The Bridle Path Page 6

  'And now,' he said, stepping back to take up the final item, 'we are ready to travel. Look upon your new master and remember the image until I restore the privilege of sight to you.' He stood for several seconds, unmoving, unspeaking, and Corinna stared back, already becoming lost in the forest of emotions and sensations. Finally, he held up the padded leather blindfold and, with an effort not to stumble, the Lady Corinna Oleanna, daughter of the Protector of Illeum and now a willing slave, stepped forward, head erect to receive it.

  The two women took turns at leading the way through the seemingly unending cave system, going ahead on foot, whilst the other followed some distance behind, riding one horse and leading the other. It made for slow progress, but was safer, guarding against their approach being heard, or their stumbling across their quarry without warning. It was a trick both had learned at an early age and their caution proved well founded.

  Jekka, using her mounted shifts to rest her eyes as well as her legs, was nevertheless instantly wide-awake at Alanna's return, even though the older girl moved with the silence of a mountain cat. Even before Alanna spoke, Jekka knew this was not just another change around.

  'They've made camp,' Alanna said, speaking quietly. 'I smelt wood smoke long before I came upon them and was able to get up quite close.'

  'Did you see our man among them?'

  Alanna nodded. 'It's difficult to tell some of them apart,' she said, 'wrapped in their furs and all bearded as they are, but I identified one who seems to be giving all the orders. That must be friend Mielgaard, unless there are two bands of these fiends in the same area.'

  'How many are they?'

  'As we calculated from the tracks, about ten, and the mystery of the footprints is solved, too. They have a girl with them, probably taken from that last farm we saw, though she could have been with them longer.'

  'Not one of their number, then?' Jekka said.

  'Not unless they drag their own women around in slave hoods and collars, no.'

  Jekka regarded her companion steadily. 'You think we should try to free her, don't you?' she said, accusingly. She sighed and swung herself out of the saddle. 'No,' she continued, 'you don't have to say anything - I just know you.'

  'Would you have us leave her to these stinking vultures?' Alanna demanded.

  Jekka shrugged. 'And what do we do with her then, even supposing we do manage to get her away from them? Gods of Mount Ignis, isn't this quest fraught enough as it is? I say let's just shoot this Mielgaard fellow and get our arses out of here in one piece.'

  'And forget all about this poor wench?' Alanna made a sour face. 'I don't have to tell you the sort of life a slave girl can expect among the tribes of the Snow Kingdoms. First a shaman will use his knives and potions to ensure that she becomes barren, and then she'll be no more than a warm sheath for every fat cock in their mountains.

  'Then, when she becomes older and no longer pleasing on the eye, they'll use her as a beast of burden and then, when her strength finally starts to leave her, she'll be cast into a ravine and her brains dashed among the rocks.'

  'And non human vultures will pick her bones clean; yes, I know.' Jekka sighed irritably, but she knew it was pointless to argue further. 'All right, my princess and honoured leader, if we must, we must. And I assume you have thought as to how me might free this poor bitch without becoming vulture carrion ourselves?'

  Sprig and Mielgaard had spent several minutes in animated discussion, both men gesturing with their hands. Melina, sitting cross-legged on the edge of Sprig's furs, strained her ears in an effort to catch what they were saying. But they spoke in low tones, despite the earnestness of their attitudes, and their dialect, more heavily accentuated when they spoke among themselves, was difficult to follow at the best of times.

  Melina, however, knew full well the topic of their discourse; it was herself and her ultimate fate, for Sprig seemed determined now that he should own her and had approached Mielgaard in order to barter for this. The chieftain, however, did not seem well disposed to this proposition and appeared to be taunting his youngest follower.

  The other men, though trying to appear disinterested in the argument, were plainly all following it closely. None ventured an opinion, none dared to interrupt, but there were several low guffaws of laughter, presumably each time their leader scored a particularly telling point.

  At last, however, some sort of agreement seemed to have been reached, though the dark expression on Sprig's countenance as he returned to Melina suggested to her that it was not exactly to his liking. Standing over her, he stooped, grasped her wrists and hauled her to her feet.

