by John Dalmas
"And now we have had this winter unlike any before, and our people wonder if we can make a crop. We have had to kill many cattle, poor in flesh, because the hay barns were becoming empty, and it's better to kill some than lose all. But we have butchered the seed, so calves will be few. And we cannot live on wild flesh, for there are too many of us." He paused and looked around at the faces turned toward him. "So I believe the Sea Eagles have the right idea," he went on. "The time has come to leave.
"But the lands to the south are peopled already. We have all heard wanderers who have been to some of them. A wanderer of your Otter Clan"-he turned again to Tjur Blodyxa-"has told us stories in this very longhouse of the Daneland where he had lived, where the clearings are greater than the forests, and the warriors have high stone walls to protect them. And when I questioned him he said that in the Daneland, too, people complained that the winters were growing longer and harder.
"And from your Seal Clan"-he turned to Isbjorn Hjelteson, chief of the Norskar-"a wanderer told us of the Frisland, south across the sea, where the people speak a tongue he could not understand, where there are few trees, and the pastures and haylands are so wide a man can't see across them. There they complain that each year they must build their haystacks bigger and haul more wood from the distant forests.
"Is the whole world freezing? Or are there really lands where the summers are long and warm? We all have heard rumors of them. But how does one come to such lands? There is one man of the Wolf Clan who may be the greatest traveler of all. Last fall he returned from four years of absence, telling tales of the lands he had visited. He is Sten Vannaren; you can talk to him later and ask him questions. He brought with him what you see on this wall." The old chief turned and pulled a bearskin from the pegs on which it had hung, exposing a map of Europe. "This is a map the craft of whose makers far exceeds ours. It is said to be a copy of a map of the ancients and is made on a stuff called linen. North is at the top, as on the maps we make ourselves. Here"-his big finger circled-"are the lands of the tribes. The blue is the sea."
Axel Stornave looked around the table. All eyes were on the marvel before them, so he continued talking and pointing. "Sten journeyed across several lands and finally came to this southern sea. And he found that what we had believed is actually true: that as you continue southward the sun gets nearer and higher and the climate warmer. The lands around that sea are never cold except high in the mountains, and even in the heart of winter the snows lie on the ground for only a few days at a time, or a few weeks at worst.
"It is a land where the clans could be happy.
"There are two ways to reach that land. One is by sea." He traced a route from the Skagerrak across the North Sea, southward along the Atlantic coast and through Gibraltar. Grim eyes watched. "Although perhaps we would not have to go that far. This might serve as well." He pointed to the coast along the Bay of Biscay. "But if every fishing boat left filled with warriors, they still would be too few. By the time the boats could make a second trip, those few would be dead at the hands of the tribes who live there now.
"The second way is across the land, after boats have made the short trip here." He ran his finger along the shores south of the Baltic. "The tribes of each land we entered would fight, of course, and their people are very numerous, so there are many of them for each one of us. In some of those lands the chiefs hire foreigners in their armies, so Sten never went hungry for food or fight. And their warriors, which they call knights, are less skilled with weapons than we. Also, their warriors do not care to go on foot. If they must go into battle on foot, they prefer to delay. He even found some who would hardly be able to fight after a day's march. Do not be mistaken. They have fierce men, men not afraid to die"-here the old chief paused for effect, then spoke slowly and clearly-"but never did he find any knight who was a match for one of our warriors.
"Even so, if the Sea Eagle Clan landed here"-he pointed to northern Poland-"at the nearest place to their homeland, and started south, the knights of that district would attack them on horseback and kill many. And the chief of that land would gather a strong army, of many hundreds, and attack until no man of the Sea Eagles was left alive, they would be so outnumbered. And what then of their women and children and the spirits of their dead?
"But here is a place of low sand hills along the coast, covered with forest, and only a few fishermen live there." He pointed to a stretch of Polish coast. "And behind the sand hills are marshes, where knights cannot cross on their horses. If the Sea Eagles landed there, it is likely that they would not be strongly attacked so long as they stayed there.
"And what if the Otter Clan followed, and the Bears, and then others? This district behind the coast," he continued, his big finger circling inland, "also has large forests. If enough warriors landed on the coast, they might march in strength and defend and hold some of the forest while still more of the people landed-freeholders, women, children and thralls. If all the clans landed there, I believe they could then cross the lands to the south, regardless of the armies raised against them, and take and hold a land near the southern sea."
The old chief looked around the split log table for a moment without speaking, and a small smile began to play around the corners of his wide mouth. "I see that Jaavklo of the Gluttons wants me to sit so that he may speak. He wants to ask me how I propose to move the tribes across the sea in a few score fishing boats that cannot take more than a dozen men each, besides the oarsmen.
"I led the Wolf Clan before I was chosen chief of the Svear, and I have talked about this to the warrior who now is chieftain of the Wolves, Ulf Vargson. He in turn held council with his warriors and freeholders. And it is agreed. The Wolf Clan will send out half a dozen fishing boats of warriors with Sten Vannaren to guide them. They will find this place I spoke of," he pointed, "land the warriors and come back for more.
