Birds of Prey

by David Drake

  “Slack ’em, dammit,” grunted the first speaker. As the archers obeyed, he added, “Yeah, we were, ah, going on leave and this thing…” Then, “Magnus, Celestus—I’m going to check this goddam thing from the tower.”

  The arched doorway in a back corner led to the crenelated tower above the roof proper. Perennius stepped forward to join the Gallic—non-com was more likely than officer. “Gaius,” the agent said, “you others—be ready to get the donkeys in if that thing moves away, right? Don’t take chances, but we need to get them closed up or they’ll draw him back themselves.”

  Perennius was off before either of the archers could decide to stop him. The agent’s boots made precisely the same echoing clatter on the stairs as did those of the man in front of him. The meeting could not be pure coincidence, but the agent strongly hoped that it was not as—someone, some thing, had planned either.

  The dragon was hissing into the courtyard at the donkeys. The sound was like that of flames in ripe wheat. The creature did not appear to notice the men rising behind the battlements of the tower, but something else invisible to them made it turn abruptly. “Have you tried shooting it?” the agent asked.

  The Gaul snorted. “Do I look crazy?” he demanded. “This is how it acts when it’s not pissed off!”

  The dragon’s turn was complicated by the length of the rigid tail which balanced the body. It did not spin as a man would have done. Instead, the creature backed as it rotated like a swimmer reversing at the end of a pool. The new object of its attentions veered into sight also. It was a donkey, the one Sestius had ridden. By now it had shed its saddle and all accoutrements. Instead of bolting into the courtyard with the remainder of the party, it had broken away and run around the building in panic.

  The donkey might have been as safe behind the common room as it would be within the courtyard, but the madness to which the dragon’s bellows had driven it did not permit the beast to halt there. When it galloped past the bath house at the south front corner of the complex, both donkey and dragon realized what had happened. The former vectored off braying, back up toward the main road. The dragon strode after it. As Perennius had found its power and savagery stunning when the creature roared and clawed at the wall, so its speed was a horrible augury for the agent’s chances of being able to leave the inn and complete his mission.

  The dragon moved its legs with the deliberation of a robin picking its way across a lawn. Distance and the absurdity of a biped on that scale permitted the strides to seem dainty, but each one thrust the body forward another ten feet. There was a serpentine grace to the movements. The neck and tail swung sideways in unison toward the leg lifting for each stride. When the clawed feet struck the ground, dirt and gravel blasted away in a volume that mocked the cloud raised by the donkey’s frantic hooves.

  The dragon reached its prey well short of the hilltop. It strode in parallel with the donkey for a moment, like a greyhound with the rabbit it is coursing. Then the great head dipped lower than balance alone would have required. The jaws hung open. The slam of their closing was like the sound of a marble statue hitting the ground. The donkey responded with a screech that had no semblance to the noises that living things make.

  Inertia carried the dragon a further two steps. It tossed its head, spraying the air and its belly with a vast quantity of blood. The donkey was silent and flopping limp by now. The tossing did not tear loose the gobbet encircled by the great jaws.

  The dragon stopped. It raised its head again and threw it from side to side while it gripped the carcass with its front claws. The forelimbs were powerful, but the size of the great hind legs made them look small by comparison. Muscles, tendons, and bone gave way with a ripping sound. The donkey, missing part of its pelvic girdle and hams, thudded to the ground.

  The dragon’s jaws unhinged like those of a great snake. Its head cocked skyward while the tongue and throat muscles combined to force the huge mouthful down the esophagus. The beast’s nostrils made sucking sounds until the lump disappeared further downward and the jaws fitted themselves once more into their sockets. The dragon bent forward for another bite.

  It was a shocking demonstration, but the Gaul looked more sickened than afraid. He felt the agent’s eyes on him and read their expression. Gruffly, the Gaul explained, “There was four of us. Marcellus was late getting mounted like always. We’d hoped he might be joining us anyhow. Mithra!”

  On the hill fronting the inn, a third of the full-grown donkey had already disappeared down the slayer’s maw. The Gaul ran a hand through his short, under-helmet haircut and went on, “Now this on top of that other. I swear, I don’t know.…” He turned, eyeing Perennius more carefully while his fingers drummed the cross-guards of his spatha. “I’m Ursinus,” he said. “Like you figure, we’re soldiers.” He did not mention his post or unit.

