We had slept in the damp woods a few miles from Long-Vein.

Although our hasty departure must have raised some questions, Ulrick wanted to leave the village that evening, and he stayed up part of the night to make sure we weren't followed. He didn't let go of the suspicion that the presence of the peregrine had awoken in him, nor of the idea that, behind his displayed sympathy, he might be hiding something else, something darker or more interested. Personally, I was not sure what to think. On one hand, the masked man inspired no fear in me, on the other hand Ulrick taught me to be wary of my intuitions. Just like him, it seemed to me that the encounter was too unlikely to be purely by chance. We were left to guess the motives of the peregrine, and that was the problem. Doubtful, Ulrick had opted for skeptical caution, and in the end, if the decision had been mine, it seems to me that I probably would have made the same choices.

We had crossed the main road in the middle of the morning, but instead of going south, as we had done before, we continued straight on the first path that came along. Ulrick was hoping to avoid the traffic and the eyes of the travelers, and at the same time make the task more difficult for potential pursuers. The counterpart of this route was that we would lengthen our trip by several days, not to mention the possible detours we would have to make to regain access to our plateau. In spite of that, I think we were both more comfortable in the forest. Even if I regretted having had to abandon the lur season's festivities so quickly, I also understood the warnings of the peregrine, whatever they meant, that a longer stay would only have served to get on our nerves. As the horses advanced under the trees, our intermittent conversations were punctuated by the murmurings of the voice of Vaw and the frequent glances we had on the winding track that vanished behind us.

"I thought you were fighting bandits in Spinel," I said to Ulrick in the early afternoon. The horses greedily drank water from a tiny sandy gully, the glittering bottom of which was spangled with mica and quartz chips. The Val sniffed, while readjusting his position on the saddle. He swallowed a small amount of water before handing me the skin of water that we had just filled. "The primate Vilan's only half an idiot, yunling," he replied in a squeaky voice as he wiped his mouth. "I've already told you about the vine war. If word got around that the Leafy are rising again, it could spread to other cantons, as it once did. By claiming that they're only bandits, he hopes to keep control within his borders and keep face outside." I sniffed dismissively. "Then he's just an idiot," I said bluntly. "It's going to come out sooner or later." Ulrick made a ferocious smile, the first one of the day. "Yes, it's true," he said. "The neighboring primacies are not fooled and the others have their doubts. The locals know very well what's going on, some are helping the Leafys, others are thinking of joining them or waiting to see how things will change. But that's not why I said that he's not completely stupid."

I raised an eyebrow. "He called on the Vals," Ulrick said, looking at me with interest. "We don't loot, we don't rape, and we don't make life hard for the villagers just because we can, like all the cantonal militia. And that's rather clever of him." I nodded slowly. "In fact you serve as a buffer between the Vawans and the lord's men. It saves time for the primate Vilan," I finally said. "Exactly," replied the Val, and he bent over to rub my hair exaggeratedly, in the same way he would have flattered a dog. "At least you don't forget everything I tell you." I glanced at him and he smoothed his beard. "As you said, this can't go on forever," he continued after a silence. "The problem for Vilan is that we're expensive, that Spinel's lord perceives our presence as a disavowal of his authority, and that in the end we don't really make a difference. The problem for us is that even though we search the woods, most of the time we just pick up arrows without ever finding the shooters. That's what happened to my knee, and that's why we're not going to Spinel yet. We don't need another cripple."

The Val was patting his leg with a grimace, and I went down the saddle to wash my face a little. The sun shimmered on the wrinkles of the gully, which had been blurred by the horses' impatient muzzles. I took a few steps upstream to rinse my neck in the clearer water, leaning on a pile of rushes. The wind was rustling peacefully in the ferns that dotted the small mound at the foot of which the rivulet flowed.

It was a beautiful late summer day and in the sky above us a few wild ducks were quacking, the only black dots in the sky. Ulrick readjusted his stirrups once again and bent down to throw me a piece of the fresh bread left over from the previous day's shopping. "By the way," he chewed, "at Short-Pass, your people announced the belmism. Fourteen days more next year." I glanced at him with exasperation as I brought the bread to my mouth. "They're not my people..." I began to protest, and three men came out of the forest.

Skinny and scruffy, they didn't look like much, but their silence and harsh expressions didn't lie about their intentions. Two of them carried spears that had seen better days, the third held an arrow on his bow rope. They came towards us with a determined look on their faces. I immediately took a step backwards, my hand on the dagger. When the first man's boots landed in the stream, Ulrick drew his sword from under his furs and manoeuvred Berda to face them. The archer stood back among the ferns, bow raised, with the val-warrior in sight.

The two others cautiously stopped about ten spans away from us, on the sandy bank. "We want the horses and the purses," said the man in charge without preamble. He was a bald and frail veteran, whose too-thin face was as dented as Ulrick's. His teeth were black and broken. I retreated until my back touched Pike's side, my heart pounding. "You're not ready." Ulrick's words drummed inside me like a hellish echo. The bald man's companion, a teenager barely taller than me, was nervously groping the shaft of his spear, his dark gaze twirling under his bang, between Ulrick's sword and my dagger.

