Black Arrow

by J. P. Ashman

  ‘Succubi deceive the best of us, Amis. My lads can attest to that.’ Correia looked to Sav and noticed, in her periphery, Amis looking now at her, searching. ‘A tale for another time,’ Correia said, offering a weak smile. I’ve enough to think on without dredging up what Sav did in Broadleaf Forest.

  Nodding, Amis continued, voice low, like the words tasted bitter as he heard them. ‘I’ve known her since I was a squire. Years, Correia. Years. I was sent to her father, Guiscard de Steedon, by my own, as are the ways of such houses. You will know that, I’m sure.’ Correia nodded once as he continued, his eyes without focus, lost to memory. ‘My father had the better of it, Flavell’s…’ he grimaced, ‘…Flavell’s family being of higher standing than ours; Guiscard being a seigneur and mine a vassal of his.’

  ‘A prestigious position and a great opportunity for you.’

  Amis nodded. ‘So I thought.’

  ‘She may have been replaced, Amis, within Easson. I’m not sure, but a Succubus may have been able to take her form.’ Correia wasn’t sure, that was true, but she saw the hurt in the man and couldn’t help but try to fix it.

  Amis nodded again. ‘Perhaps. Truth is, I never knew her in her father’s chateau. I saw her about…’ He grunted a laugh. ‘She caught my eye as much as any other man’s, but I didn’t know her, not until the journey north.’

  ‘Why were you her only escort?’ It sounded like an inquisition and Correia bit her lip, worried she’d overstepped the mark.

  ‘She’s Guiscard de Steedon’s third daughter, Correia. Truth is, he never much cared for her, hence sending her so far away to be wed.’ Amis shrugged. ‘Seems he didn’t think much of me either.’

  Correia placed a hand on Amis’ arm and squeezed, much like Sav had done for her. ‘You don’t know that, Amis. The way I see it, he felt safe with his daughter in your hands, so he only needed you. A long way from home, a woman like that could fall prey to the very men sent to protect her. I believe he had a great deal of trust in you, this Guiscard. Take pride in that, messire. Take pride. We have to find the light in the dark sometimes, all of us.’

  Amis smiled, eyes and all. ‘Remember your own words, Correia Burr.’ He squeezed her arm in return, stood and left for his bedroll.

  Correia took a deep and shuddering breath. Would that I could, Amis. Would that I could.

  Chapter 49 – The field lay bare

  The trees overhanging the road gave way to a slate grey sky, heavy with distant rain. Weather aside, the opening of the forest gave the riders pause, causing them to squint against the wind as they shielded their eyes to look upon an army that was not there.

  ‘I… I don’t understand?’ Giles Bratby stared at the hill before them, to hundreds of circles and rectangles of yellow grass, intermingled with much smaller dark disks where campfires had warmed soldiers and boiled pots. Three white campaign tents remained, one with Bratby’s own banners snapping in the rising wind. His eyes moved to the men crossing the distance between, two on horseback, shields and padded gambesons in his own colours, the other dozen carrying war bows, their garb plain, drab. He frowned. ‘Why so little?’ He urged the red knight he sat behind to ride on, but Hud and Salliss came alongside, Correia and her red rider mirroring the two women off Giles’ other shoulder.

  ‘Wait,’ Hud said, arm outstretched. ‘Let them come to us. Despite our red livery, I don’t want your archers mistaking us for an enemy.’

  Giles chewed his bottom lip but nodded.

  ‘Fall back a bit,’ Correia said, turning and waving at the rest of the mounted group. They did as they were told, leaving three men and three women atop two pegasi and a hippogriff. The sight was impressive indeed, much more so than the mounted men-at-arms and their archers, six to either side of the two riders.

  As Giles’ men approached, the first droplets of rain fell, or rather whipped about in the wind. No sooner had the sky begun to spit, did it unleash all it had on the hill, sweeping down like a diaphanous grey veil being drawn towards the forest.

  Hud smirked. ‘Your archers wouldn’t do much good now anyway, milord, even if their strings are waxed.’ The wind howled as if to accentuate her point.

