Octobers Baby by Glen Cook Read Free Book Online

man on to Mocker’s for reinforcements. He began galloping.
    The horse was fresh but incapable of carrying such aheavy rider so hard so long. It collapsed a mile north of his northernmost sentry post. There was no flogging the animal on. Carrying only his weapons, he ran. That was difficult. His legs were stiff and his thighs were chafed from two hard days in the saddle.
    It never occurred to him that Elana might have sent her message before danger was actually upon her. He expected to be too late to do anything but count the dead. But he ran.
    By the time he reached the lookout post he was almost as winded as the abandoned horse. Out of shape, he thought, as he staggered the last hundred yards, lungs afire.
    The sentry remained on duty. He ran to meet Ragnarson. “Bragi, what happened?”
    “Horse foundered,” he gasped. “What’s going on, Chotty?”
    “Your wife got up excited. Put out sentries. Sent Flay to get you. But nothing happened till a minute ago.”
    “What?” His guts were about to come up. All this action after last night’s beer.
    “South call. The wolf.”
    “Uhn. Any others?” They reached the man’s hiding place. He had only one horse.
    “No.”
    “No ideas?”
    “No.”
    He had a vague notion of his own, inferences drawn on yesterday’s mysteries. “Got your horn? Get up behind me here. She can carry us to the house.”
    As they rode, Ragnarson sounded the horn, alternat-ing his personal blast with those for the greathouse. Anyone not already in a fight would meet him there.
    He found a few men there ahead of him, saw a half dozen more coming. Good. Now, where was Elana?
    Gerda Haas came from the house.
    “Where’s Elana?”
    “Crazy fool you married, Ragnarson. Like I told Uthe when you did, you’ll get nothing but trouble from that one.”
    “Gerda.”
    “Ah, then, she rode off with Uthe and Bevold and the others. South. Took my Dahl’s horse, she did, just like...”
    “How many?”
    “Counting her ladyship and the sentries already down there, nineteen I’d guess.”
    Then all the help he could hope for was already in sight.
    Ragnar came running round Gerda, but the old dragon was quick. She caught his collar before he got out of reach. “You stay inside when you’re told.”
    “Papa?”
    “Inside, Ragnar. If he gives you any trouble, whack him. And I’ll whack him again when I get back. Where’s Dahl?”
    “In the tower.” She scooped Ragnar up and brushed the tears from his eyes. The boy was unaccustomed to shortness from his father.
    “Toke,” Ragnarson ordered, “get some horses for me and Chotty. Dahl! Dahl Haas!” He bellowed to the watch-tower, “What you see?”
    “Eh?”
    “Come on, boy. Can you see anything?”
    “Lot of dust down by the barrow. Maybe a big fight. Can’t tell. Too far.”
    The barrow lay near the tip of a long finger of cleared land pointing south, with the millstream and lumbering road meandering down it. He had been clearing that direction because the logs could be floated to the mill. It was two miles from the house to the barrow.
    “Horsemen?” Bragi called.
    “Maybe. Like I said, a lot of dust.”
    “How long?”
    “Only a couple minutes.”
    “Uhn.” Bad. Must be something besides, a gang of bandits. H is people could take care of that with a flight of arrows.
    Toke came round the house with the horses. The women had started saddling them when he and Chotty had come in sight. “All right, everybody that can use one, get a lance. Gerda, get some shields.” He was wearing a mail shirt already-a habit when he traveled-so neededwaste no time donning that. “And for god’s sake, something to drink.”
    While he waited he looked around. Elana had done well. All the livestock had been herded into the cellars, the heavy slitted shutters were over the windows, the building had been soaked with water against fire, and no one was outside who had no need to be.
    A girl Dahl’s age brought him a quart of milk. Ugh. But this was