Scarlet kr-2

by Stephen R. Lawhead

  The commander of the knights summoned his soldiers to him. They seized their lances and hastened to join their commander. Back-to-back, weapons drawn, they formed a tight circle and waited behind their long, pointed shields for the next flight of cursed black arrows.

  For a moment, all was quiet save for the quick breathing of the men and the neighing of the wounded horses. And then…

  I saw a clump of snow fall from an elm branch overhead, sending a glistening curtain of down upon the road. When the frozen dust settled, there he was: King Raven. Black as Satan's tongue from the crown of his head to booted feet, and covered all over with feathers, great wings outspread with long, curving claws on the ends. But the thing which gave him the look of the pit was the absolutely smooth, round skull-like face with its wide hollow eyes and unnaturally long sword of a beak.

  King Raven-it could be none other.

  The knights saw this phantom creature and shrank back at the sight. I forgave them their fright. I felt it, too. Indeed, it seemed as if the day, already cold and dim, grew cold and dark as the grave in the moment of his appearing.

  That dread beak rose slowly until it pointed straight up toward the dense webwork of snow-laden branches and boughs. The creature loosed another of its horrific cries. As if in reply, I saw a bright flicker in the air, and a flaming brand landed in the snow midway between King Raven and the cowering knights. Another joined the first-more or less the same distance from the knights, but behind them. Then a third fell behind the second-to the left of the huddled body of knights this time. A fourth fell among the others, on the opposite side of the third. I saw it arc high through the surrounding trees, and before it had even touched the ground, three more were in the air.

  The knights, stunned and lifeless with disbelief, were ringed about with fire. The torches sputtered in the snow, sending thick black smoke boiling up through the down-drifting flakes.

  So far, all had fallen out as planned, and I imagined we would escape clean away with the goods. But bad luck has a knack for catching a fella when he least can abide it. Even as our numb fingers reached for victory, ill fortune arrived in the person of Abbot Hugo. Dressed in a white satin robe with white leather boots and a woollen cloak of rich dark purple, he appeared more king than cleric as he came galloping into the clearing. With him was Marshal Guy de Gysburne, commanding a small company of oafish louts spoiling for a fight.

  Truth be told, at the time I did not know who these men might be, though I would be learning soon enough. All I knew was that they had come to the banquet as guests uninvited, and had to be driven off before one or another of our folk got hurt.

  Well, they burst into the clearing, weapons drawn, ready to start lopping heads and making corpses. Eight soldiers not counting the abbot broke into the ring of torches. Guy, all in mail and leather, greaves and gorget, charged ahead on a pale grey destrier. He took one look at the black-feathered phantom, reared up in the saddle, and let fly with his lance.

  King Raven darted lightly to the side as the spear sailed past, easily evading the throw, even as I nocked one of the black arrows onto the string and, holding my breath, drew and aimed at the marshal.

  Someone else had the same idea.

  Out from the brushwood beside the trail streaked an arrow. It blazed across the clearing, struck Guy, and slammed him backwards in the saddle as he reached to draw his sword.

  That reaching saved his life, I think. The arrow pierced the steel rings of his hauberk at the fleshy part of his upper arm and stuck there. If he had been more upright in the saddle, he'd have had it in his bonnet. As it was, he dropped the sword and called his men to shield themselves as the arrows began falling thick and fast.

  Three men went down before they could unsling their shields, and a fourth took an arrow in the back the instant he swung it around to protect his chest. They fell like stones dropped in a well.

  Abbot Hugo, shouting in Ffreinc, drove into the clearing, heedless of the missiles flying around him. Well, I suppose killing a priest is serious business-Norman or no-and Hugo maybe felt safe even with men falling all around him. Or, it may be he is that brave or stupid. Even so, he was urging the knights and men-at-arms to throw off their fear and attack, but that showed no understanding of the nature of the assault. A fella afoot cannot strike what he cannot see, and a warrior on a horse cannot charge into the brush and brake if he hopes to live out the day.

