“I wish it were not you alone who could intervene,” he said. His gaze went past her to the wintry landscape and then came back, a piercing look.
Dorrin shook her head. “I cannot do it alone, my lord. But I can do what no one else but a paladin can do, and we have seen no paladins of late. I would have thought, with Pargun invading Lyonya, that Paks might come, but she did not.”
He squeezed his eyes shut, as if that would help him think, and then opened them again. “Well. I will try to fix my mind on your better deeds and your better traits, Duke Verrakai, and put out of thought your treacherous family and the concerns others have had. But if Beclan dies—”
“If Beclan dies before we arrive, it is not my fault,” Dorrin said. “I will do my best if he is alive then, but I can promise no more than that.”
“I want to believe you,” Mahieran said. “But it is hard … Serrostin’s son with green blood in his veins …”
“But not a cripple,” Dorrin said. She was tired of apologizing for Daryan, when the lad himself was delighted to have nimble legs and a usable thumb growing ever stronger. He’d told her he hoped the other thumb would bud as well. His family would just have to accept it.
The shortest way across country would take too long, Mahieran insisted. Dorrin was equally insistent that they not approach by the direct route from the Mahieran country house. They compromised, taking the River Road west, then a forest track Mahieran knew that bypassed his home and led to another that approached the cottage from the east. They had with them Mahieran’s personal guard, ten of his household troops; he had refused her suggestion of a Royal Guard contingent. Dorrin hoped it would be enough.
On the second day, Mahieran would have stopped at dusk to camp again. Dorrin insisted they ride on. They reached the outer ring of guards at the turning of night. No one answered the hail, and with only a little searching they found the first bodies, garroted. “Holy Gird help us,” Mahieran said.
Dorrin touched her ruby, calling on Falk. The ruby glowed. “They’re still here,” she said. “In the cottage, and soon they will know I am here. Speed and surprise is Beclan’s only chance now. They expect no visitors.” She dismounted, pulled off her spurs, and put them in the saddlebag. They tied the horses; Dorrin tried a soothing spell on them; she was not sure it would work. “My lord,” she said, “this is now a military problem. I ask your leave to take command.”
“Very well,” he said, and nodded to his men.
The inner ring of guards also lay dead; the attackers had made no attempt to hide the bodies. Dorrin murmured her orders and could only hope they’d be followed. They hurried on and were almost at the cottage when the first scream wavered through the night. The cottage, a dim shape in the snowy clearing, showed a dark gap where a door stood open. Around the corner, light streaked the snow from another open door. Another shriek came from there.
“Granna Surn, the cook,” Mahieran muttered.
“This door,” Dorrin said quietly. She waved the tensquad around to the other. Mahieran plunged forward; she caught him by the sleeve. “Carefully,” she said. “May be trapped.” Probably not, since the attackers expected no interference, but if they’d sensed her before she realized it—she flattened herself against the wall on one side of the door and eased her sword into the black gap. No reaction from inside.
She moved in and heard Mahieran’s harsh breathing behind her. When she felt the first touch of magery from another, she immediately called her light. There in the main room of the cottage two red-masked figures—priests of Liart—had hold of Beclan’s arms and were dragging him toward the door that led into the kitchen. Beclan wasn’t struggling, but she didn’t think he was dead. Dorrin tried to hold them still, but Duke Mahieran pushed past her to attack. The priests dropped their grip on Beclan; his head hit the floor with a hollow thunk. One of the priests threw a spiked ball at her, then drew his barbed sword. As fast, Dorrin caught the ball on her buckler. Mahieran, in a blind rage or panic, had tried to stab the nearest red-masked figure but instead took a swipe from the man’s blade that parted his clothes and drove his mail into his shield arm.
Dorrin parried Mahieran’s attacker’s blade just in time. She moved close to the Duke, but he was already moving again. Mahieran had never fought in formation; he had no idea how to work with her, how to let her protect his injured side while fending off attacks with his blade.
“And now we have all of you,” one of the priests said. He sounded confident. Perhaps he had not detected the tensquad. “The boy will be ours … and the two of you as well.”