  ‘Perhaps we should be thankful of that.’ Correia pulled her gifted red cloak about her shoulders and drew up the hooded mantle. She shielded her face with her hand as the wall of rain struck. ‘Welcome to Altoln, Salliss,’ she said, without sarcasm. Oh, how she loved the rain; the life-giving, revitalising and atmospheric stuff of dramatic stories and vistas and adventure. Well, perhaps not in winter when each strike of a droplet sent a chill through to one’s soul, but summer? And especially after the insects and clammy warmth of Sirreta and the forest. She relished the torrential greeting Altoln offered her. Although the smell of wet dog that permeated the air after the sudden soaking the red wolf-fur about her shoulders took didn’t impress.

  The pegasi snorted and the hippogriff snapped its beak, the mounts shifting under their riders.

  Correia could see the two riders drawing near, their kettle helms doing a better job of running rivulets of water away before it found their faces. They came to a stop, backs to the worst of the weather, waxed canvas cloaks protecting them, for the most part. The closest one, by half a horse-length, rocked back in his saddle as his eyes locked on his liege; mouth previously agape, likely because of the strange mounts, the soldier snapped it shut as he took in the Earl of Bratby.

  ‘My lord!’

  Giles grunted a laugh and smiled. ‘Mits,’ he greeted, recognising his ageing retainer. ‘You look like shit, as always.’

  Mits laughed. ‘And you look well, my lord. Considering—’

  ‘There’s no time for this,’ Correia cut in. ‘There was an army here?’ She knew she needn’t say more than that.

  Mits grimaced. ‘They’ve moved north, to march on the threat there.’

  Correia looked across to Hud, who shrugged.

  ‘What threat, Mits?’ Giles said, wiping water from his brow. He’d not drawn up a hood, like most of the others, and clearly regretted it. Mits nudged his mount closer. It whinnied and threw its head back, a greeting to the beasts before it.

  An equine salute across species, Correia mused.

  ‘Adlets.’ Mits spat the word, like he’d chewed on something bitter before saying it.

  Everyone frowned at that. ‘You don’t need such a force for Adlets,’ Correia said. ‘We saw how many gathered here, to potentially ride on Easson.’ She didn’t miss Salliss’ look of surprise at that, a touch of anger to the Sirretan’s face. ‘Such numbers,’ Correia continued regardless, ‘such an army, aren’t needed for the dog-legged raiders of the Toye Hills, surely?’

  ‘Normally I’d agree, my lady,’ Mits said, hunkering down in his saddle after swinging his shield round onto his back. He needed it more against the rain than those facing him.

  ‘But?’ Giles this time, eyes boring into Mits.

  ‘We had a warning. Came from what remains of Stonebridge…’ Mits’ eyes darted between those present, letting the implications of that sink in. He finished on Correia, who offered the next question with a shake to her voice.

  ‘Remains? Explain.’

  A gust of wind had three mounts sidestep, none of them the hippogriff, which seemed as solid as ever, talons sunk into soft earth.

  ‘May I suggest we continue this in one of those tents?’ Mits said, slouched down as he was, arms folded.

  ‘It makes sense,’ Giles agreed. ‘Ride on, Mits, and we shall follow.’

  Mits nodded and turned his horse, cursing as he took a face full of rain. He waved his arm three times and the archers turned and leaned into the wind, making their way back to the tents, a variety of mounts carrying a variety of folk at their backs; making their way to the succour of the campaign tents the army had purposefully left behind.

  The sides of the white tent bellowed and shook, rain hammering a ceaseless beat on the canvas, intensifying as gusts battered all but those inside.

 
Fal watched the stinking tallow candles glowing within glass storm lanterns that ensured none turned over and caught light; a tent aflame was a magnificent sight to behold. As long as it’s not your own, Fal mused. He shuddered at the thought of flames licking up about him, hot, painful; deadly. He shook the sudden memories of his parents away and looked to Giles Bratby, whose baritone voice was booming once more.

  Giles ran his finger across lands he obviously knew well, depicted on a single map from the Cartographers Guild. He cursed their inaccuracies as his fingers drew imaginary lines. ‘Would that I had my own maps,’ he said, before reaching for a skin of watered wine and taking a swig. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve and turned to Correia as she spoke.

  ‘It’ll do us well enough,’ she said, leaning over and looking to where Giles pointed. ‘How did they cross?’ she asked, clearly sceptical that Stonebridge could be taken by Adlets.

