Down the shallow decline the ships sailed, their skis throwing up a silver spray, and now the wolf-warrior army also felt the wind sent by Armandra. Northan's ship visibly slowed and its sails seemed to slacken as the plateau's two central vessels bore down upon it. I had ordered that those ships engage Northan's craft; now I saw that they intended to ram him!
But if that fact was plain to me, it was equally obvious to the wolf-warriors. A battle sledge was hurriedly thrown into the path of the starboard vessel, and as its skis cut great swaths through wolves and men, so they ran into the bulky obstacle. A snapping of timbers as two of the skis were ripped away; then the screams of men and animals as the snow-ship toppled, crushing down upon the milling ranks of those around it, flinging its crew to the frozen ground where, miraculously unhurt, they quickly formed themselves and their bears into a savage fighting unit.
The other ship fared somewhat better. Its bird's-beak prow struck Northan's vessel a glancing blow that threw both ships a little starboard. As their decks passed each other, scraping together, men of the plateau leaped the gunwales to engage hand-to-hand with Northan's crew. Then I saw that indeed Charlie had been right about those wolves on Northan's ship; these were not wolves bred to be ridden as mounts, nor were they bulky for the hauling of heavy loads. They were lean and rangy killers!
And three or four of them had hurdled the rails between the passing ships and were now ravaging among the crew of the plateau's vessel, while their snarling brothers tore to pieces that brave raiding party aboard the ship of Northan. Ah, but in a few moments more the bears of the plateau's ship had turned on the attacking wolves to throw their mangled bodies from the swaying deck. The ship sailed on, leaving in its wake a crushed and bloody swath.
There were ten such swaths, red on the white plain as those heroic vessels ploughed through the wolf-warrior ranks; ten one instant, but in the next only seven as three more of the great ships were wrecked upon battle-sledge reefs. And as I watched, two more, steering wildly from their courses to pick up survivors, were flung onto their sides; in a moment only five ships remained and the plain was a tumult of fighting men and animals.
But no! Those brave men of the surviving snow-ships could not see their brothers go down alone against such odds. As their vessels slowed and stopped, brought to a halt by the sheer weight of shattered flesh-and-bone that clogged their massive skis, so their crews lowered the gangplanks and rushed down them onto the plain.
At last the snow-ships stood empty, while on the plain about them the Children of the Winds turned inwards on the now desperately
battling, stranded crews. I turned my eyes away as that wolf-warrior tide washed over them, drowned them as a wave covers pebbles on a beach, then seethed forward again in triumph.
Gone, all those brave men gone. They had sailed out to their deaths with my name on their lips. But their lives were not wasted, for the snow was red beneath that surging tide of wolf-warriors, red with the blood of hundreds of men and wolves crushed beneath the skis, and certainly in the hand-to-hand fighting the plateau's braves had not given their lives cheaply.
Meanwhile Northan's ship, thrown off course by the glancing collision, had come about in a tight circle. Now, heedless of the scrambling men and beasts too slow to clear a path for him, the traitor returned his vessel to its previous course. Straight for the central keep gates its beaked prow was aimed, the breath of Ithaqua in its sails, and the sea of men and wolves before it parted in frantic haste as it sped to its target.
Would Northan see the star-stone where Tracy had nailed it to the center of the great gate? Would it deter him? I had had concentric red circles painted around all such protective stars, to draw the eyes of the attacking army and fill them with dread. Surely Northan would see the star-stone. I took my binoculars back from Charlie and, with hands I could scarcely control, refocused upon Northan's ship.
There stood the ex-warlord upon the raised deck of the prow, eyes slitted and staring straight ahead, lips drawn back in a snarl. He would breach that gate if it was the last act he ever performed, and to hell with whatever awaited him on the other side!
Below me where I stood at the very lip of the cave, the forward part of the central keep and its gates were just visible. In that moment I looked down at a steep angle upon the ship of Northan. And at the same time, with something less than twice the length of his ship between him and the gates, finally Northan spotted the star-stone within its painted circles. He saw it and knew it to be genuine. I still had him in my binoculars when that happened, and the effect upon him was dramatic!
