When Death Birds Fly cma-3

by Andrew J Offutt

  “Knud?”

  “Myself! Aye and ye sound like… Atanwald?”

  “Aye, Swift one.”

  An obscure form showed itself, hand outstretched in the sign of peace. A scale byrnie glimmered faintly in the darkness beneath the forest roof. “Be sure of my voice ere ye come closer, lad. We’d not wish to be over-suspicious and kill each other. ’Twere a joke to make the gods laugh.”

  “I know ye, man. Lead me to the Hausakluifr.”

  Knud was soon in the encampment. He was roundly cursed for accidentally kicking a sleeper wrapped in a long cloak. Erelong Cormac and Wulfhere were awake and ready to give listen to his intelligence.

  “All be as the little wench made claim, Captain,” Knud said. “They talk of little else in that pigsty village. I’ll wager it’s the mightiest thing to have happed there in a lifetime. Sigebert’s hunting, and the dogs, and the way he carried off Cathula. He paid for her, mind. The girl’s mother died. Horribly. Not long since, her father burned in his hut. All the village believes it was a drunken mischance-their ‘God’s’ will and justice. I’ve even talked to the priest.”

  “Could he understand you?” Cormac asked.

  “By the World Tree! My Latin is not that poor!”

  “Was the priest’s Latin I had ill thoughts about,” Cormac said. “An it’s like unto most of his kind he is, the garbled mess he calls Latin would be sounding better from a kittiwake. He supports Cathula’s tale, does he?”

  “Everything does. The village wenches are rolling their eyes and making guesses about her fate… they pretend to be appalled, but they giggle even whiles they bite their lips, ye know?” Knud spat on the ground. “Despite what ye said, Cormac, I’d never ha’ believed even a sounder of Britonish peasants could accept a Dane as a Frankish vagabond! Certain I was they’d know me for the liar the instant I said aught so ridiculous! Yet they believed me. They could not tell the difference.”

  He fell silent, brooding on that in disbelief and some outrage.

  Cormac grinned. “Forget fretting, Knud. Not one of them’s been more than a league from the village in his life’s days, remember. Well then ’tis settled for me; it’s honest our Cathula is.” He ceased to smile. “By which token, it’s a bargain Lucanor of Antioch has made with that bloody hearted Frank. Now we can be certain-Sigebert and Lucanor are yonder in Nantes, and teamed.”

  Since the black owl’s talons had smitten Wulfhere, he had become morose and silently brooding amid his pain. Now he spoke.

  “We have another chance to slay Sigebert, and Lucanor with him! This war of Franks on Romans Howel avows is in the making… it helps us. Do the Franks march on Soissons and conquer, all the land will be in uproar. Nantes will seethe with panic like a broken nest of ants! Fleeing country folk will howl at its gates in multitudes. In such confusion we can enter-and leave again with none remarking us!”

  “An these things happen, Wulf.” They looked at each other: blood-brothers.

  They settled to sleep. Knud wondered, half hopefully, whether he ought not return to the village for another day or two-just to be wholly sure there was naught he’d omitted to learn… His comrades brayed him down. Were the women of this village so eager that he could not bear to depart? They were assured the village priest was the man to ask about that; Knud felt sure that despite what the black-robe said in church, he’d likely had every nubile girl for a league around and some of the wives into the bargain.

  With the sun’s rising they made a fire and roasted venison killed by Howel’s foresters. Cormac and Wulfhere allowed a big cheery blaze, as they meant to leave the vicinity anyhow. Nor were they overly strict about smoke.

  By this means did the messenger from Vannes find them. Himself a forester end expert tracker, he’d have trailed them to the camp in any event. The odour of woodsmoke merely made it simple for him. He’d traveled most of the way with an armed party, but finished his journey alone. He bore ill news, he said, the Lady Morfydd having despatched him to bring it them.

  “The Lady Morfydd?” Cormac repeated. “Not Prince Howel?”

  The men shook his heed. Short-legged, heevybodied end bald he was, clad in deerskin tunic leggings. “The prince is wounded,” he said bitterly. “He may die yet.” And he glared at Cormac as though blaming him personally.

  “How?” Cormac snapped. “By whom?” There was that in his and sudden complete attention to make the man think again about voicing his own feelings on the matter, or doing aught at all save answer the question fully.

