Victor van Daen

‘’Onward march!’’

The call of the Horde crier is loud and clear and the living beast that is the Host, the combined strength of the Horde and the militia making up Paradisum’s first military advancement is intimidating in its power and aura as it moves with the call. There aren’t many of us as there once were before ore fell from the skies above like rain. But nonetheless the sight and feel of the Horde jogging south towards war is... exhilarating.

Every warrior within the Host moves with precision as though they were dance partners as we pass through the uneven grounds of the of the Outer Orchards at pace without a single foot stumbling. I grin despite myself as I’m affected by the golden orange aura of utter confidence and expertise of our entire travelling party. From veteran Barbarians to green soft skinned southerners that have found a home within Paradisum. Scattered crowds in the hills, in the trees and some openly at the sides of the roads watch us as we pass them by. Righteous indignation and the excitement of the prospective battles ahead having infected many of us as we start our two month journey to Polynesia. My crew is with me, each of us an expert of our weapons of choice, each having condensed our auras even before Awakening and having become powerhouses since Awakening.

There are two primary requirements before any Paradisian is permitted to join the militia wing of the Host on its track to Polynesia. One has to spend a ten-day with the Scouts out if the wilds and the Scout Leader must declare you fit, then you have to spend a day in the Arena and the veterans determine you’re competent. Or like me you can be a veteran of a previous war, or be ‘named’ as I ironically was.

Half of the Horde leads the host of fighters from the front of the expedition while the other half are scattered at the back where some non-combatants have chosen to follow. Some at the flanks and a few also scattered in the belly of the beast, the veteran Barbarian fighters of many battles. The old men that have all Awakened and have been dying for a fight to test out these new powers the world now has open to us. The excitement is palpable as we jog away from the city boundaries at a mild but respectable pace.

The few mounted members of the expedition already ahead to prepare the way for our passage, a few of them deployments to smooth our passage through Sandersonian land. This is also a test of sorts for them, how they react to an army passing through their lands is something the Council s eager to see? Even having sent a formal declaration of war to the Maori so they can better prepare to face us many worry the fighting might be disappointing. Having driven them back before we had Awakened and had access to the higher disciplines like magic and other creative ways to manipulate mana how much easier will t be to run through them now?

The elites of the Tribes that refuse to join the Elders even in their old age or too stubborn to die without making death itself struggle to take them are here. Some of the fae that were initially in the invading party that came to the Tundra resulting in The Never Ending Battle are here. Some of the most worthy peoples we’ve accept into our tundra are here in this Host.

But many that make up a large part of the now almost 20 thousand strong Host are untested youths still. Orcs, dwarves, highlanders, and a large number of former southerners, most of them emancipated slaves. It’s been about 30 years since the Tribes officially stopped raiding each other and as a result of that many a young Barbarian remains unbloodied still. Being an unbloodied Barbarian was something to be ashamed of just a generation ago and though things have changed since no true Barbarian with a Rage is truly an adult without having killed a sentient being.

Though every Barbarian makes their own path as the grandson of a Tribal Chieftain my crew is both the best fighters amongst friend’s I've made through the years to fight by my side and my personal protection in case of emergency. A contingency I’m embarrassed to have burdened on them but one grandda Stomm made sure to emphasize to all six in my crew.

I look to my left at the woman that insinuated herself into my party of warriors, the odd one out though her prowess in battle is unquestionable.

‘’So why have you decided to join my crew of elites?’I ask in a low voice as we jog with the throng of people all around us. We don’t jostle each other or bump into one another as we move as though we had practiced this run a dozen times.

‘’Is it not enough that I want to kill some southerners?’’ she asks through sending. Some Awakened an do that but there is a trick to it I just haven’t been able to learn yet.

‘’So its blood you want and to quench your thirst for battle?’’ My question comes out as a grumble and she grins at me amused that she has gotten on my nerve I imagine, vexing woman.

‘’I also haven’t had a proper Barbarian dick in some time and if I remember correctly you were a good lay,’’ she says out loud to the giggling of some of my men and the knowing grin from Eluna, the only other woman in my party.

I look at Ava sceptically; she knows that’s not enough for me, maybe when I was younger but definitely not now.

‘’I request that you help me watch out for my family for as long as we travel with you, we will make other arrangements later,’’ she sends. I scowl before responding with the first snide remark that comes to mind, she must have a reason for being so evasive even in the mists of loyal Barbarians.

