by John Norman
"Bring the pickets in!" cried the officer.
"Bring fire!" cried a fellow.
"No!" I cried. "Not fire!"
The wadding was thrust rapidly in my mouth, and bound in place. I was then thrust back to the sand and, the neck tether considerably shortened, fastened down, between the two mooring stakes. My keeper left me, to rush to the aid of his fellows. I tried to pull free. I could not. My hands fought the manacles, foolishly. I tried to turn my head, to rear up a little, as I could, to watch. Men were hurrying about with torches, with spears, striking at tharlarion. The shore seemed alive with them, and the marsh. I heard screams coming from all sides of the bar. Nearby several men were thrusting spears into the body of a huge tharlarion. Other fellows were thrusting torches down at others. More beasts clambered from the marsh, driven by those behind them. The bar seemed alive with men and tharlarion. A fellow might be attacking one beast with a torch while others crawled past him. The beasts swarmed on the bar. Few attacked men, except, here and there, to react, or snap at them. More injuries, I think, were suffered as the result of their thrashing about, the swift movements of those gigantic tails, the strokes of which could break legs, and hurl a fellow yards away, than from the laceration of numerous, white, curved, hooklike teeth, than from the pounding closings of those mighty jaws. These animals had not ascended the bar in aggression or menace. They had not come to attack. They had not come to feed. They moved about, here and there, twisting, turning, moving in one direction, then turning back, milling, confused, uncertain. Nothing in their experience, any more than in that of the men of Ar, had prepared them for this chaos, this tumult. Surely they, no more than the men of Ar, had anticipated it. If anything, if it were possible, I thought the beasts to be more distressed, agitated or confused than the men of Ar. I lay back, suddenly, as a long, heavy, scaled shape, on short legs, crawled over my body.
"More fire! More torches!" cried a fellow.
I struggled in the manacles, the bonds. I tried to pull free, to rear up. I twisted about. But I remained as my captors had decided, absolutely helpless.
"More torches!" called another fellow.
I tried to cry out, to scream against the gag. I tried to work the wadding, the packing, from my mouth, but it was held back, over the tongue, deeply, firmly, in place by the binding. I tried frenziedly to loosen, to move, to dislodge the binding, rubbing the side of my face in the sand. Naught availed. I tried to attract attention, but none paid me attention. I could make only tiny noises. My tongue ached. The side of my face burned. I was covered with sand and sweat. Another beast crawled by, its long body lifted a few inches from the sand.
"Light more torches!" I heard.
I lay back, miserable, in the sand. The bar now, housing its menagerie of confused beasts, its numbers of angry, frightened men, blazed with light.
Fools, I wept silently, to myself, fools, fools.
I tried to dig myself down, lower into the sand.
In an instant I heard the first strike, a sound like a fist striking a chest, and saw a fellow reeling among the tharlarion. In a moment there were other sounds, similar. I saw a man raise his hands, his torch lifted eccentrically, then lost, turn and fall. Then like wind, swift, everywhere, as though the air were alive, shafts, in flights, from all sides, sprung from the darkness of the marsh, swept the bar.
"Down!" cried a voice, that of the officer. "Down! Take cover!"
Men were screaming.
"Put out the torches!" screamed the officer.
"Aiii!" cried a fellow.
"Down!" screamed the officer. "Down!"
"The tharlarion!" protested a man. Then he had been felled, falling among the beasts.
"Put out the torches!" screamed the officer. He himself had discarded his.
Arrows sped across the bar.
Tharlarion reared up, sometimes feet from the sand, their bodies, too, struck by arrows.
Torches, swiftly, men crying out with misery, began to be extinguished.
"Down!" cried the officer. "Down!"
I saw one fellow throw back his head in terror and scream, his torch clutched in both hands. He feared to retain it, and was terrified to let it go. Then he stood very still, and then fell forward, among the tharlarion, the arrow of temwood, fletched with the feathers of the Vosk gull, in his back. I saw another fellow, too, hesitate, confused, then struck by an arrow. Better would it have been for him, too, had he obeyed orders promptly.
