“That’ll do it for today,” he said. “Let’s get back to the fort.”
They scrambled back down the rock face, to where Ulf and Wulf were waiting by the cart. As they approached, they saw Wulf tapping his right foot on the ground while he kept count.
“. . . fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen!” he said, finishing on a triumphant note. “See? Anything a horse can do, I can do just as well.”
“Maybe,” Ulf replied. “But he wasn’t using his fingers to count.”
And, once again, Wulf had no reply.
chapter five
Four hours after midnight, a small party assembled on the walkway at the western end of the north-facing wall.
The stars were still bright in the cold night sky, and as yet, there was no sign of the coming dawn. Lydia examined the rope ladder rolled up on the planks of the walkway. She unrolled it a few meters. The ladder’s sides were stout rope. The steps were pieces of hardwood, shaped flat to provide better footing, and at every third step there were hardwood battens designed to hold the ladder out from the wall, making it easier to get a grip on the rope sides—and easier for a climber to fit his or her feet onto the rungs.
“That’s fine,” she said, glancing up to meet Leks’s gaze.
The gray-haired man gestured to the top of the wall. “Do you want it over the edge now?”
But Lydia shook her head. She turned to Hal. “Is that brazier ready?” she asked, and Hal nodded. At her request, he had arranged for an iron brazier full of firewood and kindling to be placed at the far end of the wall. “All right,” Lydia continued, “get it lit up. But don’t be in too much of a hurry to get the tinder burning.”
The burning brazier was planned as a distraction, to draw the gaze of any possible observers hidden among the trees while Lydia went over the wall. The longer Hal took to kindle the blaze, the more often he would strike sparks from his flint. The resulting half dozen or so brilliant flashes of light would be highly visible in the predawn darkness and would effectively draw the attention of any potential observer.
As he turned to make his way across the walkway, he heard Lydia instructing the two members of the garrison who stood by the rope ladder.
“Lower it slowly,” she said. “Don’t just toss it over so it rattles and clatters all the way down.”
The men nodded, lifting the heavy bundle of rope and wood onto the top of the parapet. Lydia held up a hand and watched as Hal reached the brazier at the far end of the walkway. A brilliant flash of light momentarily lit up his crouching form as he struck his saxe blade against the flint in his hand. Another flash followed almost immediately.
“Let it go,” Lydia said quietly, letting her hand drop. The two men began unwinding the rope ladder, allowing it to drop quietly down the face of the wall. When it touched the ground below, they fastened the two end loops at the top of the rope over the pointed logs. Lydia swung easily over the wall, staying flat so that she didn’t present a silhouette. She reached with one foot for the first rung of the ladder, found it and began to climb quickly down.
More brilliant flashes lit up the night at the far end of the wall. Then there was an orange glow as the tinder caught, followed by a soft whoosh of flame as Hal thrust the burning tinder into the oil-soaked kindling in the brazier. The light wood caught immediately, and yellow flames rose eagerly into the night.
That should keep people watching, Lydia thought as her right foot touched the snow-covered ground. She stepped clear of the ladder, reaching back to jerk the right-hand rope three times. Slowly, quietly, the ladder began to rise up the wall in response to the prearranged signal.
Lydia was wearing a gray woolen cloak with a hood. The previous evening, she had smeared the garment with ash and soot from the fireplace, creating random patterns on the material that would break up her shape. She pulled the hood up to conceal her face, then wrapped the cloak around her and stepped away from the fort, hugging the stone wall of the ravine.
She made no sound as she proceeded up the valley. Behind her, the brazier sent up a cheerful yellow light and several of the sentries on the wall gathered round it appreciatively. Her heart beat a little faster, fueled by the adrenaline that came with stepping into enemy territory. There was an unavoidable tendency to feel alone and exposed when you left the shelter and protection of the fort, she thought, and the support and assistance of your friends. She didn’t mind being alone. In some ways, she preferred it. But the sense of possible danger, the awareness that every shadow, every tree, could conceal an enemy lying in wait, was always with her at times like this.
Probably a good thing, she thought. It’ll keep me on my toes.
And she was right in thinking so. Every nerve, every sense, was attuned to its highest possible level. She could feel the surrounding ground as much as she could see it or hear it. She was aware of it, of every aspect of it, the sight, the smell, the sounds. It was a total impression of the land around her.
The trees were becoming thicker, and she slid into the shadows beneath them, staying to the side of the ravine. The open ground stretched away in the center but now the level walls moved farther apart and she was three trees in from the edge of the cleared ground. Her view of the sky was obscured now, and the shadows under the heavily branched pines were deep. Her stained gray cloak did its job well, creating an amorphous, unidentifiable mass that slipped ghostlike between the trunks.
To her left, she heard a sudden slither, followed by a soft thump. She was between two trees, and her nerves shrieked at her to move quickly into the shelter of the nearest one.
But she didn’t. She froze in place, senses jangling so that she thought anyone nearby must hear them.
But of course they didn’t. Long experience told her that the safest move in this situation was not to move, but to stay dead still, assessing the terrain around her, feeling with all of her heightened senses to determine what had caused that sound.
