Sightblinder's Story

by Fred Saberhagen

  Meanwhile more arrows were sinking into his fur. And a javelin, hurled by some unseen hand, flew near Draffut as he rolled over and got to his feet again. He looked about him. There were no more gates here to be broken open, but there, at about the second floor level, a stony bartizan pierced with archers’ slits looked out over what would otherwise have been a blind expanse of exterior wall. If those openings were enlarged sufficiently, they would provide another means of ingress once the people outside could get a ladder of modest length into position.

  Thrusting a finger into one after another of the archer’s slits, Draffut willed power into his hand. The stones softened, and one by one the openings dilated until he could pass his whole hand through each of them. The ancient power of the Lake of Life was working in the Beastlord still, and it was capable of temporarily animating even the very stones of a castle wall.

  A small swarm of arrows stung his back. Turning round, he was unable to spot his assailants, who were keeping under cover as much as possible, but he did behold a much more welcome sight. The troops of Honan-Fu, in green and gold, were already in small numbers atop the wall where Draffut had just strung up the ladders. More were coming up the ladders all the time, but the attackers were not maintaining their foothold unopposed; already the defenders in red and gray were coming out in comparable numbers to meet them, and the fight was beginning briskly.

  Draffut could take no direct part in the fighting, much as he might sympathize with those who were fighting to regain possession of the castle. And now another movement caught his eye—leaning over the parapet that guarded the flat top of the central tower of the castle, two or three human figures were gesturing to him. These were mere signals of encouragement, it seemed. One of the figures he thought was Prince Mark, but he had no time to make sure now, and in any case their identity was not of the first importance.

  More wounds, from both javelins and arrows, were accumulating on the tough hide of the Lord of Beasts. The overall effect was increasing pain, though each hurt in itself was scarcely more than a pinprick to him. He paused now to brush from his body some of the hanging weapons whose points had snagged under his skin. At the same moment he saw by torchlight another javelin coming at him, and he blew his breath upon the weapon in mid-flight. In midair the spear was turned into a giant dragonfly. The creature veered away from Draffut and went darting innocently over the castle wall, going out above the lake. Before it had got so far as the shore, he thought, it would probably revert to inert matter and plunge into the water.

  “I must get on with the job,” the Beastlord muttered to himself, tearing a moderate accumulation of barbs out of his hide, and wincing with the pain. Yet even as he removed the weapons, more darts assailed him.

  Now he went scrambling over one of the comparatively low interior walls of the castle, reaching another courtyard. At the base of a wall there was another gate leading to the outside, this one the main entrance by the docks.

  With one wave of his fist Draffut frightened away the knot of soldiers who were gathered just inside this gate. In another moment he had knelt in front of it and knocked it open.

  He stopped, staring helplessly at what lay before him, just at the edge of the docks, beneath the fragments of the shattered gate. And suddenly it was as if the world had ended for him, the world in which he had been doing what he could, for many thousands of years, to serve humanity.

  What is that I see? What is it? And yet the Lord of Beasts knew only too well what it was. It was just that for a moment he could retain the comfort of being able to refuse belief.

  But only for a moment. The God of Healing stood up unsteadily, like a man dead on his feet, so horrified that for the moment he was unaware of what he was doing. More darts, unnoticed, pierced his skin.

  There had been a human being, a soldier, standing just on the other side of the last gate when it went down, and the momentum of the bursting gate had spent itself upon him.

  Draffut could do nothing but stand motionless, his eyes riveted upon that crumpled, mangled body in its uniform of red and gray. He had just killed a human being. That he had not suspected the presence of the man, had not intended to commit the slaughter, meant nothing to him now.

  Then his paralysis broke and he lunged forward, reaching through the gate to seize the lifeless thing and bring it to him with urgent tenderness. Meanwhile a terrible whining howl escaped his lips.

  He held the body up with both hands. With all his energy he willed his healing power into it. Meanwhile more arrows, unnoticed, struck him on his flanks and back.

  Draffut willed to achieve healing, but this time his powers could not heal. The damage to the small body was too great, death was a finality.

  He, Draffut, had killed a human being.

  He let the limp and bloody body fall. Then, shrieking out one horrible doglike growl after another, Draffut dragged himself somehow over the castle wall, and fled into the darkness of the lake.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Arnfinn was the first to hear the thudding sound. About two hours had passed since he had entered the hidden rooms at the top of the tower, and an hour since Ninazu had joined him there. Full daylight had long since come outside. Their conversation had taken an increasingly tender turn, and they were in one of the upper rooms, making their way with many sweet pauses toward the bed, when the Sword Arnfinn was wearing began to make a muffled pounding noise. Listening carefully, he needed only a moment to determine that this sound was proceeding in sympathy with a similar pounding that seemed to be coming in through the high windows from outside.

  Putting Ninazu gently aside, Arnfinn drew his weapon and stood looking at it in puzzlement. Ninazu’s surprise as she gazed at the Sword was even greater. It was as if she had not known until now that her companion was carrying anything like it, but now she was ready to accept the weapon’s presence as one more indication of his superlative wizardry.

