‘Do all the men in your family talk so much?’ she asked, untying the cord belt and letting fall her skirt.
‘Talking is the second-best talent we have.’
‘What is the first?’ she asked him.
‘Sarcasm as well as beauty, sweet one? Ah, but you are an enchanting creature.’ Stripping off his clothes, Sieben spread a blanket on the floor and drew her down upon it.
‘You will have to be quick,’ she said.
‘Speed in matters of the loins is a talent that seems to have escaped me. Thankfully,’ he added.
Kzun felt a roaring sense of exultation as he watched the two wagons burning. Leaping over the boulders he ran down to where a Gothir wagon driver, shot through the neck, was trying to crawl away. Plunging his dagger between the man’s shoulders, Kzun twisted it savagely; the man cried out, then began to choke on his own blood. When Kzun rose up and let out a blood-curdling cry, the Curved Horn warriors rose from their hiding-places and ran down to join him. The wind shifted, acrid smoke burning Kzun’s eyes. Swiftly he loped around the blazing wagons and surveyed the scene. There had been seven wagons in all, and a troop of fifteen Lancers. Twelve of the Lancers were dead – eight peppered with arrows, four slain in fierce hand-to-hand fighting. Kzun himself had killed two of them. Then the Gothir had turned the remaining wagons and fled. Kzun had longed to ride after them, but his orders were to remain at the pool, denying it to the enemy.
The Curved Horn men had fought well. Only one had a serious wound. ‘Gather their weapons and armour!’ shouted Kzun, ‘then move back into the rocks.’
A young man, sporting a Lancer’s white plumed helm, approached him. ‘Now we go, hey?’ he said.
‘Go where?’ countered Kzun.
‘Where?’ responded the man, mystified. ‘Away before they come back.’
Kzun walked away from him, back up the boulder-strewn slope to the pool. Kneeling there, he washed the blood from his naked upper body. Then, removing the white scarf from his head, he dipped it into the water before re-tying it over his bald dome. The warriors gathered behind him.
Kzun stood and turned to face them. Scanning their faces, he saw the fear there. They had killed Gothir soldiers. Now more would come – many more. ‘You want to run?’ he asked them.
A slender warrior with greying hair stepped forward. ‘We cannot fight an army, Kzun. We burned their wagons, hey? They will come back. Maybe a hundred. Maybe two. We cannot fight them.’
‘Then run,’ said Kzun contemptuously. ‘I would expect no more from Curved Horn cowards. But I am of the Lone Wolves, and we do not run. I was told to hold this pool, to defend it with my life. This I shall do. While I live not one gajin will taste of the water.’
‘We are not cowards!’ shouted the man, reddening. An angry murmur rose up among the warriors around him. ‘But what is the point of dying here?’
‘What is the point of dying anywhere?’ countered Kzun. ‘Two hundred men wait at the Shrine of Oshikai, ready to defend his bones. Your own brothers are among them. You think they will run?’
‘What would you have us do?’ asked another warrior.
‘I don’t care what you do!’ stormed Kzun. ‘All I know is that I will stand and fight.’
The grey-haired warrior called his comrades to him and they walked away to the far side of the pool, squatting in a rough circle to discuss their options. Kzun ignored them. A low groan came from his left, and he saw the wounded Curved Horn warrior sitting with his back against the red rock, his blood-covered hands clenched over a deep belly wound. Kzun lifted a Lancer helmet and dipped it into the pool, then carried it to the dying man. Squatting down, he held the helmet to the warrior’s lips. He drank two swallows, then coughed and cried out in pain. Kzun sat down beside him. ‘You fought well,’ he said. The young man had hurled himself upon a Lancer, dragging the soldier from his horse. In the fight that followed the Lancer had drawn a dagger and rammed it in the Nadir’s belly. Kzun had rushed to his aid and slain the Lancer.