by Yury Nikitin
Chapter 19
The spacious hall they came to be in went dark for a moment before some lamps lit up. From the upper floor, by narrow stairs covered with an expensive carpet, a small hunched old man, in a long oriental robe painted with comets and Cabalist sigils, ran down to them hastily. He could barely keep up his head under the burden of an enormous green turban, with the ominous bloody-red light of a big ruby over his forehead and a quivering peacock feather of incredible size. “Who?” the old man shouted as he ran. “Who are you? Hey, servants!”
There was a fast footfall. Past the old man, some brawny warriors with dark brown bodies ran down. Pieces of armor were fastened with belts on their naked bodies. The warriors moved in a strange way, keeping their eyes on their master.
Thomas turned his horse aside, for the great magician to have a better view of his big half-unsheathed sword. “Wait a bit, great magician and oracle,” he said with dignity. “You’ll need your servants later. But if they make one more step, you’ll have to wash up and sweep the floor yourself! I swear it on the hooves of my destrier with whom I stormed the Tower of David!”
He heard a nervous clatter of hooves behind. The queen’s grim bodyguards backed their horses to the door in fear but found the wings closed tightly.
Disregarding the threats of the ignorant knight, the magician breathed in, raised his hands. His sharp eyes fell on the motionless barbarian in animal skin. The barbarian replied with a direct stare. For several long moments, they were in a duel invisible to others, then the magician lowered his hands slowly. “Who are you?” he said as though in sleep. “What do you want?”
Thomas heard the queen’s bodyguards gasp with one voice at the door. He straightened up in the saddle, replied firmly. “I’m a knight crusader. Even a fool can tell it by my cloak. My friend is a pilgrim from Scythian Rus’… hell’s bells, Rossian Scythia… In a word, he’s a Scyth, descendant of the extinct ancient Ruses! He’s highborn. We have an urgent need to know what’s happening now in one noble family in Britain, far away. We have gold to pay you!”
The magician shot a glance at the motionless barbarian of Hyperborea, definitely trying to fathom his strange interest in the faraway family in Britain, thought over possibilities and consequences for a while. His reply was abrupt and bitter. “Get out of my tower!”
Thomas’s hand darted to the sword hilt but unclenched helplessly the next moment. The magician bared his small yellow teeth in a malevolent grin. Everything was as he’d reckoned; the knight would do no harm to the unarmed, and the northern barbarian was only to accompany the iron-headed, not to fight instead of him.
“What about fairness?” Thomas demanded angrily. “Do magicians live in another world?”
The magician sent his servants upstairs with a casual gesture. “I leave the slave work to slaves,” he jeered. “No evil shall pass where I stand.”
“Neither it shall where we stand!”
The magician sized him up derisively. “You are just a woodcutter. I have nothing to do with wood.”
One of the sulky guards (their horses were shifting legs near the door) grew bold enough to speak in a timid voice. “O great and illustrious magician! Our city, our splendid Merefa, is plundered by cruel enemies, barbarians of desert. Wouldn’t it be better for you if the city remained in hands of the good queen?”
The magician’s eyes sparkled. He puffed, as though about to kill the insolent man with a spell, but then caught the warning look of the northern barbarian and replied through gritted teeth, “I don’t mind on which horses my firewood is brought, on bay or light brown ones. If you do, then drive the men of the desert away.”
The other bodyguard, who had his ear pressed to the door, cried out suddenly, “Barbarians came from other side! If they shatter…”
“Nothing on earth…” the magician began proudly but stopped short as he glanced at Oleg who had opened that door not long ago.
Thomas breathed fast, his chest heaved wildly. One minute he gripped the sword hilt, ready to force the magician, who was definitely no noble man, but in another, he remembered the Christian virtues, along with the magician’s being unarmed and far past the age for fighting…
Oleg listened to the barely audible shouts and clangs of steel. “Sir Thomas, we must go. We’ll be back! The great magician still thinks his tower is above the fight. Let him see it isn’t. That will make him more compliant!” He rode up to the entrance door, tucked a blade of grass into the slit. The bodyguards pulled the reins and bared their swords. The door flung open. The barbarians who were pounding on its outer iron surface recoiled in surprise.
