Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures M

by Robert E. Howard

  Before Zenghi, playing at chess with his friend and chronicler, the Arab Ousama of Sheyzar, came the eunuch Yaruktash, who salaamed low and in his squeaky voice intoned, “Oh, Lion of Islam, an emir of the infidels desires audience with thee – the captain of the Greeks who is called Wulfgar Edric’s son. The chief Il-Ghazi and his memluks came upon him, riding alone, and would have slain him but he threw up his arm and on his hand they saw the ring thou gavest the emperor as a secret sign for his messengers.”

  Zenghi tugged his gray-shot black beard and grinned, well pleased.

  “Let him be brought before me.” The slave bowed and withdrew.

  To Ousama, Zenghi said, “Allah, what dogs are these Christians, who betray and cut one another’s throats for the promise of gold or land!”

  “Is it well to trust such a man?” queried Ousama. “If he will betray his kind, he will surely betray you if he may.”

  “May I eat pork if I trust him,” retorted Zenghi, moving a chessman with a jewelled finger. “As I move this pawn I will move the dog-emperor of the Greeks. With his aid I will crack the kings of Outremer like nutshells. I have promised him their seaports, and he will keep his promises until he thinks his prizes are in his hands. Ha! Not towns but the sword-edge I will give him. What we take together shall be mine, nor will that suffice me. By Allah, not Mesopotamia, nor Syria, nor all Asia Minor is enough! I will cross the Hellespont! I will ride my stallion through the palaces on the Golden Horn! Frankistan herself shall tremble before me!”

  The impact of his voice was like that of a harsh-throated trumpet, almost stunning the hearers with its dynamic intensity. His eyes blazed, his fingers knotted like iron on the chessboard.

  “You are old, Zenghi,” warned the cautious Arab. “You have done much. Is there no limit to your ambitions?”

  “Aye!” laughed the Turk. “The horn of the moon and the points of the stars! Old? Eleven years older than thyself, and younger in spirit than thou wert ever. My thews are steel, my heart is fire, my wits keener even than on the day I broke ibn Sadaka beside the Nile and set my feet on the shining stairs of glory! Peace, here comes the Frank.”

  A small boy of about eight years of age, sitting cross-legged on a cushion near the edge of the dais whereon lay Zenghi’s divan, had been staring up in rapt adoration. His fine brown eyes sparkled as Zenghi spoke of his ambition, and his small frame quivered with excitement, as if his soul had taken fire from the Turk’s wild words. Now he looked at the entrance of the pavilion with the others, as the memluks entered with the visitor between them, his scabbard empty. They had taken his weapons outside the royal tent.

  The memluks fell back and ranged themselves on either side of the dais, leaving the Frank in an open space before their master. Zenghi’s keen eyes swept over the tall form in its glittering gold-worked mail, took in the clean-shaven face with its cold eyes, and rested on the Koran-inscribed ring on the man’s finger.

  “My master, the emperor of Byzantium,” said the Frank in Turki, “sends thee greeting, oh Zenghi, Lion of Islam.”

  As he spoke he took in the details of the impressive figure, clad in steel, silk and gold, before him; the strong dark face, the powerful frame which, despite the years, betokened steel-spring muscles and unquenchable vitality; above all the Atabeg’s eyes, gleaming with unperishable youth and innate fierceness.

  “And what said thy master, oh Wulfgar?” asked the Turk.

  “He sends thee this letter,” answered the Frank, drawing forth a packet and proffering it to Yaruktash, who in turn, and on his knees, delivered it to Zenghi. The Atabeg perused the parchment, signed in the Emperor’s unmistakable hand and sealed with the royal Byzantine seal. Zenghi never dealt with underlings, but always with the highest power of friends or foes.

  “The seals have been broken,” said the Turk, fixing his piercing eyes on the inscrutable countenance of the Frank. “Thou hast read?”

  “Aye. I was pursued by men of the prince of Antioch, and fearing lest I be seized and searched, I opened the missive and read it, so that if I were forced to destroy it lest it fall into enemy hands, I could repeat the message to thee by word of mouth.”

  “Let me hear, then, if thy memory be equal to thy discretion,” commanded the Atabeg.

