Slaves of Socorro

by John Flanagan

  ‘What kind of diversion do you have in mind?’ Lydia asked.

  He smiled. ‘A fire’s always good. Nothing gets an Arridan trader’s attention better than a threat to his gold. And it’ll probably draw the patrols away from the slave market while they try to put it out. So I’d like to have a look at it and get an idea of the layout.’

  ‘What about me?’ she asked.

  He smiled again. ‘You’re a woman,’ he said. ‘You aren’t allowed in the gold market.’

  ‘The heck I’m not,’ she said. She gestured to the sack of clothes they had purchased. ‘With one of those robes and a headdress, who’s going to know the difference?’

  ‘You don’t think your overwhelming femininity will give you away?’ he teased.

  She gave him a pitying look. ‘You know, you’re starting to make Thorn look agreeable.’

  She found a secluded spot behind the coffee stall and donned one of the robes and kheffiyehs. Gilan gave the stall owner a small coin to take care of the clothes for them and studied her as she emerged, now wrapped in the flowing robe and with the kheffiyeh arranged over her head. It was an effective disguise and with her olive skin, dark eyes and slim build, she would pass easily for a young boy.

  ‘Let’s take a look at this gold market,’ she said.

  The attackers wore black and white striped robes over baggy linen trousers that were gathered at the ankles. Their feet were clad in stout leather sandals and they wore cone-shaped brass helmets on their heads, over long linen turbans whose tails hung down their backs. Each of them carried a small, round metal shield, shaped like an oversized bowl. As they reached the bottom of the slope, there was a series of rasping metal on leather sounds as each man drew a long-bladed curved sword.

  ‘Move it!’ Thorn barked.

  The crew scrambled to gather swords, axes and shields. As they formed up around him, he was busy shedding his grasping hook from the end of his right arm. Stig passed him the huge, bone-crushing war club Hal had fashioned for him and he strapped it in place, using his teeth to pull the straps tight. He nodded his thanks to Stig, picked up a shield – a large round one in place of the small metal shield he often used – and the two of them stepped forward, shoulder to shoulder.

  ‘Shield wall,’ Thorn said, then quickly called, ‘Shields up!’

  The warning came just in time. He’d spotted movement at the fringe of the approaching group of armed men. Three of them had short but powerful bows. The arrows rattled against the raised shields. Two deflected off the metal bosses. The third thudded directly into the wood of Stefan’s shield and stayed there, quivering.

  Hal took the situation in at a glance. So far, he hadn’t joined the shield wall, which had formed rapidly in a semi-circle. Instinctively, the crew had placed themselves in position to defend the ship. Moving behind them, Hal heaved himself up over the bulwark and ran aft to where his crossbow and quiver of bolts were hanging beside the tiller.

  He stepped his foot into the stirrup at the front of the crossbow, grabbed the cord in two hands and heaved it back until he heard it clack into the restraint. He fed a bolt into the groove on top of the crossbow and ran forward to the bow again, the quiver of bolts, slung hurriedly over one shoulder, banging loosely against his side.

  There was a man in the centre of the approaching line who was obviously in command. He gestured to the archers, placed at either end of the line, and pointed his sword at the waiting Skandians. The bows came up again and Hal could hear the creak of straining cord, hide and wood as they drew back.

  He flipped up the rear sight on the crossbow, estimating the range at less than a hundred metres. He centred the foresight on one of the archers and, as the man released his arrow, Hal squeezed the trigger lever of his crossbow.

  There was the usual ugly slamming sound, then the bolt sped on its way. He’d hurried the shot and it went low, taking the man in the thigh. The force of the shot jerked the man’s leg out from under him and he fell, dropping the bow and clutching at his injured leg. The arrow that he’d shot, along with the other two, thudded harmlessly into the Herons’ big circular shields.

  Then the leader of the group yelled a command, raised his sword, lowered it to point at the waiting Skandians, and led his men in a wild, screaming charge.

  ‘Brace!’ shouted Thorn and the Herons set their feet, leaning their weight into the big wooden shields, overlapping them so that their combined strength was ready to resist the charge.

