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Alanna scrubbed her palms with sand to dry them. “I won’t kill if I don’t have to,” she replied quietly, remembering her last duel.
Coram shrugged. “Be that as it may, if it’s a question of ye dyin’ or him, it had better be him.”
Alanna grinned mischievously at her longtime teacher and accepted her dagger from Ishak, who had brought it from her tent. “I won’t argue with that.”
She waited for the shaman to finish exhorting her opponent, fingering the ember-stone. There was no way she could avoid remembering her duel four weeks ago, the one that had ended with Duke Roger on the floor of the Great Hall, dead. Unlike the sorcerer-duke, she did not hate this tribesman. She hoped it would not come to killing tonight.
Halef stood. “Are you ready, man of the tribe?”
Hakim saluted the headman with his dagger. “I am ready.”
“Are you ready, Woman of the Northern king?”
Alanna saluted, her mouth paper-dry. “I am.”
The headman clapped his hands sharply and the tribesmen stepped back. Hakim circled, his eyes sharp.
“Meet your death, woman!” he cried.
Alanna crouched, watching his circling form and remaining silent. She had never followed the practice of shouting insults at an enemy; this was no time to start. Remembering the advice of her friend George, the King of the Thieves, she kept her eyes on Hakim’s blade. He thrust; she skipped aside, then danced in close, slashing for his chest. He leaped back and began to circle once more, his eyes wary. Her lightning response had taught him to treat her with caution.
He feinted high and then drove in, his knife coming up from beneath. Alanna turned her side toward him; as his arm shot past her, she seized it and wrenched him over her hip. Coram let out a whoop of joy—wrestling had always been her weak point—and silenced himself as the Bazhir glared at him.
Hakim rolled to his feet as she kept back, unwilling to follow up her advantage. He wiped his hands on his breeches, his eyes never leaving her. He was sweating, and Alanna could feel the fear rolling off him. Teach him to think a woman’s an easy opponent, she thought as she lunged in.
He caught her cross guard on his, bearing up on the locked knives. Alanna dropped and rolled away before coming to her feet. Hakim lunged wildly, his blade slicing toward her unprotected shoulder. Twisting, Alanna stabbed through the web of muscle on the bottom of his upper arm. She yanked her knife free just as one of his fists struck the middle of her spine, driving the wind from her lungs. Again she dropped and rolled. He threw himself toward her: This time she helped him over her head with her foot, sending him flying across the cleared space.
Breathing hard, she rolled to her feet. Hakim rose, dashing sweat from his eyes. He closed too slowly, giving her time to maneuver into position. Grabbing his knife arm, she rapped him hard on the temple with her dagger hilt. Hakim went down like a stone, and stayed down.
“You may kill him,” Halef told her. “It is your right.”
Alanna wiped her sweating face. “I won’t kill when I don’t have to. I hate waste.”
Men assisted Hakim from the circle as Coram gave her a towel. Faithful twined around her ankles. “Ye did well,” the ex-soldier whispered. “Any of us who taught ye would’ve been proud of that fight.”
The Bazhir crowded around to offer their congratulations. Only a few stayed back, including the shaman, Akhnan Ibn Nazzir. Thinking to make amends, Alanna went to him, her hand outstretched. “Is there peace between us?” she asked. “I mean no offense to you or your ways.”
“Unnatural woman!” he snarled. “The Balance will never be right as long as you act like a man!” He glared at the now-silent Bazhir. “Our tribe will suffer until this she-demon is cast out!” Gathering his burnoose around himself, he stalked off.
For a moment all were silent. Finally Alanna shrugged and turned to Halef Seif.
“Now what?” she asked.
The headman’s set face boded ill for the shaman. Then he too shrugged. “The law is the law. You survived the combat: you are one of us.” The tribesmen murmured their agreement. “Akhnan Ibn Nazzir is no longer young. New ideas come less easily to him.” He smiled at her. “Now we make you a warrior of the tribe, and your man Coram, if you will speak for him.”
“Of course I’ll speak for him.” How could he ask?
