Fanglith - Return To Fanglith Part 11

"It sounds as if you're getting it all sorted out."

Deneen's voice in my ear startled me, and I heard her laugh. "We're sitting about a hundred yards above you with the windows opaqued. There are so few people awake down there that Bubba can follow your thoughts. He's been giving us a running summary, "I've been thinking about possible rescue plans," she went on. "If you'd like, I can put Tarel down on the roof of the building you're in; there's a trapdoor in it. He could take a stunner and have a remote in his ear, and Bubba and I could guide him in finding you."

I looked at that. "Bubba, can you read Arno's thoughts?" I asked with my mind. "It would help to know more about what he's thinking."

There was a long pause, a minute or longer. Bubba's form of speech was hard to understand over a communicator, and I could picture him giving his answer to Deneen.

"Arno's still awake," she said at last, "but Bubba hasn't been paying much attention to him. He's not used to Norman French, or to the nonverbal mix in Arno's thoughts. The general tone doesn't feel threatening, but if you want, he'll monitor and see what he gets."

I knew that Bubba does better with people whose thought style he's used to. "Fine," I said. "If Arno's still awake, Bubba can monitor him for a while, and if he learns anything I ought to know about, tell me.

"Meanwhile, let's leave things the way they are-at least for now. I'll play things by ear, and you can bail me out later if necessary. I'm pretty sure Arno plans to take me to Sicily with him, and that's where I need to go anyway. That's where Robert and Roger are."

That's about all that needed saying just then. We "talked" a minute longer just for company, but I knew it was hard work for Bubba, so we ended off. Then I got myself as comfortable as I could and waited, scratching, for sleep. It seemed to me that, in spite of the lice and fleas, I'd rather be down here than up there: it was more interesting.

Now there was a different viewpoint for me! I was learning to relax and enjoy the situation. Give me a little time and maybe I'd make a good adventurer after all!

EIGHTEEN.

The next day wasn't all that enjoyable though. For one thing, I felt as if l should have slept a few more hours. And the weather had changed; it was beginning to be windy again, but out of the south this time-a warm wind gritty with sand. The sirocco, they called it, out of Africa. By the time we'd climbed into our saddles to help fetch Arno's horses, it was a stiff breeze, damp and almost hot. We chewed grit, breathed grit, and got grit in our eyes. n.o.body there seemed very happy about it.

It could last for days, they told me, though it might be gone tomorrow.

If it ever came to a vote, I'd vote for gone tomorrow.

The country behind Mileto was rough, with draws and little canyons, and Arno's herd was scattered in several loose bands with some young locals keeping track of them. There were three stallions, thirty-seven big mares, and thirty-three foals-a lot of horses. It took us till afternoon to get them all down out of the hills and penned near the wharf. There Arno selected sixty to take to Palermo this trip. That was all the s.h.i.+p would hold-the biggest horse s.h.i.+p available in Reggio.

Then we went back to the tower-the donjon, they called it-and actually bathed! The Normans were quite cheerful about it-not only Arno, but Brislieu and their squires. They even had soap, and what the soap lacked in quality, the Normans made up for with scrubbing.

It was the first time I'd had my clothes off since before I'd boarded the s.h.i.+p at Ma.r.s.eille. There were red blotches-bug bites-all over my body; it was pretty impressive. They didn't bother me the way they had at first though. And the Normans didn't have the blotches. It was as if the body quit reacting much to them after a while.

When we'd gotten rid of the grit temporarily, we had a meal. Then Arno and I sat alone in the shelter of a garden wall to talk. I'd thought he might present me to Roger's wife, but he didn't. I decided that one, he didn't know how to explain me; and two, he didn't want them to know what sort of resource I was.

What we did do was talk about the kind of kingdom or empire he'd run, if he had one. First of all, he said, he would establish his sovereignty over the Greeks- the Byzantines. Then he'd bring the cleverest artisans and weapons makers of Byzantium to his court, which would be at Palermo. At the same time, he'd send me back to the heavens to get more of our powerful weapons, an idea that fitted in with my own.

Also, he would not, he said, allow the barons to build castles; it encouraged them to defy the king. He'd let each subject people rule themselves by their own laws and leaders, after swearing fealty to him as their sovereign. Guiscard had begun to do this, and was finding that it greatly reduced revolts and other un rests And again following Guiscard's example, he would appoint Jews and Greeks to administer the offices of government. They had the knowledge, could read and write and compute; and besides, he said, Normans had no genius for the job.

