by Andre Norton
One had to be sparing of ammunition, using it only when it would be to the overwhelming advantage for either attack or defense. Dedan considered the cases of ammunition his main treasure. In an attack the mercenaries relied first on the swords. Thus all of the men Ramsay watched in practice were, he admitted, deadly foemen with what was in his own world an archaic weapon.
Without the use of sails or other visible aids, the coaster headed steadily north. At intervals the vessel seemed close to complete submergence. Ramsay speculated as to whether that stub of pillar in the midst of the ship was not the source of the mysterious energy that kept them going. Another vestige of the earlier and vanished civilization?
Ramsay had to be careful about questions. To display too much ignorance would be dangerous. He listened as men talked, attempted from scraps and pieces to build up for himself a more concrete idea of this world.
Descriptions of certain portions of the land, especially to the northeast bordering on Tolcarne, suggested that an atomic disaster had occurred during the ancient conflict. These man-made deserts were deadly, though some strange mutant races were reported to be living along the sea coast even within the fringe of that avoided area. Similar deserts existed to the east and had taken a large portion of the continent which now held Ulad, Olyroun, and two other nations. The people now living in these “clean” sections had a recorded history of having moved up slowly from the south.
Their ancestors had been wandering tribal barbarians when they had re-peopled the land. However, contact with the Enlightened Ones had brought about a radical change in their nomadic lives. They had settled and started to build anew, but their legacy of tribal custom led them to develop as feudal states often at war with one another.
Within three generations, Ulad had united some twenty of such small antagonistic kingdoms, duchies, and lordships, and now ambitiously proclaimed itself an empire. To the north Olyroun remained free. Along the coast, still farther north, buffers between the culturally advancing south and the awesome merchants who dealt in bits and pieces of forgotten technical lore, were the islands of Lynark, which were the present seat of a loose confederation of dedicated pirates. Nearby, on the mainland, was Zagova, whose people were adept workers in metal and allied with the merchants of arms.
Mentally, Ramsay tried to draw a rough map of this world; he had yet to see one. He knew that what he learned in this way was far from accurate. The one thing that all his informants agreed upon was that the Enlightened Ones had certain gifts or powers that no ordinary man could counter with any known weapon or tool. The Shaman-born might originally have been of another race; speculation on this subject seemed divided. However, it was now well known that they did draw recruits, both men and women, from all the “civilized” nations.
Simply a wish to be an Enlightened One had no force. One had to possess qualities of mind which were recognized by those already gathered into that fellowship of power. It was necessary, after being selected, that the untested recruit retire for a number of years to one of the Groves, which were scattered headquarters. Rumor said that the lifetime of one of the Fellowship far outlasted that of ordinary mortals. The Shaman brood was held in awe, and also, perhaps, a measure of dislike, mainly because of their policy of selecting some goal of their own, thus refusing help at times, even if the cause was good.
Advisers entered courts as Chief Shamans (as Osythes was in Lom), but they could only advise as to certain actions. Oftentimes they remained stubbornly dumb, refusing any words at all. They even had been known to desert a ruler at a time of extremity, simply because the course they foresaw as paramount demanded that this man or woman fall from power, a decision issuing from impending action.
“They are unchancy,” Dedan stated frankly. “He who seeks out a Foreseer does so at his peril. I believe they can weave such a man into serving them, seldom to his own good.”
“Foreseeing—” Ramsay said musingly. “Have you ever seen this done for another?” He wanted to ask how it was done but knew that he must approach the question obliquely.
Dedan frowned. He did not reply at once. Instead he shot a glance sidewise at Ramsay.
“Once,” he replied shortly, “and no good came of it. It was—” He hesitated, again eyeing Ramsay. The Free Captain might have been trying to make up his mind whether the other could be trusted with confidence. “It was in the matter of the assault on Vidin. I was Second then—Tasum commanded the company. He, poor fool, thought that perhaps he could gain a high seat—the Rule of the Outer Reef Land. So he sought a Seeress and pressed me to go with him. Though I did not give assent to any reading, mind you. No ill luck from that would I have touch me.