  The soldiers on foot drew together, trying to form a shield ring to give them protection from the whistling death all around. I loosed two, and made good account of myself so that, by now, any soldier still in the saddle threw himself to the ground even as his horse was slaughtered beneath him. Those who somehow escaped being skewered with an oaken shaft scuttled on hands and knees to join the others as arrow after arrow slammed into the shield wall, splintering the wood, ripping the leather-covered panels apart, striking with the force of heavy hammers. I sent two more arrows to join those of the others.

  The commander of the knights showed heart, if not brains. He struggled to his feet and, shield thrown high to protect his head, broke ranks, charging off in the direction of the main attack. He made but four steps from the ring before an arrow found him. There was a thin whisper as it cut through the snow-clotted air. I caught the dull glimmer of the metal head-and then the knight was lifted off his feet and thrown back a pace by the shock of the oaken missile driving into his chest.

  He was dead before his heels came to rest in the snow.

  Marshal Guy, clutching his arm with the slender shaft sticking out both sides of the wound, gave his thumping great warhorse his head, and the animal charged the black-cloaked phantom standing in the trail at the far end of the clearing.

  King Raven stood motionless for a moment, allowing the beast and wounded rider to come nearer, lifting his long, narrow beak to the sky as if taunting them. As the horse closed the distance between them, Guy released his bloody arm and drew the dagger from his belt, making a clumsy swipe with his left hand.

  The phantom ducked under the stroke. As the big horse sped by, he gave a last wild shriek and turned, wings spread wide, retreating not into the wood, as anyone might expect, but straight down the centre of the road-the way the wagons had come.

  Abbot Hugo, seeing his adversary on the run, reined up and screamed for the soldiers to give chase, but they remained cowering behind their shields. Crying down heaven on their craven heads, the abbot threatened strong punishment for any and all who disobeyed. The soldiers looked around, and when they saw King Raven fly, they did what Norman soldiers always do when an enemy retreats: they followed.

  The soldiers, weighed down by their long mail shirts and shields and heavy cloaks and what have you, lurched through the snow after King Raven, who was swift and nimble as a bird. The abbot and marshal charged after them, guarding the rear. That soon, all of them disappeared from my view; I waited, wondering what would happen next. The drivers must have wondered, too, for they stood on the wagon benches and gazed into the murk after the departing soldiers. One of them shouted for the guardsmen, calling them back; but no reply was returned.

  He did not shout again. Before he could draw breath, four cloaked figures swarmed out of the forest and onto the wain; I saw Tomas and Siarles leading the flock, two men to each wagon. While one of the Grellon threw a cloak over the head of the driver and pulled him off his bench, the other took up the ox goad and began driving the team.

  The two wagons were taken up the road a little way to a place where the track dipped into a dell. Upon reaching the dingle, wonder of wonders, the wall of bush and brush beside the road parted and the oxen were led off the track and into the wood. As the second wagon followed the first into the brake, four more of the Grellon appeared and began smoothing out the tracks in the snow with pine branches.

  The two drivers were bound in their cloaks, dragged to the side of the road, and each one left beside a dead horse where, I suppose, they might stay a mite warmer for a while. Frightened out
of their wits, they lay still as dead men, offering only the occasional soft whimper to show the world they were still alive.

  New snow was carried in reed baskets and spread lightly over any remaining tracks, and then the Grellon departed, flitting away into the gloaming, vanishing as quickly and quietly as they had appeared.

  CHAPTER 11

  I waited for a time, listening, but heard only the whispering hush of falling snow. I did not know what would happen next, and wondered if the attack was over and I should now begin making my way back to Cel Craidd. The wood was growing dark, and if I did not leave soon it would be a lonely slog on a frozen night for old Will.

  Nothing moved in the forest or on the ground, save the lone wounded man who had taken the arrow in his back. He lay with the dead, moaning and trying now and then to rise, but lacking the strength. I felt that sorry for the fella, I thought that if someone did not come back for him soon, I might risk putting him out of his misery. But my orders were to watch and wait, so that is what I would do until told otherwise. I kept my eyes sharp and bided my time.

