Much Fall of Blood-ARC (45 page)

"I think we may have to go north anyway," said Von Gherens. "Look, Prince Manfred, Erik, we are hugely outnumbered. And unless they're stupider than rocks, the first thing they will do is cut off our retreat across the river. They know where and what they're looking for. We're not going to find vessels nearby—that makes no military sense. And we won't find them in the dark, easily. It's what they'll expect us to do. By daylight tomorrow we can expect everything for a day's ride along the river to be guarded with a substantial force."

"So . . . we ride hard north. Somehow don't get spitted by watchful Mongols from this White Horde—am I right in saying that this is part of the kurultai breaking up? The two Hordes?"

Erik asked Bortai. She nodded. "Mostly this is true. We are also clan-blood with some Blue Horde clans, especially in east. There are more that bind to the orkhan in the west and south."

Erik translated. Manfred bit his lip. "And this helps us how in the medium term?" He asked. "We can find short term security to the north. But short of crossing the Carpathians into Emeric's territory, or maybe taking a ship on the Black Sea we will be stuck there.

"Well . . . I have a feeling that Benito and his fleet will be here in the Black Sea long before next summer."

"So we wait for that young jackanapes to bail us out again?" said Manfred with a grin. "Squire Crazykid. We're supposed to be getting information to him, not being rescued by him."

"I have a feeling he won't mind," said Erik, wryly. "But it may not come to that. The Danube curves northeast, as I recall. We may be able to cross it, quietly, in secure territory."

Bortai who had been concentrating intensely on the conversation—she had a accumulated a few words of Frankish, but not that much, asked Erik what they were saying. Erik explained.

"The war-shaman," she pointed at Manfred. "He that important to your people?"

"War-Shaman? I don't quite understand that word. He is . . . the third most important man in the Holy Roman Empire. We would not have let him come if we had thought the Mongol would not honor their reputation for the treatment of Emissaries. The tarkhan promised to arrange for him to speak with the new Khan."

Bortai looked at Manfred in some surprise. "Oh. I . . . did not understand. You are not mercenaries?"

"What does the last word mean?"

"Warriors who are paid to fight."

"Mercenaries." Despite the situation Erik had to laugh. And despite his anger, Tulkun nearly fell apart laughing. Of course Manfred wanted to know what about.

"She thought that we were mercenaries."

"I had wondered why a mercenary company was given a writ of safe conduct," she said, beginning to smile. "You must accompany us to the Hawk clan in lands of White Horde."

That was practically an order, Erik realized, coming from the sturdy but beautiful young woman. Despite her worn and plain clothes, she was anything but bashful and self-effacing. "And now I understand why you did not just want bloody vengeance for this betrayal. I thought maybe you were a coward. We must break out of here."

Which was what Erik had intended all along. He was surprised that it stung a little to know that she'd thought him a coward; after all, what should it matter what she thought? He nodded to her, keeping his feelings to himself. "Best to get David and your brother ready," was all that he said. "We need to organize. We'll have to abandon our pack-train, and clear their guards and organize a distraction. Tulkun—do you ride with us?"

The Ilkhan bodyguard nodded.

* * *

"The party appears to have started out there," said Erik quietly to Kari. "Now you're not to kill anyone. Not unless it is them or you."

"They may see it that way," said Kari, cheerfully embracing the excuse.

"And I may not." said Erik, grimly. "Always remember that I am more dangerous than they are. At the moment . . . we're still technically an envoy's escort, not at war with anyone, protected by these blue flags. Once they attack us, or we are out of here, out of this camp, with no more blue pennants on our lances, things are different."

They crept quietly forward. The greatest danger that Erik could see was that Mongol in the siege tower might be alerted by their horses, tethered near the open doorway of the tower. They were dependent on Ion having done his work. The man had taken some Kvass—a gift, apparently—to the five men in the tower. He had found one asleep . . . and the others glad to have the Kvass on a rapidly chilling night. They were dicing, a common enough pastime among bored soldiery. Also quite an absorbing pastime. Their attention, such as it was, was focussed on the still, broad moonlit ribbon of river. Not on someone leaving, pulling up a picket-pin. The horses probably would not go far. But they would enjoy a little unaccustomed freedom to wander and find a bit of newer grass.

