Sword in the Storm (57 page)

Brother Solstice nodded. “He is not a man of great honor. He may break his oath.”

“If he does, I shall kill him,” said Conn.

He felt suddenly weary and swung his gaze over the field. Torches had been lit, and a few lanterns were hanging from
spears thrust into the earth. Back in the low ground between the hills he saw Ruathain sitting quietly, his hands resting on his sword hilt, his chin on his hands. Conn smiled and waved. There was no movement from Ruathain, and something cold touched his heart.

He started to run. Bran saw him and followed fast.

Conn arrived and fell to his knees before his father. Ruathain’s dead eyes were staring into the distance, and on his face was a look of great contentment. In the distance the pipes continued to play. Bran knelt beside Conn, tears falling to his cheeks.

For a while they did not touch the dead man but merely sat and watched the fading sun glint on his silver-streaked yellow hair and gleam on his bright mail shirt. Then Conn sat alongside him and drew him into an embrace. Bran sat on the other side and closed Ruathain’s eyes.

“Ah, Big Man,” whispered Conn, his eyes misting with tears, his throat tight. “What will we be without you?” He stroked his father’s hair.

The last of the sunlight blazed across the land, turning the mountains to gold.

And the pipes fell silent.

V
ALANUS STOOD ON
the hills above the dockside, watching the hundreds of commandeered ships moored in Goriasa’s crescent bay. The Stone officer removed his helmet and counted the vessels. Three hundred twenty-three. Jasaray had ordered four hundred. The general would not be pleased.

The sound of scores of women wailing drifted up to Valanus. He glanced down the hillside to see the crowds milling around the execution site. Two hundred Gath prisoners, their arms nailed to twelve-foot beams, were being hoisted high. They will die quickly, thought Valanus. As their bodies drag down on their arms, their throats will constrict, denying air to the lungs. It would have been far more lingering if the general had ordered that their feet be nailed. But Jasaray had been in a good mood since the fall of Goriasa.

He would not be in such a fine mood when he learned that the traitor Ostaran had stolen twelve ships and escaped across the water with almost two hundred of his followers.

“Do not think you will be safe, Osta,” whispered Valanus, his eyes scanning the horizon. “We will follow soon.”

In that moment a cold wind blew across the cliffs. Valanus shivered. “You could catch a chill here, soldier,” said a voice. Valanus spun and saw an old Keltoi woman wrapped in a threadbare shawl.

“You move silently for one so old,” he said, embarrassed that she had frightened him.

“You were lost in thought, man of Stone. Why do you stare across the water?”

“It is where the army of Stone is to journey,” he told her. “We are to fight there.”

“Connavar is there,” she said simply. “Far to the north, but he is there.”

“You know him?”

“We have spoken. And what is it you seek across the water, Valanus?” she asked. He glanced at her sharply, wondering for a moment how she knew his name. Then he relaxed, for did not everyone now know the name of Goriasa’s commander?

“I seek fame,” he told her.

“And you shall have it,” she promised. Her laughter was cold, the sound chilling. “Oh, yes, Valanus. You shall have fame.”