Adalwulf: The Two Swords (Tales of Germania Book 1) by Alaric Longward Page A

men knew this.
    Where the stream ended below the hill closest to Mattium, there was a deep, cool body of water, a holy spring the women bathed in, and that was where the warriors visited first when they went hunting, though they usually didn’t show their faces, but stayed in the woods. There, they gazed down at the lithe bodies, braving the anger and feuds of the fathers and brothers of those maidens, perhaps hoping to marry one of the girls one day.
    In the dream I was having, I was there, one of these lecherous warriors, sitting on Snake-Bite, who didn’t care much for the women. I was looking at a dozen such nude creatures, who were frolicking in the small pool below. I reached out to remove an offending branch hampering my sight, when I accidentally pressed the sides of the horse with my calves, and the damned fool thing took a step forward.
    Suddenly there was rubble under the hoof, and the rubble gave away. The hillside betrayed us, the horse fell, toppling me with it. It happened so fast, I had no time to yell. We rolled crazily down a mossy bank of flowers, and while we rolled, the horse kicked me in the chest, stealing my breath. I hit the water.
    I fell amidst the shrieking, nude group of feminine beauty and went under. I went deep, much deeper than I thought possible, and felt my lungs burning. There was a pain in my back as I hit the bottom. I swam up to the surface, looking apologetic as a child with his hand in a jar of honey, and hoped they’d forgive me. Around me a group of young women flocked, furious, gloriously naked, sputtering, but then the women smiled, and I smiled back, relieved. They dragged me out of the water with happy whoops, but instead of kisses and care, they began to kick me so hard I felt my morning gruel surge for the daylight.
    I woke up, saw an older, armored champion heave above me, and another of his kicks struck my belly. I emptied my belly weakly on the planks.
    “Enough, Harmod,” said a murderous voice, and I turned to see another man, high lord of the Marcomanni, his armor glittering with golden hoops at the hem, and a fabulous helmet of a carved beast head under his arm. His spear was at his side, and all around me stood a scowling group of Marcomanni warriors. I tore myself up, and howled, as my back—flesh and tunic—ripped out of the floor, and I dimly remembered I had been wounded there. I fell back, writhed with shock, and knew the blood had dried up and glued me to the floor. I groped for my back, twitching with pain, but the older warrior placed an implacable foot on my chest, and pushed me back to the floor, and made me gasp breathlessly.
    Then I noticed some other things.
    First, I was wearing a cloak of hair and skins, similar to what the attackers had worn, and the dead enemy mercenaries were all heaped on the side of the hall, red, grisly streaks on the floor showing where they had been dragged across the floorboards. Some dogs were sniffing their corpses experimentally.
    The dead of Hulderic and the Celtic lord, who was not apparent in the hall, were heaped by the doorway.
    Save for the blacksmith, Bellows.
    He was on his back next to me, dead as a stone. He was bleeding from a very thin wound on his throat, or perhaps from a wound to his belly, where there was a spear buried. The shaft was broken.
    And I held half of the broken shaft.
    “Shit-faced thief,” the warrior hissed. “They left you for dead, didn’t they? You Chatti piece of shit.”
    “What?” I asked, and let go of the broken weapon like a viper had been slithering in my hand. ‘No! That’s not—”
    “Where did you come from?” the older warrior asked venomously, and pressed down so hard, I had to grab the foot in hope of wrestling it away. “They tell us you are a Chatti. That another Chatti looked for you, Adalwulf, earlier this week. You lot came here, one-by-one, and did you thing, eh? But you live. For now.”
    A Chatti had been looking for me earlier? The man Raganthar had