Blood Of The Righteous

by J. E. Sandoval

Lord General Sagoroth sat in his den, sipping brandy, staring into the fire. Even though it was summer, nights this close to the Blackrock mountains tended to get a little chilly. Things had quieted down here in Ironshield over the past few years. The people were generally content, crime was down, and there was no immediate threat to the nation.

  Suddenly the roaring fire died completely. Sagaroth jumped to his feet and grabbed for his hellfire blade. There was the stench of sulfur, then a blinding flash of light.

  “Lord Sagaroth,” Dameus said as the fire roared back to life.

  Sagaroth set his sword down, but still within reach. “Necromancer Dameus. To what do I owe this ‘pleasure’?”

  “I’ve just heard from one of my spies in the Eddington household. It would seem that the body we discovered in the kitchen at the Ki Kalendeen castle was not the young boy.”

  Sagaroth looked at Dameus quizzically. “David is alive?”

  “Indeed he is. His brother and sister found him. They are staying near the Eddington’s castle. I need a small contingent of men from your personal guards. A dozen or so should be enough. I have spoken with Kadeus, and they are transporting us to Lystra in one hour.”

  “Why don’t you just do it?”

  “There would be a very small chance that we didn’t all end up there inside out. No, Lord General, multiple necromancers are needed to transport more than oneself.”

  Sagaroth groaned. He hated traveling via magic transportation. “What do you want the men for?”

  “By now, Ki Kalendeen Castle has been taken over by squatters. I want your men to use thin blades to create some corpses for me. We’ll need undead guards. We are going to bring the children of Lord Alexander back to their ancestral home, and kill them.”

  * * * * * *

  A knock on her door woke Eleenia up. She groggily got up and walked across the wooden floor of her small room. “Who is it?” she asked.

  “It’s me, El,” David answered. “The banquet is in two hours, miss sleepy head. You’ve slept through breakfast and lunch.”

  “Okay, I’ll be down in a few.” El still couldn’t believe he was alive. “We did stay up until sunrise, you know.”

  “Yeah, some of us aren’t as young as we used to be.”

  “Brat,” El said.

  Within a half hour, she was bathed and dressed in the beautiful gown Lady Eddington had sent to her. She made her way down to the common room of the inn. David wolf-whistled at seeing her. El’s blush made them both chuckle.

  Gabriel was dressed in his Holy Defender outfit. David had purchased a new outfit, a pair of trousers, some new boots, a frilly shirt, and a beautiful maroon jacket. His blonde hair was pulled back and tied into a pony tail. He wore his saber and their father’s dagger. It didn’t matter. He still looked extremely roguish.

  “Here, El,” Gabriel said. “I’ve saved you a little stew and bread.”

  “Thank you,” she said. It was very kind of Gabriel, as she was starving.

  As she ate, David continued to tell of his adventures and the friends he made, along with the enemies.

  “With Karinga in that much trouble with the guild, are you glad to be off his ship?” Gabriel asked.

  “To be honest, I’m just glad to be with my family again. I still can’t figure out who the saboteur was when we fought Donegal.” He took a long drag from the apple juice he was drinking.

  “We got to see Nana Jolina and Drake on our way here. Remember that hunting lodge we stayed at near the family crypt? They bought it and run it. They even have Father’s hunting dog,” Gabriel said.

  “Really? I can’t wait to see Jake again! Maybe they’ll let us take him back with us!”

  El set down her cup of juice. “It was them that gave us the first real confirmation that you were still alive. When they buried the body there, she said it didn’t have the scar I stitched up for you.”

  “Yeah, and that that body actually had a visible manhood.” They all laughed at Gabriel’s joke.

  They continued to chat and drink non-alcoholic drinks until it was time to head to the castle for the banquet. Eleenia received seven thank you’s on the way there. She also caught many an eye being in her dress.

  Lady Eddington was waiting for them when they got there with her little girl.

  “Miss Eleenia! You look beautiful!” Arianna exclaimed as she ran over to Eleenia, who scooped her up.”

  “David,” Laurel said, “It is so good to see you again. I want to offer my most sincere condolences on the loss of your family.”