Then she heard it again, but this time from in front of her and much farther away. Her nerves jumped again, but this time she recognized the sound. It was snow sliding off an overloaded branch and falling to the ground below: slither—thump. She waited several seconds, poised with one foot in front of her, then she continued to move forward, gliding into the shelter of the tree she had been heading for. She paused there, letting her nerves calm, and became conscious that a light predawn breeze had begun to blow up the valley from the fort toward her.
The leaves around her moved gently, and she listened for a few moments as the breeze soughed gently through the pine needles. As ever, she was struck by the way the wind moving through pine needles sounded like distant surf on a beach. In among the other sounds, she heard a suggestion of voices talking quietly—too quietly for her to understand what was being said. Again, she tensed, then relaxed as she realized that, with the wind blowing from the fort to her, it was carrying the muted conversation of the men on the wall, grouped around the warmth of the brazier.
She nodded to herself with satisfaction. The noise of the wind and the voices and the moving branches would effectively mask any sound she might make—although there would be precious little of that.
She stepped out, moving deeper into the cover of the trees.
* * *
• • • • •
Hal and Leks waited on the walkway for some thirty minutes after Lydia had gone.
Leks spent the time peering into the dim shadows up the valley. He had seen Lydia moving for the first ten or twenty meters, sliding along the rock walls, semi-concealed by the smudged cloak that blended with the uncertain light. Then he had been distracted by a low-flying night bird and had looked away. When he looked back, he could see no sign of her.
He said as much to Hal. The young skirl smiled in response. He was familiar with Lydia’s stalking skills.
“And you won’t see her again,” he told the older man. “Once you t
ake your eyes off her, she’s gone. She’s been doing this all her life,” he added, by way of explanation.
“So why are you still here?” Leks asked.
“I’m listening. If she strikes trouble, we’ll hear it. But by now, I’d say she’s in the clear. I think I’ll go back to bed.”
Suddenly, in the predawn chill, the thought of his warm blankets in the barracks room, close by the glowing fireplace, was a very attractive one. He moved toward the top of the stairs.
“Coming?” he asked.
But Leks, who lacked Hal’s confidence in Lydia’s skills, shook his head. “I’ll stay here,” he said. “And listen.”
Hal shrugged, understanding the man’s anxiety. “Suit yourself,” he said. “See you at breakfast.”
* * *
• • • • •
After breakfast—a substantial meal of sausage, fried potato and toasted flatbread washed down with hot, fragrant coffee—Hal took Stig and the twins down the valley to the site of the second shooting platform. As before, he clambered up the valley wall and quickly marked out the plan for the platform, cutting steps into the rock where the support beams would rest.
When he was finished, he eyed his handiwork with satisfaction.
“You can take over now,” he told Stig. “Put the crew to work building the platforms. I’ll start assembling one of the manglers. I want to show Damien how they work.”
Damien was the commander of the fifteen Araluen archers assigned to garrison duty in the fort. They had met him the previous night and discussed Hal’s plan to install two of the massive crossbows to augment the fort’s defenses. Damien would be providing the marksmen to man the weapons, and he was eager to see them at work.
Hal and Stig returned to the fort, leaving the twins relaxing beneath the site of the eastern platform. Stig pulled the empty cart back with them. They had unloaded the tools and some of the timber for the platforms. Now he summoned the rest of the crew and put them to work loading the rest of the materials onto the cart. Hal went to where the two disassembled manglers lay, wrapped in canvas. He untied the thongs that held the cover of one in place and called to Ingvar.
“Ingvar, you stay with me. I’ll need you to help me demonstrate the mangler.”
The huge young man nodded. On board ship, he worked with Hal, who sat behind the sights of the Mangler. Ingvar would traverse the giant weapon, using a long pole to swing it left or right as Hal directed. These manglers would be set on tripods, and the shooter would stand behind it and do his own traversing. But Ingvar’s mighty strength would be useful for cocking and loading the big crossbow.
Quickly, Hal began assembling the components, checking as he fitted them together that there were no faults in the wood, no cracks or splits that might suddenly—and catastrophically—give way when the limbs were under tension.
When he had the body, the limbs and the trigger mechanism assembled, he stood the weapon on end, butt to the ground, and took the heavy cord, looped at either end. He slipped one loop over the notched end of the right-hand limb and gestured for Ingvar to bend the arms of the bow down so that he could position the cord over the other limb. Normally, it might take two or even three men to do this. But Ingvar, with a loud grunt, flexed the bow down so that his skirl could slip the loop over the second limb.
Hal regarded him with admiration. “I’m glad you’re around,” he said. “Don’t know how I’d manage that on my own.”
Ingvar smiled quietly. “I’m sure you’d invent a machine to do it for you,” he said, his faith in Hal’s ingenuity all too obvious.
Hal shrugged. “Maybe. But it’s a lot easier when you do it,” he said.
chapter six
Once the body of the mangler was ready, Hal hefted it over his shoulder and headed for the stairs leading to the ramparts. Ingvar followed, carrying the folded tripod and a canvas sheaf of darts.