The val-warrior spat into the rivulet from Berda's back, who neighed with excitement, and pointed at the archer with the tip of his blade. "I won't give you time for two arrows," he grumbled, before turning his attention to the other two. "You guys are making a mistake," he said to the one who had called us. "I'm a vaïdogan, and this is my yunling," he continued in a clear voice. "I have no gold, and I'd rather kill my horses than give them to you. There's nothing for you here, except my sword."

While the Val was talking, well wedged on his saddle, and under him Berda was weaving impatiently, furiously scratching the sandbank with her wide hooves, I saw the teenager swallowing and the veteran hesitating. Few men would have voluntarily sought quarrel with a val-warrior. The bent bow lowered a few inches. Apparently, the bandits hadn't been expected to encounter resistance, and Ulrick's assertive attitude had put them in doubt. "Back on your saddle," the Val whispered to me.

I obeyed slowly, while ogling the archer, whose lower face was hidden under a black and faded cloth. My heart was pounding. The tension in the air was palpable. It was screeching on my skin. It played on my tendons like the strings of a rebec. I knew that it would only take one gesture, one wrong word for everything to happen: the shot, Ulrick charging the archer, and me facing the other two with a dagger and a clumsy gelding. "We're going to leave now," Ulrick said in an authoritative voice. "If anyone tries to stop us, I'll kill all three of you." The two bandits on the bank began a lively exchange in a low voice as Ulrick led Berda through the trees. "Go ahead," he said to me as we moved away, and I pressed Pike until he went on a heavy gallop. After a mile, I slowed down with trembling hands, and the rigan mare passed me.

Ulrick pulled on the reins and rotated his mount to get in my way.

"Berda's limping," I said with concern. The Val shook his head. "I taught her to do that," he replied calmly. His verdigris glance caught mine, full of intention. "It's not over, yunling. They were desperate, and they're hungry. They're going to follow us anyway. I made Berda limp so they would rush in. To make them think we're exhausted, like them." I moistened my lips, while trying to grasp reality.

"When?" I croaked nervously as my mind reared up, shaken by doubt and questions. "Tonight," Ulrick replied. "They will come with the night. You'll take the boy. I'll take care of the other two." Anguish enveloped me in its icy claws, and I tried to remember the face of the one I was going to have to kill, with his bangs and his malnourished ferret looks. Ulrick snapped his fingers in front of my eyes. "This is no time to give up, Sletling," he said, his voice tinged with an ounce of contempt. "What did you learn from what you saw?" I frowned as I tried to get myself together, before speaking in a hesitant voice. "There are three of them, all right-handed," I began, and my tone became firmer. "No armor. Two spears and a bow. I couldn't see how many arrows because of the ferns. The one who spoke was scarred like a soldier, and he held his spear well. I think he's the leader."

" Not bad," Ulrick grumbled when I finished. "But a good hobblar has to grasp all the details. You didn't tell me about the boy. He seemed nervous, while the others were not. He must not have been with them for long. The archer was missing a finger. His stance was a little stiff, but good. He may have been a soldier, too." I nodded. "So we'll have to kill him first and hope that the other two flee," I added. Ulrick stared at me again with disapproval, and I ran my hand through my hair as I realized the extent of my mistake. "No," I said with growing apprehension, "we'll have to kill all three of them. Otherwise the story will spread, and the bounty hunters will hear of it, and they'll know where to find us." As an answer, the mouth of the Val twisted into a strange pout, between disgust and ferocity. I swallowed. He rotated Berda north, and I followed the direction he was taking, with a knot in the stomach.

We went on for a few more hours and as we meditated on what was to come, I began to wonder if it was all real. Then, as the shadows lengthened, I began to hope with all my heart that Ulrick was wrong, and that the bandits would not follow us.

We stopped in the early evening as we crossed a small steep clearing lined with alder and birch trees. "Here's good", announced briefly Ulrick, after having studied the place during a few moments. I remember thinking to myself: "This is how you decide where someone will die", finding it frightfully simple. Yet I understood it very well. The slope would give us the advantage if we waited in the woods above, and the open space would allow us to see our opponents arrive. We set up camp in a hurry, then the Val asked me to collect some dead wood. Fire would be one of the essential components of the trap.

"It's unfortunate, but we're going to cut them to shreds," Ulrick said as he blew on the burning campfire and I placed the two bags of beans under our blankets with what was left of the furs to stuff the Val's blanket. The false camp was located near a pile of mossy granite, just over ten spans from the woods and stump where we had stored the bow and quiver. "We'll have to go as hard and as fast as we can. Remember what I taught you about spears?" I took a deep breath. "Haï. I remember," I replied in a voice that was meant to be firm. We had spent long, long hours on the spear during training. Because of its simplicity, effectiveness and cost, it was the weapon that, usually armed with a spear himself, any warrior would face most often.

I had repeated the gestures and techniques until it all turned into a set of almost natural reflexes and I had collected my share of bruises in the process. This time, without armor or shield, the slightest mistake could mean death.

