A Barnstormer in Oz

by Philip José Farmer

  Hank, standing at the head of the next staircase, could see some of the hall below. It had a luxurious carpet and a piece of statuary with diamonds for eyes on an ornately carved marble pedestal. A part of a huge oil painting was visible on the gold-filigreed walls.

  There would be six guards and two hawks there while the queen was gone. When she returned, she would be accompanied by many guards, ladies-in-waiting, and courtiers.

  Thunder boomed closer now. The windows at the end of the hall where Hank stood rattled with a hard wind. He went down to it and saw that it was also raining.

  Glinda and Hank had talked about trying to kill all the guards of the queen's suite and then dressing up the human raiders in the uniforms and having the hawks replace the dead ones. That idea had been quickly dismissed, however. There would be an unavoidable amount of noise which might attract the guards on the floor below.

  Hank was to wait until Erakna came home and toss a grenade at her before she went into the suite. He would then step out and finish the work with his BAR.

  "You don't mind killing women?" Glinda had said.

  "I mind killing anybody," Hank had said. "But it has to be done."

  Sharts came to him and looked out the window.

  "She'll be here soon. It's just as well. Better, in fact. I didn't like the idea of waiting for her. Too much chance of somebody checking on the guards. As it is, somebody will be coming up these steps before the queen gets on this floor. I hope that there isn't more than one."

  The bodies had been dragged around the corner of the staircase. Unwaz was occupying the late hawk's perch, and two men had put on the casques of the guard.

  Ten minutes later, the hawk listening at the top of the steps turned and fluttered over to Sharts.

  "I heard an officer challenge the guards. Must be our man."

  Sharts got on one side of the doorway, and Blogo got on the other. As the officer came through the doorway, he was gripped around the neck and the mouth by giant hands. Blogo cut the officer's throat.

  There was much noise down in the hall, the grounding of spear butts, hoarse commands, and the shrill voices and laughter of little women and men.

  "Holy Thun!" Sharts said. "They're here! Quick, jpan!"

  Hank went down the steps as softly but as quickly as he could. When he got to the doorway, he stood behind the wall and pulled a grenade from his jacket pocket. He had another in the other pocket if the first one did not explode.

  "The queen! The queen!" an officer bawled. "Open the door for the queen!"

  Hank stepped out into the hallway, pulled the pin on the grenade, got a glimpse of the crowd around the door, heard a warning shout to his right from down the hall, and threw the grenade. He turned then and ran up the steps. The door had been twenty feet away, and the wall would protect him. But there was going to be a hell of a blast. If the grenade worked. If it did not, he would have to run back down and use the BAR. His plan for tossing the second bomb might not work out. The queen could be behind her door by then.

  There were shrieks and then a very loud boom.

  Air rushed up the staircase. Black smoke followed it.

  Hank turned, his BAR in his hands, ran down the steps, and plunged into the hall. Behind him he heard feet striking the steps. Sharts and the others were following him.

  The smoke was still dense, but he could see some torn bodies on the floor. A few were still alive and screaming.

  Pointing towards where he thought the door was, Hank pressed on the trigger until the twenty rounds were expended. Smiirn at once handed him a fresh magazine, and he attached it to the underside of the rifle.

  A guard at the end of the hall charged them. He was a brave man, but he died when Blogo's ax caught him between shoulder and neck.

  Hank ran toward the stairway down the hall past the door to Erakna's suite. He hurdled the bodies but slipped on blood, and he fell heavily backwards. Though partly stunned, he got up at once and continued running. He got to the stairway just as a mob of soldiers came up it. The BAR cleared them away.

  He looked down the hall. The smoke had thinned enough to see that the queen's door had been blown off. His compatriots were examining the bodies to determine which was the queen's. Blogo looked at Hank and shook his head.

  He cried in his piping voice, "She's not here! She must have gotten away!"

  Hank groaned and said, "After all this!"