The grim bodyguards were the first to burst out. They landed violent blows sideways, in a hurry to do as much damage as possible, their horses knocked the foes down. Oleg’s stallion made a heavy long leap out into the sunlit square. The wonderer slashed with his sword in all directions, knocking down both mounted and pedestrian soldiers in fur caps. After him, Thomas flew out like a steel demon of death; each strike of his sword clove the enemy down to the saddle. The tower door banged shut behind the knight, so they only heard the clang of steel and screams of dying men.
“Let’s get out of city!” Oleg shouted. “Or the whole bloody tribe will come here!”
When the dozen foes were reduced to a couple of men backing away, Oleg prohibited to chase them and drove his horse first, in gallop, to the eastern gate. Behind him, there was a thunder of the hooves of three horses: one heavy and two light ones. The bodyguards galloped at their heels without meddling in fights. Thomas had guessed right: the queen had commanded them only to protect the strangers.
They darted along the street as a whirlwind, their horses trampling on marauders, their swords reaching the robbers who ran across their way. Several times Thomas tried to stop and rush to the aid of the offended, but one or other of bodyguards seized the bridle of his horse and dragged him along after the Hyperborean.
The road brought them to a tall wall of white brick. The huge gate lay on the ground, the gape of it being webbed by a giant spider, even bigger than the one killed by Thomas. Another spider of the same size gorged itself on the dead and wounded men who lay around the broken gate in scores. There had been fierce fighting.
Three furry-capped warriors were shifting the corpses. They kept away from the spider’s long legs, jumped aside in fear should the vampire drop a drained body and reach for the next one. They were filling their big sacks with adornments, rings and earrings, pouches of coins.
Thomas nodded at the marauders. “Will you do them?” he asked the bodyguards. “And the insects are ours. As a child, I hated spiders!”
“You just hated them,” Oleg said angrily, “but I was afraid of them!”
They drove the horses in a gallop again. Thomas, with his faithful lance under his arm, rushed to the corpse eater, while Oleg rode up to the giant webbing the breach in the city wall. The spider was as large as a fat bull, not to mention its enormous legs, each the size of a log – but an easily bent hairy log, with knife-sharp thorns hidden in the thick hair. Each of the eight legs ended with the sinister curve of a long claw, which resembled a Persian khanjal, though a too curved one.
The huge hairy belly had four twitching pipes that looked like goose necks, set close to each other, dripping with saliva-like liquid, setting at once and making a viscid glue. The spider pulled it out with two legs, twisted it into a single rope, as thick as a ship’s one, hooked it up to the stone slabs hastily, ran aside, stretching the thread, and hung it on the other side of the opening. The rope had sticky sparkling drops on it; the spider would put those all over its web, in a step interval. Should the thread be sticky all over, Oleg thought involuntarily, as the ignorant common folk think it is, the spider would not be able to run on his web: he’d get stuck himself!
He pulled out the knife, sawed the load-bearing thread with difficulty; it was the thickest, framing one. It’s easier to saw silk, he thought gloomily, hemp, or even a rope of iron threads! A cobweb is hundred times
that tight. One could hang the whole city of Merefa, with its walls, towers, palaces, and kennels, on this single rope!
The spider dashed about, as it felt something wrong. Faster, Oleg cut the remaining three ropes. The construction collapsed, blocking the gap with a grey tangle of cobwebs, with sticky beads gleaming on it very close between. The spider darted up to its web. Oleg made several steps aside, stopped dead. The spider started shoveling the silvery ropes up to itself, the forelegs tucked them, in disorder and hurry, into the mouth breathing out hot stench. The insect almost choked but kept swallowing its precious thread. Its dark unblinking eyes were fixed at Oleg but the wonderer did not stir; as a sorcerer, he knew that spiders can barely distinguish light from dark and even the most sharp-sighted ones of their kind are unable to see farther than their noses.
Behind Oleg, there were still crashes, shrieks, grinding of steel, neighs of scared horses, clanks of swords. He did not look back. He waited till the spider had picked the last thread, thrust it into its jaws and went backing along the city wall. Eight dark eyes on the top of its hairy head seemed to be looking in all directions. Oleg gave promised himself that some time he would find out what purpose those huge eyes served. They see not a damned thing, but still each new generation of spiders comes into the world with them, again and again!
Finally, the spider got away to find another crack. Oleg turned his face to the fight. The knight had landed such a mighty blow that it had pierced the other spider through, but also threw Thomas into its hairy legs. The agonizing creature gripped him with all eight of them, rumpled, tucked into the monstrous mandibles, trying to crack the steel shell of armor. Bathed in sticky saliva, Thomas struggled out, keeping his limbs pressed his the body, lest the spider break them away. His empty-saddled horse had run aside and stood there, crouching, shaking all over.
