by Dave Luckett
At the noon halt, Gerd could fall out and eat his bread and sausage. He sat on a drystone wall by the road and stared out over the immense blue emptiness, sea and sky and land. It was then that he saw the dragon.
It flew, immensely high in the endless dark blue of the mountain sky. It was no more than a dot, and there was nothing to give a scale, but Gerd had seen a dragon fly before, and he knew it for what it was. It sparkled, reflecting metal glints from scales that were steel-hard, and there was the suggestion of the slow sweep of mighty wings.
He could have called. Perhaps it could see them. Perhaps it would spiral down, descending on the town, bringing ruin. But he said nothing, and did not point. The others ate and chaffered and belched, their eyes down, looking at their food or the green earth or the vast fretted enamel of the sea. Only Gerd watched the dragon as it flew, a jewel in the sky. He watched it, and it dwindled to a glittering mote, and was gone in the endless blue. Slowly he lowered his gaze until he found the earth again, and the equally endless ocean.
Master Hawken had said that there was more to be found than a life watching the backside of an ox. Gerd nodded to himself. Already he had found a part of it. But there was more yet to be seen, and more to do than carrying a spear and a pack, and the world's rim beckoned.
The afternoon's march trended downwards, just as the morning's had climbed. Subbay, it was said, was no more than a cluster of fishermen's huts set behind a shingle beach on the southern shore. The road led more or less directly towards the little settlement, and as they went the patches of worked land diminished, for this was the dry side of the island. Soon they were passing only low scrub interspersed with rough grazing, and with stands of spindly thorn-tree. Goats browsed in scattered flocks here and there, with an occasional goatherd to watch over them.
But now the captain, who had been leading, turned his horse off the road and took a bridle-path that led sharply downwards, to the left. They followed, as it entered and then descended a long gully, a narrow seam of greener foliage on the slope of the mountain. It ran in swoops and drops towards the sea, and in its depths a tiny stream bubbled over pebbles. It was cooler, for the gully was mostly narrow enough to give a shade, and there were trees. They were strange to Gird, not tall, but with thick scaly trunks and a sudden crown of long, ferny leaves. The captain simply rode on, and they followed, not questioning. This was a shorter way, perhaps.
The mouth of the gully was almost choked with thick scrub that had taken advantage of the water and the soil washed down from higher up. The captain reined in. He dismounted and threw the reins to the nearest man, before untying a pair of saddle-bags hanging on either side of his horse’s quarters. These he draped over one shoulder, one before and one behind, joined by a strap.
"Water him and rub him down," he said. "Corporal Sankey, your section to come with me. The rest stay behind cover. Corporal Hergan, you can fall your men out, but keep them quiet and be ready to form up in column and advance at the double on my whistle. Only when I call, mind." He touched his silver whistle, worn on a cord around his neck.
And so Gerd found himself following the Captain again as he pushed through the screen of brush and out onto a flat shingle beach.
The beach was perhaps fifty paces across and thirty deep, a shallow scallop set between two low headlands, which were the walls of the gully continuing out into the water. Small waves curled and smacked at the water's edge, and the pebbles clicked under Gerd's boots, his strides in step with the others.
The captain halted, glanced upwards at the sun, and then at the line of the water, comparing it to the tidal marks. "Form line, Corporal," he said, in a conversational tone, and they obeyed, facing the sea and wondering.
Captain Mannon unbuckled his sword-belt and thrust his sword, still in its scabbard, point-first into the shingle. Then he eased his back a little, and Gerd, watching from behind, saw a hard shape come and go under his tunic at the small of his back, below where the saddlebag hung over his shoulder. A long shape like a sausage, but more angular.
He started to puzzle over it, but his attention was suddenly taken away. A ship was coming into sight around the southern point. It had clearly been waiting for them.
It was long and low, and along its sides brightly painted shields were hung. The striped sail was furled. Oars dipped and swung like a gull's wings. Gerd counted them. Fourteen oars a side, so a crew of thirty or so, a large number for a small vessel. Then a twinkle of light reflected from the afterdeck. A sparkle, off metal. There were armed men aboard.
Gerd glanced sideways at Sankey, and saw his narrowed eyes, confirming it. That was a Kihree longship out there. The Islanders had a saying, and Gerd already knew it. A Kihree trader's a "t" too long. He hadn't understood it the first time he'd heard it.
"Dress it up, lads," said Sankey, out of the corner of his mouth, and the line straightened and tightened up.
"Stand easy, Corporal," said the Captain, without turning around. He was watching the longship. It was turning, moving into the shelter of the little cove. A minute later it had taken the ground ten or fifteen paces from the water's edge, bows on to them, but that had clearly been the intention of its crew, for a dozen men leapt down from the sides into water that was no deeper than their waists, to wade ashore.
"Stand fast." Again Captain Mannon had not turned around. He moved three paces forward, until he was ten paces short of the highest place where the little waves spent themselves, wetting the pebbles as far in front of his feet as a man might flick a pea. His sword still stood upright in place, behind him.
