One King's Way thatc-2

by Harry Harrison

  In their hut, the English catapulteers were preparing their breakfast and at the same time checking their weapons. Light was just showing in the sky, but ex-slaves rose early, out of habit. Besides, in spite of the pendants they all wore, in spite of being at the heart of their adopted religion, they felt uneasy, isolated, unsafe. Their leader had vanished, no-one knew where. They were surrounded by men of alien speech and unpredictable temper. In their hearts they knew that most of the Norsemen they met thought all foreigners were just slave-material waiting to be seized. They had come to Kaupang as men of a conquering army. Slowly their status seemed to be slipping away. If they were disarmed they would be back to tilling fields and herding goats, working under the lash once more. Without saying it, every one of them had determined that that was not to happen. If need be, they would have to break out. But how?

  In the army of the Way in England there had been three main divisions: crossbowmen, halberdiers, catapulteers. No-one had made any effort to train them as swordsmen, though each carried a broad, single-edged seax-knife in his belt, as useful for firewood as for enemies. But Udd had made sure that each man there, whatever his original trade, carried and knew how to use one of the latest model crossbows, no longer wound by belt-pulleys, the spring-steel bow cocked instead by a long, pronged lever. It fitted under the bowstring and latched onto inset bolts. With a single, heaving effort the bow was cocked as the pull was exerted against a foot stirrup on the front of the bow's wooden frame. Osmod and three of the others also carried their unwieldy halberds, the combination axe and spear that Shef had invented for himself to make up for his lack of weight and training.

  But the group's main weapon stood outside the hut: the mule, the stone-hurling catapult they had unshipped from the Norfolk and loaded into Brand's Walrus. The Thor-priests had been busy ever since they arrived, observing it, watching them shoot it, getting them to build further models of the two other styles of catapult they knew, the twisted-rope dart-shooter and the simpler stone-lobbing pull-thrower that the Way had already deployed on three battlefields. It was said that King Halvdan had ordered experiments on fitting mules to bow and stern platforms on his coastal patrol craft, large enough to take them if maybe too weak in the keel to stand the repeated shock of recoil. But till then the mule outside was the only one in the North.

  There was one further innovation that no-one as yet had tried. Udd's invention of case-hardened steel as yet seemed all but useless. The material, once hardened, was too hard to work with any tools they had. Udd had suggested hardened crossbow-bolts, but as the others pointed out, the ones they had would go through any known armor anyway, so why bother? In the end Udd had made one thin round plate of the new steel, two feet in diameter, and pegged it on to a standard round shield of linden wood. Few warriors if any carried iron shields. The weight was so great that the shield could not be wielded for more than a few moments. Soft linden wood was used instead, to catch and trap the enemy's point or edge, usually with an iron boss as hand-guard. The plate Udd had made was so thin that if it had been normal iron it would have added no protection. But the case-hardened steel would turn any ordinary sword, spear or arrow, and weighed no more than a second layer of wood. Udd and the others had not yet worked out what the utility of the new shield was—none at all to men who fought as they did. It was a case where a new technique had not yet found a use.

  At first, in the early-morning hubbub, no-one heard the scratching at the door. Then, as it was repeated, Cwicca paused. The rest fell silent. Fritha and Hama snatched up crossbows, cocked them. Osmod stepped to one side of the door, poised his halberd. Cwicca jerked out a peg, lifted the latch, swung the door open.

  Karli fell in on hands and knees, barely able to support himself. The seven men inside gaped at him, then slammed the door shut and sprang to help.

  “Get him on the stool,” snapped Osmod. “He's soaked. Hah, not all water either! Get his clothes off, one of you bring him a blanket. Rub his hands, Cwicca, he's half-frozen.”

  Karli, supported on the stool, was pointing towards a mug. Osmod passed him the strong warmed beer, watched it go down in a dozen gulps. Karli finished, breathed out, sat up straighter.

  “All right. I'll be all right in no time. Just cold and wet and dead-tired. But I've got news.

