Good Company

by Dale Lucas

  “Tzimena,” Korin said, begging now, “you need to—”

  “I won’t,” she said flatly. “I’m through running. Being a prize. Or a pawn. Let this bastard do with me what he will. I won’t even give him the satisfaction of a scream.”

  The Duke of Erald smiled broadly at that. “Oh, milady . . . challenge accepted. Besides, I think you know running would be pointless. My bowmen are well placed, after all.”

  He gave a single gesture, waving one hand lightly and pointing toward one of the Devils near the front of the line. From somewhere in the distance Tzimena heard a faint twang, and suddenly an arrow buried half its length in the man’s chest. The life went out of him instantly, heart pierced, and he crumpled to the forest floor.

  Tymon grabbed Tzimena and yanked her close, holding her before her like a shield. Orhund had done the same with Korin. Dedrik was on his knees, having already drawn an arrow from his quiver and nocked it, eyes scanning the trees for the hidden archer.

  “There are several of them,” Verin Lyr said. “Well hidden. Do not try to cross me, or you’ll see just how deadly their aim can be.”

  Tymon responded, and though she was behind Tzimena and remained unseen, Tzimena heard something peculiar in the brigand chieftain’s voice.

  “Cagey, sire. Very cagey.”

  From the corner of her eye, Tzimena saw Tymon give a gesture of her own, indicating the herald who had met them at the tree line and who had now delivered the gold. An instant later another arrow flew from the trees behind them and found a home in the man’s left eye. Down he went.

  Verin Lyr stared at his dead companion, then raised his eyes to Tymon. He looked mildly annoyed, not angry or aggrieved or even fearful. “Fair enough,” he said. “We’ve both got bowmen hidden in the trees. With a few more gestures, we could each shower this glade with enough steel points and goose feathers to slaughter the lot of us. But what good would that do?”

  “I agree,” Tymon said. Tzimena could hear the nerves in her voice—the tight control exercised over her natural inclination to fight or flee, her fear tempered by rage and defiance and a desire to just be away from here with the reward that lay just a few feet away on the ground. “We’ve both shown what we’re capable of,” Tymon continued. “What say we forego mutual destruction and just transact some business?”

  Verin Lyr nodded, then indicated the bags of gold lying on the ground nearby. “There’s your bounty,” he said. “Give me my prizes and you can be on your way.”

  Tzimena was about to make a counteroffer of her own when Tymon shoved her roughly forward. Tzimena went plunging toward the Duke of Erald and landed in a heap at his feet. She raised her eyes and glared at him.

  If he touches me, she thought, I’ll bite his fingers off. Let him kill me if he likes . . . I won’t be bought and sold like a broodmare.

  “Get up, darling,” Verin Lyr said from above her, bending down and offering his hand. “This has already taken long enough . . .”

  Tzimena was just about to pull herself up from the ground so that Duke Verin would not lay hands on her. That was when she heard the voice from the tree line. It was a female voice, strong, clear, and familiar.

  “Touch her and you’ll never know what hit you,” Captain Tuvera said.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Torval would have preferred that they make themselves known in a less threatening fashion. Clearly there was already a tense standoff underway here—prisoners being traded for gold, two men lying dead with arrows in them, probably hidden archers in the trees surrounding the clearing. Sundry hells, if those same hidden archers hadn’t been so bloody intent on what was happening in the clearing instead of around it, they might have actually heard the approach of Torval and company as they picked their way through the brush—their stealthiness notwithstanding.

  The lord marshal and Wallenbrand had circled around to the right—on the eastern side of the clearing—while Croften and Elvaris had gone left, to the west. On the south side of the clearing, directly behind the party from the Red Raven’s camp, Torval had joined Captain Tuvera and Galen. The group had agreed to remain quiet and hidden until either help was needed or the lord marshal led an attack. That much they had all concurred upon and deemed “the plan.”

