Child of the Knight

by Matt Heppe

  “Will you need me with you? I could stay with the horses in case you need to run back.”

  “That’s good,” she said, looking off into the forest as another horn called. More smoke blew through the trees. Hadde wiped the sweat from her brow.

  They rode north to the stream that ran to the Arawe and then east to the gully that would take them to Long Meadow. It was slow riding, but the gully kept them hidden.

  Hadde had just decided to dismount and approach on foot when the stranger appeared ahead of her. A Saladoran rider in mail carrying a crossbow. He wore a tabard checked in blue and white.

  More riders followed, but none had seen Hadde or Calen as they focused on getting around a massive Landomere oak partially blocking the gully.

  Hadde raised her bow as the Saladoran spotted her. “Garde fiore!” the Saladoran called as he dropped the reins and raised his crossbow. He was too slow.

  Hadde drew and loosed before the stock reached his shoulder. He was only twenty strides away. Her arrow struck him solidly in the chest. The Saladoran dropped his crossbow and clutched at Hadde’s arrow, his face twisted in pain.

  She drew another arrow as a second Saladoran drove his horse past the first. This man held his crossbow in both hands as his legs commanded his horse forward. A trained horse archer, Hadde realized. She loosed her arrow at him an instant after he pulled his trigger.

  The bolt struck Hadde in the ribs at the same moment her arrow pierced his mail and plunged deep into his throat. He reeled back, grabbing his saddle pommel with his left hand. His horse reared, only to be struck in the chest by Calen’s arrow. Both man and horse toppled to the ground, unhorsing the first rider as they fell.

  “Back, Hadde! This way!” Calen called.

  Hadde glanced down, expecting to see a bolt protruding from her chest, but there was none. Just a deep gash in her tunic. And blood. The dark green tunic was soaked in it. And a heavy, throbbing pain, as if she’d been struck by a club.

  There were at least two more Saladorans. The third rider in line turned his horse, attempting to flee the carnage in front of him.

  A tree blocked Hadde’s shot. She leapt off Quickstep and scrambled a few strides up the gully slope. She choked back a cry of pain as she drew. The wound in her side tore at her. She had to let the tension out of her bow.

  The Saladoran had turned his horse around, but the last rider, the one with the horn, had been slow in turning and blocked his escape.

  The Saladoran, twisting in his saddle, stared back at Hadde, his eyes wide with terror. She drew her bow, gritting her teeth at the pain and shot him through the back. Her arrow pierced his mail and aketon and he fell without uttering a sound.

  The last Saladoran dropped his horn and raised his arms. “I yield!” he shouted in heavily accented Saladoran. “I yield!”

  Hadde nocked another arrow. A breeze brought a heavy veil of smoke down the gully. They are burning Long Meadow. The smell was the smell of destruction.

  “Did you kill them? Are they dead?” She raised her bow, ready to draw.

  He flinched back, his eyes closed. “Prisoners, prisoners all!”

  “You swear to it, no one was killed! The children are safe?”

  “Orders! No one to die!” His accent was too thick. Not the accent of a commoner. He wasn’t Saladoran. “Especially children. Just take village. Only to fight if they fight. Orders.” He opened his eyes, but they fluttered in fear as he stared at the arrowhead.

  Horns blared nearby. She could hear Calen close behind her. “They are coming,” he said.

  “Who are you? Where are you from?”

  “Idoria. We are contractos. Work for Saladoran Duke Grax.”

  “Go back to them,” Hadde commanded the Idorian. “I am Hadde. Tell them that if any harm comes to my child—my family—they will all die.”

  “I will,” he said, his head bobbing up and down to show his agreement. “I will tell them.”

  “Drop your crossbow and go.”

  The man unslung his crossbow and threw it to the ground. Still looking over his shoulder, he rode up the gully.

  Hadde pulled her arrow from the back of an Idorian.

  “No time for that,” Calen said. “They are coming.”

  “We need every arrow.” She took Calen’s arrow from the horse it had struck. The arrow in the second man had broken in his fall.

