Lord of Janissaries (108 page)

He thinks we should make up several portable presses, with all the metal parts bronze so they won’t rust, and train a couple of dozen acolytes of Yatar as printers. Then we store the presses in the Caves of the Preserver along with everything else we want to keep safe from the bombs. When the fallout’s gone and it’s safe to come out, we can start on printed books. The
Shalnuksis
won’t be back for a long time. . . .

I suspect there are a few holes in that plan, and it probably gives the priests of Yatar a monopoly on printing. Does that matter? Schultz is right, moveable type is one thing that’s
got
to survive the Time, however we manage it. I asked him for an estimate on labor and materials, and I’ll write to Yanulf as soon as I get it.

And now Rick is gone to Margilos, Larry with him, and Les is God knows where, and Caradoc’s dead. When will Rick be back? And when he comes back—enough. Back to work.

* * *

Elliot reined in close and spoke low. “Colonel, something’s got Sam spooky.” He indicated the older of the two centaurs the Margilans had given him as goodwill gifts.

Larry Warner eyed the sling hung round Sam’s neck. “Still don’t know if I want to trust those things with weapons.”

“My problem, Professor,” Elliot said.

It could be bigger than that, Rick thought. Most of the Guards felt the same way Warner did. But no doubt about it, Elliot was proud of Sam and wasn’t going to part with him. And we trust dogs with teeth, don’t we?

Sam wrinkled his nose and swung his greying head from side to side. His hands clenched into fists. Pete, the younger centaur, wasn’t sniffing the air but Sam’s nervous excitement had made him skittish.

“Badger-bear? Cat?” said Rick.

“This isn’t cat country. Or wasn’t last year.”

“Yeah. A lot of the wild herds have come north. If the cats have followed them . . .”

The greatcats were larger than mountain lions and would attack a mounted man if they were hungry enough. “Okay. I don’t want to stop, this close to Westrook.”

“Sir!”

Rick lifted his canteen. Nearly empty. Well, it wasn’t far to Westrook, and there were streams. He shifted in the saddle. Twenty-five miles a day in armor. But tonight he’d be in Murphy’s castle, with bath—hot water! And maybe Murphy had some Preparation H left—

Sam screamed and reached for his sling. He plucked a stone out of the cloth bag hung below the sling. Pete threw up his head, and waved his arms. He backed away to give his mentor and friend room to use his sling.

“Sam! Hold!” Elliot shouted.

Dust rose at the crest of the next hill. Half a dozen leather-armored men on scrubby ponies rode into view.

“Westmen!” one Guardsman screamed. Another nocked an arrow and started to draw before his sergeant stopped him.

“Skirmishers left and right!” Elliot commanded. “Colonel? How you want to handle this?”

“Hold what you’ve got,” Rick said. He pointed. The Westmen hadn’t moved from their hilltop, and no more came to join them. The Westmen held at the hilltop until it was clear that everyone had seen them. Then they came down at a fast walk. Just beyond longbow shot they stopped and waited again.

“Odd enough,” Elliot said. He lifted his binoculars.

“You know it.”
And thank God there aren’t more of them.
In the previous Time six hundred years before, a Westman army washed clear across Drantos and almost to the gates of Rome itself.

“The one in front’s got his hands out. And Colonel, none of them have drawn weapons.”

“I see that,” Rick said.

“Big wads of turf on their lances, too. I got no experience with Westmen, but these sure don’t look hostile.”

Mason rode up. “Cap’n, I think they want to parley.”

“Looks like it.”

“But what about?” Elliot demanded.

“I don’t know, but it can’t hurt to find out,” Rick said.

Mason frowned. “Okay, Captain. Not you. I’ll go talk to them—”

Three more horsemen rode over the crest of the hill. They were mounted on full-sized horses and wore Drantos clothing and armor. The leader carried a Westman bow, and reined in to speak briefly with the Westmen before he rode on toward the column.

Curiouser and curiouser, thought Rick.

“Those are Murphy’s troops,” Mason said. “He got Westmen for allies?”

“Sure like to ask him a couple of questions,” Elliot said.

Me too.

The three men rode up to Rick. “Lord Murphy bids you welcome to his lands and hopes you will avail yourselves of the hospitality of Westrook.”

“Now just a goddamn minute—” began Art Mason. Rick raised a hand.

“Perhaps you would be kind enough to tell us who you are? And of your friends there.”