  Sharts had plunged through the doorway. Blogo followed him, and three hawks flew in after him. Smiirn came to Hank and said, "How long can you hold them off with that thing?"

  "Until the ammunition runs out," he said.

  "We may need more time to look for the witch than we thought," Smiirn said. "It's a big apartment."

  A helmeted head poked from the doorway below. Hank loosed two shots. The soldier was not hit, but two minutes passed before there was a yell and men poured through the entrance. The BAR crumpled ten before those behind ran, some falling down. Hank let them go. He just wanted to discourage them.

  Two more minutes went by.

  Another head came around the corner. This time, Hank did not shoot. He thought that his mere presence would keep them back. For a while, anyway.

  Another sixty seconds.

  All but Smiirn had gone into the suite to help in the search. It was well that Smiim was there as his ammo supplier. Otherwise, Hank might have been caught off-guard. Smiirn yelled. Hank looked at him and saw that he was pointing past him. He whirled. Two men were at the end of the hall and more were corning through the doorway of the apartment there. Glinda was not the only one who had prepared secret routes.

  Their crossbows were pointed at him. He fired as he fell forward. The bolts missed, and his burst knocked the soldiers backwards. He reached forward and pulled the supports of the BAR down and fired from a prone position. Ten men fell. No others followed them.

  He got up and beckoned for Smiirn to bring more boxes of magazines. He removed the empty one and put on a new one. Then he told Smiirn to watch the stairway while he took care of this other matter. When he was close to the door, which was open and bore two bullet holes, he took out the grenade, pulled the pin, counted, and threw it inside the door. He ran away along the wall and then dived. The explosion tore the door off and filled that end of the hall with black smoke for a while.

  He put the third grenade in his pocket.

  Sharts came running out. He stopped when he saw the bodies at the end of the hall.

  "So!"

  "Yeah, so," Hank said. He had resumed his post at the top of the steps. "Did you find the queen?"

  "No. She must have gone into a secret hideaway. Or down secret steps. She's probably on the floor below now."

  "We'd better run then," Hank said. "Now."

  "I don't like to fail!" Sharts yelled.

  "Who does?" Hank said. "There's something worse than failure, though. Death. Let's get out of here."

  "Do you think you could shoot your way through to the queen?" Sharts said. "She could be just around the bottom of the staircase. You might catch her before she could get away."

  "No, I don't think so," Hank said. "Let's get out of here!"

  Sharts snarled, but he turned and went to the door and bellowed for the searchers to come out into the hall.

  Hank said, "Do you want the Gillikins to know what we're doing?"

  Sharts gave him the finger. For some reason, Hank found that very funny. He laughed until he realized that he was close to hysteria.

  Before following the others, Hank half-emptied a magazine just to let those below know that he was there. He turned and ran then, but he stopped when his eyes caught something extraordinary. It was a velvet-covered box which had been blown open when he had thrown the grenade at the queen. Something dull yellow gleamed inside the box. He removed it and looked at it. It was a hemispherical object of gold large enough to fit over the head of an Amariikian of normal stature. He turned it over and looked inside it by the light of an oil-lamp which he too
k from a table near the window.

  There were inscriptions in four rows inside its rim, but the light was not bright enough for him to read them. Even if the illumination had been stronger, he would not have been able to read them, for they were written in the undecipherable script of the Long-Gone Ones. Nevertheless, he knew what the gold hemisphere was.

  "I'll be a monkey's uncle!"

  With the golden object in his knapsack nestled beside his last grenade, he ran after the others. By the time he got to the room where the rope hung from the ceiling hole, he was breathing heavily. He had plenty of time to regain his wind. Four men were waiting for their turn to climb the rope. He guarded the door while they swarmed up. So far, so good. There was no sound of pursuit. The Gillikins would have no trouble tracking them, however, by the footprints in the dust. Even so, the queen's men would be further delayed because they would have to find a ladder.

  Sharts was by the hole. He pulled up Hank easily with one hand, while holding a torch with the right hand. The others were out of sight in the shaft.

