Kingdom of the Grail (29 page)

CHAPTER 33

S
arissa watched from the peaks as the Frankish army ascended the pass. Charles rode in the van, unmistakable even from this distance: he wore a golden helmet that flashed in the sun. The long train of his soldiers and servants wound behind him, down into the deep valley.

The scouts that he had sent ahead slept in the shadow of a stone, lost in dreams of joy and peace. Tarik crouched by them in cat-shape, ruffled and surly. There was a wishing on him, the first compulsion that she had ever laid on that fierce free spirit. But need knew no mercy. Set free, he would have vanished on swift wings, bearing word to Roland of what she did here. The time for that was not yet—though it was close.

A man climbed toward her summit, a wiry Basque born to these mountains, light and agile on the sheer and treacherous slopes. “It's ready, high one,” he said in his ancient tongue.

That same tongue came easily enough to her, though she did not doubt that her accent was abominable. “Wait on the signal,” she said.

The Basque inclined his head. That, for his kind, was deep obeisance indeed. After a moment he said, “Others may not wait.”

Sarissa did not speak her first thought, which was that
his men would obey or know the consequences. They were in position, obedient to her will. “Others?” she said.

“Down below,” he said. “Gascons. They stink of brimstone.”

What she felt was not surprise. It was a kind of relief. “Where? Show me.”

“They're not to be seen,” said the Basque. “We smell them. We trust they're not yours.”

“Not in this world,” she said.

“We wager they're doing the same as we. I don't suppose we'll make common cause with them?”

“Not likely,” she said through set teeth. “Send a small company of your men, those with the keenest noses and the strongest minds, and bid them find these Gascons. Let them not be found themselves, but send word back, and wait. Let the Gascons move first. We'll judge our course by what we see.”

The Basque looked as if he might have had somewhat to say of that, but he bent his head again, turned and made his way back down the slope.

Sarissa stayed where she was. Her own men were no more visible than the Gascons—and those belonged to the old enemy, she was as certain as she was of the sun beating on her head and the wind whipping her cheeks. She could hope that they had had no inkling of the forces above them. Ambush upon ambush. What it did to all her plans, she could not yet tell.

She kept fear at bay, and kept her mind clear, her spirit strong. In that state of pellucid calm, she saw the line crumble far to the rear as the king reached the summit of the pass. He went on in ignorance of the confusion behind him. The center drew away from the rear, likewise unaware.

That was accident, but accident shaped into design. A glint drew her eye. In the same instant, one of the younger Basques bounded up the slope, light as a mountain goat. He was red-faced when he came level with her, perhaps with exertion; or perhaps it was a furious blush. He spoke clearly, at least. “High one, my cousin Ioan says, the Gascons move.”

She could see the movement for herself, distinct from above, invisible no doubt from below. Men were creeping through the deep wood, closing in on the column.

“Tell Ioan,” she said to the boy: “to arms, and swiftly. But quietly! We'll ambush the ambush.”

As he bounded back down the mountain, she set Tarik free. The grey cat vanished without so much as a glance. A falcon sped on swift wings toward the rearguard so far below, and so far apart now from the rest of the army.

Her own forces were well up in the pass. They streamed down along it, silent as shadows. The army passed oblivious.

She left her vantage, making her way along the ridge. It was rough going, the wood thick, tangled with undergrowth. Once she was in among the trees, she could see nothing. Nor was there anything to hear. The birds had fled the coming of so many armed men. Not even a squirrel stirred in the trees.

She kept her hand to the hilt of the Roman shortsword that she had had since she was as young as she looked. It was smooth and hard and familiar. It had drunk deep of Gascon blood before the lurker in the trees was even aware of her existence. He never saw her face; when she saw his, his eyes were glazed in death.

She paused for a moment to clean her sword on his breeches. He was armed with bow and sword and spear, but wore no armor, only a light helmet. His breast was bare—sensible enough in the heat of this day. He wore something about his neck, a small object on a string of leather.

