When Death Birds Fly

9

Hooves rang on the pave as the big black horse entered the walled yard. Arbors and flowerbeds breathed scent to one side, while trellises entwined with vines formed a partial roof above. The stable was beyond. Although cleaner than most, it smelled as stables smelled; yet Sigebert never noticed. Many a street of this city of Nantes reeked worse.

With an athlete’s grace Sigebert One-ear alighted from his saddle. Not a trace of burlesque or mockery informed his manner as he helped the girl Cathula to dismount. She accomplished it far less stylishly than he; her limbs were stiff, she who had never ridden before in her life.

She shuddered uncontrollably when he took her hand. Rather would she have been touched by a coiling adder. Her eyes were those of a trapped doe. After what he had done this day, this blackmasked rider on a black demon masquerading as a horse… his studied courtesy unnerved her more than open brutality. At least she could have comprehended that.

“You shiver,” Sigebert said, “and of a warm summer’s night! And you never cried out whiles we galloped! Indeed my dear, you must suffer in winter! Well, well, never dread that. Who knows? You may not have to endure another winter.” He let his captive peasant feel a threatening tightening of his strong hand on hers. “Austrechilda!”

That bellow brought a creak from the massive main door of Sigebert’s mansion. It opened to spill forth the yellow light of candles. A woman of formidable proportions emerged. Her features were like iron and her arms big as Sigebert’s. Household keys chimed at her belt. She gazed upon Cathula without astonishment.

“Take this wench and make her presentable. Burn the clothes she wears.”

“Aye sir,” Austrechilda said, with no more concern than had she been told to sweep the yard. Less, in truth; that she would have considered beneath her position, although she’d have obeyed none the less. Would be madness for a servant of Sigebert One-ear to do aught else when he spoke.

The big woman took Cathula by the wrist. Her thumb and fingers overlapped, though the stout farmgirl was not tiny. She was drawn within the house while the master watched the girl’s backside. She made one small effort to hang back and desisted swiftly when she felt the strength of Austrechilda’s grip.

Glancing at the big woman’s face, Cathula despaired of finding sympathy. Not that Austrechilda looked cruel. No, it was worse. The peasants of Cathula’s own village wore Austrechilda’s expression, year in and year out. Stolid, it accepted all, questioned nothing aloud and little in silence. It said, “The great ones of the world do as they please, and however bad they may be, we must bend our necks and like it, or they will do worse.”

Cathula felt a sudden scalding upsurge of hate. No! She was here, with no way to go back. So be it. She would watch and listen, however filled with danger that might be, and perhaps… perhaps she’d learn of a way to do her captor some great harm.

She had not yet even had time to mourn her mother.

Tucking her head down to hide the wild gleam in her eyes, she went meekly with Austrechilda. Her bare feet made no sound; Austrechilda was silent; her keys jingled, reminding all that the master’s mistress of household passed.

In the stableyard, Sigebert tossed his horse’s reins to a groom. Though he gave over his latest concubine to another to burnish without supervision, he would not deal so with his mount. Unusually for a Frank, the One-ear was a superb rider.

Sweat prickled on the groom’s unwashed hide at the prospect of seeing to the beast under those masked eyes. The rubdown had better be satisfactory. Sigebert had an affection for his horse that he showed no other living creature.

“My lord Sigebert!”

Sigebert turned at the hail, ripping forth his sword. The figure emerged from the shadows stopped dead while he repeated his greeting to a naked blade. Sigebert recognized him, and put up his sword.

“Faraulf! You are alone?”

“I am, sir.”

“You have word for me? Come within.”

The portal banged shut behind them and Sigebert drew its bolts. Hearing them snib, the groom expelled a breath of relief. Not even to himself did he wonder as to the stranger’s identity or purpose. Was no affair of his. In this household a lack of curiosity helped one live longer. He led the raven-hued horse to its stall.

Sigebert One-ear preceded the messenger through the richly furnished halls of his mansion. Lighted candles vaunted wealth.

The house went with his position. The city’s previous chief customs assessor had acquired all this by turning a blind eye to the dealings of a certain merchant with pirates; shares in the plunder came to the official. This had proven his mistake, and at last it had caught up with him. Sigebert was appointed to replace him. The treacherous Frank had done so right briskly. Both merchant and former official were dead now, executed in grisly fashion at Sigebert’s orders. Nothing to do with manse and furnishing save give them use…

In an arrased chamber on the upper floor, Sigebert lit more tapers. The wavery light imparted a sinister, even an inhuman look to the black leather mask he had not yet troubled to remove. The man Faraulf stood uneasily in his linsey-woolsy and leathers. He knew Sigebert of old, and had heard of his recent disfigurement.

Sigebert folded himself lithely into a chair. “Well?”

“I bring word from our lord Clovis, sir. ’Tis this: The ravens are flying!”

Sigebert hissed softly between his teeth. The pre-arranged code he had waited to hear! “So soon, then!”

“Aye, sir. Our lord Clovis moved swiftly after he heard of your… misfortune.”