  The agent nodded. “I’m Perennius,” he said. “I’ve been other things, but I’m a wool buyer now.” He frowned toward the dragon before adding in corroboration, “It can’t have eaten all the sheep, but I don’t suppose there’s been much shearing going on lately. You been here long?”

  “A day.” Put like that, Perennius’ question had not aroused suspicion. “Thought we could outrun it, even without remounts, if we travelled light. Mithra. Lay-over here, then ride on in the morning. Only it jumped us when we were watering the horses, and we beat ’em so hard for the next mile that hell, I don’t know when I’ll want to chance going out again. Plenty of food and fodder here, but not a soul. Not a goddam soul.”

  The dragon had finished its meal. It was a sloppy eater. Behind on the blood-splashed ground lay the donkey’s head and left forequarters. The latter, at least, was meatier than some of the chunks the creature had bolted. The dragon wandered back up the hill with its tail swinging, as if the beast had forgotten the inn and those trapped there. Perennius was far from sure that was the case.

  Judging from his expression, Ursinus was equally doubtful. “We thought it might leave us be if we kept hidden a couple days,” the Gaul said. Then he added, echoing the statement an archer had thrown out in anger, “I hope by the Bull that your lot didn’t convince it to stick around longer.”

  “It’s fed now,” the agent suggested mildly. He walked toward the spiral staircase again as if oblivious to the way the Gaul’s fingers were toying again with his sword hilt. There was not enough room on the narrow stairs to draw the long spatha quickly. “Might be a good time for a break if your horses have had a day to rest.”

  Ursinus snorted as he fell in behind the agent. Their boots clicked and scuffled again on the stone treads. The Gaul’s hand was relaxed again. “Right, with it south of the ford for sure we’re supposed to ride past it. Not fucking likely, bud. And don’t think one donkey’s going to fill that bastard up, no.…”

  The mortar had been less discolored than the stones by soot from the poorly-vented fires. The walls of the common room, curving upward to groins, were a latticework of pale on dark to Perennius as he stepped out of the stairwell again. He was in time to hear Gaius asking, “Say, you fellows were in Rome about a month ago, weren’t you?”

  The younger man had seen Perennius work. In the youth’s ignorance, he thought he was duplicating the agent’s subtlety. He should never have done that on his own hook, and even he should have realized that the question identified the asker as surely as the answer could have done the Gauls.

  “It’s them!” shouted one of the archers, out of Perennius’ sight beyond a pillar.

  Somebody else would have to handle that, the agent thought. Behind him he heard the rattle and curse of Ursinus trying to clear his spatha and jarring his elbow on stone. It was Perennius’ own damned fault. He knew that Gaius was smart enough to connect these Gauls with the earlier ambush … and he should have known that Gaius was too inexperienced to keep from blurting the connection in his pride.

  Ursinus was good. Reflex had tangled his arms with a sword half-drawn in the strait stairway, but the Gaul met Perennius�
�� lunge with a kick. The agent had not delayed to draw a weapon of his own. He had thought he would be on Ursinus before the Gaul could respond effectively. Now Perennius did the best he could, grabbing the bigger man’s foot even as Ursinus tried to hop back around the core of the helical staircase.

  Perennius had underestimated the Gaul once. Now it was Ursinus’ turn to think he could surprise his opponent by leaping toward him instead of trying to pull away. Perennius had the advantage of being at the base of the stairs with all the room he needed to maneuver the flying Gaul. The agent stepped back and kept Ursinus’ right leg rising. The Gaul hit the floor on his shoulders and left hand, unwilling to release his sword to take some of the shock with his right arm too. The crash did not stun Ursinus, but it left him open for Perennius’ hob-nailed kick to the head.

  The agent drew his own sword and dagger. He put the sword into Ursinus’ chest with a swift lunge that ended when the point jarred against the stone beneath the Gaul. The killing was a judgment call that Perennius did not especially care to make … but the fight was not over, and Ursinus had proven himself too damned good to be put out of it by a quick boot. Perennius tugged the blade free without examining the damage. He was running toward the sounds of fighting from the far end of the big room.

