And was surprised when the pointed end slid in between the raider's ribs.
Shocked to the point of staring, fortunately Kern's muscles remembered enough to draw the blade free and immediately jab the weapon again at the Vanir. He pumped his arm twice . . . three times. The Vanir took piercing wounds through his ribs, in his shoulder, and finally through the throat as he pitched forward with a dying grunt.
The downhill charge had given Kern's warriors all the momentum they needed. As the raiders staggered up to meet them, they crashed through the thinned line and buried several Vanir under a swarm of flesh and sharp metal. There was a thundering against the ground, cries of rage and pain, and ringing steel as blades and shields met in full force.
Kern smashed one raider in the face with the boss on his shield, kicked him aside to Maev who had taken her place in the line of battle as any Cimmerian woman would be expected to do. She fought back to back with Desagrena, each woman sensing the other's movement and shifting to guard. Maev's arming sword flicked out like a striking snake, pinking the raider in the arm and leg, whittling him down a piece at a time. Then, charged by a fresh warrior, she spun around to face a new threat.
Desa rotated with her, broadsword flashing out, down, and around. Taking the Vanir's head.
The odds were not so uneven anymore. Numbers and raw strength hedged a bit on the side of the raiders, but the momentum of their charge and several heartening cries of “Cimmeria” lent the Gaudic survivors a natural edge. Kern traded sword strokes with a larger man, ducked back from the slashing edge of a bastard sword, and found again that his stabbing sword actually had better length than he would have thought. The difference was apparently in the angle of attackâa slashing sword was held so flat to its intended victim that there was not a huge advantage in reach.
They pressed back and forth, Kern retreating uphill, then pressing back down. He saw raider reinforcements shifting their way. Another dozen northerners. Scattered pairs and trios showed themselves from huts and from the far side of the lodge.
Two dozen. Maybe even three. More than he'd counted at first.
Too many.
Kern's breathing came pitched and ragged, and he tasted blood from a backhanded strike that had smashed the hilt of a broadsword into his mouth. Lucky it wasn't the bladed edge, he decided, spitting out the metallic taste and hammering away at a Vanir's shield. He caught himself using wide, overhead smashing strikes, then remembered his practice again. Short, stabbing strokes. He held to it, even when his muscles quivered to be let free to cut and slash.
Eventually he sneaked in past the other man's guard and laid his thigh open down to the bone. The flap of muscle lay down along the raider's leg, bleeding severely. The Vanir limped back, grinding his teeth in the pain, seeking escape.
Brig Tall-Wood gave it to him. Having waited farther up the hill with Hydallan, he and his hoarded arrows went to work with devastating effect. One took the wounded raider in the stomach.
The next shaft found his throat. The man dropped like a stone.
Staring past where the raider had stood a heartbeat before, Kern was left with a clear line of sight at the advancing frost-man, who obviously saw Kern as well. His yellow eyes read a moment of confusion before feral rage showed through. The raider led forward a fresh knot of Vanir, having been among the closest bands when Kern sprang his trap.
The Ymirish's battle-axe smashed Wallach's wooden buckler into kindling, and possibly broke the man's arm as well.
A back-slashing swing folded Roat, another of the Gaudic prisoners Kern had rescued, over the spiked flange. The clansman screamed as the flange tore out his intestines, spreading them over the ground like so much knotted rope.
“Close up,” Kern yelled, calling his people together. “Form a circle. Protect the wounded!”
The Cimmerians staggered back together, some of them holding the flatter ground at the base of the hill, others shuffling along on the slope. Maev dragged Wallach back by the man's thinning hair. From his yells of complaint, he wasn't too badly wounded.
Desa was, with a long shallow cut bleeding down the side of her ribs. As was the other Southlander rescued from the Vanir. A Brythunian with sandy brown hair and the tattered robes of a noble, or maybe a very successful merchant. All Kern knew about the man was that his name was Prospero, and he wanted to go home as soon as possible.
It wasn't looking likely, with a wicked gash bleeding at his neck and a raider arrow stuck in his shoulder. Nahud'r stood over the Brythunian, protecting him from further injury, but two raiders pressed in, one from each side.
