Today, though, they had come up the last snowy reach and broken out in the pass under the snowy bulk of the mountain to their left. Lesser peaks fell away to the east, on their right, and Thyatis pointed that way now. Ragged ranges of bare stone and icefields receded before them to the horizon. Beyond the range that they had climbed, a great wall of mountains rose up to the southeast, behind them.
"Persia," she said. "Beyond those mountains is Tauris." She turned and pointed northeast; there the wall ended and plunged down into a broad valley, visible even from here, that cut between the blue wall and the pyramid of Ararat to the north. "The valley of the Zangmar; it will lead us into the highlands north of Tauris and then to the city."
Nikos shivered. The wind bit at his exposed face, and he pulled up the cloth that in lesser elevations he had worn to keep the dust from his nose and mouth. Now it kept his nose from freezing off. Thyatis did not seem to feel it, though, and she rode with her face and hair exposed now that they were beyond the habitations of men. He followed her down the rocky trail that curled off of the pass and plunged into a steep canyon that wound toward the valley below Ararat.
"Are we going to go into the town?" he asked, once they were below the pass and the trail had widened a little.
Thyatis shook her head. "Even in this disguise, I will not risk it. The rider said that he was going to see the headman of Dogubayazit—not the garrison commander. I think that the valley ahead is free of either Roman or Persian troops. You saw the way the last village looked at us. We might receive a fine welcome, or we might not live past the night. We have supplies enough now with their rations, and we know which way to go."
Nikos spurred ahead a little, so that they were even on the road.
"We've been out of touch for six days," he essayed. "We should get some kind of news—anything at all might be helpful, the war might already have begun!"
She turned to look at him, and her gray eyes were cold like the sea. "We have only three more weeks before the Emperor is before Tauris. I will not be late."
—|—
East of Dogubayazit, the old road turned away from the river to the north and climbed up a hill onto a broad plateau studded with stands of trees and high grass. Nikos was in the lead since they had crossed the sluggish river that ran west toward the town. Thyatis rode behind, lost in thought, her cloak hood pulled up to cover the color of her hair and the broad hat nodding over her eyes. They had swung wide around the town, leaving the trail down from Tendürük as soon as possible to cut across the foothills—through gorse bracken and myriad sharp ravines—to reach the river well east of habitation. Much of the previous day had been spent searching for a ford across the river, but they had not found one until early this morning. They had swum the horses across in the predawn darkness, hanging to their saddle straps.
Only two hours ago they had reached the road and turned onto it. By the rough map that Thyatis retained from the oilskin pouch, it ran east alongside the river to another plateau and thence to the Zangmar. It should be deserted for much of its length. Soon they would be past the last of the trees clinging to the fringe of the river and be in highland plain again. Nikos suddenly whistled and held up his hand. He was looking back down the road toward the town. She reined to a stop at his side.
"Look," he said, pointing behind them to where a curve on the road rose up beyond the grass and trees. There was a line of mounted men descending the hill. The afternoon sun glinted off their spearpoints and flickered from helmets and mail. "It must be a Persian patrol."
"Off the road," Thyatis said, spurring her horse into the trees. "Let's make for the next ravine and lay up until they pass." She goosed the horse with her heels, and it broke into a trot through the high waving grass. Nikos followed close behind, though he turned in the saddle to see if they had been spotted, letting his horse follow the one ahead.
They had crossed the grassy slope that slid down from the road and were urging their mounts up the far side of the streambed when horns sounded from the southeast.
"Hi-ya!" Thyatis shouted, and the horses bolted up the slope. Nikos turned and looked over his shoulder, rising up in the saddle. Behind them, on the road, scouts riding in advance of the main body of horsemen were winding their horns and pointing in their direction. One rose up in his saddle, a long horse bow drawn from the saddle scabbard.