She was careful not to touch it. Unlike the Basques, she did not smell brimstone, but she saw darkness lingering yet about him, the serpent's tooth sunk deep in his spirit. The talisman that he wore sealed him to powers that she knew too well, and shielded him from others that woke her to heightened wariness.

She went on more quickly but with greater caution. The wards that she had laid on her men were holding, though she felt the strain about their edges. There was no sound of battle, nothing to alert or alarm the Franks in the pass.

At length the trees opened on a bare stretch of stony hillside. Men were fighting on it: her Basques in leather and steel, the Gascons in light armor or none. It was a fierce fight, but nearly silent. Neither side, just then, seemed stronger than the other.

A great blow struck the wards and flung her to her knees. Her skull rang with the force of it. Fool, she thought. Fool and fool. The enemy was older, stronger, and far more devious than she. He had lulled her into complacency, lured her forces out of hiding, and provided them with this thoroughly mortal diversion.

The battle itself was elsewhere, raging over the heads of the Franks—and directing its strongest blow to the rear. Desperate it might be, and dangerous, but she left her body lying in the shelter of the trees and opened wide the eyes of the spirit. Dark wings spread over the Frankish army. What waited beyond the pass was such a thing as she had not seen in long years. To men's eyes it would be nothing more than a mist in the mountains. To she who was more than man, it was a wall and a gate, and beyond it a darkness she had no desire to plumb.

Powers waited on her command. Forces gathered in the heights. The gate cast them into confusion.

Her lovely plan of battle was all in ruins. Her Basques were prevailing over the Gascons, but they mattered little in the face of that gate. Already the Frankish van was coming near to it, breasting the summit of the pass and beginning the descent into shadows and mist.

She left her body altogether and sent her spirit winging aloft. Chains of flesh dragged at her. Dark sapped her strength. It was aware of her. It laughed at her.

She blocked out the laughter and gathered all such strength as she had. She summoned the powers from the heavens and from the mountaintops. She forged of them a shield and a spear, and smote the gate asunder.

Men saw lightning out of blue heaven, and swift melting of the mist: strong enough portents, but nothing that they would understand. The darkness reeled. Its mockery had died a merciless death.

But there was laughter in it still, and a stab of triumph. She hurtled into the bonds of flesh, snapped together, rolled, caught the stab of swordblade down the length of her arm. The pain sealed her to her body. The man who would have cloven her asunder fell dead. The Basque chieftain had already turned away to strike down another of the Gascons.

She barely took notice. As she plummeted into her body,
she had seen the broader shape of the enemy's design. The van and center of the Frankish army were escaping, safe from that dark gate. But the rear, the baggage, the Companions and the king's picked troops, and last of all the Count of the Breton Marches, fought a bitter battle in the defile of Roncesvalles.

She yearned with all her heart for wings. That gift was not given her. She had her feet, and a glimmer of magic still, that lengthened her stride and lightened her step. It was slow, too terribly slow. An army had fallen on the rearguard, men and creatures other than men. They were cutting it to pieces.

All the powers of air were scattered in the fall of the gate. What other forces she had were farther away than she herself was, cut off like the king of the Franks, oblivious to the great need behind them.

As little as was left of her, as hopeless as it might be, she made all speed she could. She gathered men as she ran. The diversion had nearly played itself out: most of the enemy were down, dead or wounded. “No prisoners!” she cried. “Kill and go. There's worse below.”

They ran for life and for the fate of kingdoms. She ran for all that, and for the commander of the rearguard, the king's Companion, Merlin's pupil, Roland whom she loved. She knew with terrible certainty that he was the focus of that divided attack; that the others had been meant to pass through the gate, but Roland was the enemy's personal, special prey.

Not, by all the long-dead gods, if she could help it. She stretched her stride, bounding down the steep hillside, spending strength and magic without care for the cost. She would pay it later, when the battle was ended. When Roland was safe. She made of that a prayer, ringing in her heart as she ran.

