by Alex Bledsoe
Then movement across the courtyard caught my eye. I gently stopped her and pointed. “Uh-oh. I should get out of sight.”
Beatrice looked at the four soldiers, whose grim demeanor was in such contrast to the joviality around them. “Oh,” she said. “They do look like trouble. Except for the one who’s walking funny.”
“No, he’s trouble, too. I made him walk like that.”
“Really? Good grief, how long have you been here?”
“I don’t know. Maybe an hour?”
“If you stayed for a whole day, there wouldn’t be a building left standing, would there?” She took my hand and said, “Come on.”
She pulled me around the fringe of the crowd. I stayed low and tried to avoid attracting Arcite’s attention. I guess my blow to the groin had not done as much damage as I thought; well, either that, or his target was a lot smaller than most, which also explained his attitude.
Flies and dust danced in the sunlight, stirred up by all the frolicking, stumbling folk cutting loose after a winter locked indoors with each other. Bits of clothing had been trampled underfoot; by nightfall, it would be crazed.
We reached a woman seated on an overturned basket, keeping a close eye on the containers of raw wool for sale in front of her. The family resemblance was clear even before Beatrice handed her the baby.
“Eddie, this is my mother, Bianca Glendower.” Beatrice passed her the baby. “Here, Mom. She’s fussing again.”
Her mother, who had the same general look as Beatrice but with the signs of her difficult life, took the baby. As she undid her dress and let the child begin to nurse, she said, “And where are you from, young Eddie? I don’t recognize you.”
“He’s some traveling ruffian who wants to pull me into a dark corner and do unspeakable things to me,” Beatrice deadpanned.
“The man that gets you in a dark corner better be well armed and well rested,” her mother said.
“Mom!” Beatrice cried in outrage.
“My daughter’s strong-willed,” Bianca said to me. “That’s spinster-bait around here. If she has any sense at all, she’s looking for a husband while the men aren’t thinking clearly.”
“Don’t pay any attention to her,” Beatrice said dryly. “She’s content with a view of sheep, rocks, and grass. She doesn’t care that there’s a world out there.”
“I’ve seen the ocean, young lady,” Bianca fired back. “And the great houses of Boscobel. I’m just content with my lot.” To me she added, “And that’s what drives her crazy.”
Beatrice took my arm. “Come on, if we keep this up, I’ll end up being sent to my room. Oh, that’s if I had my own room,” she added in annoyance.
I nodded to her mother, who grinned. “Get married if you want your own room!” she called after us.
When we were safely away, I stopped Beatrice and began, “Listen, before we—”
She kissed me the way I’d always wanted to be kissed, only I hadn’t realized it until that moment. She smiled up at me, knowing exactly how good she was.
I waited for my head to stop spinning. “Wow. Okay, look, that was great and everything, but—”
“But?” she repeated in disbelief. “There’s a ‘but’?”
“I really want to find out what happened to Isidore. Look, everything I told you is true, it’s just . . . I just want to make sure she’s okay.”
“You said she was with Audrey.”
“I know.”
“Then she’s safe.”
“But with those guys around—”
Beatrice rolled her eyes. “All right, come on. I’m pretty sure I know where Audrey took her.”
We reached a barn with small flocks of sheep crammed into corrals around it. Beatrice knocked on the door.
A young boy opened it. “Hey, Beebee,” he said.
“They call you, ‘Beebee?’ ” I said.
“Yes, they do. You, however, may call me Beatrice. Or ‘Miss Glendower’ if you’re nasty.” We went inside. Beatrice asked, “Angus, did Audrey Fencinger bring a baby in here a few minutes ago?”
“Yeah,” he said, and sneezed. “Man, I hate crib duty.”
It was dark, and my eyes took a moment to adjust. Sunlight found every crack in the roof and western wall, making bright shafts outlined by dust and pollen. It was warm, and the smell of wool, manure, milk, and hay was overwhelming.
Beatrice squinted and said, “Audrey? Are you in here?”
