Willow turned her head slightly and told the girl, “Remember: keep your hands around me at all times. It’s important.”
Willow seethed. She had possibly been within feet of the King and she had let him pass. Now every moment she dallied was a moment wasted until she could fulfill her orders—after all, she had been ordered to go first to Venucha and then to Cerendahl—and then return to Bryanae.
A pair of masked figures emerged on foot from the woods to her left and right. They were both modestly built, dressed in dark shirts and breeches. Each carried a small crossbow. Willow could tell by the awkward way they grasped them that their experience with the weapons was limited at best.
“I don’t have time for this!” she snapped at them before they could utter the expected your-money-or-your-life demand. She fished out her purse and hurled it at the one on the left. “There! Take it. Now get out of my way!”
The highwayman fumbled, and the purse fell to the ground, spilling the twenty pieces of gold contained therein. The bandit gaped at the fortune strewn before him and squeaked. He dropped to his knees, folded up the bottom of his shirt into a makeshift sack, and started gathering the coins.
Willow heard the girl inhale sharply behind her. She probably had never seen so much money in one place before.
The man to her right raised his nocked crossbow at her.
“Get off your horse!” he shouted, his voice muffled by his mask. He gestured with his crossbow, which was a singularly stupid thing to do.
“I don’t have time for this,” she repeated, adding venom to her voice. “You have my money. Now get out of my way.”
“There’s over ten pieces of gold here!” cried the robber on his knees. Willow arched an eyebrow. At least one of them knew how to count.
The horseman to her rear said, “If she has this much in her purse, I’ll bet she has more hidden elsewhere!”
The lead horseman nodded. “Plus, that horse is a fine animal. And her uniform: that has to be worth something.”
The robber to her left added, “She’s an elf, too! Haven’t seen one of those in a long time.”
She shook her head. They knew she was an elf, they saw she was wearing a uniform, yet they hadn’t figured out who she was? Idiots.
“I bet we could get something for her as well! Maybe sell her to the Venucha Players.”
“They’ve gone,” Willow grumbled, tapping her thigh impatiently.
“I’m not going to say this again,” said the man pointing the crossbow at her. “Get off your horse, or die.”
Willow sighed. Fine, she’d do it the hard way then.
“If I get off this horse,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone of voice, “every one of you will be dead within a minute.”
The four men froze for a moment, stunned by her apparent bravado.
“Kill her, then,” said the man to her left.
She felt the girl’s right arm leave her waist and drop to her side. Willow had been waiting for that. She had been nearly certain the girl was a plant, sent ahead to distract their victims. But Willow had needed to be sure before she acted …
The girl’s hand came back up, holding a knife. She started to bring it around Willow’s throat. Willow intercepted the arm with her right hand.
As always, time slowed down in battle. Her eyes focused on the nut of the crossbow. She hunched her shoulder, making a vee by her neck. She grabbed the girl’s arm with her other hand now, and pulled it into that vee. She yanked down, snapping the girl’s elbow.
The girl screamed, but Willow barely heard it. She was still watching the crossbow.
The man with the crossbow pulled the trigger. The nut rolled to release the bolt.
Willow slipped her feet out of her stirrups as she leaned forward, pulling the girl with her by her broken arm.
The bolt missed Willow’s neck and landed in the girl’s.
“Tricia!” cried the crossbowman, his mouth forming an enormous “O”.
Willow shouted and slapped her hand against her horse’s flank. She vaulted from its back with both hands as it galloped forward. Her mass drove the dead girl’s body from the horse; the body fell to the ground.
The crossbowman’s eyes followed the girl’s corpse instead of remaining on Willow.
She had her rapier drawn by the time her boots hit the ground. She pivoted and launched into a deep lunge, impaling the man to her left. He gasped and dropped her purse. Once more, the glittering coins spilled onto the dirt.
She stooped to draw her knife from her boot. The man to her right only now realized his mistake and returned his attention to her. He lowered his crossbow and fumbled for another bolt from his quiver.
The lead rider’s mount panicked and reared, throwing him to the ground.
She threw her knife at the rider to her rear and it found its mark in his throat. He pulled it out, releasing a jet of blood, which he tried feebly to staunch before he fell from his horse and landed on the ground dead. Amateur.
The throw from his horse had injured the lead robber badly; nevertheless, he had struggled to his knees and was trying to get up. Unfortunately for him, Willow’s mount was a warhorse. Trained for battle, it trampled him until his screaming stopped.
Now only the crossbowman remained. He had at last nocked the bolt in his crossbow. Willow stepped over the girl’s body and gently sliced the string with her rapier, rendering the weapon useless.
The man dropped the bow and raised his hands. His eyes bulged in terror and he soiled his trousers. He glanced around at his three dead comrades—four, if you counted the girl, who had clearly been intended to kill Willow.
“Please, kind lady, I beg you: be merciful!”
She ran him through as if she were swatting a mosquito. The dying man’s eyes filled with horror as he clutched his chest. He fell to the ground and his struggles weakened.
“I pierced your heart,” she said. “That’s as merciful as I get.”
When he was dead, she wiped off her blade and retrieved her money.