“She threw Twenties and drew. I can see them yet, all lying out on the handboard of her table. There they were —Hopes, Fears, Fates, Dreams. Tasum got the King of Fate. He thought it meant victory. Only he died the next day screaming, with Hot Rain flooding over him. No, I have no wish to see that again!”
Ramsay was no clearer in his mind after an explanation. He sensed that Dedan had no wish to continue his story either. And he was hoping furiously to find some way of learning more, when the signal was given from above the deck that they were nearing their chosen harbor.
Here was no wharf or easy landing. They had to lower their equipment and baggage into small boats, then be rowed through surf and lashing spray toward a rocky spit of land which projected into the tameless waves.
All of them were well soaked by the time they assembled far enough above the water to escape the dash of foam. Ramsay was not blind to the tension among them. There was more unease here than just a rough disembarkation would cause.
Ramsay had shouldered his own backpack and made sure his side arms, sword, and all were fast in place. Dedan climbed to the highest point of the rock, his head turned toward the shore, his eyes shielded from wind and spray by cupped hands. Ramsay thought that the Free Captain was seeking something he expected to see but that was not there.
The boats were all on their way back to the ship. Thus the wild rocky coast, the constant beating of the water, gave an impression of loneliness, which increased the unrest of those among the rocks.
Dedan signaled three scouts, who fanned out as best they could, moving inland across the rocks. But the Free Captain held the rest of the company where they were until those he had dispatched reached the distant beach and climbed to the highest dunes there. Finally they turned to wave all clear.
Ramsay wondered what danger the Free Company expected. There had been no hint on shipboard of this lonely landing. He knew they were to meet, shortly after disembarking, men sent by the Thantant. Perhaps it was because that force was not already camped in sight that Dedan had turned so cautious.
However, the Free Captain now ordered them on, and Ramsay picked the easiest road he could discover across and among the spray-wet, weed-bedecked rocks.
TEN
The rocky ridge slowly gave way to shifting dunes. Then they saw, flowing toward them across the ground, a mist—or a fog? Though this ground-based cloud appeared to move more swiftly than any normal fog, Ramsay thought.
Dedan’s alarm whistle raised a shrill, ear-piercing call, echoing over the beach. The company closed in tighter formation. Now they began to take on the appearance of a beleaguered host. Still Ramsay could see nothing ahead but the gathering of that thick yellowish mist. Again, more furiously, Dedan blew. Ramsay realized that already the scouts had vanished, curtained off by the fog. A glance back over his shoulder to the sea confirmed the fact that the ship was rapidly dwindling toward the horizon. Retreat in that direction was impossible.
“To the ridge—” Dedan’s arm waved them right.
That tumble of stone that had formed a very rough wharf for their landing was here rooted in a rise of rock, pitted and crannied, but, even so, providing a more solid surface than the sand through which they had started to plough.
To that ridge they made their way at the best speed they could manage, the fog
rolling inexorably behind them, rising not from the sea but, oddly enough, from an inner point of land. Ramsay was scrambling up the first of the stones when he heard, even through the now continuous pipe of Dedan’s whistle, a scream of such agony that he clutched convulsively at the rock in instant reaction. Out of that mist had that cry come. He could believe it a death shriek. Friend? Or still unseen foe?
They fought their way higher among the water-worn rocks. Here was no spray to lash at them, but the footing was so treacherous, because of the many hollows and crannies in the stone themselves, that they had to give strict heed to their going. At last they reached the crest, men fitting into hollows, dodging behind any rise of rock, dropping field packs, unslinging weapons. Those in charge of the two vibrations machines dragged off protecting coverings, swung fan-shaped antennae back and forth in search of the foe.
Ramsay squatted beside Dedan. None of the scouts had yet returned. Now the dirty yellow of the fog, washed around the foot of the ridge on which they were perched was rising higher and higher.
