21. Strangers in a stranger land

The shore was as close a Zalori dared. The fishing boats had scouted ahead, casting lead as they went, searching for rocks or reefs that would finish what the flames began. Normally seeing land would have been cause for delight on a ship; instead hushed whispers and faces wrapped in fear stole glances at the forbidden strip of rock cowering under the cold low clouds.

"Lower away!" Zalori yelled, his voice cutting over the songs Jenn and Liva were singing to calm the horses dangling in the harnesses from the rigging. Maii was in the water first, and Liva dropped down her own rope onto the mare's back, never breaking her song.

Angelica was holding on to the yard arm above them, dressed in light soldier's clothing identical to Liva's below her. Their armour and weapons were stowed in the wooden rowboat that had been unlashed from its storage upside down on top of the main hold and put in the water before them, sailors on the oars keeping it close but not *too close. Liva made it look easy, but all of them knew it really wasn't.

As Caterham went into the water his eyes went wide and he started kicking on the verge of full panic. Jenn's song intensified, and as Angelica watched Caterham suddenly settled, beginning to swim with his nostrils high above the gentle swell.

My turn. Climbing down the rope using her feet to take the weight was simple. Odd to think that ships had been such a mystery before, in her old life. Talking to Caterham she adjusted her weight from the rope slowly onto the saddle. Freeing them both from the lowering harness was slightly more complex, but they just listened to Jenn's song and neither panicked.

They swam towards the forgettable pebble beach in the small unremarkable bay, with the rowboat following behind them at a distance to not spook the horses.

Angelica looked at the dry dark grey coastal rocks, devoid of anything but the occasional seagull and washed up seaweed. What an unwelcoming place. Caterham loved the water, so all she needed to do was let him do all the work. Just keep my feet up, and try not to get kicked by his front legs if I do have to go in and swim beside him. Relax, let him keep his head well up. Good horse!

Caterham found his footing on the gently sloping beach, and snorted with anticipation and eagerness as he pulled up out of the water. Angelica patted his neck but did not let him roam, turning to watch as Liva riding Maii came ashore safely. The boat lifted its speed now, and came up though the soft surf with a grinding scrape of wood on stone.

"I know, I know" Angelica said softly to Caterham. "I want to run too. Not yet."

Antaryon came up on one side, Alexandras the other, and without ceremony dried Angelica's feet and slipped on her good boots, then passed up a gambeson that she pulled on and tied. As planned she forwent donning her chain, Antaryon dropping it over the front of her saddle then helping Alexandras to loop her bow, quiver, blanket and rations over the back of her saddle as she strapped on her sword belt and water skins. They passed up her cloak then a long light spear and shield. Antaryon checked her tack was all in order, nodding. Those on the beach saluted, and moments later Angelica and Liva were riding up the incline before them, Liva in the lead, seeking an enemy they all secretly hoped to be nothing more than myth.

Behind them, the sailors pushed the boat back out into the hissing small surf, and began to pull hard towards the ships, while the rest of Angelica's guard fanned out with bows ready and advanced slowly towards the highest rocks they could see to cover Maygus' foraging party.

"What a beautiful, brutal place" Angelica said quietly as they picked out a path though the rocks and low shrubs of the tundra.

"There" Liva said, pointing with her spear. Poking out from beneath the hardy low shrub was a bone, still partially clad with rusting steel armour.

Angelica shivered, the full impact of what she had led them into sinking into the pit of her tummy.

Riding to one side to investigate a glint, she used the blunt end of her spear to turn over a discarded shield. It would have been made by a master, a thing of awe and beauty back in its day. The device was a shining silver sword worked over a golden sun, as proud as the day it was made, with faded azure blue paint flaking off about it. The pride of some noble or brave knight, close to cleaved in two; rotting oak and fallen dreams.

"How many?" Angelica asked softly.

Liva looked about, riding up to a small ridge, and waving Angelica up beside her with a gesture of her spear.

The shard intake of her breath left no room to hide her shock, as the gentle cold light of the day glittered on fallen spear tips and shields carpeting the vale before them.

"Here lies the First Crusade" Liva said quietly, pointing to a shield bearing a sigil. "There, the Second." she gestured to another.

