Crawling out of the well into the gray morning light, Hadrian entered into an alien world. Dahlgren was gone. Only patches of ash and some smoldering timber marked the missing homes, but even more startling was the absence of trees. The forest that had hugged the village was gone. In its place was a desolate plain, scorched black. Limbless, leafless poles stood at random, tall dark spikes pointing at the sky. Fed by smoldering piles, smoke hung in the air like a dull gray fog, hiding the sky behind a hazy cloud from which ash fell silently like dirty snow blanketing the land.
Pearl came out of the well. Not surprisingly, she said nothing as she wandered about the scorched world stooping to turn over a charred bit of wood then staring up at the sky as if surprised to find it still there now that the world had been cast upside down.
“How did this happen?” Russell Bothwick asked to no one in particular, and no one answered.
“Thrace!” Theron yelled as he emerged from the well, his eyes focusing on the smoking ruins atop the hill. Soon everyone was running up the slope.
Like the village, the castle was a burned out hull, the walls gone as were the smaller buildings. The great manor house was a charred pile. Bodies lay scattered, blackened by fire, torn and twisted. The corpses still smoked.
“Thrace!” Theron cried in desperation as he dug furiously into the pile of rubble that had been the manor house. All of the village men, including Royce, Hadrian, and even Magnus dug in the debris more out of sympathy than hope.
Magnus directed them to the southeast corner muttering something about the ‘earth speaking with a hollow voice.’ They cleared away walls and a fallen staircase and heard a faint sound below. They dug down revealing the remains of the old kitchen and the cellar beneath.
As if from the grave itself, they pulled forth Deacon Tomas, who looked battered but otherwise unharmed. Just as the villagers had, Tomas wiped his eyes, squinting in the morning light at the devastation around him.
“Deacon!” Theron shook the cleric. “Where is Thrace?”
Tomas looked at the farmer and tears welled in his eyes. “I couldn’t save her, Theron,” he said in a choked voice. “I tried, I tried so hard. You have to believe me, you must.”
“What happened, you old fool?”
“I tried. I tried. I was leading them to this cellar, but it caught us. I prayed. I prayed so hard, and I swear it listened! Then I heard it laugh. It actually laughed.” Tomas’ eyes filled with tears. “It ignored me and took them.”
“Took them?” Theron asked frantically. “What do you mean?”
“It spoke to me,” Tomas said. “It spoke with a voice like death, like pain. My legs wouldn’t hold me up anymore and I fell before it.”
“What did it say?” Royce asked.
The deacon paused to wipe his face leaving dark streaks of soot on his cheeks. “It didn’t make sense, perhaps in my fear I lost my mind.”
“What do you think it said?” Royce pressed.
“It spoke in the ancient speech of the church. I thought it said something about a weapon, a sword, something about trading it for the women. Said it would return tomorrow night for it. Then it flew away with Thrace and the princess. It doesn’t make any sense at all, I’m probably mad now.”
“The princess?” Hadrian asked.
“Yes, the princess Arista of Melengar. She was with us. I was trying to save them both-I was trying to-but-and now…” Tomas broke down crying again.
Royce exchanged looks with Hadrian and the two quickly moved away from the others to talk. Theron promptly followed.
“You two know something,” he accused. “You got in didn’t you. You took it. Royce got the sword, after all. That’s what it wants.”
Royce nodded.
“You have to give it back,” the farmer said.
“I don’t think giving it back will save your daughter,” Royce told him. “This thing, this Gilarabrywn, is a lot more cunning than we knew. It will-”
“Thrace hired you to bring me that sword,” Theron growled. “That was your job. Remember? You were supposed to steal it and give it to me, so hand it over.”
“Theron, listen-”
“Give it to me now!” the old farmer shouted as he towered menacingly over the thief.
Royce sighed and drew out the broken blade.
Theron took it with a puzzled look, turning the metal over in his hands. “Where’s the rest?”
“This is all I could find.”
“Then it will have to do,” the old man said firmly.
“Theron, I don’t think you can trust this creature. I think even if you hand this over it will still kill your daughter, the princess, and you.”
“It’s a risk I am willing to take!” he shouted at them. “You two don’t have to be here. You got the sword-you did your job. You’re done. You can leave any time you want. Go on, get out!”
“Theron,” Hadrian began, “we are not your enemy. Do you think either of us wants Thrace to die?”
Theron started to speak, then closed his mouth, swallowed, and took a breath. “No,” he sighed, “you’re right. I know that, it’s just…” he looked into Hadrian’s eyes with a look of horrible pain. “She’s all I’ve got left, and I won’t stand for anything that can get her killed. I’ll trade myself to the bloody monster if it will let her live.”
