Ariosto (35 page)

Massamo held up a large sack that moved and bulged most strangely, and a new sound arose from it, a distressed cackling. Massamo held up the two ducks that flapped in his hands. “I feel a damned whoreson fool, Ariosto, but if this is necessary…”

Taking the sack from the Lanzi captain, Lodovico held the mouth open a moment while Massamo Fabroni thrust the two new ducks into it. The sack writhed and the sounds grew louder. “We’ll take these back anyway. If the others have fared as well, there should be ample ducks for all of us.”

“The only place I would consider ducks ample is in a cookpot,” said Massamo as he slung the sack onto his shoulder. “Ducks, of all things. Ducks!” He chortled and began to wade back toward firm ground.

“Per grazie Dei, be careful,” Lodovico said sharply. It was dark and the way was hazardous. He had been given stem warnings from the Cérocchi and Pau Attan of the perils of the swamps. There were voracious serpents, deadlier than the asp, which waited in the tangled vegetation of the shore to surprise their victims. It was said that these snakes struck so quickly that there was almost no time for a cry before the venom rendered the unfortunate insensible, and the serpent dragged the body under the water so that it might consume its prey in comfort. Fumovisione had described a gigantic lizard, like the crocodiles of Egypt, which lay still on the water having the appearance of a log, which could tear a man in two.

“Fables for children,” Massamo pronounced as Lodovico reiterated the warnings. “ Where are the lizards, tell me that?”

“Far from here, I earnestly hope,” he said with a quiet laugh. “Indeed, I hope that all the monsters they have described to me so vividly prefer to stay abed at night and will not trouble us in any way.”

“You’ve the right of it,” Massamo exclaimed. “The only monsters I want are the ones you can’t see.”

“That’s another matter entirely,” Lodovico corrected him, suddenly serious, his chestnut eyes shining with somber determination. “The monsters you cannot see are immeasurably worse than those you can, for no matter how terrible, the visible ones can be fought. How do you battle an enemy you are unable to see? Where is it? What is it like? Where is it armed? Where are its weapons? How does it move? Whenever you face a man in battle, those are the things that save you, whether you think of them or not. Your mind takes note of such details and you are able to defeat the other soldier or demon or monster. I am often reminded of those brave, blind Kings who still went into battle and somehow found glory and victory. What great souls those valiant Kings possessed! I cannot think of them without humility. Who am I, who are any of us, in the face of such commitment and integrity?”

Away to the left there was the sound of other waders and in a moment it was possible to see a party of Cicora soldiers coming along the edge of the marsh. There were six men, two with sacks giving ample evidence that the men had caught a great many ducks. One of the men lifted a hand in lackadaisical greeting. The others were less cordial.

“We’re still foreigners to them,” Massamo growled to Lodovico, with no attempt to lower his voice. “I know they’re good enough fighters, but what will happen in battle, that’s what I want to know. I don’t mind taking on these wizards and supernatural warriors so long as there are loyal men at my back.”

Lodovico watched the Cicora men in the gloom and kept his thoughts to himself. If only he did not share Massamo’s fear! It was well enough with most of the Cérocchi, but there were so many others, and Lodovico could not deny the apprehension that very nearly overwhelmed him. He tried to recall the problems he had had with the Turkish fighters he had taken with his expedition against the Great Mandarin, but had to admit that he could not offer these troops the plunder that had so attracted the Turks. He did not want to burden Falcone with the problem, for the Cérrochi Prince had much on his mind, and was still new to battle.

There was a shout from the Cicora band, and a flurry of activity. Then one of the men screamed out for help. Lodovico exchanged a quick look with Massamo, then sprinted out of the water. “You take the ducks back to camp and bring help,” he called to the Lanzi captain. “I will do what I can here.”

Massamo started to protest, then shrugged massively and began to slog off toward the shore, his high boots making a sound not unlike large frogs.

By the time Massamo had set foot on the bank, Lodovico had reached the Cicora, calling to gain their attention as he approached. “Good fighters he addressed them as he lessened his pace. “What has happened here?” He was hampered, he knew, by his inexpert command of their language, but he had already decided that it would be better to speak in their tongue than in Cérocchi, in which he had by now become quite fluent.