The snarl slid like butter from his face. He gabbled frenzied orders, motioned wildly with spastic arms, then hung on tight to the rail of the prow. Two of his lieutenants standing with him threw up their arms before their faces as they, too, spotted the star-stones. Then the
ship slewed crazily as its crew finally interpreted and acted upon Northan's orders. Chunks of ice flew up from the skis of his ship as they bit into the frozen surface.
Roadside, the traitor's vessel slammed splinteringly into the gate.
Battle for the Plateau
(Recorded through the Medium of Juanita Alvarez)
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As Northan's snow-ship
came to a shuddering halt at the splintered gates of the central keep, a clattering and shouting reached me from the almost vertical shafts. From closer at hand there came a savage howl as, turning, I barely found time to throw myself to one side. A hurled spear flashed past me and out through the open mouth of the cave.
Intent upon Northan's activities, I had given little thought to what was happening with the rest of the plateau. I had seen the wolf-warrior tide surging about the foot of our massive refuge; now it was made perfectly plain to me that one or more of the lesser tunnels had been breached. An Eskimo warrior, wearing on his back, shoulders and head the pelt and snarling visage of a wolf, stood astride the broken body of a youthful runner at the head of one of the steep shafts. Pulling out a long knife from his belt he stepped menacingly into the cave.
Just inside the cave, hidden from the Eskimo by a wall-like bulge of rock, Charlie Tacomah had seen the flight of the spear. He remained silent and as the Eskimo came forward swung his handaxe full in the intruder's face. The spine of that hideous weapon drove to its hilt in the fatally surprised Eskimo's forehead, splitting his skull open like a ripe melon and sending him toppling back and out of sight down the vertiginous steps. He gave a single gurgling shriek as he went.
Before I could thank Charlie, a guardsman wearing Armandra's royal insignia appeared from that same shaft. How he had avoided being knocked from the steps by the Eskimo's falling body I was unable to think. Covered with bloodâwhich clearly was not his ownâthe man bowed as he pantingly entered. Quickly he addressed me in his own tongue, which Charlie roughly translated:
“Three of the tunnels have been entered and a number of men and wolves are loose within the plateau. The rear parties and guardsmen are tracking them down. One of them has already surrendered himself and has volunteered important information. He was one of Northan's men originally and fled the plateau only under extreme pressure from the warlord. Northan's intention is to wreck the plateau and carry off both Tracy and Armandra. Even if he cannot take the plateau, he must not return without the women. Ithaqua will not allow Northan to fail him.”
A terrible foreboding suddenly gripped me. “Charlie, take over.” I tossed him the binoculars as I ran past the bloodied guardsman and swerved into a shaft that led into the plateau's labyrinths. “I have to get to Tracy. She's with Jimmy Franklin, and if the wolf-warriors have managed to get men this far into the plateau so quickly I'm taking no chances!”
I need not have worried. As I arrived at the head of a flight of stairs that reached down to the lower levels and the open cave where Jimmy had set up his catapult, he and my sister were just appearing from below. They were accompanied by four massive Eskimo guardsmen. Tracy was dishevelled and Jimmy had bruises and a few cuts, but aside from a superficial roughing-up neither of them seemed seriously hurt.
Relief flooded my being at the sight of Tracy's shaky but reassuring smile. “I must be crazy,” I told Jimmy, “to let you set up that sling of yours so close to the foot of the plateau. What happened?”
“No one's fault, Hank,” he answered. “I guess we just underestimated the enemy's penetration power. A pair of wolf-warriors made it up to our cave.” He looked grim as he added, “They weren't so hard, thoughânot after they saw Tracy's pile of star-stones. And I know just how they felt. I was pretty terrified of those stones myself.”
