An Empire Unacquainted With Defeat

  "Captain!"

  I could read Mica's thoughts. What would they do without Colgrave? Dragon would become lifeless without the dead captain's will animating it.

  "Do as I say, Sailmaker."

  Two black birds threw themselves into the pentacle together. The sorcerer got the first in midair. The second landed in his lap, tearing with beak and talons. They had to be driven by more than their original assignment. Maybe the gods were interceding . . . .

  Barley clambered to his feet with the Old Man's help. He was groggy. Colgrave dithered round him.

  The grumble of a crowd working itself up reached the cellar.

  We were in trouble.

  "Maybe we ought to run for it," Priest suggested.

  Colgrave hit him with that one cold eye. "Colgrave doesn't run." Then, "We have an enemy here." He indicated the thing in red. "He's decided to send us back. We have to stop him. Sixty men counting on us . . . . I don't want any of us to go back. It's forever this time."

  "I'll buy that," I muttered. It reflected my thinking of the moment. But I was surprised to hear it from the Old Man. It was not his kind of thinking.

  It seemed that the black birds had been trying to stop us from compounding our sins. That was all I could get their admonitory squawks to add to. "Sorry, guys," I murmured. A sin or two looked necessary for the greater welfare.

  I did not want to see that quiet, fog-bound sea again. Eighteen years was long enough. The others felt the same.

  I could see just one way out of it. Kill the sorcerer in red.

  Another murder.

  What was one more death on my soul? I asked myself. Not a pennyweight.

  The last black bird hurled itself into the pentagram.

  The sorcerer was covered with blood, reddening its clothing even more. Pain had destroyed the delicacy of its face. And yet a tiny smile began to stretch its lips again.

  I drew to my ear and let an arrow fly.

  The others had the same idea at the same instant. The Trolledyngjan hurled his ax. Priest and Barley flung themselves against the waning Power of the pentagram. Colgrave drew his blade and followed at a more casual pace. The Trolledyngjan whipped out a dagger and joined him. My arrow and the Trolledyngjan's ax did not survive the smashing fist of a lightning bolt. Both weapons touched the creature in red, but only lightly.

  The last bird became another serpent of night and slithered off to wherever they went when they devolved.

  The spells protecting the sorcerer gnawed at Priest and Barley. They screamed like souls in torment.

  And kept on.

  They were Colgrave's favorite hounds, those two. Because nothing stopped them.

  They had been the two most dreaded in-fighters on the western sea.

  A continual low moan emanated from the Trolledyngjan. Colgrave made no sound at all. He just leaned ahead like a man striding into a gale, his eye fixed on the sorcerer's throat.

  Priest and Barley went down. They writhed the way the birds had. But they kept trying to get to the creature in red. Barley's blade struck sparks from the stone beside the wizard's ankle.

  Its smile grew larger. It thought it was winning.

  I sped three arrows as fast as I could.

  The first did no good at all. The second pinked him lightly. It distracted him for an instant.

  His attackers surged at him, threatening to bury him.

  I sent my third arrow beneath Colgrave's upraised arm. It buried itself in the creature's heart.

  The Old Man's blade fell. It sliced the flesh away from one side of that delicate face.

  The thing slowly stood. A mournful wail came from between its motionless lips. The sound rose in pitch and grew louder and louder. I dropped my bow and clapped my hands over my ears.

  That did not help. The sound battered me till I ached.

  The Trolledyngjan was down with Priest and Barley. I did not expect them to rise ever again.

  The creature in red touched Colgrave. My captain started to drop too.

  He fell slowly, like a mighty kingdom crumbling.

  "Go, Bowman," he told me in a voice that was hardly a whisper, yet which I heard through the sorcerer's wail. "Take Dragon back to sea. Save the men."

  "Captain!" I seized his arm and tried to drag him away. The thing in red touched him. The touch anchored the Old Man.

  "Get the hell out of here!" he growled. "I'll handle him."

  "But . . . ."

  "That's an order, Bowman."

  He was my Captain. These were my comrades. My friends.