  “Thank you, Lady Eddington. I’m just happy you and your father got out of there in time. How is Master Lubik these days?”

  “I’m afraid he succumbed to the hack lung two winters ago.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” David said.

  “Thank you. Anyway, let’s get you three to the great hall.”

  “Father has a surprise for you, Miss Eleenia,” Arianna said.

  “He does? That’s wonderful!”

  The five of them made their way through the castle. Lady Eddington made sure they avoided the more garish pictures of Lord Richard. When they got to the great hall, their senses were assailed by every kind of food imaginable! A suckling pig was the centerpiece of the feast table. Ham, beef, pheasant under glass, and every side dish, pastry, and fruit imaginable lined the large table.

  “Wow,” David said. “I haven’t seen a spread like that since Lady Branvold last hosted the Feast of the Christ Child.”

  They took their seats, Gabriel at Eleenia’s right and David at her left. The guests filed in rather quickly until the entire hall was filled. Lord Eddington entered the room with his entourage, with the ever-present Sir Marcus at his side. When he reached the head of the household’s table, he took a seat at the center.

  “Isn’t it a bit odd that Sir Marcus is at his right and Lady Eddington is on his left?” Gabriel asked Eleenia.

  “Not really. I find that Lord Eddington follows protocols only when it suits him,” she answered.

  Lord Eddington stood up and held up his hands. The entire room went quiet almost immediately. “Ladies and Gentlemen of New Portsmouth, we are here today to honor a brilliant healer who has saved our city from the plague of Snakepox, and most of all, saved the life of my beloved wife.”

  “Whatever, Lord Shlort,” Eleenia whispered to David, who tried to contain his laughter.

  “Eleenia Ki Kalendeen, as is the law here in New Portsmouth, I hereby offer your hand in marriage to my judicial champion, Sir Marcus!”

  The entire audience gasped with disbelief. What a lucky girl Eleenia was, they thought.

  “What?” El screamed. She stood up, knocking her chair over backwards. “You can’t do that! I don’t want to marry him!”

  “I’m sorry, but unless you can produce a champion who also wants your hand, you have no choice in the matter.”

  “No! You can’t!” El grabbed the bottle of wine off the table and, with fury in her eyes, she smashed it on the ground. She ran out of the room, which erupted in murmuring gossip.

  David and Gabriel looked at one another questioningly.

  “What the hell just happened?” David asked. “Can he do that?”

  Gabriel shrugged. “From what I know about Aragil law, yes, he can. Even to non-Aragil citizens. King Dorian has given a lot of powers to the nobility.”

  “Is there anything we can do?”

  “Let’s go try to calm El down,” Gabriel said. “This might actually be a good thing.”

  David rolled his eyes. “A good thing? Are you joking? Gabriel, you saw how upset she was! If she doesn’t want it, we as her family have to do everything in our power to help her!”

  “I know, but Sir Marcus is a popular public figure here. He would provide her with a home and some status.”

  David untied his pony tail and shook his blonde locks f
ree. “I want to talk to her and get her take on the subject. Let’s go. Oh, and I want to stop by the castle library first.”

  * * * * * *

  Gabriel knocked on Eleenia’s door. “El, please let me come in.”

  “No! Go away!”

  He knocked again. “El, please! I want you to go talk to Sir Marcus. Maybe you’ll like him.”

  A loud crash of something ceramic hit against the door. “Damn it, Gabriel! Even if I were to like him, I don’t want someone else telling me how to live! You don’t understand!”

  Gabriel gave an exasperated sigh. “You try.”

  David walked over and gently knocked on the door. “El, please let me in.”

  “Why?!?”

  “I have something that might help you.”

  The latch on the door turned and Eleenia opened the door. She immediately threw herself on her bed and began to sob.

  David sat on the edge of the bed. He sat the large book he carried on the floor. “Eleenia, look at me. Look at me!”

  She rolled over and sat up. Her eyes were bright red and wet with tears.

  David grabbed her trembling hands. “El, I promise you that you won’t have to marry Sir Marcus.”

