Cloud Walker, All Fools' Day, Far Sunset (16 page)

The heat grew intense, and the men had to stand farther and farther back, while their faces became red and the sweat dried as it was formed.

Great gouts of black smoke rose to the sky, sparks showered; and the fire of death roared with its own self-consuming life.

‘Farewell for ever,’ said Kieron silently. ‘If there is a life hereafter, as the neddies swear, may you again ride a fine horse, Alyx, on a June morning. And presently I will join you and paint such a picture of you held between earth and sky that all the ghosts of all the men who ever lived will marvel. But, forgive me, I think that life is only for the living; and so your final refuge is in the memories of those who have known and loved you.’

The man who had been in the watch tower was speaking excitedly to Liam. Kieron emerged from his private thoughts to learn that, in the fading light, the watch man had seen a column of men marching from Little Hampton. He estimated that they would reach the castle within the half-hour.

‘If we are prudent,’ said Liam, ‘we will shortly depart from this place. We have fulfilled our task and more. We have seen to our dead, and we may retire with honour.’

‘Not I!’ shouted Kieron wildly. ‘I mourn my dead, and I am anxious to demand a reckoning.’

Liam, a strong man, seized him by the shoulders and shook him. ‘Boy, your spirit is great, but you are half crazed with grief. We are twenty men. I am told a hundred or more march against us. They have weapons at the very least equal to ours and possibly superior. Now is not the time to fulfil your oath. Be patient. The time will come when we may strike.’

Kieron broke his hold. ‘Sir, you are a good man, and you lead us. As you say, I am half crazed with grief. But grief sharpens my wits. These who march against us will have to come up the hill to the castle, will they not?’

‘So?’

‘So, we have burned our dead. May we not offer a similar accommodation to the freebooters? I am told that Admiral Death has little liking for fire.’

‘You speak in riddles, Kieron. Speak plain before we depart, taking you forcibly, if need be.’

Kieron tried to accommodate his thoughts. ‘They come against us, these freebooters, drawn by the sight of the funeral pyre. In the castle cellars there will doubtless still be many barrels of whale oil, along with logs and kindling. If we were to load four-wheel carts with the whale oil and with any substance that will burn, and if we were to wait until the freebooters were coming up the hill—’

Liam grasped the idea instantly. ‘Kieron, your thoughts have some greatness.’ He turned to the rest. ‘Sholto, take what men you need and find three four-wheel carts quickly. Mangan, take the rest of the men into the castle, bring out what is left of the whale oil and any substance that will burn quickly.’

Presently, the carts were loaded with barrels of oil, small wood, cloth and straw, and anything that would burn quickly. Then they were hauled out of the castle gate to the top of the hill, and were ready for launching down the road to the sea.

The watch man reported that the freebooters were already crossing the bridge over the river Arun. Twilight came rapidly. It was hard to see down the length of the hill from the castle gate.

‘If the ruse does not work,’ said Liam, ‘we shall have to run for our lives. We cannot stand against so many.’

‘It will work,’ said Kieron with utter confidence. ‘The darkness comes fast, but that is no matter. Indeed it is to our advantage. We know their numbers, they do not know ours. In the darkness, and with chariots of fire bursting upon them, they will panic. Such as escape burning, we may easily put to the sword. Let us listen for their feet and their voices before we launch the attack. Let us hear their breathing.’

Liam looked at him with respect. ‘Some day, you may be a great general, Kieron.’

Kieron laughed. ‘Some day, I shall be a general of the clouds.’

The freebooters began to ascend the hill. The darkness made the shape of their column indistinct; but their voices and the clatter of their arms could be heard clearly. They marched without any attempt at concealment, without any sign of fear. What was there to be afraid of? The inhabitants of this town were largely dead or taken prisoner. The survivors could only be a cowed and desperate few.

Now they were less than a hundred paces from the castle gate. Now they were no more than sixty or seventy paces away. Their faces began to show ruddily in the reflected glow of the funeral pyre.

‘Now!’ shouted Liam.

Three men flung torches on to heaps of cloth and straw soaked in whale oil. The rest pushed at the wheels and sent the carts careering down the hill.

