Riders of the Steppes

by Harold Lamb

  Red flashes darted out of the screen of reeds, toward the willows. Powder roared and smoke gathered between the two craft and the shore. Ayub estimated that the raiders had a dozen muskets. But they were shooting at a black void, and it was the work of long minutes to reload the clumsy matchlocks. Whereas the skilled archers, accustomed to night work, scored many hits. An arrow, in darkness, could be better trained on a mark than a pistol, or the short, poorly fashioned arquebuses.

  The galley, parted from its makeshift moorings by the impact of the other boat, had drifted downstream a short distance before being caught in the rushes. By the red flashes, Ayub could make out that the other party had used a flat barge, or scow, for the attack, binding to its sides a screen of reeds. The low bulwark of the barge offered no protection to the men within it, and presently the same voice issued a second order.

  "Pikes and swords, you fools. Keep in line, and cut down all in front."

  With that some fifteen men jumped from the barge into the shallow water and waded toward shore. The Tatars quickened their bow work, and several heavy splashes told that some of the assailants had been struck down. But they were no cowards, and came on like trained soldiery. Ayub knew that his five hunters would be of little use in a hand-to-hand fight.

  For a second the big Cossack hesitated. He knew the voice that gave the order—one of the starosta's officers. His adversaries, then, were Russians. He had started the killing as a matter of course, seeing them stealing in on the galley and thinking them robbers. But he was not the man to turn back from a fight. Besides, the screen built around the barge bespoke no honest purpose.

  With a whispered word to his companion, he stripped out the twohanded sword and sprang down to the stone-littered shore. Here, still within the murk under the trees, he was a foot or so above the muddy bank where the line of attackers was advancing through the reeds. His long blade whistled in the air and smote down the first two who stumbled out of the water.

  "U-ha!" he bellowed. "A Cossack fights. Back to the fishes, you water-snakes!"

  As if an echo of his war-cry, he heard from the slope above the trees a faint U-ha! Sheer, berserk fury gripped Ayub, when his steel thudded through cloth and leather and bones snapped under its edge. Leaping from side to side he made good his vantage point.

  The light on the river was strong enough for him to be aware of the gleam of steel in the hands of his foes, and when he dodged he struck.

  "From the sides!" cried the voice of the leader of the assailants. "Take him from the sides. Fail not!"

  Then the whirr of arrows past Ayub's shoulders, and a moan in front of him. Feet pounded over the stones toward him and the Cossack made a wide sweep with his broadsword that cut the legs from under one man. Another he jammed back with the hilt. Hands clutched at his head; the butt of a musket numbed one shoulder.

  Three or four foemen had him now, and strong fingers throttled his throat. Ayub jerked his head free, and struck out with one hand, while the other held fast to his sword. Unable to win clear, he strode down into the water, pulling with him the others who had not time to brace themselves against such a move. Once in the mud, he whirled like a dervas, felt one man fall, and another lose balance in the treacherous bottom.

  A sword-stroke knocked the cap from the Cossack, but, exerting his great strength, he cast from him the assailant who gripped his head, and kicked out at the man who clung to his waist.

  He was clear of them.

  "U-ha!" he chanted, swinging his weapon again. "You came into this world when dogs scratched you out of a dung-heap. Time you went back again—"

  Steel rasped through his side and jarred against one of his ribs. Turning, he parried the next thrust of the one who had struck him. Their swords clashed heavily, and Ayub thrust against a metal breastplate. Stepping back he swung wide and knocked his adversary sprawling, losing his balance at the same time. He rolled over in the muddy water, came up, found his weapon and peered about him.

  On both sides men were splashing away toward shore. Hoarse voices cried out in fear.

  "Save yourselves! It is a devil we have found. Each for himself! It is a devil, come up out of the water!"

  Ayub, listening in vain for a counter command from the leader, decided that the raiders had had enough, which was well as he was nearly exhausted.

  His Tatars, scenting victory, raised a chorus of guttural cries and loosed their arrows anew as they pursued the fleeing. Gifted with keener sight, and having the advantage of the ground, they soon cleared the shore. Silence, broken by stifled groaning from the barge, descended upon the river.