The bodyguards had killed two marauders. The third one was backing up, trying to parry their blows. One grim warrior left him to his friend, ran up to the spider, struck it on the lower, weight-bearing leg with all his might. The blade cut a sinew. The leg gave way, some viscous whitish blood came out. The spider flinched, dropped Thomas. With a terrible thunder, the knight collapsed on the stones. The shaggy carcass of the spider fell noiselessly on top of him.
The three men tried to drag the monster away, but it seemed to be stuck to the ground, pressing down the motionless knight. One guard fetched both heavy horses, the knight’s and the pilgrim’s, belted a spider’s leg round and drove the horses away, brandishing his sword. The other one stood with bare sword in the middle of the alley, shielding the spider and the knight; some barbarians had emerged at a distance.
They managed to shift the spider a bit. Oleg reached Thomas’s leg, pulled him out. The steel armor ground on the cobblestones, leaving deep scratches. Together they lifted the stunned knight on to the horse’s back. The bodyguard hugged his shoulders, got soiled with sticky yellow saliva and whitish blood at once, and they rode out through the gape, now free of cobwebs.
They saw a big party of barbarians riding towards them. About a hundred furry-capped warriors. With a heavy sigh, Oleg took the bow, put an arrow on. One guard bared his sword, clasped the reins. The other one who supported Thomas cried suddenly, “Tilak! Waiting for us!”
They saw red-cloaked soldiers, also about a hundred, rushing to them at full tilt from the crest of the hill. The first was Tilak, with his plain face and predatory glitter of sword in hand. He seemed to have not only his score of men, but also the warriors who’d been keeping a perimeter defense of the palace square under the command of Att.
The barbarians slowed down, then pulled up. They had no wish to meddle in a bloody and fierce fight with desperate men, professional warriors who had no valuable possessions, while a wealthy unprotected city lay close at hand, just behind the broken gate.
The four men rode slowly (because of Thomas swaying in his saddle) to meet Tilak. He had his galloping party stop, raised his sword in a greeting. “Thank gods! You’re alive. How’s the city?”
“You saw it,” the guard who supported Thomas replied grimly. “Men of the desert brought monstrous spiders with them. These creatures devour people dead and alive, spread panic and terror. The city is plundered. Where’s Att?”
“He died, shielding me with his own body.”
“The inter-clan enmity forgotten?”
“Yes. But the price was terrible.”
Tilak’s men surrounded them. The close group rode away from the city, waded a small river, ascended into a narrow valley between green hills. The green place was red with cloaks; lots of warriors, wounded or dog-tired, lay in a sparse oak grove and around it. Their horses grazed aside. Women bustled among the soldiers, carrying jugs, helping healers to dress wounds. Fires were blazing high, water boiled over them in sooty cauldrons.
Near the grove, there stood a tent of yellow silk. A small red flag on top was trembling under the blowing of the wind. Around the tent, exhausted warriors sat straight on the grass but their swords lay close at hand. At the sight of galloping riders, several men rose up and barred the entrance into the tent. They moved in no hurry, as they saw red cloaks on the newcomers and the first rider was Tilak, known to many if not all soldiers.
The heavy trample of several hundred hooves must have been heard inside the tent, as Isosnezhda, the golden-haired queen, came quickly out of it. She had washed her face and put her hair in order, but her blue eyes were still blazing with fury.
Tilak dismounted first, gave her a low bow. “My queen! We fought as hard as we could. If not for these Franks, I’d have stayed in the city. Due to them, we took out even Att’s men who fought in the square!”
Isosnezhda turned her eyes on the bodyguards. Both of them kept beside Thomas, though he was sitting in the saddle firmly by that time. On his left arm, he had a gleaming shield with his coat of arms, and a giant lance, formidable with its size, was swaying in his right hand. One guard rode ahead and bowed. “My queen! The Franks have been to the captured city. They even broke – we’d never have believed it! – into the tower of the great magician! They also slew the monsters whom the men of the desert brought.”
Thomas coughed with confusion and interfered. “There’s little honor in breaking into a helpless old man’s place. And the monsters… I doubt whether you mock me. In my country, any servant can kill spiders with his broom. Those were your warriors who fought bravely, Your Majesty!”
The riders who had come with him were dismounting, leading their horses away. They glanced at the mighty knight, due to whom they broke out of the city, with fear and respect.