I decided that Arno had the makings of a good ruler.

"But look," I told him, "today you won't even trust me to hold the speaking amulet in my hand. Yet later, you're going to trust me to leave this world in the sky boat "Of course," he said. "Things will be different then."

"Different how?"

He didn't answer for a moment, as if deciding whether or not to tell me. "First, I shall require your oath,"

he said at last, "and then I shall marry your sister. She and our children should be a.s.surance enough that your oath will be kept."

I guess my expression must have told him what kind of jolt that was, because he added: "Do not be concerned. I shall always treat her honorably and respect her ways, requiring only that she be baptized.

Admittedly I have scarcely spoken to the lady, but I have often thought about her, remembering what she looked like, and how brave she proved in the teeth of your enemies in Normandy. Thus not only have I yearned for her in seeming hopelessness, but I admire her greatly."

I didn't say anything; it seemed best not to. And I guess Arno decided he'd said too much, because after a quiet minute or so, he excused himself and left. I don't suppose it ever occurred to him that Deneen might have other ideas, might tell him to go jump in the whirlpool Charybdis. At the very least.

The s.h.i.+p from Reggio didn't arrive that afternoon, and I could see why: a south wind was a head wind. It wasn't practical to sail south in the gritty teeth of the sirocco. We'd see what tomorrow brought. Meanwhile the servants would have to feed the horses hay.

That evening we ate with the other knights and sergeants and their squires in the dungeon, twenty-one of us in all. I was the only one who didn't wear a hauberk at the table. It was a strange tradition. But at least no one wore their helmet.

When Roger was at home, Arno told me, Roger and his family customarily ate dinner with the troops. At other times his family ate separately, which apparently was different from Norman custom. In any case, the food was a lot better and more varied than it had been at Roland's castle in Normandy.

Also, there was wine instead of sour beer, and when the eating had slowed down a little, there was storytelling. One of the knights, Rollo, wanted me to tell about India, but I could see that getting awkward. I wasn't sure I could lie fast enough, or convincingly enough, or keep my lies consistent. So I told him I could speak of it only in my own language. Rollo decided that was an insult, and challenged me to fight-he'd drunk at least three or four big cups of wine, while I'd been getting through the evening on just one.

I wanted to avoid a fight if at all possible, for two reasons. Make that three reasons. Even if the fight started without weapons, I wasn't sure it would stay that way. Second, I didn't want them to know about hand-foot art; it was my secret weapon. And third, I don't like to fight. But Arno handled the situation; he got up and said it was unseemly to ask a holy monk to fight. And when the marshal of the house troops agreed with him, Rollo didn't push it.

Meanwhile it had gotten dark outside, and the lighting was poor, of course-a dozen of the crude oil lamps. Some of the troops went to their sleeping places and lay down; I decided that was a good idea and followed their example. After an hour I was still awake, still listening. The stories were interesting, and I was following the Norman with only a little trouble now and then where I lacked a key word or concept. The lamps had burned low or out, all that was left of the hearth fire was embers, and the last three or four men finally gave it up for the night. I remember thinking that I wished Deneen would call.

Minutes later I was asleep.

The reason she hadn't called was too much mental activity in the hall, which made it impossible for Bubba to read my thoughts. I'd been asleep long enough that the lamps and hearth fire were entirely dark when the remote spoke in my ear.

"Larn! Larn! Wake up. I've got something important to tell you."

Something important to tell me? The thought that hit me was that they'd detected an Imperial cruiser.

"Not that bad," she said. "A complication, not a catastrophe."

"What complication?" I thought to them.

"I was doing a routine check of s.h.i.+p's systems a while ago, and the fuel slugs have serious peripheral crystallization."

I thought I knew what could have caused it, or at least contributed to it: prolonged and constant operation in ma.s.s-proximity mode. I knew for sure what would happen if it wasn't reversed: It would get worse. And the further crystallization advances, the faster it advances, until beyond some critical point, you can't activate FTL mode anymore. If that happened to us, we could be stuck on Fanghth forever.

"A shutdown should reverse it," I thought back at her.

