"It cannot now be set aside, nor passed on" Part 2
Posted: Sat Jan 20, 2007 5:37 pm
Submitted again for your reading pleasure, with the usual disclaimers as the first part of this story, which is here:
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic ... 586#375586
2.
The dead giantess kneeled heavily on the dune-top, her torso thrust forward over collapsed thighs, forehead forced into the sand. She looked as if she had expired in some macabre act of obeisance to a departing god. Her leather rainments were streaked with seaweed and filth, as were her arms, which had been forced behind her back, and bound cruelly at the wrists with rotting saw-grass. The ragged ends of her bonds fluttered in the wind above her back like a grim pennant, catching Sill’s eye as he climbed the dune. Though he surmised she had been dead for less than half a day, the corpse’s putrescence assaulted him as he approached, amplifying the constant nausea he now carried with him; his gorge rose high in his throat , and he pushed that feelings down deep, denying its effects as he studied the scene. He circled the corpse, began to build a picture of the of the giantess’ last moments. There was much here to learn: two sets of fading giantish footprints led up to the form from the general direction of the hills, but only one descended back down towards the beach. One heavy and irregular of gait, the other regularly paced and betraying no sign of duress, as if the maker had climbed to the dune top merely to briefly survey the area before continuing on southward down the beach, in the direction of the mission’s purpose.
Korik took no note of Sill’s grim survey; he was in the last stages of exhaustion, aware only of the corruption-fire flowing in his veins. A war waged within him, his will a thinning barricade between Vow and Corruption; all of his internal energies committed to impeding that imminent clash which would end both vow and life within him. He squatted on the sand, lowered his head and arms to rest atop burnished knees, thankful that his gut no longer sought to empty itself at each pause.
Doar straggled in, frowning at Korik’s grim form at the base of the dune, and checked his condition: scored welts traced veins from neck to loins; his hip and thigh were raw, oozing blood and vile greenish pus that stained the fringe of his tunic, rendering it stiff and vile. Never had he seen a Haruchai in such as state. Doar haltingly laid a hand on the man’s shoulder, a gesture he had seen Lord Mhoram make to a lesser lord or denizen of the Keep in times of uncertainty; a token of understanding and comfort, a conveyance of readiness to aid or a willingness to provide support. Such gestures were alien to Haruchai, certainly to the Bloodguard, but Doar had been thinking as he ran just how much had changed since coercri. In another time, he would have seen that arm broken, if such an act had been possible by any haruchai. He considered how the course of this mission reflected the long path of the Bloodguard’s service, how time and circumstance had changed, and how the vow itself had not. Had Kevin seen this, sensed how it all might end when he bade the Bloodguard to leave him before he attempted his own answer to Corruption? After a time, he removed his hand from Korik’s shoulder, and turned away.
‘I am well enough.’ Korik acknowledged, either to his comrade’s departing form, or to the support he had proffered. He did not rise from the sand for a time. Doar rounded the dune and looked down the beach.
On the dune-top, Sill studied the fading line tracks leading away from the dead giantess; they were obviously giant-made, well defined in the coarse sand of the dune. They were smaller than the female’s, though of greater breadth, the arch marks evenly distributed and a slightly deeper depression where the ball struck on the leftward prints; a younger male then, Sill surmised, and unshod, carrying a load over his left shoulder, walking unhurriedly away from the corpse of an older woman no more than a half-day past.
