by Eric Ugland
For a moment, it was eerily still. Then Alexios got himself to his feet and resumed his sprint. But his pursuers seemed to realize that whatever chance they had at catching their prey had dissipated. While a few of them watched Alexios — or the village of Coggeshall, hard to tell — most of the ursus blended back into the trees.
As Alexios got closer, it was pretty clear he was running on the barest of fumes. He stumbled once, twice, then dropped to the ground. I darted out and helped him to his feet. My bow brushed against him, and he hissed as his skin smoked. He leapt back, suddenly finding a new reserve of energy.
“Fuck, man,” I said, looking at the curling black skin around the burn mark on his arm. “They got you, huh?”
He didn’t say anything, but he glared at me. His teeth bared, arms out to either side, waiting to make a move. Or waiting for me to make a move.
But I didn’t know what to do, so I just remained still.
So he lunged at me.
I hauled off and hit him in the jaw, and his head snapped to the side. He dropped to the ground, out.
I wiped my hand off on my pant leg. I knew he was infected, or corrupted, but I wasn’t sure how it spread. Was it through saliva? Other bodily fluids? Was there a ceremony of sorts? Could Alexios still talk? Plenty of questions. But for the moment, no answers. And here I was, pretty much completely vulnerable should the ursus decide to charge. I looked over my shoulder at the men and women in Coggeshall. They looked back at me, confusion evident on their faces. I didn’t know what to do. My best choice was carrying him back. If I asked my soldiers to bring out a gurney or something, it could open them up to attacks from the ursus. I had a good feeling I was immune to the corruption, thanks to my relationship with Eona. In that regard, I slung him over my shoulder and marched back into Coggeshall, ignoring the betrayed looks from my Thingmen.
Chapter Twenty
I brought Alexios to the Hall — it was the only place I could think of where no one was likely to wander in for no reason. I threw Alexios into a chair, got a bunch of rope out of my bag, and tied the man down. Still unconscious, he leaned against his restraints, drool coming down his chin.
I walked across the empty hall and barged into Nikolai’s office. He was at his desk flipping through a bunch of paper.
“What is it you want?” He asked.
“Alexios is back.”
“And?”
“He’s been turned.”
“Corrupted?”
“Yeah.”
“You have proof of this?” He asked, jumping to his feet.
“Two possible methods,” I said, pulling out the holy rock of glowing. Sure enough, the glowing edge pointed right back at Alexios. I headed back into the Hall, and Nikolai followed. Together, we walked around the restrained man, and the glow stayed pointed his way. “Also, if I touch him with Eona’s Bow, he gets some minor skin irritation.”
Nikolai pointed to the charred flesh. “This?”
“Yeah.”
“Minor irritation?”
“I think it burns the longer it’s on. But yeah, it does a bit of a number.”
“Do you know how the corruption spreads?”
“No. But that’s one reason I didn’t kill Alexios. I figured our best plan of action for the man is to experiment on him. Find a cure.”
“How was he brought in?”
“I carried him.”
“Then it is his blood on you?”
“Yeah—”
“Cleanse yourself at once. Burn your armor—”
“This is new—”
“It matters not, you have no knowledge of this corruption—”
“I’m, like, Eona’s chosen one. No way I get corrupted.”
“Perhaps, perhaps not. And even if you are immune, that does not mean others will be. Burn all your clothing that has touched his blood.”
“If I wash myself off, won’t that just spread his blood downstream?”
“Perhaps have the cleric do a blessing over the spilled blood on you first, then clean it off. I will speak to Essie and Harmut, make sure there’s a secure facility to hold him. I wish we had access to whatever intelligence he’d been gathering. It is—”
“The quick version,” I said, “there’s plenty of ursus out there. And they seemed to find our best ranger without any trouble. Also seems like they turned him without too much trouble.”
Nikolai nodded, though his attention remained fixed on Alexios.
“It looks like you were right,” I continued. “Any show of them leaving was just that. They’re out there in the woods in force, and I’m guessing they want to get us to leave the safety of our walls and go hunting for them. Or they sent some infected in here to kill us from the inside out.”
“Likely the latter. They have seen we are not the pushovers they anticipated. We have shown our strength — they must know their best chance is to take us from the inside.”
“That’s gross.”
“Likely it will be. I cannot imagine this corruption is anything other than disgusting. Where is your cleric?”
“He’s not mine.”
“Whatever. You have need of him. For the time being, leave Alexios in the Hall. I will make sure none enter from this doorway. Get a guard on the front door — no one should go inside unless absolutely necessary until we know how the corruption spreads.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
I went out into the main area, and quickly found a guard to post at the door. Then I stripped off all my armor, and tossed it into the burning coal forge, which caused Zoey to curse at me for no short length. And I was rather impressed at the breadth of the curse words and phrases she found to shout at me.
It took slightly longer to find Meikeljan, but after I explained what happened and what I needed from him, he immediately was on his knees praying. Then he lit some incense, which smelled fantastic, another deep woodsy scent, and he wafted the fragrant smoke over me. I felt a comforting sense of warmth, and couldn’t help closing my eyes.
