“But they’re not fairy tales, my lord,” the courier protested. “You have to believe me. We fought as hard as we could but . . . but, those things . . .” He seemed on the verge of tears, and the Duke raised a hand in a calming gesture.
“It’s all right, son. You are not the only courier who made it through.” He turned to Tremas and glared at him. “Go easy on him, Tremas. He must have fought his way through the enemy to get here and give us this vital news. Hardly the act of a coward, and he deserves better than your scorn. The other couriers back up his story.”
“Thank you, sire,” the courier said gratefully.
Tremas nodded grudgingly. “I beg your pardon, lad. You’ve shown yourself as brave as any man, if not braver. You’ve served the Duchy well.”
The courier flushed and stammered his thanks.
“That was well said, Tremas,” Marius seconded.
Quill agreed. Whatever Tremas’s faults, he was fair, and, it seemed, capable of being gracious.
The Duke pulled a pouch from his belt. It clinked with the sound of heavy gold coins as he passed it to the courier.
“You may leave us now. Go to the barracks and you will be taken care of. You have our gratitude.”
The courier bowed his head in thanks, and half walked, half stumbled from the room.
“Sire, this is deeply disturbing news,” Marius said. “Our most experienced warriors were in Astarlia, and if they have fallen, what is there to stop the nomads from ranging deeper into the Empire? And these strange reports . . . even without these new weapons, if something has organized them—whether these dark figures or something else—we will be hard pressed to stand against them.”
“Does the Emperor know?” Tremas asked.
The Duke sighed, and for the first time in Quill’s experience, looked his true age.
“The Emperor is still a boy, and his regent is no general. I don’t think that we can look to the court for help; it will be a long time coming.”
Marius nodded, as did Tremas, although more reluctantly. The other men in the room followed suit.
“Then we must do what we can with what we have,” Marius said. “We have some troops here, but will you give the order to raise levies, sire?”
“The heralds are already going out to every town between here and what was Astarlia,” the Duke said. “My plan is to set out now and gather the levies along the way. We cannot let the nomads establish themselves, or we will never be rid of them.”
The rest of the meeting was spent discussing logistics and on planning, but the huge maps that were unrolled and placed on the table made no sense to Quill, while the other men threw around names of towns and roads with easy familiarity. Tremas had a remarkable knack for being able to rattle off facts and figures about even the tiniest of villages, right down to details like the number of men of soldiering age, or the number of spears and shields stored in its warehouse. Quill supposed this skill made Tremas the right man for his job, but the level of detail would have bored Quill to tears even if his head hadn’t been pounding like a drum. When the meeting finally came to an end, Quill would have liked nothing more than to go and lie down in a dark room, but instead he simply sat and waited as the other men filed out.
“Yes, Lord Quill?” the Duke asked. Quill could tell from his tone that, despite his earlier comments, the Duke was far from happy with his failure against Ragnak the night before.
“Sire, if we are to defeat this enemy, we need to know more about them. It doesn’t sound as if these nomads are behaving the way you’ve come to expect.”
“I am aware of that, Quill. I have sent scouts to try and ascertain their numbers, and to discover whatever else they can.”
“No disrespect to your scouts, sire, but I have a great deal of experience in reconnaissance, military intelligence, and infiltration,” Quill said. “Let me see what I can discover.”
The Duke shook his head.
“No, I need my champion with me. You may not have basked in glory last night, but it is your duty to stand beside me if we go to war.”
“Sire, one man very rarely makes a difference in a large-scale battle, but in the right place, he can be of much more use. And unless something goes wrong, I will rejoin you before you reach the border. I can move much faster than an army on the march. If I can bring you news of the enemy or even a weakness for you to exploit . . . well, isn’t that worth the risk?”
Quill could see that the Duke was tempted, and he pressed his advantage.
“Besides, sire, I may be able to recruit some help that might make more of a difference than I can make alone.”
Now he had the Duke’s full attention. The other man leaned forward, interest lighting up his eyes.
“What do you mean? What sort of help?”
“Sire, you know that I am not from this continent?”
The Duke nodded. The Empire was at a technological stage roughly analogous to medieval Europe, and they had an understanding of the size of the planet and their place on it. They had, without any hesitation, accepted Quill’s story of a long ocean voyage and a terrible shipwreck that had left him stranded.
“Well, I wasn’t marooned here alone,” Quill went on. “I had friends with me. We had a falling out and went our separate ways, but maybe it’s time I tried to patch things up.”
“These friends of yours, can they fight as well as you?”
Quill grinned. “Oh, they all have significant talents in that area. If I can convince them to help me, the nomads won’t know what hit them. One of them is the best tactician I’ve ever met, another is the most skilled hand-to-hand fighter I know, and a third is called ‘The Destroyer’—and it isn’t one of those ironic nicknames.” Quill decided against trying to explain Groot. “Let me go and find them to scout out your enemy. The worst case is you lose the champion—one who lost his last bout—and the best case is that you might gain several more warriors who might just make all the difference.”
“When can you leave?” When the Duke made a decision, he didn’t mess around.
