Jeffrey Lord: The Bronze Axe

Blade saluted with the sword again. He smiled, his white teeth flashing in a dark stubble of beard. "I will obey, Princess Taleen. I am your true servant. But just exactly what is it that you want me to do? There is no danger at this moment." He cocked an ear. "They are still ten minutes away."

The girl put her hands on her hips and stared at him in exasperation. Her eyes flickered up the tall trunk of him, over the slim hips, tidy waist, massive chest and wide shoulders and the thick column of his neck. Her gaze softened, as did her tone.

"One thing I know you are no serf! Possibly you are a nobleman, an aristocrat, from some far-off land. Your name?" Imperious again.

"Blade. Richard Blade. And indeed from a far-off land."

"Blade? Richard Blade?" She pronounced it Rich-hard Bleed. She grimaced. "A strange name, by Frigga! My tongue will not accommodate to it. But we will speak of all this later now I command you to escort me to the town of my cousin, King Lycanto. The town is called Sarum Vil and it should be somewhere near. My cousin will protect us and give us shelter for the night."

Blade smiled. "Somewhere near, you say? But you do not know exactly?"

She frowned at him. "I well, not exactly. But I am sure we can find it. There is a path that "

He chuckled. "If we can find the path. In other words, princess, you are lost. We are both lost."

Before she could answer a great dog broke from the cover of the woods and came bounding at them. It was running far in advance of the pack, eyes glinting red and long muzzle slavering, and it was a killer bent on doing the work for which it had been trained. With bristling hackles and thunder in its throat the huge beast came straight in for the kill.

As Blade stepped in front of the girl he plucked the drinking horn from her girdle. "Behind me," he snapped. "Remain perfectly still."

The animal to Blade it looked like some weird cross between a mastiff and a wolfhound left the ground some ten feet from Blade. The long fangs glinted cruelly in the twilight. Blade went into a half crouch, the sword drawn back to thrust, the drinking horn in his left hand and in front of him.

The dog at close quarters it looked as big as a small pony crashed into Blade with furious impact, the long teeth snapping for his throat. Blade, taking one backward step, rammed the drinking horn down the red maw and twisted it. Then, in a series of fluid movements, he withdrew a bleeding hand and thrust hard into the creature's belly. He put all his mighty shoulder behind the thrust and felt the hilt of the sword grate against ribs. The dog fell away with a dying squall and went into its death convulsions. Blade thrust quickly into its throat in a mercy stroke.

He put the sword deep into earth to cleanse it and turned to the girl. She was watching, her eyes wide, one hand to her mouth, and for a moment her face bespoke fierce approval.

Yet she said, "A fine animal. A pity to slay it."

He held up a hand for silence. With the going of the sun the darkness had fallen suddenly, an abrupt curtain, and the voices and the baying of the hounds were closer. Blade, studying the thick woods to the west, saw the sudden red sputter of a torch. Then another, and still another. The scarlet flambeaus, danger beacons in the dust, denoted the two horns of a crescent that was closing in on them. Very close now. Too close. They could not go west, and already the horns of the crescent were closing off north and south. That left east, the direction in which the brook ran.

Blade took the girl's hand in his big paw. "Come on, princess. We are going to run a little."

The water was icy. The brook was not deep, never more than a foot or two, but the bottom was rough and stony with countless boulders around which the stream cascaded. Caught brush, snagged timbers and fallen trees impeded their way. It grew cold and a dank white mist began to rise and hang over the water. Blade, naked as he was, began to feel the cold. He was inured to hardship, discounted it, yet he was shivering.

So was the girl. Her hand, clinging to his big one, grew colder by the minute. Blade was setting a merciless pace and soon she was gasping. Several times, but for his support, she would have fallen. Finally, tripping over a hidden snag, she came sprawling into his arms and remained there for a moment. She clung to him, panting, and he was very aware of the lithe body beneath the thin linen. There was a fragrance about her, other than that of clean woman flesh, which he found vaguely familiar. After a moment he identified it. Chypre. It smacked of sunnier climes, of the Levant, and he wondered how she had come by it. The last time Blade had smelled chypre had been in Alexandria. A man had been wearing it then, a queer who was selling information to Blade, a young deviate who had been murdered two weeks later. What had his name been?

Blade could not remember. His mind was fuzzy and blank. With a great effort, feeling the sudden sweat on his forehead despite the cold, he switched his thoughts and tried tried Lord? Lord Leighton! Got it. And his boss? J. Yes, J. He could swear it. J? London? M16A? Yes yes then the mist seeped into his brain and he was no longer sure.

He understood it then. His memory of past life was going. Slowly, but inexorably, leaving him.

The girl cried out in pain. Blade, totally forgetting her, had tensed so that he very nearly crushed her ribs.

He released her. "I am sorry, princess. I was thinking and for a moment forgot where I was. I did not mean to hurt you."

She sounded cross, yet she did not move away from him. "You are a great brute, Richard Blade. You crush a woman like a straw."

In the east, over a waving sea of endless trees, he saw the first pale hint of a gibbous moon. He looked back along the tortuous way they had come. The mist, risen higher now, hung like a visible miasma over the stream and drifted in ghostly whorls among the trees. There were no torches, no voices, no baying dogs. Their pursuers, it appeared, had given up for the night.

Blade led the girl to the bank, where they found a grassy enclave which, if not warm, was at least better than the brook. They nestled down together and she came into his arms again.

But first she said: "I am cold, Blade. I seek only the warmth of that huge bear's body of yours. You understand this?"

She could not see his smile. "I understand," he said gravely. "What else? After all you are a princess and I am only a poor stranger a man with no clothes. What could such a one possibly aspire to? Have no fear, princess. I know my station and I will not reach above it."

None the less temptation was present and he was well aware of it. She was soaked to the skin and her nipples had risen with the cold. Her breasts, half out of the skimpy dress, lay against his naked chest. And he knew, with the sure knowledge that a true man has, that although she would demur, and possibly even struggle a bit, she would in the end welcome his lovemaking. If he so chose.

He did not so choose. That would resolve itself in time. If they were meant to be lovers they would be. Meantime there were more immediate problems they were lost, hunted, and his belly was screaming for food. If she was as hungry as he, then she was hungry indeed.

She had not spoken for a few moments. She lay against him, shivering like a drenched puppy, with her fine spun hair tickling his nose. Now she pulled away and tried to see his face in the gloom. There was an edge in her voice.

"I think you mock me, Blade. I am a princess, but I do not think I like your tone when you say it."

"Again I am sorry, princess. I cannot help my tone. It is the way I always speak."

"If I truly thought you mocked me, Blade, I would have you well whipped when we come to Sarum Vil. I swear I would."