“No,” Dorrin said. “You cannot force Falk from my heart.”
“Or Gird from mine,” Mahieran said. Though he’d lost his buckler, he now had a dagger in his heart-hand. Nonetheless, his face streamed with sweat, and his hands trembled.
Dorrin could feel the waves of hatred coming off the two priests, but they did not slow her. Protecting Duke Mahieran did; he was clearly not immune to attacks of blood magery that affected his body if not his spirit. She stamped, signaling him to advance with her.
Just as they moved, a clamor broke out in the kitchen. One of the priests glanced aside; Dorrin lunged, parrying the other’s blade with her buckler. The jagged edge caught on the buckler and jerked her arm aside, but her blade went home in the priest’s knee. He staggered sideways, his blade flailing wide; the other one’s dagger grazed her shoulder, raking the mail beneath her clothes.
She whirled, staying low and tried to free her buckler from the first’s blade, but he was yanking at it, jerking her off balance. “Get that—” she said to Mahieran as the other priest’s dagger thrust at her again. Then she dropped her buckler as her own opponent yanked and drew her dagger as he staggered back, both arms flailing. Her sword went home in his neck this time.
Before she could turn to help Mahieran with the other priest, the fight in the kitchen spilled into the main room—two more she recognized as Verrakaien backing away from Mahieran troops, all hampered by the kitchen and its furniture, the narrow door between rooms. She got one of the Verrakaien in the back; the other, turning to meet her attack, was caught in the side by one of the Mahieran troops. The troops moved immediately toward their duke; Dorrin focused on the remaining Verrakai in the kitchen, whose magery felled one of the troops as she watched.
When the melee was over, Mahieran clutched at his sword arm. Blood soaked his sleeve, dripped from his hand. Beclan lay, still unconscious, with blood beneath him. The two priests and both Verrakaien were dead—she hoped—but so was the old woman in the kitchen. She had been burned with the kitchen poker—the screams they’d heard—and killed during the fight by a sword stroke. Of the tensquad, eight were wounded, three seriously. Counting all the dead outside, the enemy had sold their lives dear.
Dorrin felt no triumph, only grim satisfaction. With the two unwounded men of the Mahieran squad helping, she bound Mahieran’s wound and then tended the others. Duke Mahieran had lost a lot of blood; he closed his eyes as they laid him down and seemed to drift off. The pool of blood under Beclan proved to be from one of the Liartian priests, not his own, though he had a lump on the back of his head and now a darkening bruise where his head had hit the floor.
“Will he live?” one of the men asked her, nodding at Beclan.
“I don’t know,” Dorrin said. She stripped off her gloves and touched his head gently. Her hands tingled. Would she be given healing for him? “One of you—are the doors closed and secured? Someone posted to give warning?”
“But—but it’s over—we’re safe—”
“That’s what the Royal Guard outside thought,” Dorrin said. “This may not be all of them; we don’t know. Close the doors—make up the fire—and one of you see if there’s hot water in the kitchen—if not, put a kettle on. We need heat and light.” She looked around. Those with minor wounds were sitting or leaning against the wall. One had only one bandage. She pointed. “You—we need to get Beclan out of these wet clothes and warm. Go upst
airs and see if there are blankets or a straw tick we can use.”
“Carry him up?”
“No. Too dangerous until I know all that’s wrong with him.” The man nodded and headed for the stairs.
Should she try to heal him now? With his father unconscious as well, with the suspicious eyes of those who did not trust her watching every move? She had helped the Marshal-General with Duke Marrakai’s similar injury, but—Beclan groaned a little, and then his whole body stiffened. She knew what would come next.
“What are you doin’ to him?” one of the soldiers asked her.
“Nothing but feeling the lumps on his head,” she said. “But if I don’t try a healing—” Beclan convulsed, something she’d seen before with head injuries. “This will kill him.”
“Then make it stop,” the man said, pulling out his dagger.