"According to the systems manual," she answered, "it will have to be about a six- to ten-day all-systems shutdown. The only alternative is to head outbound and go into FTL. Eight or ten hours at FTL would de crystallize it, but that's too iffy."

Even a day at FTL sounded better to me than a six-to ten-day shutdown.

"What's iffy about it?" I asked.

"We'd need to get out about 700,000 miles before I'd try FTL. Fanglith's a little more ma.s.sive than Evdash. That's 700,000 miles in ma.s.s proximity mode, with crystallization accelerating all the way. The computer says it's marginal whether we could go FTL when we got out there. The crystallization might have gone too far. So I plan to go back to the island we visited. It's the safest place I know of on Fanglith, and we'll get along okay there. After six days, if the reversal isn't complete, maybe then I'll take her out and go FTL to finish it.

"Now what I need to know is, do you want me to pick you up and take you with us? I don't like leaving you with no one to bail you out if things come apart down there."

To my surprise, I wasn't even tempted. "No," I told her, "I'm pretty safe here, for Fanglith. I doubt if anyone around here is interested in messing with Arno, and he doesn't want anything to happen to me.

And as far as the s.h.i.+p ride to Palermo is concerned, we'll be following the Norman-controlled coast all the way. I don't think we have anything to worry about; just get that crystallization reversed.

"Anything else to report?" I added.

"No, that's it. I'll say goodbye now and we'll be on the island before daylight. I'll be in touch again in six or eight days. Ten at most." She stopped then for a moment, a stop that I knew was just a pause.

"Larn?"

"Yeah?"

"I just want you to know that besides being my brother, you're also my best friend."

Well I'll be darned, I thought. "Thanks, sister mine. That goes both ways." And I meant it.

With that she cut off, and I could picture her accelerating westward toward the island coordinates. I lay there savoring our conversation for a minute or two before I went back to sleep.

PART FOUR.

THE VARANGIANS.

NINETEEN.

The sirocco began to die down late the next morning. The locals said we were lucky, that usually it lasted longer, just before dusk the s.h.i.+p arrived from Reggio, probably the biggest s.h.i.+p I'd seen close up on Fanglith, with a taller, heavier mast than usual and a square sail instead of the usual triangular one.

Tomorrow, Arno said, we would leave.

The next morning we met with the captain in a steel-gray dawn. The wind was out of the north now, and chilly instead of gritty. It would be best to lie at the dock a while, he said. The wind would make the Strait of Messina hard to navigate northbound. But Arno was a Norman and the captain wasn't. We would start this morning, Arno insisted, and if we had too much trouble, we could put in at Reggio or Messina. Roger had his own docks in both ports, which we could use without fee; Arno had a letter of authorization.

The captain shrugged and agreed. He was Greek, and his French quite broken, but I got the idea that it wasn't a big deal to him either way sail or lie at the dock. We started loading the horses.

Most of the deck could be taken up in sections, like a mosaic of hatch covers. Each horse stall in the hold was just wide enough for a destrier, with a sort of leather sling so the horse couldn't fall in rough weather and maybe break a leg. The horses were loaded in-you could almost say they were inserted in their stalls- with a block and tackle fastened to a boom. That seemed to be the reason, or a reason, for the taller, heavier mast: It served as part of the boom rig for loading the horses.

When all sixty horses had been loaded, we cast off- Arno, Brislieu, and three sergeants, along with their squires, myself, and the s.h.i.+p's crew. The crew kept giving me sideways looks and plenty of room; Arno had spread the word that I was a holy monk from India. I didn't know whether he had some purpose in this or if it was his sense of humor.

The breeze was brisk, but nothing like a storm. The captain took us around the point of land just west of Mileto and we entered the wide, lower end of the long, funnel-shaped strait. The wind picked up a bit then, and he tacked northwestward across it. An hour later, though the clouds were breaking up, it was blowing considerably harder, and the s.h.i.+p was pitching pretty badly. Arno agreed that we should turn southwest and make for a little bay north of Taormina, the harbor of Taormina still being held by Saracens. But before long they decided that Catania was a better choice. It was considerably farther, but safer; we wouldn't have to sail across the wind.

Then, around mid-afternoon, the wind began to slack off markedly, and Arno had us turned north again.

