“Who these humans people?” asked Uuundaamp, pointing indignantly at Shokerandit and Toress Lahl. “I no see them. They just come here one minute, cause plenty kakool.”
Ignoring him, the police leader said to Shokerandit, “I have orders to shoot you if you try to escape. Throw down any arms you have. Where is your recent companion? We want him too.”
“Who do you mean?”
“You know who. Harbin Fashnalgid, another deserter.”
“I’m here,” said an unexpected voice. “Drop your rifles. I can shoot you and you can’t hit me, so don’t try. I’ll count three and then I shall shoot one of you in the stomach. One. Two.”
The rifles dropped. By then they had seen the revolver poking through one of the slit windows.
“Grab the guns, then, Luterin, look alive.”
Shokerandit unfroze and did as he was told. Fashnalgid entered by the rear door, setting all the asokins barking.
“How did you come so providentially?” Toress Lahl asked.
He scowled. “I imagine the same way these dummies did. By following that unmistakable red-and- yellow striped blanket. Otherwise I had no idea where you were. As you see, I’m going in for disguise.”
They had noticed. Fashnalgid had had his immense moustache shaved off and his hair cut short. He kept his revolver levelled at the police in a professional manner as he spoke.
“Rifle get much money,” Uuundaamp suggested. “Cut these man throat first, ishto?”
“Never mind that, you little scab-devourer. If your shaggie was here, I’d drop him. Luckily he is not, because this place is swarming with police and soldiers.”
“We’d better leave fast,” Shokerandit said. “Excellent timing, Harbin. You’ll make an officer yet. Uuundaamp, if we keep these three police quiet, can you and Moub get the dogs harnessed up really quickly?”
The Ondod became very active. He got the two women to drag the sledge into the barn and grease the runners, which he insisted was necessary. The police were made to stand with their trousers round their ankles and their hands up the wall. Everyone stood back as lead dog Uuundaamp was unleashed and he and the other seven asokins were secured to the traces, each in its appropriate place. As he worked, Uuundaamp cursed each of them in different tones of affection.
“Please hurry,” said Toress Lahl once, betraying her nervousness.
The Ondod went and sat down on the plank where his wife had recently given birth.
“Jus” take small rest, ishto?”
They waited it out, no one moving, until his honour was satisfied. Snow came in through the rear door as he methodically checked over the harness.
From the direction of the street they could hear shouts and whistles. The three police had already been missed.
Uuundaamp picked up his whip.
“Gumtaa. Get on.”
The rifles were tucked hastily under the sledge straps as they jumped aboard. Uuundaamp called encouragingly to Uuundaamp, and the sledge started to move. The police at once began to shout at the top of their voices. Answering shouts came. The sledge bumped out of the rear door.
Outside, ravening asokins leaped furiously against the mesh of their cage. Uuundaamp raised himself, twirled his whip, sent its tip flying towards the cage door. The hasp of the cage was secured in position by a thick wooden wedge. The whip end flicked the wedge free as the sledge went by.
Under the weight of the dogs, the cage door crashed open, and the brutes hurled themselves to freedom in a torrent of fur and fangs. Into and through the barn they rushed. Ghastly cries came up from the police.
The sledge gathered speed, bumping across rough ground, swinging round. Uuundaamp shouted commands, plying his whip expertly, licking each dog with it in turn, arms tireless. The passengers hung on. The barking and sounds of pain from behind died as they went over the hillside and jarred down onto the northward road.
Shokerandit looked back. No one was following. Faintly through the snow, sounds of growling still reached his ears. Then the road turned. Toress Lahl clutched him. Under one arm, wrapped in a bundle of dirty rag, she sheltered the newborn babe. It looked up at her and grinned, showing sharp baby teeth.
A mile along the trail, Uuundaamp slowed and turned.
He pointed the handle of the whip at Fashnalgid.
“You, kakool man. You jump off. No want.”
Fashnalgid said nothing. He looked at Shokerandit, grimaced. Then he jumped.
Within a few yards, his figure was concealed in a whirl of snow. His last words reached them faintly— the terrible oath: “Abro Hakmo Astab!”
Uuundaamp turned to scan the trail ahead. “Kharber!” he cried.
Avoiding Noonat, Fashnalgid met up with a group of Bribahrese pilgrims, returning from Kharnabhar and Noonat and making their way home, down the winding trails to the western valleys. He had shaved off his moustache in order to avoid identification and had every intention of disappearing from human ken.
Hardly had he been with the pilgrims for twenty-five hours when the group met another party climbing up from Bribahr. The latter had such a tale of disaster to tell that Fashnalgid became convinced that he was heading in the wrong direction. Perhaps right directions did not exist anymore.
According to the refugees, the Oligarch’s Tenth Guard had descended on the Great Rift Valley of Bribahr, with orders to take possession of or destroy the two great cities of Braijth and Rattagon.
Most of the rift valley was filled by the cobalt blue waters of Lake Braijth. In the lake was an island on which stood an immense old fortress. This was the city of Rattagon. There was no way of attacking the fortress except by boat. Whenever an enemy attempted to cross, it was sunk by the batteries of the frowning castle walls.
Bribahr was the great grain-producing land of Sibornal. Its fertile plains reached down into the tropical zones. In the north, before the ice sheets began, there stretched the tundra barrier, skirted by mile upon mile of caspiarn trees, which could withstand even the onslaught of Weyr-Winter.
The inhabitants of Bribahr were mainly peasant farmers. But a warrior elite, based in the two cities of Braijth and Rattagon, had recklessly threatened Kharnabhar, the Holy City. Braijth would have liked a greater share of Sibornal’s prosperity. Bribahr farmers sent grain to Uskutoshk for little return; to put pressure on the Oligarchy, they had made a tentative move against Holy Kharnabhar, capable of being approached from their plains.
In return for their threats, Askitosh had sent an army. Braijth had already fallen.
Now the Tenth sat on the shores of Lake Braijth, looked towards Rattagon, and waited. And starved. And shivered.
The frosts of the brief autumn had come. The lake also began to freeze.
There would be a time, and the Rattagonese knew it, when the ice would be firm enough to permit an enemy force to cross, walking. But that time was not yet. So far, nothing heavier than a wolf could get across. It might take a tenner before the ice would bear a platoon of soldiers. By then, the enemy on the banks would have starved and crawled away home. The Rattagonese knew the habits of their lake.
They did not entirely starve behind their battlements. The ancient rift valley had numerous faults. There was a tunnel below the lake to the northwestern shore. It was a wet way to travel, the water in it always knee-deep. But food could pass by that route; the defenders of Rattagon could afford to wait, as they had done before in times of crisis.
One night, when Freyr was lost behind dense gales of snow blowing from the north, the Tenth put a desperate plan into action.
The ice was strong enough to bear wolves. It would also bear men with kites flying above them, supporting much of their weight, making them no heavier than wolves, and as ferocious.
The officers encouraged their men by telling them tales of the voluptuous women of Rattagon who stayed by their men in the fortress, keeping their beds warm.