Dark North (Malory's Knights of Albion)

by Paul Finch

  HAD ALARIC BEEN able to grease his naked form with pig-fat, he’d have found his passage through the twisting labyrinth easier. As it was, he was scraped and gouged, but almost as soon as he wormed his way into that torturous defile, a chink of light became visible. When he reached it, he found that it was nothing more than a reflection on a rock face; the true source was far overhead. The passage had become a chimney, though no chimney ever contorted as this one did. Even so, the lad snaked his way up, sweat stinging his eyes, his blood running freely. A speck of sky was visible, but it was still far above. Gasping with pain and effort, grunting incoherent prayers, he barked his shins and elbows, and cracked his head on jutting granite. The sounds of battle diminished to a distant, tinny clamour. Soon all he could hear was his own breath. But he was almost there. The air seemed fresher. The blot of sky now seemed the size of a table, but there was still some distance to go yet.

  DOWN IN THE cave, two more fighters had been dragged to their deaths. Lucan had been forced back to the front simply because he was the closest. Davy Lug stood alongside him, wielding a flail. He threshed on the apes as though mad, but then Babi’s massive claw raked across his face, ploughing flesh and bone, popping an eye from its socket. The archer tottered backward, screaming, and another knight, already wounded, took his place. A smaller ape came at this one and he skewered it, but so deeply did the blade of his sword bite and so slippery with blood was its hilt that it slipped from his grasp. The disarmed knight was taken by the legs, and dragged into their midst, where a hundred rocks rained on him.

  For a moment Lucan stood alone.

  His eyes locked on the yellow pinpoints under Babi’s bony brow. The brute stretched open its massive maw, crouching and coiling its misshapen form as though ready to spring. The other baboons, of which there were still too many to count, also coiled. They would force their way inside through sheer weight of numbers. And then, suddenly, there was a thunderous grating and crashing from overhead – as though an avalanche of stone was descending.

  What happened next was hidden from the men in the cave by a choking cloud of dust, filling their eyes and noses, coating them in fine white-grey powder. The noise was ongoing and cacophonous, yet grew louder and louder, forcing them to clamp hands to ears...

  ALARIC HAD NOT intended to bring half the mountainside down.

  On emerging far above the milling baboons, he had seen one boulder – an immense egg-shaped stone – perched precariously on the cliff edge. Jammed beneath it, at an angle which might provide leverage, was the broken bole of a tree. The naked boy put himself behind it and heaved. A first it seemed an impossible task, his muscles straining in his wounded flesh, sweat springing from his brow. But in that isolated moment there was surely no weight in the world that Alaric – the lives of whose friends depended on him – could not shift.

  With a splintering of wood and grating of stone, the mighty rock slowly moved, and then, in an instant, dropped over the precipice. It struck one ledge after another before striking the apes, and in the process took down vast numbers of other boulders, which descended on the gibbering tribe in a colossal deluge of rubble and scree.

  So much of the cliff-face disappeared that, as the dust settled, Alaric found he was able to walk down the rubble, picking an easy route.

  One by one, his comrades emerged from the recess, coughing in the dust. If at any stage it had occurred to him that his rash act might have buried them alive, it had proved unfounded.

  The baboon tribe had enjoyed less luck.

  With the echoes of the landslide still ringing in their ears, Lucan and his handful of survivors descended. The terrain in front of them had changed beyond recognition. It was little more now than a vast apron of jumbled moraine – spreading not just down the hillside, but through the stockade and far into the village. Of the baboons, only the occasional crushed face or twisted, twitching limb poked above the surface.

  Babi himself was more easily found; buried to mid-way up his shattered torso, his hide thick with dust and dirt. His left arm had broken off at the elbow, only a glinting white spear jutting through the gluey pulp. His jaw had smashed sideways, and both his eyes had gone. But he was still groping feebly about, a soft gurgling rising from deep inside him. Lucan watched dispassionately. When he pressed the tip of Heaven’s Messenger against the monster’s throat, and leaned slowly forward, it was not an act of mercy.

