To the priests, this seemed to give them an advantage; to the overman, it was a petty annoyance. Keeping his dagger in his left hand, he reached up with his right, and closed it on the would-be strangler's throat. As the man tried to pull his rope taut, Garth's grip tightened, digging in with both the thumbs on his right hand.
He misjudged the strength of the man's neck; there was a loud crack, and the priest tumbled from his back, eyes already glazing over. As he fell, his head struck the edge of the granite altar with another, similar crack of breaking bone. There could be no doubt that he was dead.
The remaining priest froze; he was facing the wall of flares, so that the lower half of his face was visible despite his overhanging cowl, and as Garth watched his mouth fell open and the blood drained from his jaw. The dagger and whip dropped from shaking fingers.
"Girl! Get them!" Garth's voice was sharp, and the girl hastened to obey; she had been watching the fight, and any thought of failing to cooperate with her saviour-or new captor; she was as yet unsure which Garth actually was-had vanished. She hurried around the end of the altar, ignoring the effect of the rough floor on her bare feet, and snatched up the weapons. The lone conscious priest stepped back out of her way without protest.
"Go wait on the steps. And," he added in a bellow, "any who hinders her will die!" Again the girl obeyed immediately, and the worshippers made no move to stop her. Garth followed her at a more leisurely pace, pausing to pick up his sword hilt from in front of the altar.
At the top of the steps he sheathed his dagger and picked up the sack of coins he had deposited there upon entering; he paused, considering, and glanced at the girl's feet. They were bleeding, and the obsidian courtyard was far worse than the shattered flagstones of the temple. He handed her the sack, telling her to hold it; she accepted it and nearly dropped it, astonished at its weight. He then put his arm around her middle and picked her up, dagger, whip, gold and all. After some adjustment he found a position that was fairly comfortable for both of them, though he suspected his mail was scratching her bare skin more than she cared to admit, and strode down the steps out of sight of the worshippers of Sai, who had silently watched the entire proceeding, without making a move in his direction.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The door and gates were still open, which was gratifying; he was heartily tired of portals that closed themselves. With the added weight of the girl on his shoulder, the jagged obsidian cut even deeper into the soles of his boots. When he finally stepped out onto the pavement of the Street of the Temples, he could feel that one puncture had gone clear through and, although his foot was not bleeding, the boot was plainly ruined. He sighed. The whole escapade in the temple of Sai had been a satisfactory way of working off his rage, leaving him reasonably calm, but it was sure to have unpleasant repercussions and results, of which ruined boots were only the first and least.
Adventuring seemed to be hard on feet and footwear; his first errand for the Forgotten King had destroyed a good pair of boots and various makeshift replacements and given him an assortment of burns, cuts, and blisters.
He found the street he had followed before and turned off the Street of the Temples, heading for the Inn of the Seven Stars. When he was out of sight of the avenue and presumably reasonably safe from immediate pursuit, he sheathed the stump of his sword and lifted the girl down off his shoulder. There was no reason to wear himself out carrying her; she should be able to walk well enough. Besides, it would be difficult to converse while carrying her, and he had several questions.
She seemed glad enough to be on her feet again; she brushed herself off slightly, making small yelps of pain whenever her hands accidentally disturbed the blood clotting on the dozens of cuts that crisscrossed her belly and breasts. She looked with dismay at the wounds, and at the reddish smudges left by Garth's hands, which were still damp with the blood of the various victims of the cult of Aghad. Garth guessed that the cuts must be very painful, though she did not whimper or complain, but stood, waiting for him to speak.
"Follow me; we are going to my inn."
She nodded, but hesitated.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
"My lord, I am naked." This was obvious, of course, but Garth had given it no thought.
"Is that bad?"
"It…it is not proper. I cannot walk the streets naked."
Garth sighed. "You will have to; I have no spare garments with me."
"But everyone will stare!"
