by Джеффри Лорд
On each breastplate was a smaller version of the device on the leader's shield. Blade was able to make it out as a wolf's head-mouth open, teeth bared, and red tongue licking out like a flame. Then the seven riders were past and out of Blade's sight.
Blade waited until the splashing and squelching of the animals' hooves faded almost into silence. Then he slipped over the wall and crouched beside the road. It hardly deserved the name-a yard-wide stretch of bare earth with a ditch on the far side. In spite of the ditch, the road was inches deep in water in many places.
Still, the road would be quicker than cutting through the vineyards and across fields, climbing over walls and risking encounters with farmers. Blade didn't expect he would have far to go. The men hadn't been on the road for long; otherwise their mounts would have been plastered with mud. Nor did they seem to be planning on any sort of long trip. They had no saddlebags on their mounts and no pack animals with them-nothing but their armor and weapons.
Somewhere not far away was a human settlement, possibly a castle matching the weapons and armor of these men. Blade would follow the riders to their destination and look the place over. If the people there looked reasonably friendly, he could introduce himself, dry off, and get food and clothing.
He hoped the people would be friendly. A night or two spent out in the rain wouldn't hurt him, not unless it grew much colder. But it would be a miserable experience, to be avoided if possible. Blade rose to his feet and started off after the riders.
The road wound back and forth between the stone wall on one side and the ditch on the other. Beyond the ditch was another wall, and beyond it a checkerboard of freshly plowed fields. They rose up a hillside until the mist and the clouds swallowed them.
Blade moved steadily along the road, as fast as he could without making too much noise or tiring himself. The mud splashed up with every step. He would have been coated up to his waist if the rain hadn't started coming down heavily enough to wash him clean.
He couldn't help thinking he must be a bizarre sight, striding along this sodden road in such weather, as naked as the day he was born. He'd gotten used to looking strange after arriving in Dimension X, though, and anyone who replaced him in the Project would have to do the same.
After a while the rain began to slacken, and Blade thought he saw a hint of the mist lifting as well. The riders were long since out of earshot, but as far as he could tell they were still on the road. The rain hadn't completely washed out their hoofprints and there was no place they could have left the road to cut across country without leaving tracks.
Now the road curved sharply, vanishing around the rocky flank of a steep wooded hill. As Blade followed the road around to the right, he came to a small wooden bridge leading across the ditch. Beyond the ditch a flock of sheep milled about aimlessly. In the middle of the flock the slight form of a shepherd boy was sprawled on the ground. He lay on his back, his dark hair spread out around his head and his cap fallen to one side. His crook lay in three pieces beside him.
Blade ran across the bridge, crouching low and scanning the landscape for signs of movement. He noticed as he ran that some planks of the bridge were scarred and gouged by iron-shod hooves and that the ground on the far side bore a tangle of hoofprints. Some of the riders had come across the bridge only a few minutes before. They'd killed the shepherd boy, then apparently ridden away without doing anything to his flock-which made no sense.
Blade pushed through the sheep, who scattered with plaintive bleats. He knelt beside the shepherd and with relief discovered the boy was not dead. He had a nasty lump on his head and blood was seeping from a cut under one eye, but his limbs were straight and his chest rose and fell steadily. Blade stood up and started looking for shelter. The boy would come to no further harm if he could be dried off and warmed up.
Then an explosion of new sounds cut through the dying rain. Men and women were crying out in fear, children were screaming wildly, sheep, goats, and cattle were all bleating or lowing frantically. Other men were shouting angrily, and the hooves of fast-ridden animals splashed and thudded.
Blade had caught up with the riders. Somewhere over on the other side of the wooded hill, they were going into action. Whatever they were doing involved many more people than a single shepherd boy.
Blade drew the boy's cap over his face, then ran back across the bridge and out into the road.
Chapter 3
As Blade reached the road the uproar from beyond the hill seemed to double. There was a pitched battle, a wild panic, or both going on over there. Remembering the riders' crossbows, Blade changed his mind about following the road around the hill. Walking unarmed straight into whatever was going on would be a fine way of committing suicide and not much else.
Instead Blade ran on across the road, vaulted the wall, and started up the hill. The trees swallowed him before he'd gone a dozen paces but the cries and shouts still came loud and clear. He went up the hill with a rush, ignoring rocks that bruised his feet and thorn-laden branches that lashed across his skin, In places the slope was so steep he had to grip saplings or roots and haul himself upward. At last he reached the crest and ran to the nearest gap in the trees. He threw himself flat behind a spreading evergreen bush and peered down at the scene below.
Nestled in a hollow at the foot of the hill was a village-sixty or seventy houses, stables, barns, storehouses, a couple of inns, all arranged on either side of a single graveled street. The six men-at-arms were riding up and down that street at a canter, while their leader sat on his mount at one end of the street.
The leader's visor was still up and his face was turned toward the sky. He seemed totally deaf and blind to the uproar around him. He reminded Blade of nothing so much as a faithful dog sitting at his master's feet, waiting for a command. Where that command was going to come from, Blade couldn't imagine.