The Kihree sailors were sun-darkened, but mostly blonde. Most had helmets, but only one wore metal body-armour, a leather coat covered with steel rings. This was a tall man, his face hard to see because his helmet clasped it on either side, with a heavy nasal bar between his eyes. He waded through the tiny surf, slid the haft of a little axe he had been carrying into his belt, and came forward to the water-line, gesturing to the others to come no further than ankle-depth.
Gerd, watching, saw no greeting pass between Captain Mannon and the man in the ring-mail. There might have been the briefest nod, no more. Then Captain Mannon lifted the saddlebags from his shoulder and tossed them on the pebbles, a few feet in front of the other.
From where Gerd stood, it was hard to say if there was a change in the man's face. He said nothing Gerd could hear, but after a quick glance at the captain he stepped forward, bent and picked up the saddlebags. The Captain nodded and started to turn around.
"Halt." The Kihreean's voice reached Gerd, though it had not been loud. The accent was odd, making it sound like "hoult". Gerd saw the Captain's face change twice. It turned from wariness to satisfaction, and then it went completely blank, before the Captain swung around again. He stood at ease, his hands behind his back under his cloak.
The tall man had opened the saddlebags. Now he reached into one and pulled out a handful of objects that gleamed in the late-afternoon sun. Coins. Silver coins.
He looked down at them, as Gerd frowned to himself. An odd bargaining, this. But the tall man was scowling and saying something in a language Gerd did not know. He spat the words, growing angrier. He weighed the saddlebags in his hand, bouncing them up and down, and finishing with a sudden sharp exclamation, with which he slapped the bags down on the pebbles again. Silver coins spilled from them, a little spray on the stones.
The Captain shrugged and shook his head. He answered in the same language, a short sentence, but cool as the other had been hot.
The effect on the tall man was sharp. His hand went to the little axe at his belt, and he tugged it loose. Behind him, the Kihree sailors growled and took a pace nearer, but the tall man himself shook his fist at the captain and stalked forward, one, two, three steps, to plant himself before the captain and shout into his face.
The Captain recoiled a step, and the other leaned in to follow up his advantage, shouting, waving the axe high. Suddenly Gerd saw a pattern, and in that moment he knew what
was going to happen. But Sankey was already ordering the spears presented, and Gerd's body took charge, snapping into the movements it had been taught, as one with the others. The sudden stamp on the shingle and the line of levelled spearheads caused the Kihreeans to halt, their feet in salt water still, and the tall man's chin also jerked up as he stared over the captain's shoulder.
In that moment the captain's left hand moved, flicking out from behind his back, slicing upward in a flash of light. Metal gleamed, then disappeared. The tall man gave what Gerd thought was a snort of disdain. His hand grasped the captain's shoulder, and Gerd thought for a moment that he was grappling to hold him for the axe-stroke. But it was for support, not attack. The axe wavered slowly down. The man's mouth dropped open, and he grunted again. The captain twisted out of his grip, and then ran towards the line of spearmen, sprinting, the pebbles clicking and starting from under his feet.
Behind him, the other slumped to his knees. Under his right arm, the one that had been waving the axe, in the spot that no armour ever covers properly, a dark stain showed and something jutted out. The captain had already covered half the distance to Gerd before one of the men in the surf reacted. He shouted a single word, hefted his spear and hurled it. It flew full at Captain Mannon's back, but the Captain was already dodging, and it sailed past and was slapped down off his shield by a man two places up from Gerd.
The man in ring-mail fell flat on his face, his axe knocking itself out of his hand, his helmet coming askew. His hair, thus revealed, was shot with grey. The others looked down at him, and then up, and a howl as from a pack of wolves came from them. More, many more, were jumping down from the sides of their ship, waving weapons. Three or four went forward, and one turned their leader over, holding up his head. But the head lolled loosely, and the one who supported it held up a hand, red with blood. He looked up at the line of spearmen, and his eyes gleamed white. Staring at them, with two fingers he traced crimson streaks down his own cheeks. Sankey grunted. "Blood-feud now, that means. Stand fast, lads."
The Kihreeans gathered in a knot at the water's edge, thirty or so of them. They began to chant, a long slow rolling boom, and to clash their weapons against their shields. The man who had marked himself with his leader's blood lowered the man's head gently to the wet ground, and then he slowly drew a sword. He, too, began to stamp and chant, making jets of shrill sound that tore through the rest like sunshafts through mist, drumming his sword against his shield.
Gerd's eyes slid to his right, to the Captain, who stood, silver whistle in his hand, watching them with grave detachment. They're two to one against us, out here. We need the others. Why doesn't he blow?
The chanting reached a climax. There were men there who were foaming at the mouth, faces twitching, biting at the edges of their shields. Suddenly the voices rose to a metallic shriek, and in one movement, like cattle stampeding, they charged. In that moment, the captain pealed on his whistle, high and piercing.
