Olan Thorensen - Cast Under an Alien Sun

He joined the others as they dismantled the barricade, not knowing where most of the parts originated and looking for something he recognized. A dozen or more men concentrated on the cathedral pews, and he found himself on one end of a pew with another man at the opposite end. About half of the pews were already back in place. Brother Fitham directed their placement, his left arm held to his side by a bloody cloth wrapping, his face pale but determined. Yozef hadn’t realized he was covered in sweat until the coolness inside the cathedral brought on a chill. When they set the pew down, the man on the other end turned. It was Cadwulf.

“Yozef!” the young man exclaimed. “I didn’t see you after the fight! I was worried.”

“I’ve been around. Helping where I could.” Peeing myself and almost puking .

“You’re all right, though? I saw you next to Carnigan, then lost sight of you.”

Yozef was quiet, as they walked back out for another pew. In the noon sunlight, Yozef’s chill faded. They pulled another pew off a line of hay bales.

“How many were killed?” he asked in a detached voice.

“Too many,” Cadwulf replied grimly. “It’s fortunate there weren’t more.” Cadwulf recited names, most of which Yozef didn’t recognize. He did know Yonkel, one of his kerosene lantern workers, and an abbey brother he knew of only by name and appearance, a short, balding man who worked with the livestock. The brother had always had given Yozef a friendly smile when they passed each other. The smile was gone forever, and Yozef wondered idly if the animals would notice they had a new attendant.

He frowned, angry at himself. What was the brother’s name? Christ! I don’t even know what his name was !

He shook himself. “How about the raiders?”

“Looked like at least eighty bodies. Damn their souls to eternal damnation!”

“Where are the bodies going? I saw them being put into wagons.”

“Out to the refuse pits. They’ll be burned down to ash and buried with the rest of the garbage.”

Yozef imaged what served as the garbage dump about a mile farther inland, a natural dry gully where locals dumped refuse, and which accounted for the relative lack of the general odors and decay he had expected from a seventeenth- or eighteenth-century-level settlement. The image of raider bodies being dumped into the gully and then set afire brought up images of World War II concentration camps, though in this case the image was accompanied by satisfaction.

“Did Denes question any wounded raiders? Who are they, and why did they do this?”

“Buldorians,” spat Cadwulf. Yozef’s expression was blank. “Buldorians,” repeated Cadwulf. “From a small country on the Ganolar continent. Pirates, slavers, and anything else you can image. One of them confirmed the Narthani were behind it.”

“Any more information from them?”

“That was all we needed.”

There must have more information. Maybe the Caedelli didn’t recognize the value of any small pieces of information. “Where are the prisoners now?” he asked.

“Dumped with the others, of course.”

Yozef swallowed . So much for further interrogations.

“Yozef, what’s wrong with your leg?”

“My leg?”

“You’re limping, and that’s blood on your pants.”

Yozef looked down. His clothes had dried after Carnigan’s dunking, but now something soaked the right leg of the pants below his knee. “I don’t . . . ” He didn’t finish before a pain washed over him and he collapsed to the ground. “Agh! What’s goin’ on?”

Cadwulf helped roll up the pants leg. Yozef’s fingers poked through two holes in the cloth, and he almost fainted when his shin was exposed. A two-inch furrow gouged across his white skin, blood caked across half of the lower leg, more blood seeping from the wound.

“You’re shot!”

“Oh, fuck!” Yozef slipped into English, then back to Caedelli. “It was a ricochet off Carnigan’s shield. I thought it just hit me and bounced off.”

“You didn’t feel this?”

“No. Not till just now.”

“Well, it needs to be cleaned and sewn up. I’ll help you into the hospital. Doesn’t look serious, but you’ll have a good scar.”

The rider Denes Vegga dispatched for help nearly killed his horse in getting to Clengoth. Boyerman Vorwich himself and fifty men were on the road back to the abbey within fifteen minutes. Another hundred men followed thirty minutes later. They had no way to know the fighting at St. Sidryn’s Abbey was over before the first group left Clengoth. When they arrived at the abbey, it had been only three hours since the first sighting of the Buldorian ships and two hours since the raiders were back aboard and gone.

Vorwich shook his head at the pile of Buldorian weapons. “I still can hardly believe the miracle that you fought them off with so few men.”

Sistian took a deep breath and turned his head skyward. “A miracle it may well be, Longnor. If it was, then I will need to pray thanksgiving for many an hour. When it was all happening, everything was a blur.”

“What on Anyar’s name made you think to let them into the complex, instead of defending the walls? It worked, but it’s insane,” queried a grizzled, burly man in the boyerman’s party.

“It was insane, but somehow it succeeded, thanks to Denes Vegga here.”

Vorwich regarded Denes with a nod of approval and raised questioning eyebrows.

Denes was discomfited. “Oh … I agree. To the insanity. But it wasn’t my idea. Remember, Abbot, Yozef suggested it.”

Sistian’s face was blank for a moment, and then his eyes widened when he remembered the chaotic scene in the courtyard as they prepared for the raiders. “Yes, now I remember. Where in God’s creation did Yozef come up with the idea?”

“I don’t know, but I’m glad he did. It was a boon from God that he thought of it.”

“Or God whispered it to him,” murmured Cadwulf, who had been listening from the outer circle of the gathering.

Sistian threw his eldest son a sharp look, frowned, and took on a more thoughtful expression.

“Yozef?” asked Vorwich. “Who’s this Yozef?”

Sistian grimaced—or grinned. “Yozef Kolsko. The stranger who washed up on the beach here not two years ago. I’ve written you about him several times.”

Vorwich’s eyebrows rose. “The stranger who’s been introducing all these new products? The same one?”

“The same,” said Denes.

“Hmm . . . ,” responded Vorwich. “And now he’s some kind of warrior, too?”

“Well,” said Denes, “certainly not a fighter. He made the suggestion and tried to help during the fighting, but from what little I saw, I doubt he’d ever held a weapon in his hands before today.”

“Then how is it he understood enough to make the wild suggestion to let the Buldorians into the abbey? And now that I think about it, what made you listen to him?”

Denes grunted. “I think you’d have to be around Yozef to understand. After all of the new ideas that seem to come from him, it’s given him the status of someone to be listened to. I only paid scant attention to him before, but when he said to let the Buldorians inside the walls, it was like a light went off in my head. After today, I’m sure I’ll I find myself listening carefully to anything he says.”

“Denes is right. There’s no doubt he’s someone to listen to,” said Sistian. “A little strange he might be, and I’ll admit I still have reservations about where he came from and some of his ideas, but I can’t deny he’s brought major changes to Abersford. I’m sure even in Clengoth, you’ve seen the effect he’s having.”