David Weber - Oath 1 - Oath of Swords
VIP免费
2024-12-05
0
0
1.18MB
358 页
5.9玖币
侵权投诉
- Prologue
hradani (hrä-dä-ne) n. (1) One of the original Five Races of Man, noted for foxlike ears,
great stature and physical strength, and violence of temperament. (2) A barbarian or
berserker. (3) Scum, brigand. adj. (1) Of or pertaining to the hradani race. (2) Dangerous,
bloodthirsty or cruel. (3) Treacherous, not to be trusted. (4) Incapable of civilized conduct.
[Old Kontovaran: from hra, calm + danahi, fox.]
Rage, the (rag) n. Hradani term for the uncontrollable berserk bloodlust afflicting their
people. Held by some scholars to be the result of black sorcery dating from the Fall of
Kontovar (q.v.).
Strictures of Ottovar (strik-cherz uv äh-to-vär) n. Ancient code of white wizardry
enforced by Council of Ottovar in pre-Fall Kontovar. The Strictures are said to have
prohibited blood magic or the use of sorcery against non-wizards, and violation of its
provisions was a capital offense. It is said that the wild wizard (q.v.) Wencit of Rum, last
Lord of the Council of Ottovar prior to the Fall, still lives and attempts to enforce them
with the aid of the Order of Semkirk.
—New Manhome Encyclopedic
Dictionary of Norfressan Languages,
Royal and Imperial Press:
King Kormak College, Manhome.
Back | Next
Contents
Framed
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___0.htm (2 of 2)24-1-2007 19:48:07
- Chapter 1
CHAPTER ONE
He shouldn't have taken the shortcut.
Bahzell Bahnakson realized that the instant he heard the sounds drifting down the inky-dark cross
corridor. He'd had to keep to the back ways used only by the palace servants—and far more numerous
slaves—if he wanted to visit Brandark without the Guard's knowledge, for he was too visible to come
and go openly without being seen. But he shouldn't have risked the shortcut just to avoid the more
treacherous passages of the old keep.
He stood in an ill-lit hall heavy with the stink of its sparse torches (the expensive oil lamps were saved
for Churnazh and his "courtiers"), and his mobile, foxlike ears strained at the faint noises. Then they
flattened in recognition, and he cursed. Such sounds were none of his business, he told himself, and
keeping clear of trouble was. Besides, they were far from the first screams he'd heard in Navahk . . . and
there'd been nothing a prince of rival Hurgrum could do about the others, either.
He squeezed his dagger hilt, and his jaw clenched with the anger he dared not show his "hosts." Bahzell
had never considered himself squeamish, even for a hradani, but that was before his father sent him here
as an envoy. As a hostage, really, Bahzell admitted grimly. Prince Bahnak's army had crushed Navahk
and its allies, yet Hurgrum was only a single city-state. She lacked the manpower to occupy her enemies'
territories, though many a hradani chieftain would have let his own realm go to ruin by trying to add the
others to it.
But Bahnak was no ordinary chieftain. He knew there could be no lasting peace while Churnazh lived,
yet he was wise enough to know what would happen if he dispersed his strength in piecemeal garrisons,
each too weak to stand alone. He could defeat Navahk and its allies in battle; to conquer them he needed
time to bind the allies his present victories had attracted to him, and he'd bought that time by tying
Churnazh and his cronies up in a tangle of treaty promises, mutual defense clauses, and contingencies a
Purple Lord would have been hard put to unravel. Half a dozen mutually suspicious hradani warlords
found the task all but impossible, and to make certain they kept trying rather than resorting to more
direct (and traditional) means of resolution, Bahnak had insisted on an exchange of hostages. It was
simply Bahzell's ill fortune that Navahk, as the most powerful of Hurgrum's opponents, was entitled to a
hostage from Hurgrum's royal family.
Bahzell understood, but he wished, just this once, that he could have avoided the consequences of being
Bahnak's son. Bad enough that he was a Horse Stealer, towering head and shoulders above the tallest of
the Bloody Sword tribes and instantly identifiable as an outsider. Worse that Hurgrum's crushing
victories had humiliated Navahk, which made him an instantly hated outsider. Yet both of those things
were only to be expected, and Bahzell could have lived with them, if only Navahk weren't ruled by
Prince Churnazh, who not only hated Prince Bahnak (and his son), but despised them as degenerate,
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (2 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
over-civilized weaklings, as well. His cronies and hangers-on aped their prince's attitude and,
predictably, each vied with the other to prove his contempt was deeper than any of his fellows'.
