The Sterkarm Handshake (41 page)

“One?”

“So they want to hang you—there's no time for this—”

“We need boots,” Bryce said.

“We haven't time!” Andrea said. “I don't know where to look for boots—there are too many storerooms, and they might be coming after us now! Come on!”

Bryce nodded, and then kicked the ladder down into the storeroom below. Crouching, he closed and bolted the trap. No one, to Andrea's relief, argued anymore, or asked questions, not even Windsor. She caught up the lantern and went, as fast as she could, down the ladder to the alley. There was no sight of the Sterkarms. Even the sound of them was distant, muffled by the tower's stone walls.

“Bring the ladder with us,” Bryce said, when they were all standing in the alley's mud, and a couple of the men picked it up.

“Why?” Windsor asked. “It'll only slow us down.”

Bryce drew a breath. “To make it harder for them to check out the lockup. Move!”

The men carrying the ladder bumped its end into a wall. Andrea spun round. “Ssh! Quiet!” She pointed upward. “There's a man on the watchtower.” They were probably hidden from his view in the dark, narrow alleys, overhung with thatch, but strange sounds might alert him.

“Put the ladder over there,” Bryce said. They'd turned a corner from the lockup, and the ladder, laid along another wall, wouldn't be found immediately.

“This way!” The tower's narrow streets wound in and out of the crowded outbuildings. Andrea led them toward the gate, not by the most direct way, but by the way that offered the most shadows and shelter. She wished that she could feel certain she was doing the right thing.

Coming up close behind her, Bryce whispered, “Will the gate be open?”

Windsor's voice chimed in from her other side. “It'll be locked and guarded. How are we going to get past?”

Andrea was shaking her head. The tower wasn't a castle under military discipline. “The gate'll probably be barred. I don't know about guards. With the feast, there probably won't be any.”

“If there are,” Bryce said, “we can deal with 'em.”

That made Andrea feel twice as miserable. More than enough people had been hurt and killed—and what if the Sterkarms caught up with them just as they “dealt with” the guards? Why, she wondered, did I ever take this job?

Huddled at the end of a lane, they looked across a small open space, where stones had been trod into the mud to make a kind of paving. On its other side was the gate. A lantern hanging above it showed them that there were no guards. It also showed them the heavy bar set in place.

The guards Andrea had dismissed, entering the hall, found everyone gathered around the family table, some standing on benches to see over the heads of others. Several people were shouting above the babble of talk. The guards filled cups from jugs of ale left on abandoned tables, and joined the edges of the crowd. No one took any notice of them, or asked them why they were there.

Joe wasn't making much sense of it all. He could tell that Gobby was pretty much embattled, with even his sons seeming angry with him, but everyone was speaking too fast and shouting too much for him to be able to understand anything being said. He'd almost stopped worrying about it when Per jumped up from his father's chair, shoving Cuddy aside, and started shouting too. Joe's anxiety increased. He felt that the row must be escalating to some higher level, especially as Per was ranging himself alongside his uncle and shouting at his father. Both Gobby and Toorkild looked astounded.

Per had been roused by Sim's announcement that Per's wounding had been all Gobby's fault in the first place. This was an unexpected doubling back to an earlier squabble, and an accusation so shocking that it produced a few eye's blinks of silence, even from Isobel.

Sim, finding everyone staring at him, hurried to explain how Gobby had taken the leadership of the tower's men from Per and had then taunted and snubbed the lad until he'd been driven to do something reckless. All Gobby's fault.

A second silence fell. Sweet Milk, hearing his private opinion so aired, had turned his back on them all. Toorkild had glowered at Gobby, who looked stunned. Sim regretted having spoken.

Per, jumping up, shouted at Sim, “Thine empty head rattles like a pebble in a pot!” His uncle was a brave and a good man, and to hear him accused of such disloyalty was more than Per could stand.

Besides, his actions were his own, and not attributable to Gobby's taunts. “It was Gobby got me
home
!”

Sweet Milk, who flattered himself that
he
had got Per home, turned around again.

