Of this saying Airar could make nothing, nor Argyra neither, when he told her of it as they sat by a fire drinking cider amid the smell of roasting chestnuts in one of the forest houses of Skogalang. Aurea had gone forth that day with Alsander of Carrhoene who, under pretext of being her warder, had made himself in some sort her squire—in this winter weather, where there was so little to do but run the red deer and wait for news from the north. Said the silver princess:
"Lucky Master Airar, to be for your own self a befriended man. At the High House, when they will still speak friendship, we learn to look at what's desired."
"It may be the case here also, though what have I to give? But little."
"Oh, nay, not little. You are more than you think on; a strong head in council, says Sir Ludomir, and a good blade in the field, as I have cause to thank you for against Sthenophon. It may be earlier than you know that you will have to give what this wizard would most desire. But before that you will learn, as we do at the court, that friendship ever clashes with friendship, desire with desire, and to give one is to refuse another."
"And love? Is that a gift?" said he.
"We were not to speak of that for now."
"What else shall I speak of when I am with you?"
"There's no need you be with me. Go, speak to your enchanter friend that can make divinations, protect you against the unseen powers, master the laughing fear. He may even tell you what the doom is that lies on Gentebbi."
She was in a bad mood for the moment, he told himself. It would pass—or had she caught some hint of his dealings with Gython among the isles?
34 Return from Sea
SO THIS WINTER slid past in the attent for tidings. From the north, they were sparse; only of a great force of Vulkings come to quarter in the larger Lectis, with brawlings on the question—who's to be Marshal now? The Korosh miners were hungry, all the towns from which they drew their victual being in Vulking hands, and it was said many of them ate beastly things among the Mictons. Black Gallil of Vastmanstad sent through that the Baron VanetteMillepigue had marched north along the great road of the Naar with six deese of his tercia about the Moon of the Stork, which would be close to the day when their flotilla reached The Heyr. It could be believed that he stood competitor for the vacant marshalate.
The Skogalang folk were kind; they live well concealed in their woodlands, trusting for their diet to fruits, nuts, and the famous fat pigs that feed on the latter, and this being not the kind of country from which a Vulking can draw much profit, these people had been less oppressed than most of Dalarna. Yet they were of the true kindred, and a cheek would blench or a hand clench at Rogai's tale of the doings in Mariupol, so that not a few came down to The Heyr, as they said, for guesting, but truly to follow the standard of Dalarna's war. Woodsmen all, who could shoot with the bow and never miss the target; there were four full shiploads of fighting men together when spring turned so warm that snow-runners would no longer run.
No word from Sir Ludomir Ludomirson at this hour, and the ship he sailed with unreturned, so there were not four ships to carry the four shiploads of men, and many must use the small fishing vessels of The Heyr. Of these there were few, since the people of Skogalang depended chiefly on Gentehbi for their sea-meat; but what they had, they gave willingly. It was a somewhat strange armada for war, since there must be space for women, the bright princess and the dark, and Aurareus that was half a woman, with attendants for the first two. Certain Skogalang damsels were with them; a fever of wiving had run through Airar's band the winter, and even Carrhoene sergeants had fallen on affections with the woods-girls and would never leave them; while, of the dancers that had served Os Erigu's pleasure, many sought permission to rest in Skogalang. Aurea the princess said it was an example of how unlike is drawn to unlike; but Meliboe, that this drawing was only that of life without labors familiar, and the two-thirds of these alliances would melt beneath the summer's sun—at which Aurea grew much angered, and would not speak with the philosopher for a pair of days.
They sailed, then, with the break of spring, a fine day, when old pine-needles looked worn and there were little white clouds in a blue sky as they rounded Shata Cape, with its nipple of rock at the tip. Toward evening the clouds increased in weight, a sea-wind came up, and the ships began to labor. It had been ill to work against it, but they were now past the broad promontories that guard outer Skogalang, and could give themselves to run before this rising gust. Yet as it held, a very damned trouble arose, namely that all their flotilla was being swept eastward toward Naarmouth, and could by no means point into the ever more southering wind to gain Gentebbi. Lank Erb's face grew long; they swung in toward the other tall ship and held brief converse by shouts under the falling light of evening, but the best counsel that could be taken for the night was to let down all sail on the larger craft, so they might drift backward, with their high poops to catch the wind like weather-vanes, and the small fishing craft lashed in line out beyond, as it were to make a long rudder, at the same time gaining some protection for themselves. The said task was much laborious; one of the shipmen asked Meliboe if he did not possess a spell to make the weather abate, to which the enchanter replied that if he could do that, he would not be magician but a god.
