by Джеффри Лорд
«And what of Juna? It is said that she was taken with Kador and Smyr to the safety of your master’s ships-has she also been executed?»
For now, to carry out his vow to Izmia, he must again possess the person of Juna. He did not know how he would do it, or if it could be done, but he had promised Izmia and he ‘must try.
Lycus slapped his thigh with a hairy knuckled hand and laughed. «It must be true, then, what the spies have said of you and Juna? You have tasted the favors of a goddess and wish to taste again, eh?»
Blade’s mouth tightened but he refused to be drawn. He would settle accounts later. He said, «You do not answer my question, man.»
Lycus made a fist and scowled. «Do not use that tone with me. Or that term. I am a captain in the.army of Samosta.»
Blade smiled. «Forgive me, Captain. But I still await an answer. What of Juna?»
«She is on the command ship of Hectoris and welltreated, though not as a goddess. Surrender and be friend to Hectoris and I have no doubt that he will be generous and give you Juna.»
Blade already knew this from his questioning of Ptol. Just as he knew that the Samostan army, as hard and efficient as it was, was a war-weary army of veterans who longed for peace and the fruits of weary years of campaigning. Blade was counting a great deal on this.
Abruptly he changed tactics. In a cold voice he said, «Hectoris has had my message? He is aware of my challenge?»
Lycus nodded. «If you mean the rumor that has spread, that is shouted from the shores by your beggars who will not fight, if you mean the talk that is meant to corrupt good Samostan soldiers, I say yes. Hectoris has heard it. And ignores it.»
Now was a time for guile, for cunning. Blade managed a look of surprise. «Ignores it? How is this? I have heard many things of Hectoris, but never that he was a coward. Is he afraid to risk single combat with me?»
Lycus put a hand to his sword hilt again. «Hectoris is afraid of nothing.»
Blade, mocking, pointed to the snake on the man’s shield. «Nothing at all? Not even the god for whom he acts?»
«Not even his god! But why should he fight you, Blade? What gain could he have of it?»
Guile. Blade put sorrow and sweetness into his smile. «Hectoris gain? I say only his death at my hands. But you, Lycus, and all the men of the Samostan army, they would gain. Gain life, for even if you do overwhelm us in the end you know that many will die. We will die hard and you will win nothing but a ruined country and piles of corpses. I hear that Hectoris has had you at the wars for twenty years-a,pity that when it is over your men will find not women and wine, but only death. The life of a common soldier is as precious to him as that of a general is to him, Lycus. If you doubt it ask among your men.»
Lycus spat. «I have heard all this before, Blade. It is the propaganda your spies whisper among our troops, and that your beggars cry from the beaches and hill tops, but you waste your time. It will not avail you. Hectoris will not fight you.»
Blade, with a sureness he was far from feeling, spoke again. «I think he will. No man can command who will not face the same dangers he — asks his troops to face. He would be a fool to try and I do not think your leader is a fool. In the end he will have to face me-I march to the beaches now and I will cry out for all to hear that Hectoris is a coward and no than at all unless he faces me. I will offer him such a bargain in combat that he cannot afford to refuse it, for if he does he will lose q credit with his army and his officers will be plotting agamst him before a week has passed.»
Lycus half drew his sword. His laugh seemed forced and for once he did not look Blade in the eye. «You will not,» said he. «For you will never reach the beaches. I am sent for that purpose-in the event that you are an unreasonable man and will not take terms. As I begin to see you will not.19
Blade ignored the half-drawn sword and leaned toward the officer. The seed must be planted, whether it burgeon or not.
«Let us suppose,» said Blade, «that Hectoris did meet me in fair fight and I killed him. I have no ambitions here in Patmos, nor in Thyrne nor in Samosta. You will soon see the last of me. Now, in such case, who would come to the throne and the power of Hectoris?»
The eyes of Lycus shifted away. «There would be a council of high officers. A new leader would be chosen. There are many who would aspire-«
He broke off and scowled at Blade. «It is said that you are a demon and I believe it Well-spoken. But you will have no treason out of me. Enough of this twaddle-will you disband your men and come with me in peace?»
