Empire of the East (13 page)

Olanthe popped up from somewhere to stand at Thomas's side. “Keep down!” he barked, gripping her protectively. He reached into her pack and took out the Thunderstone, and rolled it toward the barracks. The battered metal case bounced to a stop just at a corner of the low building.

It would take some little time for the storm to develop. Meanwhile, Thomas disposed some men to discourage those inside the barracks from sallying; that done, he turned the greater part of his attention to the headquarters building. He saw that Mewick had already led men onto the roof of it, where they were fighting with some bronze-helmets who had climbed up from inside. Others were trading spearthrusts and missiles at the doors and windows.

Yet another squad of Free Folk came pouring into the compound now, and with them the first of the farmers to rise in arms—pitchforks and reaping-hooks, as predicted, and a raging joyous fury. Thomas ran to meet these, and led them to the headquarters building.

On the headquarters roof, guards and officers and orderlies in bronze helmets were holding off the Free Folk with pike and sword and mace, protecting one corner of the palisade. There one of their number was waving torches to drive off birds, while another tried to pull the protective net away from a reptile-roost; they meant to get a courier away to Ekuman.

The soldier waving torches went down, struck by a pitchfork hurled up from the ground. Thomas skipped quickly over the shingles to kick the flaming brands off the roof before they could set fire to it. The man struggling with the net at last succeeded in getting it out of the reptiles' way—but not one of them ventured out of the doorway of the roost. The night belonged to the birds, and well the reptiles knew it.

Thunder grumbled overhead. Suddenly there was no one but Free Folk left standing on the roof, though others were still lying there. Blood slicked the shingles underfoot and trickled in the raingutters. Someone had taken up a captured pike and was starting to try to prod the reptiles out of their little house. Birds were landing at the doorway, their soft voices vibrant, urging those within who had eaten birds' eggs not to be shy now, but come out and welcome their guests come to return the call.

Men down on the ground at the entrance to the headquarters building were calling for Thomas. He swung over the edge of the roof and dropped down to discover that some of Mewick's squad thought they had nabbed the garrison commander. They shoved forward a gray-haired fellow with a thin ropy neck. They had caught him in a store-room, putting on a private soldier's uniform.

Rain pattered down, then drummed. Lightning was marching closer. In one sudden white opening of the sky, Thomas looked up and saw Strijeef, old wound still bandaged on one wing, eyes mad and glaring, emerging from a reptile-roost. Leathery eggshell clung to the talons of his upraised foot. His beak and his feathers were stained with purplish blood.

“See to the other roost!” Thomas shouted up. Then he dragged the gray-haired prisoner to Olanthe, and some of the other Oasis-folk, to make absolutely sure of who he was. Olanthe was out in the center of the parade-ground, in range of arrows from the still-resisting barracks. A couple of farmers were standing by with captured shields, ready to deflect any shafts that came at those working to take the old man down from his scaffold. Olanthe was weeping, oblivious of arrows; Thomas realized that the man on the cross must be her father.

The victim was just being lowered when the Thunderstone got the lightning it was calling for. The bolt followed the corner of the barracks from eaves to ground, opening the structure like a great egg carefully topped at table. The rain, pouring now, prevented any fire from catching. Thomas ran to join his men entering the breach, but his leadership was not needed. His force swept in through the riven wall and completed the night's work without further loss to themselves.

And so ended the battle for the Oasis. Olanthe's father and the other wounded freedom fighters were carried out of the invaders' compound to be cared for in the farmers' homes. From the farmers' compound, a prison no longer, voices began to rise, men and women and children singing in the gladness of their deliverance.

At a touch on his shoulder Thomas turned, to see Loford standing there, grinning hugely; on the upper part of the wizard's big right arm a small wound was bleeding.

“How was the fighting?” Thomas asked.

“Oh, very good! Oh, excellent! I tell you I was once facing two of them—but I am come to remind you, this time the Thunderstone is yours to pick up.”

“That's right.” Thomas, grinning, thinking how he would torment Loford by never asking him how he had got his glorious wound, trotted over to the shattered barracks and picked up the graven case from a puddle.

While he was there a bird came down to him, bringing the good report that not a single enemy had escaped the slaughter. Several members of the patrols ambushed in the fields had tried to get away, to reach the Castle, when they saw that the whole Oasis was under attack. All but one of these had been cut down by Thomas's men left along the Oasis' western boundary for the purpose. The one man who had got past them, mounted, had been dragged bloodily from his saddle while at full gallop, by three of the Silent People who had overtaken and fastened on him from above. And now even the terrified beast he had been riding was caught and being brought back to the stables.

