"No. I'm sure you have lots to discuss together. You don't want me along."
Alyss, she noticed, made no move to contradict her. Will, a little awkwardly, said: "Well, if you're sure then." He sensed the tension in the air but had no idea what to do about it. Delia was already gathering up the small earthenware pot that she had brought for his evening meal.
"I'll take this back," she said. "It's just a stew, and I'm sure Mother will want to do something special for a dear friend of the Ranger's."
"That's great," Will replied automatically, completely missing the irony in her tone. His eyes were still fastened on Alyss.
Delia waited a second or two, then asked: "What time would you like to dine?"
Alyss answered for him. "I have a meeting with the Baron first," she said. "And I'd like to settle into my quarters and have a bath before that. Perhaps in two hours' time?"
"Two hours it is then," Delia replied. Then she added to Will, "And I saw Mother making one of her special flaky pastry berry pies earlier. Perhaps you'd like some of that for dessert?" Will nodded cheerfully, welcoming the idea.
"That'd be great. Thanks, Delia," he said. She forced a smile, nodded a farewell to Alyss and turned away, walking quickly toward the village.
"Why did you have to offer them pie?" she asked herself softly as she went. It was almost as if she were trying to make matters worse for herself, she thought, adding bitterly, "Perhaps you could come back and light some romantic candles for them as well?"
She glanced back once as she rounded the edge of the grove but Will and Alyss were paying no further attention to her. Sourly, she noted that they were holding hands once more.
"You're making quite a name for yourself," Alyss said, smiling at Will across the dinner table.
"I'm just blundering through," he said. "It's all a little overwhelming, really."
Alyss's steady gaze told him that she saw through his pretense of diffidence.
"Inviting a wolfship crew to a banquet?" she said. "Preventing a pitched battle by handing over a few beasts and a skin or two of wine? I'd say you handled things pretty well."
Oh, Skandians aren't so difficult to deal with once you know them, Will replied. Then he grinned at her. He was actually quite proud of the way he had handled the potentially ugly situation. "Besides," he added, "it was worth it to see all those stuffy knights and their ladies sitting down to dine with a crew of bloodthirsty corsairs."
Alyss frowned slightly as she ran her finger around the top of her glass. "Wasn't that a bit risky?" she asked. "After all, anything could have happened with that mix of people."
Will shook his head firmly. "Not once Gundar had given me his word as a helmsman. No Skandian would ever break that oath. And I knew Norris would keep his people under control-it was the least he could do," he added meaningfully. Alyss picked up on the unspoken message and raised her eyebrows in a question. Will hesitated a moment, not wanting to air Seacliff's dirty linen in public. Then he realized that Alyss was a member of the Diplomatic Service, and accustomed to hearing secrets far more important than this one.
"Norris and the Baron had let things become very slack around here. They wouldn't have stood a chance in a battle. Their men were badly trained, badly drilled and out of condition. At least Norris realized the fact and went along with the banquet idea."
"And a good idea it was," Alyss said quietly. Will pursed his lips thoughtfully.
"I suppose it helped that I'd made the crossing of the Stormwhite when I did," he said. "I realized they were short of provisions and they mightn't last the winter without them. By doing things my way, they didn't have to fight for them-and they got to go to a banquet as well." He grinned at the memory once more.
"So they're safely out of the way?" Alyss asked casually. Will shook his head.
"They're still butchering and smoking the meat so it will see them through the winter," he said. "They'll be at Bitteroot Creek for another two or three days, then they'll be on their way."
"Does that mean they're still a danger to the fief?" she asked, but Will hurried to reassure her on that score.
"Gundar's oath still holds," he said. "I trust him totally." He grinned as he added, "Particularly as he knows I'm a personal friend of the Skandian Oberjarl."
"You'll still report on Norris's neglect of his duty, won't you?" Alyss asked. Like the Rangers, the Couriers' main allegiance was to the King. Will nodded.
"I'll have to," he said. "But at least I can report that he's learned his lesson. His men have been drilling nonstop since the morning after the banquet-and that was unpopular timing, I can tell you. In another month or so, he'll have them whipped into shape."
