Dahut

by Poul Anderson

  Terror cried: “You’ll not give in to him!”

  Gratillonius shrugged. “Not purposely. I have a strong wish for his blood, I suppose. Still, what if he does not challenge? We shall have to think about this.”

  Tears ran anew down the cheeks of Tambilis, but quietly. “Oh, poor hurt beloved. Come with me. I’ll pour you wine till you can rest the night. Tomorrow—”

  He shook his head. “I must be on my way. I came only to fetch the Key.”

  “The sea gate is already locked. Men carried Lir Captain down. Sea Lord Adruval Tyri helped him close the lock.”

  “Good.” Adruval had always been a trusty friend. “Nonetheless, I want to see for myself. Afterward I have my Watch to stand in the Wood, for the next three nights and what’s left of their days. For I am the King.”

  “I’ll meet you there,” she said with a ghost of eagerness.

  Once more he shook his head. “Nay, I’d liefer be alone.” Sensing the pain in her, he added: “Tomorrow also. Besides, you ought not carry our little princess out into this weather. It should have slacked off by the third day. Come to me then.”

  She tried to laugh. “’Twould need the Gods Themselves to keep me away.”

  He kissed her, tasting salt, and went onward. The Key was in a casket in his bedroom. By the light of a candle he had brought along, he stared down at its iron length. Why was he taking it? The gate was properly shut.

  But this was the emblem and embodiment of his Kingship. He hung it around his neck, letting it dangle from the chain on the breast of his Roman mail. It felt heavy as the world.

  Tambilis stood mute, fists clenched, and watched him go out the door. Favonius whickered and stamped. The sun was set and dusk blowing in against the wind. Gratillonius loosened the tether and swung to the saddle. Hoofbeats clopped.

  At a ring in the wall beneath the Raven Tower, he resecured his mount before he climbed those stairs. The storm screamed and smote. Surf bellowed. Here he could indeed feel its impact, up the stones and his body to the skull. Through a bitter haze of spindrift he made out the water, livid, and the western sky, the hue of a bruise.

  Light gleamed weakly from a slit window. The sentries had taken refuge in the turret. Gratillonius passed by unseen, on along the top of the wall. War engine housings crouched, blurred to his sight, in the salt rain that drenched his clothes.

  The harbor basin sheened uneasy. Metal-sheathed timber trembled to the battering of waves as he picked his way down the stair to the walk. Often he heard a boom louder yet, when a float dashed against the rampart. Yon spheres might want replacement later, he thought. The huge timber that was the bar creaked in its bracket. But the chain held it firm, and the lock held the chain. The sea gate of Ys stood fast.

  Gratillonius wondered why he had come, when Tambilis had assured him there was no need. Something to fill an hour? He’d better be off. Darkness was deepening and the wind rising further.

  On his return, a monster billow nearly came over the parapet. Water spurted across him. He stumbled, and recovered by slapping hands onto the tower. It too stood fast, above the crypt of Mithras. Should he descend and offer a prayer? No, if nothing else, that would be unkind to Favonius; and Mithras seemed remote, almost unreal, on this night.

  Did Dahut sleep gladly at the side of her man?

  Gratillonius hastened back to the pomoerium. He urged Favonius to a trot, and a gallop once they were on Lir Way. It was wholly deserted now. The buildings around the Forum loomed like giant dolmens—though did a window shine in the Christian church? The Fire Fountain brimmed with water, which the wind ruffled.

  The moon had cleared the eastern hills. Towertop glass shone blank. Gratillonius fled on through the phantom city.

  Out High Gate he went, onto Aquilonian Way, thence to Processional Way. The canal bridge rang beneath hoofs. The stream ran thickly, white with moonlight. The road bent eastward from the sea, toward the Wood. Nearing, Gratillonius heard boughs grind as the gale rushed among them. Like a second moon, the Shield swayed from the Challenge Oak, above dappled flagstones. It toned when the Hammer clashed on it.

  Gratillonius dismounted and beat on the door of the Red Lodge till the staff roused. He himself led Favonius to the stable, unsaddled the stallion, rubbed him down; but he let the men bring hay, grain, and water. When they spoke of preparing a meal for him he said curtly that he wanted nothing but a crock of wine to take to his bedchamber.

