Three hearts and three lions

22

CARAHUE LED THE WAY, with Hugi for guide. The mare took off in a clatter. For a moment Holger was aware of the red and-blue ribbons twined into her flowing tail. Then Papillon’s muscles surged between his knees.

Headed east along the scarp, they must pass the enemy. A howl arose. Holger saw a spear fly from the left. As its head caught what firelight there was, he saw it turn in the air and arch downward. He raised his shield. The spear rebounded. An instant later, three arrows thunked solidly into the wooden frame.

He rushed on into the gloom beyond. The white mare and the loose white clothes of her rider were a blob, scarcely to be told from shadows. Papillon stumbled. Sparks showered where horseshoes chipped flint. Perforce, the animals slowed to an even trot. On both sides and overhead Holger was blind. He didn’t know if his imagination or his senses told him of the cliffs to the left. He felt their weight loom above him, crushingly, as if he were already buried beneath.

A glance behind etched the heathen leader on his vision. The gaunt man in the badger mantle had snatched a brand from the campfire. He whirled it over his head till flames blossomed and he stood forth startlingly red and yellow. With a cry to his warriors he raised his ax and bounded in chase.

Swiftly he overtook the horses. Holger glimpsed others following, not quite so eager. But his attention was on this man. The chief approached on the left side, where the knight’s sword couldn’t reach. He darted in and chopped at Papillon’s fetlock. The stallion skittered away, nearly throwing his riders. Holger whirled him about to face the next attack.

If I’m delayed here longer than a minute, the bunch of ’em will surround me , the Dane realized. “Hang on, Alianora!” He leaned far over and slashed at his opponent. His blow was parried by the ax. Nimbler than any charger, the cannibal moved back. The painted face with the braided beard mocked at Holger.

But the torch in his left hand remained in sword range. Holger swatted it against the hillman’s breast. The savage barked with pain. Before he could recover, Holger was close enough to chop once more. This time the steel met flesh. The chief went down.

You poor, brave bastard , Holger thought. He spurred Papillon after Carahue. The encounter had only taken seconds.

They moved on through endlessness. The enemy trailed them, not venturing to rush. Arrows zipped through the dark. Whoops ululated. “They’ll rally themselves soon enough and close in on us,” Carahue said over his shoulder.

“I think no,” said Alianora “Canna ye whiff?”

Holger strained his nostrils. The wind was more or less in his face. He heard it go whoo-oo and shake his plume and cloak; he felt how chill it was. Nothing more.

“Ugh!” said Carahue a minute later. “Is that what I smell?”

Someone wailed in the night behind. Holger’s tobacco-dulled nose was the last to catch the odor. By that time the cannibals had given up the pursuit. They’d doubtless stick around to make sure next morning that their foes had not doubled back downhill; but they were going no farther in this direction.

If a smell could be called thick and cold, one might describe the troll’s. When Holger reached the cave mouth, he gagged.

He drew rein. Alianora leaped to the ground. “We must gather stuff for faggots, to licht our way,” she explained. “I feel dry twigs lying about, belike dropped from armfuls the beast carried hither to make his nest.” Presently she had a bundle to which Hugi set flint and steel. As the flames grew, Holger saw a ten-foot hole in the cliff wall. Lightlessness gaped beyond.

He and Carahue had dismounted. They gave Alianora their horses to lead at the rear. They themselves went in the forefront, with Hugi for torchbearer. “Well,” said the Dane uselessly, “here we go.” His tongue was dry.

“I would we micht see the stars once more,” Alianora said. The wind blew her words away. Hugi squeezed her hand.

“Oh, come now,” said Carahue. “Suppose we do meet the troll? Our swords will cut him to flitches. Methinks we’re funking at an old wives’ tale.” He strode briskly to the cave entrance, and through.

Holger went along. The sword in his right fist, the shield on his left arm, were heavy. He felt sweat trickling under his mail, itches he couldn’t scratch, dull aches where blows had landed. The air in the cave was full of troll and carrion smells. The faggot flames danced, sank low, flickered high again, so that shadows bobbed across the rough walls. Holger could have sworn some of the formations were faces that mouthed at him. Underfoot were stones on which he stubbed his toes. Alianora foresightedly continued to pick up bits of wood and straw, among the animal bones scattered along the way. The loudest noise was of horseshoes, a sharp clopping followed by hollow echoes. More and more, Holger had a sense of walls that pressed inward.

