Skaith - The Ginger Star Part 4

The meadow was wide, wide and naked in the sunlight, and now a flight of arrows came from the tower and stuck quivering in the ground around them.

Yarrod stopped. He looked from side to side, but there was no hiding place, no hope. Men were coming out of the grove behind them, arrows nocked. More men came out of the tower, kicking the bodies aside. A small rufous man led them. He wore a dark red tunic and carried no weapon but his wand of office. Halk said one word, a name, and he said it like a curse.

"Mordach!"

Stark had made his own decision. Those arrows were long and sharp, and he was sure that he could not outrun them. So he, too, stood and waited, having no wish to die in this meaningless place under the ginger star.

"Who is Mordach?" he asked.

"Chief Wandsman of Irnan," said Yarrod, his voice breaking with rage and despair. "Someone talked; someone betrayed us."

The men formed a wall around them, and Mordach came through that wall to stand smiling up at the tall Irnanese.

"The hunting party," he said. "In strange attire, and without weapons. Yet I see that you did find game of a sort." His gaze fastened on Stark, and Stark thought that perhaps he ought to have chanced the arrows after all.

"An off-worlder," said Mordach, "where off-worlders are forbidden to be. And traveling with a company of lawbreakers. Was this what you went to find? Someone who could pretend to fulfill your prophecy?"

"Perhaps he does fulfill it, Mordach," said Halk wickedly. "Gelmar thought so. He tried to kill him, and could not."

Thank you, friend, thought Stark, and felt his guts tighten in antic.i.p.ation.

Two men came up supporting Baya between them. "We found her in the grove. She doesn't look to be one of them."

"I'm a Farer," said Baya, and went on her knees to Mordach. "In the name of the Lords Protector-" She held out the end of the halter and shook it. "He took me by force, away from Skeg."

"He?"

"That man. The off-worlder. Eric John Stark."

"Why?"

"Because he lived when he ought to have died." She looked up at Stark, trembling with malevolence. "He escaped from us, into the sea. You know what that means, but he lived. He killed a Child of the Sea, and lived. And I saw him." If she had had strength and breath left she would have screamed, "He is the Dark Man of the prophecy! Kill him! Kill him now!"

"There," said Mordach absently, and caressed her tangled hair. He considered Stark, his eyes hooded and cold. "So. And perhaps even Gelmar could be mistaken. Either way-"

"Kill him," Baya whimpered. "Please. Now."

"Killing is a solemn matter," Mordach said, "and salutary. It ought not to be wasted." He motioned to some of his men. "Bind them. Securely, very securely, and especially the off-worlder." He lifted Baya to her feet. "Come, child, you're safe now."

"Mordach," said Yarrod. "Who betrayed us?"

"You did," said Mordach. "Yourselves. All your preparations took time and effort, and some of them were observed. You and Halk are known to be among the most active of the Emigration Party; the others were known to be a.s.sociates. When you all went off together to hunt, we were curious to know what the quarry might be. So we followed. After we came here to the tower, we only had to wait." His gaze wandered again to Stark. "You were bringing him back to Gerrith's daughter, weren't you?"

Yarrod did not answer, but Mordach nodded. "Of course you were. And of course they must meet, and I promise you they shall-openly, where all can see."

He went off with Baya, who looked back once over her shoulder as the men-at-arms moved in with leather thongs and began to bind the captives. They were neither rough nor gentle, merely very efficient. They were of a type Stark had not seen before, having lint-white hair and sharply slanted cheekbones and slitted yellow eyes that gave them the look of wolves. They were certainly not Farers.

"Farers are only a mob, for trampling and tearing," Yarrod said. "Wandsmen in the city-states like to have a small force of mercenaries for the serious work, and they recruit them along the Border. These are from Izvand, in the Inner Barrens." His head hung down in shame and misery, but he lifted it fiercely when one of the mercenaries brought a halter for his neck, so that he might take the rope easily and with a semblance of pride. "I'm sorry," he said, and would not meet Stark's eye.

And now it was Stark's turn to wear a halter round his own neck, and to walk behind in the dust while Baya rode.

So at length the Dark Man came to Irnan.

7.

It was a gray city, walled in stone and set on a height roughly in the center of a broad valley that was green with spring. Mordach and his prisoners and his mercenaries had journeyed a long way north, and a long way up over rainy mountains, and they had left the tropical summer far behind. All around Irnan were tilled fields and pastures and orchards in blossom, a froth of pink and white oddly tarnished by the light of the ginger star.

A road led to the city. There was much traffic on it: farm carts, people going to and from their work in the fields or driving beasts before them, traders and long strings of pack-animals jingling with bells, a troop of mountebanks, a caravan of traveling wh.o.r.es of both s.e.xes with bright banners advertising their wares, and the motley a.s.sortment of wanderers that seemed to be omnipresent on Skaith. Mordach's party went down the middle of the road, four men-at-arms riding in front and clas.h.i.+ng short stabbing spears rhythmically against their s.h.i.+elds. A clear way was made for them, and behind them the people stood along the roadside ditches and stared and pointed and whispered, and then began to follow.