“They took us aback!” Isosnezhda said in fury. “We had only a small force in the city.”
“If there are more hosts,” Thomas spoke slowly, with his admired eyes glued on the golden-haired queen, “it would be a good idea to send for them.” He dismounted. Young boys came running to him, helped to take off the heavy armor, which was caked in the blood of others and the spider saliva and slime.
Oleg found a stream and got into the cold water. He bathed, hooting with delight, splashed himself with water from cupped hands, as though afraid of drowning.
Isosnezhda took a quick counsel with Tilak, then came up to Thomas. “Sir, I see you are not only a brave warrior, but also versed in strategy. I have big groups of my trustworthy hosts on the border of my kingdom. It’s two days’ journey from here.”
Thomas shook his head. “Too long. As soon as tomorrow, the barbarians will put a strong guard on the gate and have common men walling in the breaches. We need to attack now! While their battle fever is down, while they are dispersed, robbing, raping, and drunken. I saw them breaking into a storehouse of wine. They are no fierce host anymore but drunken robbers! But tomorrow they’ll turn warriors again.”
The queen cast a glance at the green valley. There were three hundred warriors but hardly twenty men up on their feet, the rest were sprawled in the grass with exhaustion. A third of them were suffering from woun
ds they’d not noticed in the heat of the battle. “I would go with you!” she said bitterly. “But look at my men!”
Thomas shifted his feet as he glanced the grove and the valley over. Only the greatest stayers were coming to the fires and trying to eat, but even their faces expressed despair and submission to the doom. The rest lay with their arms spread, too weak to talk or even to take their armor off.
“Tomorrow we won’t have such a good chance,” Thomas reminded her. He bent his knee slowly. Isosnezhda came closer. Even kneeling, the knight was almost as tall as the young queen. He felt the warmth emitted by her body. Her blue eyes were large and begging, her golden hair seemed to have a brighter gleam than her crown with all its jewels. “My sword is at your service, Your Majesty!”
She touched his broad shoulder with her gentle hand. His thick knitted sweater was wringing wet and smelled of strong male sweat. Her thin pale fingers lingered for a while. On their way back, they touched Thomas’s cheek, leaving a red trace, then his cheek flushed all over, then his face, even his neck went crimson. Isosnezhda felt her own cheeks and ears glowing too. Fortunately, the latter were hidden by hair.
“Stand up, valiant Northman,” she said in a different voice, doing her best to pull herself together. “The help offered by a hero is a great honor to me, a weak and helpless woman. You are right. I’ll speak to my warriors!”
Thomas stood up, his broad shoulders hanging over her. He seemed as huge as a rock, his blue eyes went dark. “Let me speak to them myself,” he asked hoarsely.
Three more riders came into the valley by the road from city. Two of them supported the third one who was bandaged hastily and spattered with blood. All the three had plates of their armor cut and bent. One had a broken arrow stuck in shoulder, but he kept supporting his friend.
Others ran to meet them, helped them to dismount. “What’s in the city?” Isosnezhda asked quickly.
“No more men of ours,” one of the newcomers replied. “Pillage everywhere. They break houses, searching for gold, destroy temples. They took chasubles from the Christian church, tore golden settings off the icons. A score of barbarians, with their chieftain at the head, stormed into the magic tower.”
Thomas heard it, came running with a terrible shout. “What? The tower?!”
The wounded men were laid down on the ground. Women wiped their blood hastily with wet cloths. “They’ll destroy it,” the warrior replied gloomily. “Someone set a rumor there’s treasure in basement. A big mob gathered. With picks, crowbars… Who would think the magic tower could be captured?”
Thomas groaned bitterly. Isosnezhda looked at his blackened face with sympathy, touched his breast tenderly. “Thank you for your compassion, mighty warrior.”
Oleg came, jolly and wet like a seal, with his hair plastered to his forehead. “The magician isn’t dead still!” he said cheerfully from a distance. “While they believe he hides a treasure, they won’t kill him. They’ll only shake him a bit. And the fool will finally see the difference between us and those barbarians!”
Thomas shook his head with disapproval. “Sir wonderer, we should rescue the old man. It’s cruel to leave the old to desecration.”
