Prisoner of the Horned Helmet (10 page)

At the south end of the village, Cytherian warriors, who had been hiding in the village, now came forward and began to butcher the blinded, scalded, brightly stained Skull soldiers.

The two commanders, the priest, and a group of Skull soldiers were racing down a footpath. Reaching Market Square, the two commanders helped the priest onto the supply wagon, and the driver took off toward Weaver Pass with five mounted escorts. The commanders then led their men toward the sounds of battle at the southern side of the village. By the time they reached the area, the Cytherians had vanished and the scalded, stained soldiers were all dead.

Gath growled with satisfaction, then dragged Robin back through the ranks of colored cloth to the north edge of the Heights, and they looked down at the village and forest beyond. The smell of blood and steam hung heavily over Weaver. Below, to their left, beyond tiers crowded with alleys and buildings, they saw an open yard at ground level. At the far side of the yard footpaths angled through low buildings to the tall Forest Gate. Gath pulled Robin down off the Heights, then into the tangled alleys heading toward the open yard.

FIGHT AT WAGON YARD

A
t the intersection of two alleys, Gath and Robin stopped. The alleys appeared deserted. One descended through shadows to ground level, then twisted toward the open yard. The other came from the direction of Market Square. Through it they could see dust swirling above the southern side of Weaver where it met the bridges.

He led her quickly across the open intersection and down through the shadowed alley to the edge of the open yard. There they stopped again, still concealed in the shadows.

The irregular oval of the open area was filled with sunshine and the familiar odors of warm dirt and straw. Stables and stalls surrounded the yard. At the opposite side of the yard two footpaths angled through the low buildings toward the high Forest Gate beyond. The stalls and stables were empty of everything but shadows. The dusty ground was cluttered with straw, stacks of buckets and several unharnessed wagons.

Gath started forward, but paused at the sound of iron tinkling against a metal bucket somewhere. It made Robin shudder, but to him it was a strangely pleasing sound, as if belonging to another time and world, like tiny silver bells tied to a child’s ankles so he cannot get lost.

Gath pushed Robin back up the alley a stride, and held her against the wall listening. The sound of the bells was replaced by the distant snorting and stomping of the retreating Kitzakk soldiers and the faint unintelligible chatter of their voices.

Gath’s body heat became so intense it made Robin’s cheeks flush, and she cringed. When he turned to her, she gulped. His eyes held no more warmth than a tomb. His cheeks were dark pulsing hollows. Black vertical gouges cut into them, drawing the corners of his lips down low.

He found a side door nearby. He opened it quietly, peered inside, and pulled her in closing the door behind them.

They stood in a small, dirt-floored room with saddles, tack and blankets hanging from the log walls. Crossing it, they moved through a doorway into an empty stable. Its roof was low, forming a hayloft above. Shadows filled it. The front doors were open, letting light from the sun-filled yard partway in. Staying in the shadows, Gath crossed to a ladder lying on the ground below an opening into the loft. He drew Robin close, pointed up at the loft. Avoiding his eyes, she nodded docilely. He leaned his axe against the wall, raised her over his head, gave her a slight toss, and she landed on the hay in the loft. He picked up the ladder, handed it up to her, and she looked down at him.

An unnatural battle hunger glittered in his eyes, and his breathing was like a starved panther cat’s. But, as she took the ladder, his hand embraced hers with a gentle but firm reassurance.

He picked up his axe, crossed the stable and the small tack room, and moved back into the alley. There he looked out into the sun-filled wagon yard and waited.

What came was the strange pleasant tinkle of metal brushed by the wind. This time Gath knew where the faint, mysterious music originated. From somewhere in the yard where there was nothing but dust and sunshine.

The first thing that informed Gath that there was indeed someone else in the area was the scent of a hardy male body odor. His nostrils wrinkled at the scent, and his eyes widened with another mystery. He recognized the smell. It was his own.

The hair on his neck stiffened. Then the world of silence, blinding light and bloody sky again consumed him. It filled the open yard. He snarled silently, feeling his blood gorge through his arms and thighs.

He shortened his grip on his axe, and marched deliberately out into the sunshine to the heart of the magic world, stopped, and the real world returned. The yard was empty. But he was on killing ground. He knew it. Every tissue in his body wanted it.

He glanced about the emptiness, body cocked and eyes wary, and peered into the shade of a covered stall. Two vague silhouettes of figures were crouched just beyond a shaft of sunshine spilling through a crack in the roof. Slowly they stood, to become two massive figures which turned toward Gath, as if he had called out to them. The spill of sunshine caught their shoulders, made one burn bright red while the other glittered as if made of coin silver. The rest was shadows.