  The first Idorian still lived. He lay with his back against the oak. His breath came in shallow gasps. He had pulled Hadde’s arrow free and she took it from the ground where he had tossed it.

  “You might live,” Hadde said to the Idorian. “But remember my words. I am Hadde of Landomere, and you will all die if my child is hurt.” Hadde mounted Quickstep and sheathed Talon. Blood soaked her left side. A horn blared from the top of the gully.

  “He’s calling them to us,” Calen said.

  “Let’s go,” Hadde said. “We should take their horses, though.”

  “This one is lame,” Calen said, nodding to the nearest horse. “We have to go.”

  Calen was right. The horse held its right foreleg off the ground. The other horse was on the wrong side of the tree, the path to it blocked by the fallen horse. Another horn called. With one last glance over her shoulder, she led Calen from the gully.

  ***

  “Stop here,” Hadde said. The pain in her ribs was worse, and blood now soaked her left thigh. They had ridden west and then north, circling around Long Meadow. They sheltered behind an outcropping of boulders that jutted from the forest floor. A small creek flowed nearby.

  The sun was high in the sky above them. It had been some time since they had heard the last horn call from the south. The day seemed an eternity. Hadde dismounted with a groan.

  “How’s your wound?” Calen asked, his brow furrowed. She heard the fear in his voice.

  “I’ll be fine. Just need to clean up,” she lied.

  “Can we believe that man?” Calen asked as he dismounted.

  “It is hard to trust a man with a broadhead pointed at his face,” she replied. “Would you water the horses?”

  Calen nodded and took Quickstep’s reins. “I think he told the truth.”

  She nodded and saw a look of relief on Calen’s face.

  Hadde walked to the stream and unclasped her belt. She dropped her quiver and let her knife fall to the ground and pulled her tunic over her head. The smell of blood was strong, and she clenched her teeth at the pain.

  She heard Calen’s gasp and looked down. The lower left side of her linen shirt was bright red. She grunted and waved him off, as if to say the wound was no problem. “I should have asked why they were there,” she said.

  “I didn’t know it was so bad,” Calen said, his eyes on her shirt.

  “See to the horses. We need them.”

  With one last concerned glance at her face he took the horses to the stream.

  Hadde untied the laces at her collar and took her shirt off. The bolt had deeply scored her ribs. I hope they aren’t broken. I hope there are no splinters.

  “Dromost take them,” she said. She knelt and pulled her hunting knife from its sheath.

  “Let me help,” Calen said from the creek. He jogged up to her and took the shirt from her hands.

  “Hold it so that I can cut long strips,” she said. “Ah, that was a nice shirt,” she said as she made the first slash.

  “Your wound will have to be sewn,” Calen said.

  “It’ll have to wait. We have to find out what’s really happening first.”

  The midday heat had grown. The sun blazed down on her bare back from a gap in the trees above. In only a few moments they had cut several bandages. Hadde folded some linen and pressed it against the wound.

  She flinched at the pain as Calen cinched it tight. “Sorry, Hadde.”

  “Good and tight.”

  “This won’t stay long,” he said. “It will slip down.”

  “Take that last strip and tie it to the bandage and then over
my shoulder. That should keep it from falling.”

  He took the strip and then paused as he looked at the bandage crossing her ribs. “I, ah,” he started.

  “Bah, Calen, not the time to get bashful.” She took the bandage and tied it just under her breasts before tossing the loose end over her shoulder. She turned. “You can manage that side?”

  “You are as bad as your father,” he said as he tied off the back of the bandage.

  “Thank you,” she said as he finished. “I hope Father is well. I can’t imagine him not fighting.” She picked up her blood-soaked tunic. The idea of pulling it back on revolted her.

  She took the tunic down to the creek and soaked it in a small pool. No Hadde the Naked today, she thought. When most of the blood was out she used it to wash the blood off her waist and leg, soaking her breechcloth and leggings at the same time.