Two Wandsmen, in green tunics that indicated their lesser rank, came out of the gate to meet Mordach, with a rabble of Farers at their heels. And within minutes, the word was running ahead like wildfire.

"The Dark Man! They've taken the Dark Man! They've taken the traitors!"

More Wandsmen appeared as though from between the paving stones. A crowd gathered, clotting round Mordach's party like swarming bees. The mercenaries drew their ranks tighter, until their mounts all but trod upon the captives, and their spears pointed outward, forming a barrier against the press of bodies.

"Keep up, keep up," said the captain of the Izvandians. "If you fall, we can't help you."

They pa.s.sed beneath the arch of the great gate. Stark saw that the stone was stained and weathered, the carvings grown dim with time. A winged creature with a sword in its claws crouched on the capstone, fierce jaws open to bite the world. The halves of the gate were very strong, sheathed in cured hides almost as hard as metal. There was a pa.s.sage through the thickness of the wall, a sort of dark tunnel where every sound was caught and compressed and the din of voices was stunning. Then they were in the square beyond and forcing their way between market stalls, toward a central platform built stoutly of wood and higher than the jostling heads of the mob. Some of the mercenaries stood guard while others dismounted and hurried the captives up a flight of steps. Stark guessed that the square was the only open s.p.a.ce of any size within the walls and that the platform was used for all public occasions such as executions and other edifying entertainments.

There were standing posts, permanently placed and black with use. Within moments Stark and Yarrod and the others were bound to them.The mercenaries took up stations at the edges of the platform, facing outward. The two Wandsmen in green went away; apparently Mordach had sent them on some errand. Mordach himself addressed the crowd. Much of what he said was drowned in an animal howling, but there was little doubt about the burden of his speech. Irnan had sinned, and those who were guilty were about to pay.

Stark flexed himself against the hide ropes. They cut his flesh but did not give. The post was firm as a tree. He leaned back against it, easing himself as much as possible, and looked at this place where presumably he was about to die.

"What do you think now, Dark Man?" asked Halk.

He was bound to the post on Stark's left, Yarrod on his right.

"I think," said Stark, "that we'll soon know whether Gerrith had the true sight."

And once more he cursed the name of Gerrith, but this time he kept it to himself.

The crowd was still growing. People came until it seemed that the s.p.a.ce could not hold any more, and still they came. Around the inner sides of the square there were buildings of stone, narrow and high, shouldering together, slate roofs peaked and s.h.i.+ning in the sun. The upper windows were filled with people looking down. After a while folk were straddling the rooftrees and perching on the gutters, and the tops of the outer walls were packed.

Two distinct elements were in the crowd, and they seemed not to mingle. Foremost round the platform, doing all the screaming, were the Farers and the other flotsam. Beyond them, and quite quiet, were the people of Irnan.

"Any hope from them?" asked Stark.

Yarrod tried to shrug. "Not all of them are with us. Our people have lived in this place a long time, and the roots go deep. And Skaith, with all its faults, is the only world we know. Some folk find the idea of leaving it frightening to the point of blasphemy, and they won't lift a hand to help us. About the others, I'm not making any bets."

Mordach was urging the mob to be patient; more things were to come. Still they pushed and clamored for blood. A band of women forced their way to the steps and began to climb. They wore black bags over their heads, covering their faces. Otherwise they were naked and their skin was like tree-bark from long exposure.

"Give us the Dark Man, Mordach!" they cried. "Let us take him to the mountain top and feed his strength to Old Sun!"

Mordach held up his staff to halt them. He spoke to them gently, and Stark asked, "What are they?"

"They live wild in the mountains. Once in a while, when they get hungry, they come in. They wors.h.i.+p the sun, and any man they can manage to capture they sacrifice. They believe that they alone keep Old Sun alive." Halk laughed. "Look at the greedy beasts! They'd like to have all of us."

Arms like gnarled branches reached and clawed.

"They will die, little sisters," said Mordach. "They will all feed Old Sun, and you shall watch and sing the Hymn of Life."

Gently he urged them back, and reluctantly they returned to the crowd. All at once Stark heard a shouting and a turmoil about the doors of one of the buildings overlooking the square, and a procession moved out from it with the green Wandsmen leading and a fringe of Farers flapping at the sides and rear. At the center, Stark made out a dozen or so men and women in sober gowns, with chains of office round their necks. They walked in an odd manner, and as they came closer he could see that they were bound in such a way as forced them to bend forward and shuffle like penitents.

A low deep groan came from the people of Irnan, and Yarrod said between his teeth, "Our chiefs and elders."

Stark thought he saw the beginning of movement among the Irnanese, and he hoped they would rush the crowd and rescue their leaders by force, starting a general revolt. The movement rippled and died. The procession came to the steps and climbed haltingly while the mob jeered. The elders were herded onto the platform and made to stand, and Mordach pointed his staff at them in a gesture of wrath and accusation.