“I know that, Theron,” Hadrian said.
“I just don’t think it will honor the trade,” Royce said.
“We found another over here!” Dillon McDern shouted as he hauled the foppish scholar, Tobis Rentinual, out of the remains of the smokehouse. The skinny courtier, covered from head to foot in dirt, collapsed on the grass coughing and sputtering.
“The soil was soft in the cellar…” Tobis managed then sputtered and coughed. “we-dug into it with our-with our hands.”
“How many?” Dillon asked.
“Five,” Tobis replied, “a woodsman, a castle guard I think, Sir Erlic, and two others. The guard-” Tobis entered into a coughing fit for a minute than sat up, doubled over and spat on the grass.
“Arvid fetch water from the well!” Dillon ordered his son.
“The guard was badly burned,” Tobis continued. “Two young men dragged him to the smokehouse, saying it had a cellar. Everything around us was on fire except the smokehouse so the woodsman, Sir Erlic, and I all ran there too. The dirt floor was loose, so we started burrowing. Then something hit the shed and the whole thing came down on us. A beam caught my leg. I think it’s broken.”
The villagers excavated the collapsed shed. They pulled off a wall and dug into the wreckage, peeling back the fragments. They reached the bottom where they found the others buried alive.
They dragged them out into the light. Sir Erlic and the woodsman looked near dead as they coughed and spit. The burned guard was worse. He was unconscious, but still alive. The last two pulled from the smokehouse ruins were Mauvin and Fanen Pickering, who like Tobis, were unable to speak for a time, but other than numerous cuts and bruises, were all right.
“Is Hilfred alive?” Fanen asked after having a chance to breathe fresh air and drink a cup of water.
“Who’s Hilfred?” Lena Bothwick asked holding the cup of water Verna brought. Fanen pointed to the burned guard across from him and Lena nodded. “He’s not awake, but he’s alive.”
Search parties spread out and combed the rest of the area, finding many more bodies, mostly would-be contestants. They also discovered the remains of Archbishop Galien. The old man appeared to have died, not from fire, but by being trampled to death. His servant Carlton lay inside the manor, apparently not content to die by his master’s side. Arista’s handmaid Bernice was also found inside the manor, crushed when the house collapsed. They found no one else alive.
The villagers created stretchers to carry Tobis and Hilfred out of the smoky ruins to the well where the women tended their wounds. The old common green was a charred patch of black. The great bell, having fallen, lay on its side in the ash.
“What happened?” Hadrian asked, sitting down next to Mauvin. The two brothers huddled where Pearl had once grazed pigs. Both sat hunched, sipping from cups of water, their faces stained with soot.
“We were outside the walls when the attack came,” he said, his voice soft, not much louder than a strained whisper. He hooked his thumb at his brother. “I told him we were going home but Fanen, the genius that he is, decided he wanted his shot at the beast, his chance at glory.”
Fanen drooped his head lower.
“He tried to sneak out, thought he’d give me the slip. I caught him outside the gate and a little way down the hill. I told him it was suicide-he insisted-we got into a fight. It ended when we saw the hill catch on fire. We ran back. Before we reached the front gate, a couple of carriages and a bunch of horses went by at full gallop. I spotted Saldur’s face peeking out from one of the windows. They didn’t even slow down.
“We went looking for Arista and found Hilfred on the ground just out front of the burning manor house. His hair was gone, skin coming off in sheets, but he was still breathing so we grabbed him and just ran for the smokehouse. It was the last building still standing that wasn’t burning. The dirt floor was soft and loose like it had recently been dug up, so we just started burrowing with our hands like moles, you know. That Tobis guy, Erlic, and Danthen followed us in. We only managed to dig a few feet when the whole thing came down on us.”
“Did you find Arista?” Fanen asked. “Is she…”
“We don’t know,” Hadrian replied. “The deacon says it took her and Theron’s daughter. She might still be alive.”
The women of the village tended the wounds of those found at the castle, while the men began gathering what supplies, tools, and food stores they could find into a pile at the well. They were a motley bunch, haggard and dirty like a band of shipwrecked travelers left on a desert island. Few of them spoke and when they did, it was always in whispered tones. From time to time, someone would weep softly, kick a scorched board, or merely wander off a ways only to drop to their knees and shake.