  There, after an hour alone, he could weep.

  2

  Still the wind mounted. By dawn it was like none that chronicles remembered. And still it mounted.

  No one went forth. Even in the streets, air rammed to cast a man down, stun him with its roar as of the sky breaking asunder, choke and blind him in the spume that filled it. Glass and tiles fell from above, shattered, ripped loose, flung far before they struck. About the unseen noontide, upper levels of the tower called Polaris came apart. Metal, timbers, goods, and some human bodies flew hideously down to smash against whatever was below. The rest of the city endured, however strained and scarred. Oaken doors and shutters mostly clung to their hinges. Close-fitted dry masonry went unscathed. But the violence thrummed through, until every interior was a cavern of noise.

  Northbridge Gate and Aurochs Gate were barred, for on those sides the sea thrust between rampart and headlands—higher yet, in those narrow clefts, than the billows from the west. Overrun again and again, the span on the north finally disintegrated. Water surged beneath the wall and broke into the canal, whose banks it gouged out to make a catchbasin for itself. The rock on the south side which shouldered against the wall of Ys was a barrier more solid, across which only the tops of the hugest breakers leaped. Nonetheless that portal also must stay shut; and because it had never been meant for this kind of attack, enough water got around it and under it that Goose Fair lay inches-deep submerged and Taranis Way became a shivering estuary for yards beyond.

  Ebb brought scant relief, when the seas had such a wind behind them. At high tide, crests smashed just below the western battlements; jets sprang white above, like fingers crooked in agony; at once they shredded into spray and blew over Ys.

  Yet the gate held.

  Dahut and Niall were alone in her house. None of the servants she dismissed the evening before had dared return. It was cold; fires were out, and he cautionea against lighting any. It was dark; a single candle flame smoked in the bedchamber, where they had sought the refuge of blankets. It was drumful of tumult.

  Dahut trembled close against the man. “Hold me,” she begged. “If we must die, I want it to be in your arms.”

  He kissed her. “Be of good heart, darling,” he said, his own voice level. “Your wall stands.”

  “For how long?”

  “Long enough, I do believe. A wind like this cannot go on as a breeze might. It will soon be dropping, you mark my words.”

  “Will it die down at once?”

  Niall frowned above her head. “It will not that, either. It will remain a gale through this night, surely. And the waves it has raised, they will be slower than it to dwindle. But if rath and doors have withstood thus far, they should last until the end.”

  “Thank you, beloved,” Dahut breathed. She sat up, cast off the covers, knelt on the mattress. Her hair and her nakedness shone in the dimness. She looked to the niche where stood her Belisama image, the lustful huntress that she alone of the Nine cared to have watching over her. “And thank you, Maiden, Mother, and Witch,” she called softly. “For Your mercies and Your promise that You will fulfill—through us twain here before You—our thanks, our prayers, our sacrifice.”

  She glanced at Niall, who had stayed reclining, pillow-propped against the headboard. “Won’t you give thanks too?” she asked. “At least to Lir and Taranis.”

  Through the dusk she saw his visage grim. “For our deliverance? The Three have brought Grallon back just at this time. Is the tempest also Their work? Does Ys stand off the Gods Themselves?”

&nbs
p; She lifted her hands. Horror keened: “Say never so! Ys does abide.” She caught her breath. “And, and soon we’ll restore the law. Soon you, the new King, will give Them Their honor. They foresee it. They must!”

  He likewise got to his knees. His bulk loomed over her, blocking sight of the candle. “I have been thinking on that, and more than thinking,” he told her slowly. “Dreams have I sought by night and omens by day. For I am fosterling of a poet, stepson of a witch, patron of druids, and myself descended from the Gods of Ériu. Much have I seen and much have I learned. Insights are mine that no lesser King may know. In me is fate.”

  She stared. “What? You n-never said this. Oh, beloved, I could feel in my heart you… were more than you pretended—But what are you?”

  “I am Niall of the Nine Hostages, King at Temir, conqueror of half the Scoti, scourge of Rome, and he whom your father most bitterly wronged ere ever you were born.”

  Dahut cast herself down before him. “Glorious, glorious!” she cried brokenly. “Lir Himself brought you to me!”

  Niall laid a hand on her head. “Now you have heard.”

