Men ran along the decks with the log and rope that would let them know the speed of the carrack once she had fully taken the wind. Hawkwood bent down to the tiller hatch.

“Helm there, west-sou’-west by north.”

“Aye, sir. West-sou’-west by north it is.”

The larboard heel of the carrack became more pronounced. Hawkwood hooked an arm about the mizzen backstay as the ship rose and dipped, cleaving the waves like a spearhead, her timbers groaning and the rigging creaking as the strain rose on it. She would make a deal of water until the timber of her upper hull became wet and swollen again, but she was moving more easily than he had dared hope, even with the heavy load. It must be the ebb tide, pushing her out to sea along with the blessed wind.

The soldiers had mostly been cleared from the decks, and the Inceptine had vanished below, his blessing unsaid. Some of the passengers were in sight, though, being shunted about by sailors intent on their work. Hawkwood saw Murad’s cabin servant, the girl Griella. She was on the forecastle, her hair flying and the spray exploding about her. She looked beautiful and happy and alive, her eyes alight. He was glad for her.

He stared back over the taffrail. Hebrion and Abrusio were sliding swiftly astern. He guessed they must be doing six knots. He wondered if Jemilla were on her balcony, watching the carrack and the caravel grow smaller and smaller as they forged further out to sea.

The Osprey rose and fell, rose and fell, breasting the waves with an easy rhythm. The sails were drum-taut; Hawkwood could feel the strain on the mast through the twanging-tight backstay. If he looked up all he could see were towering expanses of canvas criss-crossed with the running rigging, and beyond the hard unclouded blue of heaven. He grinned fiercely as the ship came to life under his feet. He knew her as well as he knew the curves of his wife’s body; he knew how the masts were creaking and the timbers stretching as his ship answered his demands, like a willing horse catching fire from his own spirit. No landsman could ever feel this, and those who spent their time politicking on land would never know the exhilaration, the freedom of a fine ship answering the wind.

This, he thought, is life; this is living. Maybe it is even prayer.

The two ships sailed steadily on as the afternoon waned, leaving the land in their wake until Abrusio hill was a mere dark smudge on the rim of the world behind them. They crested the rising swell of the coastal sea and touched upon the darker, purer colour of the open ocean. They left the fishing boats and the screaming gulls behind, carving their own solitary course to the horizon and setting their bows toward a gathering wrack and fire of cloud in the west, a flame-tinted arch which housed the gleam of the sinking sun.

PART TWO

THE DEFENCE OF THE WEST

TWELVE

T HEY had been three weeks on the road, this giant convoy, this rolling city. They had fought against slime and snow and marauding wolves to force the waggons over the narrow passes of the Thurian Mountains before beginning the long, downward haul to the green plains of Ostrabar beyond.

The Sultanate of Ostrabar, now first in the ranks of the Seven Sultanates, its head, Aurungzeb the Golden, one of the richest men in the world—or he would be when this caravan reached him.

This had been a Ramusian country once, a settled land of tilled fields and coppiced woods with a church in every village and a castle on every hill. Ostiber had been its name, and its king had been one of the Seven Monarchs of Normannia.

That had changed with the advent of the Merduks sixty years ago. They had poured over the inadequately defended passes of the terrible Jafrar Mountains to the east, crossed the headwaters of the Ostian river and had overrun Ostiber in less than a year, exposing the city of Aekir’s northern flank and coming to a halt only when faced with the defended heights of the Thurians manned by grim Torunnans who included in their ranks a youthful John Mogen. Ostiber had become Ostrabar, and the wild steppe chieftain who had conquered this country took that as his family name. The captain of his guard had been Shahr Baraz, who would in time rise to command all his armies. And his sons, when they had finished poisoning one another, became sultan after him. Thus was the Kingdom of Ostiber lost to the west, its Royal line extinguished, its people enslaved, tortured, ravished and pillaged and, worst of all, forced to change their faith so their eternal souls were lost to the Company of the Saints for ever.

Thus were the children of the Western Kingdoms taught. To them the Merduk were a teeming tribe of savages, held at bay only by the valour of the Ramusian armies and the swift terror of horse and sword and arquebus.

For the folk living in Ostrabar now it was different. True, they must needs pray to Ahrimuz every day in one of the domed temples that had been erected throughout the land, and they yielded yearly tribute to the Sirdars and Beys who now inhabited the hilltop castles; but there had always been nobles in the castles exacting tribute, and they had always prayed. The terror of the first invasion was long past, and many descendants of those who had fought in Ramusian armies six decades before wielded tulwar and scimitar in the ranks of Aurungzeb’s regiments.

For some, indeed, life had improved under the Merduk yoke. Wizards and thaumaturgists and alchemists were tolerated under the new regime, not persecuted as they occasionally had been when the Knights Militant roved the land. Many, in fact, had wealthy patrons, for the Merduk nobility treasured learning above all things save, perhaps, the profession of arms and the breeding of horses.

So for those among the long train of waggons who had expected to see a nightmarish, unholy land upon their descent from the heights of the Thurians, there was a shock. They saw the same countryside, the same houses, and in the main the same people whom they had encountered every day in Aekir before its fall. The only differences were the domes of the temples glittering across the peaceful landscape, and the fantastical shapes of elephants working in the woods and along the well-kept roads. Those and the flashing silk finery of the Merduk nobility who gathered to see the train that held the spoils of Aekir.

Six miles long, it straggled out of the high land to the south. Over nine hundred waggons hauled by patient oxen, their tarred covers ragged and flapping in the wind. Trudging beside them in long lines were thousands upon thousands of captives who had been brought back as trophies for Aurungzeb to view. Most were women destined for harems and brothels, or the kitchen. Others were Torunnan soldiers, bitter-faced and savage. For them crucifixion awaited; they were to be made an example of, and were too dangerous to be allowed to live. And there were the children: young boys who would be made into eunuchs for the courts or the more specialized of the pleasure houses, young girls who would serve the same ends as the women, despite their age. There were all tastes and persuasions among the nobles of Ostrabar.

Along the flanks of the train rode bodies of Merduk light cavalry. During the crossing of the mountains they had been muffled in furs and cloaks, spattered with mud and haggard with exhaustion, but before nearing the country of their homes they had spruced themselves up, grooming their mounts and donning coloured silk surcoats over their chainmail. Pennons snapped and danced in the wind, and decorations glittered on the breasts of the horses. They made a fine sight as they stepped out, regiment by regiment, the very picture of a victorious army escorting a beaten foe.