neat rows of Thermiscrian fallen there were five empty spaces. Eurybia was staring at one space in particular. Dyak remembered they had put the warrior Eurybia had released from pain there.
"We must hurry before the pyre burns too low," Dyak said quietly. Eurybia didn't say anything; she just stepped forward, picked up a body, and slowly marched back toward the pyre. As she passed Dyak heard her mutter, "I failed a Final oath to a fallen sister."
It took well into the fall of night to put the five score Thermiscrians on the pyre. After the last body had been placed in the fire Eurybia stood staring into the flames, she was swaying slightly and hum/chanting under her breath. Dyak stood respectfully near her. Far enough not to seem to crowd her, but close enough to stop her should she try and join her comrades in the fire.
Suddenly she stooped, snatched a branch out of the fire, and in one smooth turning motion threw the burning brand onto the tent. As the tent began burning Eurybia turned back to the pyre and resumed her chanting. Dyak slowly shook his head; it seemed Thermiscrians were as destructive in death as they were in life.
Dyak woke up with a start, and squinted at the sun. He didn't remember falling asleep, just watching Eurybia swaying and chanting in front of the pyre. He struggled to sit up and found his hands bound. He didn't remember that either. Eurybia was sitting looking at the dying embers of the pyre. She turned at the sound of his struggles. Her eyes were reddened and hollowed by smoke and exhaustion.
"They come today," she said quietly. Dyak looked puzzled. "These were foot," Eurybia said as she indicated the pyre, "the cavalry comes today."
"Eurybia," Dyak said quietly. She didn't seem to comprehend him. She seemed to be staring at the ground near his foot.
"Eurybia!" he said sharply. She slowly looked him in the eyes. "It has been two days. They've seen the fires. Your cavalry carries little extra water, and no food. If they were coming, they would be here."
"We will wait till night fall," Eurybia said very slowly. "If they do not come, we will start toward the fortress in the morning." Dyak shut his mouth rather than argue. He struggled to his feet and began pacing the camp. Eurybia watched him for a moment then turned back to the embers of the pyre.
Dyak walked, muttering to himself. By surrendering to her, he had pledged before the gods that neither through his action, nor inaction would he allow any harm to come to Eurybia. She was supposed to be bound in the same manner to him, but what did Thermescrians know of such oaths.
He cursed the gods for making him bind himself to one made senseless by grief. He kicked his way through the ashes of the main tent looking for anything that might have survived and been useful. He found nothing save some lumps of molten precious metals. A couple of days ago he would have killed to possess them, now they were nothing. As he made his way to where the rear of the tent had been he made a discovery.
There in the dirt right where the rip had been in the back of the tent were tracks. He knelt down and studied the tracks closely. Two parallel ruts formed the border, in between were large cattle hoof marks. The wind was just beginning to dull the edges of the tracks and erase them.
"What interests you, Kimbri?" Eurybia called from her seat by the fire. She wondered what drew him so to that one spot.
"Tracks," Dyak called back. "An ox drawn cart was here."
"Those are from when we first set camp. They mean nothing." Eurybia lay her head between her arms, still rocking slightly as she sat. She was exhausted in body and spirit. She desperately wanted to wake up from this nightmare and find herself back in the tent with the rest of her Sisters. She would laugh with them about this crazy dream, and wash the taste of it out of her mouth with whatever good wine Anippe had managed to smuggle from the fortress.
The burning in her eyes returned. Eurybia knuckled her eyes again. It still wasn't time.
"You set this camp two days before the battle." Eurybia turned her head and looked at Dyak. Even though he couldn't read her expression too well at this distance he knew what it was.
"I was watching," he pointed to a nearby hill and the large clump of bushes on it's crest. "The winds have long erased those tracks. These are from the night before last." Eurybia struggled to her feet and walked over to Dyak. Her nightmare was deepening.
Dyak watched Eurybia as she staggered toward him. She was so exhausted a Kimbri child first picking up weapons could defeat her. There were enough weapons lying about, it would be nothing to cut his bonds and end his servitude in one quick slash across her throat or thrust through her heart. Dyak watched the sun glint slightly off the edge of a nearby lybrilum. He shook his head and resumed watching Eurybia's erratic approach. Coward men may call him, but the gods would never call him oath-breaker.
