Karee began with a quick slash of her sword that opened the man’s breeches without touching his flesh. He stared with eyes that seemed too large to be human as Karee peeled off her own breeches.

Women were at something of a disadvantage when it came to forcing an unwilling partner. However, Karee had learned arts that made up for what nature had not provided. The man was young and his flesh responded as she wished. Indeed, before it was over she had stripped herself bare of all save weapons so his good hand could play upon her breasts.

The waves of pleasure that swept through her didn’t blind her to the flames now leaping above the rooftop, or deafen her to the subchiefs’ shouted orders. She had heard them all before—rally in the village square, bind slaves, dispatch those who couldn’t walk, and so on, as their experience and their fear of Djimmi Marshul’s wrath bid them. Hearing them still meant that it was time to add this man to the slave chain.

“On your feet,” she said, with a jab of her sword at the part of the man’s body that had served her so well.

“I’m probably not your first woman, but I’ll surely be your last if you wink without asking a clansman!” Fumbling and shaking, the man pulled on his clothes. “What—what do you horsefolk mean to do with us?” “If you’ve the strength, sell you to the river pirates. What they do with you is their affair.”

Likely enough a boy this fair would fetch a good price from some northern blackhair. Knowing this, the pirates would probably sell him to an Ehleenohee agent. A pity, but not her problem. There was no room in her life for a concubine, no matter how comely or skilled.

Clan Marshul’s riders were moving too fast to be burdened with slaves on foot. When they sacked a town to provide an example to its neighbors, able-bodied survivors ended in the hands of the nearest band of river pirates. The pirates were friends to no one but themselves, and twice they had tried to ambush the clansmen. That made two pirate bands the fewer. The rest grew wiser, from that lesson and also from the silver to be gained selling able-bodied slaves farther south or ransoming them to any kin they might have in larger towns such as Blue Springs.

The man trembled again, then found courage somewhere. “As the gods wish,” he said. Karee stepped back, to pick up her clothes.

In the next breath, she learned she had not stepped back far enough. The man’s good arm leaped out like a striking snake. His hand closed on the blade of her sword. The sharp edge cut his fingers to the bone, but the oozing blood didn’t weaken his grip. It was sure and firm as he plunged the sword into his own throat.

The last sound he made was something that might have been a laugh, if the blood hadn’t choked it. Then he fell, and the sword clattered to the hard-packed earth beside him.

For a moment, Karee was too shaken by the Dirtman’s unexpected courage and her own narrow escape to pick up the sword. It might have been her own throat gaping, as well as his.

I was his last woman. And may Wind take him with honor, for he had more of it than most.

Now louder than anything else, the voice of Djimmi Marshul rose, rallying the laggards. Karee jerked her clothes on with hands not altogether steady, then wiped her sword on the ground and sheathed it. When Djimmi rode in and began giving order in person, it was best to be there to obey.

“Farewell, Djoh,” Oskah said. “Don’t try too hard to be a hero.”

“I’ll do what must be done,” Djoh replied, fighting to keep his tongue civil. His crippled leg gave a sharper-than-usual twinge as he swung himself into the saddle. Once mounted he was as good as any man, better than most because he could use his mindspeak to control his horse.

The horse pawed and whickered restlessly, at least sparing him the need to make any further reply as he brought it under control. Then he rode off toward the gate, not looking back. Marthuh had been in town since their last fight and hadn’t even returned to wish him off. Only his mother-in-law seemed to really want to see him again.

To anyone listening, such as the militia waiting at the gate, Oskah’s farewell might have sounded like a fond wish for the safe return of his daughter’s son. To Djoh, it had another meaning.

Don’t come back a hero everyone will honor. I don’t want to have to give you anything more. The last time you were a hero, I had to give you my daughter, and look what’s come of that\

Not that Oskah would really have forgiven Djoh for taking his daughter, even if he’d become the wealthiest man in the Ohyoh country and the father of six stout sons. But he would not have had the power to force Djoh to marry off his baby sister Lilia at fifteen, to a laborer who would take her without a dowry because she was cheaper and comelier than the waterfront whores!

Nor would Djoh have to endure people like Hwul. Oskah’s farrier was standing by the gate as Djoh rode up. He drew himself up and brought his hand to his forehead, in a mockery of the ancient gesture of respect from one warrior to another.

“See the hero ride forth!” shouted Hwul, as if the gesture hadn’t been enough. Djoh had a moment’s dream of making his horse rear and trample Hwul. But the elderly hack Oskah had given him could barely manage a decent trot. Few horses in Blue Springs were really fit for war, and Djoh’s mount was not one of them.

“Wait until you see him riding back before you crow like a cock on a dunghill!” Captain Kahrl snapped. Kahrl was the nephew of the old Sacred Caterpillar who’d freed Djoh at the time of the pirates’ raid and kept an eye on Oskah until his own death five years later. Kahrl had had hardly more use for Oskah than his uncle.

Djoh reined in his horse close enough to Kahrl that they could talk privately. The captain was frowning.

“If you didn’t have that power of hearing thoughts, I’d not be taking you. To Scratch with the Council! Not that I doubt your courage, but these Plains riders are a very different matter from the river pirates. Besides, I, suspect you want to be a dead hero more than you want to return a live one.”

“I’m not eager to go to Wind. Besides, the faster the Horseclans move, the more warning we need.” “You understand war, Djoh.”

Yes, and what good has it done me? I don’t understand my wife or her father or my elder sister Nee. The only house in Blue Springs open to me save from charity is my sister Lilia’s, and hers only when her husband’s sober. Too often he drinks, to forget the “witchblood” in his wife.

Aloud, he said, “I hope I understand war against the Horseclans. It won’t be like anything any of us have ever seen. What’s brought them across the river, anyway?”

Kahrl signaled to his men to close up and dug in his spurs. “Some say they have a prophecy, of a great leader who will take them back to a sacred city. Others say that even the Plains are growing crowded, and some clans would rather fight us than their equals.” “They may find the pickings less easy than they think, in time,” Djoh said. It sounded like whistling in the dark even to himself, and it drew a sour look from Kahrl.

“Tell that to the riders near Two Tanks,” Kahrl growled. “Ever since the town burned, they’ve had all the other villages and farms offering them food, forage, leather, beer, women—just for snapping their fingers.”

“Maybe that’s why they burned Two Tanks,” Djoh said.

“I told you, you understand war,” Kahrl said. “And the gods grant it does us some good.”

They reached the Y in the road that took half the riders back to town, the other half into the unknown.

Kahrl reached over to shake Djoh’s hand. “Good luck. I’d go with you if I could. But the Council’s decided we need most of the able-bodied men here to protect the town. They wouldn’t even let me send Rik!

“Well, I got you the best that bunch of old women would give me. Gil’s the blacksmith’s second son. He’s strong, if maybe a little thick between the ears. Djak’s a yahoo, but good with a sword. Steev grew up on a horse. He’s the best.”