They picked large objects off the ground, then moved out of the stall into the sunshine. They carried axe and sword. The two commanders.

One was short and thick, big jawed, and wore a red helmet with a cagelike mask of steel bars. The other was close to two hundred and fifty pounds of trouble, not counting his full-length suit of chain mail which undoubtably outweighed most men.

The two commanders looked at Gath almost with pleasure, as if he had come to polish their metal. But there was no amusement in their weapons, or the steel studs which decorated their knuckles. As if they had a single mind, each put a foot on the top rail of the stall, pushed it over slowly and stepped into the yard.

Gath moved for them, and they separated. Gath kept moving, got between them, and charged the steel suit. He blocked the giant’s sword with his axe and jabbed him with the butt end driving him back. Using his momentum, Gath pivoted and swung an arching blow at the red helmet. But Red Helmet’s axe deflected Gath’s blow, momentarily bringing him to a stop. Gath bolted sideways, but not before the tip of Steel Suit’s sword had buried itself in the meat of his left shoulder.

Gath reeled with pain, then suddenly stepped in again bringing his axe around in a backhand blow aimed at Red Helmet. The blade landed with a terrific clang flush on the steel cage, drove the owner fifteen feet back, and left Gath’s axe vibrating in his hands. The center of its cutting edge was caved in leaving a wide half-moon-shaped gap.

Gath snarled and backed up to a wall. Blood ran down the back of his arm, and dripped off his wrist in measured beats.

Red Helmet had recovered, was moving for him. The sunshine made a slight new scratch across the steel bars of his cagelike mask glitter.

Steel Suit was also advancing with a heavy plotted pace, holding his sword in two hands in front of him. He tilted it so that the blade caught the overhead sunshine and reflected it.

The bright bar of light caught Gath in the eyes, blinded him briefly. When his vision returned, both champions were bearing down on him, weapons raised over their heads. He stepped in under the blow of the sword, deflected Red Helmet’s axe with his own and again drove Steel Suit back with the butt end. Butting Red Helmet in the chest with his head, he spun and drove a shoulder into the wooden wall of a stable, splintering it, and fell through the hole into the darkness beyond.

The two commanders shared an annoyed glance and moved for the hole, but stopped short as Gath emerged from the adjacent stable. His left arm now carried an old circular wooden shield belted with iron bars. The Kitzakks grinned, then moved for him hard, weapons working.

Gath caught their blows on his shield with his arm slightly relaxed. This softened and deflected them, but the blades bit chunks out of the wood while their impact drove him backwards, allowing no counterblow.

Without breaking stride, they rained blows on him from right and left, gave him no time to do anything but block, duck, and bleed. Finally Gath’s back slammed into a wooden stable wall. He worked there awhile, blocking blows as the wall rubbed his shoulder blades and elbows raw, stitched his flesh with splinters.

Methodically Red Helmet trimmed Gath’s shield down until half the wood was gone and the iron belts looked like chewed meat. Steel Suit, with a malignant grin, let his mammoth sword play with Gath’s axe head. His blows mangled the blade and sent reverberations up, the shaft, through the Barbarian’s grip and into his arm and shoulder. Numbness spread back down his arm and into Gath’s grip. Sensing this, Steel Suit discarded his grin and struck Gath’s axe where the head joined the handle, ripping it out of the Barbarian’s numbed grip.

The huge Kitzakk chuckled huskily, shifted his weight and brought his sword blade down at Gath’s unguarded right side. Gath let it come, then squatted in place. Steel Suit’s sword sliced into the wooden wall behind him and came to a sudden shattering stop inches from the Barbarian’s hair.

Gath charged forward, drove his head into the huge man’s gut and knocked him to the ground. He kept driving, stepped on the Kitzakk’s thigh and chest, then tripped and fell into the middle of the yard.

Red Helmet leapt over his fallen comrade and raised his axe, but Gath rolled onto his back, threw dirt in his face. The Kitzakk was not blinded long. Seeing the metal of the Barbarian’s shield through the dust, he brought his axe down on it. The blade sank into the shield, split it, then buried itself deep in whatever was under it. Red Helmet almost laughed but snarled angrily instead as his vision cleared. His axe was buried to the haft in dirt.

Gath was now five strides off, backing away in a low crouch, eyes moving from one commander to the other. His dagger was in his hand.