So far, Bahzell's hostage status had kept daggers out of his back and his own sword sheathed, but no
hradani was truly suited to the role of diplomat, and Bahzell had come to suspect he was even less suited
than most. It might have been different somewhere else, but holding himself in check when Bloody
Swords tossed out insults that would have cost a fellow Horse Stealer blood had worn his temper thin.
He wondered, sometimes, if Churnazh secretly wanted him to lose control, wanted to drive Bahzell into
succumbing to the Rage in order to free himself from the humiliating treaties? Or was it possible
Churnazh truly believed his sneer that the Rage had gone out of Hurgrum, leaving her warriors gutless
as water? It was hard to be sure of anything where the Navahkan was concerned, but two things were
certain as death. He hated and despised Prince Bahnak, and his contempt for the changes Bahnak had
wrought in Hurgrum was boundless.
That Bahzell understood, after a fashion, for he, too, was hradani. He understood the craving for battle,
the terrible hot hunger of the Rage, and he shared his people's disdain for weakness. But he had no use
for blind stupidity, either, and what he couldn't understand was how Churnazh could continue to think
Bahnak a fool. Churnazh might sneer at Hurgrum as a city of shopkeepers who'd forgotten how to be
warriors, but surely even he didn't think it had been pure luck that Hurgrum had won every battle!
Of course, as a lad Bahzell himself had questioned some of his father's more peculiar notions. What need
did a warrior have of reading and writing or arithmetic? Why worry about tradesmen and artisans or silly
things like laws governing money-lending or property rights? Where was the honor in learning to hold
formation instead of charging forward to carve your own glory from the enemy's ranks? And—despite
himself, Bahzell smiled a little in memory, even now—surely bathing every single week would ruin a
man's constitution!
But he questioned no more. Hurgrum's army hadn't simply defeated five times its own numbers; it had
slaughtered them and driven their survivors from the field in a rabble, and it had done so because it
fought as a disciplined unit. Because its maps were accurate and the commanders of its fast-marching
contingents, or at least their aides, could read the orders their prince sent them and close in upon their
enemies in coordinated attacks. And because it was uniformly trained, because its warriors did keep
formation and were equipped with weapons of its own city's manufacture from the hands and forges of
the "shopkeepers" Churnazh despised.
That was a lesson even other Horse Stealers could appreciate, which explained the new allies Hurgrum
was gathering in, but since seeing Navahk, Bahzell had come to recognize an even more enduring side
of his father's accomplishments. Prince Bahnak's native city had been bad enough before he came to
power, yet Navahk was worse than Hurgrum had ever been. Far worse. It was a place of noisome streets
cluttered with garbage, night soil, and small dead animals, heavy with the stench of unwashed people
and waiting pestilence, all presided over by swaggering bullies in the colors of the prince who was
supposed to rule his people, not plunder them himself!
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (3 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
But, then, Churnazh had been a common brigand before he joined the Navahkan army, rose through the
ranks, and seized the throne, and he was proud of the brute strength that proved his right to rule.
Strength Bahzell could appreciate; weakness was beneath contempt, and he knew his father couldn't
have held his own throne if his warriors thought for one moment that he was a weakling. But in
Churnazh's eyes, "strength" rested upon terror. His endless wars had made Navahk the most feared of all
the Bloody Sword cities, yet Navahk herself was terrified of him . . . and his five sons were even worse
than he.
All of which explained why the last thing a hostage from Hurgrum had any business doing was standing
in this hall listening to screams and even considering intervening. Besides, whoever was screaming was
only another Bloody Sword, and, with the noteworthy exception of Brandark, there wasn't a Bloody
Sword worth the time to send him to Phrobus, much less risk his own life for.
Bahzell told himself that with all the hardheaded pragmatism he could summon . . . then swore vilely
and started down the unlit corridor.
Crown Prince Harnak grinned as he smashed his fist into Farmah's face yet again. Her gagged scream
was weaker and less satisfying than it had been, but his metal-reinforced gauntlet cut fresh, bleeding
gashes, and he felt a sensual thrill of power even greater than he'd felt when he raped her.
