Witch World Part 9

Simon's hesitation was prolonged into no reply at all as one of the falcons hung above them, calling loudly.

"Loose me and slide off!" his companion ordered sharply. Simon obeyed, and the four Guardsmen were left on the trail while the ponies forged ahead at a pace reckless for the country. Koris beckoned the others on.

"There is a sortie." He ran after the fast-disappearing ponies, the ax over his shoulder, his slender legs carrying him at a muscle-straining trot which Simon alone found it easy to equal.

There were shouts beyond and the telltale clash of metal meeting metal.

"Karsten forces?" panted Simon as he drew abreast of the Captain.

"I think not. There are outlaws in these wastes, and Nalin says they grow bolder. To my mind it is but a small part of all the rest. Alizon threatens to the north, the Kolder move in upon the west, the outlaw bands grow restless, and Karsten stirs. Long have the wolves and the night birds longed to pick the bones of Estcarp. Though they would eventually quarrel over those bones among themselves. Some men live in the evening and go down into darkness defending the remnants of that they reverence."

"And this is the evening for Estcarp?" Simon found breath to ask.

"Who can say? Ah-outlaws they are!"

They looked down now upon a trade road. And here swirled a battle. The bird-helmeted hors.e.m.e.n dismounted as the level ground was too limited to give cavalry any advantage, to strike in as a well-trained fighting unit, cutting down those who had been enticed into the open. But there were snipers in hiding and they took toll by dart of the Falconers.

Koris leaped from ledge to trail, coming down in a pocket where two men crouched. Simon worked his way along a thread of path to a point where, with a well-aimed stone, he brought down one who was just shooting into the melee. It took only a moment to strip that body of gun and ammunition and turn the weapon against the comrades of its former owner.

Hawks flew screaming, stabbing at faces and eyes, raking with savage claws. Simon fired, took aim and fired again, marking his successes with dour satisfaction. A fraction of the bitterness of their defeat at Sulcarkeep oozed from him during those few wild moments while there was still active resistance around and below.

A squeal of horn cut the shrieks of the birds. Across the valley a rag of flag was waved vigorously and those of the outlaws who still kept their feet fell back, though they did not break and run until they reached cover where mounted men could not pursue. The day was slipping fast into evening and a host of shadows swallowed them up.

Hide from the men they might, but concealment from the hawks was another matter. The birds swirled over the rising ground, striking down, sometimes finding a quarry as screams of pain testified. Simon saw Koris on the road, ax still in hand, a dark stain on the blade of that weapon. He was talking eagerly with a Falconer, oblivious of those who walked from one body to the next, sometimes making sure of its status with a quick sword stroke. There was the same grim finality to this engagement as there had been after the ambush of those from Gorm. Simon busied himself with the buckling on of his new arms belt, taking care not to watch that particular activity.

The hawks were drifting back down the arch of the evening sky, coming in answer to the whistles of their masters. Two bodies in bird helms were lashed across the pads of nervous ponies, and other men rode bandaged, supported by their fellows. But the toll among the outlaw force had been far the greater.

Simon rode behind a Falconer again, not the same man. And this one was not inclined to talk as he nursed a slashed arm across his breast and swore softly at every jolt.

Night came quickly in the mountains, the higher peaks shutting out the sun, enclosing growing pools of gloom. The track they took was a broader one and smooth as a highway when compared to their earlier trails. It brought them at last, up a stiff climb, to the home the Falconers had made for themselves in their exile. And it was such a keep as drew a whistle of astonishment out of Simon.

He had been truly impressed by the ancient walls of Estcarp with their air of having been wrought from the bones of the earth in the days of its birth. And Sulcarkeep , though it had been cloaked with the spume of that unnatural fog, had been indeed a mighty work. But this was a part of the cliffs, of the mountain. He could only believe that the makers had chanced upon a peak where there were a series of caves which had been enlarged and worked. For the Eyrie was not a castle, but a mountain itself converted into a fort.

They entered over a drawbridge spanning a chasm luckily hidden in the twilight, a drawbridge giving footing to only one horse at a time. Simon released his indrawn breath only when the pony he bestrode in company pa.s.sed under the wicked points of a portculis into a gaping cave. He aided the wounded Falconer to the pavement and into the hands of one of his fellows, and then looked about for the Guardsmen, sighting Tunston's height and bare dark head before he saw the others.

Koris pushed his way to them, Jivin at his heels. For a s.p.a.ce they seemed to be forgotten by their hosts.

