Odrig and Unver circled each other, and their curved swords flew back and forth like the beaks of birds, neither man able to get past the other’s guard, neither foolish enough to engage too closely too soon. Unver, still hot with rage, took a swipe at Odrig’s face; then, when the thane blocked him with his blade, he tried to score Odrig’s face with his sword’s point. He missed by the length of a fingernail, but Odrig’s eyes widened and he redoubled his efforts, hammering away with blow after clanging blow so that Unver could do nothing but defend himself and slowly give ground. The circle of trampled grass and pitted mud widened beneath them, wedding guests now stumbling over each other in their hurry to get out of the way.

The sun was high in the sky. Both men were sweating heavily, and Unver Long Legs was covered with blood, much of it his own. He lost his grip on his sword for a moment and Odrig almost flicked the weapon out of his hand, but although he had to throw himself to the ground and roll away to avoid Odrig’s slashing attack, he managed to hang on to his weapon and direct away another strike that had been intended as a killing blow, but this time the sharp edge of Odrig’s sword bit into his left shoulder before he could knock it away.

Now that his enemy was bleeding from his shoulder as well, Odrig backed off a step and took a slower, more deliberate approach, fighting mostly to keep Unver moving and the blood flowing from his wound until it exhausted him. It seemed like a strategy that could not fail, and indeed, after several more rattling flurries of blows, it became apparent that Unver was slowing down. He ceased making attacks, concentrating instead on keeping Odrig’s long, probing blade away. Odrig responded by changing his tactics to slash at Unver’s legs and exposed arms whenever possible, and by doing this gave him several more small, but bloody wounds.

Unver misstepped, barely avoided a blow to his head, then stumbled again, his free hand clutching his belly. It seemed plain that the fight was nearly over. Sickened, Fremur turned Kulva closer to his chest, as if to shield her from the sight of Unver’s imminent death, but could not look at her face for more than an instant: Her eyes were open, as if she looked at him in accusation.

“I did nothing,” he said quietly, but a black, hopeless rage boiled inside him. “I could do nothing.”

At the sound of several loud clangs in succession he looked up. Unver was in a half-crouch, doing his best to slip Odrig’s heavy strokes. Clearly, the thane meant to end this. The sun beat down, and the grass sparkled with wet scarlet: Unver had several more wounds, so many that it was hard to count them in the general mire of his bloodied clothing.

Then, just as Odrig drew back for a better killing angle, Unver leaped up at him with what must have been his final strength and swung at his head. Odrig guided the blow away easily with his own blade and then turned his sword over, trapping Unver’s weapon, but the sound of their two weapons striking each other seemed so odd and muffled that even Odrig, the path of his death-stroke now open, hesitated for a moment to glance at the blade he had turned aside.

It was not Unver’s sword that had swung toward the thane’s head, and was now imprisoned by the grip of Odrig’s own blade. It was Unver’s scabbard, torn loose from his belt. His sword was still in his other hand.

Odrig had only a moment to gape; then, even as the realization of what he was seeing drained the blood from his face, Unver plunged his own curved blade into Odrig’s belly so hard that its point tented the back of his feast-day garment.

The ending came so suddenly and so surprisingly that none of the guests even cried out. Odrig’s knees went limp. He collapsed onto Unver, who held him up for a moment, his own legs shaking, then stepped out of the way and let the thane fall into the mud.

Unver, bloody and silent, walked toward Fremur. The guests between them nearly flew in their hurry to get out of his way, but the tall man did not seem to see them, as though he passed living through the Land of Shadows. When he reached Fremur he said nothing, but only bent and lifted Kulva’s body out of her brother’s grasp. Unver was exhausted, and the dead weight of her made him stagger, but he managed to put her over his shoulder. Then, still without a word, he turned and walked across the paddock, two bodies left lying in the grass behind him and the clan guests shrinking back as from a leper. He walked unsteadily toward the gate that led out of the paddock, Kulva bouncing on his shoulder, her hair unbound now and waving behind him like a horse’s tail. For long moments, no one around the wedding tent said anything, but only watched Unver’s diminishing figure.

“Don’t let him go!” someone shouted at last. “He killed the thane!”

“Murderer!” someone else cried, and there was a general roar of agreement, mostly from the men.

A few guests near Fremur drew their swords to go after Unver, startling Fremur as though from a sudden dream. The anger that had bubbled inside him was still hot, but now felt hard as stone. He pulled his own blade and slapped the nearest man on the arm with it, hard enough to make him drop his weapon.

“What are you doing?” the man snarled. It was Gezdahn Baldhead, one of the friends who had been drinking with Drojan and Odrig only an hour before, his face bright pink with astonishment and thwarted anger. “We must catch the halfblood before he gets to his horse!”

“No.” Fremur held his sword out sideways in front of Gezdahn and the others, like a paddock gate. He felt curiously clear-headed, as if he alone had stood soberly by while everyone else had drunk themselves into madness.

“Get out of my way, Fremur-mouse,” Gezdahn snarled, “or you’ll get the same thing.”

Fremur placed the point of his own curved sword against the man’s chest. “You will do nothing. Odrig is dead. My brother the thane is dead. That means I am thane of the Crane Clan until we choose another at the next clan moot. Do you deny the law?”

Gezdahn stared at him, anger fighting surprise as if the Fremur he knew had disappeared and been replaced by some strange demon from another world. “You?”

“I am eldest male of Odrig’s house. That means I am thane.”

“But he stole your sister’s body!” cried another man. “He will shame her.”

“He will not shame her. He will mourn her, you fool, and then he will bury her. We have time enough to think about what Unver has done. Put up your swords. If you want to bury someone, you have two corpses right here.”

“You do not know what you are doing,” Gezdahn said, but after staring at Fremur for a moment he slid his blade back into the sheath. Fremur felt as if his own face must be shining, he felt so hot beneath his skin.

“No. But neither do you. Nor do any of the rest of us.” A vision had come to him even as he had drawn his sword—the fires of the stone dweller settlement biting at the sky, and Unver looming above it all like some great hunting bird sent down from Heaven to scourge the people’s enemies. “Do you not see? The gods have spoken to us today. The Sky Piercer has given us a great message and we must understand it before we act.”

And although he saw nothing but anger from his brother’s friends, he saw something else on the faces of many gathered there—not merely confusion and horror, but also a kind of awe. Even old Burtan the shaman seemed chastened, as though he had witnessed, not just something horrible, but something that was important as well. Fremur was glad to see the old man understood. The others might understand in time. Some never would, perhaps. That was what happened, his father had once told him, when the gods spoke to men.