"So things are in good order here?" Alyss said, then added casually, "There'd be no problem if you had to leave for a while?"
Will was reaching for the water pitcher as she said the last few words. His hand froze in midair and he met her eyes. They were serious now, with no hint of the humor and warmth that had been so evident earlier. This, he realized, was business.
"Leave?" he said, and she nodded.
"It's no accident that I'm here, Will. Oh, there were some routine documents to deliver, but Halt and Crowley specifically asked me to take this assignment and give you a message. You're being reassigned."
Will felt a sudden stab of doubt at the words. Perhaps his handling of the Skandian situation hadn't been quite as clever as he thought. Alyss saw the worry written plainly on his face and hastened to reassure him.
"It's no punishment, Will. They were very pleased with the way you handled things-Halt in particular. They have a temporary assignment they need you for."
He felt the weight of doubt lift at her words. "What sort of assignment?"
Alyss shrugged. "I don't know the full details myself yet. It's all highly confidential," she said. "As I said, they wanted me to deliver the message because I was an old friend. That way, people won't begin wondering why you should suddenly disappear after a visit from a Courier. They'll just put it down to the normal Ranger liking for secrecy. Hopefully, they'll think my visit was purely social-particularly with your girlfriend Delia to stoke the fires of gossip."
Will colored slightly. "She's just a friend!" he protested awkwardly.
But Alyss didn't answer. She was pointing at the dog, which had been lying contentedly on the warm stones beside the fire. Now she was awake, her ears flattened against the side of her head, her teeth bared. A low, rumbling growl sounded in her chest. Her gaze was fixed on the door of the cabin.
"There's someone outside," Will said softly.
9
Motioning for Alyss to remain where she was, Will rose and moved silently to the door. The latch was moving, a fraction at a time, as the person outside tested it to see if it was locked. As the wooden tongue rose from the socket that held it in place, Will took a position on the latch side of the door, flattened against the wall.
He nodded to Alyss, and the girl, quick-witted as always, began talking again, rambling on about Halt and Crowley and how they had sent their greetings to him. She began to describe a meal she had enjoyed with them, going into great detail over the preparation and the skill of the cook, Master Chubb of Redmont.
The door had stopped moving as their conversation had paused. Now, as Alyss began talking once more, it began to inch open, infinitely slowly, the well-oiled hinges making no noise. Will made a mental note to stop oiling the hinges. Halt had always allowed a patina of rust to build up on the hinges to his front door. Nobody can take you by surprise that way, he was fond of saying.
Will frowned. The only person about to be surprised was the intruder outside, he thought. For a moment, he wondered if it might not be Delia, come back to eavesdrop on his conversation with Alyss. Then he abandoned the idea. The dog would never have behaved as she did if that were the case. The door was open about fifteen centimeters now and he could see the hand on the outer latch. A man's left hand, he recognized. And he knew that the right hand would probably hold a weapon of s
ome kind. Alyss let out a rising peal of laughter, presumably to convince the intruder that they were totally preoccupied with her fake conversation. The ruse seemed to work, as the door opened wider and more of the man's arm was visible in the gap.
Will moved quickly, grabbing the man by the wrist with his right hand and pivoting to jerk him forward into the room. At the same time, he let the pivot movement throw his left leg out across the doorway as a barrier, so the outsider was jerked forward and tripped over the outstretched leg.
With a shout of surprise, the man stumbled into the room, propelled by the totally unexpected jerk on his arm, and tumbled over Will's leg, crashing to the floor and knocking a chair flying into one corner as he did so.
But he was fast to recover and he rolled quickly, bounding to his feet to face the Ranger. As Will had expected, there was a weapon in his right hand-a heavy-headed war spear on an ash shaft. He extended it now toward Will in a two-handed grip, the razor-sharp head weaving slightly as if to mesmerize his enemy.