  “First, Shef is alive, on Drottningsholm. The message he got was a trap but we got there just the same. So he's on the island, he's alive but he won't be much longer if he stays there. Trouble is, that queen of theirs is screwing him senseless and he won't leave. We're going to have to go and get him. But he won't come of his own free will and they've reinforced the guards over the bridges. And he's not the only one there who needs rescuing…”

  Karli poured out his story to a ring of faces that grew grimmer as he went on. At the end Osmod silently passed him a refilled mug, looked at Cwicca, who as catapult-captain shared the leadership with him in Shef's absence.

  “We've got to get him off. We could do it ourselves, but we'd never get away afterwards. That's what we've got to think about. Now, who in this place can we trust?”

  “How about Hund the leech?” asked Cwicca.

  Osmod considered a moment. “Yes, I'd like to have him with us. He's English, and he's the lord's oldest friend, and he's a Way-priest besides.”

  “Thorvin the priest, then?” suggested one of the hammer-wearers. Faces round him twisted dubiously. Cwicca shook his head.

  “He's more loyal to the Way than he is to King Shef. This is Way business, somehow. You can't tell which road he'd turn.”

  “Can we trust any of these Norskers?” asked one of the others.

  “Maybe Brand.”

  A pause while they thought it over. Finally, Osmod nodded. “Maybe Brand.”

  “Well, if we got him on our side, it's easy. He's nigh seven foot tall and built like a stone wall. He's the Champion of wherever-it-is, isn't he? He's just going to walk through them guards like piss through snow.”

  “I'm not so sure about that,” muttered Osmod. “He got a sword right through his belly last year. They've patched him up, right. But they didn't patch his head up, did they? I don't know that he'd be champion of anywhere any more.”

  “Are you saying he's gone yellow?” asked Fritha, incredulous.

  “No. But I'm saying he's got a bit careful, like he never was before. In this country full of berserks, or whatever they call 'em, that's almost the same thing.”

  “But you still think he'll help?”

  “As long as we don't ask too much.” Osmod looked round, frowning. “Seven of us here, and Karli. Where's Udd?”

  “Where do you think? Now the water's running he's up at the mills, seeing how they work. Took a hunk of bread up as soon as light showed.”

  “Well, go and get him back, someone. The rest of you, listen. Because here's what we'll do…”

  “…So that's our plan,” concluded Osmod, looking grimly across the table at Brand. “And that's what we're going to do. The only question we've got for you is, are you in or are you out?”

  Brand stared down consideringly. Though both men were sitting, Brand's face was still a foot above the Englishman's. It was a real surprise, he reflected, how these men of Shef's had changed. Everything in Brand's make-up, culture and experience had told him all his life that a slave was a slave and a warrior was a warrior, and there was no way of making the one into the other. A warrior could not be enslaved—or only with massive precautions, like those King Nithhad had taken for Völund, and look where that had got him. And slaves could not be made into warriors. Not only did they not have the skills, they didn't have the heart either. During the battles in England the year before Brand had revised his opinion, a little. Ex-slaves were useful, he concluded, for war-with-machines, because they could be made into machines themselves: doing what they were told, heaving on ropes and pulling toggles to order. That was all.

  But now here was one not just making up a plan of his own, not just telling him, Brand, that he was g
oing to do it, but defying Brand to stop him. The giant Halogalander felt a mixture of irritation, amusement, and something like—anxiety? Fear was not something he would ever readily admit to.

  “Yes, I'm in,” he said. “But I don't want my crew mixed up with it. And I don't want to lose my ship.”

  “We want to use your ship to get away in,” said Osmod. “Sail back to England and get out of here.”

  Brand shook his head. “Not a chance,” he said. “King Halvdan's got this coast sewed up as tight as a frog's ass. And the Walrus can't fight off one of his patrol ships, they're twice our size.”

  “Use the mule.”

  “You know how long that would take to ship, not just to carry, but to mount it so it can shoot. Anyway, any ship not specially designed will just fall to pieces if you shoot that thing off in it.”

  “So how do we get away after we've got King Shef back off this queen? Are you saying it can't be done?”