"But on the second trip, all our boats will go, and most of them will go here"-he pointed to a harbor on the Polish coast-"where there are ships large enough to carry a hundred men besides the oarsmen. And they will seize such of those ships as they can, returning here with them."
Strong yellow teeth began to show in the torchlight around the table.
"The Wolf Clan would go alone if they had to, but I know they won't have to. I know the other clans too well, from many raids and fights. And the Sea Eagles had decided to go before we did. If all the clans unite, our combined strength can bring us to the southern sea.
"Look!" Axel Stornave knelt for a moment and picked up a bundle of pine branches that had lain on the floor behind his seat. He held one branch up and snapped it in his hands. "By itself it has little strength," he said. "But now"-he took as many together as he could wrap his huge hands around, with a great effort strove to break them, then held them overhead unbroken.
"Which of you will go back to your people and join them with us?"
Every man around the table stood, most of them shouting approval. Axel still stood, with one hand in the air, and in a few moments the others settled to the benches again, aware that he was not done.
"I knew it," he said. "And when you take this matter to your people, they will agree to it, for this winter has caused every man to think. But we can't delay. If we can make no crop this summer except of hay, and if next winter is at all like this one has been, we will be weak and hungry in another year. We must all be gone before winter comes again. Nor can we winter across the sea except in force, for we must be able to take what we need by force from the people there.
"Our harbor is free of ice now, at last. Our people already have been killing the rest of the cattle and drying the meat over fires. We will send the first boats on the day after tomorrow, the weather willing. After our first war parties have landed, two boats will go here." He pointed to the island of Bornholm, between the Swedish and Polish coasts. "One will wait to guide the first boats of the Jotar to the landing place." He looked down the table at one old enemy, Tjur Blodyxa, and then in the other direction
at another, Isbjorn Hjelteson. "The other will guide the first boats of the Norskar." The old man grinned. "Maybe you can get the Danes to 'loan' you some ships."
A scowl had begun to grow on Tjur Blodyxa's surly face, and he stood without leave. "And who will lead this expedition?" he asked.
Axel Stornave said nothing for a moment, savoring the surprise he had for the Jota chief. "Not me," he said. "I'm too old. That leadership is what we must decide next."
It was past midnight. They had agreed that the tribes would act independently in moving their own people, except that the Wolf Clan of the Svear would pick the place. But the war leader of those who had landed would also be of the Svear. Then the clan chieftains of the Svear elected Bjorn Arrbuk as war leader. He was the tribe's most famous fighter and its most famous living raid leader. Afterward, they questioned Sten Vannaren about the place they would land and the country where they hoped to go.
Now they were going to bed. Axel Stornave stepped out the door to look at the night and found new snow ankle-deep on the ground.
13.
KAZI, TIMUR KARIM (A.D. 2064-2831), psionicist and emperor. Born in Kabul, Afghanistan, he received a Ph.D. in neurophysiology from the University of Lucerne in 2087; lectured at London University, 2087-2090; was professor of psionics at Damascus University, 2090-2094; and held the Freimann Chair of Psionics Research at the University of Tel Aviv, 2094-2105.
In 2096, Kazi developed the "esper crystal," which became the functional element of the psi tuner. At age forty-one, although in chronically poor health, he was one of the few survivors of the Great Death of 2105. He also survived the difficult and primitive conditions that followed the plague, presumably by dominating other survivors.
Seriously afflicted with asthma and without effective medicines, he eventually developed a process of ego-transfer believed to involve the use of drugs and the psi tuner, transferring his ego from his aging and debilitated body to one younger and healthier.
As a child, Kazi had been offensively egotistical, effectively alienating himself from normal human relationships. This trait intensified with his brilliant scientific successes and his increasing ability to read minds and dominate others. His development and use of ego-transfer, with the near immortality it provided, probably furthered the pathological deterioration of his personality.
Sometime about the middle of the twenty-second century, Kazi disappeared. He seems to have developed a self-controlled psionic means of suspended animation. It has been suggested that he used this to mark time until an increased population and further socio-economic development provided something more gratifying to dominate. Legends indicate that he was worshipped as a god at the time he disappeared and that periodic living sacrifices of young men were made at his tomb, believed to have been a cave in the Judean Hills. Perhaps they were used for ego-transfers. If so, he may occasionally have emerged to maintain the legend and select his next body.
He became active again sometime about 2750, and from that time our picture becomes less conjectural again. Gradually he came to dominate the Middle and Near East as far south as the Sudan, as well as much of the Balkans, ruling some of the territory directly and some of it as tributary provinces.
Kazi developed a culture specifically for his army. Each level practiced a harsh domination of the lower ranks, and all ranks brutalized slaves and subject peoples. The utmost in cruelty was not merely permitted, but demanded of the soldiers. Discipline was based on fear, the fellowship of mutual depravity, and a supersititous awe and terror of the ruler. He called them "orcs," after an army of subhuman monsters in a classic of pre-plague fantasy fiction, The Lord of the Rings. (See Tolkien, J.R.R.) After the first or second generation, all orcs resulted from forced matings between his soldiers and captive women, the offspring growing up in vicious camps whose regimens were designed to eliminate the weak and to produce the orc personality.
