The Black Beast (14 page)

The journey from Ky-Nule to the Epona took several days. I sent scouts ahead when we came near the bridge, and my heart sank at their report. Four troops held the Epona.

“Guron must have joined them,” Frain said.

“They will try to take us soon, if they have any sense,” growled Tirell. “They have their scouts, too, and they know we are here. Already the others will be hurrying down from the Varro to cut us off from behind.”

“Then let us hurry on up to cross by the Varro,” I suggested, only half joking.

Tirell eyed me sourly. “Is the Elsans shallow farther south, my lord Fabron?” Frain asked. “We could walk across.”

And Tirell was supposed to be the madman! I gaped at my son; there was that blithe daring of his again! I had never heard of a freeman setting foot in a river. The streams cut through Vale like so many knife strokes, passable only by the few bridges that curved high above them. Lives had been spent in the making of those bridges. Lives had to be spent even for the digging of a well, in sacrifice to the goddess and the flood beneath. There was a power in water. Even the shallowest stream could grow fingers that would pull a man down into oblivion. No one would name those boneless hands.

“You've been daft ever since you let that sneaking lake touch you,” Tirell growled at Frain.

“The Elsans runs deep and swift,” I stammered. “There is a legend—”

“Yes, yes, every river has a legend,” Frain interrupted impatiently. “What of it? You have ridden through Acheron, Tirell.”

“To my dismay.”

“Why? You have found us powerful allies. How can we come to harm when the lady is with us?”

“No!” Tirell flared. “I need no help from any slut. We will take these Boda now, before they have had time to prepare for us.”

“They have had
weeks
to prepare for us,” Frain protested.

Still, we really had no choice, or at least I thought we did not. We formed line of battle at the top of the rise. As you might know, they were expecting us. Some stood ranked on the bridge itself and some mounted before it. I counted more than fifty men.

“If those on the bridge stay there,” Tirell told the troops, “we shall not have to fight them all at once. Use the force of your charge to unhorse as many as you can. Ready!”

Indeed they were ready, not because of his words but because of the blue fire in his eyes. He was taut with leashed fury at the sight of those red tunics below; yet his every move was like a cat's for grace and control. My men sat straight on their horses, looking as soldierly as I had ever seen them. Then Tirell shouted—roared—and we all thundered down toward the river.

Tirell and Frain broke through almost to the bridge. I believe they could have fought their way over and been gone if they had cared to leave the rest of us. But they set themselves to back and side in the midst of the press and fought foes at every hand. Frain fought splendidly. I was not born to the sword, myself—my people joke that I use it like a hammer—but I know a swordsman when I see one. Tirell was no swordsman, but more like a reaper at harvest. He had a great iron blade that bit into everything for a lance's length around him. Boda screamed to escape him.

The battle is all bits and pieces in my memory; they always are. We seemed to do well at first, but then it became harder. I remember Frain bearing a man down, then turning his sword and stunning the fellow with the hilt—it was Guron. Tirell shouted constantly, cursing Abas and all his adherents. Once he bellowed, “Fabron!” and lunged to my side; someone was coming at me from behind. The Boda had outflanked my end of the field and had us surrounded. Tirell and Frain positioned themselves by me, fighting off foes all around, and Tirell cracked out a curse that made me shudder, swore by the blood bird, his own dying soul.… Then the man I was facing screamed and fled. I almost did the same. The black beast had joined the battle.

Not many of the Boda cared to withstand the force of jet-black, pawing hooves, a stabbing horn and vast, beating, thunderous wings. But even more than its power, I think, the sheer strangeness of the beast unnerved them. Another strange thing was happening as well: from time to time the river Elsans would reach out with a soft, uncanny grip and pull a man in. Six Boda were swept down the swift current, screaming, and the others fought desperately to get away from the brink. My men cheered and pressed them back.

“The bridge!” Tirell roared.

He leaped his horse onto the stones of the arch. Frain and I flanked his sides; there was no room for more than three abreast. The dozen or so men who held the bridge shrank back. They had been watching their comrades bleed for some little time by then, and that is enough to give anyone second thoughts. In the first rank stood an officer. He faced us pluckily and went over the stone railing with Tirell's first blow. Two more went more painfully, and then the rest broke and ran, all nine of them, into Selt.

