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Ten days of fighting, ten days of death, had ended as abruptly as the war itself had erupted.

Waaf, the Blessed Breath, had been benevolent to Ostnye's scouts thus far. She just hoped the kindness would last, for that divine force was as capricious as the wind itself, and she still smelled bwikko and blood in the air. She still wasn't certain how her talon of scouts had escaped the encroaching monsters.

Oh, she understood the story that Indkaf had told when Ostnye had awoken to relieve her and take her second watch of the night ("Never ask your subordinates to do anything that you wouldn't do twice over," her trainers had taught her; as Talonmaiden, Ostnye took her responsibility seriously.) She understood the words of the story, at least.

But she didn't understand.

Aadis held up a hand and knelt, inspecting the ground. The Waaf spoke to their tracker differently than it spoke to Ostnye; Aadis said she could sense the eddies of the Blessed Breath in footprints in the dirt and in broken stems of grass. That was something else that Osynye, who heard the divine wind every moment of her life, didn't understand. Aadis's sight showed her the past; Ostnye's hearing showed her the present.

But a Talonmaiden didn't need to understand her Maidens' talents. She only needed to make use of them. Ostnye planted her spear and halted. "What is it, Aadis?"

"Someone came this way," Aadis said. "Seven hours ago, or my mother was a bwikko."

"It's her," Indkaf said immediately. "It's the girl who came in the night."

Aadis scowled, though Indkaf, who was behind her, couldn't possibly have seen it. By the grace of the Waaf Ostnye heard, rather than saw, Kyiikwi roll her eyes. Swifthoof Maidens weren't supposed to take one another as lovers, but in the past ten days Aadis and Indkaf, who'd never done a great job of hiding their trysts in the first place, had taken to sharing one another's warmth openly. Ostnye couldn't blame them for ignoring regulations. When death was approaching, minor taboos seemed pointless indeed.

But early this morning, Indkaf had started babbling about the beautiful maiden with a strange accent and a spear of fire who had appeared to her in the night. "She was dragging three bwikko through the snow, by their stingers, as if they were a brace of rabbits!" Indkaf had said, her eyes sparkling. "She wouldn't tell me where she came from; she only told me it was a gift, so that we could know that she wasn't lying about the secret pass. If only she'd stayed...But the Waaf caught her up, and then she was gone. But she was no spirit! She was a woman. A real woman." Indkaf had sighed dreamily. "Her panoply must have been even more blessed by the Waaf than our Wind-Mail. She didn't seem the least bit cold, even though she was only wearing...licking tongues of fire..."

Aadis had scowled at that. She'd scowled even more when Kyiikwi had said, "And you'd be the one to notice the near-naked girl, Indkaf!"

Strange maiden or no, the gift of the bwikko corpses was real, and Indkaf's new intelligence was good. They'd found the pass right where Indkaf's mysterious disappearing crush had said it was.

Aadis had led them through, scowling all the while.

This was why a Talonmaiden shouldn't let her subordinates grow emotionally entangled. Unfortunately, Ostnye didn't have time to sort out her tracker's jealousy over her Spirit-Seer's infatuation with this stranger. "We can't know that, Indkaf," Ostnye said. "They could be bwikko tracks."

Indkaf looked aghast. "She wouldn't have led us this far only to abandon us to death."

"She hasn't led us anywhere," Aadis snapped. "You don't even know who she is." Aadis passed her hand through the grass and the flowers, more forcefully than was strictly necessary, and made a show of studying them.

Indkaf stared at Aadis. Surely she couldn't miss the hunch of her lover's back, the tension in her shoulders. Indkaf blinked, and then she crouched, mirroring Aadis's posture in contrition. She said nothing, however, and made no move toward Aadis. Instead, she scanned the rise ahead of them.

Good. Grumpy and jealous or lovestruck and starry-eyed, they had to act like Swifthoof Maidens, ready for action. They were on the clock, and their lives hung in the balance.

Emka, Ostnye's second-in-command and Speaker of Wisdom, leaned in from Ostnye's left. "Do you hear bwikko nearby?" she murmured.

