If you follow the western mountains northward, in time you’ll reach the enormous plateau known as ‘The Roof of the World’, where the race of the Ogri makes their home. The city of Lower Temple commands the pass through the mountains into the lands of the west, and travelers from all over the known world enter its gates to trade, to explore new lands, or to escape from the old, and so on, as many stories as there are people passing through.

But if you enter those gates, the Ogra-Magi, large female mages with hair and eyes cobalt blue, will probe your mind. If you’re a male and they find you interesting, one of them will test you. Few are tested and far fewer pass, but if you are accepted, then you must become her lover until you give her a child. If the child is to be female, as most are, you will be given a marvelous gift that is unique upon Earth and sent on your way, told never to return to the city again on pain of death. 

But if the child is to be male, then Lower Temple becomes your home, and you must remain with your son and teach him the ways of your race until he is an adult. Only then may you leave, though few do, or so I have heard, and those who depart almost always have their sons with them. For the race of the Ogri loves with ferocity unknown to Man, and what they love they never willingly leave.

My swords have been linked to me for a long time, both of them knowing what I know, and I feel the short sword’s frustration as she rattles in her sheathe. Both swords can also speak into the minds of anyone close, including each other, and I hear Master’s voice in the back of my head.

‘Patience…trust the wielder’.

Master is an ancient sword while I am the first wielder Apprentice has ever known. Yet I understand her frustration as I rise to my feet, pulling off my leather cap so my silvery grey hair is exposed to the sky as both swords unlatch the locks holding them in their sheathes. Even though I don’t think there will be a fight.

Clan loyalty runs deep, even when its divided, and even if he doesn’t care, the Young Lord will have to deal with a trained knight and her retainers, an Ogra-Ki in rawhide armor who’s carrying a cudgel as long as my leg, and a Summer Mage. The odds aren’t in his favor, and the Blood-archer at least realizes it, for he catches the Young Lord’s eye and gives him a questioning thumbs-up then thumbs-down gesture.

I smile as the winter-haired Young Lord scowls and makes a gesture: thumbs-down. I drop to a crouch as Blood-archer moves off the rock and makes the same gesture to the bandits on either side. Fire-Archer looks furious as the Young Lord turns his scowl on him. The bandits look frustrated but they obey the Young Lord’s command, all of them beginning to slowly retreat up the slope while the caravan rolls on, oblivious, and I prepare to conceal myself in the bushes behind the rock until the bandits have passed and I can continue tracking the bandits as I’ve been doing.

Then a sharp movement to my left catches my eye. One of the bandits tripped on a leaf-hidden tree root and is falling backwards, the heavy crossbow dropping from his hand. It hits another tree root with a bang and fires, hurtling the bolt towards the caravan.

The bolt hisses as it passes through the sparse forest and scores a horse’s flank, the animal rearing back with a scream of pain as men begin to shout. Beside the healer’s cart the Ogra-Ki points the end of the cudgel towards the slope and, in a voice like a war drum, bellows, “Ambush!”