L. Camp - The Exotic Enchanter

He reminded himself that Chalmers being executed or Florimel spending her life In some potentate’s harem would be a much uglier sight.

By the time the sun was halfway down the sky, the work was done. Mikhail Sergeivich leaped on a wagon and waved his sword over his head three times, the agreed-on signal for the soldiers to set on the Polovtsi. Then he jumped down, joined Shea in pulling a sheaf of rawhide thongs from their baggage and went to work.

Not all of the soldiers had obeyed orders to avoid the liquor, and those the two leaders left lying where they’d fallen. A few drunken soldiers didn’t make much difference, anyway. The Polovtsi were either sprawled flat or sitting slumped against something, and none of them could have stood unless tied to a tree. As for fighting, they were so obviously past it that in a few minutes the sober merchants came out and began helping the soldiers bind the prisoners.

A few of the Polovtsi who’d been sleeping off their breakfast woke up before they were bound. They only stared dim-eyed at their captors; Shea wondered how many of them (especially the ones who’d drunk kvass or mead) would be paralyzed by hangovers.

They’d run out of thongs and were raiding the leather merchants’ stores for more material, when Igor rode up at the head of his warriors. The prince stared at the acres of helpless Polovtsi, and laughed so hard that anyone but a Hero would have fallen off his horse. Then he dismounted and embraced Shea.

“You are a bogatyr like none ever named in song or story! The Polovtsi are finished and Rurik Vasilyevich has his life, by all the saints!”

“Did you capture the slave train, Your Highness? And what of that other wizard? And Yuri Dimitrivich’s family? And — ?” Shea hoped his days victory entitled him to a few straight answers.

“We captured it, all right,” the prince interrupted. “Word of your drinking party reached the guards, and half of them rode off to join it. They are out there,” he added, waving a hand at the field of drunks.

“The rest seemed to suspect something, but we had a scout who knew a ford across a little stream that they counted on to protect one flank. We had our men on foot right into the camp before the guards knew anything. Then the horsemen charged before the Polovtsi could so much as draw a sword!

“We had the camp and the caravan under our hands in less time than it took one of those wretches to drain a cup. Yuri Dimitrivich’s family and household, those who survived, are free.”

“What did you do with the rest, Your Highness?” The prince replied cheerfully. “They are on their way to Krasni Podok, and this vermin will join them. Don’t worry about any blood prices, Egorov. The grivnas from that sale will more than cover the price of a few wounds.”

Igor lowered his voice. “I think I really will raise the liquor tax. If these merchants will go to so much trouble to supply drink to Polovtsi perhaps I can persuade them to take as much trouble for their prince. Speaking of which, I could use a drink right now.”

“Ah, Your Highness, if anything is left, it would leave you flat alongside your enemies. In fact, I’d not offer anything here to anyone but an enemy.”

The prince looked around, then headed for the spring. He gestured for Shea to follow, which the psychologist did, telling himself that his dreams of freeing all the slaves in the train had been a few centuries too early. But what about —

“Florimel, Your Highness! Was she freed?”

“I gave Rurik Vasilyevich permission to look for her, once we’d taken the caravan,” Igor replied. “He will be coming in with the rest of my band. Oleg Nikolaivich will take the caravan to Krasni Podok and bring back my profits.” His smile grew a trifle cruel. “I will also find out who has been depending on Krasni Podok to supply his needs, at the expense of his fellow Rus.”

That should help a bit, Shea thought.

* * *

Near sunset the rest of the party rode in, including Reed Chalmers. Never was there a more truly named Knight of the Woeful Countenance.

He was still guarded, but Shea could see that the guards were now superfluous. Reed slumped in the saddle so that it was a wonder he didn’t fall. There was no sign of Florimel.

Shea helped his comrade down, and wished he had a drink to offer him. The best he could do was privacy, so he took Chalmers to the outskirts of the camp.

“What happened?”

Shea was relieved to see a trace of life in Chalmers’ eyes, even if it was only frustration. “I — I don’t know.”

“Can you tell me what you saw, at least?”

“What — how can that help?”

Florimel is gone again , Shea thought. Aloud, he said, “We never know what won’t help. Besides, we kept our promise to Igor. He owes us something. Even if I can’t help —”

“All right.”

Chalmers described a search of the slave caravan, wagon by wagon and tent by tent, him and four guards. (Not just to keep an eye on him, either; suicidal last-ditch attacks were a Polovtsi speciality.) There’d been hundreds of slaves, some more wretched then others, but none of them as happy as Chalmers had expected to find them, now that they were free.

“One man was bold enough to explain that Yuri the Red’s household had been freed but no others,” Chalmers said. “He asked If this was a true prince’s justice. One of my guards knocked him senseless.”

Chalmers kept his anger on a tight rein until they came to the last tent. It had some sort of warding at the entrance, that kept Chalmers and his guards from going in.

The warding did not keep the psychologist from seeing Florimel, standing with Malambroso in the far corner of the tent.

“It should not have kept her from seeing me, either, but perhaps it did. Certainly she showed no signs of recognition. She looked like a sleepwalker.”

Then Malambroso began making passes with his hands. Chalmers knew there was only one thing to do: break the ward, then negate Malambroso’s spell.

He tried three times to enter the tent, using three different verses (and Shea couldn’t have remembered what they were to save his life). The warding stayed firm, which was more than could be said of the guards. Igor’s orders or no, two of them ran off.

The other two remained in sight, but at a safe distance, as if fearing Chalmers might burst into flames at any moment, like a pot of Greek fire.

In the middle of Chalmers’ fourth attempt, Malambroso and Florimel vanished.

“I’m sure I did everything correctly,” Chalmers concluded. “Any one of those spells should have stopped him.” His voice was tight with rage and grief. “And what has he done with my wife?” His voice rose to a shout. “Where has he taken her?”

Shea mentally cursed the whole continuum, starting with Malambroso, going on to the Polovtsi, and not stopping there. He didn’t dare curse out loud but right now he would knowingly have accepted a drink from the caravan’s remaining stores.

The day was ending even worse than it had begun, and Shea hoped that Chalmers didn’t want any company, because he himself certainly didn’t. With a farewell grunt to Chalmers, he stumbled half-blindly, back toward the center, where fires were beginning to glow.

Shea had to swing wide before he’d gone more than a few yards. The sober merchants had pulled their wagons into a tight circle, in case any sober Polovtsi wandered by. The drunken Polovtsi covered as much ground as ever, although some of them were awake enough to groan and a few were struggling against their bonds.

The psychologist was passing a wagon with a cover of smelly furs tied to poles, when one of the furs flew out and hit him in the face. Before he could react, a human figure leaped after the fur.