Though the fighting was over, no one who was not wounded could be allowed to rest. There was too much to be done before dawn. The wounded must be moved out of sight and cared for, the dead must be buried and then all traces of their graves effaced. Any couriers from the Castle must not be allowed to suspect what had happened—not until they had landed, or at least descended within certain arrow-range.

The wall of the riven barracks was hastily propped up in place, and the gaps mended as well as possible. At dawn the farmers would go to their fields in the usual numbers to do their ordinary tasks. Men of the Free Folk would put on uniforms of bronze and black for incoming reptiles to see, and would march or ride or stand on watch. The mess of shattered eggs and purplish reptile blood was scraped and scrubbed from the outer porches of the roosts.

“One thing more,” said Olanthe. And she nodded at the empty gibbet in the center of the parade-ground, from which her father had been taken almost too late to save his life. In her voice was a hardness that Thomas had not heard there before.

“A dead man will do,” Thomas said. “A gray-haired one.” He tried to remember some corpse among those now being buried that would be a fair match for Olanthe's father; it was a hopeless effort. He turned to look over the handful of prisoners who were still alive, awaiting some questioning; there hung the long disheveled locks of the garrison commander.

Thomas nodded at him, and the men who had the prisoners in charge immediately caught his meaning. Grinning, they pulled the waxen-faced officer forward. “We'll mount him for you, Chief! And we'll see to it that his hide's decorated properly first!”

That was exactly right. That was the best thing to do. But Thomas turned away. He saw Mewick, sad-faced as ever, turning also. But Mewick was not the one who bore responsibility. Thomas made himself turn back and watch, and listen to the whipping. He was surprised at the effort it took him—as if he had never seen blood before. Olanthe was watching, with a look of remote satisfaction. But Thomas was afraid. He feared the urgings and the delights of power, that he could feel stirring within himself like the pangs of some glamorous sickness.

The whipping of the garrison commander was useless. All through the next day, while he hung dead on the cross, no couriers from the Castle came. The Free Folk, and the Oasis farmers who were going to march with them, half-rested through the day, and then relaxed more completely on the following night.

On that night the birds brought word that they had learned Rolf's whereabouts in the Castle, and repeated his message to Thomas. They had tried to alert him that the attack was coming in three nights. If Rolf was ever taken out of doors after dark they would try to put the Prisoner's Stone into his hands.

Three pebbles on Rolf's cell roof one night, and at the same hour on the next night, two. He waved back twice.

On the morning after that, Rolf for the first time was given a genuine keen-edged sword and, with this weapon he spent the morning lunging and hacking at the timber butts. His tutor stood by criticizing, flanked by a pair of pikemen who held their long weapons at the ready all the time that Rolf was truly armed.

In the afternoon Rolf and his tutor were alone again, once more dueling with the dulled and blunt-tipped blades. And during this session the tutor's parries were in several instances too low, and Rolf managed to poke him in the belly or hack him bloodlessly on the arm. Rolf drew small satisfaction from this, being thoroughly suspicious that the soldier was letting him win to build his confidence. If the tutor had but known it, the two pikemen in the morning had gone a long way to accomplish that.

That night there came the signal of a single pebble, which Rolf answered with one wave. Three, two, one, the count had gone, from night to night.

On the morning of the following day, Rolf knew, the wedding would take place. In the afternoon he would face Chup in the arena. Certainly it was neither of these things that the Free Folk were signaling to tell him—therefore something else of great importance was coming, tomorrow or tomorrow night.

He meant to be alive to see it.

He was awakened early on the wedding-day by loud shouts, and by music that sounded like the accompaniment of some bawdy dance. He thought again that today's festivities could not be much like those of the simple pledge-weddings he had seen and attended. On those occasions the company maintained at least an effort at solemnity until the middle of the day, until vows had been exchanged and perhaps some amateur wizard of the countryside had tried to put a spell of happiness upon the rings. After that the dancing and the drinking started, and the games, and whatever feasting the people could afford….

The day wore on. Rolf was given a fresh surcoat of cheap black cloth to put on over his own clothes. There was no sword practice, no sight of his instructor. He was fed as usual and escorted to the privy. About the courtyards there were men in liveries that Rolf had not seen before—in each the color black was matched with one other, red or green or white or gray. It was true, then, that wedding guests were here from all the Satrapies nearby.

In the later afternoon the Master of the Games came with two wardens to Rolf's cell, and he was hurried out of it. First to the privy once more—he supposed so their Lordships should not be disgusted if fear overcame him utterly in the arena. And then he was led under the keep, to a small windowless chamber with an overhead of oddly slanting timbers. Through the cracks in this ceiling, and around a closed door opposite the one they entered by, sunlight filtered in. Feet tramped overhead, the sound of laughter came from very near above, and Rolf realized that he was already under the seats ringing the arena. His soldier-tutor had given him some description of the place.

