Black Cross

by J. P. Ashman

  ‘The column will pass here if heading north, we should wait,’ Errolas said.

  Starks sighed in relief at the prospect of resting his legs and having a bite to eat.

  The rest of the group sat on whatever they could find as Gleave headed to the highest point on the hill to look back towards the smoke.

  Starks barely managed to take a few bites of the bread Correia had bought from Hinton’s inn, when the sound of hooves beat the ground. Everyone stood then as Gleave ran back to the windmill.

  ‘Scouts,’ Gleave shouted. ‘Stay your weapons, they’re ours.’ I think.

  Sav cursed whilst unstringing the bow he'd only just strung, and Starks relaxed the cord on his crossbow whilst the others sheathed their half drawn weapons.

  The sound of hooves grew louder as three scouts rode over the hill. Upon seeing the group, all of whom had raised their hands in a gesture of peace, the scouts pulled on their reigns and the horses slowed, trotting proudly up to the windmill.

  ‘Who goes?’ the lead scout said, from under his boiled leather skull cap. He wore pouldrons similar to his cap and a dirty white tabard over a short, maille hauberk and padded gambeson. His bare hands were clenched tight, one on the axe at his side and the other around the horse’s reigns. He was clearly the lead scout, for the other two, although wearing the same white tabards over their padded jacks, wore no armour at all, not even boiled leather.

  Correia stepped forward, her hands held high. ‘Greetings scout master, may I ask whom you serve?’ she said in the sweetest voice. Sav rolled his eyes and shook his head.

  ‘Answer me first and then I’ll tell ye.’ The scout master’s horse shifted nervously as he tried to hold it steady.

  ‘My name is Correia Burr, Spymaster to King Barrison,’ she announced regally, lowering her arms finally and saluting in the customary fashion.

  The scout master and his two companions returned the salute, but all three looked sceptical.

  ‘Am I to take yer word, milady?’ the scout master asked, his eyes searching hers for a hint of a lie.

  Sav tried to hide his amusement. Milady? That’s hilarious.

  ‘I would be disappointed if you did.’ Correia slowly reached into a pouch on her belt and retrieved an extremely small, rolled and sealed scroll, before passing it up to the mounted scout.

  As he reached for a bollock dagger on his belt, Correia shook her head. ‘Ah-ah…’ she warned, ‘that's not for your eyes, scout master, but look at the seal and recognise the King’s very own mark.’ His eyes widened and he looked around the group quickly before nodding to his men.

  ‘Return to Baron Brackley and tell him to hurry, we may have help here.’ The two scouts kicked their horses on and rode down the road before Correia could stop them.

  ‘Help with what?’ she asked, as dust from the hooves of the two horses enveloped the group.

  ‘The fight, milady. The Baron of Ullston is marching north to head off a large group of goblins that’ve come down from the mountains. They rarely push this far, but something’s spooking things lately and there’s strange folk about; hooded travellers and shadows in the night sky.’

  The group murmured as they heard the strange news and Fal asked, a little too urgently he later thought, about the shadows.

  The scout master rocked back a little when he saw Fal’s tattoos, but he composed himself quickly and explained what he’d seen. ‘Couple of nights ago, out patrolling I were, looking for this goblin tribe we’re marching on when I saw it, high up. Blacker than night it were, blotting out the stars as it passed from cloud to cloud. Sent a shiver down me spine it did.’

  ‘Griffon maybe, or a teratorn,’ Sav offered, ‘although you don’t usually see them around here.’

  The man shook his head. ‘No, I’ve seen griffons before and it were bigger, so bigger than a teratorn too. Just a large condor that ain’t it?’

  Sav and Errolas both nodded.

  ‘So no, none of those and it were nowt else I’ve seen either. Dragon I’d say if there’d been one in Altoln in the past thousand years.’

  ‘Dragon?’ Gleave could barely hide his amusement.

  The scout master frowned. ‘Listen, I don’t knows what it was, but it weren’t no griffon or giant bird that’s for sure. All I knows is we’re off to wipe this goblin lot out before they reach the village up ahead—’

  The sound of drums interrupted the man, followed by the two scouts riding back in. They nodded to their scout master as they passed, and headed back to the north.