"Weave!" he shouted at Thyatis as they topped the rise. The air thrummed as one shaft blurred past in the air, then another. "They've mounted bowmen!" She broke left and he right as they thundered down the far slope of the hill. It was thick with high brush and low trees. Nikos reached the next streambed and turned right, putting his heels to the horse. Minutes later he had reached the head of the little draw.
Behind him the first of the riders from the road had topped the hill in pursuit and was coaxing his horse down the nearer side, through the spiny bushes. Nikos slipped his own bow out of the saddle rest and strung it in one motion. All of his time spent with the Sarmatian brothers had not been wasted. He found a long-shafted flight arrow by touch in his quiver and fitted it to the bow. On the other slope, another rider had joined the first in following their trail. They were leaning over their saddle horns, examining the ground. The one on the right suddenly jerked and slipped forward off his horse. The arrow had punched right through him and out the other side into a tree. Nikos smiled, a shark's smile, as he nudged the horse back into the cover of the brush.
Seconds later he stopped smiling as twenty or thirty armored riders topped the ridge. Horns sounded to his east and south as well. Hades' infernal bollocks, he snarled to himself as he trotted the horse forward through deeper brush in the next ravine. It's an entire bloody army!
—|—
The bay horse whickered softly at Thyatis and nudged her head with its nose. Despite the tension of the chase, she rubbed the soft rubbery snout that was checking her ear to see if there were any carrots in there. The horse quieted as the ravine echoed with the clatter of hooves on stone. Three of the Persian scouts appeared briefly in a break in the scrubby trees that clogged the downstream end of the ravine. Thyatis rose up a little, readying herself for action. She could hear them pushing their horses through the brush down the slope from her. She half drew the short horse bow that the ambushed post rider had slung in a lacquered wooden case at his saddle horn. Four short-shafted arrows with tan fletching were pegged, headfirst, into the ground in front of her. They were only hunting arrows, but she would make do with what she had.
She was shielded ahead and on the left side by a heavy gray-blue bush with spearpoint leaves and a sweet odor. To her right, the rocky course of the tiny stream that had gouged the ravine out of the lower slopes of Ararat wound down toward the distant plain of Dogubayazit. Thirty feet below her, where the Persians were crashing through the brush, the streambed kinked to the left side of the ravine and ran under an enormous thorn tree with a thick base. The walls of the ravine, cut from decayed lava and sediment, rose up nearly twenty feet and were crowned with long grass. A patch of blue sky, now interrupted by scudding clouds, made a roof of this little space.
The first scout crawled out from under the overhanging branches of the thorn tree and stood up, a spear ready to hand. He looked about with care. The ground before him was rocky and poor for tracks. There was some sand, but it was all disturbed, perhaps by animals passing along the ravine. Thyatis remained utterly still, and the bay, feeling her waiting tension, did so as well.
"Anything?" called one of the two scouts on the other side of the thorn tree. His accent was thick with the glottal sound of the eastern Persian highlands.
The lead scout sniffed the air and surveyed the ground once more.
"Nothing clear," he called back. "I think they did go up this way, though. Let's press on."
The two on the other side agreed and the lead man began hacking at the thorn tree with his longsword to clear it enough to pass the horses through. After a moment, though, he found what Thyatis had found, th
at one flexible branch held back much of the brush on the right side of the tree. Putting his shoulder to it, which earned him two long scratches and countless little ones, he bent it back. The other two men urged their horses through the gap.
When the last man was almost past the tree, Thyatis bent, plucked an arrow from the ground, fitted it to the bow, drew and let fly in one smooth motion. Another arrow was on the wing as well, even as the first sank nine inches deep into the exposed side of the lead scout's head. Blood gouted from his mouth and filmed his eyes as the heavy-headed bolt punched through the side of his skull with a crack! right above the ear. He toppled and the heavy branch whipped back into its original position, lashing at the horse and the face of the third scout. Tangled, the man screamed in fear as hundreds of thorns cut and tore at him. The horse screamed too and shied away suddenly. The cut man wrestled to regain control but the horse, its own face and nose cut by the thorns, bolted.