  'Come,' he said simply. Half dragging her, he strode back to the circle of light about the campfire and deposited Melina at Mielgaard's feet. Peering out through the narrow eye slits of the slave hood, she stared up at the chieftain's weathered and scarred face and her heart sank. Being Sprig's bed slut was bad enough, but now it seemed that Mielgaard had used his seniority to claim her as his own. However, when he finally addressed her, his words gave her some cause for hope.

  'Hide face,' he grinned, baring a set of chipped and broken yellow fangs, 'it would seem our young puppy finds you pleasing. Do you find him pleasing?'

  Melina looked from Mielgaard back to Sprig and nodded, slowly. 'Yes, master,' she whispered. The closing circle formed by the other brigands erupted into gales of raucous laughter at this. Mielgaard raised a huge hand to quieten them.

  'At least the young slut has learned her place quickly,' he roared delightedly. 'She'll make a decent slave for any man. But is this young whelp man enough to deserve his own slave, that's the question, heh?' His gaze travelled around the arc of expectant faces.

  'Get her over that big rock there!' he snapped. 'Tie her down tight and let's see how steady the whelp's hand is.'

  Before Melina had time to react, several pairs of rough hands seized her, lifting her clear of the ground and bearing her across to where a particularly large rock stood near the edge of the plateau. They hoisted her over it, face down, and ropes were quickly snared about her wrists and ankles and drawn down its sides, spread-eagling her, legs wide apart, so that the only part of her body she could still move was her head.

  Mielgaard strode up to her slowly. In his hand he held something orange, which he held out for Melina to see. It was a long thick carrot and she stared at it, uncomprehendingly. Seeing her confusion, he simply laughed the more.

  'A wench has more than one use in the kitchen,' he chuckled, 'even a wench who can't cook. Now, some men like their carrots whole,' he continued. 'Me, I like them thinly sliced and my meat raw and bloody.' He moved around behind her, and Melina squealed in alarm when she realised what he intended. Her cries of protestation and feeble attempts at clenching her buttocks were of no avail, however, and the hard vegetable was quickly inserted into her.

  'Let it drop,' Mielgaard warned her, stepping back, 'and I'll flay the skin off those pretty dugs of yours with a red hot knife, understand?' Melina, terrified even more than she was humiliated, nodded. She stared backwards and saw Sprig, a coiled whip hanging from his right hand, walking slowly towards her.

  'Seven slices clean and the eighth with a sauce of blood,' Mielgaard said. 'One slice less, or more than one with her blood on it and you forfeit her to the rest of us, even your own share. Meet the test and she's yours.' He bent over, placing his bearded face close to Melina's.

  'Best you try to keep that pretty arse still, hide face,' he sneered. 'The young whelp ain't as versed in the culinary arts as the rest of us and, just in case you haven't understood, he's going to have to use his whip to chop up the carrot you're holding so prettily. If he gives me seven clean slices and the eighth with just a little smear of your blood, you go to him.

  'If not, well, bloody-arsed or not, you belong to the rest of us, and you've already had a taste of what that will mean.' He straightened and stepped away again, turning to address Sprig.

  'Chop away, my young friend!' he roared. 'And don't for
get, the pink bits are the girl, so don't start slicing her too quickly!'

  Sprig took up an open-legged stance, shaking the whip out before him. He twitched his wrist a few times, snaking little loops along the length of the braid as it lay upon the rock, and measured his target carefully. Melina shuddered, screwed up her eyes and turned her head to face forward again.

  She heard the whip hissing through the air like an arrow, the crack from its tip exploding to fill the air with a noise like a bough breaking from the top of a tree. Air hissed through her nostrils and she jumped, tensing for the jolt of pain. None came, but the assembled band let out a cry as one. Risking another look back, Melina saw one of their number step forward and bend to retrieve something from the rock behind her, holding it up in the manner of a trophy. It was a slice of carrot.

  He passed it to Mielgaard, who examined it, turning it over and fingering the stub of greenery still attached to its domed end. He nodded grudgingly.