  "Will you get the hell gone?"

  He used the old Colgrave's voice. It was strong. Compelling. I could defy it then no more than ever before. I seized my bow and fled.

  XIV

  The others had needed little urging to make a run for it. Mica and the Kid were the only ones hanging around when I hit the mansion's door. Not counting the owner and half an army of citizens headed our way.

  It was your basic mob. A ravening killer monster made up of harmless shopkeepers. An organism without fear because it knew its components were replaceable.

  Mica screeched. "Come on, Bowman! You going to wait till they tie you to a burning stake?"

  I was not as numb as I looked. I was looking for the thousand-eyed monster's brain cells. I had eight good arrows left.

  But Mica was right. The mob did not have a brain. Random fragments had begun vandalizing the grounds.

  I took off round the side of the house.

  As we loped along, the Kid asked, "What happened down there? Where's Barley and Priest and the Trolledyngjan and the Old Man?"

  "Down there. All gone but the Old Man and the sorcerer. The thing is all chopped up, but it's still alive."

  "You left him there?"

  "He made me, Kid. You ever win an argument with Colgrave?"

  He just grinned.

  "Hold up for a second, Bowman," Mica panted. We were in the street now and drawing some startled looks. "What happens when they go?"

  "What?"

  "Colgrave runs us. What do we do without him? And that wizard called us back. What happens when he dies? To his spells?"

  "Oh. Man, I don't know." I was no expert on wizardry. Some sorceries devolved with the death of the sorcerer, and some did not. I could not tell him what he wanted to know.

  There were shouts behind us. I wheeled. Part of the mob was after us.

  "Let's take them," the Kid said.

  There were about twenty of them. For a Dragon sailor, protected by the Bowman, the odds did not look bad.

  The earth started quivering like a bear in restless slumber. The timbers of nearby buildings creaked.

  Our pursuers stopped, looked back.

  We could see the steep tiled roofs of the mansion. Cracks lightninged across them. They began sagging, as if some huge invisible hand were pressing downward . . . .

  The cracks leaked a black fog that looked first cousin to the one that dogged Vengeful D. The breeze did nothing to disperse it.

  "Let's hike," I said. "While they're distracted. Maybe we can catch the others."

  I was afraid Toke and Tor would sail without us.

  Could anger be an absolute? The cloud over the mansion said it could be. I felt it from a quarter-mile away.

  That shadow was a being. It echoed the feeling I had been given by the creature in red. I now understood our ambiguous reactions to the sorcerer. He or she had no meaning if the thing were not human at all.

  It was not alone. A second being held it in a death grip. That being radiated an absoluteness too, an utter refusal to yield to any other will.

  "Colgrave," I whispered.

  Colgrave had been a man, of that there was no doubt. But he had been larger than life and animated by a determination so unswerving that it had made him a demigod.

  "Children of evil." Mica muttered.

  We resumed walking toward the waterfront. No one interfered. We were forgotten.

  The Torian Hill shook like
a volcano about to give birth.

  "What?" I asked.

  "We are all children of evil," Mica said.

  "What're you talking about?" He was off on some sideways line of thought, saying the obvious and not meaning what he was saying. "Keep stepping. I don't think the Old Man will win this one."

  "He already has, Bowman. He's forced that thing to take it's natural form. Look, it's fading. It can't stay here that way."

  He was right. The thing was evaporating the way a cloud of steam does.

  So was the thing created by the will of my Captain.

  In minutes they were gone.

  There were tears in my eyes. Mine. The Bowman's. And I was the deadliest, coldest, most remorseless killer ever to sail the western seas, excepting only the man for whom my tears fell.

  I had hated him with a passion as deep and black and cold as the water in the ocean's deepest deeps. Yet I was weeping for him.

  I averted my face from the others.

  I had not wept since I did not know when. Maybe after I had killed my wife, when I had been alive and still one of the smaller evils plaguing the world.

  We reached Dragon. They had the mooring lines in but the gangplank still down. The crew manned the rail. Their eyes were on the hills behind the city. Their faces showed relief when we raced onto the wharf. Then dismay when they realized we three were the last.