“If you kill me,” Dorrin said, meeting his gaze, “he will certainly die. You cannot heal him.” With that, she ignored him, letting the power flow out of her hands and praying—trusting—that Falk’s goodwill guided it. Beclan went limp; Dorrin closed her eyes, wishing there’d been any period in that tumultuous year when she could have learned more about healing. How could she tell if—when—Beclan was healed unless he opened his eyes and sat up?
After a time she felt herself drifting into darkness, an empty husk blown along a forest floor. Then nothing.
When she next opened her eyes, daylight came through the cottage windows. She was on the floor of the main room, wrapped in a blanket, and she had scarcely strength to move a hand. “She’s awake,” she heard someone say. And then, “Can you sit up?”
“No.” Someone behind her lifted her shoulders and pushed a support behind her; she felt dizzy for a moment, but that eased. She looked around. The bodies of the dead had been removed, the blood scoured from the floor. Duke Mahieran lay on blankets, as did Beclan. Both appeared to be sleeping; she saw them breathe.
“You fell over,” one of the men said. “But they’re alive.”
“Paladins don’t get weak when they heal,” another said. “At least that’s what the Marshal says.”
“Want some sib?” asked yet another.
“Thank you.” Dorrin wormed a hand out of the blanket to take the mug offered her. Sib—hot and thick, a soldier’s brew—cleared her head, though not all of her memory. She could feel strength returning. She freed her other arm. “What was the housekeeper’s name?”
“My lord?”
“The woman who died. Who was she?”
“I—I don’t know—”
“Surn,” said another. “She was nearly blind.”
“Where is her body?”
“On the kitchen table, my lord, where they were hurting her.”
Dorrin unwrapped the blanket and clambered to her feet, stiff and aching. She had not noticed her own minor wounds at the time, but the soldiers had bound them up after she fell. She’d taken worse in her years as a mercenary.
In the kitchen, the soldiers had laid a tablecloth over Surn after straightening her limbs. “The only thing is, my lord, you said build up the fire—it’s so warm in here.” It was hot, and it smelled like death. Dorrin’s stomach churned.
“Is there a shed, some protected place in the cold we could lay her safe?”
“A woodshed only. But it’s nearly empty.” The man looked at her, hesitating, clearly waiting for orders.
“We’ll use that. Find us a plank or a hurdle.”
“Yes, my lord.” He hurried out and returned in a few minutes with a plank. They moved Surn’s body to the plank and carried the old woman’s remains out to the woodshed.
Once Surn’s body was out of the kitchen, Dorrin could see that the soldiers had done their best to clean it up. Considering only two of them were unwounded and they’d had the wounded to look after as well, she commended their work. “But we need to eat,” she said. “All of us. Which of you is the best cook?”
Feet shuffled. “Um … my lord … don’t none of us know how. Only sib.”
Dorrin had not expected this. All the mercenaries learned at least some rough cooking. But from their expressions, these had not.
“I will, then.” On the hob, Surn had set grain to soak overnight for breakfast porridge and beans for some later meal. Dorrin washed her hands in hot water (they had at least been able to boil water) and set to work. First the porridge pot onto the fire, then a check of the pantry. Surn must have baked the day before: there were three and a half round loaves on a shelf. That was a mercy, but it wasn’t enough if they had to stay more than a day.
The sizzle and smell of frying bacon and sausage drove away the other smells and soon brought the less-wounded to the kitchen. Dorrin set one of the men to slicing bread and another to chopping onions and mushrooms; she put those in a frying pan and set them to the fire. A third she told to stir the porridge.
“He’s waked up,” someone called from the other room. Dorrin left the pan of mushrooms and onions, now beginning to sizzle, and looked through. Duke Mahieran and Beclan both had their eyes open; Beclan was speaking to his father.
“Breakfast soon,” Dorrin said, and turned back to the cooking. Let them think what they would; they were alive. The shift from warrior to healer to cook suddenly seemed funny to her, and she chuckled.
“What, my lord?” asked one of her helpers.
“We’re all alive,” she said. “And we have food to eat and a fire to cook it on. Isn’t that something to rejoice in?”
“I suppose …” He eyed her warily as he sliced into another loaf.
