by Daniel Ford
She pulled her thin wrap tighter around her shoulders and looked from the fire to the bar as if trying to decide between her warmth and her curiosity; the tale won out.
“And usually, see, these stump-jumper types, they knows what to do and they usually hands over the money right quick and maybe whatever else we likes and then on their way. Well this farmer, see, he had some starch in him so we thought t’tickle ‘is ribs with our knives, right?”
Shary rolled her eyes as she made her way carefully over to the bar; her movement was not without grace, but the way she avoided chairs and tables and hunched her shoulders spoke of a lot of time spent trying not to be noticed.
“Gonna tell us all about slittin’ another poor man’s throat, Gend?”
The man’s pocked face suddenly grew deathly silent and deathly still, and he spoke very quietly, pronouncing each syllable with the care and import of a drunk.
“No, Shary. Lemme tell the story, aye?” He swallowed once, shook his head, downed the rest of his wine, and set down the mug. When another listener reached for his purse, Gend waved him away and looked at the rough, splintered surface of the bar he sat at, running an index finger along it. He pushed his empty mug away from him, sullenly.
“Well anyways this farmer was a younger fella and maybe ‘e’d seen some fightin’. I dunno. I just know ‘e had some vinegar and didn’t take t’our askin’. So Tyl is just ‘bout to cut ‘im when we hear this voice behind us tellin’ us t’stand down. That’s all ‘e said, stand down, but ‘e said it like a man ‘spectin’ t’be obeyed. So we turns t’face ‘im and ‘e’s this big ugly bastard. Not tall, but like t’fill up a room right enough.”
Gend coughed for a moment, lifting his shirt to cover his mouth, then took a big gulp of air; the barman, Shary, and the other serious drinkers clustered around the bar hanging on his pause.
“Ugly, like I said. Nose been busted up, face too. And ‘e’s got some big bloody hammer just danglin’ from ‘is hand. I wouldn’t e’en know what t’do with the thing. Knacker a bullock, I guess, or knock down a wall. And ‘e says again, stand down, tells us t’get along, that our thievin’ days are done…or, and I marked this well, ‘e says, You are either done thieving, or you are done living. Decide right now. All fancy and somber like that. And Tyl just laughs at ‘im and slips that hatchet he likes…hatchet he liked off ‘is belt.” Here, the taleteller paused and swallowed hard. “Tyl starts tossin’ it, flippin’ it end o’er end in the air and snatchin’ the haft wi’ his hand. Tyl tells the big ugly one, there’s five o’ us and one o’you, so what’re ya gonna do? An’ Tyl catches the hatchet and rears back like ‘e means t’throw it as he’s sayin’, ‘I’ll put this in that pisspot farmer’s head if you don’t drop your hammer, fool. And the ugly bastard says, ‘I take it that means you have decided.’ And then ‘is arm lifts an’…an’ Tyl’s freezin’ head burst.”
Gend lifted his gaze from the bar and swallowed hard, flicking his eyes from one listener to the other; the tavern keeper, despite knowing just how much wine he’d poured through the evening, would’ve sworn he was looking at a sober man at that moment.
“Bastard had thrown ‘is hammer and it took Tyl’s head. Took it clean off. Tyl’s body just stood there for a moment and then crashed like a felled tree.” Gend grabbed the front of his shirt and held it up to the flickering light cast by the lamps; they could see it spotted thickly with a dark stain. “Tyl’s blood, n’his bone, n’his brain’, all o’er me. An’ the other three rush the big fella,’, and I swear t’ya, ‘e coulda killed all three o’ them like crushin’ a grape. Din’t e’en bother t’draw the sword on ‘is back. Put ‘is elbow in Mern’s face and broke ‘is jaw, n’he punched Jorry s’hard i’the stomach the poor bastard started sickin’ all o’er hisself. Klent, ‘e lifted clean off the ground and threw back on top o’Tyl’s body, like just for a bit of a laugh, ya know? And then ‘e walks o’er t’me, n’m’just standin’ there, me, blooded an’ a good man wi’ a knife, and ‘e takes m’blade outta m’hand and…”Gend paused again and reached into a purse on his belt; out of it he pulled a curled ball of iron that may once have been a knife, but had been bent so thoroughly in on itself it was no more than scrap now. He set it deliberately and carefully on the bar, and the tavern keeper snatched it up to hold it to the light.