Horses were led away, and each man took his falcon upon a padded glove before going into another pa.s.sage. But at last one of the bird heads swiveled in their direction and a Falconer officer approached.

"The Lord of Wings would speak with you, Guardsmen. Blood and Bread, Sword and Shield to your service!"

Koris tossed his ax, caught it, and turned the blade away from the other with ceremony. "Sword and Shield, Blood and Bread, man of the hawks!"

A WITCH IN KARS.

Simon sat up on the narrow bunk, knuckles pressed to his aching head. He had been dreaming, a vivid and terrifying dream of which he could recall only the terror. And then he awakened to find himself in the cell-like quarters of a Falconer with this fierce pain in his head. But more urgent than the pain was a sense of the need to obey some order-or was it to answer a plea?

The ache faded, but the urgency did not and he could not remain in bed. He dressed in the leather garments his hosts had provided and went out, guessing that it was close to morning.

They had been five days at the Eyrie and it was Koris' intention to ride north soon, heading to Estcarp through leagues of outlaw infested territory. Simon knew that it was in the Captain's mind to bind the Falconers to the cause of the northern nation. Once back in the northern capital he would bring his influence to work upon the prejudices of the witches, so that the tough fighting men of the bird helms might be enlisted in Estcarp's struggle.

The fall of Sulcarkeep had aroused the dour men of the mountains, and preparations for war buzzed in their redoubt. In the lower reaches of the strange fortress smiths toiled the night through and armorers wrought cunningly, while a handful of technicians worked those tiny beads strung on the hawk jesses through which a high circling bird reported and recorded for his master. The secret of those was the most guarded of their nation, and Simon had only a hint that it was based on some mechanical contrivance.

Tregarth had been often brought up short in his estimation of these peoples by just some curious quirk such as this. Men who fought with sword and shield should not also produce intricate communication devices. Such odd leaps and gaps in knowledge and, equipment was baffling. He could far more readily accept the "magic" of the witches than the eyes and ears, and when necessary, voices which were falcon borne.

The magic of the witches-Simon climbed stairs cut in one of the mountain burrows, came out upon a lookout post. There was no mist to mask a range of hills visible in the light of early morning. By some feat of engineering he could see straight through a far gap into that open land which he knew to be Karsten.

Karsten! He was so intent upon that keyhole into the duchy that he was not aware of the sentry on post there until the man spoke: "You have a message. Guardsman?"

A message? Those words triggered something in Simon's mind. He experienced for an instant the return of pain to press above his eyes, that conviction there was something for him to do. This was foreknowledge of a kind, but not such as he had known on the road to Sulcarkeep. Now he was being summoned, not warned. Koris and the Guardsmen would ride north if they willed, but he must head south. Simon put down his last guard against this insidious thing, allowed himself to be swayed by it.

"Has any news come out of the south?" he demanded of the sentry.

"Ask that of the Lord of Wings, Guardsman." The man was suspicious after the training of his kind. Simon headed for the stairs.

"Be sure that I shall!"

Before he went to the Commander of the Falconers, he tracked down the Captain, finding Koris busied with preparations for taking the trail. He glanced up from his saddlebags to Simon, and then his hands stopped pulling at buckles and straps.

"What's to do?"

"Laugh if you will," Simon replied shortly. "My road lies to the south."

Koris sat down on the edge of a table and swung one booted foot slowly back and forth. "Why does Karsten draw you?"

"That is just it!" Simon struggled to put into words what compelled him against either inclination or sense. He had never been an articulate man and he was discovering it even harder here to explain himself. "I am drawn-"

The swinging foot was still. In that handsome, bitter face there was no readable expression. "Since when-and how has it come upon you?" That demand was quick and harsh, an officer desiring a report.

Simon spoke the truth. "There was a dream and then I awoke. When I looked just now through the gap into Karsten I knew that my road leads there."

"And the dream?"

"It was of danger, more I cannot remember."

Koris drove one fist into the palm of the other. "So be it! I wish you had more power or less. But if you are drawn, we ride south."

"We?"

"Tunston and Jivin shall carry our news to Estcarp. The Kolder cannot cut through the barrier of the Power yet awhile. And Tunston can rally the Guard as well. Look you, Simon, I am of Gorm and now it is Gorm which fights against the Guard, though it may be Gorm which is dead and demon-inspired. I have serve Estcarp to the best of my ability since the Guardian gave me refuge, and I shall continue to serve her. But it may be that the time has come that I can serve her best outside the ranks of her liege men instead of within them.

