The soldiers moved in around the players, and Ciare turned on Call. “You traitor, you snake! We took you in, we took you to our bosoms, and all the while you were endangering us all by preaching sedition! How vile, how unspeakable! Do you think we’re nothing but toys to play with, mere pawns in your game? How could you, Coll? How could you?”
Coll turned pale but didn’t answer, only standing rigid. “Oh, aye, hold your tongue! There’s nothing you can say, is there? You have wronged us, and there’s nothing more to be said about it! Now we’re all going to suffer in the duke’s dungeon, and all because you couldn’t be honest with us! We may be hanged for your lies!”
“But it wasn’t you!” Coll burst out. “None of you! We kept it secret from you all, you couldn’t have known about it! How could I imagine they would arrest you all with us?”
“A singular lack of imagination, for a player.” The spy watched Coll narrowly.
Coll rounded on the spy. “I’m not a player, damn it!”
“True,” Gar put in. “None of us three are players.”
“I’m a mercenary, a soldier!” Dirk told the man. “Did you see us do any acting? No! We carried spears onto the stage and off it, we held the gentlemen’s horses, we told the hecklers to shut up—we earned our keep! But did you ever hear any of us three say more than four words at a time on that stage?”
“No, there’s truth in that,” the spy admitted, and turned to Ciare. “You have convinced me, lass. It was all their doing, and none of your own.”
Ciare stared, then whipped about to glare at Coll again, turning pale.
“I never asked for more than justice,” he told her. “You’re innocent; you shouldn’t share my punishment.” His voice sank to a whisper. “You’ve done right.”
Her lips parted in a soundless cry, her eyes filled, and she turned away. Mama reached out and took the girl in her arms, and Ciare burst into tears.
“How touching,” the spy said, with full sarcasm, “but I’m afraid we can’t stay to see it. Put your arms behind your backs! Sergeant! Tie their wrists! That one, too!” He stabbed a finger at Coll. “He’s one of them. I’ve seen how he stays near the big one as much as he can!” He turned on Androv. “He’s theirs, isn’t he?”
Androv glanced at the rest of his company, weighed those he could save against those he could not, and croaked, “Yes.”
“Off with you, villein!” The spy caught Coll’s shoulder and spun him away to a soldier, who held him fast while another lashed his wrists behind his back. “You can rot in the duke’s prison until he’s good and ready to let you hang! Be off! ”
The spy reached up to give Gar a shove. The big man started meekly off, hands already reddening from the tightness of the bonds. Dirk and Coll stumbled after him, but the serfs heart was singing with the relief of a partial victory. Dicea and Mama had stayed with the players, and the spy seemed never to have guessed they were tied to Dirk and Gar! Silently, he blessed Androv, who hadn’t said a word to betray them. At least his mother and sister would be safe.
12
The jailer hauled open a huge oaken slab, and the guards kicked them in. They fell, rolling, and the spy called after them, “Preach your sedition in there!” He burst into gloating laughter, cut short by the boom of the closing door.
Coll recoiled instinctively from the slimy chill beneath him, struggling to his knees, then his feet, gasping for breath. But breathing through his open mouth didn’t help much. He had never dreamed of such a stench! The smell of human waste competed with the stink of unwashed bodies for primacy of pong. The very air seemed thick with it, but that was probably because the whole big room was lighted only by one small barred window, far up on the wall across from the door. Manlike shapes sat listlessly in the shadows; others milled about aimlessly in the gloom. A few of these last turned in their direction and came shambling toward them, hunched and menacing.
Coll swallowed heavily and stepped a little closer to Dirk, who was just managing to climb to his feet. “What do we do?”
“I don’t know,” the knight answered. “What do we do, Gar?”
“Just what the spy said,” Gar answered. “Preach sedition.”
“I don’t think this is the most pious congregation in the world.” Dirk’s voice hardened with tension. “They don’t have the look of the kind who like sermons.”
“On the contrary.” Gar had risen to his feet. “They look like just the kind who would cheer the sort of things I have to say. You there!” He stepped out to meet the biggest of the advancing prisoners. “You look like a smart chap!”
“Smart enough to teach you your place,” the Neanderthal grunted. He was a head shorter than Gar, but much wider, seeming more like a door than a man-a prison door. “I’m the Gaffer, and in here, what I say goes!”
“Goes right out the window, from now on.” Gar glanced up at the source of dim light. “Yes, you do have a window. Better send your claim to give orders through it, because I’m going to be running things here.”
The gaffer didn’t growl, didn’t bellow—he just slammed a huge fist at Gar’s midriff, doubling over and following it with blow after jackhammer blow, very hard and very, very fast. But Gar saw the first one coming—how, Coll didn’t know, it had been so fast and dropped both forearms to block the Gaffer’s punches, then pulled one fist out. The Gaffer slammed in one last blow. Gar took it with a grunt, and the Gaffer leaped back, but Gar caught him on the ear with a quick right cross. The Gaffer’s head snapped to the side, and Gar was on him, hitting him in belly, chin, then belly again. The Gaffer folded, but brought his arms up to block, then slammed a fist at Gar’s face. The giant blocked and counterpunched; the Gaffer’s head snapped back, and he staggered away, still holding his arms up. Gar followed closely, keeping the series of blows going until, fast as a striking snake, the Gaffer ducked under his punches, hammered at his midriff, then came up to crack a fist into Gar’s jaw. Gar rolled with the punch, but the Gaffer leaped after him, swinging a haymaker that would have laid Gar out, but the giant stepped inside the swing, catching the Gaffer’s wrist and tunic, then turning, sticking out a hip, and throwing the prison king to the ground.
He pulled up on the man’s arm as he fell, so that he landed on his side. The Gaffer roared in anger and scrambled back to his feet—but Gar stepped in before he’d recovered his balance, knocked aside a futile punch, and slammed a fist into the man’s gut. The Gaffer doubled over, but Gar straightened him up again with an uppercut. The Gaffer’s eyes glazed; he teetered, then fell.
Gar turned to glare at the other prisoners, panting hard, bruises already beginning to darken on his face. He grinned, but his smile wasn’t pleasant. “I said I’m running things now. Anyone else think I shouldn’t?”
The prisoners muttered to one another in consternation.
“Well?” Gar snapped.
They turned back to him, faces going straight. “No, my lord,” one said, and another agreed, “You’re the Gaffer now.”
Gar nodded slowly, the grin subsiding, then gave his fallen opponent a push with his toe. “If I’m the Gaffer, who’s he?”
“Only Liam the Smith now, my lord,” another prisoner said, poker faced.
“No, he’s my sergeant.” Gar nodded at Dirk. “He’s my lieutenant, and if any of you give him any lip, he’ll take you down almost as fast as I could.”
Dirk stepped up beside him, letting his grin grow. “Anybody doubt it?” Gar’s voice cracked like a whip. “N-n-no, my lord,” another man stammered, backing up.