Oleg hemmed. He looked at the knight, then at the queen. She blushed under his gaze but raised her small nose with pride and straightened up, though her back was straight before. “And save the kingdom while we’re about it?” he asked Thomas. “Oh, Thomas, a good knight of Christ’s host… A knight of Anglic dream! All right, but you see to everyone having a rest and a hearty meal. Meanwhile, those in the city will get drunk enough to crawl on their fours…”
The queen looked at him with disgust. “You are a companion of the noble knight. Otherwise, I would not tolerate your abominable words. Men will take a rest if they can but any food will stick in their throats! Back in the city, their families are dying!”
“That will make them angrier,” Oleg said sadly.
The sun touched the tops of distant hills when Isosnezhda, on her white horse, rode into the middle of the camp. The filly shifted her chiseled legs nervously. Isosnezhda raised her hand. The wide sleeve slipped down, baring the white skin, never exposed to direct sunlight. “Warriors of glorious Merefa! Our beautiful city is taken by foes. If we retreat, we shall have no future. Now our families are destroyed, our beloved raped, our children thrown into the fire! There will be no more Merefans if we leave. All of us will be chased like wild beasts. We shall die all, perish with no fame. But the gods heard us. They sent two great warriors to our aid. Though both are Franks, as you see, even their far North can sometimes, at the will of gods, birth heroes to serve our great nation! These two Franks have slain two monsters and drove away the third one. They will lead us for the battle if we find enough strength to follow them!”
Thomas towered on his huge black stallion, like an iron mountain riding a stone one. He jerked up his arm that looked like an iron-bound log for knocking castle gates away. “Warriors of Merefa!” he roared in a thunderous voice. “I speak as a professional warrior, a veteran of many battles. Believe my great experience: the best time for attack is now! Their bellies are heavy with food, their minds befuddled with wine, and instead of swords, they carry bags of plunder along, as they can’t trust each other. They are dispersed in the city: the biggest parties number no more than five or six men, as that’s enough to break the strongest gate. Though their total number is much larger than ours, we Franks win wars not by numbers but by skill. I advise you to try it too.”
Three hundred warriors volunteered to go with the iron knight, whose superiority was recognized unreservedly even by Tilak and other generals. Determined to win or die, the party burst into the city through the broken gate. Just as Thomas had predicted, there were no guards on the gate, nor in the streets. Dead bodies were everywhere. Narrow streets and alleys were encumbered with furniture and dishes thrown out of the windows. In some places they saw houses on fire, heard terrible howls of dogs. Sometimes they bumped into barbarians loaded with loot and slashed them on the go. Thomas was leading his party to the palace.
At full tilt, shaking the earth and the city with the thunder of their hooves, they rushed to the palace square. Drunken, befuddled barbarians started to drop out of the houses. Those who got in the way of the galloping party fell down, with their heads cleaved, or simply trampled by hooves; the knight did not allow them to stop and muddle in fights.
Thomas galloped at the head, bending to the stallion’s neck, his long lance looking for prey. Two grim guards rushed after him, glancing at the mighty Frank without their former aversion. He slew monstrous spiders, killed many barbarians and was now leading Merefans to save their own city!
A short skirmish broke out at the entrance to the square; they bumped into a small party of newcomer barbarians. Thomas left some of his soldiers to the fight and galloped to the palace with the rest.
One guard cried out, pointed at the windows with anger. Thomas saw human figures darting there above; only few had the furry caps of barbarians on. “The treasurer?” he asked quickly.
“In person,” the guard uttered fiercely. The knuckles of his fingers gripping the sword hilt went white. “And his traitors!”
“He’s yours,” Thomas allowed. “Tilak, surround the palace! Let no bloody dog slip out.”
The warriors dashed into the wide-open gate with blood-curdling screams, galloped ahorse up the broad marble stairs. In a brief fight at the door, they crushed the defenders and burst in.
Thomas followed the red cloaks with approving eyes. “They went wild. Good! And I thought no people in the world were as strong as we, Angles… Do you think they’ll cope?”
Oleg moved his shoulders. “I always thought so.”
“Oh, sir wonderer,” Thomas said, upset.
At once, they turned their horses and rode by a narrow street to a smaller square, with the skyscraping magic tower on its edge. “Can you open the gate again?” Thomas asked tensely.
“It’s easier n
ow,” Oleg assured him.
Thomas looked into the wonderer’s tranquil face with suspicion. “Why? Do you have stronger herbs?”
“No. The tower has no gate anymore.”
