her hair to silver Casca remained as always. He had grown a beard so that his lady could not feel there were no lines in his face from age. All had kept faith with their strange Lord of the Hold. All knew that anyone who broke faith would face his wrath, a great and terrible wrath, for, as Glam had told them, Casca was as one who had been touched by the gods and was not to be taken lightly. But they also served the Lord Casca and his lady as much out of love and affection as they did out of fear and respect for the strength of Casca's arm. To them, they were part of a living legend, privileged to be part of that legend… the legend of Casca the Unchanging.
This morning Casca shaved.
Neither he nor anyone else of his people knew that outside in the cold, men were watching the fort…
THREE
The men watching Casca's fort that morning so soon after Lida's death might have thought twice about attacking it had they known of the black grief gripping Casca, or had they known of his prowess with blade and axe. Might have thought twice… but perhaps not. They were not ordinary men. -
They stood in the cold, the icy wind whipping their beards and mustaches. Big men. Outcasts. The thieves and murderers of a dozen different tribes. Their bodies were clad in furs, and they had the feral look of wolves; wolves they resembled so much in temper and taste that no man, woman, or child was safe from them. Their weapons were ready to drink the blood of any and all they could reach. These men-wolves reveled in their bestiality. Now, as they watched the small fort lying below in the valley, they thought it easy pickings. They had watched long, and knew there were no more than forty men in the Hold. The others, as was the custom of this land, were on their farms with their families waiting for the spring thaw to set the fjord free from the ice, for then they could set sail to fish and trade and occasionally raid an enemy land.
These men-beasts had been careful to avoid any of the farmhouses. They took no chances of being spotted, of the warning being given so that the villagers could rally to the fort below.
Their leader watched. Big. Singularly repulsive. His teeth were black and worn-down almost to the gums. He suffered constantly from toothache and had been known to bash in the skull of his nearest comrade just for being too close when the worst aching came. His beard was black, streaked with gray. He was not tall for one of his race, but he made up for it in width; his shoulders and hips were almost the same size, and his legs were like tree stumps in their fur wrappings. A hide of bearskin served to keep out the worst of the icy wind, but it failed to cover all the matted, dirty hair and skin beneath.
The reason he had been cast out from his own tribe was that he was so cruel even his own kin could not tolerate him. He had been driven from their camps for killing all the members of his family in a black rage even the children of his own body. Malgak the Killer, he was named and he was so in truth. No man had ever stood before his axe and lived to speak of it. This well-used chunk of iron weighed over fifteen pounds, yet its owner handled it as a child would a toy.
Malgak turned from watching the fort and grunted to his men to move back to the rude shelters they had set up. No fires for cooking. They would eat cold meat, most of it raw. Like wolves, they had developed a taste for blood… and not only that of animals… With the night they would take the Hold. Two hundred and eleven of them should be more than enough to settle with these farmers and fishermen.
Malgak crawled on his knees into the small skin tent he called home and looked at the slender form of the young girl he had taken captive a week before when they burned out her home and put her family to the sword. Her face was dirty and frightened. She whimpered when he entered and drew back against the tent wall, trying to make herself as small as possible. Her hair had once been blonde and her skin fair, but now she was merely a dirty child, bruised, with matted hair and sores.
Malgak stripped his breeches off and threw her under him, taking the fourteen-year-old girl as he would an animal. He thrust, grunted, and sweated over her, slapping her in a futile attempt to get some response. It did not take him long to finish. He looked at her then, thinking of the women they would have when they took the fort tonight. He no longer needed this one, so he took her small head in his hands and snapped her neck as one would snap the neck of a chicken. Throwing the carcass out the flap of skin that served as a door, he immediately dismissed her from his mind, as though she were nothing.
Satisfying his hunger on a piece of raw horseflesh, he thought again of the fort below and grinned, his black stumps worrying over the tough flesh. They had butchered the last of their horses and pack animals two days before. Their food would be gone tomorrow. But no matter. They would have their fill before dawn.
The rest of his hairy band slept as best they could, wrapped in their fur robes and skins, curling up in knots to get warmth from each other's bodies, in the process exchanging an unknown quantity of lice and fleas. They, too, dreamed of the women and food in the fort. The only clean things about them were their weapons. These showed no signs of mistreatment or rust. They were clean, sparkling, sharp ready for use. Earlier they had cut down fifty tall pines and trimmed the branches off short, leaving just enough to use as hand and foot grips. These would be their scaling ladders. With fifty of them there would be no way the forty defenders of the small fort below could keep them from scaling the walls and getting inside.
Between the midnight hour and the dawn, when men sleep the deepest and the sentries' eyes are fogged from looking out into the dark, Malgak gathered his men, his human vermin, and they slipped silently close to the walls, first walking, then crawling, the snow and ice sliding inside their furs and leaving cold, clean spots unseen beneath the rags they wore.
Inside the fort, Casca could not sleep. The image of Lida kept returning to haunt him… Lida as she was when she was young and beautiful. That was how he saw her, even to the end when she quietly wasted away and fell into the sleep of no return. To him she would always be young.
He checked his sentries, giving an encouraging word and a slap on the back to those who looked too drowsy. He walked the ramparts. The cold wind coming in from the sea had the taste of salt to it and chilled his skin into a red glow. It felt good.
Casca wore only a light cloak and trousers of flax, dyed blue. There was no need for armor this night, only for sword and dagger. His sword hung from a shoulder belt on his right side, in the Roman manner. The dagger was in the wide black leather stomach belt that fastened in the back with straps. He looked out on the darkened countryside. Old habits die hard, he thought. Even though there had been no sign of trouble for months, he scanned the blackness, using his eyes as he had been taught; turning his head slightly off-center, he searched the shadows with his side vision, knowing that he would be able to see better with such peripheral sight.
Nothing.
He leaned between the stone crenellations and looked down, letting his eyes sweep the rocky, snow-covered ground and keeping his ears alert for any unusual sound.
What the Hades!?
A muffled thump, barely audible, seemed to flow vaguely out of the dark, and then Casca definitely heard an involuntary, whispered curse. Someone is out there… Casca slowly, now more carefully, focused his eyes on every shadow and saw movement. Here one movement, there another. Finally he made out definite figures. Oh, shit. There's a bunch of them out there. And it looks like they're carrying something to scale the walls with. Probably trimmed trees… How many? Now that he had spotted the first, his eyes seemed to sharpen tenfold and the figures became clearer. From his height they looked in the dim light and ground fog more like the trolls out of Norse legend than men. He came to a quick decision: Too many of them to meet on the walls. We'd be spread too thin to cover every approach.
Casca cursed himself for his carelessness. He had been sunk so deep in self-pity that he had forgotten that others needed his care and attention. Guilt slapped him. He was responsible for this.
Turning swiftly, and half-running, he reached the first of his watch. Vlad the Dark stood as silent as his name, spear relaxed in his grip, but the man's physical attitude spoke of his instant ability to turn into action. Whispering in Vlad's ear, Casca sent him to circle the walls and also to send a runner to the sleeping quarters and quietly rouse the men. They were to put those unable to fight down into the dungeons where they were to bar themselves in until the fight was over. The women and children were to be especially quiet this night. There must be no sound from anyone. They had but minutes before the invaders would begin climbing the walls. They must hurry.
As Casca was securing his people, Malgak and his scabby force had reached the walls. Frost from their