Porridge, sausage, bacon, bread, honey from the jar in the larder, dried fruit … Dorrin set it out on the table, and while the soldiers carried food to those in the other room, she took one of the raggedly cut slabs of bread, dipped honey onto it, and ate. Then she went to speak with Duke Mahieran.
Though pale from blood loss, he looked in no danger of dying, and he had an appetite … he was halfway through the bowl of porridge already. Dorrin made a pad of the blanket she’d been wrapped in and sat on the floor near him.
“A bloody business,” he said. “Too many lives lost. But at least Beclan’s alive and himself.” He glanced at Beclan, who nodded at Dorrin, his mouth full of bread. “He is, isn’t he?” Mahieran asked softly.
“He is indeed,” Dorrin said; she had sensed nothing evil in him from the first. Nor would the enemy have nearly killed one of their own. “He was not invaded.” As Mahieran’s face relaxed, she said, “My lord, I’m afraid I must remind you that we are not safe yet.”
“You think there are more?”
“There might be. The worst of this is that I do not know—no one knows but themselves—how many are left, of either Verrakaien or the Bloodlord’s priests. We must get you and Beclan back to the safety of your home—however safe it may be—and more than that ensure the safety of the king. But eight of your soldiers left alive are wounded, and three cannot travel.”
“One will have to go and take word that we need help,” Mahieran said. Then he grimaced. “No … if they are waiting, they’d simply kill him.”
“Exactly,” Dorrin said. “We must travel together when we go, or stay together when we cannot travel.”
“If we had carts—”
“They brought provisions in a cart,” Beclan said. “And surely the outer guards have carts.”
“The outer guards are all dead,” Mahieran said. “At least—we believe so; the ones we found were dead.”
“But the carts might still be there,” Dorrin said. “Maybe even animals to pull them. We’ll look.” She pushed herself up, wincing at the various pains.
“My lord, you should rest.”
“There isn’t time,” Dorrin said. “Or you’ll be suffering from my attempt at making bread, because Surn’s won’t last the day. My cook taught the Verrakai children to bake this year, but I was too busy. I can fry things or boil them, but not bake.”
The two able-bodied soldiers went out with Dorrin to
search. They found more bodies, a mutilated horse—“They used it for blood magic,” Dorrin said—two hitch lines of horses, and five two-wheeled farm carts. Despite the need for haste, Dorrin paused beside each dead Royal Guard to say a prayer. As the soldiers gathered the horses and hitched some to the carts, Dorrin tried to think how to move the bodies, but there were too many. In the end, they dragged them into groups and covered them with branches for protection until a larger burial party could retrieve them.
Slowly—too slowly for Dorrin—horses, carts, and some provisions from the Royal Guards’ camp arrived at the cottage. By then it was well after midday, and the beans and beef she’d started after breakfast were ready.
“No, we can’t make the house by dark, not starting this late,” Mahieran said. He had slept awhile; Beclan, whose only injuries had been to his head, was now up and around. He had brought down all the rest of the bedding and warm clothes from the upper story, and without being asked had taken on the job of cleaning up dishes and pots in the kitchen.
“Then we should leave tomorrow,” Dorrin said. She went outside again; the bodies of the Verrakaien and the priests still lay in a heap. They should be burned, she knew from Paks, to dispel any lingering evil. When she put a torch to them, the flames leapt up as if she had poured oil on the bodies. Flame and smoke whirled, making dire shapes. Dorrin stood watching until the flames died down and the ash blew away on a clean north wind.
Nothing happened in the night; Dorrin slept soundly and woke at first light. She roused the others, then started breakfast in the kitchen. By full daylight, the more able-bodied were packing to leave. They had ample horses—the Royal Guard horses, except for the dead one, as well as those they’d brought. Provisions could be packed on the unridden horses; the carts would carry the wounded. Beclan insisted he could ride and helped with the packing. Dorrin didn’t argue with him, but exchanged glances with his father, who shrugged.
Before midmorning, the little caravan started for Mahieran’s country home. Surn’s body rode alone in one cart. Duke Mahieran rode alone in another, swathed in blankets and cushioned on straw, and six of the injured soldiers rode in the other three.