Pirates Of Gohar

Chapter 19

Blade found it easy to pass himself off as a shipwrecked sailor, half-starved and nearly out of his wits from hardship and the loss of his mates. In fact, his main problem was not in getting sympathy and help but in refusing offers to put him to bed and nurse him back to health and sanity.

The women were particularly generous. Half of them seemed to already know they'd lost husbands, brothers, or sons in the storm. The other half were sick with fear that a man of theirs caught out in the storm might not be returning. Blade found it easy to carry away more food than he suspected even his half-starved comrades would be able to eat.

He was wrong. Khraishamo and Rhodina emptied the basket Blade set before them down to the last crumb, scrap, and drop of cider. Then the pirate chief belched happily and put his arm around Rhodina. For the first time in many days he looked happy.

«Now I think the next thing we do is sleep.»

Blade nodded. He wouldn't have bet a penny on his staying awake another ten minutes. There was no shelter overhead except the branches of the trees, but as long as they were on land and out of the wind Blade didn't care. He also didn't see much point in anyone keeping watch. It would be many hours, perhaps days, before the storm blew out and let normal traffic along the shore start again.

Blade lay down on the opposite side of a thick tree from Khraishamo and Rhodina, and heard them both snoring just before he fell asleep himself.

They awoke in a drenching rain, as soaked as if they'd just staggered out of the sea again. They started off in a drenching rain, begged their breakfast in the rain, ate it in the rain. This went on for every hour of the first two days of their march inland.

Blade knew he shouldn't have been surprised. Storms like this hitting land frequently turned into downpours. That didn't make it any more pleasant to be continuously soaked to the skin, unable to build a fire or even keep food dry for ten minutes, blinded and deafened by lightning and thunder, occasionally menaced by falling trees, chilled to the bone, and always unsure of where he was and which way he was going.

The only consolation was that they didn't have to hide by day, but could march boldly along as fast as the sodden ground would let them. Along the shore there'd been shipwrecked sailors. Inland there were even more people driven from their homes by the storm and the floods it brought. Blade, Rhodina, and Khraishamo were just three more refugees from disaster.

«I suppose I ought to be happy, seeing my enemies suffering like this,» said Khraishamo during one brief stop. «But then I remember they're Rhodina's people. The idea that they're 'the enemy' isn't so strong in me anymore.»

Blade was happy to hear this. It made it even easier to trust Khraishamo. He still couldn't trust the pirate with his private thoughts about what might follow in the wake of the storm.

Mythor was going to be battered, reeling, ready to be grateful for any help and vengeful toward anyone who inflicted more injury. This would be a golden opportunity for either Harkrat or Kloret to step forward as the generous friend of the suffering Mythorans. If Harkrat was able to move first, he might be able to stifle the rebellion for many years and strengthen his position at home. If Kloret was able to move first, he might either stifle the rebellion-or turn the rebels to his side.

Who would move first? Harkrat had more resources, but he also had all the new responsibilities of ruling Gohar. Kloret might easily sabotage the Emperor's efforts to aid Mythor, delaying them until he himself could step forward to aid the storm-stricken city. The rebels themselves might not wait for any Goharan, but take advantage of the confusion and discontent to strike now. What were the odds on that? Rhodina might have known once, but her information was now the better part of a year out of date.

Three days' marching took them well clear of the coast, up into the hills to the east of Mythor. North of the city, the hills stretched away in a tangled maze of crests and valleys into unexplored wilderness. Farther south, they flattened out into broad plains. On those plains lived the fourteen tribes of the Maghri. They were more civilized than the horsemen across the Sea, who'd driven the Sarumi onto their peninsula. They were also even more formidable in war, and only a little safer to have as neighbors. The menace of the horsemen wasn't yet as serious as the menace of the pirates, so it hadn't played as big a part in Mythor's relations with the mother city. However, there were rumors of a new aggressiveness which might change this.

By the end of the third day's march, Khraishamo threw back the hood he'd used to disguise himself as human, and strode along bareheaded. He said he liked the feel of the rain on his face. Rhodina cheerfully told him that he'd gone mad.

On the other hand, the country was more rugged, there were fewer bridges across rain-swollen streams, and many fewer houses where they could beg food. Blade hoped they'd find some rebel sympathizers before hunger forced them to turn chicken thief to stay alive.

Toward late afternoon on the fourth day since their landing, they were coming down a rocky slope into a small valley. The slope was too steep to support many trees, but at the bottom the forest was thicker. Blade thought it might even give them a dry spot to spend the night. The sun was peeking through the low clouds to the west, but it hadn't been out long enough to dry the ground. They were halfway down the hill before Blade spotted the horsemen riding out of the trees and dismounting.

There were just enough trees on the hillside so that the three travelers could easily get under cover. Khraishamo stayed there while Blade crept down the hill, moving from tree to tree until he was close enough to get a good look at the horsemen.

They were definitely Maghri. Blade recognized the rough-coated, sturdy little brown or gray horses, the rawhide harnesses, the leather jackets and breeches, the wooden shields with iron or bronze spikes in the middle, the short thick bows and long spiked war clubs.

He also saw something he hadn't expected to see. Stirrups. They were no more than loops of heavy leather, but they should be enough to let a rider use lance or club from horseback and press home a charge. Some unknown genius among these horse people had come up with the invention needed to give this whole Dimension effective cavalry. Blade was certain this little surprise was going to have interesting consequences the first time the horsemen and the Goharans met in a full-scale battle.

