He was bareheaded, and the long black strings of his hair were whipped about his face by a rising wind. But he carried in the crook of one arm a helmet with two bat like wings set in a center ridge. A sword swung at his belt. Taller than the hunters, less swarthy of skin, he seemed of a different caste. But the same emotionless mask covered his features.
After a long survey he barked an order, and one of the hunters came to slit the bonds about Ray’s wrists and pull the American to his feet. The officer asked questions and the hunter replied, with a pantomime, as well as words, explaining the capture. When he had done, the officer proceeded to interrogate his prisoner by gestures-a wide sweep of hand to the west and then one word:
Mu.
Ray shook his head. And the officer seemed disturbed at his reply. He frowned and pointed east with another question Ray did not hear very well. Suddenly the American understood-they wanted to know where he came from; that must be it.
He pointed back to where that grim forest must stand. For any more than that, they knew as much as he did about it. He was unprepared for their reaction to his answer.
The officer’s eyes narrowed as might a cat’s. His
thick lips drew apart in a snarl, displaying purplish gums and yellow teeth. Then he exploded in a cackle of derisive laughter, his disbelief very plain. Rounding on his followers, the officer made another of the hunters repeat the story of Ray’s capture. It was given as before. Then the hunter pointed to Ray’s bare head, to his wind-ruffled short brown hair, and reached out a hand still unwashed after the elk butchery to tug at the leather jacket their prisoner wore, directing the officer’s attention to it. He promptly signed for Ray to take it off: The hunter rifled its pockets, producing a handkerchief, a notebook, and a spare film pack. In a few minutes the prisoner stood shivering in the wind, his clothing all spread out on the sand. But his captors still searched the pockets as if they were convinced he must carry some important object. One of the hunters appropriated his pocket knife; another turned his wrist watch around and around until ordered sharply by the officer to hand it over. Shaking out the handkerchief, the leader piled therein the contents of Ray’s pockets, tying it all into a bag, placing that in a wicker basket. Ray stooped to reach for his clothing, but the officer’s hand shot out with a backhanded slap that sent him sprawling. A hunter tossed a package of hide to the captive. Hot with anger, Ray pulled on a meager garment that was rather like a kilt and utterly inadequate as protection in the growing chill of the wind. He wondered what would happen if he tried to jump the officer. Even as his imagination supplied a few details satis-factory to him, steel fingers closed upon him again, spinning him half around as his right arm was whipped away from his body. On the pale skin of his right forearm was a small bluish circle, radiating lines, a juvenile attempt at tattooing that the years had not erased. The officer sneered as he inspected it. Then he flung Ray’s arm from him and spat. “Mu.” Not a question now but statement. So night came in the new world. Apparently they
had some future use for him, for he was given a portion of roasted elk. Then his arms were tied again-and his ankles as well-and one of the men flung a skin cover-let over him as he tried to burrow into the sand for warmth. Where was he? Suddenly that mattered more than how he had come here. The historic mound, then the trees, now here. Indians? But even if time travel was possible outside of fiction, these were not Indians. And the sea did not run into Ohio and-and- Ray fought the panic again rising in him, which wanted to set him running, screaming-All right, he did not know how he got here, nor where here was. But his immediate problem was the hunters and what they planned to do with him. After a while his tired brain was as benumbed as his shivering body, and he slept, exhausted. The shrill cry of a bird awoke him in the early dawn. Under a makeshift tent of cloaks, the officer snored and twitched, and a sentry nodded by a dying fire. So the dream continued. Ray attempted to sit up, but his bonds bit cruelly into his flesh. By digging his heels into the sand, he edged along until his shoulders scraped one of the boulders about the camp site. Cautiously he worked himself up to a sitting position. In the east a faint pink deepened. A gray bird dived to seek breakfast in the waves. With a sharp nod the sentry roused, yawned, and spat noisily into the fire. Then he got to his feet, looking at Ray with an evil grin. Opening proceedings by planting the toe of a boot in the prisoner’s ribs, he twitched Ray forward to inspect the security of his bonds before slamming him back with a jolt against the rock. Having carried out one duty, he went to stir the fire into life. Ray shook his head. Dried blood and dust encrusted his face. A pulse throbbed heavily in throat and tem-ple. If he could only get his hands free-The officer rolled out of his tent and unbuckled the clasp that fastened his under tunic. Dropping the garment by the armor he had shed the night before, he ran out into the waves. As he splashed there, he suddenly shouted, and the rest of them came to their feet, calling and pointing to the open sea, where a black shadow cut through the blue-green. Returning, the officer dried his body and dressed, loosing a volley of orders that sent his men into scurrying activity. One of them unfastened Ray’s ankles and hauled him to his feet. A ship was coming, but it was unlike any vessel Ray had ever seen pictured. Perhaps half a mile off shore it halted its rush, oars flashed from its narrow sides, and it scuttled on in like a water beetle. Ray had seen illustrations of Roman galleys, but those had also masts and sails. This only possessed bow and stern superstructures, crowned with roofs, which were also upper decks. The waist was lower, and there the rowers labored in open pits. The bow came to a sharp point set with a brightly painted figurehead. From a slender pole on the afterdeck whipped a blood-red flag. There was a look of power to this slim, cruel vessel, an air of grim efficiency. Whoever Ray’s captors might be, they were evidently well able to care for themselves in this strange world. The ship came to anchor, and a few moments later a long boat swung overside to hit the water. With a rhythmical sweep of oars, it made for the shore where the hunting party waited, their bundles ready, the fire smothered in sand. Now the officer cut the cord about Ray’s wrists. He rested his hand on the hilt of the sword in a way to be understood. To suit his captor’s convenience, the prisoner must be freed, but he would be foolish to try an escape. Six men and an officer made up the boat crew. They shouted questions at the hunters as they splashed overboard to drag in their craft. The commander of the shore party pulled Ray forward, showing him off: It would appear that his capture was a noteworthy exploit
on the part of the hunters and that the officer in the boat was openly envious. Then the hunter-officer pointed inland and asked a question to which the other nodded assent. Unloosing their dogs, three hunters padded away while the others made for the boat. Ray climbed in clumsily, his legs and arms still stiff from his bonds, and was shoved down between two seats. They headed back to the vessel. Nearing the flank of the ship, they warded off their boat with shortened oars until a rope ladder dropped. Two of the shore party went up, and then the ladder was thrust into Ray’s hold. He climbed awkwardly, giddy from the swing, chill with the fear of losing hold and falling, to be caught between boat and ship. The officer from the camp came behind, impatiently prodding him on. The prisoner dropped down into the crowded waist, and behind him the officer flung up an arm to salute a red-cloaked individual. The red cloak, so like a smoldering coal, drew the eye. It was not really a cloak, Ray saw, but a long crimson robe, the color of new-shed blood, which covered a tall, very spare man from throat to heels. Beneath the rounded dome of a closely shaven skull, large black eyes peered from either side of a jutting, beaklike nose. The mouth below was sunken, the lips puckered, and the chin had a sharp upward hook. With one earth-brown hand the man caressed the bony line of his jaw, staring not at the officer making the report but at Ray. And under the probing of those lusterless black eyes, the prisoner suddenly felt unclean, as if something foul with slime had crept across his flesh. The hunters and their officer were brutal, but, Ray realized, this man was something he did not, could not understand, wholly alien to his own world. He experienced a shrinking inner horror under that gaze, a need to range himself against the wearer of the red robe and all he stood for. And so strong was this surge of revulsion that it frightened him.