Mask of Swords by Jonathan Moeller Page A

stark, severe braid, a short sword and a quiver of arrows at her belt, and a short bow over her shoulder. The Jutai needed headmen and hroulds to defend them, but all their headmen had perished in the middle lands, and their hrould Mazael Cravenlock could not be everywhere at once. So it fell to Sigaldra to defend what was left of her people. 
    She examined her expression in a fragment of mirror they had found in the ruined village. She looked stark and grim, her face harsh, her blue eyes bloodshot and ringed in dark circles. In truth, she looked like one of the shieldmaidens from the epics the loresingers loved so much, pale and stern and doomed to die in tragic battle against the Dark Elderborn. 
    Sigaldra did not think it a flattering comparison. 
    “You look like a headman,” said Liane.
    “I had better,” said Sigaldra. “Go get dressed and meet me in the hall.” 
    Liane smiled and dashed from the room. Her sister’s moods were as changeable as the weather. 
    Sigaldra descended to the keep’s great hall. Banners hung from the rafters, and weapons forged by the hands of humans and Malrags both adorned the walls. The Jutai had carried those relics of past glories with them out of the middle lands, and Sigaldra had insisted that they hang in the great hall, to remind the Jutai that they had once been a great nation. Doors behind the dais led to the chapel, where Sigaldra had placed the ashes of the past Jutai. The urns, too, had been carried out of the middle lands, and every Jutai that died was burned and a pinch of his or her ashes added to their ancestral urn.
    Perhaps someday those urns would be all that was left of the Jutai. 
    She stood alone in the hall, gazing at the bow in her hand. It was well-worn, its haft and grip familiar. She had held that bow during the great battle of the Northwater, standing with the other Jutai archers in the host of the Grim Marches…
    “Holdmistress?”
    Sigaldra shook off her dark thoughts. Old Ulfarna, the chief of her bondswomen, stood in the hall. Her face was as hard and as lean as if it had been carved from oak. She wore a widow’s black dress, and though she leaned upon a cane, she was still vigorous otherwise. Her husband had fallen against the Malrags, along with two of her sons, and two more once they had come to the Grim Marches. Yet she still had three living sons. Ulfarna was one of the fortunate ones. Sometimes Sigaldra thought that Greatheart Keep was a hold of widows and orphans and cripples. 
    “Is anything amiss?” said Ulfarna. “I was going to prepare the evening meal.”
    “No, nothing is amiss,” said Sigaldra. “I am simply lost in my thoughts, that is all.” 
    “We all have much to be lost in, holdmistress,” said Ulfarna.
    “I have too much to do to brood,” said Sigaldra. “If the Jutai are to thrive in our new land, then there is much to be done.”
    “To which we owe a great deal to you,” said Ulfarna. 
    “No,” said Sigaldra. 
    “Yes,” said Ulfarna. “You kept Ragnachar from killing us all during the long march. When Athanaric sought for peace with Lord Richard, you supported him in the face of Ragnachar’s wrath. When Ragnachar betrayed Lord Richard, you sided with Lord Mazael. And when Mazael became the new hrould of the Tervingi nation, you accepted him as our hrould, and we now live on his land under his protection.” 
    “I should have done more,” said Sigaldra. 
    “You could not possibly have done more,” said Ulfarna, “and had you done any less, the Jutai would be no more, and there would be no one left to remember our ancestors.” She thumped the flagstones of the floor with her cane. “I say this to remind you of the obvious. You know I speak the truth. I am not a Marcher lordling, to speak honeyed words, or a Tervingi, to ramble endlessly about the deeds of Tervingar of old. I am Jutai, so I speak the truth in all things.” 
    “Thank you,” said Sigaldra. “You are too kind.” 
    Ulfarna