  By a fire, kindled by the hunters, Ayub surveyed the fruits of his generalship and found them notable. Four badly wounded footsoldiers and musketeers in the barge, three who had been struck down by arrows and had drowned in the shallow water, and five others, victims of his sword, crippled or dying.

  "By the Cross," he muttered, "it was something of a skirmish, after all." His wounds were not serious, and only one of the hunters was slain, by a chance bullet. "Now where is the chief of these devilkins?"

  A Tatar pointed to a tall figure in the livery of the starosta, a form nearly covered by a dark, satin cloak, water-soaked. Ayub kicked it off with his toe and swore in earnest. It was Varan, his forehead scarred deep by an arrow that seemed to have stunned him, and his right shoulder pierced by another shaft.

  Under instructions from the Cossack, Varan was rubbed and bound up roughly, after the water had been emptied out of his lungs. He had looked closely into the face of death, and when he recovered consciousness, lay without speaking.

  "Lieutenant," said Ayub gravely, "these men of yours wear not the governor's livery. They are evil-faced hounds. What were you after when you sidled up to my galley like a fox stalking a hen roost?"

  Varan winced.

  "We thought the galley another craft."

  "A lie! I saw the signal fire kindled on Kudak, when I pulled down the river. You or your men saw it also, and followed us on shore and took to the barge when we made camp. You are he who is called Lord of the River, pirate and king of thieves."

  The officer's long face set, and he turned away his eyes.

  "If it pleases you, say it."

  Ayub tugged at his mustache thoughtfully, watching his men strip spoil from the assembled bodies. "Then you are a dog, and this is what will happen to you. The Tatar arrow glanced off your skull, and so you live. But when I am done with you, Lieutenant, you will journey in haste to your liege lord, Satan. So, shrive yourself by telling the truth for once. Why did you set out after me?"

  "I had a score to settle." Varan looked at the stained steel of the broadsword indifferently.

  "Hm. So you carried on your work of darkness under the shadow of Kudak, protected by the governor's livery. I see now why you took such an interest in the bodies of the pirates. You wanted no dog-brothers of yours to blab your secret."

  Varan nodded.

  "Well, my pirate, you must have had brains in another man's skull, to guide your work and dispose of your takings, for you are not shrewd enough for that. Is it the merchant Sigismund who is your brother in wickedness?"

  "I am no tale-bearer."

  Ayub's eyes hardened.

  "Nor am I a lady-in-waiting, my falcon. Answer, or these Tatars will flay the soles off your feet. After that we'll burn your flesh."

  For a while Varan considered. Then, with a shrug, he raised himself on his elbow. "I am the chief of the band of river-thieves. As you say, another in Kudak guided our ventures and took a third of what we gleaned from the captured ships. That man was young Michael, who dwelt in the town in disguise, the while his sister thought him at Kiev. We quarreled, he and I, and—"

  "You strung him up with the thieves that were slain by the governor." Ayub's teeth gleamed under his mustache. "You are a pretty fellow. The starosta trusted you. How did you know I was in the galley? Is it true that you can see by night as well as by day?"

  The officer flushed.
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  "I—one of my men saw you go out of the inlet. I was in command of a detachment watching the road to Khor. By pushing our horses on the river trail we got abreast of you."

  "Another thing. What is your governor planning to do to Khor? Will he pass over the affront or start a battle with Demid?"

  "John of Kudak is angered." Varan chose his words with care. "He is minded to take Khor, keep the princess shut up from her people, in the fortress. If you want to bargain for Demid's life, you can say to the sta-rosta that you have taken the Lord of the River. He, at least, will give me an easy death—and he would exchange me for the young Cossack. But you have no time to lose."

  Doubtfully, Ayub studied him, but Varan's eyes were steadfast.

  "I have talked enough. Do what you will."

  Just then there came one of the hunters with tidings.

  "Father, the burlaks are gone."

  "How, gone?"

  "They are not here. We have searched the woods. The thickets are dense and the ground impassable. They could not have gone far. But we hear them not."

  "The —— take them!" Ayub glanced up at the stars, noting by the Dipper that the hour was close to dawn. "Well, we will take to the galley, with our prisoners."

