W&W 44

I've learned that love *isn't* all you need; knew all along Lennon was being a snide bastard when he wrote that song. I've learned that you can't prevent bad crap from happening, even if you do become a wizard. You can work all the complicated spells ever written and it'll still find a way to get to you.

But what I also *know* in my bones---without any fucking training, thank you kindly---is that you don't go down under even overwhelming odds without a fight. You may lose, natch; but you make sure the victors go away with outrageous lumps on their heads and talking in awe about that final stand when you pulled out a tie-dyed grenade and bounced it off their collective beans.

Now: Warchief and lover, a dark and molten presence in my life. Savage, sensual and beyond belief sexy; just owning his desire filled me with monster self-esteem and by-gawd attitude. Who the hell could be loved by the ruler of a whole nation and not kinda glory in it? And beyond that---I was so proud, that the bitter, abused kid had become such a splendid creature, so much what I'd always known he could be in this place of magic.

Then: Dark lonely Goth boy, trapped by a monster. Trusting no one, hating everything. I held him; I knew him. He was part of me, and how I ached for his pain. How I wanted to protect him, knowing it would always be impossible.

I woulda preferred to go the hell without. Aside from the fact I was jealous of my hero status to Carson, sometimes "allies" can be a total ass pain, and with no sense of timing. I mean, after all that finger-sucking, a bit more boinking and a relaxing few hours wrapped around the big guy wouldn't have hurt me in the slightest.

But then, Kef was still in my face, the elvish motherfucker. I'd thanked his ass and hinted his absence might be desired. Yet still he chose to hang and socialize. What can I say? Some people are too full of themselves for words.

The damn elf touched me now, there in that weird part of me where magic lived, as if verifying something. Becoming so chatty it almost bored me to tears.

"So. Do you wish to bother with this problem your Bonded has? It is held off for now in any case. You are elf by more than you think. Magic I could teach you, if you committed only a space of years to the learning of it. You have the strength beyond anyone I've known, I admit! But the disciplining of that strength will take some study. Some---effort, beyond what you have attempted. And you cannot focus on anything beyond your craft, to be a true worker of magic. For that space of years, at the least."

I'd fought Carson's Darkangel---again. This time, though, it was way tougher and I had to accept help when I didn't really want it. There was something about Darkangels I'd been told, something that would scare me brainless if I remembered it. Knowing there was more than one was bad enough!

This Elf side of me was a wild card, crazed and inhuman. Scary to me, and now he hinted of power I could have if I would only give up everything that mattered most to me. Not such a leap; once you say yes to *that*, something *else* matters and the old stuff fades like melting butter.

Magic. To hold that eldritch power under my control instead of by lucky guess, be invincible instead of helplessly facing this major war. Call stars and command their thoughts. Cities of ocean, by my command lifting in glories of deep greens and clear amethyst, becoming stadiums filled with the wild scream of planetary music from a guitar I wielded like a weapon and fondled like a lover. Striking enemies, shielding friends. Doing everything necessary, and doing it with style.

"Carson isn't melted butter," I snapped, cutting off temptation with a ruthless mental knife, and even partial success. "No fuckin' deal. Not even if you say I can open my own Starbucks, have pizza for breakfast every day and sit on my ass watching galactic teevee from light years away, man!"

He pulled back, insulted more by my smart-assism than by the refusal, I betcha. I mocked him further, on a roll and kinda digging it now. "Gollum, Gollum! Oh my precious---at the end, it was Sam's common hobbit-sense that saved him!"

"Train your Riders," he whispered. "You have mere days, but they have not been idle. Let others deal with the Easterners, once you show them your brand. Your task there is finished."

He paused then, and said almost gently, "Be brave. Stand. Four realms must seal your Bond before its banner flies, and the final two are the hardest by far. And remember in the last battle---you are healer more than warrior."