“Tomorrow.” Quill promised, realizing that left enough time for one memorable night.
The Duke nodded. “Just remember, I won’t be waiting for you. We will be at the border thirty days from tomorrow—whether you are with us or not. I begrudge the nomads every hour they spend on the Empire’s soil.”
Quill grinned at him. “I won’t keep you waiting, sire.”
“Good enough,” the Duke said. “And, I can promise you this. If you deliver, gold will never be a problem for you again. I take good care of those who serve me well.”
That wasn’t what Quill was worried about. He had no doubt that he would be taken care of if he succeeded, but the Duke was a good leader, and part of that was knowing that some things didn’t have to be said. Quill knew that if he failed the Duke again, he would soon be looking for another profession. The Duke met his gaze and smiled slightly, as if reading Quill’s thoughts.
“Go and make your preparations to leave. If all goes well, I will see you at the border in thirty days.”
The Duke’s unspoken words hung in the air. One way or another, if things didn’t go according to plan, the Duke did not expect to see Quill again.
Interstitial
The woodcutter makes his way deeper into the forest, trying to ignore the eerie silence that has fallen over the woods. No birds sing, nothing moves through the trees, and for a man who has spent all his life in the forest, it feels terribly wrong. He knew that when he stepped over the boundary and entered the territory that the Duke’s laws had forbidden them, that there would be no going back, but this is unnatural.
The woodcutter is a huge man, arms corded with muscle and with a bushy red beard cascading down his broad chest. The massive axe slung over his shoulder looks like a toy. But he is dwarfed by the ancient
trees that loom over him, leaning in threateningly, as if to devour him.
But he is no coward. He is here because wood has become scarce in the land in which he is entitled to work, and he has a family to feed. He refuses to go home empty handed, to a wife who would never voice her disappointment, to a son and daughter who won’t understand why they are going hungry.
He moves towards a copse of likely looking trees and unlimbers his axe. As he works through a few practice swings, he hears a rustling in the branches above him, but he ignores it, comforted to hear some sign of life in the otherwise dead woods.
With a fluid motion, he sends the axe whistling towards the trunk of the tree he has chosen. He gasps in shock as it simply stops, shivering in the air, vibrations traveling along the haft and sending pain shooting through his hands.
His incredulous gaze follows the handle to where it is trapped in a branch-like hand, and then up to a face set into a bark-covered trunk with wide eyes that give it a quizzical, almost friendly look. A shadow detaches itself from the branches above and lands at his feet, sharp fangs bared in a rictus-like grin.
“You’ve picked the wrong place to be chopping down trees, my friend.”
The woodcutter knows that if by some chance he makes it home, he will never break the Duke’s law again—but right now home seems a long way away.
Chapter 5
Quill slouched sullenly as he rode, muttering under his breath every time the pillion of his saddle dug painfully into him. It was a long time since he had sat on a horse, and even though he had picked the mildest beast he could find, he was still out of his comfort zone. The horse seemed to care little for his unease, and simply kept moving at a mile-eating pace. Occasionally, Quill would dismount to let the horse stop for a few mouthfuls of grass; after all, it wasn’t the horse that was causing his foul mood.
After he had left the Duke, everything had seemed to be going wonderfully. Karyn must have heard from her father that Quill had volunteered for an important mission, because she had come to his chamber to check on his wounds from the fight. She had been all sympathy and consideration, and had stayed longer than she had perhaps been expecting. By the time she had left for the night, Quill felt much better about things, and his headache had virtually disappeared. He spent the following hours saying goodbye to some of the many friends he had made around the castle, some of whom had been quite upset to hear he was leaving, and so had insisted on some very thorough leave-takings.
Quill had been in a very good mood while packing his saddlebags, and had been hoping for a nice, leisurely departure—but suddenly a commotion had penetrated the musty quiet of the stables. He could hear raised voices, and what sounded like an attack on the keep. Drawing his sword, he had rushed into the courtyard, only to come to a sudden stop at the sight of a number of young women hurling abuse (and other, more tangible items) at one another. His stomach had lurched as he recognized some of his friends among the serving girls and—to his horror—Karyn. From what they were yelling, he realized that they’d all had the idea to come and say a final goodbye, not expecting to meet anyone else on the same errand. He’d turned to sidle back into the stables unnoticed, but it was too late. One of the girls had noticed him, and their argument with each other had come to an end as they found a better target for their anger.
Quill shuddered as he remembered his undignified dash for the stables, and the mocking laughter of the stable hands as he had galloped out of the gate. He tried to put it out of his mind as he surveyed the scenery around him. It had taken him only an hour or so to leave the city behind, and as he had moved farther out, shops and bullrings had given way to small, neatly-kept tenant farms. He’d spent the night at one of them, grateful for a final night in a bed, even if it was stuffed with straw instead of feathers, and happy to augment his meager provisions. As the farms grew more spaced out, he saw more and more trees, solitary sentinels becoming copses until, finally, he entered the vast Greenmyre Forest. The road on which he had traveled had gone from a raised thoroughfare wide enough for three wagons to travel comfortably alongside each other to a track rutted with the wheels of woodcutters’ carts.
