Authors: Nicholas Anderson
Paul reached the
door of the cellar. He paused, looking at it. Someone had closed
the door without latching it. A small oversight, no doubt; but in this
environment it was enough to give one a moment’s hesitation. Paul opened
the door and stumbled back with a shout, kicking the door shut as he
fell. Rawl and Josie were at his side in the next moment. Rawl
pulled his brother to his feet.
“What was that?”
“There’s
something in there,” Paul said. “It was standing right at the bottom of
the steps when I opened the door.”
Josie put her
hand to the latch. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Paul said.
“It’s just a middling one, but it’s fast.”
“A middling one?”
Rawl said. “
What,
are you an expert on these things now?”
Josie stepped
back from the door. Paul unslung his bow and loaded it. Rawl handed
the torch he had been carrying to Josie and did the same.
“I thought you
stopped up that hole,” Paul said to Rawl.
“And I thought
you knocked in that tunnel,” Rawl retorted.
Rawl nodded to
Josie. She swung the door open and the twins thrust their bows through
the opening. There was nothing there but the hanging hams.
“I think it
darted into the corner,” Paul said, nodding towards the far corner that had
housed the tunnel mouth.
Rawl went down
the steps first. Paul followed, then Josie, holding the light above her
head. Paul reached the floor and stepped sideways, facing the dark corner,
until his left shoulder was against the wall of casks. Rawl stood just to
his right and Josie behind them. Rawl held up a hand for silence.
There was a slight scuffling noise from the corner.
“Josie,” Rawl
whispered, reaching back, “The torch.”
Josie pressed
the torch into his hand. Rawl took the candle that hung in a sconce by
his head and lit it. He tossed it over the barrels into the corner.
There was a sudden movement and a scream (although everyone realized later the
scream had come from Paul) and then everything happened at once. A dark
shape leapt from the corner behind the barrels; Paul raised his crossbow on it;
Josie threw herself against Paul from behind, throwing him against the barrels
and causing him to drop his bow. Rawl, who caught just enough of a
glimpse of the thing that leapt from the shadows to make the gamble of altering
his course, dropped his bow and torch and sprang at the thing with open
arms. The room was plunged into darkness. Rawl had more thrown than
dropped the torch, snubbing off the burning end and extinguishing it.
There was a confusion of noise.
Paul crying out in
surprise and anger at Josie.
Josie calling for
Rawl.
Rawl grunting and kicking against things in the dark and
then finally saying, “I’ve got him.”
“Got who?” Paul
almost screamed.
“The boy,” Josie
said. “The boy you tried to shoot.”
***
A half hour
later, Dane was up on the wall. Josie and the twins had brought the
shivering child into the infirmary, Rawl half carrying, half restraining him.
Once he’d gotten inside the lit room with the fire and the calm adults, he
settled down. Josie heated him up some soup and set him by the hearth in
a blanket. Pretty soon Molly got there and did a great deal of talking to
him and touching him. The boy never spoke. He never answered a
single question they asked him, not even with a nod or head shake. When
he seemed warmed up, Molly’s husband, Will,
carried
the boy (who no longer resisted) to their house. Josie, who was staying
with them, had walked home with them.
Dane heard
footsteps behind him and turned to see Bax mounting the stairs. “I
thought I’d find you up here,” he said.
Dane nodded to
him. “How are your hands?”
“I couldn’t
sleep. Everything is so terribly awkward with your hands in bundles.”
Bax stood beside him peering into the dark forest beyond the wall. “Why
aren’t you sleeping?”
“I haven’t
worked up the courage to try yet.”
Bax
nodded. “It’s easier to stare the darkness down than go swimming in it,
isn’t it?”
“Sometimes.”
“You know why I
told that story?” There was a hint of a smile in his voice.
Dane glanced
over at him. “For the simple pleasure you take in embarrassing me?”
Bax grinned
wider. “You know, that wouldn’t be so bad. You used to laugh, you
know. Even laugh at yourself.
Might do you good
to try it again.
But no, that wasn’t the reason.” Bax was
silent for a moment, as though waiting. “Well, aren’t you going to guess
again?”
“Sorry. I
guess that’s the only explanation I have for anything you do around me.”
“I’m crushed,”
Bax said.
“So why’d you
tell it?”
“I wanted to
teach them something.”
“About redheads from Parcia?”
Bax
grinned.
“About you.”
Dane kept his
eyes fixed on the forest.
“Even better.”
“You know, I
could have told a dozen such stories. Our whole lives you’ve been getting
us into the worst scrapes. But you always found a way out of them.
I wanted the younger men to know that. I’m still wondering how you’re
going to get us out of this one. I don’t know if I’ll be around to see
it, but I don’t doubt you will.”
