Ravens gathered overhead, reapers come to feed on flesh and claim the souls. I added them to the canvas. Black wraiths circling a tombstone-cold sky, bearing witness to the birth of new spectres to this unwelcoming land.
I had one more canvas to work at. I picked up my optics, searching for my next scene.
Broochman roared. A sound like that leaves little room for question. I dropped the optics. Four blood-spattered, wild-eyed Ant soldiers stood chest’s heaving and weapons drawn.
“Fuck!” Winston scrambled at the corner of my eye. The sound of metal grinding as he pulled his sword free.
“Shit! Shit!” Broochman yipped, fumbling the grip of his shield and dropping it as he drew his sword. Clumsy fucker.
I eyed the nervous looking Ants. Their dark-metal swords were edged with a red glimmer. I saw the droplets of blood still wet on their faces. Other men’s blood. I stepped backwards and sure as shit, tripped over my paint box. Fell right onto my arse. They stepped further into the glade. Maybe we could just let them past? Maybe we could be civilised about this whole—
The Ants attacked, pairing off on Winston and Broochman. I would say my pride was hurt that they didn’t see me as a threat, but I’d neither a weapon, nor was I within sniffing distance of their wives.
Winston ducked a swipe from an Ant sword and lashed his own blade across the man’s thigh. A crescent of red sprayed out from the slash, and he dropped. Winston spun and blocked the thrust of the other Ant.
Broochman howled for help as he was pressed by his two. He crouched behind his round-shield, breath hissing between clenched teeth.
I started to shuffle backwards. Maybe they wouldn’t notice. Maybe by the time this was done, I’d be halfway the hells away from this cauldron.
Winston had the second Ant in a grip, the other man grunting like a drunk humping some velvet up an alley. Then the Ant fell away, and Winston’s sword slid red from the man’s chest.
“Behind!” I shouted to Winston. Too late. It was Winston’s time to grunt. Heard so many soldiers say, ‘Never leave an enemy behind you.’ Winston took thigh-struck’s sword right through the back. He turned around, all slow like dying men seem to do, and prodded his sword point into thigh-stuck’s neck. Was almost as casual about it as I’d be dipping my brush into paint. Winston fell onto his knees, and I swear, before he toppled, it looked for all the word like he just called me a cunt.
Broochman was on one knee, swords battering his shield to kindling. He rushed a jab around its edge. Got lucky. The sword punched into the Ant’s gut. The man cried, and Broochman poked his head out. Not the finest of brains in young Broochman’s head. Actually, not much brains in his head at all after that. The second Ant’s sword split Broochman’s head, spraying blood and brain across the glade.
One Ant remained standing. As it would happen, I was sat on my arse, mouth hanging like, well, like Broochman’s after that sword brained him. Four men lay dead, and one squealing, his life half-drained into the bleak, hungry ground.
The Ant shouted something to his injured comrade, then hawked a lump of his finest cheddar and spat onto Broochman’s ruined head. The private’s tongue poked fat from his mouth like a hung toad. I tried my old trick of closing my eyes and hoping when I opened them the hatchet-faced old troll I was fucking had turned into a beauty. Didn’t work. Never worked, and this ugly prick was still eyeballing me. The Ant licked the spray of blood off his lips and walked towards me. Time slowed. It slowed as the Ant flicked his sword, sending an arc of tiny rubies sparkling in the grey daylight. It slowed as his old leather boots with the toes sticking free pressed down on the heather. Time slowed as my bowels twisted, and I shit my pants. The Ant pulled back his sword arm. Cold, hard, sharp and fuck-ugly steel raised ready to cut me open. No more painting and poking for me. As luck would have it, the Ant turned around towards the edge of the glade. That herd of deer from the valley came bursting out of the treeline. They sprung over Broochman’s hung-toad corpse, crashed into my easels, and trampled gut-struck into the heather with a retching noise. Something bellowed, and the stag burst through the trees and into the glade. The beast’s tongue lolled as it bounded my way. The Ant looked back at me, his mouth framing an O. It framed fuck-all apart from a, ‘Whoop,’ and a gout of blood. The stag dropped its head and rammed antlers up into the Ant’s body, lifting him off his feet. He was shaken about, all bloody vomit and jumbled words, then was cast to the ground like the wasted remains of a doll unfavoured. The deer bounded out of the glade, leaving me alone save for the heather, meadow flowers, and corpses.