  Those strange eyes missed little. He said, "What's that in your sack?"

  "Something that might come in very handily."

  Sharts grabbed Hank's arm with a grip that threatened to pop the blood vessels.

  "Remember. We all share in any loot."

  "Not this. I think this belongs to Glinda. And take your hand off me."

  Sharts bit his lip, but he removed his hand. He went down the shaft. Hank crouched by the trapdoor for a moment listening for the Gillikins. He heard nothing, but, when he straightened up and began lowering the trapdoor, he caught a faint sound. In a few seconds, he could hear loud voices. He hesitated. Should he wait until the room below was filled and then drop the grenade? That might make them so fearful that it would be a long time before they pushed on after the invaders. But Erakna would be very angry, and she would drive her soldiers on no matter how reluctant they were. They would fear her more than his fearful weapons.

  He decided that he should save the grenade for a more critical situation.

  Going down the rungs, he felt very uneasy. If the Gillikins should get to the top of the shaft while he was still in it, they could drop something on or shoot him. He was a comparatively easy target since he was holding in his teeth the torch which had been left for him in the room.

  No shouts of exultation came from above. Reaching the bottom, he found his box magazines. Smiim had wisely concluded that Hank might need them handy now that they were separated. Hank put one in each pocket and the remaining five in his knapsack.

  He ran upright through the rooms and stooping through the tunnel. Then he stopped.

  "My God!"

  The pool had spread at least twenty feet on each side. That was both good and bad. By the time the pursuers got here, they might find the tunnel flooded. On the other hand, he would have to swim holding the torch up above his head with one hand while the BAR and the gold object and the magazines dragged at him.

  There was no use hesitating. He walked into the cold water until it was up to his chin and began paddling with one hand. He had to work furiously to keep his nose above the water, but he was soon touching the floor, and he began walking again. He was glad that it was not winter. He would freeze when he left the house.

  Sharts was putting on his wooden-shoed boots.

  "They're upstairs," he said. "Everything's ready. The wagon is in front of the house. First, though, put on your boots."

  They went outside. Many of the houses had bright windows; the inhabitants had all returned from the rally. The rain smote him, thunder rumbled, and lightning did its best to put the fear of God in all living creatures. The storm had shattered their plan to get lost in the mobs returning from the rally while they made their way to the escape point. The hawks, however, had flown away. Bargma, the owl, looked as if he would have liked to go with them.

  "The city will be swarming with soldiers!" Sharts yelled. Hank did not reply; none was needed. He got into the wagon with the giant and Blogo and assumed the fetal position again. The others piled hay and fruit on them in a thin layer. They had removed these and put them on the street, and now they did not think that there was time to completely cover the three.

  Audag, his son, and one man would get up on the seat. The wagon began moving slowly, then it picked up speed. Now that there were no crowds and no traffic, there was no use ambling innocently along.

  Hank began counting the minutes. One thousand and one, one thousand and two, one thousand and three.... Four minutes had just passed when he heard a loud challenge. There was the clatter of iron deershoes on the cobblestones, and the wagon stopped. Hank gripped the stock and barrel of the BAR and waited.

  "Who are you?" a hoarse voice said. "What are you doing out in the storm?"

  "Please, sir, we're just farmers," Audag whined. "We were turned out of our inn because of a little disagreement with the owner. He charged us more than he had promised he would. We're looking for a place to stay."

  "And just where is this inn and who owns it?"

  "The Jolly Cheeks. The crook who owns it is Skilduz the Stammerer, may he rot in the ground and worms enjoy his beer-soaked putrid carcass."

  "The Jolly Cheeks? That's on the other side of town. Sergeant, probe that pile in the wagon with your spear."

  "Yes, sir!" the sergeant bellowed. "You, Izak and Azgo, help me!"