A bronze helm and a shield and sword were waiting for him. While the Master of the Games hurried off on some other errand, Rolf's guards handed him the first of two of these items at once. They eyed him critically while he took the shield on his arm and set the barbut on his head; he supposed they wanted to see whether he was likely to collapse with fear.

From against the wall they swung out a cunning sort of cagework, meant to hold him against the door leading to the arena. Only after he was thus restrained did they put the naked sword into his hand. Some signal came to them almost at once when that was done, and one man hauled on a chain to make the door in front of Rolf fly open, while the other took up a spear to urge him, if need be, out onto the sand.

The spear was not needed. Rolf's legs carried him out into the glare of the low sun. Through the T of his helmet's opening he had a glimpse of a ring of faces above him, gay colors, movement; he was greeted with a burst of brutal noise. He stood at one end of a sandy oval, some twenty meters long and proportionately wide, surrounded by a high smooth unscalable wall.

There came another roar of applause, and Rolf saw the tall, black-clad figure of his opponent stalking toward him, coming from the opposite end of the flat little world in which the two of them were now alone. A red mask painted on the front of a black barbut-helm concealed Chup's face. Holding sword and shield ready, he came straight forward; in his gait there was a swaying movement that Rolf could interpret only as some intended mockery.

Rolf put out of his mind everything but:
strike first, and strike hard.
His knees that had been quivering now bore him forward steadily.

His enemy was taller, and longer of reach, and so had the privilege of striking first; an option he chose to exercise. The straight overhand cut seemed a mockery also, for it was slower than some that Rolf had parried from his tutor's blade. Rolf caught the downstroke on his shield, and perhaps he shouted—he had thought earlier that when this moment came he should shout something, so the evil ones who watched would know that he was dying for the cause of freedom.

Later, he did not know whether he had cried out anything at all at this moment. He knew only that he deflected the clumsy downstroke with his shield, as he had been taught to do, and thrust straight in to kill.

His point slid so easily through the black cloth and between his opponent's ribs that for a moment Rolf did not believe in his success. He retreated a step, thinking only:
What trick is this?

But the man in black was not shamming. A spurting stain of red spread down his front. His arms sagged with his weapons in them, and with what seemed infinite weariness he went down upon his knees. Then, turning sideways, he toppled out full length upon the sand.

Victory still seemed unreal to Rolf. The gay throng encircling him above the wall were cheering, a sound was made even more incredible by the groans that mingled with it—not laments of rage or shock, but whines of mere disappointment, the sounds of watchers cheated by the sudden ending of a show.

Taking off his helmet, Rolf looked up. Chup sat there, in the first bank of seats, looking down at Rolf, smiling lightly and applauding. Beside Chup was his golden bride; even now Rolf noticed that Charmian was looking across the arena and up, with expectancy in her face.

Rolf turned and looked down again at the figure on the sand. He scarcely noticed when soldiers came to take his weapon away; he was watching two dungeon-wardens approach the fallen man. One of them cautiously kicked away the dropped sword while the other turned the body on its back and pulled off the demon-painted barbut. The face revealed was young, and quite unknown to Rolf.

One of the wardens had begun to raise a heavy maul, to give the quietus. His motion was stopped on the backstroke by a scream—a woman's shriek so sudden and so terrible that it sent reptiles cawing up in startlement from their high perches on the overlooking keep.

And Rolf knew whom he had stabbed; he knew when he looked up and saw that the screaming girl was Sarah.

 

The Satrap Ekuman, twisting around in his cushioned seat of honor under a bronze-black awning was looking at Sarah also. Plainly the girl was screeching the name of the man who had just fallen in the oddly unequal bout. Something more than a coincidence, thought Ekuman. With a look he ordered the Master of the Harem to be quick about quieting the girl, getting the nuisance of her shrieks and her contorted face out of the presence of the guests. And then he faced forward again, looking across the arena to where his daughter sat beside her bridegroom. It had become almost a reflex for Ekuman to suspect his daughter, whenever some nasty internal intrigue threatened the peace if not the very security of his household. And the expression she was wearing now, a look of slight aristocratic puzzlement at the disturbance, was quite too good for him to believe in it for a moment.

So.

The Satrap was not, of course, concerned about the bereavement of a harem slave. Nor, really, about the fixing of a gladiatorial contest, though that was an annoyance. What bit him was the discovery that an intrigue of any kind could be accomplished, in his own Castle and without his knowledge, by one who was departing, who tomorrow would presumably have no power here at all. It meant that there were people in his establishment, in positions of responsibility, whose first loyalty was to his daughter today and would be so tomorrow, when she would be Lady in a rival house, when there would be things of infinitely greater moment at stake.