I scrambled up on wobbling legs and puked onto the feet of the gored Ant. Winston’s accusing eyes stared blankly as I stumbled to my toppled easels. A hand grabbed at my boot. A bloody hand, staining my Ferocci Leather boot. Fucker.
“Help. Me,” the voice called in a mangled attempted at Warungsland. Ugly fucking language at best, but even worse on the tongue of this dying Ant. Would’ve thought being gut-struck and trampled by deer would kill a man.
“Get off. These boots are expensive.” I shook off the man’s hand. Hell of a dirty face he had. All hollow-eyed and hungry. I looked about, saw Winston’s sword, and picked it up. In fairness, I’d probably look more comfortable holding a horse’s cock, but needs must. I jabbed it into the Ant’s chest. The tip didn’t go far. “Fuck.” I avoided the man’s eyes and leaned down on the handle-end, pommel, whatever. The wretch wheezed and gagged his way into death.
I turned back towards my easels and saw a troop of Warungsland foot come into the glade.
“Boss!” a soldier called back over his shoulder. “Painter’s alive. He killed the Ants!”
I puffed my chest, good and bold, and gripped the blood-stained sword like a hero. I think. Soldiers rushed into the glade from the wood now, laughing and cheering. Quite the nice feeling, as it happens. Soldiers picked up my easels. Blood sprayed across the worked scenes of violence. Great splatters of dark, and thin lines of bright red speckled the artwork. Never had my paintings been so alive, rendered so by death. If that crusty old fuck wanted visceral, well, he had it. A couple of back slaps tore my attention from the canvases. Shouts of, ‘Hero,’ set me grinning. I was there. This would work well for me. Warrior Poet. Hero of the bedroom and the battlefield. Wielder of brush and steel.
The Best and Bravest
M.L. Spencer
Silence shattered, the quiet of the morning fracturing like glass.
The cry of a war horn rose out of the gray stillness of the forest. The call was answered by others, some not so distant. Michel cast an anxious glance over his shoulder at his father. The old man didn’t react, just kept his heavy stare fixed on the ground ahead of his horse. The slight breeze faltered, and then died off completely.
“Over there, sire.” One of the baron’s knights pointed into the forest with a mailed hand.
Michel stared into the shadows of the surrounding trees but could make out nothing. Just a thick veil of fog that hung like a curtain between their own party and the defenses of Brouette. The fog encased the forest, smothering the dawnbreak.
The baron shifted in his saddle. He scratched his whiskered chin, eyes narrowing as they scoured the mist. Jean de Verglas was not a large man, but his burgundy surcoat and the sword at his side made up for what he lacked in stature. He scowled, swiping a dark lock of hair out of his eyes.
He grumbled, “They cower beneath the mist. Make ready.”
Michel wondered at the baron’s words as he swung from his horse’s back. If Brouette’s men were using the fog as cover, then why signal their presence by sounding horns? The discrepancy made no sense, adding yet another texture to the layers of anxiety he already felt.
He left his own mount where it stood and untied his father’s best warhorse, leading it toward the group of knights gathered at the front of the column around the Baron de Verglas. Michel didn’t dare look the baron in the eye as he moved around his tall stallion. He could feel the man’s cold stare lingering on h
im, following his every motion.
He stopped at his father’s side, holding the stirrup for him to mount, then handed the old knight his shield and lance. Bernard de Torleaux gazed down at his eldest son with a look of calm assurance and gave a slight nod. To Michel, his father’s bright eyes seemed much too youthful for his age-worn face. He moved with a grace that was unaffected by his years, bringing his lance up smartly as he eased himself back in the saddle.
