Marauders of Gor (46 page)

           
"Kill Kurii," I heard. "Kill Kurii."

           
"What is it?" I asked Ivar Forkbeard.

           
I saw a man, with his fingernails, blind himself, and feel no pain. With his one remaining eye he stared into the valley. I could see foam at the side of his mouth. His breathing was deep and terrible.

           
"Look upon Rollo," said the Forkbeard.

           
The veins in the neck, and on the forehead, of the giant bulged, swollen with pounding blood. His head was bent to one side. I could not look upon his eyes. He bit at the rim of his shield, tearing the wood, splintering it with his teeth.

           
"It is the frenzy of Odin," said the Forkbeard. "It is the frenzy of Odin."

           
Man by man, heart by heart, the fury gripped the host of Svein Blue Tooth.

           
It coursed through the thronged warriors; it seemed a tangible thing, communicating itself from one to another; it was almost as though one could see it, but one could not see it, only its effects. I could trace its passage. It seemed first a ghastly infection, a plague; then it seemed like a fire, invisible and consuming; then it seemed like the touching of these men by the hands of gods, but no gods I knew, none to whom a woman or child might dare pray, but the gods of men, and of the men of Torvaldsland, the dread, harsh divinities of the cruel north, the gods of Torvaldsland. And the touch of these gods, like their will, was terrible.

           
Ivar Forkbeard suddenly threw back his head and, silently, screamed at the sky.

           
The thing had touched him.

           
The breathing of the men, their energy, their rage, the fury, was all about me.

           
A bowstring was being drawn taut. I heard the grinding of teeth on steel, the sound of men biting at their own flesh.

           
I could no longer look on Ivar Forkbeard. He was not the man I had known. In his stead there stood a beast.

           
I looked down into the valley. There were the lodges of the Kurri. I recalled them. Well did I remember their treachery, well did I remember the massacre, hideous, merciless, in the hall of Svein Blue Tooth.

           
"Kill Kurii," I heard.

           
Within me then, irrational, like lava, I felt the beginning of a strange sensation.

           
"I must consider the beauty of the Torvaldsberg," I told myself. But I could not look again at the cold, bleak beauty of the mountain. I could look only into the valley, where, unsuspecting, lay the enemy.

           
"It is madness," I told myself. "Madness!" In the lodges below slept Kurii, who had killed, who had massacred in the night. In my pouch, even now, there lay the golden armlet, which once had been worn by the woman, Telima.

           
Below, unsuspecting, they lay, the enemy, the Kurii.

           
"No," I said. "I must resist this thing."

           
I drew forth the golden armlet which had been worn by Telima.

           
On a bit of fiber I tied it about my neck. I held it. Below lay the enemy.

           
I closed my eyes. Then I sucked in the air between my teeth.

           
Somewhere, far off, on another world, lit by the same star, rnen hurried to work.

           
I fought the feelings which were rearing within me. As well might I have fought the eruption of the volcano, the shifting of the strata of the earth.

           
I heard the growling, the fury, of those about me.

           
Below us lay the Kurii.

           
I opened my eyes.

           
The valley seemed to me red with rage, the sky red, the faces of those about me. I felt a surge of frenzy building within me. I wanted to tear, to cut, to strike, to destroy.

           
It had touched me, and I stood then within its grip, in that red, burning world of rage.

           
The bowstring was taut.

           
There was foam at the mouth of Svein Blue Tooth. His eyes were those of a madman.

           
I lifted my ax.

           
The thousands of the men of Torvaldsland, on either side of the valley, made ready. One could sense their seething, the unbearable power, the tenseness.

           
The signal spear, in the hand of the frenzied Blue Tooth, its scarlet talmit wrapped at the base of its blade, was lifted. The breathing of thousands of men, waiting to be unleashed, to plunge to the valley, for an instant was held. The sun flashed on the shield. The signal spear thrust to the valley.

           
With one frenzied cry the host, in its fury, from either side of the valley, plunged downward.

           
"The men of Torvaldsland," they cried, "are upon you!"
 

           
Chapter 18
  
               
What then occurred in the camp of the Kurii

           
The Kur dropped back from the blade. Howling I leapt upon another, striking it before it could rise, and then another.

           
Simultaneously with the attack from the slopes the girls in the cattle pen, following the orders of masters, conveyed to them by Hilda, crying out, fled in their hundreds from the pen, streaming throughout the camp. The herd sleen rushed among them but, confused in the numbers, found lt diffcult to single out women for returning to the pen. Similarly the marine predator attacking a school of shimmering flashing bodies makes fewer successful strikes than he would if he were able, undistracted, to single out individual quarries. A sleen would no sooner mark out a girl for return to the pen than three or four others would constantly enter and disappear from his ken, often luring him into their pursuit, while the first slips free, in her turn later perhaps to save another similarly. Furthermore, when a sleen would fasten on a given girl she would permit herself, rapidly, to be returned to the pen. Thus the sleen, obedient to its training, would not harm her. As soon as she was back in the pen, of course, she would leave it again, escaping from a different sector. Any girl found remaining in the pen by a man of Torvaldsland, seeking her own safety, unless she had been ordered there by a free attacker, was to be summarily slain. I was pleased to note that the women feared more the men of Torvaldsland than even sleen and Kurii. Danger to them was of no interest to us. Their lives were unimportant. They were slaves. Accordingly, we used them to create a diversion. Many Kurii, springing from their tents, emerging from the leather and fur shelter tunnels, confused, first saw only the sleek, two-legged cattle streaming past, until perhaps axes fell upon them. The nature of the attack, and its extent, would not be clear to them.