  Winter twilight deepened the shadows, and the snow had been steadily melting into my cloak; the icy damp was spreading across my shoulders. As night came on, I knew I would have to leave my post soon or freeze there with the corpses on the trail.

  As I was pondering this, I heard someone approaching on the road from the dingle where the wagons had disappeared in the direction of Elfael. In a moment, a man on horseback emerged from the gathering gloom. Not a tall man, he sat his saddle straight as a rod, his head high. Across his legs was folded a deerskin robe; his hat had a thin, folded brim which was pointed in front like the sharp prow of a seagoing ship. Heavily swaddled against the winter storm, he wore a monk's cloak of brown coarse-woven cloth secured at the throat with a thick brooch of heavy silver. Even from a distance in the failing light, I could tell he was more devil than monk: something about that narrow hatchet-shaped nose and jutting chin, the cruel slant of those close-set eyes, gave me to know that Richard de Glanville was happier with a noose in his hand than a rosary.

  He reined up at the carcase of the first dead horse, regarded it, and then slowly swept his eyes across to one of the dead knights. He observed the arrows jutting rudely from the corpses and, after due contemplation, let out a shrill whistle. I've heard the same when falconers call their hawks to roost and, quick enough, four riders emerged from the gloaming to join him on the road… Yes, Odo, this was the first time I laid eyes on the sheriff," I tell him. My monkish friend knows well of whom I speak. Our sheriff is a right sharp thorn of a man and that nasty-a man who thinks frailty a fatal contagion, and considers mercy the way most folk view the Black Death.

  "If it was the first time," says my scribe, "how did you know it was the sheriff?"

  "Well," says I with a scratch of my head, "the authority of the man could not be mistaken."

  "Even in a snowstorm?" asks Brother Odo with the smarmy smile he uses when he thinks he has caught me decorating the truth a little too extravagantly for his taste.

  "Even in a snowstorm, monk," I tell him. "Anyway, it was the same with Abbot Hugo and Marshal Guy-if I did not know their names right off the first I saw them, I knew them well enough before the day was over. More's the pity, Odo, my friend. More's the pity."

  Odo grunts in begrudging agreement, and we stumble on… The sheriff 's men quickly dismounted and began searching among the dead men and horses for survivors. De Glanville remained in the saddle; he did not deign to get his fine boots wet, I reckon.

  Well, they found the bundled-up wagon drivers, untied them, and brought them to stand before the sheriff. The drivers were still quaking from fright and gawking around as if they expected to be swooped upon by the phantom bird again. Under the sheriff 's stern questioning, however, they soon lost their fear of the great preying bird. The sheriff had them now, and he was flesh-and-blood fiercer than any phantom or host of unseen archers.

  I could tell from the way the ox handlers were gesturing and squawking that they were filling the sheriff 's ears with their weird and wonderful tale. Oh, yes! And I could tell by the way the sheriff 's scowl deepened by the moment that he was having none of it. He listened to them prate a while, and then cut off their mewling with a shout that travelled through the silent wood like a clap. Wheeling his mount, he cantered down the King's Road in the direction the abbot and soldiers had gone, passing so close to my perch I could have reached down and plucked that absurd hat from his pointy head.

  He rode on, leaving his men and the ox drivers behind. Meanwhile, I studied hard to see what they might find, but was relieved to see that the snow had mostly filled in the tracks of men and beasts and wagon wheels; the only disturbance now to be seen was that left by the sheriff and his men themselves.

  Soon enough, de Glanville returned. Close on his heels came Abbot Hugo and the marshal and the surviving soldiers. The fighting men were that weary and out of breath, they could hardly hold their weapons upright. King Raven had led them a wild chase right enough. Their snow-caked feet dragged, and their hair was stringy wet beneath their steel caps; they looked as cold and damp and limp as their own soggy cloaks.

  They assembled in the road, gawking at the dead horses and knights, casting many a sideways glance into the wood lest the phantom catch them unawares. After a brief word with the sheriff, Marshal Guy sent his knights and the remaining soldiers and wagon drivers down the road. It would be a long, frozen walk to Count de Braose's castle, and I did not envy them the welcome they would likely receive. The wounded soldier, clinging to life, was taken up behind one of the sheriff 's men, and they all clattered off with a rattle of tack and weapons.