  One or two baboons had survived on the peripheries of the slide, and now bounced around on all fours, gibbering – though more with fear and confusion than anger. When Lucan brandished his sword at them and gave a battle howl, they fled.

  “Did God supply you with a thunderbolt?” Maximion asked Alaric.

  “I pray it was Him and not some other,” Alaric replied.

  He eyed Lucan, who turned and caught his gaze. This time, for once, the emboldened ex-squire did not look away.

  Twenty-Eight

  AS THEY ROSE higher into the Ligurian massifs, Trelawna wondered what kind of world her lover was taking her to. Rags of mist blew across a dismal, sloping landscape; a place of rocks, chasms and black, stunted trees. Each night, more soldiers slipped away under cover of dark. The tiny handful soon remaining was cold, tired and desperately hungry. Their mounts plodded listlessly, some lame, others simply exhausted.

  “What is this place?” Trelawna asked. “This country, I mean?”

  “Italy,” Rufio replied. “You are now in Italy’s far north.”

  She smiled wryly. “Every country has a north.”

  “Even my most loyal companions are abandoning me,” Rufio complained. “They owe everything they have to my beneficence. I gave many their commissions. I promoted some from the ranks...”

  “They don’t want to die,” she said simply.

  “Which shows what a milk-livered bunch they are. We are a day’s ride from Castello Malconi... one day, that’s all, and the danger will be past.”

  “Tribune!” came a voice from behind.

  They turned, to see a scout who had been posted at the rear galloping towards them. He was red-faced and sweating. Steam rose from his horse’s flanks.

  “Well?” Rufio demanded.

  “It’s Earl Lucan, sir. He’s less than a day behind us.”

  Rufio placed a fist to his knotted brow. His eyes screwed shut.

  “You can keep running, Felix, and hope we make it to Castello Malconi in time,” Trelawna advised him. “Or I can do what I said... return to my husband and beg his forgiveness. If he kills me, he kills me... but at least the affair will be over.”

  “And how do I live with my conscience?” he replied. “If I send you to your death while I run for safety?”

  “Your conscience hasn’t troubled you much until now,” Gerta muttered.

  “Silence, you hag!” he screamed, pointing with trembling finger. “Trelawna, I swear... if your servant misspeaks herself one more time, I’ll...”

  “Gerta, you’re not helping,” Trelawna said tiredly.

  Gerta returned Rufio’s fierce glare. “Take it out on me if you wish, Roman lord... though you should be taking it out on your real enemy. Were you a knight of Albion you’d know there’s only one solution to this problem. You would ride down there yourself and challenge Earl Lucan to single combat.” She turned to her mistress. “But I’ll hold my tongue from now on. I know how painful the truth can be.”

  She turned her animal around and rode slowly away.

  Rufio watched her balefully, saying nothing, and gradually his expression slackened. “Single combat? Against the Black Wolf of the North...”

  “Only a fool would consider such an option,” Trelawna said.

  “Maybe I’d rather be a fool than a coward.”

  “Felix...you’re not actually considering this? You won’t stand a chance.”

  Rufio reached to his waist and, still missing his sabre, drew instead his gladius. He glanced around, surveying the rock-strewn plateau on which they had halted. “This looks as good a
place as any. Who knows... maybe God will guide my blade to his heart? If He doesn’t, I’d like to know why. I’m a Roman officer and a gentleman, after all. I did my part to spread Christian civilisation.”

  “You can ask Him why personally,” Trelawna retorted. “Less than one minute after you’ve entered the field.”

  “If you’ve so little faith in my ability, Trelawna, at least have respect for my courage. That all-licensed wet-nurse of yours for once speaks true... I should have done this days ago. In any case, needs must. When that husband of yours catches up with us, who else will save me?”

  “Gentlemen!” Trelawna cried, turning to the only two officers remaining, Centurion Marius, and a sub-tribune, Cohortis Bartolo. “Tell him he’s throwing his life away!”

  Both remained grim-faced. “Sometimes we must take hard decisions, ma’am,” Marius said. “Value life too highly, and it ceases to be worth living.”

