They moved along the subterranean hallway with the cautious silence of great stalking cats. An occasional scuff of buskin on hardpacked earth or stone, and a faint clink of mail were the only hints of the advance of two weapon-men followed by a silent, faceless mage and a cloak-swathed young woman. All three men were forced to stoop as they went along that pearl-lit passage within the earth.
It came upon Cormac to wish he had asked whether the tunnel debouched into such a chamber or “room” as the one in which they’d found Erris. Too late now. If not-fighting in this low-ceiled tunnel with oppressively close walls might well be to the advantage of the Danans, Cormac clamped his lips. He had not come here to fight the people of Danu!
If only surprise could be with him and Wulfhere…
They rounded a turning, and Cormac’s eyes narrowed; aye, up ahead was an obvious widening and heightening on the other side of what resembled a doorway notched in the earth. Dithorba Loingsech was not bound in the tunnel itself, then, but within a larger chamber. Good! They approached more slowly now, careful not to jostle each other or to make the faintest sound.
At what might be called a doorway without a door, they paused. Within lay a chamber of stone that was nigh square, each wall perhaps thrice Cormac’s length. Not a huge room, but big enough for the wielding of ax and sword and buckler, and the swift necessary movement of their feet.
In the far right corner was piled a cairn of stones, and there too was him they sought. The Moonbow of Danu hung upon his chest at the end of its silver chain, its points downward. This had to be Dithorba, who like Thulsa Doom was captive of the Chains of Danu. A very short and passing thin man he was, with a beard like dirty snow that was plaited on his chest; above, his pate was bald and gleaming. In addition to the Moonbow necklace, the queen’s mage was chained to the wall itself by shackles of silver. Pitifully, the old fellow wore naught but a loincloth.
Gael gave Dane a querying look; Dane nodded.
And the bigger man moved. Before Cormac could step forward, Wulfhere entered the chamber of stone. He sidestepped swiftly leftward so that there was room for his companion to enter and range himself beside him-and it fell out that the guards were there, to the left of the entry.
Two men squatted, and the knuckle-bones in the hand of one struck the floor with a little clatter just as the newcomers came upon them. Four others stood about them. Instantly a dozen pale de Danann eyes fixed on Wulfhere the Splitter of Skulls, and every man showed shock.
A full half dozen there were, unnaturally pale, grim-faced men who were both armed and armoured. Their widened eyes changed swiftly; now they flared as unnaturally with the scarlet killing-lust. Cormac saw on the instant that Tarmur Roag was their master, and that the traitorous sorcerer of Moytura had made animals of these guards; they were mindless, fearless slayers.
The two dicers scrambled up and wrapped, fists around pommels; six short pale men faced the two who had come so unexpectedly upon them. Surprise had been lost; Wulfhere had not immediately charged. Yet the men of Moytura hesitated, staring at men who to them were weird of hair and complexion-and gigantic of stature. Like their cousins of the Isle, none of these Danans was above five and half feet in height.
Corselets of scintillant, superbly wrought mail they wore, chain after the manner of Eirrin rather than the short coat of overlapping scales that armoured Wulfhere’s massive frame from collarbones to upper thighs. The links were dark. Each Danan bore a sword rather than ax or spear, and their bucklers were ornately wrought, six-sided and inlaid and painted and enameled as though the makers had sought to make jewellery of the implements of war and red death. Shaped like crescent moons were their helmets, with outcurving wings that Cormac thought were surely silver, welded onto the sides of their round helms of iron.
As though frozen, the Danans stared. Cormac seized the moment.
“It’s for Dithorba we’ve come,” he said. “Stand ye back all, and live another day.”
Wulfhere rotated his wrist so that his great ax swung in readiness. The face of mac Art twisted into a sinister and violent expression as he lifted his buckler. In his fist his sword was ready for the letting of Danan blood. A light that seemed to welcome battle blazed blue in his eyes like sword steel.
The Danans made reply in action rather than words. They came grimly, death-hounds of the land below-earth pitting their hatred-glaring selves against two tigers of the sea, men with hearts of wolves and thews of fire and steel, feeders of countless eaters of carrion; men to whom the death-song was sweeter than the love-croon of a maiden.
Wulfhere grinned and waited. Far greater men than these had been given pause by that smile that betokened joy in battle. Not so these sorcerously encouraged Danans; they came on.
Grim of mien, a man of the earth launched a sword-slash with a savagery that bespoke his unreasoning hate for these who challenged his charge-and his blind senseless obedience to the fell conditioning of Tarmur Roag. Only then did the redbearded giant heave up his weapon and with a tremendous swipe of that outsized ax destroy sword and beautiful mail, skin and bone, shoulder and chest so that the attacker was cloven to the pectoral and Wulfhere was forced to fight and worry his ax free. It came away drooling scarlet gore while his victim sank down with only a gasp to mark his passage from this world into the next.
The man beside and just back of him was shocked at the tigerishly lithe swiftness of the unbearded man with the dark skin. Then he knew shock again when that scarred intruder did not chop, but thrust, in a blurring forward motion of his entire right arm. Steel entered the Danan betwixt his collarbones and sank to the length of his own hand. That hand flexed in a spasm and his sword fell at Cormac’s feet. The short man’s body followed, twitching.
None cursed or made battle cry; the battle beneath the earth was fought in an awful silence but for the ring and scrape of arms.
The other diminutive sons of Danu came frothing on in a ravening onslaught so that Cormac and Wulfhere were forced to use all skill and swiftness against the close-bunched foe. Blue sparks flew from the edges of shield and hacking blades and the terrible clangour of war arose.
A mighty sword-sweep missed the Gael only because he blurred backward a half-pace. Then forward; Danan blade rang off stone wall with an ear-splitting screech that sent a thousand bright sparks aflying. At the same time, Cormac’s point whisked forth like a striking blue-grey serpent and vanished into the eye whose socket it widened. Another sword came rushing at his side; before he could shift up his buckler Wulfhere’s ax-blade came whining to shorten the deadly sliver of death by a halfscore inches. Ten inches of Danan iron clanged and clattered off wall and floor of yieldless stone-and three inches of Gaelic steel destroyed Danan chainmail and opened its wearer’s stomach nigh to his backbone. A dark hand of incredible skill and strength gave the sword a quick twist and jerked it forth so swiftly that it was clear and rushing elsewhere ere the spate of blood followed.
In the narrow chamber walled all about with closely pressing, echoic stone beneath its low ceil, the clangour of striving weapons was nigh onto deafening.
At the doorway stood robed man and cloaked woman, watching; Erris had forgot her fear to press against the undying wizard while she stared at a sight she had never before witnessed. So too stared Dithorba, moveless in his bonds amid the pile of loose stones.
A hideously grimacing head rolled over the floor of hardened earth, sheared from Danan shoulders by the bite of Wulfhere’s ax. At the same time, an ugly grunt was wrenched from Cormac by the impact of the edge of a Danan blade on his sword-arm. His fingers quivered, threatening to drop his own brand.