The other arrow flashed past the face of the second scout, who had turned at the last moment to say something to the lead scout, and smashed itself against the dark wall of the ravine. He spun back and spurred his horse forward with a shout. Thyatis abandoned the bow and snatched up a hunting spear from its rest against the gray bush. The Persian rushed past her position, slashing down with a slightly curved longsword. She took the stroke on the spear-haft and the wood splintered but held the blow. Half of the spear hung limply, nearly cut through. She hurled it at the man's face as he curvetted his horse around for a second try. He leaned nimbly to one side and the crude missile spun past him.
With a ringing "Ha!" he spurred forward again, his blade out and ready to strike. The longsword in the scabbard on the bay horse rasped as it slithered out into Thyatis' hand. She crouched and then scuttled behind the nervous bay and into the clear space beyond the horse. The Persian turned as well, edging his horse forward with good knee work. The ravine was a tight fit for a man trying to fight on a horse, particularly with all of the brush to hand. Thyatis lashed out, cutting for the face of the horse. The Persian and the horse, moving as one, pranced aside, and she barely recovered her guard in time to fend off a ringing overhand blow.
Cursing, she skipped farther right, clearing away from the wall. Her right hand, free, clawed a long knife out of her belt scabbard.
The Persian rushed his horse forward a little while he slashed with the longsword, trying to pin her with the shoulder of the horse against the crumbling rock of the ravine wall. Steel rang loud in the enclosed space as she beat back his attack fiercely. In a half a breath, she lashed out with a boot against the horse's leg and it shied away. In the moment of opening, she darted left past the head of the horse and the long knife slashed, glittering.
The Persian kneed the horse hard, trying to spin it around to follow her, but the saddle strap, cut through, gave way and he spilled himself and then the horse onto the gravel and stones of the ravine floor. Thyatis rushed in, weaving past the kicking horse, and the tip of her sword sank into the man's throat. There was a fountain of dark red that covered his face and doublet. Thyatis staggered back, her blood afire with the rush of battle. The horse whinnied in distress and then managed to stand up. Thyatis spun, gravel spitting from under her boot.
The lead scout lay dead under the thorn tree, the arrow standing up from the side of his head like a gruesome signpost. The other scout, the one trapped behind the tree, was nowhere to be seen. The lead scout's horse was nudging him with its nose, blowing softly. Thyatis grimaced and walked up carefully by the side of the horse and took it in hand. It was confused, but she led it back to her own horse and introduced them. Flies began to buzz about the bodies of the dead.
Thyatis mounted, feeling a twinge in her left arm. Wincing, she peeled back part of her shirt—there was a gash on her upper arm, running diagonally down from the shoulder. Blood curdled from it. How did I get that? she wondered. With the two other horses roped in behind her, she nudged the bay to a trot up the ravine. Somewhere ahead the ravine would reach a break in the ridge, she hoped, and she could cut across the slope of the mountain. Night was coming quickly.
—|—
Running on foot, Nikos crashed through a stand of cattails at the edge of a pond. The call of horns echoed off the wooded hills to his left, up toward the slope of the mountain, and again to the rear. He splashed quickly along the edge of the pond, stirring up a roil of muddy water and torn seagrass. The sky was growing dark and the land under the mountain was falling into shadow. The horns came again, much closer, though farther up the slope. Nikos plunged into the deeper water of the pool and began to half wade, half swim toward the far bank.
Horses snorted close behind him and he slid soundlessly down into the water. The western sky was a boil of hot orange, violet, and deep blue-purple. Clouds had gathered in the late day over Tendürük and now the sun had plunged into them, filling the vault of heaven with all the blood of its passing. The pond lay in twilight shadow now, deep gray and muffled blue-black. Nikos lay back in the water, only eyes showing, and slowly moved backward toward the far bank. The shore he had abandoned he watched carefully. Two men, perhaps more, were moving there on horses. He could make out bare glints of their movement as they searched the shoreline.