  Rufio turned back to the scout. “Ride down to that wretched little band and issue my challenge. In the meantime, Marius, you are charged with continuing the journey. Take my lady and her maid to Castello Malconi.”

  “At the very least, I should stay with you!” Trelawna cried.

  But Rufio was resolute – he already regretted his decision, but he could not reverse it. She protested further, but Marius was only too glad to take her reins and lead her away.

  “You hellish old cat!” she hissed at Gerta. “You’ve consigned my love to his grave!”

  Gerta stared doggedly ahead. “He risked the same when he took arms against King Arthur.”

  “But he survived that. And now you’ve pitched him into the same fight again. Your vindictiveness has taken away my one chance of happiness. How dare you!”

  “How dare you, mistress,” Gerta retorted, her wizened cheeks reddening. “It’s your girlish folly that brought us here, not mine.”

  Trelawna was too stunned to reply, so Gerta ranted on.

  “When you were first taken as Earl Lucan’s prize, I feared for you. I dreaded your fate in the hands of that dark, solemn warrior, and yet at no stage did I have the premonition of disaster that beset me when you made the ridiculous decision to run away with a milksop boy whose world was hanging by a slimmer thread than he could ever imagine.”

  “Hold your tongue!” Trelawna stuttered. “Who do you think you are addressing?”

  “At present, mistress, I am addressing no-one. A once great lady who is now a chattel... a pawn in a game between warlords.”

  Trelawna could make no immediate response. She seethed with anger, but also with hurt. The truth of Gerta’s tirade tore her insides, yet she could not bring herself to admit it. Everything she had once been – honoured noblewoman, adored beauty of King Arthur’s court – was now gone, leaving a yawning gap in her life, to be replaced by Heaven knew what.

  “And I’ve known you too long be fooled by this charade of anger,” Gerta added. “You want this thing to end, just as I do.”

  “You think I want to see Felix die?” Trelawna said in disbelief.

  “Perhaps not that, though it hardly matters. We’re being sent to this fearsome fortress regardless, are we not?” Gerta’s voice became hoarse with emotion. “So now we get the worst of both worlds.”

  FOR EARL LUCAN’S party, there’d been little time to recover.

  Only eight now remained: Lucan himself, Alaric, Wulfstan, Maximion, Hubert, Guthlac, and Davy Lug. And, surprisingly, Malvolio.

  They were back in what remained of the village when the chubby squire showed himself, emerging pale and cut across the brow from a dilapidated house. When the monster ape had hurled him, he’d smashed through a pair of shutters and into a heap of furniture. He’d lain there senseless through the entire fight – at least, this was the story he gave, though none of them had the energy to dispute with him. In fact, Alaric had been amused.

  The burials followed with indecent haste. There was no time to swathe the broken forms in linen. A pit was dug and the dead were laid out. With no priest to sing a eulogy, Lucan spoke himself, his mailed hands clamped on the pommel of his longsword.

  “Hail to those who gave their lives in service to overlord and King!” he cried. “Those of us remaining will honour their names and the memories of their deeds. We lay them now in soft earth to ease the passing of their ghosts, but to render it easier still we pledge a sacrifice of those who slew them. These sleeping sons of Albion will not have died for naught; peace will be theirs when all wrongs are righted, and blood for blood stains this black Roman earth.”

  “That invocation sounded pagan,” Malvolio whispered afterwards.

  “He’s taking us beyond the scope of God’s love,” Alaric replied dully.

  When the soil had been laid and a single wooden cross erected, they searched for their horses. A few mounts had survived, found scattered around the village or beyond the stockade. Many were bleeding, or lathered with sweat, but they were adequate for the survivors’ needs. Nightshade was among them, which Lucan was grateful for. There was a single packhorse upon which they loaded the few stocks of food and drink they’d been able to preserve. The men were in an equally poor state – all hurt to some degree or other. A cloth bound the head of Davy Lug, concealing his torn eye-socket; it was already thick with clotted blood.

  Before leaving, Lucan had them hitch the Scorpion to the tail of Malvolio’s mount.

