“Come!” Wulfhere panted, and charged.
The custom-house door slammed in his face.
No matter that it was made of iron-bound oak. Wulfhere attacked it with an ax he wielded like a madman. The door began to splinter.
Cormac, cool and deadly in battle, had seen and heard what befell. Guessing that Sigebert had gulled Wulfhere into charging the front and would now vanish out the back, he sent five Danes to prevent it. His powers of command were tested greatly to separate them from the murder boiling in the alley and make them go. Just as he made to accompany them, several Franks came running. Mac Art found himself in a desperate rearguard fight.
The Franks spread out to flank him. Cormac got an alley wall at his back and glowered at them. One lean wight moved in too recklessly; his foot slipped on the blood-greasy stones.
Instinctively, Cormac leaped forward, a man who was ever happier taking the initiative. His shield-rim broke the man’s exposed neck almost in passing. Then immediately, it was interposed between himself and a Frankish sword swung two-handed. Cormac’s own point vanished into that man’s belly, and his knees buckled.
In the mean time, Sigebert One-ear departed the customs-house by its rear. With him were three stout soldiers. They emerged just in time to meet the five Danes dispatched there by mac Art, and Sigebert ceased to laugh and mock. He tasted cold fear. The red-bearded giant would be upon him at any moment.
Snarling in desperation, Sigebert fought like a demon.
This was his first experience of real battle, and he went well at it, goaded by fear and necessity. Hungry Danish swords sought a way past his shield and blade. Dropping almost to one knee, Sigebert rammed his point into a bearded pirate’s crotch. Though that harsh thrust failed to pierce the skirt of the man’s shirt, it dropped him writhing in agony for all that. His face a snarl, Sigebert straightened and all in that motion his point ran into a Danish throat. Beside him an ax cut through the cheekpiece of a Danish helm and into that pirate’s brain through the temple.
Sigebert took that opportunity to run. His horse was tied in the customs yard and he knew he had acquitted himself well. With a sweep of his blade he cut the black animal free, and sheathing his sword he leaped to the saddle. Behind him, ignored and unsung, his Frankish guards were dying.
Wulfhere burst into the yard in time to see the horse’s tail vanish.
He wasted no time in outbursts of rage or disappointment. Striding like a colossus, he crossed the yard and gained the street on its far side. Sigebert had kicked the horse into a gallop, to trample pedestrians as if they were so much rubbish. His short cape flapped from his shoulders.
Wulfhere raised his huge ax, and hurled it.
The terrible weapon flashed through the air, turning almost gently, flying for Sigebert’s backbone. Wulfhere began to run, even while the missile was in the air. It needn’t slay Sigebert. Gods! An it merely knocked the cur-begot bastard from his horse’s back, or struck the horse itself and caused it to throw Sigebert, that would be enow. Wulfhere yearned only for the chance to get his hands on the swine. Of that there could be but one end.
Ever after, Wulfhere cursed the fools who made that street too short. Sigebert had reached its end and was turning the corner to safety by the time the Danish ax caught up to him-and hissed by. The head caught his flapping cape, tangled therein and ripped it from his shoulders. Though rocked in his saddle, Sigebert was untouched. His horse galloped.
Swearing mightily, Wulfhere continued his ponderous, armoured run and swore the more. The iron scales of his byrnie jolted and rang with each step. A woman, helping her young brother from the street after Sigebert had ridden him down, shrank fearfully aside from the big red beard. He never noticed her, nor gave thought to the possibility of being mobbed by the people.
They showed no sign of wishing to meddle with this enraged giant loose on their city. The contagion of mass fear had convinced them all in moments that they had a Saxon invasion to dread.
Wulfhere grunted with satisfaction to see his cherished ax lying in the street, enwrapped by the Frank’s rich cape. Seizing the weapon, he left the garment in the muck and returned to the customhouse, bawling for Cormac.
“Wolf!” he roared, absently knocking a wounded Frank aside with his shield when the fool-still on his feet-seemed to want to attack him. “The slimy dock-rat’s escaped us! He’s run, the mangy scum, and left his men! There’s no more to be done here!”
“Bad,” Cormac said, betrying little emotion. “We must leave. It’s defeat we’ve put on these Franks, but if we tarry, the Count of Nantes will be sending a little war-host against us. This time, let us be very sure we leave no wounded, for that polished filth to play with.”
Wulfhere, fully agreeing, began to shout orders.
Cormac ran to inspect the three Danes by the custom-house’s back door. Poor old Horsejaw had his helmet off and his brains, showing. Unquestionably he was dead. Another lay in his blood with a sword-thrust through the throat. Anlaf’s gullet, windpipe and arteries were severed, all. Cormac took in the nature of that particular wound, and did not miss its significance. His icy eyes slitted briefly in thought.
The third Dane was Einar, still suffering greatly from that blow in the stones. He’d lurched to his knees, sweating, grey-faced and bent over, but he needed Cormac’s aid to rise and walk. On the way to Norn he vomited; once he’d gained her deck he sank down groaning. He’d lack interest in women for at least a month, mayhap for life.
“Out of here, swiftly,” Cormac bade Odathi, and added with harsh humour, “Best ye be not come trading again in this port!”
Odathi chuckled. “I’d not ha’ lent myself to your scheme if I’d any pressing need to return! Your enemy, chieftain-did he die hard?”
“He died not,” Cormac said bitterly. “It all went for naught. It is the rest of the day ye mean to stand there babbling?”
Grimly, they counted their dead. Those numbered not so many as Cormac had feared; indeed fewer than he’d dared to hope: three only. Some others were sore wounded, and most, including Cormac and Wulfhere, had at least minor hurts.
“The first good thing in this business, Wulfhere growled as they cleared Loire-mouth, “is that no trap was set for us this time.”
He was thinking of their first meeting with Sigebert, when they had almost been captured. That had been a most carefully planned trap. Few could have scaped it. Even Cormac and Wulfhere had found it needful to abandon their hard-won loot in order to keep their lives, and cross the tempestuous waters of the Cantanabrian Sea to evade the Romish warships that pursued them.
“Sigebert cannot have dreamed we’d dare set foot in Nantes again,” Cormac said. “He knows better now, curse him-and it’s even greater care he’ll be taking to safeguard his putrid life!”
Morbid silence descended on them both. Three men slain, others hurt, and naught gained. Further, Einar was victim of Sigebert himself and so, Cormac thought, was Anlaf.
They knew not of the lost and hating young girl Sigebert kept in his house. They cared not that their bold attempt on the Frank’s life was the talk of Nantes by midday. Sigebert’s guards were those who spoke of it loudest and most vehemently, for they had greatest cause. The names of Wulfhere Skull-splitter and Cormac mac Art were freely bandied about. Cathula recognized them with great joy when the story came to her ears.
12
Bright was the weather as Norn eased through the straits of Mor-bihan, bright the weather and gloomy the mood of the reivers. As the vessel moored, a horse came plunging along the beach. Its rider unhesitatingly urged it up the timber ramp and galloped recklessly along the jetty.
He was Prince Howel of Bro Erech. The reverberations of hoofbeats on timber yet echoed while he greeted them.