Robert W. Krepps

“ What's a flying carpet?"
"Not a very hard trick, really. You get on a carpet and say a certain incantation, and you're flying."
"How fast?"
"As fast as you will it."
"And you can do it? You can turn a carpet into a bird, as it were?"
"I think I can," said Pepi doubtfully. "No, no," he added hastily as Godwin flexed his biceps, "I'm sure I can."
"Do it, then. El Sareuk, put your blade across his neck. At the first out-of-the-ordinary thing that happens, except for the carpet's enchanting, deprive him of his head."
El Sareuk laid his scimitar to Pepi's throat with a warm smile. ”

“ A wide-breasted dune stretched before them. They topped the rise and Ramizail gave a cry, while the men checked their steeds and glanced at each other. "Another illusion?" asked Godwin.
"Who can tell? There are more beasts in the desert than are known to man," shrugged El Sareuk.
In the hollow formed by four dunes' meeting stood an enormous lion, all orange-red of hue, facing them with black mane bristling up like the spines of a porcupine. ”

“ He stared narrowly around him now, scratching absent-mindedly for an annoying flea in the small of his back, and saw that no one moved on the deck of the plague ship. By good fortune, by the grace of God, and by his own skill and brute force, he had obliterated the crew. Even the men who had fainted had inhaled flame and died. Godwin stood alone on the deck, while beneath him sounded the perpetual vociferant clamor of the rats.
The flames spreading dangerously close to his bare flat feet, he skipped along the bulwarks and up to the poop, which was as yet untouched by fire. ”

“ He hauled out the iron broadsword from its sheath, advanced once more toward the furiously thrashing white shark, and thrust half a dozen times. Then he swam upward, leaving behind him an ever-expanding blotch of blood and a quivering, twitching, forty-foot piece of dead meat.
The ship was far away. He sheathed the sword and set out to overhaul her where she sailed serenely, dark sail spread, with her cargo of obscene death.
"Even Godwin in his proper form could never have caught her," he thought to himself. "Heraj's baneful magic will win the day for England yet!" ”

“ Within the jail, the fifty-one men still prisoner were raising echoes with a rousing drinking song imported from Germany.
Godwin, as the gorilla, smashed down upon two guards who had been sleepily cursing together the tyranny of their master Mufaddal. They never knew what crushed them.
The other guards, inundated by a wave of angry captives, died as quietly; while the men at the corners did their work with practiced, pitiless hands. Godwin skipped up to the corner of the jail and looked toward the barracks, some seventy yards away. ”

“ He shaded his eyes from the blazing sun, which was the only stable object in sight. "The magic cannot stretch from edge to edge of the desert, for such a thing is beyond the power of even the djinn."
"Speaking of which, have you found that ring, Godwin?" queried Ramizail with weak petulance.
"No, let me be," said the tallow-faced Godwin.
"I was going to say," continued El Sareuk, "that if we manage to survive for the few miles, I think we will pass these rolling sands. Can you stick on your horses?"
"While I'm alive, I can ride," said Godwin, but without much conviction. ”

“ You know, it isn't just us. It's the land. It is rising and falling. The dunes are rolling like ocean waves."
Ramizail raised herself on her elbows and stared out across the sands. "They are! We stopped atop a dune, now we're in a valley." She spat. "If this isn't the messiest miracle ever worked, and the dirtiest, and the foulest, then I am not the mistress of the djinn!"
"What'll we do?" moaned Godwin. "How can you fight a shifting desert? How can you make it lie down and be good?"
El Sareuk stood up. ”

“ The Lord Mohammed El Sareuk was a man of sixty, slightly built, fanatic-faced, whose body always seemed on the point of disintegrating from sheer concentration of energy. His boots were of red Cordovan leather worked with gold thread; his clothing was blue silk and rose samite, topped by the green turban of a Hadji; under the soft robes he wore gold-washed Turkish light armor, and over the whole outfit a black Bedouin burnous. He was weaponed well: from his girdle hung a Damascus steel scimitar, and a beautiful gold-etched steel knife with a silver hilt and a ruby in the pommel. ”

