Empire of the East (31 page)

The thought was no surprise to Charmian. “No, Chup. No. Hann examined my hair closely, when we were planning how best to use the charm, trying to find the source of its unusual power. Hann would have found a demon's life if it were there. We could have made the Demon-Lord our servant.” She smiled. “No, Zapranoth would not have been fool enough to give his life into
my
keeping. He understood me far too well. When he had touched my hair, he said to me: ‘Go freely from this cave, and serve the East. It has great need of such as you.' Yes. Now all the memories come back. My father was much amazed when I caught up with him. Much amazed to see me, and not entirely pleased. Oh, he looked back hopefully enough to see if my sister had also been released. She was the one he favored, truly cared for. But her the demon kept.

“And I think my father also was made to forget what happened here; at least he never spoke of it, or of Carlotta—Chup, what is it?”

He had got to his feet as if to face the enemy again, but he did not raise his weapon, only stayed down fixedly at Charmian. Without taking his eyes from her he sheathed his sword and gripped her hands and pulled her to her feet. She twisted as if expecting another blow. But he only held her fast, demanding: “Tell me this. What was his aspect, when you saw him then?”

“Whose?”

“Zapranoth's.” Chup's voice was not much louder than a whisper. “What did he look like then, what form did he take?” His eyes still bored relentlessly at her.

“Why, the form of a tall man, a giant, in dark armor. It matters little what form a demon takes. I knew him today, even at a distance, because the feeling he brought with him, the sickness, was the same—”

“Yes, yes!” He let her go. Caught by a powerful thought, he turned away, then turned right back. “You said that your sister was six years old, when the demon took her?”

“I don't know. About that, yes.”

“And was she fair of face?”

“Some thought so. Yes.”

“That could be changed—a small thing for the Demon-Lord,” he murmured, staring past her into space. “What was the season of the year?”

“Chup, I—what does it matter now?”

“I tell you it does matter now!” He glared at Charmian again.

She closed her eyes and lined her perfect forehead with a frown. “It must have been six years ago. I think—no, it was in spring. Six and a half years ago, to this very season. I do not think I can calculate it any more closely—”

“Enough!” Chup slapped his hands together, rough triumph in his face and voice. “It must be so. It must be. The young fool said she came to them in springtime.”

“What are you babbling of?” Charmain's temper edged her voice. “How can this help us now?”

“I don't know yet. What happened to your sister?”

Before Chup could finish the question there came a faint sound behind him and he had turned, sword drawn and ready. But the shape that dropped now to the narrow ledge was only a small brown furry creature, half the length of a sword from head to tail.

“Chupchupchupchup.”
Stretched as if in supplication on the ground, just outside of thrusting range, it opened a harmless-looking, flat-toothed mouth to make a noise between repeated gasps and hiccups. It took Chup a moment to understand this was a repetition of his name.

“Chupchupchup, the High Lord Draffut bids you come.”
The creature's speech was almost one long word, like something memorized and all but meaningless to the speaker. A beast as small as this one could not have much intelligence.

“I should come to the Lord Draffut?” Chup demanded. “Where? How?”

“Chup come, Chup come. Tell man Chup, now he is hunted, the High Lord Draffut bids him come to sanc-tu-ar-y. Haste and tell man Chupchupchup.”

“How am I to come to him? Where? Show me the way.”

As if to show Chup how, the little four-footed animal spun around and bounded off, going up the side of the cliff again with ease, darting between rocks where a man could not easily have thrust an arm. Chup took one step, and then could only stare after it, hoping it might realize he could not follow.

He turned to Charmian. “How do you reckon that? If it's a trap, the bait's being kept safely out of reach, so distant I can't grab for it.”

She shook her head, and seemed both envious and mystified. “It seems that you are genuinely offered sanctuary. I've heard that the small animals run the Beast-Lord's errands now and then. Does Draffut know you as an enemy of demons? That might account for it.”