At full tilt, they stormed into the tower through the gap. Steel horseshoes rang against the broken iron door. On the stone floor inside, the clatter became dry and muffled. The furniture had been reduced to scorched splinters, the walls speared through in search of hidings. There was a strong smell of burning. The magician’s servants lay dead on the stairs.
Thomas vaulted off his horse and ran upstairs. His iron soles banged on the floor, he breathed heavily and swore. Oleg also left his horse, rushed after the iron champion of justice. Three barbarians dashed towards them. Thomas was ready. He slew two of them with mighty blows, and the third fell with a knife hilt in his eye. Thomas jumped over him, darted into the room. Oleg pulled the knife out of the bloody socket, wiped it thoroughly, tucked it into the cover as he went. The sword was dangling on his back, reminding him importunately of itself, but Oleg hoped he would not have to unsheathe it soon.
The strange room probably belonged to the magician. It was crammed with magic things, the floor strewn with pieces of broken glass and crockery, scraps of clothes and old books and manuscripts. The naked magician was crucified violently on the wooden wall. His wrinkled senile body bore huge swollen blisters and black charred places where his flesh had been burnt with hot iron.
Thomas hastened to cut the bindings and put the magician carefully down onto the bed. Oleg covered the old man’s tortured body sympathetically with a cloak bearing comets and Cabalist sigils. “Do you hear me, magician?” Thomas called insistently. “It’s we again! Franks!”
The magician’s eyelids flickered but his eyes remained closed. “The same… I tell… nothing…” his dry lips whispered.
“We are friends!” Thomas cried more loudly. “We don’t need your dribbling treasures! Even those in the base of your tower!”
Oleg came out onto the observation desk, shouted from there, “Tell him we drove away the enemies! Those who were roasting him like a quail!”
The magician listened. “Foes still in city…” he said in a faint voice. “I feel… Drive them away, then…”
“Fool!” Thomas yelled in a helpless fury. “This is your gratitude?”
The magician opened his eyes, senile and lackluster, with effort, whispered in a choking voice, “You can torment me, burn, tear with pincers… I say… nothing…”
Thomas clenched his fists, gritted his teeth. His eyes narrowed till they turned into slits flashing with blue streaks of lightning. Suddenly, a wide palm fell on his shoulder, a mighty voice roared in his very ear, “Let’s go! The old man takes stubbornness for persistence. Worse, he takes it for being steadfast. Let’s get back to the sub… to our soldiers.”
“He’s a magician!” Thomas cried in angry astonishment. “Why doesn’t he understand?”
“A magician. So what? A skill to make spells does not make one smart or kind. Or simply good!”
Oleg pulled the furious knight out into the hall downstairs, where their frightened horses strolled among the broken furniture. Thomas took a running jump into the saddle, imitating Oleg. His stallion reeled, moved his legs apart.
Shoulder to shoulder, they galloped out of the tower and across the evening square. On the far side of it, some houses were blazing, crimson smoke went high into the darkening sky where the first stars had emerged. Shouts and the clang of steel were heard from the palace.
A crowd of drunken barbarians was coming towards them from the plundered market. They made much noise, cried out wild songs. Many of them carried sacks or were dripping with necklaces they’d torn off women, small pockets in their wide belts filled to bursting with coins. At the sight of two huge riders, the robbers who walked ahead got sober in a flash, their hands gripped their saber hilts.
“A timely meeting,” Thomas gasped out with great relief. “Without it, I’d have exploded with rage!”
Oleg sighed, looked at the enraged knight askance with his sad green eye, adjusted his quiver with a move of the shoulder: that put the feathered ends of arrows just beneath his fingertips. He hated to kill even animals and birds but had to send sharp iron into live men.
With a roar of fury, Thomas burst into the middle of the crowd, trampling over the first rows. His long sword glittered scarily in the glow of fires, red with both the fires and fresh blood. The barbarians surrounded him, screaming wildly. Thomas cleared the space around himself with three violent blows, flung his stallion ahead, leaving the slashed corpses behind. He roared with laughter, his destrier snorted, knocked with hooves, kicked and bit, as though infected with the rage of his rider.
Thrice Oleg drew the bowstring, but Thomas slashed with such a fury that barbarians crumbled like wooden chips. The darts they threw from a distance slid on his armor with no harm done. An arrow hit it with a ringing click, broke into splinters. Paying no heed to saber blows, Thomas spun in the saddle, as though on hot coals, his sword seemed to slice in all directions at once. The air was full with rattles, shouts interrupted on half a sigh, and the terrible crunch of crushed bones.
