Rogue Sword Read online

  “Up, I say!” His temper snapped. “Or I leave you here! Haven’t you been enough of a burden?”

  She buried her face in the grass and lay unmoving. He started off. After a few yards, he looked around. “Well, are you coming?” he said.

  She climbed to all fours and then, slowly, to her feet. He went on ahead, fuming.

  The clatter of hoofs burst through his preoccupation. Too late! He stood slack-jawed, near the door of the house, as a dozen horsemen galloped around a bend in the road and up toward him.

  For one instant he thought of escape. Then Djansha came out onto the path. An exultant yell reached his ears. He shook his fist at the saints, hefted his pike, and went to stand beside her.

  The horsemen reined in with a clang. There were six Turcopols, armored in light mail over flowing shirts and trousers, with spiked helmets on shaven half-Asiatic heads. They rode their ponies high-stirruped in the nomadic fashion; their weapons were saber, ax, and a powerful double-curved bow. Five other men were also light cavalry, but in Western gear: breastplate, flat helmet, sword, dagger, and lance. Boots were drawn over trunk hose and round leather shields banged their horses’ cruppers. Their features were equally European, tanned, bearded, and hard.

  The leader was Occidental too, a full-armed knight. Cuirass, brassards, elbowpieces, tasses, and greaves were added to the hauberk that protected his neck and arms, the ringmail on his thighs. A red cloak fluttered at his shoulders and a plume on his conical, visored helmet. There was a coat of arms on his oblong shield and a pennant on the mastlike lance he gripped in one gauntleted hand.

  Teeth flashed white through his beard. He said in Catalonian: “Keep away from that pike of his. Put an arrow in him, Arslan. Be ready to catch the girl if she runs, Ferrando. We’ll take her into the house.”

  Catalan traders were nearly as ubiquitous as Venetian or Genoese. Lucas had gained fluency in their tongue while he was working out of Sinope. “Wait!” he cried. “In God’s name, Micer, what is it you do?”

  The knight reined back his big gray stallion. “I thought you a Greek,” he said. His tone was rough and unschooled. “Well, then, what are you?”

  Lucas hesitated. How had the story gone--? Oh, yes, the Genoese had seized the ships of the Catalan Company. “Venetian.”

  “All alone here?” The leader raised shaggy brows. He was a hulking figure of a man, with a heavy and deeply-pocked face. His nose had been broken in the past, a few teeth were missing, a scar zigzagged past one brown eye. “How does that happen?”

  “A petty misunderstanding. If Micer Knight will let me explain at length--”

  “If you’re an outlaw, you’ve no value. Be off!” Death-white, Djansha looked from one rider to the next. A Turcopol leered at her. “Leave the woman, Venice dweller,” he said in bad Catalonian.

  “On second thought,” said the knight, “he could make trouble later. Kill him, Arslan.”

  It leaped forlornly to Lucas’ tongue: “Wait, I say! I have a message for En Jaime!”

  “Who?” The leader gaped. The archer lowered his bow.

  “The rich hom En Jaime de Caza, of course.” Lucas stamped the butt of his pike on the ground. “I suppose you can take me to him. Do so!”

  “Hold!” rapped the knight to his followers. “Hold off, you whoresons! Back, there. . . . Uh. Your pardon, Micer de Venezia. I didn’t know. As soon as we’ve stripped yonder house, I’ll be glad to bring you and your lady before my lord.”

  Chapter V

  The house in Gallipoli had belonged to a noble of Byzantium. Now En Jaime and his staff occupied it. By day, boots racketed across mosaic floors, weapons clattered and horses tramped in the formal garden, a cowed servant corps waited on unwashed men-at-arms with a kick and a curse to speed them.

  This evening, however, the knight baron used a dining room whose riches of carpet and tapestry had escaped such treatment. Between slender columns, candles in silver brackets lit the stiff depictions of East Romans many centuries dead. A glazed window overlooked a steep downhill view. Here and there a light glimmered from some other house, or the bobbing torches of a sentry squad. There was more illumination beyond the city walls, at the waterfront: not only the moon but a pharos, high on one of the cliffs, revealed a few ships tied at otherwise empty docks.