The nearest of the Cicora turned, distressed. “Our companion,” he cried, pointing out a dim figure thrashing in the mud some little distance beyond them, “has been seized by the sucking earth.”

The others nodded in agreement and the man in the mud cried out in a doleful wail.

“What is the sucking earth?” Lodovico was not entirely certain that he understood the word correctly. Sucking earth sounded very strange to him, though it did remind him of the dangerous sands in the desserts of the Orient where he had wandered not so long ago. There he had seen those stretches of sand, in no visible way different from any other area of sand, where, if man or beast set foot, he would be dragged down to a slow and terrible death of suffocation. He went quickly to the edge of the mud, heedless of the warning of the Cicora. In the desert, he had learned that it was possible to save men from the sands, and so it might be possible to save the man in the mud.

“Do not, Ariosto…” the nearest of the men cautioned him.

But already Lodovico was pulling off his scaled guarnacca. It was a cool night and he was half soaked. “Hold my feet,” he ordered tersely.

Two of the Cicora glanced at each other as if to disavow any idea this clearly deranged foreigner might profess.

“If that is your wish,” the man beside him assented dubiously.

“I’ll need one man on each leg,” he went on, ignoring the protestations that rose from the warriors. “Hold them firmly, and if I tell you to pull, then pull me hard as you can away from the mud.” He did not wait any longer, but dropped to his knees and began to stretch out in the direction of the man who was by now deeper than his waist in the hideous bog. Carefully Lodovico slithered forward until he could feel the consistency of the mud change to a treacherous, jellylike, smooth and unstable surface. He stopped at once and lay spread-eagled on the clammy mud.

“Ariosto.” The Cicora who had spoken to him before sounded impossibly distant, as if speaking over miles of open water instead of two arm lengths of marsh.

“My feet!” Lodovico shouted, and murmured a brief prayer that the warriors would do as he told them. “Hang on. Now!”

The Cicora obeyed him, reluctantly.

The next maneuver, he knew, was the most difficult and the most essential. If he failed in it, he would not only lose the man flailing at the air not far from him, but he might be trapped the same way himself. He clutched his guarnacca, and, holding the cuff of one sleeve firmly in his hand, he swung the rest of the garment so that it might reach out to the man.

At first the garment fell short, but, undaunted, Lodovico mustered his strength to try again. He felt his skin growing cold from the wet that had soaked through his shirt and hose and calzebrache. He tossed the guarnacca again and almost lost his hold on it. He could hear the men behind him mutter among themselves, and it seemed as if the grip on one of his ankles lessened.

“Hold fast!” he shouted and swung the guarnacca with all his might.

The garment arched through the air, the metallic scales shining in the muted light from the Cicora’s lantern. It fell swift and true, the cuff of the sleeve landing within reach of the man caught in the mud.

The Cicora gasped and one of them uttered words that, though Lodovico did not understand them, could only be an oath. “We are holding you,” the leader of the group assured Lodovico, and the tightness of the hands on his knees and ankles attested eloquently to this.

“You,” Lodovico said to the trapped man, not allowing himself to be distracted from his purpose by the enthusiasm of the men behind him. “You must take the end of the sleeve, just there.” He waited, tense, while the man scrabbled for the cuff. His chest was growing icy from the dampness. “Have you got it yet?”

The man nodded frantically, and rasped out a few garbled words. “He has it,” the spokesman of the group interpreted.

“Very well,” Lodovico said, deciding that it would be best for the man in the mud to hear the instructions plainly and in his own language. “Tell him that I am going to start to pull him toward me. I will pull very slowly at first. Tell him that he must do nothing. All that is necessary is that he maintain his hold on the sleeve. Be certain he understands.”

The Cicora relayed this, and there was an anxious burst of words from the trapped man. “He says that he is still sinking.”

“I am aware of that,” Lodovico responded as calmly as he could. “Tell him that it is not important and that it will not be for long.”

The man did as he was told, then said to Lodovico, “What must we do now?”