Will didn't move. He stood, balanced on the balls of his feet, ready for instant action. His hands were empty of weapons. Alyss, he noticed with interest, had come to her feet, a long and dangerous-looking dagger in her hand. She held it loosely, looking as if she knew how to use it.
The dog, excited by the sudden flurry of movement, was barking furiously. Without taking his eyes from the intruder, Will called sharply for her to be still. She subsided, growling threateningly while he took stock of the spearman.
He was big and heavy-shouldered, with unkempt black hair and a black beard. The eyes were dark and burning with anger under heavy brows and the large nose had been broken at some time and badly reset so that it had a distinct crook in it. He wore dark clothing a jerkin and woolen trousers, and a dark brown cowled cloak. Will had never seen him before, but he knew who he was.
"John Buttle," he said calmly. "What do you want here?"
An unpleasant smirk touched the man's mouth as he answered. The voice was deep and throaty and his accent and manner of speech marked him as a commoner.
"Know me, do you? Ain't that a prize."
"I know of you," Will replied evenly. "You have a reputation around this fief."
Buttle sneered. "Reputation! Nothing's ever been proved against me. Nothing ever will be."
"That could be because there are never any witnesses left alive when you do your dirty work." Then Will added briskly, "Now get on with it! What are you doing sneaking around my home in the middle of the night?"
For a moment, a puzzled look flicked across Buttle's face. Will's peremptory tone took him by surprise. After all, he was the one who was armed. The small Ranger, who he now saw looked to be still a boy, had no weapons. Oh, he did have what appeared to be an oversized knife at his hip, but Buttle would have him spitted on the spear before he could get that unsheathed. As for the blond girl, her dagger held no fears for him.
"I've come for my dog," he said, at length. "Heard you'd stolen her and I want her back."
He glanced at the dog as he spoke and she flattened her belly to the floor, the growling intensifying as she did so.
"Shut up, you!" he shouted at her, but the dog only snarled more, baring her teeth at him.
"You certainly have a way with her," Will said. He made a quick hand gesture and she quieted instantly.
"Very clever!" Buttle sneered, now thoroughly angry. "I'll teach her manners, like I taught her last time. Little bitch tried to bite me, so I taught her."
"With that great big spear, I suppose?" Alyss asked. "How incredibly brave of you." She leaned nonchalantly against the back of the chair she'd been sitting in, assessing the bearded man coolly. Will smiled quietly to himself at her absolute composure. Buttle, on the other hand, seemed to be enraged by it.
"Don't come the high and mighty with me, girl!" he shouted. "Not you with your little knife and your secret Courier doings!" He lowered his voice and continued, "Got a secret assignment for our Ranger, have we? I'll bet there'll be those who'll pay to know about that."
Will and Alyss exchanged quick glances. Buttle saw the exchange and continued, with growing confidence.
"Oh yes, I heard you and your plotting. Rangers and Couriers, always sneaking around with secrets, aren't you? Learn to keep your voices down when John Buttle's around, you should."
He was in control of the situation now and pleased to see that he had shattered their air of unconcern. He realized now that he had overheard something important when he had been outside the door and his criminal brain was working to see how he could profit by it. Long experience told him that when there was something that somebody wanted to keep secret, there was inevitably another somebody who would pay to know about it.
"Oh dear," said Alyss to Will. "He seems to have overheard our conversation."
Buttle laughed at her. "Overheard you, all right. And there's nothing you can do about it."
Alyss seemed to consider his words for a moment, thinking them over. Then, in a very matter-of-fact way, she replied, "It seems not. Short of killing you."
As she said the words, she flipped the long dagger, catching it by its point and taking her arm back in a smooth, flowing motion. Buttle swung instantly toward her, dropping into a defensive crouch, the spear ready to thrust…
… and heard a strange hiss-clunk! followed by a jarring sensation in both hands as Will's saxe knife seemed to leap from its fleece-lined scabbard. Without pause, it swung in a chopping arc to strike his spear just behind the steel head.