  En Jaime nodded toward the harbor. “Those vessels brought men to enlist with us,” he said. “Certain Turks--and Greeks, who hate their degenerate overlords so much they’ll shave their heads and join us as Turcopols. They have come, and we’ve sent envoys whom we expect will recruit many more such allies.”

  The years had changed him little in outward appearance. His hair was slightly gray at the temples, and the narrow hook-nosed face bore deeper lines. But his bearing was as soldierly as Lucas remembered, his elegance of white linen and black velvet as unpretentious. He turned about, hands behind his back, to give Lucas the old thin smile. “Enough of the future,” he declared. “We have many yesterdays to learn about. It seems to be my destiny to pull you from one fire of your own lighting after another. But good to see you again, you scapegrace!”

  Lucas lounged back in a carven chair. Good to be here, he thought, with a well-cooked meal inside him, wine goblet in hand and luxurious plum-colored garments (looted from the Genoese factory) on his skin. Djansha lay between silken sheets in the room given them, and he preferred to let her sleep and talk to his friend, instead.

  Or his lord? That was no easy question. Even in those few months of his service, before En Jaime went back from Constantinople and left him, the fugitive boy and the proven man had been something more than master and servants. Lucas owed much of his skill in swordplay to En Jaime’s teaching. For his part, he had instructed the knight in Greek and shown him how to write his name. Lucas had been impudent as a sparrow--but the Catalan had allowed it, without loss to his austere dignity.

  When they parted, Lucas had wept a little.

  Now, he thought, matters were not quite the same as before. The knight who found him, Asberto Cornel, had lent spare horses and accompanied him here. That had been a wild ride, bursting doors and seizing what they would, sleeping one night in a Byzantine villa and the next night on the ground! Arriving late today, Lucas had been well received by En Jaime; but the rich hom was preoccupied with the Company’s affairs, as it finished plundering the camp of its recent besiegers. This evening had been their first opportunity to speak at length, in private. They were still feeling their way with each other, the awkwardness of long-interrupted acquaintance upon them.

  “You mentioned having traveled as far as Cathay,” said En Jaime.

  Lucas nodded. “I set off for the Orient soon after you departed, Micer. Only this month have I come back to Europe.”

  “You must have much to tell.” The gray eyes lit up. “Did you learn anything of Tartar military practice?”

  “Somewhat. I’m unsure how much could be adopted by your light cavalry--what’s the word?--your jinetes. Doubtless your Turcopols have already learned a great deal from the Mongols in Persia and elsewhere.”

  “We shall see.” En Jaime stroked his pointed beard. “You retain your clerkly skills, I hope? Excellent. We’ve need of men who can read and write. If they can also wield a blade, why, we’ll make counts of them!”

  Lucas stirred uneasily. “I know not if I--”

  En Jaime went on without noticing: “You’ve kept other gifts, too, I observe, such as finding beautiful women and causing trouble.” He seated himself and picked up his goblet. “You’ve told me how you escaped from the galleys, and intimated why. I gather you’re outlaw in every Venetian domain. Well, then, here’s your country!”

  He flushed a trifle at the ring of his own words, which did not accord with aristocratic reserve. “We are glad to enroll any worthy man as a soldier of the table,” he said with more dryness. “I can make immediate use of you on my own staff. That starts you high. I am on the Council of Twelve which the Company has elected to govern them under our new comm
ander, En Berenguer de Rocafort. Good service on your part cannot go unnoticed; you may hope to be knighted before long.”

  Lucas stared into his wine cup.

  “Well?” said En Jaime.

  Lucas jerked. “Oh . . . yes. You’re most kind, Micer. But--”

  He was remembering how Asberto’s troop had been ready to kill him like a beetle and drag Djansha into the house they intended sacking. And he remembered, even more vividly, another moment on the ride hither. The approaching horses had flushed a Thracian peasant from the brake in which he huddled. He ran down the road, his tunic flapping about skinny shanks. A jinete galloped after him, pricked him in the rear with a lance point, again and again, until blood soaked his gray tunic. At last the peasant collapsed in a faint, if his heart had not burst. Asberto Cornel rocked in the saddle with laughter.

  “I know so little about the Grand Company,” faltered Lucas.

  “What? You’ve traveled in Anatolia and not heard of Roger di Flor?”

