Star Gate, page 10
Lord Bardon touched the sword hilt, but he did not take it into his hand, and the other's eye shone. He was accepted by fealty and not as a bondsman, and Lord Bardon's knowledge of that ceremony impressed him still more deeply.
He was on his feet once more, the sword slammed smartly into sheath.
"I await orders, Lord—"
That reminded Lord Frans of the problem to hand. "We can't just turn these people loose on the countryside. They would die or be scooped up by another patrol."
"What about it, Ospik," Lord Bardon asked the mountaineer. "Will your chief suffer us to take such a party through the ways?"
Ospik plucked at his lower lip. "You have struck a smart blow at the 'gods,' outlander. But, suppose those are taken again, they will blat out all they know and speedily. All men talk when the 'gods' will it. We have kept our land because its secrets were not known—"
"Once they are in the valley of the hold, Ospik, I do not think they will fall prey again."
Ospik nodded. "There is that to consider. But I have not the final word; I can but be a messenger. Come you with me and speak to our chief yourself."
"And in the meantime? What if there is another body of guards along this way?" asked Lord Bardon.
"As to that—get these back into the shelter of a side gulch here. It is a place you can easily defend if the need arises, and it is out of sight."
So they brought the released prisoners, the possessions of the guards, anything that might be of use to the captives, into a small side valley Ospik showed them. Archers on the heights above might well hold that camp against a strong attack. And they remained there as Bardon went back with Ospik into the mountain ways.
The shock of the captives' sudden change in fortune was beginning to wear away, and a handful of the men bestirred themselves, under the command of the man Lord Bardon had enlisted, to shepherd the less alert of their fellows and arm themselves from the spoil of battle. Seeing that their leader appeared to have matters well in hand, the three from the hold remained aloof, save when physical help was needed. But when the temporary camp was in some sort of order, the leader came to them, saluting Lord Frans with upheld palm.
"We are at your command, Lord. Though perhaps you do well not to walk among us until those know you better for what you are. For their fear and hate for those you resemble—in outward form—runs high, and it is seldom that we have a chance to approach a Dark One within sword distance. Someone, with dulled wits and a good reason, might well attempt to try your deathlessness with metal—"
"But you do not think as do they?"
"Nay, Lord. I am Kapal, once Band-leader to free men of the wastes—until I was trapped arid collar-tamed (or so they thought) by the Hands of the Dark Ones. We have fought, and hid, and fought again ever since the Dark Ones sent to enforce their rule upon the fringes of the Barren Lands. Mostly we die, our blades in hand, cut down in battle. We are very few now. When they took Quaar, they left but a
handful of posts, and these can be overrun one by one, as they will do. We die, but we die free! Only"—his eye flickered from Lord Frans to the tall bow the Star man carried—"mayhap with weapons such as these to kill silently and at good distance, men need not die so hopelessly any more."
"It may be so. We shall see—"
Kapal manifestly took that as a promise of a brighter future. "Let me out into the Barren Lands, Lord, with such a hope to voice, and I shall bring you a hundred hands of good men to ride beneath your banner! I can be gone within the hour if you wish."
"Not so. It is not given to me to have the ordering of this matter, Kapal. And what of these?" Lord Frans pointed to the late captives. "Are any among them minded to raise blade against their late masters?"
"Perhaps they are so minded," Kapal admitted. "But most of them are broken in spirit. Two, mayhap three of them could rally to a battle call. The rest—" He shrugged. "They have worn the collar chain too long."
"So do I think also. But what if they are given a measure of safety, a stretch of land where they may rest without fear, will they sow seed and reap, hunt meat, and work thus for a community that does not ask sword service in return?"
"That they might well do, Lord. If you know of such a place—safe from the Dark Ones' raids. But then you must have come from there!" He glanced from Lord Frans to Kincar and Jonathal. "It is plain to see that these, your guardsmen, have never known the bite of chain or whip, and yet they wear not a Hand's brand upon them—"
"A Hand's brand—?"