Behind us, the battle was over. Shamarra joined us, picking her way down the hill on her white mare. “Well fought, Prince!” she called to Tirell, her eyes sparkling.

“Were you meddling with the river?” Tirell demanded.

“I have some small power over water,” she answered coyly.

He snorted and turned away without a word. I set to gathering my men, and in a few moments I could have wept. Only a dozen were left, and some of those were too badly wounded to ride. Tirell stood checking his black horse and the black beast, running his hands over their limbs. Frain was sitting his horse rather stupidly, looking at Shamarra. But he shook himself out of his trance and came to me before I had to call him.

“Are you all right?” he asked me.

“Well enough.” I had taken a few cuts, but those of us who had been under the special protection of Tirell's iron sword had gotten off lightly. Three of my men lay groaning. “Frain,” I asked, “can you help those fellows?”

He knelt, took his iron dagger, and passed his hands across them. No human healer can return the hurt instantly to health, but everyone who watched could see how their pain lessened, their bleeding stopped, their hope and strength increased. My men glanced at each other in wonder. Two of them stood with hacked and useless arms. Frain touched them also, then turned to his brother. “Are you all right?” he called softly.

“I am,” came the curt reply, “and the beast also. We had better be riding.”

I left one man who was well with the five who were hurt, to catch horses for them and help them back to Ky-Nule. The other six prepared to come with us.

“This is a paltry force, my prince,” I mourned.

“No help for it,” Tirell said brusquely. “It would be well, perhaps, to slit the throats of these Boda. Some of them may yet live to trouble us.”

“No!” said Frain sharply before anyone could move. He and his brother matched stares for a moment, and then Tirell turned away, expressionless.

“Very well,” he said. “Let us ride.”

We clattered across the blood-splattered stones of the bridge and into Selt. Shamarra went readily, not seeming to mind the gore, close behind the princes. The beast snorted at the bridge and then lunged across.

We rode for the rest of that day and well into the night, constantly mindful of the nine Boda who were roaming somewhere about; we wondered if they would join with more. We knew we must make our way to Sethym's court city of Gyotte as quickly and secretly as we could. I kept a watchful eye on Frain, for healing saps the innermost strength. He rode stubbornly, his eyes vague and glazed with weariness. By moonrise he was ready to fall from his horse. Though I did not like to speak before the men, I called to Tirell.

“Have a care for Prince Frain, my lord. He is spent. We had better stop and let him rest.”

“Healing is wearier work than battle,” came Shamarra's clear voice across the night. “It is all giving, no taking of prizes.”

Tirell did not reply to either of us. He merely got down from his own horse and got up behind Frain on his, taking the reins from his brother's limp hands. I led the black, and we went on.

“There's one vow broken!” Shamarra cried happily, with her rippling laugh. “I thought you were never to mount any horse except a black!”

“I may break more vows before I am done,” Tirell retorted grimly. “But in the night all horses are black, lady, and every queen a whore. Remember that.”

We rode in silence. In the frosty light of a half moon I could see Frain's head nod back to rest against his brother's neck.

In the morning Tirell went back to his black. For the next few days we all rode in a close group, for I did not have enough men to scout for us, and we breathed in fear of the Boda. Shamarra and the black beast no longer gamboled off to one side. I could see that Frain was tormented by the lady's closeness. I worried about him, for he had not had enough rest to restore his strength, and I wondered if he could defend himself. But when he took leave of the van and dropped back to the rear of our little cavalcade I could not deny him, even if it had been my place to do so. He rode beside the black beast, and my men felt easier for his presence; the creature made them shudder.

Gyotte is a hilltop fortress with two great painted eyes staring from its gates, ever watchful for approaching enemies. After three long days of riding we had it in sight, stare and all. The sun dipped low as we toiled up the stony road to the gates.

