by Andre Norton
had to be replaced quickly, whatever the difficulty or expense of doing so.
Thus far, I Yoroc had in the greater part succeeded in meeting that
challenge, but there had been times when the mercenaries had been less
than content, and each new success Firehand's people tore from them
reduced their dependability as fighters and, more and more frequently,
their very ability to fight as well.
Because of this unending pressure, Zanthor was forced to keep large
numbers of men back from the front to ride patrol and to mount guard on
the baggage trains or lose control of the area entirely, and he was
beginning to sorely miss the service they should be giving against his
primary foes, who were not slow in their turn to read his budding
difficulties and press all the harder to exploit them.
Murdock straightened. Soon now.
He glanced at those on either side of him, Gordon on his left, Eveleen
on the right. Allran, the Dominionite Lieutenant who was second in place
to Eveleen and one of those who customarily rode with them, waited
farther back, out of his immediate line of sight.
His thoughts snapped back to the present. Riders were just topping the
low rise to the northeast.
His sharp eyes fixed on them. He counted quickly. Twenty-five, thirty,
deermen riding guard on a dozen large pack animals. They were moving
rapidly but cautiously as well, taking care not to skyline themselves any
more than necessary, but the guerrillas had been expecting their coming
and knew where to watch for them.
Ross glanced at Ashe, who caught his gaze and raised his hand in the
old Terran gesture of victory. Their scout had not failed them. Their
enemies would come directly to them; they would not have to so much as
alter their present position to receive them.
The agent could feel the familiar surge of fear well up within him, but
he kept face and body impassive as he raised his once-bright battle horn
to his lips. It was a dull black now so that neither sun nor moon could
reflect from it.
The invaders seemed to advance with agonizing slowness, as if they
moved through water, although he knew they were actually riding at a
good pace.
The thirty made a small column, but that gave it both a speed and an
ease of concealment a larger unit would lack. Fortune had been with them
in discovering it. They had missed many of its like since their foes had
begun moving supplies thus.
Zanthor was anything but a stupid man. He had learned from his
opponents' tactics and had soon realized that more supplies would get
through in the long run if he utilized such compact trains as well as the
more massive conveys which, although safe from destruction in the event
of a single assault, were, by their very nature, slow and visible and subject
to harassment along the whole of their route, however strong their guard
upon setting out.
Murdock mounted, and the others followed suit. No noise escaped
them, no sudden flash of motion that might have been spotted by those
travelers still a little below them on the slope.
The partisan commander continued to carefully study the column,
watching the way the individual riders sat their mounts.
He nodded after a few minutes, satisfied. They were wary but not
extraordinarily so. They would not know of their danger until it was upon
them.
The two units were fairly evenly matched in number, thirty of them,
twenty-seven with him, but with surprise to aid him and barring some
foul turn of chance, he was confident his party would be able to overpower
and take most or all of their foes quickly, before the invaders could settle
themselves into an extended battle costly to both sides.
The column had been steadily ascending and had at last reached the
level of the waiting guerrillas.
The partisans remained motionless, scarcely breathing, until it was
parallel to them, then Ross touched his lips to his horn.
Arrows rained upon the Condor Hall force before the low, soft note had
finished sounding.
A few struck true, but most glanced harmlessly off the strong helms and
the shields so borne as to face outward from the column's center.
It was usually thus on such a raid, and he felt no disappointment. His
archers aimed high to minimize the danger of striking the valuable
springdeer. Their purpose was rather to unsettle their victims before
battle was joined than to fell any great number of them outright. In other
circumstances, when different objectives were before them, his bowmen
could wreak terrible damage and had done so many times during these
last months.
Only that one volley was sent. The charge followed almost instantly
upon it, well before the invading mercenaries could recover from their
surprise to bring themselves and their animals into order.
They did attempt to defend themselves. They, too, had bows and
brought them quickly to bear, but their aim was off, and they were given
no opportunity to fire a second round.
The Time Agent felt a plucking at his right sleeve as he raced toward
the column. He had no time even to glance down. The first of his foemen
was before him.
There was no resisting the force of the Sapphireholders' charge. The
skirmish was briskly, even savagely, fought for a few tense minutes, then it
was over, leaving Murdock's warriors masters of the field.
Five of the enemy were dead, another eight wounded, one of them
seriously. The majority of the rest were captives along with their mounts
and baggage animals. The latter had been roped together for ease of
handling and had, therefore, been unable to scatter during the battle. Four
of the mercenaries had broken from the fray and had succeeded in making
their escape.
