"Shouldn't wonder," the stranger grunted. "I saw you pop out of your
tank like a cork coming out of a wine bottle. That was a fair shot he
hit you. You're lucky." A broad hand pressed him down as the memory of
Dugald's treachery started him struggling to his feet. "Hold still, lad.
We'll give you a chance to catch your breath and wrap some bandages
around you. You'll live to give him his due, but not tonight. You'll
have to wait for another day."
There was something in the stranger's voice that Geoffrey recognized for
the quality that made men obey other men. It was competence,
self-assurance, and, even more, the calm expression of good sense.
Tonight, Geoffrey needed someone with that quality. He sank back,
grateful for the stranger's help. "I'm Giulion Geoffrey of Geoffrion,"
he said, "and indebted to you. Who are you, stranger?"
The darkness rumbled to a deep, rueful laugh. "In these parts, lad, I'm
not called by my proper name. I'm Hodd Savage--The Barbarian. And that
was a fair knock _you_ gave _me_."
Young Geoffrey's silence lasted for a long while. Then he said in a
flat, distant voice: "Why did you give me water, if you're going to kill
me anyway?"
The Barbarian laughed again, this time in pure amusement. "Because I'm
not going to kill you, obviously. You're too good a cannoneer to be
despatched by a belt knife. No--no, lad, I'm not planning to kill anyone
for some time. All I want right now is to get out of here and get home.
I've got another army to raise, to make up for this pasting you
Leaguesmen have just given me."
"Next time, you won't be so lucky," Geoffrey muttered. "We'll see your
hide flapping in the rain, if you're ever foolish enough to raid our
lands again."
The Barbarian slapped his thigh. "By God," he chuckled, "I knew it
wasn't some ordinary veal-fed princeling that outmaneuvered _me_!" He
shook his head. "That other pup had better watch out for you, if you
ever cross his path again. I lost him in the rocks with ease to spare.
Bad luck your shot smashed my fuel tanks, or I'd be halfway home by
now." The rolling voice grew low and bitter. "No sense waiting to pick
up my men. Not enough of 'em left to make a corporal's guard."
"What do you mean, _if_ I ever cross Dugald's path again? I'll have him
called out to trial by combat the day I can ride a tankette once more."
"I wouldn't be too sure, lad," The Barbarian said gently. "What does
that look like, over there?"
Geoffrey turned his head to follow the shadowy pointing arm, and saw a
flicker of light in the distance. He recognized it for what it was; a
huge campfire, with the Leaguesmen's tankettes drawn up around it.
"They're dividing the spoils--what prisoners there are, to work the
mills; whatever of your equipment is still usable; your baggage train.
And so forth. What of it?"
"Ah, yes, my baggage train," The Barbarian muttered. "Well, we'll come
back to that. What else do you suppose they're dividing?"
Geoffrey frowned. "Why--nothing else. Wait!" He sat up sharply, ignoring
his ribs. "The fiefs of the dead nobles."
"Exactly. Your ramshackle little League held together long enough to
whip us for the first time, but now the princelings are dividing up and
returning to their separate holdings. Once there, they'll go back to
peering covetously at each other's lands, and maybe raid amongst
themselves a little, until I come back again. And you're as poor as a
church mouse at this moment, lad--no fief, no lands, no title--unless
there's an heir?"
Geoffrey shook his head distractedly. "No. I've not wed. It's as you
say."
"And just try to get your property back. No--no, it won't be so easy to
return. Unless you'd care to be a serf on your own former holding?"
"Dugald would have me killed," Geoffrey said bitterly.
"So there you are, lad. The only advantage you have is that Dugald
thinks you're dead already--you can be sure of that, or it would have
been an assassin, and not me, that woke you. That's something, at least.
It's a beginning, but you'll have to lay your plans carefully, and take
your time. I certainly wouldn't plan on doing anything until your body's
healed and your brain's had time to work."
Young Geoffrey blinked back the tears of rage. The thought of losing the
town and lands his father had left him was almost more than his hot
blood could stand. The memory of the great old Keep that dominated the
town, with its tapestried halls and torchlit chambers, was suddenly very
precious to him. He felt a sharp pang at the thought that he must sleep
in a field tonight, like some skulking outlaw, while Dugald quite
possibly got himself drunk on Geoffrion wine and snored his headache
away on the thick furs of Geoffrey's bed.