  Then suddenly a man’s voice, unnaturally loud, came blasting in through the high windows. “Ho, on the roof!”

  “On the roof?” Arnfinn whispered, looking up.

  “Ho, there!” The voice blasted in at them again. “This is the master of the castle speaking! Let your ladder down for us at once! You are trapped, and I will show you mercy if you come down now!”

  Arnfinn felt himself able to make at least a fair guess as to who those people on the roof were.

  “But who is that shouting?” he whispered to Ninazu, perturbed. “Where is he?”

  “There is a stair outside, going up the outside of the tower to the roof. But no one out there can see in here.” Ninazu frowned. “It sounds like your voice, shouting.”

  What further comment she might have had on that point Arnfinn never learned. There was a violent explosion somewhere very close outside the windows, followed by a muted outcry. Hardly had Arnfinn’s ears ceased ringing from that blast when he could hear whoever was on the stairs quietly retreating.

  He went on listening, in fear and total bewilderment, without any idea of what was happening now. He could only hope that his fear was not evident to this lady he wanted to help and protect.

  This time it was Lady Ninazu who asked the question. “What was that?”

  “An event of magic,” said Arnfinn, swallowing. “Don’t worry, I will protect you. Are you all right now?”

  “Yes, great lord.” She sounded confident in his protection.

  “I have decided,” he said, and had to pause to swallow again, “decided that it would be well for us to make contact with those people on the roof, whoever they may be.”

  “Do you think, lord, they will be ready to surrender to you now?”

  “Actually it is not surrendering that I had in mind particularly. But I would like to talk to them at least.”

  Standing on the foot of one of the beds, Arnfinn located the trapdoor in the roof—there was a false panel concealing it, as Ninazu showed him. Arnfinn unlocked the trap, and tried to raise it.

  He straine
d, pushing upward with all his force, but nothing happened. Some weight above was holding the door immobile.

  At last, determined to make contact now, he called out. “This is Arnfinn here! I have the Sword of Stealth!” And he hammered on the trapdoor with the pommel of his Sword.

  “Arnfinn?” Lady Ninazu questioned gently. “If that is one of your names of power, lord, it will be safe with me.”

  Arnfinn gave her a sickly smile, knowing that she doubtless saw the cowardly grimace as something else entirely.

  Presently there were sounds from overhead as of heavy weights being moved.

  At last, when he pushed on the trap again, it swung up.

  Gray daylight flooded down into the bedroom. Arnfinn, looking up at three people who were standing on the roof, found himself, with some relief, confronting huge Ben and gray Lady Yambu. Zoltan, who had been with them in the grotto, was gone; Arnfinn remembered he had seen him getting ready to row the boat away. But Arnfinn could not recognize the tall, brown-haired man who was now with the familiar pair. Certainly he did not see in this tall man one of the victims who had been pulled nearly dead out of the well some hours ago.

  It was plain, from the way the lady and the huge man deferred to this newcomer, that they recognized him as their leader.

  Arnfinn glanced back at Ninazu, who was scowling to see Lady Yambu again.

  “We heard someone shouting on the stair,” Arnfinn opened the conversation lamely.

  “Your twin,” Mark informed him. The Prince, even familiar as he was with Sightblinder’s capabilities, was studying the shape that Arnfinn presented with fascination. “So, you are Arnfinn.”

  “I am. What of it?”

  “Nothing. Never mind. I thank you for whatever contribution you made to helping Honan-Fu and me out of the well.”

  “That was you?”

  Mark nodded. “Yes. I am glad you opened the trap … your twin upon the stair just now had Shieldbreaker with him. I suppose you heard what it did to the one weapon we tried against it.”

  “I heard the sound it made, whatever happened. And this Sword—”

  “Performed an imitation, yes. We heard it. A word of advice, though, my friend. Don’t use the Sword you have there against Shieldbreaker. Can I trust you not to do so?”

  “It would be better,” said the big man, “if one of us three had the Sword of Stealth instead.”

  “I agree,” said Mark, his eyes not leaving Arnfinn. “But we should not be fighting this young man—we all have our real enemy to fight.”

  Mark was thinking back to his own boyhood, when he had run away from a small village, to find himself alone and far from home, with only the terror and beauty of a Sword to keep him company.

  “Hard to get rid of, isn’t it?” he went on, speaking to Arnfinn gently, indicating the Sword the other carried. “And hard to keep. I know something of how that goes.”

  “You?” The youth was obviously suspicious of him. “How would you know?”

  “I’ll tell you about it someday. So, if you refuse to give it up, then keep it. Perhaps you can do as much good with it as we three could. But mind what I have said about the Sword of Force. It’ll mow you down like a blade of grass if you go armed against it, whatever weapon you may have in hand.”

  Ben grumbled privately, and would have tackled the youth again to reclaim Sightblinder, but Mark held his big friend back. The Prince was not going to have their two small groups fighting with deadly effect against each other, and it would be hard to fight against anyone who was using Sightblinder as a physical weapon because you would not be able to tell which way they were swinging or thrusting it.