He let her slip to the floor, let her try to crawl away with her arms bound behind her, then kicked her in
the ribs. The shredded chemise wadded into her mouth muffled her gurgling shriek as his boot smashed
her into the stone wall, and he laughed. The bitch. Thought she was too good for a prince of the blood,
did she? Well, she'd learned better now, hadn't she?
He watched her curl in a beaten ball and savored her hopeless terror. Rape was the one crime that might
turn even his father's men against him, but no one would ever know who'd had this slut. When they
found her body and saw all the things he'd done—and still looked forward to doing—they'd assume
exactly what he wanted: that someone taken by the Rage's blood frenzy had slaughtered her like a sow,
and—
An abrupt explosion of rending wood shattered his hungry anticipation and snatched him around in
shock. The long abandoned sleeping chamber's locked door was thick, as stout and well built as any door
in Navahk was likely to be, but its latch simply disappeared in a cloud of splinters, and the door itself
slammed back against the wall so hard one iron hinge snapped. Harnak jumped back in instant panic,
mind already racing for a way to bribe or threaten his way out of the consequences of discovery, but
then his eyes widened as he saw who stood in the opening.
That towering figure could not be mistaken for anyone else, but it was alone, and Harnak snarled in
contemptuous relief as the intruder glanced at the naked, battered girl huddled against the wall. Big he
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (4 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
might be, but Bahzell of Hurgrum was no threat. The puling, puking coward had hidden behind his
"hostage" status for over two years, swallowing insults no warrior would let pass . . . and he was armed
only with a dagger, while Harnak's sword lay ready on the rotting bed. Bahzell would never raise his
hand to the heir to Navahk's throne—especially if it meant matching eighteen inches of steel against
forty!—and even if he carried the tale to others, no one in Navahk would dare take his word over that of
a prince of the blood. Particularly if Harnak saw to it that Farmah had vanished before the Horse Stealer
could get back with help. He straightened his back with an automatic, arrogant snarl, gathering his
scattered wits to order the intruder out, but the words died unspoken as Bahzell's eyes moved back to
him. There was something in them Harnak had never seen before . . . and Bahzell wasn't stopping in the
doorway.
A ball of ice froze in Harnak's belly. He had time to feel one sudden stab of terror, to abandon his
swaggering posture and leap desperately for his sword, and then an iron clamp seized him by the throat.
Shouting for help would have done him no good—he'd chosen this spot so no one would hear his
victim's screams—but he never got the chance to try, for his cry died in a wheezing gurgle as the clamp
lifted his toes from the floor. He writhed and choked, beating at Bahzell's wrist with his gauntleted
hands, and then another hand—not a clamp, this one, but a spiked mace—crashed into his belly.
Harnak screamed as three ribs snapped. The sound was faint and strangled . . . and dwarfed by the sound
he made when a knee like a tree trunk smashed up between his legs.
His world vanished in agony so great he hardly noticed the mace crashing into his belly again. And then
again and again and again. But he retained enough awareness to realize what was happening as Bahzell
released his throat at last. The choking hand clasped the nape of his neck instead. Another hand caught
his belt, and Crown Prince Harnak of Navahk screamed in terror . . . until he smashed face-first into the
dirty little chamber's wall and the impact cut his shriek off like a knife.
He oozed down the stone, smearing it with red, and Bahzell snarled and started forward to finish the job.
The Horse Stealer's muscles quivered as fury snapped and sputtered through them, but sanity still
flickered, and he made himself stop. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, fighting back the red haze. It
wasn't easy, but the killing madness ebbed without quite passing over into the Rage, and he shook
himself. He opened his eyes once more and looked down, grimacing at the knuckles he'd split on his
enemy's metal-studded leather jerkin, then turned to Harnak's latest victim.
She writhed away in terror, too battered and beaten to realize he wasn't Harnak, but then she felt the
gentleness of his touch and whimpered.
"There, lass. There," he murmured, bitterly aware of how useless the soothing sounds were yet making
them anyway, and her frantic struggles eased. One eye opened, staring fearfully up at him, but the other
was swollen shut, and the cheek below it was clearly broken.
He touched her hair gently, and disgust filled him as he recognized her cut and bloody face. Farmah.
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (5 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
Who but Harnak—or his brothers—would rape a mere girl supposedly under his own father's protection?
