The light illuminated what must once have been a storeroom but was now a dormitory. A women’s dormitory. Bodies lying on crude bunks turned to look at the intruders and the faint sobbing that had caught Yehna’s ear redoubled itself fearfully. Aaren’s eyes widened in dismay, but Yehna’s narrowed and her lip curled viciously. She put the lantern on the floor. ‘Most of the men have gone for the time being,’ she said, her voice icy with restraint, and her accent heavy. ‘You’ll probably find some weapons in the rooms along the passage at the top of these stairs.’ Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, ‘Some of the villagers are doing their best to hold the gate open. They’re as much captives here as you are. Mind you don’t kill any of them on your way out.’
Then she and Aaren were running up the stairs and motioning the two men forward with gestures that forbade any questions. As they reached the top of the stairs, the sound of voices and shuffling feet came up from below, followed by the crash of breaking glass. They were a long way away before the fire started by the broken lantern began to send smoke up the stairs.
Though the guard was speaking predominantly in his own language, it was quite apparent that he was deeply dismayed by what had happened. Gryss was both flustered and placatory, fussing around him, picking up odd pieces of timber here and there and then dropping them again, promising to have the gateway cleared immediately and asking where the staves should be stacked.
The other villagers, after having, amid a great deal of confusion and noise, righted the horse and calmed it, were wandering around equally vaguely. Some were examining, with much head shaking, the broken cart and its scattered contents, while others were hurling recriminations at no one in particular about why the cart had been so heavily loaded, and how it should have been stacked this way, not that, and how two carts would have been better…
Jeorg remained leaning against the gate mumbling happily to himself.
Attracted by the noise, more of Nilsson’s men began to gather. The jeering from some of them increased the guard’s agitation to the point where he began to lash out at those villagers nearest to him. Those who were half-heartedly beginning to move the staves dropped them and scattered, causing further mockery from the watchers.
Infuriated, the guard drew his sword and waved it menacingly. ‘Get this lot moved, now!’ he bellowed. ‘Put them over there. Now! Move!’
The villagers stared at him, wide-eyed and fearful.
‘Move, move,’ The guard’s command was echoed drunkenly by Jeorg.
The guard strode over to him and, seizing him by the front of his loose tunic, dragged him to his feet and pushed him violently on to the tumbled heap of staves. ‘Start moving them now,’ he shouted, levelling his sword at Jeorg’s throat.
Jeorg blinked and nodded. ‘All right, all right,’ he muttered several times, as he clambered awkwardly to his feet. ‘Don’t get angry. It is Whistler’s Day, you know. We’re only trying to help.’ He took hold of two staves at once and yanked at them. One of them came loose suddenly and he staggered backwards waving it wildly. The guard stepped back to avoid this flailing confusion. As he did so, Jeorg abruptly recovered his balance and, swinging the stave round, struck him a stunning blow on the side of the head.
The four slipped across a darkened hall and paused by a closed door. Light streamed underneath it and voices could be heard. Engir listened intently and then silently signalled, ‘Two.’ Very slowly, he eased the latch and began to pull open the door. It creaked immediately. Without hesitating he yanked the door open and strode through. Levrik and the two women followed right behind him. Almost before the brief screech of the door had died away, a savage blow from Levrik’s iron-protected knuckles had silenced one of the two startled speakers while Engir’s knife had finished another.
‘Attack! Attack! Atta…’ The cry rent open the breathless silence in the brightly lit passage. It came from a man just emerging from a room nearby and it cracked as he saw Aaren hurling herself towards him. None of Nilsson’s men were such as would readily flee the threat of personal violence, but the knowledge that he was being attacked by a woman, together with the unhesitant ferocity of her approach and the shock of realizing who she must be, conspired to make Aaren’s intended victim falter as he reached for his knife.
Aaren seized his fumbling knife hand and, swinging round, drove her knee into his groin. As he lurched forward, she stepped aside and pushed him head first into the opposite wall of the passage. He slumped to the ground.
As Aaren turned away from him, she saw the door being pushed shut. A massive kick from Levrik sent it crashing open and he was dragging the prostrated occupant to his feet as Aaren entered the room. ‘Saddre!’ she heard, as the figure was drawn up on to his toes and thrust against the wall, Levrik’s hand tight about his throat. ‘No!’ she hissed, laying her hand on Levrik’s free arm as it drew his knife.
Levrik paused at the touch but did not take his cold, unreadable eyes from Saddre’s face. Saddre’s eyes, by contrast, showed his every emotion as they flicked from his would-be executioner to his unexpected saviour. Fear and cunning mixed equally, but terrified recogni-tion overrode all. ‘You can’t kill me,’ he gasped. ‘You’ve no authority. You have to take me back.’
Levrik’s eyes flashed fiendishly alive for an instant, and his knife came up under Saddre’s chin. Aaren’s hand still rested gently on Levrik’s arm, but she made no apparent effort to stop him. ‘Exigencies of the situation are all the authority we need now, Saddre,’ she said. ‘If we kill your new master, then you’ll get your accounting, have no fear. Failing that…’ She shrugged. ‘Now, take us to him.’
Despite the threat to his own life, Saddre’s eyes opened in scorn. ‘Kill him? You’re insane. You’ll not even get near him. He’s probably already as powerful as…’
Levrik’s grip tightened about his throat, choking off his reply. ‘Don’t even say that name,’ he said very quietly, but with such intensity that Aaren let her hand slide from his arm. ‘Just take us to him if you want to live long enough for your accounting.’
Saddre, his hands wrapped futilely about Levrik’s wrist and his face contorted with pain, managed a flickering and desperate nod. As Levrik eased his grip, an angry voice reached them from the passage.
Chapter 25
‘Riders coming! Riders coming!’
The cry galvanized the resting camp. Nilsson burst out of his tent and almost collided with the frantic messenger. Before he could ask any questions, the man answered them. ‘Dozens of them,’ he gasped, pointing northwards. ‘Armed. Coming fast.’
With uncharacteristic gentleness, Nilsson eased the man to one side, then bellowed out, ‘Arm up. Take close positions.’ The order was unnecessary, however, for his men needed no urging. Even as he shouted, Nilsson saw they were gathering up weapons and forming defensive groups.
A torrent of thoughts swept over him. He had no doubt about who these riders could be. They’d come at last to demand an accounting from him and his men. It puzzled him a little that they’d come from such an unexpected direction. They could only have come to the valley from the south, but how had they managed to move around him in force, unnoticed? And what were they thinking of, using cavalry in this terrain? Was there an infantry force somewhere? But he dwelt on none of these questions. He was content to thank the old habits that had made him place seemingly unnecessary lookouts about the camp. His lips curled back to reveal his teeth, predatory in the firelight that lit the camp. Good discipline on his part meant that the attackers had lost the element of surprise they were obviously relying on, and now it was they who would be surprised.
Suddenly he felt exhilarated. For years, the fear and the rumour of pursuit had debilitated his troops, and to some extent even himself. And even though the fear had dwindled greatly over these last months, it had been with them too long to be banished utterly. If his men could now destroy this force, then the threat would be gone for ever, and morale would be enhanced tenfold.