  Unfortunately, when that big woman from the Devils shoved Tzimena to the ground and the man in the cloak who appeared to be buying her made a move to help her to her feet, Captain Tuvera and Galen had thrown the plan out the window. Torval didn’t know precisely what was going through their heads, but he guessed it had to do with their sworn duty to protect the young woman at all costs. One moment they’d all been hunkering down behind a hump of mounded sedge; in the next instant, Tuvera had given Galen an order.

  “Draw,” the captain said quietly. Galen obeyed without question, smoothly couching an arrow on her bow, nocking it and drawing it as the captain stood and strode from her hiding place.

  “Touch her and you’ll never know what hit you,” she said loudly, forcefully.

  Everyone in the clearing turned toward the sound of her voice. Sheathed weapons were drawn. Weapons at rest were lifted and brandished. Torval made a hasty count: six Devils, the buyer who stood above Tzimena, four guards close to him, three more lingering at the pond with their horses. Two of the men in the Raven’s company readied their bows, arrows nocked and drawn. The four cloaked swordsmen behind the buyer spread out in a broad line behind their master. All readied themselves, their stances telling Torval that they were professionals, probably full-time soldiers, not just some other brigand band trying to trade valuable booty with the Devils of the Weald.

  Something was wrong here.

  Captain Tuvera stood alone—armed, yes, armored, certainly, but all alone—with only a single archer hidden in the brush at her back to cover her. Torval turned and searched the treetops nearby, trying to see if he could pick out a hidden archer or two. He thought he saw another secreted guard about twenty yards westward—off to his left—but the greenery was too thick and he couldn’t be sure. He desperately wanted to bolt from cover to stand at Tuvera’s side, but something in him kept him rooted to the spot, a strange sense that this was not his fight unless dire need dictated otherwise, a sense that this was something the captain and her scout would have to play out together, alone.

  For the moment.

  The man in the cloak who’d been moving to help Tzimena to her feet studied Captain Tuvera, threw an irritated glance at Tzimena—still on the ground—then planted his hands on his hips.

  “Who are you, then?” he asked.

  “Captain Tuvera, house guard to the Countess of Toriel, and that young woman’s protector. Step away from her, now, or you’ll be the next corpse on the ground.”

  The man smiled, showing a mix of admiration and irritation. Torval didn’t like that look at all. Who was this man? He didn’t look rough, like the Raven or his own men. Moreover, his exasperated confidence indicated an ingrained sense of superiority that made Torval uneasy.

  “Well, Captain Tuvera, house guard to the Countess of Toriel, and this young woman’s protector, I suggest you drop your sword and tell your archer not to loose that arrow, because you’re speaking to Verin Lyr, Duke of Erald and this young woman’s rightfully betrothed husband.”

  “Cack,” Torval said under his breath.

  Galen lowered her bow and looked to Torval. She looked just as puzzled, just as worried, as he was.

  “I don’t care who you are,” Tuvera continued. To her credit, there was no trepidation in her voice—no indication that she was scared. “That girl is my responsibility until she’s safely ensconced in her new home. Since we’re still in the wild, I’d say I’m still on duty.”

  Torval saw that something was happening. The parties in the clearing were moving. It was a subtle drift, but it was noticeable nonetheless. The swordsmen behind the duke were closing on their master, but fanning out farther around him, putting more space between them to allow for greater range of movement when
the fight began. The Raven’s Devils, meanwhile, were also slowly dispersing, aware that there were new parties on the scene, and that the chance of a confrontation was rising with each passing second. They were scattering themselves—however slowly—so that they wouldn’t present such knotted targets. At least one of them—a bald man with earrings shining in each ear—scanned the tree line calmly, searching for all possible avenues of egress.

  They’re no fools, Torval thought. They know what’s coming.

  “Milord!” someone called from far off to the right.

  Torval and Galen looked. The lord marshal had appeared. He marched out of the tree line, sword sheathed, arms raised in deference. Clearly he didn’t want to be mistaken for an attacker and shot.

  “Good help, at last!” the duke said with a laugh. “Lord Marshal Kroenen, good to see you, sir!”

  Wallenbrand had emerged from hiding, as well. He trailed some distance behind his commander, looking far more suspicious about what was underway and how it might turn out. The lord marshal, for his part, kept his eyes on his master and addressed only him.

