Yaluh Nimun waited. Patience was a skill a warrior needed almost as much as a hunter. And he was as great a hunter as he was a warrior. The greatest of all the People of the Swift Coursers, even before they had been reduced to this motley crew of slaves and prisoners. Which was why he was alive, of course. The only surviving man of the Swift Coursers. The orcs respected a strong warrior and killing three of their number with a sword, even after his horse was killed under him and he lost his bow had been enough to earn him his life and, rather less welcome, the unpleasant attentions and ‘affections’ of one of the orcish women.

  They valued strength, which was also why most of the women taken prisoner and carried along were those who’d fought back with their bows when the orcs had somehow ambushed them in their own camp. It had been some sort of magic, he was certain of it, because one of the orcs he’d cut down had summoned darkness no torch could penetrate with a single word.

  But the fool had failed to realize that it did nothing to block Yaluh Nimun’s keen hearing and so he had been able to evade the orcs slow, clumsy strikes and take its head off with his scimitar. If not for their numbers, swamping him and dragging him to the ground, wrestling off his weapons and helmet before savagely knocking him unconscious, he would have slain them all.

  Better that than this. The discovery that his body was not under his own control and could be aroused against the will of his conscious mind was not one that Yaluh Nimun was comfortable with. He had no idea if it was true of the women who were subjected to the attentions of the orcish men, but they could hide such things, unlike his own shame, which was obvious to all watching. And the orcs did not generally bother with such niceties as privacy. Teylas curse their bones.

  He prayed every day as they marched to the Lord of Storms to curse his enemies. Yaluh Nimun did not pray for his own freedom, or those of his fellows, of course, for all the Teylas was the God of the Sky and Movement and Freedom, he was not a God who helped those who could not help themselves. Yaluh Nimun would free himself, when his moment came.

  He spoke some of the orcish languages, as they were, along with other nomadic clans and the northern, mostly human cities, the prime targets for both raiding and trading and Yaluh Nimun went along on both such expeditions, his smooth tongue almost as effective as his horn bow at separating outsiders from their belongings. What he heard floated around his brilliant mind as he considered it. And what to do about it. Usually, any attempt to force him to cross the Great Dawn River would end with immediate death to anyone who dared try it.

  It was taboo to cross the river. Also, there wasn’t anything on the other side worth having, even if you took one of the rare lowland passes to it, or fought your way through the orcish camps in the foothills. The land on the other side was too heavily forested to be good for anything true people would want to use it for. Which made the taboo all the more reasonable and important. There might be some reason to violate other taboos, but this one...the only reason to violate it was cowardice, flight before some enemy. And anyone who made such an absurd suggestion about Yaluh Nimun’s motives deserved the death they courted. But, his hands were quite thoroughly bound, his weapons taken, his horses mostly dead, save for those which pulled the wagons these orcs had dragged along until they had horses, or prisoners to drag them, and the carts of the Swift Coursers themselves. He still had his sheep, or those which had not yet been eaten, but they belonged to the orcs now. And sheep were, even in the best of times, a poor weapon of war, save in their absence, or in using them to cut ahead of another tribe and eat up all their grass, forcing them to change their route and abandon a region. But that didn’t really work on orcs, who were usually too stupid to maintain proper herds.

  This group was smarter than most, as proven by their ability to ambush the Coursers in their own camp. But, they had at least lost most, or all (even his keen eyes could not tell if the orc arguing with the warchief about strategy was a magic user himself, or merely supportive of their sneaking style of combat) of their magic users and there were rumblings within the tribe about dishonorable tactics and cowardice. The problem for them was that there was no one to fight. Their plan had been correct, these territories, which should have been full of Screaming Hawks, were entirely empty. Which made the sneaky one brag so much that the warchief bodily threw him out of her cart. Yaluh Nimun spotted the pouch containing the potions stolen from the Courser’s shaman on her belt, then looked away again. Staring at orcs was considered a challenge and he was too cunning to begin the fight before he was ready.

  Yaluh Nimon listened to the conversation at a distance that the foolish orcs did not realize his keen ears could pick up each word and pieced them together with the intellect of the cleverest of the Coursers, even when they had numbered more than three hundred warriors! Admittedly, that had been in his youth, they had only had a hundred warriors when they were ambushed, and most had been out hunting, or raiding, to be picked off piece-meal upon their return, as he was. But they surely must have taken a fearsome bodyguard of the orcs with them to Acheron...even if he hadn’t seen such bodies and there were not that many unclaimed belongings or weapons…

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  But that was besides the point, the point was that it was the Screaming Hawks, ancient enemies of the Coursers, whose lands the Coursers had raided since time immemorial, who were the cause of all this. They’d found...something which made them more powerful, but still, obviously, not powerful enough to face their dreaded enemy and so were heading north, conquering and unifying orcish tribes. This bunch, the Golden Fangs, were, though they didn’t have the courage to admit it, running from the Screaming Hawks. They’d raided the Coursers for supplies and slaves, as they lacked the rations, or skills to acquire them, needed to cross the steppe on their own and were running away to where they didn’t think the Screaming Hawks would follow, cutting across the other tribe’s path behind them, in hopes of avoiding their warriors.

