Read Swordmage for Free Online Page B

a few scrawny herds of livestock, but with the coming of spring the passes would soon open, and he’d be able to send hunting parties to the mountain vales and the open steppeland beyond. It would be good for his warriors to have something to do. Too many of his ores were growing bored and restless after the long winter, and that usually spelled trouble.
    He glanced to his left and scowled. The camp of the Vaasans was still there, perched in the shelter of a rocky tor a quarter-mile from the hold’s walls. In the center of the humans’ tents stood a small tower of iron, summoned up out of nothing at all by the Vaasan lord’s magic. The humans had shown his tribe every respect, sending fine gifts ahead of their emissaries, and his scouts had counted an escort of almost two hundred spears for the lord they sent to speak to him—a sign of the man’s importance. But the fact remained that if negotiations were to take an ugly turn, he was not sure that he could drive the Vaasan company away from his keep, not with the sort of magic the black-clad humans evidently commanded.
    “What do they want with me?” he growled.
    Yevelda stretched out atop the furs, deliberately not covering herself to remind him why she was his favorite. She answered him, even though he had not meant the question for her. “You will find out soon enough,” she said in her throaty purr. “But if you must guess, then ask yourself this: What does the Vaasan lack?”
    Mhurren grimaced in annoyance. Along with her straight, smooth limbs and dusky beauty, Yevelda’s human blood blessed her with the same sort of fiery ambition and quick curiosity he himself possessed. She had a mind every bit as sharp as his own and seemed to feel that entitled her to help him rule over the Bloody Skulls. In truth, Yevelda might just
    be clever, strong, and ruthless enough to govern the tribe without him, but it was rare indeed for any woman, no matter how exceptional, to rule as queen over ore warriors. “He’s here to bribe me to attack the Skullsmashers,” he guessed. “The stupid ogres don’t have enough sense to leave the Vaasans alone, so they send this man Terov to find my price for an alliance against King Guld and his band of dimwits.”
    “What price would you demand for your aid?”
    “Gold, furs, wine, good steel … and some assurance that the Vaasans will actually fight. I’ll be damned if I let my warriors get mashed to bloody pulp by the ogres while the Vaasans sit back and watch us kill each other.”
    Yevelda rolled over onto her belly and looked up at him. “It depends which warriors, doesn’t it? I can think of a couple I wouldn’t be sorry to lose.”
    Mhurren barked a short, harsh laugh. “True enough. The warriors grow restless, and it would be good to find someone to fight. My berserkers are ready to turn on each other. But I can’t let the tribe think the Vaasans played me for a fool. That would look weak.” He reached out and slapped her shapely flank. “I go to see what he thinks my price is.”
    He buckled on his weapon harness and padded out of his den. Six fierce warriors with the elaborate facial scarring of the Skull Guard waited for him. They grounded the butts of their spears against the stone and shouted, “KailKail” when Mhurren appeared.
    Without another word they fell in around him and escorted him through the keep’s tortuous passageways and cramped guardchambers, brutally striking and shouldering aside any who got in their way. Mhurren was as sure of their loyalty as he could be. He made sure that his personal guards freely plundered the rest of the tribe. Should anything ever happen to him, the warriors of the Skull Guard would not long survive his demise. And, just to be sure, years ago he’d had Sutha lay fearsome curses and compulsions on each Skull Guard with her priestess magic. But Sutha was likely not very pleased with him at the moment,
    not as long as Yevelda was first among his wives … he would be