The Thunder King (Bell Mountain) (26 page)

Orth felt the weight of the future pressing down on him. He must not let it crush him.

“Try to live quite a bit longer, Excellency!” he said. “I need your guidance.”

That was the first intelligent thing Orth had said since the beginning of the siege, Reesh thought. “Maybe I wasn’t altogether wrong about him, after all.”

Late in the day, Ryons passed through a whole town that was entirely deserted. He’d never seen a real town before, with streets, and shops along the streets, and stables and a smithy, and houses, and in the center of the town, the chamber house. He didn’t know what most of these things were, but they were all marvelous.

He spent some time exploring. Cavall chased rats. The townspeople must have packed up everything and taken it with them: there was precious little left behind. He wondered where they went. Could there possibly be room for so many people in Obann? How big could the city be?

Many of the houses and shops had their doors broken. People must have knocked down the doors to go inside and take things. Ryons found some odd items left behind, like scraps of girls’ and women’s clothing, old boots, and a great many broken jars and bottles. If there had been any food left behind, the rats must have eaten it. He’d never seen so many rats.

The Wallekki didn’t live in towns. When they made war on each other, it was with a great deal of fuss and ceremony and very little fighting. The clans had little fear of one another. It was only the blood feuds that got really nasty.

“But the people who lived here were afraid,” Ryons thought. “They didn’t even stay to fight for their town.”

He thought of the Thunder King brooding on his throne, away out East, and granted that the people of this town had something to be afraid of. The terror of the Thunder King’s name had been enough to conquer most of the Wallekki. “We can fight men,” they said, “but we cannot fight a god.” The mardars came and issued commands, and the Wallekki obeyed—clan elders who spoke against it died suddenly. The people were afraid the Thunder King would dry up their wells and make their herds of sheep and goats die off. They were afraid of the vast armies he already had. They spoke in hushed tones of a people called the Quadi-Quai, a cattle-raising people who existed no more because they defied the Thunder King and perished—every last one of them and all their cattle.

Cavall seemed impatient to move on, but Ryons was drawn to the chamber house. He didn’t know what it was, but it was the only building with a bell tower, and the bell was still there.

Ryons went inside to look for a way up to the tower. He passed through the assembly hall, where the whole town used to stand in prayer, led by the prester from his pulpit. He peeked into the various chambers, once used for lessons, study, accounting, and other purposes, but now of interest only to spiders. At last he found a steep spiral stairway that could only be the way up to the tower. Ryons started up, but Cavall wouldn’t follow.

From up in the tower he could see out all over town and the surrounding countryside. No people, no horses, no cattle, no carts—it was all deserted, very dreary.

Above him hung the bell, with the rope still attached to it. Obst had told him of the ancient bell atop Bell Mountain, the one that everybody in the world heard when Jack and Ellayne rang it. He remembered the excitement it had caused among the Thunder King’s army—and fear, too. But that army was now his army, King Ryons’ army.

“King Ryons—that’s rich!” he said to himself. “I don’t know where my army is, and I can’t even find the biggest city in the world.” But in case God was listening, he didn’t say more.

His hand strayed to the bell rope. In the west the sun was setting over the deserted land. He wondered if God would hear this bell if he rang it. Well, why not?

Ryons tugged on the rope—once, twice, three times. The bell was heavy, and it took some doing to build up enough momentum to set it ringing.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

He rang it three times, then stopped. There was no one in the town to hear it, and it made the loneliest sound you could imagine. He let go of the rope and caught his breath. He was sweating.

And then over the plains, up from the south as if in answer to the tolling of the bell, floated the deep, musical bellow of the unseen creature—if creature it was, and not a spirit. How far that call carried before it reached his ears, Ryons couldn’t guess. He suspected it was miles and miles. He peered out of the tower, into the south, but there was nothing to see. The call was repeated four more times—then silence.

Suddenly lonely, Ryons hurried down the spiral stairs. Cavall was waiting for him. Ryons bent over and hugged him.

“I don’t think I like this place, after all,” he said. “It’d be different if there were people in it. I was going to sleep in one of the houses, but now I don’t want to. I don’t suppose you want to, either.”

Cavall barked once, and they went outside. It was quickly getting dark, but Ryons didn’t stop to make camp until they were out of sight of the town.

Jack had never seen a map, but Ellayne’s father, the chief councilor, had a kind of chart of the Imperial River, useful in his logging business. It wasn’t a proper map, but it had taught Ellayne a few things. So she knew that eventually the Griffs would come to where the Chariot River flowed into the Imperial. If they didn’t cross, they would have to turn northeast. But if they did cross the Chariot, and continue along the Imperial, they would pass right by Ninneburky, just across the river.

“Home!” she thought: where her father and her mother and her brothers lived; where she had her own room in a fine, big house, and her own books, her clothes, her bed. To come so close to it, and yet not be able to go there, was bitter. “And where we’re going,” she thought, “there’ll never be another chance to go home.”

How easy it would be for her father to lead out the militia and save her and Jack and Martis—if only he knew! But he didn’t know. There was no way he could know.

And it was all her fault, she thought. If she hadn’t been so pigheaded about running away from Gilmy, none of this would be happening now.

Tormented by such thoughts, she lay awake while Jack and Martis slept nearby. Chillith had given them blankets to sleep in—not very comfortable, but no worse than the Griffs themselves had for sleeping gear. A few yards away a campfire burned low, and two men sat hunched over it, keeping watch over their prisoners. High overhead, the stars shone. Ellayne looked up at them, hungry for sleep but unable to get it.

Grass rustled in her ear. She flinched, but bit back a cry.

A pair of tiny hands patted her cheek.Was she dreaming? She turned her head, and by the starlight made out a familiar shape crouching in the grass beside her.