And then he was gone and despite all expectations I was missing him badly. Mainly because I wanted a bit more concrete advice and not more fucking riddles! "Train my Riders", what the hell? Realms, what the fuck? I mean, we had *won*, right? The Dark Angel was toast, all we had to worry about was some stupid war or other. Damned arrogant Elf just loved to ref mysteries with no solution, for his own weird satisfaction I supposed.

Healer more than warrior. That was important, I thought. Somewhere, I'd heard it before, but he'd only reminded me, explanation of the quote or its relevance be damned. What a bastard! Well, one could only consider the source and move on.

My fault probably, for quoting Tolkien at him. Well, what the hell. The Dark Angel had been booted; Carson was safe, and if the Tribe felt the Gods would be annoyed, too tough for them. We'd deal with any stinkin' gods.

Le'ghan and about a dozen other teenagers of the Tribe had become rather fluent in Earther slang, thanks to shameless eavesdropping and the nightly campfire meetings to share their gathered vocabulary and impressions of Firehawk. A couple of the older ones proudly groomed fledgling mustaches. And one incredibly lucky bastard had announced in an excited, newly-breaking voice that puberty had granted him a gift of the finestkind. He then managed after ten minutes of concentration to light the campfire with a thought.

He also, unfortunately, torched one of those fledgling mustaches. Le'gahn was the unofficial leader of this group and usually the one to restore order when they got too rowdy, but even he could do nothing but lie back and howl with laughter. The sight of Bearfang being chased around "his" fire by an infuriated lad with a smoking upper lip had been too damned funny! Thank Odin, none of their parents had bothered to investigate.

Their "biker" group needed to remain a secret. At least until Hawk remembered his promise and taught them to ride a little better than they had managed, in their impatience, to train themselves on the sly. They'd watched their hero's moves carefully when he was Steelbound, and to be honest some of them had more skill at commanding the metal beasts than others. Many, Le'gahn included, could buzz around the camp swiftly and with little effort when attached to the alien creatures!

But all of them tended to fall over at most unhappy times when riding the monsters, or the metal brutes would sputter and die under their hands more often than not. Offering the disabled steeds fresh meat or sacrifices of blood hadn't worked very well. It had to be admitted---efficient as these new creatures could be, they were some kind of construct and not thinking beings, nor even minor gods. His group needed Hawk's advice, to keep them running!

And other things were going on too quickly for Le'gahn's pleasure. He might have been young but he was no fool. Now that he had seen what was occurring in Nightwolf's tent combined with the arrival of the Easterners, he understood that everything needed to be speeded up a bit.

He threw the brash tendrils of his mind outward, caught Lightstorm in the preparation of a stew as befitted her attempts to be a proper third wife to LionEyes, the Bonded of Foxmoon. "There's god-trouble and we need to be on hand to help!" he explained.

Or maybe that was for the best! Although he was a formidable creature in a war, the Spearmaster was not exactly patient in peacetime. Maybe, because he had no skills besides the power of his weapons? He tended to get bored quickly, and would disappear to hunt game or attack other tribes for fun as the mood struck him, explaining his actions to no one. Then he'd return home days later and be astonished when Fox gave him the hard side of her tongue and made him sleep in the stable for a couple of nights despite his aching dick. Of course now his absence was probably truly related to war, but Le'ghan didn't feel inclined to be fair to the self-centered warrior or admit to any of the man's good qualities.

"Not the brightest hammer in the bag," Le'ghan whispered, remembering a Firehawk insult and grinning fiercely. Then he sobered, thinking not for the first time how difficult it must be for the older woman, to have wasted her Bonding on a shallow soul like LionEyes. The man appreciated her only for her cooking skills at this point. He had gathered in a couple of new wives under the pretense of them being children needing help. And truly, they had been youngsters orphaned by Southern depredations. But since both were in their teens, he'd had no difficulty in assisting them with any sexual problems they might have aside from the lack of a home. Or in choosing to handfast them and expect his true Bonded to deal with it.

This was all well and good, as long as you weren't Bonded. A Tribesman could have twenty people handfasted to him or her, create a small community from it and be honored for sociability if nothing else! But a

It was meant to be, at its ultimate, like what the Nightwolf and Firehawk shared. Few could attain that, he thought. But a halfway decent person would at least try!