  The attackers crashed into the unyielding shield wall, rebounding and staggering with the shock of contact. Their normal victims were traders and travellers, not used to fighting and more inclined to flee at the sight of the charging, sword-wielding Asaroki. This time they had come up against trained, expert warriors, fully armed and ready for their attack. Four of the attackers went down in that first impact, as the Skandian axes, and Thorn’s mighty club-hand, smashed into them. Thorn himself took care of two of the attackers, with a blindingly fast forehand and backhand sweep that sent them flying off their feet. Stig’s vertical axe stroke dropped another where he stood and Edvin accounted for the fourth with a swift, expertly placed sword thrust. As the bandit sank to his knees, a surprised look on his face, clutching at the wound in his side, Edvin grimly recalled Thorn’s teaching:

  Three centimetres of point is as good as thirty of edge.

  Instinctively, the surviving attackers withdrew from that implacable wall of shields and deadly weapons. The leader looked back in an attempt to rally his men and, as he did, another crossbow bolt buzzed over the heads of the Skandians and hit him squarely in the chest. The impact hurled him backwards and he crashed into two of his men, dead before he hit the sand.

  But if the defenders thought his death might discourage the remaining raiders, they were quickly disabused of that notion. The second in command of the band screamed an order and they hurled themselves forward again. This time, they had a little more success. They concentrated their attack at one end of the line, reasoning that the most capable fighters would be at its centre. Seven of them drove Ulf, Wulf and Edvin back, and began to spill round the flank of the line to encircle the defenders. One of them avoided Edvin’s darting sword by mere centimetres, then moved behind the smallest of the Skandians while another attacker took his attention. The first bandit drew back his sword, ready to plunge it into Edvin’s unprotected back, when a snarling black and white hurricane smashed into him.

  Forty-five kilograms of enraged dog slammed into the Asaroki, sending him sprawling. Desperately, he raised his sword arm to protect himself, but Kloof’s mighty jaws crunched shut on his forearm and the weapon fell to the sand while its owner screamed in pain and fright.

  ‘Good dog, Kloof!’ Edvin said, realising the threat a few seconds too late. Without the dog’s intervention, he would be dead by now. Kloof released the terrified bandit’s arm, wagging his tail at Edvin. ‘I’ll make a note to feed you more often,’ Edvin told her.

  The man she had attacked crept away, sobbing, dragging himself on his stomach with his left arm, his ruined sword arm dragging behind him.

  As Kloof foiled the flanking movement, Thorn saw the time was right for a counterattack. He felled the bandit facing him with a side sweep of his club-hand into the man’s ribs, caught Stig’s eye and nodded forward.

  ‘Let’s get ’em, Stig!’ he yelled, in the traditional battle cry of Skandian warriors.

  The two of them surged forward, their terrible weapons rising and falling with blinding speed. By their side, and a little behind them, Jesper and Stefan added their share of mayhem as they drove a wedge into the confused attackers. More of the bandits went down. The others held for a few seconds, then, as if at a signal, broke and retreated up the beach.

  ‘Hold!’ Thorn shouted. They had accounted for more than half of the band that had attacked them, but they were still outnumbered and their safety lay in their cohesive formation. If they broke ranks now to pursue them, the bandits could possibly turn the tables on
them.

  The raiders retreated up the beach. Then, seeing they were not being pursued, they stopped and re-formed. The two groups faced each other, neither willing to move. The bandits’ new commander harangued them, shouting insults and exhortations. But they hesitated. None of them wanted to be the next one to go down before the Skandian axes.

  Ingvar had spent the battle behind the Skandian line. His poor eyesight put him at a disadvantage in a fight like this. Uncertain as to whom he was facing, not sure if it was a friend or an enemy, he would hesitate, and that could be fatal. But there was one task at which he was the consummate expert.

