Swords From the West (34 page)

One of the Moslems was broad and short, and his teeth gleamed in the tangle of his beard when he laughed at the solitary Christian. Like Hugh, he gripped a dagger in his free hand. The taller warrior on Hugh's right held his scimitar high above his shoulder and his shield against his chest.

As the Provencal walked to meet them he unrolled the cloak from his left arm until it hung loosely from his dagger. When he came within spear's length of them, he bent forward and flung the cloak up into the face of the bearded warrior. With his sword he parried the other's scimitar slash and struck with the full sweep of his arm. His heavy blade smashed through the leather shield and he heard steel links break and bones snap.

At the same instant the short Turk-who had freed himself of the cloak-cut him heavily on his left shoulder, so that his dagger dropped from numbed fingers.

"Yah Allah!"

Hugh leaped back to avoid the thrust of the curved knife that would have disemboweled him. But the tall warrior, enraged, sprang after him and slashed twice at his head. With an effort the Provencal shortened his arm and parried the curved blade. His sword hand was within a yard of the other's dark face, and swiftly the Provencal struck, straight into the man's forehead, with the iron pommel of his hilt.

The tall Moslem groaned and reeled back, and Hugh slashed off one of his legs at the knee.

Before the maimed man fell to the water, Hugh was engaged with the bearded swordsman, who struck the steel cap from his head. The blood roared in his ears from the blow and trickled from his nose into his throat. The other stabbed upward with the knife, but the point caught in the Provencal 's chain mail and snapped upon his hip bone. It flashed through Hugh's brain that his left arm and leg were lamed, and he must deal with this man before the third came up. Already the lantern was waving near his eyes. Yet he could not free his sword for a thrust.

He caught a blow of the scimitar upon his hand guard and struck down with his full strength. His blade crunched into steel chains and flesh, and the man panted like an animal in pain. The scimitar struck Hugh again on his injured thigh, and he swung his sword down, feeling it bite into the soft turban cloth and break the solid bone of the man's skull.

It needed a wrench to free his blade, but he knew that the bearded Moslem was done. Again the lantern flashed in his eyes, and he smote at it. Darkness covered the bridge like a veil, and for a moment neither the Christian nor the surviving Moslem could see anything. Hugh knew that the other man could hear him panting, so he ventured a lunge forward and a blind slash in the air.

The Moslem was nearer than he thought. His arm struck the other's shoulder, and they both staggered. Hugh thrust at him swiftly, but his blade met nothing-and he heard a heavy splash below him.

"He has fallen from the bridge," the girl cried softly.

Hugh felt for the edge with his sword. He was standing on it.

"Come, then," he said hoarsely.

And she groped her way to him, taking hold of his belt again without a word. He limped up the slippery steps to the balcony, turning into the corridor of the outbuilding. Almost at once he stopped. Feet were padding through the passage toward him, heedless of the darknessslippered feet.

Hugh braced himself against the wall and held his sword straight out from his shoulder. The feet came up to him, and he felt his point tear into something heavy. Grimly he thrust forward, and a gasping scream echoed in the passage

"Ai-ai!"

Freeing his blade, Hugh bent down and caught Irene about the knees. Holding her in the crook of his arm, he lifted her and limped forward again.

"'Twould soil thy feet here," he muttered.

Before him appeared the gray square of the postern he had entered, and he stepped through it, out upon the terrace, beneath the stars. At the edge of the terrace he peered into the garden below.

It was full of moving figures-men and horses-and a deep buzz of voices. Hugh held his breath to listen, and the girl upon his arm stirred, and bent to whisper in his ear.

"Nay, my crusader, this is the end of our way. But I would give thee thanks, for brave thou art."

"Body of Lazarus!" rumbled a voice below them. "'Tis no fiend, but a living Wight-"

"Bellame," cried Hugh. "Bring my horse to me."

"And mark ye good, my lord," said Bellame, the sergeant-at-arms, in the courtyard of Montevirbo castle after matins the next sunrise, "he is a man who knoweth his own will. Forby, he carried the strange maid before him on his horse from the mountain to the crossroad of Baalbek, nor would he suffer one of us to carry her-though his arm was hacked. And upon the way he made clear all that befell at the tower.

"'Twas the Moslems sacked the tower afore us. By Lazarus, his body-there was a sweet hewing and smiting at the courtyard, my lord! But Messer Hugh would not stay for a blow at the Moslems since they were a power too great for us. Aye, they set torch to the tower, and it fair lighted our way.

"And at sunup-" so Bellame explained the events of the night to my lord Renald-"we had a sight of the maid, a strange piece and outlandish, but fair to look upon. And she had been weeping, but Messer Hugh said to her, 'Did I not swear I would take thee with me?' And he bade me hand over a horse to her. 'Where will ye be going, Messer Hugh?' said I to him. 'Why, to Jerusalem,' quoth 'a. "Tis a long road, that,' said I. "Twould be longer, if I went to Montevirbo,' said he. And-"

"By God's life and thy cup-shot addlehead, didst thou let him go with that maid? She is the lady of the Tower of the Ravens," my lord Renald roared, "and would fetch a ransom."

"Well-" Bellame scratched his head thoughtfully-"the tower is burnt, see you, and the Turkish sultan is bearing away its gear and gold. I mind now that Messer Hugh said you could ride with all your men and overtake the Turks-"

Renald glanced up at the sun and at the liegemen who clustered around him. He hesitated a moment, as a man will when he chooses between two roads.

