“Harken, Franks, Muhammad Khan, sultan of Kizilshehr, has no quarrel with you; but there stands one who has stolen a woman from the sultan; therefore, give her up to us and ye may depart peacefully.”
“Tell Muhammad,” answered Sir Eric, “that while one Frank lives, he shall not have Ettaire de Brose.”
So Kai Kedra rode back to Muhammad who sate his horse like a carven image, and the Persians conferred among themselves. And I wondered again. But yesterday Muhammad Khan had fought a fierce battle and destroyed his foes; now he should be riding in triumph down the broad streets of Kizilshehr, with crimson standards flying and golden trumpets blaring, and white-armed women flinging roses before his horse’s hoofs; yet here he was, far from his city, and far from the field of battle, with the dust and weariness of hard riding on him, and all for a slender girl- child.
Aye – Muhammad’s lust and Sir Eric’s love were whirlpools that drew in all about them. Muhammad’s warriors followed him because it was his will; King Harold opposed him because of the strangeness in his brain and the mad humor Franks call chivalry; Hrothgar, who hated Sir Eric, fought beside him because he loved Harold, as did Skel Thorwald’s son and his Vikings. And I, because Sir Eric was my brother-at-arms.
Now we saw the Persians dismounting, for they saw there was no charging on their weary horses over that ground. They came clambering over the gullies and boulders in their gilded armor and feathered helmets, with their silver-chased blades in their hands. Fighting on foot they hated, yet they came on, and the emirs and Muhammad himself with them. Aye, as I saw the sultan striding forward with his men, my heart warmed to him again and I wished that Sir Eric and I were fighting for him, and not against him.
I thought the Franks would assail the Persians as they clamored across the ravines but the Vikings did not move out of their tracks. They made their foes come to them, and the Moslems came with a swift rush across the level space and a shouting of “Allaho akbar!”
That charge broke on the shield-wall as a river breaks on a shoal. Through the howling of the Persians thundered the deep rhythmic shouts of the Vikings and the crashing of the axes drowned the singing and whistling of the scimitars.
The Norsemen were immovable as a rock. After that first rush the Persians fell back, baffled, leaving a crescent of hacked corpses before the feet of the blond giants. Many strung bows and drove in their arrows at short range but the Vikings merely bent their heads and the shafts glanced from their horned helmets or shivered on the great shields.
And the Kizilshehrians came on again. Watching above, with the trembling girl beside me, I burned and froze with the desperate splendor of that battle. I gripped my scimitar hilt until blood oozed from beneath my finger nails. Again and again Muhammad’s warriors flung themselves with mad valor against that solid iron wall. And again and again they fell back broken. Dead men were heaped high and over their mangled bodies the living climbed to hack and smite.
Franks fell too, but their comrades trampled them under and closed the ranks again. There was no respite; ever Muhammad urged on his warriors, and ever he fought on foot with them, his emirs at his side. Allaho akbar! There fought a man and a king who was more than a king!
I had thought the Crusaders mighty fighters, but never had I seen such warriors as these, who never tired, whose light eyes blazed with strange madness, and who chanted wild songs as they smote. Aye, they dealt great blows! I saw Skel Thorwald’s son hew a Kurd through the hips so the legs fell one way and the torso another. I saw King Harold deal a Turk such a blow that the head flew ten paces from the body. I saw Hrothgar hew off a Persian’s leg at the thigh, though the limb was cased in heavy mail.
Yet they were no more terrible in battle than my brother-at-arms, Sir Eric. I swear, his sword was a wind of death and no man could stand before it. His face was lighted strangely and mystically; his arm was thrilled with superhuman strength, and though I sensed a certain kinship between himself and the wild barbarians who chanted and smote beside him, yet a mystic, soul-something set him apart from and beyond them. Aye, the forge of hardship and suffering had burned from soul and brain and body all dross and left only the white hot fire of his inner soul that lifted him to heights unattainable by common men.
On and on the battle raged. Many Moslems had fallen, but many Vikings had died too. The remnant had been slowly hurled back by repeated charges until they were battling on the beach almost beneath the ledge whereon I stood with the girl. There the formation was broken among the boulders and the conflict changed to a straggling series of single conflicts. The Norsemen had taken fearful toll – by Allah, no more than a hundred Persians remained able to lift the sword! And of Franks there were less than a score.