  “As thou wilt. My master says to thee, ‘Concerning that which hath passed between us, I must have better proof of thy good faith. Wherefore do thou send me by this messenger, who, though unknown to thee, is a man to be trusted, full details of thy desires and good proof of the aid thou hast promised us in the proposed movement against Antioch. Before I put to sea I must know that thou art ready to move by land, and there must be binding oaths between us.’ And the missive is signed with the emperor’s own hand.”

  The Turk nodded; a mirthful devil danced in his blue eyes.

  “They are his very words. Blessed is the monarch who boasts such a vassal. Sit ye upon that heap of cushions; meat and drink shall be brought to you.”

  Calling Yaruktash, Zenghi whispered in his ear. The eunuch started, stared, and then salaamed and hastened from the pavilion. Slaves brought food and the forbidden wine in golden vessels, and the Frank broke his fast with unfeigned relish. Zenghi watched him inscrutably and the glittering memluks stood like statues of burnished steel.

  “You came first to Edessa?” asked the Atabeg.

  “Nay. When I left my ship at Antioch I set forth for Edessa, but I had scarce crossed the border when a band of wandering Arabs, recognizing your ring, told me you were on the march for Rakka, thence to Mosul. So I turned aside and rode to cut your line of march, and my way being made clear for me by virtue of the ring which all your subjects know, I was at last met by the chief Il-Ghazi who escorted me thither.”

  Zenghi nodded his leonine head slowly.

  “Mosul calls me. I go back to my capital to gather my hawks, to brace my lines. When I return I will sweep the Franks into the sea with the aid of – thy master.

  “But I forget the courtesy due a guest. This is the prince Ousama of Sheyzar, and this child is the son of my friend Nejm-ed-din, who saved my army and my life when I fled from Karaja the Cup-bearer – one of the few foes who ever saw my back. His father dwells at Baalbekk, which I gave him to rule, but I have taken Yusef with me to look on Mosul. Verily, he is more to me than my own sons. I have named him Salah-ed-din, and he shall be a thorn in the flesh of Christendom.”

  At this instant Yaruktash entered and whispered in Zenghi’s ear, and the Atabeg nodded.

  As the eunuch withdrew, Zenghi turned to the Frank. The Turk’s manner had changed subtly. His lids drooped over his glittering eyes and a faint hint of mockery curled his bearded lips.

  “I would show you one whose countenance you know of old,” said he.

  The Frank looked up in surprize.

  “Have I a friend in the hosts of Mosul?”

  “You shall see!” Zenghi clapped his hands, and Yaruktash, appearing at the door of the pavilion grasping a slender white wrist, dragged the owner into view and cast her from him so that she fell to the carpet almost at the Frank’s feet. With a terrible cry he started up, his face deathly.

  “Ellen! My God! Alive!”

  “Miles!” she echoed his cry, struggling to her knees. In a mist of stupefaction he saw her white arms outstretched, her pale face framed in the golden hair which fell over the white shoulders the scanty harim garb left bare. Forgetting all else he fell to his knees beside her, gathering her into his arms.

  “Ellen! Ellen de Tremont! I had scoured the world for you and hacked a path through the legions of hell itself – but they said you were dead. Musa, before he died at my feet, swore he saw you lying in your blood among the corpses of your servants in your courtyard.”

  “Would God it had been so!” she sobbed, her golden head against his steel-clad breast. “But when they cut down my servants I fell among the bodies in a swoon, and their blood stained my garments; so men thought me dead. It was Zenghi himself who found me alive, and took me –
” She hid her face in her hands.

  “And so, Sir Miles du Courcey,” broke in the sardonic voice of the Turk, “you have found a friend among the Mosuli! Fool! My senses are keener than a whetted sword. Think you I did not know you, despite your clean-shaven face? I saw you too often on the ramparts of Edessa, hewing down my memluks. I knew you as soon as you entered. What have you done with the real messenger?”

  Grimly Miles disengaged himself from the girl’s clinging arms and rose, facing the Atabeg. Zenghi likewise rose, quick and lithe as a great panther, and drew his scimitar, while from all sides the heron-feathered memluks began to edge in silently. Miles’ hand fell away from his empty scabbard and his eyes rested for an instant on something close to his feet – a curved knife, used for carving fruit, and lying there forgotten, half hidden under a cushion.

