“Why so long? Has there been trouble with pirates?”
“Oh, no. Not any trouble that we know. But he didn’t go by ship, my lord. He walked.”
Tristan stared at him in astonishment. But the reverence on the faces of the boys dried his laughter in his throat. “I see. That’s quite an undertaking. Who holds Lanascol in his absence?”
“My mother, the queen, of course. She sent our troops to attack Ryol, but they died, every single one of them. Now we’re shorthanded at home in Benoic, and she’s sent to my uncles for help. But until the men come, I—I just can’t do nothing.”
Tristan nodded quickly. “I’d feel the same in your place. Well, show me the way to this wonderful fortress and let me think how it may be taken by a wandering harper and a handful of brave, beardless youths.” He smiled at their grim faces.
Tristan lay on his belly in the sand behind a gorse bush. Beside him, clear-eyed Kaherdyn pointed wordlessly seaward. Tristan nodded. There was no need to speak. In all the wide blue bay, in all the golden stretch of sand, there was only one possible place the boy’s sister could be. Rising from the empty sea like the broken fang of some strange, primordial beast was a circlet of solid rock, ringed by cliffs, bound by water, crowned by a crude fortress of wood and stone.
“The fortress doesn’t look like much,” Tristan muttered, squinting.
“No, but there’s a good, solid tower of dressed stone behind it,” Kaherdyn said. “Probably Roman. They can see everything for leagues. The only approach to the beach is the one we took, because the forest comes down so close. Getting from here to there is the problem.”
“I see the problem very well. There must be a causeway of some kind. How do they get supplies in?”
“There is at low tide, but it’s well guarded. They say you can ride two abreast most of the way, but it’s treacherous, and if you put a foot wrong, there’s quicksand all about. Even Ryol loses men that way.”
Tristan grimaced. “Not a hero’s death. What about boats? Do they use them?”
“Very small craft. Little more than coracles. It’s so shallow, you see. Sandbars everywhere. And when the tide comes in, it races. They often find their boats on the beach in the mornings.”
“What’s on the backside of the island? The seaward side?”
Kaherdyn raised his shoulders. “No one knows. I don’t know anyone who’s ever seen it.”
Tristan grunted. “That’s my best chance. I’ll row in on the last of the tide and sail out at the turn. Let’s hope there’s someplace at the back of those cliffs to stow the keel safely.”
Kaherdyn shook his head. “You can’t do it by sea. It’s too shallow. Except at the very height of the tide, and then the current’s too strong. Ryol bragged to my father once that the place was impregnable. I heard him.”
Tristan turned his head in the sand and looked at the boy. “When was this?”
“Three years ago,” Kaherdyn said steadily. “They were allies then.”
“And what changed that?”
Kaherdyn looked away. Already Tristan recognized the firm set of the jaw and the thinned lips that signaled private ground. When he made up his mind to be obstinate, the boy could not be moved.
Tristan put out a hand to his shoulder. “Prince Kaherdyn, it may be no business of mine, but if this man took your sister as some sort of revenge when your father was away, then it might help me to know what he wants revenge for. Don’t send me in there blind.”
Nothing in the boy’s face moved. “What you have guessed, you have guessed aright, Sir Tristan. More than that I cannot say. It is not my secret to share.”
Tristan sighed. “Well, he was probably boasting, anyway, about the inaccessibility of the place. It can’t be any worse than Lyon’s Head. Every fortress has its weak spot, if you can find it. I’m willing to wager this one does, too. I only wish I didn’t have to find it in the dark.”
“God will guide you,” Kaherdyn said gravely.
Tristan forced a smile. “Don’t be too sure. The Great Goddess may be pleased with me, for all I know, but Christ is most certainly disappointed.”
Kaherdyn’s eyes widened. “Are you a pagan?”
“I’m a little of everything. My parents were Christians and I was baptized. When I was a boy, the Christian God spoke to me. But lately, I’ve heard other voices.”
Kaherdyn smiled in evident relief. “All men sin,” he said easily. “Don’t worry. God is with you even when you doubt.”
Tristan smiled at the youth in his voice. “Would it make a difference, Prince? If I worshiped Mithra, or Yahweh, or Cerunnos, would you let me die to save your sister?”
