by Barry Sadler
And then, as blood stained more of the water surrounding him, the crabs began to leave, as did the small fish that had come with them to claim what scraps they could. They went back to their holes in the crevices and rocks of the fjord. There was something about the man on the stake that wasn't to their liking. The fish kept their distance, too. The scent of his blood served as a shield to ward off even a cruising shark, who opened his gapped, thousand-fanged mouth, took one taste of the blood, and fled back to deep water. This one was not to be touched. The cold and fatigue took him, and his head nodded down as darkness wrapped itself about him.
When the tide receded, a curious warrior from the hold came to inspect the remains, took one look and yelling, ran back to the fort. Soon, others came to see if what the warrior had said was true. A crowd gathered on the stones of the beach and waited. They did not know why. They only knew that something had happened that had never occurred before. The murmurs brought Ragnar and the druid to the scene.
Casca's body was covered with hundreds of tiny bites, but that was all. No bones showed through his rib cage. The Roman survived.
The druid made signs to ward off evil and Ragnar chewed his beard in confusion. Making up his mind, Ragnar called to a couple of his spearmen. "If the crabs won't have him then you finish him off. Use him for target practice."
But at this, Hagdrall had to interfere. In his own way, he believed in magic and spirits and the curses that could come if the laws were broken. Raising his staff, he stopped the spearmen. "No! Ragnar. The law says that any who survive the tide stakes may not be killed."
Ragnar thought about the situation for a few moments, then made up his mind. "All right, if that's the way of it, then I won't do him any harm at all." He laughed a nasty sound. "By Wotan, I won't lay a hand on him." Motioning to his spearmen, he said, "Take him to the dungeons and leave him there. No one is to ever enter his cell and he is not to be given food or drink. If I can't kill him then I'll just let him do it for me. After all, I can't be held responsible if he starves to death, now can I?"
Casca heard his sentence and tried to speak, but dropped back off into the darkness.
Chapter Eight
Consciousness slowly crept back to him. The throbbing in his head threatened to keep the darkness with him. Filth from the straw-covered stone floor filled his mouth with a bitter taste. He rose to all fours, shaking his head to clear it of the cobwebs trying to drag him down.
Slowly, painfully, he forced his eyes open, only to see black. The dungeon was as dark as his thoughts. He dragged himself to the side of the wall, feeling his way with blind hands. Slowly, bitterly, full awareness came to him. Remembrance...!
Rising, he stood in the dark and screamed, "Lida ..." Even from the depths of the underground chambers, his cry could be heard faintly in the halls above: "Lida...." Battle-toughened veterans shivered and made the two-finger sign to ward off evil spirits.
After a time, he grew used to the darkness. There was a thin blue-tinged glow in the cell where a minute amount of light came in from a single narrow slit, high on the wall. There was nothing in the cell - no cot or pallet, no blankets or anything to cover his nakedness with. There was only the filth-encrusted straw, which he knew from the sour odor of urine hadn't been changed in years. Going through the straw, he found a single wooden bowl; though from what Ragnar had said, he would never have food in it.
He was to starve. Hate settled on him, forcing the pain from his mind, taking him over with one thought and goal. One day he would come out of this crypt. Those above would think him dead soon and, though it might be years, he would be silent. There would be no sound from him to tell Ragnar he lived; and one day that door would open and when it did, the Hall above would run red with rivers of blood. He would take his vengeance then.
He was used to going days without food, but the lack of water was unbearable. There was nothing, not even a drop of moisture to dampen his lips with. It was three days before he discovered the dung beetles living beneath the decaying layers of packed straw on the floor. Each beetle had a tiny bit of moisture in its body. It was a hunt. Casca would lie on his belly, fingers groping through the refuse, until he would feel the cool, hard shell of one of the insects. At first, he would pop them into his mouth as quickly as he found them, but he found later it was more satisfying to wait until he had a handful. Then he could taste the moisture. After chewing slowly, he would swallow them, shells and all; anything to fill the void in his gut.