  'Not bad for a whelp,' he said, and tossed the piece over his shoulder. 'Let's see if you can do that six more times, now, eh?'

  Blindfolded, gagged, bound and hobbled, Corinna was completely at the mercy of the man who led her by the short chain he had clipped to the stiff collar of her slave hood. In the soft sandals she padded down stairs, along corridors, trusting to his guidance, the sound of her pulse echoing inside her head to the accompaniment of her laboured breathing, so that even her ears, part muffled by the soft hide that stretched over them, gave her little assistance.

  After a few minutes they had reached the ground floor and Corinna's sense of direction and memory told her he was leading her along the wide corridor that ran almost the full length of the main building at this level, passing the great hall, the reception chambers, the antechambers and private rooms, and then on into that area which housed the small detachment of castle guards, the storerooms and the kitchens.

  As she shuffled doggedly along, she occasionally fancied she heard the sounds of other people moving nearby, but after the first near encounter she put such thoughts out of her mind. After all, she reasoned, if any should be about at such an hour and see them, all they would see was a dark-haired slave girl being led away by the Stewardess's captain, and assume that the girl who had been brought into the castle earlier that day had failed to meet with the Lady Corinna's approval.

  None would imagine that this was the lady herself, breasts and sex bared and ringed for public gaze, head bowed in its all-enveloping symbol of servitude, the hood of a slave now to be transported as just another piece of livestock, the hood and chains ensuring that she remained compliant and easy to handle.

  Except that the hood and chains were having a totally different effect upon this particular slave and, as she continued to follow where the leash led her, the slave Corinna almost buckled at her knees as the first wave of orgasm threatened to betray her intended composure.

  'They seem to have found a way of amusing themselves,' Alanna hissed, sliding back down to join Jekka, where the younger girl waited on the riverbed. 'They are playing the sort of game that only a man could find entertaining,' she added, and briefly described the scene she had just witnessed.

  'In her arse?' Jekka echoed, wide-eyed. 'Some sort of stick, you say?'

  'Something similar in shape, anyway,' Alanna said. 'I wasn't close enough to see properly. At a guess, I would say the fellow has to cut away as many pieces as possible before his whip finds her flesh, poor little bitch.'

  Jekka picked up her regular crossbow, which was already cocked and loaded. 'Perhaps I should shoot the bastard now, before he gets too close,' she suggested, as another cheer echoed back along the tunnel.

  Alanna held up a restraining hand. 'Not yet,' she said. 'Better the wench gets a bloody backside than we risk ourselves too soon. Let them play their game, for they are all drinking heavily as they look on. Before long they'll be falling asleep, or sluggish at best, and then we can move on them.

  'Who knows, we may even be able to use the same trick we did at Varragol and reduce the odds a little to begin with. Judging from the smell, the small hollow just beyond that rock shelf is used as a midden, so in a while I think I shall go and hide myself nearby. A man with his drawers about his ankles is an easy mark.'

  In the near darkness, Jekka smiled. 'My princess,' she whispered, barely able to speak for laughing, 'I am beginning to wonder about you.'

  The single sentry stood inside the doorway leading from the tower out onto the north rampart, almost invisible in the deep shadows. Above, thick clouds scudded across the night sky, obscuring moon and stars alike, so that the treetops of the forest that surrounded Castle Varragol on three sides became one black mass, devoid of feature or definition.

  Ingrim leaned out over the wall and peered down at the inky thread of the moat and spat a ball of phlegm. Orfal, standing alongside him, kept his eyes firmly fixed on the inner courtyard, ears keened for any sounds that would indicate possible eavesdroppers below, though at this hour, apart from the night watch posted at strategic points about the battlements, the inmates of the castle palace would all be sleeping soundly.

  'In the morning, then,' Ingrim said, straightening up and turning back to the veteran sergeant. 'As soon as the poison in the oats takes effect, any remaining Illeum guards on the walls are to be overpowered as quickly and silently as possible. After that, we can deal with whatever remains inside the palace itself, but we do not want to alert them to what is happening until it is too late for them to make any sort of stand.