  Thoughts of home fires and welcomes put me in mind of a nice steaming bowl of something hot, and I was that close to quitting my post and finding my way back home… but glanced back to see that the sheriff had not yet departed. He simply sat there on his horse, alone, in the middle of the road, waiting. I could in no wise leave before he did, so I stayed put.

  Good thing, too.

  For as winter twilight settled over the forest, out from the undergrowth stumbled a man with two fat hares slung on a snare line over his neck, and another in his hand. I did not recognise the fella and supposed he was from Elfael-a farmer, out to get a little meat for his table.

  "You there!" shouted the sheriff, his voice loud in the quiet glade. Startling as it was, it took a moment before I realised old rat face was speaking English. "Stand where you are!"

  The poor man was so surprised he dropped the hare in hand and turned to run. The sheriff was that quick; he spurred his mount forward to catch the poacher. The fleeing man lunged for the brush at the side of the road, but was caught and hauled back by the hood of his cloak.

  The fella gave out a yelp and tried to struggle free of the cloak. The sheriff, well used to catching folk this way, pulled him off his feet. He hung there at the side of the sheriff 's saddle, feet dangling off the ground, swinging his fists, and yelling to be released. When the sheriff drew his knife and put it to his squirming captive's neck, I reckoned the affair had gone far enough. Easing myself from my place, I tucked three arrows in my belt, put another on the string, and moved down onto the road as quickly and quietly as stiff muscles would allow.

  Creeping like a shadow, I came up behind the sheriff 's horse and, with an arrow already on the string, drew and took aim. "Let him go," I said, in my best English. "Or wear this arrow to your wake."

  The sheriff 's head spun around so fast I thought his neck would snap. He gaped at me and at the bow in my hand, opened his mouth, then thought better and closed it.

  "You might be thinking your little knife will save you," I said, "but I think it won't. If you want to find out, just you hold on to that Welshman."

  De Glanville recovered himself then, and said, "I am sheriff of the March. This thief is caught poaching in the king's forest, and unless you want a share of what is coming to him, turn aside and go your way."

/>   "Bold words, Sheriff," I replied. "But it is myself who holds the bow, and my fingers on this string are getting tired."

  I gave my arm a jiggle to sharpen my point, as it were, whereupon the sheriff dropped our man. "Pick up the hare," I told the farmer, "and light out." He scrambled to his feet, snatched up his prize, and dived into the wood.

  "You cannot hope to gain anything by this," the sheriff informed me. "I have marked you for a felon. You will not escape the king's justice."

  "The king's justice!" I hooted. "Sir, the king's justice is rough, to be sure, but it is fickle and inconstant as a flirty milkmaid. I will gladly take my chances."

  "Fool!" cried the sheriff, suddenly angry. Heedless of the arrow, he spurred his horse at me so as to run me down. I stepped lightly aside, and he made a wild, looping slash at me with his small blade as he passed.

  He wheeled the horse at once. A beast well trained to war, it turned so fast the sheriff 's long cloak flung out behind him. I saw it flying like a dull flag against the dark bulwark of an oak bole as he made to drive me down, and loosed the shaft.

  The arrow whined through the air, catching the heavy cloak and pinning it to the oak as he passed. The cloak snapped taut, the horse charged on, and de Glanville was jerked clean from the saddle.

  The sound of ripping fabric cut sharp in the little glade, but the cloth and arrow held fast. Sheriff de Glanville was strung up like a ham in a chimney to dangle with his feet a few inches from the snowy ground. Oh, he squirmed and wriggled and cursed me up one side and down t'other. But I was not ready to let him go so easy, so I sent two more arrows into the trunk to better nail my captive to the tree.

  Red-faced and foamin' with rage, if that fella coulda spit poison, he would have. No mistake. Instead, he swung there, ripening the air with his rage. I calmly trained an arrow at the centre of his chest.