by Dan Allen
“Thank you.”
The guard stepped out of her way but dropped his halberd down, blocking her cart. “Just don’t be late—I’ll lock you out, I swear. I won’t waste my evening waiting around for you. Besides, you should leave the hauling to the boys. Why don’t you let Ret do it and stay here and keep me company?”
“I owe Ret a favor,” Reann explained. “Now let me go before I call for your sergeant.”
The guard lifted his halberd slowly. “Get on.”
She leaned against the cart and got the heavy wooden wheels rolling again.
“If you bring me back something, I might consider waiting an extra five minutes.”
Reann stopped and looked back. “The brewer is on the way,” she offered. “Make it thirty minutes and I’ll bring you his stale ale.”
“You’re a sweetie, aren’t ya?” the guard said with a gap-toothed grin. “I’ll give you an extra twenty minutes. Take it or leave it.”
“Done.” She was headed for the tavern anyway. And it would make a nice alibi if she were accused—a win all around.
With her extra time secured, Reann shoved against the cart and got it rolling again. It would’ve been a lot easier if the wheels hadn’t been closer to square than round.
Ret probably made it by himself.
Reann wondered how a kid so deft with his fingers when it came to making music could be so clumsy when it came to handiwork. She walked the cart down to the bakery and picked up a load of bread from the baker after a long, bothersome argument with his nosy wife about the fact that Reann was the castle servant sent to pick it up. Then she pulled the cart quickly back through the deserted market toward the castle. As she neared the side street leading to the tavern, she stowed her cart among some empty barrels, wrapped herself in the makeshift cloak, and walked briskly down the narrow alley.
It was already half past seven.
Reann stepped carefully past a few huddled figures on the ground, either dead or drunk. She wasn’t going to stop to ask which.
The brewery was built against the side of a sloping hillock. Its pub was a low-ceilinged shack cobbled onto the front of the brewer’s burrow. The narrow street wound around the obtrusion and continued into shadow.
An oil lamp lit the pub’s entrance. Below it, a wooden sign creaked in the evening breeze. Reann could smell the freshness of the air coming from the river. It mingled with aromas of a ranker sort coming from the mire along the side street.
Reann approached carefully, wondering if this were not the best idea. Dull voices and throaty laughter spilled out through the open door of the pub.
Reann put a bare foot onto the weathered floorboards, expecting someone to shut her out immediately.
None of the regulars at the pub gave her any attention, but that could change if she didn’t look the part. Reann huddled forward under the cloak and took in the scene, turning slowly as an old woman might do as she searched for her drunkard husband.
Large men sat on bowed birch-bough chairs around tables. Some played at dice and others arm wrestled while they listened to travelers’ tales at the bar.
Sitting by himself along the side of the pub was a tall, gaunt fellow. White sleeves and a tan waistcoat stood out against the smoke-darkened black wood of a pub bench. He sat staring. His posture was rigid, hands gripping the edge of the table. A mug sat alone on the table before him, like an offering.
Verick.
Reann edged closer.
He wasn’t meeting with thugs—or at least if he was, they hadn’t showed up yet. But he wasn’t talking either. And unless somebody got chatty with the morose foreigner, she wouldn’t learn anything.
That didn’t seem very likely. Reann cursed her luck. It had been a dumb idea to come here in the first place—a big waste of time. Paranoia or curiosity, whatever it was, she was no better off for it.
I’ll just get some ale for the guard and get out of here.
Reann slipped between swaggering drunks. Men seemed to close in around her as she neared the bar.
“Excuse me. Could I trouble you for an old half bottle?” She pipped.
The brewer looked down at her over his large belly. His rotund red face shined out from under his beard.
“If you’ve got troubles, little girl, ale isn’t the answer.”
“I promised the gate guard. I’ve got a loaf to trade for it.” She drew a round of bread from under her cloak.
The brewer made the exchange and set a browned glass bottle in front of her. He closed it with a stopper and gave a wink. “Now don’t be sipping that stuff. It’s not made for—”
“What have we here?” bellowed a voice. A viselike hand seized her arm and spun her around. “Drink and entertainment tonight!”
“Let me go,” Reann said crisply and all too politely to faze the sloshed brigand.
The man yanked her cloak free of her clasping hands. “You can’t dance with that cloak on.”
She reached for the bottle, but the stubble-faced fellow grabbed her other wrist and wrapped a sweaty, hairy arm around her waist. He heaved her into an awkward turn and started into an off-color sea shanty.
A bargeman. Oh no.
More men joined in the song. Reann was torn from the first and passed into the groping hands of a second man. She tried to slap him but he dodged backward.
The crowd only grew more raucous.
“Let me go,” she ordered.
“But the fun’s just getting started,” a man said from behind her as he squeezed her rear with both hands.
Reann tried to run, but a man caught her arms and pulled them over her head.
Men formed up like wolves in front of her.
Reann struggled frantically. She thrashed with her feet but a man seized her legs. The two tipped her backward lowering her toward the floor, prepared to take every advantage of her that their strength allowed.