The tracks continued southward down the beach, as far as the bloodguard’s earthpower-enhanced sight could discern in the shimmering haze. He surmised that the departed giant had either spent little time where the giantess succumbed, or had stood in one place for a time, perhaps anticipating the haruchai’s approach. In any case, the tracks were made to be followed, and this fact gave the Bloodguard cause for hope. He had been thinking about time, and the rough approach to Foul’s Creche. He felt Korik had as little as two days left before the multiple assaults of heat, exhaustion, privation purloined the mission of his beneficence; himself he gave a few more, and then Doar, who had not yet endured rejection by the aliantha, would carry out the mission alone. Sill had doubts about the chances of a lone Bloodguard making a credible attempt on Corruption in such a state, not to mention the fording of Hotash Slay. Mastering the guardian said to haunt that portal might be beyond even a single hale Haruchai. In any case, it would be a futile attempt; yet these departing footprints stank of malice, surely placed at the direction of Corruption. They were being tracked, watched. Perhaps a raver had mastered another giant, one of the numbers lost in the search for the triplets Sparlimb Keelsetter bespoke. If so, perhaps the mission might rid the Land of a second fragment as a final act, giving back some meaning to their vow; a final blow struck against Corruption to aid the Lords and the Land they defended.
Oddly encouraged, he returned again to Korik’s side, allowing him rise unassisted. He had witnessed Doar’s earlier accedence, and did not approve. He gave no thought to offer aid, or even to acknowledge their leader’s failing strength. He considered that Korik must be weak indeed to allow such fragility to be witnessed by others; had such an affliction accosted a Bloodguard in the long service to the Lords, he would have been reverentially slain, his body returned through Guard’s Gap on the Ranyhyn who had chosen him. Much has changed. He thought again, and made a mental grunt; Doar turned to look at him. Sill returned a disapproving glance, but Doar held his eyes until Korik indicated with a wave he was ready to continue. Silently, they waited until Korik took a few steps southward, and then fell in beside him, adding their tracks to the departed giant’s.
Later, when the sun had set again behind the Shattered Hills to the west, Korik began moaning, his mental elocution washing dully over his companions private meditations. Sill, contemplating deeply the logistics of their approach to Foul’s Creche, did not at first attend the beginning of Doar’s story.
‘I speak now of the loss of the ainu’, The younger man began in the blunted fashion those of the mountains used when they began such a telling, ‘and of how my Great-Father-Uncle Shorn of the Nimishi came to break a vow with honor; some said that he transcended that vow. Others argued that it was not his vow to break, that the seeds of the clan-joining had already been sewn in secret councils the spring before, and that anything he accomplished that winter was ultimately moot. I was not yet sired; I cannot say, but it was well known then that the ainu dwindled on the high slopes, perhaps lost to the entire world, and that the eighteen left in our herd were likely among the last kept by our people. No wild ainu had been captured in the past three seasons; raids on the Ho-Aru camps below the eastern col showed us they had taken neither meat nor milk in a season, and no drying skins were counted by our scouts or captured in the spring raids. In those years, we depended heavily on the ainu, and without their benefice we would suffer much. Eighteen were barely sufficient for breeding stock in the spring, and some would be lost through the deep-winter, which was already upon us. It would be a hard winter, the passes linking camp and winter fields ice-locked and impassable through the darkness. Our numbers had dwindled as well, and there were few enough to care for them, vital as they were.
A council was held, the problem addressed, and a challenge issued:one alone must suffice to see the herd through the winter dark. The warriors were needed to hunt and care for the families, keep the fires fueled and the kala at bay. One was needed to stay with the herd on the high fields, to guard them, help them forage, keep them alive. Shorn, who was young then, and having only recently cut his locks and taken oaths, answered the challenge simply: I suffice, he said. And rose to leave the council den.
I do not know the oaths taken there, or whether he was rebuked for his boldness, or if those there who saw the need simply acquiesced. It was not a long council and many there that night thought little of it. Perhaps the needs of that time were so great that such a great burden would be strapped unquestioningly across the back of an untried youth.
My Great-Father-Uncle Shorn gathered the ainu that very night from the holding pens and, without returning to his den, took up his staff and began the trek up the mountain to the winter fields, where wintergrass and ice-root still strained for the last rays of the dying sun. Though he forsook the comforts of his new wife for ice grottoes, and rejected the companionship of the other young warriors to herd goats between field to col as they grazed on darkening slopes, few questioned his fortitude or aptness for the task; Shorn was known even then as a man of extremes, and it was not his way to take the path of comfort or certainty in times of need; those that speak of that winter do not say if he returned for brief visits of food or comfort from his new wife in the months that followed, and many surely feared him lost or raided in the cold dark.
