Free Honored Enemy by Raymond E. Feist Page A

mountains to either side of the pass were concealed by the low grey clouds of the storm.
    He paused for a moment, staring up the trail. He had never been this far north, for the ridgeline had always been a backdrop to his war, a distant mystery.
    Hakaxa, his lead scout, was down on his knees, gasping for air, with Sugama bent double beside him. Hakaxa looked up as Asayaga approached.
    ‘Crest of trail just ahead.’
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    Tasemu grunted. ‘The crest. At the pass, they’ll have something there.’
    Asayaga nodded. He looked back again. His men were staggering forward, pressing stoically up the steep incline.
    ‘Five minute rest here,’ Asayaga announced. ‘I’ll scout ahead.’
    Tasemu cocked his head slightly, gazing at him with his one good eye. ‘No. Sugama with me.’
    Tasemu gave him a bit of a hopeful gaze but Asayaga ignored it.
    No, there would be no knife in the back.
    ‘Sugama,’ Asayaga said quietly, and continued on. He could hear the ragged gasps for breath as Sugama struggled to stay up.
    The storm was blowing straight into their faces from the north, and he could hear the moaning of the wind as it whistled through stunted trees in the pass just ahead.
    He held his hand out, motioning for Sugama to stop, looked back and touched his nose, then flared his nostrils. Sugama stopped, looked at him curiously, and finally realized what Asayaga was signifying. He sniffed the air. His eyes grew wide.
    Good, let him learn that he must use all senses out here.
    Asayaga drifted to the side of the trail and moved forward cautiously. The trail turned and his heart froze. Sugama slipped up to his side and a sigh of anguish escaped him.
    Asayaga found himself staring intently at a stockade wall. The pass over the top of the mountains went through a notch, the walls of the pass sloping up nearly vertically for a hundred or more feet to either side. The passage was barricaded by a stone wall a dozen feet high, with a crude wooden gate in the centre. Beyond the wall he saw the roof of what must be a garrison house. He sighed inwardly at the thought of the comfort that must lie within.
    He saw no one, but the smoke gave it all away. This far north the garrison had to be moredhel.
    ‘Can we go around it?’ Sugama asked, whispering.
    Asayaga shook his head. ‘Not enough time. We don’t know how close the pursuit is – those Kingdom soldiers may have bought us time, but we don’t know how much. If we try to crawl our way over the mountain to either side, and the moredhel are still chasing us, we’ll be destroyed. They’ll go through the pass ahead, cut us off . . .’
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    ‘But if we attack and those behind us, Kingdom or moredhel, come up, we’re doomed.’
    Asayaga forced a grin. ‘We take it quickly and hold it. Then let the bastards from the Kingdom sit on the outside while the Dark Brothers come up and finish them. With forty good men I could hold it against three to four hundred. ‘And besides,’ he added, ‘it’s warm in there. We need rest, hot food, and a place to dry out.’
    His words trailed off as he caught a glimpse of movement. A sentry, cloak pulled up over his head, peered over the top of the wall for a moment. Asayaga sensed that the sentry was looking straight at him, he froze. Long seconds passed and the head disappeared.
    Asayaga crept back from the tree and started down the trail, Sugama following.
    ‘What you did back there, striking me,’ Sugama hissed, trying to force the words out through ragged gasps for breath.
    Asayaga slowed, fixing him with his gaze. ‘If you are demanding a duel there’s no damn time now. No time for Tsurani honour, no time even for the Great Game, you Minwanabi lapdog. There is time only for survival. If we die, I can’t return home to see my younger brother grown, and you can’t serve your masters. Dead, neither of us serves. Do you understand?’
    Sugama’s anger slowly subsided, and he looked around. Asayaga could almost see the comprehension dawning