Before he could reply there came again the whispery slide of men trying to get at them from both sides. Perhaps they had seen the little messenger run past, and feared their prey was plotting an escape. As before, Chup smote the foe upon his right before the man could get his weapons up. This time the man on the left side was impeded by Charmian's falling at his feet. She had ducked for safety and lost her footing, and now she was clutching at her enemy's ankles while he was forced to concentrate on Chup. Much good his concentration did him with his feet immobilized; Chup's swordpoint tore him open and he toppled. Charmian let go his ankles quickly as his weight cleared the edge.

Chup spun back purposefully to the man he had struck down upon his right. It was the lieutenant of the Guards whom they had duped into letting them pass; he now had dropped his weapons and clung with blood-slippery, failing fingers to the rock. Chup cautiously pulled him in from the brink and cut his throat. Charmian watched, at first without understanding, as Chup continued cutting through the neck, gorily separating head from body.

When the collar of seamless-looking Old World metal was free, he wiped it clean on the lieutenant's uniform and held it up. With two motions of his foot he sent the headless body into the abyss.

By now she understood, or thought she did. Anger was in her voice, perhaps from envy or from fear of being left alone. “You are a fool. The valkyrie will take no unhurt man to the Lord Draffut. And none who does not wear the collar properly around his neck.”

“You are not entirely right in that, my lady. I have talked with the soldiers. The valkyries
will
take a man whose collar is off. Provided he is so wounded that his head is severed from his trunk.”

Now her face showed that she fully understood his plan. Her anger grew. “Not every dead man is brought to Lord Draffut's domain in time to be restored, nor heals properly.”

“Nor has a personal invitation from the High Lord Draffut. Listen, lady, I think you will not be worse off if I go. If more soldiers scramble down here, you may do as well with your eyelashes and sweet voice as I would with a sword. As things stand now, you can't get out of here.”

That was true; now she was listening.

He pressed on. “Your situation may be greatly helped if I can go. What I was saying when the animal came is more important now than ever. What happened to your sister?”

“The Lord of Demons took her, as I said. Devoured her, I suppose.”

“You
saw
the tall black man do that?”

“I…no. He laid his hand upon her, and her screams were quieted. I did not linger to see more.”

With a quick movement Chup reversed his sword, and held the pommel of it out to Charmian. “Take this.”

She stood in hesitation.

Chup said: “If the Beast-Lord hates demons, as you say, I had better go to him, and quickly.”

“Why?”

“To tell him where to find the life of Zapranoth. Now take this and cut off my head.”

Holding out the sword and waiting, Chup felt content. True, she might murder him good, or his plan might fail for other reasons. But since he had turned his back on Som and on the East, he felt like his own man again, and that feeling was enough; perhaps it was all that a man like him should try to get from life.

He fought on now to win, to live, because that was his nature. But he was tired, and saw no future beyond this battle. Death in itself had never been a terror for him. If it came now—well, he was tired. Half a year of paralytic near-death he had endured, out of sheer pride, unwillingness to give in. Then, when as if by miracle, his strength and freedom had been returned to him, he had come near throwing them away again, to serve the East—and why? What power or treasure could they offer that was worth the price they asked?

“Strike off my head,” he said to Charmian. “A valkyrie must be coming for this collar by now; there'd be one already here if they weren't having a busy day.”

She was still hesitating, fearing, hoping, thinking, desperately deciding what course was best for her own welfare. She reached out and took the sword, then asked him: “Where is the demon's life concealed?”

“Lady, I would not trust you with my beheading, save that you must see how it is in your own interest for me to reach Draffut with what I know. If we can kill or threaten Zapranoth, and tip the battle to the West, then you may sit here safely until Som is no longer dangerous. Unless, of course,
you
would rather bear the message; in which case I must cut off your—no. I thought not.”

He turned and knelt down slowly, face toward the cliff. Charmian was at his right, holding the long blade point down on the ground. He said: “Now, about this little surgery I need…I suppose a single stroke would be too much to ask for. But more than two or three should not be needed, the blade is heavy and quite sharp.” Without turning to see her face, he added: “You are most beautiful, and most desirable by far, of all the women I have ever known.”

From the corner of his eye he saw Charmian losing her hesitation, gathering resolve, straightening her thin wrists in a tight two-handed grip to lift the weapon's weight. Chup studied the details of the rock wall straight before him.