"Down!" cried the officer. "Take cover!"
"Aiii!" screamed a man.
"Kill tharlarion!" called the officer.
"I cannot see!" cried a man.
"Take cover behind them!" called the officer.
I heard a hideous scream.
"Down! Down!" screamed the officer. "Get down! Dig into the sand!"
Then the arrows, I think, stopped. The bar, that island of sand in the delta, was dark. I heard some of the beasts moving about. Most, however, confused, not now troubled by the men, the torches, seemed to remain much where they were. I turned on my side, as I could. This would narrow the width of my body. Then, after a moment or two, I heard the sudden bellowing, again, the hissing and squealing, of tharlarion. Some began to move about, again, to leave the bar, to reenter the water. The arrows, for an Ehn or so, descended unto the island, like rain. I heard one drop into the sand a yard or so from me. It would be almost upright, in a bit no more arrows fell. Arrows, of tern wood, like the ka-la-na wood of their bows, not native to the delta, are precious to the rencers. They seldom fire unless they have a favorable target. Accordingly, like the men of the Barrens, they will often go to great lengths to approach an enemy closely. In the case of the rencers this is to conserve arrows. In the case of the men of the Barrens some think this is connected with their smaller, less powerful bow. Others think it has to do primarily with the desire of the men of the Barrens for glory, having to do with the counting of coup, and such. I was once in the Barrens. Although it is difficult to comment on such cultural matters, the origins of which are often obscure, I note that the two explanations are not incompatible. The small bow, incidentally, is designed in such a way that it may be fired, shifting rapidly from side to side, from the back of a racing kaiila. I then, after a time, heard various tharlarion leave the bar, returning to the marsh, in two or three Ahn it became dawn. The rencers had gone, at least for the time.
15 We Continue Westward
Again I struggled westward in the marsh, gagged, my hands manacled before me, tied at my waist, my body pulling against the harness. Too, I was now hooded. It had been a supposition of my keeper that I might, somehow, be able to communicate, perhaps by glances or such, with rencers. Perhaps, too, they now desired to conceal from me the wretchedness of their state. So I struggled ahead, closed in the hood, manacled, harnessed, drawing the weighty raft through the marsh, through the rence, through the mud, now with several men upon it, some wounded and sick, little more, if anything, than a beast of burden, a despised beast subject to the frequent blows, the lashings, of an impatient, hostile master.
It was now four days after the incident of the drive of the tharlarion.
We had continued to move west.
Rencers had now chosen to pick their targets with care. Sometimes Ahn would pass, and men would think themselves secure. Then an arrow would dart forth from the rence, the bowman unseen, his presence perhaps not even suspected, and another man, perhaps silently, would sink into the marsh. The officer no longer cared to assign men to point positions. Too often these scouts and flankers, and rear guards, failed to return. Now the men of Ar, I gathered, trod together, for many seemed close about. I think many from other columns, even, with their own tales of woe and terror, may have joined ours, or caught up with us. Perhaps they had been gradually moved toward us, by the rencers, in effect, their herdsmen. I wondered if many wished, somehow, if only half consciously, to use his fellows for cover. "Lines!" I had heard, often enough. "Lines!" I had supposed then that they must have again
formed lines, now doubtless, given their exhaustion, staggering, straggling lines, yet lines that would provide at least an isolation, a separation, of targets. I could imagine weary, terrorized men looking fearfully to the left and right. Everywhere the rence would seem the same. As for myself I could concern myself with little but the weight of the raft, my footing, and the blows which drove me.
"Glory to Ar!" cried out a man, somewhere behind me and to my left.
"Glory to Ar!" wept others.