Erik had a squad of Knights in reserve, but knights had no skill in moving like thieves through the night. Kari was even better at that than he was. They'd dealt with the perimeter guard without any trouble.

They edged closer. Sure enough, the horses had wandered away. And the men in the tower sounded very cheerful over their game. Erik and Kari waited. As luck would have it two of them came down from the upper level to let the grass share some secondhand Kvass. Erik and Kari were waiting as the first man stared in irritation at where the missing horses should have been. You could rely on a Mongol to notice that first. Next thing Erik and Kari had them from behind. The warrior had barely time to grunt before a knight came out of the darkness and helped Erik to gag and tie him. Von Taub, Erik noted, had helped Kari with his victim with a mailed fist. It was very effective. Bortai would not be talking to him for a while. "They wrestle better than I thought," muttered Kari.

"It's a Mongol sport," said Erik quietly.

"Among my mother's people too," said Kari. "I thought I was good at it."

"Even their women do here, apparently," said Erik. "Anyway. Let's get on with it," Erik pointed at the dark doorway. "You two—Von Taub, Wellmanns. Come and add a bit more weight. The rest watch the door. No-one gets away."

They went in. Erik realized that it would be less simple than he had thought. Access to the decking where the siege weapons were mounted—and the dice-players played—was a single, long ladder. Easy to defend, easy for those at the top to cry warning to half the camp. Well, there was nothing for it but to climb. It was not a ladder you could sneak up either. It creaked.

But of course those above were expecting their companions to return. Erik took the last rungs at a rush.

Basically, it was going to be one against three . . . And he didn't want to kill them. That Bortai and Tulkun had agreed on implicitly: they were technically still under the truce flag. The Mongol—Golden Horde and Ilkhan—the old red Horde, Erik gathered—held strongly to the concept of the moral high ground. If came to negotiations and recriminations—a knock on the head could be forgiven. The one who killed first, not so easily.

Erik dived up through the trapdoor and took the legs out from under a warrior who was just walking toward it. Maybe it was the sound of the armored men below. Something had stirred the fellow. Kari was up before the second yell or the two others had time to come their companion's aid. The one, poor fellow, had just woken up. Wellmanns was just in time up to stop a knife-thrust to Kari's kidneys with the intervention of steel armor. The sleeper had been rendered comatose again. The other two . . . well, one had learned not to bite steel-clad fingers. The other still had his teeth, and a gag. There had been some noise . . . but the camp was fairly noisy anyway. It was sounding increasingly like a stirred up beehive, Erik thought. They passed the prisoners down, and waited in case anyone came to investigate the noise from the seige tower.

No one did. So Erik sent Kari to fetch the bombardier and his barrels of powder. The knights set to moving and resetting the siege weapons. They weren't trying for precision, just effect. In fact, the less precise, the better—it was paramount that no one end up dead tonight. Shortly they were hauling several small barrels upwards.

The bombardier was delighted with the trebuchet. Soon they were winding a long, long careful fuse around the perimeter of the tower. The arbalests were ready with some bolts set with naphtha soaked rags from a container the guards had kept for attacking the sails of barges. The bombardier had added a grenade to each, tied in place with thongs. The arbalests were aimed into the inoffensive night sky to the west. More cords and fuses were set hastily in place. Finally the main fuse was lit and they scrambled down the ladder—taking it outside with them, before heading back at a brisk trot for the camp.

Inside the circle of felt gers the horses were ready. Harnesses jangled. Armor clanked. Fortunately there were no Mongol guards watching the perimeter. They were watching the inside of the tarkhan's ger instead, tied and gagged.

Now all they had to do was wait. Watch the silhouette of the tower in the darkness. And hope the fuse burned down faster than the fuse of the Mongol in the camp. You could almost hear rumor and affront doing the rounds out there.

Someone out in the camp flung a burning torch from the darkness and noise of the camp. It bounced off the felt and landed still burning in among the horses. Kari dismounted and kicked it out. "I reckon it's started without our tower," he said.

