Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
CHAY
“Don’t curse the darkness if you can light a candle instead.”
~ Raider’s Ban proverb
I left my cloak. The oiled one would protect against some of the rain but would interfere with movement, and I couldn’t afford that. I donned chainmail with my tabard over it. In the stables, Audrey’s horse stomped her foot as I passed her stall.
“Easy, girl,” I murmured, sparing a moment to pause at her stall door. Checking on the horses had become part of my routine, but she hadn’t forgiven me for cutting Audrey loose when she would’ve been dragged.
I didn’t mind the grudge. I was just glad she’d made it back somehow. “You rest up,” I told her, and her ears flicked back as if she didn’t like taking advice from me. You get that from your rider. As much as the thought made me smile, it wasn’t true. Audrey listened to me. But she didn’t trust me.
Bliksem was already saddled and waiting, his breath steaming in the slow, dreary drizzle that had settled over the city. I remembered how she’d wept for those children.
I remembered how I’d blamed her.
Wrong?
No.
Kind?
…No.
I scrubbed my hand over my face and tried to focus on the group of us, assembling quietly and without fanfare in the bailey. Everyone knew what was happening and why. A few bits of information were murmured. How the swordsmen would ring around the cart, how they’d move depending on what angle we were rushed from, where they’d fall back to if it was needed. I was greeted with raised hands and nods.
All I had to do was stick my neck out to save theirs when they had no other options, and they’d treat me like an equal.
We moved out, a loose ring around the three supply carts. We weren’t transporting anyone who was unwell, turning back those who came into the streets, for now. Audrey would’ve hated that. And she’d hate it later when I told her of it.
For today, we just had to keep the tourney grounds supplied, so there wasn’t an immediate issue. Then they had to figure out how and where to relocate it so we didn’t need to pull this stunt again.
The heavy clouds darkened the streets, so it felt more like dusk than midday as we rumbled along, a big, noisy, slow-moving target. Bliksem pranced a little, sensing the unease as we rolled closer to the ambush location. I didn’t even know what the street names were, but I didn’t need to, so openly did they all show their tension.
Due to the quality of my armor and the distance Bliksem would defend, I was taking the lead. The true leader was halfway down the wagon’s length.
They were happy enough with me being bait, and I was happy enough not to rely on any of them at my back.
I was thinking like a local now.
It said something about how grim our straits were that I found humor in the thought. As soon as I saw movement on the road ahead of me, I hefted my shield and called, “Come on out, we’ve got you surrounded.” The amusement that still laced my words was an unintended but nice touch, and I was pleased with it.
An arrow whistled past my head, and my mouth went dry. My shield snapped up. I heard shouts from behind. Shock, anger, and pain. Archers.
Time slowed. I saw the situation in an instant. The group of us surrounding the cart in the center of the crossroads. Exposed. Able to defend from an attack from the ground by using the cart as a bulwark. Almost helpless against archers because I was surrounded by peerless swordsmen and exemplary pikemen. There wasn’t a loaded crossbow in sight.
“Do you?” the man on the road called. “Do you really, Butcher’s dog?”
I barely heard him. We had to flee or flush them out of the surrounding houses. Flushing them out was too risky. We’d be pinned down and picked off. We’d charge into houses without knowing where they were. We’d be separated, easy prey.
An arrow sped past, and Bliksem stomped furiously. Movement caught my eye. The man who’d stood in the road ahead of me clawed his throat, staring at me in shock. An arrow was in his throat. He held it, his eyes huge, as one knee went out, pitching him forward at an odd angle.
My heart did a slow roll. It couldn’t be. None of us had bows. Had they accidentally shot their friend?
With my eyes, I traced the approximate path of the last arrow to fly past me to its starting point. A man hung partially out of a window; the top half of his body crumpled over like a long stalk of grass in the summer. He swayed, twitching. Behind me, from the guard, there was a heavy moment of silence.
Audrey?
Surely, it couldn’t be. But if it was—and without Isolde to watch her back…
“I did say you’re surrounded,” I called into the rain, flicking my shield back over my shoulder to better drive home my bluff. If Audrey was out there, in those houses with these folks, infected with the One only knew what this plague was …
I had bigger problems than a stray, inexpertly carved arrow.