"How many did they send?" Angelica said, the tears choking her voice.

"One every third generation." Liva replied, trying to quell her own horror at the waste of life.

"Liva, maybe we should go back?" Angelica confided quietly, allowing her doubts out into the still air.

"No, M'Lady. They will never expect your plan" came the reply with calm certainty.

"But ..." Angelica gestured to the tundra, gentle wind sighing past the dry testament to the folly of war. "Qin help us" she muttered quietly "or better yet give us another option?" She looked to the sky, and when nothing happened, she sighed and returned to the slightly daunting task before them, moving Caterham beside Maii.

"Besides" Liva said with a smile in her tone "if we die, we're in the right place?"

Angelica laughed despite herself, and try as she might could not banish the giggling that made Caterham even more excitable. "Put that on my stone if this goes wrong" Angelica tried to breath between her laughter "Invaded the Land of the Dead to make it a short walk."

Liva laughed "Carve it yourself if it comes to that!" and pointing to the next rise, drew in a large breath and said more sensibly "Come on, up there." With a kik kik and flick of her knees she let Maii into a walk then up to a trot up the slope, leaving the silent history behind them amid the hardy shrubs struggling to survive in this cold, bitter place.

@->-/-----

The view was stunning, a long sweep of rocky coast rambling away on one side and towering mountains hazy in the distance the other. Their modest fleet cowering in the small bay looked like lost toys, hoping not to be found.

"Can you see it?" Liva asked, staring intently inland.

"There" Angelica replied "See that large mountain on the right? The ridge that drops down left with the forest beyond it."

"Seen" Liva replied automatically, completely in the soldier's mode. "Half a day's ride you think?"

"Depends what we meet on the way" Angelica replied simply "only a couple of hours if we pushed it".

"You sure about this, M'Lady?" Liva queried "We are putting an immense amount of trust in a near stranger's directions."

"Yes" Angelica paused, looking about them "had she wanted us dead, we would never have made it though the mists. It would have been so simple for her. Whatever her game is, she is the best move for us."

Liva nodded, and with a gentle tap of her knees set Maii into a walk along the shallow spur, her eyes sweeping left to right and back again as she led out.

Caterham's hooves crunched on something as she followed, and Angelica leaned to look and check he was not caught on anything. It was just shell ... no, those were not shells. The crunch of another bone shattering beneath her horse's hooves made her wince; it was better when she thought it was just some sea shells.

@>-/----

Liva stood in her stirrups, then with a nod of her head Angelica pulled left, shield pulled up to the ready. Caterham's ears flicked back, his excitement matching her own in anticipation.

Maii and Liva went right over the shallow bowl ahead of them, Liva's eyes locked on a clump of unremarkable shrubs in the centre. Angelica still did not see what was up, but followed Liva's signals anyway, hand suddenly all too aware of the leather grip of the spear she carried. This was no longer practice, no longer a game. Her mouth was entirely dry for no reason ... she could see a bug flying lazily over the shrubs, could smell salt water on the soft breeze.

Liva angled in, spear lowered and shield up; Angelica turned in kind.

"Don't!" a frightened squeaky yell emerged from the shrubs, followed by small empty hands raised to the sky.

"Up." Liva commanded ominously.

With a grunt the Mann stood up, keeping his hands high. He was dressed in lurid green and purple, a combination that somehow made him look less threatening than the oft-polished old worn leather on the short sword at his hip betrayed.

"Who are you?" Liva said simply.

"Name's Ods Bodikins" he replied, risking a look behind him "And you're not locals neither. Am-I-rite?"

Liva smiled, but did not lower her spear.

Angelica looked carefully at the boy ... no man. He was really short for a Manneran, far smaller than any she had met before. The name drifted up from one of her old lessons on the Peoples of Elyira. Kypiq. He's a Kypiq.

Ods whistled softly, and a petite dun mare rolled from where she was laying hidden. After unhurriedly lumbering up, she walked to her friend without paying any attention to the strangers. The mare nickered in a low rumbled as she nuzzled Ods' side. Keeping his right hand up in the air far from his sword, the Kypiq slowly reached into the bag slung over his shoulder, producing an apple. "This is Gorki, she only likes red apples. Not green. No idea why."