Bit by bit, from the reports of men from other units, sometimes coming across us, sometimes found wandering in the marsh, sometimes half mad, we had been able to build up a picture of what was occurring in the delta. It was not difficult to overhear these things, at night, and during the march. The rear column, interestingly, had been the first to break, but its retreat had been stopped by rencers, apparently in great numbers. The arrows of tern wood, it seemed, had chosen to close the return to the east. The rear column, then, had fled deeper into the delta.
"They want to keep you in the delta," I had told the officer two nights ago, when unhooded, ungagged, to be fed. "They want you here, all the more at their mercy, where they may deal with you at their leisure, and as they please!"
Labienus had looked at me, not speaking.
"You must try to break out of the delta!" I had said.
He had not responded.
"But what shall we do, Captain?" asked a man.
"We continue west," had said Labienus.
Other reports soon began to trickle in. Two columns had been decimated in rencer attacks. Hundreds of men had perished in quicksand. Many of these had apparently been lured into the mire by rencers who had permitted themselves to be seen, and pursued, rencers who doubtless knew their way through the area, perhaps even drawing up safe-passage markers behind them. Others had fallen to the attacks of tharlarion and the marsh shark, which becomes particularly aggressive early in the morning and toward dusk, its common feeding times. Sickness and infections, too, were rampant. Hunger, exposure, sunstroke, and dysentery were common. There were many desertions. Perhaps some of the deserters might find their way from the delta. One did not know. And always it seemed the rencers were about, like sleen prowling the flanks of a herd.
"Cursed rencers!" I heard a man scream. "Cursed rencers!"
"Stay down!" someone called to him. "Do not stand so!"
"You will unsettle the craft," said another.
"Cursed rencers!" he screamed again. Then I heard a cry of pain.
"It came from there!" cried a man.
"I saw nothing!" cried a man.
I heard a body fall into the water.
"From there!" cried the fellow, again.
"Hurry!" cried a man.
I heard metal unsheathed. I heard men wading to the right.
"Fulvius! Fulvius!" cried a fellow.
"He is dead," said a voice.
I heard a cry of anguish.
I had stopped, and the column, too, I think, as a whole, had stopped. I did not, at least, hear men moving in the water.
There was not much noise, only the cry of a marsh gant.
We waited.
In few moments I heard some men approaching. "We found nothing," one said.
"Lines!" I heard. "Lines!"
"I will avenge you, Fulvius!" I heard a man cry. I heard, too, metal drawn.
"Come back!" I heard. "Come back!"
"Lines!" I heard. "Lines!"
"Let him go," said a man, wearily.
"Shields right!" I heard. Normally the shield, of course, is carried on the left arm, most warriors being right handed. The shields were now to be shifted to the right arm, for that was the direction from which had come the arrow. There might be rencers, too, of course, on the left. But they knew that they were on the right.
I heard the whip snap again behind me. I then, and I gather, too, the rest of the column, began again to move forward.
"Keep the lines!" I heard. "Keep the lines!"
We did hear, an Ehn or so later, a long, single wailing cry from the marsh. It came from behind us, from the right.
16 It is Quiet
"Cos may not be in the delta," said the officer.
"I do not think she is," I said.
No fires were lit. There was little noise.
"I have tortured myself," said the officer, "particularly of late, considering whether or not the things you have spoken to me might be true."
"I am pleased you have considered them," I said.
"It has been difficult of late not to consider them," he said.
"I would suppose so," I said.
"Even though they be the utterances of a squirming spy," he said, bitterly.
"Even if the motivations for the thoughts which I have confided to you were purely self-regarding," I said, "which, under the circumstances, I think, would be understandable, it was nonetheless appropriate that you consider their plausibility."
"Would you teach me duty?" he asked.
"No," I said. "I think you are much concerned with it."
"The men are weary, and sick," he said. "I, too, am weary and sick."