"Aye, lord. Those who are one in spirit with the Dark Ones bear their seal for all men's seeing. Look you!"
He crossed to the prisoner. The former guard spat filth, but Kapal stooped to fasten fingers in the other's hair, holding up his head and pointing to a mark just above and between the other's brows. Set deep in the skin was the brand left by hot metal, a small, threefold figure familiar to Kincar, to Jonathal—but reversed! And at that blasphemy both of the half-bloods raised fingers in the blessed sign to repudiate such vileness. Kapal saw their gesture, and when Lord Frans echoed it, he burst forth:
"The Three—you give service to the Forest Ones, Lord?"
"I give service to a belief of my own, of which the Three are another manifestation, Kapal. Good thoughts and beliefs have the respect of any man, whether they be his own by birth, or native to his friends and kinsman. But here, I think, a certain symbol has been deliberately used vilely—"
"That is true, Lord. For those who serve the Dark Ones with their full will allow themselves to be marked thus, and take pride in it—so that all others rnay see it and fear them. But there are those who do not fear, rather do they hate!" He loosened his hold, and the prisoner's head fell back to the ground.
"It follows a very old pattern." Lord Frans spoke more to himself than to those about him. "Sneer at and degrade what might be a banner of hope to the slave. Aye, an old, old pattern. It is a ripe time for the breaking of such patterns!"
They were never to know what argument Lord Bardon used successfully with the ruler of the inner mountain in behalf of the rescued slaves. But in the late afternoon he returned with the message that they might use the passages to take the company to the hold valley. It was a long, slow trip. And they had left two heaped piles of stones to mark graves in the gulch. The woman Kincar had tried to coax into eating was gone, and with her an old man whose wits wandered so that none of his companions in misfortune knew his name or where he had been taken.
More than a day was spent on that journey, for they had to rest many times, the larngs carrying the weakest when the passages permitted riding. The men Kapal had indicated as being worth recruiting for spear-festing formed a unit under the wasteland leader, accepting his commands readily, and they alone of the rescued were interested in their strange surroundings.
The prisoner stayed in the hands of the hold party, his safety was only assured with them. But, as they penetrated deeper into the' winding ways undergrond, his defiance seeped out of him and he was willing enough to stay very close to his captors, tagging either Kincar or Jonathal as if he were a battle comrade.
At the fifth rest period Lord Bardon called Kincar to him. "By Ospik's reckoning we are now not too far from the entrance in the hold valley. Tosi will go with you as a guide; take your larng and ride for aid. Many of these are close to collapse and we cannot carry them to the hold. Get extra mounts and more food—"
So it was that they brought the weary party into the fortress where the freed slaves, their wounds dressed, their hunger eased, sat for the most part in dumb surprise at the life about them. But the Lord Dillan called a council of war in the upper chamber he had taken for his own—and to this Kapal alone of the rescued was summoned.
"The guard is wide open to probe," Lord Dillan said of their prisoner. "Doubtless that is used regularly upon him by his masters. The man he was—he might have been—was destroyed when they set that brand upon him. By that act he surrendered his will and they can use him as they wish. It is a horrible thing!"
"So we agree. But we cannot concern ourselves too deeply now with what has been done in the past. We must think of what lies before us. The question is, dare we, with our few numbers, make any move against the entrenched strength of these tyrants?" asked Lord Bardon.
Lord Jon broke the long moment of silence. He was the youngest of the Star Lords, perhaps by their reckoning as youthful and as inexperienced as Kincar had been in the company of Wurd and Regen. Now he asked a simple question.
"Dare we not?"
Lord Dillan sighed. "There it is. Being what we are, striving toward the goal we have set for ourselves, we must interfere."
"Aye. But not foolishly, throwing away any advantage we may have," Lord Bardon cut in. "We must make our few count as well as an army. And we must know more of the lowlands before we venture there. Wring that guard dry of all he knows, Dillan. And let us set a post on that road, take what toll we can- from other slave trains passing. Then—send a scout into the lowlands—Kapall"
Soothing dressings about the outlaw's head covered all but one eye and his mouth, but he arose limberly.