  ‘Ingvar! Load for me!’ Hal yelled. He had cast the wrappings off the Mangler and was sitting behind it, training it round by shoving with his feet against the deck to line up with the reduced group of attackers. Ingvar peered around, realised what was happening, and ran for the ship, hauling himself up over the bulwark and making his way forward. Leaning past Hal, he seized the two cocking levers and heaved them back in one swift, powerful motion, cocking the crossbow’s massive arms. He turned to the locker where the bolts were stored, but Hal already had one selected. He dropped it into the loading groove and Ingvar saw that it was one of the new pottery-headed bolts.

  By sheer chance, the bandits had grouped around a rock outcrop at the end of the beach. Hal lined the sights up on it now, adjusted the elevation slightly and pulled the lanyard.

  SLAM!

  The bolt streaked away and smashed into the rock, its warhead shattering and releasing a storm of sharp pottery shards and small rocks. They sliced into the grouped bandits. Two of them went down, lacerated and bleeding. A third had his arm torn open by a whirring chunk of shattered pottery. Most of the others were struck by smaller fragments or stones.

  Coming on top of the beating they had already taken, this was too much. With one accord, they turned and ran for the ridge, slipping and falling in their haste, staggering to their feet and continuing to climb the steep slope, conscious all the time that another of those frightful missiles might shatter to pieces among them.

  Thorn lowered his shield to the ground beside his feet and looked around at his small band of fighters.

  ‘Everyone all right?’ he asked and received a chorus of affirmative answers. Only Ulf had sustained an injury – a long, shallow gash above his left eye. Edvin put down his weapons and went to fetch his medical kit. He quickly wound a bandage around Ulf’s head.

  Thorn smiled contentedly at the sight. At last, he thought, they had a way to distinguish between the identical twins – if only in the short term.

  ‘And which one are you?’ he asked.

  Ulf, always ready to exploit a situation like this, smiled back.

  ‘I’m Wulf,’ he said innocently.

  The gold market, or souk, was an immense rectangular space that stretched for several city blocks in all directions, surrounded by a continuous wall built from massive sandstone blocks. There were four entrances, one in the middle of each side. A spreading roof of flat tiles covered the rectangle, which contained a labyrinth of narrow alleys, each one lined with stalls selling gold, precious stones, silver, brassware and, incongruously, musical instruments. The term ‘gold market’ was obviously a loose one, as there were also a large number of stalls dealing in ornate carpets and heavy fabrics.

  With its network of narrow cross streets, twisting and turning away from a broad central thoroughfare, it resembled a city in miniature. The ground followed the natural contours of the land, so that the alleys ran up and downhill in a random pattern, at times rising quite steeply, then plunging down once more, adding to the impression that one was traversing a vast indoor city.

  Light was provided by hundreds of oil lamps, creating moving shadows and reflecting garishly from the gold and brass that was on display on all sides. In addition, the roof was pierced at regular intervals by large skylights, and broad, glaring shafts of sunlight pierced down into the dim interior, sending more golden reflections dancing and shimmering, and making the areas where direct sunlight didn’t reach seem dimmer by comparison.

  The market was crowded with people, all bargaining intensely with the stall holders. Competition between the different stalls was fierce, so that if a buyer wasn’t satisfied with the price on offer, he could move on to another stall and another trader.

  While the bargaining was nonstop, it was nowhere near as raucous as that in the outdoor general market. Voices were restrained and negotiations were conducted in lowered tones, albeit forceful ones. Possibly, thought Gilan, the traders didn’t want other potential customers to hear the prices they were offering to their current client. That way, each customer had to negotiate his own best price, without benefiting from someone else’s ability to haggle.

  The alleys were crammed. People moved in both directions, hurrying and jostling one another heedlessly in their attempt to get where they were going. Gilan and Lydia had to force their way through, at times bumping shoulders with those coming in the opposite direction.

  Several times, Lydia muttered, ‘Sorry,’ as she brushed against people. After the fourth such occasion, Gilan, who had been watching carefully, led to her one side, out of the flow of traffic.

  ‘Don’t apologise,’ he said quietly. ‘They don’t. It’s all part and parcel of being here. If you bump someone out of the way, that’s simply the done thing. Just keep your eyes down, don’t make eye contact, and don’t stop walking when you bump someone.’

  Lydia nodded. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered. He patted her on the shoulder, then led the way out into the milling human tide again.