  “Hengist, lord. He came with three Saxon longships, end raided the Mor-bihan in full daylight! The prince was newly returned to his keep on the island. Hengist made no attempt to storm it, for he could never ha’ taken it in any case with three ships’ companies. He stole your ship-”

  “What?” That from Wulfhere, in a bellow. “Raven stolen?” He made three titan’s strides and seized the forester. He lifted the man as if he were a doll. “Hengist, ye say? Ye dare tell me he has lifted Raven from out the Little Sea? From your master’s own doorstep? What were his coast-watchers doing to prevent it?”

  The forester said into Wulfhere’s congested face, “The coast-watchers died to a men! My master the prince led a sortie down from the hall to prevent those Kentishmen’s launching your ship. ’Tis how he came to be wounded. When he fell, his warriors carried him back from the fray and covered his retreat wi’their lives-”

  “And allowed Hengist to have my ship?” Wulfhere howled.

  He shook the forester like a flapping sail. Even while the men turned grey in that grip, rage got the better of his common sense. With a violent curse, he spat full in Wulfhere’s eyes end reached for his hunting knife.

  Wulfhere dropped the man in sheer astonishment.

  The man crouched, his skinning knife point upward in his fist. “Rot your ship, and your vast self with it!” he snarled. “Would ye’d both been destroyed ere my lord took a wound for you!”

  With a strangled bellow, Wulfhere reached for his ax.

  An attack of prudence came on the forester. He wheeled, dodged between two Danes, end vanished down a game trail with alacritous churning of short legs. Wulfhere blundered after him, enraged. He found that his quarry had disappeared into the nigh impenetrable brush. Wulfhere hunted about, beating the undergrowth with his ax. It availed naught.

  “I lost him,” he growled, returning to the campfire. “Brave little rooster!”

  “I’d guessed as much,” Cormac said drily. “There’s only green on your beloved little toy there. Ye needn’t be hoping to see him again, either. He’ll not show his face whiles we two remain in Armorica.”

  Wulfhere shrugged massive shoulders. “He’d delivered his message. Hengist! The bastard! He must ha’ learned we be guests of Howel’s. Word would get about.”

  “Aye. It’s we he wanted. We were not present when he came avisiting, so he took our ship instead.” Cormac’s hard fingers clenched over his sword-hilt. “Desire is on him that we seek him out to regain Raven. Damn!”

  “He will get his wish. Ah, wait! The five men left to finish work on Raven! Yon fellow said Howel’s coast watchers were all slain, but I frighted him off ere he said what became of our own!”

  “Right. Thought was on me of that very thing,” Cormac said, shooting Wulfhere a look and sounding bitter. “It’s in my mind that we have no need of him to tell us. We can both guess.”

  Wulfhere swore thunderously. Whirling up his mighty ax with both hands, he struck it deep into the mossy log whereon he’d sat a few moments since. All the power of his giant’s body went into that strike, and much frustration. The heavy log split from end to end so that it fell in halves. Fat grubs writhed in its partly rotted center and thousand-leggers scuttled.

  “Take up your gear, wolves!” the redbeard ordered. “We march for Vannes, and thence we take ship for Howel’s island. We march hard!”

  There was no protest. They, too, had heard all.

  “An other insults be bandied when w
e reach the Mor-bihan, Wulfhere, do keep your ax still,” Cormac counselled. “Doubtless others will be feeling as yon forester does. Morfydd herself well may.’

  “What? Blaming us for this?” Wulfhere was taken aback. “Why, Howel’s a reiver himself! ’Tis the risk of the game. He might ha’ met Hengist on the open sea at any time.”

  Cormac’s thin lips parted in a wry half-smile. “Well done. Good hard sense that is, and none can gainsay. And how much difference might it be making to a woman whose man lies at the point of death? Or may have died, for aught we ken.”

  “Get of Loki,”, Wulfhere said, scratching pensively within his beard. “I’d not thought. Well-let us hope he lives. He’s a good man, that Howel.”

  “Among the best,” Cormac said quietly. Then, abruptly, “Let’s march.”