But The Barbarian was right. Time was needed--and this meant that, to a
certain extent at least, his lot and Savage's were thrown in together.
The thought came to Geoffrey that he might have chosen a worse partner.
"Now, lad," The Barbarian said, "as long as you're not doing anything
else, you might as well help me with my problem."
The realization of just exactly who this man was came sharply back to
young Geoffrey. "I won't help you escape to your own lands, if that's
what you mean," he said quickly.
"I'll take good care of that myself, when the time comes," the man
answered drily. "Right now, I've got something else in mind. They're
dividing my baggage train, as you said. Now, I don't mind that, seeing
as most of it belonged to them in the first place. I don't mind it for
this year, that is. But there's something else one of you cockerels will
be wanting to take home with him, and I've a mind not to let him.
There's a perfectly good woman in my personal trailer, and I'm going to
get her. But if we're going to do that and get clear of this country by
morning, we'd better get to it."
Like every other young man of his time and place, Geoffrey had a
clear-cut sense of duty regarding the safety and well-being of ladies.
He had an entirely different set of attitudes toward women who were not
ladies. He had not the slightest idea of which to apply to this case.
What sort of woman would The Barbarian take to battle with him? What
sort of women would the inland barbarians have generally? He had very
little knowledge to go on. The inlanders had been appearing from over
the westward mountains for generations, looting and pillaging almost at
will, sometimes staying through a winter but usually disappearing in the
early Fall, carrying their spoils back to their mysterious homelands on
the great Mississippi plain. The seaboard civilization had somehow kept
from going to its knees, in spite of them--in this last generation, even
though the barbarians had The Barbarian to lead them, the Seaboard
League had managed to cobble itself together--but no one, in all this
time, had ever actually learned, or cared, much about these vicious,
compactly organized raiders. Certainly no one had learned anything
beyond those facts which worked to best advantage on a battlefield.
So, young Giulion Geoffrey faced his problem. This 'perfectly good
woman' of The Barbarian's--was she in fact a good woman, a lady, and
therefore entitled to aid in extremity from any and all gentlemen; or
was she some camp follower, entirely worthy of being considered a spoil
of combat?
"Well, come on, lad," The Barbarian rumbled impatiently at this point.
"Do you want that Dugald enjoying _her_ tonight along with everything
else?"
And that decided Geoffrey. He pushed himself to his feet, not liking the
daggers in his chest, but not liking the thought of Dugald's pleasures
even more. "Let's go, then."
"Good enough, lad," The Barbarian chuckled. "Now let's see how quietly
we can get across to the edge of that fire."
They set out--none too quietly, with The Barbarian's heavy bulk lurching
against Geoffrey's lean shoulder on occasion, and both of them uncertain
of their footing in the darkness. But they made it across without being
noticed--just two more battle-sore figures in a field where many such
might be expected--and that was what counted.
The noise and confusion attendant on the dividing of the spoils was an
added help; they reached the fringes of the campfire easily.
* * * * *
It was very interesting, the way history had doubled back on itself,
like a worm re-growing part of its body but re-growing it in the wrong
place. At one end of the kink--of the fresh, pink scar--was a purulent
hell of fire and smoke that no one might have expected to live through.
Yet, people had, as they have a habit of doing. And at the other end of
the kink in time--Giulion Geoffrey's end, Harolde Dugald's time, The
Barbarian's day--there were keeps and moats in Erie, Pennsylvania,
vassals in New Brunswick, and a great stinking warren of low,
half-timbered houses on the island of Manhattan. If it had taken a few
centuries longer to recover from the cauterizing sun bombs, these things
might still have been. But they might have had different names, and
human history might have been considered to begin only a few hundred
years before. Even this had not happened. The link with the past
remained. There was a narrow, cobbled path on Manhattan, with sewage
oozing down the ditch in its center, which was still Fifth Avenue. It
ran roughly along the same directions as old Broadway, not because there
was no one who could read the yellowed old maps but because surveying
was in its second childhood. There was a barge running between two ropes
stretched across the Hudson, and this was The George Washington Bridge
ferry. So, it was only a kink in history, not a break.