Days became weeks and the weeks changed into seasons, and still Casca endured. He cursed himself for taking so long to discover that there was moisture to be had on the stone walls of his cell. There lingered cool beads that collected on the stones when the mist came in from the sea.
During the winter, he found warmth by crawling under the layers of impacted straw and lay there for days, forgetting even to lick the dew from the walls or eat his ration of beetles. Nearly comatose, he rested in a form not dissimilar from the hibernating animals of the forests. In the first months, he had several times thought he could never endure the idea of years of confinement in this one dark silent cell without going mad. It was worse than when he had been a slave in the mines of Greece. At least there he had work. It was something to do besides sit and watch the passing of light to dark from the single aperture cut in the wall, the only access to fresh air and mist from the fjord. It was too narrow for him to climb through and too high to reach. He lay there for days, watching the change from thin light to blackest dark, one cycle after another. He learned to turn his mind back on itself. To take a thought, isolate it, turn it around, and look at it from a thousand angles.
His beard grew, as did his nails. The beard, he did nothing about. At least it gave him some covering. His nails he chewed off and ate. Never was a word spoken to him. In obedience to Ragnar's orders, there were no visitors allowed. Not once did he even hear anyone pass by his cell. He knew they believed him dead by now - long dead, and no more than a shriveled husk lying withered in some corner, falling apart one joint at a time. Increasingly, he turned in on himself. Several times it was as if his soul had left his body and would float above the floor. He could look down, out of the spirit's eyes, and see himself in startling clarity. He saw filthy matted hair and beard, and ribs sticking out from the chest as if they were embarrassed to be of this body and wanted to find a new home.
He wished now he had listened to the words of Shiu, the yellow sage from far Khitai, a little more closely. The yellow man would have had no problem dealing with the isolation. He knew how to use his inner consciousness to live inside himself. He'd often said that was all one really had to begin with and all that one would have to end this plane of existence with. The circle was always complete. One had merely to accept the idea that the mind was all. Time and the body were nothing. Desire was the single most item which caused all of man's grief and pain: the desire for wealth or power; or to have a horse, or to eat better food. Once man had rid himself of all physical desire, then he would find peace and be able to develop the only thing of true value ... the mind. Man's only true purpose for existence was to think; for in the mind were found the answers to all questions and time was meaningless. If in one's life a man can but find one truth, and pass it on to those who come after him, he has done well.
But Casca was no philosopher, and try as he might to find the peaceful state of mind that Shiu counseled, it was hate that sustained him. The desire to have Ragnar's throat between his fingers was food for his soul; and the hope of vengeance satisfied him more than a handful of grub could ever do.
The only sounds he had ever heard were those faint trickles that crept through the aperture, distant and far. He had never made a sound. Not a word had come from his lips in two years, for he had a sense that told him it had been about that long. The corridor, connecting his cell to the rest of the dungeon, was similarly as quiet. He rested on the floor, his head lying on his forearm, face down. His body was only half the weight it had been before
his confinement, and most of that was from his bones. The elbows, knees, and wrists were swollen to twice their normal size, but it was only the shrinkage of the tissue around them that made them appear so large and deformed. His cheeks were drawn into the sides of his face, eyes sunken into deep hollows, hair hanging to his shoulders in dirty clotted Medusa tendrils, matted and held together from the two years of accumulated filth and body grime.
But he knew he would not die, and for once that pleased him. He would survive. He didn't understand or even care about the mechanics of his survival or how his body made the most of every atom of nourishment he consumed. He hadn't had a bowel movement since he had come there. A small blessing - at least he didn't have to add his own waste to the stink already present.
One thing he hadn't lost was all of his strength. What was left of him was twisted, knotted sinew and stringy muscle tissue. Most of every waking moment he exercised to keep away the weakness that would come if he merely stood idle, waiting. He knew he would one day have need for every ounce of strength he could muster.