Excitement suddenly filled his voice. “You should have seen it, Hank. When we started hurling the stones at Ithaqua's armyâwhat a frenzy and a scattering! Anyway, during the scrabble the catapult was wrecked, then I got one of the intruders with his own spear. But by Codâspears and tomahawks are no match for star-stones! While I was occupied with my man the other one tried to get behind me. Tracy managed to hit him with a stone. It seemed to stick in him and burn there. His side seemed to roast away!”
“Oh, Jimmy, don't!” Tracy cried, the tremulous smile dropping instantly
from her face. She looked suddenly very small, pale and frightened. Only her tremendous courage was keeping her going.
“A couple of seconds after that.” Jimmy finished off, “these fellows arrivedâjust too late to give us a hand. They told us it wouldn't be safe for a while in the lower levels. There are about a hundred enemy warriors loose down there, not to mention some two dozen wolves.”
“That many!” I gasped. “Look, you'd better follow me to Armandra. Two of the guardsmen will stay with you, in case you come up against trouble along the way. The other two can go and help Charlie Tacomah. He's running the show now. I have to get a move on. And look after Tracy, Jimmy. I happen to know that Northan has plans to kidnap her. He's after Armandra, too. I'll see you both later.”
No sooner had I left them, climbing in a spiral toward the uppermost levels, then I sensed Armandra's mental presence. I opened my mind and she said,
“Hank, what is happening?”
“There are wolf-warriors in the plateau, I don't know how many. The guardsmen and rear parties are hunting them down but you may be in danger, Armandra. Northan means to take you back to Ithaqua, and Tracy with you. Tracy is safe enough for now, but what about you?”
“There are eight guardsmen within hailing distance, plus Kasna' chi and Gosan-ha. All are sworn to protect me with their lives.”
“You should have ten,”
I told her.
She answered,
“I sent two of them away with their bears. I ordered them to the snow-ship keeps, to the side of Kota'na, Oontawa's, man.”
“Good,”
I said.
“I'm sure there's, a lot more of your mother's nature in you than you suspect, Armandra. Anyway, I'm on my way to you. I've left Charlie Tacomah in command; he will make a better job of it than I could. Right now I'm wondering what tricks Northan and Ithaqua have up their sleeves.”
With that thought another occurred to me; the plateau had a couple of tricks of its own. By now the wolf-warriors should be attacking in a frustrated crush all along the face of the plateau. I hoped the holes they had already found in our defenses had by now been blocked. All being well, Charlie Tacomah should have ordered the pouring of the burning oil down upon the heads of the invaders. The plateau's mineral oil reserves had provided a defensive device of hideous potency.
Armandra plucked the thought out of my head.
“Yes, I have been to the balcony. The foot of the plateau is a sea of fire. The Children of the Winds are dying by the hundreds.”
No trace of pleasure showed in her thoughts. Alien though her anger might be, her compassion was warm and human.
“Go back to the balcony,”
I told her.
“I'll meet you these. I want to see how things are going.”
“Things seem to be going well for us indeed. But war isâterrible. The only thing in it that gives me pleasure is the thought of my father at this very moment. He must be beside himself with rage! I will go now to the balcony. Hank?”
“yes?”
“Take care.”
Two thirds of the way to my destination the sounds of a chase reached me. I slowed to a halt and as I stood there trying to control my breathing and listening in the light of many flickering flambeaux, it soon became apparent that the sounds of flight and pursuit were coming closer. In a few seconds more three wolf-warriors, clinging to the sides of one great wolf, burst from the mouth of a horizontal tunnel.
They saw me. As they dropped from the wolf's sides like ticks from an infested dog, one of them spoke to the beast. It sprang at me, its massive muzzle thrusting forward. I had a spear but no time to throw it. I leaned back on the shaft of the weapon until its hilt found a purchase against the uneven floor, bracing it against the wolf's spring. The great beast impaled itself on the spear, knocking me aside and wrenching the weapon from my hands.
While the wolf howled out its life in agony on the floor, the three warriors came at me in a rush. Weaponless, I threw myself up a flight of steps, turning to kick the fastest of my pursuers full in the face. He fell from the steps with a scream and crashed to the stone floor head first.