Ostnye shook her head. "I hear..."

Wind and rustling leaves and unique snowflakes melting into identical droplets of water the air tore away layers of last night's snowfall and sent the frozen white dust swirling down the mountainsides. A herd of alpine deer chewing through both grass and blossoms; was it a herd of ten a single mile away, or a hundred ten miles away? A single figure striding through the meadows--

"Someone's coming," Ostnye said.

Indkaf kept her mouth shut. Aadis looked up.

A man came striding over the rise. He walked unhurriedly, as if he knew that the meadows belonged to him, as if bwikko were not rampaging through the mountain range even now. His back was straight, his brown eyes sharp, his skin as pleasantly sun-kissed as Aadis's, his hair dark and shiny and dancing with the gusts as if the breeze were its playful lover. His chest was bare, his loins skirted, his feet booted, and if his lack of weaponry was a story of vulnerability, his thick muscles belied that tale.

A diadem sat on his brow.

Regal. The word came unbidden to Ostnye's thoughts.

"That's...not the woman," Indkaf said.

Kyiikwi barked a laugh. "Yeah, even we could tell that." She grinned and pressed her tongue against the inside of her cheek, an act half of consideration, half of interest. "Gotta say, I do like what I'm seeing..."

Ostnye couldn't trust anything out here. Not even--or perhaps especially not--a strange man walking through the meadows, no matter how appealing he looked. "Emka," Ostnye said. "Your advice?"

Emka smiled slightly. "I advise that we listen to our Silent Judge."

Of course. Gyiv was standing with a foot up on the rubble of a ruined pillar, saying nothing, seeing everything. Sometimes it was easy to forget that Gyiv was one of them, but that was the purpose of a Silent Judge. To notice, and not to be noticed; to see the soul within, and not to be distracted by pretty faces or pretty stories.

"Gyiv?" Ostnye asked. "Do we trust him?"

If the answer was no, Ostnye would have to decide between fight and flight. If the answer was yes...

...Well, that might make things even more complicated. Honestly, a lone man walking through war-wracked alpine meadows without even a weapon, much less backup? Things had gotten very strange this past day.

"Steady as the pillar beneath my feet," Gyiv said at last. She blinked as if surprised, and a look of astonishment crossed her face. "No, steadier, for I can't count the Pillars that dwell within him."

That sounded like a yes, but with Gyiv it was hard to tell. "Stand down," Ostnye said to her Maidens. "We'll hear him out."

The man stopped a short distance away. He stood in the swaying grass, studying them in silence, for a long moment.

Then he said, "I see you saw fit to follow Savannah's advice. Well done. Had you not, your bodies would already be moldering. Come." He turned on his heel and strode away.

If this stranger thought that Ostnye's scouts were going to run after him, he was sorely mistaken. "Where are you going?" Ostnye called.

"To safety," the man called back. "If you are wise, you'll follow, and then we'll discuss how you can pay us back."

"For what?"

"For saving your lives."

Ostnye typically prided herself on being level-headed, but she couldn't help but scoff. "Unbelievab--Gyiv, where are you going?"

But Gyiv was already halfway to the man.

Waaf take the Silent Judge. She'd be the death of them all--except, Ostnye reflected, she'd never known Gyiv's judgments to be wrong, not once. Fine. "Swifthoof Maidens, follow that man." Ostnye didn't add, but be on your guard. Her Maidens were no fools.

"Don't have to tell me twice," Kyiikwi said, starting after Gyiv. The Waaf carried her whispered words to Ostnye's ears. "Follow him anywhere..."

It looked like Ostnye would have a third infatuation among her Maidens to deal with. But considering those thick biceps, those protruding lats, those powerful calves that rippled as the man swept through the grass, Ostnye would have to keep a tight grip on herself lest she add a fourth infatuation.

A very strange day, indeed.

----

This stupid piece took me more than a day, and I really like it despite the fact that it's a stupid piece that took me more than a day.

Daz3D Iray->Affinity.

