Krozair of Kregen [Dray Prescot #14] Read online

  In that uproar it was difficult to make myself heard. I turned to Duhrra. “Go and bash on the drum, Duhrra."

  “Aye, master."

  When the booming banging went on and on the men gradually quieted down and turned to look at Duhrra as he bashed away where usually the drum-Deldar beat the rhythm. I held up my hand. Duhrra stopped banging the drum and the silence fell.

  I bellowed. I am able to let rip a goodly shout, as you know.

  “Men! We must fight those swifters! There is no other way out for us. We can win easily if we stick together and fight for Zair!” This was mostly lies, of course. We could have run into the island and hidden. That would have been better than slaving at the oars. And as to winning, it would not be easy. But, Zair forgive me, I needed these men and their flesh and blood to further my own plans. I own that this makes me a criminal—a criminal of a kind, perhaps—but there was nothing else I could do, impelled as I was.

  Vax shouted, before them all, “Aye! Let us take the two swifters to the glory of Zair!"

  So they all bellowed and stamped and then it was a matter of finding weapons and clothes and armor and of seeing that not too many men fell down dead drunk.

  We would have to wait for the attack until the last moment.

  I said to Fazhan, “You are a ship-Hikdar. Can you organize from these men a crew to run the swifter?"

  “Aye, Dak."

  “Then jump to it. If we have to man the banks with our own men, they will have to do it. By Zair! They should be proud to row for Zair! We'll cripple those rasts out there!"

  I turned to Rukker, who during all this had stood glowering, with his tail waving dangerously. I felt he would not strike just yet. He was too shrewd for that. “You want to be in command, Rukker. But you know nothing of swifters. Let Fazhan run the ship. Once we have those other two, we will have three alternatives."

  He started to say something, thought better of it, and swung away. I bellowed after him, “Go and command the prijikers, Rukker. That is a post of honor."

  The two swifters made no attempt to turn in the narrow mouth of the river. They could have done it. No doubt their captains wished to get up to us as fast as they could. I fancied they erred in this. I hoped I judged correctly.

  The water rippled blue and silver, with jade and ruby sparks striking from it as the suns rose. The birds were busy about the trees. The day would be fine. I sniffed and thought about breakfast.

  No time for that now. Men were arming themselves from corpses and from the armory. I went down and had to push my way through a throng crowding along the quarterdeck and so into the cabins. Men gave way for me, for they knew I was Dak, and Dak had freed them. They had been told this by Duhrra, although some still thought Rukker had organized the break. It did not concern me.

  We could find no red cloth anywhere, and no one seemed over keen to wear green. Not even the Grodnim criminals, who kept very quiet, with good reason.

  With seven hundred men or so to arm there was no chance of my equipping myself with a longsword to match the Genodder, and any man with two weapons had, perforce, to give up one to a comrade who had none. I bellowed for bowmen and soon all the men who said they were archers clustered on the deck where all the bows we could find were issued. As for arrows, these were brought up in their wicker baskets and likewise issued. There were insufficient bows to go to all those who clamored for them.

  I saw Nath. He had a piece of cloth. He saw me and waved and then stood on the bulwarks and dived cleanly into the water.

  One or two men yelled and they would have started an outcry.

  “Silence, you famblys! Nath the Slinger goes to collect pebbles."

  A few other men turned out to be slingers and they went off to collect ammunition. Rukker turned up again; he was growing tiresome, but I wanted to humor him, for not only did he intrigue me, I needed his bull-strength in the bows as a prijiker when the attack came in. And that would not be long now. He wore a mail shirt and a helmet. He carried a longsword. He looked exceedingly fierce.

  “I do not know why I suffer your impertinence, Dak. But after we have taken those ships—"

  I turned to Vax.

  “Why have you not put on a mail shirt, Vax?"

  “Because they are all taken already."

  That was the obvious answer to an unnecessary question.

  But Rukker took the point. His face went more mean than ever, and he began to bluster. I pointed forward. “They are almost here."

  He swore—something about Targ and tails—and stormed off to the bows. He had selected a strong prijiker party, those stern fighters who were the cream of a crew.