The men-at-arms, on the other hand, seemed to know exactly what they were doing and were grimly at work. They still had their bows slung, but their swords and maces danced in their hands. Blade saw one of them ride down a boy who could not have been more than ten. The mace whistled down and Blade braced himself to see the child's head smashed to pulp. Then he saw the mace flash with frightening precision inches over the child's head, close enough to ruffle his dark hair. The boy missed a step and sprawled on the gravel, kicking and screaming hysterically, frightened into a fit but otherwise unhurt. The man-at-arms rode on without a backward glance at his victim.
Toward the other end of the village Blade saw a woman burst out of a doorway, trying to make a dash across the street. Two of the men-at-arms saw her and pulled their mounts around so violently Blade expected the animals to lose their footing on the wet gravel. If the men-at-arms went down, it would be easy for the villagers to surround them and take them prisoner or bash out their brains.
The white riding antelopes were too sure-footed. They reared, seemed to spin on their hind legs, then dashed toward the woman. One man rode between her and the houses on the far side of the street. The other swept in behind her, pulled his mount to a stop, and sprang down from the saddle. She whirled, mouth opening in a shrill scream. The man dropped his sword and punched the woman in the stomach hard enough to double her up. Then he grabbed her by the shoulders, threw her on her back on the gravel, pulled her skirts up to her waist, and went to work.
Four of the six men-at-arms raped the woman, and her screams floated up and down the village street. As the fourth man rose and began doing up his breeches, the remaining two rode out from behind a barn. One bad a nude teenage girl slung across his saddle, her hands and feet bound and tied to his stirrups. The other had his crossbow cocked and aimed, and was herding ahead of him two husky young men, barefoot and stripped to the waist.
As the last two men-at-arms rode out into the street, a wild cry of rage exploded from one of the houses. A door flew open and a gray-haired man with a huge ax swinging in his hands burst into view. He took three steps, then the rider with the crossbow shif
ted his aim and fired. The bolt took the man in the leg and he went down with a howl of pain.
This seemed to snap the armored leader out of his trance. In a single fluid motion he lowered his lance and dug in his spurs. His mount leaped forward, spraying gravel. The lance dipped and plunged with terrible precision straight into the center of the man's chest. He rose clear of the ground, impaled on the lance as the leader swept on. Then the body slid free and thudded face down into the street. The leader pulled his mount around, wiped the blood from the lance point on the dead man's clothes, and rode back up the street. In a sharp voice he gave three orders the words of which Blade could not make out. Then his face turned up to the sky again and he fell back into his trance.
The man with the ax was the first and the last bit of resistance from the villagers. No one else did anything but scream or try to run a few steps as the men-at-arms swept back and forth through the village. Three more women writhed and cried out under the pounding bodies of the riders. A dozen more children were frightened into fits or fainting spells. Another young man was dragged out of a hut and bound with the first two. A second girl was stripped naked and thrown over a rider's saddle.
Then three of the men remounted and sat with crossbows at the ready. Of the other three, two began going into houses and barns and hauling out clothes, shoes, small articles of furniture, dishes, whatever seemed to come to hand. Some of it they smashed, some of it they trampled, some of it they just left lying on the ground where they threw it. The street began to look like a trash dump.
The third man-at-arms was the largest of all the riders, inches taller and broader than Blade himself. He wore a thick red beard and an ugly scar ran across his left cheek. He picked up the dead man's ax and strode up and down the street, taking swings at anything he felt like hitting. Porch beams split in two, doors fell off their hinges, fence rails were chopped into firewood.
At last the leader came out of his trance for a second time. He did not speak, but his quick gestures were so clear and precise that no words were needed. The three young men were each tied by the wrists to one of the stirrups. The dismounted men-at-arms scrambled into their saddles. The leader raised his lance high into the air and swung it in three slow circles. Then he spurred his mount forward and the men-at-arms did the same. All seven men rode out of the village at a brisk trot, the three young men trying desperately to keep their feet and the two unconscious women bouncing wildly. The red-bearded man brought up the rear. As he reached the end of the street he flung the ax down and spat on it. Then all seven riders were vanishing into the grayness without a backward glance.
Blade wasted no time wondering what all this might mean. There were clothes, footgear, and perhaps weapons scattered all up and down the village street. He wanted to get down there and get himself clothed, shod, and armed before the villagers recovered and came out to gather up their possessions. The next village might be miles away and the daylight was beginning to fade.
Blade scrambled down the hill as fast as he dared go. He reached the end of the street before anyone came out of the houses. He darted from one heap of the villagers' possessions to another, scooping up whatever looked useful. He found baggy trousers, a woollen vest, a leather tunic, a belt, boots, three pairs of heavy stockings, a carving knife heavy enough to make a good weapon.
Now he came to a wicker basket and saw it full of loaves of hard gray bread. He scooped several into the vest and was just straightening up when a woman appeared in the doorway of a but across the street.
«Heeee-ya!» she shrieked, waving her arms furiously at Blade. Her cry brought heads popping out of doors and windows all along the street. One man stepped out of a barn, holding a pitchfork. Several children picked up stones and clods of mud.
