Not so harmless was their charge into the middle of the infantry. The new recruits scattered, screaming. The veterans ran too, but silently and in a formed body, spears thrusting out like the quills of a porcupine. Pirvan drew his own sword, wheeled his horse, and rode back to help his men.
By the time he reached them, or where he thought they had been, the moonlight had faded, to leave Pirvan in that dreaded situation of not knowing where either friend or foe might be. So when a man on foot ran at him, thrusting with a spear, he did not cut the man’s head from his shoulders. Instead he slashed at the man’s arm, controlling his horse with his knees while he gripped the spear shaft with the other hand.
The man howled and let go of the spear as the sword tore his flesh. Pirvan lifted it, tested its balance, and realized that he had just acquired a serviceable lance.
This realization came not a moment too soon. The man was running at him again, a short sword in his good hand. Pirvan shifted his grip on the lance, wheeled his horse, and thrust downward.
The lancehead took the man in the throat, ripping it open, then tearing free. The dying man toppled to the ground; Pirvan’s horse nearly unseated him trying not to step on the writhing body.
“Behind you!”
Pirvan crouched low, wheeled his horse, and couched his lance in a single flow of motion. The enemy rider was too surprised to see a lance coming at him to do anything before the lance took him in the chest. He flew backward off his horse with a thump and a clang of armor, screamed once, screamed a second time as the man behind him rode over him, then lay still.
“We’ve taken the other two, Sir Pirvan!” a voice called from the darkness.
“Which two?”
“The ones who killed the sentry.”
“Keep them alive if they’re not dead. Or I’ll ram this lance up somebody’s arse!”
Both men turned out to be alive, which made two prisoners and three dead among the attackers, against three dead and one wounded among Pirvan’s men. It was not an exchange to be proud of, even if for the first time in his life he had fought in an actual battle like a knight of tradition, wielding a lance from horseback.
The best thing he could hope to salvage from tonight’s wreckage was learning who had sent these men into the jaws of his patrol. Somebody very bold, very careless of the lives of his men, or very eager to learn Waydol’s secrets-and none of these made for pleasant thoughts.
Darkness again lay within Pirvan, as well as around him, as the patrol turned about and marched for camp.
* * * * *
Aurhinius was perusing the last of a pile of letters, most of them concerned with one matter.
Several towns on the north coast were sending their levies west against Waydol. Their total strength might be as much as three thousand men. Add this to the two thousand Istarian regular troops already ashore, and if they concerted their attacks, they might overwhelm Waydol by sheer weight of numbers.
It would be a bloody victory even if a certain one, but blood would not daunt the commander ashore. Next in seniority to Aurhinius, High Captain Beliosaran had been the inevitable choice, in spite of his reputation for cruelty as well as courage.
However, it would take time for Beliosaran to gather all his men, more time for the town levies to assemble and march. Some of the towns might insist that Beliosaran detach some of his men, to take the place of their absent levies.
This, of course, risked making the whole bounty-hunt even more futile than it would be otherwise. Aurhinius wondered idly if even Beliosaran would dare attack Waydol with the number of men likely to survive hunger, fluxes, fevers, shoddy boots, swamps, snakes, ambushes, and simple loss of enthusiasm for war.
His secretary entered, as was his right, without knocking.
“Signal from Pride of the Mountains,” the man said.
He uttered the name with more than a touch of disdain, which was nearly universal toward the Karthayan ship in the fleet. It had proved neither well found nor well manned. The only reason Aurhinius had not prayed for a storm to dismast it was that it would then need an escort home, else the Karthayans who thought they were winning favor with the kingpriest would howl like starving wolves-probably for Aurhinius’s head.
“Anything important?”
“Possibly. They think their wizard, that Red Robe Tarothin, fell overboard.”
Aurhinius did not groan or utter other unmanly sounds. He did briefly wish Pride of the Mountains afflicted with shipworms and its crew with blue scab and the choking fever.
“Tarothin?” Aurhinius said. “Is he the same-?”
“Yes. The one who went to Crater Gulf, with Sir Pirvan, before the knights took him in. They say he was going with Pirvan to Waydol, but quarreled over a woman. A Black Robe, they say.”
“First wizard I’ve heard of with that much sap in him,” Aurhinius said. “Well, put some boats over and have a search made. It’s all but a flat calm, so there’s no danger to the boats and perhaps even some chance of finding Tarothin, if he’s not already drowned. It would be best if we could tell Sir Pirvan that we tried to find one of his old comrades.”
“Aye-aye, my lord.”
Alone, Aurhinius looked at the messages again, and then at the map on the bulkhead. Perhaps there was something he could do about matters on land, besides leaving them to fate, town levies, or Beliosaran.
The fleet carried close to a thousand seasoned soldiers, though many of them the worse for seasickness. They could be landed closer to Waydol’s stronghold than any Istarian or town soldiers now stood. Marched inland, they could enforce a truce between Waydol and his enemies, until Jemar the Fair removed the Minotaur’s men or it became plain that the Minotaur and the sea barbarian were plotting treachery.
Then there would be ample strength both ashore and afloat to deal with open enemies as they deserved.
* * * * *
Pirvan and Waydol walked side by side up the path to the Minotaur’s hut. It was narrow for two when one was a minotaur, but Pirvan had come to know it well in the last few days.
They said nothing for much of the way. Indeed, it sometimes seemed to Pirvan that he and Waydol said the most when they were silent. It was as if they had been friends for years-and it was a grief to Pirvan that the future could not hold such a friendship.
Waydol was adamant about returning to his homeland, resigned to whatever fate might await him there as long as he could first tell his people what he had learned about the humans. He was equally adamant about seeing his people and Darin provided for before he set sail.
Far off in darkness and fog, a pinkish glow pulsed and flickered.
“They have lit the beacons,” Waydol said. “It may help guide any friends who are joining us by sea. I doubt that it will help Jemar much. Any ship of good size close enough to see the beacons will be too close to the rocks. If she takes the ground now and the surf gets up before morning, we will be rescuing her people instead of they us.”
“Jemar’s a cautious man-for a sea barbarian, that is,” Pirvan added, as he heard Waydol trying not to laugh.
Another twenty steps brought them to the top of the path. The hut was a dim bulk in the fog, with a lantern burning golden above the door. Haimya wanted to learn the secret of Waydol’s lamp oil, which gave that particularly pleasing color as well as an agreeable scent.
“We have questioned the prisoners,” Waydol said, unbarring the door.
Pirvan was silent. His honor was involved in their not being tortured. He also could not stand alone against Waydol’s whole band if they thought such necessary.
“They talked freely enough,” Waydol added. “They’re levies from Biyerones, trying for the glory of the first kill against us among the townsfolk. I suppose they can claim it if they wish, but also the first dead.”