A night of little pleasure and less sleep, in which no peace from wind, nor did the dawning day bring cheer. Off leftward, the other ship reared and rocked with her string of fishing vessels trailing. One of the latter had lost its mast, there was a hole in its bulwarks, and they seemed, to have distresses aboard. Off rightward and a little astern the leadgrey water was being thrown up again in clouds of spray, with a booming sound. Airar clung to the rail to watch it; one of the free-fishers laughed grimly:
"Good luck, young master, we did not just turn on this wind more southerly. The embrace of they white maidens be death; a are the Naarmouth skerries."
Fortune's favor indeed to save them from such shipwreck; but they could have done with more kindness of the sort, for all that day the ships and shallops drifted and the waves battering them. Dragg's seams began to give; all who could stand upright were set to pump or with buckets to bail. Out on one of the fishing craft they saw a man washed over and swept down the tossing waves with a thin cry, nor could any aid him, and the flung rope fell short.
Airar had by now seen peril enough to be peril's familiar, yet he found himself resentful of this danger as unreasonable, not brought on by desire or honest exposure to hazard, but by merest chance. Through most of a second night without rest his anger rose till it came on him that here was a question for Doctor Meliboe, but that one was lying crippled with the unease of the sea, so the succeeding thought rose in him, why should the enchanter do more than himself to resolve his difficulty? But no time now for thought, with the cold seas sliding down the waist of the ship, the men to encourage at bails and pumps under fitful lantern-light, the wind flying past.
Toward day, everyone hollow-eyed and hungry (for it had not been possible to keep fire on the roundstone against such motion), the ship began to heave less easily than ever. Airar voiced trouble to a haggard Erb, but the tall man said no; the sign was in fact good, it meant that they stood in the cross-chop brought about by the outflowing of the river Naar and might find shelter within his western cape, though that were indifferently long. Daydawn made him a good prophet, a whiter dawn than the two before, with clouds more torn and less frantic. Soon, far on the northern rim and dwarfed blue with distance, could be seen the unmistakable shape of Spanhavid mountain. It would seem the wind had seen it too, and would abandon them as beyond its power, for with that sight it spun round still more to the south of west and fell sharply in force. Within the hour Erb said they should try getting up a piece of sail, the which done, Dragg— answering her helm somewhat sluggishly because of the tow of fisher-boats—became a ship again, moving round out of danger of drifting leeward onto the rocks that lie at the foot of Spanhavid peak. Earl Mikalegon on the other ship was a good seaman; had been tryin
g even earlier to hang out canvas, though with trouble because of a broken mast. Now it was done and the twain craft drew near enough together for more talking. To all questions there was but one answer: they must sail straight up Naar River and take their chances at contact with the Vulking guards of Naaros city, for the wind had come dead foul for Gentebbi, and with Dragg leaking, the fisher-craft so battered, it was madness to attempt the passage.
Ho for up river, then. The Skogalang boats cast loose and put up their own little sails so soon as the outrush of Naar quieted a little the heave of the sea. At this time one could make out clearly Naaros citadel on its rock; the two princesses came a-deck, Argyra to praise all for having overcome the danger of the voyage, but Aurea asking might she have somewhat warm to eat. She feared a flux of the bowels from the intake of cold food.
They made decent progress, the current being truly not so much against as across their path, for Naar turns his race westerly at the outlet to avoid the front of the mountain; but now the question of what advice to take became troublesome indeed. The Spanhavid flank of Naarmouth is rocky and fierce, the opposite shore holds few beaches short of Naaros city. Words passed from poop to poop; they made for the quieter water by the shore, took down sails behind a screen of trees there, and were making a decision when all doubts were solved from outside by the appearance of a guard-boat, crawling like a waterbug down Naarmouth, with a red triangle aloft at her stern.
