The Tiger and the Wolf (17 page)

The Coyote man, who had perhaps the least trustworthy face
Asmander had ever seen, was their main speaker, and his given
name was Two Heads, which turned out to be short for Two
Heads Talking, in that peculiar northern fashion for names.
Even though he had already sworn his agreement over guiding them, Two Heads was suspicious. First he wanted to know
why Eshmir wanted to go to the Many Mouths, who he claimed
would not be pleased to see her.

‘Everyone is glad of the Horse Society,’ she replied implacably.
‘Wolves from all over the Crown of the World have come to
the Many Mouths,’ Two Heads went on. ‘You have chosen an
unlucky season. You should come next year.’

‘We’re here now,’ Venater grunted, ignoring a look from
Eshmir that said she wanted to do the talking. ‘Piss on next
winter.’

‘Seven Skins, the High Chief . . . he passes,’ the Coyote
explained, spreading his hands helplessly. ‘Not a good time for
strangers to come near the Jaws of the Wolf, or anywhere in the
Wolf’s Shadow. Me and mine, we go where we will, but Horse
. . . ? And these?’ An incredulous nod towards the southerners.

‘Nonetheless, we must travel.’ Eshmir tried unsuccessfully to
talk over him. She glanced at Asmander. ‘We all have our duty.’
‘Of course we will take you.’ This was the Crow man with his
half-darkened face. Currently he was eyeing them with the
unpainted half, the other eye glowering past them at the sloping
roof. ‘You must have gifts for the road, though. You Horse, you
always carry gifts.’
‘You’ve had your price,’ Eshmir told him flatly. The currency
had not been coin, which apparently was something alien to the
cold north, but in future favours from the Horse.
‘We? Yes, yes.’ The Crow bobbed his head. ‘There will be
others.’
‘The Hetman said nobody travels in winter,’ Eshmir stated,
nothing in her face acknowledging how foolish that made her
own mission sound.
‘Winter?’ The Crow chuckled deep in his throat. ‘This is not
winter. If we are not with the Many Mouths when true winter
comes, then you will all die.’
‘And you?’ Asmander asked, not as a challenge but from genuine curiosity.
‘I, Black Man? I shall fly away.’

There were only two steeds left for them, so Eshmir and one of
her people would get to ride, and the rest must walk. Their supplies – a reluctant gift from the outgoing Horse Hetman – were
distributed over every set of shoulders that would consent to
bear them, which meant everyone except Venater.

‘How do
you
get to go without?’ Shyri asked him, then she
cast a look at Asmander, with a flash of white teeth. ‘You have a
disobedient slave.’

Venater lunged for her, utterly without warning, and yet she
slipped beyond his clawing grasp, quite ready for him. ‘Are you
not his slave?’ she asked delightedly, her voice bouncing back
from the inside of the stockade.

‘I’m no man’s slave,’ the pirate spat.
‘Then what are you, old man?’
Asmander watched with interest as the pirate tried twice to