  ‘By all accounts… well, one, my lady,’ Mits said from the shadows, the candles offering insufficient light to illuminate the tent’s corners, ‘they took it with siege engines and great numbers.’ Mits shrugged to the faces frowning at his answer.

  Hud stepped forward, hands on the table. She looked around everyone. ‘Adlets rarely band their clans, or packs rather, since that’s what they are, let alone move in great numbers and wage siege warfare.’

  ‘But they have!’ Errolas came to the end of the table, locked eyes with Hud. ‘As have Orismaran tribesmen. As did goblin tribes from the Norlechlan Mountains, which went on to take Beresford of all places.’

  ‘And likely the Twin Inns, although I know not where those goblins came from,’ Correia said, voice low; several of the heads looking her way hung lower after that. Correia took in a deep breath and released a deeper sigh. She stood straight and ran hands through her lank hair.

  ‘That sigh says it all.’ Giles offered Correia a sympathetic smile, then looked to Hud. ‘Do your borders remain clear, Captain?’

  ‘For now,’ Hud said. ‘Although that’s the land border. Our ships have stopped sailing south, to and along the Chriselle Coast. Strange ships, small fleets even, have been spotted and narrowly avoided. There’s more to this than a wicked coincidence.’

  ‘Of course there is.’ Errolas’ words were short, unlike him, and Fal watched him intently. ‘Succubi in Broadleaf Forest,’ Errolas went on, his tone little better, ‘and now in Easson, taking a marquis’ chateau? There’s a lot more to this, and we knew it, hence our trip down to The Marches, no? But this,’ he said before anyone could speak, pointing to Stonebridge on the map, then Twin Inns. He hammered his finger down on a third spot: Lejeune Forest and Sirreta’s capital city within. ‘This is far worse than we feared. This is war on a scale we have not witnessed in an age. For all these races to be acting at once, co-ordinated – for that’s what it is, a co-ordinated attack, starting in Wesson, with the plague. Someone, or something, is behind it all, and that means they have messengers, agents on the move; on the roads or seas, or air.’ He looked up to the tent ceiling, to accentuate the point. ‘You don’t co-ordinate such movements, such activity, without communication.’

  Fal watched Giles begin nodding before Errolas finished.

  ‘Errolas is right. He must be, for all this to be happening the way it is.’ Giles looked up from the map, met the eyes of everyone present. ‘I need to ride for my army, but we will be leaving this border crossing unguarded.’ He pointed to the tent wall, in the direction of the forest and its road. Fal looked that way as a reaction. It wasn’t as if he could see through the canvas.

  Errolas lent across and ran his splayed fingers through the map-drawn forest as Fal looked back, from Twin Inns on the map, to their position in Suttel. ‘Goblins attacked Twin Inns and goblins move through forests largely unhindered, such is their way. They could come out anywhere along the tree line, and likely will. They’ll fear an ambush on the forest road. You can’t defend the whole border from here, anyway, and by the sounds of it,’ he added, as Giles made to speak, ‘the adlets pose the most immediate threat.’ He finished with his finger on Stonebridge and the road that ran from it, into Altoln.

  That spot on the map will be worn through by the time this lot are done, Fal mused from his corner, eyes now on the map and folks’ fingers more than their faces. He listened on, although he couldn’t quite feel the emotion about it all that they seemed to. He continued to feel pain, that was true enough, despite the Twin Inns barber-surgeon’s ministrations, but worry and fear for what was to come? He merely shrugged and pressed his bound fingertips together. Some pains you have to prod and prod. He silently laughed at that before listening to what was being said.

  ‘…the Orismarans come through the forest,’ Hud was saying, ‘along the road we’re to leave unattested?’ Hud raised a single brow, scars creasing.

  ‘Can Royce not send aid?’ Correia looked to Hud, who shook her head and offered a frown.

  ‘Earl Royce will look to his own defences. If armies are marching on the other two border crossings, we have to assume they’ll march the coastal road too. Or land by sea.’

  ‘Or both,’ one of Hud’s knights said. Fal looked to the man who, until now, had held his tongue behind his neatly trimmed black beard. He’d been the knight who’d carried Fal from Easson to the Twin Inns. Fal decided he didn’t like the man. He didn’t know why, he just didn’t. Shrugging it off, he looked back to the officers, Correia central amongst them.

