The man was drowsing uneasily, twitching and shifting in the blanket. He muttered indistinct words that sounded almost like an argument, then cried out and woke completely. Tears stood in his eyes. Gird squatted beside him, and laid a hand on his arm.
“Pain, or worry?”
“It—hurts a lot.”
“Aye. I’m sorry we’ve nothing better. Are you hungry yet? Can I bring you water?” The man nodded for water, and Gird fetched it, then lifted him to drink. When he was through, Gird let him down gently.
“How many people do you have here?” the man asked, looking around. Gird blinked, thinking.
“Oh—two or three hundred, maybe more. It varies. Does that surprise you?”
“I thought—bartons—a few men each—”
“Some bartons are small, no more’n two or three hands of men. Others are larger. But you weren’t in a barton.”
“No. I—they didn’t like me much.” The expression on his face was curious; Gird would almost have said spoiled, but the man was too old, and had worked too hard, to be a spoiled child.
“Rumor says you’re a lord’s bastard.” He watched for a reaction, and got it. Selamis’s face closed, hardening; his eyes seemed to chill from warm brown to the color of icy mud. “You won’t let me stay?”
“Why wouldn’t I? I care more for honesty and courage than blood; that’s what all this is about.” That had surprised the man; Gird wondered again just what he’d been through.
“My—my sponsor assigned me that cottage,” the man said quickly. “I didn’t have anything to do with old Kerith being evicted; I’d have taken her in myself, but she wouldn’t come—”
“I’m not blaming you,” Gird said. Clearly someone had, and Selamis still felt he had to explain himself. He could believe that the local barton might have shunned the man, unfair as it was. But unfairness at the top made everyone unfair. “Here you will have the trust you deserve: if you are honest and brave, you will find loyal friends who care not at all who your father was—or your mother, for that matter. If you’ve suffered from both lord and peasant, you may find that hard to believe, but it’s true.”
“You’re peasant-born?”
Gird laughed. “All the way back, near’s I can find out. Farmer after farmer, born to plow and plant and harvest, to tend my stock.”
“But they say you’re a great general,” Selamis said. Something in the tone rang false; Gird looked at him a moment, but couldn’t place what bothered him. He laughed again.
“I’m no great general, lad; I know how to do a few things well, and keep doing them. As long as they work, we’ll survive. The gods have been with us, so far.”
“You believe they care who wins a war down here?”
“You don’t?” Gird looked him up and down. “You don’t think the gods gave you a bit of extra strength, to open your trap door with burned hands? You don’t think they hid you from the soldiers as you came through the night—that they led you to our camp? I’d say you’ve had some bounty of the gods already—”
“But my family—”
Gird laid a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. The last thing you need now is a scolding, and you still weak from what happened. I’ve cursed the gods myself, more than once, in such trouble.” He patted the man’s shoulder, and levered himself up; his knees seemed stiffer every day. “I’ll talk to you again, but for now you rest.”
He had gone only a few steps, when Selamis called “Gird—” Gird turned. The man’s face had gone white again, and he was shaking.
“What’s wrong?” Gird asked, coming back to his side.
“I—I can’t—” Selamis shook his head violently.
“Can’t what?”
“I can’t lie to you!” That came out loud enough to attract attention; Gird glared at the faces turned his way until they turned back. He knew they would be listening anyway. He sat heavily beside Selamis, facing him.
“What’s this now?” he asked, in the tone that had always gotten the truth from his children. Selamis had started crying, the rough, painful sobs of someone who cried rarely. “Easy, now, and tell me what it is you’ve lied about.”
“They sent me,” Selamis said, so softly that Gird could hardly hear him between sobs. “They sent me.”
“Who? The soldiers?” Selamis nodded; Gird chewed his lip, fighting back the rage that spurted up in his mind. He looked away; he was afraid of what Selamis would see in his face. “Sent you to spy on the camp? To betray us?”