He would impress his guests. He would find out, today, who those folk were, and today he would be rid of them.

Already he was leaning forward, with an outstretched hand staying the wardens in the arena from disposing of the fallen man, who might be saved for questioning. Garl, Master of the Troops, having seen from his Lord's expression that something was amiss, was already at his side. Ekuman issued quick orders that both gladiators, and those who had had them in charge, should be brought before him at once. “In my Presence Chamber.”

Turning his head, Ekuman said to the Master of the Games, “See that some other entertainment is set before my guests, and then do you attend me also.” He shot his glance across the arena, and raised his voice from its confidential level: “My dear daughter and my son, please come with me.”

But as Ekuman arose he had to delay, for now the Master of the Reptiles was pressing toward him along the aisle before the lowest tier of seats, creating a fresh wave of puzzled comment among the guests. The Reptile Master's face showed clearly that he thought his errand urgent. In his hands he held a reptile courier's pouch, that had some bulky weight inside.

“Bring it along,” Ekuman told him, and strode along the passage that opened for him between courtiers, heading for the keep. He noticed clouds coming with portentous suddenness over the lowering sun, and behind him he heard the Master of the Games call out, “Lords and ladies, I pray you come inside! The weather conspires with other disturbances against our celebration here. My Lord Ekuman bids you make merry in his hall, where he will join you when he can!”

Once inside the keep, Ekuman drew the Master of the Reptiles aside.

The Master of the Reptiles whispered, “My Lord, this pouch was most likely sent toward us from the Oasis, for it was found in the desert. It was sent some days ago, for the fallen courier's body was decayed when one of my scouts discovered it during this last hour. The courier may well have fallen in one of those untimely rainstorms that have raged over the desert for the past few days.”

“What's in it?”

“There must have been a message, Lord, but—see?—the pouch's lock is broken, from storm or fall, and the desert wind has left no paper. Only this.” The Reptile Master let the torn pouch fall away; his hands remained holding up a weighty case of metal, the size of two clenched fists. It looked as if it had come through fire and battle both.

Ekuman took the thing. The graven markings tickled his stroking thumbs with power; he knew strong magic when he felt it in his hands. “You did well to bring this straight to me.”

Problems were encircling him like armed men, attacking all at once. He would just have to fight them all off as best he could, dealing a stroke here and another there, till he could pin one down and settle it; it was a common predicament for a ruler.

“Summon Elslood to the Presence Chamber too,” Ekuman ordered a soldier who was standing by. The man saluted and ran off. Ekuman let two more soldiers pass him, bearing between them the fallen gladiator on a litter. Then he walked himself in the same direction. Passing a narrow window, he marked how sudden a gloom had fallen outside. The Master of the Games had been right to summon the guests into the hall.

 

Rolf had been willing enough to be disarmed; at the moment he wanted never to touch a sword again. He stood there in the arena, not knowing whether he wished to live or die. Only once since Nils had fallen had Sarah looked in Rolf's direction, and that look had stabbed him like a blade.

At least Nils still lived—whatever his life might be worth. A pair of robed men came to minister to Nils and supervise his being carried off. Rolf was soon prodded on to follow. Under a suddenly threatening sky, all the gaily appareled spectators were also starting to file into the keep.

Rolf was marched indoors and upstairs. Gradually he began to understand that something about his fight with Nils was perturbing the great folk of the Castle; the faces of his guards were concerned about something more important than avoiding a rainstorm.

An officer came to search Rolf, then preceded him and his escort through a large and richly furnished hall, filling up now with the spectators from the arena. They stared at Rolf as he passed and whispered curiously, while the Master of the Games called to them, trying to rouse interest in his jugglers. Servants were putting torches in wall sconces, against the sudden onslaught of the night.

One more flight of steps, then a wait in a rich antechamber. Then Rolf was brought into a large circular room, the lower level of the squat tower that crowned the keep. Against one wall was Ekuman, enthroned on a great chair. In flanking chairs sat Chup, and golden Charmian, haughty as a statue. At Ekuman's back the curving wall was hung with many trophies, of war and of the chase, and among these were some Old World things—Rolf thought he could recognize them as such, seeing their precise smooth workmanship, like that of the far-seeing glasses and the Elephant.

Nervous attendants milled about. On the floor of inlaid wood before Ekuman was set the stretcher with Nils on it, the robed men bending over him to stanch the flow of blood. And standing before Ekuman was the soldier who had taught Rolf his swordplay, at attention now, quivering with a rigidity of discipline. And there was Sarah, between two soldiers who gripped her arms to keep her from collapsing or going to her lover on his pallet.