  El and Gabriel both stared at him astonished that he would make such a claim.

  “Over the last four years, I’ve killed men for less than the honor of my sister. If worse comes to worst, I’ll sneak into Sir Marcus’ room and slit his throat while he sleeps. No one will ever know I was there.”

  Gabriel gasped. “David! You wouldn’t!”

  David turned to him, murder in his eyes. “Yes, I would, I can, and I will. But first…” He picked up the large book. “This is the most recent copy of Aragil law. Look through it. See if we can find a legal way out of it. You may not like Sir Marcus, but his life is now in your hands.”

  Eleenia threw herself on David in a hug. “Thank you, David. I owe you everything.”

  “Buy me a cold creamed whiskey and we’ll call it even.”

  Eleenia laughed a little through her tears. She immediately grabbed the book, looked through the table of contents, and thumbed her way to a specific page. After reading a few minutes, her eyes went wide. “That’s it! Listen! If a woman is promised to a man by the local lord, another man who wants her hand can issue a challenge, which will result in a martial contest of a joust. If the joust is inconclusive, the battle will continue with the sword. Now listen to this part. If no suitor will issue a challenge, the woman can also be championed by her father or an older brother!”

  They both looked to Gabriel hopefully.

  “I am not that good of a jouster, but if it comes right down to it, I’ll do it.”

  El slumped in relief. “Thank you, Gabriel.”

  “But, first I am going to go talk to Sir Marcus. I am going to try to convince him to renounce his claim. David, I would like you to come with me. He doesn’t like me and he might react violently.”

  David smiled. “Want me there to keep you from getting your hind end kicked?”

  “No, I want you there to make sure I don’t kill him. And in case he is with his friends and there are more of them than I can handle.”

  “So yes, you want me there to keep you from getting your hind end kicked.” David slugged Gabriel playfully on the shoulder. “I would be honored, Brother Gabriel, Knight of the Holy Defenders, to be thy second, and thus keepeth thou from getting thine holy ass kickethed.”

  Gabriel laughed. “Come on, we better go soon. Sir Marcus is a heavy drinker, and with the spread they had at that feast, we want to make sure he can still think clearly.”

  * * * * * *

  The sickly yellow light filled the room as Dameus raised the 28 murdered squatters. He had been impressed. Sagaroth’s men had only spoiled three of the corpses with excessive damage. Not that he would give him any praise for it, though.

  The old Ki Kalendeen castle was a mess. The junk left from the squatters wasn’t really his concern. He had sent several men down to the dungeons to make sure the cells were intact, as well as up the main tower. Lord Ki Kalendeen was known to keep a very good sturdy lock on his bedroom door, and he suspected that no one had been able to breach it.

  The 28 newly raised undead rose in unison and looked at him with their pale, dead eyes, waiting for instructions.

  “Stay here until you are needed,” he ordered.

  “Lord Dameus,” a solder said, entering the room. He looked warily at the undead. “The lock on the door of the main bedroom has not been breached. I talked to Sergeant Bogg. The dungeons need to be cleaned up a bit, but the cells are still usable.”

  “Good.” Dameus turned to the undead. “Go down to the dungeons and clean them up. Take any bodies you find over to the incinerator. Do as Sergeant Bogg tells you. Soldier, send Bogg down to the incinerator and inform him of the duties he is to perform. Then fetch General Sagaroth. Inform him that he and I will leave for New Portsmouth tonight.”

  “Yes, sir.” The soldier left quickly. The undead were far too unnatural.

  * * * * * *

  Gabriel and David entered the Great Hall of Eddington Castle. The feast was winding down. About half of the guests had left, and the others were dancing, drinking, and picking at the desserts.

  David motioned to a few figures in a shadowy corner. “I think that’s him.” The two walked over to the corner. Sir Marcus was with a plump serving girl, his face in her cleavage and hand up her skirt.

  “Sir Marcus, I’d like a word,” Gabriel said, tapping the large knight on the shoulder.

  “Piss off, Churcher!” Marcus said with a slur. He returned to the moaning woman’s breasts.

