Return to Fanglith

THIRTY-TWO

This time the castle wall looked different to me, Bigger. Forbidding. When I'd ridden up to it before, I'd been a guest, and the gate had been open for me. Now I was on foot, an enemy trying to trick my way in.

It occurred to me that maybe no one was on gate duty this time of night.

I'd thought there might be a big knocker or a bell rope, but I ended up pounding on the gate with my sword hilt. After several minutes and some hard pounding, I tried yelling. Finally, someone spoke angrily to us through a slot in what I suppose you could call the gatehouse, a rounded section of wall to the right of the gate.

"What do you want?!"

"I want in, that's what I want!" I disguised my voice by making it higher pitched and nasal. I also made it angry and imperious, because the identity I'd decided to pretend here was an envoy of Robert Guiscard de Hauteville, Tancred's son, Duke of Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily. Someone whom hopefully they wouldn't want mad at them, and wouldn't question too hard.

"I am Laurent de Caen," I continued, choosing Caen because I'd at least been there, even though it had been at night, in a storm, and I hadn't ventured inside the walls. I'd come close to getting killed, too. "I did not come all the way here from the duke," I continued, "and have my horse killed under me, to be kept standing outside in the night."

There was no answer, and I wondered if I'd blown it-irritated whoever it was so badly that he was going to leave me out here. Or maybe said something that had given me away as a fake. It was dangerous pretending to be something you don't know much about, I told myself, especially with people like these.

We waited about five minutes, and I was just getting ready to start pounding again when a small door opened to the left of the gate. A knight stepped out and motioned us in. The wall was about twelve feet thick, and the gate like a dark trap they could close at both ends while we were inside.

But we went in and nothing happened.

I recognized the knight who met us on the other side: Stephen, Gilbert's steward, seneschal is the Norman word. He'd been in charge of the banquet that evening, and maybe in charge of drugging the drink. That much gray hair meant a lot of experience and years of weapons practice; in a sword fight he'd take Moise and me before we could yell "mercy." And his narrow eyes didn't look very trusting.

"Caen?" he said.

"Caen. On the River Orne."

"Your speech does not sound like Normandy."

I gave him my coldest look. "I did not come here to relate the circumstances of my childhood," I said stiffly. "Where is your master?"

He didn't answer for several seconds. "He is-not well. Perhaps I can be of service to you."

That sounded fine to me. Although actually, Gilbert and I had hardly spoken to each other, he'd seen more of me than Stephen had, and there was a better chance he'd recognize me. "Perhaps you can," I said. "The duke has sent me to seek the whereabouts of a renegade vassal, Arno de Courmeron, who has trafficked with Vikings preying on Norman shipping. His profit from it will be his head separated from his body.

"Delivery of this Arno to the duke, alive, will be rewarded by a special ducal fief: precedence above all others in the showing and sale of destriers." I was getting into it now; the story was flowing. "Also, ownership of this Arno's well-known herd of brood mares," I went on, "which has been landed at Palermo and is currently in the duke's possession."

I glanced around at the three armed men who stood nearby, then back at Stephen. "Arno is known to have been shipwrecked on Sicily, and is traveling with several dangerous thaumaturgists said to be from India, as well as with a band of Vikings. The duke will also pay well for each of these other miscreants delivered live to him." I turned and gestured at Moise. "This is Isaac, a Levantine Jew employed by the duke to counter their thaumaturgy."

Stephen chewed a lip thoughtfully; he actually seemed to be buying all this. My hopes began to brighten.

"Come with me," he said after a moment. "I will find out if the baron is well enough to see visitors."

He turned and began to lead us across the grounds to the building that was Gilbert's residence. We hadn't gone more than a few steps when someone started yelling near the tower. Stephen paused, staring in that direction; then we heard swords clash. "Come!" he said, and started running toward the noise with his men. Moise and I followed. We turned the corner of a building, saw the fight, and ran toward it. Two men were backed into an angle of the castle wall; one stood in front of the other and was holding off three knights with his sword. In the angle, only one of them could get at him at a time.