  "Nuts!" Hank said. He came up out of the pile at the same time as Sharts and Blogo. He only had time for a quick estimate of the situation. The wagon was surrounded by nine men on deer and three getting off their beasts. None of them seemed to have crossbows. He stood up, yelling at Sharts and Blogo to get out of his fire, and he turned, shooting until he had completed a circle. The officer fell first; eight either dropped from their saddles or fell under the weight of their stricken animals. Then Hank had to attach a fresh magazine to the BAR. Three on the ground leaped up and started to run away. They and the three still mounted might have gotten away in the darkness if Hank's colleagues had not brought loaded crossbows from under their cloaks and shot them.

  Blinds went up in the nearby houses, and people looked out through the rain.

  "Go like hell!" Sharts screamed.

  The wagon started with a jerk that hurled Hank off his feet. Fortunately, the hay and fruit softened his fall.

  While the wagon rattled, bumped, and jolted down the streets and skidded around corners, Hank reloaded. A minute later, a patrol spread out across a wide street to block them. The BAR was emptied clearing them out of the way. Hank attached another box magazine. Five left.

  The wagon finally stopped below a sentinel tower on the outer wall of Wugma. It was a half-mile from the north gates. While Audag and his son unhitched the deer, Sharts hallooed the guard in the tower. He would be, if all went according to plan, an agent of Glinda. He had been in the Gillikin army for three years, and he was supposed to put his fellow guard out of commission and let down a rope ladder. Every tower had one; they were to be used to admit other troops to the top if besiegers broke through and cut off the access of other defenders to the top of the wall.

  Their disadvantage was that they could be lowered to let enemies in or out.

  The man in the tower was barely visible by his torchlight. He waved, and, two seconds later, the ladder fell down. Smiim was the first up; Audag, the last. The deer were gone then. They would hide during the night. When morning came, they would dash through the city gates and be lost in the country. At least, that was what they hoped. The plan to haul them up by ropes had to be abandoned. There just was not enough time for that. The sentinels in both towers on each side were yelling and beating drums now.

  A lightning flash showed that a man had left each of these towers and was advancing towards them. Hank killed them with four rounds.

  Presently, they were on the ground with the agent Lukaz, and they were heading north through the village there. Just as they left it and were going across farmland, Bargma lit on Hank
's shoulder.

  "Give me some warning the next time!"

  The owl laughed, then said, "There's no sense in my staying with you. I'll go on to the farm."

  "O.K. Tell the farmer to unstake Jenny if the storm quits and if there isn't a high wind. He'd better be ready to run with his family if we're tracked to the farm."

  The owl flapped off heavily. A little later, the group left the farmland and took a narrow deeply rutted dirt road which ran northwest. Every step the group took would head them one step more from the main road. There would be cavalry—cervusry?—out on the highway now and perhaps on the sideroads. When daylight came, Erakna's hawks and eagles would be surveying from the air. However, the band only had ten miles to go now and should be on the farm before dawn.

  Even so, if this storm continued, the airplane would be grounded.

  Hank plodded on, his jacket collar around his neck, the rain trickling down his neck, looking now down at the ruts so he would stumble less, then at the bull's-eye lantern. Sharts would occasionally turn it around so that the others could see him.

  They came to a road at right angles that ran to the main highway. They would have preferred to cut across the country toward the farm, but they could easily get lost in the dark hills and woods. They would have to chance encountering the soldiers.

  Luck played out on them. Erakna's men were in a copse of oaks ten yards from the crossroads. They had with them what Hank had not expected: hawks and eagles. These had ridden on the pommels of the saddles. They swept out of the darkness and struck the band before it was aware that anybody was within a mile.

  The cavalry charged, screaming and whooping, the moment the screeches of the birds and cries of the men notified them that the birds had attacked. They came through single file on the narrow bridge across the ditch along the meadow. Fortunately for Sharts's band, the third deer in line slipped and fell down. Six mounts and riders piled up on top of them. The three behind them managed to pull up in time. Their beasts jumped the low fence and plunged into the ditch. Here two deer fell under the water, but the third got his beast to scramble up the bank.