  “Sir Marcus, I apologize for interrupting one of your last nights of carousing, but...”

  “Last nights?” Sir Marcus interrupted. “HA!” He turned and poked Gabriel in the chest. “If you think I have to stop bedding other women just because I’m married to that whore, you’re a fool.”

  “Excuse me?” Gabriel said, pushing the finger from his chest.

  “In fact, I’m giving Lord Eddington first night! And he’s going to bugger the bitch!” Marcus tried to go back to the serving girl’s cleavage.

  A long-distant memory of Gabriel losing his cool and going into a rage flashed through David’s mind. In an inn near the family crypt the year before Alexander was sent off to the University at Avonshire, a group of the owner’s grandsons were trading insults with Alexander and Gabriel. At one point, they had called Lady Ki Kalendeen a whoring heifer who pleasured the stable hands behind the castle. Gabriel had stood in stunned silence for a few seconds, then his eyes went wide, his skin flushed red, and he set upon all four boys and beat them senseless until Father had pulled him and Alexander out of the fray. Gabriel had the exact same look in his eyes now. David gingerly took a step back.

  Gabriel’s scream of rage drew the attention of everyone in the dining hall. He grabbed Sir Marcus by the back of his long brown hair, pulled him backwards into a trip, and the large man’s head smacked against the stone floor. Gabriel was straddling him with his knees on the knight’s arms a fraction of a second later. He landed gloved fist after fist on Sir Marcus’ quickly-bloodying face.

  Cheering and boos echoed throughout the large room as Lord Eddington called for the castle guards. David figured it was time to get involved before Gabriel either killed him or wound up in the dungeons.

  “Gabriel,” he said as he tried to restrain his enraged brother. “Gabriel, it’s over. He’s out cold. Come on, Gabriel, time to stop.” He caught one of Gabriel’s arms and held it. The Holy Defender turned and stared into David’s eyes. Slowly the rage started to melt and David pulled his brother off of the unconscious judicial champion.

  “What is the mean
ing of this?!?” Lord Eddington screamed. “I’ll have you both thrown into the pit for this!”

  David held up his hands. “My lord, my brother merely issued a challenge to Sir Marcus’ claim to my sister’s hand. He is within his legal right to do so according to King Dorian’s laws.” David pat Gabriel on the shoulder as his brother tried to compose himself.

  “This is far beyond issuing a challenge, Ki Kalendeen! He beat my champion senseless! Guards! Take them!”

  “Now hold on there, Lord Eddington! I read that particular law myself. According to tradition, a challenge may be issued by the challenger striking his opponent with a leather glove.” He grabbed Gabriel’s hand. “As you can see, my brother is wearing leather gloves. There is nothing in the law that specifies whether or not a fist may be present in it, nor how many times the opponent may be struck!”

  The crowd laughed, which only made Eddington even more angry.

  “Surely the mighty Lord of New Portsmouth, inspiration to the people and slayer of the mighty wickeraks would not send a man merely challenging for the honor of his sister to the dungeons while he was merely following the King’s law!”

  The crowd murmured in agreement. The guards paused.

  Eddington pursed his lips. “Fine! Assuming that Sir Marcus is ready, the joust will be held the day after tomorrow at high noon.”

  “Very wise decision, my lord,” David said. He grabbed Gabriel by the arm and rushed him out.

  “Wait!” Gabriel said.

  “Be quiet. Come on, let’s go. I got us out of a few nights in a cell. Now come with me.”

  The two beat a hasty retreat out of the castle.

  * * * * * *

  “Oh my God, El! You should have seen it!!!” David said entering Eleenia’s room.

  Eleenia looked outside her room. “Where’s Gabriel?”

  “He went back to his room to pray. It was magnificent!”

  El shrugged, closed, and locked the door. “Did he issue the challenge?”

  “He almost got us thrown in the dungeon! Lord Eddington was furious! Sir Marcus insulted you, announced his less than honorable intentions, and Gabriel snapped! Threw him on the ground and beat him senseless in front of everyone! I had to pull him off of Marcus before he killed him with his bare hands!” David was almost bursting with glee.