Gobby, deserted by his own sons, and with tears in his eyes, put his arm around Per's shoulders. “Toorkild! Isobel, we've often not been best of friends—but tha can no believe I'd wish any harm to my brother's-son! I love him like one of my own. I was never so glad as to see him come back to us whole and well.”

Isobel looked as if she would have liked to deny it but hadn't the nerve. She turned away.

Toorkild looked confused and tired. He had no idea how things had come to his brother being accused of harming his son. He could think of nothing to say, and shook his head. Moving to his chair, he sat heavily and waved his hand in dismissal. “Into hell with lot of you!”

The quarrel had worn itself out, leaving behind a listlessness. People went back to the benches and poured ale.

Gobby still had one arm draped across Per's shoulders. “Father's-brother, may I ask a favor?”

Gobby sighed. “What?”

“Daddy's-brother, be so kind, do no kill Elven.”

Gobby dimly remembered that, what seemed days ago, at the beginning of this exhausting row, a similar favor had been asked. His eye glinted; he was about to refuse.

“If you kill them, my Elf-May'll be angry with me.”

Gobby relaxed and grinned. “Be that it? That be whole of it?” His arm pulled Per closer. “I'm to rile my folk, and let a man's death gan by, just so thee—”

“Daddy's-brother, be so kind. We can ransom them, and thou canst have it all, to make up for thy man.”

Gobby laughed, hugged Per and thumped him on the back. “I can see thy daddy agreeing to that!”

Per went over to his father, pulling Gobby with him by the hand. “Daddy, Gobby can have all of ransom, can he no?”

Toorkild, who had been leaning his head in his hand, started up. “What?”

Per knelt beside his chair, leaning on its arm, and explained it to him. “Our prisoners,” Toorkild said, “held in our lockup, at our cost, and I'm to ransom 'em and give all to Gobby?” He cuffed Per's head. “I'll send thee to deal for me at market.”

“But Daddy—”

“It be to please Elf-May,” Gobby said.

“Be that it?” Toorkild and Gobby both laughed, and Per's face reddened. He thumped his head against his father's shoulder. “Daddy!”

“My folk'll no settle for ransom anyway,” Gobby said. “They want Elven's lives for their friend's life. If I took ransom, they'd still give me trouble.”

Toorkild was hankering after little white pills. “What if we hang half Elven and ransom others?”

Gobby nodded slowly. “Aye. And we divide ransom? Aye. I could make my folk happy with that.”

Toorkild turned to Per, kneeling at his side, and pulled at a tuft of his hair. “Will that do for thee, tup?”

Per nodded, smiling. He thought it an excellent deal, the best that could be made, and Andrea would have to be pleased. “Aye! A thousand—ten thousand thanks, Daddy!” He kissed his father's cheek, got to his feet and kissed his uncle before going down the hall toward the stairs. Halfway there, he turned and came back, to bend over his father's chair. “Daddy, hast thou any wee white pills left?”

His father pressed a thick, hot hand over his brow. “Art sick?”

“Nay! It be for Entraya—she has head pain.”

Toorkild heaved at his belt, groping for the pouch he wore under his robe. “And tha wants to cure her head pain, aye.”

Gobby laughed again. Toorkild found, in his pouch, a strip of white paper with aspirins sealed into it. Carefully he tore off two and gave them to Per. He gripped Per's wrist as he started away, holding him. “If she uses only one, bring me other back.” Per kissed him again and ran across the hall to the stairs. He didn't bother to take a candle or lantern. Cuddy, under the table, roused with a yap, got up, shook herself and ran after him.

She overtook him on the steps and reached the basement before him, making the horses shift and stamp. Together they crossed the yard toward the bower where Andrea slept. It was dark, but Per knew his way.

Cuddy growled faintly. Looking at her, Per saw her ears cocked and a faint glimmer of teeth as her lip lifted. “What dost hear?” He stopped and listened but couldn't hear anything but the murmur of talk and laughter from the hall above. The quiet and darkness, even the chill, of the yard seemed to increase. If an armed force were approaching the tower, the dogs who guarded the cattle would holler from the valley. Maybe Cuddy growled at the ghosts of the dead Elven. Did Elven have ghosts? Better to get close to a living Elf than stand in the dark wondering about that. Per ran on into the alleys, and Cuddy hurried after him.

