Part 13 (1/2)
Feste frowned. ”Will they believe that?”
”Why should they not?”
Feste gazed at Gar a moment longer, then shrugged and went forward to lead the way. The other men cl.u.s.tered around Gianni and Gar and moved toward the gatehouse.
”What if the guards recognize us from the Gypsies' descriptions?” Gianni muttered.
”Then they'll be sure the prince knew what he was doing,” Gar muttered back. ”In fact, we just might come out of this with everyone thinking we're dead.”
”Not when they don't see our bodies hanging from a tree near the drawbridge, they won't!”
”True,” Gar sighed, ”and when they find a halfdozen naked guardsmen.”
”In fact, they'll be after us even harder!”
”Don't let it bother you,” Gar a.s.sured him. ”They can only hang us once.”
Gianni s.h.i.+vered at the casual, offhand way he said it. For a moment, he imagined he could feel the noose tightening about his neck-but he shook off the fantasy and plodded angrily after Gar.
As they came to the gatehouse, Feste barked, ”Halt!” The rest did a creditable imitation of a soldier's stamp-to-a-stop. ”Drop the bridge!” Feste ordered the real sentries. ”The prince has commanded that these two be hanged at once!”
The sentries stared, and one said, ”He can't wait till dawn?”
”Who are you to question the prince's orders?” Feste stormed.
”I don't know this captain,” the other guard said doubtfully.
” 'You will,”' Gar muttered to Feste.
”You'll know me soon enough, and better than you like, if you don't obey orders!”
Feste raged. ”The prince wants these two hanged outside as a warning to any who would defy him! Now lower that drawbridge!”
”As you say, Captain,” the taller sentry said reluctantly, and turned to call into the gatehouse. Gianni waited with his heart in his throat, hearing the huge windla.s.s grind away, thinking the bridge would never stop falling, thinking crazily that the sentries must see through them, their disguises were so transparent. How could they possibly accept Feste as a new captain when they had never seen him before?
He couldn't believe experienced soldiers could actually be persuaded by so obvious a lie!
So when the sentries stepped aside and waved them on, he followed mechanically, amazed-and, as they came out across the moat, he found himself wondering how it could ever be that the soldiers had obeyed. He could only think that Feste was far more persuasive than he seemed.
”No shouting,” Gar said, his voice taut, ”not a sign of victory till we're half a mile away! Just march us back into the woods over there, and keep marching!”
Silently as a funeral procession, they marched through the moonlight and into the trees, with Gianni expecting any minute to feel a crossbow bolt in his back.
But they came into the blessed darkness unscathed and marched on for twenty minutes more until they came to a clearing, where Gar stopped and said, ”Now.”
The men cut loose with a howling cheer, throwing their borrowed helmets up into the air, then running fast to avoid them as they came down. Gar turned to grin at Gianni and slap him on the shoulder. Gianni felt himself grinning back, all his nervousness sliding away under the triumph and sheer joy of being alive and free.
When they calmed a bit, Gar said, ”They'll be searching for us by daybreak, if not before. Drop those soldiers' clothes right here and hide them in the bushes. Keep the belts and boots-you can trade them to peasants for whole suits of clothes.”
”What about the halberds?” Rubio asked.
”A dead giveaway,” Gar said, ”and if you let them give you away, you'll be dead indeed-soldiers take a dim view of peasants beating up other soldiers.”
”But that leaves us unarmed,” Vincenzio protested. Gar hesitated a moment, then said, ”Break off the handles so you can thrust the heads into your belts as hand axes. That way, you'll each have a walking staff, too. You'll need it.”
”We will?” Feste looked up at him alertly. ”Why?”
”Because as long as you're on the road, you'll be in danger. You need a refuge, and the one place that's sure to take you in is Pirogia.”
”Pirogia!” Rubio cried indignantly. ”I, a man of Venoga?”
”There's a lot of country between us and Venoga,”
Vincenzio reminded him, ”and most of it's infested with Stilettos.”
Feste frowned. ”Why should Pirogia admit us?”
”Because I'll vouch for you,” Gianni said. ”You can join our army.”
”I didn't know Pirogia had an army.”
”We don't, but we will,” Gianni said grimly, ”and very soon, too.”
”But each pair of men go by a different route,” Gar counseled. ”Find different bypaths within this wood, and come out at different points. The more of us there are together, the more the prince's men will be sure we're the fugitives who stole their clothes. At the very least, if you absolutely must go by the same road, let one pair go out of sight before the other starts from this wood. If you can, trade your boots for the clothes of a woodcutter or a poacher. Go now, and meet us at Pirogia!”
He and Gianni set the example by striking off through the woods without any trail.
The rest of the trip home was surprisingly uneventful, but Gianni later decided that was because they had learned how to cope with the roving bands of Stilettos who roamed the countryside-and because Gar kept his wits, though he certainly did a good job of pretending to have lost them when he needed to. A dozen times they heard hors.e.m.e.n coming and managed to hide in the brush, or to lie down in a roadside ditch and cover themselves with gra.s.s, before the riders came in sight.
They were always Stilettos, of course-they seemed to have driven all other traffic off the roads, except for the occasional farm cart. Gar and Gianni hid in one of those, too, and rode it for a mile before the carter began to wonder why his beasts were tiring so quickly. Only twice did Stilettos catch them out on the open road without any cover, and both times, they played Giorgio and Lenni to such excellent effect that the soldiers settled for giving them a few kicks, then riding on as the ”half-wit” and his ”brother” fell by the wayside.
Finally, one day in the middle of the morning, Pirogia's steeples rose over the horizon. Gianni ran ahead a few hundred feet until he could see his whole city spread out before him and shouted for joy. Grinning, Gar came up behind him, clapped him on the shoulder, and pa.s.sed him, striding toward their haven.
As they came up to the land gate, though, four grubby forms lifted themselves from around a campfire and hailed them. ”Ho, Giorgio! Ho, Gar! What kept you?”
”Only the road, and a few beatings from Stiletto gangs.” Grinning, Gianni clapped the jester on the shoulder. ”Ho, Feste! But why are you camped here outside the city?”
”Oh, because the guards wouldn't let us in without your word,” Feste told him.
”They were quite rude about it, too,” Vincenzio added.
Glancing at him, Gianni could see why--dressed in a patched woodcutter's smock and sandals, he scarcely looked like the man of letters he was.
”They told us they didn't even know a man named Giorgio who traveled with a giant!” Rubio said in indignation.
”Ah! I'm afraid there's a good reason for that, friends.” Gianni felt a rush of guilt.
”My name isn't really Giorgio, you see.”
”Not Giorgio!” Vincenzio frowned. ”But why did you lie to us? And what is your name?”