A Sterkarm Tryst

by Price, Susan;

“Saints save us, no! It be a good hound.”

  “It be his hound,” Sandy Yonstone said.

  There was little doubt of that. The hound was plainly overjoyed to find Per Sterkarm, and it was a strong, well-fed animal with a wide collar around its neck, not a hound that would be roaming loose about the hills.

  The men, Mistress Crosar saw, were all looking up in the direction the hound had come. She didn’t have to think about why. If this Sterkarm hunting hound had sought and found—then how far behind was the hunt?

  16th-Side A:

  The Grannam Tower

  The Elves: Patterson, Gareth, and the Mercenaries

  “What’s going on?” Gareth asked.

  It was cold up on the tower’s roof. The wind’s edge was slicing his ears off. Patterson and Ledbury were crammed into the lookout turret, with Patterson leaning his elbows on the parapet to steady his field glasses.

  “What?” Gareth said. He needed to know, because he couldn’t stand anything else going wrong. This place was Hell. No exaggeration. This was what past centuries had based their descriptions of Hell on. Half the buildings once crowded inside the walls of the tower were burned away. The rest had survived because the wind had driven the fire against a wall, where it had cracked the stone and burned itself out.

  Now, the whole place reeked of burning. If Gareth leaned over the parapet, heat from smoldering buildings came up and hit him in the face. Every breath choked him on charring and ash and earthy stinks of baked clay and shit. The smell of pork crackling, too, but he didn’t want to think about that.

  Yesterday, they’d seen the smoke above the hills. Something over there was burning. At first, Gareth hadn’t been too bothered. Almost every building here was wooden and thatched, and with an open fire. They burned down a lot. The other men seemed not to remember that.

  But their nervousness got to him. They were always watching that smoke. Slowly, Gareth put it together. Whatever burned lay in the Tube’s direction. It could still be some peasant hut with a carelessly tended fire, but … And to make things worse, a patrol Patterson had sent out hadn’t returned.

  “Well?” Gareth called.

  “For fuck’s sake, shut the fuck up!” Patterson said. For him, Gareth was like a two-year-old you couldn’t shake off your leg. Scared of the other men, he followed Patterson around, asking stupid questions.

  Through his glasses, Patterson watched Sterkarms riding­ openly across the valley toward the tower. All carried leafy branches.

  “Ours?” Ledbury asked.

  “Dunno.” Patterson methodically scanned around the hills. Still no sign of his patrol. Typical. He’d told them to hurry home, and they’d gone to the pub. “Whoever they are, they’re coming to try and sell us something.” Patterson straightened and hopped down the turret steps. Gareth waited anxiously at the bottom. “Out the fucking way.”

  Gareth moved aside but, of course, followed. For once, he’d be useful. He spoke Sterkarm.

  16th-Side A:

  The Grannam Tower

  Changeling Per

  Changeling Per dismounted and looked up at the Grannams’ Brackenhill Tower above him.

  The night before, Grannam herd boys had crept from the scrub to their campfire, so scared and angry that they’d dared to approach a Sterkarm band. Their laird’s tower, they said, was now in the hands of the Elves.

  They’d told of walls toppled by Elvish powers and their friends murdered; of Elves leaving the tower to range the country, killing, trampling crops, burning barns.

  “Can you kill Elven?” the boldest boy had asked.

  “That be why I’m come,” Per said.

  It had been easy to boast to boys at the fireside. Now the Grannam Tower was above them, and he had to make good his boast.

  Dismounting, they led their horses up the steep track, hooves clopping. Cuddy trotted at Per’s side. The sprig of fern tucked through Per’s shoulder strap tickled his neck, but he needed it to be seen. Green branches signaled that they came to talk peacefully. It might persuade the Elves to hold fire.

  The higher they climbed, the thicker the stink of burning grew. Fragments of ash blew past, and they caught the stench of decaying flesh. They reached the yard, where the reek of burning thickened and they saw the bodies they’d smelled. Hummocks of flesh heaved from the wall above. Black birds hopped away from them.

  Movement above drew their attention. Heads looked over the gatehouse parapet. Per dropped Fowl’s reins and wrenched off his helmet so his face could be seen. With a big smile, he waved and shouted, “Ken-gah-rrrew! God dai, migh fenner! Dey glayder migh a say thu atter! Vor har thu holt?”