"You have done wickedness," he cried, in a voice that rang across the square. "Now you shall do penance!"

The crowd screamed. They threw things. The citizens of Irnan stirred uneasily. They muttered, but still they did not move.

"They're afraid," Yarrod said. "The Wandsmen have packed the town with Farers, as you see. One word, and they'll start tearing Irnan apart stone by stone."

"Still, the Irnanese outnumber them."

"Our party does not. And the Wandsmen have hostages." He nodded his red head at the men and women standing bent in the sun.

There was a smell in the air now. The hot, close, frightening smell of mob; mob excited, hungry, dreaming blood and death. The primitive in Stark knew that sweaty acridity all too well. The ropes cut him; the post was hard against his back. The ginger star burned him with bra.s.sy light and his own sweat ran down.

Someone shouted, "Where is the wise woman?"

Other voices took up the cry, howled it back and forth between the gray walls.

"Where is the wise woman? Where is Gerrith?"

Mordach calmed them. "She has been sent for. She will be with us soon."

Yarrod cursed Mordach. "Do you plan to murder her as you did her mother?"

Mordach only smiled and said, "Wait."

They waited. The crowd became increasingly restless. Roving bands began looting the market stalls, scattering food and produce, smas.h.i.+ng the stalls themselves to make clubs. Wine and drugs pa.s.sed freely. Stark wondered how much longer Mordach could hold them.

Then the cry went up from the gate. "The wise woman! Gerrith is coming!"

An expectant quiet settled over the square. The hundreds of heads turned, and it seemed as though the Irnanese all drew one deep breath and held it.

Men-at-arms appeared, clearing a way through the press. Behind them came a cart, a farm cart soiled and reeking with the work of the fields, and after that more men-at-arms bringing up the rear.

Inside the cart were two Wandsmen, each one clinging with one hand to the jolting stakes and holding with the other the tall figure of a woman who stood between them.

8.

She was dressed all in black, in a great veil that enveloped her from head to heels, a single shroud-like garment that concealed her face and all else beside her height. Set upon her head and circling the veil was a diadem the color of old ivory.

"The Robe and Crown of Fate," said Yarrod, and the folk of Irnan let out that held breath in a savage wail of protest.

The mob drowned it in their own blood-cry.

Men-at-arms and farm cart crossed the square, halted at the platform steps. The woman was made to leave the cart and climb. The diadem appeared first above the level of the floor. It looked very frail and old, and its ornament was a circle of little grinning skulls. Then there was the sway of dark draperies, and Gerrith, the wise woman of Irnan, stood before Mordach with the Wandsmen on either side.

Because of the veil Stark could not be sure, but he thought that Gerrith was looking past Mordach, straight at him.

Yet she spoke to Mordach, and her voice was clear and sweet and ringing, without a hint of fear.

"This was not well done, Mordach."

"No?" he said. "Let us see." He turned from her, speaking over the heads of his Farers to the people of Irnan. His voice carried to the walls. "You of Irnan! Watch now, and learn!"

He turned again to Gerrith and pointed his wand at Stark. "What do you see there, daughter of Gerrith?"

"I see the Dark Man."

"The Dark Man of your mother's prophecy?"

"Yes."

Well, thought Stark, and what else could she say?

"The Dark Man, bound and helpless, waiting for death." Mordach laughed. He laughed often, as though he found these human lapses from reason genuinely amusing. "He will destroy nothing. Do you recant, woman? Do you admit the lie?"

"No."

"Then you are no wiser than your mother, and your sight is no more true. Do you hear out there, you of Irnan?" Again his words carried far, and where they did not reach other tongues took them up and pa.s.sed them on, whispering like surf against the walls, up to the windows and the rooftops. "Your prophecy is false, your wise woman a liar, your Dark Man a sham!"

In one swift motion he ripped crown and veil from Gerrith.

Astonishment, surprise, shock, outrage! Stark could hear the sounds beyond the delighted screaming of the mob. Halk, Yarrod, and the other Irnanese on the platform made instinctive, futile movements toward the killing of Mordach.

Only Gerrith stood tall and calm, as though she had expected this. As indeed she must have done, thought Stark, unless the wise women of Irnan habitually went naked beneath the ceremonial veil. And naked she was, all warm bronze with the sunlight on her and a thick braid of bronzy hair hanging down her back. Her body was strong and straight and proud, not flinching before the lewdness of the crowd. Nudity was commonplace on Skaith and hardly to be noticed, but this was different. This act was a stripping of more than the mere body. Mordach was attempting to strip her soul.

He tossed the black veil out to the mob and let them tear it. The diadem he smashed beneath his feet and kicked the old yellowed fragments contemptuously away.

"There are your robe and crown," he said. "We will have no more wise women at Irnan."

This, too, she had expected. But her eyes held a cold and terrible light.