The creaking of rusty hinges, followed by the thump of a door closing, made him jerk his head up from his arm. Rising, he stood beside the door. He waited, holding his breath, his heart pounding in his chest. Was this the day? Were they going to open the cell? Gruff voices, amused, came to him.
Two warriors were laughing at the sound of someone's misery. He could hear the sound of a man being dragged down the stone corridor. He almost bit through his lower lip in anticipation. They must open this cell. They had others, but this must be the one. If they passed by this time, when would he have another chance? It might not come again for years. They were near. It sounded like they were going to pass him by. He ran a dry tongue over his lips and gave a slow, soft whistle, once, then again. On the other side of the door, he could hear that the dragging sounds had stopped. Good, they were listening. He whistled again, slightly louder - just a strange, whispering trill.
The men on the other side cocked their ears at the sound. There were no prisoners in this corridor, unless someone had been moved without their knowledge, and that was unlikely.
One guard said to the other, "Isn't this the cell where Ragnar put the Roman?"
His associate responded in the affirmative. "Aye, but that was two or more years ago, and as you well know he was to starve. There has been no one permitted in the area since then. It must be something else. Maybe a bird flew in through the air hole." They started to move off again.
Panic seized his mind. "No, they can't." Casca gave a low grunt, the kind a rooting hog might make. The sounds of movement stopped again.
One spoke to the other. "That was damned sure no bird. We'd better check it out."
The other hesitated. "I don't know. Ragnar said that cell wasn't to be opened."
His friend laughed. "What are you worried about? There's nothing in there but the bones of a man long dead." Footsteps again, nearer, then stopping. There was a grunt, as the man outside strained at the locked bar of the cell. It had been so long since it had been moved that the wood had swollen shut. Casca closed his eyes. Please, open. He heard a sliding sound, and the exhaling of the man's breath, straining to force the bar back. It took an eternity, longer than the years he had spent there, for the door to creakingly and laboriously swing open. One guard entered, his axe held low in front of him, although he wasn't really expecting any trouble. He was only being cautious and curious about the sounds that had come from inside the cell, which was supposedly unoccupied. Bony fingers wrapped around his throat, and thick fingernails dug in deep and squeezed until the cartilage crumpled. The man's fingers loosened their grip on his axe: The weapon fell with a dull thud onto the straw-matted floor, and still the squeezing continued until the world ended for the man in a burst of sparkling lights, then darkness. Casca let his first victim down and picked up the axe.
The dead man's companion called to him from where he was still holding the ropes of their prisoner near the next cell. "What is it? What did you find?"
A fearful apparition stepped out to answer his question. A terrifying, twisted, muscled skeleton of a man stepped forth, swinging an axe. The blade struck once at the collarbone and sunk midway into his chest, splitting him open. The last thing he felt was a foot on his chest as the blade was pulled out. Casca stood, the dripping axe in his hand. Covered with a crust of filth and dirt, his eyes wild, he raised the axe above his head and screamed. The new prisoner fainted.
Casca screamed again. The years of hate and frustration burst forth in a cry he couldn't stop ..."Lida!"
In the Great Hall above, it was feast day - a day to celebrate the coming of the summer solstice under the auspices of a druid priest. For a moment, several of the guests stopped their drinking. What was it that they heard coming to them faintly above the clamor of the revelers? Probably nothing. But still, for that moment it left them chilled. Then they returned to the business at hand, drinking and feasting in honor of their host.
Ragnar sat at the center of the table. He had heard nothing. As was his pleasure, his daughter sat beside him to play hostess, with her sightless gaze resting upon nothing. For her, the world was as dead as her eyes, and she cared not what she did.
