Oakleaf Bearers

25

B ETWEEN THEM, H ALT AND W ILL HAD FOUND A HUNDRED SLAVES who claimed to have some level of skill with the bow. Finding them had been one matter. Convincing them that they should volunteer to help defend Hallasholm was something else.

As a burly Teutlander forester, who seemed to have assumed the role of spokesman for them, told the two Rangers, "Why should we help the Skandians? They've done nothing except enslave us, beat us and give us too little food to eat."

Halt eyed the man's ample girth speculatively. If some of the slaves were underfed, this one could hardly claim to be one of them, he thought. Still, he decided to let that matter pass.

"You might find it more agreeable to be a slave of the Skandians than to fall into the hands of the Temujai," he told them bluntly.

Another of the assembled men spoke up. This one was a southern Gallican and his outlandish accent made his words almost indecipherable. Will finally pieced the sounds together in sufficient order to know that the man had asked: "What do the Temujai do with their slaves?"

Halt turned a steely gaze on the Gall. "They don't keep slaves," he said evenly, and a buzz of expectation ran through the assembled men. The big Teutlander stepped forward again, grinning.

"Then why would you expect us to fight against them?" he asked. "If they beat the Skandians, they'll set us free."

There was a loud mumble of consent among the others behind him. Halt held up a hand and waited patiently. Eventually, the hubbub died away and the slaves looked at him expectantly, wondering what further inducement he could offer them-what he would consider to be more attractive to them than the prospect of freedom.

"I said," he intoned clearly, so that everyone could hear him, "they don't keep slaves. I didn't say they set them free." He paused, then added, with a slight shrug of his shoulders, "Although the religious ones among you may consider death to be the ultimate freedom."

This time, the commotion among the slaves was even louder. Finally, the self-appointed spokesman stepped forward again and asked, with a little less assertion, "What do you mean, Araluen? Death?"

Halt made a careless gesture. "The usual, I suppose: the sudden cessation of life. The end of it all. Departure for a happier place. Or oblivion, depending upon your personal beliefs."

Again a buzz ran through the crowd. The Teutlander studied Halt closely, trying to see some indication that the Ranger was bluffing.

"But:" He hesitated, not sure whether to ask the next question, not sure that he wanted to know the answer. Then, urged by his companions, he went on: "Why should these Temujai want to kill us? We've done nothing to them."

"The truth of the matter is," Halt told them all, "you mean nothing to them either. The Temujai consider themselves a superior race. They'd kill you out of hand because you can do nothing for them-but left behind their backs, you could constitute a threat."

A nervous silence settled over the crowd now. Halt let them digest what he had said, then he spoke again.

"Believe me, I've seen what these people are like." He looked into the faces of the crowd. "I can see there are some Araluens among you. I'll give you my word as a Ranger that I'm not bluffing. Your best chance of survival is to fight with the Skandians against these Temujai. I'll leave you for half an hour to consider what I've said. You Araluens might tell the others what a Ranger's word means," he added. Then, beckoning for Will to follow, he turned on his heel and walked some distance away, out of earshot.

"We're going to have to offer them more," he said when the others couldn't hear him. "Reluctant recruits will be almost useless to us. A man's got to have something worth fighting for if he's going to do his best. And that's what we're going to need from this bunch-their best effort."

"So what are you going to do?" Will asked, almost jogging to keep pace with his teacher's urgent stride.

"We're going to see Ragnak," Halt told him. "He's going to have to promise to free every slave who fights for Hallasholm."

Will shook his head doubtfully. "He won't like that," he said. Halt turned and looked at him, a faint grin touching the corner of his mouth.

"He'll hate it," he agreed.

"Freedom?" Ragnak exploded. "Give them their freedom? A hundred slaves?"

Halt shrugged disdainfully. "Probably closer to three hundred," he replied. "A lot of them will have women and children they'll want to take with them."

The Oberjarl gave an enormous snort of incredulous laughter. "Are you mad?" he asked the Ranger. "If I give three hundred slaves their freedom, we'll have virtually no slaves left. What will I do then?"

"If you don't, you may find you have no country left," Halt replied. "As to what you would do next, you could try paying them. Make them servants instead of slaves."

"Pay them? To do the work they're doing now?" Ragnak spluttered indignantly.

"Why not? The gods know you can afford it well enough. And you might find they do a better job if they've got something more than a beating to look forward to at the end of the day."

"To hell with them!" Ragnak said. "And to hell with you, Ranger. I agreed to listen to you, but this is ridiculous. You'll turn me into a beggar if I let you have your way. First you want me to abandon Hallasholm to this rabble of horsemen. Now you want me to send all my slaves off back to where they came from. To hell with you, I say."

He glared at the Ranger for a few seconds, then, with a contemptuous wave of his hand, he turned away, refusing even to make eye contact. Halt waited a few seconds, then spoke to Erak, who was standing by his Oberjarl, an uncomfortable look on his face.

"I'm telling you, we need these men," he said forcefully. "Even with them, we can still lose. But with them fighting willingly for us, we'll have a chance." He jerked a thumb in the direction of the Oberjarl. "Tell him," he said finally, then turned on his heel and left the council room, Will hurrying behind him as he went.

As they left the hall, Halt said, almost to himself, but loud enough for Will to hear, "I wonder if it occurs to them that if the slaves agree unwillingly to fight for them, and if, by some mad mischance, we do win, there's nothing to stop the slaves from turning their weapons on the Skandians." That thought had occurred to Will. He nodded agreement. "That's why," Halt continued, "we've got to give them something worth fighting for."

They waited at the training field for over an hour. The slaves had come to a decision, agreeing to fight against the Temujai. However, a few shifty eyes among the group told Halt and Will that, once the battle was over, the newly armed men were not going to return meekly into slavery.

There was a buzz of expectation as Erak arrived. He walked up to Halt and Will, who were standing a little apart from the archers.

"Ragnak agrees," he said quietly. "If they fight, he'll free them."

Halt nodded his head gratefully. He knew where the real impetus for Ragnak's decision had come from.

"Thank you," he said simply to Erak. The Skandian shrugged and Halt turned to Will. "They'll be your men. They need to get used to taking orders from you. You tell them."

Will hesitated, surprised. He had assumed that Halt would do the talking. Then, at an encouraging nod from his master, he stepped forward, raising his voice.

"Men!" he called, and the low murmur of conversation among the group died instantly. He waited a second or two to make sure he had their full attention, then continued.

"Ragnak has decided. If you fight for Skandia, he'll set you free."

There was a moment of stunned silence. Some of these men had been slaves for ten years or more. Now, here was this slightly built youth telling them that the end to their suffering was in sight. Then a mighty roar of triumph and jubilation swept through them, at first wordless and inchoate, but rapidly settling into a rhythmic chant of one word from one hundred throats:

"Free-dom! Free-dom! Free-dom!"

Will let them celebrate for a while longer. Then he climbed onto a tree stump where he could be seen by all of them and waved his arms for silence. Gradually, the chant died away and they crowded closer around him, eager to hear what else he had to tell them.

"That's all very well," he said when they had quieted down. "But first, there's the small matter of beating the Temujai. Let's get to work."

Halt and Erak watched as Will supervised the issuing of arrows to the men. Unconsciously, both men nodded their approval of the boy. Then Erak turned to Halt.

"I nearly forgot, Ragnak had a further message for you. He said if we lose this battle and he loses his slaves as well, he's going to kill you for it," he said cheerfully.

Halt smiled grimly. "If we lose this battle, he may have to get in line to do it. There'll be a few thousand Temujai cavalrymen in front of him."