Chapter 6 – Blood-rights

  The wind whipped across the summit plateau, cold and sharp, carrying the smell of pine smoke, hot blood, and old stone. I stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the war party, our deer still heavy across my back, legs burning from the climb.

  Dagon pressed in on my left, Efran on my right, both of them breathing hard but grinning like they’d just won the whole damn mountain.

  One more so than the other.

  Erduin stepped forward and yanked the Mire prisoner’s head up by the hair so every eye in the crowd could see the man’s broken face.

  “Verak!” Erduin’s voice rolled out, deep and sure. “We bring meat for the feast, heads for the ancestors, and one enemy who will learn the price of crossing our borders!”

  The roar that answered shook the carved stone under my boots. My new third eye gave a faint, warm pulse behind my forehead, like it was tasting the sound.

  Dagon leaned in close, voice low and right against my ear. “Here we go. Watch the four up there. You’re about to get the full show. But don’t stare too long at any of them.”

  A stern one-eyed man stepped forward first. The torchlight carved every scar on his face into deep shadow. He looked older than the mountain itself.

  “That’s elder Tharok,” Dagon murmured, barely moving his lips. “Don’t ever let him catch you calling him old. He’ll break your jaw just to prove he still can.”

  Tharok? The name rang a bell, a historical figure I’ve only heard from passerby stories and tales. Never thought I’d get to see him in the flesh.

  Tharok slammed his staff down. The crack cut through the noise.

  “Blood of the peaks!” he bellowed. “All of you have returned, battle scarred. I expected no less for my Verak warriors. You have brought honour to the ancestors. Tonight we feast. Tomorrow we sharpen steel again!”

  Gods, he’s exactly how I pictured him as a kid, I thought. Speaks as if every word is a war cry. I muttered to Dagon, “He always this loud?”

  Dagon snorted. “Don’t let him catch you saying that.”

  The crowd thundered. I felt the vibration in my teeth.

  I swallowed. “He looks like he’d still carve through waves of enemies.”

  “He would,” Dagon said flatly. “And he’d do it without breaking a sweat.”

  Efran’s voice was quieter than usual. “The old guy isn’t all that bad, well minus the missing eye.”

  An elderly woman moved next. She didn’t raise her voice, but the words reached me anyway, soft and steady.

  “Children of Verak… I see the wounds already. Bring them to me before moonrise. I will stitch what is torn and remind your bodies they are the mountain’s children too. Feast hard… but heal harder.”

  Efran exhaled through his nose. “That’s Lirael. Saved my leg last winter when the wound went bad. Never once have I doubted her skill.”

  I glanced at him. “You nearly lost a leg?”

  “Yeah, and he cried like a bitch,” Dagon muttered.

  Efran scoffed at the jab, “Did not. Stop talking nonsense.”

  Dagon gave a dry chuckle. “Anyone who’s ever bled on her table respects her. Even the elders do.”

  “..But don’t let her appearance fool you, her poisons are the best in the entire peaks,” he added quietly.

  Vaelor Moon-Touched glided forward then. The silver in his hair caught every flicker of torchlight. When he lifted his arms the wind seemed to pause.

  “The moon has drunk deep tonight, I feel it in your bodies. “The ancestors walk among you—feel their breath on your necks. Sing the old hymns. Dance until the stars wheel. For the moon remembers those who remember her.”

  My third eye flared hot for a heartbeat. I felt… watched. Not just by the crowd. By something older.

  Dagon’s whisper was almost inaudible. “Don’t look him in the eye too long. They say he sees things in you that you haven’t seen yet. Good or bad.”

  “He’s a creepy one,” Efran shifted uncomfortably. “Last time I met his gaze he told me I’d die under a falling rock. I still check the cliffs every time I climb.”

  I kept my eyes on Vaelor’s hands instead, watching him make gestures toward the sky. “That’s… unsettling.”

  “Probably not wrong,” Dagon said. “But without him the moon might stop listening.”

  “…or so they say,” he remarked lazily.

  “Between yous and me...” Efran neared closer, hiding his mouth, “I think it’s all horseshit.”