  They stopped at a crossroads set at the top of a steep hill, looking down on all four sides to where the alleys twisted and wound through the golden, glittering light. The low roof accentuated the narrowness of the alleys. They seemed to wind and stretch far into the distance. There was a tea stall at the summit of the hill, serving tea, sweet cakes and savoury snacks. Gilan led the way to a table and they sat, looking around them, taking note of the surrounding mass of stalls, traders, shops and people.

  ‘It’s like an ants’ nest,’ Lydia said.

  Gilan nodded. ‘Could be the perfect place to stir things up,’ he said. ‘I’m thinking if we started a fire somewhere like this, where’s there’s a kitchen and lots of cooking oil, it would give Hal and the others a free hand to break into the slave market and get the prisoners out.’

  A waiter approached them and Gilan ordered mint tea and savoury potato cakes stuffed with spiced mutton for the two of them.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘they’ll probably have to contend with a few locked doors to get in and out of the slave quarters. That might be tricky.’

  Lydia shook her head. ‘Locks mean nothing to Jesper,’ she told him. ‘He can open the strongest lock in a matter of seconds, and pick your pocket while he’s doing it.’

  Gilan’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Sounds like a valuable skill,’ he said. ‘We should try to get a closer look at the slave market – at least from the outside – before we head back. I’m still trying to figure a way we can get a look inside. Be a bit difficult breaking the prisoners out if we don’t know what we’re walking into.’

  ‘I’m sure Hal will come up with something,’ Lydia said complacently.

  Gilan pursed his lips. ‘Let’s hope so.’

  They finished their meal and he paid the bill, then stood and began to lead the way downhill. They had entered via the gate in the north wall and he knew the slave market lay on the south-west corner of the gold market. He stopped at a crossroad, got his bearings – not easy in a place where cross streets ran at irregular angles and directions – and pointed south.

  ‘We’ll go out the south gate, and have a look.’

  Lydia nodded and followed him downhill. The street was too congested to allow them to walk side by side and they threaded their way through the crowd in single file. Although they were on one of the wider main thoroughfares, the fact that it was wider didn’t make the going any easie
r. It simply accommodated more people pushing and shoving in opposing directions. The hill was quite steep and the cobblestones were slick with the passage of thousands of feet. Lydia found she had to pick her way carefully to avoid slipping.

  They heard shouting coming from downhill and to their left. It was subdued at first, and masked by the stalls and shops. Then, some thirty metres below them, a man emerged from a side alley onto the main street, running flat out and looking back fearfully over his shoulder.

  The shouting intensified as three members of the dooryeh burst out of the same alley, in hot pursuit of the running man.

  He was fifteen metres ahead of them, running like a hare. But he slowed as he hit the steep upward slope, leaning forward, driving his legs to greater effort. Before the dooryeh reached the slope, they had narrowed the gap. One of them was still shouting, but he was the one bringing up the rear. The others were saving their breath to tackle the steep climb. They were burdened by their armour and the weapons they carried and their quarry gradually began to pull away from them again as they encountered the sloping ground.

  As the running man drew near, Lydia could see he was dressed in filthy, tattered rags. He was thin to the point of emaciation, and his beard and hair were wild and stringy. His eyes were haunted, wide with fear. That fear seemed to lend extra wings to his feet as he put on a spurt and began to widen his lead over his pursuers. Lydia noticed a heavy gold chain clutched in his right fist. Obviously, he had stolen it from a stall down one of the side alleys and had been seen doing so.

  Gilan put an arm back and drew her to one side. There was no future in getting involved – to do so would only draw attention to them and then Lydia’s male disguise, flimsy as it was, would probably be pierced.

  Then everything went wrong, all at once.

  A waiter from the tea stall they had just left was walking ahead of them, carrying a tray of glasses of tea to one of the stalls. He held it in one hand, hanging from a swivelling handle, so he could hold it above the jostling crowd. He managed to sidestep the careering thief just in time, avoiding spilling the hot tea with the skill of long practice. He fired an angry epithet after the fleeing man.