“Yes.” That was as soft as the other; he heard fright as well as misery in Selamis’s voice. Gird waited it out, staring at his fingernails, until Selamis went on. “They—they killed my son. Said they’d—they’d keep my wife and daughter—in prison—so if I didn’t come back they could—could—”
“I can imagine,” Gird said. He could hear the iron in his own voice. When he closed his eyes it was as if he could see all of them together, all the men and women and children taken hostage in the past years—beaten and raped and tormented and killed—he opened his eyes, and stared hard at the leaves on the ground in front of his knees. “Why you?”
“Because I’m a lord’s son,” Selamis said bitterly. “He—he put me there, where everyone hated me; he knew I would have no friends, no one to turn to. They said I owed it to my father, that my only hope was with him. I would—if he had asked, as from a son, I would have done anything for him, but they forced me—”
“And your hands? Was that to make us believe?” Selamis shook his head. “No. That was the guard captain; he knew me before, as a boy. Just to remind me what he could do, he said. He’s one of them—the horned circle—” His head rolled again. “I can’t—I can’t stand it—what they’ll do to her—to my daughter—and I can’t lie to you—what can I do?” Gird pulled him up and cradled him in his arms. There was nothing to do but endure, and Selamis surely knew that. Yet the pain the man was feeling would be like the pain he felt when he found Rahi—when Amis was killed—when Metis was tortured. He held Selamis with all the love he felt for all of them, all the ones who suffered in person or through those they loved.
“It’s all right,” he said, knowing as always that it was not all right, not yet. It was as much promise as reassurance. It would be all right someday; he would make it that way, make a world in which such things did not happen—or if they did, someone who cared would work to change them.
“But my daughter, my little girl! I have to go, I can’t—”
“You can’t go. You’re hurt. And you can’t betray us now; you don’t really want to. You want to save your child, as any father would—as I did, and failed. I won’t lie to you, Selamis. Your child may die, and die horribly. I can’t promise anything better for her. But you can help me, help me make a better land than this.” Selamis was still sobbing, but less wildly. When he was finally silent, Gird laid him down gently. “You are a brave man, Selamis. Brave to come here, brave to tell me—and brave enough for whatever comes of it.” He left him then, and told one of the healers to watch Selamis closely. She peered at Gird, as if she could see his churning belly and the rage in his heart, but said nothing. He was grateful for that.
He was not grateful for the wariness of his marshals, who accosted him before he made it to the cookfires for his supper.
“Are you sure he can be trusted?” asked Felis, “I heard he was sent—”
“He told me that himself,” said Gird. “If he tells me himself, that stands for something.”
“He might have thought we’d heard something from the villagers.”
“Have we?”
Felis scowled. “No. But we might. He wasn’t liked.”
“He wasn’t liked because he was some lord’s bastard, and the lord arranged a cottage for him. One of theirs was evicted. Not his fault. He wasn’t in their barton because they didn’t want him, but he gave food. They’ve got his wife and daughter, threatened him with what you’d expect if he didn’t betray us—and he told me that. Himself. Tha
t’s not like a spy.”
“Not if he’s told you everything,” Felis said. Behind him, Ivis and Cob said nothing, but their eyes agreed.
Gird’s own doubts vanished in a perverse determination to have Felis be wrong. “We’ll watch him, but I say he’s honest, and we can trust him. Are we to make the same mistakes they do? It’s a man’s own heart says what he is, not his father’s bloodline. Men aren’t cows.”
“No, some of them are foxes.” Felis stomped off, his own fox-red hair bristling wildly. Ivis and Cob laughed.
“He could be right, all the same,” said Ivis, dipping out a measure of beans. “No better way to convince us he’s honest than to confess something. I’ve done it m’self as a boy.”
“And what if he is honest? How would you have an honest man act?” Ivis shrugged and did not pursue the subject. The next day, when Gird insisted they move on, Selamis was able to walk. Rahi said it would be many days before he could use his hands.
They had been threading their way between the domain of Ivis’s duke and that of a count, to his east. North of that, they would come into the domain of the sier Gird had saved. Although the main lines of the hills ran across their way, gaps existed: ways known to herders, hunters, foresters. Gird had his scouts out all around; for several days they found nothing but their own people.