answer her, murder glinting in his eyes.
‘He is mine,’ the Champion announced at last, when Venater
had suffered long enough. ‘That is all.’
‘For just so long,’ Venater got out. ‘And then I will be my own
again, and I will have my name back, and then I will kill you,
boy. I
will
!’
The others – especially the three northerners – stared,
because what was going on was something they simply did not
do
, not here where names were cheap and they did not understand. Chiefly they could not understand the sudden warmth of
Asmander’s smile.
‘You will try,’ he agreed. ‘And who knows, perhaps this time
you will succeed.’
Venater’s stony eyes flicked away from him to their audience,
then to Shyri. ‘So what? You’ll make me your pack dog?’
‘Never,’ Asmander assured him, his smile still there but hard.
‘I’ve loaded you with so much weight already that another grain
of corn might break you.’
He never knew the precise limits of Venater’s temper – surely
there was a point where the man would just snap, fly into the
mad rage he had once been famed for, and so give up any
chance of reclaiming his name and his soul from Asmander’s
keeping. For a second, those eyes seemed desperate, hunted,
lost. The look in them was such that Asmander regretted his
words, because he had never been one to find joy in torture.
Then, incredibly, the man’s teeth were bared in a hard crescent. ‘Oh, boy, I’m stronger than you know.’ And the hurt was
gone, and they were grinning at each other.
Look at what we’ve
learned about each other.
‘But I’ll still not carry for you.’
The expressions of the others, when Asmander looked
around at them, were utterly bewildered, profoundly disturbed.
All except Shyri: she had been mightily entertained, he saw.
The Laughing Men did not care about understanding others:
that was her secret. He envied her the contentment it must
bring.
Once on the road, he placed himself at the front – beside Two
Heads Talking and his trade-wife, whatever that was. They
regarded him warily, as though he might suddenly do . . . anything, he supposed. He was the alien in their midst, a man of
different skin and shape and customs.
‘But tell me,’ he addressed them, ‘if the Wolves are so dangerous to outsiders, why go there yourself? Surely the Horse’s
favour cannot be worth endangering your skins? Or are coyotes
enough like to wolves for you to avoid their wrath?’
Two Heads regarded him morosely. ‘We need to be somewhere for winter. We came to the Horse too late, and now
home’s too far. At least your Horse woman will get us in
amongst the Many Mouths. Winter has more teeth than all the
Wolves in the world.’
‘Never say a Coyote is a Wolf,’ his wife spoke up. ‘But in their
eyes we’re not worth shedding blood for.’ She grinned ferally.
‘Not when they’ve got you.’

The attack came three days later, when they were all worn down
from journeying and numb from the cold. The day before there
had been snow, though light enough that Two Heads Talking
had advised simply pressing on. On the morning that they
fought, the sky was utterly clear – a pale blue that Asmander had
never seen before.

Their guides were earning their keep. Whilst Two Heads led
the way, his trade-wife – her northern name was Quiet When
Loud – was forever straying off and coming back with game or
even fish. The Crow cooked and tended the fire, and while they
were camped he sometimes sang, strange wordless songs that
made the hairs stand up on the back of Asmander’s neck. He
went by the name of Ragged Sky, but by now Asmander had
worked out that they each of them had another name, a real
name, that they did not share with mere strangers. They were an
untrusting people here in the Crown of the World, keeping their
names in darkness.

That day, Asmander had noticed a number of large birds
dark against that strange sky, but had thought nothing of it. In
truth, he needed most of his concentration focused on the
ground. This Crown of the World was the most jagged country
he had ever seen, as though great spirits had broken it apart
with hammers in ancient times, and then some of it had grown
over with grass and thick stands of slope-boughed trees. Water
wormed through it everywhere, and much of the time their path
was along the cut of some streambed. Right now they were
ascending, in steps and lurches, along the channel that a river
had carved into a steep hillside, the water’s work making the
unscalable into the merely laborious. The flow of water itself had
atrophied to little more than a brook, the result of the oncoming
freeze creeping down on them from the north.

With the rocky ground rising away from them on both sides,
this was the obvious point for an ambush. Even before the trouble started, Asmander found himself feeling tense. Ahead of him,
the stomping form of Venater already had his
meret
to hand,
weighing its comforting heft with every step.