Another had heard the sound and felt not a shiver of fear, but one of anticipation. Glam stood near the corridor leading to the Hall. He moved to the guarded, bolted door in the feasting room that led to the dungeon below. As always, there were two armed men standing there. The door could only be opened from the outside. Several times he had tried to figure a way to get to the dungeon below, but there were always too many sentries on duty to insure any chance of success. And the men at the door weren't the only ones so employed; there were others below them. He had obeyed Casca's last words and waited, but now the waiting was about to end. The faint cry of Lida's name, reaching through the din of the feasting, told him Casca was coming and he must make ready to help him. Glam smiled a death's-head leer at old Ragnar's back and loosened the thongs holding his great axe to his side. Soon, you swine. Casca is coming, he thought. Glam moved closer to the guarded doorway, smiling at the guards, a horn of mead in his paw. He grinned knowingly. . .
Chapter Nine
Glam chewed his mustache and watched Ragnar worrying at a beef bone like one of his dogs, and bellowing in raucous laughter at a story told him by one of his warrior captains. Glam took a pull from his horn and wiped the foam from his face with the back of one hairy hand. Soon, you dirty bastard, soon. For two years, I have waited and done your dirty work and kissed your ass. But that is just about over now. Muted groans from the other side of the door brought his and the two guards' heads around. The guards merely looked somewhat confused and bored, but Glam knew. Deep in his heart, he knew what was now on the other side of that massive oaken door - death!
The slide bar moved an inch back and forth but it couldn't be opened except from this side and Glam knew that now was the time. Moving closer to the guards, he laughed out loud. Bellowing laughter as if he had just seen or thought of something terribly funny. He roared with mirth and lurched toward the guards. They grinned and began to laugh a little, not knowing why they laughed, but the giant's obvious good humor was contagious. Glam leaned a heavy arm on the shoulder of the nearest man. "Jonash," he addressed the smiling guard, "you won't believe what's going to happen." The laughter rolled forth from him again. "You just won't believe it." He wiped a tear from his eye with his free hand, the other holding the mead, almost spilling over.
Jonash couldn't keep back a chuckle. "Why then, tell me, you great hairy old walrus. What wouldn't I believe?"
Glam almost fell over laughing. "Why, that you're going to die, you fool, and soon."
Confusion broke over the warrior's face; a touch of anger in his voice. He didn't like people making jokes at his expense. "And just how do you know that?"
Glam leaned heavier on his shoulder, his hand gripping hard. "Because, I'm going to kill you."
The latch bar on the door
rattled again. The other guard merely looked bored. They all knew that Glam had a penchant for practical jokes and as long as he wasn't involved, he really didn't give a damn. Jonash was getting pissed. "Knock off that crap, Glam. I don't like that kind of talk, even if you are joking."
Glam roared with glee. "But that's what's so funny, you little swine." He straightened up and threw the half-filled horn of mead into the man's face. "I'm not joking." Before either one could move, the great axe was free of its strap and swinging up to slice off the side of the blinded man's head. Then, with a quick turning of the wrist, the axe, without being brought back up or down, was heading into the open mouth of the other guard. The thick blade broke teeth and bone on its way to reach the spinal cord in the back of the man's neck.
Neither one made a sound in their dying. What little sound there had been of their falling was covered by the noise of the revelers.
Glam moved one of the bodies out of the way of the door and put his hand on the latch that would release what he knew was waiting on the other side. He whispered at the door, "Casca, it's me, Glam. I'm going to open up, so don't start swinging. There's a party going on, and the hall is filled." The latch slid and the door swung open to the inside.
Standing there, lit by the glow of the torch, was Casca. Glam almost dropped his axe. His master looked more like a nightmare caricature of a man than the clean-shaven Roman he had fought beside so many times. Caked filth hung from his chest and body in clots, his hair and beard were wild and tangled, and he held a dripping axe in each hand. But the eyes were the worst. Deep-sunken, the gray blue in them was gone. They were as dark as the river Styx in which the fires of hell were ready to be set free. Words came out of the cracked lips, a dry whisper from the years of not speaking. Hoarse, the voice spoke: "Glam, it's good you waited. We have work to do this night."