He looked to the Free Captain. “What is it?”
Dedan shrugged impatiently. “Your guess will equal mine. I have not seen the likes of it before. But to my mind the fog is not natural.”
“Pirate magic!” A man behind them spat. “Some trickery of Northerners. Perhaps the sea devils bought such with their loot from Razlog.”
“A gas—something noxious in the air?” Ramsay felt his throat tighten, his breathing grow faster, shallower, even as he asked.
Dedan shook his head. “With the sea wind rising, they could not control such an attack well enough.”
“They might have masks to breathe through, to purify,” Ramsay pointed out from the knowledge of his own time and space.
The Free Captain looked unconvinced. “I think this is to provide attack cover.” He turned to the man who had suggested pirate magic. “Give me the message bird, Rahman.”
From his shoulder the other slipped a thong supporting a small cage in which sat, silent, yet watching them with its black beads of eyes, a gray-winged bird, slightly smaller in size than the pigeons Ramsay knew.
To Ramsay’s surprise, Dedan made no move to fasten any message clip to either slender red leg. Instead he lifted the bird, now lying calmly content between his palms, to eye level. Staring straight at the winged messenger, Dedan repeated slowly: “Besieged—Yasnaby—fog—foe unknown—”
The bird’s long, pointed bill opened, then closed with a sharp click. From its throat there croaked a somewhat garbled but still understandable imitation of his speech: “Beesiege—Yassby—fog—foe— unnnknownn—”
“Right!” Dedan tossed the bird upward. Aloft, it spread wing, to circle the rocks of their natural fortress twice heading inland, flying well above the curtain of the fog at a swift rate of speed.
“Let that speaker reach the frontier post—” Dedan did not continue.
Rahman laughed. “The Marchers will then come thudding, perhaps in time to bury us, Captain. It is a long ride from the nearest post, though they may have a flyer or two.” Maybe hope made him add that.
Dedan whistled imperatively. All heads turned in his direction. By now the first wisps of fog had already curled between those men in lower positions on the ridge.
“Stay set,” their Captain ordered. “Let them come to you no matter what ruse they may employ to shake us loose. With the stones of our walls we shall not prove the easy prey they expect—”
His answer was a low growl of assent spreading from hollow to hollow. Already some of the company farther away were half hidden from sight. Mist, damp and cold, puffed into Ramsay’s face. At least his worst fear was not realized. However this fog had been engendered, it was not a gas—
“Captain—”
A rattling sound rose from below. Someone was climbing toward them. Ramsay’s hand tensed on the butt of his hand weapon. However, the man who climbed was no enemy, rather one of the missing scouts.
He fought gaspingly for breath, as if he had out-raced death. Then, as he spilled forward beside Dedan and Ramsay, he mouthed rough sounds before he could find meaningful words.
“Pirates—out there—” He gestured wildly at the mist as he drew himself up to his knees. “They were waiting for us.”
“How many?” Dedan wanted to know.
“I saw only two. They arose out of the very sand to cut down Hoel. You must have heard his death scream. Ury? Ryales?” He repeated the names of his two other comrades not accounted for.
“Have not reported in,” Dedan returned.
“Then—count them as dead.” The man spoke dully. “I could hear men moving through the dunes everywhere. It was only because I was closest to this ridge that I made it.”
“Pirates?” It was not as if Dedan protested the report of the scout—rather that he was astonished at some other factor Ramsay did not understand. “You saw nothing of the beginning rise of this fog?”
The scout shook his head. His chest was still rising and falling swiftly as might that of a hunted runner. “Only that it spread first from a point north and inland. There the mist arose into the sky as might the smoke of a fire growing ever stronger and thicker. I was on the crest of a dune when first I sighted it. But I swear by the Four Fangs of Itol it is not of nature.”
“So we had guessed. You saw no trace of any of the Thantant’s force?”
“This only.” The scout opened his clenched hand, let fall a small object which hit the rock with a metallic clang. By now the ominous mist crawled up, to settle about them, so thickly that even Dedan and the scout, close as they were to Ramsay now, were enwreathed nearly to the point of invisibility.
