like a death’s-head in the sky. A purple cloud floated across the horizon.
CHAPTER SIX
E ven before the war with Nar, the Dring Valley had never been a peaceful place. Voris the Wolf had done his best to live up to his title of warlord, and so the people of his land endured many hardships for his sake, losing sons in battles with their neighbors from Tatterak, the largest of all the Triin territories. Voris was iron-fisted, and his feud with Kronin had dragged on for years, never coming to any conclusion, and never winning the ostensible prize of the Agar Forest. This attrition had drained the coffers of Voris’ castle and had made his people pariahs among the rest of Lucel-Lor, who looked upon the Drol of the valley with suspicion and disquietude.
And yet the Wolf was beloved in Dring, a mystery Dyana puzzled over as she walked with her ragged company along the winding Sheaze River. They were refugees now, these people she traveled with, the meager handful of the valley’s populace who saw the Wolf as something less than deified. With their shabby clothes and dirty faces, they no longer looked Triin at all. They were ghosts now, thin and pale, and Dyana muttered bitterly as she trudged alongside the wagon, for she knew that they all had Tharn and his henchman Voris to thank for their misery, and she wondered at the stupidity of people who would follow such men.
People like her uncle, Jaspin.
She didn’t miss the Dring Valley, not like she missed Tatterak. Dring had merely been a home of necessity, a place to flee when no others would accept her. Jaspin had opened his home to her, but had never made her feel welcome or called her “niece” withany affection. He had feared her, like her mother and sisters before him. And he had discarded her with the rest of the outcasts, labeling them as dangerous heretics. But they were not heretics. They were survivors and fighters, and Dyana was glad to be among them.
Each day for them was much the same. By Falger’s reckoning, they had journeyed halfway to Ackle-Nye so far, crawling along at a snail’s pace. Because there were only two riding horses, most of the group walked, except for the children and the infirm, who were allowed to ride in the mule-drawn wagon along with the few possessions they had brought with them. Falger walked in front of them all, leading his horse over the rugged landscape and letting the weary take turns on its back. Only on rare occasions did he ride his horse himself, and only then when he was just too tired to continue walking.
Falger was an older man, with a well-earned reputation for eccentricity. If there was a heretic among this dismal lot, it was he. A self-proclaimed hater of the gods, he was quick to denounce those who prayed and quicker still to laugh in the faces of the village’s devout. And like Dyana, he despised the Drol and their revolution with a fervor she had thought no one else shared. This mutual disdain had fostered an unusual kinship between them, and Falger quickly became her one defender, for even these folk were nervous to have Tharn’s betrothed among them. But they showed her respect, and that was all Dyana wanted. That and to find her way, somehow, to Nar.
None of them knew precisely what they would find in Ackle-Nye, but they hoped it would be freedom and a willingness to take them into the Empire. They would be outcasts there, too, of course, but they would be free of Drol tyranny. For Dyana, Nar might mean a new life. Perhaps in Nar she could fulfill her father’s dreams and become a woman with dignity, and not a lapdog of the kind she so despised, the type of woman a Drol society demanded. In Nar, she could choose her own husband, and not be sold to a man. She hoped that not all Narens were like Kalak and his murderers.
The noon sun beat down on her uncovered head, and as she trudged along she considered this again, letting her imagination ease the drudgery of the endless trek. These days, her thoughts often
CHAPTER SIX
E ven before the war with Nar, the Dring Valley had never been a peaceful place. Voris the Wolf had done his best to live up to his title of warlord, and so the people of his land endured many hardships for his sake, losing sons in battles with their neighbors from Tatterak, the largest of all the Triin territories. Voris was iron-fisted, and his feud with Kronin had dragged on for years, never coming to any conclusion, and never winning the ostensible prize of the Agar Forest. This attrition had drained the coffers of Voris’ castle and had made his people pariahs among the rest of Lucel-Lor, who looked upon the Drol of the valley with suspicion and disquietude.
And yet the Wolf was beloved in Dring, a mystery Dyana puzzled over as she walked with her ragged company along the winding Sheaze River. They were refugees now, these people she traveled with, the meager handful of the valley’s populace who saw the Wolf as something less than deified. With their shabby clothes and dirty faces, they no longer looked Triin at all. They were ghosts now, thin and pale, and Dyana muttered bitterly as she trudged alongside the wagon, for she knew that they all had Tharn and his henchman Voris to thank for their misery, and she wondered at the stupidity of people who would follow such men.
People like her uncle, Jaspin.
She didn’t miss the Dring Valley, not like she missed Tatterak. Dring had merely been a home of necessity, a place to flee when no others would accept her. Jaspin had opened his home to her, but had never made her feel welcome or called her “niece” withany affection. He had feared her, like her mother and sisters before him. And he had discarded her with the rest of the outcasts, labeling them as dangerous heretics. But they were not heretics. They were survivors and fighters, and Dyana was glad to be among them.
Each day for them was much the same. By Falger’s reckoning, they had journeyed halfway to Ackle-Nye so far, crawling along at a snail’s pace. Because there were only two riding horses, most of the group walked, except for the children and the infirm, who were allowed to ride in the mule-drawn wagon along with the few possessions they had brought with them. Falger walked in front of them all, leading his horse over the rugged landscape and letting the weary take turns on its back. Only on rare occasions did he ride his horse himself, and only then when he was just too tired to continue walking.
Falger was an older man, with a well-earned reputation for eccentricity. If there was a heretic among this dismal lot, it was he. A self-proclaimed hater of the gods, he was quick to denounce those who prayed and quicker still to laugh in the faces of the village’s devout. And like Dyana, he despised the Drol and their revolution with a fervor she had thought no one else shared. This mutual disdain had fostered an unusual kinship between them, and Falger quickly became her one defender, for even these folk were nervous to have Tharn’s betrothed among them. But they showed her respect, and that was all Dyana wanted. That and to find her way, somehow, to Nar.
None of them knew precisely what they would find in Ackle-Nye, but they hoped it would be freedom and a willingness to take them into the Empire. They would be outcasts there, too, of course, but they would be free of Drol tyranny. For Dyana, Nar might mean a new life. Perhaps in Nar she could fulfill her father’s dreams and become a woman with dignity, and not a lapdog of the kind she so despised, the type of woman a Drol society demanded. In Nar, she could choose her own husband, and not be sold to a man. She hoped that not all Narens were like Kalak and his murderers.
The noon sun beat down on her uncovered head, and as she trudged along she considered this again, letting her imagination ease the drudgery of the endless trek. These days, her thoughts often
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