  Kargath Stone-Shield stepped up last. The moment his boot hit the ground the air tightened. His scar pulled white when he spoke.

  “I stood the long watch while you warriors hunted,” he said, voice rough like stone. “These walls held. But next time the call comes, I will not be left guarding shadows.”

  His grizzled gaze flicked to Erduin—brief, cold, deliberate. “Still… you brought meat and glory home.”

  “…Verak endures because we are many blades, not one. I only hope to lead the next one,” he looked towards the three elders with contempt.

  Damn, I thought. That wasn’t praise. That was a warning wrapped in some ill compliment.

  Dagon’s breath hissed out. “There it is. The knife in the ribs. I bet he’s been waiting to say that all day.”

  Efran’s jaw worked. “I hear he wanted this raid. Badly. When they picked Erduin instead… you could hear the teeth grind from the lower gate.”

  I kept my face still. “So he hates the headman.”

  “Not hate,” Dagon corrected quietly.

  “Resentment. Deep. The kind that doesn’t fade with meat and mead. We don’t talk about it loud. Not here.”

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  Kargath stepped back.

  The cheers finally faded, leaving only the wind and the crackle of torches. The four elders and Erduin still stood on the dais. No one had moved to dismiss us yet.

  That was when elder Tharok stepped forward again.

  He planted his staff and looked out over the war party like a butcher judging meat.

  “Seventy-two of you left this mountain,” he said. His voice was flat, the same tone he would use as if to announce the weather.

  “Fifty-one came back.”

  The courtyard went still.

  Tharok continued without pause. “Those who fell were weak,” he slammed his staff hard on the ground.

  There wasn’t an ounce of mocking in his voice, only cold truth.

  “They broke when faced against lesser Mire blades. They fell behind. Dead because they were not strong enough to live. Let their souls rest with the sky gods. That is all there is to say about them.”

  My stomach tightened.

  Thoughts went back to the others and Ravaan.

  The arrows, the blades, the blood and the corpses. It was less than twelve hours ago. No one around me lowered their heads. No one whispered their names.

  I could’ve been one of those nameless corpses.

  ‘Lucky pup...’ those words sounded in my mind, tasting bitter.

  Tharok’s milky eye swept across us.

  “Their women and their children now belong to the strong. Their lodges, their weapons, their meat stores—everything they once claimed—passes to those who returned with blood on their blades,” he paused.

  “...This is the law,” he slammed his staff down again.

  “This is how new blood rises. The weak feed the strong. The mountain does not waste what it takes.”

  A few of the older warriors near the front simply nodded, as if he had just reminded them that snow falls in winter.

  Tharok lifted one scarred hand and pointed at the line of returning warriors.

  “Any man among you who took a life today may choose first. Speak your claim tonight at the feast. The rest will be divided by blood-right and spear-count. No arguments. No mercy. The mountain has spoken.”

  He and the others stepped back, whilst Erduin addressed the crowd.

  “Three elders have spoken. The Guardian has spoken. Now hear your war-leader: the feast begins at moonrise! Let every fire burn high. Let every song be sung loud. Tonight we remember who we are—Verak!”

  The mountain answered with a final roar that pressed my ribs together.

  I let my eyes drift across the crowd.

  Noticing a low ripple moving through the returning men. Not grief. Not shame.

  Something hungrier.

  Gorrak, two places to my left, ran his tongue across his teeth and grinned wide enough to show the gap where a Mire axe had taken a tooth.

  His stare was already locked on a young widow near the front—Ravaan’s wife, I recognised her with a sick twist in my gut.

  She stood there, perfectly still, arms folded tight across her chest, eyes searching for a man she couldn’t and wouldn’t find.

  Further down the line, three of the older warriors were already celebrating, exchanging low, ugly laughs.

  One of them—scarred, thick-necked, still carrying the head of the Mire he’d killed, jerked his chin toward a cluster of women and made a crude pumping motion with his hips.

  The others snorted. Though, their eyes gleamed with the same look I’d seen on wolves circling a fresh carcass.

  I guess this is how it works, I told myself. Strong men take. Weak men feed the plants.

