'Arrows,' Jason said. 'But then his archers always were crap. He won't waste time or ammunition with that ploy again.'
Good. We can slow down. Claudia adjusted her pace accordingly, but she had barely grabbed hold of the next tuft of grass when a vicelike paw swooped out of nowhere. 'Patoviki,' Geta growled, hauling her up by her wrist. "Bastarvac Azan gabanja i patoviki.'
'Shrapnel,' Jason translated. 'He said Azan's loading his ballista.'
'Didn't you miss a word out there?'
'Not one I could repeat to a lady.' To Geta, he pointed at a stand of stunted pines. It seemed a long, long, long way up. 'Two, maybe three volleys,' he told Claudia, 'before we're safe.'
'Tell this flat-faced oaf I've got the message about hurrying, he can let go now,' she shouted.
'I already have,' he said, laughing.
Bumping against Geta's ironclad side, she felt strangely protected when the first shoosh of iron bolts came scything through nothingness. With an unceremonious thud, he slammed her down behind a diminutive cypress and threw his body on top of hers.
'Wide,' Jason yelled, scrambling to his feet. 'Keep climbing, but when I give the word, scrabble as fast as you can to your left.'
'Why not right?' she panted, groping for a handhold.
'Because that's where the volley went wide. Azan will expect us to either continue straight up in a bid to get out of range, or hook right in the hope that his artillery master won't make the same mistake twice.'
'Won't he?'
'He'll broaden his shot to encompass both possibilities. Which means our best tactic is waiting until he's taken aim — then run like blazes.'
Her toe found a slender root to balance on. 'What if the artillery master reckons the same way that you do?'
'You talk too much,' Jason said. 'Now… Left!'
Claudia didn't need any prompting with the second whistle of iron bolts. She was behind a twisted stump before you could blink, but this time the bounce of metal against rock was considerably closer, slamming chunks out of the stone just six feet away. Also, the bolts were much larger. Fifteen inches long, maybe more. The further the range, the heavier the missiles to cover the distance. And thus, of course, the more deadly.
One more. Only one more volley and we're safe.
'This time,' Jason shouted, 'no zigzags. You just keep running.' He hadn't glanced back once, she reflected. He'd just counted, knowing exactly how long it would take to load, take aim and fire.
'Mountain goats will have nothing on me,' she called back, but her limbs betrayed her confidence. Clammy hands made the rocks greasy. Jellified legs could not get a foothold. She was losing more ground than she was gaining, slithering sliding, slipping inexorably downwards. Come on, come on' don't do this to me, she told her body. But her body refused to listen and, like a teardrop, Claudia Seferius continued to slip down the rockface.
'Kluv,' a gruff voice muttered softly and, looping a bearlike arm round her waist, Geta swung her on to his hip.
'NOW!' Jason called, but Geta, too, had been counting, even as he came back for Claudia. Before his captain had opened his mouth, the big ox scuttled across the rocks like a crab, but his burden was hindering him. With Claudia under his arm, he had only one free hand to find a grip on the slippery rocks.
'I can manage,' she said, but he refused to let go, even when the whistling began.
At first it was faint. Faint and oddly comforting. Like a mother's shush when her baby is crying. Then it grew louder. More strident. Geta had barely found a small outcrop of scrub than the ballista's load exploded into the stone. Azan's weapons master had predicted Jason's move. He had fired higher, straight up. Direct hit.
Claudia's breath was expelled as Geta fell on her, and she heard a squeal, as some small, furry mammal caught the blast of a bolt and was sent spinning down the hillside. Metal and rocks rained down over them until finally, mercifully, the last bolt clanged harmlessly down the slope.
'You all right?' Jason called down.
'Da,' Geta grunted, hauling himself on to his knees.
'Absolutely bloody da! ' Claudia shouted.
The pines might be pathetic specimens, stunted and twisted and rooted in gravel, but she had never seen a more beautiful stand. Just as no flat-faced, slant-eyed Scythian ox had ever looked more handsome!
Say what you like, however much blood this Scythian sun god demanded, the offerings worked. Targitaos certainly protected his own! Dirty, thirsty, white as ghosts from the dust, but by Croesus, the three of them were alive. ALIVE. Claudia felt strangely light-headed as she threw herself into the welcome umbrella of shade. Having survived shipwreck and shrapnel, how hard could it be to make it a hat-trick and escape from this pair of scalpmongering pirates?
Geta puffed up behind her. 'Litja ba kula!' He snorted, lumbering on to the soft cushioned floor. 'Vlodor bastarvac Azan.'
'I'll drink to that,' Claudia told him, 'but look on the bright side. We're out of range now.'
'Who told you that?' Jason asked, raising one eyebrow.
'You.' Don't pines smell heavenly? That little murmuring sound they make. So comforting. And the way the branches creak. Really softly. Like rocking a cradle. 'You said once we reached this stand of trees we'd be safe.'
'That's not the same as out of range,' Jason said dryly, clearing the ground of pine needles with the back of his hand. 'The ballista has a range of over three hundred yards and, as you can see, we're barely a hundred and fifty.'
'Janus! How big will the bolts be at that range?'
'Up to a yard.' He didn't seem remotely fazed by the enormous gap he measured out between his hands. 'Lethal stuff, huh?'
'So what's the plan? Remain here till dark then make a break for it?'
'That's what Azan will be wondering, even as he musters a mulun. Er, posse.'
Posse? Claudia flapped the dust off her trousers. 'Call me thick, but am I right in saying we can't stay because we'll be hunted down like stags, but then again we can't go because we'd never make it through another five volleys of shrapnel?'
'A fair assessment.' (And this is what he considers safe.) 'I warned you our chances were slim.'
'Not prone to exaggeration, are you?'
'Ah!' Under the soft layer of leaf litter, Jason seemed to find something of interest. 'Perfect.'
It was, of course, a stone, and Claudia found herself gripped by a sudden urge to hurl herself down the slope and take her chances with Azan.
'You see, it all depends on how accurate an eye his ballistics master has,' Jason said, loading the stone into a small pouch on a string attached to his belt. 'Or not,' he added cheerfully 'Once I've taken it out with the slingshot.'
The shade was welcome and no mistake. Them pine needles made a comfy soft nest to park his butt and Geta found himself drifting. Aye, and why not? He'd not slept for two moons and he were fair shattered. Especially after rowing all the way to Cressia last night. He wriggled to get comfortable. Worth the effort, though, fetching a woman from the Villa Arcadia for his captain, like what Jason had wanted. And although the tight-lipped bugger didn't say owt, Geta reckoned he'd have been right pleased with that little present! As nice a way of saying thank you for bringing him on this expedition as Geta could think of, particularly after the last bloody fiasco. Kind of balanced things up, like.
Cursing, he shifted position once more, but the rough bark still dug into his back. Bloody land, that's the trouble. Ain't right for a Danubian boatman to be stuck ashore and no ship to go back to. He wriggled again, and decided to put up with the discomfort. What the hell. The rewards were well worth a sore bum, and it weren't for long, after all. Besides. He was that bloody weary. Limbs like sodding anchor stones. Eyelids heavier than the lead markers on the depth lines, making things hard to focus. All the same. Geta sniffed. He'd rather have a ship's wale at his back any day! Planks under his feet, something solid, something reliable, something you know how'll behave. Aye, and he ought to have the sky over his head, too. A bloke can't see buggery under this canopy. Stars. That's what a bloke needs to see. Stars to steer by, stars to look up at like the old friends they are, bright shining comforting stars. Not sodding pine cones. This canopy turned the world darker than stormclouds.