  They had the drunk at the head of the gangplank, holding him like a hostage against Portsmouth's ill-will.

  "The others?" Toke asked.

  "They won't be coming," I replied.

  "What do we do?"

  "You're asking me?" He was First Officer. He should have taken charge.

  He looked me in the eye. He did not have to speak to tell me that he was no Colgrave, that he was incapable of commanding Vengeful Dragon.

  I glanced around. Every eye fixed me with that same expectant stare.

  I am the Bowman, I thought. Second only to Colgrave . . . . Second to none, now. "All right. Mica. Take the old guy and leave him on the wharf. Healthy. Tor, stand by to make sail."

  Some of them looked at me oddly. Letting the drunk go was not Dragon's style.

  But Dragon had changed. We had learned, just a little, the meaning of pity and mercy.

  "Give him something to tell his grandkids," I remarked to Tor, whose disappointment was obvious. He was the most bloodthirsty and unchanged member of the crew.

  A breeze rose as the gangplank came in. It was a perfect breeze. It would carry us into the channel at just the right speed. I assumed Colgrave's old place on the poop and peered at the sky. "You still with us?" I murmured.

  I started. For an instant I thought I saw faces in the racing clouds. Strange, alien faces with eyes of ice, in which no hint of motivation could be read.

  Was this what Colgrave had seen? Had he just looked up whenever he wanted to know if the gods were still with us?

  I had a lot to learn if I was going to replace the Old Man . . . . I looked at the clouds again. I saw nothing but clouds. Imagination?

  I paused to reflect on the fact that I was the only survivor among Dragon's four greatest evils.

  Why? What had they done that I had not? Or was it the reverse?

  The crew seemed thin. How many had been redeemed? "Toke, take a muster."

  "I have, Captain. We lost five besides those you know. One-Hand Nedo. Fat Poppo . . . ."

  "Poppo? Really? He said he knew . . . . I'm glad for him. But we'll miss them all."

  "We will, Captain."

  Mica's "We are all children of evil" returned to me. I think I understood now. He was stating the reason why I could not understand why some had been redeemed and some not. The evil in us was such that we could not recognize facts laid openly before us. It would take a moment of truth, an instant of revelation, to drive the message home.

  I remembered sitting with Priest and Mica and the Kid, fishing, pulling in a sand shark that just could not quit hitting our hooks. I glanced at the clouds and wondered if they would quit trying to teach that stupid shark.

  XV

  The dividing line between the sea and the Silverbind's flood is as sharp as a pen stroke. Turgid brown against slightly choppy jade. The two do not mix till you are out of sight of land.

  Dragon is in the brown, straining toward the green. We have bent on every piece of canvas we can find. Lank Tor is up top yelling things nobody wants to hear.

  "Another one, Captain. On the starboard quarter."

  Their sails crowd the north. They came back in a hurry.

  I try to think like Colgrave. What would he do?

  Colgrave would fight. Colgrave always fought.

  I try to remember his face. I cannot. The forgetfulness of Dragon is at work. Before long he, and the others, will be completely forgotten and we'll have a whole new style.

  It is necessary. Colgrave was incapable of backing down. But Dragon is no longer invincible. These Itaskians' fathers proved how vincible we are. They just have to be willing to pay an extreme price.

  I look at the clouds. "You tired of hauling in the same stupid sharks?"

  A distant cloud wears a face for an instant. I swear it sticks out its tongue.

  The tongue is lightning. It stabs the sea. "Steer for that," I order. The helmsman shifts our heading.

  Another bolt falls. Then another and another. The sky grows dark. The wind picks up. Dragon fairly dances toward the sudden foul weather. The sails in the north seem to bounce in anger as this slim chance to escape develops.

  "Damn you!" I shake a fist at the sky. For an instant I think I hear mocking laughter.

  The seasickness is grinding my entrails already. It will be tearing me apart after we hit the storm.

  The gods do have senses of humor. But the level seems to be that which ties the tails of cats for draping over clotheslines.