  'I don't want to have any more casualties among our men than is absolutely necessary, understand?'

  Orfal remained stone-faced. 'Of course, captain,' he replied levelly. 'We'll go through them like a hurricane through a wheat field, only a lot quieter. What about the poison, though? If a whole watch starts rolling around holding their stomachs and groaning, someone's bound to get suspicious.'

  'No need to worry about that,' Ingrim replied, smiling nastily. 'This stuff has been specially selected for the task. Ten minutes after swallowing it they'll just start feeling drowsy, which they'll probably pass off as tiredness or the effects of whatever they drank the night before. Another five minutes or so and they'll be fast asleep.

  'The poison then starts to spread out and paralyse every part of the body, so within a further quarter hour they'll all be well beyond any hope of ever waking up again. No fits, no frothing at the mouth, no death agonies, just a nice, peaceful, tidy death. So make sure none of our lads touches anything from that pot, right?'

  'Right,' Orfal agreed. He turned his gaze towards the shadowy sentry, though not from any fears of being overheard, for the guard was one of their own men. 'What about milady's little harem?' he asked. 'Only some of the lads were asking, if you know what I mean?'

  'I know exactly what you mean,' Ingrim confirmed. 'As far as I'm concerned, once the guards have been accounted for they can share out the spoils in any way they want - including those soppy pageboys, for those who are that way inclined. But make sure they know that no one is to touch her ladyship and, apart from securing her, neither are they to interfere with the black bitch. The noble lord wants to keep that privilege for himself.'

  'Yes, but I thought—'

  Ingrim raised a hand, cutting Orfal short. 'Keep your thoughts to yourself, sergeant,' he warned. 'Lord Fulgrim will not thank anyone who reminds him of what these harpies have done to him and besides, I think you'll find he still retains the ability, if not all his previous drive, as it were.'

  'I wouldn't want to be in that black cow's boots come tomorrow morning,' Orfal sneered.

  Ingrim chuckled and turned away. 'Somehow, sergeant,' he said, 'I don't think they'd suit you anyway.'

  Alanna plunged the blade of her knife in and out of the soft silt, wiping the blood from it, and bent to drag the second body away into the darkness, far enough so that the next man to come to empty his bowels would not see it. Not that he would be expecting to see anything, for the brigands were all now cl
early and noisily drunk, those who had not already fallen asleep.

  The presence of the girl was irksome, Alanna thought, as she laid the second corpse alongside the first. Without her to consider, it would have been a simple matter to remain hidden, ignoring Mielgaard's men and waiting for the chieftain himself. Even kings needed to relieve themselves eventually, and their contract had been to kill only this band's leader. That done, it would be an easy matter to slip away and they could have been back out into the snow covered open long before any of his men realised he was missing.

  The official from the court who had approached the two Yslanders had not even asked for proof of their success; no head in a sack, not even a hank of hair and scalp. Alanna's integrity was beyond question, as was that of all the Yslandic warrior women. Her word that Mielgaard was dead would not be questioned, but it would never enter her head to claim this until it was so.

  As events had transpired, assuming they both survived, she would indeed be able to take back the chieftain's head, but that moment was still a long way off. On the small plateau above at least eight men still lived, drunk or otherwise, and Alanna knew enough about these snow warriors to know that, once the first surprise had worn off, they could make even more dangerous adversaries in their present condition than if they were sober.

  Sitting on the chest of the second corpse, she twirled her knife in her fingers and thought carefully. Two dead so far - how many more could she risk before one of them must surely become suspicious?

  Away on the far side of the plateau Jekka now lay waiting among some broken rocks, her crossbow at the ready, her instructions, if the alarm should be raised, to take Mielgaard with her first shot. His death - and Alanna had no doubt that Jekka would indeed kill him, for her aim was the surest Alanna had ever seen - would hopefully cause enough initial confusion to allow the red-headed assassin to reload and shoot again. In addition, she had her miniature crossbow cocked and armed, less accurate than the larger bows at distance, it was true, but Jekka's position was easily within its range.