“It is done,” Meikeljan said. “She has cleansed the blood on you.”
“Thanks, buddy,” I replied.
Business concluded, I took another shower, then air dried standing on my balcony.
I looked over Coggeshall and noticed there was quite a bit more activity going on. Mainly it was people moving out of the longhouses, but there were also a bunch of people fighting. I rolled out the rope, and slid down.
Well, halfway down. That’s when I realized I wasn’t watching fighting, I was watching practice. And I was wearing a towel. Which wasn’t exactly staying on as I slid down the rope. I hung there for a moment, hoping no one saw me, but as soon as I heard Ragnar’s unmistakable laugh, I started hauling myself back up the rope.
I got dressed.
I put on some armor.
I went searching for Wian.
I found him overseeing the sparring session I’d spied earlier from my balcony. Men and women used blunted swords to whack at each other with wild abandon. At least, that was the general idea. It wasn’t exactly a challenge to see who was good and who was bad. The bad ones were bleeding and out of breath. The good fighters appeared bored.
“Have your Thingmen found Emeline?” I asked.
“Emeline?” Wian replied without moving his attention from the training.
“Yeah, she’s one of the council? Sassy, kinda short, brown hair.”
“Race?”
“Human.”
“Is she wanted for something?”
“She’s one of the council, has some pretty important magic books in her possession, and she hasn’t been seen for a while.”
“She lives here though?”
“Yes. Originally from Osterstadt, but—”
“Your grace,” Wian said, interrupting me, “if you are asking me to search Coggeshall for this woman, I will happily do so. However, being there are two sieges in progress, your soldiers are stretched to the bones keeping every yard of your walls under watch
. I am doing my utmost to bolster those forces, but even if all these willing recruits pass muster, our army is smaller than when I arrived. Now, on the other hand, if you are just asking me for my guess as to what happened, the most simple is thus: she left Coggeshall before the siege was set, and she is currently unable to get back inside what with all our entrances and exits quite blocked.”
“That does make a certain sort of sense,” I said, musing on the topic.
“Thank you, your grace. I think it is more likely she is not in Coggeshall than she has found a hiding spot where not one of the thousand members of the town have found her. Or that something nefarious has happened.”
I shrugged, then said, “Just ask the soldiers to keep an eye out for her.”
“I will pass that on.”
Chapter Twenty-One
It took some time before I managed to find the redheaded archer again. Partly because I was still feeling the sting of Wian’s dressing-down, and partly because I was avoiding Ragnar who started laughing whenever he saw me. I thought about mentioning how cold it was outside, but I figured that’d be a reference he’d miss.
When I found the young woman, she was ready for me. As soon as she saw me, she nodded, and walked right past without saying a word. Then, when she realized I wasn’t moving, she looked over her shoulder. “Follow, my lord.”
Some of the archers had set up a small range at the other end of Coggeshall. There were a bunch of hay bales with targets painted on them. The range was currently empty — all the other archers had other places to be. Or, maybe, the nice redhead thought it would be best for the duke to be allowed to look like an idiot without an audience.
“Have you shot a bow before?” the red head asked.
“You mean beyond the one arrow you saw me shoot out front?” I replied.
“I am doing my best to forget that particular display of incompetence, your grace.”
I’d had two brief exposures to archery. The first was the one archery class I’d taken in middle school where I’d basically just used the bow to lift up Kayla Mastersen’s skirt, much to the dismay of Dan Bornside, who was playing at being her boyfriend. He challenged me to a fight after school, and I let him get a punch in on me, because he was right to. But I was also an ass, and lost my temper and wailed on him pretty hard. The second was the one summer camp I went to as a Boy Scout, and I may have skipped out on archery because the Girl Scouts were right on the other side of Lake Popyacherry. I had little to no self-control at that point and definitely earned my merit badge in swimming and water sports that summer.
“Nope,” I said. “That was my first time. But I do have some levels in the Archery skill.”
“How did you get those?” She asked, an eyebrow arched up.
“Gift from a god.”
“Well then,” she replied with a smirk, “I suppose I should pretend to be impressed. Let us hope this goddess didn’t leave you with bad habits.”
“Do you have a name?”
“I do, your grace. Saivoer Stene.”
“Pretty name.”
“Thank you your grace. Shall we shoot some arrows?”
“That sounds like a grand idea,” I said, pulling out my bow.
She gave the bow a quick once-over, then handed me an arrow.
I knocked it against the string and pulled back. But she put her hand on my arm.
“My lord, you have the arrow set incorrectly.”
I looked down, but the arrow seemed fine: pointy bit towards the target, feathers at the back.
“Any decently made arrow will have one different-colored feather. That feather point up to the sky.” She plucked the arrow off the string, rotated it, and put it back. “Sight along the arrow. Take a breath, and on your exhale, release.”
I followed her instructions.
Upon the release, though, there was a sharp crack, a loud boom, and the hay bale exploded. And maybe some of the wall came off.
“What is this madness?” Saivoer asked, taking a step back from me and the bow.