“Faraulf,” Sigebert said very quietly, “you court… misfortune, yourself, by speaking of that.”

Faraulf paled. “‘The ravens are flying!’“ he repeated, for a change of subject-any change of subject. “Now, sir. This moment as we talk!”

“The black birds of war,” Sigebert muttered, and laughed aloud. “The death-birds! That is good to hear!”

Beside his chair squatted a small table on dog-curved legs. It supported a flagon of wine and five goblets. Sigebert swept the mask from his head with an exultant motion as he turned to pour. The taper-light fell on the unscarred side of his face, smoothly shaven, fair of skin, handsome beyond the ordinary.

“And do you know what means this word you have carried me?”

“I do, sir. The Frankish kings march against Syagrius. My lord Clovis added a word from himself to yourself; that when he has taken the kingdom, you shall be Count of Nantes.”

“Splendid.” The word was a soft purr of satisfaction. “Well, my friend, you have come far. I’ll hazard you are both weary and thirsty.”

Sigebert turned with deliberate suddenness to hand the messenger a brimming goblet-and to display the gashed corner of his mouth, the savagely scarred cheek on the earless side of his head. He saw the effect with twisted amusement: Hard as he was, Faraulf came nigh to dropping the wine-cup. He did splash golden liquid over the brim. And he drank deeply, swiftly.

“Thirsty indeed,” Sigebert One-ear murmured. “You may find yourself a bed, Faraulf. In a day or two I will send you back to our lord Clovis with my thanks.”

It was dismissal. Dismissal from him who’d be Frankish lord of Nantes, once Clovis and his Frankish army had crushed the last holding of Rome in Gaul. Glad to receive it, Faraulf drained the wine to the lees. He set down the goblet, bowed to his lord Clovis’s one-time master agent at the court of Soissons, and departed.

Sigebert lounged back in his chair, smiling, stretching forth long, good legs.

Good tidings to receive! Aye, splendid, as he had said. He had been greatly chagrined to be sent from the court of Soissons, to take this insignificant if lucrative post. Plainly Syagrius had begun to distrust him. Well, that distrust would not matter long, now! He’d be swept into the rubble of the past where resided all broken kings and “kings” and shattered kingdoms-and the empire of Rome. In place of the Roman realm would stand a Frankish one. This boring time of obscurity would be over; Sigebert would stand powerful and highly placed in the world again. He chuckled softly, savouring his reward in advance. Exultantly he emptied his cup and filled it anew with topaz-hued wine.

As he sat drinking, he bethought him of the girl he had carried off. He’d not intended to enjoy her this night. Anticipation was also a pleasure, and she’d be filled with wonderment and apprehension; and too he had ridden far this day. Now… he smiled. He changed his mind. The word brought by Faraulf fired him with exhilaration. The girl should be bathed and prepared by now. His smile was gloating. Just a bit more wine. Then he would show her the pleasures of the body, along with the pleasures of pain.

The tapers throbbed and faltered as if nearly bereft of air.

Darkness seemed to intensify in the chamber, to press palpably down on the feeble sources of light. Sigebert froze in mid-movement, and he frowned though his eyes had widened.

An odour filled the Frank’s nostrils… a smell as of musty feathers. His throat seemed to close. He had difficulty breathing. The chamber seemed smaller, as though giving way before another Presence.

Wildly Sigebert thought, I have felt this afore!

When?!

Huge, round yellow eyes gleamed at him from the shadows like pools of the very wine he drank.

No! Madness! Begone! He held the cup of wine from him, regarded it as a traitorous friend become enemy. He looked back to the eyes. They remained, and now there was other movement…

A shape stirred there, a blocky black shape with a sinisterly tufted head. Immense wings ruffled and Sigebert heard them. Visions from a half-remembered-nightmare?-returned to him. Words had been spoken to him then, words that had since slipped his mind. It had been impossible anyhow. He looked upon that nightmare, now, materialized here within his privy chamber in his own home, in his waking hours. Eyes of topaz, wings of onyx.

Sheer freezing panic rooted him to his chair.

I have returned as I promised Sigebert of Metz. Dost thou know me?

Sigebert choked on words. “Not I, by the gods!”

I am the soul of Lucanor the mage. Luke-anner, magus. Indeed, your memory fails you. Once before, when thou wert wounded and ill, I came thus to thee. Neither wounded nor ill art thou now. Behold me, and believe.

“Believe?” Sigebert gabbled. “Yes, yes, I must! The soul of a wizard? Are you then a ghost?”

Nay. I enjoy bodily life yet. Mine is the power to leave my body and travel the night in this form, Sigebert of Metz, and my body is even now in Nantes-city. Far and far have I come on many a weary road, seeking thee.

“Seeking me?” Although chilled by this malevolent Presence, Sigebert One-ear maintained control over his nerves. Despite that it was uttered by such-such unnatural horror, this had the sound of the language of bargaining.

Siegbert said, “Why?”

We have mutual enemies, thou and I.

