in
Valerium an inferior does not address one of superior rank until he is
addressed first!”
Marcus tossed
his wavy dark hair and sniffed his affront. Cadeyrn continued to look at him.
“Oh,” he
replied, and he turned his back on Marcus and stoked up the fire.
Marcus had
expected a more dramatic response. In Valerium such a statement of superiority
would have prompted an apology from the offending party, and he was puzzled by
the Eirini’s cool dismissal of him. It angered him beyond reason; suddenly all
the bitterness of his captivity erupted from his lips.
“How dare you
turn your back on me!”
Marcus grabbed
Cadeyrn by the arm. Cadeyrn whirled around. He grabbed Marcus’ arm and pulled
it behind his back.
“It is you,
Valerian, who forget who you are addressing!”
Marcus threw
his weight forward onto his right hip. With a mighty heave he sent Cadeyrn
flying over his head. Cadeyrn landed with a sickening thud. For a moment he lay
stunned.
Then, a howl
pierced the night. Not ten feet away stood a snarling, angry black wolf that had
crept up on them like a ghost while the two had been fighting.
With a speed
that took Marcus’ breath away the wolf leapt straight at Cadeyrn, who lay
defenseless on the ground.
Faster than
thought Marcus grabbed the wooden staff that lay by the fire. He passed one end
through the flames and jabbed it at the oncoming wolf. It singed his snout and
the wolf howled and whirled around on Marcus. Marcus brandished the flaming
staff at the wolf again, and as it opened its mouth wide he plunged it down its
throat and stabbed the beast, knocking it to the ground. With one foot on its
belly he continued to twist the staff from side to side in its gaping jaws,
searing its throat and suffocating it. Finally, the wolf lay still and struggled
no more.
Panting for
breath, Marcus turned to Cadeyrn. He helped him to his feet. Cadeyrn stared at
Marcus; then he smiled. He held out his hand.
“I thank you.
In return for saving my life, you are free to go.”
It was now
Marcus who stared.
“Do you mean that?
I am free ?”
“Yes. Go. You
saved my life. I owe you yours. Go.”
Marcus did not
wait for Cadeyrn to change his mind. Cadeyrn raised the staff in salute, as he
had seen Valerian soldiers do. Marcus hesitated, then lifted his arm in the air
with the hand extended in the custom of the Eirini.
Then he flew
down the wind-swept hilltop to freedom.
Chapter IV
The Homecoming
“Keep going,
just keep going,” the words beat through Marcus’ brain. “Almost there, almost
there,” he panted.
Numb with
fatigue, every step was an agony, every breath seemed to pierce his lungs with
sharp stabbing pain. He recalled the words of Valerius of how solders on long
marches forced themselves to focus on something other than the actual trek,
which helped to make the trudging more endurable. Due to the necessity of
secrecy when on the move they could not engage in conversation, so they used a
variety of hand signals to communicate with one another, and had advanced to
the point where they could even speak back and forth through their hands to
while away the monotony of their hike.
But Marcus had
no one to exchange signals with, and it had been a long journey from Erinia.
Having no money to pay the boat fare across the sea which was the shortest
path, he had been forced to take the land route, by far the longer way. Through
the bare woods of November he had wandered uneasily, the trees shorn of the foliage
that would have covered him from inquisitive eyes. He felt as naked as the
trees as every step upon withered leaves that crackled underfoot exposed him to
the keen ear of any foe, human or otherwise, that would track him to his death.
For he knew
that to be seen was to risk capture at the hands of the Eirini, a fierce people
who looked on all foreigners to their lands as an enemy, and one who would not
be tolerated to live. In Eirinia were other terrors as well, the legend of
strange,