CHAPTER 34

T
he ambush burst upon the rearguard as the last of it ascended into the pass. There were hundreds, thousands of the enemy. Nor were all or even most of them human, though they were man-sized, roughly man-shaped, and ran more or less as men ran. But no man wore the face of wolf or bear or leopard, or raked flesh with great curved claws, or bit out throats with long sharp fangs.

The Franks were strong and seasoned men of war, even the servants in the baggage-train, but against such enemies they were utterly out of their reckoning. Brave men shrieked and cowered and fled from creatures out of nightmare. Weak men simply died of terror where they fell.

The rearguard held as best it could, but horses were never meant to stand against such horrors as this. Far too many went mad, flung their riders to the ground and bolted.

The twelve Companions held to their saddles, which for some was a war in itself. Roland's Veillantif kept his head, but barely; he snorted and plunged but did not run.

This was not a battle. It was a massacre. They were trapped in the narrow defile, with enemies swarming from above, from before and behind. The guards on the baggage died swiftly. The rearguard fought in close ranks, drawn up
afoot. The Companions, among the few still mounted, defended the edges as they could.

The enemy converged on them, driving direct for them, drawn by the horses and the wealth of their armor: finely woven mail, blazoned shields, bright helmets, and weapons of rare quality. Roland above all, with Durandal singing her sweet eerie song, was drowned in attackers both human and not. They swarmed on him like wolves on a stag, leaping, snapping, tearing at whatever they could reach.

Olivier on his right, Turpin on his left beat off those whom Durandal did not touch. Thibaut and Milun fought beyond them, and Ogier the Dane roaring with Berserker fury; Gerin and Gerer, twinned and inseparable, fierce Anseis and Otker the valiant, and Ascelin of Gascony who saw his countrymen among the enemy, but fought for the Frankish king. Twelve paladins, twelve great warriors bound as brothers. They laughed as they fought, and sang as they slew.

Roland sang strongest of them all. When the ambush broke upon them, he woke to a white, mad joy. He counted the numbers against them, reckoned the ranks drawn up from hell, and laughed.

Durandal drank heart's blood from a thing with a wolf's jaws and an owl's great round eyes. A half-naked Gascon leaped yelling in the thing's wake. He fell with his head nigh cloven from his shoulders. There was another behind him, and another, and another, a swarm of fangs and blades and claws.

Milun was down, Thibaut standing over him, howling like a wolf. Anseis had fallen. Gerin and Gerer he could not see at all.

The enemy were innumerable, inexhaustible. The wall of them drove the Companions together, those who were left.

Veillantif shrieked in mortal agony, reared and fell thrashing. Roland tumbled free. Limbs tangled, blades clashed. Something smote him between the shoulders, but his mail-coat held. He dropped, rolled, staggered up. Claws raked his face. Durandal hewed the demon down.

Behind him a stallion screamed. He whipped about. A snow-white shoulder thrust against him. Long white mane streamed, catching his free hand. Tarik all but flung him onto the broad white back, no saddle, no bridle, but the
puca
needed none. His sorrow rang in Roland's skull, made fiery with anger. He had come as swiftly as he could, but he was sore hindered. Demons—no kin of his, by the old gods—had barred his way.

It did not matter. He had come; he fought with more than mortal strength. He carried Roland among the Companions, those grievous few who still stood: Olivier, Turpin, Ogier bloodied to the eyes, and Ascelin the Gascon fighting with grim and loyal ferocity.

There was no end to this battle, no respite. No moment to rest, to breathe, to bind one another's wounds. They could not take up the dead, nor mourn them, either. They could only fight for their lives and their souls' sakes.

Three fanged wolf-things together pulled Ogier down and gnawed his throat. Ascelin shrieked something appallingly profane and flung himself at them. A mob of Gascons, of his own people, fell on him and hewed him in pieces.

Tarik lunged. Roland glimpsed fangs—no blunt horse-teeth in that gaping mouth. Durandal whirled of her own accord, cleaving, hacking, killing.

He saw Olivier sway, with half a dozen men and devils gathered to pull him down. Roland caught him with mad strength and heaved him up on Tarik's back. Tarik barely staggered under the more than doubled weight.

