“They brew this in a village two miles east of here,” the knight said, as if the question had been brought up in conversation. “The way they do it, better than wine, I say.”
Bloodraven took a slow drought from his own mug, sat it down without comment, and then looked up, golden eyes unreadable. Alasdair lifted a brow dryly, meeting that gaze. Gauging what lay beneath, Yhalen thought. Trying very hard to discern what mood lay beneath the facade, what violence might be hidden, before he took Bloodraven before his king.
“Are you not hungry?” the knight spoke to Yhalen without quite looking at him.
He was. Ravenously. His knees shook from it. Either that or the after effects of the ride still plagued him. Sitting down at the table under the eyes of the guard, however, seemed more than his frayed nerves could endure. He shook his head, standing there, feeling lost. Bloodraven canted a look at him, but said nothing. Yhalen retreated to the chair with the bounding hounds and sat, sighing with relief to have support under him that didn’t rock and jolt of its own accord. Sir Alasdair spoke no more to Bloodraven, content to sit and nurse his favored mead, observing.
Soon enough, after the meal was done and they were allowed the time to catch their breath after the harried ride here, word came that the king had called. It wasn’t a meeting that Yhalen was invited to join, and Bloodraven left in the company of Sir Alasdair and the majority of the guard. It was only then that Yhalen ventured finally to the table to partake of the remainder of bread and cheese, though his stomach churned in apprehension over what was to come.
Bloodraven doubted very little that the human men escorting him down the smooth stone hallway of this human keep would be swift and efficient with their usage of the weapons they kept so close at hand, should he make a movement that didn’t fit with their notions of what he ought to be doing. He might take some number of them down before he himself fell, but fall he would amongst this particular company. The elite of the human fighters, he thought. The big, scar-faced man who had accompanied him from the one keep to this one was deadliest amongst them. This Bloodraven knew without ever having seen the human fight. One simply knew, by observation, and by innate feeling that it was so.
It had surprised him somewhat to see that the king of the human lands didn’t exude the same deadly presence. Certainly no ogre chieftain held his place if he declined in physical prowess. If he were not shrewd enough to step down on his own and retreat to the fires of the wise elders, then he died at the hands of a younger, stronger warrior, keen on gaining power for himself.
But humans, Bloodraven supposed, with their penchant for creation, were of a different mindset.
Even if he thought he might break through the guard set around him, he’d come too close to realizing a flickering, reckless hope to risk it.
They escorted him down the long, main hall and to a corridor branching off to the right of it. Guards outside a door told him to what destination they walked. The knight, Alasdair, opened the door without knocking, then entered and waited for Bloodraven to follow. He did so without hesitation, finding the room to be smallish, but with a high ceiling. A crackling fire was in the hearth and a thick round rug in the center of the floor. A table sat upon that, and the narrow-shouldered man that Bloodraven took to be the king sat behind it, with the much broader Lord Tangery standing at his 116
shoulder.
The king didn’t rise, but regarded Bloodraven keenly.
“My lord.”
Alasdair bowed slightly, hand on the hilt of his sword. Bloodraven heard the movements of guards positioning themselves on the inside of the doorway. He didn’t turn to look.
Though this king didn’t have the bulk or the feel of a warrior born, there was in his presence a great gulf of quiet power. Like the old ones who sat around the fires of every camp, giving wisdom when wisdom was asked for and subtly maneuvering the actions of the brash younglings without the younglings ever knowing.
Bloodraven inclined his head in a gesture of respect. He’d always had a fondness for the elders, always listened with great interest to the twisting pathways they wove with their words.
“I’ve had reports of the number of innocent folk murdered by the hands of your fellows on this latest foray into my lands. It grieves me,” the king said without preamble, his shrewd eyes sharp on Bloodraven’s face.
“There will be more,” Bloodraven said bluntly and Tangery’s face hardened, seeing that statement as a threat, though the king’s remained impassive.