“Hold me until I tell you otherwise. Do not let me slip.” It was perilous now, he realized. The first tugs were the most difficult, and the most essential. If the mud had not gripped him too completely, it would be a routine matter to pull him from it. Lodovico knew that it was senseless to jerk at the guarnacca. It would not help the trapped man and it might tear the sleeves off the garment. He drew the sleeve toward him until he felt the cloth grow taut, then he began slowly increasing the pressure. “Don’t let me move!” he ordered the men holding him. He felt the first, slight shift that told him the man was no longer sinking. Lodovico took heart and dragged on the guarnacca with more force than he had dared use at first.

The trapped man shouted something, shook his head wildly and tried to scramble out of the mud.

“No!” Lodovico cried out, and felt himself start to slip toward the ominous stretch of quivering dampness. “Hang on!”

There were frantic hands on him and a hubble of voices.

Lodovico slid a little farther and he felt his elbows start to sink, a gentle, seductive plucking from the ravenous marsh. Then he very nearly released the cuff he held. He could hear the trapped man shriek terribly, but it was a temptation that came from his fear. To sink down in that! Only the knowledge that he would condemn the man on the other end of the guarnacca to just such a hideous death kept his fingers closed tightly on the fabric. He had stopped moving now, but for the sliding of his elbows. “Do you have me?” he called, glad that he could keep his words steady.

“Yes,” came the prompt answer, from a voice that was strained and unnaturally high.

“Good. Now, tell that man that he must not move again. He must lie still. If he moves again, I don’t know whether I will be able to pull him out.” He gradually pulled the guarnacca taut again while the Cicora explained to his trapped friend what had been said. “Are you certain that he will not move?” He asked the question in trepidation. He doubted if he could sustain another such disruption.

“He will lie still,” the man behind him said with cold authority.

“Excellent. He wrapped the end of the sleeve more tightly around his hands. “We try again.” The sweat on his brow was as gelid and slimy as the mud around him, but Lodovico hardly noticed it. All his concentration went into the strength of his arms, of that steady pressure that would mean the difference between life and death to the horrified Cicora warrior in the sucking mud. His breath hissed over his clenched teeth as he strove to keep up the hauling force.

First there was a sound like a kiss, then another, more like a belch. The jellylike surface of the marsh shuddered, and the trapped man began to reappear. His hands were locked in the sleeve and his face was set in a grimace worse than the rictus of death.

At last the man was out as far as his hips and Lodovico, seeing this, yelled with all the energy left in him:
“Pull!”

The Cicora who held him obeyed at once. They dragged him back, over the mud and marsh grass, towing him and their comrade away from the mud and well onto the solid ground, coming to rest only when Lodovico’s shin bounced against an exposed tree root.

The man who had been trapped lay on the ground, his knees drawn up to his chest. He shook as if gripped by ague and in the feeble light of the lantern, his skin appeared to be the color of slate.

A commotion nearby attracted the attention of the little group before Lodovico could suggest ways in which the rescued man might be revived. There was a clatter of breaking branches and twigs trod underfoot, and then a large company of men burst upon the scene.

First of their number was Massamo Fabroni, his wide face shiny with sweat and worry. Immediately behind him came Falcone, who, judging from his well-soaked leggings, had just returned from catching ducks himself. Lodovico could also make out Nebbiamente’s benign features, and Lungobraccio’s distinctive armor.

“Ariosto!” Falcone shouted, and hurried forward.

In the next moment, everyone began to speak, after the cacophony had crescendoed unbearably, Lodovico shouted for quiet. “There is a man hurt here!” He raised his arms as he shouted and now, he saw that his shirt was caked with mud. Looking down, he had to laugh. “Nome del Dio,” he said. “I look as if I just crawled out of the grave.”

“That isn’t humorous,” Falcone snapped.

“Of course it is. It is only when you cannot laugh that the joke is gone.” He turned toward the man huddled on the ground. “This man knows that better than any of you, but he came too close to be able to laugh. He’s a very brave soldier.” Lodovico went down on one knee beside the man. “It is over,” he said gently, and tried to pry the straining hands from the sleeve of his guarnacca.

“We foolishly had not brought our nets,” the Cicora who had spoken to Lodovico was saying to Falcone. “When we were returning from the hunt, we grew careless and Accettafosco was caught by the death-well.”