  “Wulfgar Edric’s son lies dead among the trees on the Antioch road,” said Miles grimly. “I shaved off my beard and took his armor and the ring the dog bore.”

  “The better to spy on me,” quoth Zenghi.

  “Aye.” There was no fear in Miles du Courcey. “I wished to learn the details of the plot you hatched with John Comnene, and to obtain proofs of his treachery and your ambitions to show to the lords of Outremer.”

  “I deduced as much,” smiled Zenghi. “I knew you, as I said. But I wished you to betray yourself fully; hence the girl, who has spoken your name with weeping many times in the years of her captivity.”

  “It was an unworthy gesture and one in keeping with your character,” said Miles somberly. “Yet I thank you for allowing me to see her once more, and to know that she is alive whom I thought long dead.”

  “I have done her great honor,” answered Zenghi laughing. “She has been in my harim for two years.”

  Miles’ grim eyes only grew more somber, but the great veins swelled almost to bursting along his temples. At his feet the girl covered her face with her white hands and wept silently. The boy on the cushion looked about uncertainly, not understanding. Ousama’s fine eyes were touched with pity. But Zenghi grinned broadly. Such scenes were like wine to the Turk, shaking inwardly with the gargantuan laughter of his breed.

  “You shall bless me for my bounty, Sir Miles,” said Zenghi. “For my kingly generosity you shall give praise. Lo, the girl is yours! When I tear you between four wild horses tomorrow, she shall accompany you to hell on a pointed stake – ha!”

  Like a striking cobra Miles du Courcey had moved. Snatching the knife from beneath the cushion he leaped – not at the guarded Atabeg on the divan, but at the child on the edge of the dais. Before any could stop him, he caught up the boy Saladin with one hand, and with the other pressed the curved edge to his throat.

  “Back, dogs!” His voice cracked with mad triumph. “Back, or I send this heathen spawn to hell!”

  Zenghi, his face livid, yelled a frenzied order, and the memluks fell back. Then while the Atabeg stood trembling and uncertain, at a loss for the first and only time of his whole wild career, du Courcey backed toward the door, holding his captive, who neither cried out nor struggled. The contemplative brown eyes showed no fear, only a fatalistic resignation of a philosophy beyond the owner’s years.

  “To me, Ellen!” snapped the Norman, his somber despair changed to dynamic action. “Out of the door behind me – back, dogs, I say!”

  Out of the pavilion he backed, and the memluks who ran up, sword in hand, stopped short as they saw the imminent peril of their lord’s favorite. Du Courcey knew that the success of his action depended on speed. The surprize and boldness of his move had taken Zenghi off guard, that was all. A group of horses stood near by, saddled and bridled, always ready for the Atabeg’s whim, and du Courcey reached them with a single long stride, the grooms falling back from his threat.

  “Into a saddle, Ellen!” he snapped, and the girl, who had followed him like one in a daze, reacting mechanically to his orders, swung herself up on the nearest mount. Quickly he followed suit and cut the tethers that held their mounts. A bellow from inside the tent told him Zenghi’s momentarily scattered wits were working again, and he dropped the child unhurt into the sand. His usefulness was past, as a hostage. Zenghi, taken by surprize, had instinctively followed the promptings of his unusual affection for the child, but Miles knew that with his ruthless reason dominating him again, the Atabeg would not allow even that affection to stand in the way of their recapture.

  The Norman wheeled away, drawing Ellen’s steed with him, trying to shield her with his own body from the arrows which were already whistling about them. Shoulder to shoulder they raced across the wide open space in front of the royal pavilion, burst through a ring of fires, floundered for an instant among tent-pegs, cords and scurrying yelling figures, then struck the open desert flying and heard the clamor die out behind them.

  It was dark, clouds flying across the sky and drowning the stars. With the clatter of hoofs behind them, Miles reined aside from the road that led westward, and turned into the trackless desert. Behind them the hoof-beats faded westward. The pursuers had taken the old caravan road, supposing the fugitives to be ahead of them.

  “What now, Miles?” Ellen was riding alongside, and clinging to his iron-sheathed arm as if she feared he might fade suddenly from her sight.