This was a new wrinkle in the story; Gend hadn’t shown that bit of iron around before. “No man can bend a piece of iron like that with his hands. Snap it, mayhap, but simply twirl it ‘round like that?” The tavern keeper tossed it back on the bar with a snort.
“I tell you ‘e did, and if ya don’t believe me, go find Jorry or Klent. Mern won’t be talkin’ none for a few months, I reckon. “Gend swallowed and then fingered his mug anxiously; a few links clicked onto the bar and the tavern keeper bent down to fetch the jug.
“And then ‘e ‘ands me the knife back and tells me t’show e’eryone I care ta. ‘E leans that broad ugly face an’ that bent-up nose right up against mine an’ I can see…oh I can see somethin’ hard in ‘is eyes. I been t’ war an’ I been a thief an’ I seen hard men an’ I seen killers…I saw somethin’ harder than any of ‘em. Harder than all o’ ‘em put t’gether. Says ‘is name’s Sir Al-us-stare.” Gend paused for a beat, and then said, “Called hisself a paladin, then. Sir Al-us-stare, paladin, Arm o’the Mother…whate’er that means. And then ‘e told us t’run, and you mark me, I freezin’ ran and I din’t look back t’see what the lads did. And then I hear ‘im chattin’ all peaceable with that farmer lad, din’t catch much. Somethin’ about the Mother.” He took a big gulp of wine then, nearly emptying the mug; his hand shook slightly and a bit of wine slopped over the edge, and he lifted it quickly to his mouth.
When he set it down, his face still pale, his hand still a little shaky, he added, “I think maybe I am done thievin’. I don’ ‘e’er wanna see those eyes again. Nor ‘is freezin’ hammer.”
The drinker who’d been supplying Gend with wine tossed a broken copper link on the bar in derision. “A paladin, Gend? Ya’ve done better’n that before. My guess is, ya came inta some weight w’those lads, slit their throats and on the way o’er, heard some minstrel singin’ o’ paladins—Parthalian and that lot—and thought it a fine excuse.”
Shary, meanwhile, had edged nearer to Gend and place a tentative hand on his arm. In the light spilling from the lantern and the rushlights clustered around the counter, her features came into better focus—fair but weathered skin, bedraggled blonde hair falling limply around her shoulders, wearing worldly wariness surely thicker than her shawl. A fresh, thin red line stood out vividly on her pale neck.
She cleared her throat tentatively and spoke, her voice not quite making it all the way out of her throat at her first few words. “Di…did you say the Mother? Arm of the Mother?”
The tavern keeper looked toward the woman, frowning, though not, it seemed, at her. He leant over the bar and pitched his voice low enough for her voice alone to hear. “Shary, lass, are you s’posed to be in here? Does Stehan know?”
She looked up at him, her eyes wide, shining in the darkness, and said loud enough for everyone to hear, “Stehan’s dead.”
“What?” The barman straightened up, missing a lamp hanging above his head by an inch or less. “Ya didn’t kill him, didya? I won’t be having the greenhats storming in here accusing me of harboring a murder—”
Shary cut off his sudden tirade with a quick shake of her head. “No, Hod, I didn’t kill him, but I’m glad the bastard’s dead.” She looked back toward Gend, who was fiddling with the broken link tossed to him and staring ahead vacantly, and said, “I saw somethin’…somethin’ odd this night too, Gend. And I heard the same thing. Well almost the same thing. About the Mother.”
At the word Mother, Gend looked up at her, blinking away the vacancy in his eyes. “Eh? What of it?”
Shary licked her lips and glanced at Hod, then nodded toward
a stool. Hod reached under the bar, pulled up a cup, filled it from a flagon, and handed it over. She took a quick sip of it, wiped her face with the back of her hand, and said, “Stehan was angry at us, at me and Filoma. We asked for warmer clothes; with fall comin’ on, streets are gonna get chill. Or failin’ that we asked him could we work indoors somewhere, like in a house or a tavern or the like, and he laughed at us. And then he got angry when Filoma said somethin’ about leavin’ maybe, n’he started askin’ her where she got the weight t’talk like that. And when she didn’t say anythin’ he started hittin’ her.”