When, at last, the men were bandaged and the supplies stacked, Tomas, who had cleaned himself up, stood and said a few words over the dead and they all observed a moment of silence. Then Vince Griffin stood up and addressed them.
“I was the first to settle here,” he said with a sad voice. “My house stood right there, the closest to this here well. I remember when most of you were considered newcomers, strangers even. I had great hopes for this place. I donated eight bushels of barley every year to the village church, though all I seen come of it was this here bell. I stayed here through the hard frost five years ago and I stayed here when people started to go missing. Like the rest ’a you, I thought I could live with it. People die tragically everywhere, be it from the pox, the plague, starvation, the cold, or a blade. Sure, Dahlgren seemed cursed, and maybe it is, but it was still the best place I’d ever lived. Maybe the best place I ever will live, mostly because of you all and the fact that the nobles hardly ever bothered us, but all that’s over now. There’s nothing here no more, not even the trees that was here before we came, and I don’t fancy spending another night in the well.” He wiped his eyes clear. “I’m leaving Dahlgren, I ’spose many ’a you will be too, and I just wanted to say that when you all came here I saw you as strangers, but as I am leaving, I feel I’m gonna be saying goodbye to family, a family that has gone through a lot together. I…I just wanted you all to know that.”
Everyone nodded in agreement and exchanged muttered conversations with the person nearest them. It was decided by all that Dahlgren was dead and that they would leave. There was talk about trying to stay together, but it was only talk. They would travel as a group, including Sir Erlic and the woodsman Danthen south at least as far as Alburn where some would turn west hoping to find relatives while others would continue south hoping to find a new start.
“So much for the church’s help,” Dillon McDern said to Hadrian. “They were here two nights and look.”
Dillon and Russell Bothwick walked over to where Theron sat against a blackened stump.
“’Spect you’ll be staying to find Thrace?” Dillon asked.
Theron nodded. The big man had not bothered to wash and he was coated in dirt and soot. He had the broken blade on his lap and stared at it.
“You think it’ll be back tonight, do ya?” Russell asked.
“I think so. It wants this. Maybe if I give it back, it will give Thrace to me.”
The two men nodded.
“You want us to stay behind and give you hand?” Russell asked.
“A hand with what?” the old farmer asked. “Nothing you can do, either of ’ya. Go on, you both have families of your own. Get out while you can. Enough good people have died here.”
The two men nodded again.
“Good luck to you, Theron,” Dillon said.
“We’ll wait a while in Alburn to see if you show up,” Russell told him. “Good luck.”
Russell and Tad fashioned a sled from charred saplings and loaded what little they had on it. Lena mashed up a salve, which she applied to Hilfred’s burns, and left it and a pile of bandages with Tomas who took it on himself to stay with the soldier. And so it was, that with only a few things to pack up and carry with them, the bulk of the villagers were on their way westward by early afternoon. No one wanted to be anywhere near Dahlgren after sunset.
“What are we doing here?” Royce asked Hadrian as the two sat on a partially burned tree trunk. They were just up the old village path from the well near where the Caswell’s two little wooden grave markers used to be. Like everything else, they were gone, nothing left to mark their passing. They could see Deacon Tomas sitting with Hilfred who still lay unconscious.
“This job has cost us two horses, over a week’s worth of provisions, and for what?” Royce went on, and with a sigh broke off a bit of charred bark and absently tossed it. “We should head out with the rest of them. The girl is likely dead already. I mean why would it keep her alive? The Gilarabrywn holds all the cards. It can kill us at will, but we can’t harm it. It has hostages, while all we have is half a sword that it doesn’t really need, but apparently would just like to have. If we had both parts of the sword Magnus could put them back together and we could at least bargain from a position of some strength. We could even have the dwarf make us all swords, and maybe even spears with the right name on it. Then we could have a go at the bastard, but right now, we have nothing. We are no threat to it at all. Theron thinks he’s going to bargain, but he doesn’t have anything to bargain with. The Gilarabrywn set this up only to save itself the tedium of hunting for that sword.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Sure we do. It won’t keep those girls alive. It probably had them for lunch already and when night comes, old Theron will be standing out there like a fool with exactly what it wants. He’ll die and that will be that. On the other hand, his stupidity will buy time for the rest of us to get away. Considering his whole family is gone and his daughter is most likely already dead, it’s probably for the best.”
“He won’t be standing there alone,” Hadrian said.
Royce turned with a sick look on his face. “Tell me you’re joking.”
Hadrian shook his head.
“Why?”
“Because you’re right, because everything you just said will happen if we leave.”
“And you think if we stay it will be different?”