"How do I know . . ." his dark young eyes had shadow smudges under them, tired eyes, worn with a fatigue which was not of body, "how do I know that through me because I am of Gorm danger cannot strike at the very heart of Estcarp? We have seen what the Kolder have done to living men whom I knew well, what else that devil-haunted brood can accomplish what man may tell? They flew through the air to take Sulcarkeep."

"But that may be no fruit of magic," Simon cut in. "In my own world air flight is a common mode of travel. I wish I had had sight of how they came-it could tell us much!"

Koris laughed wryly. "Doubtless we shall be given numerous other occasions in the future to observe their methods. I say this to you, Simon, if you are drawn south, I believe it to be by intelligent purpose. And two swords, or rather," he corrected himself with a little smile, "one ax, and one dart gun, are of greater force than one gun alone. The very fact of this summoning is good hearing, for it must mean that she who went with us to Sulcarkeep still lives and now moves to further our cause."

"But how do you know it is she, or why?" Such a suspicion had been Simon's also, to have it confirmed by Koris carried conviction.

"How? Why? Those who have the Power can send it forth along certain lanes of mind, as these Falconers dispatch their birds through the reaches of the air. And if they meet any of their kind, then they call or warn. As to why-it is in my mind, Simon, that she who sends must be the lady you saved from the pack ofAlizon, for she would be well able to communicate with one she knows.

"You are not blood of our blood, bone of our bone, Simon Tregarth, and it would seem in your world the Power lies not only in the hands of women. Did you not smell out that ambush on the sh.o.r.e road as well as any witch might do? Yes, I shall ride into Karsten on no more proof than you have given me at this hour, because I know the Power and because, Simon, I have fought beside you. Let me give Tunston his instructions and a message for the Guardian, and we shall go to cast in troubled waters for important fish."

They rode south well equipped with mail and weapons taken from vanquished enemies, blank shields signifying that they were wandering mercenaries open for hire. The Falconer border guard escorted them to the edge of the mountains and the traders' road to Kars.

With no more than that tenuous feeling as a guide Simon wondered at the wisdom of their venture. Only the pull was still on him night and day, though he had no more nightmares. And each morning found him impatient to take the highway once more.

Karsten had villages in plenty, growing larger and richer as the travelers penetrated into the black-earthed bottom lands along the wide rivers. And there were petty lordlings set up in fiefs who offered employment to the two from the north. Though Koris laughed to scorn the wages they suggested and thus increased the respect with which he and his ax were regarded, Simon said little, but was alert to everything about him, mapping the land in his head, and noting small customs and laws of behavior, while, between times when they journeyed alone, he pumped the Guard Captain for information.

The Duchy had once been a territory spa.r.s.ely held by a race akin to the ancient blood of Estcarp. And now and then a proud-held dark head, a pale face with cleanly cut features, reminded Simon of the men of the north.

"The curse of the Power finished them here," Koris observed when Simon commented on this.

"The curse?"

The Captain shrugged."It goes back to the nature of the Power. Those who use it do not breed. And so each year the women who will wed and bear grow fewer. A marriageable maid of Estcarp may choose among ten men, soon among twenty. Also there are childless homes in plenty.

"So it was here. Thus when the st.u.r.dier barbarians came overseas and settled along the coast they were not actively opposed. More and more land came to their hands. The old stock withdrew to the backlands. Then warlords arose among the newcomers in the course of time. So we have the Dukes, and this Duke last of all-who was a common man of a hired shield company and climbed by his wits and the strength of his sword arm to complete rule."

"And so will it go with Estcarp also?"

"Perhaps. Only there was a mingling of blood with the Sulcarmen, who, alone, it seems, can mate with Estcarp and have fruit of it. Thus in the north there was a stirring of the old blood and a renewing of vigor. However, Gorm may swallow us up before there has been a proving of anything. How is it, Simon; does this town we approach beckon you? It is Garthholm on the river, and beyond it lies only Kars."

"Then we go to Kars," Simon answered wearily after a long moment. "For the burden is still on me."

Under his plain helm Koris' brows rose. "Then it is indeed laid upon us to walk softly and watch over our shoulders the while. Though the blood of the Duke is not high and he is eyed sidewise by the n.o.bles, yet his wits are far from blunt. There will be eyes and ears within Kars to mark the lowliest stranger and questions asked of blank shields. Especially if we do not strive to enlist at once under his banner."

Simon gazed thoughtfully at the river barges swinging at anchor by the town quay. "But he would not be inclined to enlist a maimed man. Also are there not doctors within Kars who would treat one injured in battle? A man, say, who ailed from a blow on the head so that his eyes no longer served him well?"

