through the party, throwing aside the foes, both alive and shot down, until he clashed with the back ones, unattainable for the arrows of damned wonderer.
Roaring, Thomas brought his menacing sword on the nearest rider, slashed him down to the waist in his armor, tugged the sword free with effort, as it got stuck in bones and sinews, brandished at the next foe. One of enemies waved his saber briefly and briskly to land a sider on the knight’s neck, another rose on his stirrups, gave out a terrible howl, struck on the sudden opponent’s head with his glittering Damask saber. Thomas bellowed like a furious bear, dropped his shield, gripped the sword hilt with both hands.
The left rider kept holding the broken handle in fist. He could not believe his eyes, shifting his gaze between it and his foe’s gleaming helmet. The long sword cut him unprotected, his head and his arm, the one chopped away near the shoulder, flew up with a dull sound. The other rider still tried to cleave the knight’s neck, denting the blade of expensive saber and annoying Thomas with clanging. The two-handed sword halved him down to the waist.
Oleg shot the remaining arrows quickly. The road was littered with corpses and wounded men creeping under the hooves of mad horses, but Thomas was attacked by the five survivors. Fortunately, other horses dashed about, bumped into each other, neighed with fear, three dragged the riders entangled in the stirrups. In such a mess, the five men could not gather and attack altogether. Thomas spun round in his saddle like a loach, slashed with his giant sword, bellowed threats.
Oleg wanted to stay aside until the fight was over, but the two foes of Thomas cried something to each other, then both sheathed their sabers and took heavy axes from hooks. Both started to approach Thomas from behind: that made Oleg sent his horse into a heavy gallop.
One rider had stolen into the thick of the fight, raised his axe, but Oleg caught up and him seized by hand. The rider looked back, white with pain: Oleg squeezed his hand until bones crushed, only then he let the poor man out. The rider cried in a guttural voice, snatched a knife from his belt by another hand. Reluctantly, Oleg hit him in the face. Blood gushed out, the rider collapsed silently to the hooves of his horse.
Thomas slayed two more foes. The fourth had run into Oleg who waved away with sorrow: he had no wish to take a human life though had to do it, so the last foe was left to Thomas. The knight breathed heavily, his giant sword rose slowly, his armor belched with steam.
Suddenly they heard a distant clatter of hooves. Oleg and the rider in furry cap wheeled round together, and Thomas saw, over their heads, it were the red-cloaked riders coming back. He landed the last triumphant blow. The dead man, halved down to the saddle, slipped off the horse and plopped heavily on the road, which was already flooded with blood, strewn with corpses and moaning wounded men.
The red-cloaked riders stopped in ten steps, looking over the place of battle with distrust. Between them and the city they’d left, there were at least twenty dead enemies lying on the trodden road. Eight more men were crawling away into the thick ripe wheat, dragging their guts, left red traces behind. One of the red cloaks, an elderly man with malevolent face, vaulted off, rushed along the tracks into the wheat, unsheathing his saber on the run.
Thomas sheathed his sword, waved his empty hand as a greeting. “Good sires! We, my friend and I, thank you for the opportunity to have a fight!”
They watched him with goggled eyes. “Have… a fight?” one repeated in perplexity.
“Yes, I mean it. We rode for three days, and no one to cross weapons with!”
The riders parted, giving way to the golden-haired beauty with the crown on top of her head. He sat majestically on a splendid white horse, but her rich clothing was stained with soot. The rider on her right glanced at Thomas angrily, spat on the dusty road. “My princess,” the rider on her left told her loudly, “they are no true men! Wandering brawlers. They don’t care whom they fight.”
“Mercenaries?” the princess asked softly. Her musical young voice, a bit husky with excitement, made Thomas’s heart jump up to the throne of the Lord and fell down into the fire. He found no words to answer her, he could only look in her eyes, of the same blue as his own.
The rider on her right replied instead of Thomas, with disgust in his hoarse voice, “Worse. They fight even if not paid, just for joy. Beasts of North!”