“Have a care,” Bernard said under his breath. “I mislike the feel of this place.” He reached down and clapped his son on the arm. Then he kicked his horse toward the forming line of cavalry.
Michel stared after his father, feeling his nerve wither. Bernard was an accomplished knight. In his youth, he had accompanied the great King Roland on his last foray into Khash. Bernard’s experience across the sea made him a fair judge of the portents before a battle. Michel had great confidence in his father’s judgement. If the old man was troubled by this field, then he had every right to be afraid.
With deep misgivings, Michel led away the plow horse his father had ridden on the journey, heading back toward the jumbled collection of squires at the rear. The countryside around Bélizon had been Michel’s home all his life, but this forest was strange to him. Yesterday’s march had brought their small warband deeply into a part of the county held by the Baron de Brouette, Verglas’s sworn enemy. Generations of feuding between the two noble houses had begun over some small offence no one living cared to remember. Regardless of reason, enough blood had been spilled over the past two centuries to darken the ground of the woodland that formed a natural barrier between their holdings.
Michel pulled himself back astride his horse as he watched his father position himself in the line of knights making ready for the charge. Footmen ran forward to assemble in a disorderly throng behind the mounted cavalry. More horns brayed out of the roiling fog, closer than they had been before. Another noise rose as well: the constant swell of echoing thunder.
Ahead, in a clearing through the trees, the mist yielded before a ragged line of enemy horsemen. The sight made Michel’s throat go dry, a shiver tracing the small of his back. There were many more knights than he’d expected. Brouette’s numbers far surpassed their own. The baron himself sat astride an elegant warhorse, distinguishable by the emblem of Brouette on his surcoat. He bore no lance, but held a sword raised at his side, his tapered shield marked with the insignia of his house.
“Hold,” Verglas commanded, slamming his helm down over his face. Behind him, the baron’s young standard bearer fidgeted anxiously, the boy clinging to the staff in his hands with what looked like a death grip.
The horses tossed their heads and danced in place, the jingle of tack upsetting the silence of the woodland mist. One stallion broke forward, its rider having to fight to bring it back in line with the others. An uneasy stillness encroached, charged with compressed tension. It was as though time itself was wound tight as a spring, stretched and ready to snap.
Brouette’s men formed up in one long rank at the edge of the clearing. Michel searched behind the line of cavalry, scanning the mist for signs of footmen but seeing none. Perhaps they were back there somewhere, hidden under the gray cover of fog. Or perhaps they were somewhere else entirely.
A small group of riders had positioned themselves off to one side of the field, almost invisible in the roiling mist. There, astride tall horses, sat two knights wearing mantles of pristine white emblazoned with the splayed emblem of the Order of Syre. Michel could only stare at the two undead knights in bewildered horror. He’d only seen their kind once before in his life.
The Knights of Syre were a mystical order composed entirely of the risen dead, unholy paladins sworn to the service of Syre even beyond the grave. But neither of the two wights looked ready to add their skill to the impending fight. They held themselves aloof, watching with ice-dead eyes the two forces squaring off at opposite ends of the clearing.
Verglas bellowed out the command to advance. The line of horses started forward, breaking toward the enemy. Brouette’s cavalry advanced at a trot, their lord allowing his knights to draw abreast and overtake him. The forest rang with the thunder of hoofbeats, the clamor of men and arms, armor and tack.
The distance between the advancing forces narrowed. Both lines broke simultaneously into the charge, their knights dropping lances. Michel gripped his horse’s reins as he watched his father’s destrier careen ahead of the others, directly toward the center of the enemy.
Just as the opposing lines closed with one another, every lance pulled sharply up.
The ranks of horse converged, parting again as Verglas’s knights continued past their foes at a gallop, quickly swallowed by the fog.
Michel’s mouth hung slack in confusion. He took an anxious step forward, his concern deepening. As he watched, every man of Brouette wheeled in unison, doubling back with swords drawn toward the only knight left behind on the field, the only man whose lance had remained couched throughout the whole of the charge.
