True Warriors Sing by Rowan Erlking (classic book list .TXT) 📕

Blinking hard, Ljev peered into LjuBa’s earnest eyes, grabbing hold of her shoulders. “How many?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. If it were light we could see them and count, but to me it is all just noise. Lots and lots of noise.”

“How do we counter that?” Ljev murmured.

LjuBa shook her head. “I don’t know. If we had some large belt to circle us, then may be—”

Pulling her sharply in a hug and kissing the top of her head, Ljev then cried out. “Genius! Absolutely perfect!”

“But we don’t have a large belt!” LjuBa snapped at him, going red especially since her father was staring at the both of them next to the king, his hands on his hips.

But Ljev immediately called two men over to him. He said to her, “No, but remember what Jonis did with one sword and the words to the song? He said all you need is a circle. You go with these two men. They will drag their swords in the ground around the camp as you sing the song. The line must be unbroken.” He nodded to the two warriors to make sure they understood it.

They bowed back, reaching for LjuBa to hurry with them.

Rushing out of the king’s pavilion, LjuBa looked back one more time before rushing into the darkness.

The king ordered the camp to pull their tents in closer, taking the horses into the center, as LjuBa and the two warriors found the northern point. One of the men decided to draw the line while the other chose to keep watch while LjuBa sung the ‘luck’ song to their belts. The hate ward slowly encircled the camp, their pace at a slow march though LjuBa could hear on the skirts the low hate-filled groan of those waiting for their camp to sleep. But she did not quit their song until they had walked around the entire camp back to the northernmost point where LjuBa finished the song, a sudden rush of ringing immediately breaking through the air to her ears like someone had thrown a bell over them to keep everything else out.

“There,” LjuBa said. “That should keep us safe from all those who hate us.”

She and the two men turned, returning to the center of the camp.

There were cries on the night wind, but all of them were outside the ring LjuBa and those warriors had drawn. The cries grew louder then quit after a while, clearly those assassins giving up once they realized they could no more step over that scratched line in the earth than touch it or remove it. So when dawn broke and the KiTai camp started wake up, not one horse was lost, not one warrior was dead, though the baron’s army stood outside it with gathering forces growling in wait to take on their red-haired enemies.

The prince rubbed his eyes blinking at the horde the moment he stepped out the king’s tent. One of the baron’s men spotted him as the earliest riser and called out to his master.

“Which one of you is the one that presumes to be my king?” the baron shouted in perfect well-studied KiTai dialect. “You?”

Blinking first at the blustering man, Ljev then called back into the tent. “Father! It seems the baron is in a rush to die. His army is right outside our camp, waiting for us.”

The king hopped up from his blankets, pulling out his sword, his tunic askew as was his hair and his beard. He stumbled from the tent to look at the armed crowd standing in the fields just a short distance from his tent. The baron’s men laughed at the disheveled sight of the warrior king. However, the warrior king blinked at the bare space in front of his tent that the baron’s men had not once stepped on. He nodded to Ljev. “Good job with that. I see your magister friend was not a liar. I’ll take him at his word now. We’ll leave Westhaven alone and deal with these barbarians.”

“Thank you, Father,” Ljev bowed his head then walked back into the tent to get his sword.

MiKial climbed out of his tent upon hearing the noise. His two daughters scrambled out also, pulling their robes on over their loose clothes. K’sjuSha stared out at the baron with a snort. LjuBa scowled and grabbed her sword belt, singing the song to fasten it around her waist.

“There!” shouted one of the baron’s men. “The she-witch! Her song magic is!”

“How pathetic!” the baron called out in KiTai, mockery leeching from his voice as well as his conceit. “You employ a witch to protect you? What kind of warrior is that?”

Stomping over to the wall, LjuBa drew her sword. Ljev rushed up to stop her.

“Not yet,” he hissed. “Don’t let them goad you.”

“She’s no witch,” the king said with confidence. “Calling her one shows your ignorance. She is a warriess.”

Ljev led LjuBa back to the tent, hissing for her to get fully dressed so they can meet the baron’s men with the proper strength of the KiTai. “We do this on our terms, not theirs.”

Exhaling, she stomped back to her father’s tent, joining K’sjuSha who was already brushing her curls back so they would not obscure her vision. She adjusted the light jewel headdress that all warriesses wore, shifting anything that moved in the night from sleep. Of course K’sjuSha had the ability of looking gorgeous regardless of how travel-worn she was. LjuBa grabbed the hairbrush after her, combing out her straight hair. The baron’s eyes were on them, recognizing the sisters that had threatened him in his home.