  Hadde looked up and was pleased to see that Calen had feedbags over the horses’ muzzles. He was great with horses, especially for having grown up in the forest. The residents of Long Meadow had no horses before Hadde and the refugees from Forest Edge had joined them a decade ago.

  Hadde clenched her teeth as she pulled on her wet tunic and then went to Quickstep. She untied her sword from the saddle and took it back to where she had left her belt. She looped the scabbard through her belt, now heavy with the weight of her quiver, sword, and long knife.

  “What are you doing, Hadde?”

  “I have to get closer to the village. I have to see what’s happening.” She did a quick count of the arrows in her belt quiver. Fourteen. She cinched the belt around her waist before returning to her horse and taking another six arrows from her saddle quiver.

  “The horses need to eat more. They’ve had a long day,” Calen said.

  “I know. You stay here with them. I can’t get close to Long Meadow on horseback.”

  “Should we go together?” Calen said. “Or should I stay?” He nodded toward the horses.

  “Stay here. If I’m not back by nightfall ride to Fallingbrook and fetch help. If there is no one there you’ll have to ride for Belavil.”

  “I can do that.”

  “Don’t come for me.” She looped a water skin over her shoulder and stuffed a handful of venison jerky into her belt pouch.

  “My mother is there. Maybe I should go,” Calen said.

  “I will check on her. I promise. The horses must be protected, and I need to know that nobody is coming up behind me. I need to know that all Landomeri get word of what has happened.”

  His face was glum as he nodded. “Be careful.”

  “I will.”

  Hadde headed south, back toward the stream that marked the northern edge of what most considered the border of Long Meadow. Behind her was the true forest of Landomere. Not Deep Landomere, the land of the giant great oaks, but rougher going than the immediate vicinity of the village.

  Hadde knew this area intimately, and knew she could approach the village unseen, even if the Idorians had set a strong watch. She moved swiftly and silently, the memory of Belor and her doing almost the same thing two years before strong in her mind. Except that time the raiders had never reached the village.

  She had gone only three arrowflights when she heard voices ahead. Voices and movement. There was no effort at stealth. Hadde crossed the stream and cut right, keeping a low rise between her and the voices. When she next paused she heard a young woman’s voice shouting. It could only be Maret. And then she heard crying children.

  Enna.

  Hadde desperately wanted to charge forward, but restrained herself. Instead, she lowered herself to the ground and crept forward on all fours. Her ribs were an agony, but she bore the pain in silence.

  And there they were, soldiers. One had Maret over his shoulder, her dress caked in dirt and mud. Her normally perfectly combed hair was a tangled mess.

  She shouted and pounded on his mailed back. “Let me go! Give me my baby!”

  Two more soldiers each carried a crying child. They were in their night shifts and were swaddled in blankets. The men carried them carefully, as if they intended no harm.

  More soldiers walked with the three captive bearers. Two carried the others’ crossbows. Six more guarded the group, but only occasionally scanned their surroundings. Hadde hoped her cover too deep for them to spot her.

  A strident horn sounded from the village. Another soldier rode from that direction on horseback and shouted in Idorian.

  The four guards immediately changed their attitudes, raising their crossbows and paying much more heed to their surroundings. Hadde lowered herself deeper behind the everbloom that hid her.

  Another man appeared from the direction of the village. A knight in full harness on a warhorse. She could tell even from a distance that he was a big man. As big as Sir Nidon, she thought. He wore a coat-of-plates over his mail, and had a full-faced helm, although the visor was up. It was too far to make out his features, but a chill went up Hadde’s spine when she saw the device on his shield.

  A white field with two crossed black warhammers upon it.

  The sign of Earl Waltas.

  “Why?” But in the pit of her stomach, she knew.

  Waltas had been a vile, despicable man. He had abused Hadde, attempted to rape her, and to kill her. He had raped and nearly killed Maret when he had accidentally lured her into a trap set for Hadde.

  Hadde had killed him. More than killed him, she had filled him with arrows in a long, terrible death. She felt not a moment’s remorse for what she had done. He had deserved every moment of agony. He had deserved death.

