by Harold Lamb
"I will ask," he assented. "But it will take time and great skill with words to find out all we must know."
So Skol waited at a crossroads ale shop, sometimes selling a gold armband to pay for his ale and sometimes helping to get the grain in from the fields. Daimen was his voice, and he could not go on without the minstrel, even if he had wanted to leave him. But after the snow came again Daimen appeared suddenly at the tavern-the woman's tongue had grown too sharp for him-with tidings.
"A merchant's sledge train is setting out with furs, to go to the west," he said. "And they will take you for a weapon man in the guard. We must make haste, because there in the west we will find out more about Jerusalem."
But it was a year before they could leave the service of the merchants, and the people who met them on the roads scowled at them, not understanding their questions. All they could learn was that at the edge of the sea to the south was the great city, toward which all travelers went. And thither they begged and fought their way, having no more gold left, through endless hills. Daimen's blue cloak was stained and faded, and he no longer tried to tune up his fiddle at night. The men here had dark faces and went barefoot or in saddles, except the nobles, who galloped past or stood in chariots. The crowds became greater on the road as the two crusaders went farther south.
The sun blazed overhead, and brown-robed pilgrims went swinging by. Of them Daimen asked one word, "Jerusalem?" And they turned and pointed to the south. Until the wanderers saw from the summit of a hill a mighty white wall with square towers, and beyond the wall the gleam of sunlight on gilded domes. White walls and green trees, and the deep blue of the sea beyond.
"Well, the priests did not lie!" cried Daimen.
They found it a rich city indeed, with strings of laden mules passing through the gate, under the eyes of strange guards in gilded breastplates and shining silver helmets. Skol stopped to stare at them, but Daimen pulled him on, and they wandered through alleys, past the stairs of marble churches, and a column of carved marble with a rearing horse atop it, and a bearded king on the horse. But it seemed to Skol strange that the king had nothing on him but a kind of long shirt, and no saddle beneath him. Daimen pulled him along until they sniffed the damp reek of wine, up from a cellar shop.
"Come," cried the little minstrel, "it bath been a long road, this, and they will not grudge a tankard of wine to crusaders, although we have no coins or gear to pay for it."
They sat on stools in the cool gloom of the shop, and pointed at an open cask, and a fat man with an oiled beard bowed to them and hastened to bring two jugs. They drank more, and Daimen said it was well they had come to Jerusalem at last. When the tavern keeper held out his hand, the minstrel pointed to the cross on his shoulder, and the oiled beard spat out harsh words. The tavern keeper waddled out of the shop and came back with a tall and glittering figure following him-a weapon man wearing over one shoulder a red cloak, and carrying in his free hand a short ivory baton. Daimen had never seen such a splendid man, even a prince, before; but Skol looked up frowning.
The stranger spoke words they knew.
"Hail, ye far-faring fellows! This Greek is saying ye have robbed him."
And the prince sat down between them and looked into the jugs. They were empty.
"What is this?" said he.
Daimen's tongue was loosened, now that someone listened who understood his words, and he told the tale of his crusade, until the stranger, a man of mild manner, motioned to the tavern keeper to bring more wine.
"Have done," he cried. "Have done, little man. 'Tis a whine and a plaint I have heard overmuch. Sure it is that Jerusalem was beset and captured by the crusaders years ago. And now that the weapon smiting is at an end, every spindle shanks weaned of woman is marching on Jerusalem. When the fighting was ahead, they were all for being pilgrims, too holy to fight; and now, by Thor's thunder, they are all cross-bearers, ready to eat and drink their way to the holy city."
"Well, we're here," said Daimen after awhile.
The stranger paid the Greek and spread his long legs before him, his hand on his hip.
"And where," he asked, "is that?"
"Jerusalem, and a fair-"
"Some call this Byzantium, and some call it Constantinople, which is to say the city of Constantine; but it was never Jerusalem, for that is in the country of the Turks, far to the south."
