The Sterkarm Handshake (47 page)

Per was still fighting Bryce—but as the cramped muscles of his arms and shoulders ached, and the abrasions on his wrists stung, it came to him, dimly, that his hands were no longer tied behind him. Bewildered, he stopped struggling. The arms around him tightened again, and he was rocked.

The bruises on his face hurt as they were pressed into a jakke. He knew it was a jakke: He could feel the small iron plates flexing under the cloth. Elves didn't wear jakkes. Elves didn't smell like this either: like a stable a fox had been kept in.

A gentle pressure on the crown of his head felt like a kiss. Only one Elf had ever kissed him, and she wasn't this strong and didn't wear a jakke. He braced his hand against the iron-filled leather but couldn't find the strength to break the hold around him. A voice grumbled close to his ear, vibrating through him.
“Lilla ladda min, min wey barn.”
My little lad, my wee bairn. This could only be his father.

He pushed hard, the muscles of his arms creaking, and pushed himself far enough back to see his father's face. From beneath the shadowing helmet, Toorkild's pale-blue eyes stared at him, while tears and snot ran down into his thick, gray-flecked beard. His hand came up and touched the bruises and scratches on Per's face with thick, hot fingers. “Look at this,” he said. “Look at this.”

“He be alive!” someone shouted close by Per's ear. He turned his head so sharply, he went dizzy. Ecky was crouched beside him. Beyond Ecky were horses—and grass, and the legs and boots of other men. Above was a blue sky, and his cousin Wat's face, looking down.

He looked up, astonished and disbelieving. He had been trying to get away from the Elves. What Elf-Work had dumped him down, untied, among his own people and made the Elves vanish? Trying to sit up, he said, to his father, “Entraya?”

People stooped over him, laughing at his confusion. They laughed the more when he scowled, and someone rubbed up his hair.

Gobby's voice said, “Toorkild, up! This be no place for us to stay. Back through Gate—move, now!”

Per was lifted to his feet without his having to make any effort to get up. Toorkild's arm was around his waist, and Wat gripped his other elbow, as if he needed help to stand. “Daddy! Entraya, where be she?”

“Ssh!” Toorkild said, pulling him along. “Ssh!”

Per was distracted from protesting by the sight of a little metal wagon on wheels. It had shelves, loaded with cups and plates and cans that rattled and clunked as the wagon was dragged over the gravel and up the ramp to the Elf-Gate. A man followed it, his body wrapped around with thick folds of cloth—a curtain, torn down from the nearest windows. A third man was carrying a big framed painting and a fourth clutched an armful of brightly colored cushions. And then he saw Andrea, her brown hair falling down her back, and a man on either side of her, gripping her arms, hustling her along.

“Hey!” He lunged out of Toorkild's hold and grabbed at the shoulder of the nearest man. “Take your hands off her!” Both men turned in surprise, and Per pulled Andrea away from them. “Did they hurt thee? Did they?”

Andrea wrapped her arms around Per's ribs and held on to him tight. She wasn't hurt, but she was scared. She shook her head against his shoulder and was glad to feel his arms move protectively around her back and head.

The men were saying that she was an Elf and had helped the Elves, and couldn't be trusted. Others came pressing up behind Per.

“Guthrun!”

“Hounds'd choke on her.”

“Any man—” Andrea felt Per's chest move as he sucked in air to shout. “Any man looks at her wrong answers to me! Hear?”

They stared back at him, surprised, even annoyed—but if he said so … Especially as Toorkild stood behind him, with his hand on his shoulder.

“Veensa,” Per said, looking around. “Where be Veensa—Elf-Veensa?” Their blank faces made Per angry. “You let him go? My small fowl you can catch, but not—”

At the back of the crowd, Sweet Milk lifted his arm above his head. From his hand, by the hair, hung Bryce's head.

Per was swayed slightly as Andrea turned her face into his shoulder, to hide from the sight. He cupped the back of her head in his hand but called out, “Nay! T'other one! Hast thee Veensa's head?”