“Uh,” I said, looking once more at the bow and wondering what was going on with it. Why was it making exploding arrows? “To be honest, this is new and I’m not sure why it does anything it does. Loud exploding arrows unusual here?”
“Maybe you put that bow down for now, start off with something a little less, uh—”
“Explode-y?”
“That would be preferable, yes.”
I slipped the bow into my bag, and stood there like an idiot for a minute.
“Do you have another bow?” I asked.
She pointed over to a weapon rack near the wall. One that was quite liberally covered with hay bits left over from the bale explosion. The bows there were basic things, but what more could I expect from practice weaponry? Or what more did I need from practice weaponry?
Saivoer showed me how to string the bow, and let me get a feel for it. She explained there were two main types of archery: war, which was all about arrow volume and not necessarily about aim, and hunting, which was all about aim. She would teach me hunting, since she doubted I would ever be in the position to be part of an arrow volley.
Then, it was practice time. Saivoer was not the best teacher. But also, I was not the best student. I fired arrow after arrow at the target, and my instructor would make constant comments on what I was doing right (very little) and what I was doing wrong (everything else). After an hour though, I could consistently hit the target. That’s when we finally had to stop and Saivoer took a break while I gathered all the arrows.
I took that moment to clear a few notifications, pleased to see that I’d gotten six levels of archery so far. There was definitely an advantage to one-on-one training when it came to leveling up.
She’d pulled a chair over for the next round, and seemed rather relaxed as she pointed out my flaws.
Pulling back too quickly, releasing at the wrong point in my breath, not looking where I ought to be looking, not keeping my feet in line. All sorts of little annoyances, just to make a stick fly. But I didn’t say that out loud. I kept my distaste for archery to myself.
Hour two.
Hour three.
Hour four.
This is where she stopped me from getting arrows. “Do you need a rest, your grace?” She asked.
“No,” I replied. “I need to get this into my arsenal as quickly as possible.”
“Your stamina level is sufficient?”
I nodded. “That it is.”
“It is just, well—”
“What?”
“Your hand is bleeding.”
I looked down. Sure enough, I’d managed to get some rather deep wounds from overuse of the bow.
“Just give it a minute,” I said, “it’ll be fine.”
“Yes, your grace,” she said.
I thought, perhaps, we’d have some sort of conversation. Maybe she’d tell me about her time in the Imperial military. If she’d been a Thingmen the whole time she was an adult. Maybe some stories about where she grew up. I even opened my mouth to ask her a question, but then I realized she was cleaning her fingernails out with a dagger, and doing her best to not look bored out of her minds and I realized she had absolutely zero interest in socializing with me. So I just stared at the clouds. They were big. And white. Some were fluffy. And there was something moving between them. A large creature. At least, I swore I saw it. But the second I blinked, I couldn’t find it again.
I looked down at my arms and my hands, and I flexed everything quickly. No pain.
“Ready,” I said.
“Proceed, your grace,” she replied.
So we were back to work after another boring round of pick-up-pointy-sticks.
Hour five and six were a bit of a blur, and though my physical stamina was doing fine, I could tell that mentally I needed a break. As did Saivoer. I knew she was willing to do whatever her leader, me, told her, but she was definitely bored out of her gourd.
“How about we break until tomor
row?” I said.
“Yes, your grace,” she replied, not even trying to hide the relief in her voice. She walked off before I could even say a quick thank you to her.
I put the bow back on the weapon rack, taking a moment to unstring it.
Looking around, I realized I was mostly alone. So I took out Eona’s bow, pulled out an arrow, and I shot.
Again, a giant boom, the arrow moving faster than my eye could really track. The arrow practically exploded on contact with the wall, hitting with enough force to take a large block of granite down to rubble.
Subtle, it was not. And I was totally meaning to hit the wall, not the target below it.
I put the bow away, and walked off to find Harmut and let him know something had put a chip in his wall.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The assault on the southern gate came as no real surprise to us, we’d been watching Caticorix’s soldiers make their way up our tunnel ever since they came into our tunnel. And it wasn’t a huge thing, they moved a battering ram into place, smashed it against the door over and over again. Arrows were shot at any of my soldiers who peeked over the wall. Nikolai and I had decided that we didn’t want to kill any of the Imperials going up against us, so standing orders for the guards were to harry our attackers instead. Throw rocks at them, dump chamber pots on them, verbal abuse — the sort of elementary school fun I used to engage in on a daily basis. Essie and Mercy got together and made a bit of magic happen, both literally and figuratively. They rerouted some of the underground river so it came splashing down just in front of the doorway. Any time the soldiers started banging on our door, we could open the sluice gates, and a great torrent of water would rush down on them. It probably hurt a bit — it was an impressive amount of water — but, more importantly, it made standing anywhere in front of the gate next to impossible, and sent a great rush of water all the way down the tunnel. Which turned out to also be super useful for keeping the tunnel clear of horse shit. Something I’d come to view as a real problem in this pre-car world. There was always shit somewhere because animals were so ubiquitous in Vuldranni.