Instantly there was a crashing in the brush behind Gerd. The rest of the column must have been formed up, immediately ready. Twenty paces of loose shingle separated the line of spears from the charge, and there was a palpable pause that seemed to go on and on. Gerd gazed at a man who seemed to be coming straight at him, watching in a strange numb calm as the howling mouth seemed to grow slowly wider, as the whites around the staring eyes became clearer and more shocking.
A spearhead appeared over Gerd's right shoulder, with its shaft jutting out two paces in front of him, and then another slid over his left. A flicker of a glance to left and right, and he saw that suddenly the line of shields had sprouted a hedge of points, spearheads three deep. He felt a reassuring pressure against his back. Someone's shield supported him. He concentrated on keeping his own shield in line, helping to cover his left-hand neighbour, just as his right-hand neighbour's shield was helping to cover him. A throwing axe clattered against it and fell away. And then the charge hit.
The sprinting, howling man before him batted Gerd's spearhead aside with his shield, and if that had been the only spear, he would have leapt past the point and closed to sword-length. But the rear-rank spearman stabbed forward, inside the man’s swung shield, and the Kihreean's staring eyes rolled upwards in dreadful surprise.
Someone was bellowing orders, and again Gerd's body reacted. The hedge of spears shifted, and then took a pace forward, a single shove. He saw a Kihreean dancing in a nest of spearheads like a man in a swarm of wasps, and then stumbling backward. He stepped forward with the rest, moving off on the correct foot, keeping his spacing, watching his dressing, making sure the line stayed straight. Another pace forward was ordered, then another. He almost didn't notice what he was stepping over.
A spearman fell, three lines up. Instantly his place was filled from the rear, and the advance continued, pace by measured pace down the beach to the water's edge. The Kihreeans raved and danced and howled and hurled themselves against the wall, and were dashed to pieces. It was as if they were matched against some implacable machine, unable to reach it, impotent to harm it.
On the brink of the waves they broke and scrambled to board their ship, to heave her off and get away, but there were not enough of them by that time to shove off. The last part was the worst, for though they tried to get away, they would not surrender. But it was over at last.
*
Sankey sat back on his bed roll, massaging his calves. "We were doing our jobs. What we're paid to do. And so was the Captain."
"When he cut the throats of those last two badly wounded Kihreeans, you mean?" asked Gerd. He hadn't seen it done, but he'd seen the results - the Captain straightening up, his knife bloody.
"They were raiders," said Sankey. "Pirates. There was a Gleddis trader taken only a week ago, and three others in the last two months, and that's only the ones we know about. Their crews were butchered like sheep."
Gerd looked around. Others were listening. The evening meal had been eaten, and the watch was about to be set. A cold little breeze blew up from the sea. Gerd drew his cloak around himself. "Uh-huh. How did the Captain know the Kihreean would be there, then?" he asked.
Sankey flipped a hand, to push the question away. "Well now, as to that, the Captain didn't call me in and tell me. It must have slipped his mind." Grins in the firelight answered him. Gerd began to feel he was in a minority of one.
"And the money he was going to give them?" he persisted.
"Well, he didn't give them any, did he? He only gave them one thing, and he got that back." Somebody grunted with laughter, and Gerd realised that the conversation was being closely followed by other men, listening as they cleaned gear and weapons, or simply sat and watched the play of the flames. Sankey followed up his advantage, as any good soldier should. "He didn't tell me what he had in mind. Sometimes he fails to ask my advice. Sad, that is. But then again, he's the Captain, and I'm a corporal, and you're a spearman, still an apprentice, really …"
"I'm a Brother Knight," said Gerd, shortly. "Same as you. Same as him."
Sankey's brows drew down. "Now, what's that supposed to mean?" he demanded.
Gerd looked at him. "I don't know. I think we used to know, and that it would be a good thing if we found out again," he said. "Good night."
He thought about it during the march back. That was around the western side of the island, on the other road, which kept close to the shore rather than climbing the slope. It was longer, but with neither scenery nor hard going to distract him, Gerd had plenty of time for thinking.
What about that money? Those saddlebags had been full of coins - though they hadn't been full enough, it seemed. Not full enough for what? What was the bargain? How had it been made?
Gerd remembered the words of the sailing-master, the day he had seen the castle for the first time. The Western Knights. They rule here. Rule, not defend, not protect. The Knights ruled. But who ruled the Knights?
Gerd glanced across at Sankey, who was stumping along beside him, a dogged look on his face. S
uddenly it came to him that Sankey and the rest didn't care a rap about the Captain's methods for dealing with pirates and raiders and brigands, so long as they worked. But he thought about what the corporal had said about the rations, frowned thoughtfully, hitched his shield further up on his back, and marched on.
*
"It's ready for a test," said Alissa. She pulled it out from underneath her bench.
It was an awkward object. A stock of wood, bent slightly in the middle, with odd metal fittings. Fixed across the end of it was a horizontal span of browned iron - the rod, tapering towards both ends, that she had finally succeeded in tempering to her liking. It was bent by a heavy cord, taut as a fiddlestring.
Gerd considered it. "It doesn't look like any bow I've ever seen," he said.