Blade shook his head. «You know the answer to that, Lycus. I will go to Hectoris in my own way and on my own terms.»
The man pulled his horse about and scowled back over his shoulder. «We will see as to that. I will send a part of you to Hectoris, though the mouth will not be so glib when he sees it. Make ready, Blade, for I attack.»
Blade sent the black galloping back into the square. He gave orders to disperse his stingers and grouped his mounted officers around him. Cheers went up from the ranks of the Guard as they saw there was going to be a fight.
The Samostan trumpets began to ring clear in the dank misty air. The sky was fast curdling into black porridge and the wind was rising. This must be short and sharp, Blade told himself. He must make the beaches before the storm struck in full fury or all his planning was for nothing.
The cavalry of Lycus wheeled and trooped by left and right flank and came into a line of charge. Blade was surprised. He did not deem the man a fool, and yet a frontal attack in these circumstances was a fool’s trick. Either Lycus was angered and had lost his judgment, or he was so arrogant that he trusted his horsemen to break the square by sheer fury and weight of numbers.
Blade gave orders that unleashed his slingers and bowmen, the latter firing over the two ranks in front of them.
«Aim’ at the horses,» Blade commanded. «The horses first. When they are afoot we can handle them easily enough.»
He called his mounted officers to form around him. «We are the reserve,» he told them with a wry smile. «All of it. If they break the square we must be quick to plug the hole and beat them back.» He glanced at Edyrn. «If they break through in another place you will take half the men and see to it.».
Edyrn nodded understanding. There was time for no more. The first wave of cavalry smashed into the square with a shock and din that drowned even a man’s thoughts.
Each of the pikemen in the first rank, at Blade’s orders, had dug a slanting hole in the earth and couched his pike in it. The pikes, twelve feet long and cruelly pointed, thrust outward in a savage picket. Into this came the galloping cavalry of Lycus.
Blade, standing high in his stirrups for a better view, watched the carnage with bitter satisfaction. The slingers and bowmen wrought havoc on the charge and now concentrated on the Samostans who had been dismounted. The war horses, fierce and obedient, ran their bellies onto the pikes and were gutted or went down with broken legs. More came on behind, only to pile up on those dying before them. The charge had broken.
Blade sought for the blue plumes of Lycus in the melee and found him only just in time. The Samostan officer, his mount dying on a pike, leaped agilely to earth and called a group of other dismounted soldiers about him. With his sword he beckoned a solid contingent of his horsemen into a mass attack on a small segment of the square. They came on in a last effort, some twenty horse against two files of pikemen and javelin throwers and bowmen. Ten went down in the effort. Ten broke through, hewing a narrow lane through the square, and Lycus led his impromptu infantry in behind them. These Samostans were all tough and well-disciplined veterans and they knew what to do. They wheeled and faced right and left, fencing off a corridor through the square. A sub-officer on the field began to organize what cavalry was left, and those wandering afoot, and direct them into the channel. Blade watched all this with calm.
The Guard.was now hampered by their numbers and the close quarters. Blade called a halt to sling and bow fire, lest they sl
ay each other, and sent Edym galloping to close the gap on the outer side of the square and contain the Samostan forces beyond it. He spurred to meet Lycus who, with some thirty men behind him, was determinedly hacking his way into the square and certain death. A death that Blade, at the moment, had no intention of giving him.
As Lycus and his little band broke through the square the mounted officers around Blade watched him and waited for his command to ride the Samostans down and slash their to bits. Blade gave no such order. He waited.
After a moment he held up a hand and bellowed a command that all the Guard cease to fight. Bewildered, the sweating and bloody men did so. And stared at Blade.
Lycus also, his sword dripping, his harness battered and slashed and his plumes clipped by a javelin, rested and stared at Blade in amazement
«What now, man? You have had the best of it. I was wrong and did not think your Guard to fight so well. Why do you hold off? I have lost and am dishonored and have nothing left but death. So have on with it. I will never surrender.»