Night began to fall quickly. A light breeze blew from the west and caressed the foliage. We tied up the horses further into the woods, a few steps from our hiding place, before we sat down under the cover of smooth trunks and darkness. The situation suddenly seemed strange to me, in spite of the year Ulrick had spent training me for such occasions. I leaned against the stump and held the carmian steel dagger, which I had used to finish off dozens of prey, while wondering for the first time if I would have the courage to thrust it into a man's flesh. Around me, nature was singing its evening songs, and I had been irritated by the obscenity of its calm. Motionless and attentive, his bow in hand, Ulrick was watching for the shadow of the undergrowth on the other side of the clearing. "You're nervous, yunling, and that's normal," he whispered without looking at me. "Try to focus on what you have to do. Here and now, everything is simple. Then we'll have the luxury to philosophize." I nodded, trying to focus on my breathing and to put everything else aside. The waiting began.

The fire was slowly burning, smoking the starry sky, projecting a thin circle of light onto the grass in the dewy clearing and our padded blankets that laid there like two rounded bait. Hours passed, to the rhythm of the fresh air that inflated my lungs. Sometimes I doubted it, but each time my gaze fell on the val-warrior and his unchanging killer mask, my resolution was revived.

Then Berda neighed softly. Ulrick unfolded like a wild animal on the hunt. " Now," he whispered to me. "Be ready." I braced against the stump, and my heart began to beat so hard that I was afraid it might betray us. Then everything happened fast, an inescapable and swift process.

Three silhouettes materialized near the fire, their footsteps whipping the ground, and a few moments later the spears sank through the blankets in a crescendo of dull shocks. Close to my ear, the Val composite bow snapped, a howl was heard, and Ulrick swooped down on the camp as silently as an eagle plunges on its prey. With my knees wobbling, I accelerated right behind him. The archer had time to scream again, and we were on them.

I saw Ulrick divert the staff of the scarred man who pivoted to face him, then he hit him with all his weight and his blade drew a new deadly curve. Beyond the glow of the fire, the indistinct silhouette of the archer was twisting on the ground, squeezing the fletching of the arrow that had pierced him. Just as Ulrick's second blow made a cracking noise, the weasel-looking young man, his eyes filled with fear, tried to stab me. The forest resounded with a long gurgling scream, then the wet sounds of the Val's sword. I didn't slow down in front of the kid.

My training took over. I dodged the spear, screamed when the tip caught on my shirt, and then I went through my opponent's defense. The boy's mouth drew a big surprised circle.

My dagger opened his knuckles to the bone and he dropped his weapon. I grabbed him by the rags and struck again and we fell to the ground in a tangle of legs.

I stumbled up to finish what I had started, just in time to see Ulrick almost behead the archer. Blood sizzled on the embers.

It was over, we had won, but the boy didn't want to die. It was the first time I had ever killed a man, I wasn't even twelve years old yet, and it was more terrible than anything I could have imagined. No matter how many times I cut him, his hands miraculously saved him, two slippery, red, dripping eels. He was sobbing and screaming, begging me to stop. After a while I was crying too, I called Ulrick to help me, but Ulrick had sat by the fire and bowed his head, and he didn't come to my rescue. I had to fight the quivering kid alone until the screams faded away, the slippery hands weakened and I could finally get my blade under his ribs. He had a hiccup that I'll remember for the rest of my life, tried to free himself, then his wide-open eyes blurred. I did it again, just to be sure, and he died with his lips cut up to his teeth and his mouth distorted by terror.

I bent over the boy's body for a very long time, in the acrid smell of smoke and urine, then Ulrick put his hand on my shoulder and put me back on my feet. I took three wobbly steps and vomited loudly, after which I turned to the Val, my mouth trembling. "Why didn't you do anything?" I asked him, but he didn't answer me. Then I suddenly started crying again and he held me close to him while I did my best to hit him. "Why didn't you do anything?" I cried out in his cape, but he still didn't say anything. Eventually my sobs became less frequent and Ulrick let go of me, "You'll kill better next time," he said. I shook my head and he knelt down to wipe my splashed face.

Later, after we had gathered our belongings, I took care of the horses in silence. Ulrick came to find me. He praised Berda without looking at me, while speaking softly. "Every life is a life, from the gnat, to the horse, to the serif." He turned to me, his serious eyes searching mine, reflecting the glow of the dying hearth. "No life wants to die out and no life is better than another. This is the cruellest truth a man can understand, and believe me, I measure my words. There's nothing more cruel than that. But still, you might have died slower than that kid if you had been in the place of the beans." Ulrick's look was sad, but he said his words fiercely with the tip of his index finger, which he pushed hard into my chest. "You're a warrior, Fyss. Philosopher, because you're alive, and mourning. You'll kill better next time." I sniffed. Ulrick spat, then stepped over the bald man's butchered body to throw a load of dry branches into the fire.

Many years have passed since that night, and many dead people too, but it seems to me that I still have to mourn the kid with the face of a weasel and that, warrior or not, I've never really forgiven myself.