The Ancient Enemy (25 page)

Five longboats moved silently in toward the land. Rukkh stilled his nerves with a pinch of war snuff and looked back over the dark water. There was always tension just before an attack, no matter who the enemy. The moon had frosted the edges of things and given the waves a silvery glint. He closed the little wooden snuff-egg and tucked it back inside his leather breastplate. The breeze brought them the scent of the land. The oarlocks were muffled in cloth, and the oarsmen knew their job. No sound betrayed their progress. Each boat carried twenty men, handpicked from the Blitz Regiment, the toughest of the tough.

Five other boats were heading in on the other side of the village. They would swing around on either side and then move in to trap the animals in a classic pincer attack.

The village was laid out like all the monkey places, packed tightly around a central core. There were a hundred or more small houses, set close against one another, as if they'd grown together over centuries. Rukkh wondered if the monkeys were afraid to build away from each other.

Small immaculately kept fields surrounded them, and offshore there were always wide arrays of circular ponds built of rock and shingle. It was amazing how much work they had put into it all, and yet left so much of the country quite empty. Beyond the villages and the small fields lay nothing but a tangled jungle of oak and pine, scouts reporting game animals by the hundreds on every hill.

Admiral Heuze had decided that the monkeys in this village must have learned of the destruction of the place just eight miles south. But, nonetheless, the monkeys had not fled their own village. Telescope observation from the top of the mast had shown that smoke still rose from the village chimneys. Either the monkeys were very stupid, or they were damnably self-confident.

Heuze had chosen the former. The stinking monkeys had no reason to be confident. They hadn't put up much of a fight anywhere yet, and eight ships had conducted successful raids along the coast.

Heuze expected some sort of resistance, however, even if weak and disorganized, and his men were prepared. Each twenty in the boats had five bowmen among them, and the warriors wore full leather armor. It was inconvenient but necessary, since the monkeys did possess bows and swords, though so far they had never used them very effectively. The priests claimed that the monkeys did not make these things and therefore had little idea of how to wield them. According to the priests the monkeys were pure abomination, inferior beings created by the Fallen Ones and intended to usurp the world from Man. The Great God himself called for their total extirpation.

The warriors had found little difficulty so far in carrying out the commands of the priests. So poor had been their resistance that no one had taken a monkey's head. The monkeys simply weren't worth the honor of having their heads shrunk for a warrior's personal shrine.

The war snuff had taken effect and banished any nervousness. Rukkh was confident enough about the upcoming action that his thoughts returned to the girl, Simona of Ghuiter.

She was the pretty one! Despite eating the same rations as everybody else, she retained her womanliness, her rounded hips and firm breasts, that spoke to him of good fertility. There was a fire in her eyes which spoke of passion in the bedroom.

Perhaps, if he could distinguish himself in some way, the girl's family would be mollified. He knew that her parents were bound to resist him at first. They were of noble blood, she more than he, but both were from landed families. His own bloodlines were poor and rural, of little account in the social world of Shasht.

But this was the new world, the New Land, and flexible conditions would exist for a while. If he proved himself worthy, he could rise into the nobility.

Someday soon, he swore to himself, he would take the girl, and they would found a mighty clan together on the New Land. He felt a surge of pride. He and his fellows were unstoppable. They were the warriors of Shasht. No one could defeat them, not since the days of the first emperor, Kadawak. Now they were in the reign of the twenty-third emperor, Aeswiren III, and Shasht stood triumphant over the entire world.

Except here on this distant shore, unknown to any except the priests. Where only the monkey folk stood to contest the law of the Great God, He Who Eats.

The boat ground ashore on the mud. The tide was out and they had a wide expanse of mudflats to cross. Toward the village, the flats were covered in the maze of walls that contained the seaponds. The walls were mostly about five feet tall and usually two or three wide, made of stone and cemented together by mollusc-growth mats. Between them wound torturous little pathways that had confused even the scouts. They would have to be avoided by the warriors.