When he returned before the spring sun, not with the herd, but with children draped in fresh ainu skins, faces fat and sallow from goats-meat, they feared his mind had fled him, or that Corruption had taken him.
As you know, the children were Ho-Aru, the last survivors from Doreil’s encampment below the eastern col, a camp we had raided many times, and had also lost much to them. They had no allies among my people, nor we among them. Shorn had found them below the shelf, huddled in a hunter’s kit packed with skins and dried meat. They were all close to death. Blood plague, and the loss of their own herd had decimated their people far below the reports of our scouts. These children, the last of that camp, had taken on the women’s tasks for the warriors as they sought meat, thinking to raid our own herd as they were led to the upper fields. They never returned for the children, for they had perished while waiting for our herds to appear; Shorn had found their frozen, plague-riddled corpses, still lying in wait, while he retrieved a young goat tracing a false trail. He found the errant kid just before the blind path led it over the southern face and down into the white abyss beyond. Coming back he caught their sign. He retraced the hunter’s faint ascent backwards down to the shelf, and discovered the children near death from exposure.
Now, it is not our way to show mercy, or to give aid to enemies, even though they were but children. So it is not for me to say what was in Shorn’s mind that day when, instead turning away, he chose another path. I think he realized his path, his truth, had changed.
He carried them then to a small cave, where he slew three of the ainu for their meat and hides and nourishing blood, which lent them strength and eased their chill. He took the stone cup, making each child drink heavily, then wrapped them in skins and banked the fire. The other ainu were slain as needed for their meat and hides, a few reserved alive for milk and blood.
Days passed, and the first to revive was the eldest, all of eight seasons and still too young to carry or pass the blood plague. He named himself Orman, son of Dariol, and helped Shorn care for his siblings, working alongside him for the days that followed. He told him of the death of his father, of the loss of all of his people from disease and privation. Shorn was moved; he related how he came to find him and his siblings, tracking an errant kid on a course for oblivion. Meanwhile, the wind blew and the darkness fell about the slopes, which by this time were impassible. Through the dark winter, Shorn kept his new herd alive, even as the last of the ainu dwindled, until they were all spent.
‘What of your vow? Orman finally asked the older man that day, as the last ainu hung draining its lifeblood into a stone cup. ‘You are the ainu now’, Shorn shrugged, and continued skinning the carcass. Outside, the sun began to creep above the eastern sky, and the ice on the passages and trails of the slopes began to drip.
And so it was as ainu these children did first appeared to my people that day; Shorn herded them along, clucking and tapping his staff after his new herd, clad in wet skins and smelling of smoke and apprehension.
They were the children of our enemies, but there were many among us who had also lost children, and others who had lost more. And so they became Nimishi-in, until the seasons had rounded again, and then the following spring, Orman was recognized by Ho-Aru scouts. They too chose another path, another truth; they looked past what perception told them and held back their killing hands from the young warriors who accompanied Orman, saw how he was one of them, and not a captive. Somehow, diplomacy, not war, was in their minds; these Ho-Aru were not known among us for their quickness of thought. They shadowed the boys back into camp, and appeared. After tense moments, they indicated they knew the children, were their kin from another encampment who had been sent to discover their kindreds fate. They asked to meet with us in council; their families arrived later, welcoming back their kin and swearing oaths against raiding, giving gifts to us for our service to the children. Many wept, it was a glad time.'
‘And you wish us now to forsake our mission to become goatherds?’ Sill asked sharply when Doar fell silent. ‘Take up orphans?’
‘No. I wish you to consider how a vow might be forced to extend past its own truth; how old familiar paths can lead to new ones, or down into an abyss.’
Korik groaned suddenly, and collapsed upon the sand, unmoving. The two companions stopped, Sill knelt to check their leader. 'He is alive,' Sill said. A shadow fell across the three men.