  “If we ride straight for the border they will have us before dawn,” he answered. “But I know this land as well as they – I have ridden all over it of old in foray and war with the counts of Edessa; so I know that Jabar Kal’at lies within our reach to the southwest. The commander of Jabar is a nephew of Muin-ed-din Anar, who is the real ruler of Damascus, and who, as perhaps you know, has made a pact with the Christians against Zenghi, his old rival. If we can reach Jabar, the commander will give us shelter and food, and fresh horses and an escort to the border.”

  The girl bowed her head in acquiescence. She was still like one dazed. The light of hope burned too feebly in her soul to sting her with new pangs. Perhaps in her captivity she had absorbed some of the fatalism of her masters. Miles looked at her, drooping in the saddle, humble and silent, and thought of the picture he retained of a saucy, laughing beauty, vibrant with vitality and mirth. And he cursed Zenghi and his works with sick fury. So through the night they rode, the broken woman and the embittered man, handiworks of the Lion who dealt in swords and souls and human hearts, and whose victims, living and dead, filled the land like a blight of sorrow, agony and despair.

  All night they pressed forward as fast as they dared, listening for sounds that would tell them the pursuers had found their trail, and in the dawn, which lit the helmets of swift-following horsemen, they saw the towers of Jabar rising above the mirroring waters of the Euphrates. It was a strong keep, guarded with a moat that encircled it, connecting with the river at either end. At their hail the commander of the castle appeared on the wall, and a few words sufficed to cause the drawbridge to be lowered. It was not a moment too soon. As they clattered across the bridge, the drum of hoofs was in their ears, and as they passed through the gates, arrows fell in a shower about them.

  The leader of the pursuers reined his rearing steed and called arrogantly to the commander on the tower, “Oh man, give up these fugitives, lest thy blood quench the embers of thy keep!”

  “Am I then a dog that you speak to me thus?” queried the Seljuk, clutching his beard in passion. “Begone, or my archers will feather thy carcass with fifty shafts.”

  For answer the memluk laughed jeeringly and pointed to the desert. The commander paled. Far away the sun glinted on a moving ocean of steel. His practiced eye told him that a whole army was on the march. “Zenghi has turned aside from his march to Mosul to hunt down a pair of fleeing jackals,” called the memluk mockingly. “Great honor he has done them, marching hard on their spoor all night. Send them out, oh fool, and my master will ride on in peace.”

  “Let it be as Allah wills,” said the Seljuk, recovering his poise. “But the friends of my uncle have thrown themselves into my hands, and may shame rest o
n me and mine if I give them to the butcher.”

  Nor did he alter his resolution when Zenghi himself, his face dark with passion as the cloak that flowed from his steel-clad shoulders, sat his stallion beneath the towers and called to him: “Oh man, by receiving mine enemy thou hast forfeited thy castle and thy life. Yet I will be merciful. Send out those who fled and I will allow thee to march out unharmed with thy retainers and women. Persist in this madness and I will burn thee like a rat in thy castle.”

  “Let it be as Allah wills,” repeated the Seljuk philosophically, and in an undertone spoke quietly to a crouching archer, “Drive me quickly a shaft through yon dog.”

  The arrow glanced harmlessly from Zenghi’s breastplate and the Atabeg galloped out of range with a shout of mocking laughter. Now began the siege of Jabar Kal’at, unsung and unglorified, yet in the course of which the dice of Fate were cast.

  Zenghi’s riders laid waste the surrounding countryside and drew a cordon about the castle through which no courier could steal to ride for aid. While the emir of Damascus and the lords of Outremer remained in ignorance of what was taking place beyond the Euphrates, their ally waged his unequal battle.

  By nightfall the wagons and siege engines came up, and Zenghi set to his task with the skill of long practice. The Turkish sappers dammed up the moat at the upper end, despite the arrows of the defenders, and filled up the drained ditch with earth and stone. Under cover of darkness they sank mines beneath the towers. Zenghi’s ballistas creaked and crashed, and huge rocks knocked men off the walls like ten-pins or smashed through the roofs of the towers. His rams gnawed and pounded at the walls, his archers plied the turrets with their arrows everlastingly, and on scaling-ladders and storming-towers his memluks moved unceasingly to the onset. Food waned in the castle’s larders; the heaps of dead grew larger, the rooms became full of wounded men, groaning and writhing.