"Kapal, what are the chances of a scout into the lowlands?"
"Few and ill, Lord. They have control posts along every road, and all travelers must account for themselves. To one who knows not the land it is impossible."
Lord Bardon corrected him. "Nothing is impossible. It is merely that the right way is not clear at first. Supposing a Dark One was to travel, would any dare question him?"
Kapal shook his head. "Lord, the Dark Ones never travel. Death comes not to them through age, but metal enters their flesh as easily as it does ours. They live well protected and only go forth from their hold in air-flying wains, the magic of which they alone know. Just one sort of man wquld dare such a scout—"
"And that?"
"One bearing the mark of evil—he could pretend to be a messenger."
Kincar's hand sought what he wore secretly. His eyes went from man to man about that circle, studying each in turn. Already he knew the answer. Of all the hold party he was the only one showing no trace of alien blood. The scout could only be his.
"I will go—"
He did not realize that he had said that aloud until he saw Lord Dillan look at him, caught the grim approval in Lord Bardon's appraisal. His hand was at his lips, but it was too late.
STORM, NIGHT, AND THE SHRINE
KrNCAR stood at one of the narrow windows in the Lady Asgar's chamber. The sky as seen through that slit showed clear rose. It was going to be a fair day, and the wind that swept the snow from the courtyard had died away.
"Is it not a matter of time?" he asked without turning his head.
There was no answer, for there was only one they could make, and so far they did not voice it.
"You cannot do it—not and still wear the Tie." Lord Dillan put into words what Kincar had known for long hours since he had made that impulsive offer. "I am not sure you could do it in any case. Such an act might cause an unthinkable traumatic shock—"
Now Kincar faced around. "It is a mark only."
"It is a mark which negates everything in which you believe. And for one bearing the Tie—"
But for the first time in long minutes the Lady Asgar moved. "This devil's mark must be set upon its victims with some ceremony. And the very ritual of that ceremony impresses its meaning upon the new servant of evil. It is a thing of the emotions, as all worship—whether of light or dark forces—is a matter of emotion. If a thing is done without ceremony, or if it is done in another fashion altogether—"
"You mean?"
"That mark is made with a metal branding rod, is it not? Well, it is in my mind to reproduce its like another way— without ceremony. And while it is done Kincar must think upon its falseness and the reasons for his accepting it. Let him hold the Tie in his two hands and see if it repudiates him thereafter."
He crossed to her eagerly. "Lady, let us try!" If this was the answer, if he could have the mark without suffering inner conflict-She smiled at him. "I have many forms of magic, Kincar. Let us see if my learning reaches so far. Do you hold the Tie now and think upon what you would do for us and why. If all goes well, we shall transform you into the seeming of an obedient Hand."
He was already clad in the alien trappings of one of the slave guards, assembled from their loot of the road attack. Now he brought out the smooth stone that was his legacy and trust from Styr's lord. With it between his palms, he whispered the words of Power, feeling the gentle glow which answered that invocation. And then he closed his eyes.
Concentrating upon the Tie he waited. His flesh tingled under a pressing touch upon his forehead. Three times that pressure. The nothing at all. The Tie was quiescent, nor had it gone dead as he feared.
"Is that it?" asked the Lady Asgar. "That is it!" Lord Dillan' replied.
Kincar opened his eyes and laughed. "No change. The Tie did not change!"
Lord Dillan released pent breath in a sigh. "You had the right of it, Asgar. He is free to go. Give' her the Talisman, Kincar, it will be well guarded—" But he paused at Kin-car's shake of the head.
"Not so, Lord. It has not repudiated me. Therefore, it is still my trust and I cannot resign it elsewhere."
"If it is found on you, if they so much as suspect you wear it—! The result might be worse than you can imagine. In our Gorth it must be borne secretly, though there it was an object of reverence. What would it be here?"