It was Gunnlag, and the one behind him was another Varangian! "Hold!" I shouted. "These are two of the men I seek! The duke has first claim to them, for a long list of outrages!"

The Norman who'd been battling Gunnlag backed away. The noise was drawing a small crowd, knights and foot soldiers with blood in their eyes.

And the second "Varangian" in the corner wasn't Varangian at all; it was Tarel in Varangian gear!

"Get a bear net," I said. In Normandy, I'd seen the nets the nobles used to capture bears. "We shall take them alive."

"We have no bear nets here," Stephen said. "There are no bears on Sicily." He turned to the growing cluster of men. "Fetch pikes, staffs, rocks. We will batter them into submission."

"Isaac," I said to Moise in Norman, "speak to the criminals in Greek. Tell them they can save themselves serious injury if they throw down their swords."

Moise repeated it in Greek. Tarel, of course, had understood my Norman French, and tossed his sword out readily enough. Gunnlag could hardly bring himself to let go of his, but he did, dropping it at his feet. That's when I decided to forget about getting some energy weapons back.

I'd settle for horses, with Gunnlag and Tarel my prisoners. "Bring shackles," I said. "I'll…"

I stopped there, because everyone's attention was shifting from me to someone else. It was Gilbert arriving, drawn like the rest by the noise. His hair was wild and his eyes wilder. He stared at Gunnlag and Tarel, then demanded to know what was going on-why they were still alive.

Stephen explained, and Gilbert's eyes turned to me, "An envoy from Guiscard? From the devil, I'd say. It is the same. Let me see your paper of authorization!"

I struck my forehead-the front of my helmet actually- with the heel of my hand. "In my saddlebag!" I said. I didn't expect him to buy that, but I had to try.

He peered at me then in the pale moonlight. "Don't I know you from some…"

He never finished. A floodlight spread around us from above, freezing the action. Then, as I looked up, the action really froze. Because someone up above- Deneen, obviously-was playing a stunner over the crowd. I fell, not unconscious, but unable to move.

Overhead, an emergency hooter began to sound, probably to spook the Normans. I hadn't realized the Rebel Javelin had a hooter; only a honker, I'd thought. It kept on, sounding as if the scout was settling to the ground. I couldn't see what was happening because I'd fallen on my side, and someone's body lay almost in my face. Seconds later I heard running feet. Someone grabbed me under the arms and raised me partly off the ground. Then I saw-Bubba? Bubba looking at me.

Someone started dragging me. I wanted to yell: Deneen, don't risk the scout, don't… She was handling me as if I were a little kid, dragging me.

None of this felt right, felt real. The stunner must have affected my perceptions. I hadn't known they did that.

Then she was pulling me up the ramp into the scout. And someone else was there, by the ramp, with a blast rifle. That's Deneen, I thought. Deneen, slender in jump suit. So it had to be someone else dragging me.

I was laid out in the dark cabin, able to see only upward, and my rescuer ran back out. The cabin wasn't right either. Everything was weird.

A minute later someone else was dragged into the scout, and a voice said, "That's it! I've got Tarel too. Close her up and take her up!"

It was dad!

"Wait!"

I don't know how I got it out, but I said it. Slurred and slowly I had pronounced the word. And again, "Wait!"

"Hold it," he said. "What is it, Larn?"

"Frien's. Don'… leave… frien's… Be… killed."

I wasn't sure if he could understand or not.

"Jenoor, blast a couple of bolts against a wall, to keep anyone back who might be thinking of rushing us." I heard a rifle thud out three bolts.

Jenoor! He'd said Jenoor!

"Help me, Aven," he said. "He's heavy and he feels boneless. I need him up on my back." Between the two of them, my parents got me onto his back with my head flopped over a shoulder. He had to move bent over so I wouldn't fall off.