Olivier's arms closed about Roland's middle. His voice rumbled in Roland's ear. “I don't suppose this beast has wings?”

Roland did not trouble to answer that. “Turpin. Where—”

“Down,” said Olivier, brief for once.

Roland would weep. Later. For them all, all the paladins, and his beloved Veillantif who had been so valiant.

“You might,” said Olivier, “blow your horn. The king probably doesn't know—”

“Lost it,” Roland said, with little breath to spare amid a storm of fangs and steel.

Something thrust against Roland's free hand. He almost batted it away, but his eye caught the shape of it. It was the aurochs' horn. “Hold it for me,” he said.

“I'd rather you winded it,” Olivier said. “Remember what he said. If there is need—”

Roland could not fight and talk and lift the horn, not all
at once. Olivier was leaning heavily against him. He had to take the horn or let it fall. His battle-brother's breath was loud in his ear, thick and labored. He did not want to hear what he heard in it: the bubble of blood.

“Wake the hosts of heaven,” Olivier said, faint now but determinedly light. “Let the mountains ring. Blow the horn!”

The hosts of heaven, thought Roland. Except for Olivier, he was all alone in that swarm of hellspawn. No mortal men here, no simple human faces. They were all demons. He could not see the army at all, nor the baggage. Only the seething mass of devils.

It was rout, it was slaughter. It was, he knew with perfect clarity, all for him—for Merlin's child, the last and least of his blood.

He prayed to God and to His holy mother that the king was safe, that the greater part of the army had escaped; that only the rearguard had been so beset. It was a forlorn hope and perhaps a vain prayer, but it gave him a little strength. It let him fight a few moments longer.

Olivier had stopped even trying to defend himself. Roland protected him as he could. He fought his way to a little rise of ground, a low hill on which he could make a stand. There, for a miracle—or perhaps for a mockery—he was given a few moments' pause.

Olivier slid from Tarik's back. Roland had no strength to catch him. He crumpled at the
puca
's feet. His body was a mass of wounds, his helmet lost, his face white and far too still.

He could not be dead. No, not Olivier. They had made a pact. They would live to a great old age, and then they would die together in the same woman's bed, in the same moment, neither before or after the other.

Roland flung himself down, heedless of the hordes that circled the hill. He took Olivier in his arms, cradling the big fair head. The blue eyes were open. They were empty. There was a faint frown on his brow.

A great wail rose in Roland's throat. He did not let it go. Instead he did as Olivier had bidden him, the last words he ever spoke. He lifted the great ivory horn to his lips, filled his lungs and blew.

No man, even Roland who was other than mortal, could
have made such a sound. It rose up and up, higher and higher, clearer and ever clearer, till heaven itself rang with the strength of it.

And as that long note died, he sounded a second, clearer and even stronger than the first. His ears were ringing, his lungs burning. But he found breath in them for a third great blast, with all his heart and soul in it. So strong was it, so powerful the force of it, that his sight grew red with blood, and blood trickled from his ears. The horn burst asunder in his hands.

The shards fell. He all but fell with them, blind, deafened, reft of breath and strength. But not of will. Somehow, with arms that shook as if with palsy, he raised Durandal, and steadied his feet as best he could. He stood against the tide that poised to overwhelm him.

The horn's cry was ringing still, echoing in the deep valley, resounding among the peaks. As hell's children swarmed upon him, he saw heaven split asunder. A host rode forth in armor of light. And at their head—

He laughed, there on the border of death, for surely he was dreaming. Sarissa rode foremost on the back of a great white swan, and on her head a crown, and in her hands a cup brimming over with blood. She was beautiful beyond mortal measure, shining with power, splendid, glorious.

And she was too late. The Companions were dead. The rearguard was gone—cut down, vanished, he did not know. Roland would die before she came to him.

Still he laughed, for she was beautiful, and he was not afraid to die. Durandal's song was faint and thin after the horn's great cry, but it was wonderfully sweet. The sword was insatiable in her hunger for demon's blood. He was more than glad to feed her.