  “The people in the brush are mine,” he said. “Two over there”—he pointed to where Torval and Galen were still concealed—“and two more on the far side of the clearing. Let them show themselves. Tell your archers not to fire, if you please.”

  The duke raised his hands and made two tight fists. That done, the lord marshal addressed everyone waiting for his promised signal.

  “Show yourselves!” he called. “The time for games is over! This all ends, here and now!”

  A big, broad man in the Raven’s group drew the bound Red Raven closer to him, a convenient human shield. “What is all this?” he growled.

  That tall, muscular woman who’d thrown the Lady Tzimena at the duke’s feet now reached for her and yanked her back into her arms. She drew Tzimena close, a knife to her throat, and began a slow turn, scanning the whole of the clearing and the tree line surrounding it.

  Torval looked to Galen. “It’s time,” he said.

  Galen nodded and stepped out of the brush. Torval followed from the opposite side of the tree that had been sheltering them. Over on the far side of the clearing, Croften and Elvaris had appeared, moving forward slowly, cautiously. Two of the three guards on horse duty left their charges and approached the swordmaid and the mercenary, probably to dissuade any hasty action. Torval hated the thickness of the air—the sense of menace and hazard—now laying heavily upon the glade. This was when things went awry, when there were too many beating hearts and bared blades in one place at one time.

  The duke finally lowered his balled fists and surveyed the scene, betraying no trepidation, only endless amusement.

  “A dwarf?” the duke said upon seeing Torval. “Where’d you acquire a dwarf, old friend?”

  “One of the city guards from Yenara,” the lord marshal explained. “He and his partner—lost to us—were the ones who caught your brother.”

  “Watchwarden!” Torval barked. “Not city guard!”

  “You couldn’t shake him?” the duke asked, eyeing Torval as if he were a stray cat that kept begging for milk.

  The lord marshal shrugged. “He and his companion were coming to claim the reward, sire. The gold pieces promised on the Wanted circulars.”

  The duke nodded, then indicated the bags of gold lying before the Devils. “Bad news, my little friend. I’m cash-poor at present . . . unless you can solve that problem for me.”

  Torval stared back at the grinning fool. “And how do you propose I do that?” he asked. He hated the man instantly—the smug, entitled, little whelp.

  “Well, it’s very simple,” the duke said, raising his voice so that all in the clearing could hear. “I am the Duke of Erald. I am fabulously wealthy. And if I’m not mistaken, these poor, shabby Devils of the Weald are now far outnumbered. So if the lot of you who came here with the lord marshal could just assist my men in mopping them up—”

  Torval heard a gasp. It was Tzimena. The tall woman who held her at knifepoint had suddenly tightened her hold, forcing that surprised breath out of her prisoner.

  “Try it and she dies,” the woman said, pressing the blade of her dagger against Tzimena’s dark, olive-skinned throat.

  The big man holding the Raven was playing the same game, his big war club having been thrown down in favor of a jagged knife of his own, its point pressed into the Raven’s ribs.

  “Is this how you’d betray those who would treat with you fairly, good duke?” the big man asked.

  The archers in the Devils’ midst had their bows half drawn now, circling, searching for potential threats and targets.

  Torval could feel the situation spiraling out of control. He tightened his grip on his maul. It would happen soon now. Any moment . . .

  In answer to the big man’s challenge, the duke nodded. “It is. I was perfectly happy to pay you and get my prizes in return, but now the situation has changed, and I’d like my gold back.”

  “There will be no prizes,” the woman who held Tzimena said. “Threaten us again and your bride-to-be dies.”

  “Did you not hear my intention to kill her myself?” the duke asked.

  Torval heard Captain Tuvera draw a breath. No, she hadn’t heard that.

  “So go on,” the duke continued. “Kill them if you like. Then my soldiers will kill you, and I can go back to my city knowing that my gold will remain in my coffers and these two unfortunate walking, talking complications will be beyond my concern.”