The water was cold when he jumped out into the knee-deep foam. There was a breeze building off the sea now. He took his first step on the New Land.

"There's a light up there, damn it!" Captain Cauta was pointing to the headland up above them.

Piercing the gloom above and to the south was a single bright flare of yellow light. As they watched, it moved. Someone was waving it back and forth.

"They are signaling to the village?"

"What else?"

"I didn't think they were capable of such complicated thinking."

"We'd best hurry. Bowmen be prepared."

They moved out of the surf and across the flats, jogging at a steady pace. Above the mudflats was a bank of shingle, small loose stones the size of hens' eggs. They scrambled up the bank in a roar of stones and emerged on top of a grassy open area along which ran a narrow road paved with rough flint cobbles.

Rukkh was mildly surprised by the road, which though only five feet wide ran ahead unbroken, paved with stone. He hadn't thought the monkeys would be capable of something like this. Then he thought that of course they must have inherited all these things from others. There must have been men here once, long ago.

Up ahead lay the village, the dark outline of the roofs and chimneys was visible in the moon's light. Despite the lateness of the hour smoke still rose from a few chimneys.

Hukkit was beside him, and behind them came Forjal.

"For the glory of the Great God!" said Forjal with the mad excitement of a berserker in his eyes. "Let's kill the fucking monkeys! Kill them all."

"For His glory!" echoed Hukkit.

"Silence in the ranks," hissed Sergeant Burok.

Rukkh said nothing, but his eyes glowed. He shifted and adjusted the strap that held his shield on his back, then took the spear in both hands.

They moved down the dark road as quickly as they dared. It was rough and uneven in places, but not as much as Rukkh had expected. It was as good as any road in his home village.

Ahead lay the monkey village, a cluster of deeper darknesses against the gloomy mass of the land beyond. Trees grew up close on both sides of the road, and there were stone walls, perhaps four feet high along the edge of the fields. The walls seemed extraordinarily precise in their layout.

They slowed a little.

The village ahead was quiet, but watchful. They could all sense it. The road ran into the village and became a narrow way between the walls of the houses. It did not look inviting. Unfortunately, there didn't seem any other way through the continuous wall of housing that stretched right down to the beach.

They would have to enter on the main road. A little tentatively, they pushed forward with a wary eye on the rooflines ahead. The monkeys had killed a couple of men with arrows during a raid by the
Batterer
. Ahead through the murk they saw that the road was barricaded.

Cauta halted them for a moment while he studied the situation and weighed the possibilities. He talked briefly with Sergeants Burok and Hugga.

"We're very close, and they've not shown any opposition at all."

They were indeed barely a hundred feet from the barricade between the grey-stone walls. But the barricade was only six feet high, easily climbed.

"Forward!" said Cauta crisply. They were the warriors of Shasht! Nothing could stand against their assault. They charged the barricade.

Rukkh took two steps, and with startling abruptness bright lights lit above their heads and dropped down toward them.

Pots of oil were smashing on the stones, and flames were blazing up. Someone fell over screaming, covered in fire. A hail of arrows and stones came flashing through the light. A stone hit Rukkh on the upper arm, another caught the crest of his helmet and bent his head sideways. Then he had his shield around and his spear in his right hand and was going forward again, with the war cry of Shasht on his hips.

Men were going up the barricade. Ulu in front of Rukkh. Big Ulu bellowed the war cry and suddenly there were monkeys standing up atop the barricade, with spears in their hands and bright steel swords.

"Kill!" bayed Ulu, and he plowed ahead. There was a flash of metal, Ulu gave a grunt and staggered back, dark blood spurting from his neck. Rukkh dodged Ulu's toppling body as he scrambled up. Something collapsed under his weight and he sank into the barricade. He put his hand out for support and came up with a handful of Ulu's intestines.

Then Hegg fell past him with a bubbling shriek as blood fountained from his neck. Mugutta was going up, cursing steadily as he sought to keep his feet on the barricade.