"Larn," he said as he carried me back down the ramp, "We're going over among the bodies. Tell me when I come to the right one. Can you do that?"

"Two," I mumbled. "Two… frien's."

"Two," he said. "I got that." We went back among the bodies, pausing over one after another, seeming to take forever. Most of a minute, I suppose. We'd looked at eight or ten before we came to Gunnlag.

"Him," I said.

"Right."

The next was Moise. "Him."

"Is that all?"

"Yes."

There was growling, then an espwolf barked out "Down!" We hit the ground, arrows hissed, and the rifle thudded again, and again. Dad was back on his feet, had grabbed me under the arms, dragging me hurriedly, roughly, to the cutter and up the ramp. I hadn't known he was so strong; I'm not sure he had either. He dumped me and ran back out. I heard shouting in Norman, clashing of swords-clashing of swords?-more thuds from the blaster, and in half a minute another body was dragged in and dropped. The confusion of sounds continued outside, but for then the blaster was silent, and dad was gone again. The blaster thudded twice more, and a moment later once. Dad was back with another body, breathing hard.

"In, Jenoor! Aven, close her and lift!"

There were espwolves aboard, too-more than one.

Not Bubba, obviously. Lady and the pups-pups who'd been half-grown when I'd seen them last, but were near full-size now.

The door shut out the moonlight, and gradually the cabin illumination came on.

We'd be well above the ground now, I knew. The cutter's windows couldn't be opaqued like the scout's could, but we'd be high out of sight in the night sky. I didn't know what to think, what to feel, it had all happened so fast.

Then Jenoor was on her knees beside me, crying all over me, and I didn't worry about it anymore-just lay there with my eyes spilling over. It seemed impossible that she was still alive, and for an empty moment I was sure I'd wake up to find I'd been dreaming again.

After half an hour though, she was still there, and I was functioning well enough to talk better, even though I couldn't move much. By that time, Tarel and Moise and Gunnlag were talking, too. Slowly of course. Tarel had explained to Moise who these people were, and Moise had been explaining to Gunnlag. I was impressed with how matter-of-fact Gunnlag seemed about the whole thing.

I noticed, though, that Jenoor sat near with her stunner on her lap, just in case.

"Dad," I said, "there's one more guy we need to get back there." The words still didn't flow at normal speed, but they were clear now.

"One more? How do we get him?"

"I'm not sure. But I'd like to try to bring him out, too. I owe it to him. He's a Varangian, like Gunnlag. A barbarian warrior. A huge guy, tall, and strong as a gorn."

He didn't answer right away.

I remembered how Arno had recovered from a light stunning, back in Provence. After he got so he could talk decently, it hadn't been an hour before he could get around pretty well. "When I can get around all right," I added, "say in half an hour or so, we can go back. I'll think of a way."

"Tall, you say. Did he fight with a two-handed sword?"

I knew right then what he was going to tell me. I remembered the sound of swords back there.

"Yes," I answered.

And he wouldn't even have had a helmet. He'd given me his.

"Larn," dad said quietly, "it's too late for him. Some men came running toward me, from the other side of the cutter, and before Jenoor had a chance to fire, he came out of the shadows and cut them off. He was kind of hopping, as if something was wrong with one of his legs. He killed a couple of them before they cut him down, then Jenoor took care of the others."

I felt a surge of grief! Ketil. Big, mean, ugly Ketil. I couldn't even guess how many men he'd killed in his life. But still, I hadn't felt this bad since we'd raised from Evdash, leaving Piet and Jenoor. It was embarrassing. It took a minute or more before I trusted myself to talk again, and it was dad who broke the silence.