  Where would it come from? Torval wondered. Who would start it? And when it did come, whose side would he be on? Whose side would anyone be on? If Tzimena died, would her bodyguards make for the duke, to kill him in answer? If Torval fought alongside Tuvera and Galen and Elvaris in Tzimena’s name, would he be fighting Wallenbrand? Croften? The lord marshal? And there was still the matter of how many men the duke actually boasted. Seven visible in the glade, but there had to be more in the trees . . .

  Too many variables. Too many complications. Too many threats to be rightly assessed and prioritized.

  Someone screamed—pure shock and surprise. That scream mingled with a sound like something enormous being broken, the bones of a giant snapped by a bad fall, the creaking of old wood and the rustling of leaves.

  Movement drew all their eyes to the southeastern edge of the clearing. A big cedar on a knoll just beyond the tree line was swaying back and forth, bending forward toward them. Up in it, an archer was clinging to a thick limb for dear life, legs already loose, dangling, kicking empty air.

  Something gigantic and angry was twisting the tree, pressing on it, applying pressure until—

  Its roots tore loose and the whole tree teetered. The sound was slow, gradual, but the effect came suddenly. One moment the tree shook and bent precariously, the next it was falling. The archer on the high limb lost his grip and plunged along with the toppling tree. The huge trunk, almost a hundred feet high, swept right down into the clearing like the hand of an angry god falling out of the sky to swat an unrepentant sinner. All those in the middle of the clearing scattered like ants, and the cedar came crashing down. Its impact sent up a great cloud of dust, dirt, and fallen leaves, obscuring the world around them and shaking the ground.

  Torval retreated instinctively. As he coughed dust from his lungs and blinked stinging earth from his eyes, he tried desperately to scan the clearing again and figure out what was happening, what had brought that tree down into their midst like that.

  And then, he saw it, standing tall and proud and ugly where the base of the cedar now stood, its torn-up roots stretching every which way in an arboreal corona.

  It was the troll. That gods-damned, bone-snapping, flesh-eating troll from the day before! The beast stood there, blinking dumbly, as though it was just as amazed at its feat as any witness might have been. Then it looked to the clearing, saw the staring eyes and pale faces of everyone who’d just scrambled to avoid being crushed, and roared. The roar was long a
nd loud, one of challenge and defiance.

  Its companions showed themselves: the female, the young buck with the war hammer, the ax swinger, the spearman, that blasted goblin with its deadly bow—and finally their chief: the big orc with the triple braids trailing from its otherwiseshorn skull. Arrayed for battle, the orcs roared and raised their weapons high before bounding down the knoll-side, charging toward the humans scattered about the clearing on either side of the great fallen tree.

  Finally Torval had a target, knew whom to fight—whom to kill.

  He raised a hoarse, hearty battle cry of his own and rushed to meet them.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Rem watched from hiding—helpless, hopeless—as Gnusha’s Blades charged down the gentle slope toward the clearing and the groups of armed fighters waiting there. It wasn’t his plan to stay here indefinitely, but he’d wanted to get some sense of what was unfolding, who the combatants were, and just what was at stake before he ran—unarmed—into the midst of all that insanity and tried to find his own useful place in it.

  As they’d watched the proceedings, hadn’t he urged Gnusha to do the same, if unsuccessfully?

  Just minutes ago, they’d been quietly hidden up here, wholly unknown to those in the clearing below.

  “They’re making a trade,” Rem had quietly explained to his captors. They were too far away to hear any of the words spoken if they were not shouted, but Rem recognized Tzimena and the Red Raven well enough, even at a distance. “That man in the cloak is buying those two prisoners.”

  “Buying, he,” Gnusha rumbled thoughtfully. He looked to Rem. “Being brigand, must be. Buying, selling people, do only brigands.”

  Rem nodded. Anytime Rem was tempted to dismiss Gnusha’s thought processes as slow or backward simply due to his halting speech, he needed only look into the orc’s pale-green eyes to remember how wrong he was. This war band leader, however fearsome and brutish he might appear, was an individual of uncommon charisma and a warrior of unparalleled valor. Speaking another tongue was never easy, after all. How much harder would it be if your mouth and jaws weren’t even shaped for it?