Then Ragged Sky appeared alongside Eshmir’s horse, tugging
at her boot as she guided the animal over the uneven ground.
‘You should have your gifts ready,’ he advised. ‘You will need
them.’
Two Heads Talking shot him a sharp look and then cocked an
eye towards the sky. He put his fingers to his mouth and gave a
piercing whistle. For a moment Asmander thought he was actually calling down the ambush there and then. Only Quiet When
Loud came at his summons, leaping and bounding down the
slope in her skinny little dog-like shape, before Stepping back to
human form beside him.
Asmander took up his
maccan
, resting the flat of the toothed
wooden blade on his shoulder. Their three guides were plainly
tense, but not enough to suggest that they were about to fight
for their lives.
‘Pirates,’ Venater declared, and Asmander nodded. That was
the business with the gifts, of course. Whoever was about to
make themselves known could apparently be bought off.
At that moment there came a sound out of the sky, starting
just beyond the limit of hearing and building swiftly into a sawedged shriek that split the ears. Asmander looked about wildly,
ducking aside as one of the horses started stamping and plunging, its rider sliding off it but still holding tight to the reins.
Some of the Horse had their bows strung, but the strange sound
ripped into them, making them cluster together, fumbling their
arrows.
Another high-pitched, savage voice joined the throng, and
then a third. They came from above and all around, and
Asmander saw those winged shapes passing and re-passing,
stooping from on high and then climbing back into the cold and
cloudless heavens.
Abruptly they started dropping down on all sides of the travellers, to end up perched on rocks and outcroppings overlooking
the riverbed. They swooped with negligent speed, the
nerve-shredding screaming arriving with them, stopping as they
stopped. They came down as hawks but, when they landed, it
was as men.
They were harsh-looking and barbarous creatures, to
Asmander’s eyes. They were still northerners, but their faces
were craggier, with sharper noses and mad staring eyes. Like
Ragged Sky, each had half his face painted, but they had used
jagged patterns of black and red and white, so that when they
glared with the eye on that side, it seemed to be at the centre of
a storm. They wore surprisingly little, despite the cold: cloaks
and breeches, their bare chests painted with designs of lightning
and wings and eyes. Some had bracers and greaves and long
hauberks all made of ranks of bones laced together. For weapons they carried spears, and curved war-clubs with vicious
bronze beaks. Many had odd lengths of wood strapped to their
ankles, cut with holes, like flutes. With a sudden understanding
Asmander realized that these must be the source of that terrifying sound as they dropped through the air.
The Horse had formed a solid group, standing back to back.
Asmander, Venater and Shyri were each on their own, looking
for room to fight. Eshmir stepped forward, apparently to
address the newcomers, but Two Heads Talking quickly gestured
for her to stop.
‘Do I see Yellow Claw?’ he called out to the newcomers, and
then, ‘These are his warband, are they not? Where is he?’
For a moment all fell still, the newcomers staring at them
from their painted eyes, spears and clubs at the ready. Then a
shadow passed over them all, and a vast winged form circled
close overhead before displacing one of the raiders to claim his
perch. It was white as the snow, and whilst the hawk shapes of
the others had seemed smaller than their human forms, this bird
could have looked Asmander in the eye. It was surely large
enough to carry away a man in its talons.
A Champion among birds
, he realized, awed by the thought.
When it fixed a single orange eye upon him, he had to work
hard to face up to that burning regard.
Then it was a man in armour of bones and claws and quills.
Curving struts of wood, thick with feathers, jutted above his
shoulders, so that even standing on human feet he was winged.
‘You sully my name, old dog,’ he reproached Two Heads, and
then, as a kind of formal announcement to the rest of them: ‘I
am Yellow Claw. I swoop on man and bear alike. In the wake of
my wings I hear the cries of my enemies, the wailing of their
women.’
Venater made a small sound that was a surprisingly subtle
indication that he was not over-fond of Yellow Claw.
‘Yellow Claw, these travellers of the Horse Society are not