The Sapphirehold party had suffered no damage save for a slight scrape
across one fighter's hand and an equally insignificant injury to Allran's
mount.
Because part of the column had won free, the partisans made no delay
in quitting the battleground save that necessary to stanch the wound of
the gravely hurt man.
They rode hard and fast for the next hour until Ross at last felt they had
put enough distance between themselves and possible pursuers and
permitted a halt.
His eyes glowed as he looked over the fruits of the raid. Twenty-six of
the enemy were prisoners or casualties, bringing with them their
equipment and mounts, not to mention a dozen fine dray deer. That were
prize in plenty even discounting the bulging packs.
Those last proved a rich take. The unit had been assigned to the front
and had been carrying with it everything necessary to support itself until
it should be able to settle in and establish itself with the regular supply
lines.
He watched with satisfaction the unloading of each animal. These
goods would still reach the battle line, but they would enter into a very
different service from that for which they had been intended.
Some of his comrades, Allran among them, were less pleased than their
commander with what they found in the baggage. "Jerked meat and
corn!" the Dominionite Lieutenant grumbled. "We used to eat better at
Zanthor's expense."
His commander smiled. "So used his own soldiers… Stop scowling,
Comrade. Gurnion will make good use of this."
Eveleen overheard the exchange and joined them. "Pay no attention to
him, Captain. He's just sulking over that cut Sundance took."
Ross glanced at the animal. "He's not much hurt, but take the
Sergeant's doe. She's a good mount and should serve you well enough until
he's fully healed again."
The other man nodded his thanks and moved to claim the gray.
There was nothing irregular in that. Sapphirehold was not part of the
Confederacy, and what they took in their fighting was theirs by war right.
Ton Gurnion was still surprised even after their months of informal
alliance by the amount of materiel and the number of mounts sent to him
by the hard-fighting partisan warriors, knowing no claim of his but only
the generosity of these people and their perception of his needs moved
them to give as they did of their spoil.
The weapons expert's expression was thoughtful, as was her voice when
she spoke. "He's right, you know. There has been a change in the type of
supplies Condor Hall is providing for its army."
He nodded. "In kind, but the quantity remains unaltered, and quality's
still high. No warrior has cause to complain of this fare."
Ross felt her eyes on him as Eveleen searched him for sign of injury.
Her fingers darted out to separate the rent left in the material by the
Condor Hall arrow. "A good shirt in need of mending," she commented
dryly.
"Better that than the arm beneath it."
Both turned in response to a low whistle.
"Let's see what Gordon's found," the war captain suggested even as he
began moving toward his partner.
Ashe had just opened the packs borne by the last of the baggage
animals and had obviously discovered something totally unexpected.
His fellow Terrans joined him. He held one of the satchels open, and
their eyes widened. Gold.
"The other pack holds the same?" Murdock asked after a moment.
"It does. Scant wonder the poor beast seemed to be lagging worse than
the rest. There's enough here to pay off a small army."
"Probably its very purpose," Eveleen remarked. "Some of the mercenary
companies must be getting restive."
"That's about the way I read it," Ross agreed. He grinned. "It seems
they'll have to bear their discontent a bit longer thanks to our
intervention."
Ashe's blue eyes sparkled. "This won't be going south with the rest, I
presume?"
The other man made a show of pondering the question. "I think not.
No, Ton Luroc deserves some little prize to gladden his heart now and
then. —Do you believe this'll serve the purpose, Lieutenant EA Riordan?"
"Very nicely, Firehand," she replied, matching the mock gravity of his
tone.
"You're in agreement, I presume, Doctor?"
Ross glanced sharply at his partner when Ashe did not respond.
"Gordon?"
The archeologist's eyes seemed to be looking into the distance. His
expression was puzzled. "Sorry, Ross," he said, recalling himself to his
comrades, "but this is wrong."
"Taking the gold?" he asked in amazement.
"No. The fact that it's been made into bars."
"They're easier to transport that way," Eveleen protested. "The same
weight in links would be incredibly bulky."
"Yes, and I wouldn't question it in our own time, but pretech and
low-tech peoples generally don't abuse gold like this. They wear it or
decorate with it or mint it into coins or some other convenient type of
specie. Molding it into ugly blocks and stashing it away like so many spare
bricks is usually the work of a more machine-oriented society."