  “It whelms me, lord of mine—oh—”

  “It could be the death of me, did news get about too soon.”

  “My tongue is locked like the sea gate.” Dahut rose to a crouch. Hair had tumbled over her eyes. She gazed through it, up at his massive murkiness. “But once you’re King in Ys, we’re safe, we’re free.” Joy stormed through her voice. “You’ll be sacred! Together we’ll beget the new Age—the Empire of the North—”

  “Hold,” he commanded.

  Again she knelt, arms crossed over bosom against the cold, and waited. The wind wuthered, the sea thundered.

  “Sure, and that’s a vaunting vision,” he said, stern as a centurion. “But ofttimes have the Gods given men their finest hopes, then dashed them to shards on the ground. Grallon follows his soldier God; and who shall foreknow whether Mithras proves stronger than the Mórrigu? Grallon is a Roman, living out of his proper time, a Roman of the old iron breed that carried its eagles from end to end of the world. He and his like cast me bloodily back at the Wall in Britannia. He and his schemes wrecked my fleet, slaughtered my men, and killed my son at the wall of Ys. Well could it happen that his sword fells myself in the Wood.”

  “Nay, Niall, heart of mine, nay!” She groped for him.

  He pushed her back. “Your earlier lovers came to grief. Will you be sending me to the same?”

  She flinched. He pursued: “You’ll get no further chance after I am dead. You’ve made your desire all too clear. Grallon can be fond and foolish no longer. What do they do in Ys with unchaste Queens? Throw them off the cliffs?”

  Dahut straightened. “But you will win! And then naught else will count. Because you’ll be the King of Ys.”

  “Your wish spoke there,” he said bleakly. “My insight has told me otherwise.”

  “Nay—”

  He reached to lay a palm over her mouth. “Quiet, lass. I know what you’d say. If I despair, I can still escape. Sure, and ’tis dear of you. But could I be leaving my love to a cruel death, and name myself a man?

  “Hark’ee. There is a hope. I have seen it in the flash of a blade, I have heard it in the croak of a raven, I have understood it in the depths of a dream.

  “The King of Ys bears on his breast the Key of Ys. It is more than a sigil. It is the Kingship’s very self. Behold how Heaven and Ocean cannot open the sea gate. That power lies with him.”

  “But Kings die,” she quavered.

  He nodded. “They do. And the power passes onward. It is mostly small. How often must the gate be barred and locked? A few times a year, for caution’s sake. Sailors who ken wind and tide spend no great strength at their work. Nor do the Gods, keeping the world on its course—most of the time.

  “Tonight, though, the sea beleaguers Ys. It hammers on the shield of the city. Power must needs blaze within the Key, the Key that stands for the life of your people.

  “While this is true, the bearer is invincible. Were I or any man to go now against Grallon, he would prevail.

  “Hush. Bide a moment. I cannot wait till the need is past and the power that is in the Key has faded. Tremendous seas will be crashing on wall and gate for days to come. Meanwhile the wind will have slacked and folk can move abroad. Grallon will seek me out. He must. Think. If I do not challenge him, he will challenge me. He is the King; he may do this, the more so if he claims he’s exacting justice. And there will be no stopping him. For ’twill not be for his own peace or safety. ’Twill be on your account, Dahut, you, his daughter. He’ll hope that having killed me, he can win clemency for you—blame the dead man for leading you astray—though because he is not really a fool, Dahut, never again will you have the liberty to work for his death.

  “So it is.”

  She shook her head, bewildered. “The Sisters never taught me this.”

  “Did they teach you everything the Gods might ever reveal?”

  She was mute, until: “What can we do?”

  Teeth gleamed in the night-mask of his face. “If I bore the Key, the power would be mine. I could call him forth ere his Watch is ended, and slay him in the Wood.”

  “But—”

  He leaned forward and took her by the shoulders. “You can do it for me, Dahut,” he said. “You’ve told me how you can cast a sleep spell, how you did at the Red Lodge itself. This time you need not rouse him. Only steal in, lift the chain of the Key from off his neck, and carry the thing to me.”

  “Oh, nay,” she pleaded.

  “Would you liefer I die at his hands?”

  “The Gallicenae have a second Key. They’ll lend it to him.”

  Niall laughed. “Then at worst, we meet on equal ground, Grallon and I. Gladly will I that. Even so, puzzlement and surprise ought to have shaken him.”