The ladder was in place at Andrea's bower, left for him to climb. He did so, and knocked at the door. Cuddy reared up, her forepaws resting on the same rung as his feet. “Entraya?” No answer. No light shone through the latch hole: She had blown out her candle and gone to bed. Maybe she really had a head pain. He knocked again and called her name. No answer.

He put his finger through the latch hole and lifted the latch, half expecting the door to be bolted, but the door swung inward. His heart began to beat faster as he stepped inside.

Oh pleasant thoughts come to my mind,

As I turn back smooth sheets so fine,

And her two white breasts are standing so,

Like sweet pink roses that bloom in snow.

The room was in deep darkness, but smelled of wood and straw, and of Andrea—there was an Elvish perfume that clung to her things. He stumbled against the bed and felt over it with his hands, raising a thicker scent of hay from the mattress, mixed with a stronger whiff of Andrea. The bed was empty.

He straightened. “Entraya?” But the room was empty. The way his voice sounded told him so.

Where was she? Crouching, he felt under the bed and touched the cold earthenware of a chamber pot. So she had no need to go to the privy. Still crouching, he leaned his chin in his hand and said to Cuddy, “Where be Entraya? Entraya!”

In the dim light from the open door he could see Cuddy sitting on her haunches. When he spoke, she cocked her ears and her eyes brightened. Stretching out her neck, she gave his face a couple of gentle licks.

Andrea could only have gone to another bower. At the thought, he seemed to breathe in anger—but she wouldn't, not Andrea. The Elves! She'd gone to see if the guards would let her talk to the Elves, to let them know they might not be hanged. That was like her. She was kind.

He could go to meet her, and give her the pills, offer to see her safely back to her bower …

“Entraya! Find Entraya!” Cuddy bounded to the door, and he rose and followed her. Cuddy was a gaze-hound, hunting by sight rather than scent, but like all hounds, she had keen senses of smell and hearing. She would hear a footstep or a whisper when a man wouldn't. Per had taught her to know Andrea by name, and she knew her step and her voice as well as her smell. Leaping to the ground, Cuddy raced away into the darkness.

Per slid down the ladder and whistled for her, and she came cantering back from the dark and jumped at him, knocking him back against the wall, her paws heavy on his shoulders. “Entraya!” he said, and she bounded away again. He ran after her, his boots sticking in mud, trying to keep her dark, moving shape in sight.

Andrea went forward alone, out of the alleyway, across the little open space in front of the gatehouse, into the lantern's light. There'd been some whispered argument about whether this area would be visible to the watchman at the top of the tower. One opinion was that of course it would, another was that the buildings between the tower and the gate would block the view.

“We have to assume it
is
visible,” Bryce said. Assuming that, the only one among them with a chance of crossing it without arousing suspicion was Andrea. If she could take down the lantern, so the space was unlit, the rest of them might be able to unbar the gate.

She was tall, and taking the lantern down from its hook wasn't difficult, though she felt that she was glowing in the dark and setting off sirens. Her hands trembled in expectation of a shout from the watchtower.

As she left the gate, she heard a scampering and panting behind her, and her heart lurched with fright. She whipped around to face the sound, and a big, dark shape rose from the ground, gave her a hefty shove on the shoulders, driving her back on her heels, panting in her face with hot, stinking breath.

She went staggering back under the thing's weight, but almost laughed, because she knew what it was. “Cuddy! Oh, Cuddy, you gave me a fright!”

Cuddy leaped away from her and leaped back again and, as the hound danced in the dark, Andrea's breath caught and her relief curdled into another kind of fear. Cuddy, unless she was taken and locked up, was never far from Per. If Cuddy was here …

She looked toward the alley where Bryce and the others hid. In the darkness, she glimpsed the hazy gray blurs that were their faces.

She glanced back toward the other dark alleys that opened between the many buildings. Out of their darkness came Per's whistle, and the sound of his running feet.

“Cuddy!” he called. “Entraya!”

21

16th Side: “Sterkarm!”

