The Outlaw and the Upstart King

by Rod Duncan

  He tipped the logs and sticks next to the fire. The peasants scowled at him.

  “You gotta take it back,” said one, meaning the sledge.

  Elias turned away.

  Night closed in and the camp grew quiet. One gatherer had been left to watch. From some of the tents he could hear the slack breath of sleep. The fire, which had been huge before, had fallen in on itself to become a wide circle of glowing coals. He threw some sticks on the top, which crackled into flame. By that light, he hefted in a log. Sparks flew up from its fall.

  The beach stones had dried near the fire, despite the fog. He lay on them, trying to make himself comfortable. The watch guard stopped to warm himself, then moved on out of the circle of light. Elias listened to the scrunch of his boots. Then there was just the crackle of burning wood and the sound of the shingle being sifted by the waves. They’d built the fire at the very top of the beach, where the stones gave way to grass. The tide was low, but coming in, he thought. It would peak before dawn. Out there, somewhere, the submarine boat would be waiting.

  His thoughts were broken by a shout from the dark: a wordless noise. It seemed almost joyful. But as it trailed away, he knew it for a cry of pain. The watch guard. Without thinking, Elias rolled over and over, out of the firelight. An arrow hissed through the air, near where he’d been lying, clattering on the stones beyond.

  The guard’s cry cut to a sharp silence.

  More shafts landed, one arrowhead sending up a spark. Elias scrambled over the lip of the beach, getting his head down behind a ridge of stones. Only now, he found his voice: “Attack! Attack! Archers on the hill!”

  Shadows were moving through the camp, spreading out. Light footfalls. Darting forms. Jago’s men. Metal clashed on metal somewhere to his right. The sound of combat. Men began roaring battle cries.

  He’d been born for the fight, trained for it. It had been his life once. But all he had with him was a short knife. Little use in open combat. He drew it anyway.

  A crunch of stones made him look back. Three figures were advancing towards him. Two held swords, one a chain mace. Elias swore and jumped to his feet. They charged. Pebbles rolled and slid under his boots as he scrambled away up the beach. They’d halved the distance when a thought of Elizabeth hit him. He’d been leading them towards her tent, so turned in his path, jagging off to the side, drawing them away. He’d put the fire between him and them. The two swordsmen started around it to the left. He’d have no chance against them. So he dived right, towards the swinging mace.

  The spiked iron ball droned as it cut through the air. He’d seen a man’s arm smashed to pulp by such a weapon. A touch would rip through flesh and bone. He stepped towards it, counting, then dived in between swings, driving his knife under the man’s guard arm. Something thwacked against his shoulder. The handle, not the ball. The man had lost his grip and the whole thing was flying, thudding into the turf. Elias tried to pull out his knife, but the tip had wedged in bone. The man dropped. Elias fell with him, still gripping the hilt.

  A blade hissed above his head.

  The swordsmen were on him.

  Letting go of the knife, Elias threw himself into a shoulder roll, winning a couple of extra yards, twisting in the air so he landed in a crouch, facing them. The sword he’d dodged was two-handed. A bad choice for a night fight. That gave him a chance. But the second man had a quicker weapon. Some kind of scimitar.

  The two-hander swung again. Damn, but the thing had a long reach. Elias jumped away, feeling too late the hard line of a tent rope against the back of his calf. It flipped him clean. His shoulders hit the ground hard. The breath knocked out of him. The two-hander lifted, ready for a downward cut. Then it was falling, and one of the arms was falling with it. A spray of blood caught Elias in the face.

  The man screamed. Behind him, Firehand swung against the scimitar man. A huge blade. Once. Twice. The third blow cut half through his neck. The man crumpled. Joy was written over Firehand’s face.

  All had seemed slow, like a clock about to stop, the sounds of battle far away. Now it came rushing back: gunshots, shouts of anger, grunts of effort. And everything was moving fast. Metal and death.

