Грег Бир - The Unfinished Land

“No, señor, ” Reynard said. “The trees and wind are wrong, and there be nought of Queen’s soldiers. And neither is it Iceland, ’cause I heard we ply too far north, and not so far west.” He knelt and bowed his head. “ señor, the horse’s hooves are damp and could split on these rocks. You should not ride far till they be trimmed and shod.”

Cardoza observed him critically, then turned to the old man. “I will see what is near and a threat—and then thou canst do thy work. Unless thou wish’st to discourage me?” el capitán chuckled. “ el viejo, this boy is either a cunning fraud or a spy.”

The old man inclined his head. “Spies know much, lord. And he knoweth horses.”

“And of this land, thou say’st correctly, I know little. We will stay awhile, look about, give my beauty a brief run in the sweet air, curry and shoe her, and let her crop sweet grass.”

“After so much time in the galleon, she should not eat her fill of fresh grass,” Reynard advised. “She will bloat.”

“ Conozco a los caballos, muchacho, ” el capitán said shortly. But then he called for hay and the last of the oats to be sent down the ramps.

el maestro ’s bark of a laugh irritated Reynard, who wondered why there was amusement, but the bulky man’s attitude was neither aggressive nor angry—not yet, though el maestro then scowled, perhaps more worried than el capitán. El capitán seemed eager to learn the ground on which they found themselves, restless, Reynard thought, to conquer someone or someplace, having been unable to face an enemy for so many days.

The old man again jerked his rope, but Reynard growled and yanked it from his grasp.

“ Rescataste un cachorro, Manuel, ” Cardoza said with a curl of his lip.

So that was the old man’s name!

“ Sí, señor. ”

“ Gitano, as thou art?”

Manuel made the most elegant and tiny of shrugs.

el capitán smiled. “Keep him quiet till we have use of him, o córtale la garganta. ”

“ Sí, señor. ” Manuel, for Reynard’s sake, ran a finger across his own throat.

“And watch that he tendeth well my horse.”

“ Sí, señor. ”

Manuel gripped Reynard’s rope and led him back up the narrow ramp to gather more tools. Two other horses were being calmed on the quarterdeck before also being winched to the beach. Reynard could not understand how such animals could be kept from sun and field, in tight wooden stalls no doubt, without exercise… for weeks or months. Horrible planning.

Soldiers on the shore were ordered to gather wood, and others helped convey an anvil down to the beach as Manuel and Reynard, on the galleon, descended steps to plunge deep into the stink and noise of the hull. Other soldiers were clanking and shouting, still removing weapons and armor, as if preparing to besiege the land they had found; this then was the business el capitán alluded to. Having left the battle for England behind, outcome unknown, the Spanish would now explore, fight, if necessary, and bring this place under Philip’s rule, for that was what the Spanish did. Reynard found nothing unexpected about this effort, this prospect, though he was surprised he would be allowed anywhere near el capitán ’s fine horse.

“Are you Roma?” Reynard asked the old man as they opened a crate filled with iron shoes and boxes of nails. They were so near the bilges that Reynard clenched his teeth not to gag.

“ Esto es lo que soy. Gitano, from Madrid,” Manuel said, his yellow-outlined shadow moving about in the scant light of his one candle, backlit by whatever echoed from several decks above.

“And think you I am Roma as well?”

Manuel raised his candle and shrugged.

“I am not,” Reynard said.

“Do not deny in haste,” Manuel said. “Here, methinks there be advantage.” Manuel handed him the box, a long iron file, and black iron clippers. “ ¿Sabes cómo usarlos? —how to use these?”

“Yes,” Reynard said. “Unless the Spanish follow other ways.”

“ Caballos son caballos, ” Manuel said, and with a wrinkled expression of disgust pinched his nose. “ Alejémonos de este olor y regresemos a la playa. ”

They climbed out of the lower deck and made haste to the ramp. Manuel stopped them halfway down to the beach, and pointed along the curve of the shingle, southwest, toward an advancing shadow—like a small cloud crossing the sun. Trying to keep his balance, Reynard looked up and shaded his eyes. All he could see was the flash of a rainbow-colored triangle, then another, with a long dark line between, vibrating, rising—and then gone.

Manuel looked at Reynard, glanced over his shoulder, and continued down to the beach. On the sand and shingle, the men seemed frozen in attitudes of listening, of fear. They murmured to each other until Cardoza rode back from the northern curve, shouting orders, telling them to get the horses and dogs under cover.

“Giant eagles!” he cried. “Guard thyselves!”

Reynard did not believe what he had seen was any kind of eagle, nor any bird at all. The triangles, if they were wings, were like panes of glass from a cathedral window, and about as big—and the bodies had been slender and long, too long, four or five yards. As well, the shapes had vanished too quickly, flying too fast. He had once seen a peregrine dive that fast, but never ascend.

He stood beside Manuel on the beach. Soon the sailors and soldiers had all been told to spread out and cut down the trees that lined the shingle, and to bring from the galleon what little lumber and rope remained after repairs at sea. The forward spritsail was cut loose and slung like a tent over the animals, held by six men in a tight, restless bunch—the dogs growling at the horses and the horses scraping the shingle and kicking at the men and the dogs.

The weather along the beach grew sharp, and more maggoty clouds swooped in low, obscuring the promontories and the forest along the ridge that lowered over the cove, shadow upon shadow, until the men themselves and the constructs they tried to erect cast no shadows at all.

Cardoza’s personal cook, a small, stout man with a leather apron and a bandolier of cleavers, knives, and spoons slung around shoulders and paunch, waddled at last down from the galleon, followed by three boys bowed under casks and bags. The cook ordered los grumetes to gather wood and set about making a cooking fire, personally gathering rocks on the beach to bank the heat. It seemed certain his efforts would not benefit the soldiers, but only el capitán and perhaps el maestro, who were now exploring the beach and the verge on foot.

Another fire, banked, bellowsed, and hotter, was lit between the anvil and the shelter of the sail, and Manuel and Reynard prepared to forge the shoes and repair the hooves of the horses, which had spent too much time in their stalls aboard ship, mired in sour straw and their own dung and piss.

“The wood is not happy,” Manuel observed, lifting a branch, leaves dead and dry, but still difficult to grip, as if its twists and flaking bark were part of a serpent. Manuel pushed it in with the other embers, where it hissed but at last caught and crackled.

The fire hot enough, they took to their blacksmithing. Reynard inspected and rasped, Manuel tried a selection of horseshoes from el maestro ’s cask, special-made for his horse, and saw that some would also fit the other two. The horses twitched their flanks and withers, but seemed happy at this familiar ritual, for the human contact, for feeling once again sure of foot and free of the creak and sway of the ship.