“We’ve never quit a job before, Royce.”
“What are you talking about? What job?”
“She paid us to get the sword for her.”
“I got the sword. Her old man’s got it right now.”
“Only part of it and the job won’t be finished until he has both parts in his hands. That’s what we were hired to do.”
“Hadrian.” Royce ran a hand over his face and shook his head. “For the love of Maribor, she paid us ten silver!”
“You accepted it.”
“I hate it when you get like this.” Royce stood suddenly, picking up a charred piece of scrap. “Damn it,” he threw it into a pile of smoking wood that was once the Bothwick’s home. “You’re just going to get us killed, you know that, right?”
“You don’t have to stay. This is my decision.”
“And what are you going to do? Fight it when it comes? Are you going to stand there in the dark swinging at it with swords that can’t hurt it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re insane,” Royce told him. “The rumors are all true; Hadrian Blackwater is a damn loon!”
Hadrian stood to face his friend. “I’m not going to abandon Theron, Thrace, and Arista. And what about Hilfred. Do you think he can travel? You try dragging him through the woods and he’ll be dead before nightfall, or do you want to try stuffing him in a well all night and think he’ll be just fine in the morning? And what about Tobis? How far do you think he’ll get on a broken leg? Or don’t you give a damn about them? Has your heart gotten so black you can just walk away and let them all die?”
“They will all die anyway,” Royce snapped at him. “That’s just my point. We can’t stop it from killing them. All we can do is decide whether to die with them or not, and I really don’t see the benefit in sympathy suicide.”
“We can do something,” Hadrian asserted. “We’re the ones who stole the treasure from the Crown Tower and put it back the very next night. The same two that broke into the invincible Drumindor, we put a human head in the Earl of Chadwick’s lap while he slept in his tower, and busted Esrahaddon out of Gutaria, the most secure prison ever built. I mean we can do something!”
“Like what?”
“Well…” Hadrian thought, “we can dig a pit, lure it there and trap it.”
“We’d have better luck asking Tomas to pray for Maribor to strike the Gilarabrywn dead. We really don’t have the time or the manpower for excavating a pit.”
“You have a better idea?”
“I’m sure I could come up with something better than luring it into a pit we can’t dig.”
“Like what?”
Royce began walking around the still smoldering stick forest, angrily kicking anything in his path. “I don’t know, you’re the one who thinks we can do something, but I know one thing; we can’t do squat unless we can get the other half of that sword. So the first thing I would do is steal it tonight while it’s gone.”
“It would kill Thrace and Arista for certain if you did that,” Hadrian pointed out.
“But then you could kill it. At least there would be the closure of revenge.”
Hadrian shook his head. “Not good enough.”
Royce smirked, “I could always steal the sword while you and Theron fool it with the blade Rufus was using.” Royce allowed himself a morbid chuckle. “There’s at least about a single chance in a million that might work.”
Hadrian’s brow furrowed in thought, and he sat down slowly.
“Oh no, I was joking,” Royce backpedaled. “If it could tell the blade was missing last night, it can tell the difference between the real thing and a copy.”
“But even if it doesn’t work,” Hadrian said, “it might give me time to get the girls away from it. Then we could dive in a hole-a small hole, that we do have time to dig.”
“And hope it doesn’t dig you out? I’ve seen its claws, it won’t be hard.”
Hadrian ignored him and went on with his train of thought. “Then you could bring the other half of the sword, have Magnus forge it and then I can kill it-see it was a good thing you didn’t kill him after all.”
“You realize how stupid this is, right? That thing decimated this whole village and the castle last night, and you are going to take it on with an old farmer, two women, and a broken sword?”
Hadrian said nothing.
Royce sighed and sat down beside his friend, shaking his head. He reached into his robe and pulled his dagger out. Still in its sheath, he held it out.
“Here,” he said, “take Alverstone.”
“Why?” Hadrian looked at him, puzzled.
“Well, I’m not saying Magnus is right, but, well, I’ve never found anything that this dagger can’t cut, and if Magnus is right, if the father of the gods did forge this, I would think it could come in handy even against an invincible beast.”
“So you’re leaving?”
“No.” Royce scowled and looked in the direction of the tower of Avempartha. “Apparently I have a job to finish.”
Hadrian smiled at his friend, took the dagger, and weighed it in his hand. “I’ll give it back to you tomorrow then.”
“Right,” Royce replied.
“Did your partner leave?” Theron asked as Hadrian approached him walking up the slope of the scorched hill that once was the castle. The old farmer stood on the blackened hillside holding the shattered sword and looking up at the sky.