He lifted her, and bleak hate filled his eyes at her pain sound when broken ribs shifted. Her hands were
bound behind her, and fresh contempt snarled through him as he recalled Harnak's swaggering bluster
about courage and hardihood. Courage, it seemed, required a "warrior" to bind a teenaged girl half his
size to be certain she was helpless before he raped her and beat her bloody!
He eased her into a sitting position on a battered old chest against the wall. It was filthy, but the only
other furnishing was the bed Harnak had raped her upon. She shuddered in terror and pain, yet she
leaned forward to help as he cut the cord that had flayed her wrists raw and plucked the wad of cloth
from her mouth. Returning intelligence flickered in her good eye. "Thank you, M'lord," she whispered.
"Thank you!"
Her hand rose and squeezed his wrist with surprising strength. Or perhaps not so surprising, for she, too,
was hradani, however slim and delicate she might be compared to Bahzell.
"Hush, girl. Don't be thanking me," Bahzell rumbled, and looked away from her nakedness in sudden
embarrassment. He spied Harnak's discarded cloak and scooped it up, averting his eyes as he held it out
to her, and her sound as she took it was trapped between a sob of pain and shame and a strange, twisted
ghost of a laugh.
It snarled deep inside Bahzell, that sound, striking fresh sparks of fury. He bought a few moments to
reassert control by ripping a length of cloth from Harnak's none too clean shirt and wrapping it around
his bleeding knuckles, but the delay was little help, and his hand itched for his dagger once more as he
glared down at Harnak. Rape. The one crime not even the Rage could excuse, even in Navahk. Hradani
women had enough to endure without that, and they were too precious to abuse so, for they alone were
immune to the Rage, the guardians of what little stability most hradani tribes could cling to.
"Lillinara must have sent you." Farmah's slurred words sent his ears flat once more, and he sketched an
instant, instinctive warding gesture. She huddled in Harnak's cloak, shaken by pain and reaction, and
used a scrap of her torn clothing to wipe at the blood trickling from her nose and split lips.
"Wish me no ill fortune, lass. No good ever came of mixing in the gods' business, and it's Phrobus' own
tangle we're in now, the both of us," he muttered, and Farmah nodded in understanding.
Hradani notions of justice were harsh. They had to be for a people afflicted by the Rage, and the
universal penalty for rape was castration and then to be drawn and quartered. But Harnak wasn't just
Churnazh's son; he was his eldest son, heir to the throne, and ten years of Churnazh's rule had made it
plain the law did not apply to him or his. Farmah knew that better than most, for her father and elder
brother had died at the hands of an off duty Guard captain. Everyone knew Churnazh had borrowed
heavily from her father, but the prince had accepted his captain's claim of the Rage and pardoned him,
and somehow the debt—the money which might have meant Farmah's livelihood or means of
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (6 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
flight—had simply vanished. Which was how she came to find herself living under Churnazh's
"protection" as little more than a slave.
"Is—is he alive?" she asked weakly.
"Um." Bahzell gave the limp body a brutal kick, and it flopped onto its back without even a groan. "Aye,
he's alive," he grunted, grimacing down at the ruined face and watching breath bubble in the blood from
its smashed nose and lips, "but how long will he stay that way? There's the question." He knelt, and his
jaw tightened as he touched an indentation in Harnak's forehead. "He's less pretty than he was, and I'm
thinking he hit the wall a mite hard, but he's a head like a boulder. He might live yet, Krahana take him."
The Horse Stealer sank back on his heels, fingering his dagger. Cutting a helpless throat, even when it
belonged to scum like this, went hard with him. Then again, a man had to be practical. . . .
"Chalak saw him take me," Farmah said weakly behind him, and he spat a fresh oath. Finishing Harnak
might protect him, but if the prince's brother knew his plans for Farmah, Harnak's death would only
make her hopeless situation still worse. Chalak might keep quiet, since Harnak's elimination would
improve his own chance for power, yet he was only Churnazh's fourth son. It was unlikely Harnak's
removal would profit him significantly . . . but identifying his brother's killer to their father certainly
would.
The Horse Stealer stood and glared down at the motionless body while his mind raced. Killing Harnak
wouldn't save Farmah, and that meant it wouldn't help him, either. Enough torture would loosen any
tongue, and Churnazh would apply the irons himself. He'd like that, even if he hadn't lost his son. So
unless Bahzell was prepared to cut the girl's throat as well as Harnak's . . .