Daimen stared.
"But this is what we looked to find-a queen of a city, with gold in its walls and jewels to be picked up-"
"'Tis so, little man. I am from Dane-mark, and I have served the Emperor of Byzantium eight years, and every month now eight gold byzants are paid into my hand, with a largesse for hazardous fighting, and tribute from the shopkeepers like this dog-sired Greek, and a gift now and then from the slavers. The women are the finest of the world, and when my service is done I'll be given land in Asia, with slaves to till it, and the rank of centurion of the mercenaries."
Then Skol spoke.
"'Tis not Jerusalem."
"Better for thee, ax wielder." The strange officer smote his hip. "Six thousand Northmen are in the emperor's pay, and we have a place-in my company-for a man of weapons, who can wield steel, shoot a shaft, and back a horse."
Skol considered all this. It was his skill, to do this.
And he stayed. Six months later Daimen had a new cloak, and he had learned the names of the wines and the places where the heaven-descended emperor held weekly games and beast slayings for the multitudes; he knew the luckiest chariot racers and the best horses of the hippodrome. But then he went home one evening to Skol's barracks and found the manslayer clad again in his old leather and dull steel cap.
"Have the mercenaries disbanded?" he asked. "Are you dismissed from the service?"
"Nay," said Skol. "I have enough silver money now to buy passage in a galley. We will sail to the Holy Land this night, and the ship will not lose its way as we did."
"Are you mad, ax clasher?" cried the minstrel. "Such a fine figure as you were, a decurion of the ax bearers! Jerusalem was captured long since-are there not pagans enough in Byzantium to give drink to your thirsty steel?"
Skol shook his head, thinking of one thing at a time.
"There is an oath between us," he responded, "that we should fare forth and not turn back from Jerusalem."
"An oath!" But the minstrel looked long at his comrade, for by now he had come to know Skol's moods. "Is your mind settled upon that?"
"Aye."
Daimen sat down, fingering his new red cape. Long he brooded, and began to rock back and forth upon the stool. At times he had the foresight upon him, and this was such a time.
"That will not be good! That will be a road to sorrow, and a breaking of shields, and a sating of wolves upon the bodies of men."
But he went, after awhile, to look for the stained blue cloak with the crusader's cross.
When the afternoon sun beat down upon them, they stopped to sit in the shadow of a broken wall where weeds grew among great stones. They were passing through a half-ruined place in the foothills. Sweat stung their eyes and the heat was like a blanket that could not be pushed off.
They slaked their throats with wine from Daimen's stone jug and chewed at pieces of the bread and shreds of garlic that they had brought from the seacoast, and they listened to the clanging of bells. Sheep jostled past them in the dust. Through the dust women hastened with covered heads. Skol's drowsy eyes noticed the dome of an old church made of square stones, and beyond it a height of black rock. Beyond, he saw only bare ridges and green patches of olive groves.
He was sleeping when a voice roused him.
"I would relish some of the garlic, my sons."
A pockmarked priest, a little father of the Russian land, had stopped in front of them. A man, Skol observed, with lean, starved flesh and a dirty robe. Daimen handed up some of the garlic stalks.
"'Tis a long day since we have heard a word we knew," he said. "What is this ringing of bells here?"
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"More sorrow!" The yellow teeth of the bearded Russian bit into the garlic greedily. "They are praying for the armed host."
"For what?" Skol asked, sitting up.
"For the army of Jerusalem."
The priest swallowed and would have gone on, but the manslayer rose, and laid hand upon his shoulder.
"Where will we find these armed men?"
The priest pointed behind him, along the street.
"Go through that gate and follow the road for two or three leagues. God knows if you will find them." And he padded off hastily.
Skol leaned on his ax and reflected.
"I am thinking that the weapon men of Jerusalem have fared forth, and it may well be that they are coming hither to raid this place. However it may be, we are near, and we will join them."