“No, well sort of, he’s headed back inside Avempartha to steal the other half of the sword just in case the Gilarabrywn tries to double cross us. There is even a chance it might leave Thrace and Arista in the tower while it comes here, and if it does Royce, can get them out.”
Theron nodded thoughtfully.
“You two have been real good to me and my daughter. I still don’t know why, and don’t tell me it’s the money,” Theron sighed. “You know, I never gave her credit for much. I ignored her, pushed her away for so many years. She was only my daughter, not a son-an extra mouth to feed that would cost us money to marry off. How she ever found the two of you and got you to come all this way to help us is…well, I just don’t think I will ever understand that.”
“Hadrian,” Fanen called to him. “Come down here and see what we’ve got.”
Hadrian followed Fanen down the hill to the north edge of the burn line where he found Tobis, Mauvin, and Magnus working on a huge contraption.
“This is my catapult,” Tobis declared, standing proudly next to a wagon on which a wooden machine sat. Tobis looked comical in his loud-colored court clothes propped up on a crutch Magnus had fashioned for him, his broken leg strapped down between two stiff pieces of wood. “They dragged it out here when I was bumped from the roster. She’s exquisite, isn’t she? I named her Persephone after Novron’s wife. Only fitting, I thought, since I studied ancient imperial history to devise it. Not easy to do either, I had to learn the ancient languages just to read the books.”
“Did you just build this?”
“No, of course not, you silly man. I am a professor at Sheridan. That’s in Ghent by the way. You know the same place as the seat of the Nyphron Church? Well, being brilliant, I bribed some church officials who let slip the true nature of the competition. It would not be a ridiculous bashing match between sawdust-filled heads, but a challenge to defeat a legendary creature. This was a puzzle I could solve; one that I knew did not require muscle and a lack of teeth, but rather a staggering intellect such as mine.”
Hadrian walked around the device. A massive center beam rose up a good twelve-feet, and the long thick arm was a foot or two longer than that. It had a sack bucket joined to a lower beam with torsion producing chords. On either side of the wagon were two massive hand cranks connected to a series of gears.
“Well, I must say I have seen catapults before and this doesn’t look much like them.”
“That’s because I modified it for fighting the Gilarabrywn.”
“Well, he tried,” Magnus added. “It wouldn’t have worked the way he had it set up, but it will now.”
“In fact, we fired a few rocks already,” Mauvin reported.
“I’ve had some experience with siege weapons before,” Hadrian said. “And I know they can be useful against something big like a field of soldiers or something that doesn’t move like a wall, but they’re useless against a solitary moving enemy. They just aren’t that fast or accurate.”
“Yes, well that is why I devised this one to fire not only projectiles but nets as well,” Tobis said proudly. “I’m very clever that way you see. The nets are designed to launch like large balls that open in mid-flight and snare the beast as it is flying, dropping it to the ground where it will lie helpless while I reload and take my time crushing it.”
“And this works?” Hadrian asked impressed.
“In theory,” Tobis replied.
Hadrian shrugged. “What the heck, it couldn’t hurt.”
“Just need to get it in position,” Mauvin said. “Care to help push?”
They all put their backs to the catapult, except, of course, for Tobis, who limped along spouting orders. They rolled it to the ditch that ringed the bottom of the motte and within range to fire on anything in the area near the old manor house.
“Might want to get something to hide it-rubble or burnt wood maybe, so that it looks like a pile of trash,” Hadrian said. “Which shouldn’t be hard to do. Magnus, I was wondering if you could do me a favor?”
“What kind?” he asked as Hadrian led him back up the hill toward the ruins of the manor house. The grass was gone, and they walked on a surface of ash and roots that made Hadrian think of warm snow.
“Remember that sword you made for Lord Rufus? I found it, still with him and his horse on the hill. I want you to fix it.”
“Fix it?” The dwarf looked offended. “It’s not my fault the sword didn’t work, I did a perfect replica. The records were likely at fault.”
“That’s fine because I have the original, or part of it at least. I need you to make an exact copy of what we have. Can you do it?”
“Of course I can, and I will, in return for you’re getting Royce to let me look at the Alverstone.”
“Are you crazy? He wants you dead. I saved your neck from him once already. Doesn’t that count?”
The dwarf stood firm his arms crossed over the braids in his beard. “That’s my price.”
“I will talk to him, but I can’t guarantee it.”
The dwarf pursed his lips, which made his beard and moustache bristle. “Very well, where are these swords?”