She had a decision to make: continue riding to Cerendahl on her own horse, or did she take one of the highwaymen’s fresher mounts?
Given the amount of riding she had ahead of her and considering how tired her own horse was, she reluctantly took the reins on the horse to her rear.
Surprisingly, it seemed a very fine horse. It would be quite suitable for her purposes. Her own horse would find its own way back to Bryanae in a week or so.
This robbery had worked out well for her, after all. Those amateurs were able to do at least one thing right. She flipped a copper coin at the dead girl. Tricia, Willow thought she had said her name had been.
“Thanks,” she said, and resumed her ride toward Cerendahl.
Chapter 15
She caught sight of the wooden fence surrounding Cerendahl just before dawn. She had ridden continuously for over two days, robbery attempt notwithstanding, and had caught only fleeting moments of sleep when she drifted off in the saddle. Now she felt worn and stretched, and she stank of stale sweat and horse.
She dismounted at the gate and rang the bronze bell attached to it by a curved wooden arm. A sturdy wooden beam barred the gates. After a minute or so, a panel in the gate opened a crack and the gatekeeper appeared: a formidable-looking man rich in muscles but poor in hair wearing a haphazardly belted wool coat. He peered at her cautiously.
“An elf, eh?” he said in a brilliant conversational gambit. His powers of observation were impressive. “Long way from home, aren’t you? What do you want in Cerendahl?”
“I’m standing in front of a gate,” she said. “I just rang the bell for admittance. What do you think I want?”
The man’s head recoiled as if he had been struck. He glared at her as though she had defecated in front of him.
“I think what you want is to turn around and go back to where you came from if you’re not going to be civil,” he said.
Willow’s hand itched for the hilt of her rapier, but she
restrained herself through force of will. Discipline.
She took a deep breath, counted to ten, and then exhaled.
“My apologies,” she said. “I have ridden for days without rest. I am in a great hurry, and have no time to waste.”
“Why the hurry? What’s your business?”
She balled her hands into fists.
“If you let me in,” she said, keeping her voice calm, “I will show you.”
The man hesitated but relented. He unhitched the wooden beam and pulled the gate open.
Willow approached him on foot.
“What about your mount?” He gestured with an arm as thick as her thigh. “You just going to leave it there?”
“This won’t take long,” she said.
She withdrew one of the portraits of the King from her jacket. She showed it to the gatekeeper. “Have you seen this man?”
He scratched his head and then shrugged. “Can’t say that I have. Why, who is he?”
“Never mind,” she said. She returned to her horse and mounted.
“Wait. Where are you going? Aren’t you coming in?”
She shook her head but didn’t reply. Her mission was to go to Cerendahl and ask if anybody had seen the King. She had entered the town and asked. Nobody she had asked had seen him.
Now she could return to Bryanae.
Chapter 16
She rode for much of the day before she finally had to stop. Fatigue had been mounting in her, and now she felt slow and brittle; she needed rest. The afternoon was cool and overcast, and sunset was near. She tied up her horse in a shady spot by a tree, and sat back against the tree with her sheathed rapier resting in her lap.
She had been within feet of him.
The thought worried at her, flitting about her sleep-starved mind. The man she had been seeking had very likely walked right up to her and she had sent him away. She had come so close only to fail so spectacularly!
She had talked with him.
The thought nagged at her. It followed her into her dreams, where she was buffeted mercilessly.
Just past dawn, she opened her eyes and sprang to her feet. The sun was just visible between the trees on the right side of the road. A cacophony of birds had been squawking, but they fell silent at Willow’s sudden movement.
She had talked with him!
He had been right in front of her, in the eerie silence of that night, and they had conversed.
So if he really was the King, then why hadn’t she recognized his voice? And why hadn’t he recognized hers?
Chapter 17
She rode at a canter for the last few miles, desperate to reach the dock before the last ferry crossed Frost’s Vice into Bryanae.
She hadn’t recognized his voice. She had served the King for decades; she would have known his voice under any circumstances. She had known him his entire life. The stranger in the forest had sounded nothing like him: the accent was wrong, the cadence, even his pitch was higher than she remembered the King’s. Neither, for that matter, did he appear to recognize her.
However, the circus rabble had recognized the King’s portrait; the woman dressed like a prostitute had mentioned the wide-brimmed hat Willow had seen him wearing. Could there be two men wandering the area wearing the same ridiculous plumed hat? It seemed unlikely; she didn’t know much about style and apparel, but she imagined that such a hat would require weeks of specialized labor, which would make it fiendishly expensive.
She left the ferry at a gallop the moment it reached the Bryanaen shore. She sped along the moonlit road as it wound its way from the frigid shores, through the tangled Broken Woods, and on to the city gate. The gatekeepers recognized her from a distance and had the gates open for her by the time she reached it.
Once back in the city, she slowed to a trot while considering her best move. Report to the Chancellor? Find Marcus? (Gods, no.) Get a fresh horse and scour the city and its surrounding countryside?
“Captain Willow!”
A figure waddled down the darkened street, running towards her. She wrapped her fingers around the hilt of her rapier, but did not draw.
“He’s back, Lady Captain! He’s back!”