  “Not by name, Micer. You understand how distorted such news is. In the eastern emirates, we heard only that a band of Giaours had brought God’s wrath with them.”

  “Which was not so ill put,” En Jaime agreed in a satisfied tone.

  He crossed one leg over the other, raised the glass to his lips, and looked cordially across it at his guest. “Our tale has many ins and outs,” he said. “I would need years to relate all that has happened to every man of us. And, desperta ferres, more will happen in the future. But I can give you the bare bones of the story at once.

  “So. Where shall I begin? The Sicilian War was a long one. But in the end, with God’s help, Aragon was victorious and King Fadrique mounted the throne of Sicily. That was three years ago. Now, during that war, he had hired many troops. Good, skilled, valiant lads, every one of them. However--” a touch of sardonicism--”as is not uncommon, the Lord King found his coffers not quite deep enough to pay them.

  “The mercenary captain, En Roger di Flor, had distinguished himself in the war. He had had a gallant career even before, as I must someday relate to you, until his enemies caused his expulsion from the Templars and he ended taking service under Aragon.”

  Lucas reflected that anyone cast out of so notoriously lax, greedy, and violent a brotherhood as the Knights Templar must have been a bandit indeed. It would be most impolitic, though, to voice his suspicion. Judging from what Asberto Cornel and others had let fall, Roger di Flor was regarded by his company as a martyred saint.

  “After the war,” said En Jaime, “seeing the danger King Fadrique was in from his own troops, En Roger broached a plan which the king was very willing to assist. You doubtless know in what poor condition the Empire here was, with the Turks gobbling up one Anatolian city after the next. En Roger offered to lead a strong Catalan force to the Emperor’s aid. This was gladly accepted. In September, three years ago, we reached Constantinople in a fleet of thirty-six sails, six thousand men, many of whom had their families along, as well as the thousand cavalry and thousand infantry who carried En Roger’s private standard.”

  “Ah,” laughed Lucas, “you say ‘we.’ That was the thought which saved my life: wherever Catalans were fighting, my old master was likely to be.”

  En Jaime’s smile was a warm response. “For a time,” he said, “it looked as if we’d get no fighting, except riots. Body of Christ! I’d not dreamed a government could be so corrupt and effete. No provisions whatsoever had been made for us. Yet Emperor Andronicus did at once, before we had so much as lifted a halberd, issue four months’ wages. With idle soldiers and mariners lounging about the streets for weeks on end, brawling with the Greeks and with the Genoese of Galata--why, in one such riot, the Grand Drungarios himself was slain, as his troops tried to halt it. But those Greeks are worthless, the merest yellow mongrels. . . . Your pardon. Of course, I don’t include Cretans.

  “Meanwhile Andronicus sought to curry favor with our officers, adopted En Roger into the Imperial family, named him Grand Duke, wed him to the Emperior’s granddaughter Maria. At last we were removed to Asia, where we cleared Cyzicus and Pegae of the Turks. We stayed the winter there. In spring, it was found that most of our men, quartered on the townsfolk, had incurred larger debts than they could pay. Duke Roger sought to get the needful monies from the Emperor, but failed.”

  And so the townsfolk went unpaid, thought Lucas.

  En Jaime moistened his throat with wine before he resumed:

  “There were also riots with the Alan cavalrymen serving the Emperor, as well as the civil populace. The son of their chief was killed. In the end, that was not a lucky happening for us. . . . Well. Finally we marched forth. Philadelphia, the largest city in Anatolia, lay under siege. We routed the Turks and pursued them to the Iron Gates on the Lycian frontier. Meanwhile our fleet occupied Chios and other islands, gaining a good booty.”

  Which belonged to the Byzantines, Lucas thought.

  “We wintered in Philadelphia, chiefly,” said En Jaime. “At that time the rich hom En Berenguer de Rocafort arrived with reinforcements. It became ever more plain to us how little strength or honor the Imperial government had. In revenge for our disputes with the Greeks, our treasures, which we had stored in the city of Magnesia, were confiscated next year, and our people there were put to the sword. Duke Roger laid siege, but I confess we failed to take the city, for lack of engineers and war machinery. The Imperial armies demanded to be led against us, and our Alan auxiliaries quit the standard and wandered about freely, living off the countryside. In the end, Andronicus’ son, the co-Emperor Skyr Miqueli--Michael, they call him here--smoothed matters over. But as we had long been unpaid, and had lost our treasures, we levied contribution from the provinces.”

