Flight of the Maiden

He nearly toppled over, as it struck naught but a wispy cape. In the instant it took to recover his balance there was an icy blast of wind that forced his eyes shut. When he opened them again there was no sign of the girl. He was about to find her tracks in the gory snow and follow, when he heard a low groan beside him. Valdstok, now fitting properly back in his armor, was still alive. Davion knew he had no time to lose. The ring of bodies around the warlord attested to the fierceness of this proud warrior, but the number of rents and dents in his armor told Davion of grievous wounds that must be tended quickly if he would keep him alive. Also, the temperature was dropping rapidly as the long northern twilight faded to night. Davion, as gently as he could, drew the dying man up and over his shoulders to carry him to shelter. At each small group of bodies he stopped, checked the bodies and drained their waterskins. He drained slush from the last dead man's waterskin. Though it made his head ache from cold, he knew that he must stay hydrated for what was ahead. By now, he was in sight of the long, low lodge that was his destination. This body at the edge of the battlefield had been the first to die. The hurled ax frozen into the cleft youthful face. Davion checked Valdstok before lifting him again to finish the last few hundred yards of the trek. His head held low, he just kept the light of the beacon fires in the top of his vision and plodded on. The hall was silent as he entered. The women had seen the battle from a distance and knew there would be no victory feast tonight. Only one woman came to meet him. She was a statuesque beauty with flaming red hair. She wore some hastily thrown on chainmail armor and there was blood on her hands and a bruise on her forehead. These and the fire burning in her eyes made Davion suspect that she had been about to join the battle, but had been restrained by the other women. Now her only concern was the burden that Davion carried. He carefully laid the body upon a table near the great fire pit in the center of the hall. Several women helped strip the armor from his body, but were violently driven away by the fierce redhead. She finished undressing the man, exposing several gaping wounds. His skin and lips were turning blue and his breathing was ragged and shallow. Davion reached for his wrist to check the pulse, but the she-warrior intervened.

"Look, lady I carried this gigantic carcass halfway across a glacier, and now I'm going to make sure that I wasn't just carrying him back so you could watch him die on this table!" Saying this, Davion pushed her aside and began to check Valdstok's vital signs. "Cover him with warm blankets," he said "and boil some water." Davion barked more instructions and soon had all the women in the hall mobilized. They brought equipment from his quarters. He had been distilling purified alcohol to perform various feats to convince these primitive people of his power as a sorcerer. Now he would use these things to perform a real miracle. He snatched a hairpin from one of the dames, snapped off the jeweled head and inserted it into the smallest glass tube among his gear.