Svanhild peered over her brothers' shoulders as they watched by the little protruding ridge of limestone, arquebuses at the ready. The stream, which had been no more than a bare trickle so recently, was now making so much noise that they were forced to shout. But at least the smoke was gone. The rain, too, was nearly over.
"Give it a little while longer and I'll go and scout. That was the luckiest rainstorm in history," said Kari.
Bjarni raised an eyebrow. "Maybe so. But why did the stream flood before the rain fell?"
"It must have rained higher up in the catchment, Bjarni."
The oldest Thordarson brother shook his head. "This damned trickle hasn't got a catchment worth talking about, Kari. There is something funny going on here. I hope things haven't just got worse."
"There is someone coming up the gorge!" shouted the hearthman on guard up on the slope.
They all took cover, including Svanhild. "Pick your marks!" commanded Bjarni. "Don't open fire until I say so."
Svanhild peered anxiously toward the mouth of the gorge. Bright sunlight was shivering into scatterings of brief rainbows through the last veils of rain. The rider came in sight around the corner. His dark hair was wet and plastered about his face, but Svanhild knew those facial planes instantly. Her heart hammered, and she found herself abruptly breathless.
"Svanhild!" he called, his voice echoing off the cliffs.
A shot boomed. The bullet kicked a white spurt of dust from the limestone next to the rider's head. Erik Hakkonsen whirled his horse in the direction of the firing and shook an empty fist. "You stupid Vinlander bastard! I've come to rescue you!"
Svanhild stopped only long enough to lay down her bow, and then was out and running down the slope. "Erik! Erik!"
A huge smile nearly split Erik's face in half. As she skidded to a halt on the slippery rock beside his stirrup, his face went from angry and anxious to—well . . .
Foolish. "Er. Good morning, Svanhild Thordardottar."
She stood there smiling up at him, feeling equally foolish and desperately wishing she could think of something to say. He vaulted down from the dun he was riding. She could see, though it was no help, that he too was fumbling for words. All the long and carefully thought-out speeches had gone from her head, as if she had never even considered making them. But she had to help get something started, or they would both stand there, looking, not touching, not saying anything.
"Why is your hair dark now?" was all she could think of to say.
He ran his fingers through his hair as if he had not known it was dark. "I was trying to pass as one of the locals."
Svanhild looked at him, branding his appearance into her memory, in case—well, in case. He was tall, lean and athletic; she had known that, of course, but now she was aware of it. His face had a hewn masculinity to it, planar and strong, and nothing detracted from the way he looked in her eyes, not even the soot on his face and the water dripping from his hair.
Then a thin sliver of reality intruded. With the high cheekbones and the straight hair, even with his skin and hair darkened, Erik looked as much like a local as a wolf looks like a bison. She had to laugh. And Erik began laughing with her. By the time that her brothers and their hearthmen joined them, they were virtually leaning on each other, helpless with laughter.
Benito heard the shot, and decided he'd come running. He was wise enough about his own horsemanship to approach on foot. He also kept his head down. Still, by the time he got to where he could see them, the Vinlanders, Erik and his sweetheart were all standing around beaming at each other.
"Well, they look really miserable."
Benito turned to see both Spiro and Thalia had followed him. Spiro was being his usual quirky self.
"Good," said Benito. "Let's go and make them more miserable and tell them they have got to get out of here. Before the villagers come back and roast them again, or roll rocks on them."
Thalia shook her head. "Not likely. The men will be hiding under their beds and hoping their wives don't find out where they decided to make a fire."
"I wouldn't tell these foreigners that in case they decide to have a roast goat to celebrate," said Spiro. "People are very touchy about their goats around Paleokastritsa. More touchy about their goats than their wives, which, if you look at the wives, makes sense. Not like the women in Liapádhes, of course."
Thalia looked at him with her mouth open, as if she wasn't entirely certain whether or not Spiro was mad.
Spiro winked at her. "Of course the goats around Liapádhes are prettier than those in Paleokastritsa, too. They have to be."
Benito walked out to the Vinlanders rather than find out any more about the local goats and goat-herds.
"Ah, Benito," Erik greeted him. "Friends, this young gentleman is the reason I'm here."