I was beginning to get a better idea of how hard it could be, with sailing rigs as crude as ours, to travel by sea with nothing more than wind power. I'd be willing to bet that sport sailors back on Evdash had a lot fewer problems with wind direction than the Fanglithans did. At any rate, after five hours at sea we were quite a lot farther from Palermo than when we started. The swell continued pretty high, lifting our bow, then the entire s.h.i.+p, letting it slide down the back side, but we weren't taking spray across the deck anymore. The captain had the crew remove some of the hatches so the horses could have suns.h.i.+ne and fresh air.

As we zigzagged clumsily northward, we saw a sail riding the wind southward toward us-a square sail like our own. The captain told us it was almost surely not Mediterranean; Mediterranean vessels carried triangular sails. Ours was an exception, designed for hauling des triers Before long we could make out her hull, which was slender. My first thought was pirates, and that was Arno's thought too. But the captain said a corsair would have a triangular sail; this looked like a s.h.i.+p of Norse pilgrims on its way home from the Holy Land.

The word "Norse" triggered Arno's interest. The Norse, he told me, had founded Normandy, and some of his ancestors had been from Norse kingdoms. Also, the Varangian mercenary regiments in the Byzantine armies were Norse, and were famous fighting men. He asked the captain if we could sail near enough for a close look at their s.h.i.+p, and after a moment's hesitation, the captain agreed. He changed our tack so that we'd pa.s.s close to her.

The Norse s.h.i.+p moved fast by Fanglithan standards, riding high in the water, and soon we got a good look at her. Her lines were as smooth as the pirate's had been, and more slender. A "long s.h.i.+p," our captain said; he'd never seen one before, but he knew of them. Most Norse s.h.i.+ps were broader, he told us, to carry cargo. We pa.s.sed her at a distance of no more than two hundred feet, and there seemed to be fifty men or more on board her, most of them watching us. One of them had climbed her mast to the spar, presumably to get a better look.

Then we were past, and our attention left her. No one was even aware when she began to put about; she was mostly through her turn when our steersman noticed and called out. By that time her sail was down and she had oars in the water, her oarsmen pulling hard. Over the next few minutes, the Normans and I watched her draw up on us. It took skill to row in a swell like that. Our captain changed our course northwestward, angling toward the Sicilian coast, but it was obvious that she'd catch us. With the primitive Fanglithan sail rigs, oars worked a lot better in a headwind.

And Deneen was hundreds of miles away with all systems shut down, which meant no radio. When the long s.h.i.+p had drawn near, I could see one of her men in the bow with a grapple in his hand, rope attached, I could imagine the technique: When they were close enough, he'd throw it and hook us.

Brislieu had strung his bow, but Arno warned him sharply not to shoot. The Norse, he said, might all have bows, many to our few. Instead he drew his-my-blast pistol.

"Let them draw alongside," he muttered. "Do not cut their lines." He gestured with the blaster. "This will put the fear of G.o.d into them. They'll let us go as if we carried the Devil himself, and we'll have their grapples for our own."

The Norseman began swinging his grapple around his head, then released it, its line snaking behind it across the water. It fell onto our deck, narrowly missing me, caught the gunwale, and bit deep and hard into the wood. Then other Nors.e.m.e.n threw grapples, and strong arms drew the ropes taut. They s.h.i.+pped their oars then, the oarsmen lending their tough hands to the ropes. I could see them plainly now-well-tanned, bearded men, mostly with brown or blond hair. At about fifteen feet, Arno leveled the pistol at the Nors.e.m.e.n in the bow and pressed the firing stud.

And nothing happened! It flashed through my mind that the safety was on; the double safety on this heavy military model was different from that on the police model he'd had before.

"Let me have it!" I shouted at him.

But instead, one of the Nors.e.m.e.n let him have it- slung a throwing axe spinning toward us. It slammed hard against Arno's helmet-fortunately end on-sending him sprawling unconscious.

The pistol went sliding along the deck, but what I dove after was the stunner on Arno's belt. At close quarters, it would stop the Nors.e.m.e.n as well as the blaster would, and it was closer to hand. Arno's body was lying on the stunner, though, and by the time I got my hands on it, the Nors.e.m.e.n were boarding us. Brislieu and the sergeants and squires, in true, reckless Norman style, had drawn their swords, and for maybe half a minute I could hear their furious fight. If I'd gotten to my feet, or even to my knees, I'd probably have been killed for my trouble, so I shoved the stunner and communicator into my s.h.i.+rt and lay beside the unconscious Arno, playing dead. Blood was spreading across the deck planks-Norman blood, I thought-and the brief noise of fighting had stopped.