Description
Ten days of fighting, ten days of death, had ended as abruptly as the war itself had erupted.

Waaf, the Blessed Breath, had been benevolent to Ostnye's scouts thus far. She just hoped the kindness would last, for that divine force was as capricious as the wind itself, and she still smelled bwikko and blood in the air. She still wasn't certain how her talon of scouts had escaped the encroaching monsters.

Oh, she understood the story that Indkaf had told when Ostnye had awoken to relieve her and take her second watch of the night ("Never ask your subordinates to do anything that you wouldn't do twice over," her trainers had taught her; as Talonmaiden, Ostnye took her responsibility seriously.) She understood the words of the story, at least.

But she didn't understand.

Aadis held up a hand and knelt, inspecting the ground. The Waaf spoke to their tracker differently than it spoke to Ostnye; Aadis said she could sense the eddies of the Blessed Breath in footprints in the dirt and in broken stems of grass. That was something else that Osynye, who heard the divine wind every moment of her life, didn't understand. Aadis's sight showed her the past; Ostnye's hearing showed her the present.

But a Talonmaiden didn't need to understand her Maidens' talents. She only needed to make use of them. Ostnye planted her spear and halted. "What is it, Aadis?"

"Someone came this way," Aadis said. "Seven hours ago, or my mother was a bwikko."

"It's her," Indkaf said immediately. "It's the girl who came in the night."

Aadis scowled, though Indkaf, who was behind her, couldn't possibly have seen it. By the grace of the Waaf Ostnye heard, rather than saw, Kyiikwi roll her eyes. Swifthoof Maidens weren't supposed to take one another as lovers, but in the past ten days Aadis and Indkaf, who'd never done a great job of hiding their trysts in the first place, had taken to sharing one another's warmth openly. Ostnye couldn't blame them for ignoring regulations. When death was approaching, minor taboos seemed pointless indeed.

But early this morning, Indkaf had started babbling about the beautiful maiden with a strange accent and a spear of fire who had appeared to her in the night. "She was dragging three bwikko through the snow, by their stingers, as if they were a brace of rabbits!" Indkaf had said, her eyes sparkling. "She wouldn't tell me where she came from; she only told me it was a gift, so that we could know that she wasn't lying about the secret pass. If only she'd stayed...But the Waaf caught her up, and then she was gone. But she was no spirit! She was a woman. A real woman." Indkaf had sighed dreamily. "Her panoply must have been even more blessed by the Waaf than our Wind-Mail. She didn't seem the least bit cold, even though she was only wearing...licking tongues of fire..."

Aadis had scowled at that. She'd scowled even more when Kyiikwi had said, "And you'd be the one to notice the near-naked girl, Indkaf!"

Strange maiden or no, the gift of the bwikko corpses was real, and Indkaf's new intelligence was good. They'd found the pass right where Indkaf's mysterious disappearing crush had said it was.

Aadis had led them through, scowling all the while.

This was why a Talonmaiden shouldn't let her subordinates grow emotionally entangled. Unfortunately, Ostnye didn't have time to sort out her tracker's jealousy over her Spirit-Seer's infatuation with this stranger. "We can't know that, Indkaf," Ostnye said. "They could be bwikko tracks."

Indkaf looked aghast. "She wouldn't have led us this far only to abandon us to death."

"She hasn't led us anywhere," Aadis snapped. "You don't even know who she is." Aadis passed her hand through the grass and the flowers, more forcefully than was strictly necessary, and made a show of studying them.

Indkaf stared at Aadis. Surely she couldn't miss the hunch of her lover's back, the tension in her shoulders. Indkaf blinked, and then she crouched, mirroring Aadis's posture in contrition. She said nothing, however, and made no move toward Aadis. Instead, she scanned the rise ahead of them.

Good. Grumpy and jealous or lovestruck and starry-eyed, they had to act like Swifthoof Maidens, ready for action. They were on the clock, and their lives hung in the balance.

Emka, Ostnye's second-in-command and Speaker of Wisdom, leaned in from Ostnye's left. "Do you hear bwikko nearby?" she murmured.