  Dahut covered her face. “Sacrilege.”

  “When you are the Chosen of the Chosen?”

  She cowered.

  His sigh was as cold as the wind: “Very well. I thought you loved me, Emer to my Cú Culanni. I thought you had the faith and the courage to fare beside your man. Since you do not, I may honorably go from Ys in the morning. Meanwhile I shan’t trouble you.”

  He swung his legs around and stood up.

  “Niall, nay!” she screamed, and scrambled after him. He caught her before she went to the floor. “I will, I will!”

  3

  By sunset the wind had indeed lessened. It was still such as few could travel in, but along the Armorican seaboard it had wrought the harm of its full rage. There remained its malevolence.

  Clouds blew thicker. Guards had resumed their posts, with frequent relief; but the moonlight was so fitful that the night watch did not see the two who slipped out through High Gate.

  The going was treacherous at first. Workshops and stables beyond the wall had littered ruin over Aquilonian Way. Nails and splinters lurked for those who must climb across. More than once, Niall’s strong hand saved Dahut from falling.

  After they reached Processional Way they had a clear path save for torn-off boughs. The bridge across the canal survived. To the left, light flickered across water that chopped a foot or more deep under the rampart. It had not drained back into the sea, for even at ebb, waves boomed in through the gap between city and headland. On the right the amphitheater glimmered ghostly, the Wood of the King hulked altogether black. Farther on were gulfs of darkness. The moon hurtled among clouds which it touched with ice. When the road turned east and the walkers left the lee of Ys behind them, they felt the wind on their backs as an oncoming assault. It hooted and yammered. Louder, now, was the roar of Ocean.

  Near the Wood, that sound was matched by the storm through the trees. Their groans were an undertone to its wails. Some along the edge lay uprooted, limbs clawing at heaven. Pieces broken off the Challenge Oak bestrewed the court. The Shield tolled insanely to the swinging of the Hammer. When a moonbeam reached earth, the metal shone dulled by the
dents beaten into it.

  Otherwise the Sacred Precinct had protection. The three buildings squatted intact, lightless. As Dahut came between them, a neigh burst from one, and again and again.

  “Be quick ere that brute wakes the whole house,” Niall snapped.

  Dahut raised her arms. The moon saw her attired in the blue gown and high white headdress of the Gallicenae. Her chant cut through soughing and creaking. “Ya Am-Ishtar, ya Baalim, ga’a vi khuwa—”

  Niall felt for the sword scabbarded across his back. At once aware of what he did, he dropped his hand. Its fingers closed on the haft of his knife.

  “Aus-t ur-t-Mut-Resi, am ‘m user-t—”

  Niall made a wolf-grin.

  “Belisama, Mother of Dreams, bring sleep unto them, send Your blind son to darken their minds and Your daughter whose feet are the feet of a cat to lead forth their spirits—”

  The horse had fallen silent.

  Presently Dahut did also. She turned to Niall. Moonlit, her face was as pale as the windings above it. He barely heard her amidst the noise: “They will slumber till dawn, unless powerfully roused. But come, best we be swift.”

  “We?” he answered. “Nay, go you in alone. I might blunder and make that awakening racket. You know your way about your father’s lair.”

  She shivered, caught her lip between her teeth, but moved ahead. He accompanied her onto the porch. At the entrance he drew blade and took stance.

  Dahut opened the door enough to get through. It was never barred, in token of the King’s readiness to kill or be killed. She entered, closed it behind her, poised breathless.

  Coals banked in the fire-trenches gave some warmth; shelter from the wind meant more. That sullen glow revealed little, but a lamp burned lonely. It had served two men slumped at a table, heads on arms. Other must already have been asleep on the benches along the walls. The light straggled forth, discovering among glooms only the ragged lower ends of battle banners, the scorn on two of the idol-pillars upholding the roof.

  Dahut straightened and glided forward to the interior partition. Seeing its door ajar, she peered around the jamb. The corridor beyond was not quite a blindness. Windows were shuttered, and the moon would have given scant help anyhow, but a dim luminance, reflected off tile floor and plaster walls of this Roman half of the building, sufficed. She moved on, smoke-silent, though the storm would surely have covered any footfalls.