           
A Kur lifted its great ax. I charged him, my ax swift before he could strike.

           
I wrenched free the blade of the ax, as it slumped down, breaking it free from its jawbone and shoulder.

           
"Tarl Red Hair!" I heard cry. It was the voice of a girl, wild, slender. I turned. I realize now it was Thyri, but I did not recognize her at the time. I stood mighty and terrible, the ax ready, my clothes drenched with blood, the Kur rolling and jerking at my feet. She put her hand before her mouth, her eyes terrified, and fled away.

           
I saw a Kur seize a man of
 
Thorgard of Scagnar's camp and tear his head from his body.

           
The attackers, as well as the men of Thorgard of Scagnar, wore yellow scarves at their shoulders. Many Kurii, confused in the beginning, had fallen to the axes of scarved men, putatively their allies. Now, however, indiscriminately, they sought to destroy all armed male humans. Many were the men of Thorgard who fell beneath the teeth and steel of Kurii, and several were the Kurii who fell to the weapons of Thorgard's men, as they fought madly to defend themselves.

           
Once I saw Thorgard of Scagnar and Ivar Forkbeard trying to reach him. But Ivar was blocked by Kurii and warriors, and joined in their combat.

           
I heard the screaming of slave girls.

           
I saw two Kurii converging on Gorm.Twice , from behind, the ax swept laterally, once to the left, the second time to the right, chopping through the spines.

           
A sleen, more than eleven feet in length, six-legged, slid past, its fur wiping against my thigh.

           
Gorm, in his madness, was cutting at the bodies of the
 
Kurii fallen now before him, shrieking.

           
Shoulder to shoulder, fighting, I saw Bjarni of Thorstein Camp and the young man, whom I had championed on the dueling ground in the thing.
 
I smelled fire. There was the howling of Kurii.

           
I saw a Kur, barred with brown, turning, backing away, snarling, limping, from Ottar, who kept the Forkbeard's farm. Ottar pursued it, heedless of his safety, his eyes wild, killing it, cutting its body then in two with repeated blows of his ax.

           
I saw the huge, little-known man of Torvaldsland, who had joined the host late, calling himself Hrolf, from the East, who had come from the direction of the Torvaldsberg. With a cry he thrust his spear through the chest of a Kur.

           
He fought magnificently.

           
A Kur charged. I side-stepped, catching it in the belly with the ax.

           
I saw another Kur, undecided, startled. I slipped in gut. It charged. I reared the handle of the ax, catching it in the stomach, turning it to one side. It grunted. I leapt up, catching it in the side of the neck before it could rise. Its head half to one side it rose to its feet and ran for a dozen yards before it slipped, falling sideways, rolling into the fur and burning leather of one of their lodges.

           
"Protect
 
me!" I heard. A female threw herself to my feet, putting her head to my ankle. "Protect me!" she wept. I looked down. She lifted her face, terrified, tear-stained. She had dark hair, dark eyes. I saw the iron collar, dark, on her white throat. It was Leah, the Canadian girl. With
 
my foot I thrust her, weeping, to one side. There was men's work to do.

           
I met the attack of the Kur squarely. The handle of its ax smote down across the handle of mine, forcing me to one knee. Slowly I reared up, forcing the handle, now held in the two paws of the Kur, upward and backward. It again thrust down, with its full weight and strength, certain that it could crush the puny strength of a human. I held it only long enough to satisfy
 
myself that I could, then I withdrew the handle swiftly, twisting to one side and lifting the ax. It fell forward, startled. I stepped on the handle of the ax. It tried to dislodge it. My ax was raised. It roIled wildly to one side. My blow fell against its left shoulder blade, dividing it. Howling, it leapt to its feet, backing away from me, baring its fangs. I followed it. It turned suddenly and leapt away. I caught it before the opening of a pavilion tent, one of those of Thorgard of Scagnar, perhaps his own. The tent was striped. The Kur, turning, now facing me, moved backward; it stumbled against a tent rope, jerking loose its peg. I leaped forward, striking it again, at the left hip. The side of its furred leg was drenched with blood. Hunched over, snarling, it backed into the tent, where I followed it. There was screaming from within the tent, the screaming of Thorgard's silken girls, many of them short, plump, lusciously bodied. Some were chained by the left ankle. The silks they wore, clinging and diaphanous, were designed not to conceal their beauty but to reveal it, to enhance and accentuate it, to expose it sensuously to the survey of a master. They, collared, shrank back, cowering on the cushions, drawing back to the side of the tent. I scarcely glanced at them. They would belong to the victors.

           
The Kur, backing away, with its right arm, reaching across its body, tore up one of the tent poles, wrenching it free of the earth, the tent. The tent sagged near him. He snarled. He thrust out with the tent pole, using the spike at its top like a spear. Then he swung the pole, striking at me. I waited. It was weak from the loss of blood. It turned about again and fled to the opposite wall of the tent. It tried to tear the siIk, and it was at the wall of the tent that I caught it. I lifted my ax from the body, and turned to face the women. I strode to them. They knelt, huddled together, holding one another, at the side of the tent. They put down their eyes, trembling. I left the tent.

           
"Where is Thorgard of Scagnar?" asked Ivar Forkbeard. His shirt was half torn away. There was Kur blood on his chest and against the side of his face.