The alley per was following, pursuing Cuddy, ended at the tower's gate. “Cuddy!” She must still be intent on chasing Elf-Ghosts, or maybe she could hear a fox outside the walls. Andrea wouldn't be at the gate.

But as he emerged from the narrow alleyway, fending himself off the wall, he saw Andrea standing in front of him. She had Cuddy's collar in one hand and was being pulled a few steps this way and that as the hound, growling, made lunges toward the alleys. In her other hand was the lantern that should have been hanging over the gateway, its light swinging low about her feet. As the light briefly swung high enough to show her face, he saw that she looked scared half to death, as if she'd been caught doing something wrong. He went to her, laughing, asking, “What be matter?” He was startled, and he sidestepped, when Cuddy gave a loud, shivering growl.

A sound behind him, a nudge and, before he could turn, something hard against his throat, yanking him backward against solidity. He made to smack his right elbow backward, but his arm was entangled, held. A man's arm around his neck: He felt the warm flesh, and his fingers slipped on the hair. Sweet Milk playing a joke! But the movement around him in the darkness, Cuddy's snarling, the sounds of breathing and of feet in the mud told him that there were many men, and strangers—Grannams! Inside the tower walls!

He reached for his dagger with his left hand, but the arm was caught and pulled partly behind him. He snatched breath to shout, and a large, heavy hand smacked across his mouth and clamped there, sealing in the breath and reducing his shout to an incomprehensible moan.

Per reacted with fury. That the Grannams should dare! His head was being held against the shoulder of the man behind him, but he smashed his skull sidelong into his captor's face. It hurt, but he knew by the gasp in his ear, and the loosening of the hold on him, that he'd hurt the man holding him more. He kicked backward at the man's shins, scraped the heel of his boot down the shin and stamped hard, hoping to smash the man's foot. With more gasps of pain, the man shuffled backward, out of reach. Per's arms were still held, but he was all but free. He lifted his head, and drew breath to shout.

The darkness moved, in the shape of a big man in front of him. Something was said, in no tongue of the Grannams, and a fist driven hard into Per's belly.

What breath he had left him in a long groan, and the pain and shock of the blow made it impossible to draw another. His legs buckled and the man behind him came close again, leaned on him, and pushed him down into the mud. His arms were twisted behind him, and a weight settled heavily on his back. Somewhere nearby, Cuddy's growling had changed to a wheezing.

Per strained for air, choking, his face turned sidelong in the dirt. His lungs seemed turned to stone, refusing to open. He struggled, trying to free his arms, but they were at their weakest, pulled behind him. He tried to get his knees under him, to throw off the weight that held him down, but the effort and lack of air dizzied him, making the darkness flicker with white flashes. So he lay still and made repeated hoarse snatches for air. He knew he'd been outwitted, beaten, and had let attackers into his home. He was afraid for Cuddy and Andrea, and then for his mother, his father, his cousins and uncle and everyone he'd failed. It made him furious, and the angrier he grew, the more his helplessness enraged him.

Andrea spoke near him, urgently. He couldn't understand what she said but recognized the slippery, hissing sound of the Elven language. Surprise made him lie still and silent for a moment. His captors were not Grannams. They were Elves. Either the prisoners escaped, or others come to rescue them. And Andrea was helping them.

The realization was another defeat. He felt anger rise in him until, with his already hard-thumping heart, it was like a blockage in the throat, stifling. The lantern light turned dark in his eyes. He gasped for breath, and struggled again. If his heart burst, if his joints cracked, he didn't care. He spread his legs, pressing his knees and toes into the ground, trying to lift up and twist his hips, to throw off the man on his back. He pressed his head into the mud, arching his spine.

Bryce, sitting astride Per, had a glow of pain on his face where Per's skull had smacked into his cheekbone and nose; and another glow of pain down his shin, where Per's boot heel had kicked and scraped. But he'd thought Per beaten, and was taken aback by this sudden and fierce coming to life. He twisted Per's arms higher, but the body beneath him still bucked like a bronco and almost threw him off. “Get his legs, get his—”

One of his men grabbed Per's legs, held them, lay on them. Another pressed Per's head down into the mud. Sobbing for breath, Per subsided again. “Bastard!” Bryce said, and wiped his bleeding nose on the shoulder of his shirt.