  Lightning bolts are falling like the javelins of a celestial army. The helmsman is nervous. He keeps glancing my way, awaiting the order to turn away. Others join him.

  Nobody asks questions.

  My predecessor trained them well.

  Now the bolts are hitting the sea around us. We have never seen anything like this . . . .

  "Tor?"

  "They're coming after us, Captain."

  Those bold, brave fools. They would be. They know the game well now. They know they have to be as determined as we.

  The granddaddy bolt of them all hits the mainmast. Tor shrieks. The mast snaps. Topmen scream. The Kid tumbles through the rigging and hits the main deck with a thud I can hear over the roar of wind and sea. The masts, the spars, the lines and stays all begin to glow. Dragon crawls with a pale, cold fire that must be visible for miles.

  She rides up a mountainous wave and plunges down its nether side.

  Darkness comes, sudden and sharp as a sword stroke.

  I am striding across the poop when it does, intending to take a look at the Kid.

  I trip into the rail when the light returns as suddenly as it went. I catch myself, look around.

  We are in a bank of dense fog. The sea is absolutely still. "Damned! No."

  The fog thins quickly. I can see my command.

  The men are scattered over the decks, motionless, eyes glassy. I know where we are, what has happened. We have returned to the beginning, and Colgrave's sacrifices were in vain.

  The jokes of the gods can be damned cruel.

  The fog gives way. We glide into the heart of a circle of lifeless jade sea. Lethargy gnaws at me. It takes all my will to take up my bow so I can use it as a prop on which to lean.

  I will not go down. I will not fall. I refuse. They do not have the Power . . . .

  Dragon eases to a stop and begins revolving slowly in the imperceptible current. The featureless face of the fog slides past. The mist overhead is light sometimes, and sometimes dark. It does not make an exciting day. Before long I lose interest in counting the days.

  It will not be long before I cease to think at all
.

  Till then, I must try to find the answer. What did I do wrong?

  Severed Heads

  The following story is one of my favorites of everything that I've done. Partly, that is, because it was so very successful, having been reprinted so many times overseas that it earned me more, in its time, than most of my novels had. Then, too, at its core lie elements of a family legend.

  I

  Narriman was ten when the black rider came to Wadi al Hamamah. He rode tall and arrogant upon a courser as white as his djellaba was black. He looked neither right nor left as he passed among the tents. Old men spat at his horse's hooves. Old women made warding signs. Children and dogs whined and fled. Makram's ass set up a horrible braying.

  Narriman was not frightened, just confused. Who was this stranger? Why were her people frightened? Because he wore black? No tribe she knew wore black. Black was the color of ifrits and djinn, of the Masters of Jebal al Alf Dhulquarneni, the high, dark mountains brooding over Wadi al Hamamah and the holy places of the al Muburak.

  Narriman was a bold one. Her elders warned her often, but she would not behave as fit her sex. The old ones shook their heads and said that brat of Mowfik's would be no good. Mowfik himself was suspect enough, what with his having gone to the great wars of the north. What business were those of the al Muburak?

  Narriman stayed and watched the rider.

  He reined in before her father's tent, which stood apart, drew a black rod from his javelin case, breathed upon it. Its tips glowed. He set that glow against the tent, sketched a symbol. The old folks muttered and cursed and told one another they'd known despair would haunt Mowfik's tent.

  Narriman ran after the stranger, who rode down the valley toward the shrine. Old Farida shouted after her. She pretended not to hear. She dodged from shadow to shadow, rock to rock, to the hiding place from which she spied on the rites of her elders.

  She watched the rider pass through the Circle with arrogance unconquered. He did not glance at Karkur, let alone make obeisance and offerings. She expected the Great Death to strike him ere he left the Circle, but he rode on, untouched. She watched him out of sight. Narriman stared at the god. Was Karkur, too, a frightened antique? She was shaken. Karkur's anger was a constant. Each task, each pleasure, had to be integrated with his desires. He was an angry god. But he had sat there like a red stone lump while a heathen defiled his Circle.