Theron agreed to the plan as long as he got the piece back and brought the broken blade to the manor’s smithy, which now consisted of no more than the brick forge and the anvil. He would hold the blade during the exchange and hand it over immediately should the ruse be discovered.
“Hrumph!” The dwarf looked disgusted.
“What?” Hadrian asked.
“No wonder it didn’t work. There are markings on both sides. There’s this whole other inscription. See, this is the incantation I bet.” The dwarf showed Hadrian the blade where a seemingly incomprehensible spider web of thin sweeping lines formed a long design. Then he flipped it over to reveal a significantly shorter design on the back. “And this side I’m guessing holds the name that Esrahaddon mentioned. It makes sense that all the incantations are the same, only the name is unique.”
“Does that mean you can create a weapon that will work?”
“No, it’s broken right along the middle of the name, but I can make an awfully good copy of this at least.”
The dwarf removed his tool belt hidden beneath his clothes and laid it on the anvil. He had a number of hammers of different sizes and shapes, and chisels all in separate loops. He unrolled a leather apron and tied it on. Then he took Rufus’ sword and strapped it to the anvil.
“Carry those everywhere, do you?” Hadrian asked.
“You won’t catch me leaving them on a horse’s saddle,” Magnus replied.
Hadrian and Theron began digging a pit on the side of the courtyard. They dug it on the site of the old smokehouse, making use of the already turned soil to ease their effort. Without a shovel, they used old boards that left their hands black. Within a couple hours, they had a small hole big enough for the two of them to get down fully under the earth. It was not deep enough to avoid being dug up, but it might hide them from a blast of fire so long as it did not come straight down. If it did, they would be like a couple of clay pots fired in sand.
“Won’t be long now,” Hadrian told Theron as the two men sat covered in dirt and ash looking up at the fading light. Magnus was using his smallest hammer, tapping away with a resounding tink, tink. He muttered something, then pulled a heavy cloth from a pouch on his belt and began rubbing the surface of the metal.
Hadrian looked out over the trees, feeling Alverstone inside his tunic. He wondered if Royce made it to the tower. Is he inside? Has he found Esrahaddon? Can the old wizard do anything to help them? He thought of the princess and Thrace. What has it done with them? He bit his lip. Royce was probably right. Why would it keep them alive?
The sound of horses approached from the south. Theron and Hadrian exchanged surprised looks and stood up to see a troop of riders racing out of the trees. Eight horsemen crossed the desolate plain, knights in black armor with a standard of a broken crown flying before them. Leading them was Luis Guy in his red cassock.
“Look who is finally back.” Hadrian looked over at Magnus. “You done yet?”
“Just polishing,” the dwarf replied. He then noticed the riders for the first time. “This can’t be good,” he grumbled.
The riders trotted into the remains of the courtyard and pulled up at the sight of them. Guy surveyed the smoldering remains of the old castle for a moment, then dismounted and walked toward the dwarf, pausing to pick up a burnt bit of timber, which he turned over twice in his hands before tossing it away. “It would seem Lord Rufus didn’t do as well last night as we hoped. Did you forget to dot an i, Magnus?”
Magnus took a frightened step back. Theron stepped forward quickly, grabbed the original broken blade, and hid it under his shirt.
Guy noticed the act, but ignored the farmer and faced the dwarf. “Care to explain yourself Magnus, or shall I just kill you for lousy workmanship?”
“Wasn’t my fault. There were markings on the other side that none of the pictures showed. I did what you asked, your research was to blame.”
“And what are you up to now?”
“He’s duplicating the blade so we can use it to trade with the Gilarabrywn,” Hadrian explained.
“Trade?”
“Yes, the creature took the Princess Arista and a village girl. It said if we return the blade we took from its lair it will free the women.”
“It said?”
“Yes,” Hadrian confirmed. “It spoke to Deacon Tomas last night just before he watched it take the women.”
Guy laughed coldly. “So the beast is talking now, is it? And abducting women too? How impressive. I suppose it also rides horses and I should expect it to be representing Dunmore at the next Wintertide joust in Aquesta.”
“You can ask your own deacon if you don’t believe me.”
“Oh I believe you,” he said walking up to face Hadrian. “At least the part about stealing a sword from the citadel. That is what you’re referring to, isn’t it? So, someone actually got into Avempartha and took the real sword? Clever, particularly when I know that only someone with elvish blood can enter that tower. You don’t look very elf-like to me, Hadrian. And I know the Pickerings’ heritage quite well. I also know Magnus here couldn’t get in. That leaves only your partner in crime Royce Melborn. He’s rather small, isn’t he? Slender, agile? Those qualities would certainly serve him well as a thief. He can see easily in the dark, hear better than any human, has uncanny balance, and is so light on his feet that he can move in almost total silence. Yes, it would be most unfair to all the other poor thieves out there using their normal, human abilities.”