Andrea was swinging the lantern erratically. It showed her Cuddy, teeth locked in a man's arm, and another man squeezing her throat between his hands. It showed her Per panting in the mud with three men holding him down. “Don't hurt him! He's only a boy—”

From the darkness near her, Windsor said, with satisfaction, “I've already hurt him.” She glimpsed him miming the action of a punch.

She could hear Per fighting for breath, and it reminded her distressingly of when he'd been bleeding to death. “You haven't hurt—?”

“Whose side are you on?” Bryce was out of breath too.

Andrea crouched beside them. Per, his face turned sideways on the ground and masked with mud, was hardly recognizable. His narrowed eyes glittered in the lantern fight, and he breathed in strange, hiccuping little gasps. “Don't you know who you've caught? It's Per—Per Toorkildsson. The May.”

Bryce's head jerked up.

“Don't hurt him.” She meant—the word was large in her mind, though she wouldn't say it—don't kill him. “Listen, if we don't make it to the Tube—if Toorkild catches us, and you've hurt Per—I can't even bear to think about what Toorkild will do to us.”

“Keep your voice down,” Bryce said. “Everybody!” The man who'd been bitten was breathing hard with a sobbing sound. Faintly, seeming miles away, came shouting, laughter and what might have been music from the tower. Their struggles, though desperately loud in their own ears, must have been swallowed up among the stone and thatch of the surrounding buildings and had passed as the usual nighttime noises of the tower. Bryce said, “Are you wearing those hiking boots?”

“What?” Andrea said. It seemed a strange question. “Yes.”

“Give me a bootlace. Do it!”

She was baffled but tugged at the lace of her right boot, pulling it undone and unthreading it from the six iron loops. It was thick, strong and very long. Pulling it free, she handed it to Bryce.

“Hold him,” Bryce said to the men holding Per's head and legs, and he used the bootlace to lash Per's arms together at the elbows.

Per hadn't yet recovered his breath, but knew that once tied, he would have even less chance of getting away. He struggled again, trying to pull his arms free of the lace being wound around them, trying to lift his head, to kick. It was a waste of strength and breath. He grunted as his shoulders were dragged further back and the lace bit into his arms. His eyes filled with tears of rage that mixed with the mud on his face.

“Okay, get off him.” The two other men moved away, and Bryce, grasping Per by the collar, hauled him up to his knees, his legs folded under him. Bryce felt about his waist, found his belt, followed it and said, “Ah!” as he found Per's dagger. “Good man!”

Their prisoner surprised them all by calling out softly, as if he was quite alone, though his voice was broken by breathlessness. “Cuddy? Cud—?”

Bryce clamped his hand over Per's mouth, pulled his head back against his shoulder, and showed him his own dagger. “Tell him to keep quiet!”

Despite the knife, Per was twisting his head, trying to get his mouth free—but Bryce's hand had sealed to the mud on his face and was glued in place. “You're choking him,” Andrea said.
“Per—stilla!”
Quiet!
“Han har thine kneefa!”

Per was still, and Bryce loosed his hand a little, to let him breathe. Looking straight ahead, not trying to look at Andrea, Per whispered,
“Vordan staw Cuddy?”

“What's he say?”

“It's his dog, he's asking about his dog.” She moved the lantern so its light fell where she'd last seen Cuddy. There was a huddle of men, one clutching his bleeding arm. On the ground in front of them lay a long gray shape, its ruffled fur muddied.

Per made a lurching movement, trying to get to his feet. Bryce dragged him back and clamped his hand hard over his mouth again. He said, “Is it bad?”

The man grimaced. “Hurts.”

“You've got to keep going,” Bryce said. The man nodded.

Andrea had gone to Cuddy and was running her hands through the long hair. The hound was still warm, and she thought she could feel the rib cage moving, but that might just have been wishful thinking. “Have you killed her?”

The man crouched beside the bitten one said, “Might have done—dunno.”