Le'ghan shrugged and banished his annoyance with LionEyes. It was none of his business, really. And if the older man were too stupid to realize what a fine lady he had, there were at least five teenagers including Le'ghan who knew better. And one quiet, fierce hunter in his thirties who was only held back from challenging Fox's Bonded by the gentle hand of the woman herself. If Lion was dumb enough to think Foxmoon was pining over him like a lovesick drell or a dim Southern tart, he just didn't realize that his lady, for all her obsession with cleaning, was a warrior in her heart and just as Tribal as he!

Le'ghan's thoughts jerked back to the present as the young ones converged on Smitty's tent about the time that Firehawk and Nightwolf strode there, cold-eyed and chained together. Although Hawk looked rather tentative and possibly approachable, Nightwolf seemed as grim as Le'gahn had ever seen him and that was saying something! Do'nar followed the two closely, upset as hell and showing it. By the gods, what was all this crap?

"Captain!" Le'ghan bleated, appealing to the one who in his experience was most likely to be rational in the face of insanity. "We know there's gods work afoot. How can we help?"

Do'nar turned in surprise, rolled his eyes, and spoke briefly. "Shut the fuck up and guard the tent, for one! These are private matters inside!" He relented a little at the boy's petrified look, and spoke in a gentler tone. "You know Hawk and the King are both god-touched. That's never easy, boy." He glanced briefly at the horde of teenagers behind Le'ghan, and smiled faintly. We never fooled this one, Le'ghan thought, obscurely guilty.

"The Easterners have come, lad. They're as full of talk as a word salad, but some of their piffle has meaning for us. As I said---guard here, and trust the Hawk to give you training on those strange machines when it's needed. Our party will be delayed for a day or two if I'm not mistook." He scowled in disgust at that thought, then studied the group of spike haired, mustached, oddly dressed children, and bit back a grin through sheer willpower.

It wouldn't do, to chuckle at a collection of dead-serious ragamuffins no matter how damn proud he was of them. The laugh would be what they remembered; probably wouldn't even notice the pride.

Despite his very real distress, Do'nar watched sternly until they had distributed themselves around the tent. Though young, they bristled with weaponry, and the odd hairdos and unusual facial hair made them appear alien and fierce. The Riders had known them from squabs, of course, and wouldn't be too intimidated, but the extra Easterners he could see milling around outside might be put off by this honor guard. That was his hope, anyway!

The Easterners. As he remembered them---girls and lads dressed in kilts and little else. Short on clothing but long on politics! Made his ass ache.

Yet as he knew some of them it would be his job to talk. Dammitall! He eyed the people outside the tent, and wasn't disappointed in his memory skills at least!

Braided hair on both men and women wasn't so different, but this was entwined with colorful beads and trinkets that set them apart from the Rider norm. Their slim bodies and pale faces also were a giveaway that they weren't Tribal. Scrawny lads like Jalin were rare, most Tribal kids boasted lean ropey muscles and tanned skin by age twelve, and from there they shot up in height and breadth as a general rule. These people weren't children or teenagers, they just tended to the small and fragile.

And also tattooed, pierced---and masked! He remembered that worriedly, as a slim girl in a wooden fox mask began to stalk him, her sun-yellow braids weaving behind her like a trap. Well, he *thought* it was a girl. With the Easterners it was hard to tell, they were all built the same and the complex hairdos tended to be universal! She/he was naked from the waist up, yet the hair hid a lot. When Do'nar found himself squinting for boobs to make sure, he admittedly panicked a little. Mainly because he couldn't see a thing!

This time, he was fairly certain there'd be no surprises as pleasant as a gorgeous lad confessing his feelings for an old fighting man. Next time, by Thor, he'd take what was offered and revel in it!

Come to think of *that*, he was still fucking sober! And probably due to remain that way for hours or even days----dealing with the Witchlady and foreign politicians would ensure it, by gad!