On the tall ships the catapults had been badly handled by the storm, and where they had not, the cords were wetted and useless, but this did not apply to the bow-shooters of Skogalang, who keep their tools in cases and care for them not much more than a mother for her child. These made ready under cover of the bulwarks; everyone else was ordered down out of sight to leave an impression of peaceful visitors.
All this hastily done, quick agreement among the leaders in few words as the Vulking waterbug came in from mere visibility to close sight. Had their leader been a man of thought and thoughts, he had wondered to see two tall ships in assoication with so many fisherboats, but there were not above twenty Vulkings in the guard-ship, and under the tight rule of Briella a leader of twenty thinks little. On they came, unsuspecting, till Mikalegon leaped up and roared the word; they tried to turn or raise shields, but the arrow-storm caught them all but a few and these fell into as evil a case when the free-fishers leaped up and ran aboard them with spear and short-sword to slay mercilessly all that were left.
Thus the leaders had a victory behind them when they met on the poop of Dragg to counsel again, with a torn red evening sky falling away west into promise of better clime tomorrow. Few were the words spoken at first, and those mostly by shipmen—Mikalegon, Erb, the masters of the Skogalang smacks. All said the same thing —voyage to Gentebbi flat impossible, even if the wind would serve. New masts were needed, careening to fix the one ship's leaks, the fishing craft—
"In fine, you'd say we must go up to Vulking-held Naaros and give up our bodies to save our lives," cried hot Pleiander, when these had spoken. "I smell a stink of cowardice!"
Mikalegon growled and reached for a blade, but up stood Airar, straight as a spear. "Call it what name you will and I'll not quarrel—in union's name, for when we want quarrels with you, Master Star-Captain, we'll have heavier debates than this one word. Call it coward; the Earl has merely said we cannot sail. Can we not diddle them as we did those at Lectis Minima, if we are brisk enough?"
Pleiander: "Brisk indeed that must needs be. How of their missing guard-ship? By the Well, I marvel how you northerners have yet to learn that war is death, bloodshed, destruction. What did we swear at old Piebald-beard's drinking?"
"It was something about the High House of Carrhoene, but how does that matter here?" said Rogai. "Do you propose sailing thither still? You have called me rash, but here's rashness redoubled, when you cannot sail to Gentebbi, to propose the longer journey."
"Master Rogai," said Airar, "may I say a word? I give you grace, Master Pleiander—have you another plan than for us to go to Naaros in some cozening manner, as for assistance?"
"That I have, and one a thousand times better. The night falls; they'll not want their guard-ship back till late. Let us all go by road and shore; attack the town, take-it by storm. Our ship has a broken mast; we'll batter in the gates."
Earl Mikalegon pulled his beard and muttered. "It is true; cozening's a woman's remedy." Said Alsander thoughtfully: "We slew a deese when we were barely sixty; there cannot be more than four deese in this town, and we're above four hundred."
Rogai's expression changed; Evimenes snapped his fingers. "Surprise by night our aid."
Said Airar: "Why, then, good friends, good gentles, are we not nearly all of one mind that this is an acceptable hour of daring, since nothing else will serve?"
"By God, yes," said Mikalegon.
Airar: "Master Pleiander, confess this is not the word of cowardice."
The Carrhoene shook his head, but touched hands, and the lines round his mouth twitched. They rose; the need was now for haste, and in spite of the fatigue of the storm few were found that felt any weariness, as the word was spread. Men snatched a piece of cold meat, looked to their weapons, and hurriedly came to the shore. There was competition to avoid staying with the ships, and Airar must name a captain of the rear-guard. He told off Erb, who took this ill.
They landed across the rocks of the inlet that held them and with trouble lugged the broken mast through the screen of trees that hid the shore road running from Naaros out into Skogalang. The wind on the water had been accompanied by rain on the land and there was mud, not easy going. The order of the march was that the mast went in the center with torches, the Skogalang men carrying it; bows were no good at night. Airar's fisher-spearmen mingled with the heavy-armed Carrhoenes, who walked like walking lobsters in their mail. Tramp, tramp in the dark, and Airar with the advance, it seemed to him that enthusiasm burned down somewhat and weariness rose on that long, clumsy journey. But all flared up once more when they came round a turn of grove into bowshot space before the city walls, with the citadel on its rock at one side and the southeast city gate before. There were lights in the citadel; wall and gate were dark, but they did not forever stay so as the black tide of men flowed across the road toward the city's inlet, for someone at the wall's foot raised a cry and someone atop it a shout of "What's here?"