  One of the Gauls was crumpled in the central bay over an arrow nocked too late to be used. The agent did not have to guess who had cut the man’s throat so deeply that only the spine and the cartilaginous windpipe kept the lolling head attached to the body. Gaius and Sestius crouched to either side of a pillar. Their swords angled up, threatening the archways that opened into the final bay. Fanned back from the pillar which hid the remaining Gaul were Sabellia and Calvus. Sabellia held her bloody knife advanced. Her legs were splayed, her knees cocked to launch her toward the Gaul if he showed himself. Calvus held a spear awkwardly. The tall woman eyed Sabellia as if hoping to gain pointers from the red-head.

  “Hold it!” Perennius shouted as he burst into the central bay.

  “Now!” cried Sestius. He and Gaius rushed the hidden Gaul from either side.

  Perennius heard the bow-string snap. He did not hear the arrow strike, and he knew what that meant. If the arrow had missed—and men do miss point-blank shots when no prize but life itself is at stake—the iron head would have smashed and sparked clearly on the rock walls. There had been no need of risk. The isolated Gaul could have been talked out, waited out; at worst, charged by men wearing the armor packed on the donkeys outside. Anything would have been more sensible than the present melange of shouts and swords glittering in overarm cuts. The pillar still hid the sword-wielders and their victim from Perennius as he ran to the slaughter.

  The Gaul was sprawled on his face. He had dropped his bow. Apparently he had tried to cover his head with his arms instead of drawing his sword. Sestius slashed a final time at the man. The centurion’s heavy blade thunked deep enough into the skull to stick when he tried to remove it. Gaius was still thrusting into the Gaul’s abdomen.

  Sestius straightened and turned, leaving his sword where it was. The fletching and half an arrow’s length protruded from his chest, well-centered and between the second and third ribs. Only a drop or two of blood had seeped onto the centurion’s tunic around the shaft. When he opened his mouth to speak or gasp for breath, the blood spewed out. It splashed the stone floor an instant before Sestius’ body fell to cover the splotch. The scream the centurion could not voice for choking burst from Sabellia’s lips instead.

  Perennius caught Gaius by the wrist. “You’re all right?” the older man demanded. Gaius’ eyes were glazed, but he bore no obvious signs of injury. He did not answer Perennius. Instead, he leaned on his sword as if it were a cane.

  Sabellia was weeping and mopping at the blood on Sestius’ face. She was probably unharmed. It wasn’t the time to check that, anyway. Calvus anticipated the agent’s question, nodding as soon as the agent’s eyes fell on her. “Nothing touched me,” she said. Then she added, “They were part of the group that attacked us in Rome.”

  “I guess everybody’s figured that out,” said the agent bitterly. He turned back toward the younger Illyrian. “If Gaius’d kept his mouth shut, we might even’ve learned why. Well, maybe we can.…”

  Ursinus was not dead. He had rolled over, but he had been unable to summon enough strength to rise to his hands and knees. He saw Perennius coming, trailed by the tall woman. The Gaul made another attempt to rise. It too failed. His lips blew a froth of blood. The hole in his chest was making liquid, sucking sounds as Ursinus tried to breathe. He spat, drooling a line of blood and saliva down his chin.

  “It’s over, Ursinus,” the agent said. “We’re going to help you now.”

  “Bastard,” the Gaul whispered. “Don’t you think I know it’s over?” But he relaxed none the less, letting the tension go out of arms that had trembled as they failed to lift him.

  “Get some wine,” Perennius hissed in an aside to Calvus. To the dying man, the agent said, “Were you supposed to ambush us here, then?”

  Ursinus coughed red-shot phlegm that the agent wiped away with the hem of his own tunic. “Mithra,” the Gaul said. He forced a smile. “We were running away. One of the things what was giving us orders had its mask slip. Hell if I was going to stick around after that, dragon be damned. Not if God offered to come down and wash me in blood.” It was an unfortunate expression and brought on another fit of coughing.

  “Gray?” Perennius asked. Calvus was back with a skin of wine. The agent held the open end to Ursinus’ lips, letting the Gaul suck greedily at it while the agent squeezed the skin for him. “A band around it and a hole the size of a cow’s bung near the top?”