“I am Etro, son of Panar, headman of Irakla, steward to Lord Murphy. This has been my reward, for fighting well when the Westmen came to Irakla in the year of the Wanax Ganton’s great victory on the—”

“Who the hell are those Westmen?” Rick didn’t realize that he’d shouted, but Etro looked stunned and Sam reached for another stone for his sling.

Elliot gentled the centaur. Etro stammered, “My Lord Eqeta, they are not enemies! These are warriors sworn to the Chief Mad Bear. Mad Bear found enemies among his own people and fled here.”

The Guardsmen who weren’t looking at each other in confusion were glaring at Etro.

A strange enough story, Rick thought. A Westman chief seeking sanctuary? Or alliance? There’s more to learn about Tran than I thought. Or Ben Murphy’s a damned fool. Or both.

Only one way to find out.
Rick waved the column forward.

* * *

Mad Bear stood a bowlegged five and a half feet tall. His skin was the color of the leather trousers and tunic he wore, and his head was bald except for a single grey-shot scalplock. Bone and gold wire ornaments dripped from both tunic and belt, and a Drantos-style dagger rode on his right hip in a gilded horsehide sheath.

He looked as if he could have been dropped into the front rank of one of Genghis Khan’s armies with nobody the wiser.

Rick couldn’t help wishing that when Mad Bear was putting on all his finery for the Great Chief of the Stone Houses, it had also occurred to him to bathe. Or else that this meeting was taking place outdoors with Mad Bear downwind, instead of in Ben Murphy’s study. At least Westrook’s thick stone walls kept out the worst of the heat.
I could use a bath myself.

Mad Bear was speaking through an interpreter. Rick recognized the Margilan priest of Vothan. He’d been a slave among the Westmen for ten years until Ben Murphy rescued him during the Hooey River campaign. Since then he’d served as a combination of chaplain, administrative assistant, and translator to Murphy.
Ben reports everything, but I could sure use that man back at Armagh. Oh, well.

“So it came to New-Grass Time,” Mad Bear was saying. “Once more I was hailed as chief of all the Silver Wolves. So by the gods and the laws I could do nothing but what I did, when the warrior Chintua slew a man of the tent of Walking Stone. He slew the man honorably, for the man had said Chintua was not father of his sons, and then struck the first blow.

“Yet Walking Stone would not come forth to avenge his tentman. Instead he sent a hand of men against Chintua by night and slew him, then carried away his body so that his kin could not honor it. Chintua’s spirit and body alike died that night.

“I went to Walking Stone and demanded that he face me, or be known evermore as a man without honor or shame. Walking Stone said that he and those chiefs who had sworn to him were now the judges of honor among the Horse People. They judged that there was no honor in such as Chintua, and that such men as Chintua were no better than weakling foals, to be cast out lest they breed more weaklings.

“I could not believe that any of the chiefs had sworn to follow such a man. Yet it was so. I will not name them, for they may still return to the way of honor. But there were so many that I was fortunate to pass alive from the tent of Walking Stone.

“Walking Stone could not fall without warning on the Silver Wolves as he had fallen on Chintua, but yet we could not stay close to him. If we moved swiftly, the gods might yet grant us a life with our kin and our herds, and without shame. So we rode to the Green Lands, and sent messengers to the Great Chief of Westrook. He gave us honor in our need, as he had given it in our defeat.”

Mad Bear sat down cross-legged on the floor, arms folded on his chest.

“Great Chief, eh, Ben?” Elliot said.

Murphy shrugged and turned to Rick. “Mad Bear brought the message himself, Captain, him and six others with turf on their spears.

“He swore a whole bunch of oaths that he’d keep the peace. I called up enough of the ban to keep them out of mischief, and gave them a campsite and some food. The crops were real good last year.”

And the surplus should have gone to the Caves of the Preserver, but let’s not get into
that
now. “Have they behaved themselves?”

“Far as I can tell. There’ve been a couple complaints of missing sheep, but a little silver took care of that. I sent a report, but I reckon you were on the road out of Margilos by then. So I had to sort of make do.”

Make do. And it’s always easier to get forgiveness than permission.
Rick was certain that despite Murphy’s elaborate politeness, Ben had decided to make alliance with Mad Bear no matter what Rick Galloway might want.

Typical Drantos nobleman. But dammit he reports to me. . . .

