“Friends?”
And then, of course, I realized that this part of Vallia was firmly in the hands of a vicious foeman, that Kataki Strom, Rosil Yasi, the Strom of Morcray, who was a tool of Phu-si-Yantong’s and who would joy to see me dead. I may add that those sentiments were reciprocated in part.
“More likely to be enemies, Turko.”
He did not reply; but I saw the muscles along his arms bunch and roll. Andrinos, with his keen foxy face concerned, said, “Then this ship full of armed men could be enemies going to join their friends?”
I shook my head. “It is a possibility, and a risk we must take.” I did not say that I considered Quienyin would have acted differently had this been a shipfull of enemies. Andrinos and Saenci shared the respect and caution accorded Wizards of Loh. Feeling my reply to be somewhat abrupt, and, into the bargain, hardly reassuring, I added, “I am convinced they are not friendly toward the enemies of Vallia. On the contrary, if I am right they have sailed here to fight for us.”
“We pray Pandrite and Horata the Bounteous you are right, pantor,”[6]said Saenci. We were almost clear of the point. Beyond the crags the water ceased its frantic turmoil and smoothed into placidity. Once there the argenter could drift gently toward that muddy shore and ground without a fuss. After that, in due course of the seasons, she could molder to ruination. At that point the hawser snapped.
Turko moved. One instant he was checking the tension and calling to me, the next he was flat on the deck, yelling a warning.
The end of the line snapped over our heads and came down like a sjambok, thwack, across the cabin roof.
With a frantic snatch at the control levers, I halted the mad onward leap of the voller. She swung about and soared back over the argenter. The men down there stared up. The seas took the ship into their grip and remorselessly pushed her down onto the rocky crags.
“There’s only one thing for it, now!” I yelled at Turko. The voller swerved and descended. We felt the force of the breeze. With finicky movements I brought her low over the sea, to leeward of the argenter. As we passed that high, ornate poop the name leaped up, gilded and carved, Mancha of Tlinganden. Tlinganden was one of the Free Cities left after the collapse of the old Empire of Loh, situated on the east coast opposite the country of Yumapan in Pandahem. This ship had successfully fought her way through the renders infesting the Hobolings. Now she was going to come to grief with all her people, if we could not save her.
Gently I eased the voller in until we nudged the surging bulk of the argenter. It was touchy business. I had to maintain the same rhythm as the sea, lifting and lowering the flier, and at the same time maintain a steady pressure against the bulky hull.
“By Morro the Muscle!” exclaimed Turko, joining me forward and craning out over the coaming.
“You’re going to push her free!”
“It’s the only way left. Just hope we don’t stove her in.”
The voller rose and fell and rolled and the argenter was like a sodden souse refusing to move along.
“Or she doesn’t drag us down.”
Water sluiced inboard, drenching us.
The pressure kept up. The black crags ringed with creamy foam seemed to be racing up toward us as we went careering down, forced by wind and sea. But the silver boxes of the voller exerted their power as I forced the levers over. Slowly, we saw the angles widen, slowly we saw the bows creep past the last disturbed confusion of water, slowly the argenter, Mancha of Tlinganden, rolled and sagged and pitched clear of the last fangy outcrop.
“We’ve done it!’” shouted Andrinos. His hands were clasped together. Saenci clung to his arm. “Never have I seen such flying!”
Spray burst over us. The argenter rolled uglily. Men clung to her, like bees on a honeypot. And we weren’t done with her yet. She had to be turned, now, turned poop on to the run of the sea, so that she would ground less forcefully.
And then disaster struck. One moment I was beginning to think that we had successfully done it, the next a brute of a sea surged in, crisscrossing the current, the towering sterncastle punched at us, the poop swung shrewdly, and the voller was caught and flung and toppled end over end into the sea.
Chapter sixteen
Homecoming
The water felt like a brick wall.
Spread-eagled, cartwheeling, I crashed into that brick wall and burst through it with all the breath knocked out of me. Water buried me.