Indistinct voices carried over the water to him; there were at least three men there now. A horn sounded in the woods behind them, clear and ringing in the twilight. Others answered it from the woods above and more men began to gather on the shore. Nikos cursed all the gods and the fates that had brought him to this point—particularly the one who had snatched the horse and all of his equipment from him two miles back along the trail. His hands found the hard-packed mud of the bank.
Someone struck a flint and a spark of light guttered among the men gathering under the eaves of the trees. A lantern was lit and helms and bright mail glinted in the warm light. Thirty or forty men had come out of the forest now, faces lean and marked with narrow beards and mustaches. Some wore red tunics over their armor; others wore tall spangenhelms. A voice of command boomed among them and the crowd shifted, focusing on someone whom Nikos could not see over the confusion of men and horses. He slid beneath the jutting root of an ancient and gnarled tree.
The men on the far shore listened while the booming voice rose and fell, then they began to break up into smaller bands. Some mounted and rode off into the woods, others quartered the area around the shore, gathering firewood and unpacking baggage from the horses. A single figure remained standing by the pond, staring across it into darkness. In the light of torches and lanterns, Nikos could see that the man was exceptionally broad of shoulder and possessed of a mighty beard. The Illyrian crawled carefully up the bank, keeping the old tree between him and the watching man, then he jogged away into the darkness.
—|—
Breath hissed from clenched teeth as Thyatis dragged a length of tattered cloth around her wounded arm. The bleeding had grown worse as she had pushed herself and the three horses to make distance across the flank of Ararat. Always, she had heard the horns of the Persians away and below her, but sometimes they grew nearer. Following the game trails across the mountainside was hard going. Rocky canyons cut the slope, forcing her into long detours. She had made only a few miles since she had left the ravine where she had killed the two men. She had come down a dizzying slope of loose shale and talus to reach the bottom of a broad canyon. For a little while she had made good time, but then the canyon had dropped away in a broad glassy lip of stone that spilled a trickle of water over a sixty-foot drop.
Full darkness had caught up with her, and beyond a sliver of moon, there was little light in the canyon. Attempting to find a way down around the cliffs was a useless effort at night, so she had denned up in an overhang upstream from the waterfall. A tiny fire guttered at her feet and the faces of the horses loomed at her out of the darkness. The horses had her water and the last of the grain from the saddlebags. Her fire was only twigs backed up against a small boulder. There was a bit of cast-up wood
at the edge of the overhang as well.
She wrapped the length of cloth around her upper arm again and tied it off with one hand and her teeth. When she could see clearly again, it was a ragged edge of the night, stars peeking in around the overhang of the rock shelter. The fire was still flickering and the scant light picked out figures carved into the rock above her head—lions, gazelles, and a fat figure of a woman with a beehive. They glittered and sparkled in the darkness. Thyatis closed her eyes, all unaware that sleep had stolen up upon her.
—|—
Nikos jogged on, his legs still moving even though they seemed to drag through mud with each stride. His clothes, soaked by the trip through the pond, were dry again and rasped against his skin. The rocky plain, cut with odd mounds and sculpted towers of black stone, stretched ahead of him. His foot hit a rock and nearly turned his ankle. He stopped. Running on unknown ground under almost no moon was unwise. Stopping was a mistake, though, for his arms were leaden and he slumped against the nearest outcropping. The stone, brittle and spongelike with tiny razor edges and a crumbling nature, cut at his hand though it seemed to take a very long time for the pain to reach his consciousness. He staggered back, wiping the blood off on his leggings.
He walked on, picking his way through the eroded lava field with mindless care. Exhaustion crept up upon him, and when he started awake, he was lying, curled up, between two pitted stones in a tiny patch of sand. The boat of the moon had crossed most of the sky. He levered himself up and continued on.
The Shadow of Ararat Page 32