  The man whose arm had been severed was slumped over the tent rope, bleeding out in spurts. He groaned as Firehand hauled him across the ground. Then the giant took the severed stump and thrust it onto the red hot stones at the fire’s edge.

  Flames licked from the ragged end of the man’s sleeve. But the fountain of blood had stopped. Too late, perhaps, for there’d been no scream or recoil. Firehand threw him down on the pebbles.

  The battle was over. From here and there, men called out that they were safe or that they needed help. But not the attackers. Logan was shouting orders. Survivors began to gather on the beach, but away from the fire. There might still be archers on the hill behind. Elizabeth was there. He saw her shivering. Not from the cold, he thought.

  Jago strode among his men. His own sleeve was dark with blood. Elias couldn’t see a wound.

  “We’ve lost three killed,” said Logan. “And three wounded. The worst is Caricks. He’ll lose an eye.”

  “And them?”

  “Six dead. Two got away at least. Maybe more. And there’s him.” Logan pointed to the swordsman with the severed arm, who lay near Elias.

  “What are their marks?”

  “Unaligned.”

  “Paid men?”

  “Yes, Patron.”

  The man with the severed arm was still breathing but his eyes hadn’t been open since he fell. The Patron knelt and slapped his face.

  “Who sent you?”

  Saliva dribbled from the corner of the mouth.

  Jago selected a large pebble, lifted it, then brought it down hard on the severed end of the arm. A spasm gripped the man’s chest. His eyes snapped open.

  “Who sent you?” The pebble lifted again.

  The man shook his head and breathed something, which Elias couldn’t hear. But the lips had said “Patron Williams”.

  “How many came with you?”

  “Ten.”

  “Where are you camped?”

  At this the man looked away. There was terror in his eyes. Elias knew well enough what it meant. He didn’t want to betray his brothers in arms.

  “I respect your trade,” Jago said. “My grandfather was a mercenary, before he was Patron. I’ve no grudge. But you know the price. So I’ll offer you this deal. You tell me freely where you camped. I’ll go there and kill your friends. I’ll do it clean. Or you can try to hold out. You will tell me, though. They always do. But if we go that way, I’ll kill them slow. A special death.”

  Jago held out a hand towards Logan and received a thin blade. This he showed, holding the point so close to the man’s eyeball that a tremor would have been enough to blind him.

  “Where did you make camp? I’ll not ask again.”

  The answer came all in a rush. Jago smiled. Along the woodmen’s trail and over the brow of the hill. Away to the left between a low outcrop and a stream.

  “Well chosen,” Jago said, then felt along the underside of the man’s ribs, as might a butcher inspect the carcass of a pig. The narrow blade slipped in with little effort. The man began to breathe hard. He opened his mouth like a beached fish, hungry for air, then began thrashing his one arm. But his heart had been skewered. The eyes lost focus. All the while, Jago stroked the man’s forehead like a lover.

  Patron Williams could have been sold a lie. Or a story out of date. Either way, he’d sent eleven mercenaries, which might have been enough if Jago’s force hadn’t grown. But since riding into New Whitby, he’d gone from two guards to twenty-five.

  A pack of warriors and hunting dogs left camp, following the woodmen’s track. Elias lay watching the tide creep up the beach. Somewhere around its mid flow, he fell asleep.

  Chapter 28

  Caltrops and ambush. The other Patrons could scent change in the air. But they didn’t know what form it would take. They wer
e throwing punches in the dark, hoping to connect. Their spies would have told them of Jago’s journey along the North Road and back. They would feel a plot hatching.

  Elizabeth lay on her side, facing away from the Patron, pretending to sleep. The smugglers were close. She couldn’t let him know that she needed to talk to them. But neither could she give up the chance.

  Jago wasn’t sleeping either, though he didn’t pretend. From time to time, his fingers drummed on his chest. She could hear him swallowing. Then footsteps approached.

  Logan’s voice, a whisper: “It’s time.”

  With the Patron gone, she sat up and listened to them assembling on the path. No words were spoken as they set off. She waited until the sound of their footsteps had thinned to nothing before looking out of the tent.