‘’Fine, I will fuck you. But no fighting and no permanent marks during sex, I’ve gotten used to the compliance and soft bodies of southern women.’’ The men snicker at that, all aware that I really do prefer the southern women a lot of the time nowadays, having already performed my duty to the Norse and fathered five sons of pure Barbarian heritage already. All now under the watchful eye and exacting standards of Stomm and his elites, crazy old men one and all and I’m glad to be free from them.

I give Ava a look I hope will convey the fact that I’m not satisfied with her flimsy explanation and she just grins at me that condescending grin of hers before slowing her pace and letting herself be left behind. I shake my head as she disappears among the throng of warriors and would be warriors.

‘’Think we can trust her?’’Arvid asks after ensuring that she’s really gone with his overwatch ability.

‘’You question her ability or her purpose for choosing this fight?’’ I ask Arvid seriously, he being my primary advisor.

‘’All know not to question the prowess of Ave Avandra the Bloodthirsty nor do I doubt that she has gotten bored of playing security for the diplomats and Elders that occasionally leave the tundra. I ask because she is known to be loyal to your enemy Sachihiro van Damage.’’ I digest that a moment with worry. I did not mean for my men to insinuate Sachi is an enemy because it may lead them to do something stupid. Now that I think about it, a lot of the little shits that have been bad mouthing Sachihiro in the longhouses are in one way or another associated to one of my crew members or retainers.

‘’Sachihiro is not my enemy,’’ I say in a stern voice. ‘’He is a respected rival, nothing more and deserves the greatest of respect for what he has done for the Tribes.’’ I say indicating with my tone that the discussion is over. I brood, some of the magic of the ambience having been ruined for me.

*

We make camp late in the night, guards being posted and supervised by the Scouts from the Horde. For some reason the command structure seems to confuse some of the ‘Paradisums’, but thankfully I don’t have to witness the confused stares of empty headed southerners trying to fit in by going to war. I’m part of the militia force and not even slightly interested in taking any form of responsibility in this expedition, thankfully my duties will be minor before the fighting starts and I don’t have to command anyone.

After setting up our tents in a semi circle facing the fire we are building I step inside and wait for the woman I know will come soon enough, I’m not disappointed.

*

‘’So...?’’ I say as she lays on her back besides me panting with a little smile on her face.

‘’So?’’ She asks back not bothering to open her eyes or cover her nakedness and I lean on my side studying the scares that cover almost half her body.

‘’Come now Ava, you said you wanted my help protecting your family and last I checked you were a Viking orphan with only a tenuous relation to Teá, Dustin’s first mate. So now is the time tell to me what is really going on seeing as I’ve satisfied one of your cravings tonight.’’ I say crabbing her breast and kneading it in my hand lewdly, so soft.

‘’Believe it or not I spoke truth, and though this tent is warded I hesitate to speak freely even here.’’ She says before swatting my hand away.

She sighs before getting up and strapping on her kilt, binding her sandles and tying the laces all around her leg up to just below her knee. The sight of her has my manhood stirring again yet when I had her fully naked with her breast in hand I was sated and in control of myself.

‘’Speak woman,’’ I say getting up quickly and trying to pull her back but end up in a hold with my arm being twisted behind my back painfully.

‘’What did I say about fighting?’’ I ask in a strained voice before twisting hooking my free arm around her neck and performing a shoulder thrown that has her underneath me. But my arm is quickly locked in another awkward position and I really don’t want to test my strength against her. ‘’Damnit woman, why are you this difficult?’’

She grins, sweeps her legs around my neck and reverses to end up on top again, the coarse hair of her mound hairs tickling my chest as she straddles me. I’m still completely naked and now hard and scowling unhappily at the betrayal of my body.

‘’You prefer the compliant southerners do you?’’ She asks in a teasing tone before gently grabbing my erection and caressing it pleasantly, at least she isn’t all fury and rough edges.

I groan as her hand caresses me enjoyably, ‘’how did you get so good at that?’’ I ask clenching my ass in rhythm with her strokes.

‘’Practise,’’ she says and before I know it her mound is in my face and I take her mound in my mouth almost on reflex and suckle gently.

*

It’s another twenty minutes before we are both sated enough to have a serious conversation but neither of us speaks. Me because I fear she will run away and I really won’t chase her this time, I don’t know why she won’t speak but I’m curious and think I suspect what family she’s referring to.

‘’We are heading down to Pangaea but are using the Host as Cover to move in numbers, safty and annonimity,’’ she says and the stays silent. Frustrating contrary woman.

‘’Who is we, if you are to be under my protection I need to know who I’m protecting, what from and why. I will not risk my men’s lives on the whims of a woman, even one as competent as you.’’