But Kincar was restoring it to the usual place of concealment beneath his clothing. "All that may be true, Lord. I only know that I cannot render it up to anyone unless it is ready to go. That is the nature of a Tie. Were I to leave it here, I would be drawn back speedily, my mission unaccomplished. It is a part of me until my guardianship is done, which may come only at my death—or earlier if it is so willed."
"He is right." The voice of the Lady Asgar held a troubled note. "We have never learned the secret of the Ties, as you know. It is his trust and his fate. And somehow"—she hesitated and then added her last words with a rush—"it may be his salvation also!"
Together they went through the hall into the courtyard. It was a very early hour, and no one noted their passing. Cim was padded and ready. And Kapal walked the larng slowly back and forth.
"You have the map?" he asked as Kincar took the reins from him and swung up on the mount. "Think again, young lord, and let me take on a slave collar and go with you!"
Kincar shook his head and smiled a little crookedly. "Back to your wastelands, Kapal, and raise those men for a festing. Be sure I shall take care, and all we have learned from that guard is safely here." His hand went to his forehead, but he did not touch, remembering what was painted there.
The captive had talked, freely, in detail. Lord Dillan, the healer of sick minds, could have thoughts forth when he wanted them. And all that other had recounted was now Kincar's—the passwords for the frontier posts, customs, manners, minutiae that should take him safely in and out of U-Sippar, city of the lowlands.
Now, wishing no formal farewell, he headed Cim through the outer gate and rode out of the hold into the morning, down the cleft toward the openness of the lowlands. He did not once turn to see the fortress. As he had ridden out of Styr, so he now left this new security to face a future that might be largely chance, but in a small part of his own making.
The promise of a fine morning did not last. But at the same time the wind that pulled at his cloak was surprisingly warm. And that was a warning to the weatherwise hunter. He could now be heading into one of the thaws of mid-cold season, when drenching rains blanketed the countryside, making traps of mire for the unwary—rains that turned in seconds, or so it seemed to unfortunates caught out in them, to icy sleet and freezing cold once more.
That map, supplied partly by Kapal and partly by their prisoner and memorized by Kincar, gave him a mental picture of a broad expanse of open plain. But between him and the first outposts of the plains civilization was a stretch of woodland. He had intended to ride south along the fringe of this to a river, then follow the bank of the stream seaward. But perhaps the forest would provide better shelter if the threatening storm broke before the day's end.
This Gorth had a different history than his own, even before the coming of the Star ships. That much they had learned in the past two days. In his Gorth the aliens landed upon a planet where the native race was just struggling out of barbaric tribal wanderings, a world without cities, without villages. The holds marked the first settlements of tribes influenced by the new knowledge of the outworld men. So their customs, laws, ways of life still held many elements of the nomads.
But this Gorth had already been well advanced from the primitive when the Star Lords had come to crush a rising civilization, hunt to extinction the native rulers who had built such fortresses as the hold, proscribe the old learning, the old religion. Where the Star men had striven to raise their own people, here they had reversed the process and attempted to reduce them to a dull level of slavery, not even equal to suard and mord or larng—for those were beasts, and their savage independence was rebom in each new generation.
Far from interbreeding with the natives, the outworlders here considered such a linkage of blood unspeakable, something obscene, so that Kapal found it extremely hard to accept as a fact that the hold men were partly of mixed-birth. But that might work to their advantage in another way, for the ranks of the Dark Ones here were exceedingly thin. A handful of births in a generation, and many deaths by assassination, by duels among themselves, kept the balance uneven.
Between each Dark One and his fellow there was only uneasy truce, and their guardsmen warred for a whim or an insult that had no meaning to the natives. Fear fattened upon night terrors, was not to be sated, even on battlefields or in burnt-out holds. Yet at the hint of an uprising—and in the beginning there had been many as Kapal testified—the mutual distrust and jealousy of the aliens was forgotten, and they combined forces to deal quick death. Of late years the few remaining sparks of freedom were to be found only in the wastes. And now the alien rulers were methodically stamping those out, one by one, as might men bringing boot soles down upon insects scurrying hopeless in the dust.