"Just some troublemaker," said Von Gherens, looking pointedly at Kari. "You always get one."

"I hope you're right. When trouble comes, it'll come mounted. I'd prefer it if they still had to get to that point," said Kari. "They ride well."

It appeared that Von Gherens was right. There was no follow up on the torch. Instead . . . maybe five hundred heartbeats later, Erik spotted a fire on the top of the siege tower. That was as should be. Quite a good fire, by the looks of it.

Erik looked at grizzled bombardier. Even in the moonlight he could see the powder-burn marks on the fellow's face. "Count of five, Ritter Hakkonsen," he said serenely.

Erik checked the situation hastily. Everyone was mounted. Everyone was waiting. Ropes tied and ready, to pull down the ger blocking their way to the nearest through-path, through the encampment of felt tents. Horses nervous. They caught the excitement and fear from their riders. The boy David and young Kildai—making it look as if he were seeing double on one steed. Bortai and Tulkun close beside them. Erik could only hope her clan would be pleased to see them back, and that she saw things the same way its leaders would.

He signaled to the two with the ropes on the ger. "Now." It fell. "Lead out," he yelled, trusting the bombardier. They wanted to be moving when it all happened.

Somewhere in the distance a horn sounded, as, eight abreast, the knights rode up the low berm and into the main camp.

And off to the south a tower burned, and, suddenly, fire streaked into the sky. High up the grenades exploded in little flares of abrupt brightness. There was a sudden, startled silence from the noisy encampment. The knights rode warhorses and no horse likes fire or explosions, but these had been exposed and hardened to such things. They cantered on, calmly, moving forward as if this was what they should be doing. The knights had direction and purpose . . . which was more than the camp had. Now there was pandemonium breaking loose, the sounds of horns and yelling. And in the midst of it the trebuchet launched its little vat of black powder, to explode, thunderously and with a magnificent flare off to the west. At a steady trot the knights moved toward the outer northern perimeter, passing through a mill of men and horses—who were mostly heading west.

Erik was beginning to wonder if they might just, possibly, get away without even a challenge, when a squad of horsemen came riding toward them.

They could even see the outer felt tents of the encampment. Thinking about it, it was quite logical. Besides sentries, such a war-camp would have substantial patrols on horse
outside
the camp. The Mongol did not fight the way that settled people did. This was not a society that relied on the security of walls; instead they relied on the mobility of their horses. Every man in the camp was trying to get mounted. Some, outside the camp, had been patrolling and were sober and fully ready. And unless Erik was very much mistaken those horn-calls told the entire camp that beside the possible Hungarian bombardment and attack from the river, the foreigners were out of their encampment and on the loose. Erik only hoped the order to 'stop them at all costs' had not been given.

By the reaction of the patrol, it had. An arrow sang off armor, and the patrol—at least two Arban strong—had their lances out and were charging. They were very brave, very disciplined and very fast—and also very, very stupid. The horse-path between the gers was wide enough—in close formation—for ten horses. If they'd let the knights get out into the open, they'd have had all the space they needed for their famous charge, divide and retreat firing backwards technique. Here they had no space, and they had also misjudged the pace and potential acceleration of the big horses in the moonlight. The knights' column of eight nearly filled the horse-path. And then one of the knights peeled out of his saddle, an unlucky arrow finding a chink in his armor, on the edge of the gorget. "Charge!" yelled Manfred, beating the others, barely, to the order. The big horses, already moving at a fair pace did not have to accelerate from a standstill. They were a solid avalanche of armored horse-flesh and armed with longer lances than the Mongol carried.

* * *

From the middle-back of the column David felt as if he was somehow stuck on a run-away cart on a very steep incline. And what was worse his co-rider was urging their horse to go faster. There was a brief clash, but the column did not even slow down. Looking down, he thought he saw a man under the hooves as they burst out of the edge of the encampment and away onto to the steppe. The land around the camp had been denuded of trees. It was far too open for a boy from Jerusalem who just wanted to hide. Preferably in a nice alley. Ideally in Jerusalem. But anywhere would do.