Damien, the commander of the Araluen archers, met them at the top of the stairs. Eight of his men were with him. The others were currently on guard duty, relaxing in the ready room in a small tower at the eastern end of the ramparts. Four of Leks’s men were stationed on the ramparts themselves, keeping watch up the valley for any sign of an attack.
The archers gathered curiously around the big weapon as Hal set it down, leaning it against the timber parapet. They studied it with professional interest.
“It’s big, isn’t it?” Damien said, and Hal nodded as Ingvar unfolded the legs of the tripod and set it up beside the wall. The skirl unwrapped the canvas sheaf and took out one of the heavy wooden darts. He passed it to Damien.
“I imagine this would make quite a mess if it hit someone,” the commander said, turning the heavy projectile back and forth in his hand, studying the stiff leather flights and the metal warhead. He handed it on to the other archers.
“They usually don’t stop at one,” Hal told him, stepping aside as Ingvar lifted the mangler onto the tripod, setting it in place and making sure it was firmly attached. He traversed it back and forth a few times, then elevated it up and down, making sure the movement was smooth. When this was done, he tightened the screws on both adjustments so that the weapon was held more firmly, while still free to move.
“I’ve set out the targets you asked for,” Damien told him, indicating the three man-sized wooden targets that one of his men had placed out in the center of the valley.
“Good,” said Hal, judging the range to the three with narrowed eyes. “About fifty, one hundred and two hundred paces, right?”
“Near enough,” Damien told him. He turned as the fort commander appeared at the top of the stairs and came toward them. “Morning, commander. Come to see the show?”
Leks nodded, looking at the mangler with interest. “Never seen one close up before,” he said to Hal. “You carry one on your ship, don’t you?”
“That’s right. We’re usually outnumbered when we face an enemy, so it tends to even the odds a little,” Hal told him.
Damien made a small moue of interest. “Never heard of a ship carrying a weapon before.”
“Neither had a lot of the people we’ve fought,” Hal said. He glanced at Ingvar. “All right, Ingvar, load it up.”
The archers watched as the massive young man seized the two cocking handles and heaved them back and up, catching the thick cord and drawing it back to click into place behind the retaining latch.
“It might take two of you to do that,” Hal told them, and they nodded among themselves, impressed by the young giant’s power. Hal stepped up behind the weapon now, but stayed slightly to one side so he could demonstrate to Damien and his men. He flicked up the rear leaf sight and pointed to it.
“Unlike your longbows, where you have to estimate elevation and direction, the mangler is fitted with these sights, which make things a lot easier.” Highly skilled archers like these, he knew, would have little trouble adapting to the system he had devised. Araluen archers were among the best in the world, used to estimating distance and elevation by eye. The sights would make the task much easier.
“Let’s have a dart, please, Ingvar,” he said quietly. He waited as his companion placed one of the heavy darts into the slot on top of the crossbow, sliding it back until the shallow notch in its rear end was nestled against the thick cord of the bowstring. Hal studied the nearest target for a few seconds.
“Maybe a touch over fifty paces?” he said.
Damien nodded, suppressing a smile. He had instructed his man not to bother being too accurate in his measurements. He was interested to see how good this young Skandian leader might be.
“You got sloppy there, Willis,” he said to the man who had placed the target.
Willis grinned. “Sorry, chief,” he said, without any note of apology in his voice.
Hal looked from one to the other for a few seconds. He knew what had gone on here. Whenever you tried to show w
arriors a new weapon or technique, they always wanted you to mess it up. It was standard behavior.
So be it, he thought. He stepped closer to the mangler, leaned down and put his shoulder to the butt. Then, without seeming to take too much care over it, he traversed the weapon until the blade foresight was aligned with the target, twisted the elevating wheel until the V of the backsight was sitting slightly above the top of the target, with the blade foresight centered in the V, and almost casually squeezed the trigger lever.
SLAM!
The surrounding archers flinched with the sudden shock of the release. The bolt streaked away from the ramparts and smashed into the target where it narrowed to form a rough approximation of a head. The wood shattered under the massive impact and the target cartwheeled end over end in the snow, coming to rest nearly three meters from where it had begun.
“Orlog’s toenails!” Damien muttered. It was a local curse and one he had grown fond of during his time here in the north. “That thing is dangerous!”
“Just a little,” Hal agreed, and nodded to Ingvar to reload. This time, he took aim at the second-farthest target. He estimated this one to be slightly less than the stipulated hundred paces, so he set the sights at the base of the man-shaped figure. Again, there was the massive SLAM! of the release, and another bolt streaked away. This one hit the middle of the target, showering splinters in all directions, splitting the target in two and causing the two halves to fold up on themselves.
The third shot, at the most distant target, was off center, catching the side of the timber shape. More splinters flew and the target spun away crazily under the impact, with a large hole torn in its edge.
Hal stood back from the weapon and looked at the archers. After the first shot, they had remained silent. But he could see they were impressed by the power and accuracy of the big crossbow.
Return of the Temujai Page 4