Then about midmorning on the fourth day, the forward scouts reported that soldiers were blocking the next gap to the north. Gird halted the ragged column and thought about it. They could swing west, here, between two lines of hills, and take the next gap… but that would mean stringing his whole line out, down on the streamside. Here that meant open land, arable. They would be trampling young grain they might want to eat, come winter… and they would be visible from hills on both sides. Downstream, westward, was a largish village with a permanent guard detachment. Could the blocked gap be intended to push him into a trap?
“How many in the gap?” he asked his scouts.
Fingers flashed. “Two hands. Four in sight, and the others in the trees on either side.”
“Did they see you?”
“No—I don’t think so.” The scouts exchanged looks, agreed on that, and went on. “One of ’em said as how it was boring. They’d been told to guard the gaps—all of ’em—but they didn’t think anyone’d come this way, not with the good bridge downstream.”
Two hands of guards, but well placed in a narrow gap. The noise of battle would bring more—that had to be the intent, that or some similar trap. Overbridge, the village, had a barton but Gird had not called on it yet. His scouts reported that the Overbridge farmers seemed to be at normal work in their fields. Gird looked around. All his people were watching him, waiting for him to make a decision. The longer he waited, the more nervous they would be—and the more likely that some child would get loose and go off noisily, to reveal where they were.
“Six hands,” Gird said. He pointed to Felis and Cob. “Three each from yours. Ivis, have four hands ready for support, if we need it. The rest close up and be ready to get everyone across and through the gap quickly. If there’s a real fight—if they have more hidden that the scouts missed—they’ll have reinforcements coming, from both upstream and down. That won’t hurt us as long as we know it’s coming, and have reached higher ground before they do.” He placed pebbles on the ground to show them what he meant. “If they do come after us, let ’em get right up in the gap, and then turn on ’em. Be sure you don’t cross the water until all of us are across and out of sight. If they see us, I want them to think we’re all the trouble they have.”
Six hands of men—three from the original Stone Circle outlaws and three from Fireoak barton—followed Gird and the original forward scouts. They crossed the rushing little river upstream of the gap, at a narrows where the forest almost met across the water, going single-file as quietly as they could. Then they worked their way upslope, hoping to flank the ambush. Gird was not at all sure this would work; he would have expected his own maneuver. But if the guards were still expecting ignorant peasants, they might have no one on the hilltop to watch for it.
His idea almost worked. Gird spotted one of the guards at the moment the guard spotted him, and yelled. More yells, and the noise of movement. Gird held his group still. It was possible that the guard had not seen them all, and in a moment he would know where all the guards were.
“Come out here, you!” the guard said. “Who are you, skulking about in the woods?” He sounded as much nervous as angry.
Gird did his best to look frightened; he could hear the others clearly now, and then they came in sight. Seven… eight… nine… in yellow and green uniforms. They carried short swords; two had bows slung over their shoulders. That was a mistake; he hoped they would not realize it in time to cause him any trouble.
“Answer me, serf!” said the guard, bolder with his friends around him. “You know the rules: no one’s allowed on the hills now.”
Gird would like to have said something clever, but he couldn’t think of anything. The man was three long strides away—farther than that for the men behind him—and Gird would have to be fast or the bowmen might get their bows into action. Someone behind him, trying to move closer, rustled the leaves; the guard’s eyes widened. “Are there more… ?” His voice rose, as Gird charged straight ahead.
They had swords in hand, but swords could not reach him. Not if the others came in time. Gird thrust the point of his stick at a face that had blurred to a white blob; the man staggered back. Someone’s sword hacked at his stick; he felt the jolt, swung the tip away, and jabbed forward again. The guards were yelling, surprise and fear mixed together. Gird paid no attention to them; he could see his own men on either side of him, jabbing again and again at the soldiers who flailed wildly with their swords, stumbling into trees. The two bowmen backed quickly, reaching for their bows.