Guy looked around carefully. “Where is your partner?” he asked, but Hadrian remained silent. “That’s one of the biggest problems we have; some of these cross-bred elves can pass for human. They can be so hard to spot sometimes. They don’t have the pointed ears, or the squinty eyes, because they take after their human parent, but the elven parent is always there. That’s what makes them so dangerous. They look normal, but deep down they are inhumanly evil. You probably don’t even see it. Do you? You are like those fools that try and tame a bear cub or a wolf, thinking that they will come to love you. You probably think that you can banish the wild beast that lurks inside. You can’t, you know, the monster is always there, just looking for the chance to leap out at you.”
The sentinel glanced at the anvil. “And I suppose one of you was planning on using the sword to kill the beast and claim the crown of emperor?”
“Actually no,” Hadrian replied. “Getting the women and running real fast was more the plan.”
“And you expect me to believe that? Hadrian Blackwater, the consummate warrior who handles a blade like a Teshlor Knight of the old empire. You really expect me to believe that you’re just passing through this remote village? That you just happen to be in possession of the only weapon that can kill the Gilarabrywn at the precise moment in time when the Emperor will be chosen by the one who does so. No, of course not, you are just using what is arguably the most powerful sword in the world to make a trade with an insanely dangerous, but now talking monster, for a peasant girl and the Princess of Melengar, whom you barely know.”
“Well-when you put it that way, it does sound bad, but it’s the truth.”
“The church will be returning to continue the trials here,” Luis Guy told them. “Until then, it is my job to make certain no one kills the Gilarabrywn who is, shall we say, unworthy of the crown. That most certainly includes thieving elf-lovers and his band of cut-throats.” Guy walked over to Theron. “So I will have that blade you’re holding.”
“Over my dead body,” Theron growled.
“As you wish,” Guy drew his sword and all seven seret dismounted and drew their blades as well.
“Now,” Guy told Theron, “give me the blade or both of you will die.”
“Don’t you mean all four?” a voice behind Hadrian said and he looked over to see Mauvin and Fanen coming up the slope spreading out, each with his sword drawn. Mauvin held two, one of which he tossed to Theron, who caught it clumsily.
“Make that five,” Magnus said holding two of his larger hammers in his hands. The dwarf looked over at Hadrian and swallowed hard. “He’s planning on killing me anyway, so why not?”
“There are still eight of us,” Guy pointed out. “Not exactly an even fight.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” Mauvin said. “Sadly, there’s no one else here we can ask to join your side.”
Guy looked at Mauvin then Hadrian for a long moment as the men glared across the ash at each other. Then he nodded and lowered his blade. “Well, I can see I will have to report your misconduct to the archbishop.”
“Go ahead,” Hadrian said. “His body is buried with the rest of them just down the hillside.”
Guy gave him a cold look then turned to walk away, but as he did, Hadrian noticed his shoulder dip unnaturally to his right and his foot pivot, toe out as he stepped. It was a motion Hadrian had taught Theron to watch for, the announcement of an attack.
“Theron!” He shouted, but it was unnecessary, the farmer had already moved and raised his sword even before Guy spun. The sentinel thrust for his heart. Theron was there a second faster and knocked the blade away. Then out of reflex, the farmer shifted his weight forward took a step and performed the combination move Hadrian had drilled into him, parry, pivot, and riposte. He thrust forward, extending, going for reach. The sentinel staggered. He twisted and narrowly avoided being run through the chest, taking the sword thrust in his shoulder. Guy cried out in agony.
Theron stood shocked at his own success.
“Pull it out!” Hadrian and Mauvin both yelled at him.
Theron withdrew the blade and Guy staggered back gripping his bleeding shoulder.
“Kill them!” the sentinel hissed.
The seret knights charged.
Four Knights of Nyphron attacked the Pickering brothers. One rushed Hadrian, another launched himself at Theron, and the last took Magnus. Hadrian knew Theron would not last long against a skilled seret. He drew both his short sword and the bastard and slew the first Knight of Nyphron the moment he came within range. Then he stepped in the path of the second. The knight realized too late he was walking into a vice of two attackers as both Hadrian and Theron cut him down.