“Don’t hold your
breath,” Dane said.
“No, I know you
will,” Bax said. “I know because, after all those reckless, foolhardy
adventures, after all those narrow escapes, after all that mad, meaningless
living, you found a way out of that, too. And you got out unscathed.”
“Unscathed?”
Dane said, more to himself than to Bax.
“But you left me
behind that time,” Bax said. “Ever since you started changing, I knew
things would never be the same for us. ‘Cause you pulled a trick I never
learned,
and I couldn’t follow you. You got out and
away from your father. Ever since I was a boy I wanted nothing so much as
to be nothing like my father. I hated him; I hate him, with every part of
me.”
Dane knew the
kind of man Bax’s father had been. He had his wife and his family and his
estate, but he had women and other families all over the country. Whether
Bax’s mother was wise to it or not, his father kept up an elaborate
charade. Bax was always the alibi, the unwilling accomplice. They
were going fishing, father and son. They were going swimming. They
were going to spend the night on the mountain and hunt wood pigeons with
homemade bows and roast the meat over their campfire. Whatever the story,
Bax always spent the days the same way: waiting for his father to come
out of some other woman’s house; sometimes more than one woman in the same
day. Then one day they really did go on an outing together.
A hunting trip.
A horrible accident befell them.
Bax’s father came home draped over his horse. Bax never talked about it,
but Dane had always wondered.
“I wanted to get
as far away from my father as I could,” Bax said. “I cursed him to his
face. I cursed him every way I knew how. I swore I’d never be like
him. But now look at me.” He laughed horribly. “I’m his
spitting image. But you, I never heard you speak one word against your
father. And I’ve never seen two men
so
different
as you and he are today. It’s the one thing I admire most about you and
the one thing I’ll never forgive you for.”
So,
Dane
thought
, you hate me because I remind you of what you are and I hate you
because you remind me of what I was. Maybe if we could make our peaces
with ourselves we could make peace with each other.
“I know what you
did, but I still have no idea how you did it,” Bax said. “You figured out
a way to get out. And you did. And you never came back for me.”
“I haven’t
figured anything out, Bax.”
“And you’ll
figure your way out of this one.” Bax slapped him on the shoulder and
started towards the steps. He paused and looked back at Dane. “Just
don’t leave me out of your calculations this time.”
Dane hardly slept that night, and
at sunrise the next morning he and Bailus were taking inventory of the weapons
and stores while the others were breakfasting.
They went first
to the room which sheltered the kegs of blasting powder.
“There’s so much
of it,” Dane said. “My father must have been planning to turn the whole
island inside out.” He tapped one of the kegs with his foot. “I
wish we could make some use of it.”
“Whether you
find a way to use it against them or not,” Bailus said, “I’ll stick to the old
rules.” He tapped his finger on the head of his war-hammer. He
studied the kegs wistfully. “One day this will be the way of war and
there will be no place for old men like me. They’ll blow breaches so big
in the walls that no man, no matter how brave or strong or skilled, will be
able to hold them. The mysteries and the miracles will depart, and the
world will continue to shrink around us. War will be an ugly, artless
thing and life will follow suit.”
“Maybe if it
gets that bad we’ll stop fighting altogether,” Dane said.
Bailus
laughed. “No. I’m just glad I won’t be around to see it.”
They shut the
door to the explosives room and went to the armory. Here were things they
could use.
Bows and spears and round wooden shields
with brass bosses in their centers.
They checked the
cellar next. What with the well in the center of the courtyard and all
the food the colonists had left, Dane’s small company could survive in the fort
for weeks without having to open the gate. But Dane did not want
that.
He turned to
Bailus. “Say we were to leave the fort behind. What’s the best we
could do as far as setting up some kind of nightly perimeter? Each man,
say, carrying a long stake or two and a bit of rope to make a pointed fence
each time we make camp.”
“What for, sir?”
“Because I want to take everyone, every last man and woman with us
here, across the island.
One big sweep, even if it takes days,
until we’ve cornered these butchers and forced them to fight.”
“I don’t think
that’s necessary, sir.”
“Why not?”
“Think about it
from their perspective. They’ve baited us, they’ve led us here, and now
they’ve cut off our escape. I don’t think we need to go looking for
them. I think they’ll come to us.”
“So what do we
do?”
“We wait.”
Dane stood for a
moment longer in the open doorway of the cellar. Then he stepped back,
closed the door, and nodded. They would wait.
They would not
have to wait long.
