Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

I diverted myself momentarily from the unpleasant task ahead of me by leaning forward and gazing down into the awful hole that gaped beside Mordechai. Fascinated, I picked up a large stone fragment and dropped it straight down, listening for the sound of its fall. I heard nothing, and remained there for long moments, contemplating what that meant before I turned, shuddering, back to my task. I worked quickly then, taking advantage of the fact that my companion was so deeply unconscious. I straightened the leg—a grim procedure marked by creaks and snapping, grinding sounds and much welling blood—by pulling on the ankle against the leverage of my own foot lodged in the side of Mordechai's crotch. He moaned again, three times, though still unconscious, and each time I felt sick. As soon as the leg was straight, I cleaned the worst of the blood from my hands before splinting the rough-set bones and binding everything tightly with the woollen strips I had prepared. Rainwater oozed from them as I tied the knots. That done, I reached again for the noose at the end of the rope, but the movement remained incomplete. As my hand stretched out, the air about me exploded in blinding light and I saw a ball of dazzling, unearthly brilliance flash down the cliff, pass in front of me and vanish upwards, streaking faster than my eyes could follow up the other face. Simultaneously, the walls of rock around me seemed to crack asunder, the sound, a solid, concussive impact, deafening me and throwing me aside so that I fell sprawling over Mordechai and into darkness.

I could not have been senseless for long, perhaps mere moments, for when I opened my eyes again, the daylight seemed as before, but my head was ringing with strange noises and my nostrils were filled with an alien scent. That something momentous had occurred I had no doubt, but I had no idea what it was. I touched my head and found that I had cut myself, in all probability when I had banged my head against the ground or the cliff wall. When I examined my fingers, they were coated with blood, but some of it, I knew, was Mordechai's, so how much was my own I had no way of telling. And then I saw the markings on the wall in front of me, a vertical black streak, a handspan wide, ascending with perfect regularity where the ball of fire had passed. Astonished, I turned my head to look behind me, but there was no similar marking on the other wall, down which the ball had flashed. Unknowing what to think, I turned to Mordechai. He had not moved. His leg lay flat, tightly splinted and bound. I had finished that, I thought, and was about to—

The rope had vanished.

I leapt to my feet and rushed to search for it, peering vainly up at the towering wall above me, and there, hanging down less than the height of a man from the edge above, I saw the noose, twisting slightly as it dangled. I knew what had happened now—my knees gave way and I slumped to the ground. A lightning strike had terrified my horse into running, and as he ran, the rope had travelled with him. He had not gone far, I could see, but far enough to condemn me to death with my injured companion. I felt tears mingle with the rain on my upturned face.

Sometime in the course of the following hour, Germanicus returned to search for me, creeping forward daintily until he could look down, as greatly shamefaced as any horse could be, to where I sat huddled, looking up at him. Had he been smart enough, he might have kicked the rope back down to me, but he was no more than a horse, and soon he wandered off again in search of grazing.

It was growing dark when I heard and identified a tiny, alien sound as the chattering of Mordechai's teeth, and the recognition of it helped me pull my scattered wits together again. The others, I knew, would come seeking me at daybreak, and would have little trouble finding us. The sight of my armour piled at the side of the path would send them this way. I knew, too, that I would survive the night, but Mordechai's survival was another matter altogether, and I knew the achievement of it must become my primary concern. Gritting my teeth against the certain knowledge of his dreadful sickness, I dragged him closer to the cliff face, unfastened the warm blanket from against my ribs—I had forgotten its existence completely until then—and spread it over him. Miraculously, it was still dry, thanks mainly to the waterproofing wax scraped over both its surfaces, and the heat of my body. I then added my cloak on top of that and crept beneath both layers to lie beside him, so that we might share our bodies' warmth. Mordechai remained motionless throughout all of this, breathing deeply and regularly, and I felt some confidence that, if I could keep him warm through the night, he would live until morning.

Some time, long after dark, I fell asleep. When I awoke, hearing the caw of a crow somewhere above, my first conscious thought was that the rain had stopped, and my second was that Mordechai was dead. I could hear only my own breathing. I had no means of knowing when he died. I remember only that when I awoke, he was cold beside me.

Shelagh and Rufio found me as I had thought they would, less than two hours after daybreak. Germanicus was still above me on the hillside, and they threw the rope down to me. I stood with one foot in the noose and held on to the rope with both hands, my blanket and cloak slung over my shoulder, and they pulled me quickly from my prison, simply by making Germanicus walk forward. Before that, however, while Rufio and Shelagh looked on from above, I had tipped Mordechai's body into the abyss by which he had lain, saying a silent prayer as he tumbled over the edge. I did not hear him land, but as I rose up the cliff face I gained some comfort from the thought that it was unlikely, wherever he now lay, that his bones would be gnawed by animals.

When I reached the top of the cliff, Shelagh took one look at me and set Rufio to work gathering fuel higher up the hill. She would not let me ride, but bullied me into walking up the slope until we were among the trees again, where she produced a tinder box and soon had a fire going. As soon as she believed the flames healthy enough to feed themselves, she unloaded the pack roll behind her saddle and brought out dry, clean clothes. Knowing that I, and presumably Mordechai, had spent the night out in the rain, and the entire day, too, she had come prepared to find us dying of exposure.

I stripped naked, shivering too mightily even to think of being modest, let alone concupiscent, and dried myself with my own blanket, and then Shelagh threw another over me, after which she and Rufio took turns pummelling me and chafing me until I grew warm again. I had never thought, even in the midst of the terrible winter that had gone before, that I could be so deeply chilled as I was then. In the meantime, on two stones over the fire she had heated a clay bowl of meat and vegetable stew, made by Liam the day before. It was too hot to hold at first, and as I waited for the chill of the damp grass to cool it, the saliva filled my mouth with agonising pangs of hunger.

While I ate, I told them everything that had transpired, here on this cold hillside, and Rufio groomed my poor horse while I spoke. I noticed Shelagh looking at me strangely and asked her what was wrong. She sniffed and shook her head.

"You're covered in blood, all of it dried. You've a cut on your head, and another on your arm there. You are a mess, Commander."

"I know, Shelagh," I said. "But the blood is not all mine. The greater part of it belonged to poor Mordechai. I'll be fine."

"Aye." She looked far from convinced. "Well, do you feel strong enough to travel now? We told Ded we would be back by sunset and here we are, a whole night late and still four to six hours' ride away from Glevum. They'll be waiting for us, ready to go."

"True, they will, but they will wait."