  ‘Here’s the Baron now.’ The scout master side-stepped his horse off the road as a column of men-at-arms, archers and light cavalry headed towards them, including a couple of poorly armoured knights at their head.

  The Baron of Ullston, who rode in front of them all, wore a dirty white surcoat over an old maille hauberk. His horse’s trapper matched the scruffy attire of its rider, and the Baron’s maille covered arms led to a pair of dented and rusted mitten-style plate gauntlets. A chewed and scarred white heater shield with a black hart in its centre hung from one side of his saddle, and a broadsword hung from the other, its blade the only clean thing about the Baron. He wore a rust-stained arming cap under his maille coif and his dark eyes gazed out at the group.

  ‘Greetings, milady,’ Brackley said, bowing as best he could in his high fronted saddle.

  Correia bowed in return. ‘Greetings, my lord Baron, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.’

  Brackley grinned, showing teeth about as white as his surcoat.

  A young squire sat on a smaller horse next to the Baron. He carried his lord’s black lance, the fluttering pennant of which repeated the black hart on a white field, which was present on most of the Baron’s mounted men, and some of those on foot.

  ‘Sire, fresh smoke!’ The squire pointed north and everyone followed his finger with their eyes.

  Brackley turned to the scout master and the man shrugged.

  ‘They weren’t at the village when we were there, milord,’ he said, shifting in his saddle. ‘They must’ve moved in fast.’ Without another word, he turned his horse and sped off in the same direction as the other scouts.

  The two drums of the column pounded once again and Brackley turned in his saddle to face his men. ‘Form a line, form a line!’ The men-at-arms and archers began to fan out immediately across the fields surrounding the windmill.

  Slightly hunched archers, their drawing arms large and their backs broad, ran to the front and strung war bows that stood as tall as most men. Men-at-arms tightened the straps on their shields and shoved their blades into the ground, dirtying them before the fight. The twenty or so light cavalry and two knights; maces, swords and axes held at the ready, stayed in a column behind their commander as he turned back to face Correia.

  ‘If ye are who the scouts said ye are, then I need yer pathfinders help, milady. We need to re-take the village and its lands ahead, and drive these damned retches back to the mountains from whence they came. Or preferably slaughter the bloody lot of them here and now, damned sacks of putrid shites that they are.’ The large framed Baron spat on the floor and then frowned, as Correia shook her head and looked apologetic.

  ‘My apologies, Baron Brackley, but I cannot. We are on a mission of the utmost urgency for the King himself, and I need seven fast horses to get us on our way, as even now an unknown enemy pursues us from the west.’

  The Baron’s eyes strayed in that direction briefly before returning to Correia’s gaze.

  She showed him the seal on the scroll the scout master had passed back to her.

  The veteran soldier sighed and looked back at his cavalry, rubbing his face roughly and leaving fresh marks from his rusting gauntlets.

  ‘Very well,’ he said, without argument. ‘I realise ye wouldn’t ask, especially now, if it weren’t as urgent as ye say it is. Ye say ye don’t know who follows?’

  Correia shook her head and Brackley sighed again.

  ‘If I survive what comes,
which I will,’ he said with a wink, ‘then I’ll imprison anyone else who crosses me on the path ye take.

  ‘Seven from the back, to me!’ he shouted.

  The rear most seven mounted men kicked their horses forward through the wheat at the side of the road.

  ‘I need you seven to join the infantry line on the left, yer horses are forfeit in the name of the King,’ Brackley said, no sign of apology in his tone.

  The seven riders looked furious as they dismounted and handed their reigns over to the strangers by the windmill, before running off to get into line, much to the amusement of those already on foot, who hooted and jeered at the new arrivals, hoisting their weapons – some makeshift, as was often the case with local militia – high as they did so.

  Correia mounted the dappled grey horse she had taken. ‘We owe you a great debt, Baron Brackley. The King himself will hear of your generosity and service.’

  ‘Yes yes I’m sure. Now away with ye all and have done with whatever it is ye need do. I have goblin arse-wipes to kill.’ Brackley winked at Correia before turning to his mounted column behind.