To find exactly the thing he *hadn't* expected---Jalin, completely alone and sitting in the middle of the tent cross-legged on the heavy bronze-toned rug, eyes downcast as if in profound thought.

Do'nar had waited a little too long, in following Hawk and Nightwolf into the shaman's tent. He wasn't sure what was going on, or why only Jalin remained in a place that should have been filled with a dozen Easterners, Sa'thal throwing a fit, and his warchief plus bonded explaining themselves to a hard-working fighting man!

Ignoring Jalin for the moment, he strode past the boy and bent his not inconsiderable warrior skills to finding out where Sa'thal had secreted the ritual wine.

He found the stuff in a locked cabinet; securing the rune-covered bottles made no sense, given the poor quality of the brew. But he supposed after all was said and done he could replace the thin beverage with a bit of Blue Death and give the witch-woman and her cronies a little more incentive to have visions!

"Well, now," Do'nar observed, sitting heavily upon a ceremonial cushion and breathing a sigh of relief when it made no farting noise as he'd half expected. "Lad, what's going on with this place? I know I saw a mess of Easterners walk in here---"

Jalin looked up from his bottle of wine---by Thor, the lad had nearly drained it in one swallow! Impressive, if unexpected. The boy might be ready for a more manly drink sometime soon!

"Lad, I sympathize. I guess. Since I had no idea what you're talking about, or if it's important in the least beyond your immediate feelings! And yes, they're of some worth, don't get me wrong. But I need to know where the Easterners went first! Not to mention the Warchief. In case everyone but me has forgotten, I'm responsible for the Tribe in his absence. Especially since he's chosen to behave like a---a godammn Black Moon boy!"

"Oh, I know that; Hawk went into my brain in that sneaky way he has. 'I had to, dude', he said. 'He wouldn't have survived, doing that to me!'" Do'nar sighed. "It's true, I suppose. The Warchief would rather die than hurt that fool wizard in any way; there's only one softness in that man, but it runs deep, by Odin! To feel that way for someone---it must be---" He eyed Jalin's mournful face, and said firmly "Damned inconvenient!"

The boy was startled into a chuckle, which turned into a real smile at Do'nar's fiendish grin. Then his face turned serious, and he said quietly, "You're right; the Easterners were here. But when Sa'thal heard but part of their words, she asked Hawk to portal them elsewhere, for privacy's sake."

"The hell you say," Do'nar blurted, astonished and, truth be told, a little miffed. He'd been dreading the politics, true, but he WAS second in command after all, not the blasted witchwoman! Was his opinion on these matters worth so little, by thunder?

"The portal is still here if you care to use it," Jalin added, before the big man could get a decent anger worked up. "Sa'thal told me to show you---"

"Hmmm! Well, let's wait a bit on that," Do'nar said hastily. "First, tell me what the problem is, boy. You seem a mite unhappy." Charitably, he didn't add that Jalin *usually* looked as if his favorite puppy had died five minutes ago. It was just the way his face was made, all big woeful eyes and pouty, petulant lips.

Instead of instantly going into a long-winded tale of some imagined slight, as Do'nar half expected, the boy studied him gravely. "Captain?" he said softly. "I need to tell you something. Promise not to yell?"

Jalin winced, and then amazingly enough he smiled ruefully. "I suppose it is! Well, it's just that---I should have told you this years ago. But I didn't know you as well back then, and I was---ashamed."

"Odin save us, another confession? Haven't I been through enough? Oh, damn, boy, I'm sorry! My mouth works without my brain attached, some days."

Jalin smiled at him then, a blindingly warm look from this overly reserved youngster. "Most of the time," he agreed pertly. "But your heart is so good, being insulted would just be stupid of me!"

And before the beet-red, sputtering warrior could recover from this remark, Jalin told him with great brevity about what Sun Eagle had done to him, years before.

And amazingly enough that confession would affect other things ---things of time, and light, and dragons --- and a sacrifice that would occur, whether Nightwolf plotted against it or not.