“All right, Sergeant. How many warriors does he have?”

Mad Bear clearly understood the question. He made rapid gestures with his hands. Rick noticed that he had a long scar across the knuckles of the left one.

Baldy, the interpreter, nodded. “He says—call it three hundred and fifty. He speaks the truth, for I have seen the camp and counted that many but no more.”

“Okay. I suppose something can be worked out, if he’s telling the truth about wanting—”

Mad Bear glared and his hands twitched. Then he snarled something Rick hardly needed interpreted, and went on with a speech that made Baldy turn pale under his tan. The priest could barely keep up with the flood of words.

“He says that he has already taken all the oaths before all the gods that a warrior may honor. If the Great Chief of the Stone Houses doubts him, then let the Chief Murphy take those oaths. Better, let the Great Chief take those oaths himself—or if he is too much the coward to bear the fire, the sun, or the wind, let him come against Mad Bear with a warrior’s steel. Mad Bear will meet him with no more weapons than his knife and his honor, and let the gods judge who lies.”

Suddenly Rick was glad of the .45 in his shoulder holster. “I meant no offense. Tell him that. Offer him whatever is customary.”

Mad Bear spoke again. This time he seemed less angry. The priest translated. “I hope the Great Chief of the Stone Houses is wise enough to see how much he may win by friendship toward the Silver Wolves. Sooner or later, Walking Stone will drive other clans to do as we have done. If they may hope for friendship among the Stone Houses, they will come in peace.

“If they cannot do this, then they may yet follow Walking Stone’s banners when he marches again. We fought well when our horses were thin. Think how we shall fight when our horses are fat.” He sat down again.

Murphy shrugged. “It’s pretty much as he says, Captain. The grazing is getting a lot better out to the northwest. If Walking Stone can unite all the Westmen, they’ll really be a handful. From what Mad Bear says, they weren’t exactly driven out of the Five Kingdoms. Walking Stone and some other big chiefs ordered a retreat, and made the order stick.”

It made sense to provide a way out for the chiefs and the clans who didn’t want to follow this self-proclaimed Genghis Khan.
But do we want any Westmen allies at all? Mad Bear came south because Walking Stone had the sense and the muscle to try sitting on blood feud. What will the chiefs say when they find out they’ve got less freedom to follow their old customs in the south?

He wants an answer. Think fast, Galloway.

Mad Bear grinned. “I know that there may yet be a blood price we owe you, for the last time we came. I will ask the gods. If they say so, my warriors and I will swear to ride with you against your enemies in the north. We know they dream of avenging their defeat upon you. The prisoners we took said as much. If the gods will it, we will shed our blood in battle at your side.”

That sounded a lot like an offer of alliance—gods permitting. “Will the other chiefs do the same?”

“I can bind no other chief. Each must call upon the gods himself. Yet surely if the Silver Wolves are bidden to swear oaths of friendship with the Chiefs of the Stone Houses, it will be a sign to others.”

Which, freely translated, hinted that Mad Bear might twist a few arms.

Ben Murphy looked expectant. So did Baldy. Mad Bear had no expression at all.

I’d hate to play poker with him.
Man for man the Westmen were the best light cavalry on Tran. They weren’t all that bad in bunches, either, if they could get behind a single chief.
Damn Ben Murphy and damn Mad Bear. I want a bath and Preparation H, not decisions—

“Surely Mad Bear must seek the will of his gods. No man of honor could do less.”
And just hope that doesn’t mean human sacrifice or I’m for it with the Yatar people. But I think they just sacrifice horses.
“If the gods wish that the Silver Wolves ride with us against our common enemies, they will be greeted with honor. If that is not the will of the gods, the Silver Wolves may depart in peace.”

Mad Bear grinned widely as Baldy finished the translation. So did the other two. Rick wished he felt as relieved as they did. He’d committed not only himself but the whole alliance to friendship with rebels against Walking Stone.
Serves me right for praying for a chance to make a decision without having to consult everyone and his fifth cousin’s steward.

Rick recalled a Chinese proverb. “Be careful what you wish for. You may get it.”

* * *

The anticlimactic council of war took place after the dinner Murphy hosted on the roof of the keep of Westrook. Murphy had had a table, benches, and several kegs of beer lugged up, then dismissed the servants and sat down at the foot of the table. Rick took the head and Bisso, Elliot, Warner, and Mason ranged themselves along the sides.