Kaherdyn’s untroubled gaze met his. “Of course I would,” he said at once. “My father once told me not to mind if my soldiers had feet of clay, or if the workmen I employed to build my house had dirty hands. The important thing is that the battle is fought bravely and the house built well.” He smiled quickly. “Does that make any sense to you?”
“Your father sounds like a wise man.” Tristan turned and stared back out at the lonely island. “My keel draws no more water than a coracle. At high tide, I’ll make it to those cliffs. Pray for me that I find a place to land without smashing the boat against the rocks. Pray I can find your sister without being killed. Pray that I can get her down to the boat unseen. Pray that I can sail out of the range of fire arrows before they see me.”
Kaherdyn grinned. “That’s a lot to ask of prayer. We’ll create a diversion on the shore with torches and smoke. They’ll never think to look behind them.”
Tristan laughed softly. “I like you better, Kaherdyn of Lanascol, every day I know you. What did the bishop once tell me at Castle Dorr? Ah, yes, I remember. God helps those who help themselves.”
The night was dark with a fair wind. Clouds scudded across the stars, blowing unseen shadows across the sea. Tristan sat at the helm, racing in on the pull of the tide, scanning the shore for lights that would mark the island. He had spent the afternoon well out to sea, only drifting landward as the sun set and the tide came in. At dusk he had hoisted his dark sail. Kaherdyn had thought of that trick, smearing charcoal on the sail to make it more difficult to see. Tristan was not yet afraid of being seen; he was more afraid of sailing by the island onto a sandbar in the dark.
At last he saw a light, but it was high above him. He dropped the sail and leaped to the oars, pulling hard. He was nearly on the island! He could hear the crash of waves on rocks. How had he come so far so fast? The tide must be at full race! He pulled hard against the current to slow his approach, but it was like trying to hold back the wind. He saw the white froth of breakers ahead, then the boat lifted on a swell and darted past the rising wall of rock. The tide was sweeping him around the island! Desperately he pulled for the rock face, no longer caring if he smashed the boat. If he missed the island, he would beach on a sandbar and end his life in quicksand trying to escape. All at once, the pull of the tide released him. He lost his balance and fell to the floor of the boat as it was swept into an eddy and spun around, oars bobbing in the water. He sat up. The boat rocked gently, bumping the cliff face, at rest in a calm pool. Above him rose the sharp finger of rock that stuck out from the cliff and created this eddy behind it. The swirl of water, circling in the reverse direction from the tide, would hold him there forever unless he thrust himself out into the racing current.
“God is with you even when you doubt,” Tristan whispered. “Who is that boy’s father, anyway?”
He scrambled out onto the rocks and searched for footholds, toeholds, any way to climb the cliff. To his amazement he found a path. Drawing his sword, he crept stealthily up the steep, twisting trail, expecting any moment to come face-to-face with an armed guard. But he met no one. At the top of the cliff the trail turned again and ran along the cliff face. But Tristan, ducking low, ran toward the lights of the fortress. Out of the corner of his eye he caught movement. Flames showed on the distant shore, moving everywhere, thirty or forty se
parate flares. These must be Kaherdyn’s troops, lighting fires as well as torches to give the impression of greater numbers. That single-minded boy would burn down Broceliande itself to get his sister back. Ahead, Tristan saw three men with their backs to him, silhouetted against the raging light. He prayed Ryol would be as curious about the fires as his night watch.
Ryol’s fortress proved to be little more than a ruin of rubble patched with wood and roofed with thatch. Tristan slid in shadow from window to window, from knothole to crack, and peered inside. He saw a great room full of drunken men, some slumbering, mouths slack with snores, some weaving unsteadily in the dim light of smoking torches, a few villains stealing coins from their sleeping comrades, a few men alerting to the lookout’s warning cries of fire. But no sign of a woman, and no Ryol. He continued from wall to wall until he had circled the fortress. He found the cookhouse, the barracks (if he could use such a term for a single room strewn with bedrolls and hammocks), the storehouse, and the waste pit, but he found no woman. To the west rose a square tower, solidly built of stone, with two lookouts at the top, both eagerly watching the shore maneuvers. He approached cautiously, sword raised, expecting it to be well defended, but found no one at the entrance. Either everyone was out on the southern cliffs enjoying the show on the beach or Ryol thought his tower too secure to worry much about its capture.
