There was a twisting track now, looming rock walls on either side, then an opening, and below a great snow-bound dip, terraced and falling away at its far end to a piled-up chaos of giant boulders. Beyond them there seemed to be a drop, where the heads of other rocks stood out faintly in the thickening color of dusk. In the dip itself a vast camp stretched out, milling like a hive. Already the red points of torches. Smoke from fires drifted up. There must be thousands grouped here, apart from the wagons, machinery, and picketed animals. Away to the east of the dip natural arches opened into further levels where other parts of the armies and their lights were moving back and forth.
I was at the front now, behind the men of Ammath, flanked by Mazlek on my left, the scarlet commander on my right. We picked a way down the rocks. I could not help but remember the ravine camp, and a dismal panic was growing on me helplessly.
Sentries challenged us. We rode between the tent lanes now, smoke, firelight, men moving out of our way. Soon I should see the black pavilion.
A man standing by the commander’s horse was saying something….
“No, sir. The overlord has moved ahead to the lower camp-two days away now, sir.”
Slowly the words penetrated my brain. Vazkor-was gone.
Now the man was bowing to me. My pavilion should be got up at once, and all things arranged for my comfort. They were very surprised to see me, but it was an honor, an en-
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couragement to them all to have my holy person in their midst.
It was true, my arrival seemed to have had a peculiar effect on the great camp. They appeared genuinely excited and glad of my presence. And it was the men of Kmiss, Za, SoEss, and Arnmath whose pleasure seemed doubled. I was still special for them, because I was not theirs. They cheered me as I rode now, and a sort of warmth ran through me-relief that Vazkor was elsewhere-and a sense of my own Power so abruptly evident to me in this unexpected place called Lion’s Mouth.
4
I was very grateful that Vazkor had not been there. He had apparently ridden ahead with some two hundred men of Ezlann and So-Ess, to a lower area near to the pass, where a perfect view presented itself of the valley terrain. There he made a new camp, plotting the moves of the game, while the last stragglers arrived at the Lion’s Mouth above. The command of the Mouth had gone to Kazarl, Javhovor of SoEss-a logical move, since only he, of all Vazkor’s fellow Javhovors in White Desert, had come in person with his armies. The troops of Kmiss, Za, Ammath, and Eshkorek had come under the lords’ younger brothers, elder sons, cousins, or nephews. Age, easy-living, and general disinclination had caused this absence of the first three; besides, I could see Vazkor would rather have the youthful and the willing on such a venture. No doubt he had taken measures to see no plots hatched among the figureheads left at home. As to Eshkorek’s new master, he was too fresh in his seat to run out of it so quickly. Probably he had remained at Vazkor’s express order.
My first full day at the Mouth was taken up with two enormous small things. First the business of getting from them the winelike drink on which I now so comfortably lived. I had brought enough of it for my journey here, but all wells run dry at last. With Vazkor there had been no problem, for he had seen to it. Alone, I must break down their barriers of embarrassment, describe it, and then witness its furtive and deferential arrival at my tent. I had not lost their admiration, nevertheless, for none of them could live on such a flimsy thing. My second trouble I considered a foolish one,
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yet it nagged at me. My bleeding had long since assumed a predictable rhythm, presenting itself to me after every unit of twenty days, and no longer distressing me in any way, being light and painless, and lasting only forty-eight hours or less. Now, twenty-five days had passed and the expected guest was absent. I reasoned with myself that very likely the journey here had upset things, but I was not consoled. A stupid, icy little certainty was growing in my brain, though I had not yet voiced it, even in my thoughts.
The second day at Lion’s Mouth, I turned my mind to other matters. Soldiers had been marching in, in regular bursts, and the huge camp had grown even more crowded and sprawling. I sent Dnarl with two others to bear my greetings to the various High Commanders, Kazarl among them, and ask them to attend me at the twentieth hour in my pavilion. I knew they would respectfully come, and also that they would be very unsure of what should be said to a female deity roosting in the center of a war-camp. But they found it was easy for them. Throughout the two hours of their company, I spoke only a few words, and these were really promptings. I gave them free and full rein to talk about the war-its history, and its future campaigns. They had no notion Vazkor did not want me here. They thought it would please him that they had attempted to inform me of all they knew, and when they discovered that I could apparently follow what they said, and seemed both interested and involved with their prowess, they came, I could see, to a new opinion of me. I was, they would assess it, a woman, but with a man’s mind; it shone out of their faces, this high tribute of the human male. They left me in good spirits, impressed with their goddess, having taught her a little of what to expect hi the war, and a good deal about their own characters.
In the morning I rose early, and walked about the tent lanes, Mazlek, Dnarl, and Slor behind me. There were more starings than obeisances, yet the soldiers I stopped and spoke to seemed both awed and pleased to have been singled out by the Risen One. Tomorrow would see this camp on the move to join Vazkor at the lower site, and already preparations for departure were in progress. Kazarl appeared and took me on a tour of the war machines, and an inspection of the drilling of swordsmen and horses. In the archers’ quarter men were restriing their bows, a few on horseback aiming practice shots at a swaying man of straw and sacking, others, on foot, at random targets hung upon poles.
I remarked to Kazarl that I had omitted to choose a bow
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for myself, and that I would now do so. He seemed amazed at each new thing I showed myself capable of, and this was no exception. He called a man, however, and we went among the stores, and after a while, I chose what seemed to handle best. It had no intimate feel to it, like those I had used with Darak-which had been made for me-‘but I hoped a union might come between us in time. I took it outside with some shafts, and made short work of the colored eyes of the targets. There was a murmur of interest around me from the archers, and I knew word would spread.
There were other things I did, perhaps foolish things, for I was not sure I would be successful at them, but then, I had very little time. I fought a practice bout of swords and knives with a thin and devious fighter among the officers’ pavilions. I think at first he held off in alarm at the situation, but after a while my skill convinced him he had better do something about me. We were judged on points and ended as equals. I think I could have beaten him, though I will not swear to it, but I did not want any jealousy or anger from what I did. In an open place there were horse herds from the mountain valleys of Eshkorek Arnor, still wild, that men were breaking bit by bit for battle work. I had not liked this business since I watched Darak ride Sarroka in the tribal krarl and I had learned that to conquer a horse means to snap its spirit also. Yet I singled out a white stallion-the pride of the herd, ungelded, untamed, and furious at this whole world.
“That one,” I said.
Kazarl began to protest, but I politely told him to be quiet They got the white one into a separate pen by the use of goads and curses, and I jumped in after it. I see now it was indeed a foolish thing to do, but at the time the deed had its own perverse logic.