Blade noted that the square had closed, healing the wound, and the remaining Samostans were in full retreat. Edyrn came back and Blade gave him new orders. «These men are prisoners until I say otherwise. No ‘man is to fire or attack them. See that all understand this.»
Blade dismounted and walked toward Lycus, where that officer stood with the group of soldiers who had followed him into the square. Blade held up a hand for parley. Lycus, bleeding from a long cut on his cheek, showed his teeth in contempt.
«You want to talk, Blade, when you have us in such a trapl I was wrong-you are no demon. You are an idiot. The first rule of war-«
Blade held up a hand for silence. He ignored Lycus and spoke to the Samostan soldiers clustered around him.
«I am.. Richard Blade. Most of you have heard of my challenge to your leader, Hectoris, but for those who have not I will repeat it now. Listen carefully, and remember, for I intend to free you, with your honor and your weapons, and send you back to Hectoris that you may remind him of these words. Here is my challenge:
«I will light Hectoris on the beach. Man to man, in single combat. I will use shield and sword, nothing more. As for Hectoris, he may be horsed and use any weapons he likes-sword, lance, mace, bow and arrow, I care not. I give him these great odds because I deem him no true warrior and know I can defeat him.»
Lycus was staring. His men gaped and muttered amongst themselves and cast furtive looks at their officer. Blade pressed on.
«You will see the equity of it. Hectoris has all the advantage. If he defeats me your lives are spared, for the war is over. If I defeat him we will talk of terms and I think there will be no war, and again you will be spared. I have no quarrel with common soldiers or with officers who merely obey orders. Why should you die for Hectoris when I offer him terms that nobody but an arrant coward can refuse? And if your leader is a coward it is time you found him out! What say you to all this, Lycus?»
That officer snarled and spat in the dirt. «I say it is a trap for Hectoris, though I know not how you intend to spring it. I say I will have no part of it.» He glanced about him. «And I say that any who listens to this liar, anyone who passes on such talk, is guilty of treason and will pay for it-I will see his bones broken to powder on the wheel.»
Blade sighed inwardly. He was going to fail with Lycus, and it was he most of all that he desired to win. But there was no help for it. He drew his sword, and approached Lycus. Edyrn gave an order and an outer ring of the Guard began to press in. Bowmen and slingers moved into easy range.
Blade halted six paces from Lycus and spoke past him, over him, to the Samostans huddled behind. «This is not your quarrel. Remain out of it and live. I promised you life and your honor and your weapons and you shall have them if you do not interfere.»
Lycus whirled to face his men. «Do not listen to this Blade. I command you die with me.»
Blade waited. The Guard waited and for a moment silence hung like the dust over the battlefield.
Blade said: «Think well, men of Samosta. If I lift a hand you all die. You have fought bravely and have not been dishonored. Why should you die for the likes of Hectoris-will he comfort your wives and sweethearts? Will he provide them with bread and a roof to shelter them? And think you, Lycus, are you not the equal of Hectoris and might not you be elected in his stead if I slay him?»
The Samostans around Lycus stepped back and lowered their weapons. Lycus spat at them and leaped at Blade. «Your tongue is a weapon indeed, Blade. Let us see if your sword matches it.»
The man was determined to die. Blade, even as he took the first ringing blow on his shield, felt the pity of it. He could have used Lycus. But it was worse than that-now he must kill the man and show proof of his prowess at arms. This he had wanted to conceal from Hectoris until the last moment, had wanted the Samostan leader to reckon him nothing but a braggart and a boaster, a man to be held in contempt. That would not work now. He must play the opposite tactic; he must prove himself to these watching Samostans and let them spread the word and so subject Hectoris to a different sort of pressure.
And yet he made a last effort. He fended off the flurry of blows and spoke loud to Lycus. «This is not a fair fight. I am fresh and you are battle weary. Why are you so intent to die, Lycus?»
The officer was already panting, but he bore in and began to force Blade back. Sweat gleamed through the blood on his face and in his beard. His shorn plumes drooped. and there was a great dint in his helmet.
«I swore my faith to Hectoris,» he gasped, «and that oath I will keep. I have failed my mission and I deserve to die, but if I take you with me it will not be total failure.»