He sat near me. Few men in this camp now assumed an upright position. Even in moving about they usually did so in a crouching position. The crouching figure makes a smaller target. I sat up, my neck-rope lengthened to permit me this lenience. My ankles were tethered to a mooring stake. We spoke softly. There was little sound in the camp. My hands were now, again, as it was night, manacled behind me. My captors, I thought, however, were growing careless. I thought I now knew who, for this day, had carried the key to the manacles. In the morning, after I had been again gagged and hooded, my hands would be again manacled before me, and fastened there with a strap, that my back might be more available for blows. If I listened carefully, my captors perhaps being less careful than before, given my hooding, I might be able to determine to whom the key was delivered. A word, a careless sound, might be sufficient.
"Some think we should try to withdraw from the delta," he said.
"It is perhaps too late," I said.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"I think it unlikely that a single column can withdraw successfully from the delta."
"What of several columns?" he asked.
"That would seem to be possible," I said, "though difficult."
"Why difficult?" he asked.
"The movements of so large a force will be easily determined," I said. "Cos, if nothing else, even disregarding the rencers, controls the skies. She has tarn scouts. And the forces of Cos, moving swiftly on open ground, well informed, adequately supplied, in good health, can be marshaled to a given point far more rapidly than can be the men of Ar, struggling in the marsh."
"Nothing can stand against Ar," he said.
"Do not underestimate the Cosians," I said.
"Mercenaries," said he scornfully.
"There are Cosian regulars, as well," I said. "Too, your columns will be exhausted and ill. Too, your columns must reach the edge of the delta. Do not forget the rencers."
"Seven columns, four to the south, three to the north, are intent on breaking out, even now," he said.
"How do you know these things?" I asked.
"From stragglers," he said, "from fellows found in the swamp, from men separated by rencer attacks from their units."
"What of the left flank?" I asked.
"It is intact, as far as I know," he said.
"I would guess that the columns to the north have the best chance of success."
"It is unwise to go north," he said. "It is farther from Ar, from our allies. There is much Cosian sympathy in the north. It is enemy country. Port Cos lies in that direction. Then, even if successful in escaping from the delta, the columns would have to manage the crossing of the Vosk to return to Holmesk, or Ar."
"It is for such reasons," I said, "that I expect there will be fewer Cosians in the north."
"You expect more in the south?"
"Of
course," I said. "They will expect you to take just that course, to avoid the crossing of the Vosk."
"I do not know," he said. "I do not know."
"Too, it is convenient for them," I said. "They can be supplied from Brundisium. They can even bring up men from Torcadino, if they wish."
"I still think it possible that Cos is in the delta," he said.
"Apparently many of the other commanders do not agree," I said.
"Or now fear the pursuit is too costly," he said.
"Perhaps," I said.
Out in the marsh we could hear various sounds, movements in the water, the occasional bellow of a tharlarion, usually far off, and the cries of Vosk gulls, perhaps Vosk gulls.
"You, too, now plan to withdraw?" I asked.
"No," he said.
"Why not?" I asked.
"Cos may be in the delta," he said.
"That is unlikely," I said.
"My orders are clear," he said.
"It is perhaps just as well," I said. "Indeed, it probably makes little difference."
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"You are isolated," I said, "probably like most of the other units in the delta. I regard it as unlikely you could, with this strength, enforce an exit."
"You suggest that we are doomed?" he asked.
"I think men will escape the delta," I said. "I suspect some have already done so, perhaps even units, some days ago. Perhaps, too, these large-scale efforts by united columns will be successful. Let us hope so, for the sake of Ar."
"But?" he asked.
"But," I said, "I think the only real hope of escape from the delta lies not with units but with individuals, or small groups of such, individuals who might with fortune, and with skill and stealth, elude rencers, the surveillance of tarn scouts, and the patrols of Cos. Such I think, and, ideally, lone individuals, would have the best chance of escape. Obviously Cos cannot survey the entire delta. She cannot investigate every rush, every stem of rence. She cannot, with adequacy, patrol every soft, dark foot of its perimeter. Indeed, I think that an individual, experienced in marshcraft, familiar with techniques of evasion and survival, of penetration and infiltration, traveling alone, moving with care, might easily escape the delta."