Blade wasted no more time in gathering up more equipment. Tucking his heavy bundle under his left arm, he held his right hand out in front of him, fingers spread.
This peaceful gesture was ignored. «Snake!» the woman screamed. «Dung-eating swine!» shouted someone else. The man with the pitchfork started toward Blade. Several stones and clods flew at Blade. One hit him in the shoulder. More men were stepping out of doorways, holding sticks, chair legs, and lengths of firewood.
Blade realized that his chances of making friends with the villagers were just about nonexistent. His chances of being killed, on the other hand, were very good and rapidly getting better. It was embarrassing to have to retreat from a village of half-armed, furious peasants, but it would be a great deal worse to be pulled down and torn to pieces by them.
Blade took three long steps to the fallen ax and picked it up. He whirled it around his head until it hissed in the air, and twisted his face into a ferocious glare. The men who'd been edging toward him stopped. A number of heads popped hastily out of sight and a number of doors slammed. Blade swung the ax over his shoulder and broke into a run toward the far end of the village. Beyond it he could see the road winding away into the countryside. He didn't know what lay out there, but he knew that if he went the other way he'd be following the seven riders. He wanted to see as little as possible of the riders with the wolf's-head device until he knew a good deal more about them.
Blade plunged down the street and did not look back until he was well out into the countryside. More of the villagers were back out into the street and faint curses reached Blade's ears. He shrugged, turned, and ran on.
This time he did not stop running until the village was out of sight behind him. Then he picked out a pair of trousers and a vest that would fit him, pulled them on, tied the rest of his loot into a more manageable bundle, and moved on through the twilight that was settling down over the land.
Chapter 4
It was nearly dark before Blade found any sort of dry shelter. It was a woodcutter's hut, obviously abandoned for years but still almost intact. It was closer to the road than Blade would have liked, but he'd heard no signs of pursuit.
The boots he'd snatched up turned out to be three or four sizes too small. If he tried to walk a mile in them he'd be crippled for a week with blisters. He threw the boots into a corner and tried on the rest of the clothing. Some of it actually fitted, after he'd ripped a few seams here and there. This was a problem he was used to facing in Dimension X. Even in Home Dimension his massive frame-six feet one, two hundred and ten well-muscled pounds-was hard to clothe. In Dimension X, where people were often smaller, it was sometimes impossible.
Blade pulled on all three pairs of stockings and swept dead leaves into a rough bed. Then he lay back on the leaves and munched a loaf of bread while he considered what he'd seen.
The more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed. The seven riders were obviously highly trained, expert fighting men. In the face of the villagers' lack of resistance, they could have made a shambles of the place, looting, burning, slaughtering people right and left.
Yet what had they actually done? They'd kidnapped three men and two girls. They'd raped a few women, and frightened a good many children out of their wits. They'd done a lot of vandalism, but nothing that even these peasants couldn't make good in a few months. They'd only killed one man, although they'd obviously had the skill and weapons to kill fifty.
They must have had orders, Blade realized. Orders to take able-bodied prisoners, terrorize women and children, smash enough property to annoy everybody, but kill only when absolutely necessary. If that man hadn't come dashing out with the ax, he would probably be alive and drinking his beer tonight.
The riders had their orders. From whom? That was an entirely different question, and one not so easily answered. Blade remembered the leader sitting on his mount, eyes fixed on the sky, apparently lost in a trance. Had the man been waiting for orders? If so, how had he expected to receive them, doing nothing but sitting on his mount and staring up at the gray sky?
That helmet of his was roomy enough to hold a radio, but radio made no sense in a Dimension of peasant villages and riders in plate armor. Maybe he'd been seeing some signal f
rom outside Blade's field of vision. Maybe-
Maybe it was time to stop guessing! This Dimension contained extremely well-trained fighting men, who seemed to follow the orders of some distant master. Both the men and their master could be dangerous enemies or powerful friends.
That was all Blade could know for the moment. He would just have to do what he'd done in a dozen other places, both in Home Dimension and in Dimension X. Watch his step and his tongue, guard his back, and keep his eyes and ears open. It was an effective prescription for survival. If it hadn't been, Richard Blade would have been dead many times over.
Blade finished the first loaf and ate half of a second. The bread was lumpy, coarse gray stuff, sour, damp, and heavy. It lay like a brick on his stomach, but almost any sort of food gave some energy. There'd be no shortage of water, either, not with this rain.
Blade pulled the blanket tightly around himself and lay down to get some sleep.
The rain must have stopped well before dawn. Blade awoke in full daylight, with sun flooding the forest and the only sound the drip of water from the leaves and needles. He found a spring only a few yards away, drank, shouldered his ax, and moved on.
In daylight he could get a better look at the clothes he'd snatched up from the village and roughly pulled on. No two garments were the same size, the same color, the same material or texture. He looked like a scarecrow run away from its field, a tramp dressed in stolen castoffs-or perhaps a footloose woodcutter, with no home but the forest and no roof but the sky. A footloose woodcutter, exactly the sort of man who might be found in this forest. Certainly no one would suspect a man looking like Blade, tramping along with an ax over his shoulder, of being from a world far beyond the imagination of anyone in this Dimension.