“Will there?” the king finally asked, as if they were speaking of the weather instead of invasion from the northern reaches.
“Winter comes,” Bloodraven said, “and with it, hunger and desperation that my folk didn’t feel so keenly only a dozen winters past. The winters grow colder, the game grows scarce. We have our own enemies dwelling deep within the mountains who venture forth now more frequently than they did years past. South is relief of a sort, and the clans don’t know how to ask politely for aid. They only know to take it. There’s no reasoning with them.”
“You’d have me believe there’s reasoning with you, though?”
Bloodraven shrugged, betraying nothing of the curling in his gut at the importance of this baited conversation. “I’m not what they are, the majority of my people. You wouldn’t get such dialogue from the war chief of my clan.”
“No. I don’t suppose I would.”
The king sat back, steepling his fingers. He nodded minutely and a guard dragged a sturdy field chair from against the wall, positioning it in front of the desk. It was large enough to support Bloodraven’s weight, though it groaned when he settled upon it.
“We know little enough of the ogre clans of the North, our ancestors having learned hard lessons about your people’s unwillingness to peacefully trade or parlay,” said the king.
“Parlay is not a concept most ogres understand,” Bloodraven admitted slowly. “For an ogre to bend to negotiation would seem a weakness. Even our wise ones wouldn’t consider it, fearing scorn. It’s rare enough that the clans even band together for a common goal, which is why your lands haven’t experienced a concerted invasion in many, many years. It’s not that the war chieftains don’t wish it, it’s simply because they cannot agree to the specifics among themselves. They’re fast coming to that end though, with the winters worsening as they are.”
“We’ve fought off incursions before,” Tangery said. “‘Tis only a matter of reinforcing the border garrisons and vigilance.”
Bloodraven shrugged. “Perhaps.”
Tangery frowned, a bold man, but not one who would delude himself of harsh reality. The borders between human lands and the territories of the northern reaches were too vast by far to patrol with force enough to repel incursion.
“Tell me what I’d gain from an alliance with you and the half-bloods you claim to speak for?”
Bloodraven canted his head, and held up a hand conspicuously larger than the hands of the human men in this room.
“Most full-blooded ogres outweigh me twice over. Their reach is half again as long. They stand two heads taller. How many of your men, on horse or off, could stand alone against such a foe? No single one, unless catastrophe weighed heavily on his side. No three or four common men, even well armed.
I’m able. I have, otherwise I wouldn’t have survived to lead war parties of my own. I offer you a people desperate to flee the condemnation of our full-blooded brethren. I offer you fighters that can stand against a foe that no group of your own kind could topple. I offer you fighters like me, who would 117
gladly pledge to your service for the simple exchange of life beyond the reach of the northern clans.”
“If they were all like you, then why do you seek the aid of weak human men?” the king asked coldly, perhaps offended by Bloodraven’s assessment of his kinsmen’s fighting ability. Bloodraven would have been, had it been posed in such a manner to him. It was a perspicacious question regardless. A delicate one. There was hardly room for mistruths, if any bargain were to be struck.
“They’re not,” he conceded. “They’re for the most part condemned to lives little better than the human slaves that fathered them. My people—my
mother’s
people—have little tolerance for weakness, and a child born half the size of its brethren...most don’t survive the first few years. But that doesn’t mean that they won’t take up arms and fiercely fight for their chance at freedom. There’s simply no chance, if there isn’t a haven for them to flee too.”
“A haven isn’t a simple thing to give,” Lord Tangery said. “Not without outcry.”
His brother nodded, agreeing with that point. “You’ve shed human blood and recently. Why should any trust be placed in you? Why should I let the wolves across my border freely?”
“My father was a human man,” Bloodraven said simply, then added, “I followed the orders of my clan chieftain. Would you expect a man of yours to obey your command in such a thing or not?”
“And did those orders include treating with me?”
Bloodraven shrugged. “Opportunity comes when it will. It’s not to be ignored.”