"On Terra," Murdock said slowly after a moment. "Zanthor's ahead of
his time in other ways, too, remember. That's how he managed to overrun
most of the north and would have taken the whole damn island in short
order if we hadn't come back to spoil his game. He'd probably be classed a
genius if he'd turned his attention to some decent project."
"I suppose you're right," the other man agreed, although his eyes
remained dark. He shrugged in the end. "I hope we manage to take
Zanthor I Yoroc alive in the end. I want to have a long, close talk with that
bastard, if only to add to the knowledge of our psycho people back home."
The partisan unit did not delay much longer there. The pack animals
were reloaded, and the prisoners were bound to their mounts with their
arms fastened to their sides, all save the heavily wounded warrior, who
was placed in a litter slung between two of the springdeer. His injuries
were indeed grave, but if he survived the journey south, he would receive
good care there until he healed and then, in company with his comrades,
better treatment than Confederates or Sapphireholders falling into
Zanthor's power could ever hope to find.
Ross pressed them as much as possible without taxing the heavily
burdened dray animals until they reached the base of the highlands, the
point beyond which he would not suffer any outsider to come. Here, the
party divided, most riding as guards with the captured column, the rest
turning for their home base, bringing with them the gold and the animal
carrying it plus the doe Allran had claimed and one other wardeer, a fine
young buck that had captured Ross's interest.
8
THE DOMAIN RULER'S quarters were larger than any of the others in
the camp and were marked by considerably more luxury. Furs covered a
good part of the floor, and hangings of worked skins and cloth both
decorated the walls and blocked the drafts which would otherwise have
had free access to the rooms inside, a large public chamber and a smaller
sleeping area. The furnishings, though sparse enough out of consideration
for mobility, were of good quality, and several of the chairs were padded to
provide for comfort as well as utility.
Luroc himself was still a fine-looking man of his race, tall and
broad-shouldered, with heavy and flat but regular features and steady
black eyes that seemed to read a man's very soul. His hair was a slightly
lighter shade of auburn than was the norm among most of his people and
was liberally peppered with gray.
Strength of mind and will were patently his, a strength nature had
decreed should be matched in power of body. War had denied him that,
however, and his legs now rendered him but poor service. He could walk
no more than a few yards unaided, if his slow, painful shuffle could be so
termed at all. To venture outside, he was forced to depend on the support
of crutches or else take to a chair borne upon the shoulders of his
warriors. Even to sit a springdeer was agony, but he could ride and did
when strong enough necessity, such as the conference with the
Confederate Tons and their commanders from which he had just returned,
called him from the camp.
&nb
sp; He was seated by the fire when Murdock entered, for the day was a
brisk one for so early in the fall, and his inactivity rendered him sensitive
to unaccustomed chill.
His dark eyes fixed on the newcomer, noting every detail of his
appearance, so different from that of his own kind. He relaxed at once,
finding no indication that anything had gone amiss on the partisan's
recent raid, even as the preliminary report he had already received had
indicated.
He returned the younger man's salute and motioned him into a seat
near his own.
Ross obeyed at once, knowing the Ton did not like having to look up at
those with whom he spoke, particularly if their discussion was to be of
significant length.
Ordinarily, he would have launched at once into an account of his most
recent mission, but he now studied Luroc closely, with no small concern.
The journey south and the conference itself could not but have taken their
toll. "You must be tired, Ton. I've got nothing to say that won't wait
another day."
"What of your curiosity?"
A faint smile touched the other's lips. "I can stand it that long."
Ross started to rise, but the Sapphireholder's hand lifted. "Stay,
Captain."
The black eyes pierced him suddenly. "Do you consider yourself
disgraced before your own kind because of the sort of war you are waging
for us?" I Loran asked him bluntly.
"With the success we're having? Not likely!"
The Dominionite smiled at his assurance. "Good, because Grunion has
hired mercenaries, a huge column under Jeran A Murdoc."
The Terran thought quickly, reviewing the sea of background
information he had studied in preparation for this mission. A blank shield
would know by repute every column Commandant…
He remembered then and raised his brows. There was no larger or
better force for hire on all the continent, or any other more expensive.
"They can afford him," he remarked, "better than another year or two at
war, at any rate."
Luroc eyed him curiously. "Any relationship there?"
"Somewhere way back, I suppose… No, you'll find no greats or near
greats among my kin," he responded with perfect honesty. The question
had been reasonable considering the similarity in name and profession. It
was this closeness in the sound of Terran and Dominionite names that
allowed the Time Agents to retain so close an approximation of their own,