"Unwise! You should have declared yourself a loyal vassal, but far too ill either to receive visitors or come down from your castle, thereby offering neither challenge nor pretext."
"I obey no man's bidding," said Carfilhiot fretfully.
Tamurello made no comment. Carfilhiot went on. "The second emissary was Shimrod."
"Shimrod!"
"Indeed. He came in company with the first, skulking in the shadows like a ghost, then springing forth to demand his two children and his magic stuff. Again I gave refusal."
"Unwise, unwise! You must learn the art of graceful acquiescence, when it becomes a useful option. The children are useless to you, as are Shimrod's stuffs. You might have ensured his neutrality!"
"Bah," said Carfilhiot. "He is a trifle compared to you—whom, incidentally, he maligned and scorned."
"In what wise?"
"He said that you were undependable, that your word was not true and that you would not secure me from harm. I laughed at him."
"Yes, just so," said Tamurello in an abstracted voice. "Still, what can Shimrod do against you?"
"He can visit an awful magic upon me."
"So to violate the edict? Never. Are you not the thing of Desmei? Are you not possessed of magical apparatus? Thereby you become a magician."
"The magic is locked in a puzzle! It is useless!" Murgen may not be convinced. After all, the apparatus was stolen from Shimrod, which must be regarded as provocation of one magician by another."
Tamurello chuckled. "But remember this! At that time you lacked magical implements and so were a layman."
"The argument seems strained."
"It is logic; no more, no less."
Carfilhiot was still dubious. "I kidnapped his children, which again could be construed as ‘incitement.'"
Tamurello's response, even transmitted through the lips of the sandestin, seemed rather dry. "In that case, return Shimrod his children and his goods."
Carfilhiot said coldly: "I now regard the children as hostages to guarantee my own safety. As for the magical stuffs, would you prefer that I use them in tandem with you, or that Shimrod use them to support Murgen? Remember, that was our original concept."
Tamurello sighed. "It is the dilemma reduced to its starkest terms " he admitted. "On this basis, if no other, I must support you. Still, under no circumstances may the children be harmed, since the chain of events would at the end certainly confront me with Murgen's fury."
Carfilhiot spoke in his usual airy tones. "I suspect that you exaggerate their significance."
"Nevertheless you must obey!"
Carfilhiot shrugged. "Oh I shall humor your whims, right enough."
The sandestin precisely reproduced Tamurello's small tremulous laugh. "Call them what you like."
Chapter 31
WITH THE COMING OF DAYLIGHT the Ulf army, still a mutually suspicious set of small companies, struck camp and mustered in the meadow before Cleadstone Castle: two thousand knights and men-at-arms. There they were shaped into a coherent force by Sir Fentaral of Graycastle who, of all the barons, was most generally respected. The army then set off across the moors.
Late the following day they established themselves on that ridge overlooking Tintzin Fyral from which the Ska had previously attempted an assault.
Meanwhile, the Troice army moved up the vale, encountering only incurious stares from the inhabitants. The valley seemed almost uncanny in its stillness.
Late in the day the army arrived at the village Sarquin, within view of Tintzin Fyral. At the behest of Aillas, elders of the town came to a colloquy. Aillas introduced himself and defined his goals. "Now I wish to establish a fact. Speak in candor; the truth will not hurt you. Are you antagonistic to Carfilhiot, or neutral, or do you support him?"
The elders muttered among themselves and looked over their shoulders toward Tintzin Fyral. One said: "Carfilhiot is a man-witch. It is best that we take no stance in the matter. You are able to strike off our heads if we displease you; Carfilhiot can do worse when you are gone."
Aillas laughed. "You overlook the reason for our presence. When we leave Carfilhiot will be dead."
"Yes, yes; others have said the same. They are gone; Carfilhiot remains. Even the Ska failed so much as to trouble him."
"I remember the occasion well," said Aillas. "The Ska retired because of an approaching army."
"That is true; Carfilhiot mobilized the valley against them.
"We prefer Carfilhiot, who is a known if erratic evil, to the Ska, who are more thorough."
"This time there will be no army to succor Carfilhiot: not from north or south or east or west will help come."
The elders again muttered among themselves. Then: "Let us suppose that Carfilhiot falls, what then?"
"Yoy will know a just and even rule; I assure you of this."
The elder pulled at his beard. "It makes good hearing," he admitted; then, after a glance at his fellows, he said: "The situation is of this nature. We are staunchly faithful to Carfilhiot, but you have terrified us to the point of panic, and therefore we must do your bidding, despite our inclinations, if Carfilhiot ever should ask."
"So be it. What, then, can you tell us of Carfilhiot's strength?"
"Recently he has augmented his castle guard, with wolf-heads and cutthroats. They will fight to the death because they can expect nothing better elsewhere. Carfilhiot forbids them to molest the folk of the valley. Still, girls often disappear and are never again heard from; and they are permitted to take women from the moors, and they also practice indescribable vices among themselves, or so it is said."
"What is their present number?" "I guess between three and four hundred."
"That is not a large force."
"So much the better for Carfilhiot. He needs only ten men to hold off your entire army; the others are extra mouths to feed. And beware Carfilhiot's tricks! It is said that he uses magic to his advantage, and he is an expert at his ambushes."
"How so? In what fashion?"
"Notice yonder: bluffs extend into the valley, with little more than an arrow-flight between. They are riddled with tunnels; were you to march past a hail of arrows would strike down and in one minute you would lose a thousand men."
"Just so, if we were rash enough to march under the bluffs. What else can you tell us?"
"There is little else to tell. If you are captured you will sit a high pole until your flesh rots away in rags. That is how Carfilhiot pays off his enemies."
"Gentlemen, you may go. I thank you for your advice."
"Remember, I spoke only in a hysteria of fear!"
That will be the way of it."
Aillas marched his army another half-mile. The Ulf army occupied the heights behind Tintzin Fyral. No word had yet arrived from the force which had set out to take Kaul Bocach; presumably it had succeeded.
The exits and entrances to Tintzin Fyral were sealed. Carfilhiot must now trust his life to the impregnability of his castle.
In the morning a herald carrying a white flag rode up the valley. He halted before the gate and cried out: "Who will hear me? I bring a message for Sir Faude Carfilhiot!"
On top the wall stepped the captain of the guard, wearing Carfilhiot's black and lavender: a massive man with gray hair flowing back on the wind. He cried out in booming tones: "Who brings messages to Sir Faude?"
The herald stepped forward. "The armies of Troicinet and South Ulfland surround the castle. They are led by Aillas, King of Troicinet and South Ulfland. Will you convey the message I bring, or will the miscreant descend to hear with his own ears and answer with his own tongue?"