***
After breakfast,
Dane had each man inspect his weapons and armor and assemble before the
armory. In military terms, his men could be described as
irregulars. There was little uniformity in terms of weapons and armor
from man to man. The wealthier and older men were generally the best
supplied. Some, like the Johnson twins, favored the crossbow; others
preferred the axe or spear as their primary weapon. Bailus had his
hammer. Dane made sure each man was outfitted with a shield and spear and
a double-edged knife either from the armory or what they’d brought from
home. The knife, a standard piece of equipment for most Hallander
soldiers, doubled as tool and weapon and made a passable short stabbing sword.
There were enough helmets in the armory to suit those who did not yet own
one. Ira Scott, a young veteran, refused to wear a helmet as he said it
would muss up his
mohawk
. There were even a few
mail shirts and the men cast lots for these. Rawl won one of them and
immediately modeled it for his comrades.
Dane had some of
the men fill sacks with straw and set them on poles in the open
courtyard. Bailus ran the men through drills. Bailus had trained
each of these men in the art of war on the mainland and they were already
familiar with the weapons. But Dane’s intention was not training but the
surge in adrenaline that the activity, and especially the simulated killing,
would bring his men. He felt they had been too long on the defensive already.
He watched them
as they drilled. Skewering the strawmen with their spear tips and using
their spear shafts to spar with one another. He helped Fish, the company
cook, and the women, Josie and Molly, for he had not seen Mirela all morning,
set out a veritable banquet and excused the men to an early lunch.
The boy was at
the table, seated between Will and Molly. He may have been silent and
wary as a wild animal, but he ate like one, too.
A
hungry one.
It gave Dane a measure of satisfaction to see the
skinny child stuff his mouth so full he could hardly chew. Dark circles
ringed the boy’s eyes and scratches covered his arms and face. Dane
wondered how long he’d been sleeping in the forest.
Dane ordered
four men who had finished eating to relieve the sentries so they could
eat. As he stepped away from the table with them, Bax met him, coming
from the infirmary. He looked sick. He caught Dane by the arm and
leaned close.
“Dane, she’s
gone.”
“What are you
talking about?”
“Mara; I can’t
find her anywhere.”
Dane pulled his
arm free. “You’ve checked the infirmary?”
“Of course.
She was there this morning when she
changed my bandages, but Leech says he hasn’t seen her now for a couple of
hours.”
Dane left him
before he had finished his sentence. He searched the obvious places
first: Bax’s house, the kitchen, the infirmary. Then, starting with
the Thatchers’ and Josie’s house, he checked every building and room in the
compound. By the end he was shouting her name. Bax caught up to
him. “You’re wasting time,” he said. “I’m sure she’s not inside the
walls.”
Dane pulled away
from Bax again and headed for his room. Bax ran alongside him. Dane
retrieved his crossbow and
quiver
from his room and
started for the south gate. Bax followed him.
“What were you
doing now, Bax?” he said, not even bothering to look over his shoulder.
“Finding new ways to hurt and humiliate her?”
“I didn’t do
anything to her. I told you I haven’t seen her since breakfast.”
“You didn’t do
anything to her,” Dane said. “You realize she’s probably already
dead? I hope you’re happy now.”
“Of course I’m
not happy. I’ve never been happy. You know that.”
“Then why do you
have to make your misery everyone else’s?”
“Dane, I was
going to marry her.”
“Marry
her? Why on earth would she want to marry you? Or were you not
going to give her a choice in that either?”
“Dane, I’m
trying to make things right.”
Dane finally
turned on him.
“Right?
What could you
possibly do to make things right?”
Somewhere in the
trip across the courtyard, Bax had picked up a spear. He looked rather
pathetic standing there before Dane with his eyes cast down and his spear
cradled between his bandaged hands.
“You want to
make things right? Where were you when she was lying in the infirmary,
bleeding half to death?”
“How could I
stand to be there when I was the whole reason she was there?”
Dane spun on his
heels and in a few strides reached the gate. He did not bother waiting
for the sentry to come down from the wall; he opened it himself. He
whirled on Bax once more. “Stay here and stay out of my way.”
Bax held his
ground. “I told you: I want to make things right.”
Dane shouted up
to Tanlin Hall, the sentry. “Close it as soon as we’re through.”
Tanlin stood as
though he’d been turned to stone until Dane and Bax appeared on the other side,
then he took the stairs in the three bounds and slammed the gate.
Dane headed for
the beach. He remembered Mirela lamenting being so close to the sea and
not being able to visit it. They reached the beach. The ruined
hulks of their ships listed lopsidedly in the shallows. There was no sign
of Mirela.
“Maybe we should
split up,” Bax said.
“Good idea,”
Dane said. “Otherwise I might kill you.”
