"Tall, you say. Did he fight with a two-handed sword?"

I knew right then what he was going to tell me. I remembered the sound of swords back there.

"Yes," I answered.

And he wouldn't even have had a helmet. He'd given me his.

"Larn," dad said quietly, "it's too late for him. Some men came running toward me, from the other side of the cutter, and before Jenoor had a chance to fire, he came out of the shadows and cut them off. He was kind of hopping, as if something was wrong with one of his legs. He killed a couple of them before they cut him down, then Jenoor took care of the others."

I felt a surge of grief! Ketil. Big, mean, ugly Ketil. I couldn't even guess how many men he'd killed in his life. But still, I hadn't felt this bad since we'd raised from Evdash, leaving Piet and Jenoor. It was embarrassing. It took a minute or more before I trusted myself to talk again, and it was dad who broke the silence.

"Where are Deneen and Bubba?" he asked. "We quartered most of the continent between the northern sea and the Mediterranean, looking for the radiation signature of a scout, and had just about decided you hadn't come to Fanglith. Then I remembered you and Arao talking about 'Sicily,' and this island seemed to fit the description. But instead of getting an instrument read on a ship's systems, the wolves got an esp locational on you and Tarel "

"Deneen's got the scout on an uninhabited island in the western ocean," I told him, "with all systems off. She's had serious problems with fuel crystallization, apparently from the scout taking multiple blaster charges on the shield."

"Can you guide us there?"

"Sure. But she ought to be all right for now, and there's something else I'd like to check on first. Arno's back near the castle somewhere. Not in the castle; at least I don't think so. Back in the hills. Hopefully, with about ten warriors. Varangians."

Varangians! It hit me then: Varangians had attacked our ship, taken us captive, killed half a dozen Normans, lost Arno's horse herd for him, and planned to sell us as slaves. And we'd ended up allied with them against- who? Some of Arno's fellow Normans.

Fanglith's a crazy world! I told myself. Well, maybe not crazy, but the rules were awfully strange, so far as there were any. It occurred to me that this was not a world for a rebel base. Someday, possibly, but not now. Not for a long time. It was too unpredictable.

Testing my legs and balance, I got to my feet slowly but unassisted. It turned out that standing made me feel better.

"So you want to find Arno," dad said.

"Right. It shouldn't take long."

"Can you find him with the night scanner?"

"Sure," I said, and with my arms half out for balance, I walked carefully to the copilot's seat, next to mom. She smiled without speaking. She looked beautiful, even if her eyes were a little soggy, and I grinned at her. Then I returned us to coordinates five miles above Gilbert's castle. At that height, we didn't need to go hunting for Arno. On the screen I could see a troop of ten mounted men waiting on the road half a mile from the castle. That had to be them, I thought, then spotted a single rider approaching the castle wall. That would be Arno.

I took us down, intending to call him with the loud hailer. But he stopped, so I decided to wait a minute and see what he was going to do. Killing the cabin light, I dropped to 250 feet with the sound receptor on high.

Arno:

It had been good to get out of the dark and rocky ravine, where even with moonlight a horse could easily stumble and fall. In the open valley I'd been able to turn my attention to the castle and what I might find there.

It did not seem to me that Gilbert would have sent ten Varangians out to be killed without having plans to dispose of the others. The question was whether he'd been more successful inside the castle than out.

I hoped that Larn might have foiled him, or at least been spared, and it seemed to me he might well have. For I doubt I have known anyone more favored by fate in hazardous circumstances. But luck is treacherous, and in enterprises like his, or mine, one can meet death as readily as victory, and more quickly.

The wisest course now, it had seemed to me, was to leave my Varangians a little distance from the castle-far enough not to be seen or heard by any watchman on the wall. I myself would halloo from outside and see what I could learn. If the situation seemed beyond salvage, we'd ride the rest of the night toward Palermo and perhaps some friendlier castle along the way. Almost any would be friendlier.

So I had left the Varangians on the dark and silent road and gone on alone until the wall loomed close before me. But not too close; I kept some fifty paces between it and myself, with my pistol in my right hand. Looking upward toward the parapet, I called out: "Halloo, the castle! Who is in command here?"

A watchman answered from atop the wall. "This is the castle of Baron Gilbert de Auletta," he called back. "The baron himself is at home and in command. Who asks?"

That told me part of what I wished to know: Larn and Gunnlag had not overthrown him. It would have been miraculous if they had, of course, unless Larn's sister had returned in their skyboat. There would have been half a score knights left, and thirty or more foot soldiers, after Gilbert had sent his troop into the mountains. In close quarters, even sky weapons would avail little against such numbers, especially in the presence of treachery, which Gilbert would surely attempt.

I ignored the watchman's interest in my identity, and continued my ploy. "I have been told that you have in the castle three holy monks from India, and their Varangian bodyguard. I have a message for them from the Bishop of Palermo."

I was less interested in what he said than how he seemed when he said it. For if my friends had been massacred, he would hardly tell me so. His considerable delay in answering suggested that he might have sent word of me to Gilbert. Thus I backed away a bit, shifting my shield from my saddle pommel to my left arm, turning my horse that my protection would be toward the wall. Bowmen could well be on their way to the parapet.

"Go to the gate," said the watchman at last, "and you will be let in. Then you may speak with Gilbert himself."

I was tempted, but my sky weapons would not protect me from ambush, from being rushed in close quarters. And for the first time, it occurred to me that Gilbert himself would probably have sky weapons now. "No," I said, "I will wait here."

While I waited, I backed my horse another twenty or thirty paces away. If Gilbert did have sky weapons, he'd hardly be skilled in their use, but he might well have learned how to fire them.

Shortly I spied another head above the parapet, and a different voice called to me-Gilbert's. "Who are you to disturb our rest here?"

His words were slow, his voice weak. Even in the quiet of night it was hard to hear him, and it seemed to me that he might have been shot by a stunner. I remembered the symptoms very well, from my first meeting with Larn and from scoundrels I myself had stunned while driving my first herd to Marseille.

"I am Arno de Courmeron," I said. "Your troop of horses came upon a misadventure in the mountains and will not be back. Any you may send after me will suffer the same fate.

"I have come for my friends, to take them to Palermo. If they are within, send them out unaccompanied and we will leave you in peace. Otherwise, Guiscard will send for them, and you will not like his messengers."

I expected either words of compliance, or likelier, some angry retort, but for a moment nothing seemed to happen. Then I felt a sudden tingling, and reined my horse to turn, for I recognized the weak touch of a stunner. It reached farther than my old one had. The beast wheeled, rearing, and half stumbled. Affected as I was, I was thrown from the saddle.