  “That’s a cumbersome cargo,” Wulfstan observed. “It will slow us down.”

  “We need something with which to strike the Malconi ramparts,” Lucan replied.

  Wulfstan seemed dissatisfied with this. “My lord... might I appeal to your good sense?” Lucan regarded him stonily. “This machine is useful, but it will not replace those good men we have lost. The odds are increasingly stacked against us. No man would think the less of you for turning back now.”

  “If I cared what men thought of me, I wouldn’t have come to begin with.”

  Again they followed the trail left by the fugitives, though this time Wulfstan had trouble thanks to the churned ground left by the baboon tribe. They only knew for sure they were on the right path a day later; they were ascending a steep trail through brakes of tangled, leafless thorns when they rounded a bend and found a horseman awaiting them.

  “Greetings, Earl Lucan,” he said, one hand raised.

  “Who are you?” Lucan replied.

  “Roberto Giolitti, outrider of the Fourteenth Legion.”

  Lucan regarded him skeptically. “Say your piece.”

  Giolitti nodded curtly, and issued Tribune Rufio’s official challenge. At first Lucan thought he’d misheard. So did the rest of his men. They swapped wondering glances.

  “Your master would fight me?” Lucan said.

  “That’s his desire. Too many others have died, he says.”

  “When and where?”

  “There is a plateau an hour’s ride to the east of here. He awaits your pleasure.”

  “Go ahead,” Lucan replied. “We will follow.”

  The Roman wheeled his animal around and ascended the path. Lucan turned to his men. They still regarded him with wonder, though many wore hopeful smiles. Could their ordeal now be at an end? Was it possible that as soon as this evening they would be heading home again? Alaric looked unsure, and Wulfstan, by his frown, felt the same.

  “This may be a trap,” he said. “I wouldn’t put it past them. They’ve used sorcery against us once already.”

  “They’ll pay for that,” Lucan replied. “When Felix Rufio lies dead on the field, the rest will hang.” He caught Alaric regarding him with distaste. “Look at me that way if you wish, sirrah. But it’s Arthur’s law, not mine. Arthur rules these lands now... as the Malconi are about to learn.”

  Twenty-Nine

  THEY FOUND THE plateau, an exposed spot, very drear and rocky, with a belt of dark fir trees at its far side. Midway across, Giolitti had joined two other Roman soldiers, all on horseback. They wore the orange leggings and cloaks of the Fou
rteenth, but by their ornamented breastplates, roundels and greaves, and the plumes on their helms, the other two were high-ranking officers. One in particular, though he bore the same dents and abrasions of his comrades, had polished his plate so that it shone in the afternoon sun. His visor was drawn down, covering his face. Even from a distance Lucan could see that he was taut with fear.

  As the new arrivals reined up, Giolitti approached them. “My master requests that you fight on foot,” he said.

  “On foot?” Lucan replied. “He’s a cavalry officer, is he not?”

  “His horse is lame.”

  “As you wish.” Lucan and his men dismounted, Wulfstan signalling to Malvolio to take charge of the horses.

  “There are some formalities first...” Giolitti began.

  “There are no formalities,” Lucan interrupted. “Let’s get on with it.”

  He put on his helmet, drew Heaven’s Messenger and was handed one of their few remaining shields, kite-shaped and painted jet-black. He advanced warily but confidently, the sword-blade angled on his right shoulder. By contrast, the visored Roman almost stumbled as he came forward. He’d drawn his gladius and hefted his round cavalry shield, which, though bossed and rimmed with iron, was far too small for hand-to-hand combat on foot.

  The combatants halted when they were a couple of yards apart. In the intensity of the moment, it was probably understandable that neither noticed the favours bound to each other’s hilts – a red scarf for Lucan, a blue scarf for Rufio.

  Though well concealed beneath polished plate, the Roman’s limbs were visibly shaking. In some ways this made it the more impressive that he had come here voluntarily. He must have known Lucan’s reputation, and Trelawna would certainly have made an effort to stop him. Assuming, of course, that this actually was Felix Rufio.