She paused then and had another sip from her cup, and set it down again. “She still din’t say anythin’. Filoma’s been hit a lot, by better than Stehan. And then he turns t’me and pulls out his knife and puts it against my cheek and tells Filoma if he don’t tell him he’ll cut me. He’s usually bluffin’. Usually,” she said, suddenly dropping her eyes to the bar and swallowing once, hard. Without looking up, she added, “He weren’t bluffin’ this time, but he started on my arm so custom wouldn’t notice.” She reached up and slipped down the shawl she’d been wearing; her upper arm had several thin red lines upon it.
She looked up, covered her arm again, reached for her cup and drained it with forced casualness. “He cut me up a little and Filoma tried to stop him—she jumped at his arm and he smacked her away and then told her she better watch while he cut my throat open,” she said, spitting out the words fast, and then turning wide-eyed to her audience and pointing a bitten fingernail at the thin line on her neck. “And he puts the knife to my throat and I suddenly see this shadow behind him that sorta…slides away from the side of the buildin’, and suddenly it’s no’ a shadow, it’s a woman. Tall and dark-skinned like I only seen on Concordat caravaners, and with a long scar here,” she said, touching the left side of her chin. “And she has the knife out of Stehan’s hand faster than I can follow, and he forgets all about me.” Hod went to refill her cup but she put her hand over the top of it and shook him off, saying, “I’m not tellin’ tales for drink. I’m tellin’ somethin’ I saw.”
She turned back to Gend and the small crowd of drinkers who’d listened to his tale and said, “Well then he pulls out the lil’ cosh he likes to carry on his belt, and takes a big swing at her, only she…she isn’t there. And then she’s behind him again but I n’er see ‘er move. Then she takes that cosh away and hits him with it, once, twice,” she mimicked the blows to either side of the head with one hand, “but not real hard. I think, this woman, I think she could’ve hit him a lot harder than she did then. And she tries tellin’ him to stay down and back off and he can live through this. But then he calls out for Mathern. His bruiser, ya know, fat bastard, carries a mace, standin’ just out the alley. And he tells this woman that she’s in for it now, tells Mathern to splatter her brains all over the walls.”
Shary gulped then, hard. Her eyes went huge with memory and awe. “Then I realized she’s been…jus’ playin’ with Stehan. She draws her sword, long and curved like I never seen b’fore, and she has Mathern gutted almost before he knows what’s happ’nin and then Stehan comes roarin’ up after her wi’ his knife again, or maybe he’d another, and she guts him too.”
She licked her lips once, and ran her eyes over the crowd, then looked off toward the hearth, shivered a little and hugged her arms around herself. “I never saw anyone move so fast, and she weren’t runnin’, she weren’t even hurryin’. She’d just be one place, and then another. She talked to us a little, after they were dead.”
Shary paused then, thought for a moment, then shook her head and went on. “Talked to us a moment or two. Never said her name…when we asked, she said she was…said she was the Shadow of the Mother. Told us the Mother was…was a Goddess, like Fortune n’those, but new n’that…well lots o’stuff. Told us there was a temple t’Her risin’ in a town out a ways….”
* * *
“Thornhurst, he said. Said all were welcome, but he had t’be goin’, and Mother bless me n’mine.” The farmer, a tall, broad and still young man carefully set himself down on the stool that faced the hearth, while his wife, her back to him, stirred something in a pot. “I thought I was dead or we were poor, Liss, and then…a paladin…a paladin outta stories. Can ya credit it?”
“Aye, Mich, I can,” she said, turning around to face him with a slightly dazed expression. She’d listened to his story carefully, but as soon as he’d described the big, broken-nosed man she’d known just who he meant, could feel again that presence, that calm that he had, some great well of hope and sorrow all mixed up together and carried on his back. “He was here while you were away in Ashmill Bridge, Mich, not three days ago. Maris’ and Nils’ new baby—they hadn’t named ‘im yet—well, it looked like they were gonna bury him too, after their last. Poor thing couldn’t breathe. And he rode into the village with all his armor and his arms and that woman behind him, strange lookin’ one, southerner I s’pose, didn’t say a word, but he went right up to the house where the women were gatherin’ t’try n’help poor Maris and he asked what was wrong?” The woman shook her head, smoothing out her apron with one hand, and sat down at the stool across from her husband, her eyes shining and huge as she reached across the table to one of his large hands.