enemies of the Eyrie,’ Two Heads went on, speaking quickly.
‘They simply pass through these lands, as the Horse often does.
I know even the Eyrie trades with the Horse.’
Yellow Claw cast a sour look towards Ragged Sky, who had
been staying very still and silent. ‘Let the Bone Pickers do whatever they wish. That we permit them to reside under the shadow
of our wings is more than they deserve.’ He hopped to another
perch, his men moving around him, watching for his lead. ‘But
these are not my enemies, you say?’
‘No indeed, Yellow Claw.’
‘What can they be then?’ He thrust out a bare foot and
walked onto thin air. In that instant he had Stepped, his colossal
wingspan blotting out the sun for a moment as he ghosted down
to them, becoming a man again as he reached the ground. The
buffeting of his wings rocked the travellers.
‘Friends, with gifts,’ Eshmir explained, but Yellow Claw
looked through her as though she was not there. Only when Two
Heads echoed her words did the Eyrieman appear to hear them.
‘Show me these gifts.’ He was easily close enough for Asmander
to attack him. Worse, he was close enough for Venater to do so,
too, which seemed more likely. There was a confidence about
the man, like stone, though. He stood there before them fully
armoured in his belief in himself, in his status as a Champion.
If I Step . . . ?
But Asmander knew the answer to that.
It would
be a challenge to this Yellow Claw that he could not ignore. And I
don’t think even my vaunted honour will give me wings to match
his.
He had no idea how these Eyriemen lived or what flaws held
them back from being a power like the Wolf. Or perhaps they
were so, in other parts of the Crown. He was finding his ignorance pressing in on him from all sides.
The gifts were some goldwork from the south, some turquoise and jade. None of it seemed notable to Asmander’s eyes,
but he guessed it seemed exotic enough when brought to these
cold places. Yellow Claw looked at it all derisively, but he nevertheless snatched it from Two Heads Talking in a single swift
motion. Then he went stalking over to stare at the southerners.
‘Black man,’ he noted. ‘Why are you here, Black Man from
the south?’
‘Drawn by the wonders of the north,’ Asmander told him.
Yellow Claw stared at him, first with one eye and then the
other: war; peace; war; peace. He turned back to Two Heads.
‘You have many women here, Two Heads Talking,’ he noted.
The Coyote held himself quite still. ‘Not really so many.’
‘More than enough for an old man. Too many perhaps. Gifts,
you said.’
It was not reassuring to see the sudden hunted expression
appear on their guide’s face. Ragged Sky had started shuffling
away from the others, too, as though trying to deny any connection.
‘Yellow Claw . . .’ Two Heads started. His hand reached out
and found his wife’s.
‘I know Quiet When Loud. She is funny,’ Yellow Claw
observed. ‘Quiet when loud, loud when quiet. I know her. I do
not insult you, to suggest I seize on her. But so many women.
Horse women. Plains women.’
‘Yellow Claw knows the ways of the Horse Society,’ Two
Heads said carefully.
‘You walk under my skies, Two Heads. This is a hard season
for travelling. It is good that you have gifts. Gift me a woman,
Two Heads Talking. Then you may have the blessing of the
Eyrie for a year and a day.’
Two Heads’ eyes flicked from Yellow Claw to Eshmir. ‘They
are not in my gift.’
‘If they are not yours, then they are for the taking,’ Yellow
Claw suggested, his voice softly dangerous.
‘Surely one so great as Yellow Claw has many mates already,’
Shyri’s voice broke in. When the Eyrieman did not seem to hear
her, she prompted, ‘Tell him that, dog-man.’
Stuttering a little, Two Heads did so.
Yellow Claw laughed, flashing bright teeth. ‘Ah, yes, my nest
is well feathered. But I have many followers, and some must
return to a cold bed. Look at them.’ A broad gesture towards the
predatory gathering around them. ‘Have pity, Two Heads, and
share your bounty.’
‘Have him pick one such, and I shall wrestle him,’ Shyri intervened. ‘If he beats me, say I’ll go with him. If he cannot beat me,
he’s no man and I’ll have none of him.’
The Coyote opened his mouth, but that boast was apparently
too amusing for Yellow Claw to ignore. He regarded Shyri with
his disparate gazes and laughed again. ‘Oshkyr, come down
here. Your wife wants to know you.’
One of the Eyriemen – younger, but still a broad-shouldered,
strong-framed man – jumped up, Stepping at the apex of his
leap and then feathering his way down to stand as a man by