She grins and begins dressing again, I let her. Watching silently as she goes through her process and finally stands ready to leave having equipped a plain dagger from her silver storage ring.

‘’Sachi’s family is relocating and there are too many non combatants for me to be comfortable making the trip without extra eyes to help watch my back.’’ I grunt at that and take it in. So many implications, first she considers them family, I knew that though. Then she called them none combatants, then she implies she’s watching them alone.

‘’Where is Sachi?’’ I ask carefully.

‘’He was summoned by the Conclave, he couldn’t refuse.’’ She says plainly with a shrug and I spit before I can think better of it.

‘’Fucking Sachi, fucking Conclave, it’s all fucked up in so many ways. Separating a man from his family in these trying times, leaving your family for any reason in these trying times, I’m not sure which is worse.’’ I say shaking my head, that man has always vexed me for some reason. Well I didn’t know he existed until we fought but from then onwards he has vexed me.

‘’How many are with you?’’ I eventually ask as Ava just stands there watching me e frustrated.

‘’There is Kuyoki, Ingwe, Mira, Shea, Cicilia, Isis, Thandeka, Divina, Kiera, Vuyo/Ntombi, Damage, Tabitha, old man Zhen and Freya their son Sway, Helen and her husband (Whose name I forgot), the new girl Selah, Eldritch and his wife and sons, Gaia and his wife and kids, Sirgur, Rigs, the sexy slave girl, Tóma the unpleasant one of the twin dwarves, Saya and her Proelium team are a day behind, the rest of Sachi’s kids including Om’s of course –‘’

‘’Okay I get the picture, everyone of the fucking van damage clan is leaving the Tundra, why?’’ I ask genuinely curious and completely bewildered, its an exodus, one Sachi isn’t part of.

Ava just shrugs noncommittally and I grumble under my breath trying to figure it out but coming up blank, ‘’more training at the conclave maybe?’’ I ask looking up at her but I get nothing in response.

‘’In any case the only people I don’t consider dangerous in that group are the kids and even they have reputations of being ferocious amongst their age groups, you don’t need me at all.’’

‘’We are going into Pangaea and all the way to Conclave controlled territory not to Polynesia with everyone else, we’ll need more eyes and axes to be safe.’’

‘’Gates of the beyond! You want me to forsake the war and help you cross Pangaea?’’ I exclaim more loudly than I intended. ‘’Why in Gaia’s name would I do such a stupid thing? I mean the sex is great and all but not that great.’’

She laughs loudly, head tilted back and cackling open mouthed before looking back at me with amusement clear on her face, that goddamned smile on her face. I’m so confused right now.

‘’You’ve never been fully invited into the Conclave have you?’’ she asks and I snort.

‘’Of course I have, I spent three years in the Den training and absorbing as much about killing and staying alive as I could from those strange people,’’ I s ay leaning up and crossing my arms over my chest before scowling and relaxing my posture.

"I meant invited into one of the enclaves, either way the fight on Polynesia is nothing compared to the fight I will be leading you towards. We will rush over the Maori like a flood, you know this, they will hardly be a challenge,’’ she says looking at me in the eye.

‘’The only peoples that weren’t isolated in this little rock we call Sandoria are the Hito and the dawn elves, the rest are almost as green as we were thirty years ago, the difference being that they had magic and we didn’t. Now we have magic, we train with fae, we wrestle with beastmen and orcs, our elders are back on the field. We will slaughter the Maori and when they surrender we won’t know what to do with all the loot we take from them, it will be child’s play.

‘’You know how serious competition is on Pangaea, you could bump into a single person there that could single handedly take out the entire tribes if you aren’t careful, excluding the sidhe of course. And that’s nothing to what’s eventually coming our way with the prophesied calamity.’’

‘’What’s coming our way?’’ I find myself asking, already won over by the prospect of facing nay unbeatable odds with my crew by my side and other barbarians to sing our names when we eventually fall in the struggle to improve ourselves. To reach a worthy death.

The exasperating woman shrugs at my question, shrugs! I have a mundane dagger in my hand in a second and I’m sorely tempted to stab her, she won’t die but it will hurt. We eye each other a moment before my knife disappears back in my ring’s storage space.

‘’Do you think Sachi would approve of this ‘generous’ offer you’ve presented to me?’’ I ask, I don’t have beef with the guy but I can see how the actions of my crew may be construed as though I do.

She shrugs before sending, ‘’I wouldn’t have made the offer without Sachi’s blessing.’’ With those words she leaves the tent without a backward glance. Fuck!

‘’Arvid! I’m in need of your council,’’ I shout with the tent flap open before stepping inside and getting dressed.