Sweet Milk pointed down the length of the gravel path toward the distant end of the redbrick and glass building. “He ran.”

“He lives?” Per said. Andrea's mouth was cut where Windsor had hit her. Windsor had killed Cuddy.

Gobby beat the butt of his lance on the ground and said, “Toorkild! Call 'em in. Let's be gone.”

Per swung Andrea around and shoved her into his father's arms. “Look after her!”

Toorkild staggered but clutched at Andrea. “What—?” He had to turn his head to see where Per had gone.

Per shoved through the crowd to its edge, where one of Gobby's men held two horses by the reins. Taking the reins of one from him, Per swung up onto the horse. The stirrups were too short, but that he could cope with. What he couldn't bear was the injustice of Windsor being alive. Windsor had slapped his face with a hand covered in Cuddy's blood. Windsor had knocked Andrea down. Insufferable that he should live to laugh at them—insufferable that, when they were home, when it was too late, he would be jeered for letting Windsor live.

A man gawped up at him from the ground, a lance on his shoulder. Per leaned over and took the lance. As Toorkild yelled somewhere behind him, Per kicked his horse, and men scattered out of their way.

“Per!” Gobby's voice.

Per kicked his horse again. “On!” The horse bounded from a walk to a canter, pounding for the far end of the building, kicking up dust and gravel.

“Per! Get back here!” In exasperation at having wasted so much breath, Gobby hammered the butt of his lance on the wooden wall of the smaller Elf-House.

Toorkild let go of Andrea and ran for his own horse. Ingram looked from his father to Per, galloping away, and swung up onto his horse. And then other men, of both Gobby's and Toorkild's households, were mounting up. Sweet Milk dropped Bryce's head on the grass, so he could ride.

Seeing both Per and Toorkild ride away left Andrea feeling lonely and scared, and when she saw Joe running after the horses on foot, waving an axe, she felt that she hadn't a friend anywhere near. She was looking warily around, wondering if there were somewhere she could run, when she felt a big, strong hand close on her arm and tug her backward. It was Gobby. As he watched his second son, Wat, ride after Per, followed by a run of men on foot, he ran through every obscene and blasphemous word he knew. “If I'd had rearing of him …” He called the men remaining near him to order. They were to stay where they were, and guard the Elf-Gate, so it would still be open if the madheads ever came back. “Some bugger has to think!”

A sudden howling came from the Elf-Gate and made Gobby and every man turn sharply toward it. Only Andrea knew what the noise was, and she felt her heart ache with strain and fear. The Tube was closing down, was bringing its other half home. As the noise dropped from a howl to a roar and then diminished to a whirring, she watched the lights near the Tube's entrance.

Silence fell with a thump. Then Sterkarms came running to tell Gobby that a new length of pipe had appeared. Gobby's grip on Andrea's arm tightened, and he glowered down at her. “What be happening?”

She'd never been on as good terms with Gobby as with Toorkild, and she was too afraid of him to try and lie or make anything up. “Gate's closed. You can no go back.”

He nodded, looking out over the lawns around them, as if he could see the other Sterkarms. “I promise thee,” he said, “I promise, if my sons and I die here, thou'lt die too. Thou too.”

27

21st Side: The Battle of Dilsmead Hall

Windsor crouched behind the door leading to the parking lot in an agony of indecision, afraid to go forward, afraid to go back, afraid to stay put. He knew his best chance of escape was to dash for his Mercedes. Once locked inside that steel box, he could drive away faster than any horse could run. But he was afraid to set foot on the long stretch of open ground between him and the car.

