The Shaman (31 page)

A
scattered flight of arrows shot straight toward the Vanyar, and the barbarians
snapped their shields up to catch them. Points thudded into leather and wood,
and the Vanyar let out a shout of vindication and contempt—which changed to
shrieks of horrified surprise as more arrows rained down upon them. Most who
had not already fallen had the presence of mind to pull their shields up
overhead. The others simply turned and charged back into their own lines, and
the horde churned into chaos.

“Well
done, half-elf!” Riri crowed, and a cheer went up all along the wall.

Even
now, the spark of outrage flared in Lucoyo, to be called “half-elf”—but he
realized that Riri had not meant it as an insult and turned to grin at the
lamed fisherman. “It will not work a second time,” he cautioned, “at least, if
they are as smart as they are ferocious.”

And
the Vanyar were proving their ferocity, for they charged again with a low, ugly
roar. The front line bore its shields before them, and the men behind held them
overhead.

“Smart
indeed!” Lucoyo snapped. “Shoot for their feet!”

Bows
thrummed along the wall, and Vanyar fell rolling—but their mates, prepared for
this, leaped over them and came on, lowering their shields. Fallen men
scrambled out of the way, trying to regain their footing; some of them
succeeded.

“Shoot
their feet, too!” Lucoyo cried, but he knew his part of the battle was almost
done, for the human wave was rolling closer and closer. Bows thrummed,
arrowheads bit ankles and shins, Vanyar fell—but more came on.

Still,
the warriors who hit the wall were far fewer in number than they had been.

“Archers
back!” Ohaern roared. “Pikemen to the fore!”

The
archers leaped down off the ramparts, and the spearmen scrambled into their
places. Those spears were long—eight feet long—and they stabbed downward as the
Vanyar clambered atop one another’s shoulders, forming a human ladder in an
attempt to scale the twelve-foot wall. That only required three men, the third
leaping over—but even as that third man scrambled up, an eight-foot pike
stabbed the second man. All down the line the second man fell back with a cry
choked by blood, and the third toppled with him. Here and there the third man
came up fast enough so that the spear struck down into him; even more rarely,
the third man brought his shield up in time to ward off the spear point, and
managed to leap over the wall. The spearman stepped aside, and an arrow struck
into the Vanyar’s chest. Even then the barbarian warriors kept fighting, hewing
about them with their swords as Death pressed its cuneiform into their faces,
until they finally fell from the parapet, where other spears transfixed the
dead bodies through the chest, just to be sure.

Here
and there spears broke; here and there the barbarians were just a little too
quick, and the spearmen died, their chests ripped open, falling from the
parapet, their bodies striking hard against the invaders, knocking them askew
even in death. Their wives caught up their fallen spears, shrieking in grief
and rage, and struck downward again and again, until sword points took them and
they died with one last stroke.

Then,
suddenly, the fight was done. The Vanyar were retreating—not running, but
pulling back, gathering up their wounded as they went, driving their chariots
forward to take away the bodies of their dead. Slowly, their lines moved away,
with much shaking of swords and shouting of curses, calling down the wrath of
Ulahane on the heads of the people of Cashalo—but move away they did.

The
defenders stared, scarcely believing their eyes. Then a huge cheer erupted,
tearing along the wall until the whole city seemed to be howling with joy and
victory. The Vanyar heard and raised their swords, answering with a shout of
murderous rage.

“They
threaten that they shall yet capture the city,” Riri translated.

“I
do not doubt it,” Lucoyo said grimly, “and I fear they may be right.”

“If
they come again, we shall slay them again!” one of the Cashalo traders said,
grinning.

“Will
you indeed?” Lucoyo turned to him. “Are you willing to pay the price?”

The
trader frowned. “What price is that?”

“Constant
drill,” Lucoyo answered, “constant training in the weapons of war—and not just
bows and spears, but
all
the weapons of war—slings and swords and
shields and axes. Constant, and early—raising your sons in the Way of the
Warrior from their earliest days, aye, and your daughters, too! Their earliest
toys must be wooden swords, their earliest games mock battles. Will you pay
that price, peaceful trader?”