  Again I went a little way up the mast. Grodnim swifters still had only the one mast, apart from the smaller one for the boat sail forward. I studied the oncoming swifters. Their tall upflung sterns towered. Men clustered their quarterdecks and poops, armed and armored men, anxious to revenge their fellows in Green Magodont.

  I called down to Fazhan standing on the quarterdeck.

  “Get under way and aim for the rast to larboard."

  He was a merry soul, this Fazhan ti Rozilloi, when not being flogged at the oars.

  “I have ample volunteers to act as whip-Deldars, Dak. But not many oar-slaves."

  “We do not need a great speed. Just enough to get our beakhead onto his quarterdeck."

  “That I will do."

  Vax met me as I reached the deck.

  “And the cramph to starboard?"

  “If Rukker can handle his swifter, I'll take that one."

  “Then I will stand with you."

  I lifted an eyebrow, but did not comment. Truth to tell, at that moment I was pleased to have him with me in the fight. Rukker had his party poised, and I saw he had about twenty Katakis with him. Again the incongruity of Katakis actually being slaves, instead of slavers, struck me.

  We could all hear the steady double drumbeat from the oncoming swifters. Their helm-Deldars kept them sweetly on course, going stern first, and I fancied they would both be smart ships. This was not going to be as easy as many of the ex-slaves seemed to think, screeching their joy at freedom and their malefic hatred of the damned Green Grodnims.

  Duhrra said, “The one to starboard is Vengeance Mortil, Duh—just let me get aboard of her..."

  Vax lifted his handsome, fine-featured face, with the blood staining under the skin. “It will give me exquisite pleasure to chastise her whip-Deldars."

  I said, “And each time you strike you will strike at your father, no doubt."

  He flung me a scorching look.

  “It is likely, for he and they have much in common. He has done me a great injury and I shall never forgive him."

  “My old man,” said Nath the Slinger, walking up dripping wet, carrying a leather bag filled with stones, “used to knock the living daylights out of us kids. But he meant well, the old devil."

  “Back in Crazmoz,” said Duhrra, fussing with his hand, “my father was always chasing the women. My mother used the broomstick on him right merrily. Duh—how we all ran!"

  My father had died of a scorpion sting, back on Earth; but now was no time to consider how that had affected my life.

  “Just so long as we get onto the deck. By Zair! We hold the Grodnims in play and the men slide below and release the slaves. That's the only way we'll win."

  It was not the only way, of course; but it would be the easiest. And I wished this fight to be over so that I might resume my tasks in the Eye of the World.

  A brief inquiry among the men as the two swifters hauled up to us established the second galley as Pearl. She was smaller, a two-banked six-four hundred-and-twenty swifter. She was not a dekares of the Golden Chavonth type. I eyed both of them as they backed up. Fazhan had those men of ours who had not found weapons at the upper tank looms. A little byplay had ensued there, for a group of ex-slaves without weapons had protested vigorously at taking their places on the rowing benches. I strode up, mighty fierce, not happy but knowing
what I did was right.

  “Give us weapons'” bellowed the men. “We will fight!"

  “You will row,” I said. “That will be your fighting."

  I did not say that by not already snatching up weapons they proved themselves less able than their comrades who had. But I glowered at them, and spoke more about the glory of Zair, and shook the Genodder, and finished with, “And two last things! Once we strike the damned Grodnims you will have weapons in plenty. And if you do not row I shall beat you most severely."

  They were convinced.

  My friends, even, say that sometimes I have a nasty way with me. This is so. And even if I deplore my manner, it does get things done in moments of crisis. As I went back to the station I had taken on the quarterdeck, Vax gave me a dark look, sullen and defiant.

  “You are a right devil, Dak."

  “Yes,” I said, and went off bellowing to a party of men to sort themselves out, with the bowmen in rear, a great pack of famblys, asking to be slaughtered.

  Rukker looked back. The gap narrowed.

  I yelled at him: “Get your fool hands down! They'll be shooting any moment."