Yellow Claw’s side.
‘You’ll go with him, will you?’ Asmander murmured to Shyri.
‘We don’t all have your honour, Champion, nor do we all
keep our word,’ she growled back. ‘You’re lucky that I don’t
intend to lose.’
She strode forwards: a match for this Oshkyr in height, but
more slender.
Yellow Claw clapped his protégé on the back. ‘Go teach your
wife,’ he told him.
The man leapt at Shyri in that moment, obviously planning
to make a quick end of it. She threw herself aside, Stepping for
an extra burst of speed, and then regarded him again from out
of reach. There was a current of jeering laughter from among
the Eyriemen.
‘Watch out, she has an ugly side!’ one of them called.
Oshkyr scowled, and then he darted forwards again. Even as
Shyri came to meet him with teeth and claws, he himself had
Stepped, rising above her and then plunging down. For a
moment he had his claws hooking at her back, but she Stepped
sinuously back into her human shape, his talons merely gouging
her coat. Briefly, he was snarled there, beating his wings hard
enough to yank her off balance. Then she slipped out of it, down
to a sleeveless tunic, and he wheeled away, almost clashing his
wings against the rocky ground and Stepping down to face her,
man to woman.
There were more exclamations from the Eyriemen, some
mocking their fellow, others in loud speculation about how
much more of Shyri would be revealed by the end of the contest. After his initial rash onslaught, Oshkyr was apparently
learning some wisdom, keeping his distance, even backing up
along the side of the river channel. A moment later he had
kicked off, Stepped and was diving on her again with wings
outstretched.
The first time she Stepped and warned him off with her
bared jaws, forcing him to pull up awkwardly, faltering in the air.
Yellow Claw found it hilarious. ‘We’ll need a collar and a muzzle
for her, when we get her back,’ he called out.
Then Oshkyr dropped back into his human shape even as he
fell on her, trusting to his greater weight and the speed of
impact to break her. For a moment Asmander thought he had
succeeded, as Shyri seemed to fall beneath him, but then they
were grappling, and she was holding him off, matching strength
for strength, to Oshkyr’s obvious astonishment. He grimaced
and put his all into the next shove, trying to force her off balance. To Asmander, the Eyrieman’s youth and inexperience
practically screamed out.
Shyri had been waiting for it. She melted away before him,
kicking his front leg out from under him as he shoved, so that
Oshkyr hurtled head over heels past her, tumbling into the shallow draft of the river.
She was on him instantly, smacking his face into the water
and then reaching an arm about his neck. For a second there
was a winged thing struggling for flight there, but then she had
her hold, and he was a man again, straining and struggling to
remove her arm. Asmander watched thoughtfully as she locked
her legs about his waist and began the careful business of strangling him. He had thought Yellow Claw would make some move
to halt the fight, but either he reckoned Oshkyr was due for
some humiliation, or the spectacle of one of his warriors being
beaten by a woman had rendered him speechless.
Strange are the ways of the north . . . or of the Eyrie, anyway
, he
considered. Not unique, certainly, but the traditions of the
Laughing Men were certainly a rude shock to these locals. From
what Asmander remembered, the men of that tribe had been
allowed little enough to laugh about.
Oshkyr had gone purple, eyes bulging, and abruptly his body
went limp, head lolling. Shyri released him, then kicked him over,
none too gently, to keep his face out of the water. ‘This is no
man,’ she announced. ‘You have sent me one of your children.’
For a moment all was still, and Asmander could read something of Yellow Claw’s conflicting thoughts: his desire to avenge
his people struggling against the deal he had made openly
before them.
At the last he laughed, although it sounded forced. ‘Another
year before you earn your name, Oshkyr,’ though that surely fell
on deaf ears.The other Eyriemen sent up a half-hearted murmur
in support.
‘Go, Two Heads Talking.’ Yellow Claw waved dismissively.
‘Take your amusing wife and your amusing friends. Take them
far off.’
The Coyote nodded hastily, looking as though he was surprised to still be alive and, under the stern regard of the Eyrie,
the travellers got under way with as much haste as they could
muster.