Eurybia kneeled and looked at the tracks herself. "Only jackals on two legs need a cart." She looked off in the direction the cart tracks pointed. "All that lies within easy distance that way is the holding of Garok."
"Garok?" Dyak said questioningly. He leaned down to help Eurybia to her feet. She seemed to stare at the bindings on his wrists, as if surprised they were still there.
"He is the Sycarian who holds these lands." Eurybia, with Dyak's help, rose unsteadily to her feet. "He warned us about your crossing the border."
As Eurybia watched she saw the change come over Dyak. His shoulders tightened and his eyes narrowed. She noticed the lybrilum near Dyak's hand but said nothing. If he wanted to kill her she could offer no resistance.
"It was a Sycarian who called us here," Dyak whispered. Eurybia saw the muscles in his jaw twitching slightly. "He said he held these lands and was tired of rule by women." Dyak looked in Eurybia's eyes as he finished, "his name was Garok."
Eurybia nodded slowly. She turned and began stumbling back to where their blankets lay. Dyak walked beside her, not touching her, but when Eurybia appeared to nearly fall his shoulder was somehow there for her to steady herself on.
"I wish to sleep," she said when they reached the blankets. Collapsing on them she looked up at Dyak. "Wake me when the sun is four hands from the end of his journey. That will give us enough time to reach Garok's before the moon begins her journey."
Dyak looked down at Eurybia as she made herself comfortable on the blankets. "You trust me."
"I couldn't stop you," Eurybia murmured as she drifted off to sleep.
Eurybia awoke to the gentle touch on her shoulder. "Anippe?" she murmured confused and disoriented.
"It’s time," a faintly accented male voice said from above her. Eurybia opened her eyes and saw Dyak's face. Eurybia was surprised to find herself among the living. Anippe was likely dead, living only in her rapidly fading dreams.
Dyak helped Eurybia to sit up and handed her a mug of vinegary wine. Eurybia drank it without comment. She rose to her feet, then bent down retrieving her armor.
"Armor and arm yourself," Eurybia said sliding the breastplate over her head and then cinching in the side straps. She picked up her pelekys and bow case. She could hear Dyak rummaging around. She turned to look to Cyme. To Eurybia's surprise, save for the saddle, Cyme was ready to go.
Eurybia turned back to face Dyak. He was standing next to her holding a large Thermiscrian shield and carrying a lybrilum. Eurybia noticed his hands were still bound close together. She pulled out a dagger and sawed through the leather thongs.
"Now you can put on armor," she said. Dyak looked at her, but didn't move.
"I can't jog beside your horse in armor."
"We ride double," Eurybia said as she swung a saddle onto Cyme's back. She stiffly leaned down and cinched in the belly strap.
"I won’t tax your horse with the weight," Dyak said as he slung both the shield and lybrilum across his back.
"You fear slavery that much," Eurybia murmured as she swung herself into the saddle. She leaned over to help Dyak up. Dyak swung up behind Eurybia. Eurybia turned Cyme toward the hills and began following the cart tracks.
Two hours into their journey, Eurybia and Dyak found the missing Thermiscrian cavalry. The stench of mass death reaching them as they crested a hill. In the valley below they saw the bodies of a score and seven Thermiscrian cavalry. Even their mounts had not been spared. Here and there among the bodies was the carcass of a horse who had tried to escape once its rider was cut down.
Cyme snorted, and tried dancing away from the stench, but Eurybia firmly pulled her head around and prodded the mare forward. Cyme began to descend into the valley, the whites of her eyes showing and twisting her head this way and that. Eurybia used nearly all her strength controlling the skitterish mare.
As they rode through the valley neither Eurybia nor Dyak looked about them. They no longer wanted to see scavengers at their feast. They did not want to see the expressions on the bloating corpses. As they rode through the slaughter Eurybia was muttering something under her breath. At first Dyak thought she was saying a prayer, until he listened closely and realized she was reciting the names of the dead.
