Raven Speak (9781442402492) by Diane Lee Wilson

into the dirt. She blinked, breathed, and pushed herself up in time to see a dark gash rip Rune’s tawny neck. His eyes rolled to white. Trying vainly to scramble backward, he was losing his balance—and the knife came arcing down again, fast and true, like a wicked bolt of lightning.
    Not even fully conscious yet, she targeted the skald. She drove off the dirt and rammed him at the knees. He buckled like a stand of barley beneath the scythe. The two of them fell together in a chaotic heap of tangled boots, elbows, and flailing fists. The horses careered around them, snorting and squealing. One of them leaped right over them as they tumbled.
    Asa loosed all her fury; she scratched his greasy, pitted face and battered his chest and slammed a fist into his ragged teeth. Blood darkened his beard. He tried to block her blows, but they fell as relentlessly as hail. When he finally managed to catch her forearm and stop it midair, he gave it a vicious twist downward, roughly yanking her off him. The move tore a fire-hot pain through her shoulder and a cry from her lips. The cry hardened into a scream of determination, and the skald got only as far as his knees before she knocked him flat again. This time his chin hit the dirt at an awkward angle, and she saw the shock in his eyes as his arm flopped uselessly and the knife came free.
    She buried one knee between his lumpy shoulders and braced the other against the ground. Both of them eyed the knife; its handle lay tantalizingly close. The skald wriggled beneath her.He stretched his arm longer and longer, using his fingers to pull himself through the dirt. It took all her strength to keep him pinned while trying to reach over and past him.
    She was almost there. He squirmed with surprising strength, and his middle finger scraped the handle. Alarmed, she made a desperate lunge. That teetered her off balance, and he seized the opportunity to heave himself upward and toss her off.
    His fingers closed around the knife’s handle. He was breathing hard, and for a moment she thought he was going to lie there, but with a rasping snarl he turned on her. His arm drew back and—as if she were watching it happen to someone else—she saw the point of the knife come stabbing through the air straight at her.
    Instinct jerked her aside, and the knife seemed to bury its blade in her tangled hair, though another fire seared her neck. He lifted the knife again. She rolled to safety, calling for Rune.
    She couldn’t see him but she knew he’d come. And just as she pulled an arm across her face, her world became a storm of stamping hooves and sickening thuds. There was another scream—a man’s scream this time—and she found her feet and stumbled away. From the other side of the byre she watched in queasy horror as the dun horse savaged the skald. He reared all the way to the ceiling and brought his sharp hooves down on the cowering man. Jorgen hugged the wall but Rune turned and delivered a barrage of kicks. The skald managed to twist out of the way and take a few running steps, but Rune chased after him, his teeth clacking like iron on iron. He trapped the skald in the corner.
    Jorgen turned to face the furious animal. Panting, and cradling his ribs, he yet managed to lift the knife high and charge at Rune. The knife slashed across the horse’s chest.
    Every pore of Asa’s skin felt Rune’s pain, and she screamed with him. To her bewilderment, Rune didn’t retreat. He lifted onto his hind legs again, an effort that spattered blood across the skald’s face and arms. The hoof that glanced off the man’s shoulder crumpled him, but as he fell Jorgen kept stabbing the knife at the horse’s legs.
    She had to get Rune out of here; the horse was going to kill himself trying to protect her. She ran up the earthen ramp to push the byre door all the way open. The red stallion nearly knocked her down rushing through it; the bay followed on his