  Brand chewed his lip. “We can do it. Maybe. Not by sea. I think the best thing is this. I'm going to invent an errand and get off now—say I'm going out in the hills for some sport, they'll believe that after a winter cramped up indoors. I'll buy horses for the lot of you. When you've done your bit, meet me at a place I'll tell you. Then we all have to ride like smoke till we're out of Halvdan and Olaf's territory—they won't know right off which way we've gone. Then we all cut across country to the Gula Fjord. My helmsman Steinulf will take over here for me. I dare say with the Way behind him, or anyway with Thorvin and Skaldfinn and their friends, he'll be able to get the Walrus free and take it round the coast to meet us. Even if there's trouble, Guthmund should be able to get away with the Seamew. All meet up at the Gula and head back to England, like you said.”

  “You don't want to be in on the attack?”

  Brand shook his head silently. Osmod in his turn stared across the table. He too had always believed that a slave and a warrior were two different breeds, as different as sheep and wolves. Then he had found that given a reason and a fighting chance, he had wolf in him. Now he wondered about the giant figure facing him. This was a man famous even among the fierce, quarrelsome, everlastingly competitive heroes of the North. Why was he now standing out? Leaving the dangerous work to others? Was it right that a man who recovered from a wound that took him to the gates of death was never the same man again? He had stood by the door and felt the cold wind come through…

  “You can leave that to us, then,” said Osmod. “Us Englishmen,” he added, rubbing the point in. “Do you think we can do it?”

  “I think you can do it the way you said,” replied Brand. “You Englishmen. What worries me is getting you all across the mountains to the Gula Fjord. You've only met the civilized Norwegians so far. The ones who live up in the back hills, where we're going—they're different.”

  “If we can handle King Halvdan's guards, we can handle them. And what about you? You're the champion of the men of Halogaland, aren't you?”

  “I think taking you midgets across Norway will need a champion. I shall feel like a dog taking a troop of mice through Catland. They're going to think you people are just so many free dinners.”

  Osmod's lips compressed. “Show me where we are to meet you with the horses then, Lord Dog. I and the other mice will be there. Maybe with a few catskins.”

  The little convoy moving down to the bridge and the islands beyond it looked as ragged and unthreatening as it could be made. In the lead an old farm-horse pulling a battered cart, with one man walking by its side chirruping encouragingly to it. The cart's load was invisible, but a dirty tarpaulin held it all down, one end flapping loose. On the other side of the horse walked Udd, the smallest of the men, gaping near-sightedly at the horse-collar: a Norwegian invention which few Englishmen outside the catapult-teams had ever seen. It enabled a horse to pull twice the weight of the ox-style straight pole, and Udd, characteristically, had forgotten about the point of their journey in fascination at the new artifact.

  Round and behind the cart straggled eight more men, the six remaining English catapulteers, Hund the leech, his white priest-clothes hidden under a gray mantle, and Karli. None carried a weapon in sight other than their belt-knives. Halberds were stowed inconspicuously on nails along the sides of the cart. The crossbows, already cocked, lurked under the loose tarpaulin.

  As the cart dipped down to the shore, two guards by the side of the bridge straightened up, retrieved their javelins from the ground.

  “Bridge is closed,” one of them shouted. “Everyone's off the island. Can't you see the sun, nearly down?”

  Osmod pushed forward, shouting indistinctly in poor Norse. There were six men on this post, he knew. He wanted them all outside. The man leading the horse joined in, continuing to walk forward.

  One of the guards had had enough. He jumped back, javelin poised, shouted at the top of his voice. Other men came suddenly out of the hut to one side, handling axes, picking up shields. Four more of them, Osmod silently counted. That was right. He turned and raised a thumb to the others clustered round the cart.

  In an instant the crossbows were out and leveled, six of them, with Udd slipping back to seize his and join in.

  “Show 'em,” said Osmod briefly.

  Fritha, the marksman of the group, sighted and released. A sharp twang and an instantaneous thud. One of the men with shields gasped, his face suddenly white, stared down at the iron quarrel which had driven through his shield and deep into his upper arm. Fritha dropped the bow forward, thrust his foot into the stirrup, jerked over the goat's foot lever, dropped a second quarrel into place.