  As I spoke, the first shafts rose from the two Green swifters.

  “Get the ship moving, Fazhan!” I swung about and roared at the two men who had taken the helm positions. “Bring her around to starboard! Put some weight into it!"

  Green Magodont's wings rose and fell. We could put out only a few oars; but these gave us sufficient way to take us out into midstream. I judged the distances. Arrows struck down about us. The helmsmen looked at me, hard-muscled men, hanging on to their handles, waiting my orders.

  “Hard over! Larboard!” I bellowed at Fazhan. “Every effort, Fazhan! Make ‘em pull! Speed! Speed!"

  The oars beat raggedly and then settled and the swifter's hard rostrum swirled to larboard and cut through the blue water. We surged ahead, aiming for the starboard quarter of the larboard vessel, Pearl. Our stern swung to starboard. We formed a diagonal between the swifters. Arrows crisscrossed now. I saw Nath leap up and swing his cloth about his head, let fly. I had the shrewd suspicion his stone would strike. The swifters neared. Any minute they would strike.

  "Ram! Ram! Ram!"

  The bull roar bashed up and men tensed for the shock of impact.

  We struck.

  The bronze ram gouged into Pearl. Both vessels shuddered and rocked with the impact. Men were yelling. I bawled out to Rukker; but there was no need. With his knot of Katakis about him, a compact force of devils, he leaped onto the swifter's deck. Instantly a babble of brilliant fighting ensued. Our stern swerved on, still going.

  “Rowed of all!” I screamed at Fazhan. Our oars dropped.

  The stern hit.

  Somehow I was first across, scrambling over gilding and scrollwork, hurling myself onto the deck of Vengeance Mortil. Like a pack of screeching werstings my men followed. The blades flamed and flashed in the light of the twin suns, and then we were at our devil's tinker work, hammering and bashing, thrusting and slicing.

  Vax followed and Duhrra leaped at my side. We swept a space for ourselves and then flung forward; for to stand gaping was to invite feathering.

  “Below!” I yelled and men darted off to drop into the stinking gloom of the rowing banks and begin the task of freeing the slaves.

  A monstrous man in green and gold fronted me, swirling his longsword.

  This kind of work demanded a longsword; but I made shift with the Genodder, dropped him, and with no time to snatch up his sword engaged the next man with a clang. Swords flamed all about me. Men screamed and dropped. The rank raw tang of blood smoked on the morning air.

  “Grodno! Grodno!” rang the shrieked battle cries.

  “Zair! Zair!” the answering screams ripped out.

  Mailed men boiled across the quarterdeck. For the next few murs the mere strength and solidity of packed men would tell. I cursed the damned shortsword, for its premier advantage in the thrust availed little against mailed men, although I gave a couple of fellows sore ribs before I got the point into their faces. I swung the Genodder in a short blurred arc and bashed through a mailed shoulder. A longsword hissed past my ear. It was a case of duck and twist and to the devil with the so-called dignity and art of fighting. I chunked a Fristle's eye out and slashed back at a Rapa, who spun away, screeching as Rapas do screech. The very fury and frenzy of the fight pushed us back and forth across the deck. But we had men, many men, and soon more swarmed up from below as their chains were struck off.

  * * *

  Chapter Five

  Vax

  The sheer pressure at our backs drove us on. The hideous sounds of mortal combat shocked into the sky. Blood ran greasily across the deck and men coughed or screamed or said nothing as they died. In the press the shortsword proved of value, but I caught a distorted glimpse of Duhrra swinging his longsword and clearing men from his path as a gardener hews weeds. Vax drove on with him. I cursed and beat away a spear-point, thrust short and sharp, and brought the blade back to catch a longsword sweeping down at my head and felt the jar smash along my muscles.

  I made a grab with my left hand at the longsword and after one fumble, during which I kicked a fellow in the guts, the longsword was mine. It was a common one with a small hilt; but it would serve. I swapped with a feeling of release.