The
man stared at him, appalled. Then his face hardened, and he said, “Aye—for must
we not? We have no choice.”

“Oh,
yes,” Riri told him, “you have a choice. Just look at me.”

Farther
along the wall the king clapped Ohaern on the back, crying, “We have won, War
Chief, we have won! I scarcely thought we could, but we have won!”

“Aye,
we have won.” Ohaern could not restrain a grin. “But do not relax your
vigilance, O King—the Vanyar shall return!”

The
king sobered at once. “Aye, they will not leave it at this, will they? No, we
must be watchful indeed.”

Ohaern
gestured at the writhing bodies below the wall. “And what shall you do with
their wounded?”

“What
of
our
wounded!” The king turned to bark at the Captain of the Guard. “Send
out men to see if any of our people who fell outside the wall still live!”

“Guard
that party well,” Ohaern advised, “from the ground, but also from the wall.”

The
Captain of the Guard nodded and turned away. The king turned back to survey the
wounded Vanyar, who sat or lay, clutching bleeding wounds or the stumps of
limbs, white-faced, but with lips clamped tight to hold in cries of pain. “Indeed,”
the king said heavily, “what shall we do with these?”

“Geld
them!” Riri cried, face lit with savage joy. “Hamstring them! Do to them as
they have done to us, to all their captives—as they would have done to you!”

Silence
fell about them.

“There
is justice in what he says.” But even Lucoyo could find no enthusiasm for the
idea.

“If
we gave only that justice, though, we would be no better than they.” The king
lifted his head with decision. “We shall bind their wounds, we shall see them
healed—but they shall serve us as our slaves!”

Riri’s
face flamed with anger, and he pointed with a shaking arm. “Geld that one, at
least! For he is a chieftain.”

Everyone
turned to stare.

The
captive in question set a hand against the wall and pushed himself to his feet,
though one leg hung useless, still bleeding freely. “He speaks truth,” the man
said in barely understandable Cashalan. “I am. What shall you do with a Vanyar
chieftain, O You-who-call-yourself-king?”

The
people all turned to stare at the king, holding their breath as they waited for
his answer.

The
king said slowly, “If he deemed himself the highest of the high, he shall
become the lowest of the low. No, we shall neither geld nor hamstring him, for
that is how you treat a beast, and if we pretend that he is less than human,
then we shall become less than human. But he shall fetch wood and draw water,
and do all the things that any slave does.”

The
Vanyar chieftain stood stiffly against the wall on his one good foot, stiff in
outrage, crying, “I am no common man, but Ashdra, a chieftain of the Vanyar!
How dare you treat me as a slave!”

“By
the fortunes of war,” said Ohaern, his face hard, and the king agreed. “We
treat you as you have done to defeated rival chieftains in your own turn. Be
glad we allow you life.”

“I
would sooner have death!”

“Keep
on with such impertinence and you may find it.” The king lifted his head to
look out over his people. “All the Vanyar who live shall be slaves of the king!
The others I shall sell to the merchants—but this one I shall keep for myself;
we can spare him this much token of respect. Take him away! Take them all away
to the cellar of my castle and see they are tended till their wounds are
healed. Then they shall set to work indeed, helping us strengthen our wall!”

Ashdra
gave an incoherent shout, but guardsmen held spears to his throat and heart. As
they laid hands on him he turned, striking out at them with hard fists—and the
guards struck back with the butts of their spears. When the tussle was over,
one or two guardsmen were picking themselves up with black looks, rubbing the
places the Vanyar chieftain had bruised, while others bound his unconscious
form to the shafts of two spears and bore him away. His tribesmen fought as he
had, and if they did not fight as well, they certainly fought well enough to
knock out several of the fishermen before they were finally borne down, then
borne away.

“They
are beaten!” the king cried. “Hail Ohaern and Lucoyo, who have showed us the
path to victory!”

“Hail,
Ohaern!” the people cried. “Hail, Lucoyo!” And they surged forward to seize the
Biri and the half-elf, bearing them up on their shoulders and parading in
triumph to the king’s hall.