  “You're all marked,” called Osmod. “These bows will go through any shield or armor. You can't fight us. Only die. Drop what you're holding and go into the hut.”

  The guards looked at each other, brave men, but unnerved by the lack of face-to-face challenge, the threat of being shot down from a distance.

  “You can keep your swords,” offered Osmod. “Just drop those javelins. Go in the hut.”

  Slowly they dropped spears, shuffled backwards, watching their enemies, trooped into the guard-hut. Two Englishmen ran forward with bars, hammers, nails, quickly and roughly nailed bars across the door and the one shuttered window.

  “We learnt something from King Shef,” remarked Cwicca. “Always work out what you're going to do before you do it.”

  “They'll soon bust out,” said Karli.

  “Then they'll reckon they've got us trapped. That'll give us a bit more time.”

  The cart rolled on to the bridge, in winter logs embedded in ice, in summer with planks laid over the logs now floating. The men were carrying crossbows and halberds openly now, easy to see in the long Northern twilight. But there should be no-one to see or challenge till the other side of the first island and the next bridge.

  Hearing the cart roll towards them, and knowing there should be no-one there, the pair of guards manning the second bridge had more warning and more time to decide what to do. Facing a line of crossbows, one of them immediately and sensibly turned and ran, hoping to get away and call for help. Aiming carefully, Fritha put a bolt through his thigh that brought him instantly down. The second man carefully grounded his weapon, eyes glaring vengefully.

  Hund walked from his place at the rear to glance at the wound the crossbow-bolt had made, clicking his tongue at the spreading blood, the bolt buried firmly in bone.

  Osmod joined him. “Nasty job getting that out,” he remarked. “Still, better alive than dead, and the best leeches in the world over at the college at Kaupang.”

  Hund nodded. “You, fellow, when you take him to master Ingulf to have his leg mended, give him the regards of Hund the priest and say the Englishmen spared this man's life, at my urging. Till then, pad the wound, check the blood-flow.” He showed his silver apple-pendant, sign of Ithun goddess of healing, and turned away.

  The cart rolled over the second bridge, over the second island, and on to the final span to Drottningsholm. Occasionally l
ooking behind them for signs of pursuit, the freedmen closed up. This time, they knew, they would have to fight.

  The third guard post was the main one, a dozen men. They had already spent the day in serious anxiety, following the disappearance of their captain Stein. They had searched every part of the island for him except the queens' quarters, found nothing. They waited now only for word from King Halvdan before they searched the queens' hall too, but even so they did not expect to find him. They knew enemies were nearby, whether human killers or monsters from the deep. Some had seen a school of orcas cruise by, their great fins showing, and wondered if Stein had been fool enough to enter the water. The faint shouts they had heard from the brief clashes to the north had alarmed them further. As the cart and its escort came into view they moved on to the bridge to block it, four men abreast, three deep. From the rear rank an arrow flew, aimed at the horse's head. Whatever the cart and its cargo, they meant to block it. Wilfi, leading the horse still, now carried the new case-hardened shield. He lifted it, caught the shaft square on. It leapt back, point blunted.

  Cwicca, Osmod, Hama and Lulla walked forward, halberds ready, dropped on one knee to make a hedge of points facing the Norsemen forty feet away. Four cross-bowmen stood behind them.

  “Drop your weapons,” shouted Osmod. He had no hope that his order would be obeyed. A dozen veteran warriors surrender to less than their own number of strangers? Their mothers would disown them. Yet Osmod felt at least a flicker of compunction about shooting men down who were all but helpless, helpless against weapons they did not understand. He waited for the bows to be bent, the javelins to poise before he shouted again.

  “Shoot!”

  Four crossbows twanged together. At forty feet, against standing targets, no-one could miss. The Viking front line collapsed, one man lifted off his feet by the impact of the bolt, many foot-pounds of energy stored in sprung steel and delivered in a moment. A man in the second line gasped and flinched as a bolt passed through the man in front and plowed up his rib-cage.