“Well we thought he was jus’ some lord, and we told ‘im it was nothin’ t’trouble such as him. But he got down off his horse and he took his helmet off, and I’ll tell ya, Mich, he’s not a comely man, with that broke nose and those hard eyes and those thin lips. There was somethin’ frightenin’ about him, yet…I knew I never needed t’fear him. “
“He asked again, real careful and slow like, and we told him there was a baby dyin’. And he just asked us to get out o’the way, and he went into ‘er house and begged ‘er pardon—him, with armor and horse, beggin’ her pardon—for trackin’ dust into ‘er house. And he asked to hold the child, that’s how he said it, only it was more a command, I think. “Let me hold the child,” he said. And she did, without thinkin’. And he unwrapped some of the swaddlin’ and put his hand on the baby’s bare flesh, and he closed his eyes and Mich, he said some words I din’t hear and that baby took to cryin’ so loud it startled all of us and then Maris was cryin’, and he handed her the boy back and said t’call him Balendin, that was his name.”
Mich absorbed this in stunned silence, finally saying, “Mayhap we should take a ride to Thornhurst, Liss…”
* * *
Lord Captain Luden Thryft was a busy man, and he damn well made sure everyone that came into contact with him knew it; his armor was carefully smudged, but not too smudged. His cloak was edged with mud and casually gathered at one shoulder. He constantly rattled his sword in its scabbard and paced around his spacious command tent so as to set his carefully gathered, pale-green cloak fluttering behind him. He had decided to make it a habit never to turn immediately when addressing reporting knights or bannerman; instead, in order to press upon them just how busy their newly elevated lord captain was, he’d continue with whatever he was doing prior—pouring wine, staring at a map, reading a book—while ordering them to report.
When he heard a horse barreling toward his tent, hooves pounding in the muck, he turned, cloak fanning out behind him, stamped to his feet in order to rattle his spurs and his swordbelt, and began carefully studying the empty space on a map showing the borders of Barony Delondeur with Barony Innadan, the eastern frontier of which he was now encamped near. Several wooden tokens representing Delondeur and Innadan troops lay scattered over the map; Thryft considered shifting some, but then decided he’d better leave them where they were. He heard the solid thump as the approaching rider dismounted behind him and heard his boots approach; he heard no jingle of spurs. He continued studying the map as he said, “Report, Bannerman.”
“Sorry m’lord,” came the reply, through heavy breathing, “Bannerman’s dead. I’m just a chosen man.”
Thryft looked up from the map upon th
e table, twisting his body to turn his face to the man. He was sweaty, mud-spattered, and pale. With careful deliberation, the captain straightened up to his full and considerable height. “Whose troop are you with?”
“Sir Goddard Bainsley, m’lord,” the man replied, pushing the words out through his gasping breaths.
“And why is he not making this report, Chosen Man…?”
“Kyle, m’lord,” the man said, suddenly wrapping an arm around himself as his breath heaved. “And Sir Goddard is bad hurt, m’lord. Bad hurt.”
Thryft’s hand fell to his sword and curled dramatically around its hilt. “You have made contact with the enemy, then? Where? Are we in danger of attack?”
The man shook his head, and finally seemed to have his breath under control. “I don’t think so m’lord. It weren’t no Innadan patrol…no patrol at all. Just two…two folk.”
The captain pressed his lips into a thin line beneath his carefully manicured mustache and said, “Start at the beginning, Chosen Man Kyle. Quickly!”
“M’lord, we was on a press—”
“Recruitment!” Thryft suddenly spat, interrupting the man-at-arms.
“On a recruitment trip t’the border villages. We found a likely one, not been visited yet and we started, ah, we started offerin’ Baron Delondeur’s link around. There was ten of us. Sir Goddard, the bannerman, and eight men at arms, all’ve us horsed, blooded men, sir. Well we had some lads lined up, and their ma’s and da’s shunted aside ‘cept for the men still young enough, and then this big voice behind us tells us t’clear off. I mark what he said well, m’lord, I can’t forget it. ‘Tis burned into m’mind, like. He says, These folk will have none of your press gangs. Put this village at your back and trouble its people no more. He spoke like a captain or a marshal, m’lord.”