‘It is a great boon that he lives, little bloodguard’, said the Giant, hands on his hips. ‘For my master bade me to take my own life if you three were not delivered to him. ‘ The giant grinned and peered down at them as if from a far height, cupping the hand over his brow as if they were too small to be easily seen.
‘I have come to take you to your new Lord, little ones, since you seem to have misplaced the old ones.' He looked around, and out to sea, as if examining where the Lords might be. ' You are weary, as all small creatures are; here ' - he offered a cupped hand – ‘ I shall carry you.’
'We three slew your brother at Coercri, raver, we are indeed fortunate to rid the Land of another such as you!' Sill cried, and then launched himself at the giant's grinning face, and was promptly struck down by a lazy blow that sent him rolling. He rose readily, but Doar stopped him with a thought : 'We must choose another path, brother. Trust me.’
The giant smiled, and produced his own tiny fragment of green stone, swinging it like a charm meant to catch and hold the eye of a child. He spoke calmly and matter-of-factly, as if explaining reason to an angered child:
‘Come now, children. What pride is this that you have left in you? Your leader is near unto death, yet you ask him to continue. Your service –‘ he swept his hand towards the north, they way from which they had come, where Coercri lay silent – ‘has been spent for naught. What does this serve? Whom does it serve? It is my master who has sent me back here to serve you; do you not ken that I am here to take you to that one you have sought to confront? I am merely here to see that you can finish the task to which you have so brazenly set for yourselves. He does not fear your coming, or seek to thwart that which you hold so close to your hearts. Was he not a Lord in your beloved Council? Does he not then merit such service as you have given for so long? Come now, little --‘
Korik spat, still on the edge of action. He held the eyes of the giant, but was more aware of the fragment he held than his words. With two such talismans at their service, what might they not accomplish? He calculated how he might relieve the tortured Giant of his prize, put his soul to rest. It would be a service to the Giant; Hyrim would agree. The thought stopped as Korik stirred at his feet; Sill looked down at him. Doar frowned.
No, Korik whispered into his mind. ‘Do – do not think it. You see what ruin it has caused me, we seek only to destroy that which we serve when we fall to such.’
Seven urviles appeared from behind the Giant, chattering blackly towards the three men, carrying as many long poles and a clutch of bonding straps. The largest one gesturing and directing the others; two of their number approached Korik’s form, began tying him to the pole for transport. Sill leapt, snapped the neck of the first, and was again knocked senseless by the Giant. He landed harshly, his leg folding under him. Doar went to Sill, motioning him to stay down; he placed himself between Sill and the Giant, began to examine the sitting man's leg.
Another creature came forward and took the slain urvile's place, and they began to lift Korik. The pouch carrying the fragment was left alone, save to bind it tightly against his side. Korik groaned and passed again out of consciousness.
'It is not broken, only bruised. Move away', Sill spat in disgust at Doar's seeming concern. He pushing Doar aside. But Doar had strength that Sill did not; he gripped the Haruchai's leg, probing the bone and ankle with a rigid thumb pressed deep into the flesh. He placed his other hand below the knee, steadying the limb. 'Trust me, Sill.' Doar sent into his mind, and then cleanly snapped the bone; Sill grunted in surprise, teeth gritted, his brown eyes wide in shock.
Korik awoke, and began to struggle against his bonds, causing the two urviles carrying him to stagger. They scolded him, and one produced a small black dagger, and waved it menacingly at him.
‘Bind the other two.’ The Giant ordered from behind Doar. ‘Carry them. Let not their bodies touch the rock as we pass. Bring them here alive, or die in agony. These are the words of my Master. I may not kill you, but you do not have to arrive -- whole. Lie down. Or be struck down. ‘
Doar did as he was bade, lying down in the sand. Two urviles began to tie his limbs to the pole.
TRAITOR! Sill screamed into Doar's mind. 'What are you doing?' He tried to rise, stumbled on the fractured leg, and was struck down a third time by an urvile's pole.
'Taking a new path.' Doar said simply.
‘The one that leads to the abyss, little goat?’ Sill asked, and passed out. The urviles began to tie him to the pole.