The minstrel followed and grumbled because Skol had had a nap and he had not slept at all. He grumbled more when the heat of the clay valley rose into their faces, and he pointed out that not even the cattle herds were astir in that hour. The doors of the hamlets were deserted, and so was the road that wound through the rocky swales.
The road led them out into the barrens, where the pastures and the villages ended, and they walked in silence through narrow gullies until they plodded up a rise and stopped to look at what lay before them.
An open valley, the slopes rising on either hand like an amphitheater. The empty road running through the pit of this amphitheater to the shadowy entrance of another defile at the far end. Daimen thought it was like the great stadium of Byzantium where the emperor held his games. Only the heights of this valley were full of armed men. To his left he saw lines of men in dull armor standing by horses, some of them kneeling around a high, gilt cross-Christians, they must be.
To his right, among thickets and huts, were massed horsemen he had never seen before-bearded men in cloaks of all colors, wearing turbans and glittering helmets. He tried to count them and gave it up, because he could not count over twenty and there were hundreds of twenties yonder. The faint roar of their restlessness was like the surging of surf against a shore. Skol put down his bundle between two rocks and stood up to tighten his belt and swing the long ax once around his head.
"Well," Daimen said then, "we have come in time for a battle." Skol began to walk down the road into the valley. He was going to join the men under the cross, up yonder; but the slope near him was covered with brush and it would be easier to climb from the bed of the valley. So he went down the road. He strode along swiftly, because he knew that once those horsemen were in motion a man on foot would have trouble getting to where he could strike a blow. But the men up there made no move toward their horses, although several Moslem riders were down on the midway point of the road, jeering at them.
Then the jeering stopped. The three Arabs had seen Skol and Daimen, and in a moment one of them urged his horse toward the wanderers. He could make out the crosses on their mantles, and he thirsted for the honor that came to a follower of Allah who slew the first infidel in a battle. Moreover the fall of the tall Christian with the horned helmet would be an omen-a sign of victory for the banners of Islam and doom for the crusaders.
"Come into the brush!" cried Daimen, who had already leaped nimbly up the bank from the road.
But Skol's blue eyes, no longer drowsy, gleamed with fierce exultation.
"By Thor's thunder!" he growled. "I have not walked for two years to turn my rump to the first foeman. Stay there, little man, for this road is no place for the like of you."
While he spoke he lifted high the iron shield on his left arm, and his right hand gripped the long ax shaft halfway to the head. The oncoming rider had challenged him, and never had the manslayer held back from a challenge. Daimen shivered, and the Arab came on at a gallop, his scimitar swinging by his right knee, his small round shield well out on his rein arm.
Once the Moslem shouted, kneed his horse to the left and leaned over to slash down with his scimitar. Beneath the flashing arc of steel, Skol flung up both arms.
The scimitar clanged against his iron shield. But the long point of the great ax came up inside the Arab's shield and caught the man beneath the beard. He rose in his stirrups as a stricken deer starts up, and the giant Northman staggered, holding to the ax shaft with both hands.
The horse ran on with an empty saddle, and the quivering body of the Arab dangled from the ax point that had pierced to the bones of his head. Before Skol laid it down, all life had left the body.
"Ha!" roared the Northman, drawing free his weapon carefully and wiping each hand in turn on his hip.
Daimen cried a warning, but the manslayer was watching the other two Moslems who reined toward him, scattering dust and stones in the haste of desert clansmen to avenge a death. They came together, steel swirling over their hooded heads, as merciless as striking wolves, and no single man could have stood his ground in the road before them.
Skol did not. He swung his ax slowly about his head from left to right, his knees bent until he could have struck the foam-flecked muzzle of a horse. Then he leaped to the bank at the left of the road. But as he leaped he whirled and struck, the ax extended in his long arms.
The hammer head brushed aside the sword of the nearer horseman, crushed in the light leather shield, and crashed into the man's face. And the Arab rolled over the horse's tail with his skull shattered.