The king sat back, thinking. Tangery paced to the wall and back, his face a mask of deliberation.
The guards remained motionless, even Alasdair who stood silent guard at Bloodraven’s shoulder.
“How many are there, your half-blood brethren?” the King finally asked.
A small quiver of tension eased out of Bloodraven at the question. There was in this human king’s eyes, a speculation, a gauging of things that could be beneficial to him.
“Many hundreds, spread throughout the clans. I could gather them, but there would be eventual pursuit when it was realized what was afoot. There are young among them who wouldn’t fare so well against concerted onslaught.”
“Many hundred half-blooded ogres wouldn’t be welcome in most parts of my kingdoms, human folk having long memories where the slaughter of their family and friends is concerned,” the king said.
“We’d have to take them some place well shy of established settlements, yet defended against easy access from the north and retaliation,” Lord Tangery surmised.
“There is a place, within my lands...yet disputed. Where no villages or settlements lay.” The king canted his head, glancing up at his brother, who furrowed his brows.
“Gods,” Tangery whispered. “Treating with
him
is more dubious than with a half ogre who’s just finished ravaging our lands.”
The king shrugged, and looked back to Bloodraven.
“There’s a valley northeast of here, overseen by the most reclusive of my...subjects. Lord Elvardo.
Very few venture there, as his lands are shrouded in...shall we say, superstition. It’s a vale rich in soil and teaming with game. A prime place for a large group of people to settle.”
“The dark lord,” Bloodraven said softly with a slight, uncontrollable shiver. “I know of this vale and its protector. Only the most foolhardy young warriors, desperate for fame among their clans, venture into those lands. Few return, and none with the trophies they sought. You propose that I take my brethren there?”
The king smiled. Not a particularly pleasant turning of his thin mouth. This wasn’t a man that practiced mercy, save when it benefited him and his to do so.
“Though he hasn’t attended court in a very long time, Lord Elvardo owes a pledge to Suthland. If his cooperation were garnered, then he’d be a mighty shield between your ogr’rons and ogre strikes from the north.”
Bloodraven tightened his lips, not prepared to argue a point of ogre superstition. Tales of dark and mysterious things centering on that particular vale to the east had passed from mouth to mouth around clan fires for as long as Bloodraven could recall. Tales of witchcrafts and dark magicks that could only be plain truth, considering that no army stood in protection of those lands, no armed force to keep out raiders from the north, and yet the lands stood untouched.
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The king lifted his hand, signaling wine to be brought, and Tangery pulled up a chair of his own, settling next to his brother. The verbal fencing was over, for the most part, and it was time to get down to the particulars.
Yhalen waited. And waited. And waited. Nerves fraying and irritation growing as time dragged by.
The presence of the lone guard they’d left him with, had become insignificant, that one man bored and drowsy and probably wishing for nothing so much as the company of his fellows and the warmth of his bunk. He became little more than a sleepy fixture in the small chamber, Yhalen not being threat enough to warrant him standing wary and alert. They more than likely thought Yhalen little more than a servant, which assumption grated. Still, better to be thought a servant than a slave.
He paced until his legs grew weary, and then sat in the hound-backed chair until that too grew uncomfortable, and paced again. He finished the ale and the remnants of supper, and grew chill as the night progressed into dawn. The walls grew cold to the touch, save for the west one, which must have backed the kitchens and their always burning hearths. He slumped in the chair, arms wrapped about himself, and wondered if Bloodraven were ever coming back. Wondering if he’d offended the King of Suthland with his blunt arrogance and been executed on the spot.
Which thought made Yhalen’s heart beat a little faster and the food and ale sit uneasily in his stomach. It wasn’t that he
cared
if Bloodraven met his demise at human hands—he certainly deserved that fate—it was simply what they would, in turn, do to a Ydregi that they had thrown into confidence with him. That they
thought
had his confidence, at any rate. Bloodraven was monstrously shy at sharing his plots.