  Up on the gatehouse, as wind blew sharp past his ears, Patterson asked Gareth, “What’s he say?”

  “Well, ‘kangaroo,’ obviously—”

  “Obviously! The rest? When you’ve time?”

  “‘Good day, my friends.’ Or, ‘Hello.’ Er—‘I’m glad to see you again,’ and, er, ‘How’ … ‘How have you held?’ Ah, “How are you holding up?’ You know, ‘How have you been? How are—?’”

  “Okay, I get the gist.” Patterson looked down at the grinning Per Sterkarm. “Cheeky bugger. Ask him what he wants.”

  Gareth didn’t want an arrow in the face and kept back. He shouted, “Vah vil thu?”

  Per laughed at having an answer. “We want to come back to you!” He waited, but there was no answer. A black bird hopped back to the corpses. “Master Patterson was right. There be no place for us here. Ken you Elf-Gate burns?”

  On the gatehouse roof, Gareth translated. “He says the Tube is burning!”

  Patterson leaned on a merlon, a section of wall between the gaps, or crennalations. “You don’t say.”

  The Sterkarm kid, Patterson thought, was a cheeky bugger. Comes straight up and tells me the Tube is burning. Is that because he genuinely doesn’t know anything about it, but is a little lost sheep who wants to come home and thinks this news will earn him a gold star? Or is it because he set it on fire but wants me to think he had nothing to do with it?

  They were up to something. He should order his men to open fire and shoot the bloody lot.

  But … They knew the country. They spoke the jabber. If he could only trust them, they’d be worth their feed.

  Moving out from behind the merlon, Patterson looked over the parapet. The Sterkarms stood below, looking up, all of them dismounted and holding their horses’ reins. And what a bunch they were. Shaggy, dirty, hard as nails—and that was just the horses. A big dog came loping into view, all shoulders and hipbones, like a catwalk model. It sniffed at the corpses, for God’s sake.

  Per Sterkarm stood directly beneath Patterson, looking up and smiling. The big bruiser, Sweet Milk, was a couple of steps behind him. At Per’s feet were, of all things, two bulging supermarket bags. They had been shopping, then.

  What it really meant came to him a moment later. They’d been to the Tube, where shopping bags brought through by the guards blew about and caught in the fence.

  “Translate,” he said to Gareth. To Per, he said, “How did you burn the Tube?”

  After listening to Gareth, Per shouted, “We no did it! But we were there, we saw it. It was your enemies—those Elven disguised as Sterkarms and Grannams.”

  Patterson watched Per’s face closely. It gazed up at him, smiling and guileless. Patterson knew that there were no enemy Elves disguised as Sterkarms and Grannams. But Per Sterkarm had been told that story, so it was just possible that he honestly believed what he said.

  If so, then Sterkarms from this world, or Grannams, or both, in alliance, had burned the Tube. How? How had they got past rifles, grenade launchers, and a steel fence? “Ask him how the ‘enemy Elves’ took the compound.”

  Gareth and Per Sterkarm chatted, and then Gareth said, “He says they didn’t see the attack. The Tube was
burning when they got there. The guards were all dead.”

  As Gareth spoke, Patterson watched Per, who stooped and tipped something from one of the bags. “Jesus!” Patterson said, and started back before he caught himself. He heard his men exclaiming and heard their hands on their rifles. “Hold fire! It’s only a fucking head—you’ve both got one. No need to squeal like girlies.”

  Per was talking, but Patterson didn’t hear as he stared at the man’s head that had spilled from the bag. It was unshaven around the chops, though the hair was cropped very short. Its flesh was leaden blue-white, with bruiselike tints of dull pinkish red. “What’s he say?” Patterson asked Gareth.

  There was no answer. Gareth stood in a crennalation, staring rigidly down. “Gareth! Get a grip! What’s he say?”

  Gareth choked. “He says … says … we’re all trapped here in Elf-Land … but he thought you might not believe him, so he brought that … as proof. He’s got two. He says they were dead when they, er—”

  “Cut the heads off,” Patterson said. He remembered standing by a graveside in 16th-side B and watching this same Per Sterkarm all but cut a girl’s head off. A girl he’d just married.