«So be it,» said Blade. And determined to make it as fast as possible. He had wasted a deal of time and the sky was black and the wind steadily rising. He had planned everything to this day and this hour-if it passed and nothing came of it he would not get another chance.
For a moment Blade took the sword blows on his shield. Then he thrust suddenly and as Lycus skipped back and to one side, for the moment on the defensive, Blade fell to the attack. He went both to the point and to the edge, sudden darting lunges and massive battering blows that spun the shield of Lycus in his grip and sheared away the rim. Lycas began to fall back, gasping, his legs slow to respond. Blade kept after him without mercy.
The circle tightened around them, pressured by the curious Guard who had broken their square and fought for a place with a view of the fight. Blade herded Lycus neatly into the very center of the circle and then, seeming to lapse, offered him an opening by lowering his shield and speaking. «Lycusl You have proven enough. I-«
Lycus made a desperate lunge. Blade parried it, dropped to one knee, took another stroke on his uplifted shield, and slashed at the legs of the officer. It was a savage stroke and cut the muscles of both legs above the knees. Lycus sagged and, with the blood spurting, tried to support himself with his sword. Blade feinted at his throat. Lycus brought his sword up to parry and began to fall as his legs failed him. Blade leaned into the thrust and aimed at a rent in the man’s chest armor. His steel went in with a jolting shock felt clear to his shoulder, and stood out half a foot behind Lycus. Bits of gut and lung tissue dripped and fell away as Blade withdrew his sword and, let Lycus sway and topple to fall with a crash at his feet.
Blade did not hesitate. He hacked off the head, thinking that here had been a man indeed, and sent fqr a pikeman. When the pikeman arrived on the run Blade gave orders. The head of Lycus was fixed on the pike and given to a Samostan sub-officer. A way was opened in the square.
Blade stared at the sub-officer and said, «Take that to Hectoris. Remind him of my terms. I will be at the beaches in a few hours and, unless he be craven, I will expect to find him waiting for me. And if you are wise, and as weary of war as you seem, you will spread word of what you have seen and heard here. Come to wisdom, man, you and all your fellows! Let Hectoris take the risks for once.»
As the remai
ning Samostans were filing out of the square Blade called the sub-lieutenant back.
«Remind Hectoris that Juna is part of the bargain. I will expect to find her on the beach as well. Tell him this from me-that he brought Juna as a bargaining point, so now let him deliver on his word. Go. I will give you half an hour start of me.»
Blade remounted and listened as Edyrn gave him a report of the dead and hurt. «Dose and bandage those who can walk,» he ordered. «We must leave the others.»
Edyrn agreed. «It is the custom to cut their throats, sire. It is an easier death than lying hurt and waiting for wild beasts and vultures.»
For a moment Blade hesitated, then shook his head. «No. 1 do not act for God. Let them be. A man may sometimes live no matter how grave his hurt. I will not deprive him of that chance.»
A mounted officer cantered up. «Your man returns, sire.’
Nob made a sour face as he approached Blade. «I knew it, master. I told you it would be so-I have missed all the fun.» He glanced at the heaps of Samostan dead and whistled softly. «Aye, you handed them a better whipping than even I thought, by Juna’s Reece. And me without a chance to unsheath my sword. I tell you it was not fair, master. I owe these Samostan dogs for many a blow and curse and I-«
Blade looked at him and Nob closed his mouth.
«What of the beaches, man?»
Nob wanted to grumble more but dared not. «Nothing of them,» he said sullenly. «The wind at the coast is twice as strong as we feel it here and the waves are tall already. The Samostan fleet lies off in the harbor and will not venture. I have called off the crying of my beggars because the wind drowns their words.»
Blade cursed. «Do not exaggerate with me, Nob. Surely the storm is not that furious yet? That small boats cannot make their way in?»
Nob nodded dourly. «Oh, that can be done, master. And no great skill required. A small boat has no draft and will not catch on the reefs, though it may founder in the surf. But the fleet, the great battle ships of Hectoris, they all retreat to the outer harbor and I do not think there will be an invasion today.»