But Rome was not re-built in a day. Hodd Savage--The Barbarian, the man
who had come out of the hinterlands to batter on civilization's badly
mortared walls--clamped his hand on Giulion Geoffrey's arm, grunted,
jerked his head toward the cluster of nobles standing beside the
campfire, and muttered: "Listen."
Geoffrey listened.
The nobles were between him and the fire, and almost none of them were
more than silhouettes. Here and there, a man faced toward the fire at
such an angle that Geoffrey could make out the thick arch of an eyebrow,
the jut of a cheek, or the crook of a nose. But it was not enough for
recognition. All the nobles were dressed in battle accoutrements that
had become stained or torn. Their harness had shifted, their tunics were
askew, and they were bunched so closely that the outline of one man
blended into the mis-shaped shadow of the next. The voices were hoarse
from an afternoon's bellowing. Some were still drunk with the acid fire
of exhausted nerves, and were loud. Others, drained, mumbled in the
background like a chorus of the stupid. Gesticulating, mumbling,
shouting, shadowed, lumped into one knot of blackness lighted by a ruddy
cheekbone here, a gleaming brow there above an eye socket as inky and
blank as a bottomless pit, they were like something out of the wan and
misty ages before the Earth had had time to form completely.
Two arguing voices rose out of the mass:
"Those three barbarian tankettes are _mine_, I say!"
"Yours when I lie dead!"
"They surrendered to me!"
"Because I pounded them into submission."
"Into submission, indeed! You skulked around their flanks like a lame
dog, and now that I've taken them, you want your bone!"
"You were glad enough to see me there when the battle was hot. Call me a
dog again and I'll spit you like a rat on a pitchfork."
No one else in the group of nobles paid the two of them any attention.
No one had time to spare for any quarrel but his own, and the whole
squabbling pile of them looked ready to fly apart at any moment--to draw
sidearms and knives and flare into spiteful combat.
The Barbarian spat quietly. "There's your Seaboard League, lad. There's
your convocation of free men. Step out there and ask for your lands
back. Care to try?"
"We've already decided that wouldn't be wise," Geoffrey said irritably.
He had never cared much for these inevitable aftermaths to battle, but
it made him angry to have an inland barbarian make pointed comments. "I
suppose it's different when _you_ win, eh?"
"Not very. But then, we're not civilized. Let's get moving, lad."
Silently, they skirted the fire and made their way toward the parked
vehicles of The Barbarian's captured supply train. The ground was rough
and covered by underbrush. More than once, The Barbarian stumbled into
Geoffrey, making him clench his jaw against the pain in his chest. But
he saw no point in saying anything about it.
"There she is," The Barbarian said in a husky growl. Geoffrey peered
through the brush at an armored trailer whose flat sides were completely
undecorated except for a scarlet bearpaw painted on the door. A lantern
gleamed behind the slit windows, and The Barbarian grunted with
satisfaction. "She's still in there. Fine. We'll have this done in a
couple of seconds."
In spite of the incongruity, Geoffrey asked curiously: "What's a
second?"
"A division of time, lad--one sixtieth of a minute."
"Oh. What on Earth would you want to measure that accurately for?"
"For getting women out of trailers in a hurry, lad. Now--let's look for
sentries."
* * *
There were two guarding the trailer--men-at-arms from Dugald's holding,
Geoffrey noticed--carrying shotguns and lounging in the shadows. One of
them had a wineskin--Geoffrey heard the gurgle plainly--and the other
was constantly turning away from the trailer to listen to the shrieks
and shouting coming from among the other vehicles of the train, where
other guards were not being quite as careful of their masters' new
property.
"I see they've found the quartermaster's waggons," The Barbarian said
drily. "Now, then, lad--you work away toward the right, there, and I'll
take the left. Here--take my knife. I won't need it." The Barbarian
passed over a length of steel as big as a short-sword, but oddly curved
and sharpened down one side of the blade. "Stab if you can, but if you
have to cut, that blade'll go through a man's forearm. Remember you're
not holding one of those overgrown daggers of yours."
"And just why should I kill a man for you?"
"Do you think that man won't try to kill you?"