Bryce said, “It's
his
dog?” He threw Per's dagger over to the men huddled by Cuddy. Per, by the lantern's light, saw his dagger land in the mud and guessed what it was to be used for. He made another convulsive attempt to rise, but Bryce held him and pinched his nose shut as well as covering his mouth. Remembering the word Andrea had used, he said, “Still—or else.” Threatened with suffocation, Per stopped fighting, and Bryce let him breathe again. “Make sure it's dead,” Bryce said. “Last thing we want is it coming round and following us.”

The man who'd throttled Cuddy picked the dagger up but then just held it. He was prepared to shoot people with automatic rifles, it seemed, but not to stab a dog. “Kill it!” Bryce said.

Windsor took the dagger and knelt over the hound. Andrea turned sharply away but still heard the sounds of the dagger tearing into Cuddy, its hilt banging on her ribs. “Cut its throat!” Bryce said.

A painful sorrow for Cuddy filled Andrea. Poor Cuddy, who'd adored Per as a blend of pack leader and pup, and had never known or cared what danger she was in, set only on protecting him. Then she heard another sound: a choked, grunting, coughing sound that, when she realized what it was, made the pain in her heart well-nigh unbearable. It was Per, sobbing.

Windsor walked over to Bryce and handed him back the dagger. He was panting, and his heart was beating fast. Killing the dog had been hard work because he'd never killed anything before, and he'd thought the only way had been to go at it hard, with all his strength. He was shaking, and the sticky, greasy blood on his hands was disgusting. But he'd done it. He felt proud, exhilarated.

Per looked up at him, staring. The boy's face was plastered with mud, but the lantern light caught the eyes, fixed on him. They seemed huge, with only a thin ring of pale blue around the dark centers. Tears were glinting in them.

“You broke off the point,” Bryce said.

Windsor laughed, boastful and appalled and scared, but quickly smothered the sound. He gave Per's face several rapid, sharp slaps, and said, “What d'you think of that?”

Per twisted his head and bit at Windsor's hand. He succeeded in nipping the flesh of a finger between his teeth before Windsor snatched his hand away and swung it to deliver a blow.

Bryce swore and hauled Per to his feet, yanking him away from Windsor. He put the edge of the dagger to Per's throat. “Get that bloody gate open!”

The men rose and, leaving the lantern light behind, moved to the gate, dim shapes in darkness. Andrea went close to Per and Bryce, meaning to try and say something to Per—but he gave her such a straight, stony stare that she felt ashamed, even guilty, and looked away.

They heard the sound of the gate's bar being lifted. From above, ringing through the dark upper air, shocking them all into silence and stillness, came a voice from the tower's height.
“Vem air day?”
Who's there?

Per gasped, and Bryce pressed the dagger's blade harder against his neck. Andrea, though her heart thumped, realized that the watchman's voice wasn't too alarmed. He'd heard something but, if answered, would be satisfied. Taking a deep, shaky breath, she cupped her hands about her mouth and shouted,
“Olla air rikti, min fen. Air Per oh yi.”
All's well, my friend. It's Per and I! From the top of the tower came a laugh. She didn't dare look at Per.

The men were struggling with the gate, lifting it up so it wouldn't drag and make a noise. Bryce nudged Per forward. With his arms tied and the knife blade scraping his throat, Per went. His mind was racing like a river in spate, too full of Andrea's treachery and Cuddy's butchering and his own failure to think …

The gate was opened narrowly, and they edged through. “Ditch the lantern,” Bryce said to Andrea. “They'll see the light.” The land in front of them looked terrifying, impenetrably black, but she set the lantern down just outside the gate.

They were at the top of the steep, rough path that led down the tower's crag. The night was colder, now they were out from behind the shelter of the walls. A cold wind whipped past them.

The lantern, flickering behind them, was no help in descending the steep path. Holding their breath, they went forward step by step, feeling for each foothold on the pitch-black ground, never knowing when a loose stone was going to throw them down. We're not even going to make it to the bottom of the crag, Andrea thought.

Bryce slipped, muttered, clutched and dragged at Per's arm. Their feet kept getting tangled. He took his arm from around Per's neck—he didn't want to stumble and slit his prisoner's throat by accident. Keeping a tight grip on one of Per's arms, he pulled him along behind him.