Corum stepped closer to the window and glanced down. "The priest comes," he said, "with his men."
"I thought it likely you would be seen entering here. They have waited until after the parade lest you escaped in the confusion. I like not the thought of killing them, when we have no business in their age at all…"
"And I like not the thought of being killed," Corum pointed out. He drew his long, strong sword and made for the stairs.
He was halfway down when the first of them burst in, the priest in the gown at their head. He called out to them and made a sign at Corum-doubtless some superstitious Mabden charm. Corum sprang forward and stabbed him in the throat, his single eye blazing fiercely. The warriors gasped at this. Evidently they had not expected their leader to die so soon. They hesitated in the doorway.
Jhary said softly from behind Corum, "That was foolish. They take it ill when their holy men are slain. Now the whole town will be against us and our leavetaking will be the harder."
Corum shrugged and began to advance toward the three warriors crowded in the doorway. "These men have horses. Let us take them and have done with it, Jhary. I am weary of hesitation. Defend yourselves, Mabden!"
The Mabden parried his thrusts but, in so doing, became entangled with each other. Corum took one in the heart and wounded another in the hand. The pair fled into thestreet yelling.
Corum and Jhary followed, though Jhary's face was set and disapproving. He preferred subtler plans than this. But his own sword whisked out to take the life of a mounted man who tried to ride him down and he pushed the body from the saddle, leaping upon the back of the horse. It reared and arched its neck but Jhary got it under control and defended himself against two more who came at him from the end of the street.
Corum was still on his feet. He used his jeweled hand as a club, forcing his way through to where several horses stood without riders. The Mabden were terrified, it seemed, of the touch of his six-fingered, alien hand and dodged to avoid it. Two more died before Corum reached the horses and sprang into the saddle. He called out, "Which way, Jhary?"
"This way!" Without looking behind him, Jhary galloped the horse down the street.
Striking aside one who tried to grab at his reins, Corum followed the dandy. A great hubbub began to spread through the city as they raced toward the west wall.
Tradesmen and peasants tried to block their path, they were forced to leap over carts and force a path through cattle or sheep. More warriors were coming, too, from two sides.
And then they had ducked under the archway and were through the low wall and riding swiftly down the white, dusty road away from the city, a pack of warriors at their backs.
Arrows began to whistle past their heads as archers came to the walls and shot at them. Corum was astonished at the range of the bowmen. "Are these sorcerous arrows, Jhary?"
"No! It is a land of bow unknown in your age. These people are masters of it. We are lucky, however, that it is too bulky a bow to be shot from a horse. There, see, the arrows are beginning to fall short. But the horsemen stay with us. Into yonder wood, Corum. Swiftly!"
They plunged off the road and into a deep, sweet-smelling forest, leaping a small stream, the horses' hooves slipping for a moment in damp moss.
"How will the doctor fare?" Corum called. "The one who took me in."
"He will die unless he is clever and denounces you," Jhary told him.
"But he was a man of great intelligence and humanity. A man of science, too-of learning."
"All the more reason for killing him, if their priesthood has its way. Superstition, not learning, is respected here."
"Yet it is such a pleasant land. The people seem well-meaning and kind!"
"You can say that, with those warriors at our backs?" Jhary laughed as he slapped his horse's rump to make it gallop faster. "You have seen too much of Glandyth and his kind, of Chaos and the like, if this seems paradise to you!"
"Compared with what we have left behind, it is paradise, Jhary."
"Aye, perhaps you speak truth."
By much backtracking and hiding they had managed to throw off their pursuers before sunset and they now walked along a narrow track, leading their tired horses.
"It is a good many miles to Warleggon yet," Jhary said. "I would that I had a map, Prince Corum, to guide us, for it was in another body with different eyes that I last saw this land."
"What is the land itself called?" asked the Prince in the Scarlet Robe.
"It is, like Lywm-an-Esh, divided into a number of lands under the dominion of one monarch. This one is called Kernow-or Cornwall, depending whether you speak the language of the region or the language of the realm as a whole. It's a superstition-ridden land, though its traditions go back further than most other parts of the country of which it is part, and you will find much of it like your own Bro-an-Vadhagh. Its memories stretch back longer than do the memories of the rest of the realm. The memories have darkened, but they still have partial legends of a people like yourself who once lived here."
"You mean this Kernow lies in my future?"
"In one future, probably not yours. The future of a corresponding plane, perhaps. There are doubtless other futures where the Vadhagh have proliferated and the Mabden died out. The multiverse contains, after all, an infinity of possibilities."
"Your knowledge is great, Jhary-a-Conel."
The dandy reached into his shirt and drew out his little black-and-white cat. It had been there all the time they had been fighting and escaping. It began to purr, stretching its limbs and its wings. It settled on Jhary's shoulder.
"My knowledge is partial," said Jhary wearily. "It consists generally of half-memories."
"But why do you know so much of this plane?"
"Because I dwell here even now. There is really no such thing as time, you see. I remember what to you is the 'future.' I remember one of my many incarnations. If you had watched the parade longer you would have seen not only yourself but myself. I am called by some grand title here, but I serve the one you saw on the yellow horse. He was born in that city we have left and he is reckoned a great soldier by these people, though, like you, I think he would prefer peace to war. That is the fate of the Champion Eternal."
"I'll hear no more of that," Corum said quickly. "It disturbs me too much."
"I cannot blame you."
They stopped at last to water their horses and take turns to sleep. Sometimes in the distance groups of horsemen would ride by, their brands flaring in the night, but they never came close enough to be a great threat.
In the morning they reached the edges of a wide expanse of heather. A light rain fell but it did not discomfort them, rather it refreshed them. Their surefooted horses began to canter over the moor and brought them soon to a valley and a forest.
"We have skirted Warleggon now," said Jhary. "I thought it wise. But there is the forest I sought. See the smoke rising deep within. That, I hope, is the manor of the Lady Jane."
Along a winding path protected on each side by high banks of rich-scented moss and wild flowers they rode and there at last were two posts of brown stone which were topped by two carvings of spread-winged hawks, mellowed by the weather. The gates of bent iron were open and they walked their horses along a gravel path until they turned a corner and saw the house. It was a large house of three stories, made of the same light brown stone, with a gray slate roof and five chimneys of a reddish tint. Lattice windows were set into the house and there was a low doorway in the center. Two old men came round the side of the house at the sound of their horses' hooves on the gravel. The men had dark features, heavy brows, and long, gray hair. They were dressed in leather and skins and, if they wore any expression at all, their eyes seemed to hold a look of grim satisfaction as they looked at Corum in his high helm and his silver byrnie.