Lucoyo
looked about him in amazement, holding hard to the shoulders of the men who
bore him. He could scarcely believe that he, the outcast, the stranger, the man
who was always an alien, could be acclaimed as a hero!

Ahead
of him Ohaern was taken aback, too, but quickly recovered his poise. He began
to smile and to wave to the people about him, calling, “Thanks, brave fighters!
All thanks, valiant people of Cashalo! Valiant bowmen, valiant archer-women! It
is you who have won the victory, not I!”

But
the people cheered him all the harder, for they knew the truth.

At
the doors of the castle, they set the outlanders down beside the king, who grinned
widely as he waved at the cheering throng. When their noise began to ebb, he
called, “Tonight we shall feast, though two hundred must offer to fast and
guard the walls so that others may rejoice!”

“Your
scouts must be out and about,” Ohaern muttered.

“Scouts,
you must be scouring the countryside!” the king called. “All others, come to
the central circle, to roast fat meats and pour out wine! We have earned our
jubilation!”

The
crowd roared their approval, then began to move away to the fire pits in the great
open space before the king’s palace.

“Come.”
The king led Lucoyo and Ohaern through the great portals and into his hall. “While
the cooks make ready the festival, let us have wine—and rest!”

They
came into a large room with heaps of cushions. The king called, “Ho! Bring
wine!” Then he sat down and leaned back against the softness of fine cloth over
down as women appeared, bearing wine and platters of fruits. Ohaern stared for
a moment, unable to conceal his surprise. The women he had seen in Cashalo all
these past two weeks had been clothed decently, if lightly, but these
handmaidens of the king were in cloth so fine that he could see through it,
though not clearly, and wore only skirts and bodices, with their midriffs left
bare. Moreover, each was a beauty, very obviously selected for grace and form.

“They
are lovely, are they not?”

The
king’s words brought Ohaern out of his reverie with a start. He tore his gaze
away—and saw Lucoyo, his eyes so wide they nearly bulged, staring at the women
and hissing, “Yessss—O King! They are comely indeed!”

“This
office has heavy burdens,” the king told him, “but it has its pleasures, too.
You see now why I thought it best to fight—these butterflies are worth
defending.”

He
said it in a joking tone, but Ohaern caught the seriousness beneath it and knew
that this king would have defended any woman, young or old, pretty or ugly. “Your
people are, indeed, worth defending,” he said. “Therefore I think it unwise that
you put the captive Vanyar in your cellar with the priests and worshipers of
Ulahane.”

“Why?
Think you they will brew mischief together?”

“I
do not doubt it for a moment.”

“Nor
do I,” said the king, “but I also think they will find ways to come together
and brew mischief even if we let them free—so it is better to have them where
we can watch them all and have spies among them, while we may.”

Ohaern
stared; the king was more subtle than he had realized, “ ‘While you may?’ But
what could prevent you?”

“Peace,”
the king sighed, “and the worshipers of Ulahane whom we had no reason to
imprison. When we are sure the threat is past and the Vanyar have passed on, I
shall have to let them go free again.”

“What?’
Lucoyo tore his gaze from the nearest handmaiden and fastened it on the king. “Wherefore?
You are the king! Is not your word law?”

“No,”
the king replied. “There is the ancient law of the fishermen, handed down from
parent to child since time began—and we have added to it the laws of the
foreigners with whom we trade, if those laws are simple and blend well with our
own. If I flout those laws in my judgments or commands, the people will be
discontent—and if I do it too many times, they will pull me down and choose a
new king in my place.”

“So,”
Ohaern breathed, “you are not so different from a tribal chieftain, after all.”

“Only
in state, and the number of people I lead,” said the king, “but I cannot force
them all. Indeed, I can only guide the force that comes from all, against those
who break our laws.”

“But
there are ways of gaining power over all the people!” Lucoyo leaned forward,
frowning. “You have guardsmen, and surely there are many of your fishermen who
would be glad to join their ranks, now that they have learned something of
fighting! Pay enough of them, and you could force all your people to your will!”

Ohaern
stared at the half-elf in horror. Had Lucoyo always been like this, and he had
never seen it?