Kern's pack of skirmishers pressed together in a tight knot, bristling with pointed steel. On the slope above, Brig Tall-Wood took two arrows in his side and folded over as if struck by a huge fist. Hydallan rushed to his aid, pulling him back up the hillside, away from the raiders. An arrow stuck into the earth close to the old man's head. Another stabbed near his leg, chasing after him.
The Vanir raiders roared in challenge, and half of them pressed forward with savage blows that rained down on shields and sword edges.
The other half turned and set themselves in a line against a Taurin charge.
Through the shifting wall of flame-haired Vanir and the ash and smoke that hung over the village, Kern caught a glimpse of the lodge and its open bulwarks. A dozen swordsmen and pike-carrying women rushed forward from their abandoned defenses, picking up Vanir stragglers, smashing in behind the raiders' main line.
The first Taurin was too eager, and came up against the frost-haired leader of the raiders with no help and nothing but a broadsword to protect him. The battle-axe came around in a devastating arc, shattering the sword and cleaving deep into the man's chest, knocking him back several paces.
The Ymirish jumped forward, grabbing the dying man by the hair. Chopped once. Twice. Severed his head, and threw it into the middle of the Taurin line.
Kern pushed forward, trying to reach the northern leader, but a pair of Vanir closed the gap and one nearly took Kern's head with a savage broadsword cut. But Reave staggered between Kern and his attacker, blood slick along his arm and staining his leather jerkin, greatsword held forward in a defensive gesture. Clashing steel rang out in sharp, clear tones.
The second raider, this one with red-golden hair that spoke of Aesir parentage, leaped in at Kern. The snarl in his eyes, though, was pure Vanaheim. He slashed with his war sword, the tip clipping the top of Kern's shield and barely missing his right eye. The raider drew back as if to come at Kern again. Then he twisted about as if shoved asideâa pair of arrows sprouting from the back of his shoulder.
Kern quickly sighted back along the path, and found the two archers, both men with bows at full arm's extension. One was Daol, looking grim-faced but determined as he stalked forward in the midst of the Taurin charge.
The other man was Aodh!
Slipping forward, low and fast, Kern's arming sword slid a glancing blow off the raider's ribs. The press of battle swept them apart right after. Kern stumbled over Wallach's outstretched legs, finding the aging warrior stretched out in a mire of snow and muck and blood. The side of his face was bruising a dark purplish color, but he still breathed. Kern got a hand beneath the man's shoulder and dragged him back just as the first horn call sounded across the battlefield.
The frost-man held a great horn to his lips, blowing in strident calls to his warriors. Like quicksilver the band of raiders shattered into pairs and trios, all trading a last few sword strokes or bites with their axes, then sprinting for the cover of nearby brush and forest. There were several clansmen within striking distance of the Vanir leader, but the frost-man kept a healthy knot of warriors around him, enough to make a direct press against him come with a steep price in blood.
The Taurin seemed just as satisfied to let the raiders go.
Kern's people were in no shape to pursue.
One man lay dying painfully, wrapped in his own intestines. Two others lay stretched over the ground with possible grave wounds, and several more limped by with hands clasped around arrow shafts or shallow cuts.
Reave shoved the point of his greatsword into the earth, then sank to his knees while breathing in huge gulps of air. His face was red with exertion, but his shoulder wound did not look too bad. More blood than injured flesh. Maev's scalp cut bled even worse but looked even better.
She wiped blood from her eyes, spit red phlegm into the snow, then set about helping the wounded where she could.
With the raiders quit of the battle and the village, Kern had a job to do as well. He limped over to where Roat lay. The Gaudic clansman grunted through clenched teeth stained red with flecks of bloody froth, still trying to hold his stomach in though both hands weren't enough to cover the ruin the battle-axe had made. A latrine stench boiled out of the steaming wound.
Roat was already dead. His body just hadn't caught up to the fact yet.