The mare munched happily on the apple.

"Liva" she returned her spear to rest, setting the end on top of her boot and relaxing her hand in the loop "behind is Ann. What in Elyria are you doing out here?"

"Trying to stay alive" he replied simply. "You?"

"Same" Liva replied truthfully, if befret of detail "How did you ..." she gestured to the vast empty land around them.

"There is going to be a battle" he said simply. "I signed on to fix things, not to cross the Qin and die for some fool's dream."

"So you ran away?" Liva pressed.

She was met with a glare from the young man "Certainly not!" he spat out defiantly. "I'm looking for timber for a new mast; that's my job today. Fighting's not in my contract so I ain't doin' it."

"Put your arm down" Liva laughed, sparking notes in such contrast to the muted hues of the place. "We're on a job too, you're welcome to come with. We've seen no trees the way we came, but if you prefer to follow our tacks back to our friends Zalori may be able to help you find and cut one."

Ods nodded "Thanks. You'll forgive me" he tapped his forehead in salute "but the business you're on dressed like that is not for me. I'll galdly go ask your friends for help with getting a mast."

Liva nodded, smile on her lips. "As you wish, I hope to meet you again."

The Kypiq bowed low in an unexpectedly perfect Court bow. His tone was deadly serious as his eyes met Liva's. "Stay safe, great Lady."

Angelica had ridden around beside Liva, her spear also at casual rest. The Kypiq mounted his mare with practiced ease, and with a wink turned towards the bay.

Liva turned towards the mountains, and the long ride to the smudge of colour on the mountains that was their salvation, or their end.

@>-/----

"Should we be worried?" Angelica asked quietly as she looked about at the seemingly endless brown-green low shrubs, with the occasional crunch under Caterham's hooves.

"About?" Liva replied.

"There is an army out there somewhere". Angelica replied.

"Not somewhere," Liva replied "it's over there." she nodded along the coast.

Angelica looked, peering. "How? I can't see- "

Maii squealed, a high pitched scream that sliced though the silence as she threw herself sideways in an awkward jump.

Angelica's head snapped around at the sound, to watch in horror as a huge black mass shot forward to where Maii and Liva had been moments before, huge fangs slamming a glancing blow into the shield Liva had reflexively bought up. As she struggled to make sense of what she was seeing, she turned Caterham and lowered her spear.

The thing ... no, the spider was huge, legs fanned wide with a body as large as a wolf, wicked black mandibles clacking and scraping on the shield as the mare evaded.

Caterham was having none of it and roared his disapproval and challenge at the thing. Angelica did not even hesitate, but charged instead while the thing tried to work out what to do next. The steel tip of her spear sank smoothly into the abdomen of the thing, eliciting a scream that had no business being heard by the living. Angelica pulled her spear back to stab it again, and looked in shock as a stream of sand and dust tumbled out rather than blood. The spider turned to look at her, Liva still trying to stay on Maii as she spun away on the terrified mare.

Angelica felt ice shoot down her spine as she looked into the sockets that once, long ago, probably held the spider's many eyes.

Caterham's ears pinned back against his head, and with another roar he did not bother to wait for permission but slammed both front hooves down on top of the spider, then stomped it repeatedly until Angelica was shaken back into thinking enough to quiet him. Dead or not, the thing was definitely not moving any more, and Liva had control of Maii again.

"What the?" Liva asked, perplexed.

"Giant trapdoor spider." Angelica replied, breathless. "Look, there, I bet its burrow is under that" she pointed to a flat mat of soil, silk and bone chips with her spear.

"But it's..."

"Well it certainly is now" Angelica said with dark humour as Caterham stomped on the spider again, as if for luck. Then one ear flicked forward and the other back as if to sigh that his plaything was not playing any more.

Liva was leaning forward, checking the ugly scrapes on the side of Maii's neck and shoulder, singing softly to her mare. "You know, I'm not entirely sure we are welcome here." she said dryly.

Angelica laughed, and at Liva's nod continued towards the mountains.