“Report,” Temuchin ordered. Ahankk stepped forward.
“We did as you ordered, Temuchin. Rode fast to this tribe and the one Shanin took us to a camach. We entered and fought. None escaped, but we had to kill to subdue them. Two have been captured. The slaves breathe so I think they are alive.”
Temuchin rubbed his jaw in obvious thought. Jason took a long chance and spoke.
“Do I have Temuchin’s permission to ask a question?”
Temuchin gave him a long, hard look, then nodded agreement.
“What is the penalty for rebellion and private vengeance in your horde?”
“Death. Is there any other punishment?”
“Then I would like to answer a question that you asked earlier. You wanted to know what Pyrrans are like. I am the weakest of all the Pyrrans. I would like to kill the unwounded prisoner, with one hand, with a dagger alone, with one stroke, no matter how he is armed. Even with a sword. He looks to be a good warrior.”
“He does,” Temuchin said, looking at the big, burly man who was almost a head taller than Jason. “I think that will be a very good idea.”
“Tie my hand,” Jason ordered the nearest guard, placing his left arm behind his back. The prisoner was going to die in any case, and if his
death could be put to a good use, that would probably be more than the man had contributed to any decent cause in his entire lifetime. Being a hypocrite, Jason? a tiny inner voice asked, and he did not answer because there was a great deal of truth in the charge. At one time he had disliked death and violence and sought to evade it. Now he appeared to be actively seeking it.
Then he looked at Meta, unconscious and curled in pain upon the ground, and his knife whispered from its sheath. A demonstration of unusual fighting ability would interest Temuchin. And that ignorant barbarian with the hint of a smug smile badly needed killing.
Or he would be killed himself if he hadn’t planted the suggestion strongly enough. If they gave that brute a spear or a club, he would easily butcher Jason in a few minutes.
Jason did not change expression when the soldiers released the man and Ahankk handed him his own long two-handed officer’s sword. Good old Ahankk: it sometimes helped to make an enemy. The man still remembered the thumb, twisting and was getting his own back. Jason slapped his broad, bladed knife against his side and let it hang straight down. It was an unusual knife that he had forged and tempered himself, after an ancient design called the “bowie.” It was as broad as his hand, with one edge sharpened the length of the blade, the other for less than half. It could cut up or down and could stab, and it weighed more than two kilos. And it was made of the best tool steel.
The man with the sword shouted once and swung the sword high, running forward. One blow would do it, a swing with all of his weight behind it that no knife could possibly stop. Jason stood as calmly as he could and waited.
Only when the sword was swinging down did he move, stepping forward with his right foot and bracing his legs. He swung the knife up, with his arm held straight and his elbow locked, then took the force of the blow full on the edge of his knife. The strength of the swing almost knocked the knife from his hand and drove him to his knees. But there was a brittle clang as the mild steel struck the toolsteel edge, all of the impact coming suddenly on this small area, and the sword snapped in two.
Jason had the barest glimpse of the shocked expression on his face as the man’s arms swung down, his hands still locked tightly about the hilt that supported the merest stub of a blade. The force of the blow had knocked Jason’s arm down and he moved with the motion, letting the knife swing down and around, and up.
The point tore through the leather clothing and struck the man iow in the abdomen, penetrating to the hilt. Bracing himself, Jason jerked upward with all his strength, cutting a deep and hideous wound through the man’s internal organs until the blade grated against the clavicle in his chest. He held the knife there as the man’s eyeballs rolled back into his head and Jason knew thét he was dead.
Jason pulled the knife out and stepped back. The corpse slid to the floor at his feet.
“I will see that knife,” Temuchin said.
“We have very good iron in our valley,” Jason told him, bending to wipe the knife on the dead man’s clothing. “It makes good steel.” He flipped the knife in the air, catching it by the tip, and extended the hilt to Temuchin, who examined it for a moment, then called to the soldiers.
“Hold the wounded one’s neck out,” he said.
The man struggled for a moment, then sank into the apathy of one already dead. Two soldiers held him while a third clutched his long hair with both hands and pulled him forward, face downward, with his dirt-lined neck bare and straight. Temuchin walked over, balancing the knife in his hand, then raised it straight over his head.
With a single galvanic thrust of his muscles, he swung the knife down against the neck and a meaty chunnk filled the silent cainach.
The tension released, the soldier moved back a step, the severed head swinging from his fingers. The blood-spurting body was unceremoniously dropped to the ground.
“I like this knife,” Temuchin said. “I will keep it.”
“I was about to present it to you,” Jason said, bowing to hide his scowl. He should have realized that this would happen. Well, it was just a knife.
“Do your people know much of the old science?” Temuchin asked, dropping the knife for a servant to pick up and clean. Jason was instantly on his guard.
“No more or lessthan other tribes,” he said.
“None of them can make iron like this.”
“It is an old secret, passed on from father to son.”
“There could be other old secrets.” His voice was as hard and cold as the steel itself.
“Perhaps.”
“There is a lost secret then that you may have heard 0f. Some call it ‘flamepowder’ and others, ‘gunpowder.’ What do you know of this?”
Indeed, what do I know of this? Jason thought, trying to read something from the other’s fixed expression. What could a barbarian jongleur know of such things?
And if this was a trap, what should Jason tell him?
9
Meta made no protest as Jason washed the dirt from her cuts and sprayed them with dermafoam. The medikit had sewn 14 stitches into the cut on her skull, but he had done this while she was still unconscious and had covered the shaved area with a bandage. She had come to right after this, but had not moved or complained when he had put two more stitches in her split upper lip.
Grif breathed a hoarse snore from the mound of furs where Jason had placed him. The boy’s wounds were mostly superficial and the medikit had advised sedation, which suggestion Jason had complied with.
“It’s all over now,” Jason said. “You had better get some rest.”
“There were too many of them,” Meta said, “but we did the best we could. Let me have a mirror. They surprised me, going for the boy first, but it was a wise plan. He went down at once. Then they came at me and I could not talk to you any more.” She took the polished steel mirror from Jason, had one brief glance and handed it back. “I look terrible. It must have been a quick fight. I don’t remember too clearly. Some of them had clubs, the women, and they tried to hit my legs. I know I killed at least three or four, one of the women, before I went down. What happened then?”
Jason took the aehadh skin and worked the hidden valve on the mouthpiece that sealed off the fermented milk and opened the reservoir of spiced alcohol that the Pyrrans favored.
“Drink?” he asked, but she shook her head. He joined himself and had a long one. “Skipping the finer details for the moment, I managed to send some of the troopers after you. They brought back both of you, and a few rat survivors, all of whom are now dead. I killed the unwounded one myself in true Pyrran, vengeance fashion, for which I do not feel too ashamed. But I had to give my knife to Temuchin, who instantly spotted the advanced level of technology. I’m very glad now that I hand, forged it and that the tool marks can still be seen. Bight away he asked me if we Pyrrans knew anything about gunpowder, which rocked me. I played it slippery, told him I knew nothing, just the name, but perhaps others in the tribe knew more. He bought that for the time being, I think. You just can’t tell with that guy. But he wants us to move in. At dawn we have to truck our camach into the camp next to his, and say good-bye to Shanin and his rats, whom we shall not miss. And in case we should change our minds, there is a squad of Temuchin’s boys waiting outside. I still haven’t decided whether we are prisoners or not.”