"Such a one as would be brought by a comrade to see the wise doctors of Kars?" chuckled Koris. "Yes, that is a fine tale, Simon. And who is this injured warrior?"

"I think that role is mine. It would cover any awkward mistakes which a keen witted eye-and-ear of the Duke would note."

Koris nodded vigorously. "We sell these ponies here. They label us too much as being from the mountains, and in Karsten mountains are suspect. Pa.s.sage can be bought on one of the river boats. A good enough plan."

It was the Captain who carried out the bargaining over the ponies, and he was still counting the wedge-shaped bits of metal which served as payment tokens in the duchy as he joined Simon on the barge. Koris grinned as he slapped the handful into his belt purse.

"I have trader blood and today I proved it," he said. "Half again what I was prepared to take, enough to aid in any palm-greasing when we come to Kars, should that be needed. And provisions to keep us until that hour." He dumped the bag he carried on board along with the ax from which he had not been parted since he took it from the hands of Volt.

There were two days of lazy current gliding on the river. As it neared sunset on the second, and the walls and towers of Kars stood out boldly not too far ahead, Simon's hands went to his head. The pain once more shot above his eyes with the intensity of a blow. Then it was gone, leaving behind it a small vivid picture of an ill-paved lane, a wall, and a door deep set therein. That was their goal and it lay in Kars.

"This is it then, Simon?" TheCaptain's hand fell on his shoulder.

"It is." Simon closed his eyes to the sunset colors bending the river. Somewhere in that city he must find the lane, the wall, the door, and meet with the one who waited.

"A narrow lane, a wall, a door-"

Koris understood. "Little enough," he remarked. His gaze was for the city, as if by the force of his will he could hurl them across the s.p.a.ce still separating the barge from the waiting wharf.

Soon enough they came up the quay to the arch in the city wall. Simon moved slowly in his chosen role, trying to walk with the timidity of a man who could not trust his sight. Yet his nerves were p.r.i.c.kling, he was certain that once within the city he could find the lane. The thread which had drawn him across the duchy was now a tight cord of direction.

Koris talked for them at the gate and his explanation of Simon's disability, his plausible story-as well as a gift pa.s.sed under hand to the sergeant of the guard-got them in. The Captain snorted as they pa.s.sed down the street and turned the corner.

"Were that man in Estcarp I'd have the sign off his shield and his feet pointing on the road away before he had time to name me his name! It has been said that the Duke grows soft since he came into rule, but I would not have believed it so."

"Every man is said to have his price," Simon remarked.

"True enough. But a wise officer knows the price of the men under him and uses them accordingly. These are mercenaries and can be bought in little things. But perhaps if the code still prevails, they will stand firm in battle for him who pays them. What is it?"

He asked that sharply for Simon had stopped, half swung around.

"We head wrong. It is to the east."

Koris studied the street ahead. "There is an alley four doors from here. You are sure?"

"I am sure."

Lest the sergeant of the gate be more astute than they judged him, they went at a slow pace, Simon being guided. The eastward alley led on into more streets. Simon sheltered in a doorway while Koris sniffed their back trail. In spite of his distinctive appearance the Captain knew how to take cover, and he came flitting back soon.

"If they have set any hound on us he is better than Estcarp's best, and that I do not believe. So now let us get to earth before we are remarked to be remembered. East still it is?"

The dull pain in Simon's head ebbed and flowed, he could use it as a "hot" and "cold" guide in a strange fashion. Then a particularly bad blast brought him to the mouth of a curving lane and he stepped within. It was walled with blank backs of buildings and what windows looked out on it were dark and curtained.

They quickened pace and Simon shot a glance at each window as they pa.s.sed, fearing to see a face there. Then he saw it-the door of his vision. He was breathing a little hard as he paused before it, not from the exertion of pace, but rather from the turmoil inside him. He raised his fist and rapped on the solid portal.

When there was no answer he was absurdly disappointed. Then he pushed, to encounter a barrier which must be backed with bars.

"You are sure this is it?" Koris prodded.

"Yes!" There was no outer latch, nothing he could seize upon to force it open. Yet what he wanted, what had brought him there, was on its other side.

Koris stepped back a pace or two, measuring the height of the wall with his eye.

"Were it closer to dark we could mount this. But such a move now might be noted."

Simon threw away caution and pounded, his a.s.sault on the wood that of a drum. Koris caught at his arm.

"Would you rouse out the Duke's companies? Let us lay up in a tavern and come back at nightfall."

"There is no need for that."