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multi-colored furry bodies. Swords, shields, bucklers, and helmets flashed like night sky in the heavy
sunlight. The Horde was leaving the rafts.
"There's a slight crosswind up from the south," Hunnar in-formed them, glancing at the sky. "I expect the
main body will come from that direction. They'll slant due west and then up at us. The brunt of the attack
will fall on this line."
Sure enough, clumps of nomad troops began to detach themselves from the main mass and tacking
against the wind to gain distance to the west.
Ethan saw that they stood nearly at the end of the wall. The Great Gate Tower was to their immediate
left, another battle tower to their right. He looked back the way they'd come. All along the wall, curving
back to the castle like a gray snake, there was motion. Knights strove to adjust their men in accordance
with the enemy's movements, made last minute changes, hopeful preparations.
"Will they attack only this section of wall?" asked Ethan a little apprehensively.
"That would be foolish. As they outnumber us by so many, they will assault the entire length of the
harbor in strength, hoping to find a point we have vacated or weakened. Other-wise we could
concentrate our strength here alone and have a better chance of beating them off. But they can spread
them-selves thin and still outmatch us four and five to one at every kijat. Tis merely that from this side
they will have slightly bet-ter wind, therefore better speed and maneuverability ... Also, we must keep
troops to guard the mountain passes. They may try a thrust there, though I doubt it. Still, some of our
strength must stay there, though Sagyanak has no reason to resort to subtlety. They will come to us with
great confi-dence."
He paused and looked at September. "Friend Skua, you have no weapon."
"Why bless my soul, so I don't! Forgot the damn sword." He turned and hurried to the battle tower on
their right.
"I see you carry a sword, friend Ethan. Can you use it?"
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"I guess I'm going to learn in a hurry. I'd feel a lot better with a nice new wide-aperture laser."
"I should feel better if you had one of your magical weap-ons, too," the knight replied, managing a slight
grin. stared out across the ice. The raft-head was growing huge, horns to south- and northwest. Half to
himself, he muttered, "There will be archery fire to cover, despite the wind. Will they try to move in close
and shoot linear, or stay above us and fire downwind? Distance or accuracy?" He shook his hel-meted,
red-maned head uncertainly.
September reappeared, carrying the biggest battle-ax Ethan had ever seen. Of course, he didn't have a
working knowledge of such devices, but it looked godawful big tohim . It was double-bladed and made
of black iron. September swung it back and forth and over his head and behind his shoulders, mimicking
an action of a long-vanished terran sport.
A number of the men-at-arms gave a cheer when they saw the ease with which their alien- ally handled
the monstrous cleaver.
"You throw that axe around like a cub's toy, friend Septem-ber," said Hunnar admiringly.
"Well," said September, taking a friendly swipe with it at Ethan and nearly giving the salesman heart
failure, "I'm not much on thrusting, but I appreciate finesse. So I tried to select something suitable to my
delicate sensibilities."
Hunnar stared at him uncomprehendingly for a moment, then let out a jerking trannish laugh.
"I see. You joke. You grill tell it in more direct fashion to our verminous friends when they come over the
wail."
"I'll be as entertaining as possible," September promised. He took a deep breath. "When are they going
to get on about it? Or do we wait until after lunch?"
The answer came several minutes later in the form of a low basso rumbling from across the ice. It
sounded like distant thunder. Ethan thought he could detect an odd swirl of mo-tion near the big raft, but
it was too far off to make out de-tails.
A weird sound was that deep drone. It reached right down inside a man and caressed the bones.
"The Mardan," explained Hunnar quietly. "'That means no quarter and no prisoners. Well, we expected
no less."
Hunnar's men stood frozen at their stations along the wall. Ethan could understand their feelings. Death
made its own music.
Surprisingly, it was September and not the memory-stuffed Ethan who was able to identify the sound.
"I've heard something like this on Terra and a few other worlds," he said, "only on a much smaller scale.
On Terra they call it a bull-roarer. The natives of the northern conti-nent on G'Dim call it a Dane. But this
version must be much, much bigger to carry this far against the wind. Come to think of it, the device itself
night be wind-powered."
Abruptly, the sound ceased. Ethan could hear himself breathing. Only the wind moved. Only the wind
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talked. Ethan drew his sword, the rasp of metal against scabbard gratingly loud.
The peace was split asunder by a monstrous howling from all sides. Ethan had never heard the like
before. It came from everywhere, had no one source. And the enemy was barely in sight, since they were
moving far west to gain wind.
"Working themselves up good and proper, what?" Septem-ber whispered. "I expect when they've [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]