Flame Winds

by Norvell W. Page

  In an instant, he had scooped up the sword of the black guard and had taken a half dozen swift leaps in retreat. He whirled then to peer back at his enemies and his sword made a whistling arc about his head.

  “What, do you delay?” he cried, and mocked them with his deep laughter. “Has something robbed your hearts of blood? Or are your feet planted to the ground by enchantment?”

  It was only then he saw that the red guard lay motionless while blood from beneath his throat was drunk eagerly by the thirsty sands. The guard in silvery livery was wrestling to free his sword, deep-buried in the body of the black. So only four men gripped shield and sword and ran heavily to oppose him. Prester John smiled to see them come so weightily to the attack. The muscles in his thighs felt taut and eager and laughter worked in his throat. He could hear the constant roaring of the arena crowds and, carelessly, he turned his back upon the approaching soldiers and lifted his captured blade in salute.

  “A moment more,” he cried, “and I will show you some real waging of battles. Trumpet in your gods!”

  That gesture almost cost Prester John his life. As he swung about, a heavy dagger flickered past. He felt its cool, stinging kiss upon his cheek, and the blade tangled with his fiery, shoulder-length hair and clung there. He saw that the golden guard had thrown it.

  “Well thrown, fool in gold!” he cried. “For that I will kill thee last!” He dashed the warm blood from his cheek, and his left hand wrapped about the dagger hilt. The four were almost upon him. In two leaps, he had turned their left flank and was charging, with a warning roar, upon the silver guard who still wrestled with his corpse-locked sword. The man saw him coming and, with a final frantic wrench, freed his weapon and fell on guard, shield protecting belly and chest.

  Just out of his reach, Prester John checked and saw the sword swing up for a death stroke. John flung himself forward—and something gripped at his feet to plump him awkwardly to his knees! Desperately, his sword reached out, cutting edge uppermost. Its tip flickered across the armor-bare armpit, and red blood gushed to answer the caress of the steel. Sword toppled down from nerveless fingers and the arm dropped like a stick. The guard struck out fiercely with his shield, but his strength was pouring from him with the red staining of his silver tunic. His knees buckled and he groveled, dying, within reach of Prester John’s hand.

  Pallor touched the cheeks of Prester John. The blood from his cheek dripped from his fiery beard to dabble his swelling chest. He thrust fiercely to his feet—and they were sunk to the ankles in sand! He wrenched at them and, with a gasp of relief, he felt them tear free of the grip of the earth—but at his next stride he sank ankle-deep again! Even more heavily than the armored men he moved with this new accursed enchantment. Yet his lips could curve in his battle smile! Laboriously, he turned to face the charge of the four guards who remained alive. Glittering in their brass, resplendent in their tunics of blue and green, purple and gold, and with grimly confident smiles on their lips, they came in steadily. Sword points gleamed beneath the rims of their shields.

  Prester John took two slow backward steps so that he stood once more against the altar. He made an awesome figure with the red sword in his hand, with his bloody beard and the smeared gleaming trunk of his body and, though ankle-deep in the black sand, still he towered above his four enemies. They were coming in steadily, side by side, a semicircle of death in brass and steel. The crowds were silent and the burning pressure of the sunlight struck dazzlingly from the gleaming white of the altar, framed the bronze Barbarian in a halo of exquisite flame.

  “Come, my fine slaughterers,” Prester John said gently. “Come and let me kiss thee with steel.”

  There was an answering smile on the faces of the men, but they were wary with death and there was grimness in the taut lines of their cheeks, a fierce keenness in their watching eyes. Prester John’s smile widened. They were close enough. His sword flickered toward the face of the blue guard. The shield came up—and Prester John’s left hand threw the dagger! Straight and true, it drew its silvery line through the metallic sunlight and grated home under the edge of the cuirass. Its keen steel was buried to the hilt in the guard’s thigh joint where a great artery pulsed close to the skin.

