Well of the Unicorn Page 8

  "The hills of Vastmanstad are not like yours here," he said, on the day he lay in the shut-bed, with her sitting beside it, speaking of Vagai Front in winter and how blue the dark crows looked against it, after he had made a protection for the second skonara. "They go up in long slow rises, and on days like this we used to run ski along them. The snow smokes and we would take darts because there was sometimes game to be had. Would you like to try that sport?"

  "Oh, aye. But I would think a bow better."

  "It may be I can take you there hunting one day." Airar felt his own face suddenly flame, and half to ease his shamefastness reached forth to take her hand. She did not resist, returning his pressure for a second, but then drew her fingers away.

  "But you're for the wars and Mariupol city and all. There are great ladies there; when you return poor fishers of Gentebbi will not seem worth a copper aina— if you return."

  "Aye, if I return. ... It has been the fall of better men than Airar son of Alvar that they had not strength to draw a bow or heave a blade when it was needful." The black shadow seemed to close; between despite and sheer weariness of flesh two big tears detached themselves from Airar's eyes and rolled out on his cheek. "What lady great or small would look on me, so little of avail? I am thinking it might be better to let Visto and Erb go to Mariupol, but myself stay and brew potions like a witch in some outbuilding of your Queen Kry's house."

  "It might be better," she said slowly, then on a sudden stood up, so rapid and vigorous that the stool whereon she sat was overturned. "Aye, and better still to take livery of petticoats! Visto told me how you were one of dauntless daring that would deal his stroke and never think twice about it, but now it is to be seen that he was wrong and my mother right when she said that all magicians were peeping dastards, only fit to flaunt tricks for children. I'd rather Ove Ox-mouth."

  Up went her head; she swept from the room all queenly, while Airar, struggling from his bed as he called after her, found his legs would carry him only as far as the door before down he flopped, muscles twitching like those of a hooked fish.

  The next day being that on which he did not go to the ships, he tried to find her, but she slipped him somehow after breaking fast, and when he went in search of Visto that one was gone too. Airar suspected they were to gether—as why should they not be? he asked himself, but that eased matters not at all. He spent the day lonely, idle, and miserable. It was too chill to wander uncompanioned through town or hills, so he went back to Rudr's house to wait Gython's return. This fell in good season before the evening meal, but she would bring with her a companion, a girl of fat cheeks and no presence, who drew Airar aside, then tittered and giggled maddeningly before coming to the point that she would have a love-potion to melt her reluctant swain.

  By time they sat at meat Airar had reached such a peak of reckless resentment that he burst right out across the table and everyone present to know why she evaded him, and if he had done her offense, would offer penitence and explanation. Old Rudr laughed heartily and made some gleeful remark that with women the only wrong is to be right, but he looked hard at Gython, and next morning Airar, coming somewhat late to the fast-breaking, found father and daughter both silent, she biting her lips, he champing away at his victual with a face held studiously blank.

  That day was another of the skonare to exorcise. The usual thing happened; when Airar came to himself in the lock-bed, a mug of warmed aquaviva with honey stood on a stool beside it, but no Gython, so he lay alone and miserable all afternoon. The short day turned dark fast and he drifted into a doze from which he was roused by a sense of chill, to see that across from him the fire in the room had burned low. Beyond the door partly ajar were voices without words—Rudr's slow accent and Gython speaking higher and more vehement, rising and rising.

  "—quit you and Vagai and all!" she cried, suddenly clear. There was a moment silence; then banging, a shout, and many other voices. A cold gust from the winter outside swept through the chamber as an outer door was opened; torches were being borne in and in their midst one with a clout round his head and blood dried all down his jacket.

  It was Rogai. "The damned baron beat us," he said. "Wigrak's dead and his head on a spike at Mariupol portal. Sir Ludomir's in hiding."

  9 Ships Come to Salmonessa

  HE TOLD the tale between gulps of mead to a room crowded round a fire brought to brightness. Through prevision or treachery—he thought the latter— Vanette-Millepigue had gained a clear view of the purpose of Mariupol. Or ever Airar and Rogai had left Naaros, his riders carried warnings to the Count's governor in the fatal city. A halftercia of men-at-arms came down from Briella itself; another was sent from Naaros citadel; so that by time Rogai reached Mariupol the place swarmed with Vulkings in steel, patrols were going through all the streets to make arrests, and the gate-guards had orders to let any in but none go forth.