Magnus held up his hammers as menacingly as he could, but the little dwarf was clearly no match for the knight and he retreated behind his anvil. As the seret got nearer, he threw one hammer at him, which hit the seret in the chest. It rang off his breastplate, causing no real harm, but it staggered him slightly. Realizing that the dwarf was no threat, the seret turned to face Hadrian who raced at him.
The seret swung down in an arc at Hadrian’s head. Hadrian caught the blade with the short sword in his left hand, holding the knight’s sword arm up as he drove his bastard sword into the man’s unprotected armpit.
Mauvin and Fanen fought together against the four attackers. The elegant rapiers of the Pickerings flew-catching, blocking, slicing, slamming. Every attack turned back, every thrust blocked, every swing answered. Yet the two brothers could only defend. They stood their ground against the onslaught of the armored knights who struggled to find a weakness. Mauvin finally managed to find a moment to jump to the offense and slipped in a thrust. The tip of his blade stabbed into the throat of the seret, dropping him with a rapid jab, but no sooner had he done so than Fanen cried out.
Hadrian watched as a seret sliced Fanen across his sword arm, the blade continuing down to his hand. The younger Pickering’s sword fell from his fingers. Defenseless, Fanen desperately stepped backward, retreating from his two opponents. He tripped on the wreckage and fell. They rushed him, going for the kill.
Hadrian was too many steps away.
Mauvin ignored his own defense to save his brother. He thrust out. In one move, he blocked both attacks on Fanen-but at a cost. Hadrian saw the seret standing before Mauvin thrust. The blade penetrated Mauvin’s side. Instantly the elder Pickering buckled. He fell to his knees with his eyes still on his brother. He could only watch helplessly as the next blow came down. Two swords entered Fanen’s body. Blood coated the blades.
Mauvin screamed. Even as his own assailant began his killing blow, a cross slice aimed at Mauvin’s neck. Mauvin, on his knees, ignored the stroke much to the delight of the seret. What the knight did not see was Mauvin did not need to defend. Mauvin was done defending. He thrust his sword upwards, slicing through the attacker’s rib cage. He twisted the blade as he pulled it out, ripping apart the man’s organs.
The two who had killed his brother turned on Mauvin. The elder Pickering raised his sword again but his side was slick with blood, his arm weak, eyes glassy. Tears streamed down his cheeks. He was no longer focusing. His stroke went wide. The closet knight knocked Mauvin’s sword away and the two remaining seret stepped forward and raised their swords, but that was as far as they got. Hadrian had crossed the distance and Mauvin’s would-be killers’ heads came loose, their bodies dropping into the ash.
“Magnus, get Tomas up here fast.” Hadrian shouted. “Tell him to bring the bandages.”
“He’s dead,” Theron said as he bent over Fanen.
“I know he is!” Hadrian snapped. “And Mauvin will be too if we don’t help him.”
He ripped open Mauvin’s tunic and pressed his hand to his side as the blood bubbled up between his fingers. Mauvin lay panting, sweating. His eyes rolled up in his head revealing their whites.
“Damn you, Mauvin!” Hadrian shouted at him. “Get me a cloth. Theron get me anything.”
Theron grabbed one of the seret who had killed Fanen and tore off his sleeve.
“Get more!” he shouted. He wiped Mauvin’s side finding a small hole spewing bright red blood. At least it was not the dark blood, which usually meant death. He took the cloth and pressed it against the wound.
“Help me sit him up,” Hadrian said as Theron returned with another strip of cloth. Mauvin was a limp rag now. His head slumped to one side.
Tomas came running up, his arms filled with long strips of cloth that Lena had given him. They lifted Mauvin, and Tomas tightly wrapped the bandages around his torso. The blood soaked through the cloth, but the rate of bleeding had lessened.
“Keep his head up,” Hadrian ordered and Tomas cradled him.
Hadrian looked over at where Fanen lay. He was on his back in the dirt, a dark pool of blood still growing around his body. Hadrian gripped his swords with blood soaked hands and stood up.
“Where’s Guy?” he shouted through clenched teeth.
“He’s gone,” Magnus answered. “During the fight he grabbed a horse and ran.”
Hadrian stared back down at Fanen and then at Mauvin. He took a breath and it shuddered in his chest.
Tomas bowed his head and said the Prayer of the Departed:
“ Unto Maribor, I beseech thee
Into the hands of god, I send thee
Grant him peace, I beg thee
Give him rest, I ask thee
May the god of men watch over your journey.”
When he was done, he looked up at the stars and in a soft voice said, “It’s dark.”