Although not out of any concern for her modesty, he found that argument was the most effective she could have used; Garth did not want to draw attention to himself. Although he had thought he was safe from recognition by the followers of Tema or Andhur Regvos, the Aghadites knew that he was responsible for the desecrations of both those temples as well as their own, and he had made a public display of himself just now in the temple of Sai. If he maintained a casual manner and walked the streets openly, he doubted that most Dыsarrans would pay any attention to him; they hadn't done so previously. However, if an unclothed female was sufficiently unusual to attract stares, he could not afford to be seen with one. Someone might well point him out to Aghadites or followers of Sai who might otherwise have missed him.
Accordingly, he removed his belt, peeled off his suit of mail, and began untying the gambeson underneath. He stopped abruptly when he noticed the girl backing away apprehensively.
"What's wrong with you? I'm just going to give you this to wear; I have nothing else available."
"Oh!" The girl calmed visibly; Garth stripped off the quilted garment and handed it to her, standing uncomfortably in little but his soft leather breeches and natural coat of thin black fur. She accepted it, but then stood motionless, watching Garth don his armor once more.
He looked at her, wondering why she was just standing there.
She burst out, "You're furry!"
"You're not," he replied. "Put on the gambeson; this night air is cool."
"Oh!" she exclaimed again. Flushing slightly, she managed to pull the oversized padded shirt over her head; Garth noticed that she winced in pain as she worked it down over her body, and realized that it must be rubbing against the cuts inflicted by the sacrificial dagger. It must be horribly painful and irritating, yet she gave only a single quiet squeak, then began struggling with the ties at either side intended to keep the garment tight on the wearer's body. The lower hem, which came to slightly below Garth's waist, reached her knees; it not only covered her nakedness, but completely hid the cuts, which was doubtless all to the good if it didn't hurt her too much.
When she had the gambeson arranged as best she could manage, she asked, "Are all overmen furry?"
Garth, still struggling to get the mail settled comfortably, took his time about answering and limited his reply to, "Yes."
When he had the iron links arranged so that they did not scratch or chafe intolerably, he turned his attention to the girl. It was fortunate, he thought, that he had had his armor and accoutrements dyed or painted black, to decrease visibility. The gambeson's quilting did not show in the dim light, where it might have in a lighter-hued fabric. From a distance one might well mistake it for more ordinary attire-if not for the fact that it only reached the girl's knees. Still, it was better than nothing. He picked up the dagger and whip, stuffed them in the sack with the gold, and swung it over his shoulder.
"Good. Come on."
The girl obeyed, as he led the way back toward the Inn of the Seven Stars. He kept to the shadows and back alleys as much as possible and looped around the marketplace, giving it a wide berth. These tactics were fairly successful; the few passersby they encountered gave them no more than a passing glance.
This journey was hard on Garth's nerves; he kept expecting to hear someone shouting out the presence of the wanted thief and committer of sacrilege. Eventually, however, the pair reached the inn without being accosted, and crept through the archway into the stable. Dugger the stable-boy was still on duty; Garth motioned fo
r him to be silent, and he assented with a grin and a nod.
Koros was curled up asleep but still occupied most of his stall, which had been designed with smaller animals in mind. Garth stepped in and settled comfortably on the straw on the other side, beside his supplies and the concealed loot from his first two thefts; with only a slight hesitation the girl obeyed his gesture and sat down beside him. He found a sponge in his pack, wetted it with water from one of his canteens-he would have to fill them soon-and said, "Get that thing off so I can clean your wounds."
She obeyed, untying the gambeson and pulling it over her head; despite the delicacy she displayed in this, Garth saw that several of the cuts beneath had been rubbed raw by the garment and were bleeding anew. He began washing away the blood and dirt as gently as he could but she still twitched away occasionally when the contact of water or the pressure of his hand stung her.
As he attended to this task he asked, "Now, girl, who are you?"
"My name is Frima." The girl's voice was high, but not unpleasant; she spoke timidly.