  "What did you?"

  "Went into hiding with a certain dame whose establishment is not conducted to the best morals—craving your grace, bright lady—but devoted to the Iron Ring, and tried to find Lord Wigrak. I found him—hah! The second day after my arrival trumpets were blown in all the streets with heralds announcing a public spectacle in the great square, all persons being required to attend. I dared not fail, since you must know in Mariupol they keep a register of quarters, whereon my name was already inscribed as our dame's dandyman. They had a structure there built up to resemble a mountain all hung with Vulking colors—"

  He drank and someone said, "Make honest men puke to see the curst red and white so exalted."

  "Aye, that enough. Well, that bloody Red Baron's an enormous man for symbols and shows—as he made clear. When we were all gathered, Vanette-Millepigue himself pops out from somewhere at the top of this play-mountain with the Vicount Isele, who's governor of Mariola, takes off his helmet and makes us a talking. It had come to him, he said, that certain among his good Dalecarles were ambitious to climb as high as a mountain-peak. He would not deny them that privilege, only reminding that the Mountain was the Vulking badge and dangerous for all not of that blood. On this a trumpet was blown and they began pushing up their mountain, two and two, a dozen of the Mariupol syndics, Wigrak among them, with their wives and children, maybe twoscore persons all told. As they reached the peak, Vanette-Millepigue and Isele sworded them handsomely, by pairs, the women and children first, then a headsman cut them at the neck and exhibited the heads to those present. Some of the children screamed and tried to run."

  He gulped and drank again. "Dolorosa Dalarnasaid someone and Airar could see how Gython held both hands before her face. His own eyes felt wet, to cover which he cried:

  "But the Star-Captains of Carrhoene? Were they trapped as well?"

  Rudr snorted. "Not they slippery eel-fish. More like wearing Mountain badges themselves now."

  "Sir, you are less than just which is less than honorable," said Rogai earnestly. "They could come no earlier; and you know, as I, that no Vulking Lord will take the hire of mercenary spears. Nay, they'll be warned at sea, by one of your own boats, the one that fished me up as I came over the Mariupol sea-wall with my head a-bleed and a dead guard under my arm."

  "Ah, hmf, and with a's warning, they beauties will now run for Os Erigu most like, to join the pirates."

  "Nay—Salmonessa. It was covenanted if aught miscarried. We retake the war from there."

  Airar found voice again. "Then all's not lost?"

  "Lost? Lost? We have lost a conspiracy; the battle's yet to begin."

  Rudr got up and took a step or two, hands behind, head down. "They young twiggets in Vastmanstad, did they go up or get theyself in Red Dog's trap?"

  "I cannot say for certain sure, but my best knowledge is nay. Black Gallil held them for our signal, and there's a hard holder."

  "Nah, hah, vmf. Duke Roger, what says un?"

  "Oh, he has already sent heralds to Isele on the ground of his old treaty, the Privilege of Mariola, that gives him suzerainty and the right t
o sit in judgment on treason cases there. Breathing defiance; means war for sure. I gave the word that all who rallied to my arrow throughout the province should" fall in on his standard. We but begin."

  "No two ways." The master of the free-fishers drew a long breath. "Mayhap not one, but such as be, we take. Erb, Powry, summon the fifty that go, from bed if need. They must just sail on the wind tonight for Salmonessa, and young Master Airar, you with a. I'd say more and wish you in better spirit, but now must wait happier times. Master Rogai, you go, too."

  Tall Erb goggled. "Tonight?" But Rudr turned on him fiercely. "Aye, no delay. Do you not see, foolish man, that if not the Red Baron of Naaros, then Vulk his master will know Mariola's never be in this alone. We will have their war-cogs here with the day unless storm prevents."

  There was a stir. Erb stood up, but a voice deep among the group: "But our free-fisher charter. We have a charter against such reivings."