“If I have your attention,” I called into the shadow-filled crannies, hoping my voice would carry behind the twitching curtains in unshuttered windows, “I’ve a message from lady Audrey.” I hope she didn’t mind me putting words in her mouth. “She’d like to know who needs aid. Because these supplies are for sick folks. She’s looking after us all. But I’ve got orders to protect this here caravan. So, your choice. Ask and receive, or fight and die.”
An arrow whistled through the air and clattered harmlessly on the stone at my feet. “Death to the Butcher’s Brat!” someone shouted from the shadows.
Three guardsmen, their shields locked together, closed in on that nook. A skinny man was pulled out, dripping, his homemade bow broken in his hand, his lip bleeding. He was tossed at my feet. Bliksem stomped his disapproval twice as my heart drummed in my head. The Butcher’s Brat . It had a ring to it. I thought of her, out there in the rain, freezing, getting sicker by the minute for these people. She’d better be in her tower beneath disorganized piles of parchment.
With violence in my heart, I dismounted and leaned over the asshole who’d called her brat. His eyes were round with terror, but his lips were sealed tight.
He wasn’t going to say it again. But he wasn’t going to apologize, either.
“You can try to kill her,” I whispered under the rain. “And when you do, you’d better hope she gets you before I do.” I straightened, nodding to the closest guard. “I’ll take your spokesman to the lady, then,” I called to the listeners hidden behind the rain and gloom. It took me only moments to have him tied to the back of my saddle, far enough that Bliksem wouldn’t accidentally crush his skull with a kick.
“Let’s get going, then,” Paedar said, his words carrying only as far as the closest guardsman, who passed it along quietly. Another guardsman peeled off and paced along behind our captive, spear in one hand and shield on his arm. It was slow going, and as the violence drained from me, I became aware of how cold I was, how I was covered in filth from the road, and how heavy my sodden gambeson was beneath my armor.
If we were lucky, Audrey hadn’t made those shots. Some random person who’d opted to help us out just happened to be in the right place at the right time, and knew how to work a bow.
I had no evidence of her presence. None at all. I’d never seen her loose a single arrow. I’d never seen her leave the tower. While she could’ve quite easily kept pace on foot, why would she?
In my mind, I heard that grunt of effort as she hoisted the guard and tossed him, all by herself, over the sea wall. Because she’d sat beside her fire with eyes that burned like liquor and promised she’d never ask me to take a life.
If she hadn’t worn an oiled cloak, I was going to have to respond somehow. Surely, the woman wasn’t so stupid.
Inappropriate reactions ran through my head. Shouting, shaming, locking doors, hogtying.
The only thing I could come up with that I could actually do that might have an impact was to rat her out to Isolde, who would absolutely dress her down for taking unnecessary risks.
The thought brought me some pleasure. However sick Isolde was, if she wasn’t dead, her tongue would be sharpened and ready to use.
She knew I couldn’t go to the Matri’sion lands. She didn’t want my oath to kill me.
Why did the thought make me want to grab her, shake her, and then crush her to me until her bones creaked?
When we finally got back to the castle, I left the guardsman with the captured bandit, but not before tying up the newly made criminal. No point asking for trouble, after all, not after Audrey had gone to such lengths to keep us all safe. “I’ll be back,” I told them both.
I went, alone, to her rooms, expecting to find her there ahead of me. I stopped to strip off my chain mail and hang it to dry, knowing it would need love later, so it didn’t seize up. The gambeson, too, I put aside.
I knocked on the door to her rooms once I’d removed the worst of the wet clothing, but I got no response. I let myself in, annoyance and embarrassment making my steps heavy. “So, you didn’t bar the door,” I said to the silent tower, waiting for her to appear on the staircase, straightening her clothes or carrying fresh sheafs of parchment.
She didn’t.
Dread gnawed at my belly. She’s in the kitchens. She’s bathing. “Audrey?” I called loudly. “I’m coming up.”
There was no response. When I eased into the room, it was warm. Isolde was sleeping, curled up like a wounded creature on the edge of the bed closest to the fire. Quietly, I stoked the fire and checked all the rooms and the upper level, my heart drumming in my chest.
I found the overdress and skirts she’d worn that day. And with that vanished my last hope of it being a misunderstanding.