He had knelt down facing this way so that his head would not roll over—

Enough of that. He was Chup. He would not even close his eyes.

On its way, the sword sang thinly. His muscles cried for the signal to roll away, his nerves screamed that there was still time to dodge. His ruling mind held his neck stretched and motionless.

Out near the middle of the tableland that divided the forces of the East and West, in a part of the rough plateau that was shattered and split into a dozen peninsulas divided by abyssal crevices, the High Lord Zapranoth came bursting up into the morning air like some foul pall of smoke, from a huge chimney-opening in the ground. Rolf, turning from his work of grappling down great gasbags, looked up at Zapranoth and saw that which made him squint his eyes half shut and turn away—though he could not have said what it was about the smoke that was so terrible. Looking around him, he could see that only Gray, and Loford who now stood beside his brother, were able to face the demon with their heads raised and eyes wide open. They were standing in the rear of the invaders' little line, near Rolf and the balloons. The smoky image of the technology-djinn was fluttering and darting to and fro above the gasbags, like some frantic bird confined in an invisible cage.

Now Gray raised both his arms. Before the face of Zapranoth there appeared a haze or reflection of light gray, a screen as insubstantial as a rainbow, but as persistent. It stood steadily before the demon as he drifted gently nearer. Now it was possible for the soldiers of the West to look toward him—and toward the citadel, through whose open gate the Guard and its auxiliaries were pouring out, quick-march. Arrows began to fly both ways across the field. When the defenders of the citadel had finished a quick and practiced deployment in four ranks, Rolf estimated there might be nearly a thousand of them. He was too busy to give much time to pondering the odds, for the last balloons were landing now and he and his assistants had all they could do with work and dodging arrows. Each wore on his left arm a light shield woven of green limber branches; such shields were thought capable of squeezing and stopping piercing shafts that could bite through a coat of mail.

“Sound the trumpet once more!” Thomas now ordered with a shout. The Northman with the horn, his head now bandaged, turned back to face the pass—its thread of road still empty—and once more blasted out the signal.

This time there came an answering horn, though it sounded dishearteningly far away.

“There is our army coming, friends!” Thomas shouted in a great voice. “Let's see if we can do the job before they get here!”

As if the distant horn had been a signal for them too, the Guard swayed now in formation to the shouting of its officers, and as one man stepped forward to attack. At a range of a hundred and fifty meters there came from their rear ranks a volley of arrows.

Rolf and those around him, finished at last with tying down balloons, took up their weapons and moved into their places for the fight. Some, holding shields, raised them to protect Gray and Loford. The two wizards still were standing motionless, and gazing steadfastly upon the ominous but also nearly motionless bulk of Zapranoth, high in the air above the middle of the field. Loford was swaying slightly on his feet; there was no other overt sign as yet of the struggle of invisible powers that had been joined.

The horn from down below, within the pass, now sounded once more, noticeably closer; and again as if its signal had been meant for them, the Guard of Som the Dead began to run and came on in a yelling charge.

The broken ground delayed them unequally, so that their lines were bent. Rolf, with bow in hand and arrows laid out before him on the ground, knelt in the middle of a line of archers. He took little time to aim, but loosed into the oncoming swarm of men in black, nocked and drew and loosed again. The air was thick with dust and missiles, and his targets moved confusingly, so it was difficult to tell what damage his own shots were doing. Certainly the ranks of black were thinning as they came. A steady droning sprang up in the air above, as the valkyries whirred industriously, in madly methodical calm they dipped into the fury of the fight below to lift the fallen warriors of Som and take them to the high place of Lord Draffut. Some machines flew through the image of the Demon-Lord, with no awareness shown on either side. It was as if each were unreal to the other, and only humans must know and deal with both.

There was no thought of saving arrows; if this attack was not stopped there would be no need to worry about the next. The man next to Rolf went down, killed by a flung stone. Others were falling in the Western ranks, but those thin lines did not pull back. Behind them was the cliff edge, or defeat and death retreating down the pass. They braced themselves instead, and readied pike and battle-axe and sword.