  Rudr's laugh rang cracked. "Writ on parchment. Just try steel against un one time, as Red Baron's now in mind."

  They were all moving now, but—"The sea-demons," said the black-bearded man whose name Airar never did learn.

  "Time's enough when time is; all goes down before this necessity."

  Visto helped Airar to dress, which he did stumbling and missing getting his points home. He looked round for Gython, but she had clean disappeared, so their final parting must be unfriendly and without farewell, he halfleaning on Visto's shoulder out into a night shaken with winds and low-driving snow. Down the steep street there was a sound of shouting and someone emerged with a torch, words and sparks alike trailing along the dark stormwind. The tempest made it hard to draw breath; at the quayside there was much babble in the bitter cold that cut right through a cloak, and men arriving in twos and threes, companied by torches that threw red glint on a steel cap or caught the silhouette of a spear-point, with cries of "Where's Vardomil?" "Hold, there!" "Gone in the skonara Nedil's Gallai."

  The ships had all been brought in to lie close along the dockside and each other when storm threatened in the afternoon. They were grinding and pounding together as seas rolled through the entrance between the paws of the Sphinx of Vagai. It made Airar's heart beat to see the gap heave in the uncertain light betwixt bulwark and quay, all slippery with frozen spray, but with Visto's arm and a friendly hand he got across and was led below on the nearest ship.

  A fire was already alight on the roundstone. "Keep it live, young master," said one of those who had helped him down. "We be needed above to manage ropes."

  "Can I do aught to aid?"

  "Not you; you be cargo."

  He was left. The hatch closed above, there were foot-stampings and muted shouts, with presently an end to the jars from the outer side of the ship, which Airar took to mean that the vessel next beyond had pulled out. Now they were moving also, the wild irregular thumping of the skonara giving way to jerk and come again as she felt the heave of the seas. The movement turned more intense as they reached the outer bar; Airar lay down on a bench beside the fire, all wrapped in his cloak, but no sleep for him, so he let his thoughts drift idly over the place where he was bound, what he might find there, and the reason for Gython's sudden anger.

  It made him full sorrowful that she on whom he had in a measure depended had so failed him, not recognizing his need of mere encouragement and human sympathy in the black aftermath of his magic-making. But then he thought—dead and gone now, all of that, and she out of his life forever, so that he might look on the matter with clear eyes as one distant, and what did he see? Aye, she had a certain amount of reason, the more if Rudr had planned they two for a union. No woman wants her man hanging to her skirts when strength and valor are praised —or almost none, he amended himself, recalling how his own father Alvar had not infrequently wept tears and was soothed by his wife in the days before she died and the heart went out of the old man, thereupon to Naaros to join Tholo in the high house of Leonce Fabrizius.

  But this Gython was another stamp—and he stirred restless, thinking on the graceful cling of her garments as the wind blew round her. Dead and gone; now Visto would likely have her to raise a brood of fisher brats. It had been her fault more than Airar's own that she missed any higher destiny, but his own for letting Rudr pursue him into these clerkly doings. Yet that had been the price of the fifty in which lay his hope of the future—and what advantage had he over any of those fifty, save archery (which they despised) and his knowledge of gramary? Too deeply moiled and coiled for his working—and Airar, clinging to a beam against the rocking ship, placed more logs on the roundstone and fell on a resolve not to make more magic save where naught else would serve. Then his thought fell on a little vein of self-pleasure at what Pertuit the archer might have said to see him going up to Salmonessa, not as hireling but as captain of fifty, and he followed that delight round and round a waking dream of cities and honors and ringing bells till the hatch was thrust back and someone or other came below for a draught of hot drink.

  By day the motion of the ship had eased. Airar went aloft to find her running fast northeastward along the flank of the north wind, with the tiller lashed, under a bright sky, climbing flowing mountains of water to slide down the opposite slope without a tremor. Around her bows was a fairyland of fantastic ice-forms; one of the free-fishers stood there, braced and chopping. It was cold.

  Airar clutched a rope and looked round; close aboard another skonara swept like their own along the wind, and far out he could just see the speck of a third when the heaving waves brought them to rise together. The spray stung his face; the master of the ship turned to him with a visage somewhat glum.