Within moments, the flames rose high. Burning whale oil slopped from the barrels and on to the wheels, turning the carts truly into chariots of fire. The freebooters were confronted with a fearsome sight. The fire-carts bearing down upon them took up most of the width of the narrow street. In the terrible moments as the carts gathered speed, the column of freebooters panicked, became an unreasoning mob. The front ranks turned to flee, elbowing and kicking their fellows out of the way, trampling some of them. But the fire-carts were already moving faster than a man could run.

Four or five of the freebooters retained cool heads and pressed themselves against the castle walls to allow the fire-carts to run past. It availed them little. They fell to arrows from bows or bolts from crossbows, their positions being made wonderfully clear by the light from the flames.

Two of the carts collided and careened crazily. Their flaming barrels of whale oil shattered upon the street, creating a terrible river of fire. Men danced dreadfully in it as their legs burned, or fell into it and were destroyed with merciful speed.

The carnage was horrible, but it lasted no more than two minutes. The carts reached the bottom of the steep hill and fell to pieces in great bursts of fire.

‘We have worked a great destruction,’ said Liam. ‘Now let us go. This will be something to gladden the hearts of our people.’

‘Not I, captain. Not yet!’ Kieron brandished the sword he had plucked from the body of Alyx. ‘There are those who still live. They are burned, but if we do not destroy them they will crawl back to their ships and they will live.’

‘Kieron reasons well, captain,’ said Sholto. ‘Let us—’ He gave a great cough and looked at his chest in surprise. An arrow had buried itself deep. He sank to his knees. ‘Look after her,’ he said to Kieron. ‘But remember that a woman is—’ He fell. Kieron knelt and lifted Sholto’s head. But the smith’s spirit had already departed his body.

‘Well, then,’ said Kieron, standing up. ‘Who is for Sholto and those we have set upon the pyre this day?’

There was a great roar of approval. Liam sensed that it were better to go with the tide.

‘Forward, then,’ said Kieron. ‘Kill without mercy.’ Nineteen men, armed with bows, swords and axes went down the hill.

The freebooters, such as survived, were in a pitiful condition. The river of fire had passed by them, round them, over them. They lay in the road, some dead, some still in great anguish, beating feebly at their smouldering clothes.

Kieron, dreadful to look at, his face distorted with anger, a torch in one hand and his sword in the other, leaped skilfully among the fiery rivulets of oil, the flaming wisps of straw and crackling fragments of timber.

He found one man, barely recognisable as a man, writhing. ‘One for Alyx!’ The sword plunged into the freebooter’s chest. He coughed, choked and lay still.

Another man, though badly burned, could still hold his sword. Pitifully, he tried to defend himself. But retribution was upon him.

‘Another for Alyx!’ Kieron was possessed.

He took joy in the killing. He leaped across islands of fire to seek out fresh victims.

‘One more for Alyx!’

‘A fourth for Alyx!’

One freebooter was not so badly burned that he could not go down on his knees and hold out his hands in an obvious appeal for mercy. He babbled in a tongue Kieron could not understand.

Kieron savoured the moment, dreadfully enjoying his power of life and death. ‘Mercy, you shall have, fellow. Better than your people gave.’ With a terrible sweep of the sword, he sliced through the freebooter’s throat. The man fell, gurgling.

‘Another for Alyx!’ One small part of Kieron’s mind remained shocked at the pleasure he could take in the death agony of a human being. The rest of him exulted in blood lust, goaded on by the vision of a girl who had been violated and brutally murdered.

He continued his deadly journey down the hill. With mindless fury, he struck at those who were already dying, even at some who were already dead. Presently he stopped, drained, exhausted. There was no one left to kill.

He stared about him, as if in a trance. The flames were dying now. The battle, such as it had been, was over. More than a hundred corpses lay on the hill. The stench of burnt flesh was terrible and sweet.

He was aware that someone was shaking his shoulders. It was Liam.

‘Kieron, are you well?’

Kieron looked at him vacantly. ‘Yes, captain, I am well.’

‘Listen, then. Your stratagem was wonderfully successful. But while you have been doing your bloody work, I have taken prisoners. They are not to be killed, Kieron. You understand? They are not to be killed.’

‘Why are they not to be killed?’

‘Because they speak English. They will tell us more about Admiral Death, and his intentions.’