There was just enough vision left for Ramsay to see Dedan pick up what the scout had dropped.
“A belt badge of the March forces. Such might have been dropped and lost any time.”
“Uneaten by salt wind and with blood on the edge, Captain?”
Dedan held the badge closer to his eyes. He might not have been studying what he held but sniffing at it.
“You are right, that clot is fresh. Perhaps this explains the ambush awaiting us.” If pirate scouts had witnessed the coming of the Marchers and wiped out those sent to meet the Company, there was little hope they could entertain for any help within perhaps hours—or days.
The yellow of the fog already lapped about the base of the ridge, rising about pockets where part of the Company had gone to ground. Dedan gave a quick glance right, then left, before he wheeled to face the crew of the vibrators that had been brought into position on the very crest of the ridge. His Second, standing by the vibrators, nodded. Dedan raised his whistle and once more blew a thin, shrill blast. Insert ear plugs—that was the order for his own small force. The Free Captain was going to bring into action his most potent weapons at once.
Ramsay fumbled for the plugs issued him, got them into his ears. The rest of the orders would come now in dumb show. He watched the vibrators lower their wide amplifiers to the farthest notch, so that the effect of their unseen assault would strike as close to the now-hidden dunes as possible. The Second himself stepped from one machine to the other to make certain of their aim. At his nod Dedan brought down his hand in a sweeping motion of command.
What happened then Ramsay was never able to find any explanation for. Out of the fog came a spear of light rising high, darting in. There followed a vast concussion that sent him sprawling, brought him up with punishing force against rocks, driving the breath momentarily from his lungs. But he lay in such a position as to see the site where the vibrators had been.
Had been! For only twisted masses of red-hot, smoking metal remained where, moments before, the two trim, highly prized weapons had been positioned for use.
Ramsay clawed at his ears, freeing them from the plugs. Now he could hear. Screams—shouts filled the air. Out of what had been an inferno of explosion crawled a single seared shape, inching painfully across the ground. It was plain that these pirates had come with
an effective answer to Dedan’s most cherished arms.
Somehow Ramsay got to his feet, unable as yet to take in the magnitude of that quick stroke from below. The heat still radiating from the wreckage of the vibrators made him cringe away. But a small yammering cry from the thing which crawled brought him to his feet, sent him wavering into that blasting heat almost against his will.
Much of the clothing had been charred from the body. Ramsay had no time to be gentle. He stooped and hooked fingers under the armpits of the wounded man, heaved him up and away from that fierce furnace. Back—he must get back into some kind of shelter. At the moment, confused as he was, Ramsay guessed that the worst of the battle had just begun. Wedging the man he had rescued into a hollow behind him, Ramsay drew his needle weapon and crouched, waiting for the enemy to loom close enough in the fog to provide a target.
A glance around was enough to make plain the disaster. There had been eight men near the vibrators when those blew. Crews of two each serving those weapons, Dedan, Rahman, himself, and the scout. Ramsay saw at once those of the crews could be written off. And there was another blackened bundle where fire fanned sideways over the rock.
Half missing—out of that first count. He hesitated to leave the hollow in search of men already dead. Was the mist at last beginning to clear? Ramsay thought those evil billows more ragged—showing holes—downslope.
Through that now tattered cover came a wave of fire—but not such as had ruined the vibrators. No this soared in banners upward from the hidden sand. Ramsay had never seen flamethrowers of his own world in action, but what he sighted now along the ridge sickened him. He fought the bile rising in his throat and mouth. These attackers were not trying to capture, to accept any surrender. They were simply killing as they came, and those of the Company had no shield against this new and fearsome weapon.
Ramsay squatted beside the man who was now moving feebly, moaning. He knew it would be only a matter of time before the pirates reached the crest of the ridge. Then he and this other, in turn, would be roasted before they could even strike back. To wait for a useless and horrible death made no sense.