  Efran shifted beside me, breath quickening. He was staring hard at a particular woman near the back. She couldn’t have been more than nineteen winters. Her braid was coming undone, and she kept swallowing like something was stuck in her throat.

  “Fuck me,” Efran whispered, voice thick.

  “I’ve had my eye on Lira since last spring. Look at her standing there… all alone now. I could walk straight over after the feast, claim her and the lodge. She’d warm my furs proper—”

  Dagon’s hand shot out and smacked the jiggle on Efran’s arm like swatting a fly.

  “Shut your mouth fatty,” he growled, low and flat.

  “You’ve got two heads and one deer. That’s not enough blood-right to jump the line. Kargath’s men already called dibs on Ravaan’s bloodline before we even reached the lower gate,” he deliberated adjusting his sword.

  “You heard Tharok—first blood claims first. You push this and you’ll be the one feeding the mountain next.”

  Efran’s grin faltered, but only for a second. He shrugged, still staring at Lira like she was already his. “Doesn’t hurt to look.”

  “It hurts when someone stronger than you decides to look back, fool” Dagon muttered. “Save your cock for the feast girls tonight. The real claims are already spoken for.”

  I saw no wrong in his words, after all strength speaks the loudest.

  I simply kept a blank face, but my stomach twisted anyway. Not with pity, that was for children and weak men. This was simply the way of it. I’d grown up hearing the bland stories anyway.

  Pity has no place in a cruel world.

  Dagon was already turning to leave when Efran muttered under his breath, still staring at Lira like she was a prized stag.

  “What would you know anyway?” Efran snorted. “At least I’m not some cockless sword fanatic who sleeps with his blade instead of a warm pair of thighs.”

  Dagon didn’t even flinch. He just gave that flat, half-smile of his and shrugged.

  “Women are temporary,” he said. “Strength is forever. I’ll still be swinging steel when your cock falls off and your stomach dies with you.”

  Efran barked a laugh, loud and ugly. “Oh, listen to this monk! Your poor ancestors are probably up there right now denouncing your name,” he puffed, putting on a voice.

  “‘Look at that fool Dagon, died without planting a single seed. What a waste of good Verak cock.’”

  Dagon scoffed, the sound dry as bone. Not offended in the slightest. “My ancestors can complain all they want, curse me if they have to.”

  “At least they’ll know I died with a blade in my hand instead of buried between some widow’s legs. Go claim your jade, fatty. Just don’t come crying when she poisons your stew for not satisfying her,” he said not looking back.

  Efran grinned wider, then suddenly swung his attention to me like he’d just remembered I existed.

  “What about you, brother?” He slung a heavy arm around my shoulders, still reeking of old sweat and blood. “Any woman catch your eye on the way up? Come on, don’t be shy. You took a head today. That earns you a good look at least.”

  I tried to picture one. I really did.

  I searched my mind for any face that had ever made my blood run hotter—some girl from the lower lodges, maybe, or one of the huntresses who sometimes passed through Grey Peak. But nothing came. Just grey stone, grey sky, and the same tired faces I’d grown up with.

  I shook my head.

  “Nothing,” I said quietly. “I came from Grey Peak. Nothing there but dispirited orphans and old retirees waiting to die. The women… they’re all already claimed or too old. Never really looked twice.”

  Efran’s grin faltered for the first time all night. He actually looked sorry for me.

  “Grey Peak?” He let out a low whistle.

  “Shit, Alikad… I didn’t know. That place is worse than a tomb.” He gave my shoulder a rough, almost fatherly pat.

  “Don’t worry, brother. This main peak’s got plenty of jades in waiting—fresh ones, unbroken, still got fire in them,” he brought his arms towards the crowd before bringing them to his chest looking spirited.

  “You’ll surely have your pick once the claims settle. Hell, I’ll even point you toward a couple who like quiet types,” he added with a lecherous expression.

  He squeezed my shoulder once more, almost gentle for a guy who’d just been talking about claiming widows like livestock.

  “Come on,” he said, voice lighter again. “Let’s go find that bone marrow before the real animals start fighting over it.”

  I nodded, but the new fire behind my eyes burned a little colder now.

  Grey Peak had only taught me how to survive.

  It seems the main peak was about to teach me how to take.