Geoffrey had no satisfactory answer to that. He moved abruptly off into
the brush, holding The Barbarian's knife, and wondering just how far he
was obligated for a bandaged chest and half a pint of water. But a man's
duty to his rescuer was plain enough, and, besides, just what else was
there to do?
The blame for it all went squarely back to Dugald, and Geoffrey did not
love him for it. He slipped through the bushes until he was only a few
yards from the man who had the wineskin, and waited for The Barbarian to
appear at the opposite end of the trailer.
When it happened, it happened quite suddenly, as these things will. One
moment the other sentry was craning his neck for another look at what
was going on elsewhere. The next he was down on his knees, croaking
through a compressed throat, with The Barbarian's arm under his chin and
a driving knee ready to smash at the back of his neck again.
Geoffrey jumped forward, toward his own man. The man-at-arms had dropped
his wineskin in surprise and was staring at what was happening to his
comrade. When he heard Geoffrey come out of the underbrush, the face he
turned was white and oddly distended with shock, as though all the bones
had drained out of it. He might have appeared fierce enough, ordinarily.
But things were happening too fast for him.
Geoffrey had never killed anyone but a noble in his life. Not
intentionally and at close range, in any case. The completely baffled
and helpless look of this one somehow found time to remind him that this
was not, after all, one of his peers--that the man was hopelessly
outclassed in fair combat--or in anything else, for that matter.
Geoffrey did _not_ stop to weigh the probity of this idea. It was the
central tenet of his education and environment. Furthermore, there was
some truth in it.
He couldn't kill the man. He swept up his arm and struck the flat of The
Barbarian's broad knife against the side of the guard's head, and bowled
the man over with his rush. But the guard had a hard skull. He stared up
with glazed but conscious eyes, and squalled: "Lord Geoffrey!" Geoffrey
hit him again, and this time the guard stayed down, but the damage was
done. Scrambling to his feet, Geoffrey ran over to The Barbarian, who
was letting the other guard ooze to the ground.
"We'll have to hurry!" Geoffrey panted. "Before that man comes back to
his senses."
The Barbarian gave him a disgusted look, but nodded. "Hurry we shall."
He lurched to the trailer door and slapped it with the flat of his hand.
"Let's go, Myka."
There was a scrambling sound inside the trailer, and the light went out.
The door slid open, and Geoffrey found himself staring at the most
beautiful woman he had ever seen.
She was lithe almost to the point of boyishness, even though she was
clearly some years older than Geoffrey. She had short hair the color of
hammered copper, high cheekbones, and tawny eyes. She was wearing a
tunic and short trousers, and there was an empty pistol holster strapped
around her waist. Obviously, she was not a lady. But it was much too
late for Geoffrey to care about that. She stopped in the doorway,
shaking her head slowly at The Barbarian. "I swear, Hodd," she said in a
low, laughing voice, "one of these days you _won't_ come back from the
dead, and I'll be surprised."
"It was close enough, this time," The Barbarian growled. He jerked his
head toward Geoffrey. "That young buck over there knows how to handle
his enemies. Once he learns what to do about his friends, I may have to
retire."
Myka arched her burning eyebrows. "Oh? What's the story behind that, I'd
like to know."
"We can always talk," Geoffrey said a little edgily. "But we can't
always find an empty tankette."
"Quite right, lad," The Barbarian said. "I saw some vehicles parked over
that way."
"Those belong to the nobles. There ought to be some captured ones of
yours somewhere around here."
"With plenty of guards on them. No, thanks."
"That didn't trouble you earlier."
"Myka, as you may have noticed, is more than a tank. This time the prize
isn't worth it. I'd rather just slip over to where I can get
transportation for the choosing."
"Not with my help."
The Barbarian looked at him and grunted. He seemed oddly disappointed.
"I would have bet the other way," he muttered. Then the shaggy head
rose, and he circled Myka's waist with one arm. "All right, I'll do it
without your help."
"Is Myka trained to drive a tankette and fight at the same time?"
"No."
"Then you'd better do it my way. You'd make a poor showing, kicking
drive levers with a broken leg." Geoffrey nodded toward The Barbarian's
right shin. "It's been that way since before you picked me up, hasn't
it? I saw it wobble when you kneed that man-at-arms."