Ostnye shook her head. "I hear..."

Wind and rustling leaves and unique snowflakes melting into identical droplets of water the air tore away layers of last night's snowfall and sent the frozen white dust swirling down the mountainsides. A herd of alpine deer chewing through both grass and blossoms; was it a herd of ten a single mile away, or a hundred ten miles away? A single figure striding through the meadows--

"Someone's coming," Ostnye said.

Indkaf kept her mouth shut. Aadis looked up.

A man came striding over the rise. He walked unhurriedly, as if he knew that the meadows belonged to him, as if bwikko were not rampaging through the mountain range even now. His back was straight, his brown eyes sharp, his skin as pleasantly sun-kissed as Aadis's, his hair dark and shiny and dancing with the gusts as if the breeze were its playful lover. His chest was bare, his loins skirted, his feet booted, and if his lack of weaponry was a story of vulnerability, his thick muscles belied that tale.

A diadem sat on his brow.

Regal. The word came unbidden to Ostnye's thoughts.

"That's...not the woman," Indkaf said.

Kyiikwi barked a laugh. "Yeah, even we could tell that." She grinned and pressed her tongue against the inside of her cheek, an act half of consideration, half of interest. "Gotta say, I do like what I'm seeing..."

Ostnye couldn't trust anything out here. Not even--or perhaps especially not--a strange man walking through the meadows, no matter how appealing he looked. "Emka," Ostnye said. "Your advice?"

Emka smiled slightly. "I advise that we listen to our Silent Judge."

Of course. Gyiv was standing with a foot up on the rubble of a ruined pillar, saying nothing, seeing everything. Sometimes it was easy to forget that Gyiv was one of them, but that was the purpose of a Silent Judge. To notice, and not to be noticed; to see the soul within, and not to be distracted by pretty faces or pretty stories.

"Gyiv?" Ostnye asked. "Do we trust him?"

If the answer was no, Ostnye would have to decide between fight and flight. If the answer was yes...

...Well, that might make things even more complicated. Honestly, a lone man walking through war-wracked alpine meadows without even a weapon, much less backup? Things had gotten very strange this past day.

"Steady as the pillar beneath my feet," Gyiv said at last. She blinked as if surprised, and a look of astonishment crossed her face. "No, steadier, for I can't count the Pillars that dwell within him."

That sounded like a yes, but with Gyiv it was hard to tell. "Stand down," Ostnye said to her Maidens. "We'll hear him out."

The man stopped a short distance away. He stood in the swaying grass, studying them in silence, for a long moment.

Then he said, "I see you saw fit to follow Savannah's advice. Well done. Had you not, your bodies would already be moldering. Come." He turned on his heel and strode away.

If this stranger thought that Ostnye's scouts were going to run after him, he was sorely mistaken. "Where are you going?" Ostnye called.

"To safety," the man called back. "If you are wise, you'll follow, and then we'll discuss how you can pay us back."

"For what?"

"For saving your lives."

Ostnye typically prided herself on being level-headed, but she couldn't help but scoff. "Unbelievab--Gyiv, where are you going?"

But Gyiv was already halfway to the man.

Waaf take the Silent Judge. She'd be the death of them all--except, Ostnye reflected, she'd never known Gyiv's judgments to be wrong, not once. Fine. "Swifthoof Maidens, follow that man." Ostnye didn't add, but be on your guard. Her Maidens were no fools.

"Don't have to tell me twice," Kyiikwi said, starting after Gyiv. The Waaf carried her whispered words to Ostnye's ears. "Follow him anywhere..."

It looked like Ostnye would have a third infatuation among her Maidens to deal with. But considering those thick biceps, those protruding lats, those powerful calves that rippled as the man swept through the grass, Ostnye would have to keep a tight grip on herself lest she add a fourth infatuation.

A very strange day, indeed.

----

This stupid piece took me more than a day, and I really like it despite the fact that it's a stupid piece that took me more than a day.

Daz3D Iray->Affinity.