Sigebert was regaining confidence and aplomb. If what the apparition said-said? Sent, into his mind?-were true concerning its origin, the sorcerer had a fine sense of drama. Now Sigebert was supposed to ask “Who?” He would not. It was natural to him to seek to gain ascendancy; to hold it; having lost it or seeing it threatened, to regain and reaffirm. He sat silent, and forced the… owl, to tell him what it had to tell, unaided.

Their names be Wulfhere the Skull-splitter and Cormac mac Art of Eirrin.

“Ahhhh.” Sigebert gusted a slow, vengeful breath as those names unlocked the gates of memory.

Aye, this monster had appeared to him afore now. It had spoken then of those piratical thieves, reivers; had given him news whereby they might have been destroyed-and aye, he remembered: it had also predicted then that he would give no heed. As he had not. The black owl! Again! He remembered it. It had predicted too that when it came to him again, he’d give listen.

He would indeed.

“Aye,” Sigebert said grimly. “Now I call it to mind. A king over in Hispania cast you forth because of them, and would do death upon you, could he capture you. Was that not the way of it?”

It was.

The brief acknowledgment made the room suddenly heavy with a miasma of hate. Sigebert grinned, feeling himself on surer ground. He shared the hatred-and he knew it weakened a person, even though he did not seek to put it from him. His awe of the ghostly presence in his chamber diminished a good deal. Human, this Lucanor who sent giant owls in his stead, and driven, by hate. Ah yes.

“And now here in Nantes, in your corporeal body?”

I have said so.

“Your human body.”

So I have stated.

The haughtiness covered unease and Sigebert knew it: He did not know that Lucanor’s fleshly body was ragged, filthy, almost starving, and slept now in a stinking alley by the river front. The black owl was impressive and horripilating. It could feign to be free of these considerations and inspire terror in ways that a man, a most mortal man indeed, could not. The black owl could even kill. It was not merely a ghostly apparition; it was real.

Yet the black owl was Lucanor, and bound to his body. It dared not allow that body to be harmed.

A man had come to tell Sigebert that the ravens were flying: the black birds of war and death; Clovis’s war on Syagrius of the Roman kingdom. Now another bird came ‘to tell him other news… and once again a bird was involved, and once again it was the black bird of battlefields. Raven, for such Sigebert remembered was the name of the ship of Wulfhere and Cormac.

“It is a season of birds,” Sigebert muttered, and aloud, smoothly, “Well then, come to me in your own form on the morrow, and we will join forces.”

What said thee? It had the sound of an order. Bare, helpless to my talons and beak, you dare speak of joining forces? Foolish man! I am not here to accept thee as my equal, but because I can use thee. Beware! I can rend thee apart and find another tool!

Horripilation crawled over Sigebert’s skin like a migration of ants and a little frisson went through him. The creature could do as it threatened; he doubted that not. Yet… would it? Did it dare? Had it come for a tool or for an ally? Was he not strong, Sigebert of Metz soon to be Sigebert of Nantes, and coming on for being stronger? He thought to recognize the bluster of desperation in its seeming strength and big words. Was it not there?

Two things Sigebert the Frank was not: true coward, or poor judge of men. Indeed, his was judgment that kings might envy and seek. If only one knew… if only Clovis would hasten to take more power, and more; soaring power! Then, Sigebert thought, then will Sigebert come into his own. Valued, valuable, powerful… rich! As, of course, he deserved: surely advisor to Clovis, truly King.

Having thus bolstered and gathered his courage, Sigebert spoke in response to the threat of this fell creature.

“Then do so. Waste no more time on threats. I say that you bluff-and lie! None but I, Sigebert, will or would shelter you. None but I will give you your chance of vengeance and house you after. You know this, creature! An you can deny it-strike!”

The silence that followed his challenge was terrible.

In all the world Sigebert was aware of nothing but the lambent topaz eyes of the thing he faced, and of his own maddened heartbeat. He’d gone sodden from armpits to belt, and running sweat tickled. He bore it, unmoving, wishing that he had contented himself with the word “bluff” and not added the directly angering and challenging “lie.”

The huge black owl screamed. Never had Sigebert heard a more frustrated cry. In raging anguish it acknowledged that whether he walked in his own unimpressive body or winged abroad in baleful spirit-form as greatly enlarged bird of prey, Lucanor the mage of Antioch was a meager being who had need of a powerful ally… a powerful master.

The Frank suppressed his smile of relief. He sat impassive-seemingly-and he stared with flat, hooded eyes.

The vast wings beat wildly-and the black owl was not there. It vanished.

Sigebert sat for a time ere he reached for the flagon. Even after that pause it slid in sweat when he lifted it, and he must set it down again until his hands had ceased their shaking. He wiped them on his clothing and felt their chill. He lifted and looked at them with a sort of remote curiosity while they trembled. And then, cynically, he laughed. It was release.

“By the gods! Had I been wrong-!” More release, that; the sound of his own voice helped. Now more wine was required, and more.

The girl Cathula was not troubled by his attentions that night, after all.