Free Kavin's World by David Mason Page B

doubted that he would live, myself, tough as he seemed. He must have broken half the bones in his body in that fall, and he did not seem to have much chance.
    The father, groaning and spitting, I sent after him, to watch the healing or the death, whichever came. Thuramon waited at my elbow.
    “The boy’s words slew any chance of peace,” he said. “He told them his father had been tortured, that they must not believe anything, and to come into the city and slay.”
    “Filial devotion,” I said bitterly.
    “No,” said Thuramon. “The boy probably believed you would slay or enslave them both anyway. He could not bear to see his father weakened by fear for him. It was bravery.”
    “He’s left us with no hope of talking to his kind, not now,” I said. “Well, he’s paid for it. If his wounds don’t kill him, the plague will. And his fool of a father goes over the wall on the end of a rope when I return. We’ll have no food to spare a useless prisoner then.”
    “Pledge no deaths,” Thuramon said. “You need luck.”
    “I have luck,” I told him, meaning two things. “But—well, we’ll see if I can afford mercy, later. Let’s see if all’s ready at the waterside.”
    The boat we had selected lay ready, a large scow with a shallow draft, eight oars to a side. We loaded it deep with food, since Granorek might be a hungry place by now. There was barely room for three casks of powder and two of the culverins, which we clamped to a forward rail. We took out the mast for room, since the wind would be against us all the way, and crammed a full two-score men into the craft, a tight fit.
    When night came, we pulled out and round the south sea-tower, into the river’s mouth. We were sure we had not been seen. But Thuramon made ready with certain things that had been in the sorcerer’s box, and other things of his own.
    He fixed a bronze lamp, an ancient, clumsy thing of twisted ornament, in the prow; midships, he set a huge jar made of green clay and painted with serpents. Then he sat down beside the jar and waited, smiling to himself. At times he lifted his head, sniffing at the air like a mare downwind from a stallion.
    We rowed on, as quietly as we could, Thuramon waited, and we watched the black river banks flow past.
    Then Thuramon chuckled low in his throat.
    “I hear horsemen,” he said, and lifted the cover from his green jar, muttering words too low to hear.
    A faint mist rose from the jar and thickened. In a moment, the fog that rolled out was so dense that we could no longer see, and it continued to flow steadily. Thuramon crawled forward, stumbling over knees and casks. When he reached the prow he struck flint, and lit the queer old lamp.
    Suddenly, a strange light glowed about the bronze lamp, a sea-green light that spread so far that we could see the banks of the river on either side, although the mist still flowed impalpably about us. That light was almost as bright as day.
    On the nearer bank, half a dozen skin-clad riders had halted, and stared out at the river. They were only a spear-cast away, and we could see them clearly. But they could not see us, as was quite evident from their actions.
    “They see only fog, and sea mist, coming up the river.” Thuramon said. “The lamp is for our eyes alone. Row, now, and make haste. The mist will not last forever.”
    All that night we rowed, by relays, steadily, with no fear of discovery. As the sun rose, we were halfway to our goal, and the mist still spread obediently about us; our lamp still lit the way, though the sun glowed dimly through our fog.
    We saw no riders, now; they must all be either down river at the city wall or gathered near the castle Granorek. Nevertheless, Thuramon glanced anxiously into the jar, from time to time, and added sprinkles of a black powder there. Sometimes we saw the riversides too clearly; black bones of peasant villages, dead cattle, and human dead. There were blackened fields, and foulness, everywhere. I watched,