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic ... 586#375586
2.
The dead giantess kneeled heavily on the dune-top, her torso thrust forward over collapsed thighs, forehead forced into the sand. She looked as if she had expired in some macabre act of obeisance to a departing god. Her leather rainments were streaked with seaweed and filth, as were her arms, which had been forced behind her back, and bound cruelly at the wrists with rotting saw-grass. The ragged ends of her bonds fluttered in the wind above her back like a grim pennant, catching Sill’s eye as he climbed the dune. Though he surmised she had been dead for less than half a day, the corpse’s putrescence assaulted him as he approached, amplifying the constant nausea he now carried with him; his gorge rose high in his throat , and he pushed that feelings down deep, denying its effects as he studied the scene. He circled the corpse, began to build a picture of the of the giantess’ last moments. There was much here to learn: two sets of fading giantish footprints led up to the form from the general direction of the hills, but only one descended back down towards the beach. One heavy and irregular of gait, the other regularly paced and betraying no sign of duress, as if the maker had climbed to the dune top merely to briefly survey the area before continuing on southward down the beach, in the direction of the mission’s purpose.
Korik took no note of Sill’s grim survey; he was in the last stages of exhaustion, aware only of the corruption-fire flowing in his veins. A war waged within him, his will a thinning barricade between Vow and Corruption; all of his internal energies committed to impeding that imminent clash which would end both vow and life within him. He squatted on the sand, lowered his head and arms to rest atop burnished knees, thankful that his gut no longer sought to empty itself at each pause.
Doar straggled in, frowning at Korik’s grim form at the base of the dune, and checked his condition: scored welts traced veins from neck to loins; his hip and thigh were raw, oozing blood and vile greenish pus that stained the fringe of his tunic, rendering it stiff and vile. Never had he seen a Haruchai in such as state. Doar haltingly laid a hand on the man’s shoulder, a gesture he had seen Lord Mhoram make to a lesser lord or denizen of the Keep in times of uncertainty; a token of understanding and comfort, a conveyance of readiness to aid or a willingness to provide support. Such gestures were alien to Haruchai, certainly to the Bloodguard, but Doar had been thinking as he ran just how much had changed since coercri. In another time, he would have seen that arm broken, if such an act had been possible by any haruchai. He considered how the course of this mission reflected the long path of the Bloodguard’s service, how time and circumstance had changed, and how the vow itself had not. Had Kevin seen this, sensed how it all might end when he bade the Bloodguard to leave him before he attempted his own answer to Corruption? After a time, he removed his hand from Korik’s shoulder, and turned away.
‘I am well enough.’ Korik acknowledged, either to his comrade’s departing form, or to the support he had proffered. He did not rise from the sand for a time. Doar rounded the dune and looked down the beach.
On the dune-top, Sill studied the fading line tracks leading away from the dead giantess; they were obviously giant-made, well defined in the coarse sand of the dune. They were smaller than the female’s, though of greater breadth, the arch marks evenly distributed and a slightly deeper depression where the ball struck on the leftward prints; a younger male then, Sill surmised, and unshod, carrying a load over his left shoulder, walking unhurriedly away from the corpse of an older woman no more than a half-day past.
The tracks continued southward down the beach, as far as the bloodguard’s earthpower-enhanced sight could discern in the shimmering haze. He surmised that the departed giant had either spent little time where the giantess succumbed, or had stood in one place for a time, perhaps anticipating the haruchai’s approach. In any case, the tracks were made to be followed, and this fact gave the Bloodguard cause for hope. He had been thinking about time, and the rough approach to Foul’s Creche. He felt Korik had as little as two days left before the multiple assaults of heat, exhaustion, privation purloined the mission of his beneficence; himself he gave a few more, and then Doar, who had not yet endured rejection by the aliantha, would carry out the mission alone. Sill had doubts about the chances of a lone Bloodguard making a credible attempt on Corruption in such a state, not to mention the fording of Hotash Slay. Mastering the guardian said to haunt that portal might be beyond even a single hale Haruchai. In any case, it would be a futile attempt; yet these departing footprints stank of malice, surely placed at the direction of Corruption. They were being tracked, watched. Perhaps a raver had mastered another giant, one of the numbers lost in the search for the triplets Sparlimb Keelsetter bespoke. If so, perhaps the mission might rid the Land of a second fragment as a final act, giving back some meaning to their vow; a final blow struck against Corruption to aid the Lords and the Land they defended.