“Where is my accuser?” the baron called out, searching the crowd. “I wish to face him.”

Ljev had walked back to his tent, grabbing a tie for his long hair to pull it back also. He looked up then glanced to his father who shrugged. Huffing, Ljev walked back to the front of the camp, tying back the long ponytail, his eyes fixing on the men he had spared on the hill top, looking each one in the eye so they knew he knew they were there. Lifting his chin, he replied, “I am.”

The baron blinked at the young man and frowned. “You are liar. You come here to cause trouble, to make you look good in front of your king.”

LjuBa hopped out of her tent again, this time with her coat on, her sword belt around her waist once more. She jogged over to Ljev. “He is no liar! I was with him!”

Blanching, the baron staggered back. The crowd murmured.

“He is the crown prince,” MiKial suddenly said, his voice mild as he gazed on the baron. “Surely the prince has the right to visit one of his provenances without being attacked.”

As he bristled, the baron set his teeth in a grimace. “This is not your land! You warriors don’t belong here!”

“We belong here as long as people like you continue to exploit his fellow beings for your own gain,” Ljev snapped.

“Isn’t that what you do?” the Baron called back. “You KiTai! You claim to give us protection in exchange for a tribute and yet the only protection we ever need is from you!”

LjuBa bristled.

K’sjuSha darted up. “So says a man who is taxing the people here over half of what they make! The tributes to us are fair. Hardly even ten percent of what is made!”

Baron Hoisten glared particularly at K’sjuSha, recognizing the woman very well. “At least I live here. I am one of the people. You are conquerors. Outsiders! The KiTai Empire has been dead for centuries. You are all relics.”

MiKial bristled.

LjuBa shook her head.

“We are all alive and well,” Ljev answered coolly. The warriors all marched from their tents, now walking behind him. It was just enough time for everyone to get ready. Now all were prepared. “And now, you will see for yourselves we are not relics. LjuBa, you can take down the wall now.”

Nodding, LjuBa felt into the wall with a song, willing that the hate those outside held for them no longer created it. And like a discordant crash, it leveled, shattering.

Those outside could feel it gone. The baron gave a nod, and the war cry went up. Weapons high, the barbarians of the Eastern Provenance and the KiTai warriors of KiTai central crashed together.

The sheer number of dead among the baron’s men was astounding. The sheer lack of number among the KiTai was not so much. It was expected that most of the KiTai warriors would survive the battle with only a few scratches on their arms. Two, at most died…and that was from blood loss.

The baron was killed at the beginning. His guards were no match for MiKial’s blade or his strong arm, and the baron himself was a pitiful fighter. Ljev got his fair share of scars, none life threatening, but it seemed most of the baron’s men were aiming to kill him the most. LjuBa and K’sjuSha fought off their clump of men, soon frightening most away as several of the enemy were terrified of LjuBa’s ‘singing’ ability. Her songs made her sword strike true. Her war cries were deadly. And K’sjuSha dazzled all with her fantastic skill, as usual.

In fact, at the end of the battle when they were counting the dead and tending to the wounded, LjuBa was dazed at how in her element K’sjuSha was. So amazed, that LjuBa withdrew from the after battle arrangements Ljev was making with her father and the other warriors for dealing with the remaining baron’s men in the land. K’sjuSha volunteered at once, hinting that she didn’t need to return to the Northern Corner for a while, the citizens there well in hand—including the Cordrils.

Several of the warriors headed home, packing up tents and clearing the camp. Their job was finished. There were other places in KiTai they were needed. LjuBa felt she was one among them. Her task was complete. Her father was safe, the prince was found, and they had finally routed out the baron as promised. She knew Ljev would take care that Jonis would get back his horses. She was no longer needed.

LjuBa drew in a breath, saddled her horse with her pack on the back and turned from the Eastern Provenance towards home.

Peace returned to KiTai weeks after the conflict with the baron. The king returned to his throne to mete out justice and the warriors separated back to their respective stewardships. The rhythm of the village surrounding the king’s castle once more was a melodious tune of songs interweaving to create the perfect world. And though LjuBa could hear all the undertones of the music, the song and the magic that flowed around her, her heart beating strong and healthy so that she would have yet many years to appreciate it, she did not feel part of it.

It wasn’t an off tune. Rather, it was like there was an empty space in the melody. Something was missing, something that she had become so familiar with, a tune which she had fallen in love with—and it was gone.

She tried to ignore it. LjuBa knew what it