The shouting band of Sterkarms had passed by his hiding place without seeing him, but they'd shaken his nerve. What if they were still close by, but keeping quiet? They'd spot him as soon as he stepped through the door. But he wasn't safe inside either, because other Sterkarms were in the building and would soon turn the corner of the corridor, and see him, and come running at him, yelling …

A shout, distant and half muffled by the walls, decided him. It was from somewhere behind him, from some spot lost among turns of corridors and walls of rooms. It was enough to push him out the door and across the path that separated the building from the nearest corner of the parking lot.

He'd reached the first cars when he heard the shouting again. Not words, but long whooping cries. They were clear now, and he could tell they came, not from inside the building, but from its other side. With the voices was another, deeper sound that hadn't carried to him inside the building—the sound of horses' hooves, coming closer.

He stopped and looked back at the door he'd left. It was so much closer than the car. But once cut off from the car, he was trapped. He swayed on his feet, undecided which way to run.

A black horse appeared at the corner of the hall, on the farther side of the parking lot from him. It went back on its haunches as it was reined in and then curvetted in a circle, its rider turning in the saddle to look toward Windsor. Raising his long lance above his head, the rider cried out, with a sergeant major's scream: “
Sterk
arm!”

Windsor ran a couple of steps back toward the building—and saw other Sterkarms, on foot, coming toward him, running, carrying pikes and axes. He stopped, his heart a center of pain inside him, his feet stammering in the gravel as he made to run now this way, now that. He lifted his gun, its weight awkward in his hand, and pointed it at the men on foot. It made him happy to see that they stopped. He spun around and ran from them with all the strength and speed he could force from himself, cursing his own slow heaviness, making for his Mercedes at the other end of the parking lot.

Joe, axe in hand, ran his hardest but soon found himself overtaken by Sterkarms who'd never smoked and had spent their lives bounding up and down sodden hills. And not even they could keep up with the ride.

Ahead of him, horses with riders standing in the saddle were turning the corner of the house; and by the time he'd panted around the same corner, the horses were out of sight, at the front of the house.

His run slowed to a tired jog, Joe reached the front of the house, with its broad gravel drive, its marble pillars and the lawns and flower beds sweeping down toward the gates. The horsemen were gathered in a knot in front of the hall's marble steps, reined in for some kind of conference.

It was easy to spot Per among them—he was the one without helmet or jakke, the one who, at the cry of “Sterkarm!” turned his horse and kicked it to a trot, pounding over the lawn toward the parking lot on the hall's farther side. As he went, he rose and fell in the saddle, bringing the heavy, eight-foot lance he carried down to the horizontal, managing it with as little thought as he'd need to move his arm. Through a flower bed the horse went, scattering petals. In seconds, the other horses were following, with a great drumming that made the ground thrum under Joe's feet. Despite his fear of what might follow, it was an exhilarating sight, and Joe picked up heavy feet and ran after them.

As Per reached the corner of the hall and saw the great gray square where the Elf-Carts stood in row after row, all flashing and gleaming in the sun, he reined his horse to a walk. A movement on the farther side of this pound for Elf-Carts caught his eye, and squinting against the glare, he saw an Elf-Man—Windsor!

He kicked his horse to a fast walk, scanning the long line of Elf-Carts, looking for a gap between them wide enough to let his horse through. Windsor was running. Doubtless he meant to climb inside one of these Elf-Carts and ride it away.

Per kicked his horse to a canter, standing in his stirrups and leaning over his mount's withers. “On! On!” He felt the horse stretch to a gallop beneath him, hardly seeming to touch the ground. He balanced above the power, riding it.

The horse carried Per to the end of the line of Elf-Carts before Windsor could cover half the distance—but at the end of the line, Per had to turn the horse. He reined in to a walk while watching what Windsor did, but the horse still wanted to run, and then it shied at the other horses coming up—and Per had to tussle with his mount and turn it in a circle.

Windsor, midway along the parking lot's side, looked back and saw mounted men guiding their horses along the path between the cars and the building, toward the clear aisle that ran the parking lot's length. Ahead of him, a knot of horsemen was gathering, though there was still the width of the parking lot between him and them.