  March they did. The Roman road through the forest still existed and not even a legion in the days of Julius Ceasar or Trajan could have bettered the time Wulfhere’s Danes made in reaching Vannes. Nor did they pause there. Another day saw them landing on Prince Howel’s island estate. Lady Morfydd did not rant or shriek at them, but Cormac knew he’d been right about her feelings. He suspected that she had wept violently and raged violently too, since Hengist’s raid. They found the slim, broad-hipped woman strongly under control, determined to be just-and seething inside, against them.

  Their five Danes had indeed been slaughtered in the fighting on the beach. They had been the next fatalities after Howel’s coast-watchers, among whom had been Garin. Prince Howel was laid low with a wound that might yet prove fatal. He could not rise, or even speak. Morfydd’s was the voice that commanded in Bro Erech.

  “What mean ye to do?” she asked.

  “Follow that old bastard and take Raven back from him!”

  Morfydd stared. “And you with two dozen men left to you? Captain! If ye be fixed on suicide, there are simpler ways! Besides, how can ye follow him? Ye no longer have a ship.”

  “Howel’s captains have several,” Cormac said. “Fury’s on them for vengeance against the White Horse, and they’ll follow us to gain it-even if they do partly blame us for what has happened. I have a plan, Lady.”

  “Which they may not care for,” Morfydd said.

  “It’s accepting it with joy they’ll be, when they hear the greatest risk is to be ours. That ought to blunt the edge of their resentment.”

  Morfydd hesitated. Was in her mind to forbid the business without hearing Cormac’s plan. Wisdom stayed her. In their present mood, her husband’s corsair captains might well defy such orders. These were experienced men all. She could count on them to reject a plan that seemed mad. Besides, she too desired vengeance for Howel’s wounds. She became practical:

  “What of Sigebert?”

  “It’s truth the girl Cathula’s after telling us,” Cormac said. “Our mage Lucanor has leagued with the Frank, it seems.”

  “Then might it not be better to deal with them first? Wulfhere’s injury-”

  “Will not stop me fighting!” the Dane snarled. “It does but sting me to a fouler temper to cleave Saxon heads! I’ve carried all before me in seafights when I had worse wounds on me.”

  He might have thundered on. Instead, becoming aware of Morfydd’s proudly lifted head and angry stare, he drew a deep breath. “Nay, Lady, I be your guest; and that was mannerless. Ye spoke with my welfare. in mind. See-I know risk of death whether I fare against Sigebert or against Hengist of Kent. One did not drown in a tempest on yester day, so one slips on a balky gangplank and breaks his neck on the morrow. Who knows what’s fated? I know only that I’ll not leave my ship-my ship!-to a gaggle of Kentish Jutes.”

  Nor was that all. Were it necessary, Cormac and Wulfhere might have taken another fine ship for their use, anywhere they pleased; even from the Jutes of Kent in Britain, in just retaliation.

  What they could not replace was the five yards of chain riveted to Raven’s forward anchor, tarnished black with great care and thoroughness to make it seem only plain iron. For in truth it was pure silver, and they must have it were they ever to reach the north and hire a master shipwright for King Veremund.

  17

  Raven Uncaged

  Cormac had not been mistaken. He had little work in finding men among Howel’s corsairs to sail against the Saxons. The problem lay in inducing some few to remain behind!

  Soon three Armorican galleys rowed southward over the blue sea, their bright sails furled to the yards. Their prows were more imaginatively figured than those of the dark serpent-ships of the Saxons; one had the shape of a whimsical seahorse, another a swan, and the third a carven sea-woman whose eyes were mother-of-pearl and whose tresses were green.

  Aboard the galley with the seahorse prow were Wulfhere and Cormac mac Art. Ship’s master was Drocharl, a cousin of slain Garin the coast-watcher. More even than most, this man had been fiercely delighted by Cormac’s scheme.

  “I’ve made my oath afore God,” he said, “and the old gods as well, to take nine Saxon heads in payment for Garin’s.”

  “I made mine long ago,” Wulfhere growled. “To have Hengist’s ugly head!”

  Cormac spoke to the sword he was whetting. “It’s having your chance ye’ll both be. Saxons and to spare there are in the Charente and the islands offshore-and since Hengist is plundering in Gaul this summer, where else would he be making his base? He has kindred there, too.”

  “Thanks for telling me,” Drocharl said with irony.