Oleg dismounted, gathered his arrows hastily, took the quiver of the furry-capped man who’d shot the young boy. He listened to the conversation from distance. “As I told you!” he cried to Thomas. “They can have other values here!”
Thomas blushed, spoke in a tone of gross insult. “We came to the aid of the weaker side! This is how noble men do on my North, that’s true. I hope someday nobility will come here too… even if it comes at our sword points.”
“Who are you?” the golden-haired princess asked. The horse under her pawed the ground with its slim chiseled legs, proud of such a beautiful rider. The crown on her golden hair was scattering the sparkles of diamonds, sapphires, even amber, the rare gem from northern lands.
Her men watched Thomas and Oleg with a mixture of fear and hope. Three more of them dismounted and walked around with knives in hands, turning the bodies of enemies, cutting throats, gathering weapons. Five riders were trying to catch the empty horses.
“A knight crusader,” Thomas replied proudly. “Sir Thomas Malton of Gisland. I’ve slain giants, killed Saracen, fought a dragon, ate the roast liver of the lion I killed with my own hands. Now I’m coming back to my northern homeland. The one who rides with me is my friend, a noble sir wonderer from Scythian Rus’… or Rossian Scythia… from Hyperborea, in a word. He’s a great warrior and greater ascetic and hermit. His posture and words are full of dignity and speak out his noble origin, though he denies it in every possible way.”
The princess cast a glance at Oleg and forgot him at once, as she spoke to Thomas with passion and great entreaty, “Enemies broke into my city, my beautiful peaceful Merefa! You need to leave: they spare no one. I think it’s better for you to ride away with us.”
“Who are your enemies?” Thomas asked arrogantly.
“I’m a queen,” the golden-haired maiden told him. “Isosnezhda, a daughter to Kryg. The enemies came by stealth into the city, into the palace! They were led by the royal treasurer. He knew the underground passage. My father trusted that man like himself, and he… when Father died, he wanted to marry me and become a new king! I refused him, and he gave our treasury to barbarian chieftains to buy their warriors. Now they are making slaughter in my city!”
“It seems we’ll have to make our way round Merefa!” Oleg told Thomas while walking to the horse.
Thomas blushed to the roots of his hair. He sounded sharp as his sword. “A slaughter or Beltane dances, I don’t care. I
Thomas reined up near the open gate, shot a commanding look back, as though Oleg had no choice but to follow him. Oleg trotted after him, feeling the hilts of throwing knives and the sword hilt. Then he felt the ends of arrows and discovered the ones he’d taken from dead furry-capped riders to be three fingers shorter.
As Oleg came up to the gate, he heard a clatter of hooves behind. He and Thomas were caught up by two sullen warriors: he’d seen them beside the beautiful queen. “We’ll ride with you,” one of them grunted. “You don’t know the city.”
Thomas grinned and winked to Oleg.
The four of them burst into the wide open gate, dashed along the main street. Shouts and malicious laughter were everywhere, as the furry-capped warriors broke into houses, shattered the doors and windows of shops, flung things, clothing, and furniture out through the smashed windows into the street. Straight in the street, two women were raped. A naked old man was crucified on the door of his house, while women and children cried and squealed around.
The battle on the main square, in front of the palace, was burning out: about a hundred soldiers in red cloaks stood in a circle, covering with shields and repelling sluggish assaults. Pressed to the palace, they held there firmly, bristling with swords and spears, while their foes glanced back with envy at those who dragged the loot, stripped women naked, tore earrings out of their ears, broke their fingers to get precious rings. The barbarian chieftain, huge and stout, also in a furry cap, bellowed fiercely, commanding attack, but most of his preferred to plunder the captured city rather than to fight its last defenders.
The four riders galloped by the edge of the square, passed by a very old man bound to a pillar. Two furry caps were prodding him with blazing torches, the old man shrieked, the warriors yelled. Oleg heard, “Money!