Tristan put his shoulder to the door. Inside, a stair twisted upward and vanished into the dark. He paused, listening hard. He heard nothing. Cautiously he ascended the stairs until he came to a landing where a torch burned sullenly. Two doors faced him, one large, curved, and ornately carved, the other small and ill-fitting but serviceable. He inched open the smaller door and saw, as he expected, stairs leading to the upper battlement. With his sword he cut a swatch from his cloak and wedged it into the doorjamb until the door stuck so tight he could not budge it. Then he put his hand to the latch of the other door and lifted it slowly. Someone whimpered. He pushed hard and the door swung inward on oiled hinges.
He stood in a large room, richly furnished with tapestries on the dressed stone walls, rushes on the floor, furs and stuffed cushions on the huge carved bed, a double-flamed lamp on a bronze stand, a silver candle stand on a marble-topped table beside a gigantic chair. He wrinkled his nose. The place was luxuriously furnished, but it stank. It reeked of sweat.
A breeze blew softly through the window and set the lamp flames dancing. It was then he saw the woman. She stood perfectly motionless by the edge of a tapestry on the other side of the bed, as much a part of the furnishings as the bronze winestand at her elbow. If the wavering light had not swept a shadow across her alabaster flesh, he might not have seen her at all. But once he saw her he could not take his eyes from her. She took his breath away. Eyes of vivid blue looked straight into his own. Raven hair shimmered in the lamplight against skin so pale, so smooth, so unblemished, it cried out to be caressed. As the thought crossed his mind her eyes flashed and her lips lifted in a snarl.
He cleared his throat. “Princess Elen of Lanascol? My name is Tristan. I am sent by Kaherdyn, your brother, to take you home.”
For a moment nothing happened. She looked at him with eyes full of malignant, unwavering hatred. Then she shook her head, once, and he gasped. With the movement of her head her hair swung aside and he saw that she was half naked, her gown ripped so badly only a ragged skirt remained. She had smooth, rounded shoulders, full, firm breasts, and a narrow waist he could encompass in his hands. He tried to speak but found he could not command his voice. The longer he stared the icier her cold blue gaze became. Slowly, she raised her hands before her face to ward him off. Slender, long-fingered, classically elegant, they were the most beautiful hands he had ever seen. Iseulte of the White Hands. He had heard of her before. Surely some bard at Lyon’s Head had sung her praises once.
“Lady Elen.” He cleared his throat again, annoyed to find his voice a whisper. “Lady Elen, come with me, quickly! I’ll get you off this island and away—back to your family. But there isn’t much time.”
She shook her head again and then bit off a cry as a loud thud sounded on the stairs. Tristan whirled. The door slammed open. Ryol the Giant filled the doorway, breathing hard. He had long, stringy red hair and small, light eyes. Once he had been a warrior, perhaps, but his flesh had grown slack from lack of discipline and use, as his vigilance had grown slack from lack of challenge. He grinned when he saw Tristan and showed a mouthful of rotten teeth. He spoke a broken pidgin of mixed Breton and Latin, with an accent so outlandish Tristan could barely make out the words.
“So. Here is hero. You brave man, eh? Rescue maiden? Go home, laddie. You too late. She be no maiden now!” He bellowed in laughter, his great belly jiggling in waves. He had already unlaced his tunic and loosed the cord that bound his leggings in anticipation of the evening’s entertainment. His arms and legs were as thick as tree trunks. He stank of sweat.
Tristan backed slowly. If only he had more room! The giant filled the chamber; it was impossible to get past him. To be caught in those fists meant death. A sword thrust would do the monster little harm, with all that flesh, unless . . . Tristan leaped onto the bed, picked up the cushions, and threw them at his face. Ryol caught them in his hands and laughed. With his sword held low in a dagger grip, and while Ryol still had his hands full of cushions, Tristan lunged and stabbed his sword hard upward, deep into the giant’s throat.
He pulled the sword out as Ryol staggered toward him. Bright blood splashed down the giant’s chest, onto his tunic, onto the rushes on the floor. Ryol bellowed again, this time in rage. He lifted a mammoth leg to kick Tristan across the room, but Tristan dove under the bed. Ryol drew his own sword and thrust it after him. It missed Tristan by a hair. He wriggled out from under the bed near Elen’s feet. With a roar, Ryol threw himself across the bed. Tristan grabbed the woman and pulled her hard against the wall. Ryol landed on the bed with a crash. The wood splintered and the bed collapsed. Ryol grunted, head down, his sides heaving as he sucked in air. Blood spurted rhythmically from the gash in his neck, pooling in a dark, glistening lake on the stone floor.
