There were five of them. Behind each rode an esquire. They were cruel young men who inspired Gathrid's loathing. They dismounted, surrounded the girl. They taunted her, laughed at her, kicked her down again when she tried to rise.
Gathrid crossed to the beech. One of the esquires turned, cocked his head then resumed watching his master's sport.
Sometimes, Gathrid thought, you have to compromise a moral resolution to meet the demand of a greater obligation. He had been determined never to draw Dauben-diek except in self-defense.
Rogala would have called him a fool for interfering.
He dropped the last dozen feet, landed quietly on the soft grass. The sharp-eared esquire turned again. Gathrid drew the Sword.
The esquire tried to shout, could only gobble.
Gathrid felt the familiar growing sensation, the eagerness of the blade, the momentary vertigo as Daubendiek drank a soul. The Ventimiglians froze when they sensed the surge of Power.
Gathrid raged among them, slaughtering all the esquires and two of the nobles before they could defend themselves. The others, after crossing the brook, began some hasty sorcery. Two moved toward Gathrid's flanks while the third retreated. A red mist roiled in the pocket thus formed.
Within that mist an anthropoid, bow-legged, squat, long-armed, hairy and toothy thing took shape.
It looked at the girl and grinned.
Despite its origins it did not seem all that remarkable till Gathrid splashed across the creek and attacked it.
Daubendiek behaved like an ordinary blade swung into a hardwood post. It cut, but with no more effect than that ordinary blade would have affected that mortal oak.
Though Gathrid was startled, Daubendiek was not. It beat about the demon in an almost invisible storm. Chips of monster flew. The Sword clanged like a beaten gong.
The demon seemed astonished that it was vulnerable at all. Rocking with each blow, grin waning, it kept trying to reach Gathrid. The three who had summoned it kept yelling in amazement.
Gathrid remembered the field where his father and brothers had practiced with their horses and weapons. The demon began to take on the target-post's well-hacked look.
Daubendiek would strike for the creature's neck, then go for a leg when it raised an arm protectively. The Sword fell into a rhythm of high and low, staying a move ahead, till one demon leg parted at the knee.
Daubendiek howled gleefully.
While the demon sat staring at its severed calf, Gathrid slew the nearest Ventimiglian and charged after the other two.
He caught one, but the last captured a horse before Gathrid overtook him. He escaped as a scream drew the youth's attention back to the brook.
The demon was after the girl, stalking her on all fours, looking like some weird wolf spider awaiting the right instant to pounce. The girl kept scooting away. She seemed unable to take her feet.
Swinging Daubendiek with both hands, Gathrid severed the demon's head from its neck. It rolled down into the chill water. Its mouth broke the surface and began cursing in fractured Ventimiglian.
The decapitated body crawled round the slope- hands feeling for the missing head. When it encountered a stone of appropriate size, it tried settling that atop its shoulders.
Gathrid turned to the girl. She cowered away from him. She seemed more terrified of him than she was of the demon.
Though the Sword protested, Gathrid forced it into its scabbard. He offered the girl a hand. She accepted as if afraid refusal would bring reprisal. Gathrid did not know whaf to say, so said nothing. Ventimiglian words would not roll right on his tongue anyway. He helped her climb the bank, leaned her against a sapling while he rounded up horses and examined his enemies' gear. He found their memories more interesting than their, equipment. They knew the way to the Library. It was there that the Mindak had gifted them with their demon.
Said demon kept cursing in the streambed.
He was wasting time. He helped the girl onto a horse. Then, on impulse, he scrambled down and salvaged the talking head. He bound it to his saddle by its wiry hair. It chattered right along, telling him what it thought.
The girl spoke for the first time when Gathrid started to leave. "What about me? What am I supposed to do?"
He looked into her dark, frightened eyes. He shrugged. "Whatever you want. You're free now."
She understood despite his recalcitrant tongue. "No. I'll never be free. I've been dedicated." She indicated the head. "The thing's masters will compel them. They can't break their bargain with it.
Nor it with them. The one who escaped. He'll bring friends. Powerful men. The high sorcerers. The fathers of the ones you slew."
Gathrid shrugged again. What could he say or do? He had not thought beyond her rescue. "Come on."
His plans had no room for companions, yet he could not abandon a responsibility once assumed.
She hesitated. She was afraid of him. She did not want to remain near a man so deadly. Yet he had saved her from the devils she knew.
Shortly after he shrugged a third time and started off, exchanging unpleasantries with the head, she called for him to wait.
Chapter Nine
Round Dedera The girl's name was Loida Huthsing. "Any relation to Franaker Huthsing?" Gathrid asked.
"My father." She seemed startled because he knew the name.
The demon was Gacioch. The girl was seventeen, the demon ageless. Loida had been part of the plunder the Mindak had sent home from Grevening. Gacioch was the lackey of a demon-lord in the service of high Venti-miglian nobles.
The youths Gathrid had slain belonged to the Mindak's own household. They had been sons of cousins and nephews. Loida told him to expect a cruel death. Gacioch gleefully confirmed her contention.
The demon let up on the cussing and fussing. His game, now, was to describe at length, and in loving detail, the sophistication of the tortures to be found in the Mindak's dungeons. Ahlert's family was sacred, at least by their own decree.
"Don't you ever shut up?" Gathrid demanded. "Right now Theis Rogala is looking good."
The demon grinned and babbled on.
Gathrid shrugged off the threats. "Ahlert can't want me any worse than before. Loida? Your father is really Franaker Huthsing? The infamous Sheriff of Rigdon?"
"Infamous? Look, friend ..."
"He was infamous on our side of the border." He had been afraid his identity would frighten the girl. She grew relaxed instead.
"Heck, we're neighbors. Almost kin. What went on between our fathers doesn't seem very important now, does it?"
"Not when you look at it from a forest in the heart of Ventimiglia, no."
The exchange of identities occurred during their second day together, while they paused at the forest's edge and Gathrid quietly debated going afoot once more. Before, Loida had tagged along in silence while Gacioch had done the chattering. For his part, Gathrid had been too preoccupied to worry about the girl or demon.
By now an alarm would have spread throughout Ventimiglia's ruling class. The hunt would be up.
Could he reach the Library before the pursuit overtook him?
The city Dedera was the obstacle. Daubendiek should see him through the countryside. Out here, sheer distance would keep the enemy from gathering in number. But the city, with its quarter million people, could throw an army across his path.
He saw no way, now, to conceal his presence and destination. He decided to retain the horses and try for speed.
A dozen riders passed through a field a quarter mile away, boredly watching the wood. To Gathrid's surprise, Gacioch kept his mouth shut while they were within hearing.
"Why didn't you yell?" Gathrid demanded.