Skel Thorwald’s son and Yar Akbar met face to face just as the Viking’s notched sword broke in a Moslem’s skull. Yar Akbar shouted and swung up his scimitar but ere he could strike, the Viking roared and leaped like a great lion. His iron arms locked about the huge Afghan’s body and I swear I heard above the battle, the splintering of Yar Akbar’s bones. Then Skel Thorwald’s son dashed him down, broken and dead, and catching up an axe from a dying hand, made at Muhammad Khan. Kai Kedra was before him. Even as the Viking struck, the Seljuk drove his scimitar through mail links and ribs and the two fell together.
I saw Sir Eric hard beset and bleeding and I rose and spoke to the girl.
“Allah defend you,” said I, “but my brother-at-arms dies alone and I must go and fall beside him.”
She had watched the fight white and still as a marble statue.
“Go, in God’s name,” she said, “and His power nerve your sword-arm – but leave me your dagger.”
So I broke my trust for once, and dropping stiffly from the ledge, came across the battle-trampled beach, my scimitar in my right hand. As I came I saw Kojar Khan and King Harold at sword strokes, while Hrothgar, beard a- bristle, dealt mighty blows on all sides with his dripping axe. And the Arab, Ahmed El Ghor, ran in from the side and hacked through Harold’s mail so the blood flowed over his girdle. Hrothgar cried out like a wild beast and lunged at Ahmed who faltered an instant before the Saxon’s terrible eyes. And Hrothgar smote him a blow that sheared through mail like cloth, severed the shoulder and split the breast-bone, and splintered the haft in the Saxon’s hand. At almost the same instant King Harold caught Kojar Khan’s blade on his left forearm. The edge sheared through a heavy golden armlet and bit to the bone but the ancient king split the Kurd’s skull with a single blow.
Sir Eric and Mirza Khan fought while the Persians surged about, seeking to strike a blow that would drop the Frank and yet not touch their emir. And I strode untouched through the battle, stepping over dead and dying men, and so came suddenly face to face with Muhammad Khan.
His lean face was haggard, his fine eyes shadowed, his scimitar red to the hilt. He had no buckler and his mail had been hacked to open rents in many places. He recognized me and slashed at me, and I locked his blade hilt to hilt; leaning my weight upon my weapon, I said to him: “Muhammad Khan, why be a fool? What is a Frankish girl to you, who might be emperor of half the world? Without you Kizilshehr will fall, will crumble to dust. Go your way and leave the girl to my brother-at-arms.”
But he only laughed as a madman laughs and tore his scimitar free. He leaped in, striking, and I braced my legs and parried his stroke, and driving my blade beneath his, found a rent in his mail and transfixed him beneath the heart. A moment he stood stiffly, mouth open, then as I freed my point, he slid to the blood-soaked earth and died.
“And thus fade the hopes of Islam and the glory of Kizilshehr,” I said bitterly.
A great shout went up from the weary, blood-stained Persians who yet remained and they stood frozen. I looked for Sir Eric; he stood swaying above the still form of Mirza Khan and as I looked he lifted his sword and pointed waveringly out to sea. And all the living looked. A long strange craft was sweeping inshore, low in the waist, high of stern and bows, with a prow carved like a dragon’s head. Long oars hurtled her through the calm water and the rowers were blond giants who roared and shouted. And as we saw this, Sir Eric crumpled and fell beside Mirza Khan.
But the Persians had had enough of war. They fled, those who were left to flee, taking with them the senseless Kai Kedra. I went to Sir Eric and loosened his mail, but even as I did so, I was pushed away and the girl Ettaire was sobbing on her lover. I helped her get off his mail and by Allah, it but hung in blood-stained shreds. He had a deep stab in his thigh, another in his shoulder and most of the mail had been hacked clean away from his arms, which bore many flesh wounds; and a blade had cut through steel cap and coif links, making a wide scalp wound.
But none of the hurts was mortal. He was insensible from weakness – loss of blood and the terrific grind of the previous days. King Harold had been slashed deeply in the arm and across the ribs, and Hrothgar bled from gashes in the face and across the chest muscles, and limped from a stroke in the leg. Of the half dozen warriors that still lived, not one but was cut, bruised and gashed. Aye, a strange and grisly crew they made, with rent, crimson mail and notched and blood-stained weapons.