To struggle back to the surface and to gulp air… To struggle, never to give in, to go on fighting and clawing even as they shovel the grave sods over your face. That is the way of Dray Prescot, and often and often I wonder just how far it has got him. As the sea smashed into me and water clogged my nostrils I gave a few erratic strokes with my legs, turning and twisting upright, forcing myself to rise. Up. Up I went and my head broke the silver sky and the Suns of Scorpio blazed in my face. Light blinded me. Shimmer of wavetops, spray cutting across, all a liquid movement of colors and radiance. I spat. I shook my head. I forced my eyes to remain open. I felt, I admit, like a side of beef must feel after it has been corned and stuffed into a tin.
The situation was quite other than I had expected, for the voller floated. Amazingly, the flier sat on the water, upright, rising and falling with the motion of the sea. Just beyond her the argenter Mancha of Tlinganden rolled and wavered in my vision, surging on like a runaway temple to Kranlil the Reaper, shedding bits and pieces, falling apart, scattering timber as she lurched and shuddered to her doom. A few strokes took me to the voller. I handed myself up and felt the sluggishness. The canvas had been ripped and most of her starboard side stove in. She would sink in a few murs. There was no sign of my companions.
Standing on the splintered deck of the voller, I looked about. The advantage of vision afforded by that little extra height proved sufficient. Two heads showed in the sea, among white splashes, and then a third. Saenci’s reddish foxy hair drifted on the water and I dived in first for her. She was swimming well; but going the wrong way.
Spitting, I gasped out, “Steady, Saenci. It’s all right now. Just relax and let me-”
“Where is Andrinos?”
“He’s all right. We must reach the argenter.”
I held her in the prescribed fashion for lifesaving and swam across to the drifting ship. Turko and Andrinos swam across. We trod water and looked up and they threw ropes down for us and helped us inboard. Like half-drowned gyps we crawled aboard.
Being your ruffianly kind of mercenary, I knew I had not much time left before the voller sank to act as any proper hyrpaktun would act now. I dived back and swam to the flier. I left the hubbub and howls of protest. Clambering onto the warped deck and working very rapidly, very rapidly indeed, by Krun! I snatched up my weapons and that superb harness of mesh links. Swimming back with the bundle was not too difficult although not a sport I’d take up for pleasure, and once again they hauled me inboard. This time I was content to lie on the deck and let my battered old carcass recover.
“You’re a right maniac, dom!” quoth a cheerful voice. I looked up. He stood, his thick legs spread apart, his hands on his hips, stark naked but for the weapons belted to him. His face was plug-ugly, scarred, with prominent eyebrows and a mass of thick brown hair, plastered into shiny flatness by spray.
“Aye,” I said. And then, “Llahal.”
“Llahal, dom. I am Clardo the Clis. I thank you for saving us-” A gleam of gold at his belt caught my eye. He had taken his pakzhan, the little golden zhantil head that is the mark of the hyrpaktun, from around his neck and twisted the silken cords tightly around his belt. About to reply that, Llahal, I was Jak, a sudden shadow fell over me as I sat up and a fierce, excited, bubbling voice burst about us and brought instant silence from everyone.
“Lahal!” said this voice. “Lahal and Lahal, Strom Drak! It’s me, Torn Tomor. And you are now Emperor of Vallia. Lahal, majister, Lahal!”
I stood up and looked at him.
Yes, he had the viril
e toughness of his father and the slim agility of his mother, and if he had a tithe of their strengths he would be a most puissant young man. I smiled.
“Lahal, Torn Tomor. And your father and mother are well and thrive, thanks be to Opaz. And, as for you, your faith was too fragile, for the murderer confessed.” He started at this, a young, eager, alive man with all his life to lead. “Yes, Torn, you ran off to be a paktun when we all knew you would not strike down a man from the shadows, with steel between his shoulder blades.”
“But,” he stammered, “majister — everyone said — it looked black-”
“It is black no more. Do I need to ask why you return to Vallia?”
“By Vox, no!” spoke up Clardo the Clis. “But-” And here his scarred face swung toward Torn Tomor. “-is this really the emperor, Torn? How can he be, seeing the emperor sits in Vondium and waits for us to fight and win his battles for him?”