Myka looked at The Barbarian sharply, worry on her face, but the man was
chuckling. "All right, bucko, we'll do it your way."
"Fine." Geoffrey wasn't so sure it was. Suddenly he was committed not
only to helping The Barbarian escape, but also to escape with him. He
was faintly surprised at himself. But there was something about the man.
Something worth saving, no matter what. And there was the business now
of having been recognized. Once Dugald learned he was still alive, there
would be a considerable amount of danger in staying in the vicinity. Of
course, he had only to stoop over the unconscious guard with The
Barbarian's knife....
With a quick motion, he tossed the weapon back to its owner.
_That_ one was an easy choice, Geoffrey thought. Simply stealing--or was
it recapturing?--a tankette and using it to drive away with Myka and The
Barbarian didn't mean he had to go all the way to the barbarian lands
with them. Let the guard revive and run to Dugald with the news. All
Geoffrey had to do was to remove himself a few miles, find shelter, and
bide his time.
One recaptured barbarian tankette might not even be missed. And the
guard might not be believed--well, that was a thin hope--but, in any
case, no one had any reason to suspect The Barbarian was still alive.
There'd be no general pursuit.
Well ... maybe not. There was a man-at-arms choked to death, by a
stronger arm than Geoffrey's, and it was The Barbarian's woman who would
be missing. There might be quite a buzz about that.
Geoffrey shook his head in impatient annoyance. This kind of life
demanded a great deal more thinking than he was accustomed to. All these
unpredictable factors made a man's head spin.
And then again, maybe they didn't. The thing to do was to act, to do
what would get him out of here now, and leave him free tomorrow to do
whatever thinking tomorrow demanded. With a little practice, too,
thinking would undoubtedly come more easily.
"All right," he said decisively, "let's get moving over in that
direction, and see if the guards haven't gotten a little careless." He
motioned to Myka and The Barbarian, and began to lead the way into the
underbrush. He thrust out a hand to pull a sapling aside, and almost ran
full-tilt into Harolde Dugald.
* * *
Dugald was almost exactly Geoffrey's age and size, but he had something
Geoffrey lacked--a thin-lipped look of wolfish wisdom. His dark eyes
were habitually slitted, and his mouth oddly off-center, always poised
between a mirthless grin and a snarl. His long black hair curled under
at the base of his skull, and his hands were covered with heavy gold and
silver rings. There was one for each finger and thumb, and all of them
were set with knobby precious stones.
His lips parted now, and his long white teeth showed plainly in the
semi-darkness. "I was coming back to inspect my prizes," he said in a
voice like a fine-bladed saw chuckling through soft metal. "And look
what I've found." The open mouth of his heavy, handmade side pistol
pointed steadily between Geoffrey's eyes. "I find my erstwhile neighbor
risen from the dead, and in the company of a crippled enemy and his
leman. Indeed, my day is complete."
The one thing Geoffrey was not feeling was fear. The wire-thin strand of
his accumulated rage was stretched to breaking. Somewhere, far from the
forefront of his mind, he was feeling surprise and disappointment. He
was perfectly aware of Dugald's weapon, and of what it would do to his
head at this range. But Geoffrey was not stopping to think. And Dugald
was a bit closer to him than he ought to have been.
Geoffrey's hands seemed to leap out. One tore the pistol out of Dugald's
hand and knocked it spinning. The other cracked, open-palmed, against
the other man's face, hard enough to split flesh and start the blood
trickling down Dugald's cheek. The force of the combined blows sent
Dugald staggering. He fell back, crashing into a bush, and hung against
it. Stark fear shone in his eyes. He screamed: "Dugald! _Dugald!_ To me!
To me!"
For a second, everything went silent; nobles quarreling, guards
roistering among the captures--suddenly the battlefield was still. Then
the reaction to the rallying cry set off an entirely different kind of
hubbub. The sound now was that of an alerted pack of dogs.
Once more, Geoffrey swept his hand across Dugald's face, feeling his own
skin break over the knuckles. But there was no time for anything else.