The Boda came at us from behind, out of the shadow of trees and the glare of the opposing hill. We all swung around with startled shouts at the sound of their clattering charge. But they closed with us almost before we could draw weapons. The force of their attack was lessened by the slope, praise be, but Frain bore the brunt of it. He put up his sword and fought—if I had not seen him fight so splendidly a few days before, I would have said he fought well. The black beast interceded for him fiercely, and Tirell surged to his side, cursing and pushing my men out of his way. We were hard beset. It was a full troop of Boda, nearly a score, and they had us on three sides. Only the height of the cobbled road helped us withstand them. Tirell raged and foamed and fought like—like a very madman. But even so he had the sense to see that we must not be surrounded. The lady Shamarra had galloped the small distance to Gyotte and was pounding on the gates. We followed her, carefully retreating, fighting all the way, and set our backs to the wall with the lady in our midst. I fought with sweat and blood running into my eyes, and I could hear Tirell all the time, roaring and snarling like a great cat. I could not look for Frain. After a hazy time I began to realize that I might never see him again, and a squeezing fear turned my stomach against me. I felt old and doomed, and the Boda seemed as many as ever.

I did not understand when Tirell shouted the retreat. I had nowhere to retreat to, backed up against the wall of Gyotte. But then his long iron sword cleared away the foes that faced me and his hard hand propelled me toward the gates. The gates! Sethym had opened Gyotte to us, and a swarm of his retainers poured out; he wanted to make sure no Boda lived to bring Abas's vengeance down on him.

I found Frain within the courtyard, resting his head on his horse's mane, deathly pale and making the red steed's neck redder than it had any right to be. Shamarra stood beside him, and then she turned to me with real sorrow on her face; I am sure of it. Tirell had me by the elbow. The gates clanged behind him. We were safe. But I stood watching Frain bleed onto his horse, and I suppose I must have fainted.

Chapter Four

I awoke in a kind of sickchamber, much later. Frain was sitting beside me with his auburn hair curling over a bandage and his face still too pale for comfort beneath. Tears came to my eyes as I reached out to him.

“By Aftalun, lad, I feared you were dead!”

“It was close for all of us.” He took my hand absently. “Some did not live. Your men, I mean. They all died of wounds, within or without the walls. I could not help them.” He tried to speak collectedly, but pain tightened his face, and I loved him for it. Some kings spend soldiers like coin, but we had eaten and ridden with mine; they were comrades to us.

“We only lived who were under the protection of Tirell's long sword,” I murmured.

With a slam of the door, Tirell strode in as if he had heard his name. One hand was bandaged, but otherwise he looked whole and as irascible as ever. “Get in bed!” he barked at Frain. “Blood of Eala, brother, he'll mend without your help.”

“No fear,” Frain replied. “I don't have strength to lift a finger on his behalf.” He stayed where he was.

“See that you don't!” Tirell scoffed stormily. He turned to me. “My lord Fabron, if you are feeling well enough, would you please tell me: what manner of fool is this Sethym?”

I had to smile. Sethym was rather a fool. He was a good neighbor for all that, though we skirmished from time to time just to keep our men mettlesome and ourselves respectful.

“A ceremonious fool,” I said. “He lives for ritual. He cloisters his men before a battle, and he will not eat anything red—he says that is the food of the gods. He claims that a fate is laid on him that he may not eat the meat of a rabbit, lest he die. The sight of a white rabbit or a white bird would kill him. He scarcely ever goes out, for fear of seeing rabbits or omens. He devoutly worships the goddess, and he pays mighty tribute to the Sacred Kings.”

“I thought so,” Tirell growled. “He and Shamarra are two of a kind. He has a sort of den here, a temple of the goddess, barred to men on pain of death. Maidens on the rugs, fancywork on the walls. She is housed there, looking down her long beak like a proper bird of prey. Sethym loves me because I am wearing a torque.” Tirell paced the room in quiet fury as he talked. “He would be delighted to see Abas slain, but he wants him to go to the altar. I had not thought to give that satisfaction to the priestesses.”

“Have you thought,” Frain asked in a low voice, “that it may not be well to be a parricide? I cherish no fondness for the priestesses, but I believe their hands are better suited to such blood than yours.”