  “Lady Ninazu and I intend to remain in the apartment,” Arnfinn called up to them.

  “All right. Just as well. We three will keep to the roof for a time; they already know we’re here and it lets us see what’s going on.” Mark hesitated, then called down. “What’re you going to do if the real Ancient One finds that tunnel and comes up after you?”

  Arnfinn had no ready answer for that. At last he said: “Even if he is proof against the magic of this Sword, the men with him will not be. Am I right?”

  “Right.”

  “Then I will be able to confuse them at least.”

  Mark added: “Let me say it again. One thing you’d better do if he comes against you with Shieldbreaker, and that’s disarm yourself. Your Sword won’t help you against that one—he’ll see you as you are anyway. But he won’t dare attack you if you’re disarmed.”

  Arnfinn nodded, though in his heart he still half suspected this advice might be a trick.

  The trapdoor to the roof was closed again, but left unblocked and unlocked. Before this closing, Mark and Ben came down to look the apartment over, and to their satisfaction they found a war club, hung up as a decoration, that would become an eminently practical weapon in Ben’s hands. And before retiring to the roof again, they blockaded the tunnel entrance with a wardrobe. The barrier thus formed would hardly be proof against a determined assault, but would at least serve to give warning that the entrance to the apartment had been discovered.

  Left to themselves again, Arnfinn and Ninazu got through the remainder of the day in the hidden rooms of the uppermost interior level of the tower. There was some dried food still in a cabinet, preserved with a touch of magic that left it reasonably flavorful; indeed, it was better than most of the food Arnfinn had eaten during his lifetime. And there was wine, of which he had but little experience, so that it went to his head and left him feeling giddy.

  Now that she had come back to this apartment, Ninazu did not want to leave. And Arnfinn was in a way as subject to her enchantment as she was subject to the power of the Sword he carried. Whenever he looked at her, with Sightblinder held tightly in his own hand, he saw a mystery that seemed to him divine. This is, he thought, the mystery of courtly love that minstrels sing about. And I, though only a peasant…

  When night fell, they quietly locked the trapdoor again, and then spent the night together in one of the beds in one of the highest rooms. Whether it had originally been Ninazu’s bed, or Kunderu’s, Arnfinn had no idea.

  The two of them were roused roughly in the hours before dawn, when the racket of Draffut’s invasion awakened the entire castle. Jumping out of bed, the lady and Arnfinn moved from window to window, trying to see what was going on outside, where the sounds of battle were unmistakable.

  Then there was a pounding on the locked trapdoor above.

  * * *

  On the morning the battle had started, on a lower level of the castle, Wood rejoiced to see the at-first-mysterious rout of Draffut. This eucatastrophe was closely followed by another stroke of good fortune for the Ancient Master, his griffin had returned, and could now be seen circling in the clear morning sky above the aerie tower.

  Wood’s first elation at this sight was somewhat dampened by the fact that the beast was riderless.

  Running out of his tower, across a first floor roof in the gray light of a clouded morning sky, Wood waved his arms in practiced gestures. The eagle-eyed creature saw him at once, and came gliding swiftly down to land on the low roof near him.

  In a moment Wood had reached the griffin’s side, and was rifling its saddlebags, in search of a written message from Amintor, or at least some clue as to what might have happened to the general. But there was nothing in the containers, not even the small amounts of food and other supplies that Amintor had had with him on his departure. The general might, of course, have fallen to some kind of enemy action. Or deserted. Or he might have consumed his supplies, Wood supposed, and then fallen from the beast’s saddle at high altitude. If so, that was that. Such an accident would not have been impossible, though decidedly unlikely; the griffin knew that it was supposed to return with the man who had ridden it away.

  The griffin now turned its fierce impassive gaze upon its master, who glared back at it in frustration. The beast was possessed of many valuable powers, but those of speech or any o
ther intelligent communication were not among them. The poorest of the small flyers could do better in that regard. For Wood to try to question this mount now would be about as profitable as grilling a riding-beast on what had happened to its human rider.

  But the discovery of Amintor’s fate, and even that of the expected army of reinforcements, would have to wait. Wood’s main consideration at the moment was that he now had the griffin back for his own use. Smiling grimly, he vaulted into the saddle.

  * * *

  By the time Wood got back his griffin, Mark, Ben, and Yambu had changed places with Arnfinn and Ninazu. Mark and his people had gone down from the roof through the trapdoor, meaning to take a more active part in the fighting for the castle, at least to divert part of the defenders’ strength.

  Arnfinn, with Ninazu at his side, had gone out on the roof to see what was happening, with a vague plan of using the Sword to create a distraction of his own. He was ready to destroy Ninazu’s real lover if he could.

  There seemed to be fighting everywhere on the walls and in the courtyards below, and as near as Arnfinn could tell, the invaders in green and gold were winning. Before Arnfinn could decide on what false orders he ought to shout, to do his rival the most harm, there was a rushing in the air above him, as of giant wings, and he looked up. He was just in time to see Wood on his griffin come swooping down with intent to destroy the impostor and, if at all possible, capture another extremely useful Sword for himself in the process.