by Duncan Lay
He had made her duties plain to Ely. She was to win their confidence and report back to him. Do her job well and she, her mother and her sister would be freed. Anger him and she would pray for death. She had been shown her expected fate and he had known she would not dare to fail. She would be forced to watch her sister and mother die horribly before joining them. He grimaced at the thought. Just a moon ago, the thought of using someone’s family as a threat to make them do what you wanted was perfectly normal. Now it did not seem such an easy thing to do.
Kemal quickly considered his options. Letting them escape could help but what if some of them were killed? A death or two would normally not mean too much but what if one of those killed were the wives or children of Fallon’s lieutenants? What would that cost him? He swiftly came to a decision.
“You stay with me,” he ordered Ely. “But first, get me the captain of my guards. We have much to do.”
*
Bridgit cursed Ely. Just at the point when she needed someone with a good command of Kottermani to talk to the guards, the girl had run off in fear. She also cursed herself. She should have stayed with the girl, kept a close watch on her. Ely had been trying to tell her something before. If only she had listened better then, perhaps they would not be facing this problem now.
Half of the guards were inside, while half were still outside. She needed to get them in somehow. Trying to attack a dozen men in the streets was doomed to failure. In desperation she grabbed Ena and another of the younger, prettier wives and took them into a side room, where others could not see them. There she took a knife and crudely cut at their skirts, ripping the hem until it exposed half their thighs.
“What are you doing, Bridgit?” demanded Ena. She had wide eyes and pale skin, even with the time she had spent working in the sun. Bridgit had seen how the guards always watched her.
By way of an answer, Bridgit took the knife to the loose top she wore, ripping down around the neckline.
“Is this some kind of jest?” Ena continued. “Answer me, for Aroaril’s sake!”
Bridgit stopped tearing at her loose shirt. “We have to get the others inside,” she said. “I need the pair of you to dance like it was your marriage night.”
“Like this?” Ena asked indignantly. “Murphy would be shocked!”
“Well, he’s not going to get the chance unless we do something fast,” Bridgit said, moving on to the other woman and cutting away her skirt. “If you can think of a surer way to get those guards in here and not watching what the rest of us are doing, say so now!”
As she had expected, neither had an answer.
“Look, I would do this myself but we all know that won’t get the guards so eager for an eyeful that they leave their posts and get in here. You are our best hope.”
“And if it doesn’t work?” the other woman, Clare, asked. Bridgit did not know her as well, for she was from Killarney, but like Ena she had red hair and pale skin.
“Drop your clothes on the floor and keep dancing. If there’s a man out there who can stay at his post while that’s happening instead of rushing in to watch, then we will just have to kill him, because he would have to be made of stone,” Bridgit said shortly. She inspected the two women critically and nodded.
“Good. Now let’s get moving. They will call for prayers at any moment and our chance will be lost.”
*
Bridgit led the way, clapping her hands, while around her others took up the rhythm and formed a circle in the front room. The guards who were already inside came along, swept up by the others, and they swiftly joined the Gaelish in cheering as the scantily clad women gyrated around the circle.
“Give them more! As if you were dancing for Murphy!” Bridgit told Ena as she danced closer. “Do it for the children!”
She could see neither woman was happy or comfortable with what she was doing but they danced on, spinning and stretching, and the guards in the circle began to call out to their comrades outside.
Bridgit glanced over her shoulder and saw heads appear around the door then, as she hoped, the guards outside began to hurry in. In a city where the women went covered from head to toe to protect themselves from the sun, the chance to see bare limbs flashing pale skin at every turn was enough to get any man away from his post.
They had been dulled by the drinks they had taken, but she could see their eyes locked onto the dancing women.
Bridgit signaled to Ahearn, and to Carrick and Blaine, and men eased through the crowd to stand near the guards.
“Now!” Bridgit cried, jumping into the circle herself.
The guards all looked at her – then they were overpowered a moment later, struck and stunned or dragged down and choked. Half-asleep thanks to all the drugged drinks, none even put up a fight. Pieces of the makeshift rope she had used to get in and out of the house were used to truss them up, while their weapons were swiftly taken. Ahearn handed Bridgit a long knife, its blade gently curved, and she hurriedly slipped it into her belted robe.
“Get the children and get ready,” Bridgit said, quickly embracing a puffing Eva and Clare.
Nola and Riona handed them cloaks and they all quickly lined up, watched by battered, bruised and dazed guards, whose eyes promised murder even though their mouths were gagged and hands tied.
“What if one of them escapes and raises the alarm? Would we not be better off silencing them?” Carrick asked.
Bridgit had considered that herself but the thought of killing helpless men turned her stomach. Besides, the soldiers’ bonds had been secured by Ahearn’s crew of fishermen.
“They will not get free in a hurry. By the time they do, we shall be long gone,” she said firmly.