At the end of the cave a tunnel had been dug, nine feet high and not much wider, so that Holger and Carahue were crowded close. Holger tried not to wonder if the troll had dug it out barehanded. Once or twice he kicked recognizable pieces of human skulls. After the tunnel had dipped a few times his sense of balance quit and he knew they were headed downward, endlessly downward, into the guts of the earth. He strangled a wish to scream.

The passage debouched in a slightly larger cavern. Three other holes opened on the far side. Hugi waved his companions back and stumped around. The torchlight threw his face into craggy prominences but painted his shadow behind, like a black grotesque thing about to eat him.

He studied the flame, which had turned yellow and smoky; he wet his thumb and held it this way and that; he stooped to smell the ground. Finally he looked at the left-hand exit. “This ane,” he grunted.

“No,” Holger said. “Can’t you see the floor slants down in that direction?”

“Nay, it doesna. Mak’ no such muckle noise.”

“You’re nuts, I tell you!” Holger protested. “Any fool—”

Hugi stared through his brows at the man. “Any fool can follow his ain fancy,” the dwarf said. “Mayhap ye’re richt. I canna say for certain. But ’tis ma opinion that yon tunnel’s wha’ we want, and I ken a bit more to burrowing than ye do. So, are ye man eneugh to heed?”

Holger swallowed. “Okay,“ he said. “I’m sorry. Lead on.”

A ghost of a smile lifted Hugi’s whiskers. “Guid lad.” He trotted into the passage he had chosen. The rest followed.

Before long the way bent unmistakably upward. Holger said nothing when Hugi passed several holes without a glance. But when he came to another triple choice, the dwarf cast about for minutes.

In the end, troubled, he said, “By every token, we maun tak, the middle o’ those. Yet meseems the troll stink is strongest thither.”

“You can tell a difference?” said Carahue wryly.

“Mayhap his nest lies in yon direction,” Alianora whispered. A horse blew out its lips: in that narrow, resonant space, a gunshot noise. “Could ye no find us a roundabout way?”

“Mayhap,” said Hugi doubtfully. “’Twould tak’ a lang whiles.”

“And we’ve got to reach the church soon,” Holger said.

“Why?” asked Carahue.

“Never mind now,” said Holger. “Will you believe me on my word?”

This was no place to stop and explain the complicated truth, however trustworthy the Saracen had proven himself. But the obvious fact was, the sword Cortana was crucial. The enemy wouldn’t have striven so hard to block this quest, were it a wild goose chase.

Morgan could get to the church ahead of him without trouble. However, then she couldn’t shift the weapon elsewhere. Doubtless it was too heavy for her natural strength and too holy for her spells. She would need human assistance, as she had had when Cortana was first stolen. But by all accounts, the heathen were too frightened of St. Grimmin’s church to go near, even at her command; and her men elsewhere in the world were too busy preparing to march on the Empire.

Still, given time she could certainly find someone. Or... more likely... she could summon Powers that would intercept Holger on his route. He’d been luckier so far than he deserved; he knew damn well he couldn’t fight his way through her ultimate allies. Only a saint could do that, and he was a long way from sainthood.

Q.E.D.: he had to make haste.

Carahue’s gaze rested gravely on him before the Moor said, “As you wish, my friend. Let us take the straightest path, then.”

Hugi shrugged and led on. The burrow twisted, rose, dipped, rose again, cornered, writhed, widened and narrowed. Their footfalls sounded like drumbeats. Here, here, here we are, troll. Here, here, here we are.

When the rock walls closed in so they almost brushed each shoulder Holger found himself behind Hugi, with Carahue at his back and Alianora guiding the horses in line to the Saracen’s rear. Before his eyes were only red-shot glooms as the torch sputtered. He heard Carahue murmur:

“The heaviest of my sins is that ever I let so sweet a maiden enter so foul a place. God will not forgive me this.”

“But I will,” she breathed.

He chuckled. “Heh! That suffices! And after all, my lady, who needs sun or moon or stars when you are present?”