He also suspected that this first meeting might be only a few days away. Certainly the horsemen were well inside Goharan territory, and in considerable strength. Blade counted at least two hundred and fifty horsemen, with more coming out of the trees every minute. The Goharan commanders in Mythor were going to hear of them sooner or later, and have to do something about them.

Then Blade realized that the horsemen weren't behaving as if they were in enemy territory. They were dismounting, building fires, butchering and roasting their day's catch, making no effort to set guards or search the forest around them. They didn't even seem to care that their fires were sending up thick clouds of grayish smoke. With the clearing weather, the smoke would be visible miles away.

There might be many reasons for this apparent carelessness, Blade realized. They might know there was no enemy close at hand, they might be relying on their numbers for safety, or their leaders might simply be foolish. Blade knew that many «mysterious» events had a simple explanation: somebody didn't know his job.

There was another explanation, both sinister and plausible. The horsemen weren't on guard because they knew they weren't in enemy territory. They'd been invited to march on Mythor by Prime Minister Kloret.

The more Blade thought about this explanation, the more sense it made. Sooner or later, Kloret would need allies outside Gohar. The riders of the western plains were too barbarous, and the pirates would demand too high a price. The merchants of Gohar would certainly turn against Kloret if he gave the Sarumi what they asked. The Maghri, on the other hand, might ask nothing except a free hand against Mythor. Kloret was the sort of man who would calmly throw away half an empire if this increased his chances of ruling the other half.

By now the horsemen were settling down for the night. It was time for Blade and his friends to be on their way, just in case all the horsemen weren't as careless as they seemed. In the fading light Blade was able to make the trip uphill faster than he'd come down. Without bothering to sit, he told the others what he'd seen and what he suspected.

Both Khraishamo and Rhodina started off by looking at him as if he'd lost his mind. He went on, and gradually both of them began to look as if they might believe him. Blade was even ready to reveal his mission for Harkrat and Elyana if he couldn't convince them any other way. Fortunately this wasn't necessary. Khraishamo stood up and pulled Rhodina to her feet, although she groaned at the pain of half-rested muscles.

«We need to get to the first honest rebel you know,» he said. «Never mind how big he is, we want the closest one. Your friends need a warning.»

Rhodina nodded, frowning as she tried to call up a mental map of the farms and estates of rebel sympathizers in the area. Fortunately, like many illiterate people, she had an excellent memory. Her time on Shell Island and the ordeal of the escape hadn't weakened it. In a few minutes she came up with the name of Riddart, a wealthy farmer only a day's march away.

Even that was more time than Blade wanted to take, but they didn't have any choice. They were going to have to walk. Blade knew he could steal one horse from the poorly guarded Maghri camp, but probably not three. In any case, Khraishamo couldn't ride. The leg and hip bones of the Sarumi were so arranged that they couldn't straddle a horse. As far as Blade was concerned, it was still «One for all, and all for one,» and he wasn't even going to think of abandoning the pirate and Rhodina.

They didn't know exactly when dawn came, because in the middle of the night it started to rain again. They splashed along through puddles and under dripping branches, once more soaked to the skin, stopping only to check their bearings. Fortunately they'd passed through a rocky gorge before the light went, and Rhodina said that as long as they kept going downhill after that they wouldn't get lost. Blade knew that didn't guarantee they would find Riddart's farm in time to do any good, but said nothing, Rhodina was only on her feet by sheer willpower. Blade suspected that she might have asked to be left behind long since, if she'd thought either man would listen to her. Knowing they'd never leave her, she was determined to keep going until she literally dropped dead in her tracks.

Before that happened, Blade swore, they were either going to find Riddart's farm or rob another man's for proper food, clothing, and a riding mule for Rhodina. She deserved more-such as being clothed in silk and waited on hand and foot for a year. But that would be enough to keep her alive until either they found friends or their enemies found them.

Slowly the night gave way to a dreary, damp dawn. The coming of what passed for daylight didn't do much to lift their spirits. That only came when Rhodina recognized a yellow barn with a narrow cart track winding away behind it.

«That's Old Wuga's Stead,» she said. «Riddart's another hour down the road.»

They moved on, grimly putting one foot in front of another. At last they came to a point where the track widened into a road, and a hundred yards beyond it a point where another road joined it. Rhodina looked down at the hoofprints and fresh horse droppings, and burst into tears.

It did look bad. A large force of horsemen had come out of the side road and moved off toward Riddart's farm. From the droppings, they'd come by no more than an hour ago. Who were they, and what were they doing at the farm?

There were — two encouraging facts. There was no smoke visible ahead, and the prints were those of shod horses. The mounts of the Maghri weren't shod. The riders might not be friends, but at least they weren't the enemy Blade now feared the most.

The three now moved forward like a patrol advancing into enemy territory and expecting an ambush at any moment. A mile short of Riddart's farm they left the road entirely and cut across country, using the cover of the woods until they were nearly at the farm. It was bounded by a low wall of piled field stone, and beyond the wall Blade could see broad fields of partly harvested grain. The chimney of the house was smoking heavily, but otherwise Blade saw no signs of unusual activity. All the farm buildings seemed to be undamaged, which was definitely a good sign.

Both Khraishamo and Blade made it clear to Rhodina that she was going to sit down, rest, and wait while they took a closer look at the farm. Then the two men crept out of the trees, and through the standing grain. They came to the edge of the grain and stared at the farm across a broad stretch of bare, black muddy ground.

Then they heard an angry shout. «There they are, the bastards!» Six riders spurred their horses out from behind the farm buildings toward the field.