  The lined face of the hunter twisted curiously.

  "The galley is gone."

  Ayub got to his feet and went to the shore, even walking some distance downstream. Yet the boat, that had been stranded within sight, was not to be seen. He inspected the barge, but abandoned that in contempt. It lacked oars or rudder, and leaked freely.

  Sunrise showed him the long stretch of the river, and not a boat to be seen. For several hours he waited impatiently, but except for a single fish-ing-smack that kept obstinately to the other shore, the Dnieper was bare. Reflection brought him little comfort. He might wait for days before a serviceable vessel came within hailing distance. Varan had sent back his horses to Kudak, and between them and Khor, thirty miles north, was not so much as a hamlet. To push on to the siech on foot was out of the question. Neither Ayub nor the Tatars were cut out for walking, being bred to horses.

  "It is plain," he grumbled, "that God never ordained me to be a ship's captain. It was an evil hour when I left my black stallion and took to planks on the water. Now we must tramp like slaves for a hundred versts, to reach Demid again with this prince of robbers."

  Leaving, perforce, the crippled and dying thieves, to drift downriver in the barge, he took Varan and the one slightly wounded captive, and set out toward the river trail in no pleasant frame of mind. The sight of the Tatars, stumbling through the brush in their heeled riding-boots, brought him some comfort. To lift his spirits and cheer his men he began to sing heartily.

  When you are back from the wars, my lad,

  When you are back from the wars,

  Your dog will be dead Your wife will be fled With a fat pursed alderman.

  VI

  The Man in the Cloak

  Ayub's one thought was to get back to Demid. His kunak had been bewitched by a young girl. To be sure, Ayub had decided that the princess, Ileana, was not a vampire; but he believed she might be a basilisk—a thing with inhuman eyes that drained the courage from a man.

  It was quite clear that some power, some agency unknown to the Cossacks was at work upon the river. Ayub had caught Varan at his evil trade of plundering and slaying; still, immediately after that the galley had vanished. Moreover the big warrior had heard a shout from the forest mocking his own war-cry. Along with the galley the watermen had disappeared to the last man.

  Ayub did not wait to reason it out. The galley might have drifted clear from the rushes, certainly, but—unmanned—it could never have floated out of sight before sunrise. Nor would the burlaks have fled from his fire. He had no desire to match wits with a devil.

  Demid would know what to do with Varan.

  On the second day of the march, luck favored the Cossack for the first time. A boy horseherd of Khor overtook them a few miles south of the manor house with half a dozen ponies—a roundup of the stragglers before the Winter set in.

  Mounted, after a fashion, they made better progress, and by mid-afternoon arrived at the forest edge near the spot where the Cossacks had watched the farm. Leaving his men on the trail, Ayub climbed to the knoll to have a look around before venturing out into the fields.

  Well for him that he did so. It was a warm afternoon—one of those that come long after Summer, when the sky is dark, but the slanting sun once more repels the clouds, and no wind stirs the bare limbs of the trees or the brittle leaves on the earth.

  The blue haze did not conceal a half-squadron of dragoons, dismounted a quarter-mile from the forest, in the pastures behind Khor. Nor the videttes sitting their horses a gunshot from each flank of the line of cavalry. By their plumed helmets, and fur-tipped, blue cloaks, Ayub knew that this was the detachment of the dead Cornet, Boris.

  They had taken position in the open, where they could cut off any attempt at flight by those in Khor.

  In front of the manor house and its palisade an earthwork had been thrown up, with fascines through which projected the mouths of two brass cannon. Behind this line stood the banner bearing the arms of John of Kudak. The steel caps of musketeers—a company of Walloon mercenaries—were visible over the breastwork.

  On each flank were compact masses of dull-clad footmen, sailors and peasants of the town, armed with pikes and flails. Ayub estimated them to number a hundred, the musketeers a score, with as many officers and their servants. With the three-score dragoons this made close to two hundred men under the command of John of Kudak.

  "Enough to draw and quarter every soul in Khor thrice over," thought the Cossack.