“Bowmen first!” yelled Gird—the first thing he’d actually said, in words, and lunged at one of them. His stick caught the man hard in the chest; it didn’t penetrate, but the man staggered and fell. He gave Gird a look of such utter surprise that it almost made Gird back a step—but instead he thrust again. This time the point caught the man in the neck, slid off to one side, and pinned his shoulder to the ground. Gird leaned on the pole. It was surprisingly hard to force the point in… but the man was clawing at his throat, his face purplish. Gird pulled the stick back and clouted him hard on the head. The soldier fell limp; when Gird checked, he was not breathing.
Around him, the fight was ending in a wild flurry of blows, counterblows, and bellows. The sharpened sticks worked, but clumsily: driving a sharp point of wood through clothing and flesh took strength and weight; once spitted, the enemy was even harder to free. Most of Gird’s people had done what he did: use the point to fend off attack and throw the swordsmen off balance, then finish them with a blow to the head. It worked because they outnumbered their opponents, but Gird knew that would not always be true.
“Get their weapons,” Gird reminded his people, as they finished off the last of the soldiers. “Knives as well: we can use everything. All their food, any tools.” The dead soldiers had not worn armor. Gird shook his head over that; they must have assumed that the peasants had no weapons worth wearing armor for.
“Boots?” asked one of his still barefoot yeomen.
Gird nodded. “Clothes, if you want ’em. Felis, take two hands and go downslope; watch for their reinforcements. We made enough noise to rouse a drunk on the morning after. Cob, you take a hand back to hurry our people along.” Gird helped drag the bodies into a pile out of the way. He did not bother to look for herbs of remembrance: these were his enemies; he had helped kill them, and it would be an insult to lay the herbs on them. Only one of his people had been hurt, a young yeoman who had a knife wound on the arm to remind him that fallen enemies were not necessarily dead.
Chapter Twenty-two
Soon he could hear the rest of his people coming. They were hardly past, moving much slower than
he would have liked, when he heard hoofbeats from the stream valley. No one had said anything about a mounted contingent nearby, but it made no real difference. Felis sent a runner back up: twenty horsemen, five bowmen and the rest with swords. Dust back down the trail, as if more were coming, though he couldn’t say if those were horsemen or afoot.
“Good,” said Gird, surprising those around him. He hoped it was good; it would be good if they won. “Fori, take eight hands—go that way—” Downstream that was, “—through the woods two hundred paces, then go downslope and wait for my call. You’ll be coming in on their flank or rear. The rest of you, come with me.”
The entrance to the gap trail offered the horsemen a gently rising slope from the narrow fields near the river, a slope gradually steepening as the trees closed in. Gird placed his troops across the point of this triangle, inside the trees, with the center set back a horselength. He watched the horsemen as they rode back and forth near the river, clearly looking for signs of a crossing. One of them went upstream, and came back at a gallop, yelling. The group milled about, then formed into a double column and headed for the gap trail.
Gird was surprised at that. Could they really be so stupid? Sunlight glinted off their breastplates and helmets—these would be harder to kill, but they were trusting too much to their horses and weapons. At the last moment, as the leaders came under the edge of the forest, some caution came to the leader, for he held up his hand and the troop reined in. The bowmen had their bows strung; they reached for arrows. Gird gave the signal anyway. On either side, his men ran out, carefully keeping their formation, poles firm in their hands.
The rearmost horses squealed and tried to back away: their riders spurred ahead. Two bucked, and one unseated its rider, who fell heavily. The first two riders had also fallen, shoved from their saddles by skillfully applied poles. One lay stunned; the other had rolled up quickly, and was doing his best to defend himself with his sword. Behind him, the other riders had tried to charge forward, but their horses shied from the sharp points of the sticks, swerving and rearing. The riders cursed, spurring hard; they could not reach Gird’s men with their swords, and any who were separated were quickly surrounded, and pushed out of the saddle. Three of the bowmen, however, had managed to set arrow to string. Two of the arrows flew wide, but one—by luck or skill—went home in the throat of the man about to unseat the bowman. He managed to fit another arrow to his string, and this one narrowly missed Gird. Now his companions realized what he was doing; the remaining horsemen clumped together, protecting the bowmen in their midst, so that they had time to shoot again and again.
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