  ‘Your man’s right, Captain.’ Giles nodded sideways to the knight and chewed his own lip, all eyes upon him, knowing there was more. After a pause, he released his lip and said, ‘What of the whelp, Rell Adlestrop?’

  Fal smiled at that. I like Giles Bratby.

  ‘The young Duke,’ Giles went on, ‘can muster a decent force, and Adlestrop itself isn’t too far north of The Marches.’

  Correia shook her head this time. ‘He called for his men to march on Beresford, to aid his father in retaking the town. I believe the duchy of Adlestrop has been emptied of its levies.’

  ‘As well as his northern holds and the Reaver families?’ Hud asked, brow creased, scars deep once more.

  Correia shook her head. ‘No, he’s kept them there, for fear of more than goblins moving down from the mountains.’

  ‘Or to harry the Northfolk, as is his way,’ Hud muttered. Correia shot her a look.

  More secrets, Fal thought, scowling at Correia despite her not looking his way.

  ‘Unfortunately for us,’ Giles lamented. ‘Yewdale then, surely?’ he asked, moving on, eyes flicking from Correia to Hud and back. ‘Now there’s a Duke who’ll trounce what’s to come; he’s not Lord High Constable of Alton for nothing!’ He beamed at that, like he’d solved it all.

  Correia shrugged. ‘He’d be willing and eager, I’m sure, but his closest estates are a long way from here. It would take weeks of marching and the emptying of food and supplies from many an estate along the way. His peers, and other minor lords, would not take kindly to that.’

  ‘Weeks may do, if he acts now,’ Giles said, ignoring the latter. ‘We’re in mid campaign season, there’s plenty of time for this to drag on. A late coming army from Yewdale would be better arriving for nothing than not coming and being desperately needed.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Correia said, ‘but an army being formed, marched south and back north without a fight is a dangerous army, Will Morton’s or not.’

  Fal noticed Correia glance at Hud. Was it nerves he saw in her expression as she changed tack. ‘I can try and talk to Royce, once there.’ Hud’s head snapped up from the map. Correia held up a hand, placating the woman. ‘I know he’ll need to secure his own lands, but he may be able to spare barons from his eastern holdings, like Baron Arrisal and others of his ilk. It’s worth asking, surely?’

  Hud swallowed hard, annoyed at Correia putting her on the spot, Fal was sure, but she nodded all the same.

  ‘What of Piggett?’ Correia suggested, giving no one else time to talk. She frowned at Giles’ sco
wl. ‘My lord Bratby, Piggett’s earldom is part of Altoln—’

  ‘Well he’s done fuck all to stop an adlet incursion into Altoln proper. Has he, Correia?’

  By the look on Correia’s face, she’d expected Giles’ outburst at her suggestion. Fal really did like the man.

  ‘Call him from his mountains, my lord,’ Correia went on, determined. ‘Call on him to aid you.’

  Giles sighed and rubbed hard at his face, at the bags under his bloodshot eyes. ‘Fucking gnomes,’ he said through his hands. ‘He’s a belligerent little bastard and we don’t need him,’ he said, locking eyes with Correia’s stern stare.

  ‘And if we do and didn’t call on him?’ Correia left it at that; let the implications sink in to the stubborn man.

  ‘I’ll think on it,’ Giles said, before changing tack, his following words coming from nowhere. ‘I’ve decided to ride to Bratby Castle and co-ordinate from there, rather than riding to my army. I can trust my son to deal with adlets. I need muster a defence and fortify the old towers along the forest’s edge. Bring the villages into the walls and such.

  ‘Mits.’

  Fal had forgotten the old retainer was in the tent. He was quieter and even more absent from the conversation than Hud’s knights, Sav and Gleave; two who seemed, for all intense and purposes, to be asleep at the back.

  ‘My lord?’ Mits stepping into the light.

  ‘These archers, where do they hail from?’

  ‘Old Bailey, my lord.’

  Giles nodded, satisfied. ‘Good. Have one of them ride back there and give my order to Lord Teshe to mount patrols and prepare for a possible siege. Tell him to send birds to Bratby Castle and await their return. I shall have orders sent back with them once I arrive. We’re going to man the old watch towers and he is the anchor point between Royce and Suttel. Understood?’

  Mits nodded once. ‘I know the man to send. Want me should get on it now?’