“Don’t,” Reann cried. “I’m just a child. I’m innocent.”
“Stand aside.” The sharp order cracked like a whip over the noise of the brutes.
“She’s just a serving wench,” said a thick-bearded man holding Reann’s legs said. “What do you care? Shove off.”
The sound of a chair sliding back answered him.
“Unhand the girl,” the voice commanded.
Several men drew back.
The man let go of Reann’s legs and doubled his fists. “Want some fun of your own? I’ll be glad to oblige.”
The crowd parted enough for Reann to see Verick standing resolutely, hands placidly by his sides, his weight on his front leg—he wasn’t backing down.
The crowd chuckled as the meaty pub brawler squared off against the leaner, but taller Verick.
The bearded ruffian struck outwards with his massive right fist, a power punch that would knock a heavy man through a door.
Verick disappeared beneath the blow, thrusted the man’s punching arm upward and gave a sharp jab to his ribs.
Verick tossed the breathless man to the side as two more converged on him.
“Stop it!” Reann cried.
Both swung at Verick.
This time he stepped backward, lifting his foot off the ground as the attacker to his right charged at him. Verick’s boot heel struck the man’s weight-bearing knee, stopping him with the snap of a ligament. He crumpled with a scream.
Verick sent the second man backward with an openhanded strike to the middle of the chest. The drunk stumbled backward.
Another brute converged from behind. Reann had no time to shout out a warning. The hefty man clenched Verick’s neck in the crook of his elbow and bore down with the barrel-sized forearm of a hammer-swinging smith.
Verick’s free hand drove a thumb into the attacker’s eye. The half-blinded man roared as Verick rolled him over his shoulder and spun to face the first ruffian
who was red-faced and ravenous.
The angry man had a knife. A circle widened around Verick and Reann’s attacker.
Reann struggled to free herself, but two men held back her arms, preventing her escape, laughing at both spectacles.
The angry drunk slashed at Verick with the knife.
The Rubani’s hands were too quick as his arm counter-swirled across the arc of the knife. One of his hands seized the attacker’s wrist while the thumb of his other hand jabbed into his attacker’s upper arm, throttling the nerve. The knife fell free from his limp hand. A brutal sidekick from Verick sent the stout man sliding across the floor.
The room froze, then converged forward all at once in a frenzy of misguided loyalty.
Their answer was a flash of steel as Verick drew his shining saber in the blink of an eye. Without hesitation he slashed at the nearest of the attackers.
Reann closed her eyes. There would be blood now.
When she opened them Verick had his saber tip under the chin of the man who started the fight. Everybody else was back as far as the furniture would allow.
Verick backed his quarry against the counter of the bar.
“I’m unarmed!” the man pleaded.
“So is that girl.”
“Mercy.”
Verick sneered at the man. “Helpless? Scared?” He whipped the saber down, slicing the man’s thigh.
He fell to the floor, face racked with pain.
“How does it feel being helpless?” Verick turned quickly and sent back the converging rabble with a swipe of his blade. “Who is next? Just a little fun. It can’t hurt that bad.” He took a fencer’s step forward and lunged, putting the tip of his blade into the calf of another knife-wielding brute. In an instant, he had the saber turned the other direction, slashing forward angrily.
Men dove backward over tables but Verick was too fast. Red gashes appeared on hands and arms. The next moment the sword was pointing in the direction of the men that held Reann.
They loosed their vulture grips on her wrists.
Her skin burned from the chafing as she had struggled to free herself.
“I should kill you all,” Verick roared, “you damned cowards!”
Again he whirled the sword viciously.
Men scrambled out the door. Others stood frozen against walls.
“You would shame a maiden—I’ll teach you shame!”
Verick leveled his sword at one of the men closest to Reann. “Give her that bottle she purchased.”
The man took the corked glass flask and handed it to Reann, then moved backward as if she had the plague.
He turned to the other man, the bargeman who had first grabbed her. “Had enough fun?”
He stammered something of a drunken apology.
Verick stepped forward. He whipped his sword through the air like a madman. “I asked a question!”
“Yes, sir. Enough, sir.”
“It seems you’ve forgotten to pay for your pleasure.”
The man blustered an excuse.
Verick pressed the point of his blade against the man’s chest and spoke through clenched teeth. “Give her your purse. All of it, or I’ll take payment in blood.”
The man reached into his trouser pocket and drew out a sack of pennies.
Reann took the money without looking him in the eye.
She gripped the flask and the money and hurried toward Verick.
He picked up her discarded cloak and swirled it over her shoulders with one hand.
Ret’s face appeared in the doorway. “Reann?” He shoved a much larger man aside and stepped into the dark pub. “Reann!”
“She didn’t come back in time,” Ret explained breathlessly to Verick. “Had to throttle the guard . . . saw my cart back there.” He gestured at the rumble and remnants of the mayhem. “Missed all the fun, have I?”
Reann whimpered, tears welling in her eyes. She stumbled forward and fell against Ret’s shoulder.
Verick retrieved his coat and stepped past them without a word. He disappeared into the alleyway, driving fleeing brawlers ahead of him through the alley like a haunt.