Dane went to the
left and Bax disappeared into the woods behind him. He scouted the whole
eastern side of the harbor. The woods were thick here and he shouted her
name, but the trees seemed to throw it back at him. He reached the end of
the peninsula and doubled back along the eastern edge that faced the open
ocean. Here steep cliffs dropped onto jagged rocks and the booming
breakers. He remembered her words about death seeming more bearable than
her current existence. He wondered how much she had meant it. He
forced himself to step to the edge of the cliffs several times and scour the
rocks below for any sign of her body. He did not know how long he’d been
searching, but at some point while he was on the peninsula it began to
rain. It rained hard. He tried to keep his bow under his cloak to
protect the string but after a few minutes he knew it was useless.
He worked his
way back to the beach. He intended to cross it to the other arm of the
harbor, but partway across he came upon a stream that ran out of the trees and
into the harbor. He guessed it was the stream which flowed past the
settlement. He splashed through it but then stopped. Something
about the meeting of these waters seemed symbolic to him, as though it might be
significant to her. He moved upstream, delving into the forest.
***
Once Dane left
the compound things happened fast. Bailus was crossing the courtyard when
a dog began to bark. He recognized its bark as Dioji’s. The other
two dogs joined in. Josie, who had just laid a mountain of table scraps
before the dogs, which they were ignoring, bent over Dioji and spoke to him and
scratched him between the ears. The dog licked her hand and began to run
in circles, wagging his tail and barking excitedly.
“Sir,” Rawl
said, moving quickly towards Bailus from the gate, “Have you seen Dane?”
“Not since
lunch,” Bailus said, but his voice was drowned out by Tipper drawling down from
the west wall. “Uhh, sir, I think you had better come and take a look at
this.”
And at the same
time, Pratt shouted down from the east wall.
“Sight.
Sight! Holy Kran, where is everybody? Get your asses up here.”
Bailus was
closer to the east wall. He climbed the ladder and looked over the
battlement beside Pratt. “What am I supposed to be seeing?” he said.
“They were right
there, sir,” Pratt said.
“Running just inside the
trees.
There must have been two dozen of them.”
“You coming, sir?”
Tipper said, with the slightest hint of
anxiousness in his drawl.
Bailus patted
Pratt on the shoulder and slid down the ladder (not an easy thing to do when
you’re holding a giant hammer). He climbed the ladder on the west wall
and joined Tipper in looking out at the meadow that stood on the western edge
of the settlement. “Huh,” he said. “Well, doesn’t that beat
all?” He turned to face the courtyard. “Alright, boys; this is
it.
Welcoming committee to the top of the wall.”
There was a mad
dash for weapons and then for the stairs. Rawl was at the front of the
surge of men rushing up the stairs at the south gate when he stopped. He
was pushed from behind and jumped off the stairs into the courtyard. He
ran for the infirmary. Josie and Leech were there, standing near Elias’s
bed. “We’ve got to move him,” Rawl said.
“Where?”
Leech asked.
“To a place without any windows.
Leech, help me get
him on a litter.”
Josie grabbed
her crossbow and strapped on her quiver as the men carried Elias through the
door.
“This way,”
Leech said.
He led them to a
room set in the opposite wall. It had no windows and the door opened
inward and was secured by a heavy latch. As they set Elias on a table
against the back wall, Josie ran back out into the courtyard. Rawl called
after her but she was already gone. Leech yanked the draw-cord through
the door so that it hung limply from the latch inside. Josie returned
with Molly and the boy.
“Is your
magazine full?” Rawl asked.
She nodded.
“As soon as I’m
gone, barricade the door. Push all the furniture in front of it that you
can. I’ll come back for you as soon as the fighting’s over, but I’ll call
to you; I won’t knock. If anything pounds on the door, load your
bow. If anything opens it so much as a crack, shoot it dead. Don’t
hesitate. You won’t get a second chance.”
He turned for
the door, but she caught him by the hand and pulled him towards her, and she
was kissing him as he’d never been kissed. He was surprised by how strong
her grip was, by how strong her body was. Then she let him go, and he
turned, slightly dizzy, and ran for the stairs.
As he ran, he
realized how wrong he had been. All his life he had thought love was
something you earned. If you were brave enough or noble enough or rich
enough or good enough, love would find you. But he realized as he climbed
the wall it was just the opposite. Love was a gift. But when you
received it, it made you brave, it made you noble, it made you good. Love
made you a king.
As soon as he
reached the wall-walk and took his place beside his brother he had other things
to think about.
Bailus had done
the best he could with what he had. He had 16 men under his command at
present, including Fish, the cook. He’d put them in pairs so that if
things got really bad, each pair could become its own island, fighting
back-to-back until the end. He put a pair on either side of each gate,
where he thought the fighting would be fiercest and two each on the east and
west sides of the wall. Bailus was the odd man out and the
reserves. He had no partner. He would go wherever the fighting was
fiercest.