"And will be the reason we're getting out of here, Erik." Benito was getting increasingly anxious to break up the happy reunion. "The locals might come back, and besides, that fire will have told every Hungarian trooper in the area that something is going on here."
"But where will we go?" asked Svanhild, her face passing from joyful to desperate in a single moment. "Everyone is trying to kill us."
"We'll go back to Paleokastritsa," Benito said firmly, as Spiro and Thalia picked their way toward the group. "You'll have to do some explaining about their goats. And pay for them."
The biggest of Vinlanders snorted. "Of course we will pay for their goats! We would have paid in the first place, if anyone had been willing not to run away from us. What were we supposed to do? Starve?"
"You'd better pay up generously and say you are very sorry," said Spiro. "I'll handle it for you. For a fee, of course."
One of the huge Vinlanders—they all looked alike to Benito—looked nearly apoplectic. "Apologize? But they nearly killed us. They nearly killed my sister!"
"And you did kill their goats, no 'nearly' about it," Benito retorted. Then, couldn't resist adding: "And according to Spiro, goats are a lot more appreciated around here than sisters. Come on, let's go and see if they'll let us back into Paleokastritsa. I left my breakfast and a glass of wine behind to come and rescue you from the goat-avengers. Erik is not so bad-tempered, because he was only currying horses and he was looking for you anyway."
"He was?" Svanhild gazed upon Erik with blue eyes so bright they seemed to have stars in them.
Benito smiled slyly at Erik. "Oh, yes! When he heard from Maria Verrier that you were out here, he did not even let an entire besieging army stand in his way. He left the citadel by night, over the walls with a leaking boat, braving enemy patrols and the wild sea in the torrential rain, staying neither to sleep nor rest, riding vent a terre until he reached the villa Dentico. All that was in his mind was the safety of his golden-haired Svanhild."
"Shut up, Benito," growled Erik, glowing dully. Under the dye, that pale skin produced a truly vibrant red color. Benito decided that the next time they were cold, he'd embarrass the Icelander; you could warm a family of five by the heat he gave off.
"But it is true!" insisted Thalia. "He saved me from the raping Croats, kyria. He killed two of them, just like that. And the sentry on the hill. He is a great fighter. He pulled at the burning wood with his bare hands and he beat back the men of Paleokastritsa and—"
"And let's get out of here! Please," begged Erik. "Either the Hungarians will arrive, or the locals are bound to come back."
"Or both," agreed one of the Vinlanders. "Don't want to be in the middle of that."
Soon the entire party was riding to Paleokastritsa.
The yellow dog almost howled in triumph. At last the shaman had a trace of magic that rose above the general reeking miasma of this place. He ran through the olive groves, pine forests and the macchia. He ran on past sentries and past hiding peasants. He had many miles to go.
But it had been a piece of intense and powerful sorcery, not finely crafted and precise as the names of power he used, not demon-bludgeon strong as Jagiellon used. Precisely, he thought, what Jagiellon was looking for. This magic was raw and primal, elemental—big, in the way an earthquake or a thunderstorm was big.
Dangerous, too, but that was not his problem. His problem was to find it, Jagiellon's to tame it.
He sent his hawks winging north, a part of him seeing through their eyes, eyes that could see a field mouse twitch the grass at five hundred feet. It took him quite some time to realize that the hawks were being subtly pushed away. The thermals slid them off to the west, the winds seeming to buffet against them whenever they tried to fly to one corner of the island. The hawks were becoming exhausted. Worse, they were becoming recalcitrant. Ever since he had tried to use them above Venice, the shaman had noticed that his control over the two hawks was not as it should be.
He was both angry and astonished. It was not possible! He had their true names, which made them his. His absolutely. Yet . . . he could not ignore the fact that they were rebelling. Not in great things but in small ways, in a slow and steady erosion of his control. It must be this vile place's magic.
Well, where they could not go was as good an indication of where he had to go as them actually seeing something. The yellow dog ran on, allowing the hawks to go to roost.
It was midafternoon before he reached the place. He looked at the few burned branches and the evidence of the recently flooded stream and smelled raw magic.
He tried to take a step forward, and stumbled. Grass had grown around his feet, the thin strands intertwining and binding. He kicked his way loose, then moved forward, sniffing. A dog's nose is a wondrous instrument. He could smell the horses as individuals; he could smell the people, the peasants and the others, and know who had wandered where. He could smell the women among them, two of them. He could smell . . .