Windsor hesitated, gasping for breath. He could feel sweat running between his skin and his shirt. He lifted the heavy gun in one hand and held it out at arm's length. His arm shook with strain and fear, but he hoped the threat of the gun would keep the Sterkarms off.

As the first horse, with a clash of hooves on concrete, turned into the aisle between the cars, Windsor heard the door-locks of his car spring, as they picked up the signal from the key in his pocket. Thank God for power locks! He started running again. The passenger door was nearest. He'd get in there, lock all the doors, and crawl over to the wheel.

Per kicked his horse to a fast trot and, rising and falling in the saddle, rode it along the second side of the parking lot, and turned it onto the third side. Windsor was running toward him. Per kicked his horse to a canter and lowered his lance to take Windsor in the chest.

Windsor saw the horse's broad chest bearing down on him, heard its hooves, felt the tremor in the ground, and slipped between two of the cars parked beside him. The angle of the lance changed to follow him, and Windsor ducked desperately, not knowing if crouching would save him. The lance swept over his head, and then horse and rider were past him, and the rider was reining in, and turning the horse.

Windsor lunged for the end of the cars and reached the clear aisle. A clatter of hooves warned him to look up, and he saw other horses coming at him between the cars. He ran ahead of them and threw himself against the sun-heated black metal of his own car, reaching for the nearest door—the back door.

He got his hand around the handle and pressed the button hard. The clatter of hooves was loud and close. As he rolled himself into the car's backseat, he heard a tearing crunch, and the car rocked, nearly tipping him out again. He clung to the front seat to hold himself in and looked back through the narrowing space as he pulled the door shut. There was a sound of gushing liquid, and a stink of petrol. A long lance shaft protruded from the torn black metal of his car's side.

A lance head, aimed at him, had missed and torn through the car's bodywork, into the petrol tank. Metal screeched and tore, and the car swayed as the lance was tugged and twisted free. Stinking petrol gushed out in a stream.

Slamming the car's door, Windsor collapsed onto the seat and pressed the button on the central console. The lock of every door snapped shut, and the alarm was armed. For an instant he sagged and heaved for breath, feeling himself safe inside his glass-and-steel box. Then he scrambled over the backs of the front seats to reach the wheel. With luck, even though the petrol tank was punctured, there might be enough fuel remaining in a corner to get him away.

Per, turning his horse back to the Elf-Cart, could see Windsor inside, tumbling into the driver's seat, where he would move levers and turn the driver's wheel to make the thing move. Per looked down at the thick, black wheels that the Elf-Cart ran on. Lifting his lance, angling it, he drove it down as hard as he could into the nearest wheel.

It was easier than he'd thought it would be. Maybe the lance head, being cold iron, broke through the Elf-Work protecting the cart. The wheel puffed and hissed, and when Per twisted and withdrew his lance, the wheel groaned, and the whole cart began to list.

Ecky, at the car's other end, his lance still dripping petrol, shouted, “Sterkarm!” and drove his lance into the wheel nearest him. The car tilted still more.

Windsor, sweating behind the steering wheel, triggered the ignition. Even on punctured wheels, he could get away …

A third horseman, coming up behind the car, punctured a third tire. “Never mind,” Windsor whispered to himself as the car swayed. On three punctured tires, he'd slam it into reverse, and if the horses were in the way, he'd drive through them.

Per, wheeling his horse so he could get at the other front wheel with his lance, saw the Elf-Cart's face. It had two great glass eyes and, beneath them, a grinning mouth. With memories of heroes plunging lances into the grinning mouths of dragons, Per drove his lance into the Elf-Cart's mouth, wrenched it out, drove it again.

Jesus! Windsor thought. If he's got the radiator … He pressed the ignition again, and the engine started, sending Windsor's heart soaring as the quiet throbbing ran through the big Mercedes. The windshield might be filled with the wet black flanks of a horse, the stamping and clashing of hooves might be all around him, his own heart might be hammering in his ears and throat but he was on his way.

