Andrew Offutt - The Tower of Death

And now… who possessed this grim old pile of stone? Or-what?

He approached the cylindrical tower, accompanied by two nervous Suevi with their strange back-of-the-head hairknots. They walked all round about it, and once Cormac drew steel and prodded at lank runners of brown algae. The kelp acted like nothing but kelp. The three men ascended to the light-chamber. Here only rusty brown stains now gave evidence of the ugly occurrences here.

Eight men, he reflected, looking slit-eyed about, slain and sucked dry by… seaweed?

Was it possible?

Had it really happened, that viney thing locking onto his flesh and starting in at once to feed on his blood? Those dehiscent pods that had burst like pig’s bladders to spurt blood over a foot across the floor? Could he really hold belief that the seaweed was sentient or nearly, that it had been sent and recalled once its ghastly murders were accomplished?

Cormac peered out on the sea, thinking, wondering at how much kelp the oceans held, thinking of masses of it crawling like worms in rich soil after a rain. And tiny cold feet seemed to walk up his spine, under mailcoat and padded jacket and tunic, and Cormac mac Art sweated. He turned to stare along the brooding, craggy coast backed by its dark trees.

“There is adequate fuel lying there, in the woods. I’ll want some dry old rotted wood, and a fine supply of slim sticks, also dry.”

“It will be done.” Irnic had bade these men accept Cormac’s suggestions as orders and carry out his instructions as if they were royal proclamations.

“Well. Let’s be going down. It’s naught there is to see now, and we do want that wood gathered.”

“I don’t envy you your vigil here, Captain Cormac,” the Sueve said as they descended the narrow staircase of stone.

“Just Cormac will do, Eudo. I’ve not captained my own ship for some years now, and have little use for titles.”

“Is’t true you and the Dane have sent full a score of ships to the bottom, Cormac?”

Cormac sighed. “No, it is not true. We have sunk two. Nor have we ever done death on so many as one single man who did not have steel in his hand. Why, I’ve never even raped a woman!”

“Not one? ” Eudo’s companion said disbelievingly, and Eudo chuckled, “How about girls, then?”

“It’s never been necessary,” Cormac said, without thinking that he was not lessening his legend, but adding another line that would become paragraphs. “Ah, attend me, Eudo; I’m thinking of something else. See that a cauldron of grease is provided us here.”

“Grease?”

“Animal, aye, and coagulated. I just want it after it’s been boiled down, so that it will liquefy swiftly, rather than big chunks of fat.”

“A cauldron.”

They emerged into the sunlight. “Aye, and I’d not be minding in the least if the pot were not one of those monstrous heavy things. Bronze or iron; makes no difference. And it’s welcome your lads are to carry up the grease in ewers or skinbags, and transfer it into the cauldron up in the light-chamber. I’m not bent on breaking backs!”

“Aye, Cormac. Very well. It will be done. And where will ye be?”

Cormac turned to look at the long-faced Sueve, and the Gael’s face was open, almost ingenuous-if a visage so marked by experience was capable of anything approaching a boyish expression. “Why, right here, Eudo. It’s only my life’s at stake, man; I’ll not be wandering off afishing while my little castle is being prepared to withstand siege!”

Eudo nodded with a chastened little smile, and he and his aide hurried away to see to the gathering of wood.

Cormac walked along the shore, ascending slowly. He knew would be no easy matter, muscling a huge iron vat of hardened grease up to the light-chamber of yon tower of death. Cauldrons were built to last, and they were not light. Nor was a solid mass of melted and resolidified animal fat. Too, Cormac had never seen a cauldron that was provided with more than two lugs, or handles.

Better that job than calcining lime , he thought, and tugged off his horsehair-crested helm. The salt-fresh air over the sea stirred but little this afternoon, but each little zephyr was most welcome. He whipped his head back and forth, shaking sweat and kinks from his black mass of hair.

He entered the woods that ended just above the bluff overlooking the sea, ascended, and emerged to sit in shade and gaze out on the water. From time to time he glanced at the beacon tower, or gazed speculatively at that enigmatic pile of brine-white stone. A sentry and a haven, turned into a trap of horror and a grave. How? By what?

As the afternoon wore on he twice rose and changed his position, seeking shade in the manner of a lounging dog. But Cormac mac Art was hardly at his ease. While his body rested his brain laboured and winged afar in both space and the misty past, planning, seeking clues to the root of this new menace that had fallen athwart his life-path.

He could think of no precedent, nothing similar in all his experience asea, and in Eirrin and Alba and Britain. He stared seaward, thinking, and from time to time Wulfhere went by…

The Dane was shouting and cursing. His flaming beard bristled as he turned face and supplicating hands up to Asgard. He had taken aboard Raven a score of his own Danish seamen, with half that number of Suevi, for training. Wulfhere had not the patience to train a genius to pick his nose, Cormac reflected, smiling. Back and forth the ship went, up and down the coast, back and forth… and all the while Wulfhere Skull-splitter railed at his tyroes.

He should have come in earlier. Toward sundown a wind rose up and whipped the sea into prancing choppy waves and breakers that crashed onto the rocks below Cormac’s perch. Wulfhere’s trainees gain their seasoning now , the Gael grinned, hearing the Dane’s bellow even through the wind.

Raven plunged and beat up and down for a long hour ere the wind eased and they dared swing her swiftly in to gain shore. By then the sun had gone orange and was perching at the edge of the world.

Cormac rose and hurried down to meet the men from Raven .

Wulfhere snorted as he watched the half-score Suevi stagger and lurch ashore. Each quivered in every part and the skin of more than one showed a definite green tinge.

“Och, Cormac! We have a helpless task with these landbound plow-pushers! They’ll never make seamen!”

But Knud the Swift winked at Cormac, which told him the Sueves had done rather well.

“And what saw you, Wulf, on your little pleasure cruise?”

The Dane tried to fry Cormac with a look, then doffed his helm and slammed it at his comrade with a swift tensing thrust of both arms, from the chest. Cormac caught the iron pot in both his hands, and aye, mac Art rocked with the impact. He said nothing of the pain to the middle finger of his left hand, but did toss the helm aside for Wulfhere to pick up.

“Nothing!” the flame-haired giant said explosively. “We saw nothing! No sign of wrecked ships, not even a plank. And no slain men, sucked dry or otherwise.”

Cormac made a sympathetic face and gave his head a jerk. “Will ye be ready to-morrow evening?”

“Aye,” Wulfhere nodded. “To-morrow e’en. And… I’ll not be sleeping in our chamber this night, again.

“My chamber,” Cormac corrected. “Not a married lady, I hope.”

“Frey’s stones, No! Neither of them!”

As they were finishing dinner, Zarabdas quietly let Cormac know that he would have converse. The Gael was none loath and they went outside for a walk about the grounds of the king’s hall. The sky was still a deep slate colour, rather than black. They talked, but nothing was said.