Achoo! He erupted in a volley of sneezes.
All the flowers suddenly seemed intent on smothering him in their scents. He flicked his ears. A horsefly buzzed about them; then another. One bit him just below the tail on the exposed flesh. The shaman turned and snapped angrily at it, cracking it in his yellow teeth. Another bit his ear as he did so. Several more came buzzing up. One affixed itself to his nose. The shaman pawed furiously at it.
The shaman was one of the greatest and most powerful of magicians. He was proofed against many great magics.
Horseflies made him flee.
Horseflies in those numbers could make anything flee. They seemed immune to his protective spells.
Still, he knew the area in which the magics were being worked now. The master could send Aldanto. It would do the blond puppet good to be bitten by few horseflies.
"Go away or we'll shoot you," said one of the pair of guards on the wall. He brandished his arquebus in a manner that was more awkward than fierce. "You're not wanted here!"
One of the Vinlanders, the one who seemed to do all of the talking, contrived to look sheepish and apologetic. "It was a misunderstanding, truly. We were running from the invaders, and we were starving. We have money! We want to pay for the animals."
There was a hasty consultation between the sentries. "We'll get someone to call old Cheretis. It was his goats."
The other guard peered at them more closely. "Oh. It's you again, Spiro. I thought we'd gotten rid of you. I see you're in bad company, as usual."
"But I haven't been anywhere near your sister, Adoni," said Spiro with a grin.
The guard glared at him. The other guard nearly fell over the crenellations laughing.
The goat owner, when he arrived, reminded Benito more of a sullen, bad-tempered porker than a goat. Like the ones a few people over on Guidecca had kept on the scraps in those big market-gardens over there. He had the same sparse, bristly beard and pronounced jowls.
But he was as obstinate as a goat, even if he didn't look like one. "They must be punished! Even if they pay for the goats, they must be punished!" He pleaded with the guards, in a squeaky voice. "After all, if you shoot them, I get paid for my beasts from the money they have with them. And you get the rest."
Spiro shook his head. "Don't be dafter than you have to be, you old Malakas. They were strangers visiting our beautiful island when the Hungarians attacked. Where is our famous Corfiote hospitality? Why are you fussing over a few miserable, scrawny goats?"
"Scrawny goats! They killed my best milker! She was the most beautiful goat on the island, hair like silk, an udder as soft as a baby's face and milk, so much milk you'd have thought she was a cow. And as for hospitality: what sort of guests kill your livestock?"
Spiro turned to the Vinlanders, Benito, Erik and Thalia. "See? I told you how they felt about their goats in Paleokastritsa!"
The laughter might have infuriated the goat-owner, but it decided the two guards that they were obviously no threat. "Have you got the money to pay the old bastard?" asked one guard.
"In gold," said Bjarni, curtly.
Not much gold came to Paleokastritsa. Even the goat-owner looked less sour. "Such fine goats as mine are worth a great amount of gold."
"Let us in and we can argue about it," grumbled Benito, "before some Hungarian troopers come along because of all that smoke. And they take all the gold instead."
Benito reached into his own small pouch and hauled out a silver penny. "Here, Spiro. I owe you this for information. I promised him a ducat from you, Erik."
Erik dug in his pouch. "Here are two." He handed them over with a flourish carefully visible to the gate. "I'm in your debt for finding and helping my friends."
Guards and goat-owner had developed eyes like saucers; the goat-owner's were full of greed.
Spiro looked at the coins, beaming. "I'm rich!" He walked over to the gate and pounded on it. "Let me in. I need a drink."
"You'll have to leave your swords and guns in the gatehouse," said one of the guards. "And you owe me a cup of wine, Spiro."
Spiro grinned. "I'm buying, so you might as well get yours before the money's all drunk up."
"After you send some goat-boys to look for that friend of yours," said Benito. "The fisherman."
Spiro nodded. "Sure. But I intend to be already hung over and broke before Taki Temperades gets here." Then he elbowed Benito in the ribs. "Trying to rob you was the smartest dumb thing I ever did, eh?"
At the moment, Benito was inclined to agree.