"Bordvin's ghost come for the Red Baron!" yelledRogai, the attackers raised a shout, and the men with the mast rushed forward. There was a light grillade at the outer portal. Down it went with a clang and they stormed into the gate-passage in a tumult of sound, a high voice above crying for torches, the watch, spears and bows. Black as a pocket inside, but there were shot-windows among the flanks, where Airar stationed spearmen to jab in should light show behind or any attempt be made to use those fenestrations.
The men with the mast crowded panting past. "Heave!" shouted Pleiander and it struck the gate, thump. "Heave!"
In the dark the timber was withdrawn and again thrown forward, shivering to splinters at the butt, but though the great doors groaned they held, and a man or two went down from the shock. Behind now were confused cries, the Vulking war-shout "A pax!" rising somewhere and the thud of a thrown stone from above.
"Together—put your shoulders to it!" Pleiander screamed, his voice echoing in the passage. "Were you suckled by rabbits? Heave!" The mast came forward again, crash, and though this time doors and bars still held, the hinges did not; tore out with a shriek of rent wood, the gate hung dangling, all the Dalecarles and free companions and Carrhoenes tumbled and stumbled through into an inner darkness of space and sky from the passage darkness of surrounding stone.
Airar was one of the earliest, but before he could get his sword free a bold man attacked him from the right with an underhanded thrust. He tried to spin and took a light cut on the leg; it was no deeper because Mikalegon of Os Erigu rose behind him with a great battle-axe that dropped on the arm of the foeman, shearing it
off quick as a wink to let a stream of blood gush forth. "Look not so on it," said the Earl "it is off, right enough." Airar saw the fellow fall down as he went past, crying the "Ullu!" of Dalarna in battle.
At their left there were stairs to the wall-head; it would be Pleiander who thought of them and led his armored sergeants to gain the gate-towers. The more part of the intakers followed Airar and Rogai and Mikalegon and Oddel into the streets, and now there was one brief clash of arms, and another, for the Vulking archer-watch gathered toward the tumult. But they were too few and too unready to deal with full-armed men, down they went like pegs before pigs, and the banners of cat and otter and sea-eagle were borne forward along streets where shutters banged open and people shouted "Ullu!" for "Ullu!"
"To the central square!" said Rogai, and "Where do you think I go?" Airar. There stands the statue of King Argimenes with the old sword lifted from under the plough. At this place lights and people began to flow in, half unbelieving that Dalecarle revolters were in the town, curious that this might be some trick of the red triangle. A fire was lighted; when men saw by the banners that trick there was none, they began to come out in earnest, some with hidden, forbidden weapons, to caper round the blaze, handshaking with strangers, singing warsongs almost forgot:
Marching along, we are singing this song,
With the wolf of Dalarna we're marching along;
Our God is our leader, the heathen have wrong,
As they learn when the Dalecarles come marching along!
Strong and strange things were done that night in Naaros: doors beaten in, Vulking Allies pulled from bed and their goods strewn in the street, themselves whipped or worse; and Airar had much to do, since Mikalegon and Rogai were like a pair of wild men, and the Carrhoene captains not much better. Pleiander calmed enough to think of the citadel yet untaken on its peak of hill; gathered a group of sober sergeants with some people of the town to stand at the stockade which shut citadel from city in the normal days, but now city from the Vulking hold. A messenger went to seek Black Gallil; another to bring the ships with the women to the quays, strictly warning that none of them should yet land. In the morning's first gleam Airar of Trangsted found himself sitting in judgment at the foot of King Argimenes' statue, certain burghers of the Ring as his aids. It had been so appointed when he said "Nay!" and called his men to back him, when angry cits would have hanged a man from the bronze figure's very form, as being a Vulking-bought traitor.
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