“Anything we can do?” Daol asked, dropping to one knee next to Kern and Roat, looking for a miracle. Maev and Aodh knelt next to Daol. Desa and Reave watched from their feet.
“Something,” Kern said, searching the clansman's face.
Roat stared back, eyes wide and unseeing. Unable to talk, or do much other than lie there suffering, he at least heard and understood. He gasped, then nodded in sharp, shivering motions, holding back the screams of pain by sheer force of will.
Which was when Kern stabbed forward in one short, brutal strokeâtaking his own man through the chest and heart. Pinning him to the earth. Finally giving him release from the pain.
13
TAUR DID NOT exactly celebrate the arrival of so many Gaudic warriors. No matter Kern's small band made it possible to break the violent siege of their village, their welcome remained cautious.
To be expected, from people who had known generations of skirmishes and raids between each other.
No more than three Gaudic warriors at a time were allowed inside the lodge defenses. Instead, a large, circular clearing was quickly staked out with poles dangling strips of decorated fur and braids of brightly dyed cloth. Rivalries and feuds were left outside, by tradition.
Women swept away the snow and built several good-sized fires for warmth and for cooking. Soon flat cakes and a small treasure trove of eggs were sizzling in melted fat, replacing the scent of ash and blood. Men carried long tables out from behind the barricade. And stools. Blankets and benches. More food from their dry pits, and fresh cuts of meat from cattle that had been killed in the raid. The Taurin were reluctant hosts, perhaps, but not unthankful for their rescue.
And Kern was just as grateful for their protection of two of his own.
Aodh and Ehmish found the amber-eyed man supervising at the makeshift surgery, worrying for the Gaudic wounded. The two had arrived just before the raiders hit, apparently. Ehmish blamed himself for that.
“I hid longer than I should have,” the youth admitted. “Long after the raiders returned to camp. It was well past the Dragon's turn by the time I rolled out from my spiderhole where I hid, and only because I knew if they came back, they'd see me sure.”
Aodh gestured northeast. “When I finally caught up, he was at the end of a dead run heading north. Too far, I'd say. We completely missed any sign of you as we bent around toward Taur. Saw some raiders chasing after their escaped horseflesh. I brought one down with an arrow.” His face darkened. “Then as we got closer we began seeing the burned-out farms and hunting shacks. Bad sign, that. We pushed through to morning and talked our way into the village. The Vanir hit mebbe an hour or so later. A few Taurin wanted our throats cut as Vanir scouts.”
“What changed their mind?” Daol asked.
There were two tables at the surgery, scrubbed down to fresh wood and set at the edge of the clearing where ash would not fall easily into open wounds. Daol and Maev worked together at one of them, washing wounds clean with melted snow.
They also had taken on the task of drawing arrows. Usually this involved Daol lying over a man's chest while Maev gave the shaft a good hard yank. One of the long-feathered shafts stuck into Brig Tall-Wood had a broadleaf head, however, and had to be pushed through. They all watched while Maev scored the shaft with a sharp knife, snapping it in two about a handbreadth above the wound.
Brig grunted through clenched teeth. Ehmish paled.
Aodh had seen such things before and barely noted the efforts. “We weren't the first of Gaud to come through here, apparently. They knew about our trouble, so's most of them leaned toward believing our story.”
Only one other Gaudic had come north anywhere within the last several weeks that Kern knew about. “Old Finn. So he made it this far at least.”
“And then headed off north, looking to sell his sword where the raiders might be more of a threat than the long winter.”
Kern hadn't even considered trading on the threat of the Vanir up north when he'd been cast out. Not a bad idea. Maybe even a better one than heading south for so many long days, as he'd been planning.
When he said so aloud, Aodh nodded. “Apparently Finn was decently provisioned before he got here as well. Traded a marmot and a fox pelt for some meal, some flint and tinder.”
Watching Maev preparing to push through the arrow, Kern frowned. “Traded . . .” Then he understood. He shook his head. “That old dog raided the clan's northern traplines for himself.” Hard to blame him. In fact, Kern hoped he'd picked up enough food to see him through, wherever he was bound.