  Not quite smiling, Cormac said mildly, “I was thinking aloud, man.” And scree, scree keened his whetstone along his sword’s edge.

  He gave thought to their destination, and foes. Gaul had her Saxon settlements even as Britain did. Less extensive now than in decades past, they yet remained strong betwixt the great rivers Garonne and Loire, and plied the Saxon trade of piracy with a will. At least fifteen hundred tough-handed weapon men dwelt in the region-and perhaps as many as four thousand. None had counted their number. They had no census as they had no king. Living as they did under the rule of a dozen or so chieftains who cooperated loosely in piratical exploits-as and when it suited them-the Saxons of the Charente needed no king.

  Such was the lair of killers three fancifully prowed galleys scudded southward to strike, bearing two hundred fighters only. Even so, the galleys would ordinarily carry about half a hundred men each. On this mission each ship’s complement was close to seventy. An all went well, Cormac and Wulfhere expected to need the additional rowers to fetch Raven back.

  All went smoothly on that first day. Next day seas were choppy and winds hostile. The third day was better, though not much. Not until its waning did they come in sight of Wecta’s Isle, named for a Saxon chieftain of old.

  The two bearded Saxon fishermen drawing their net were amazed and horrified to behold the seahorse prow loom suddenly out of the dusk. They let fall the net and the taller reached for his spear. His companion scrambled after the sail of their little boat, hoping to flee. Seeing the pale line of oars so rhythmically combing the water at the galley’s sides, he abandoned that hope. In the present lack of wind, the oncoming vessel could run down any fishing boat. The fishermen could but wait. Two grappling hooks flew and bit. A mighty voice hailed.

  “Come aboard and guest with us awhile, Saxons! “

  The taller man snarled and flung his spear at the burly shape that had spoken. Up came a shield, blurringly fast. The spear struck it well with a sharp, echoic thud, and stuck fast.

  “Very well,” the huge form cried down to them in his huge voice, still genial. “Ye’ve shown ye be no tame dog. An ye be wise now, ye may even live to boast to your children that once ye hove a spear at Wulfhere Skull-splitter. That, however, is as far as my patience goes.” The voice roughened. “Step aboard smartly now, or be riddled where ye stand!”

  As punctuation, an arrow thunked into the fishing boat’s mast. It quivered there, humming nastily to strengthen Wulfhere’s point.

  The Saxons clambered aboard. At a word from C
ormac mac Art, one of his Danes sprang into the fishing-boat and wrenched the Danish arrow out of the mast. Cormac knew brave schemes had oft gone amiss because of little pieces of betraying evidence such as that left carelessly about. The Dane jumped back. The boat was cast adrift.

  “Well, fishermen,” Wulfhere boomed, “ye may keep your lives at the price of sharing one choice bit of gossip with us. Where is Hengist?”

  “Hengist?” the taller man repeated, taken aback.

  “Ah, Wolf,” the Danish giant said heavily, and turned to Cormac. “These good fellows have never heard o’ him! ’Tis natural enow. He hasn’t the fame of yourself or me, after all.” He looked again to the fishermen. “Hengist,” he explained kindly, “be a poor crazy old man not long for this world, who calls himself King of Kent. Some of us be kindly-natured, and humour him… it costs naught. Lately he’s been doing things a poor crazy old man ought not, and we’re bound to teach him the error of his ways. For his own good, ye understand. Where be he hiding?”

  “Lord,” the fisherman, said, “what know we of Hengist, or such great ones? He may be hereabouts-sith ye say it, so it must be-but he’d not confide in us.”

  “Play no games!” Wulfhere snarled, suddenly tiring of his own. “I know Hengist’s hereabouts. I know how quickly word gets around. Tell me, or by Odin, I’ll have your lives! I can see ye’re brothers!”

  At a gesture from their chieftain, two Danes seized the taller fisherman and bent him over a rowing-bench. Wulfhere lifted his outside ax.

  “A good thing there be two of ye,” he rumbled. “I can spare one, to show the other my mood is no trifling one. Once more only-where be Hengist?”

  “With Fritigern Redjowl, on Fritigern’s Isle!” the second fisherman howled. “At Fritigern Redjowl’s scalli, on the southern point. Although he may be out harrying-lord.”