  It was not a bad plan, to be honest. Far cleverer than he’d have expected an orc to come up with. Whichever one had managed it (obviously not one of the magic using ones) must have had more than a bit of human blood. Maybe even Courser blood, they’d raided enough orc camps in their time, and admittedly, been raided in turn. Orcs usually charged at any strong targets, no matter how many times the Coursers made them pay for it, proving their horses faster than orcs and their arrows swifter than axes, they would still make the mistake, every time. So, yes, it must be Courser blood in their veins, or perhaps one of the other, lesser tribes had blessed some orcish woman with a child of uncommon ability.

  Regardless, he knew where they were going and what the plan was. They called it finding new lands to conquer, but everyone knew what they were doing was fleeing the Screaming Hawks. They’d fled the northern mountains, ambushed the Coursers, moved south and west through their territory, towards Screaming Hawks territory and soon would reach the river. Then he would have to make a choice about what to do. They had been traveling for weeks and they had waited at the camp for weeks for the last of the hunters to return and to strip it of all potential loot, as well as eating all of the fallen horses and sheep, though at least they properly left the fallen Coursers to the messengers of Teylas.

  Several of the captured women and his own captors were showing signs of swelling with children, to the visible delight of the orcish woman wearing the symbol of the bear, their fertility goddess...Luthic. He’d seen that symbol before on orcs who attacked desperately in protection of home and hearth. Only a fool took them straight on, for they often had magic and always had long, cruel claws. Worse, they could be dangerously clever, or wait in ambush to defend their homes and caves.

  Besides her and the warchief, the senior members of the tribe were male. There was the warrior arguing for stealth, but who lacked the red fangs of the spellcaster Yaluh Nimun had killed, rather sporting the golden fangs of his fellows. Then there were two others, who both fit standard orcish types. One was clearly a devout follower of their high god, Gruumsh, as he was missing an eye, and was called the Eye of Gruumsh by the warchief, who listened to his advice rather more than the others. The last member of this honored group wore bone white gloves over taloned hands and never spoke, which was confusing until Yaluh Nimun saw him laugh and realized his tongue was missing.

  Besides this core, there were almost two hundred ‘standard’ orcs, though there were far fewer children than he’d expect of a band this size. Perhaps they had not survived the march? That might explain their eagerness for new slaves and children thereof, though recognizing the superior blood of the Swift Coursers could also explain it.

  Of course, he could escape into the grassland and survive to reach some other tribe, who would, no doubt, welcome a warrior and hunter of his skill and reputation...but, the Coursers were the farthest flung tendril of the great alliance of tribes known to outsiders as the Horse People (well, actually, true outsiders called all residents of the steppe that, but the Horse People were the true core of the steppe, with the other major alliances contesting that role). They had gone west to sever the Kith from the Patrein great clans as the two groups had been working together to try to let southern merchants reach the cities in the north without going through the territory of the Horse People. It had worked, of course, but that meant that as they were driving ever westward, he would have to cross enemy territory to reach that of his own people, and even then it would be that of other tribes, even if the same people.

  People who had not known him in his youth, and who he did not truly know. There would be connections, of course, Yaluh Nimun had ridden in the warbands of the great leaders of the Horse People many times and distinguished himself, but he knew how he would treat even a great warrior whose fellows had all died and it would not be well. Indeed, he would undoubtedly have to face many challenges just to be accepted. He could do it. Yaluh Nimun could do anything but that would mean abandoning the other Coursers. Outstanding as he was, he could not maintain their ways alone. Though he could obviously fulfill all the male roles, he didn’t even know the female roles and so could not teach any of the women who would doubtless seek to wed him…

  No, for now, he would continue on, enduring the situation until the moment came to strike back. The right moment would no doubt be some point during the trip across the river. Exactly when, he would have to depend upon his unparalleled combat instincts to tell him when to spring him into action.

  AN: Yaluh Nimun is a very confident man...we’ll see how that works out for him. The Swift Coursers are mildly based on the Hordelands in Forgotten Realms, and I’ve stolen their patron deity, Teylas, Lord of the Sky and Storms, who is known in other lands as Akadi, Queen of Air.

  This is about as explicit as I'm going to get, but to be clear, there will be references to sexual assault and sexual slavery, given the nature of this story.

  Comments/critiques/corrections and ratings are always welcome and help keep me focused on this story!