  The governor knew what he was about; his forces were well-placed, and by mustering the townspeople, he had been able to leave the better half of his soldiers in Kudak, to keep the fortress while he was away.

  "And Demid sticks a feather in his nest, the young fool!"

  Ayub swore feelingly; at the same time his eye gleamed and he stroked his mustache with a grunt of pleasure. Over the gate of the palisade, facing the cannon, a rude standard had been placed, a pole bearing the wide horns of a steer from which hung buffalo tails—the buntchauk, or standard of the frontier Cossacks.

  Except for this there was no sign of human occupancy in the manor house. No men moved in the stables, the hay ricks or the rambling wings of the manor house. Devoutly, the Cossack prayed that Demid had been wise enough to withdraw before the farm was invested. If he was within, with Ileana, the hand of John of Kudak would not deal with them gently.

  One of the mounted nobles rode around the breastwork and approached the closed gate cautiously. Evidently he sought a parley, but returned to his post without receiving any response. A group of the nobles walked to a slight rise, overlooking the field, and a long plume of black and white smoke rolled from the muzzle of a cannon. A roaring report was followed by another.

  Ayub spurred back to his followers, and began to lead them along the edge of the forest, to the brush nearest the gate of Khor. At intervals the cannon barked, and they could hear the splintering of wood where the logs of the gate were being pounded to pieces.

  When they gained the point they sought, within arrow shot of the footmen at one side of the earthwork, Ayub dismounted and peered through the screen of brush. The cannon of the governor had made short work of the wooden gate. It lay on the ground, a heap of logs. Ayub could see through the gap into the palisade, and he thought he made out figures moving through the smoke pall.

  An officer rode up to the musketeers. The cannon were swabbed out and moved to one side. The musketeers took up their pieces and formed in a double file, ready to move against the gate. On each side the town militia formed for an advance. Ayub could see the starosta now, mounted beside the captain of the German infantry. Out in the distant pastures, the dragoons were climbing into saddle leisurely, drawing their sabers, laughing and cracking jokes about this castle of s
traw that they were going to take.

  John of Kudak lifted his hand, to give a command. Then, without speaking, he turned his head. Several of the militia men near Ayub glanced around curiously. The Cossack was aware of singing.

  It came from below and behind the line of the governor's men. It was a deep-throated chant, barely audible. Seeking a new position in his screen of underbrush, Ayub peered down at the inlet.

  Up the neck of water from the river to Khor a galley was coming, rowed by long oars. He recognized the song as the chant of the Dnieper river-men. And he recognized the galley as the ancient craft that had been under his feet not long ago.

  But in the stern of the galley, a hand on the tiller, stood a tall figure, hatless and gray-haired. At least the scalp lock that hung down one shoulder was gray, the sun-blackened skull otherwise was shaved in the Cossack fashion. An immense red svitza was flung over the bare chest of the man of the galley. This was bound tight at the waist with a green sash, and high boots completed the attire. At the side of this man stood a short Cossack with only one arm.

  By now everyone in the starosta's force was staring at the galley and its crew. Ayub reflected that these burlaks were the same that had rowed him down the river. But then they had had no song on their lips.

  A murmur from the townspeople reached his ears, as the galley slid in to its jetty and the watermen flung up their oars.

  "Rurik! It is the, bogatyr, the hero. Rurik the Fair!"

  "It is the master of Khor, come back after ten years—"

  "Nay, dolts, 'tis the ghost of Rurik—he was not buried. See, he has only one eye, and his familiar, beside him, has but one arm. They are ghosts!"

  So ran the talk of the watchers, voiced by those nearest the jetty, and repeated further back until Ayub heard. The big Cossack crossed himself

  and felt for the hilt of his sword, because his back was cold and his hair tingled. But, presently, remembering that ghosts never walked in sunlight, he peered forth again.

  Will-he, nill-he, the starosta was forced to postpone his attack, what with the rising apprehension of the town militia, and the appearance of Cossacks at his rear. He waited impatiently, while the two men stepped from the galley to the jetty and began to walk up the slope. The servants, who stood nearest, gave ground before them precipitantly. His own retinue opened a wide lane for the newcomers.