‘And when they have spoken?’ asked Kieron.

‘I do not know. It will be for Kentigern to decide.’

‘I have already decided,’ said Kieron, swaying. ‘It was my stratagem. They are my prisoners. The sentence is—’ Suddenly, he fell, senseless. Liam picked him up and carried him back up the hill.

Within three or four days, the encampment in the Misery had become itself a small fortified village. Men had cut trees to build a stockade and to build kitchens and sleeping huts. Though the freebooters had evidently chosen not to occupy Arundel, Kentigern did not deem it safe to attempt to return to the town until his forces were stronger. He had barely two hundred men who could bear arms. Against the reputed strength of the forces of Admiral Death, they would have stood little chance in pitched battle.

Also Kentigern awaited news and instructions from the Grand Council of seigneurs in London, and from the east and the west concerning the extent of Admiral Death’s invasion. The news was slow in coming; and when it came it was not overly encouraging. The grand seigneurs had had requests for help and guidance from the survivors in several seigneuries on or near the southern coast. But the grand seigneurs, besides being fortunate for the most part to hold lands at a reasonable distance from the coast, were prudent men. The forces of Admiral Death were highly mobile: the forces of the seigneuries were not. If sufficient men were committed to the south to repulse or defeat Admiral Death, what was to prevent him putting out to sea to strike at another vulnerable area of the coast? His ships could sail much faster than men could march or ride. If it were his pleasure, he could harry the entire coastline of the island of Britain, leaving its defenders to exhaust themselves marching to and fro in futile attempts to meet his invasions with strength.

So the Grand Council cautiously committed itself to raising a force of five hundred armed men within the month to march south, provided that the southern seigneuries affected by the invasion could establish a unified army which at least doubled the strength of the Grand Council’s auxiliaries. It was a diplomatic way of saying that the southern seigneuries must look to their own salvation.

The news from the east and the west was no less discouraging. A flotilla of Admiral Death’s ships had struck with immense success as far east as the seigneurie of Brighton. Another had struck as far west as the seigneurie of Portsmouth. Each had advanced not inland but west and east respectively to join with the central assault at Little Hampton. Apparently, they were content to hold a long but narrow strip of coast.

The prisoners taken by Liam confirmed this interpretation – after they were put to the torture. The torture was not entirely barbaric. It consisted of
tightening ropes about the arms and legs of the prisoners until pain loosened their tongues.

The most reliable informant was one Jethro, a favoured lieutenant of Admiral Death. His legs and arms had been already severely burned by Kieron’s stratagem. The application of ropes served only to magnify a pain that already existed.

Jethro enlarged upon the information already received. Admiral Death had a grand design. He wished not only to establish a well-defended colony on the southern coast of Britain, but he wished also to use the island as a recruiting ground. If he was mad, he was also well-informed and concluded that many adventurous young men, tired of the restrictions and authoritarianism of the Luddites, would join his forces, attracted by the military and other machines that were denied them in the seigneuries. And if enough young malcontents did not come to him voluntarily, it would be easy to impress the men he needed by making punitive raids inland. He well knew that it would take the seigneurs a long time to unite in their common defence. Admiral Death did not require a long time for any of his operations. He was impatient of time. Soon he would be overwhelmingly strong, and whatever the seigneurs did then would not matter. Having consolidated his base, Admiral Death would then send ships to conduct similar operations along the coasts of Norway, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. Eventually he hoped to control the seaboard of Europe. When he had achieved this, he would be in a position to starve and weaken all who opposed him. And then he would be able to fulfil his great ambition – to make himself master of Europe.

Having disclosed his master’s plans, Jethro pleaded movingly for his life, swearing that, upon recovery, he would willingly bear arms against the man to whom he had sworn loyalty. Kentigern, though short of seasoned fighters, reasoned that a man who broke fealty once might well do so again. He pronounced sentence of death.

Jethro was hanged on a fine morning when the birds sang and deer leaped through the woods. Kieron, present and assisting at the execution, saw the look in the fellow’s eyes – the look of one who gazes upon the world for the last time and realises for the last time how beautiful it is. Briefly he felt pity; but then the pity dissolved in a dreadful vision of Alyx.