The argenter gave a lurching heave that made us all brace ourselves to the sway of her. The muddy shore was not far off and soon the ship would splinter to flinders. Turko stood at my side. Andrinos was holding Saenci. I looked at the crowding men, hardened men, professional fighting men, tough and ruthless in combat, easy and reckless in camp. Yes, they were mercenaries, going to Vallia to find employment. A few quick words established what I had instantly guessed, and what had made Deb-Lu-Quienyin direct me here. Every man was a Vallian. Each man had gone off from his own country as a lad, seeing that Vallia had no army but employed paktuns to fight for gold. And, now the mother country was in dire danger, beset by enemies, her sons were returning home. But they were not the country bumpkins, the smart townies, who had left. Now they were paktuns and hyrpaktuns. Now they were professionals. I sighed. What I could do with a hundred thousand like this!
The voller had taken with her the secrets of her silver boxes, and I had to quell the spurt of anger. All that had chanced to me since leaving Vallia for the Dawn Lands formed a part of a pattern, that was clear. Prince Tyfar and Quienyin; well, Quienyin was actively assisting me now and Tyfar was going to have a much more prominent part to play in my plans than he dreamed of. By Zair! He had a much bigger part to play than I dreamed of! How fate does throw the knucklebones, and sits back, giggling. And that Vajikry fanatic, Trylon Nath Orscop, had afforded me a voller able to pull. No Vajikry, no voller. No voller, no ship of fighting men for Vallia.
Turko said, “We’re going to hit any mur — and that company you spoke of. They’re waiting.”
Along the edge of the surf the lines of totrixmen cantered. They looked hard and sharp. They were waiting for us. As we staggered up out of the clutch of the sea they would ride forward and spear us. The Vallians in the ship were shouting and waving. They thought these riders were waiting to succor them. And that was the sensible thought to any Vallian who had left the country before the Time of Troubles. I shouted, hard and high, in an ugly voice.
“Those jutmen are our mortal foes! They will spear us as we wade ashore through the mud. Each man must be ready to resist them. They are a parcel of the cramphs who are eating up your homeland.”
Well, that changed the demeanor of the returning mercenaries wonderfully. A staff-slinger stepped forward. “Lahal, majister. I am Larghos the Sko-handed.” He spread his left hand. “My men will loose, seeing all the bowstrings will be wet.”
Larghos had a long, narrow chin, and a slinger’s shoulders. A squatter, fiery-faced man stepped forward, spluttering.
“Lahal, majister! I am Drill the Eye.” He waved an oilskin pouch. “Give me a few murs to string our bows and we will see!”
I did not laugh. But the vivid image of Barkindrar the Bullet and Nath the Shaft flashed up before me. By Krun! But they do love a fine professional argument, these slingers and these bowmen of Kregen!
I eyed the surf. It was not too dangerous; but it would knock a fellow over unless he was well-braced and not too far out.
“Stand back, you missile men, and give the swordsmen a chance. Loose over them.” Again I eyed the narrowing distance between us and the shore. “If she grounds close enough, best you remain aboard for as long as you can and shoot from here.”
“Aye, majister!” they shouted. “Until she falls to pieces!”
That was the moment the keel of the argenter touched bottom. We held our breaths. Some of that luxurious stern ornamentation, all gingerbread work, fell off with a roar and a splash. She lifted up with the surge of the waves and shuddered on. Thrice more she touched and thrice more she lifted and rolled nearer the shore.
The breeze blew our hair forward and chilled our skins. The smell of brine and mud grew more pungent. Turko had found a shield — I saw him talking to a swarthy fellow who nodded and handed his shield over without a fuss. I marked him. The shield was the rectangular cylindrical shield of Havilfar. Efficient. When a vessel marked for destruction touches the shore always, I think, a man must mourn for another hostage lost to the implacable elements. Mancha of Tlinganden struck at last, and her keel scraped through slimy mud, and the black stuff swirled up in the water alongside. She shuddered on for a few more paces, and then stuck, slewing slightly, canting over, coming to her final rest with a kind of peace we had bought for her. She did not fly into flinders, as I had feared. But her doom was certain. We plunged down into the sea and struck out for the shore.
Andrinos swam with me and Turko was there also, the shield almost like a surfboard. The surf crashed about us and men yelled and were knocked flying, and surfaced, spluttering and going doggedly on. With an increase of pace I managed to get ahead. I did not wear the mesh-link iron harness. I held the thraxter, and the sword glimmered wet with running water. Jumping the retreating waves, I crashed on up that muddy beach, feeling the gluey muck clinging and trying to haul me back. Like a mud-devil I reached forward with the water around my waist, and the muck did not wash off. The riders on the beach turned their mounts to face us.