Ret led Reann quickly out of the alley. The long-fingered hands of the musician pushed her forward as she stumbled ahead, blinded by the tears falling freely down her face. Ret guided her gently to the cart and tucked her between the loaves of day-old bread. He pulled her the rest of the way back to the castle.
Reann continued to cry as they neared the gate.
“I should break this over your head,” Ret hissed at the guard. He uncorked the flask with his teeth and poured the contents out on the ground. “Next time you send a girl to a pub to get your grog, it’ll be your blood on the ground.”
Reann had never heard Ret talk like that. Her shock at his tone lessened her tears.
“You can’t threaten me,” the guard said unwisely.
Ret looked straight at the guard.
The guard chanced a glance sideways. But there was no help in the street.
Ret was only eighteen. But he already had a reputation for settling disputes with his fists. Quicker that way, he claimed.
Reann tugged the tail of Ret’s shirt. “Please.”
Ret raised a warning finger to the guard. “I’ll break your nose. And I’ll do it twice just to be sure.”
The guard raised his hands. He stepped backward and yanked a lever that released the gate. The winding wheel spun as the portcullis fell, lifting its iron counterweight.
Somehow the jaws of those iron teeth closing behind her seemed closer than ever. But the rising counterweight captured the other feeling in her heart.
Verick saved me.
I can save him.
“Enjoy your first tavern brawl?” Ret said in an unamused voice. “I honestly thought you had more sense.”
Reann sniffled and climbed out of the cart.
“Street rats stole most of the bread,” he muttered. “You shouldn’t have left it alone.”
Reann raised the pouch. “We can buy more.”
“Is that gambling money?” Ret said incredulously. He led Reann by her wrist through the kitchen door of the castle.
“In a sense,” Reann managed. Her throat was sore from sobbing and her hands still shook from the terror.
“Sense?” Ret replied. “A little more sense would do. I guess I misjudged you again. That’s twice in one week—are you going to make a habit of this?”
“I had to know,” Reann said defensively, shaking her arm loose.
“Know what?” Ret said, raising his voice and throwing his hands up. “What it’s like to be a fool?”
“I had to know about him,” she explained. “Verick is not from Treban, you know. He’s got some kind of vendetta against Toran’s secret heirs.”
Ret opened his mouth, but fell silent. He stepped closer, checked over his shoulder and whispered. “He told you this?”
“I figured it out.”
“How?”
“Research, Ret, how else? He hates Toran. He was just a child when the Ruban Payment happened. There was nothing he could do when Serbani marines burned the port.” Reann clutched the front of her dress as the realization struck her. Powerless . . . like me at the tavern.
Ret raised his hands defensively. “Well, sorry to ruin your sleuthing. I guess you’ve got important business to take care of. In case you forgot again, the Summer Gala is less than a week away, and some of us have work to do.” He turned for the dining room.
Reann followed him into the room where the dirty dinner dishes lay untouched.
“You didn’t ruin anything,” Reann said quietly. She began picking up dishes.
“Just leave it,” Ret said. He shook his head and carried an armload of dishes back to the kitchen.
Reann hurried after him. “Ret,
stop.”
He began unstacking plates into a trough for washing, then spun around and pointed his finger at her. “You scared me. You know that?”
“I didn’t . . . mean to.”
Ret walked out in the dining room to get more dishes.
Reann followed. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t have any family, Reann.” Ret said. He stared at the far wall where a tapestry hung, his eyes distant.
“Neither do I—not here.”
Ret turned around. A tear ran down the side of his cheek. Embarrassed, he wiped it away and lugged two half-empty pitchers back into the serving kitchen.
Reann chased him into the kitchen, grabbed him by the elbow. She leaned up on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. Then she bolted out of the kitchen and hid in the dungeon.
Ranger meowed his disapproval from the shadows.
“You butt out of this,” Reann said. “He’s not that bad.”
Ranger clawed the wall and whipped his tail from side to side.
“Go eat some rats or something.”
Reann collapsed on the dank floor as tears came again to her eyes. “I wish my mother was still alive, Ranger.”
The cat rubbed its fur along her skirt.
She scooped him up and held him against her chest. “Nothing is ever as easy as you make it seem.”
Reann’s nosing had almost cost her dearly. On top of that, she’d complicated her relationship with Ret in a most unsatisfactory way, and rather than learning some odd bit of information that might somehow help her, Reann felt like she understood even less about Verick than she had before.
Verick was not just the son of the great traitor with a tortured soul and blood vendetta on Toran’s children. He also had a monstrous temper and gift for swordsmanship the likes of which the castle hadn’t seen since the days of her father.
Beyond that, there was his vindictive sense of justice. He had protected her at the pub, something only a man of moral principles would have dared. But in doing so, he had showed that he was a man of lethal capability and that his dangerous wrath was unpredictable.
The more she meddled the worse the situation got. It was like quicksand. It was her own doing, but it was her life, after all, and she had to live it. She had to take responsibility for it. Nobody else would, or could.