  In the next mur I had leaped after Duhrra and Vax. Together we cut a triple furrow through the Green ranks. Duhrra fought as he always did with a sword, using tremendous sweeps, enormous bashes, and mighty slashings to hew down his opponents. I felt vast relief that he had found and donned a mail shirt, for he left himself dangerously exposed. Vax fought with the trim economy of the trained swordsman. I saw the way he handled his blade and again I wondered if, at his age, he could be a Krozair.

  We reached the double doors leading from the quarterdeck into the passage under the poop. Vengeance Mortil was a longer vessel than Green Magodont, rowing thirty oars to a bank against the latter's twenty-one. The poop over our heads was now the scene of fighting. We could hear shrieks and the thumps of feet on the deck. Most of the cabins were empty and we tore straight on toward the captain's cabin.

  He was not there, and I recalled the large man I had felled at the instant of boarding. If he had been the captain, then his crew fought well without him. Satisfied that the cabins here were all empty, we turned to dart out and finish the fight. I stopped stock still.

  Duhrra and Vax halted in the doorway.

  “Come on, Dak!"

  A glass case stood against the bulkhead. A shaft of mingled light struck through the aft windows and illuminated the contents of the case. Crimson blazed. A long blade of steel shafted back gleaming light.

  “Trophies,” said Duhrra. “Some poor devil of a Zairian—"

  I swung the sword at the glass and smashed the case open.

  I took the longsword into my fists. It balanced beautifully.

  A Krozair longsword. The genuine article. I saw the etched markings, the Kregish letters in flowing script: KRZI. So this was a longsword of the Krozairs of Zimuzz. The red cloth was a flag. I ripped it down and swathed it about me. I drew it up tightly between my legs and tucked in the end. I picked up the Krozair longsword.

  “Now I'm ready to finish this little lot."

  We belted back down the passage. Our backs were secure. We had only to surge forward along the swifter and take or slay all the Green and the ship would be ours.

  A dead marine lay at the corridor entrance. I bent and ripped off his belt and buckled it up about the red flag I used, without blasphemy, in all honor, as a loincloth. We went into the fight like leems. I felt rejuvenated. How ridiculous and petty it must seem that a piece of red cloth could wreak so great a change! But the true change was wrought by the Krozair longsword. The blade flamed. The balance was perfect. I felt the power in my fists and I battled forward, bellowed for my men, and together, yelling, “Zair! Zair!” we catapulted the Greens from the quarterdeck, drove them along the
upper gangway. More and more slaves poured up from below, whirling bights of chain.

  The uproar continued.

  I took time to step back as a Grodnim dropped under the blade, and darted a quick and savage look at Pearl. Yes, the fighting there flowed forward, as did the fighting in Vengeance Mortil.

  A perverse desire grew in me to clear this swifter before Rukker cleared his. I shouted again and roared on, cutting into the last resistance. The Krozair brand sheared through mail where the shortsword would have bounced. We tore into the dying remnants of the resistance and, suddenly, we were on the forecastle with the beakhead lifted, and there were no more adversaries to taste our steel.

  The men in the swifter at my back began cheering.

  I looked across the gap of water at Pearl. Fighting boiled across her forecastle where a knot of men in the green resisted to the end. I saw the Katakis—fewer of them now—battling in the front of the struggle. Rukker was there, a giant figure striking with sword and tail-blade.

  Springing onto the bulwark, I put my left hand to my mouth—my right was bloodier than my left—and I lifted up my voice and shouted in right jocular fashion.

  “Hai! Rukker! What's holding you up?"

  He heard.

  The Kataki devil heard. I saw a Grodnim head fly into the air and Rukker stormed onto the starboard bulwark, springing up to glare across at me.

  “We have cleared all! There are no skulkers at our backs!"

  “And no slaves to pull the oars, either."

  He didn't like that.

  “We have taken this Takroti-forsaken ship! That is what matters."

  “You may have taken her—but have you slaves to man her?"

  “I do not wish to discuss that."

  I heard a gurgling laugh and looked back and there was Vax holding his guts and laughing. Well, it was funny, of course; but I had no desire to be stranded without oar-slaves by that Kataki idiot over there.