  Gareth nodded. “He says they want to join us again, because this is the Land of the Dead and they don’t belong here. They want to come back so we’ll take them home.”

  Patterson ordered himself to think slowly and clearly. There was no rush, and he shouldn’t allow events to make him feel there was. “Tell him I don’t believe him. I think he used his password to get through the gates, then he burned the Tube and killed those guards. Never shake hands with a Sterkarm.”

  As Gareth translated, Patterson watched Changeling Per’s face. He saw a flicker of something—alarm, amused appreciation? Who knew? But I’m right, he thought. He used the password to get in. He couldn’t prove it. That flicker of expression could have been caused by confusion at a mistake in Gareth’s translation or even offense at being called treacherous.

  Even if Sterkarm had burned the Tube, he could still be useful, now that he’d found he couldn’t get home and was trapped here … Providing they never turned their backs to him. The Tube wouldn’t be down forever. It would be repaired and reopened, and until then, the Changelings could help keep him and his men alive.

  “He says,” Gareth reported, “why would he come here to you if he’d burned the Tube?”

  Because you’re a bloody cheeky little bugger, Patterson thought. “Okay.” Patterson folded his arms on the parapet. “This is how it is: You’ll have to do something to show me good faith. If I’m going to trust you, you’ve got to trust me.”

  “Dey air gor,” Per said, looking up.

  “Yep, it’s a good plan,” Patterson said. He pointed at Per. “You come in. On your own. Unarmed. That bloody dog stays outside, too.”

  A disturbance ran through the men below, even before Gareth finished translating. Many of them had picked up a little English.

  “Aye, sa vair dey,” Per said, and started unbuckling his sword belt. Patterson watched the big man, Sweet Milk, step up close to Per, and speak to him. Another one, leading his horse, joined the pow-wow. Didn’t they trust him? Tut, tut.

  Sweet Milk said, in Per’s ear, “Nay.”

  “Aye,” Per said. “He owes me a blood price. I mun get near him.”

  Anders said, “Gan in there, and tha’ve given him hostage.”

  “If I gan in there,” Per said, “his time will be short.”

  “And how art going to kill him, think, circled around with his men and thine weapons out here?”

  Per glanced from Anders to Sweet Milk. “Happen they’ll get sore bellies. After eating bad nuts, say.”

  Anders and Sweet Milk straightened, looking at each other across him. Per knew what they thought: How do you persuade men to eat poison? And even if you could, wasn’t it a sneaking, craven revenge?

  Per dropped his unbucked sword belt. “They killed my father a sneaking, cowardly way. The life of the man who did it is owed me, and I no care how I collect it.”

  Anders said, “And how long dost think to live after killing him?”

  “Ach, you are old grannies, the pair of you.” Per rubbed Cuddy’s ears and kissed her nose. “Look after her for me.” Cuddy wagged her tail, attempting to rise and put her paws on Per’s shoulders. Anders had to drag her away.

  Per looked up at the parapet and spread his hands, palms up. “I be disarmed. Let me in.”

  Not enough, Patterson thought. You couldn’t trust the bloody Sterkarms an inch. Knives up their sleeves, daggers in their boots … He shouted, “Naked! Strip to the skin. Come in unarmed and bare-bollock naked or not at all.”

  Gareth translated an edited, shorter version.

  Per stared up at them for a moment. Then he grinned, shrugged, and stripped. Unbuckling his pouch, he dropped it to the ground. Unlacing the neck of his heavy jackke, he tried to struggle out of it. Sweet Milk tugged it off over his head.

  Per sat on the ground to pull off his long riding boots, but that was never easy. Sweet Milk dumped the jakke with a thump, stooped over Per and tugged off his boots. Per sprang up again and drew his loose linen shirt over his head, revealing a body that was pale against his sunburned face, neck, and forearms.

  Patterson said, “He’s going to do it. We’d better get down there.” Gareth followed him down the gatehouse steps. The reek of burning rose to meet them.

  In the dimness of gatehouse’s lower floor, Chiswick and Dunbar stood near the barred gate. “Prepare!” Patterson said to them and both men raised their rifles to their chests. The movement alarmed Gareth, and he hung back in the shelter of the stone stairway. He heard Patterson grunting as he lifted the gate’s heavy wooden bar.