“Nay, I beg ye, we must no talk.”

“So I shall think instead. Thoughts of beauty, grace, gentleness, and charm: in a word, thoughts of Alianora. “Och, Carahue—”

Holger bit his lip till the pain stabbed him.

“Quiet back there,” Hugi rapped. “We’ve come to his very nest.”

The tunnel ended. Torchlight would not reach far into the cavern beyond. Holger had confused glimpses of walls curving upward to lose themselves in a moving darkness. The floor was piled deep with branches, leaves, moldering straw, and bones: everywhere the gnawed bones. A stink of death overwhelmed him. He retched.

“Still, I say!” Hugi ordered. “Think ye I like this place? Noa, soft across yon space. There’ll be exits aplenty on t’ other side.”

The carpeting crackled underfoot, louder for each step. Holger swayed in its thick unevenness. He tripped over a log. A branch scratched his cheek, as if trying for his eyes. A human chine fell apart when he trod on it. He heard the horses sink under their weight, wallow about and whicker indignantly.

The torch brightened. At the same moment Holger felt a cold draft. “Ho, we’re na so far from the top!” Hugi exclaimed.

“Ho,” went the echo. “Ho-o-o.”

The troll crawled from beneath dead leaves.

Alianora screamed. Even then Holger thought he had never before heard real fear in her voice. “God have mercy,” Carahue choked. Hugi crouched and snarled. Holger dropped his sword, stooped to get it, dropped it again as sweat spurted out of him.

The troll shambled closer. He was perhaps eight feet tall, perhaps more. His forward stoop, with arms dangling past thick claw-footed legs to the ground, made it hard to tell. The hairless green skin moved upon his body. His head was a gash of a mouth, a yard-long nose, and two eyes which were black pools, without pupil or white, eyes which drank the feeble torchlight and never gave back a gleam.

“Ho-o-o,” he grinned, and reached out his hand.

Carahue shouted. The saber flared. It struck with a butcher sound. Smoke rose from the wound. The troll’s smirk did not change. He reached the other hand toward Carahue. Holger got his sword and attacked that arm.

The troll batted at him. Holger caught the blow on his shield. The wood cracked. He tumbled into the rotten heap on the floor. A moment he lay struggling for breath. Carahue’s mare shrieked in panic and plunged about. Alianora hung from the reins. That much Holger saw before he got back to his feet. Then his gaze focused on Carahue.

The Saracen danced over the nest. Incredibly, he kept his balance in that tangle. Each clumsy lunge he dodged, ducked, and never did his sword rest. It whistled and clamored, a blur, behind which he smiled. Each blow went far into green flesh. The troll only grunted. But Carahue continued to seek the right wrist, coldly and carefully.

Until with a final blow he lopped off that hand.

“Next!” he laughed aloud. “Give us some light, Hugi!” The dwarf had stuck the faggot upright between two branches and now tried to help Alianora control the mare. Papillon circled about looking for a chance to help.

The stallion got his chance as the troll made a left-handed swipe at Carahue. He rushed from behind. His front hoofs smote the broad back with a drumbeat fury. The troll went on his face, Papillon reared to his full terrifying height and came down again. The troll’s head was shattered.

“Merciful heaven,” gasped Carahue. He crossed himself. Turning to Holger, he called gaily, “That wasn’t too bad, though, was it?”

Holger looked at his own caved-in shield. “No,” he said in a rueful mood. “Except for my own performance.”

The mare still shivered, but had calmed enough for Alianora to stroke her neck. “Come, let’s gang on oot,” said Hugi. “The fetor here’s like to melt ma nase.”

Holger nodded. “Shouldn’t be far—Jesu Kriste!”

Like a huge green spider, the troll’s severed hand ran on its fingers. Across the mounded floor, up onto a log with one taloned forefinger to hook it over the bark, down again it scrambled, until it found the cut wrist. And there it grew fast. The troll’s smashed head seethed and knit together. He clambered back on his feet and grinned at them. The waning faggot cast red light over his fangs.

He lumbered toward Holger. The Dane knew a moment’s blind wish to bolt. But there was no place to go. He spat on the ground and lifted his sword. As the troll reached for him, he swung with all the might he had.

