John Dalmas - Return to Fanglith

Arno questioned one of the Varangians, got an answer, and turned to me with another grin. "Gunnlag told him his father eats pork." I couldn't see why Gunnlag would say that, or why the Varangians had laughed. I'd eaten pork in Normandy, and it had seemed all right. In feet, I'd liked it. Arno, seeing that I didn't get it, explained.

"To a Saracen, that is a terrible insult. Their religion holds that eating pork is a mortal sin."

Frankly, to me it seemed stupid to insult someone who's getting ready to kill you. But maybe Gunnlag figured it wouldn't make any difference, and that he might as well enjoy what he could while he could.

Arno asked some more questions. It turned out that the Saracen commander had offered surrender terms. If we surrendered, we wouldn't be killed. I suppose that anyone who wasn't ransomed would be sold into slavery. They didn't attack though. Not for hours. The morning wore on, and the afternoon, and I kept expecting it. I hardly noticed how hungry I was. The thirst was something else; it I noticed. A few times some Saracens rode near enough to shoot arrows into camp, and I was glad to have a shield. But that was it. The Varangians didn't even shoot back, They were waiting for the Saracens to get closer, I suppose.

Judging by the sun, it was mid-afternoon when, signalled by trumpets, Saracens at both ends of the knob grouped to attack. Again trumpets blew, and horsemen formed ranks of ten. They blew again, and the ranks started toward us at a walk. There seemed like an awful lot of them. The Varangians nocked arrows. At about a hundred yards, the Saracens spurred their horses to a trot, and at about eighty yards, at Gunnlag's shout, the Varangians sent a flight of arrows at them, followed by another. A few horsemen and horses fell, some to be ridden over. The Saracens had spurred to a heavy, uphill gallop. The Varangians dropped their bows, drew swords and picked up shields, or raised two-handed battle-axes, then moved out together to meet the charging enemy. Several held huge swords that took two hands to use. I stayed where I was, leaving my shortsword in its scabbard, waiting with my shield on my left arm and my stunner in my right hand.

The Saracens hit.

It would have been a lot worse if they hadn't been riding uphill. As it was, they didn't have a lot of momentum, and the Varangian swords and axes cut down horses and men in a melee of violent motion and spraying blood, impacts and bellows. Brown dust billowed; men and horses screamed and fell. Three Saracens broke through, and I zapped each of them before he could wheel to hit the Varangians from behind. After brief minutes, maybe only one, the charge broke. A trumpet blared, and the Saracens in front of us wheeled and rode back down the slope. Some of the Varangians picked up bows and sent arrows after them.

I turned. At the other end of camp the fight was over, too. Gradually, in the relative stillness, my eyes registered the shambles all around. Dead horses, dead men, bloody dirt. Quite a few of the bodies were Varangians, dead or dying, while some of those on their feet bled from slashes. Arno's hauberk was smeared with crimson, but apparently the blood wasn't his.

He looked around until he saw me, then grinned in spite of his thirst. "I saw what you did," he called to me. His voice was hoarse and raspy. "Your 'holy amulet' is a valuable weapon."

I looked at my stunner. The indicator was on red; at the most it was good for three more shots-one, at least. "It's almost used up," I told him.

"In that case," he said, "I suggest you find a sword to your liking-something longer than that." He gestured at my shortsword.

I wasn't sure how much good a sword would do me-any sword-but I hefted a few dropped by the dead. Most of them had blood on the hilts, but I made myself pick them up. The Varangian swords I tried felt heavier than I could handle properly. My arm was strong enough, but not my wrist and hand. The Saracen swords were lighter. I played with one of them, testing; this one I could handle easily.

Then a hand gripped my shoulder, and I turned around. It was Gunnlag. He beckoned me to follow, then led me to the body of a fallen Varangian. Arno came along, curious. Gunnlag picked up the man's sword-one of the big, two-handed ones-and husked earnestly at me in dry-throated Norse.

"He's telling you to use that one," Arno said. "For someone with little skill, the two-handed sword is better. It is for berserkers, or for those who are strong but inept."

I didn't know what a berserker was, or whether I was strong enough to handle a weapon like that one. But inept fitted me pretty well, so I took it and tried a few practice swings. Big as I was by Fanglithan standards, and strong, it was too heavy for me to use effectively, even with two hands. Gunnlag saw that, and looked around at the bodies, then went to one of the largest. The sword he picked up was single-handed but big, with a hilt long enough that I had no trouble gripping it with both hands. I swung it high and then low, and then in figure eights.

Gunnlag was grinning and nodding now, and said something to Arno. Other Varangians were looking on, most of them grinning too. "He says," Arno told me, "that he wishes you'd come to him earlier, when you were a boy, or even a year ago. He says you'd have made a fine Varangian."

I nodded. Not that I was agreeing with him. I was just being courteous, and maybe appreciating the compliment. I wasn't the kind of warrior who would get kicks out of hacking people up. If I was any kind of warrior at all, it was the kind that just wanted to overthrow the Empire and then retire to something more peaceable.

So far I hadn't been paying attention to what the Varangians were doing. Now I did. Some were bandaging the wounds of their buddies with pieces of Saracen robes. A few were killing the badly wounded of both sides, sticking them in the neck with their knives. I could understand that; otherwise they'd lie there and die slowly. But it was something I didn't ofier to help with.

Something else the Varangians did was look for any water bags the dead Saracens might have carried. There weren't any; they'd probably left them behind on purpose. After that the Varangians started dragging dead horses to form a crescent-shaped barricade at each end of camp, a little below the brow of the knob. I went out and helped them. It was heavy work. Even as cool as the day was, and as dry as we were, I was soon sweating from it. After the dead horses were all in place, we sort of leveled it off on the uphill side with the dead humans, Saracens and Varangians both.

When we'd finished, Gunnlag prayed over the dead at both ends of camp. Then we sat around and stood around, watching. I felt really bushed, and wondered if we had enough strength to fight oif another attack, even behind the barrier we'd built. There were plenty of Saracens left, but only fifty-three Varangians fit to fight. The Saracens didn't seem in any hurry.

It felt like an hour or more that nothing happened. I wondered if the Saracens even planned to attack again. Maybe they'd just sit down there and wait for us to die or come to them. Then some of them made a big show of riding toward us to drink from their water bags, so some of the Varangians started cutting the heads off dead Saracens and throwing them down the hill. Every time they threw one, the rest would cheer, though not as loudly as they would have if their throats hadn't been so dry.

If only Deneen would show up, I thought. Then I realized with a shock that I hadn't tried to call her since early the evening before! Of course she could be expected to call me-but I'd taken the remote out of my ear in the ravine! Fumbling it out of my belt pouch, I seated it in my ear again. Then I spoke into the communicator, my voice rasping over dry throat membranes.

"Rebel Javelin, this is Larn," I said. "Rebel Javelin, this is Larn. Over."