  One gatherer had been left to guard the camp. As she watched, he squatted to warm himself by the fire, throwing on more driftwood. He wouldn’t have done that in Jago’s presence. He wouldn’t be able to see anything beyond the bright new flames.

  Placing her feet, she set off along the grassy ridge in the middle of the track, avoiding the stones to either side, quickening her pace as the camp fell further behind. The fog had thinned. There still wasn’t enough moonlight to safely run on the potholed road. But she had to risk it or she’d never catch up. Cresting the rise, she slowed to a walk, back bent, keeping her head lower than the tuckamore, presenting no profile against the top of the hill.

  But halfway down the other side, she was stopped by a noise in the blackness ahead. Someone was swearing in a low growl, coming her way. They surely couldn’t be returning already, yet it was Jago she’d heard. Banks stood tall to left and right. In a panic she tried to clamber up the downwind side. But the top was fringed with a tangle of low spruce, too dense to push through. She made out Elias’s voice.

  “It’ll be here, Patron.”

  “It had better be!”

  She scrambled up the bank again, not trying to push through this time, but lying herself flat along the top.

  “Fitz said it’s like a goat track.”

  “Mess this up and I’ll skin the soles of your feet.”

  “Yes, Patron.”

  She could see them: darker shadows moving in the shadow of the sunken track, much closer than she’d thought. She spread hair over her face and lay still. Elias was leading the way, followed by Jago, Logan and Firehand.

  “How long till high tide?” Jago asked.

  No one answered.

  “If we miss it…”

  “We won’t, Patron.”

  Elias was passing her, then Jago. Her eyes were level with his shoulder. If one of them reached out, he could have touched her. She could smell them. Unwashed bodies and the smoke of campfires. Then they had passed. Her skin itched with sweat, despite the cold.

  “It’s here!”

  She caught the relief in Elias’s voice, then a scrambling of feet, then quiet.

  No wonder he’d missed it the first time. It was little more than a notch in the bank. Elias hauled himself up over the lip, pushing through a tangle of scratching branches onto a slope so steep that he could touch the ground on the uphill side without leaning over. If he fell, there’d be nothing to stop him, tumbling till he reached the sea.

  The path, such as it was, cut down and across the hillside, which steepened even further until the upward slope had become a cliff and they were edging around a narrow shelf of rock. The waves were small, but breaking they sent up fine spray, wetting the ground, which was in any case slick with slime. The ledge curved as it skirted the base of the headland. Elias could just make out a cleft in the rock ahead. The waves boomed from within.

  It was the place, sure enough, just as Fitz had described it. The way had been so narrow that they had to flatten themselves against the cliff to pass. But now it widened. Within ten paces he no longer felt the need to cling to handholds. A mooring ring hung from the rock, wide as a dinner plate. His fingers traced the corroded metal. The bolts that held it in place were each an inch across.

  Logan crouched down and struck steel to flint, using his body to shield the flash from anyone who might be in a boat out to sea. A yellow flame grew in the tinder. It took a moment for the candle wick to catch inside the dark lantern. He closed the shutter, hiding all but a thin strip of light.

  They were standing in a cleft in the headland, a deep inlet just wide enough for the submarine boat to enter. Waves washed in only a few feet below the ledge. The boom of them reverberated, as if they were inside a cavern, though a narrowing strip of stars showed between black cliffs above.

  “What now?” Logan whispered, though they were the only ones to hear.

  Jago didn’t answer. He stood, arms folded, feet slightly spread, staring out to the ocean.

  “We wait,” Elias said.

  When he was young and in the bosom of wealth, Elias never had to wait for anything. If he was hungry, food would be brought. If bored, distraction. Pleasure was a whim. It felt like the story of someone else’s childhood. Poverty was all about waiting. It was other people’s clocks, other people’s choices. He had learned to accept it. But this was different.

