“Anything else?” Rufus asked. George and Sabbatius shook their heads. The veteran went on, “Well, I expect a hero like Dactylius and me’ll be able to keep any giant bats from flying off with the city till the sun comes up. Why don’t you boys go on home and get some sleep?”
That was uncomplicated, direct, and obvious. So far is George could see, it overlooked no hidden difficulties.
Some problems were simple. George descended from the wall and headed back to the dwelling above his shop. He kept looking for bats all the way there, though. That he saw none relieved him only a little.
George peered back toward Thessalonica, though hills hid it from view. He liked living in the city, but he also liked escaping from it from time to time. With luck, he’d bring back some game for Irene to throw in the pot or some mushrooms to make a stew more interesting. Without luck … He shook his head. Here he was in the fresh air, away from city stinks. If that wasn’t luck, what was?
He looked around. Somewhere not far from here, he had met the satyr that had started him worrying about the Slavs and Avars and their gods and demons. He hoped he would meet the creature again, or another of its land. Bishop Eusebius--any priest--would have set a penance on him for entertaining that kind of hope.
His broad shoulders went up and down in a shrug. For one thing, he hoped he might learn more from the satyr than he had at their previous meeting. And, for another, he was curious. He tried not to admit that even to himself, but he had never been much good at such mental games.
So long as he stayed on the road--the track, really-- he was unlikely to meet up with the satyr or any other supernatural creature. Almost all the men who used the road these days were Christians. They carried the power of their faith with them, making areas they frequented uncomfortable for lesser powers. Not only that, rabbits were easier to find off the beaten track.
And so George plunged into the woods. He had a bow and an arrow in his hands, a full quiver on his back, and a knife at his belt. If brigands wanted him, they would have a busy time of it before they finally pulled him down.
He moved as smoothly and quietly as he could. He was no great scout, to slip among the trees with neither animals nor men having the slightest notion he was anywhere nearby. He knew that--and if he hadn’t known it, Rufus would have got the idea across to him in no uncertain terms. But he seldom came home empty-handed when he went out hunting, so he supposed plenty were worse at the game than he, too.
Something behind a bush moved. George nocked the arrow he carried, then settled into immobility. Out from behind the bush came … a mouse. George let out a silent sigh. If he hit the little animal with an arrow, there wouldn’t be enough left to take home. I should have brought along a cat, he thought, smiling at the conceit.
In a leather sack on his belt he had some cheese, some bread, a little flask of olive oil in which to dip the bread, and a fine, fat onion. He also had a wineskin on his belt. He knew he could drink water instead, but that didn’t mean he wanted to. Besides, the sweet scent of wine might help lure a satyr his way, as it had before.
When shadows and his belly both said it was more or less noon, he sat down on a log to eat the food Irene had packed for him. The mouse was the nearest thing to game he’d seen all day. If he didn’t come across something--or even that patch of mushrooms he’d thought about before--by evening, his wife would have some pungent things to say to him when he got back to town. He shrugged! That had happened before. It was sure as need be to happen again.
He had bread in one hand and the little flask of oil in the other when a hedgehog, perhaps disturbed by his sitting on the log, came out and scurried over to a nearby drift of leaves, in which it took refuge. He knew people who ate hedgehogs when they caught them. He didn’t get up and go after this one. He wasn’t any of those people.
He tore off a piece of the loaf Irene had baked, put oil on it, and had just taken a bite when a couple of men came out of the woods. They froze when they saw him. He froze when he saw them, too--all but his eyes, which flicked this way and that till he’d made exact note of where he’d set down his bow.
One of the newcomers had a bow of his own. The other carried several javelins. Those might have been good for hunting deer--or for hunting men. Both of them wore long wool tunics with fierce beasts embroidered in bright colors at the chest and shoulders. George had never seen tunics like those before. After a moment, he realized the strangers were Slavs.
But for the tunics, they didn’t look outstandingly peculiar. True, they wore beards, but some Roman rustics wore beards, too. They were stocky and fair-skinned, with light brown hair shiny with grease of some sort. One of them had light eyes, the other dark. They wore, he noted, excellent boots.
They seemed as nonplused to encounter George as he was on meeting them. He didn’t want to fight unless he had to. Holding up the bread, he called in Latin, “Come and share. I have enough.” He didn’t, not to satisfy three men, but a little hunger was supposed to be good for the soul.
The Slavs didn’t come forward. They didn’t go back, either. He called to them again, this time in Greek. They spoke back and forth to each other in a coughing, guttural language George had never heard before.
At last, when he was wondering whether he ought to grab for the bow, they did approach him. Both of them held right hands up, palms out. Either they meant peace or they were trying to lull him into thinking so.
One of them took out bread of his own, a lumpy looking, dark brown loaf nowhere near so fine as the one Irene had given George. The Slav tore off a chunk and handed it to the shoemaker. In return, George offered him some of his own loaf. The Slav took a bite and looked pleased.
George held out the little flask of olive oil. The Slav took it, sniffed, made a face, and passed the flask to his comrade. That fellow also looked disgusted. The two of them spoke emphatically in their own language. George didn’t understand a word of it, but odds were it meant something like, How can you stand to eat that stuff?
As far as he was concerned, bread by itself was boring. That went double for what the Slav had given him: it was dense and chewy and, he guessed, made from a mix of barley and wheat. It would, no doubt, keep a man alive for a long time, although after a while he might not want to go on living on such rations.
Then the Slav with the dark hair took out a flask of his own. It proved to hold not olive oil but honey. With honey, the bread definitely became more palatable. George shared out his cheese. The Slavs approved of that. They gave him some sun-dried pears and plums in return.
He untied the rawhide cord around the neck of the wineskin and handed the skin to the blue-eyed Slav. The fellow swigged, his larynx working. He passed the skin to his darker friend, who also drank. Courteously, though, he made sure he did not empty the skin before returning it to George.
After everyone had finished eating, the Slavs tried talking with him some more. The effort was vigorous but useless. They spoke their own guttural language and fragments of another that sounded even stranger--maybe it was the Avars’ tongue. Whatever it was, it made no sense to George. He gave them Latin and Greek, the only two languages he knew. As he’d already concluded, they didn’t understand those.
By signs, he showed them what he’d been doing out in the woods. They laughed at his impression of a hopping rabbit. He laughed, too, as he bounded about, but he was careful not to let them get between him and his bow. When he was done bounding, he did his best with gestures and questioning looks to ask why they were here.