Trendil's Story part 37 - Prey for Peace
Entry posted by jfraser in Trendil's Story
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Time was a strange thing. Especially when it had been reset. It was early in the morning of Sundas, the 17th of Last Seed. Trendil and her not-yet-husband hadn't even left Hammerfell at this point in her previous life. There were still forty days to go before the ambush that had killed her husband was supposed to happen, fifty-five days before previous her officially joined the Stormcloaks. It made no sense, and her head spun trying to reconcile it for what felt like the four-hundredth time.
Marcus was saved from a four-hundred-and-first go-through when he heard voices. He stood and took two steps and peered around the edge of the small outcropping of stone that blocked his fire from the chill northern breeze, then smiled as he spied his prey - his days of waiting had paid off. He banked his fire, strapped on his swords, and hurried across the road. By the time his prey reached him, Marcus was in position on a small boulder overlooking the valley where the sabrecats that had been so helpful those six days earlier lounged in the sun.
As expected, his prey look the bait.
“Hey, it’s Dragon Snack! Still on your trial?”
Marcus glanced back, doing his best to act surprised to see Koren and Rell, each with an arm around a wounded Crowbar, but unable to suppress a short laugh at the name so eerily similar to the one she had earned with her first promotion last time.
“No, I finished my trial six days ago. I am hunting.”
Rell frowned. “Hunting what? There won’t be any game around here. Not with that pride of sabrecats so close.”
“Those are what I’m hunting.”
“What? Why?”
“Because I am out of money and sabrecat hide turns a pretty profit.”
Koren laughed. “Fair enough. I don’t see a bow, though, or a spear.”
“Why would I need those? I have my swords.”
Another, deeper frown from Rell. “You…are going to hunt them with swords?”
“Of course.”
“You are crazier than I thought!” Koren said the words, but Marcus knew him well enough to hear the tinge of excitement. “How are you going to separate one from the pride?”
“Separate? That would be inefficient. I’m going to attack them all at once.”
“What?!” Koren almost dropped his half of Crowbar. “That is completely insane!”
“I know.” Marcus grinned. “You want to join me, don’t you?”
“Of course!”
Rell shook his bemused head. “I’m…going to stay out of this. You two maniacs go right ahead. I’ll keep an eye on Trogan.”
Marcus pointed. “My camp is just on the other side of the road, by that outcropping. Feel free to use it.”
“Perfect, thanks. Any family members I should know about, so I can return what remains of your remains to them?”
“Pfft.” Koren shrugged out of his pack and hefted his hammer. “There will be plenty of us remaining. Ready?”
“Of course.”
Then it was just like old times. Marcus explained his plan as they walked, Koren expressed his doubt and dismay at the sheer impossibility of it, and then they sprang into action.
Trendil weaved through the cats using keep ke dud’ (fighting animals was always refreshing – they were predictable enough that she didn’t have to switch styles or even use more than a couple of the alternate forms; it was as close to pure shûnyuu as one could get), slicing and stabbing as she went, dodging and skittering away from flashing claws and teeth, while Koren’s hammer sang its song of death upon heads, backs, and shoulders. She didn’t try to hold back the joyous laughter that sprang out of her, although the deep timbre of the laughs cast the smallest of palls on her joy.
It probably took the better part of an hour to finish, but to Marcus, it felt like mere minutes. As the last cat collapsed from a thrust to the chest, he yelled and raised his swords toward the sky, then almost fell over as something heavy smashed into his back. It took him a couple breathless moments to realize it was from Koren pounding him with a gleeful hand.
Marcus had just enough presence of mind to restrain himself from launching a victory hug at his companion in death. Instead, he wiped most of the blood off his swords on the nearest carcass and tossed Koren a grin as he relished the moment.
It was a familiar yet strange feeling; the immediate burst of exaltation born of shared exertion toward a common goal. She had had similar experiences before, of course, but this felt different – this was a pure extract of male camaraderie, without the taint of hormonal overtones she hadn’t even realized were there until they were not.
It was simpler and less fulfilling, less complete; like expecting a four-course dinner with all the trimmings but instead being handed a bowl of stew and a loaf of bread – still filling but not satisfying.
Still, it colored in some of the Bent-shaped hole in her heart, enough to assuage the keenest edge of her desperate longing for what she had had. It would do for now; she had a start. Now she just needed to navigate to the finish.
Koren thumped Marcus again, this time on the shoulder. “You might be short, but you are amazing! I have never seen anyone move like that! You are the best swordsman I have ever seen!”
“Thank you. You are quite skilled yourself – I didn’t think warhammers could move that fast.”
“Most people just see them as simple weapons. ‘I see, I smash!’ But they are quite versatile with enough strength and practice.”
It was clear Koren was about to go on one of his long diatribes about the historically criminal view of hammers and the assumptions made of those who wielded them. In the old days, Trendil would have cut him off at the earliest opportunity, but now, with her longing to return things to how they had been, she found herself eager to hear him. “So I see! Tell me more!”
He laughed. “Nah, you saw my hammer in action. What could I possibly say that is more eloquent than that?”
Of course, the one time she actually wanted to hear his boring dissertation …
Marcus pulled out his dagger and knelt to begin skinning the nearest cat. “We have a one-in-four or five chance to end up in the same company. If that doesn’t happen, when you have your own company, remember me.” He glanced up and winked. “Unless I have my own first.”
Koren laughed as he shouldered his hammer. “Oh, trust me, although it is easy to look over you, it is impossible to overlook you.”
And, although it was the wrong context, spoken to the wrong gender of her, meant in the wrong way, for that brief moment, Trendil felt peace.
Edited by jfraser
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