"Where are Deneen and Bubba?" he asked. "We quartered most of the continent between the northern sea and the Mediterranean, looking for the radiation signature of a scout, and had just about decided you hadn't come to Fanglith. Then I remembered you and Arao talking about 'Sicily,' and this island seemed to fit the description. But instead of getting an instrument read on a ship's systems, the wolves got an esp locational on you and Tarel "

"Deneen's got the scout on an uninhabited island in the western ocean," I told him, "with all systems off. She's had serious problems with fuel crystallization, apparently from the scout taking multiple blaster charges on the shield."

"Can you guide us there?"

"Sure. But she ought to be all right for now, and there's something else I'd like to check on first. Arno's back near the castle somewhere. Not in the castle; at least I don't think so. Back in the hills. Hopefully, with about ten warriors. Varangians."

Varangians! It hit me then: Varangians had attacked our ship, taken us captive, killed half a dozen Normans, lost Arno's horse herd for him, and planned to sell us as slaves. And we'd ended up allied with them against- who? Some of Arno's fellow Normans.

Fanglith's a crazy world! I told myself. Well, maybe not crazy, but the rules were awfully strange, so far as there were any. It occurred to me that this was not a world for a rebel base. Someday, possibly, but not now. Not for a long time. It was too unpredictable.

Testing my legs and balance, I got to my feet slowly but unassisted. It turned out that standing made me feel better.

"So you want to find Arno," dad said.

"Right. It shouldn't take long."

"Can you find him with the night scanner?"

"Sure," I said, and with my arms half out for balance, I walked carefully to the copilot's seat, next to mom. She smiled without speaking. She looked beautiful, even if her eyes were a little soggy, and I grinned at her. Then I returned us to coordinates five miles above Gilbert's castle. At that height, we didn't need to go hunting for Arno. On the screen I could see a troop of ten mounted men waiting on the road half a mile from the castle. That had to be them, I thought, then spotted a single rider approaching the castle wall. That would be Arno.

I took us down, intending to call him with the loud hailer. But he stopped, so I decided to wait a minute and see what he was going to do. Killing the cabin light, I dropped to 250 feet with the sound receptor on high.

Arno:

It had been good to get out of the dark and rocky ravine, where even with moonlight a horse could easily stumble and fall. In the open valley I'd been able to turn my attention to the castle and what I might find there.

It did not seem to me that Gilbert would have sent ten Varangians out to be killed without having plans to dispose of the others. The question was whether he'd been more successful inside the castle than out.

I hoped that Larn might have foiled him, or at least been spared, and it seemed to me he might well have. For I doubt I have known anyone more favored by fate in hazardous circumstances. But luck is treacherous, and in enterprises like his, or mine, one can meet death as readily as victory, and more quickly.

The wisest course now, it had seemed to me, was to leave my Varangians a little distance from the castle-far enough not to be seen or heard by any watchman on the wall. I myself would halloo from outside and see what I could learn. If the situation seemed beyond salvage, we'd ride the rest of the night toward Palermo and perhaps some friendlier castle along the way. Almost any would be friendlier.

So I had left the Varangians on the dark and silent road and gone on alone until the wall loomed close before me. But not too close; I kept some fifty paces between it and myself, with my pistol in my right hand. Looking upward toward the parapet, I called out: "Halloo, the castle! Who is in command here?"

A watchman answered from atop the wall. "This is the castle of Baron Gilbert de Auletta," he called back. "The baron himself is at home and in command. Who asks?"

That told me part of what I wished to know: Larn and Gunnlag had not overthrown him. It would have been miraculous if they had, of course, unless Larn's sister had returned in their skyboat. There would have been half a score knights left, and thirty or more foot soldiers, after Gilbert had sent his troop into the mountains. In close quarters, even sky weapons would avail little against such numbers, especially in the presence of treachery, which Gilbert would surely attempt.

I ignored the watchman's interest in my identity, and continued my ploy. "I have been told that you have in the castle three holy monks from India, and their Varangian bodyguard. I have a message for them from the Bishop of Palermo."