  Lucas said nothing. He was thinking of certain men he had met one day in a Turkish camp: Greeks so embittered they had turned Moslem. They told of a land robbed bare. The only plentiful article was the bones of children who had starved to death.

  “That autumn we crossed the Boca Daner,” said En Jaime, meaning the strait which Gallipoli overlooked. “We took up quarters here and in various Thracian towns. Duke Roger visited Constantinople to demand our pay, but got only a small amount, and that in debased coinage. Wherefore our men taught the Greeks a sharp lesson by plundering all around. About this time, En Berenguer de Entenza arrived with reinforcements and--”

  There was a deferential knock. A woman’s impatient voice said, “Oh, be not a cur in your timidity, Asberto, as well as in your manners.”

  She entered without waiting for En Jaime’s leave. Behind her came the knight, Cornel. A stolen robe, on which he had wiped greasy fingers, draped his bow-legged horseman’s body. His broken visage turned embarrassedly toward the rich hom. “Na Violante wanted--” he began shyly.

  “Na Violante de Lebia Tari wanted to see this newcomer from Cathay, of whom so many rumors have been flying,” interrupted the woman. As Lucas bowed, she gave him a slow, savoring smile. “And well worth seeing he is. Are they all so gallant in the East?”

  Smooth habit answered for Lucas: “No, my lady, they are not. I’m long out of practice. Yet who would not try his best to be gallant in the presence of so much beauty?” Asberto flushed. “See here!” he growled. “Let her alone, Greco, or it’ll be the worse for you.”

  “Enough.” En Jaime raised one hand. Asberto looked at his feet, gnawed his mustache, and said no more.

  Violante continued to regard Lucas. He returned her gaze with frank pleasure. Tall, dark of eye and fair of complexion, she defied propriety by leaving uncovered the raven’s-wing hair piled on her head, and by a gown of blue silk that fitted her richly curved body like a second skin and plunged low across the breasts. Her features were a little too strong in nose and chin, a little too wide in mouth; yet surely that mouth knew how to kiss. She had adorned herself with a barbaric overflow of gems: a diamond fillet above the low brow, a ruby smoldering in the cleft of her bosom, golden bracelets coiled on her arms. Her age, Lucas guessed, was
a few years less than his own.

  “You must forgive me, En Jaime,” she said. “Asberto insisted you were entertaining privately. Yet for just that reason I had to come. When else could I listen to this man, who has guested the Grand Cham in Cambaluc?”

  “You are welcome,” said the rich hom stiffly. Lucas thought he yielded more to a certain appeal in Asberto’s eyes than to the woman.

  “Oh, now,” she murmured, touching his hand. He withdrew it. “Be not so stern. Why, you look like a flounder in Lent.”

  A reluctant smile twitched En Jaime’s mouth. “Very well, my lady. You get your way, as usual. Pray be seated. If Maestro Lucas wishes to relate a few stories of his travels, we will all be grateful.”

  “Gladly,” said Lucas. He felt Violante’s presence like a tingle over scalp and spine. Evidently Asberto--best be sure to gratify that sullen dog with an “En Asberto”--no, curse it, “Nasberto,” since the name began with a vowel--Nasberto Cornel was her lover. How had he gotten so desirable a creature?

  To gain time for preparing witty phrases she could admire, Lucas said, “I should first hear out En Jaime’s relation of the Grand Company. He left them here in Gallipoli, quarreling with the Imperium.”

  “Which tried, by conferring honors on En Berenguer de Entenza, to divide us against ourselves,” said the nobleman indignantly. “But En Roger di Flor forestalled that by yielding his title of Grand Duke to de Entenza. Meanwhile the Turks again overran Anatolia and infested Philadelphia.

  “This, as well as certain treaties being made in the West, which Rocafort feared might make us feudatories of Sicily--he is, in all confidence, Lucas, a man greedy of power--made both parties more willing to deal with each other. Or so it seemed. En Roger was created Caesar, which is just below the Emperor himself, and given many other honors and promises . . . but only four months’ pay in debased coins, which we therefore compelled the Greeks to take at face value. We then agreed to march against the Turks.”