He pressed down the clutch, released the handbrake, shoved the gears into reverse—and the engine stuttered, coughed, growled and died. His hand went to the ignition button, pressed, pressed again—he was holding his breath. The engine chugged and chugged—and died.

A bang, and the windshield turned white, crazed before his eyes. He didn't know what had happened—and then saw the long, brown shaft, passing just by his arm, passing between the two front seats, and ending in the leather of the backseat behind him. The crash of it punching through the toughened glass still dimmed his hearing and made his heart hop. He watched the shaft twist, glimpsed the shifting of the horse through the shattered, whitened glass, heard the tearing as the iron head was dragged from the leather behind him—and then the shaft blurred past, withdrawing.

Oh God, Windsor thought. Oh God, help me. He remembered the gun in his hand and lifted it. He pointed it at the shifting shapes glimpsed through the shattered glass, found it too heavy for one shaking hand, and tried gripping it with two—then couldn't quite decide which finger should be on the trigger.

An explosion, of noise and of whiteness. Sharp, cutting things, glassy hailstones, flew into his face, and he closed his eyes against them, hit himself in the face with the gun as he instinctively drew back his hands to guard his face. The car alarm whooped and howled. Windsor caught a glimpse of the lance head as it smashed more of the shattered glass from the window frame. Fragments of broken glass were scattered over the car's shining hood, and beyond that, fidgeting at the strange sound of the alarm, was a thickset black horse. Leaning far from its saddle to peer in at him through the broken windshield was the wielder of the lance.

The rider wore no jakke and no helmet. Windsor recognized the bruises rather than the face. The nose and mouth and jaw all swollen and dirtied with bruising, and one eye half closed by the red, darkening swelling round it. The less bruised eye stared at him with a silvery fixity that seemed slightly mad.

Per kicked his feet from the stirrups, swung his right leg over the horse, and slid down from its back. The eight-foot lance was still in his hands as he came toward the car.

Windsor lifted the heavy gun in both hands and pointed it at Per's face, trying to ignore the car alarm's incessant screaming. At this range, could he miss? His hands and arms shook, both in fear of what he was going to do and see and from the weight of the gun, but he tightened his grip and held steady.

Per hefted the lance and held it, one hand over its butt end, ready to drive it forward. The iron head pointed at Windsor's chest. He looked into the barrel of Windsor's Elf-Pistol. He knew that Windsor was preparing to fire it at his face and kill him. But to back down from this Elf, who had hit Andrea and killed Cuddy and punched him—the rage and humiliation would be too great. It would keep him from sleeping for three nights. At that moment, risking a pistol ball in the face seemed an easier choice. Pistols were clumsy anyway. And Windsor was surrounded by Sterkarms. Even if he hit his aim, he wouldn't crow for long. Looking beyond the pistol barrel, into Windsor's eyes, Per said,
“Sa, shoota!”
So, shoot!

Windsor tried. His forefinger hauled at the trigger. His hands trembled. He even changed his grip, the gun slipping in sweat, and tried to pull the trigger with his other forefinger. The trigger wouldn't move. “Shit!” He remembered how he'd played with the safety catch. He must have set it on.

Per drew back the lance—and a banshee shrieking rang out, louder even than the wailing of Windsor's wounded Elf-Cart, a din that rose over the roofs of the Hall, setting the horses prancing and rearing. Per turned away from Windsor, startled, looking to see what made the uncanny noise.

Windsor squirmed in his seat, clutching at the gun, pushing at the safety catch. His heart thumped and pounded. He could hardly breathe, but he was ecstatic. He knew what the noise was: a police siren. Rescue was coming. The safety catch off, he raised the gun again, aiming at Per's body.

The police car drew up at the pillared entrance of Dilsmead Hall, gravel rattling against its sides. From the parking lot at the side of the hall, Joe ran hard to meet them.