The children were brought out, the babies and toddlers sleeping gently in the arms of their mothers or older siblings. A cry at the wrong moment could bring them undone so she had been careful to make sure only those who could be trusted – and were strong enough – would run with the adults. Each of these children had a pair and they were all to watch out for each other. The only ones who did not have a small child to carry or a younger to hold hands with were the dozen older boys and girls with slings.
“Good. All ready?” She smiled at them, tousling hair or brushing the cheek of one of her many favorites. “When we hear the call of prayers you start to run and you don’t stop until we are on a ship.”
She left them, feeling confident, and turned back to the front door to hear strange noises going on. “Keep quiet until we get the signal!” she snapped, then saw it was not her own people who were making noise.
Instead it was the surviving guards, as Carrick and Blaine used borrowed swords to kill them.
“What are you doing?” she raged. “I gave orders that they were not to be harmed!”
Carrick turned to her, bloodied to the elbows.
“And I said they were too much of a risk,” he said threateningly, his dripping sword pointed at her.
Bridgit saw the obvious threat but she was not going to be cowed by it. “Put down that sword and clean yourself up or you will give us all away,” she snapped. “I will deal with you later.”
“No, you won’t,” Blaine added, standing by his brother’s shoulder.
“Step away or by Aroaril I shall make sure that you never get back to Gaelland,” she told them. Behind her, she could sense that Ahearn and his men were moving to stand by her and the air in the room suddenly seemed charged with something other than the stink of blood.
For a long moment nobody moved, then they all heard the unmistakable call to prayers.
“Clean yourselves now!” Bridgit pointed at them and then turned back to the door, ignoring the brothers. Every moment counted. “Let’s move, just as we planned!”
A group of men led by Dermot, the farmer from near Baltimore, hurried out the door and down towards the docks, followed by the lines of women and children.
Bridgit paused for one last look around the house, seeing only the blood-spattered brothers t
rying to wipe the blood off their arms and faces on the remnants of the cloth rope.
“You two bring up the rear and for Aroaril’s sake keep up,” Bridgit ordered.
She saw them sneer at her words but she did not have time to waste on them. Without a backward glance she hurried out the door and caught up with the long column of Gaelish. She shuddered at the thought of guards getting among the straggling groups and urged the ones at the back to hurry. The sounds of evening prayer were still booming out across the city but that could not last long and they would stick out like a fire at night. While there may not be many guards close, they only needed a little notice and any escape would be almost impossible.
She urged them on, until the older children were trotting along to keep up, then she rushed along to the front of the group, to where Dermot led the way.
“See any guards?” she asked.
“There is nobody around,” the farmer said shortly.
That was not quite true. They had passed a score of people but they were praying, their eyes closed. One or two had looked up as so many hurried by, looking outraged, but had not said anything. Yet Bridgit knew that had to end. She had heard the evening prayers so many times, she knew time was running out.
“Push it along faster,” she said. “We have to get off these streets before the prayers end.”
The men looked at each other and then began to run, making the others behind them increase their speed as well. Bridgit stayed where she was, urging the others on.
“Take the children’s hands. Pull them along,” she instructed the adults. At the rear of the column, as she had requested, Carrick and Blaine thumped along, swords in hands. She disliked them intensely but had to admit they looked reassuring large and dangerous there. It was a hard job, perhaps the hardest of any to bring up the rear and slow down any pursuit long enough to let them get away and she promised herself she would think of them differently if they got everyone away safely.
Even though they were all running now, the adults carrying younger children and helping others along, it was still too slow for Bridgit’s liking. She could hear the prayers coming to an end and they were still a street away from the docks.
“Hurry!” she urged them on, racing to catch up with the men at the front again.
Her worst fears were realized when the prayers stopped just as they reached the docks. All was quiet but a pair of guards stood up, brushing dirt off the front of their robes where they had been kneeling down, to suddenly block the way. The guards’ eyes bulged at the rush of Gaelish slaves coming right for them and surprise held them for long enough for the Gaelish to swamp them and club them down, Dermot and another man taking their swords.
The men in and around the docks were also stirring after prayers, most of them thinking about returning home after a long day’s work. The flood of Gaelish changed all that. Chained gangs of slaves backed away, cowering in fear, while Kottermanis tried to block the way. But they were isolated and disorganized. Bridgit guessed the shouts were for them to surrender and return but it was far too late for that. The Gaelish column flowed over them, spitting them out the other side, making for the left side of the docks, where the largest ships waited and where the main harbor wall stretched out from the wharves.
A handful of Kottermani sailors tried to move towards the children but the ones Bridgit had trained were ready with their slings and unleashed a hail of stones on the Kottermanis. The men dived for cover, crying out as they were hit, and others stayed low behind piles of goods rather than try to stop them.
“We’re going to make it! Keep going!” Bridgit encouraged the others on. She was both relieved and disturbed by their progress. It almost seemed a little too easy. More than a hundred men were in sight around the docks but most just watched them go past, seemingly dumbfounded.
Then she caught sight of a dozen Kottermanis, a mixture of guards and sailors, advancing to their right. If they got in among the women and children … she shuddered at the thought and grabbed Dermot’s arm, pointing them out to him. “Hold them off!” she called.