While Red Helmet tried to remove the remnant of Gath’s shield from his axe, Steel Suit ripped his sword free, then backed Gath up to a shallow door. There the huge glittering man laughed out loud and began to play more seriously with his victim. He hammered the dagger from Gath’s hand, kicked him in the chest spinning him around. Then, deliberately using the flat of his blade, he struck him across the back driving him face first into the door and laughed again.

Gath, stunned, hung against the door supporting himself on the latch handle. The impact of the huge Kitzakk’s blow had popped the leather thongs holding his armor in place. It dripped off him like old flesh and fell to the ground. Steel Suit spit a rope of blood, and, without a trace of play in his small eyes, raised his sword over his head with both hands.

His sword blade glittered in the sunlight, slashed down. At the last moment Gath reeled backward, opening the door and bringing it with him. The sword cut into the top of the wooden door and did not stop until it had cleaved it in two.

Gath, finding half of a door in his hand, swung it at the mass of glittering steel. The door caught the Kitzakk flush from the base of his skull to the base of his spine and drove him back into the yard, mouth spread wide, gasping for breath. It did not come. Steel Suit dropped his sword and grabbed for his throat. This also did not help. He hit the ground hard, shuddering and heaving.

Gath, gasping and crusted with dust, splinters and blood, gathered up the Kitzakk’s sword in two hands and turned on Red Helmet as the short, thick Kitzakk commander finally ripped his axe free of the remnant of Gath’s shield.

Gath and Red Helmet, two-handing their weapons, moved for each other. Their weapons met with a resounding clang, then kept on meeting until they were more than well acquainted. Then the Kitzakk got in low and scooped out a cup of flesh from Gath’s side. Gath replied by bringing the sword around in an arc and caught the Kitzakk flush on the mask of his helmet. The helmet did not give, but the man inside did. A little. He dropped his axe and staggered back in a low crouch fighting for balance. He caught it about fifteen feet off, then started back for the axe he had left behind.

Gath’s eyes were thin slices of disbelief. The blow should not only have pulped the Kitzakk’s helmet, but his head. Instead, it had only exhausted Gath. He staggered over the fallen axe blocking the Kitzakk’s path. Red Helmet kept coming. His march was unsteady but relentless. He kept his head low. When Gath swung his sword, the Kitzakk deliberately fed the blade his red helmet. The blow drove the Kitzakk back five feet, but he kept his feet and started forward again. Gath growled low in his throat and struck again. In this manner he drove the Kitzakk around the yard, hammering the defiant red helmet. Ropes of blood erupted from the cagelike mask with each blow. Spider trails leaked from the neck rim, trailed down the commander’s armor, turning its dull red color bright.

When it appeared that the Kitzakk carried more of his blood outside his flesh than inside, Gath sagged back gasping and dripping sweat. Mindlessly, Red Helmet charged without a weapon. Gath let him come, then lifted the sword, and the Kitzakk ran himself onto the point of the blade. The blade cut through his gut, drove in hard, jammed itself into the corner of the pelvic bone.

Glaring at Gath from behind the caged mask of his helmet, the Kitzakk staggered back. His weight ripped the sword out of Gath’s hands, and he went over on his back with the sword sticking upright like a steel flag. Blood puddled under him. Struggling, Red Helmet unlaced his helmet, pushed it aside, then attempted to rise but only managed to twitch.

Gath squatted and leaned back against the wall gasping. He looked about for something to staunch his wounds, and through half-closed eyes saw Steel Suit rise off the ground slowly and uncertainly, as if he had never done it before. Gath was stunned. So was the Kitzakk; one eye was filled with blood, the other blinked. When it found Gath, the huge man cursed foully and staggered toward him.

Gath drew a deep breath, erupted off the ground, caught the giant around the gut and drove him back into the side of a parked wagon. The side board splintered and they fell half onto the bed, grappling without much effect. Then the Kitzakk’s hands found Gath’s neck, began to throttle him. In desperation, Gath buried his fingers in the first things that came to hand, Steel Suit’s wrist and armpit. But they were of little help. Gath could not breathe. His mind grew dark, then again swam with the blood red world of howling death, and a terrorized surge of strength went through him. He spun in place swinging the huge Kitzakk around in the air, then, with an animal roar, threw him across the yard. Steel Suit hit the ground with a clang, rolled over, and came to a limp stop.

A moment passed before Gath realized he had not let go of Steel Suit’s left arm. It dangled from his right hand by the wrist. Gath lifted it uncertainly, then discarded it like an apple core.