“ Mihrjan had on his own initiative sent the Bedouins and Crusaders back to their own places. Only corpses met his eye. "To horse, friends!" he bellowed gleefully. "This battle's done, and there are a power and lashing of wrongs left in the world to be righted!"
"Oh, heavens," groaned Ramizail. "Don't you even want to rest a week or two, swashbuckler?"
"Rest is for the dead and the aged, witch-wench." ”

“ There was a squashy sort of splash, as the man fell full length upon a turbulent blanket of milling, screaming rodents. At the same time there burst upon the upper air a horrible carrion stench, like that of a charnel house a hundred times augmented. The Mameluke gave a cry of pitiable terror, and another, and then was still. Perhaps he fainted, or perhaps the rats found his life in that instant.
Mufaddal knelt above the hatchway, chuckling in his greasy beard. His brown eyes lit with soft venomous delight. ”

“ Only an occasional fellah or more substantial citizen would appear now and again, stare for a moment at the intent horsemen, and disappear from sight like a startled wild thing. Godwin tugged at his beard. They were not, as he had predicted, wholly unexpected. Word had somehow flown through the streets and bazaars of their coming, and of the imminent brawl. Perhaps magic was at work, too, though he felt and saw nothing to indicate it. ”

“ He bent over the edge of the oasis. A thousand feet below him the desert shimmered coldly in the light of the stars. He could see their horses, the three saddle beasts and the two pack animals, standing in a knot with the Arabian camel they kept for emergencies. The creatures looked like insects, so far below him they were. He drew back with a gasp.
"El Sareuk! Ramizail!" he shouted. "Take care! The oasis has floated off its moorings!" ”

“ He drew his curved Persian dagger from its thonged sheath and judged his blow. Then he struck.
The lion, its neck slit from ear to gullet, spewed blood and uttered a horrible gurgling bellow. Slowly it began to sink toward the earth. Godwin risked a quick look down. His head reeled. He was still a good eighty feet up. If the lion died too soon, he would be smashed to a pulp beneath its dead weight. He had thought only of slaying the thing, not of how he might land safely. He swore vividly.
"This proves Ramizail's contention that I have a one-track brain!" ”

“ And this Godwin, what of him? A man of thirty-one hard winters and thirty-one baking summers that had leathered his skin and steeled his sinews, while leaving his spirit boyish and irrepressible. A tiger-muscled, blue-fire-eyed, yellow-bearded man, quick to rage, quick to forgiveness, quick to gorge food and drink and quick to go hungry when needs must. ”

“ All these beauties, scampering over England, biting people, infecting masses of men and women, gnawing on children's feet, carrying the plague hither and yon until the whole island lay gasping out its fading breath, nine-tenths of its population covered with the applesized tumors and hideous purple spots of bubonic. Then let them see who sent out Crusaders! ”

“ The ship lay at the wharf, a black swift vessel with dark lateen sails slanting high above her deck. A company of Seljuk Turks and other Saracen allies stood about the dock, on guard lest some ill-advised person attempt to board her. More were stationed on the ship, and from beneath their feet in the sealed hold came the frightful squeakings and squealings and multitudinous rustlings of thousands upon thousands of great gray rats, imprisoned there to fight and breed and die and wait their chance at sunlight again—sunlight that Mufaddal devoutly hoped they would view on the shore of England. ”

“ You underestimate that big Englishman. And the renegade El Sareuk is no babe, either."
"The cell is as well guarded as a prince's harim," said Mufaddal.
"Yes, but any man who can slay a winged lion is a match for fifty seraglio guards. Kill 'em, I say. The plague ship sails with the early morning tide. Why take unnecessary chances?"
"I have several simple but pleasurable notions in mind for Godwin and his misguided cohorts. Come here, I'll whisper one of them to you." Heraj stalked over and bent down. Mufaddal sputtered wetly and intimately in his ear. Presently the sorcerer began to grin. ”