"Allah!" cried the other, reining in and wheeling his horse swiftly. And swiftly he slashed with his scimitar.
Yet the manslayer was watching the blow. Skol's blue eyes were cold, his breathing unhurried as the sweep of his great arms when he stepped down into the road again. This was his skill, this weapon play. He caught the stroke of the scimitar upon the curved ax head, and the thin steel blade snapped with a sound like the breaking of ice.
The Moslem flung himself to the side of his saddle and pulled his horse away, but the ax reached after him with a twisting motion. The watchers on the hillsides-and thousands were watching now-saw him ride back a little way, apparently unhurt, while Skol looked after him. Then the rider wavered and slid to the ground, with one side of his groin torn out.
A cry rose from the Moslem ranks, and was echoed by a deep-throated shout from across the valley. Three horsemen had gone down under three blows.
"Come back," cried Daimen. "Is it mad ye are?"
Skol was not mad, but the mist of fighting was upon him. His own song was in his ears, and that was a song of the breaking of sword blades and the clashing of shields. No more foemen remained on the road, but others sat their horses up the hill. Skol shouldered his ax and went up to them, singing. Daimen stumbled after him.
For a moment the valley was silent except for the chanting of the giant. Then a score of Arabs rode at him. And the six thousand crusaders climbed into their saddles. The cross of the patriarch was lifted. No horns blared and no leaders cried them on; in silence they broke from a trot into a gallop, gripping sword and spear. They had seen one man with the cross on his shoulder marching against an armed host. They had been desperate before, but now they were ashamed.
The charge rolled across the valley and roared as it came.
"Christ and the Sepulcher!"
Eleven thousand Moslems flung themselves against that charge. And they were beaten back by the long swords of the crusaders. The cross wavered, and then went up to the crest of the Arabs' hill; then the mailed host wheeled and charged back again, and broke up into fiercely smiting groups that sheared through the throngs of the desert men. Still the crusaders pressed on, and the Moslems scattered and rode off, their green banners merging into the sunset.
Daimen, watching from the nest of rocks where he had taken refuge, had been able to see Skol for a time, when the twenty horsemen first closed around the giant Northman; he saw Skol's ax rise and fall, and come up red in a new place, as the manslayer leaped, twisting himself among his foes. A horse reared there, and a hooded head flew from its body. Then the rush of the Arab charge swept over the spot.
The men of Outre-mer looked, and put spurs to their jaded horses. It was a mad kind of charge that slid and stumbled and plunged down upon the head of the caliph's column. The bewildered Moslems were caught standing, and were crushed by the flailing swords-driven back upon their fellows in the ravine, lashed into headlong flight. Then darkness, lighted by torches where the crusaders sought for their wounded.
The red duke caught Daimen by the shoulder and blew the blood clots from his bearded lips.
"By God's grace, find me that mate of thine-he who showed the way to us this day."
Bells tolled and chimed, ringing out a lament for the fallen and exultation in the victory; light streamed from the doors of the churches, al though the hour was near dawn. The voices of men chanted a Te Deum, "We praise Thee, 0 Lord-"
The long hall of the hospital of Jerusalem was filled with laymen and warriors bearing candles and lanterns among the dead. On the bed by the fireplace lay Skol, his leather and iron cut off his body, and the great slashes bandaged. A white linen sheet was thrown over his body, and his sweat-matted head was propped on a soft velvet pillow.
"Skol," cried Daimen, "this is Jerusalem that we passed through without knowing it."
The blue eyes turned toward the minstrel, and Skol made a sign that he understood. A dozen knights-he knew them by the little shields in their belts and by their spurs-were sitting around the bed, drinking wine. They looked at Skol when they spoke, and one of them lifted a tankard. The same Russian priest who had spoken to him that afternoon was coming toward the bed slowly, and his brown robe was covered by cloth of silver and gold. More priests followed him with lighted candles, bearing something covered with a white cloth. They said things in Latin, and the knights stood up.