"Do you wish to stop?" Dyak asked quietly. He felt Eurybia stiffen as she warred within herself between necessity and cultural beliefs. To the Thermiscrians, the soul of the departed was trapped in the body until released by the flames of a pyre.
"No," Eurybia whispered hoarsely. "We will honor them when we return." Dyak stayed silent and did not voice the thought that crossed his mind as she spoke.
The bright crescent moon had just begun it's journey across the night sky when Eurybia and Dyak arrived near Garok's holding. It was a simple two story squarish mud brick and rock building, like most of the other small holdings in Sycaria. It sat in a rocky cut between two hills, with the fencing and out buildings for livestock just visible. Few lights showed in the main building's small square windows. As the breeze blew toward them, Dyak and Eurybia smelled cattle-and decaying flesh.
Eurybia reigned Cyme to a halt. The mare's ears were laying back and she was snorting. Eurybia reached over and rubbed Cyme's neck.
"We’ll have to leave her here," Eurybia said over her shoulder.
Dyak had just opened his mouth to answer when he thought he caught a sudden movement directly in front of them. At that moment Cyme screamed and reared back. Dyak, his grip loosened, tumbled off the back of the rearing mare landing hard on the rocky ground. Cyme continued to rear and kick while Eurybia struggled to control her. There was a crunching thud and the figure in front of the plunging horse fell away. Once Eurybia regained control of the mare, she dismounted to check Dyak. He was slowly regaining his feet and groaning.
"Can you fight?" Eurybia asked as she helped Dyak regain his feet. He spat something dark into the dirt of the path and nodded. Together then went over to the wreck of the figure that had risen to block their way. While Dyak knelt to take a closer look, Eurybia glance was enough to see that the corpse was a woman wearing armor and what Cyme's flailing hooves had done to the woman's head. Eurybia turned away, she had no desire to see another of her sisters dead. She busied herself calming Cyme and hobbling the mare.
"She was not one of your sisters, daughter of Clonie," Dyak said quietly after some moments. "She was one of mine." Eurybia was caught by the formality of his phrasing, an inferior addressing a superior, and the flatness of his voice. She turned to look at Dyak as he kneeled near the body. As she took a longer look at the body she noticed the armor was the same heavy scale favored by Kimbri warriors. She also saw a long braid of red-gold colored hair now tied to Dyak's belt.
Eurybia looked to the steading. She could see more lights now in the building and two figures, backlit by the lights from the steading, making their way toward her and Dyak. She drew her pelekys as she spoke to Dyak. "Kill all that we find. I will take Garok's head to decorate a spear at the fortress."
Dyak nodded and stood. He drew his lybrilum and turned toward the figures that were approaching from the steading. The figures were those of a pair of Sycarian servants. Both were older men armed only with long knives and loud voices. They did not even see the warrior pair until too late. Dyak slammed his shield into the face of the one on the right. As the older man stumbled back and fell stunned, Dyak chopped across his throat with the lybrilum. Any cry the man may have made was lost in the red bubbling ruin of his neck.
Eurybia swung her pelekys in a whistling side arm stroke and buried it deeply into the side and chest of the man on the left. He started to look down in shock at his side, then crumpled to the ground with Eurybia's pelekys still buried deep in his torso. Stepping down hard on the dying man's neck, Eurybia wrenched her weapon free from between his broken ribs.
Eurybia and Dyak forced their way into the main building. They began going from room to room and anyone foolish enough to bar their way, or too slow to flee, soon died under a Thermiscrian pelekys or a Kimbri lybrilum. The pair quickly made their way to the second story, Eurybia leading as they were rounding a corner came face to face with one of Garok's special guards.
In the hallway stood a Thermiscrian warrior. Her right arm hung useless, a cleaving blow had opened her shoulder deep enough to show the bones within. The woman's legs were stained a rusty red from a similar blow across her abdomen. The blood in and around both horrific wounds was the dark brownish red of blood long dried in the sun, and from the warrior came the stench of death three days old. Clutching her pelekys awkwardly in her left hand, the Thermiscrian advanced clumsily toward Eurybia and slowly drew the heavy double bladed axe back for the strike.