By now some of the enemy were come so close to Rolf that he could hear them gasping as they ran, and see the hair on hands that lifted swords to strike. Rolf threw his bow behind him and rose up in a crouch, shield on arm and sword in hand.

An Eastern officer, marked by the plume upon his helmet, came running past in front of Rolf, with great arm-wavings urging his men on. Rolf leaped forward to get in striking range, but was checked by another Guardsman charging at him. This foe was running blindly, already berserk with battle, his eyes seemed to look unseeing through Rolf even as he swung a mace. Rolf dodged back, then stepped in—not as neatly as the nimblest warriors could, but well enough to avoid this weapon, only half-controllable. Rolf cut his sword into the Guardsman's running legs, felt shin bones splinter, saw the man go plowing forward on his face.

One of the Northmen on Rolf's left started his own counter-charge, striding into the foe, making a desert round him with a great two-handed blade. Those of the enemy who did not fall back before this giant tried to spread around him and get at him from the sides. Rolf hung back a step until he had outflanked the liveliest of these flankers, then lunged in for the kill. The man was more than half armored, but Rolf's sword point found a soft place in between the hipbone and the ribs. As that man fell, another came, but this one straight at Rolf. This new opponent was the better swordsman, but Rolf would not yield an inch. He warded one stroke after another, somehow, until the Northman's long sword on its backswing wounded his enemy from behind. The odds were more than evened, and the foe went staggering back until the ranks of black had hidden him.

Then all at once there were no more of the enemy menacing, but only the retreating horde of their black backs.

“What? What is it?” Rolf demanded. Mewick had come from somewhere and had taken him by the arm.

“—bind it up,” Mewick was saying.

“What?” All the world, for Rolf, was still quivering with the shock of battle. He could not feel nor hear nor think of anything else.

“You are hurt. See, here. Not bad, but we must bind it up.”

“Ah.” Looking down, Rolf saw a small gash on the upper part of his left arm. He could not feel the slightest pain. His shield woven of green limber withes, that had been on his left arm, was all but gone now, hacked to bits. He could not recall now which of his enemies had dealt these blows, nor how he had avoided being killed by them.

The soldiers on both sides were reforming lines, just out of easy arrow range, and binding wounds. And while the valkyries went droning on, without rest or hesitation, some men of the West hurried, at Thomas' orders, to behead the enemy who had fallen among them, gather their metal collars and throw them over the cliff. This was the only way they had discovered to prevent their foemen's restoration. No blow from any weapon that a man could wield could stay a valkyrie from gathering up a fallen man; the Westerners learned this quickly, and then saved their breath and effort and the edges of their blades. They only grumbled and dodged the vicious, blurring rotors that smashed the pikemen's weapons down and broke their fingers when they tried to interfere.

One of Mewick's countrymen was calling: “Look—our boys in sight now, at the bottom of the pass. Look!”

Men turned and gathered, looking down the pass. Rolf joined them, his arm now bandaged and his mind a little clearer. He felt no great emotion at the sight of reinforcements coming.

“They're running now that they're in sight,” said someone. “But it seems they've been all day about it.”

“Only a few in sight yet, with light weapons. The mass of 'em are still far down.”

There was short time to celebrate, even had there been greater inclination. The Guard was fast reforming. Their ranks were still impressively superior in size to those of the invaders, whose small force seemed to Rolf's eye to have been drastically diminished. He started to count how many were still on their feet, and then decided he would rather not.

Now once again the Demon-Lord was drifting slowly closer, his image roiling like a troubled cloud. The screen of protective magic that Gray had thrown up before Zapranoth yielded to the demon's pressure but stayed squarely in his path.

Neither Loford nor Gray had ducked or dodged or moved a hand to save themselves as yet. Around them tall protective shields had been held up, by the minor wizards who had abandoned any thought of dueling Zapranoth themselves. More than one had fallen, by stone or arrow, of these men protecting Gray and Loford. Neither one of the two strong wizards had been struck by any material weapon, but anyone looking at their faces now might think that both were wounded.