As he pushed deeper into the forest, some sunlight still filtered down through the branches and leaves above his head, but it was definitely dimmer than it had been when he had first entered, and it was still only early afternoon. From all the tales he had heard, it would only get darker, the trees growing closer together and the canopy becoming thicker with each passing mile. Quill sighed and pulled his map from his saddlebag. He had no idea how deep he would have to go, as he was only guessing at his destination. From the moment he had established himself at the castle, he had spent what spare time he had (between fighting and feasting and frolicking) gathering whatever tall tales and rumors came through the court, and trying to glean news of his friends. None of them exactly blended in, but all he had to show for his time was the map in his hands and a rough recollection of the direction in which he had last seen them heading.
Since Quill had entered the forest he’d noticed the signs that woodcutters had been at work. Every mile or so, a shallower set of ruts would diverge from the main road and branch out into the woods, surrounded by stumps where vast trees had been felled and cut into more manageable pieces. The remains of campfires were scattered about, and very occasionally, he would spy a broken tool that had been left to rust—though most woodcutters were far too frugal to waste anything.
And then suddenly everything changed. It was as if he had crossed an invisible line. There were no more stumps, no more ashes of fires past, no more tools scattered around. Even the ruts in the road came to an abrupt end as the road narrowed to a faint track through the forest.
Quill’s skin prickled—he had heard about this, but thought that the stories were exaggerated. The Duke’s law was clear—on pain of death there was to be no logging past the three-mile boundary, but Quill would have expected there to be a slight blurring of the law. He knew better than anyone that where there was money to be made by bending the rules there would be men willing to do so. But the tales he had heard implied that death by the executioner’s axe was a merciful end for those who violated this ancient custom, that those the Duke’s soldiers didn’t capture met terrible and cruel ends in the forest. Quill had heard that traveling in the forest could be made safer if you harmed no animal and broke no living branch. While he didn’t put much stock in fairy tales, he felt it was better to be safe than sorry. Quill didn’t even intend to build a fire, and he had enough provisions to see him through without resorting to hunting.
He kept moving through the rest of the day, letting the horse set the pace and allowing it to graze from time to time—making sure it ate only grass. Quill’s eyes gradually adjusted to the changing light, but after a few hours, what light there was became so dim that details faded into shadow only ten or twenty feet ahead. The horse seemed fine following the trail, so Quill continued on until it was so dark that he was convinced that the sun must be setting. Coming into a clearing, he dismounted and gathered a pile of dead wood that he placed in the middle of the clearing. His resolution to avoid a fire had faded with the light, but he still made sure that no overhanging branches could possibly be singed.
After hammering a stake into the ground and securing his mount so it couldn’t wander off and get into trouble, Quill laid down next to the fire. The ground, deeply covered with fallen leaves, was more than soft enough to sleep on, and a saddlebag served suitably as a pillow. After the indolent months he had spent in the luxury of the castle, this was actually a refreshing change—and before he knew it, sleep claimed him.
Quill awoke to a rusty axe blade against his throat. Slowly, taking care not to startle the roughly dressed man kneeling above him, Quill opened his hands to show they were empty.
“Let’s not do anything hasty here,” he said in a soothing voice. “I don’t have much gold on me, but you are wel
come to take it. I won’t come after you, just let me go on my way.”
There was low laughter to Quill’s right, and he tried to turn towards its source, wincing as the blade’s jagged edge nicked his skin. He could make out a group of three or four men—it was hard to make an exact count out of the corner of his eye.
“That’s mighty generous of you, my lord.” The voice was dripping with sarcasm, and it made “lord” sound like a swear word. “Giving us your permission is very gracious.”
“I aim to please,” Quill said, keeping his tone light. “Whom do I have the honor of addressing?”
This brought another burst of coarse laughter, and Quill heard footsteps rustling towards him through the leafy cover. A massive figure loomed over him, and rough hands patted him down, pulling the dagger from his boot and taking the sheathed sword that Quill had left lying within easy reach beside him.
“Edric, you can let him up, but stay on your toes,” the man said. “This one has a stabby look about him that I don’t like.”
“Yes, Barak.”
Quill was pulled to his feet, and gave a show of brushing himself off, as if more concerned with his appearance than being surrounded by threatening men with wood axes. The knowing smile on Barak’s face hinted that perhaps Quill wasn’t fooling anyone.
“As you may have realized, I am Barak. Over there are Tomas and Davak, and I believe you have met Edric here.”
The man’s voiced dripped with mockery as he made the introductions, his formal manner an over-the-top imitation of the Duke’s court. His companions grinned in appreciation as Barak gave a florid bow to complete the image.
All the men were wearing homespun clothing and leather boots. The similarity didn’t stop there, though, as all were big men with the muscle of those who worked hard day in and day out, swinging axes and dragging logs heavier than they were. Barak was the biggest of the men, but there was a cunning look in his eyes that made Quill think that he was not simply leader by virtue of brawn.
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