I was less interested in what he said than how he seemed when he said it. For if my friends had been massacred, he would hardly tell me so. His considerable delay in answering suggested that he might have sent word of me to Gilbert. Thus I backed away a bit, shifting my shield from my saddle pommel to my left arm, turning my horse that my protection would be toward the wall. Bowmen could well be on their way to the parapet.

"Go to the gate," said the watchman at last, "and you will be let in. Then you may speak with Gilbert himself."

I was tempted, but my sky weapons would not protect me from ambush, from being rushed in close quarters. And for the first time, it occurred to me that Gilbert himself would probably have sky weapons now. "No," I said, "I will wait here."

While I waited, I backed my horse another twenty or thirty paces away. If Gilbert did have sky weapons, he'd hardly be skilled in their use, but he might well have learned how to fire them.

Shortly I spied another head above the parapet, and a different voice called to me-Gilbert's. "Who are you to disturb our rest here?"

His words were slow, his voice weak. Even in the quiet of night it was hard to hear him, and it seemed to me that he might have been shot by a stunner. I remembered the symptoms very well, from my first meeting with Larn and from scoundrels I myself had stunned while driving my first herd to Marseille.

"I am Arno de Courmeron," I said. "Your troop of horses came upon a misadventure in the mountains and will not be back. Any you may send after me will suffer the same fate.

"I have come for my friends, to take them to Palermo. If they are within, send them out unaccompanied and we will leave you in peace. Otherwise, Guiscard will send for them, and you will not like his messengers."

I expected either words of compliance, or likelier, some angry retort, but for a moment nothing seemed to happen. Then I felt a sudden tingling, and reined my horse to turn, for I recognized the weak touch of a stunner. It reached farther than my old one had. The beast wheeled, rearing, and half stumbled. Affected as I was, I was thrown from the saddle.

Larn:

I'd heard the exchange between Arno and the watchman more clearly than they had. And seen more clearly, too; to our scanner, the moonlit night might as well have been day.

I'd also seen Gilbert helped up the outside stairs to the top of the wall, followed by four knights or sergeants; their hauberks were longer than foot soldiers wore. Two had bows, while the others had pistols in their hands, and Gilbert gripped a stunner.

They lined up along the parapet, all but Gilbert keeping out of sight. I didn't waste any time settling downward to about a hundred feet from them, above and to the side. Then I slid the door open a couple of feet, while Arno and Gilbert had their friendly conversation. I did these about as fast as if I hadn't been stunned; all it took was light motions of the control rod in front of me, and a touch on the door control.

"Jenoor," I said quietly, "set your stunner on high, medium-wide beam, and take out the guys on top of the wall."

"Right, Larn."

As she knelt by the door, I saw Arno go down. "Quick!" I told her, and the men on the wall fell without another move. Without hesitating, I moved to just above the parapet. "Dad," I said, "the guys on the wall have got pistols and stunners. Will you pick them up? I'd rather not leave things like that with that crew."

"Right," he said, and moving to the widening door, jumped the forty inches or so down to the wall-top. He was back in maybe a minute, a pistol in each hand. An extra stunner was clipped to his belt and another pistol was shoved under it. "That's it," he said, and I lifted.

A minute later we were on the ground, and dad was outside helping Arno to his feet. Together they got aboard and I closed the door behind them for security, swiveling my seat to face them.

"Are you all right?" I asked Arno.

He looked around, saw Gunnlag and the rest of us. "Well enough," he said. "At that distance, Gilbert's stunner only numbed me a bit. And the horse, apparently."

"Good. I have an offer for you. Can you catch the horse again?"

"Probably. If your skyboat has not frightened him too badly." He looked around. "Where is your sister?"

"With our other skyboat," I said, and got him back to the subject. "Here is my proposal. Take the Varangians to Palermo, where they can get jobs as mercenaries if they want, and we'll take you with us to one of our worlds. They need warriors there who learn quickly and can lead."