“Nah, she just dropped off the baby and left. Said not to tell anyone.”
“I see you listen as well as always. Which baby is it?”
“Hell if I know. She put it in a crib and vamoosed.”
By then my eyes had adjusted enough to comprehend what was in the barn. The stalls were filled with cribs, and most of them held babies. To me they all looked identical. “Shit,” I muttered.
“I’m just watching them until my sister gets back,” Angus said defensively. “She had to go make out with Cletus Snow.”
“Do you farm babies here?” I asked.
Beatrice said, “No, but a lot of the mothers are young, and the festival is their one chance to pretend they’re still girls. So which one is she?”
I looked at enough of them to confirm that I couldn’t tell them apart any better than Angus. Audrey understood the basic strategy of hiding in plain sight. “I don’t know.”
“Men,” Beatrice said in annoyance.
I was about to mention the tattoo when someone pounded on the barn entrance. Arcite bellowed, “Open this goddamned door right now!”
Chapter
THREE
I started to draw my sword, but felt a hand on my arm. Beatrice said, “You will not pull a weapon around all these babies.”
I scowled at her, but she was right. Arcite’s voice had already stirred up a few of them.
“Who is that?” Angus asked, scared.
“The big bad wolf,” I said, “or as close as you ever want to get. Find somewhere to hide, and keep quiet.”
Beatrice went to the door and opened it slightly. Through the gap I saw Arcite’s grim, hateful face. She said in a whisper, “You do know we have sleeping children in here.”
Arcite pushed her back and strode in like he owned the place. Just as in the tavern, I slid back into the shadows before his eyes adjusted. I looked around for Angus, but he had either hidden himself very well, or escaped through some unseen exit. For folks who lived and worked on wide-open hillsides, they were great at disappearing.
One of the babies began to cry in earnest. “That’s good, tough guy,” Beatrice said. “You scared a baby.”
He grabbed her by the face, crushing her cheeks. “You better be scared, too, bitch. I’m tired of you country whores getting smart with me. I’m looking for a particular baby, one someone found outside of town and brought here to you dumb fucks. She has a tattoo on her back. If she’s in here, give her to me now and I won’t fuck you up any more.”
I could tell Arcite enjoyed this, but Strato and his two compatriots looked uncomfortable as they filed in after him. Whatever their mission, they didn’t like pushing women around and threatening children.
Strato closed the door and said, “Miss, I’m sorry about my friend. He got kicked in the balls and it put him in a bad mood.”
She wrenched free of Arcite’s grasp and glared at him with an intensity that could melt rock. “Don’t you dare touch any of these children,” she hissed.
Arcite laughed. “Bitch, you’re just a bad judge of people. If you won’t tell me which one she is, I’ll kill all the little fuckers. After I deal with you.” He went for his sword.
The thing about reflexes is that you don’t know they’ve kicked in until they’ve moved you from one place to another. I had no memory of drawing my sword or jumping from the shadows, but Arcite’s blade clanged against mine on its way to strike Beatrice. He looked as surprised as I did.
“There’s a lot of things I’ll stand by and let happen,” I said, “but not k
illing nice girls or babies.”
“You,” he said softly; venom dripped from the word. “Oh, do I owe you some payback.”
“Then let’s take it outside,” I said. Our blades quivered in the air, neither of us willing to admit the other’s sword arm was stronger. Shivering sunlight reflected from them onto Beatrice’s face. She did a good job hiding that she was scared to death. “My friends are in the same outfit, farm boy. You know anything about military loyalty? That means if you take on one, you take on all. You think you can handle all four of us?”
He suddenly pushed his sword against mine, expecting the weak and inexperienced arm of a sheep farmer. My blade didn’t move.
“I don’t think I’ll have to,” I said, hoping to all the various gods that I’d read Strato right.
“Cut the heads off all the little bastards,” Arcite ordered. “Now! Then we’ll finish this fuck and his whore!”
None of his men moved.