"Are you Dыsarran?"
"Yes, of course!"
"How did you come to be a sacrifice to Sai? Are you one of her devotees?"
"Oh, no! I worship Tema. The priests of Sai kidnapped me from my father's shop last night."
"How is it that the ceremony was being held at that hour? I had heard that only the cults of Tema and Andhur Regvos lived by night."
"That's right; that's why the sacrifices to Sai are-ow!-always at night."
"I do not understand"
"The cult of Sai is secret; its members do not-ooh!-do not admit their allegiance. Therefore, they hold all their ceremonies at night, when-ooh!-when the darkness provides cover, and when they will not be missed from their daytime occupations."
"Are the other cults equally secretive?"
"The day-dwelling cults are, yes. Ouch. That's part of why the night-dwellers avoid them; would you want to associate with someone who worships pain-ow! Damn them!-or disease? It is said that many of the day-dwellers worship no gods at all, but that's not much better, and there is no way of knowing which are which."
Garth finished his cleaning, and rummaged in his pack for the pouch of healing herbs he carried. "Your city has a very complicated way of life. Are kidnappings such as yours common?" He located the herbs, and worked some into the sponge.
"Oh, yes; people disappear all the time."
"Your overlord allows this?" He began rubbing the herbs gently along each cut; the girl cooperated by remaining as still as she could while she answered.
"There is nothing he can do. The bodies are never found, and there is no way of knowing which cult is responsible."
"Then why does he not destroy all those cults that practice human sacrifice?"
"Oh, that must never happen! The gods themselves have chosen Dыsarra; the Dark Gods must have temples here, or there would be a great disaster! Besides, nobody knows which cults have human sacrifices and which don't."
"It would seem obvious," Garth said as he finished spreading on the healing compound, "that the cult of The God Whose Name Is Not Spoken must practice human sacrifice; cannot the overlord at least destroy that one? I have noticed that even in Dыsarra most people want nothing to do with that god."
"There is no cult to destroy; no one worships the Final God but a single old priest. The god himself calls sacrifices to his temple, and no one who has entered the shrine has ever been seen again, except the priest. No one knows what is inside; no traces are ever found. No clothing, no bodies. Whenever a Dыsarran wishes to die, for whatever reason, he merely goes to the god's temple, and when the god is not satisfied with the number of suicides, he turns men mad, so they go to the temple without knowing what they are doing. The overlord would not dare to harm the priest or the temple, for then he himself might be called."
Garth made no further comment on the subject; instead, he said, "I am afraid I cannot properly bandage your wounds; they are too many, and I have not the necessary cloth. I hope they will not trouble you" He sat back to consider his situation, and the information Frima had just given him.
Frima, hesitantly, asked a question of her own. "Who are you? Why did you rescue me?"
"I am Garth of Ordunin, and I came to Dыsarra to steal whatever I found on the seven altars. You were on the altar of Sai, so I am stealing you, and will take you back to Skelleth with me."
"Are you going to ravish me?"
Garth looked at her in surprise. The question explained her behavior when he had stripped off his gambeson for her use, but the ignorance it implied was startling. "I couldn't if I wanted to. We are different species, as different as Koros, here, and an alley cat. Overmen take no interest in anything but overwomen."
"Oh." He was unable to see her blush in the darkness, and would not have understood its significance if he had.
"I am taking you to Skelleth because you were on the altar of Sai; I have no other interest in you." He wondered if her sexual expectations were justified by her appearance; she seemed fairly clean and healthy, with little excess fat but no bones showing, but beyond that he had no more idea of whether she was attractive than a bull would have. Overwomen were as noseless, flat-chested and furry as himself; they relied on scent for stimulation, not appearance, and Frima held no more interest for him than any other animal. He supposed men would like her, although her chest seemed rather overdone even for a human.
She was silent for a few seconds, and then burst out, "I don't want to go to Skelleth! Besides, if you're from Ordunin, why are you taking me somewhere else? And where is Ordunin, anyway? And Skelleth?"