Oddly encouraged, he returned again to Korik’s side, allowing him rise unassisted. He had witnessed Doar’s earlier accedence, and did not approve. He gave no thought to offer aid, or even to acknowledge their leader’s failing strength. He considered that Korik must be weak indeed to allow such fragility to be witnessed by others; had such an affliction accosted a Bloodguard in the long service to the Lords, he would have been reverentially slain, his body returned through Guard’s Gap on the Ranyhyn who had chosen him. Much has changed. He thought again, and made a mental grunt; Doar turned to look at him. Sill returned a disapproving glance, but Doar held his eyes until Korik indicated with a wave he was ready to continue. Silently, they waited until Korik took a few steps southward, and then fell in beside him, adding their tracks to the departed giant’s.
Later, when the sun had set again behind the Shattered Hills to the west, Korik began moaning, his mental elocution washing dully over his companions private meditations. Sill, contemplating deeply the logistics of their approach to Foul’s Creche, did not at first attend the beginning of Doar’s story.
‘I speak now of the loss of the ainu’, The younger man began in the blunted fashion those of the mountains used when they began such a telling, ‘and of how my Great-Father-Uncle Shorn of the Nimishi came to break a vow with honor; some said that he transcended that vow. Others argued that it was not his vow to break, that the seeds of the clan-joining had already been sewn in secret councils the spring before, and that anything he accomplished that winter was ultimately moot. I was not yet sired; I cannot say, but it was well known then that the ainu dwindled on the high slopes, perhaps lost to the entire world, and that the eighteen left in our herd were likely among the last kept by our people. No wild ainu had been captured in the past three seasons; raids on the Ho-Aru camps below the eastern col showed us they had taken neither meat nor milk in a season, and no drying skins were counted by our scouts or captured in the spring raids. In those years, we depended heavily on the ainu, and without their benefice we would suffer much. Eighteen were barely sufficient for breeding stock in the spring, and some would be lost through the deep-winter, which was already upon us. It would be a hard winter, the passes linking camp and winter fields ice-locked and impassable through the darkness. Our numbers had dwindled as well, and there were few enough to care for them, vital as they were.
A council was held, the problem addressed, and a challenge issued:one alone must suffice to see the herd through the winter dark. The warriors were needed to hunt and care for the families, keep the fires fueled and the kala at bay. One was needed to stay with the herd on the high fields, to guard them, help them forage, keep them alive. Shorn, who was young then, and having only recently cut his locks and taken oaths, answered the challenge simply: I suffice, he said. And rose to leave the council den.
I do not know the oaths taken there, or whether he was rebuked for his boldness, or if those there who saw the need simply acquiesced. It was not a long council and many there that night thought little of it. Perhaps the needs of that time were so great that such a great burden would be strapped unquestioningly across the back of an untried youth.
My Great-Father-Uncle Shorn gathered the ainu that very night from the holding pens and, without returning to his den, took up his staff and began the trek up the mountain to the winter fields, where wintergrass and ice-root still strained for the last rays of the dying sun. Though he forsook the comforts of his new wife for ice grottoes, and rejected the companionship of the other young warriors to herd goats between field to col as they grazed on darkening slopes, few questioned his fortitude or aptness for the task; Shorn was known even then as a man of extremes, and it was not his way to take the path of comfort or certainty in times of need; those that speak of that winter do not say if he returned for brief visits of food or comfort from his new wife in the months that followed, and many surely feared him lost or raided in the cold dark.
When he returned before the spring sun, not with the herd, but with children draped in fresh ainu skins, faces fat and sallow from goats-meat, they feared his mind had fled him, or that Corruption had taken him.