Bernard de Torleaux cast away the shaft and drew his sword instead, wheeling his horse around as Brouette’s men encircled him in a slowly constricting ring. The old man glanced around and, realizing his plight, raised his sword and shield. He wound his blade as his horse turned a slow circle in the center of the clearing. Throwing back his head, he gave a fierce war cry.
Then the ring of knights imploded.
There was a torrential hail of falling steel, the vicious crunch of armor yielding beneath the honed edges of blades. A blood-curdling shriek that ended in a gurgle. And then the riders fell back, scattering into the forest at a gallop. Soon, the clearing was empty, save only for the mist that groped over the ground and the prone figure sprawled like a sacrifice on the grass.
Michel kicked his own horse forward, driving his heels into the animal’s flanks. He pulled up just enough to drop from the gelding’s back, breaking his fall with his palms. He staggered the last few steps to his father’s side, collapsing next to him on hands and knees.
There was surprisingly little blood. Bernard had fallen beside his slain charger, one leg still thrown over the saddle. His fine hauberk was scored in a number of places, the steel rings yielding to the fury of the blows inflicted on it.
Michel released the helm from his father’s head, setting it gently aside. Bernard’s blue eyes stared up at him, still young-seeming in his aged face. His lips were parted slightly, as if ready to offer a chance thought or wonder at a fleeting marvel that had just occurred to him, as Bernard so often liked to do. But no air moved past his lips. There was no breath or life left in him.
Michel could only shake his head in confusion and denial. He didn’t understand. His mind fumbled desperately for an explanation. Why, out of all of Verglas’s men, had his father alone been singled out to die?
“A shame,” commented a voice above him.
Michel raised his head to stare into Verglas’s arrogant face. The noble lord had brought his horse up, unnoticed, and gazed indifferently down from the saddle. His narrow lips were pressed together, as if he found the sight of the corpse distasteful. He sat his destrier stock-still, holding the reins primly in a black-gloved fist.
Michel glared up at him, trembling with rage and grief.
The sound of hoofbeats made him turn. The Baron de Brouette had doffed his helm, holding it in the crook of his arm as he reined his mount in. He wasn’t much more than Michel’s own age, his blond hair worn tied back. His face was gravely set, an expression akin to regret moving behind his eyes as he gazed down at the fallen knight.
“It would seem that my men lack the will and heart to fight you this day,” said Verglas, offering Brouette a smile that looked more like a sneer. “I concede you the field. Bravely won.”
Michel watched Brouette’s eyes narrow as they rose to consider the man who was his enemy. But though the young lord said nothing in reply, the look he offered Verglas was one of contempt. Michel looked down into his fat
her’s death-pale face, fighting back the threat of tears. His whole body trembled, his emotions raw like an open wound.
He couldn’t understand what had happened, why his father had been left behind on the field. But the lack of concern in his liege lord’s eyes, the derision in his voice, left little room for doubt.
Somehow, for some reason Michel couldn’t fathom, his father had been murdered.
He didn’t realize his hand was moving until he felt his fingers close around the hilt of his father’s sword, fallen at his side in the grass of the meadow. He drew the sword toward him, fingers tightening on the hilt. He lifted the blade off the ground, testing its balance in his hand.
“I say before these witnesses that the house of Verglas is reconciled with the house of Brouette,” the Baron de Verglas announced from his horse. “My noble lord, let there be no further hostilities between us from this day hence.”
Michel’s grip tightened around the hilt of his father’s weapon until the entire sword shook just as violently as the rest of his body. He didn’t look at Verglas. Instead, Michel gazed down at the trembling blade, eyes focused on a gleam of light reflecting off the oiled metal. He had never noticed before how silken were those melded folds of steel, how elegant the many traces of color that were a natural part of the sword’s texture. How perfectly good the hilt felt in his hand, how keen were the edges of the blade.
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