  With a scream, the blue guard pitched forward, doubling, and he lashed out in a frantic side stroke with his waiting sword. Forgetful of the restraining sand, Prester John tried to fling himself aside and, too late, swung a fending blade. There was the rasp of steel, but when Prester John’s shoulders struck the altar, there was blood upon his thigh. Fury bellowed from his throat. Heedless of the restraining sand, he flung himself upon the three guards who remained. His sword clashed on brazen shield. His shield severed under the stroke. The purple guard leaped backward. Green and gold closed in from two sides. Their swords flashed high. In a great circle about his head, Prester John whirled his blade. The golden crest leaped from a helmet and that guard’s sword shattered in the air, but the second man’s blade was under, slashing home. Prester John dropped to one knee and shrank aside. His sword cut back at the guard in green, and the man’s fist, still gripping savagely the hilt of a sword, bounced on the ground.

  From a half dozen cubits away, the purple guard hurled his dagger. There was no time to dodge but the skill of Prester John, whose sword had severed arrows in midflight, swung his steel in exquisite timing. The dagger hissed on harmlessly to ring like a bell against the altar stone. And now, purple guard and golden drew back while the man in green gripped the blood-spurting stump of his arm and staggered off across the black sands.

  Somewhere, a trumpet blared and an arrow flicked from the barrier. The green guard groaned with the bite of the shaft, pitched to earth, and the twang of the bow, coming lately, marked the grinding of his face into the sand.

  Prester John, surging once more to his feet, smiled bitterly. It was a stern discipline that held the guard. They must triumph—or die. Gold and purple guards were rearming from the bodies of slain comrades, and Prester John moved toward them with ponderous, ankle-deep steps. The guards hovered back, reluctant to close, and twice the swift sword batted aside flung daggers. From the barriers, a trumpet sounded warning of more disciplining arrows. Pale-faced, the men glanced toward the sound, then gripped their swords in desperate hands and came forward to meet Prester John.

  He did not check his march. With each step, his mighty thighs flexed and the muscles leaped like living serpents beneath the flesh. And at each step, the thirsty black sands drank of his blood. There was no smile on his mouth, and his teeth gleamed fiercely through the fire bristle of his beard. He stooped once to snatch up a dead man’s shield, and once more he was aware of the timeless, blood-hungry waiting of the mob. The crowd recognized that tricks and flight were through. The odds were even for Prester John, two men to his mighty strength. No quarter, no more delay. The guards sensed that bitter threat and stood unmoving, shields poised. The man in purple shifted his grip on sword hilt a little Prester John saw the light quiver on its point. Five cubits’ distance from them, Prester John paused.

  “Man in gold,” he said softly, “I promised you should die last for that shrewd dagger throw of thine. Purple man—”

  No man could see the tensing of Prester John’s muscle that hurled the shield from his left hand. It was as sudden as the release of a bowstring. Like the twang of the gut, too, was the clash of the shield striking into the helmeted head of the golden guard! And its force was the force of the hammer of the gods! The guard pitched sideways, staggering to the earth, and Prester John tossed his war shout to the vault of the heavens, tore his feet from the sand and hurled himself upon the purple guard!

  For an instant, steel rang on brass, clashed and slithered against another blade. For an instant, heavy-footed men stood, slashing, face to face. Then the lion roar of Prester John’s shout burst out again and his sword, an arc of light in the hammering sun, cut through the upthrust rim of the brazen shield and leaped on. His shoulders were hunched by the thrust of his m
uscles; his whole titan’s body bent to the stroke. The sword flashed clear, and for a breath of time the two bodies stood there in confrontation, and afterward the crowd saw what had happened. A head, still cased in a purple-crested helmet, was tumbling like an awkward ball upon the sand!

  With a brusque thrust of his hand, Prester John tumbled the blood-spouting trunk backward and turned heavily toward the man in gold, who still weaved dizzily on his feet.

  “Come and die,” said Prester John.

  The golden guard lifted his sword in salute. “Nay, brother,” he said clearly. “Thou shall live for all of me. Remember this, when we meet in some other life, and call me ‘comrade’: Thou art the man!”