I made to climb higher and one of the remaining warrior threw himself after me. He grabbed my foot, causing me to loose my balance and fall between him and his companion. On my back, I managed to catch the wrist of one of my attackers as he aimed his tomahawk at my face, and while I briefly wrestled with him on the steps I wondered why the other man made no attempt to help his colleague.
Then as finally I overcame my attacker and throttled him with the haft of his own weapon, I saw why his friend had not helped him. The last of the three invaders was tottering down the steps, uselessly tugging at a spear that transfixed him. A second flashing spear pierced him as I watched, hurling him from the steps.
Then two of the plateau's guardsmen hurried up to me while five more positioned themselves at the mouths of the gallery's tunnels. “Are you all right, Lord?” one of my rescuers, a strapping young Viking, asked as I climbed to my feet.
“My thanks for your timely intervention,” I answered. “Yes, I'm unhurt. But how goes it now? How many more of Northan's warriors lurk in the plateau's caves and tunnels?”
“Perhaps a dozen of them,” he answered, “but then, too, will soon be hunted down.”
“And their wolves?”
“Few remain, Lord.”
This man seemed well informed; he had obviously been in a position to follow the course of events closely. “What about the plateau's losses?”
“The snow-ships and their crews are lost.”
“I know,” I answered. “I saw it. They were brave men.”
“Within the plateau, when the first wolf-warriors found a way in, we lost some men and bears. A man for a man, a bear for two wolves, perhaps. Now that they can no longer get inâ”
“I have no time now for talk,” I cut him off, “but you have made my mind easier. Do not stop, but keep on searching the wolf-warriors out. Tell any others of the plateau's men you may meet the same thing. Now I go to Armandra.”
And as I continued on my way, as if invoked by my mentioning her name, Armandra's mental voice came to me again:
“I am at the balcony, Hank. Is anything wrong?”
“A bit of a scuffle,”
I answered.
“Don't worry, nothing came of it.”
“The wolf-warrior hordes have pulled back from the foot of the plateau,” she informed me, “out of the way of the blazing oil. But it seems to me that Ithaqua's priests are up to some trickery.”
“I'll be with you in a minute or so,”
I said, entering the final gallery and crossing it to the tunnel with the lightning-flash symbol. And there I was brought up short in sheerest shock and terror. Terror not for myself, for Armandra. There, sprawled in attitudes of grisly death,
lay three of my woman's guardsmenâa bear, too, its spilled entrails still steamingâand the bodies of four wolf-warriors and a wolf.
Tired as I was from my race against gravity and time, my heels grew wings as I threw myself down the perimeter corridor and finally turned into the jutting balcony with its widely spaced bars. And there, his back to me, tomahawk raised to deliver a stunning blow, an Indian in the matted apparel of a wolf-warrior furtively crouched.
Beyond him, ignorant of his presence, Armandra stood at the bars, staring down at the plain where the Children of the Winds milled in confusion and frustration; but as I entered in a rush they both turned. She saw him even as he saw me, and as he leaped to meet me she cried out,
“No!”
His reactions were quick and I was tired. His weapon caught me a glancing blow on the head that sent me dazed to my knees. Up went his tomahawk again and his wild cry was one of certain victoryâcut short in strangled amazement!
He was whirled off his feet, thrust aloft and spreadeagled in midair by centrifugal force as his body spun ever faster in mad currents of air. The suddenly howling wind that filled the balcony snatched at my hair, hurled me aside, slammed the shrieking wolf-warrior time and again against the uneven surface of the ceiling, finally shot him headlong, with a snapping of bones, out through the bars and away into empty abysses of icy air.
And slowly the sentient hair fell back upon her head and her blazing crimson eyes dulled as Armandra ran to me sobbing, a woman once more, where only seconds earlier an elemental of the air had commanded familiar winds!
I held her tight and for the moment there was no war in progress, no shadow over Borea. Then I became angry.
“Where are the rest of your guardsmen? I saw only three of them, all dead, back along the perimeter tunnelâwhat of the rest?”