"Saddle up, lads," he said then. "We'll follow the Turks. And the minstrel will get nothing out of this but a maid, when he might have had gold."

Chapter I

The Gate of Shadows

It was evening on the plain of Angora in the Year of Our Lord 1394. The sun was a glimmering ball of red, peering through a haze of dust at the caravan of Bayezid the Great, surnamed the Thunderbolt, Sultan of the Osmanli and Seljuk Turks, master of the Caliphate and overlord of the mamelukes of Egypt.

Bayezid reined in his white Arab.

"We will sleep the night here," he announced, "for this is an auspicious spot."

At Angora a decade ago, as leader of the hard-fighting Osmanlis, Bayezid had won his first pitched battle. He had been acclaimed sultan and straightaway had slain his brother with his own hand. From that moment Fate had been kind to the man called the Thunderbolt.

"To hear is to obey," cried his followers. "Hail to the Mighty, the Merciful, the All-Dispensing One!"

Bayezid glanced around through the dust haze and saw the quivering shapes of silk pavilions rising from the baked clay floor of the plateau as his camp-followers scurried about. A line of grunting baggage-camels stalked into the nest of tents that marked the quarters of his grandees. Attended by Negro slaves, the several litters of his women halted beside the khanates that separated his household from the small army that attended him.

A slow smile crossed his broad, swart face.

A powerful hand caressed the pearls at the throat of his tunic. Fate had indeed exalted him. He had been called the spiritual effigy of the formerly great khalifs of Damascus and Baghdad. He knew himself to be the su preme monarch of Asia, and in that age the courts of Asia were the rendezvous of the world.

True, on the outskirts of the sultan's empire, to the east, was Tamerlane the Tatar and his horde. But had not Tamerlane said that Bayezid, given the men to follow him, was the wisest of living generals?

As for Europe, Bayezid had advanced the border of his empire into Hungary; Constantinople, glittering with the last splendor of the Byzantines, was tottering; Venice and Genoa paid tribute for permission to use the trade routes into the Orient.

Bayezid glanced curiously at the group of Frankish*
slaves whose duty it was to run beside his horse. They were panting, and sweat streaked the sand that coated their blackened faces. Fragments of cloth were wrapped about their bleeding feet.

Five of the six captives bent their heads in the salaam that had been taught them. The sixth remained erect, meeting the sultan's eye.

Bayezid half frowned at this boldness which broke the thread of his thoughts. His hand rested on the gold trappings of his splendid horse. To the side of this horse slaves were dragging a cloth of silver carpet that stretched to the opening of the imperial khanates.

This done, the hawk-faced Sheik of Rum, through whose territory midway in Asia Minor the sultan's caravan had been journeying from Constantinople to Aleppo-the lord of Rum approached his master respectfully.

"0 Light of the Faith," the old man observed gravely, "it is the hour of the namaz gar, the evening prayer."

"True." Bayezid started and his glance went once more to the white man who stared at him. "I will dismount. Bid yonder Frank kneel by my horse that I may step upon his back."

All around Bayezid the grandees were kneeling in their heavy robes upon clean prayer carpets, washing their hands and faces in fresh water brought by slaves from the springs that marked the site of the camp. The sheik bowed and gave a curt command to the master of the slaves, ElArjuk, a stalwart, white-capped janissary, whip in hand.

"The body of the Frank will be honored by the foot of the Great, the Merciful."

At this the captive stepped forward before the janissary could touch him. Bayezid reflected that the white man understood Turki, which was the case.

And then to the surprise of the onlookers, the captive folded his arms and shook his head.

"Kneel," hissed the sheik. "Dog of a caphar-unbeliever-"

"I hear," said the captive. "I will not obey."

The janissary reached for his whip and the old Moslem for his scimitar. The sultan checked them, springing easily from his peaked saddle to the cloth of silver carpet. From his six feet of muscular height he looked down at the white man. His beaked nose seemed to curl into his bearded mouth and his black eyes snapped.

Then the sultan knelt, facing toward the southern skyline beyond which was Mecca, and repeated the Allah akbar in his clear, deep voice. When the last of his followers had completed the evening worship Bayezid arose, his smile cold as the glitter of steel, his nervous fingers playing with the jeweled sword hilt at his girdle. He noted the wide brown eyes of the captive who still stood quietly at his side, and with the interest of a born leader of men he scrutinized the square high shoulders, the long chin and the wide, delicate mouth upturned in a half-smile.

The man's face was burned by the sun to the hue of leather; his ragged tunic fell away from a heavily thewed pair of arms. His body had the lines of youth, but his eyes and mouth were hard with fatigue.

"You know my speech," observed the deep voice of the Thunderbolt. "And your eyes tell me that you are not mad. What is your name and rank?"

"Michael Bearn," responded the Christian.

"Mishael Bi-orn. Your rank?"

"None, my lord." The man's smile broadened slowly.

"In what army did you serve?"

"None, my lord."

The patrician sheik, whose fathers had been warriors, spat upon the ground and assured his master the sultan that this dog and the other Franks had been taken when a Christian galley was shipwrecked on the Anatolian shore a year ago. The Turks who took them had said that this dog was khan of the galley, that he was a caphar magician who steered his craft by a bedeviled needle that pointed always to the north.

"What is your country?" demanded Bayezid.

"I have no country. The sea is my home."

Michael Bearn had been born on the cliffs of Brittany. His mother, an Irish gentlewoman, had landed from his father's ship for the birth of the boy. When his father, a taciturn Breton, had died, Michael had left his mother in a tower on the Brittany coast and had taken to the sea.