  His back pressed into the rock wall behind him. The narrow anchorage lay directly in front. A fine spray touched his face from time to time when one of the waves broke against the rocks. Logan stood on his left, Firehand on his right. Jago had begun to pace the widest section of the ledge. Patrons were not used to waiting. What would he do, Elias wondered, if the smugglers failed to arrive with the peak of high tide? If the dream of kingship were snatched from him, even for a short time, Jago’s terrible resolve would surely turn to white-hot rage.

  At first he wasn’t sure he’d seen it. The light blinked in and out, catching on the waves. He knew its soft reddish colour. It sent a shiver of revulsion down his neck. The others had seen it too.

  “Is that it?” Jago asked.

  “Yes, Patron.” Elias’s words came as a croak.

  “Then where’s it gone? The lantern! Open the lantern!”

  Logan did, pulling the shutter wide, letting the yellow candlelight show. With nothing to see but a dot of red, it was impossible to know if the submarine boat was getting closer.

  “Wave it, man! Wave it around!”

  The shadows swung madly as Logan shifted the lantern above his head.

  Out in the ocean, the red dot had started to take on a definite form. It was still beyond the arms of the rocky cleft. But reflections picked out the edges of the craft. It formed an oval in the waters like the back of a whale. The light was shining from the barrel structure in the middle, the hatchway to the deck below.

  The captain would be standing there, keeping watch, guiding them in. The shifting of his body would sometimes block the light, sometimes reveal it.

  The nose of the submarine edged between the cliffs. He could see the captain now and hear the strange whine of the motors. A second figure appeared, clambering out onto the back of the machine with rope fenders, which he threw over the side.

  Logan waved the lantern.

  “Who’s there?” shouted the captain.

  “Elias.”

  “And who else?”

  “It’s all as Fitz said.”

  “The Patron?”

  “I’m here!” Jago called.

  The man peered at them, shifting his head as if for a better view. A wave sluiced over the back of the submarine.

  At last he called, “Make us fast!” Then dipped into the hatch, emerging a moment later with ropes, which the other sailor tied to mooring cleats fore and aft before flinging the coils towards them. Firehand caught one and Logan the other. They heaved the submarine in with both lines until the fenders were tight to the rocks.

  The captain gripped the aft rope and pulled himself up onto the ledge. Oh, the wonder of thumbs.

  “Well met,” he said.

  It was only now, face to face, that Elias knew him for sure. He’d been there on that first voyage under th
e water. He’d been the one watching as the others chained Elias to the wall. The skin on his back itched from the memory of the metal girder pressing into his spine.

  “I’ve done my job,” Elias said.

  “We’ll see,” said the man.

  “I was promised a supply of the glycer-fortis.”

  “I’m the one you’ve come to see!” said Jago. His voice sounded bright, though Elias caught the note of irritation.

  “You’re the Patron then?”

  “I am. And you?”

  “Captain Fanshaw,” said the man.

  Jago gestured to the submarine. “Well, Captain Fanshaw. This… This marvel… This boat. How can I own it?”

  “It’s not for sale.”

  “I’ll pay any price.”

  “There’s no need,” Fanshaw said. “We’re giving you what you want.”

  “Giving what?”

  “A kingdom.”

  Below them, a wave washed the back of the submarine and slapped against the rock. A low boom reverberated in the depths of the cleft.

  “I’ve twenty-three barrels to bring up,” said Fanshaw. “But. With. Care.”

  “They’re delicate then?”

  He nodded.

  “I can help,” Elias said.

  Logan swung the lamp towards him. Shadows lurched. Jago’s expression was like vitriol.

  “I’ve worked with glycer-fortis. In the factory where it’s made. I know how to handle it. I know how it’s used.”

  “Is this true?” Jago demanded.

  “It’s true,” said Fanshaw. “But I think Elias is more easily controlled if we don’t let him have the free use of it. Here…” He dipped into his pocket and held a small object out towards Elias. It was Jago who snatched it.

  “Gently!” said Fanshaw. “Gently.”

  Jago held it to the lantern, another green glass pot with a stopper in the top. The lump within was the size of a musket ball.