Pilgrims from the Holy Land!

Then brown hands with pale hair curling on their backs turned Arno over and took off first his sword belt, then his helmet, collet, and hauberk. Unfamiliar voices were speaking a language I'd never heard before-a language with a sort of tonality-almost a singsong quality. There was quite a bit of laughter.

Someone grabbed me then and started to turn me over, and abruptly I scrambled to my feet. I didn't want them to take my stunner and communicator.

One of them drew his sword, and I raised my cross, holding it out at him in my left hand. My right hand drew my stunner, aiming from beneath my cape. As he hesitated, I started chanting my school fight song good and loud, as if it were a prayer, moving my cross up and down between us to hold their attention on it. Then I pushed the firing stud, and the blond swordsman just sort of sank to his knees and toppled over on his face.

Talk about a reaction! For four or five seconds no one said a thing. After that, they all started talking at once, while I slipped the stunner back inside my s.h.i.+rt. I was still holding my cross up. Then the Norseman who seemed to be the leader bellowed something and they all shut up. With his eyes slitted at me, he said something else in a quiet voice and someone grabbed me around the arms from behind so hard I thought my rib cage would break. Another put his knife tip to my throat. I held very, very still.

Their leader was a broad, thick-shouldered warrior whose red hair and beard were marked with white.

He turned to our captain and said something that had to be Greek-it sounded pretty much like what our captain and crew talked among themselves, though I could tell it was accented. Our captain answered.

The Norseman looked at his fallen warrior, then at me, and said something more in Greek, and again our captain answered. They talked back and forth for a minute or so, then the Norseman pursed his lips and frowned, said something to the man who had hold of me, and I was let go.

I sucked in a big breath of air and looked around. Except for Arno, every one of the Normans was dead, lying in their own blood-including the squires, none of them more than fifteen years old, I could see three dead Nors.e.m.e.n too, while another was sitting on a hatch cover having a gashed arm bandaged. He was b.l.o.o.d.y from shoulder to feet-must have lost at least a quart of it-but instead of looking pale and weak, he looked angry and mean. I'm not sure how I looked; probably green.

We were broadside to the swell now, rolling heavily from side to side. Some of the Nors.e.m.e.n were down in our hold, looking at the horses and talking enthusiastically. I learned later that the Norseman who'd climbed their mast had seen our rich cargo of horses. That was what inspired them to turn and attack us.

The Norse leader shouted orders, and the men in the hold started coming back on deck. Some of them laid the dead bodies out on the deck boards Normans and Nors.e.m.e.n both. When they were done, the Norse leader stood over the corpses. He called again, sharply, and two more of his men came out of the hold. Then all the Nors.e.m.e.n took off their helmets and stood quietly. Their leader wore an ornate gold cross on a chain around his neck, and he held it up with his right hand, then raised his eyes to it and started chanting in his own language. It occurred to me that he was praying.

He prayed for about half a minute, then let the cross fall against his hauberk. Another brief order, and some of his men grabbed the dead under the arms and knees and threw them over the side. He turned to look at me, gave another order, and one of his men grabbed my arm and pointed to their s.h.i.+p, gesturing forcefully. His grip was like a steel pincer, his hands as fiercely strong as Arno's. The two s.h.i.+ps had been tied snugly against each other, side by side, and were rolling and wallowing, their gunwales at almost the same level; apparently, they wanted me to cross to theirs, so I did. Two of the Nors.e.m.e.n lifted Arno and carried him across. Within minutes the s.h.i.+ps were separated. The Norse had left a small prize crew of their warriors on the horse s.h.i.+p, with her Greek captain and his men. Both s.h.i.+ps had turned before the wind now, and we were sailing southward together about two hundred feet apart, with the long s.h.i.+p in the lead, her sail raised again.

I wasn't feeling too pessimistic. If the Nors.e.m.e.n had been going to kill Arno and me, they probably would have done it already. And I had the communicator. In six or eight days Deneen would be back, and if worst came to worst, when the time came, I could jump over the side at night and let her fish me out.