As you know, the children were Ho-Aru, the last survivors from Doreil’s encampment below the eastern col, a camp we had raided many times, and had also lost much to them. They had no allies among my people, nor we among them. Shorn had found them below the shelf, huddled in a hunter’s kit packed with skins and dried meat. They were all close to death. Blood plague, and the loss of their own herd had decimated their people far below the reports of our scouts. These children, the last of that camp, had taken on the women’s tasks for the warriors as they sought meat, thinking to raid our own herd as they were led to the upper fields. They never returned for the children, for they had perished while waiting for our herds to appear; Shorn had found their frozen, plague-riddled corpses, still lying in wait, while he retrieved a young goat tracing a false trail. He found the errant kid just before the blind path led it over the southern face and down into the white abyss beyond. Coming back he caught their sign. He retraced the hunter’s faint ascent backwards down to the shelf, and discovered the children near death from exposure.
Now, it is not our way to show mercy, or to give aid to enemies, even though they were but children. So it is not for me to say what was in Shorn’s mind that day when, instead turning away, he chose another path. I think he realized his path, his truth, had changed.
He carried them then to a small cave, where he slew three of the ainu for their meat and hides and nourishing blood, which lent them strength and eased their chill. He took the stone cup, making each child drink heavily, then wrapped them in skins and banked the fire. The other ainu were slain as needed for their meat and hides, a few reserved alive for milk and blood.
Days passed, and the first to revive was the eldest, all of eight seasons and still too young to carry or pass the blood plague. He named himself Orman, son of Dariol, and helped Shorn care for his siblings, working alongside him for the days that followed. He told him of the death of his father, of the loss of all of his people from disease and privation. Shorn was moved; he related how he came to find him and his siblings, tracking an errant kid on a course for oblivion. Meanwhile, the wind blew and the darkness fell about the slopes, which by this time were impassible. Through the dark winter, Shorn kept his new herd alive, even as the last of the ainu dwindled, until they were all spent.
‘What of your vow? Orman finally asked the older man that day, as the last ainu hung draining its lifeblood into a stone cup. ‘You are the ainu now’, Shorn shrugged, and continued skinning the carcass. Outside, the sun began to creep above the eastern sky, and the ice on the passages and trails of the slopes began to drip.
And so it was as ainu these children did first appeared to my people that day; Shorn herded them along, clucking and tapping his staff after his new herd, clad in wet skins and smelling of smoke and apprehension.
They were the children of our enemies, but there were many among us who had also lost children, and others who had lost more. And so they became Nimishi-in, until the seasons had rounded again, and then the following spring, Orman was recognized by Ho-Aru scouts. They too chose another path, another truth; they looked past what perception told them and held back their killing hands from the young warriors who accompanied Orman, saw how he was one of them, and not a captive. Somehow, diplomacy, not war, was in their minds; these Ho-Aru were not known among us for their quickness of thought. They shadowed the boys back into camp, and appeared. After tense moments, they indicated they knew the children, were their kin from another encampment who had been sent to discover their kindreds fate. They asked to meet with us in council; their families arrived later, welcoming back their kin and swearing oaths against raiding, giving gifts to us for our service to the children. Many wept, it was a glad time.'
‘And you wish us now to forsake our mission to become goatherds?’ Sill asked sharply when Doar fell silent. ‘Take up orphans?’
‘No. I wish you to consider how a vow might be forced to extend past its own truth; how old familiar paths can lead to new ones, or down into an abyss.’
Korik groaned suddenly, and collapsed upon the sand, unmoving. The two companions stopped, Sill knelt to check their leader. 'He is alive,' Sill said. A shadow fell across the three men.
‘It is a great boon that he lives, little bloodguard’, said the Giant, hands on his hips. ‘For my master bade me to take my own life if you three were not delivered to him. ‘ The giant grinned and peered down at them as if from a far height, cupping the hand over his brow as if they were too small to be easily seen.