  ‘What are ye waiting for, ye bastards?’ The Baron of Ullston dug his spurs into his destrier’s flanks and the beast snorted and then surged forward. The Baron’s remaining cavalry cheered, formed into a double line and followed him, trampling the crops either side of the road as they went. The archers and men-at-arms on foot followed at a dog trot, as the whole line advanced, drums beating and horns blowing.

  Correia’s group looked to one another, soldiers all, and none liked to leave fellow warriors to face the likes of goblins, but on they needed to go and so on they went. They kicked their horses on, and the road’s dust rose from their mounts’ hooves as they cantered off to the south, a large skirmish already developing behind them.

  ***

  It had been a hard-fought escape from the cathedral, with guards, warrior monks and two more inquisitors attempting to stop the group. The Grand Inquisitor hadn’t been seen again and Biviano cursed their luck at finally finding and then losing him.

  In the bright light of an open street running alongside the cathedral, the handful of passers-by quickly dispersed as three armed and injured men and a woman with green hair piled out from a side door.

  ‘We need to keep moving,’ Sears said, breathing heavily and prodding an open wound on his right thigh.

  ‘Aye, thanks.’ Longoss headed off towards Dockside, Coppin in tow.

  ‘Woah, no ye don’t.’ Biviano caught up to the two of them, Sears close behind. ‘Ye owe us an explanation.’

  Longoss knew he couldn’t fight the two men off, not after giving his word to Elleth and not after seeing them fight, especially the bearded one, and so he nodded reluctantly. ‘Not here though.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Biviano said. ‘We’ll go to the barracks. The captain needs to hear what’s really goin’ on here and inform the Constable of Wesson, and this girl can help us tell him about it.’

  Longoss laughed. ‘I ain’t going to no barracks to be strung up, and that’s that. I need to get this one back to Mother’s—’

  Coppin pulled away from Longoss then and stumbled towards the two guardsmen, a sneer upon her face. ‘Ye said Elleth sent ye, not Mother?’

  Sears and Biviano moved either side of the girl to protect her.

  ‘And she did, Coppin, she did, but the stubborn girl won’t be leaving the damned place without ye, so I need ye to go back with me, so we can get her outta there… both of ye outta there.’

  Coppin looked unsure and looked to Sears, then Biviano.

  ‘Ye don’t need to go with him, not if ye don’t want, lass,’ Sears said, and Biviano nodded.

  ‘I do if he’s tellin’ the truth,’ she said eventually. ‘I can’t leave Elleth there, not if there’s a chance she can be free of the place, although I’m not sure being with you, Longoss, would be any better for her?’ She stared directly at Longoss when she said the latter.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ Biviano said, rubbing the weariness from his eyes. ‘With what we’ve just seen and done, Sears, we need to get the hell outta here and get to the barracks. Take these two in. Then we can get back here with the captain and more men.’

  Longoss held his hands up. ‘I told ye, I ain’t going to no barracks and there’s a girl needing me help, and yours, right now. I can make it worth yer while. I’ll owe ye big for this.’

  ‘Biviano,’ Sears said, looking into his friend’s eyes, ‘this Elleth girl needs our help, and this one’s scared to go along with him alone.’

  Biviano sighed. ‘How will you owing us be of any use, eh?’

  Longoss’ nostrils flared and his jaw bunched as he rubbed his face and looked to Coppin, then Biviano. ‘The Black Guild is planning a high status mark, something real big. How’s that for starters?’

  Coppin’s eyes widened. For all she’d heard of Longoss and known from her own experience with him, albeit a brief one in the past, the man didn’t do anything to risk himself, certainly not to expose himself. So why was he doing all of this for her? No, not for me, for Elleth…

  Biviano scratched his behind as he looked from Longoss to Sears, noticing Coppin’s reaction to the man’s words at the same time. This guy’s serious.

  Sears looked to Biviano and shrugged.

  ‘And how do ye know such a thing, eh, Longoss?’ Biviano said finally.

  Sighing hard and looking off to the side, before looking back at Biviano, Longoss simply said, ‘because I’m one of ’em.’