  He slammed his sword into its scabbard, swung about and, as steadily as a sentry, head high, shield at rest, he marched back toward the barrier, toward the trumpet and the arrow of his death.

  “Two battles have been waged,” Prester John muttered in his bloody beard. He stood on braced, rigid legs, his mighty shoulders bowed, not as beneath a load, but in menace and in power. He was aware now that purple shadows were crawling across the western rim of the black arena, had shaded in kindness the inverted face of Kassar. He twisted his head to smile up at the corpse of his blood brother.

  “A few drops of thy blood are avenged, my brother,” he said. He drew back his heavy shoulders and lifted his sword so that it glittered, red and ominous, in the diminishing sun.

  “Send out your gods!” he bellowed at the mob, “or does their purple blood shrink from the caress of Prester John?”

  There was a whisper like the stir of the Flame Wind and to the ears of the waiting man they seemed to form an echo of the golden guard’s last words: “Thou art the man!”

  Prester John frowned in impatience. What that whisper meant he did not know, but his battle-heated limbs were stiffening. He swung the sword, dragged his heavy feet once more toward the altar whose pure white was smeared with scarlet. His gray eyes, sunken under the frown of his brows, probed toward the Red Gate where Bourtai had said, a horse was waiting. Well, he would never reach it. The gods were coming, and the priests of scarlet and blue and gold, of green and silver and purple and black, would add their strength to the arm of their gods. Prester John flexed his sword in his hands, and it snapped clean in half. He shrugged and stooped for another weapon. He sprung it and, when he released the point, it quivered and sang in his hand. Briefly, Prester John smiled. He flung up his blood-crowned head and once more the trumpets blared. The third battle was begun!

  Prester John glanced briefly toward the door in the altar, but it was sealed tightly, nor did any man issue from the gates in the barrier. He frowned, feeling the pressure of the waiting throng, and then his eyes widened and short, harsh laughter leaped from his chest. From the bloodstains on the sand, tiny, pure-white flames were licking up! Even as he watched, the flames began to run together, and as each new tongue joined, the central core leaped higher and hotter, until its center was a blinding rod of radiance. He could hear the snap and crackle of the fire burning straight up in the motionless air, straight up until it towered twice the height of the bronze giant who waited with a thing of feeble manmade steel in his hand and dauntless courage in his gray eyes.

  In the wake of the flames, the clothing of the guards was smoldering. Black threads of smoke lifted and Prester John’s nostrils widened to the odor of scorching flesh, of fusing, blood-drenched sand. Stately and beautiful, this magic fire swirled before him and then, slowly, with the deliberation of marching men, it swayed toward Prester John. He gripped the steel hard in his fist. In his heart was no longer any hope, yet what man could do against this manifestation of the gods he would do! His left hand lifted and touched the bauble that still dangled about his throat, the bit of the True Cross and, briefly, a grim smile touched his lips.

  “A hundred thousand to bow before thee, Christos,” he whispered. “Nay, what more could I promise? I will make no bribe to the gods. Come, Prester John, it is only once a man may die, and what better way may he go than battling against false gods?”

  He saluted the flames with his sword and, holding it ready at his side, he marched toward that blistering core of pure white radiance. Tongues licked out to meet him like the thrusts of many swords. His skin seemed to crinkle with the heat, and he narrowed his eyes against the assault. He could smell now the singeing of his own beard. Almost, he could reach out with his sword tip to slash at the fire; but of what use was that? The sword hilt was hot in his hand. He could feel the furious winds that the flame sucked upward and, for an instant, even the fierce courage of Prester John wavered. Then his lips opened in a blurred shout, and he dropped his sword, flung himself with clutching arms straight toward the heart of the flame!

  There was an instant of maddening pain, of searing heat—and it was gone! The blinding radiance winked out and Prester John found himself, wavering on his feet, embracing the headless corpse of the purple guard! With an oath, he wrenched the carcass aloft and hurled it from him, stood glaring about the arena. So this was the way the gods fought, to dare a man to his utmost—and then vanish from under his hands? Prester John threw his tensed arms high in challenge, shouting his wrath at the skies. Then his eyes widened. On his arms was no seared flesh, no blistering trace of that magic fire. He combed his fingers through his beard, and found it full and long, uncrisped by the singeing of the flames. Even the smell of heat was gone, and there was only the staling odor of blood and the sweat of his body.

