The catwalk on both sides of the chewed-up section of the crenellations was littered with jagged bits of stone, and Bluto lay crumpled face down against the wall.
“Bluto.” The Irishman reeled unsteadily along the walk, ignoring a slight underfoot shift of the whole stony bulk, and knelt by the hunchback. He’s clearly dead, Duffy thought. His skull is crushed, and at least one stone seems to have passed right through him. He stood up and turned toward the stairs—then paused, remembering a promise.
“God damn you, Bluto,” he said, but he turned back, crouched, and picked up the limp, broken body. Duffy’s head was spinning and his ears rang throbbingly. I can’t carry you down the stairs, pal, he thought. Sorry. I’ll leave a message with someone...
Smoky hot hair beating at his face and hands reminded him of the burning house directly below. He cautiously inched one foot toward the catwalk edge and peered down; the crumpled roof of the building was smoking like a charcoal mound between the flames belching from the windows, and collapsed inward even as he watched, in a blazing, white-hot inferno of flames. The heat was unbearable and a cloud of sparks whirled up past him, but he leaned out a little and cast Bluto’s body away before stepping back and beating out embers that had landed on his clothes.
I’ve got to get down, he thought dizzily, rubbing his stinging, smoke-blinded eyes. My neck and back are wet with blood. I’ll pass out if I lose much more.
He turned once again toward the stair, and with a grating roar the whole weakened section of the wall-top sheared away outward like a shale slope, and in a rain of tumbling stones Duffy fell through the cold air to the dark water of the Wiener-Bach, fifty feet below.
Chapter Twenty-three
THE DONAU CANAL was empty except for the old Viking ship, which rocked once again at its mooring by the Taborstrasse bridge. Dawn was no more than an hour away; the sky, though still dark, was beginning to fade, the stars were dimming, and before long the bow and stern lanterns would be unnecessary. The wind from the west blew strongly down the canal and swept the deck of the ship, eventually causing the Irishman to shiver all the way back to consciousness. He sat up on the weathered planks and leaned against the rail, gingerly touching the bandage wrapped around his head.
Aurelianus had been crouched in the bow, talking in an undertone to Bugge and the three northmen, but rose when he heard Duffy stir.
He walked back to where he sat. “Don’t fool with the bandage,” he said softly. “Luckily your skull wasn’t cracked, but you could start it up bleeding again.” He shook his head wonderingly. “You’re fortunate, too, that I’ve regained my sorcerous strengths. You were a mess when they fished you out of that canal. I had to rebuild your left knee completely—you’ll always limp some, but I figure it will lend you color—and a couple of things inside you had to be encouraged to return to their proper places and recommence functioning. I looked into your skull, and there’s no bleeding in there, though you may be nauseous and see double for a day or two. I’ve told Bugge what to watch for and what not to let you do.”
Duffy glanced over at the northman and opened his mouth for a feeble joke—then closed it. “I... I no longer know his language,” he whispered to Aurelianus.
“Yes. Arthur has gone back to Avalon, and you’re completely Brian Duffy now. That ought to be a relief—for one thing, I imagine you’ll dream less often, and less vividly.” He snapped his fingers. “Oh, and I went through your pockets, and I want to thank you,” he said, holding up a wad of pulpy paper, “for the thought that made you save the signed flyleaf from Becky’s book. The ink washed out while you were in the water, of course, but it was a... kind thought.” He stepped to the gangplank. “You and these men will be rowed away northwest, along the canal and up the Danube. There’s nothing you can do here now. Now it’s just a clean-up job for young soldiers.”
“Who’s going to row?” the Irishman inquired. “There’s not one of us with even enough strength left to chop an onion.”
“Good Lord, man, after that production tonight, do you think it’ll be any trouble for me to conjure a few mindless spirits to row your ship for a while?”
The old wizard looks exhausted, Duffy thought—probably more than I do. Yet at the same time he looks stronger than I’ve ever seen him.
“Here,” added Aurelianus, tossing a bag that clanked when it hit the deck. “A token of the gratitude of the West.”
Rikard Bugge stood up and stretched, then spoke to Duffy. The Irishman turned inquiringly to Aurelianus. The wizard smiled. “He says, ‘Surter is turned back, and must now retreat to Muspelheim. Balder’s grave-barrow is safe, and we won’t see Ragnarok this winter.’”
Duffy grinned. “Amen.”
Aurelianus stepped across the gangplank to the shore, stooped to pull the plank away, and the oars shifted aimlessly for a moment and then clacked rhythmically in the locks. The wizard untied the line and let it trail out through his fingers and slap into the water.
The Irishman got cautiously to his feet, leaning heavily on the rail. “Do you have one of your snakes?” he called to the dim figure on the bank that was Aurelianus.
“Here.” The wizard fished one from a pocket and tossed it spinning through the air. Duffy caught it, and lit it at the stern lantern.
The ship was moving now, and Duffy sat down in the deep shadow of the high stern, so that all the wizard could see of him, until the ship rounded the nearest bend and passed out of sight beyond a stone arch, was the tiny ember at the head of the snake.
EPILOGUE: October Fourteenth
IT WAS CLEAR that Suleiman was preparing an attack. Through the dawn mists von Salm, from his perch in St. Stephen’s spire, could see across the plain the gathering ranks of mounted Janissaries and the milling mob that was the akinji. Inside Vienna’s walls the soldiers, their breath steaming as they trotted from the barracks, gathered about the points where the wall had been crumbled by mines. Frightened women peered tearfully from windows, priests hurried from regiment to regiment dispensing general blessings since there was no time for individual confessions, and dogs, puzzled and upset by the air of tension, huddled under carts and barked furiously at everyone they saw.
Merlin stood on the wall at the northeast corner and smiled a little sadly. The west wind had resumed and gained strength all through the night, and it blew his white hair into his face now as he lifted the massive sword and laid it in one of the battered crenels.
Merlin leaned in the wide notch and stared moodily down at the surface of the muddy Wiener-Bach. So long, Arthur, the magician thought. I wish we’d had a little leisure in which to talk, this time around. And so long, Brian Duffy, you disagreeable old Irishman. You were a lot of trouble, more than I expected, but I liked you. Werner never did... poor Werner, who succumbed to his wound this morning at about the same time you were casting off in Bugge’s ship. Oh, and you were right about Zapolya, by the way. They found a bloodstained rope hanging outside the wall somewhere near the southern gate. I suppose he’s on his way back to Hungary now.
“Good morning, sir,” said a portly sentry in a stern tone, edging past the thin wizard as he walked his rounds.