Dad had been standing behind Arno, relaxed but with his hand on his stunner; he remembered what Arno had tried the last time he'd been aboard our cutter, nearly three years before. Now, as I made my offer to Arno, dad's eyebrows went halfway up his forehead. His Norman French was rusty, but he'd understood.

Meanwhile, Moise and Gunnlag were carrying on a murmured conversation in Greek. I hoped we weren't going to have any trouble from them. It didn't seem likely.

"Otherwise," I went on, still talking to Arno, "you have your rifle, your pistol, and your stunner. We'll leave some recharges with you, and our best wishes."

I could almost see him thinking. His wealth-his horse herd-had been lost. And while he could always start over… "I will take the Varangians to Palermo," he said, "and go with you. But I have already promised the Varangians that I will go back with them and pick up their wounded where we left them. And there are people here who would gladly see us dead. Did you kill Gilbert?"

"He's alive, but he'll be out of action for hours. We've got all his blasters and one of his stunners."

Arno nodded. "If I go to Palermo, how will you pick me up?"

"We can find you. Our wolves know how."

I turned to Gunnlag and Moise then. "Moise, tell Gunnlag to go with Arno. He will take the Varangians to Palermo, where there are jobs as mercenaries if they want them."

It was me Moise spoke to instead of to Gunnlag. "I already told him your offer to Arno. He said he wants the same offer. He will go to Palermo with them, but then he wants to go with you to your land. He thinks it must be very different from any land where he has been before. He would like to see it, and fight there. He will swear himself to you if you'd like."

I could see dad looking doubtful at that, and I could understand why. But I knew these men, and I felt some loyalty to them after all we'd gone through together.

"Tell Gunnlag I'll be glad to receive his oath. And after he and Arno have gotten their wounded and gone to Palermo, I will take him with us."

Moise turned to Gunnlag and talked to him in Greek. Gunnlag grinned through his beard, then sobered as he turned and spoke Greek at me.

"He wants to know how you swear a pledge in your land," Moise said.

"Tell him to repeat after me," I said, "and we'll shake hands on it afterward."

Again Moise spoke to Gunnlag in Greek. The Varangian nodded, and looked at me expectantly.

I, Gunnlag Snorrason…" I began in Norman.

Moise said it in Greek, and Gunnlag repeated after him.

"… being under no duress… do pledge by my God and the blessed Jesu…"

Gunnlag looked especially sober when he repeated the last of that.

"… to serve Larn kel Deroop faithfully until my death… or until we agree to cancel this pledge… And in the event of the death of Larn kel Deroop… to serve such member of his family as is present with us then… on the same basis."

When we'd said it all, we shook hands. In the background, dad blew quietly through pursed lips. I'd taken on a big responsibility. Gunnlag knew nothing about the kind of place we were going, or how to live or get along there. But from the little I knew of him, he'd changed lands and careers several times before, and things new and different were like food and drink to him.

Moise broke my thoughts. "Sire," he said to me, and I turned to him. "I, too, would like to go with you."

"Moise, you might not like the world we're going to."

"I believe I would, sire. Tarel has told me something of the worlds among the stars, and of your quest to free them. Here my family is dead, and I have no place, I would like to help you."

Somehow it was a lot harder for me to agree to take Moise than Gunnlag, the seasoned Norse mercenary and occasional pirate. Moise was really a different case, and besides, he made it seem so idealistic. And I guess it is idealistic, but we knew what we were getting into, more or less.

But who was I to decide what he should do with his life? Besides, I'd come here to recruit, among other things.

"Tarel," I said, "you're the one who talked to him about it. If he's willing to pledge himself to you, and you're willing to accept it, he can come along."

Tarel looked flustered. Behind Gunnlag and Moise, I could see dad start to grin. He saw me watching, grinned wider, and winked at me.

Tarel nodded and talked it over with Moise. They shook hands on it; the pledge had been made.

Ten minutes later, with the destrier finally having let himself be caught, Arno was in the saddle, with Gunnlag up behind him, and they started down the road to the Varangians.