Heavy as an ax, sharp as a razor, the specially tempered blade of the saxe cut through the hard ash wood as if it were cheese. The heavy head dropped to the cabin floor with a ringing thud and Buttle stared in amazement at the spear, suddenly headless and seemingly weightless in his hands. He had a half second or so to register the fact before Will, stepping toward him and pivoting again, brought the brass pommel of the saxe thudding into his temple.
At which point John Buttle lost further interest in proceedings and sagged to the floor like a sack of potatoes.
"Very neat," Alyss said, impressed in spite of herself by the speed of Wills reactions. She reversed the dagger again and replaced it in the sheath concealed by a specially cut fold in her gown.
They smiled at each other. The dog, puzzled, whimpered slightly for attention and Alyss stooped to reassure her, ruffling the fur around her ears.
"I didn't know they trained you to throw those daggers," Will said, and she shrugged.
"They don't. The blades are much too fine to go hurling them all over the place the way you Rangers do. I just wanted to distract our friend here so you could deal with him."
Will crossed to the dresser against the wall of the cabin and rummaged in one of the drawers. He withdrew several pieces of rawhide, then move to the supine figure on the floor, rolling Buttle onto his stomach and placing his hands behind his back. Will looped two small circlets of leather over the man's thumbs, then pulled them tight through a double wooden block to secure them.
Then, using a larger version of the thumb restraints, he fastened Buttle's ankles together as well.
"Very neat," Alyss said once more. He studied his handiwork and nodded.
"One of the Rangers designed them. The loops hold the thumbs and ankles and these wooden deadeyes let you tighten them without having to bother about knots."
Alyss took up her glass and sat sideways on her chair, frowning at the unconscious Buttle. "Of course, there is still a problem. What do we do with him now?"
Will began to answer, then stopped as he realized what she was thinking.
"My assignment," he said. "He knows about it."
Alyss nodded. "Exactly. We went through all this subterfuge so nobody would know you'd been sent on a mission. Now we'll have this moron blurring it out to all and sundry."
Will regarded Buttle, who still hadn't stirred. "I can have the Baron imprison him, of course. He did threaten you, and threatening a Courier is a serious offense." But Alyss s
hook her head decisively.
"Not good enough. There's still the chance that he'll be in contact with other prisoners, or even his jailers. And we can't risk any word of this getting out. Damn the man! We may have to kill him, Will"
She said it reluctantly, but so calmly that Will was taken aback. He looked at her with new eyes, realizing that his old wardmate had gone through a training process every bit as tough as his own. Then a thought struck him, as memory of their earlier conversation came back to him.
"I don't think it needs to come to that," he said. "I've got an idea. Give me a hand saddling my horses and I'll tell you about it."
Gundar Hardstriker leaned into the smoke and cut a sliver of beef from the joint that was hanging over the coals. He blew carefully on the hot meat, then took a bite, nodding to himself as he tasted it. It was just about right. It was yearling beef, tender and streaked with fat, and with the smoky taste of the fire overlaying the flavor of the beef itself. He looked around the clearing next to where Wolfcloud was moored hard up against the shore. His men were busy jointing and smoking the last of the beef. The mutton had already been butchered and salted. In a few more hours, he estimated, they'd be ready. Then there'd be time for a couple of hours' sleep for all hands before full tide let them start on their delayed journey across the Stormwhite.
The flames and smoke of half a dozen fires illuminated the scene and cast weird moving shadows into the trees surrounding the clearing. Wolfcloud's savage figurehead seemed to float unsupported in the smoke, the light of the flames playing on the carved teeth of the wooden wolf's head.
"Gundar!" It was Jon Tarkson, one of his sail handlers, who called from the outer edge of the clearing. The skipper's head swiveled curiously and he made out an indistinct shape emerging from the darkness. He frowned as he realized it was the Ranger. He was mounted, which seemed to be his normal state, and he was leading a second horse, burdened with a large bundle slung crosswise.
Gundar raised his hand in greeting and started forward. He had grown to like the Ranger. He respected the young man's ingenuity in finding a solution to the situation that he had found himself facing and he admired his obvious courage.
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