As they had planned, Dermot and a score of men, armed with everything from captured swords to chair legs with sharpened ends, formed a fighting line, allowing the Gaelish women and children to continue in safety even though the Kottermanis slowly advanced.
Bridgit watched over her shoulder anxiously as her people rushed past, looking for Blaine and Carrick. The two big men were still bringing up the rear, threatening anyone who dared to come close. Neither had cleaned all the blood off themselves and Bridgit saw that was also deterring Kottermanis from coming close.
“Start to back away,” she told Dermot.
But, before he could lead the men back to join the rear of the column, the Kottermanis attacked. The Gaelish hesitated for a moment until Bridgit shouted at them, breaking the spell they were under.
“Fight for your children!” she shouted.
They sprang forwards to meet the Kottermanis then, although a trio of Kottermani guards were a tight-knit group that drove through the Gaelish line, leaving a pair of men down and screaming in their wake. The rest of them swung makeshift clubs at each other and snarled insults that the other side could not understand.
Bridgit backed away from the three guards, drawing her knife. Time seemed to slow down and she recalled the endless lessons that Fallon had tried to give her, the talks about attacking in a straight line being so much better than wild slashes. She had been bored to tears listening then but it seemed some of it had stuck in her mind because, as one of them drew back his arm to cut her down, she jumped forwards and held out her knife. He ran onto the end, the sharpened steel sliding into his chest. Instinctively she pulled the blade back and he dropped his sword and staggered backwards, falling to the ground. His two companions spat hatred at her and closed in for revenge but then Blaine and Carrick pushed past, swinging their bloodied swords furiously. One of the guards was caught a glancing blow along the arm and dropped his sword, screaming as blood spurted from his ruined forearm. The other backed into a pile of barrels and fell backwards, losing his weapon. Even as he cried for mercy, Carrick slashed down viciously and blood sprayed high.
That was enough for the rest of the Kottermanis and they backed away, leaving four more of their number lying on the ground.
But it had been an expensive victory, for five Gaelish were also down.
“Bring them! We shall bind their wounds later,” Bridgit ordered, smiling her thanks at Blaine and Carrick.
But they brushed past her, while Dermot and his surviving men dragged along their wounded, a mixture of broken bones, battered heads and, in two cases, of sword wounds.
“Quickly now.” Bridgit ran with them. One man was dripping blood from a torn arm but still ran, while the other four were supported by men on either side of them. Only one was unconscious and being dragged along. The others at least could get their feet under them and be helped along.
The resistance of the Kottermanis seemed to have been broken and Bridgit could see nobody else threatening them as they raced along the wharves. She lengthened her stride, feeling herself beginning to struggle for breath but still determined to lead them out of here.
She caught up with Ahearn, whose head was turning constantly as he watched for a Kottermani ambush as well as a likely way out of here.
“I think this one,” he pointed to a ship that sat by itself at the end of a long jetty, one lined with a variety of sacks and barrels.
“Then we take it,” Bridgit said. She did not go down the jetty, instead encouraging the others as they ran past.
“Grab a sack, take it on board,” she advised those going past. “Let the children walk now but if you see food, take it with us.”
Some ignored her, just seeking to get on board the ship as fast as possible, while others stopped to lift up some of the sacks. Bridgit hoped there was food inside them. Getting out of the harbor only to starve to death at sea seemed like a horrible finish to their hopes.
There was no sound of alarm, no warning horns or anything but surely that had to end soon. She could barely believe they were this disorganized. Surely the relief guards had to have arrived at the house by now and discovered their slaughtered comrades.
But there was no sign of angry pursuit and she stopped Dermot and his remaining healthy men.
“I need you to come with me to take out those bows, or they will slaughter our people,” she announced.
Blaine and Carrick had vanished onto the ship and she waved at them up on the deck.
“Help here!” she shouted but they ignored her.
She swore under her breath but there was no time to do more than that.
“Seven of you with me. The rest of you, carry everything you can on board that ship and help Ahearn get it under way,” she ordered.
Dermot and six others followed her as she left the jetty and ran around the dock wall, towards where the giant bows waited ominously. There did not seem to be anyone near them but she shuddered to think of the havoc they could inflict.
The ship was going to take some time to get away from the jetty. The sails had to be raised and it needed to be pushed away from the jetty, perhaps even towed out by a rowboat or two. Hopefully they could get back by then. If not, it would be a case of jumping into the harbor and trying to get into one of those rowboats – or clamber up a rope onto the ship itself. Neither prospect appealed.
There were no Kottermanis on the harbor wall, for which she was hugely grateful, and they raced around to where the first bow waited, like a barbed bird of prey. She glanced across at the ship and could see the frantic activity on the deck. Women and the older children were dragging sacks up onto the deck, while others seemed to be wrestling a handful of goats on board. The men, meanwhile, were launching a pair of rowboats at the front, or clambering up the masts and slowly unfurling sails.