Now they had to run, and not in silence. Now everything went by the
board, and the nearest safety was the best. Behind them as they tore
through the brush, they could hear Dugald shouting:
"That way! The Barbarian's with him!" The Barbarian was grunting with
every step. Myka was panting. Geoffrey was in the lead, his throat
burning with every breath, not knowing where he was leading them, but
trying to skirt around the pack of nobles that would be running toward
them in the darkness.
He crashed against plated metal. He peered at it in the absolute
darkness this far from the fires and torches. "Tankette!" he said
hoarsely. "Empty." They scrambled onto it, Geoffrey pulling at The
Barbarian's arm. "Down, Myka--inside. Ought to be room between steering
posts and motor." He pushed the woman down through the hatch, and
dropped back to the ground. He ran to the crank clipped to one track
housing and thrust it into place. "You--you'll have to hang
onto--turret," he panted to The Barbarian. "Help me start." He wound
furiously at the starting crank until he felt the flywheel spin free of
the ratchet, and then engaged the driveshaft. The tankette shuddered to
the sudden torque. The motor resisted, turned its shaft reluctantly,
spun the magneto, ignited, stuttered, coughed, and began to roar. The
headlights flickered yellowly, glowed up to brightness as the engine
built up revolutions. The Barbarian, clinging to the turret with one
arm, pushed the choke control back to halfway and advanced the spark.
Geoffrey scrambled up the sharply pitched rear deck, clawing for
handholds on the radiator tubing, and dropped into the turret seat. He
took the controls, kicked at the left side track control without caring,
for the moment, whether Myka was in the way or not, spun the tankette
halfway round, and pulled the throttle out as far as it would go. Its
engine clamoring, its rigid tracks transmitting every shock and
battering them, the tankette flogged forward through the brush. There
was gunfire booming behind them, and there were other motors sputtering
into life.
There was no one among the nobles to drive as well as Geoffrey
could--certainly no one who could keep up with him at night, in country
he knew. He could probably depend on that much.
He lit the carbide lamp over the panel.
Geoffrey looked at the crest worked into the metal, and laughed. He had
even managed to steal Dugald's tankette.
* * * * *
By morning, they were a good fifty miles away from where the battle had
been fought. They were almost as far as the Delaware River, and the
ground was broken into low hills, each a little higher than the last.
Geoffrey had only been this far away from his home a few times, before
his father's death, and then never in this direction. Civilization was
not considered to extend this far inland. When a young man went on his
travels, preparatory for the day when he inherited his father's holdings
and settled down to maintain them, he went along the coast, perhaps as
far as Philadelphia or Hartford.
Geoffrey had always had a lively interest in strange surroundings. He
had regretted the day his journeyings came to an end--not that he
hadn't regretted his father's passing even more. Now, as dawn came up
behind them, he could not help turning his head from side to side and
looking at the strangely humped land, seeing for the first time a
horizon which was not flat. He found himself intrigued by the thought
that he had no way of knowing what lay beyond the next hill--that he
would have to travel, and keep traveling, to satisfy a perpetually
renewed curiosity.
All this occupied one part of his mind. Simultaneously, he wondered how
much farther they'd travel in this vehicle. The huge sixteen-cylinder
in-line engine was by now delivering about one-fourth of its rated fifty
horsepower, with a good half of its spark plugs hopelessly fouled and
the carburetor choked by the dust of yesterday's battle.
They were very low on shot and powder charges for the two-pounder turret
cannon, as well. The tankette had of course never been serviced after
the battle. There was one good thing--neither had their pursuers'.
Looking back, Geoffrey could see no sign of them. But he could also see
the plain imprint of the tankette's steel cleats stretched out behind
them in a betraying line. The rigid, unsprung track left its mark on
hard stone as easily as it did in soft earth. The wonder was that the
tracks had not quite worn themselves out as yet, though all the rivets
were badly strained and the tankette sounded like a barrel of stones
tumbling downhill.
The Barbarian had spent the night with one arm thrown over the cannon
barrel and the fingers of his other hand hooked over the edge of the
turret hatch. In spite of the tankette's vicious jouncing, he had not
moved or changed his position. Now he raised one hand to comb the shaggy
hair away from his forehead, and there were faint bloody marks on the
hatch.
"How much farther until we're over the mountains?" Geoffrey asked him.
"Over the--lad, we haven't even come to the beginning of them yet."