  And now his men were here, in Long Meadow. And they had her daughter.

  And they could have their revenge.

  Chapter Six

  Maret kicked and screamed her rage all the way back to Long Meadow. She pounded at her captor, but he was like a rock and she could do no harm to him. Her only relief was that she could see the two children being carried behind her, and they were not being abused.

  The entire population of Landomere was gathered around the fire pit, guarded by dozens of soldiers. They sweltered under the summer sun and the heat of a raging fire.

  For a time during the night she thought she and the children might escape. The first wave of pursuers had passed her hiding place, but there had never been a chance to slip past them. Near morning, utterly exhausted, she had fallen asleep. She had awakened to little Enna’s cries. And to discovery by the Idorians.

  The soldier carrying her eased her down. As soon as her feet touched the ground she aimed a savage kick at his crotch, forgetting that he was fully armored. Not that it mattered, as he blocked the blow with his shin and laughed at her as she cried out in pain.

  “Done il kine!” a man ordered. The soldier holding Orlos immediately handed her son to her. She cradled him close in her arms. The man who spoke was the man-at-arms who had first accompanied Baron Grax into the village. Maret didn’t know the words, but she recognized the language. She’d been right before. The men were Idorian mercenaries.

  “Give her to me!” Enna demanded as she pushed her way to the front of the villagers. The Idorian officer spoke to another soldier and the man handed little Enna to her grandmother.

  As Maret watched, a soldier came forward and threw an armload of arrows onto the fire. She could see spears burning there as well. Other soldiers were loading packhorses. One horse had a dozen or more bows strapped to its back.

  Segreg’s smithy and the village stable had both been burned down. Maret saw the Landomeri horses being tended to by Idorian soldiers. It appeared that some of the cottages had been ransacked, but none had been destroyed. And most importantly, she saw no sign that anyone had died.

  “Enough of this, Captain Saunder,” Grax called out. “Lady Maret has cost us a half day.”

  Grax wore full harness. His tabard presented crossed hammers of House Valens. Waltas’s house. She choked at the sight of the device.

  Grax had not worn the colors the first
time they met.

  “We have what we came for, Lord Grax,” Saunder said in good Saladoran. He had only a slight Idorian accent. “We can leave as soon as our preparations are complete.”

  The man, Saunder, wasn’t Grax’s man-at-arms then. He wore a checked white and blue tabard. A mercenary captain.

  “Only part of what I came for, Captain. I want Hadde.”

  “Lord Grax, we shouldn’t stay. The girl and her child were our main task. The longer we stay, the greater the threat. She has killed three of my men so far.”

  “Hadde? She’s back?” Maret said.

  Grax glared at her. “Your friend has caused a lot of difficulties. She needs to pay the price for killing a nobleman of Salador. But Captain Saunder is right. We’ve taken all of the morning searching for you. But your games are over. It is time for you to return to civilization. You’ve spent enough time among the savages.”

  “I won’t go.”

  “Captain, put her on a horse. Tie her to it if you have to.” He turned on Maret. “This is for your own good. It is for your son’s own good.”

  “Hadde will kill you like she killed Waltas.”

  Grax didn’t flinch. “She’s a criminal. If she interferes she’ll be punished like one.”

  “She killed Akinos,” Enna said, rocking her crying granddaughter in her arms. “My daughter ended the Wasting.”

  “Sir Nidon killed Akinos and everyone knows it,” Grax said. “Your daughter is a murderer and a savage. You are all savages.”

  “Look around, Baron Grax,” Maret said. “Who are the savages today?”

  “Enough.” He turned back to Saunder. “Let’s go. And we’re taking that one as well.” He pointed a finger at little Enna.

  “What? No!” Enna said, turning her granddaughter away from Grax as if to shelter her from his sight.

  “I’m not leaving a rival to the throne behind.” He smiled. “She makes quite a catch. Queen Ilana will have fits of joy. And maybe your daughter will think twice before taking a shot at us if we have her daughter with us.”