This was Earth's largest post-plague army, and its only standing army. Its men were better disciplined and trained than their feudal contemporaries and could be relied upon to fight viciously and skillfully. It was also versatile, serving as both infantry and cavalry during a time when feudal armies and most barbaric tribes despised foot warfare.
Kazi himself built in its major weakness when he designed its culture. Its primary orientation was not fighting, but occupying and brutalizing. It was supreme in breaking conquered peoples and served its master's psycopathic compulsion for unbridled depravity, but it lacked the fervor and vigor necessary for a really great army in an age of edged weapons and close combat.
Kazi relied on auxiliaries to supplement that shortcoming. Many small tribes of "horse barbarians" ranged and fought one another in the steppes and arid mountains of south-central Asia as far west as Turkey. By combinations of privilege, flattery and threats, he was able to unite and command the use of large numbers of those tribesmen when he wished, mostly to control other similar tribes. The horse barbarians sometimes lacked discipline and unit coordination, but they were skilled and reckless cavalry whose passion was fighting…
(From The New School Encyclopedia, copyright A.C. 920, Deep Harbor, New Home.)
14.
The Duna had carried them out of the Hungarian prairie through forested mountains, and then eastward for several days through open grasslands again, with hills to the south and broad plains and marshes to the north. Occasionally they passed herds of cattle accompanied by mounted horsemen, and when they were near enough, Nils could see that they carried no weapons, except short bows to protect their herds from wolves. He realized they must have entered Kazi's realm.
Nils and Imre had carefully studied the map that Janos had given Imre. Therefore, they were expecting it when the river turned north and the barges left it to enter a great canal, built by the ancients, that left the Duna and struck eastward like an arrow toward the sea. On its north bank would stand the City of Kazi.
After a number of kilometers, an obsidian tower could be seen glistening blackly at a distance, and as the current carried them rapidly along, they soon saw other buildings of dark basalt. They were passing kilometers of barbarian camps on the north side of the canal, with the banners of many tribes moving in the wind above the tents. Men in mail or leather shirts, or their own leathery skins, rode at sport or in idleness, sometimes stopping to watch intently the richly ornamented barges.
In a sense the City of Kazi was a military camp, for its purpose was to house his orcs. But it was much more than a camp, for no town could match its engineering and order. From the palace with its tower, rows of dark stone buildings radiated outward like the spokes of a half-wheel.
The steersmen now were running close to the north bank, and they passed stone granaries and warehouses where stone steps led up from the wharves. Ahead was a balustraded wharf of dark and beautifully figured gneiss, with broad stairs of the same rock climbing to a gardened courtyard in front of the palace. Their steersman shouted, and for almost the first time the oars were wetted, backing water briefly to slow the barge almost to a halt as they approached the wharf. Naked brown men, some nearly black, handled the line, while others, wearing harness and weapons, waited for the passengers. A gangplank of dark burnished wood was laid across the gunwales, and Imre and Nils landed. A fat toga-clad man with a sharp beak of a nose bowed slightly to Imre. In almost falsetto Anglic he announced, "His Holiness has instructed that I escort you to your apartment. Baths and fresh clothing await you there. When you are refreshed, His Holiness would like an audience with you, and I will return to conduct you to him."
"And may my friend accompany me to that audience?" Imre asked.
"His Holiness has specified that both guests should attend, unless"-the steward bowed slightly again-"your Lordship wishes otherwise."
He led them across the courtyard to the palace and up exterior steps to a terrace garden, where, looking eastward into the distance, they caught sight of the sea and a harbor with many ships. Inside, the walls of their apartment were veneered
with white marble and hung with soft lustrous blue material. The glazed windows were open and the heavy curtains drawn back so that the rooms were light and airy.
The steward dipped his head again and left.
The white stone baths were as long as Nils's reach and set below the floor. Steps entered them. Imre knelt, dipped his fingers into one, and his breath hissed between his teeth. "My blood!" he gasped. "Are we supposed to bathe or be boiled?"
Nils grinned like a wolf and began to strip. "In my homeland we take steam baths and then roll naked in the snow."
"Huh! I'm glad we're here instead of there then. What do you call it again? I'll be careful never to go there."
"It's called Svealann, and the real reason I was exiled is that they don't tolerate midgets. My growth was stunted from missing too many steam baths." Very carefully he moved down the steps into the water. "I've never confessed it to anyone since I left there," he added, "because it's embarrassing to a northman to be a midget, and I've been keeping it a secret. I hope you won't tell anyone."
Imre had scarcely settled on the sitting ledge in his bath when a dark girl entered the room. Without speaking she set a dish of soap on the low curb beside each bath and left.
"Well!" Imre stared after her indignantly. "They certainly have strange customs here, where women come into a man's bath-and a young, pretty one at that. Say, look, the soap is white! It is soap, isn't it? And smell it. Like a woman's scent. Can stuff like that possibly get us clean?"
Nils stood and began to lather his torso, the sinews in his arms, shoulders and chest flexing and bunching as he washed. Imre stared. "You know," he said, "I'd take steam baths, too, and roll in the snow, if I thought it would grow me muscles like yours."