In the fortalice Azya’s cavalrymen hurled themselves at the very beginning on the infantry, who were defenceless for the greater part.
There was no struggle whatever; a number of knives were buried in each Polish breast without warning; then the heads of the unfortunates were cut off and borne to the hoofs of Azya’s horse.
Tugai Bey’s son permitted most of his men to join their brethren in the bloody work; but he himself stood and looked on.
Smoke hid the work of Krychinski and Adurovich; the odor of burnt flesh rose to the fortalice. The town was burning like a great pile, and smoke covered the view; only at times in the smoke was heard the report of a musket, like thunder in a cloud, or a fleeing man was seen, or a crowd of Tartars pursuing.
Azya stood still and looked on with delight in his heart; a stern smile parted his lips, under which the white teeth were gleaming: this smile was the more savage because it was mingled with pain from the drying wounds. Besides delight, pride, too, rose in the heart of Azya. He had cast from his breast that burden of feigning, and for the first time he gave rein to his hatred, concealed for long years; now he felt that he was himself, felt that he was the real Azya, the son of Tugai Bey. But at the same time there rose in him a savage regret that Basia was not looking at that fire, at that slaughter; that she could not see him in his new occupation. He loved her, but a wild desire for revenge on her was tearing him. “She ought to be standing right here by my horse,” thought he, “and I would hold her by the hair; she would grasp at my feet, and then I would seize her and kiss her on the mouth, and she would be mine, mine!—my slave!”
Only the hope that perhaps that detachment sent in pursuit, or those which he left on the road, would bring her back, restrained him from despair. He clung to that hope as a drowning man to a plank, and that gave him strength; he could not think of losing her, for he was thinking too much of the moment in which he would find her and take her.
He remained at the gate till the slaughtered town had grown still. Stillness came soon, for the bands of Krychinski and Adurovich numbered almost as many heads as the town; therefore the burning outlasted the groans of men and roared on till evening. Azya dismounted and went with slow steps to a spacious room in the middle of which sheepskins were spread; on these he sat and awaited the coming of the two captains.
They came soon, and with them the sotniks. Delight was on the faces of all, for the booty had surpassed expectation; the town had grown much since the time of the peasant incursion, and was wealthy. They had taken about a hundred young women, and a crowd of children of ten years old and upward; these could be sold with profit in the markets of the East. Old women, and children too small and unfit for the road, were slaughtered. The hands of the Tartars were streaming with human blood, and their sheepskin coats had the odor of burning flesh. All took their seats around Azya.
“Only a pile of glowing embers behind us,” said Krychinski. “Before the command returns we might go to Yampol; there is as much wealth of every kind there as in Rashkoff—perhaps more.”
“No,” answered Azya, “men of mine are in Yampol who will burn the place; but it is time for us to go to the lands of the Khan and the Sultan.”
“At thy command! We will return with glory and booty,” said the captains and the sergeants.
“There are still women here in the fortalice, and that noble who reared me,” said Azya. “A just reward belongs to them.”
He clapped his hands and gave command to bring the prisoners.
They were brought without delay—Pani Boski in tears; Zosia, pale as a kerchief; Eva and her father. Old Pan Novoveski’s hands and feet were bound with ropes. All were terrified, but still more astonished at what had taken place. Eva was lost in conjectures as to what had become of Pani Volodyovski, and wondered why Azya had not shown himself. She, not knowing why there was slaughter in the town, nor why she and her friends were bound as captives, concluded that it was a question of carrying her away; that Azya, not wishing in his pride to beg her hand of her father, had fallen into a rage simply out of love for her, and had determined to take her by violence. This was all terrible in itself; but Eva, at least, was not trembling for her own life.
The prisoners did not recognize Azya, for his face was nearly concealed; but all the more did terror seize the knees of the women at the first moment, for they judged that wild Tartars had in some incomprehensible manner destroyed the Lithuanian Tartars and gained possession of Rashkoff. But the sight of Krychinski and Adurovich convinced them that they were still in the hands of Lithuanian Tartars.
They looked at one another some time in silence; at last old Pan Novoveski asked, with an uncertain but powerful voice—
“In whose hands are we?”
Azya began to unwind the bandages from his head, and from beneath them his face soon appeared, beautiful on a time, though wild, deformed now forever, with a broken nose and a black and blue spot instead of