A darkness like the dying of the sun fell round the two tall magicians now. It was the shadow cast by Zapranoth as he loomed nearer. And now, for the first time on this field, his voice came booming forth: “Are these the wizards of the West who seek to murder me? Ho, Gray, where is my life? Will you pull it out now from your little satchel?” Still the thin gray screen before him held, but now it flared and flickered raggedly, and still he slowly pressed it back.

“Come now,” boomed Zapranoth, “favor me with an answer, mighty magician. Admit me to your august company. Let me speak to you. Let me touch you, if only timidly.”

At that Loford gave a weak cry and toppled, senseless, and would have struck the ground headlong if some standing near him had not caught him first.

Now Gray stood alone against the pressure of the dark shape above. He cried out too, and swayed, but did not fall. Instead he straightened himself with some reserve of inner strength, and with his arms flung wide set his fingers moving in a pattern as intricate as that a musician makes upon a keyboard. There sprang up gusts of wind as sudden and violent as the firing of catapults, so men who stood near Gray were thrown to the ground, and dust and pebbles were blasted into the air, in savage streams that crisscrossed through the heart of Zapranoth before they lost velocity and fell in a rain of dirt into the citadel three hundred meters distant.

The image of the demon did not waver in the least. But these howling shafts of wind were only the forerunners, the scouts and skirmishers, of the tremendous power that Gray in his extremity had set in motion; Rolf saw this, glancing behind him over the cliff edge to the west. There where the sky some moments earlier had been azure and calm, there now advanced a line of clouds, roiling and galloping at a pace far faster than a bird could fly. These clouds, confined to a thin flat plane a little above the level of the citadel, converged like charging cavalry upon the waiting, looming bulk of Zapranoth.

An air-elemental, thought Rolf, with awe and fear and hope commingled; he would have shouted it aloud, but no one could have heard him through the screaming wind.

The violence of that wind was concentrated at the level of the Demon-Lord, well above the field where humans walked and fought. Men found that they could stand and swing their weapons though they staggered with the heavier gusts. And now the Guard came charging on again. Rolf put on his arm a shield taken from a fallen Easterner, gripped his sword hard, and waited in the line. While over their heads a torrent of air and cloud-forms thundered from the west to beat like surf upon the image of the demon, men lowered their eyes and worked to injure one another with their blades, like ants at war on some tumultuous wave-pounded beach.

The earlier fight had seemed to Rolf quite short. This one was endless, and several times he despaired of coming through alive. Mewick, howling like the wind, fought this time on Rolf's right hand, and saved him more than once. Somehow he was not even wounded in this attack, which failed as the first one had.

While the warriors fought, the violence of the wind gradually abated; and even as the black-clad host fell back once more in dissarray, the weightless bulk of Zapranoth again came pressing forward.

“Gray!” Thomas, stumbling on a wounded leg, came forcing his way through to the wizard's side. “Hang on, our men are coming!” Even now the first gasping and exhausted troops of the climbing Western army were nearing the top of the pass; the bulk of that army, on its thousands of laboring legs, was now in sight though far below.

Gray slowly, with the movement of an old, old man, turned his head to Thomas. In Gray's face, that seemed to be aging by the moment, there was at first no hint of understanding.

Thomas raised his voice. “You, and you, support him on his feet. Gray, do not fail us now. What can we do?”

The answer came feebly, as from the lips of a dying man: “You had better win with the sword, and quickly. I will hold the demon off till my last breath…that is not far away.”

Thomas looked round to see that the vanguard of his main army was just arriving at the top of the pass, brave men too exhausted for the moment by their running climb to do anything but sit and gasp for air, and squint up doubtfully at the looming shape of Zapranoth. The winds had driven the demon some distance from the field; whether they had inflicted pain or injury upon him no one could tell save Gray, perhaps. Of the screen of white magic Gray had earlier thrown up, there were only traces left, flickering and flaring like the last flames of a dying fire.

Rolf found it was no longer bearable to look straight at the Demon-Lord.

“One man run down,” Thomas was ordering, pointing down the pass to the approaching reinforcements. “Tell any with the least skill in magic to push on before the other, and hurry!” He turned his helmet's T-shaped opening toward Rolf. “Ready the balloons for the attack upon the citadel itself! We must not sit here waiting for the demon to set the course of battle.”