‘I have come to take you to your new Lord, little ones, since you seem to have misplaced the old ones.' He looked around, and out to sea, as if examining where the Lords might be. ' You are weary, as all small creatures are; here ' - he offered a cupped hand – ‘ I shall carry you.’
'We three slew your brother at Coercri, raver, we are indeed fortunate to rid the Land of another such as you!' Sill cried, and then launched himself at the giant's grinning face, and was promptly struck down by a lazy blow that sent him rolling. He rose readily, but Doar stopped him with a thought : 'We must choose another path, brother. Trust me.’
The giant smiled, and produced his own tiny fragment of green stone, swinging it like a charm meant to catch and hold the eye of a child. He spoke calmly and matter-of-factly, as if explaining reason to an angered child:
‘Come now, children. What pride is this that you have left in you? Your leader is near unto death, yet you ask him to continue. Your service –‘ he swept his hand towards the north, they way from which they had come, where Coercri lay silent – ‘has been spent for naught. What does this serve? Whom does it serve? It is my master who has sent me back here to serve you; do you not ken that I am here to take you to that one you have sought to confront? I am merely here to see that you can finish the task to which you have so brazenly set for yourselves. He does not fear your coming, or seek to thwart that which you hold so close to your hearts. Was he not a Lord in your beloved Council? Does he not then merit such service as you have given for so long? Come now, little --‘
Korik spat, still on the edge of action. He held the eyes of the giant, but was more aware of the fragment he held than his words. With two such talismans at their service, what might they not accomplish? He calculated how he might relieve the tortured Giant of his prize, put his soul to rest. It would be a service to the Giant; Hyrim would agree. The thought stopped as Korik stirred at his feet; Sill looked down at him. Doar frowned.
No, Korik whispered into his mind. ‘Do – do not think it. You see what ruin it has caused me, we seek only to destroy that which we serve when we fall to such.’
Seven urviles appeared from behind the Giant, chattering blackly towards the three men, carrying as many long poles and a clutch of bonding straps. The largest one gesturing and directing the others; two of their number approached Korik’s form, began tying him to the pole for transport. Sill leapt, snapped the neck of the first, and was again knocked senseless by the Giant. He landed harshly, his leg folding under him. Doar went to Sill, motioning him to stay down; he placed himself between Sill and the Giant, began to examine the sitting man's leg.
Another creature came forward and took the slain urvile's place, and they began to lift Korik. The pouch carrying the fragment was left alone, save to bind it tightly against his side. Korik groaned and passed again out of consciousness.
'It is not broken, only bruised. Move away', Sill spat in disgust at Doar's seeming concern. He pushing Doar aside. But Doar had strength that Sill did not; he gripped the Haruchai's leg, probing the bone and ankle with a rigid thumb pressed deep into the flesh. He placed his other hand below the knee, steadying the limb. 'Trust me, Sill.' Doar sent into his mind, and then cleanly snapped the bone; Sill grunted in surprise, teeth gritted, his brown eyes wide in shock.
Korik awoke, and began to struggle against his bonds, causing the two urviles carrying him to stagger. They scolded him, and one produced a small black dagger, and waved it menacingly at him.
‘Bind the other two.’ The Giant ordered from behind Doar. ‘Carry them. Let not their bodies touch the rock as we pass. Bring them here alive, or die in agony. These are the words of my Master. I may not kill you, but you do not have to arrive -- whole. Lie down. Or be struck down. ‘
Doar did as he was bade, lying down in the sand. Two urviles began to tie his limbs to the pole.
TRAITOR! Sill screamed into Doar's mind. 'What are you doing?' He tried to rise, stumbled on the fractured leg, and was struck down a third time by an urvile's pole.
'Taking a new path.' Doar said simply.
‘The one that leads to the abyss, little goat?’ Sill asked, and passed out. The urviles began to tie him to the pole.
yikes. Yes, i did. A two year old wouldnt be much help. thanksl 
I beleive Lord Foul had very ambitious plans in corrputing the bloodguard. But enough about that.