"Ordunin is in the Northern Waste. Skelleth is in Eramma. I have undertaken this task for someone who dwells in Skelleth. I care very little whether you want to go or not, and I suggest you not argue. It was not specified that I bring you back alive." Garth was not seriously annoyed, but merely wanted quiet to think in and spoke harshly to silence the girl. His ploy succeeded; Frima shut up and shrank back into the straw. He had not intended to kill any of the followers of Sai, though he was repulsed by the use of torture and human sacrifice; he hoped the high priest, scum that he was, survived. He regretted snapping the other priest's neck, not so much out of respect for the life lost as because it would undoubtedly please the cult of Aghad. It had been inevitable, though; he had been attacked, and had responded appropriately. Besides, the man's death had cowed the others very nicely.
He had plundered four of the seven altars; three remained, two of them on the Street of the Temples. The robberies of the temples of Tema and Andhur Regvos had not gone particularly well, but would produce no definite identifications; on the other hand, several devotees of Sai and Aghad now knew him on sight, and the Aghadites knew his name as well. Frima claimed that both cults were secret societies, and presumably would not therefore spread their information about, but on the other hand might well try to dispose of him themselves.
This whole affair was getting very complicated.
He had intended to use his room in the inn in the normal manner and sleep in a comfortable bed; he had not done so previously only because he had collapsed from fatigue before he made it that far. However, now that he was definitely a hunted fugitive, even if not readily identifiable to all his pursuers, he decided that that would be a mistake. He would remain here in this stable. It was uncomfortable and uncivilized, but it was where Koros was, and where his loot and his weapons were. No one would be able to sneak up on him while he was guarded by the warbeast. Furthermore, although a siege might be effective, no frontal assault here would be able to defeat both him and his beast; it would be impossible to pour men into the stall in large enough numbers. He knew, with neither false modesty nor overconfidence, that he was capable of handling at least three human warriors at once, and that Koros could deal with twice that number. In a room at the inn, half a dozen men might slip in and kill him; in the stable, with the warbeast beside him, those same men wouldn't have a chance.
Not only that, but by keeping Frima here he avoided any inconvenient questions as to what a human female was doing with an overman-quite aside from her attire.
That reminded him of her current state of undress; he recalled that somewhere in his bundle of supplies he had a spare tunic, intended for social occasions, that would doubtless serve her better than his gambeson. Even should she fail to appreciate it, at the very least he would have padding for his mail once more; it was digging ferociously into his back where he leaned against the wall of the stall.
He reached for his bundle of supplies, and discovered that he could no longer see it; the moon was down, having sunk beneath the horizon while he mused, and the dawn was still an hour or two away. He reached for his flint and steel, only to be reminded by their absence that he had surrendered them to the priests of Andhur Regvos.
Well, the inn would have lanterns, or torches, or some form of portable illumination. "Wait here," he ordered the girl, as he stepped out of the stall.
There was very slightly more light in the stableyard than in the stall, a peculiar reddish light. He looked up, wondering why starlight should be such a color, and discovered that no stars were visible. Clouds had blown up out of the east, and most of the sky was overcast; the reddish glow was the reflected fires of the active volcanoes and the city's torchlit market. The strip of clear sky to the west narrowed as he watched, a vanishing black gap between the stable wall and the encroaching red-gray clouds.
He shrugged. A little rain never hurt anyone. He strode out the arch to the tavern adjoining.
The taproom was not crowded; half a dozen dark-robed customers sat scattered about among the tables. There was no sign of the two serving maids or their brother, but only a middle-aged woman of unhealthy appearance, carrying away empty mugs and replacing them with full ones.
"Ho, there."
She glanced his way, but did not pause until she had dealt with her current batch of ale; that properly distributed, she wound her way through the chairs, shoving them under appropriate tables as she went, until she stood in front of the overman.
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