  Holding the bar, Patterson looked over his shoulder at his men. “Ready?” Dunbar had his rifle at his shoulder, peering through its sights. Chiswick quickly copied him. Patterson propped the bar against the wall before heaving open one half of the gate.

  Light filled the gatehouse, showing the mud and water gathered in the cobbles that floored it. Gareth heard Per’s hoarse voice: “Noo kahn yi komma inn?”

  “Tell that big bastard to get back.”

  Sweet Milk understood what was meant—that he was to retreat and leave Per alone, naked and disarmed, in front of the aimed Elf-Pistols. He didn’t move.

  “Little Daddy,” Per said, “if they kill me, I’ll die glad—because I ken tha’lt make ’em pay.”

  Sweet Milk said nothing, and his expression hardly changed. Slowly, step by step, he withdrew, back to the other Sterkarms and the horses.

  Gareth couldn’t see the gate from the staircase, but as Per walked toward the courtyard, he came into view, stark naked. Barefoot, he trod gingerly through the muck and charred debris, but even so, he strolled along as if entering a pub. Gareth was envious. He couldn’t muster that much self-assurance even when fully dressed, even when not in danger. Nor was he that tall or good-looking. Weren’t olden-days people supposed to be stunted little runts with bad teeth? It wasn’t fair.

  On reaching the courtyard, Per turned to face Patterson and the guards. Gareth expected them to guffaw and make jokes about size, but they fixedly watched the gate, guns at the ready.

  Patterson took a chance and dived from the gateway to the pile of Per’s clothes—which lay just by the severed head. He doubted the other Sterkarms would try anything while their blue-eyed boy was inside the tower with rifles pointed at him. He grabbed Per’s shirt and breeches. The pouch and belt, tangled with them, came, too. Stuffing the clothing under one arm, he grabbed up the long boots and quickly retreated into the gatehouse. He didn’t want to look at young Sterkarm’s bare arse and dangly bits any longer than he had to.

  Once back inside the gatehouse, he threw the clothing onto the muddy cobbles and dragged the gate closed, shutting out the
light. Dunbar helped heave the solid, heavy wooden bar back into place. Turning, Patterson saw Per standing silhouetted against the light from the courtyard. Behind him were the ruins of the tower’s outbuildings, still smoldering, stinking of charred wood and roast meat.

  As four men, two of them with rifles, stared at him, Per said, “Vor shtaw dey til?” His voice was, perhaps, a little breathless.

  Gareth said, “He asked how you are.”

  Chiswick laughed. “Better than you, chum.”

  Patterson picked up Per’s clothes and carried them toward the courtyard. On reaching the staircase where Gareth sheltered, Patterson dropped the long boots to the cobbles and stuffed the clothes into Gareth’s arms. Gareth held them away from himself. They smelled strongly of sweat and peat smoke—and he feared fleas.

  Patterson took the long linen shirt and felt it over methodically, searching for hidden pockets or anything stitched into it. He did a thorough job and finally threw the shirt to Per. “Put that on.”

  Per pulled the shirt over his head. It hung limply, considerably stained with one thing and another, to mid-thigh.

  Patterson took the worn, soft woolen breeches from Gareth and gave them a searching, thorough squeeze. Gareth was glad he wasn’t doing that job.

  Per caught the breeches when Patterson threw them to him, stepped into them, and pulled them up. He tucked in the shirt and pulled the breeches’ drawstring tight around his waist.

  Patterson searched his woolen stockings next, before throwing them at him. Per leaned against the stone wall to put them on, drawing them up over his breeches. He spoke to Gareth.

  Patterson was examining the long riding boots, checking that no knives were hidden in any secret sheaths. “What’s he say?”

  “You’ve lost his garters,” Gareth said. One of the men sniggered. “The things he fastens his stockings up with.” There was more laughter.

  “What a shame,” Patterson said, throwing the boots to Per. “He’ll just have to have wrinkly stockings.”

  Per came into the shadow of the gatehouse and sat down on the stone steps to pull on his boots. He then turned and reached for his pouch that hung over Gareth’s arm.