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superstitious, they might quit till daylight. Maybe they'd even turn around
and go home, though that seemed a little much to hope for.
In the dark I couldn't see our tracks, but I didn't need tracks to retrace our
route. When Gunnlag had decided to move camp, we'd come down from our initial
campsite, crossed a small valley, then climbed along a ravine to its head at a
notch in this ridge crest.
From there we'd hiked along the crest till it topped off at the knob. Even
with the moon not up yet, it would be easy to follow the same route in
reverse.
The "notch" was an actual sharp one, with a big rock outcrop on one side. When
I turned there to start down the ravine, someone grabbed me from behind, hard,
arm around my neck, jerking me back with a rough strength too abrupt to let me
use hand-foot art. It took me totally by surprise.
Another man moved in front of me, knife ready, and peered into my face.
Recognizing me, he spoke quietly in Norse, and the one who had grabbed me let
me go.
Gunnlag had posted lookouts; I should have realized he would. "I'm going down
the ravine to set an ambush," I said softly in Norman French. They didn't
understand me, of course; it would have sounded crazy to them if they had. But
it seemed as if I should say something to them. One of them said something
back in
Norse. No one had understood anyone, but I guess it
made us all feel better somehow. I nodded and left them, starting down the
ravine with as little noise as possible.
As the ravine got deeper, it seemed to get even darker, probably because it
was exposed to less sky and less starlight. Where there were clumps of trees
in the bottom, it was darker still. It got stonier, too, with lots of boulders
that had rolled down from above. The upslope on my right had quite a lot of
clumpy brush and scrubby trees, probably because it faced away from the sun.
The other side was pretty bare, as if it faced into the sun and dried out too
badly during the dry season.
About halfway down the ravine I came to what seemed like a good place. When
the moon came up, visibility would be pretty good in the bottom there-no
trees, no tall boulders. And on the brushy side of the ravine, the lower slope
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was clear along there, a slant of naked rock. I scrambled up it on all fours,
to take cover above it between two clumps of stiff-twigged scrub. From there
I'd have an open shot at anyone riding up the bottom, at a range of only about
twenty or twenty-five yards.
Of course, I couldn't know for sure that any Saracens would come along, but it
seemed as if they would. If they hadn't shown up by the first Sight of dawn,
I'd just have to take off for the knob-that or hide out and try to make it to
Norman territory on my own. No way was I going to tiy ambushing a Saracen
scouting party by daylight, when they'd be able to spot me.
And any who got out of effective stunner range-maybe fifty yards- would be
able to sit back and shoot arrows at me in total safety.
Meanwhile, I had some waiting to do, and something occurred to me that I
hadn't thought about before: I
was going to have to stay awake. If I went to sleep, Saracens might ride past
without waking me up. Right away I started worrying. Turning off my remote, I
took it out of my ear so it wouldn't interfere with
my hearing.
Staying awake turned out to be easier than I'd expected, because it was
getting pretty cold again, and just sitting there didn't keep me warm like
hiking had. After checking by feel the setting on my stunner-at this range,
narrow beam and just above medium intensity seemed about right-I shoved my
hands inside my cape to keep them warm in my armpits.
I wondered what Jenoor would think if she could see me here, then imagined
that she could see me, and what we might say to each other. After a while I
dozed in spite of the cold-dozed and wakened, dozed and wakened-and didn't
worry about it. In as shallow a sleep as that, I told myself, I'd wake up if
any horses came along.
Finally I awakened with a start, and thought sure some sound must have done
it-maybe horseshoes on rock. I sat still, hardly breathing, but couldn't hear
a thing, and after a couple of minutes decided it had just been nerves. The
sky down the ravine was lighter, but it didn't seem to be the graying of early
dawn. Besides, I was sure I hadn't slept nearly that long. Moonrise, I told
myself. Of course. After a few minutes I could see moonlight shining on the
upper slope across the ravine; the moon had climbed above the next ridge east.
Now I could see quite a bit better, although my side of the ravine was out of
direct moonlight, in heavy shadow.
If the Saracens were going to move that night, they'd probably have started by
now. If they'd reached our first stopping place, chance was that they'd
followed our trail down off that ridge to camp by the creek in the little
valley below it; there were even some empty huts there. And if they'd done
that, I told myself, I shouldn't have to wait too much longer.
So I was ready when, maybe ten minutes later, I heard faint hoof sounds. I lay
down on my stomach and crept forward a couple of feet so I could look farther
down
the ravine, I saw movement, and seconds later a horseman rode out of the
shadow of some trees fifty or sixty yards away.
There were three of them, their armor covered by robes-advance scouts I
suppose. They rode one behind the other, twenty or thirty feet apart. I Set
the first ride past my position before I pushed the firing stud. He slumped at
once, falling without even grabbing to hold on, and while he was slumping, I [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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