  The sound of soft, mocking laughter whirled him about so that his deep-sunk feet tripped him and, almost, he fell. There glittered in the air before him a swirling rainbow arch of colors, the seven colors of the seven wizards. As he stared, frowning his doubts, the thing swirled at him like a sword. Prester John ducked and felt a sharpness like steel graze his scalp! A severed lock of his hair floated toward the sand. Prester John laughed sharply. He tore his feet from the sand in a frantic leap for his abandoned sword and straightened with its glittering curve before him. Now here was a thing a warrior could fight. The rainbow sword swung toward him, and he flung up the guard of his own steel to meet it. There was no sound, but the rainbow swished past his throat and, as he turned heavily to face it, he confronted not one, but two of these streamers of light that had the cutting edge of death itself!

  Anger darkened Prester John’s gray eyes. Now here, surely, was doom when a man’s fending sword multiplied his enemies! They swirled like flames, whipped through the air like the veils of a dancing girl, feinting for his throat, striking both together, chopping in swift down-strokes like a Mongol drummer’s sticks. Prester John dodged and ducked and whirled and, only in extremity interposed the flat of his defensive blade. Yet in a half dozen moments there were seven of those flashing swords of light swishing about his ears.

  Prester John’s thoughts were a whirl of madness, but somewhere in the depths of his brain an idea began to breathe. No man could fight magic with man-made tools—yet here were magic swords ready to his hand! He need only leap and grab them. The seven blades of light were circling him, quivering almost motionless in the air, lifting for a final downstroke that would slash him in seven different bits to earth. It was now he must strike, if ever. Furiously, Prester John flung his sword from him and with a dragging leap he reached out with both mighty hands for the fragments of colored light. Pain like the gash of a keen dagger knifed across his fingers and into his palms. He clamped his grip more tightly on those two grasped magic weapons and whirled them about his head—and the air about him was empty! He opened his tight-gripping hands and black sand poured through his fingers to the earth.

  Prester John stood with hanging arms, and it was weariness that bowed his shoulders, the weariness of battling the unknown, of fighting an enemy that no man’s hands could grasp and winning triumphs that vanished into the thinness of air and a fistful of sand. There was nothing he could strike, and yet he knew with an awful certainty that had his spirit faltered for a moment, he would have die
d horribly beneath the keen edges of a wand of light. He had met the beasts with savagery that matched their own, and he had met men with guile and the quickness of brain and body, but what could he summon to defeat these spirits of the air?

  He sucked in a slow breath and, slowly, too, his head lifted as proudly as of old. There were channels cut in the flesh of his bearded cheeks as if grief and the promise of despair had wielded sharp chisels on his flesh, but somewhere within him a warm spark of courage still glowed. Spirit he still had, and while that spirit burned—He grasped at an idea that eluded his warrior’s brain and, somewhere—it might be as far off as the fir-clad Suntai hills, or as near as the beating of his own heart—muffled drums began to throb and he heard the tinkle of softly clashed cymbals.

  Stiffly, on his drained limbs, Prester John turned about and saw that the door in the base of the altar had opened again. From it stepped—a woman! Prester John’s breath caught in his throat at the sight of her beauty, draped in a fluttering of veils like spider webs. Her black hair hung as straight as poured ink; almost, it seemed to stain the rosy marble-whiteness of her flesh. Slowly, as Prester John stared, her feet began to pick up that far thudding of the drums and the graceful willow of her body bent and swayed in a stirring rhythm as old as flesh, as new as young desire. Prester John dragged a war-weary arm across his haggard eyes. Honors they had promised him if he triumphed. Was this, then, part of his victor’s mead? He took a stumbling step forward, and it seemed to him that there was, in all that waiting mob, the tension of a caught breath. He frowned and stopped.