"How badly are you hurt, lass?" he asked, turning to her at last. She looked back mutely, and he waved a
hand in a gesture that mixed impatience with apology. "We're both dead if we stay, girl, whether he lives
or dies. If I get you away, can you stay on your feet to run?"
"I—" Farmah looked back down at Harnak and shivered, then stiffened her shoulders and nodded as her
own thoughts followed his. "I can run. Not fast, M'lord, but I can run," she said hoarsely. "Only where
could I run to?"
"Aye, there's the question." Bahzell gave Harnak another kick, feeling her watch him in silence, and the
look of trust in her one good eye made him feel even worse. He wished her no ill-fortune, but he couldn't
help wishing he'd never heard her screams, and he knew too well how misplaced her trust might be
against the odds they faced. But counting the odds never shortened them, and he sighed and shook
himself. "I'm thinking there's just one place, lass—Hurgrum."
"Hurgrum?"
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (7 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
- Chapter 1
He smiled sourly at the shock in her voice, for if one thing was certain it was that he couldn't return to
Hurgrum. There'd be hell enough to pay over this even if Harnak lived; if the bastard died, Churnazh
was certain to outlaw Bahzell for breaking hostage bond. He might well do so even if Harnak
lived—gods and demons knew he'd seemed happy enough to let others try to provoke Bahzell into
something which would let him do just that! And if the Bloody Swords outlawed him and he returned to
his father's court, the fragile balance holding the armies from one another's throats would come down in
ruins.
"Aye, Hurgrum," he said. "But that's for you, lass, not me." He turned away from Harnak, doubts
banished by action, and lifted her in his arms. "I came this way to avoid people. Let's be hoping the two
of us don't meet anyone else on our way out—and that no one finds this bastard before we're gone."
Back | Next
Contents
Framed
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___1.htm (8 of 8)24-1-2007 19:48:11
摘要：
展开>>
收起<<
-PrologueBack|NextContentsfile:///K|/eMule/Incoming/Oath%20of%20Swords/0671876422___0.htm(1of2)24-1-200719:48:07-Prologuehradani(hrä-dä-ne)n.(1)OneoftheoriginalFiveRacesofMan,notedforfoxlikeears,greatstatureandphysicalstrength,andviolenceoftemperament.(2)Abarbarianorberserker.(3)Scum,brigand.adj.(...
声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！
相关推荐
-
【词汇变形总汇】2025高考词汇变形总汇 - 教师版VIP免费
2024-12-06 3 -
【超简37页】新课标高考英语考纲3500词汇VIP免费
2024-12-06 4 -
《高考英语3500词详解》（WORD版）VIP免费
2024-12-06 19 -
《高考英语3500词详解》VIP免费
2024-12-06 15 -
高中英语-[教师版]80天通关高考3500词汇VIP免费
2024-12-06 17 -
高中人教选修7课文逐句翻译VIP免费
2024-12-06 8 -
高中人教选修7课文原文及翻译VIP免费
2024-12-06 20 -
高中人教必修4课文逐句翻译VIP免费
2024-12-06 8 -
高中人教必修4课文原文及翻译VIP免费
2024-12-06 23 -
高考英语核心高频688词汇VIP免费
2024-12-06 11
分类：外语学习
价格：5.9玖币
属性：358 页
大小：1.18MB
格式：PDF
时间：2024-12-05
作者详情
相关内容
-
主题班会：责任与我同行(1)
分类：中学教育
时间：2025-06-01
标签：无
格式：PPT
价格：10 玖币
-
主题班会：责任——我们共同的需要ppt
分类：中学教育
时间：2025-06-01
标签：无
格式：PPT
价格：10 玖币
-
主题班会：预防爱滋病
分类：中学教育
时间：2025-06-01
标签：无
格式：PPT
价格：10 玖币
-
主题班会：远离毒品，珍爱生命ppt1
分类：中学教育
时间：2025-06-01
标签：无
格式：PPT
价格：10 玖币
-
韶关市2024届高三综合测试（一）英语答案
分类：中学教育
时间：2025-06-05
标签：无
格式：PDF
价格：10 玖币
渝公网安备50010702506394
