The Quest - Smith Wilbur (читаем книги онлайн бесплатно TXT) 📗

It was still twenty days short of the harvest moon when the oligarchs struck. Many thousands were already privy to the planned exodus so a bright flame was burning throughout Jarri. It was inevitable that the spies would pick up its smoke. The oligarchs sent Captain Onka with two hundred men to Mutangi, the village from which the rumours had emanated.

They surrounded it at night and captured all the inhabitants. Onka interrogated them one at a time in the village council hut. He used the lash and the branding iron. Although eight men died during the questioning, and many more were blinded and maimed, he learned little.

Then he started on the women. Bilto's youngest wife was the mother of twins, a girl and a boy aged four. When she resisted Onka's questions, he forced her to watch while he decapitated her son. Then he threw the boy's severed head at her feet, and picked up his sister by a handful of her curls. He dangled her screaming and wriggling before her mother's face. 'You know that I will not stop with just one of your brats,' he told the woman and pricked the little girl's cheek with his dagger. She shrieked afresh with pain, and the mother broke down. She told Onka everything she knew, and that was a great deal.

Onka ordered his men to drive all the villagers, including Bilto, his wife and their surviving daughter, into the thatched council hut. They barred the doors and windows, then set fire to the thatch. While the screams were still ringing from the burning building, Onka mounted and rode like a fury for the citadel to report to the oligarchs.

Two of the villagers had been hunting in the hills. From afar they witnessed the massacre and went to warn That and Meren that they had been betrayed. They ran all the way to where the band was hiding, a distance of almost twenty leagues.

That listened to what the two men told him, and did not hesitate.

'We cannot wait for the harvest moon. We must march at once.'

'Taita!' Fenn cried out, in agony of spirit. 'You promised to wait for him.'

'You know that I cannot,' That replied. 'Even Colonel Cambyses must agree that I dare not do so.'

Reluctantly Meren nodded. 'Colonel That is right. He cannot wait.

He must take the people and fly. Taita himself wanted it.'

'I will not go with you,' Fenn cried out. 'I will wait until Taita comes.'

'I will stay too,' Meren told her, 'but the others must leave at once.'

Sidudu reached for Fenn's hand. 'You and Meren are my friends. I will not go.'

'You are brave girls,' said That, 'but will you go again to the Temple of Love and bring out our young women?'

'Of course!' Fenn exclaimed.

'How many men will you need to go with you?' asked That.

'Ten will suffice,' Meren told him. 'We will also need spare horses for the temple girls. We will bring them to you at the first river crossing on the road to Kitangule. Then we will come back to wait for Taita.'

They rode for most of the night. Fenn and Sidudu led, but Meren followed close behind on Windsmoke. In the early light of dawn, before sunrise, they breasted the top of the hills and looked down on the Temple of Love, nestled in the valley below.

'What is the morning routine in the temple?' Fenn asked.

'Before sunrise the priestesses take the girls to the temple to pray to the goddess. After that they go to the refectory for breakfast.'

'So they should be in the temple now?' Meren asked.

'Almost certainly,' Sidudu affirmed.

'Whatofthetrogs?'

'I am not sure, but I think they will be patrolling the temple grounds and the woods.'

'Are any of the priestesses kind to the girls? Are there any good women among them?'

'None!' said Sidudu bitterly. 'They are all cruel and merciless. They treat us like caged animals. They force us to submit to the men who come, and some of the priestesses use us for their own foul pleasures.'

Fenn looked across at Meren. 'What shall we do with them?'

'We kill any who get in our way.'

They drew their swords and rode down in a tight group, making no attempt to conceal their approach. The trogs were nowhere to be seen, and Sidudu led them directly to the temple, which stood detached from the main building. They raced towards it and pulled up the horses in front of the wooden doors. Meren jumped down and tried the latch, but it was barred from the inside.

'On me!' he shouted to the men who followed him, and they formed up in phalanx. At his next order they lifted their shields and charged the door, which burst open. The girls were huddled on the floor of the nave

with four black-robed priestesses standing guard. One was a tall, middle aged woman with a hard, pockmarked face. She lifted the golden talisman she held in her right hand and pointed it at Meren.'

'Beware!' Sidudu shouted. 'That is Nongai and she is a powerful sorceress. She can blast you with her magic'

Fenn already had an arrow nocked to her bow and did not hesitate.

She drew and released it in a single fluid movement. The arrow hummed down the length of the nave and struck Nongai in the centre of her chest. The talisman spun out of her hand and she crumpled on to the stone floor. The other three priestesses scattered like a flock of crows.

Fenn shot two more arrows and brought down all but the last, who reached the small door behind the altar. As she wrenched it open Sidudu shot an arrow between her shoulder-blades. The woman slid down the wall leaving a trail of blood on the stonework. Most of the temple maidens were screaming. The others had pulled their chitons over their heads and were cowering in a terrified group.

'Speak to them, Sidudu,' Meren ordered. 'Quieten them.'

Sidudu ran to the girls, and pulled some to their feet.

'It's I, Sidudu. You have nothing to fear. These are good men, and they have come to save you.' She saw Jinga among them. 'Help me, Jinga! Help me bring them to their senses!'

'Take them out to the horses, and get them mounted,' Meren told Fenn. 'We can expect an attack from the trogs at any moment.'

They dragged the girls out through the doorway. Some were still weeping and wailing and had to be thrown up bodily on to the saddles.

Meren was ruthless with them, and Fenn slapped one across the face as she shouted at her: 'Get up, you foolish creature, or we will leave you to the trogs.'

At last they were all mounted, and Meren shouted, 'Forward at the gallop!' and touched Windsmoke's flanks with his heels. He had two girls up behind him, clinging to him and each other. Nakonto and Imbali hung on Fenn's stirrup ropes and she carried them along with her. Sidudu had Jinga behind her and one of the other girls seated in front. All the other horses carried at least three girls. Heavily laden, they galloped in a tight group back across the temple lawns, heading for the hills and the road to Kitangule.

As they entered the track through the forest, the trogs were waiting for them. Five of the huge apes had climbed into the trees and they dropped out of the branches on to the horses as they passed below. At

the same time other apes came bellowing and roaring out of the undergrowth. They leapt up at the riders or snapped with their powerful jaws at the legs of the horses.

Nakonto had a short stabbing spear in his right hand and killed three of the brutes with as many quick blows. Imbali's axe hissed and hummed through the air as she cut down two more. Meren and Hilto hacked and thrust with their swords, and the troopers who followed spurred their horses into the fight. But the trogs were fearless and single-minded and the fight was ferocious. Even when they were gravely wounded or dying the apes tried to drag themselves back into the fray. Two set upon Windsmoke and tried to savage her hindquarters. The grey mare aimed two mighty kicks. The first crushed the skull of one and the second caught the other under the jaw and snapped its neck cleanly.