Eurybia could easily strike before the other. The movements of the corpse made animate were slow, hesitant and ponderous. Even as the other's pelekys reached the end of the draw back, Eurybia knew she would neither strike the corpse nor dodge the coming blow. She had looked into the black eyes of the other and thought she saw the faintest spark. Even to save herself Eurybia could not, would not, strike one of her sisters. She closed her eyes waiting for the blow.
There was a sharp blow on her upper arm, a splintering crack, and Eurybia was forced hard into the wall. She could hear a sharp cry then a muffled ringing thunk. Dyak had stilled the one who had felled her. Eurybia opened her eyes and looked at her arm. Instead of the ruin she expected there was only the angry red line of a bruise.
She looked over at Dyak who was struggling on the floor with the Thermiscrian, methodically striking with the hand axe he had pulled off the other's belt. Nearby she could see the shield he had picked up at the camp lying shattered near the broken haft of his lybrilum and the severed arm of the Thermiscrian still clutching her pelekys. With a final thunk the form stilled and Dyak leaned back. He cursed, yanked a long jagged wood splinter out of his leg, and looked over at Eurybia.
"Do you want to die?!" When Eurybia did not respond Dyak leaned over, grabbed something and threw it at her. The head of the Thermiscrian bounced off Eurybia's breastplate and landed in her lap. The two familiar dark eyes staring up at her. "That is you. You will decorate Garok's home."
Eurybia looked down into the Thermiscrian's eyes. Even now she thought she could detect a glint or spark deep in those black staring eyes. She slowly closed those eyes and gently set the head on the ground. Eurybia rose, walked over to Dyak and roughly pulled him to his feet.
"Do that again, Kimbri, and you’ll go next to Garok." She reached down, wrenched the pelekys from the dead hand and gave it to Dyak. "Do not break this."
Farther down the hall they could hear the slow step of another walking corpse. They could also see the door to a room nearby. As they watched a man stuck his head out, saw them and screamed some word in Sycarian. As he did the steps quickened.
"I’ll stop this one," Dyak nodded toward the figure just coming into view.
Eurybia took two long steps toward the door and roughly shouldered it aside. It slammed open with a clang and she charged into the room. It was a large bedroom area and in the center of the room was an older Sycarian man. Eurybia strode forward, drawing her pelekys back. Before she could strike she was suddenly struck hard from behind and to her side, causing her to slam to the floor.
"Stupid woman," the Sycarian cackled. "Kill her!" Eurybia rolled to her feet and turned to face her attacker. She could expect no help from Dyak. Not only could she hear his combat, but the door to the room was now closed. Aerope stood before her.
Eurybia could taste blood in her mouth and her side ached whenever she took a deep breath. She shifted her grip on her pelekys. Garok had to given Aerope weapons, but not armor. Eurybia could see the wound just under the left breast.
"I will not fail a second time," she said quietly.
Dyak found Eurybia sitting next to the body of the first Thermiscrian they had encountered. Eurybia had moved the corpse from the stairs and into the first downstairs room. As he watched Eurybia gently placed the severed head on the fallen woman's chest. Dyak could see that Eurybia was shaking. Next to her was the head of an older Sycarian man. From the way the head's eyes bulged and tongue lolled out, Dyak could see that Garok had died by Eurybia's hand, but not her steel.
Dyak laid the pelekys on the ground next to its previous owner. He gently tapped Eurybia on the shoulder. She looked up at him, long streaks ran though the dust and blood that covered her face. He held his arms out to her, wrists together.
"It’s time," Eurybia said quietly. She pushed Dyak's arms away and slowly stood. She looked down at the fallen Thermiscrian again, then turned to face Dyak.
"Leave, Kimbri. We are equals and I’ll not carry you into slavery." She reached down and picked up Garok's head by its hair. She turned and walked away from Dyak, moving slowly and favoring her right leg.
Dyak caught up with Eurybia again as she slowly walked back toward the steading, a torch in her hand. "If I have a daughter, I will name her Eurybia in your honor."
Eurybia threw the torch in the doorway and watched the flames begin to grow in the room beyond. "When you have a daughter, Dyak, you will name her Anippe." She watched the flames grow before she spoke again. "That will honor me."
-FINIS-