“Then hold out your arm,” Halef instructed. Alanna obeyed. In a swift movement the man opened a low shallow cut on the inside of her forearm. Holding out his own wrist, he did the same to himself, then pressed his wound to Alanna’s.
“Become one with the tribe, and one with our people,” he commanded, his soft voice suddenly deep and ringing. Alanna shuddered as an alien magic flooded into her body. She knew without being told that Halaf Seif was only a pathway for this sorcery, that its origins were as old as the Bazhir tribes.
Their combined blood welled up, dripping onto the sand. The watching men set up a cheer. Touching the ember-stone, she watched as Gammal performed the ritual with Coram. The magic was glittering white; it filled the air around them all, flooding from every Bazhir present.
She let Ishak bind up her arm, feeling a moment’s sympathy for Coram. The ex-soldier was obviously unhappy that he had taken part in an exercise of sorcery (albeit a short one). Now they were truly members of the Bazhir, tied by blood and magic to the desertmen.
The drinking started. Women brought out food as the men told stories, recounting their greatest legends for the two new members of the tribe. The sky was gray in the east when Alanna gave up and went to bed. Coram had been moved into bachelor quarters; evidently her new status did not excuse her from the proprieties. Amused, she fell onto her pillow and sank immediately into sleep.
Sunlight in her eyes roused her. Her tent flap was open; from the sun’s position she saw it was noon. Moaning and clutching her aching head, Alanna lurched to her feet.
“We’ve been waiting forever,” Kourrem announced.
Alanna scowled at the two Bazhir girls who had welcomed her the previous day. “I didn’t go to bed till dawn,” she growled. She ducked behind a partition and changed her clothes, feeling very old and much the worse for a night of date wine.
“They made you a warrior of the tribe.” Kara’s voice was filled with awe. “And you’re a woman.”
Alanna pulled on the fresh tan burnoose she foun
d with her clothes. If she was a Bazhir, she might as well dress like one. Emerging from behind the partition, she bathed her face in a basin of water.
“Akhnan Ibn Nazzir says you’re a demon,” Kourrem told her. “He says you have destroyed the eternal Balance. He wants us all to kill you.”
Alanna dried her face briskly and pulled a comb through her hair before answering. “Nonsense. If your eternal Balance is destroyed, why did the sun rise? If I’m a demon, why do I have such a headache?” Using fresh water, she cleaned her teeth.
“Are all the women in the North warriors?” Kourrem asked. Kara was setting out breakfast: fruit and chilled fruit juice, rolls and cheese. “Are you all sorcerers and she-demons?”
Alanna rubbed her aching head. Was she supposed to eat all that? “Hardly,” she replied to Kourrem. She sat awkwardly before the low table, crossing her legs before her. Inspired, she told the girls, “Why don’t you join me? I’d welcome the company.” It wasn’t quite the truth, but chances were the girls would be far hungrier than she was at the moment.
Kourrem needed no urging, but Kara hesitated. “It wouldn’t be proper,” she demurred, her eyes uncertain over her face veil.
“Of course it’s proper,” Alanna said firmly. “I’m female, aren’t I? At least, I was the last time I checked.”
Even Kara smiled at that. She and Kourrem slipped off their veils. Kara was older, fine-boned and dark-eyed, with two deep-set dimples framing her mouth. Kourrem had mischievous gray-brown eyes and a pointed little chin. Both were too thin, even for rapidly growing teenagers, and their clothes were of poor quality. If Alanna remembered Sir Myles’s teaching correctly, both were old enough to be married; the desert people contracted alliances for their daughters when they first donned veils, at the age of twelve. Why were these two single?
Alanna picked up a roll, and the girls eagerly helped themselves.
“If the Northern women aren’t warriors,” Kourrem went on, her mouth full, “how did you become a knight?”
Alanna smiled reluctantly. “It wasn’t easy,” she admitted. Seeing that her audience was listening intently, she sighed. “I was ten. My mother died giving my twin brother and me birth, and our father was a scholar who cared more for his work than us. Coram raised us, and old Maude, who was our village healing-woman. You see, Thom had no turn for woodcraft and archery, and I did. He was good at magical things.