“Did you hear me?” he yelled. He wanted to glare back at them, but knew better than to take his eyes off me.
“Sir,” one of them said, “this is—”
“Wrong,” Strato finished. “I didn’t sign up to massacre babies in their cribs.”
“You signed up to take orders, and I gave you one!” Arcite yelled.
“Do it yourself,” Strato said. “We’ll be outside. Guarding the perimeter.”
They left without looking back. I kept my sword hard against Arcite’s. There was the slight sound of metal rubbing against metal as neither of us committed to a move.
“You should leave, too,” I said through the gap above our crossed blades. My arm was getting tired, so I knew his was as well. “I’m not one of these people. I’m more like you. This won’t end well.”
“I have a job from the king,” he spat through his clenched teeth.
“King Ellis?” Beatrice said in outrage.
“No,” Arcite said. “A real king.”
“A king who wants a baby killed?” I said. “Sounds like something Crazy Jerry from Mahnoma would do.”
Arcite laughed, but I couldn’t tell if it was in confirmation or mockery at how wrong I was. “Now, get the fuck out of my way, or I’ll make you watch while I add your girlfriend’s head to the pile of baby skulls I’m about to make.”
There was nothing for it. He was a soldier to the core, and he’d been given an order. I prepared to feint, then cut him down as fast and thoroughly as I could.
At that moment, the barn door slammed open. Audrey and a half dozen other women, along with Angus, burst through. In contrast to their festive clothes, ribbons and flowers, they simmered with maternal fury and carried farming implements that might not be actual weapons, but would still make a thorough mess of you. They leveled them at Arcite and me.
“You two scum just stay where you are,” Audrey said. More babies began to cry. “Are the children okay?”
“They’re fine,” Beatrice said. “Just scared of all the noise.”
I started to point out that I was one of the good guys, but at the moment it seemed prudent to remain silent. So prudent, in fact, that I knew Arcite couldn’t possibly do it.
He laughed: cocky, mocking, and stupid. “Look at this, a whole herd of bleating, sheepherding whores. You think I’m afraid of pitchforks and scythes?”
You should be, I thought but didn’t say. You should be more afraid of the look in their eyes.
Abruptly he drew up one knee, put his foot against my midsection, and kicked me away. I stumbled back into a bale of hay, and it took every bit of self-control not to jump up and attack again.
He yelled, a cry that would freeze the blood on the battlefield.
The women didn’t flinch. One threw a pitchfork, javelin style, at him. He tried to knock it away, and did divert it a little, but one tine impaled his sword arm.
He shrieked in pain and dropped his weapon. The weight of the pitchfork pulled him off balance, and he fell. He let out another shriek, but not before the women surrounded him and began hacking. His cry was cut off in the middle.
Each of the women struck no more than twice. But it was enough. When they stepped back, he looked like a child’s doll ground between millstones.
Then they all turned to me.
I put down my own sword and raised my hands. “I’m on your side,” I said. “Audrey, Beatrice, I could use some kind words here.”
“He is,” Beatrice said, and stepped in front of me. “He brought the little girl here so she’d be safe.”
“That’s true,” Audrey said, Arcite’s blood dripping from her sharp-edged hoe.
I really worried they wouldn’t listen. The sunlight through the cracks sparkled on eyes maddened by righteous anger. They were amateurs, I could take most of them down, but I knew I wouldn’t strike a blow. If this was my time, I could accept it.
Fortunately they lowered their implements. I retrieved my sword and put it back in its scabbard. My heart continued to test the tensile strength of my ribs.
“Which one is she?” Beatrice asked.
“Right here,” Audrey said, and picked up one of the squalling babies.
My heart pounded in a whole different way when I saw her tiny mouth expressing her disapproval at the top of her lungs. Audrey handed her to Beatrice, who shushed her expertly. The other women put down their weapons and went to calm the rest of the children.
I looked at Angus. “Smart to go get reinforcements. Why didn’t you get men, though?”
“They’re all drunk. Besides, nothing’s meaner than an angry mom.”