Tristan raced for the door, found his cloak where he had dropped it, reached for Elen’s hand, and pulled her after him. He wrapped her in the cloak. “Stay there,” he commanded. She did not even look at him. Her gaze was fixed on the writhing, bleeding mass of fatted flesh on the broken bed. Tristan walked up to the dying giant, raised his sword above his head, whispered, “Go to your gods, Ryol,” and brought the blade down as hard as he could. Even so, it took five hacking swings to sever the giant’s head. Grabbing it by the lank, red hair, he lifted the head and ran for the door. “Follow me!” he cried. But the girl froze, staring at the headless corpse. “Elen! Listen! The alarm has sounded. We have no time! Follow me now.” She turned away from him and walked slowly to the body. While he stood there, helpless, listening to the sentries pound at the wedged door and shout for help, the black-haired beauty walked calmly to the double-flamed lamp and pushed it over. Instantly the rushes ignited and the room filled with smoke. “Elen!” Desperate, Tristan sheathed his sword, grabbed the girl by the waist, and dragged her out of the room and down the stairs.
Outside the tower Ryol’s men had gathered, alerted by the sentries’ shouts and by the smoke. Most of them had swords, a few had knives. One of them carried a Saxon ax. Tristan stopped. He could not take them all on, even if his hands were free. If they did not kill him, they would surely kill the girl. He stood still, one arm locked around the rigid body of his captive, and faced them all.
“I am Tristan the Giant-Killer,” he announced, projecting his harper’s voice to the back of the crowd. “Tonight I slew the giant Ryol. Let me pass and I will do you no harm. Stop me and I will destroy you.” The men grumbled but no one came forward. In the dim light of smoking torches he saw their stupefied, half-comprehending stares. Slowly he raised the dripping head into the light. The sight produced instant silence. He walked through the crowd unhinde
red, dragging the girl and holding the head high, and they made a path for him.
“Quickly!” he muttered to her when they were back on the cliff trail. “Use your legs, can’t you? One or two of them will come to their senses shortly, and then we’ll be for it.” But he got no response from her. She remained a dead weight on his arm. In the dark he sought for the finger of rock that marked the eddy, but nothing looked familiar, and he could not find it. “God of Kaherdyn,” he breathed angrily, “if you’re still with me, show me the way!”
“Halt!” a voice cried abruptly. A shadow loomed ahead, holding a sword. Tristan whirled, flinging the girl and the head aside and drawing his sword all in one motion. The guard leaped for him. Tristan dodged, plunged his sword into the man’s belly, and kicked him off the cliff face onto the rocks below. And there, where the guard had been standing, a narrow path branched off and wound down toward the sea.
Tristan retrieved the head and bent over the princess he had thrown to the ground. “I beg your pardon, my lady. I had to do it—it was him or us. But look! He has shown us the cliff path, so it was not in vain. Come with me now to the boat. If Kaherdyn’s God is with us still, we might even make the tide.”
Halfway down the trail he heard the pounding of feet behind them. He dragged the unwilling girl to the edge of the path, clutched her close against the rock, and waited. Three men half ran, half slithered down the steep trail, swords drawn. He let two of them go by, then swung his sword into the body of the third. With a whistle of escaping air the man collapsed. Leaving the girl alone with the head of her tormentor, Tristan hurried silently down the path behind the others. He heard them reach the boat, grunt in dismay, call out to their companion, then turn and start back uphill. Again he hid, let the first man go past, and attacked the second. But this time they were walking, not running, and the leader heard his companion fall. He turned and faced Tristan on the path. He was not a big man, but he was a fighter and in good trim. Tristan knew, as they dodged, struck, and parried, that this would take time he did not have. He backed slowly over the body of the dead man. Down they went together toward the water, step by step, until Tristan heard the sea behind him and the gentle scrape of the boat on rock. He cried out and fell, twisting sideways as the sword came down. It just missed him, tearing the edge of his sleeve. He kicked out at the soldier’s wrist. The sword spun away and the man staggered. The man staggered. In that instant Tristan leaped up and swung his blade, catching the fleeing soldier between the ribs. He died silently halfway to the ground.