  “Oh…” the Gaul moaned as he took his mouth away from the flask. His eyes were closed. “You think you’re going to join them, then?”

  “We’re here to kill them, Ursinus,” the agent said in a level voice. He daubed at the Gaul’s face again. “How many of them are there?”

  Ursinus ignored the question if he even heard it. “More guts than I’ve got, then,” the Gaul murmured. “Just wanted to get the fuck away, way from dragons and crinkly monsters that talk.… Mithra.” His eyes opened. “Sacrovir stayed,” he said. “Didn’t care what it was, he wanted the guy who’d killed his mother. We followed him here after it all went sour in Rome, but … I said—” The Gaul’s eyes bulged as if he were straining to swallow some object so great that it was choking him.

  “Easy, easy,” the agent said.

  It was too late for ease, too late for Ursinus entirely. The Gaul’s arms and legs began to flail on the stone as he gagged. The movements swelled into a mad, unsynchronized fury as Ursinus’ eyes went blank. His back strained into the arc of his last convulsions.

  Perennius swore. He stood up. The agent had seen enough people die. He did not need to watch another.

  Gaius caught the older man’s arm. “Blazes, Aulus,” he said. “Q-quintus is gone. It was so quick, one minute and then…” Gaius too had seen his share of dying, but this time it was a peer and a man he had come to know well. The youth was aware also that Fortune had made the archer left-handed. Otherwise the shaft would have been past the other side of the pillar and through Gaius’ pulmonary arteries instead of those of the centurion.

  Perennius gripped the shoulder of the younger man—the boy, in this persona. The agent shouted, “Sure he’s gone! And it’s your big mouth that killed him, isn’t it?”

  Even the sputtering fire could only suggest color on Gaius’ cheeks. “I didn’t—” he said. He tried to jerk his shoulder away and found he could not, no more than he could have pulled free a decade before. Perennius’ red, shouting rage was only a suggestion of the murder that already strained to supplant it.

  “You didn’t think!” the agent shouted. He shook the tall youth to the harsh rhythms of the words. “You shot off your mouth, handed them who we were on a platter—what else was going to happen when they learned that? We could’ve all been greased
in a rat-fuck like that! Couldn’t we? Couldn’t we? And now there’s Sestius lying there—”

  The rigid expression of Gaius’ face, anger and horror molded on an armature of innocence, gave way. The young Illyrian’s free arm had been rising as if to strike a blow or fend one off. The arm encircled Perennius’ waist as Gaius fell sobbing to his knees. “Oh god, Aulus!” he cried, “I did kill him. Oh god, oh god!”

  Perennius staggered. His skin was as clammy as if he had been douched with melt water. The great vaulted room sprang into entire focus again. “Blazes,” the agent whispered. Then he said, “I’m going.…”

  Gaius was not holding him tightly. Perennius stepped away from the other’s kneeling figure, the motion bringing only redoubled sobs. Perennius walked to the door to the courtyard. He was tottering with reaction. He stepped outside; and he was standing there, breathing deeply with his back to the wall, when Calvus joined him a moment later.

  “I told you to keep out of my mind,” Perennius whispered. His eyes were closed. “Saw you standing there like a statue … Might’ve killed him, Calvus. Me. Might’ve killed him except for you.”

  “In some ways he’s very young,” the woman said. “Younger than his age.”

  “It’s the pretending it just … ‘happens,’” the agent went on. He was looking at the empty courtyard now. “They didn’t do it. Sure, we all screw up … and this is a business that you screw up, maybe somebody gets dead. But if you pretend you didn’t do it, the arrow was Fate or Fortune or any damn thing but a kid talking … I thought he was going to say it wasn’t his fault. And then I might’ve killed him.”

  “Don’t confuse what men say with what they mean, Aulus Perennius,” Calvus said.

  “I don’t—” the agent rasped back.

  “No, you don’t,” the tall woman responded more sharply than Perennius had ever heard her speak before. “You take those lies as a personal slur on your intelligence. And you know they aren’t! They’re the prayer of somebody human that the world not tell him something he already knows. You’ve watched Gaius. Do you think he really doubts he was responsible for what happened?”