  ‘Oh, Longoss.’ Coppin shook her head. ‘They’ll kill ye for this.’

  Gold teeth flashed. ‘They’ll try.’

  Gods above, if this guy’s only half serious and I reckon he is, we can’t not get him onside, Biviano thought, as he looked to Sears. The big man nodded and so did he.

  Turning to Longoss, Biviano held out his hand. ‘We’ll help,’ he said.

  Longoss took the offered hand and shook it. ‘And I’ll do all I can to help ye with whatever ye need when we get Elleth out. I give ye me word!’

  Chapter 30: Confrontation

  Despite holding onto a spark of hope, Elleth didn’t really believe Longoss would come back, especially with Coppin, however, since he’d left, Mother had sent no more men to her room to ‘play games’. How silly she felt about it all now.

  Huddled in the corner of the room, for she didn’t wish to lie on the bloody bed, Elleth thought about how much had changed, how much she’d changed in such a short amount of time. It didn’t seem long at all and in truth it wasn’t. Not long since she had been cuddled by her mamma. She began to cry again, before slamming her fist on the floor and cursing herself.

  Ye’re a woman now, she thought, fighting to control her churning emotions. All this crying, I can’t be doing it, I can’t be showing I’m weak. Not to the men and certainly not to Mother.

  Elleth had heard her door being locked shortly after Longoss had gone, and she knew if he broke his word and didn’t return for her, it wouldn’t be long until Mother was shoving in the next man who showed her his coin.

  Well, after the dead man’s been taken away. She struggled against looking across that side of the room. Swallowing hard, she tried to block out the things that had happened to her. The pain between her legs flared then as her mind touched upon it and before she could even shift to ease the discomfort, someone hammered on the front door of the building.

  Longoss?

  She wasn’t even sure how she’d feel if he did come back. What if he came back, but hadn’t found Coppin? She would have no idea whether he’d even looked for her. Could it all be just another game? She fought the tears back again as the sound of raised voices came from down stairs.

  ‘Just another guy wanting to buy a girl, no doubt,’ Elleth whispered, bitterly. ‘And if Longoss wants to buy me?’ She didn’t even know how to feel about that. He’d been the only one to talk to her as a person and he seemed to mean it. Would it be so bad going with him? He wasn’t handsome
pretty like some of the other men, but perhaps that didn’t matter if he treated her better; better than Mother had, but that wasn’t exactly hard, she saw that clearly now.

  A scream… Mother’s scream.

  Elleth stood and stared at the locked door, her hands wringing themselves as she chewed her bottom lip.

  More screaming, then glass being shattered; someone was smashing things downstairs and Mother was screaming for them to stop. A dog yelped and then Mother went mad. She shouted curses and from the sounds of it, threw things at whoever was down there.

  Silence…

  Please be Longoss… with Coppin, please.

  A few moments passed that felt like an age, then a heavy thud; two, three and splintering wood.

  Another scream; Elleth recognised it as Aynsa’s from two rooms down.

  Elleth looked to the body in the room. So much blood had come from that man and Elleth couldn’t help but think about how it must have hurt him, to be stabbed so many times. She also thought about how quickly it had happened and how still and peaceful the man now looked.

  Footsteps in the corridor outside and the next door was kicked in, followed by furniture being turned over and more things breaking, yet still Elleth stared at the body.

  Will that be me in a moment? Despite her fear, she felt suddenly calm. It’s Longoss who’s in the house, or it’s not. Either way, I may die, like that man, or I may not and my life will continue like this and there’s nothing I can do about it, nothing at all. My life is not my own anymore and I’m not even sure it ever was. The sudden realisation of her helplessness, for reasons she couldn’t fathom, allowed her to look at the door, lower her hands and walk forward, accepting her fate. For nothing could be any worse than the life she’d fallen into. In fact, death suddenly seemed an easy way out.

  As she crossed the room, wood splintered and the door caved in. Despite her resignation to whatever may come, Elleth flinched at the sudden sound and violent entry. Then she stared at the elongated white mask of the man who now stood opposite her.