“Good point. Did you see where those other soldiers went?”
“To the tavern,” he said. “I guess they’re waiting for their general to come back.”
I turned to Beatrice. Over the top of Isidore’s head, I said, “You should probably do something about the body and all the blood. I’m going to deal with his friends.”
“But why? They didn’t—”
“No, they didn’t. But they’re still highly trained enemy soldiers in a foreign country on a mission. I’m going to make sure they don’t complete it.”
“You’ll kill them?” Audrey said. She carried two more babies, one in each arm, and jostled them gently to calm them down. “In my tavern?”
“If I have to. I’ll try not to,” I added defensively. “I’m not the one who killed him, you know.”
“I know,” Beatrice said, then stepped close to kiss me. It was the kind of kiss I felt in my scabbard. She said, “Come find me when you’re done,” and nipped my lip.
Outside the sun was sliding low in the west. I found Strato leaning against a post outside the tavern, watching his two fellow soldiers dance in a complicated line with several attractive young women.
He saw me as I approached, and moved nothing but his eyes. When I was within earshot he asked, “If you’re here with all your limbs and manly parts, I assume you killed Colonel Arcite?”
“Yeah,” I said. I wasn’t stealing the credit for myself; I wanted to minimize the chance of a reprisal raid against the town. “Where does that leave us?”
“We didn’t exactly volunteer for this job,” he said. “We were in prison for desertion, and they gave us the choice of this or the gallows.”
“And what happens when you go back and say you couldn’t find her?”
He smiled, very slightly. “Who says we didn’t find her? That bear was pretty thorough. Not only killed the child and the man with her, but Colonel Arcite as well. Gave his life to save the rest of us. He’ll get a banner in Warriors’ Hall.”
I didn’t want to trust him. I didn’t even know him. But I had little choice. I wasn’t yet the judge of character I’d become later, but I was pretty good. I nodded and said, “So you’ll be heading back to . . . ?”
“Our unit,” he said, ignoring my lead. His origin would remain a secret. “Once my friends get a little rambunctiousness out of their systems. Not a lot of pretty girls in prison.”
I watched the o
ther two men dance. They looked happy as children, as did the girls they danced with. This was as safe a resolution as I was likely to get without killing them and disposing of the bodies, which truthfully I lacked the resolve to do without more provocation. So I gave him the same half salute he gave me earlier, and left them to their gambols.
When I got back to the barn, most of the babies had been taken away, along with Arcite’s body. Fresh hay covered the bloody ground where he died. Angus and a teenage girl, whom I took to be his AWOL sister, whisper-argued in the corner about who was going to get in the most trouble.
Audrey fed one baby from a wineskin, and Beatrice sat on a hay bale with Isidore asleep in her arms. She put a finger to her lip as I approached.
“How is she?” I whispered.
“See for yourself,” she said, and before I could react, she put Isidore in my arms. I lay her on my shoulder, but she began to fuss. “Shhh,” I said, trying to lightly bounce her.
“She likes singing,” Beatrice said, amused.
“Then sing,” I said.
She shook her head and gestured that it was up to me. Her smile was mischievous, and irresistible.
I tried to remember any of the dignified songs I’d learned as a child, songs of courtly love and noble deeds. They all fled my memory. At that moment I could, in fact, remember only one song, so I sang it as softly as I could.
She fell upon her back with her feet up in the air, I knelt between her thighs and admired all her hair, You’re quite the fuzzy lass, I told her as I dove Into the furry gate and along her soft pink road. . . .
The afternoon sun blazing through the slats in the wall was tinted a bright amber, which hopefully hid my blush. Beatrice snickered and tried very hard not to laugh out loud. But Isidore contentedly cooed.
Then Audrey, with the baby she’d just fed on her shoulder, softly chimed in: She said,“I like the furry gate between my lovely thighs, It keeps me warm in winter when winds begin to rise Soft as gray goose down it is, a comfort for your head And none who have embraced it have ever fled my bed.”