John Dalmas - Return to Fanglith

"Maybe Gilbert forgot. The state he's in tonight, he could forget his Pater Noster. Let's look in…"

They'd moved on down the hall, and I couldn't make out the rest of it. Then I couldn't hear them at all anymore, By that time Gunnlag was on his feet beside me. It seemed to me that pretty soon the knights would be back, probably with others, and they'd check this room again, plus the one to our right that they'd just come out of. I opened the door wide enough to look out; to the right a little way was a corner. They'd gone around it. To our left was a stairhead that probably led down to the dining hall.

I grabbed Gunnlag's thick arm, slipped out into the corridor, and started down it to our left. Then we heard voices from the stairway, coming up. Instantly I moved to the nearest door and turned the handle. It opened and we ducked in; I closed it quietly behind us.

But before it closed, the weak Sight from the corridor had given us a glimpse of the room. In it were the hauberks and weapons stripped from the Varangian dead!

It took me about ten seconds to find a knife in the dark and cut Gunnlag's wrists free. The hauberks had to have a lot of dry blood on them, but each of us put one on anyway and picked up a belt with weapons. I'd have given almost anything to have a stunner or pistol in place of the Varangian sword, but it was something, at least.

Then I went to the window and looked out. Off to one side a little way was a bench with an ell-shaped hedge as a screen. The window wasn't very wide, but wide enough, and it didn't have any glass in it. I'm not sure these people even had window glass. I leaned way out-the walls were thick-and dropped my gear. After I heard it hit, I waited to see if anyone came to investigate the noise. When they didn't, I got into the win-ow, let myself down to arms' length, and dropped. Nothing broke when I hit, but it jarred me pretty hard. I got up, grabbed my gear, and moved behind the hedge, where I buckled on my sword belt. Then I heard Gunnlag's gear thud onto the dirt. Half a minute later he dropped too. He must have weighed two hundred pounds, even if he was only about five-feet eight, and I'd guess he was at least forty years old, but he got right up.

We crouched together behind the hedge then. I didn't have any idea what to do next, and if Gunnlag did, he didn't tell me.

Larn:

We pulled my ex-guard's body into the passage and took off his hauberk, collet, gear, and leggings-everything but his helmet; it wasn't there. I'd have to do without it. As far as I could see by Layla's oil lamp, the stuff wasn't even bloody. When we weren't so busy, I told myself, I'd ask Moise how he killed him with a knife without getting blood all over.

After I put them on, Layla led us back along the passage, shielding her oil lamp with one hand. We stopped at the hiding place to pick up Ketil and talk. Ketil put on his helmet. Even lame, he

looked ready to fight.

My plan, I said, was to get outside the castle. Then I'd go to the gate, pretend to be a Norman knight, and ask to be let in. They'd never suspect who I was. Inside, I'd try to find out where our weapons were, get hold of some, and see what good I could do with them. Maybe take Gilbert hostage. I wasn't willing to leave without rescuing Tarel. He wasn't just my friend, he was my brother-in-law.

Moise repeated most of this to Ketil in Greek, then had a conversation with Layla. It seemed a lot more than was necessary to tell her I wanted to get out of the castle. When they were done, she nodded, and lowered herself back down through the trapdoor.

"She is going to get some olive oil," Moise said. "To see if we can get your wrist irons off over your hands."

I almost shriveled with embarrassment! I'd forgotten them. I could imagine trying to pass myself off as an envoy from Robert Guiscard wearing irons and broken chains on my wrists.

Layla was back inside of five minutes with a jar of oil, and poured it on my hands and wrists. It was Ketil who held onto the slippery irons while I made my hands as small as possible and pulled. At first I thought it wasn't going to work. Then I decided I'd just have to stand the pain, and jerked hard. In spite of the oil I lost some skin, but the irons came off.

Then we followed Layla a couple of hundred yards farther to where the tunnel ended. There she reached up and touched the overhead, saying something in Arabic. Moise started to push where she touched, to open another trapdoor.

"Just a minute," I said, and looked at Ketil, then at Moise. "I'm going alone. Tell Ketil if he was with me, they'd know at once that something was wrong with my story."

He passed it on to Ketil. I wondered if the big Varangian would get mad, but he just nodded and said something in Greek. Then he took off his Norman-looking helmet and set it on my head. It even fitted pretty well. Looking at it critically, he nodded, then spoke again in Greek.

"He wishes you the blessing of the Virgin," Moise told me.

That surprised me so I couldn't say anything for a few seconds. This was a guy I'd thought of as a savage. Then Moise came up with something.

"Larn, you should take me," he said. "I can help you."

"How?" I demanded. I wasn't in the mood for wasting time in silly arguments. "You can come out with me, but not to the castle gate. You'll have to hide outside somewhere."

"I can help you," he insisted. "I can be a Saracen, or a Levantine Jew. They dress like Saracens."

"How will that help me?"

He didn't answer for several seconds. Then, "We'll think of something," he said.

"Moise," I told him, "that's not a reason."

He surprised me. His voice was hard when he answered. "Then here is a reason. I am going with you whether you like it or not."

I suppose my eyebrows went up at that. "Huh!" I said. "Do you realize we'll probably be dead by morning?"

He nodded soberly.

"Okay," I told him, "we'll go together."

I stuck out my hand and we shook on it. Then he reached up again and pushed up the trapdoor.

Unlike the other, this one made him grunt to raise it. I shook hands with Ketil before we left, then bowed to Layla. I didn't know the Norse or Saracen rules of courtesy, but I wanted to do something to express my thanks. Especially to Layla. She'd owed us nothing and put herself at risk. And saved our lives this far, anyway.

Then I pulled myself up through the trapdoor and gave a hand to Moise.

He lowered the trapdoor back into place. We were in a small room. "Layla told me this is a holy place," he whispered.

We left through a doorway with no door in it, that led into a good-sized room lit through large windows by moonlight. I'd wondered what a holy place might be like. In this one, the only furniture was a lectern in one corner, and in the opposite corner, a low platform with a railing and what seemed to be a desk. I suppose they had some meaning, but I have no idea what.

From the outside door we could see the castle some way off.

"Larn," Moise murmured, "there are two things we must consider before we go any farther. Would a knight be out without a horse? And also, you speak Norman with an accent."

He had a point. Two points. The lack of a horse I could probably lie my way around. But while my Norman French had become pretty fluent, and I could disguise my voice, I'd never pass as Norman.

"If anyone asks," I answered, "I was a boy in Provence who was adopted by a Norman knight when my father was killed."

Even by moonlight I could see that Moise wasn't entirely satisfied with that. I wasn't either, as far as that was concerned. But it was the best I could think of on the spur of the moment. And that's what it had to be-the spur of the moment.

"Let's go," I said, and we started for the castle.

This time the castle wall looked different to me, Bigger. Forbidding. When I'd ridden up to it before, I'd been a guest, and the gate had been open for me. Now I was on foot, an enemy trying to trick my way in.