They rode down, the six legs of the totrixes splaying out, their heads high against the commotion of wind and water. The spear points twitched down. They cantered on, full of confidence that they would spear us poor half-drowned rats before we could stagger clear of the waterline. Two of them came for me. I braced myself with the tug of the sea about me. The first abruptly switched from his saddle as though jerked by puppet cords. A long arrow sprouted from his neck. The second had no time to puzzle over his comrade’s fate. I leaped for him, brushed the spear aside, sank the thraxter in.
After that as the paktuns roared up out of the sea, naked, shining with mud and water, half-crazed, yelling, we tore into the totrixmen. Leaden bullets flew. Shafts pierced. Swords glinted and ran red. We had the beating of them in the first half-dozen murs. We fought as men fight coming up out of their graves. Only a dozen or so survived to gallop off wildly.
Panting, the Vallians gathered, and stared balefully after the fleeing riders.
“Hai, Jikai! Emperor!” someone shouted.
I quieted the hubbub.
“I think we are on the island of Wenhartdrin. It is a rich land, and the best wines of Vallia, some say, come from here.But the whole land here is in the grip of our enemies. We are Vallians!”
“Aye!”
“Let us then see what honest Vallians may do, by Vox, and in the radiance of the Invisible Twins made manifest through the light of Opaz, let us go forward!”
And, by Vox, forward we went!
Chapter seventeen
Emperor’s Yellow Jackets
The captain and first lieutenant of the argenter had been killed in an accident, and this in part accounted for her doomed course of destruction toward the rocks. Most of the crew were Hobolings who are among the finest of topmen. These and the other deckhands had no part of our fight. I did not inquire how the arrangements for the passage had been made. We agreed to leave these folk on the island and see to it that they were repatriated.
Ashore, we busied ourselves scrubbing off the mud. The ship broke apart slowly. I marked the spot. On
a more auspicious occasion I’d return here and see if I could salvage those silver boxes from the sunken voller.
Boxes and bales and barrels floated ashore, mingled with the sad detritus of a destroyed ship. There were many fat bales of a good quality cloth, all of that bright, strong, yellow color called tromp. There was food, also, that was not contaminated by sea water and we soon had fires going and tea brewing and food sizzling. To clothe our nakedness we cut up squares of the tromp cloth and made holes and so put them over our heads. We cinched our belts tight, and we looked a fine rousing rabble under the suns. Some few remnants of the paktuns’ original clothes drifted ashore, and a few pairs of boots. But, in general, we were a band of yellow brigands to all intents as we set off. The old emperor, Delia’s father, had always liked the wines from Wenhartdrin. We marched on and soon passed signs of viticulture, most of it blackened and ruined. Houses had burned. We saw no one for some time until, reaching a tumbledown village, we found a few poor people who told us the news. This was simple. Strom Rosil Yasi, being a damned Kataki and therefore by nature a slavemaster, was more interested in human merchandise. These folk were left free and alive because they were too ill, too weak, or could till just enough land to provide food for the conquering invaders. Well, by Zair, we sorted out that local problem.
The band of yellow-clad comrades fought like men possessed. As we progressed into the island and saw the evidences of what being occupied meant, they grew hard and fierce even above all their mercenary habits. We found the aragorn, slavers who occupy an area and from a strong point terrorize and suck dry everything of value, and we slew them in battle and drove them into the sea. Wenhartdrin is not above fifteen dwaburs long and ten wide, shaped rather like two triangles apex to apex. We discovered that Strom Rosil Yasi, known as the Kataki Strom, had left but two squadrons of cavalry and a half regiment of infantry to hold the island. These men were all mercenaries of various races. Military organization varies from country to country on Kregen, that stands to reason; but hereabouts the regiment of infantry very often consisted of six pastangs of eighty or so men each, giving four eighty men to a regiment. So there were around two hundred to two hundred and forty mercenaries swanning about Wenhartdrin that we had to deal with. Cavalry regiments varied more widely in numbers and composition and we had seen off one squadron on the beach and the second squadron, some hundred or so, we caught in a pretty little ambush along a defile crowded with tufa trees. By this time a portion of our force was mounted; but what with sickness and casualties, we now numbered not much more than a hundred and seventy-five or so.
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