There was steel clashing on steel and the constant roar of screams, clattering shields, and curses that made up any close-order combat. Someone deadly was atop the barricade though, for another man, Kunchovi, came sliding back, sliced across the belly.

Rukkh got out of the broken barrel, pushed past Kunchovi's still form, and surged up to the top of the barricade.

There were monkeys lined up all the way across, wielding swords, knives, and axes for the most part. One of them wielded his sword two-handed with ferocious skill, leaving dead men behind him wherever he stepped up.

Despite that, things were not so good for the monkeys. Forjal speared one through the exposed chest. Hukkit knocked another clean off his feet with a shield charge. A moment later Hukkit's spear sank into the fallen monkey's leg. It shrieked and writhed, like a serpent pinned to the ground. Rukkh's own spear flicked out and took its life.

Another monkey, this one with a shield of its own, was in front. Rukkh lunged overhand with his spear, keeping his shield up. His extended reach kept the monkey back while it diverted his spearpoint with its shield. Then it closed and they went shield to shield. Rukkh dropped his spear and drew his sword. They exchanged ringing blows, sword on sword, while slamming the other's shield.

Rukkh sensed he had an advantage. He dug in hard with the shield and pulled his opponent off-balance. Then he swung in, from the hips with the sword. It should have worked. He had a glimpse of a frightened face, very much like that of a man, but with the huge eyebrows of a monkey. Then his sword caromed off the other's shield, and he was forced to clip off a sword thrust at his belly with the edge of his own shield. Before he could find his footing there was an overhand blow coming for his head. He got the shield up just in time and struck out with a foot, making solid contact. The monkey was driven back a few feet.

With a loud
thunk
, an arrow suddenly sprouted from his shield six inches from the edge. More arrows were slicing the air around him. He heard Hukkit give a shriek and turned his head in time to see his old friend go down over the broken barrel to sprawl on the cobbles.

Rukkh deflected the sword again and thrust back with his own. The monkey lost his footing on the barricade and Rukkh jerked his shield up and smacked his foe in the face with it. That knocked him over, and before he could recover, Rukkh drove his sword into the monkey's groin. It doubled up with a scream and he stabbed it again through the ribs.

Rukkh gave the war cry and smashed his heavy sandal into the monkey's head as it sprawled in death. He sheathed his sword and took up his spear.

More stones were flying by, one snicking off the very top of his helmet. He discovered that he was bleeding from a long cut that had gone through the armor into his thigh. A quick examination showed he could carry on. Other men thrust past him and over the barricade. The monkeys were either running for it or they were dying. Not even the skill of the one with the sword could staunch the breakthrough.

Mugutta was swinging his sword in the street beyond. Rukkh knocked another monkey flying with a smash of the shield. Its feet left the ground and his spear flicked into its back and pinned it to the ground. It screamed and squirmed as he trod on it and pulled out the spear and thrust it down again to finish it.

He roared the war cry. Heard echoes from other men's throats all around him. Shasht was victorious! As ever and always, in the name of the Great God Orbazt Subuus.

The monkeys were all running by then. Forjal was roaring out the glory of the Great God as he cut down monkeys from behind.

There were still arrows coming their way, though. Rukkh felt something strike solidly into his shield, and another shaft appeared quivering before his eyes. He snapped it off like the first. Another one clipped the side of the shield and spun away behind him. He was becoming a target. He darted to a dark opening for cover through a hanging hide door. He barged inside. Someone struck him with a cudgel and caught him on the shield shoulder. He went down on one knee, received another blow, then thrust out blindly into the dark. There was a squeal of pain; his spear had gone home somewhere.

Someone was on his back. He ducked his still-numb shoulder. The body on his back shifted, and he reached up and flipped it over and away.

His eyes had adjusted to the darkness. There was a young monkey with a knife. Another one was sitting in the corner of the small dimly lit space clutching his belly where the spear had gone home.

The young one lunged at him with the knife. He fended it off with his shield, caught it on the rebound, and slammed it into the wall. His spear came up and sank home through the creature's middle.