“Wytt!” It was the softest whisper she could make, little more than a breath; but it was enough for Wytt’s keen ears.

He clucked and chittered to her. To the sentries it would have sounded like just another insect in the grass; but to Ellayne it was Wytt assuring her that he would always be nearby. The Omah didn’t use real words, but ever since they’d come down from Bell Mountain, Ellayne and Jack had been able to understand him. No one else in all the world could talk to the Little People—except Helki, she remembered now.

“Wytt, it’s dangerous for you to be here!” she said.

She was horrified when he suddenly leaped on top of her and let out a shrill cry loud enough to wake the dead and set their teeth on edge. It jolted Jack and Martis out of sleep and all of the Griffs who slept nearby. It brought the two sentries to their feet. Ellayne lay frozen in fear as Wytt screeched out a challenge to his enemies. But the moment the two sentries took a step toward him, he hopped off Ellayne and dodged off into the night.

The camp went into a commotion. The horses were upset and had to be calmed. Warriors milled in every direction, searching for they knew not what. Torches were lit. And before either Jack or Martis could speak, Chillith strode up and demanded to know the cause of the disturbance.

The sentries tried to tell him. Jack and Ellayne couldn’t understand their language, but Martis did.

“It was some kind of demon or a ghost!” they said. “It came out of this boy’s nose and screamed at us, and then it vanished.”

Chillith glared at Martis. “What was it?” he said. “Speak truth!”

Ellayne tried to answer but didn’t know what to say, and just stammered; but Martis spoke.

“Your honor knows of jinns and elves,” he said, “but your honor maybe has not heard of the Little People from ancient times, the hairy ones. It was one of them. They protect my grandsons, who are the servants of God. And that is nothing but the truth.”

“I have heard of the hairy ones,” said Chillith. “You westmen believe they dwell in the hills where cities used to be, but no one ever sees them. It’s very bad luck to see them.”

“Your honor is familiar with our folklore.”

“Just some stories that I heard, many years ago.” Chillith looked down at Jack and Ellayne. “If the little ones protect you, why did they let us capture you?”

“Your honor knows!” said Ellayne. She’d found her voice and her imagination, fed by fairy tales that her father used to read to her at bedtime. “They wouldn’t fight a battle with big men. That’s not their way. But they can curse a man and make him sick.”

“And you called one of them here to curse us?” Chillith looked fierce now, much too fierce to lie to.

“No!” said Ellayne. “I wouldn’t dare! But they don’t come because we call them. If they did, we would have called them already—thousands of them! But they come and go as they please. They’re never far away, and no one ever sees them unless they want to be seen.”

Chillith thought it over. “I believe you,” he said. “If you could call them, you would have before now. But if they curse me and I get sick, I’ll have the three of you killed. Tell them that!”

He barked at his men, ordering them back to their blankets. He knew it would be useless for them to chase after one of the Little People. By and by the camp was quiet again, and Chillith himself went back to his bedroll.

“Good old Wytt!” Jack said. “But what can he do, all by himself?”

“Scare the juice out of these barbarians, like he just did!” said Ellayne. “They won’t dare harm us now.”

“Unless Chillith gets a toothache,” Jack said.

“Ellayne’s right,” said Martis. “The Griffs are very superstitious people—worse than the Wallekki. As long as Wytt doesn’t let himself be caught, they’ll be afraid of him. Someday that may do us some good. We’ll have to stay ready for any opportunity that might come along.”

He and Ellayne went back to sleep, but now Jack lay awake, thinking of the time a swarm of Omah overwhelmed some outlaws who’d taken the children captive in Lintum Forest. The Omah were small, but they’d killed the outlaws.

How many Omah would it take, he wondered, to kill a hundred Griffs? He was afraid there weren’t that many Omah in all Obann.

Someone donated a cart for Nanny to ride in, and cushioned by blankets and pillows, she insisted she was comfortable. That having been seen to, King Ryons’ army began its march back upriver to Obann.

The River Road between Obann and Durmurot was a good one, the finest in the land. “It’s a very ancient road, too,” said Obst, “built on top of the Empire’s road.”

“And if the Heathen want to send ten or fifteen thousand men out here to attack us, it’ll make a nice road for them, too,” Helki answered. “But since we’ll be marching right into their jaws, they might as well just sit back and wait for us.”

Nevertheless, scouts fanned out for miles ahead of the army in all directions, and the chieftains’ eyes were constantly on the lookout for defensible ground. There wasn’t much of it; the land was flat and civilized.

Obst and Nanny recited Sacred Songs, and from these the army cobbled together a battle cry and marching song. The verses changed every time they sang it, but the refrain was always the same: “For His mercy endureth forever.” Four thousand voices sang it in a dozen different languages. They sang of the battle on the hill, in which a child taught them strategy, and of the battle in the forest, in which ten thousand Heathen marched into Lintum Forest and only a thousand marched out; and of Helki slaying the Heathen giant Shogg, the son of Sezek. For all those victories and more, they praised their God—and none more loudly than the men who’d invaded the country as Heathen.

“The Thunder King would laugh,” Helki said, “if he could see this little army marching on Obann and hear us singing.”

“Then he would be a fool,” said Obst. “But then I think he is a fool, and worse than a fool.”

Three days’ steady march would get them to within sight of the city. Long before that, the enemy would know they were coming. Captain Hennen was doing his best to draw a map of Obann City and the land around it, so that the chieftains might make some reasonable plan for deploying the army when they got there. He had to rely on his own memory, and others’.

“But one thing you can count on,” he told Helki. “There’s a ridge of low, wooded hills about a mile to the west of the city, and there we can set up a defense.”