Through and through that oak-branch arm the blade went. Iron belled in the dark. Ice-green blood spurted, turning black in the smoke of unnatural flesh. The sword seemed to glow. The arm sprang off at the shoulder. It rolled into a pile of leaves, flopped about, and began hunching its way back.

Carahue smote from the right side. His saber carved a slab off the troll’s ribs. Greasily, with a sucking noise, that chunk crawled toward its master. Papillon reared and smote with his forefeet. Half the troll’s face was torn off. The jaws landed under the stallion and clenched about his ankle. He neighed and bucked. The troll raked his haunches with the remaining hand. Blood welled forth. Carahue got in the way of another buffet, took it in the armored belly, went down with a clatter and did not rise.

Unkillable indeed! Holger thought. What a place to die. “Get out, Alianora!”

“Nay.” She grabbed the torch and neared Papillon, who was going mad with the grip on his leg. “I’ll get it from ye,” she shouted. “Hold still and I’ll free ye.”

The troll scooped up his left arm and put it in place. His half a face seemed still to laugh. Holger struck again and again, he opened deep wounds, but they closed at once. Back he stumbled. Over the troll’s shoulder he saw Alianora duck under Papillon’s flailing hoofs, seize the stallion’s bridle and somehow bring him to a halt. She knelt to try and pry the jaws loose.

As her torch came near, they let go. Startled, she flinched aside. “Ho-o-o,” said the troll. Turning from Holger, he scuttled toward the bones, picked them up and put them in his head. Teeth clashed as he went back to meet the Dane.

Alianora cried aloud. She struck his back with the torch. He hooted and went on all fours. A charred welt across his skin did not heal.

The knowledge burst open in Holger. “Fire!” he roared. “Light a fire! Burn the beast!”

Alianora plunged the faggot into a heap of straw. It flared up. Smoke stung Holger’s nose... clean smoke, he thought crazily, clean flames, burning out the tomb stench around him. He braced himself and hewed.

A hand flew off its wrist, halfway across the cavern. Alianora pounced on it. The thing writhed in her grasp. Fingers like green worms sought to claw free. She hurled it into the fire. For a moment the hand twisted about, even crawled from the flames. But it was already blackened. As it sank down dead, the fire moved out to engulf it.

The troll yammered. He swung the mutilated arm like a club. The sword was knocked from Holger’s grasp. He scrambled after it. The troll overfell him. A moment he lay under that mass and could not breathe. Papillon attacked. The monster retreated.

Carahue staggered erect and went to battle. Papillon had the troll down. Carahue chopped at a leg, again and yet again. When he got it off, Alianora seized it in both arms. The fire was catching in wood now. Its crackle had become a bellow; it filled the cave with light. She needed her entire strength, but she pushed the kicking leg in among the coals.

Holger came back. A hand closed on his ankle... the other hand cut off by Carahue. He tore it loose and threw it at the fire. Somehow it landed in the clear and pulled itself toward safety under a log. Hugi dove upon it. They rolled over together, dwarf and hand.

The troll’s head was off. It snapped and slobbered as Holger spitted it on his sword. He tossed it into the blaze. It rolled back, burning, spreading the flames, toward Alianora. Holger stabbed it again. Heedless of what would happen to the temper of his blade, he pinned the troll’s head in the fire till it was consumed.

The torso remained. Worst was that task, when Holger and Carahue rolled a thing as heavy as the world toward the furnace heart of the cave, while it fought them with snakes of gut. Afterward he could not remember clearly what had happened. But they burned it.

A last glimmer caught his eye. Red and ragged as the flames themselves, Hugi cast the troll’s hand into destruction. Then he sank to the floor and lay still.

Alianora flung herself above him. “He’s bad hurt,” she cried. Holger could scarcely hear her through the conflagration. Heat and fumes made him too dizzy to think. “Hugi, Hugi!”

“We’d best escape before this whole place becomes a cauldron,” Carahue panted in Holger’s ear. “See how the smoke rushes out yonder tunnel. That must be our way. Let her carry the dwarf. Help me with this idiot horse of mine!”

Somehow they quieted the animal. Somehow they groped their way down a passage where each breath was pain. And they came into the open air.