  "Good-morrow," said he. "It would seem we got to Salmonessa with your fifty become but a score."

  "How would that be?"

  "The Braihed shivering on the rocks at Vagai gate and none knowing how many of her people live, while only the Gulring is with us, so not unlike the Nedil's Gallai is gone, too. Sad voyage for Gentebbi, young master." He finished with a sidelong look and accent on the final word.

  "What's then that other ship that looms against the sky?" asked Airar, pointing.

  For answer the master looked sharp at him, then stepped to the bulwark, holding with one hand while the other he made a small tube and peep-hole for his eye.

  "By the peace!" he cried as he jumped down. "You have right. Draw in the sheets, bear up, bear up!" He turned to the mast and cupped his hands. "Ove, you're a pudding fool! The—the young master betters your lookout watch. Spear and helm all, lest she prove enemy."

  But she did not; when she closed she proved to be the missing Nedil's Gallai, and she had picked up all but one of the men from the vessel wrecked. So now Airar was much praised for a sharpsighted as well as a lucky leader, for among all the three ships none but he had spied the rest. They had a good voyage after that across a sea growing calmer, under a high-wheeling sun each morning and a wind that drove them fast, till on the third day toward twilight here was a hairline across their path that grew to a broad rivermouth with a tower bridge standing across it, and in the distance, insubstantial against the gloomy east, towers which Airar knew belonged to the hold of the Bastard of Salmonessa.

  The clouds had begun to climb before the setting sun and the river looked like slate as it was down sails and out sweeps to drive into it. Far to west and north Airar could see what looked like waving brown fields of harvest with the road to the towered town running through, but when he said Salmonessa was late with its crops, Visto laughed.

  "Aye, if the crop were frog and fish," said he. "Those be the marshes of Salm that run down to Mariola's border," and the Nedil's Gallai was pushed alongside, with Lank Erb in it, crying as they glided that Airar should speak for all, since the Salmonessans set great store by title and ceremony.

  The tide was out; the stream ran sluggish, leaving bare long flats of rime-covered mud on either side. Tall piles had been driven so that only one vessel might pass the bridge at a time, and for the moment
even the passage of that one was interdict by a rusty iron chain at the water level. As they drew up to it, a head in a steel cap was thrust past a mangonel on the bridge-lip and called, "Who comes?"

  Airar waved a white spear. "Free-fishers of Gentebbi to bear arms in the Duke's war."

  "Turn again. It is His Grace's ordinance that none may follow his banner but those who follow leaders of birth and not their unruled will, like those haughty Dalecarles of the west or the barbarous Vulkings that name a man * lord on one day and villain on the next."

  "I am leader here and I have birth as high as any in Salmonessa. I am Airar Alvarson of Trangsted."

  A second head joined the first. "Hah!" it cried, "a Vastman Dalecarle by the sound of the name. What are your bearings, Dalecarle?" The tone was of mockery, and now Airar was somewhat put to it, for his father was not an armigerous man, and though there had been some hint of nobility in his mother's family, the matter was never spoken on at home. Yet he answered boldly enough on the spur of necessity:

  "We bear azure, an arrow or in pale."

  "It is a coat we never heard," grumbled the second head and both disappeared behind the mangonel for consultation. Presently:

  "Have these fishers sworn allegiance in due form?"

  Up jumped a man aboard the Nedil's Gallai and shook his fist. "Allegiance, nay!" he cried. "We free-fishers owe allegiance to none below the Emperor by our holy charter." But Erb pulled him down and shouted back: "It has not been done before among the people of Gentebbi, but I for one will just swear by the Well to look on Airar Alvarson the Farsighted as my liege lord for so long as this war shall last."

  "And I!" cried Visto, "And I, and I!" others, and as Airar thanked them, proud for a moment, the gate-guards again held parley, at the close of which one came forth to say:

  "This is a weighty matter and not to be decided by us but by His Grace's Chancellor, which will need the sending of a message up to the castle. For any matter there is no entry past the gate permitted after sundown."