A Plague of Giants (Seven Kennings #1) - Kevin Hearne Page 0,136

cultural compulsion. My imagination was already composing and arranging items to give him. Maybe a nice handkerchief to offer his opponents when he had them immobilized, to wipe away their blood in style.

There were two mariners waiting at my home to escort me to Fintan. The Nentians, they assured me, had been arrested, along with some fish heads eager to do their bidding. The bard was safe. I ducked inside to get my writing materials, and we met him at a Kaurian restaurant owned by strict pacifists who served no meat of any kind, eschewing violence against animals as well as against people. We ordered marinated grilled mushroom sandwiches.

“Have an exciting night?” I asked him.

“Quite relaxing, actually,” he said, his tone upbeat. “I stayed at the home of a tidal mariner.”

“You mean Tallynd du Böll, or the pelenaut?”

“The former. She’s delightful. Great kids. And I learned how she got that limp, which I’ll share with everyone in a few days. How about you? Restful night?”

I lied and told him yes. I’d let the Lung brief him on security matters. It wasn’t my place. We worked and picked at our cruelty-free food until it was time for his performance.

—

Fintan’s voice floated over Survivor Field. “I learned a new Drowning Song last night—new to me, anyway. It’s one of your old ones to which my tutor knew only a couple of verses and the refrain. If you know more verses and manage to see me, I would enjoy learning more of them. If you know this one, please join in on the refrain.” He got them clapping or stomping in a slow beat, and then he began:

When the storm blew the ship out to sea

The mariners knew they were dead,

Oh, yes, they knew they were dead

And the ocean would be their bed.

(Refrain)

When the krakens rise from the deep

Then you will be sinking down,

You will be sinking down, down,

And you will never be found.

The currents and winds can be unkind

And you could lose sight of the shore,

You could lose sight of the shore, friends,

And then you will be done for.

(Refrain)

—

“My first tale tonight,” the bard said, “will be told by a slightly younger version of myself, since I had a unique perspective on the Nentian march on Gorin Mogen. The slightly younger me had never witnessed actual battle before, and so he had a fresher face than the slightly older and wiser me.”

When he took on a seeming, his clothing had changed to a nakedly martial appearance—the full hardened leather kit of Raelech armor—and his features had altered subtly to present a more youthful face—fine wrinkles gone, markers of stress as much as age.

It was a slow march to the south of Hashan Khek compared to the blistering pace we’d adopted in Numa’s company. The Nentian forces were sluggish at best because half of them were not professional soldiers at all but ragged people who wanted free meals and some pay in return for marching around. I am not sure they realized that they might actually have to fight. And I am not sure if the Nentian tactician, Ghuyedai, realized that if he asked them to fight, he would not get much value for his orders. They would break at the first charge or counterattack of the Hathrim.

His regular forces were much tougher; one could see the capacity for murder and cruelty etched into their features, hear it in their cynical laughter and in the targets of their jokes, which were always the weak or unfortunate. It made me reflect on the role religions play in shaping cultural attitudes to war. Those pledged to the Huntress Raena killed out of necessity only. When the words of the poet goddess failed, Raena was there to protect and rescue until words could be heard again. Hence the makeup of our party and our orders from the Triune Council: words first from the courier, and if that failed, Tarrech the juggernaut would speak in the warrior’s tongue.

But to Kalaad in the sky, everything was plants or meat, and he thought of them the same way. To Kalaad and thus to the Nentians, there was little difference between cutting down a tree or a human, except in spirit. Spirits returned to Kalaad, and he distributed them again or kept them in his company. Although I’m sure that the immortality of the spirit was a comforting thought, it was a worldview that to my own admittedly biased eyes placed little value on life.

The Godsteeth grew larger and larger