“ El Sareuk is a Hadji and has a certain reputation. Can't you command help from the Arabs, old wolf?"
"I can. He has the right of it, my dear."
"Well, at least we can have Mihrjan's djinn transport us there in comfort, and aid us in the squelching of this silly plot of Mufaddal's," said the girl, wiping sweat off her patrician nose.
Godwin frowned. He tugged at his beard. "My dear, you know my sentiments about the djinn. It's not knightly to use their supernatural powers when all one's fighting is a pack of mortals. Besides, it takes the fun out of adventuring. ”

“ A man educated to horse and hound and every weapon, bred to the saddle and the brawl, reckless and headstrong, generous and full of brag and bounce. A man of six feet and four inches, weighing sixteen stone, with scarce a thought in his handsome head but of war and hunting and being a gentleman according to his lights, of loving Ramizail and trotting happily over the world righting wrongs and murdering villains and being Godwin, Godwin of England. ”

“ The poop was the only part of the ship which was not being ravaged by fire. The rats headed for its temporary safety. As they poured over it, a repulsive and horrible crew, snapping and snarling at one another, their fangs yellow as amber slivers, their hides mangy and often showing the first signs of plague, the leaders spied Godwin roosting unhappily on the rail. ”

“ Its tiny sharp teeth met in his gallabiyah, and it swung from the cloth, snarling like an angry cat. Frantic, he knocked it to the deck with the flat of his sword, slicing off a small portion of his own belly in the process. Then he smashed down the blade. It split the rat in two and clove into the deck, so deeply that it took him three hearty tugs to disengage it.
Bleeding, cursing, and shaking with the after-effects of fear, he stamped off the ship and across the dock to his house, where he called his private surgeon to bind up the wound. ”

“ You're all but dead. Don't strive so. Die easily."
"Godwin, you're a born diplomat," said the woman's voice. "Why don't you come right out and tell him he looks like two coppers' worth of dogmeat?"
"Well, he does," Godwin said grimly. "No sense in lying to a chap who's about to give up the spirit, Ramizail. No real man wants that."
"Listen," croaked the dying one. "Who are you?"
"Three adventurers," said the voice that had sworn by the very God. It was an elderly voice but full of vigor. "Three homeless travelers pledged to right wrongs and defeat hell's minions wherever they may be found." ”

“ If we all die, 'twas in a worthy cause."
"We won't," said Ramizail complacently. "I feel it in my bones." She smiled at Godwin. "Good fortune, my dear."
"Thanks. I'd ask you to kiss me, but I've seen this face. By the way," said he to Pepi, at whose neck the blade of El Sareuk still pressed lightly but insistently, "can you give me back my own body?"
"Only Heraj could have done that," said Pepi wanly.
"Damnation. Oh, well," said the gorilla, and without more ado climbed onto the carpet and sat down. "Good-bye, all," he said. ”

“ And is the ship not as sound as any ship that sails the Mediterranean, having new sails and a new mast, and her belly caulked no later than last month?"
"Ah, very true," agreed Heraj.
"Does every rat not carry at least one flea, cleverly infected with the plague by your own subtle methods?"
"Fleas and rats are as deadly as any Saracen blade, and the grisly death they carry will spread far and wide when they are let off the ship on the coasts of England." ”

“ His shield had fallen off the carpet somewhere back in Mufaddal's house. His sword was safe, as was the Persian dagger in its thong about his neck, and his Saracen-style helmet. The sigil of Solomon was still hung round his bull throat.
He speeded up a trifle. The wind sang in his small flat ears. He shoved his broad ugly muzzle forward, drinking in the rushing air. Never had he known a sensation such as this. It made horses seem like snails. He increased his velocity again. There was evidently no limit to the acceleration possibilities. ”