As the man neared, she recognized him as Goodsmeade, the owner of a local inn named Touring Churches. He was so fat as to be almost round, and he swayed as he ran, gasping.
“He’s … back!” he gasped when he reached her. His cheeks were bright red, and sweat poured down his face. His double chin jiggled.
A shiver went up her spine. So much for Marcus keeping a secret.
“Who’s back, innkeeper?” she said softly, her expression neutral.
“His Majesty, the King!” Goodsmeade said. He clutched at her boot with meaty hands, but she shook him off. “He’s back!”
Willow leapt from her horse and clamped her hand over his mouth.
“Keep your voice down,” she hissed.
She surveyed the vicinity for any who might have heard, but the streets were deserted. She scanned the rooftops and windows as an extra degree of paranoia, but saw no spies.
“You are not to speak of this to anybody,” she said in barely a whisper, “do you understand?”
Goodsmeade nodded, his eyes wide with fear and confusion.
“Good,” Willow said. “Now tell me, how did you learn of the King’s return? Who told you? Was it the boy?”
“The boy?” Goodsmeade said, his voice shrill. “What … what boy?”
Willow grabbed the innkeeper by his sweaty shirt collar and using her body’s momentum, she pushed him against the neighboring fabric merchant’s shop wall. The blubber on his neck undulated.
“Don’t be coy with me,” she said, her eyes burning. “I have been riding for days with little rest. I am simply not … in … the … mood.” She shoved him against the wall to punctuate each word.
Goodsmeade’s expression had progressed to abject terror. His eyes bulged. Good.
“Now, I’ll ask you one more time,” she continued, “and I expect a direct answer.” She leaned close to the innkeeper’s face. “Who told you that the King had returned?”
“Nuh-nuh-nobody,” he stammered.
“Liar!” She bared an inch of her rapier’s blade. “You heard it from someone, and I want that person’s name.”
It was too much to hope that he had heard it directly from Marcus. The word was spreading, and she needed to stop it.
Goodsmeade’s arm rose, and shaking violently, he pointed towards his inn.
“Nobody t-told me,” he said. “He’s sl-sleeping in my inn!”
Chapter 18
The tavern on the ground floor of the inn was nearly deserted. An odd chill—colder than the autumn morning—filled the room and gave Willow a sense of foreboding. A handful of dedicated patrons, washed-out alcoholics all, drank at the bar in uneasy silence. The wait staff eyed each other with darting, anxious looks.
If the King of Bryanae had truly returned, the reception was oddly subdued. Willow would have expected to find the room full of petitioners fighting each other to gain an audience. So why was the inn so empty?
“Are you certain it was His Majesty?” Willow said to Goodsmeade, her voice barely audible. It was almost as if she were afraid someone—or something—might hear.
The innkeeper shrugged, glancing about nervously. His complexion was ashen.
“He’s different,” he said. “Much younger. But I think it’s him.”
Just what the Hells was going on?
She drew her rapier.
“Which way?” she said, her voice slightly louder.
Goodsmeade pointed at the staircase with a hand that shook. It curved upward into the gloom.
“Room Six,” he said. “At the end of the hall.”
She faced him, willed him to make eye contact, and told him, “Run to the Guard barracks and have them sound the alarm. Have them send as many soldiers as they can muster.”
Goodsmeade seemed to be waiting for the excuse to bolt. He whim
pered and fled his inn. The remaining patrons noted this, and drank the last dregs before they, too, took their leaves. The barmaid and the waitress glanced at each other before sweeping the coins from the bar into the hems of their shirts and exited, leaving Willow alone in the desolate room.
She walked as silently as she could. Her boots thunked upon the wooden floor, so she removed them. Her rapier reflected the flickering light from the fireplace, but the colors appeared cold and muted.
She ascended the stairs, taking each step as quietly as she could, listening for any sound before proceeding to the next. As she turned the bend in the stairs, she saw that the second floor was completely black, the darkness spilling into the stairwell.
A strange dread pressed on her, told her to turn and flee; nevertheless, she pressed forward. A moment later, darkness enveloped her as though she had been blindfolded. Only because her elvish eyes were keen was she able to discern shapes and distances.
As she neared the landing, she became aware of a soft hissing. She tightened her grip on her rapier and crept towards the sound.
She had taken two steps before she realized that something was moving ahead. Cloaked by darkness and garbed in black, it had the shape of a crouching figure. As her eyes became further acclimated, she saw that it was pressed up against one of the doors. A billowing black cloud drifted from its—what, limbs? Hands?—and rolled beneath the door of Room Six.
Shaking off feelings of dread, she bounded forward to engage the creature. Without a word, she drove her rapier into the dark figure’s center. It passed through the body as though it was going through fog.
The shadowy figure emitted a terrifying sound, something between a hiss and a howl, and turned on her. She was about to lunge again when it raised a hand-like appendage.
She heard the sound of boiling water. Acting more from reflex than conscious thought, she leapt to the side and pressed the front of her body flat against the wall. A viscous liquid jetted past her, spraying the floor where she had been standing. As she watched, the floor began to bubble and char, and the air filled with the smell of burning flesh.
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