The Way of Pain

by Gregory Mattix

  She slipped in her shock, falling on her rump and sending Iris tumbling hard to the slushy ground. Icy water soaked Sianna’s breeches, and her left wrist bent painfully, but fortunately, she was right-handed.

  “Ho there, little princess!” a Nebaran said. “Good fortune for us today.” He raised his sword and stalked toward her, the other three close at his heels.

  Sianna wrenched her short sword free of its scabbard and stabbed the surprised man in the knee. He cried out and staggered back into his companions. She scrambled to her feet, standing over Iris protectively.

  “Nobody said she’s a fighter,” another soldier said, but he didn’t seem displeased. He had an ugly smile on his face that had no humor in it. “I like a wench who gots some fight in ’em.”

  Sianna lunged, not wanting to give them the opportunity to surround her. The second soldier parried her blade aside and followed up with a lazy slash that she easily evaded.

  “Behind us!” Iris cried. She had gotten to her feet and held her improvised staff in shaking hands.

  Two Nebarans came at Sianna simultaneously. She had never sparred against two opponents before but noted the man on the left was obstructed by a log or something partially buried beneath the snow. He stumbled for a moment, his strike awkward.

  Sianna hopped to her left, evading a slash from the man on her right, and stabbed the off-balance soldier in the bicep. The sharp tip of her sword pierced his mail and lodged in the meat of his arm.

  The soldier yelped in pain, pulling back, and nearly tugged Sianna’s sword free, but she managed to maintain her grip.

  Too late. The man on her right was stabbing at her, about to skewer her kidney. She braced herself for the sharp stab of pain that would end her.

  An arrow suddenly sprouted from the man’s ribs with a meaty thwack, knocking him a couple steps back. He probed at the arrow, puzzlement on his face, before collapsing forward, nearly burying Sianna, but she managed to hop out of the way.

  She didn’t have time to consider her good fortune. She now faced three foes, two injured. And however many more are coming up behind, she thought, reminded by the splashing of slush and jingling of mail behind them.

  The Nebarans before her were suddenly fighting for their lives. Three figures charged them from out of a stand of pines: a lean, older man who seemed somehow vaguely familiar; a cowled figure with a dagger in hand; and another slim young man with a staff.

  Sianna didn’t realize the third person was actually a woman with close-cropped dark hair until after she dispatched her foe by knocking his sword free with her staff, then twirling it around and smashing him in the temple with a brutal strike.

  The others made quick work of their foes as well. The older man’s sword was as quick as a striking snake, slashing through one Nebaran’s defenses and punching through his chest. The cowled figure appeared surprisingly strong for his size, overpowering his opponent by bashing his sword aside and cleaving him open from shoulder to sternum with the long dagger.

  Sianna whirled at Iris’s scream.

  Her handmaiden swung her cudgel at the first attacker who had caught up to them—the veteran with the hooded eyes. Her clumsy weapon was no threat to the assassin. He laughed and caught her cudgel with one hand, yanking the big stick from her grip, then swung it right back at Iris’s head. The stick probably would’ve cracked her skull open had another arrow not shot past the veteran’s ear, disrupting his swing as he ducked.

  Iris backed away with a surprised gasp. A full dozen Nebarans were pushing forward to surround her and Iris, some with blood on their clothes and weapons.

  Rafe’s blood, Sianna thought sadly.

  She grabbed Iris’s arm and pulled her protectively behind her and their three unlikely rescuers. She saw the three new arrivals—make that four, as another young man with a bow stepped from the trees—moved to place themselves between her and the Nebarans.

  “Princess Sianna, if I’m not mistaken,” the older warrior said calmly with a respectful nod. His eyes took in her bared sword, tip coated in blood, and approval shone in his eyes. “All grown up now. You’re a sight to give one hope in such times.” He had long black hair, pale blue eyes, and a vertical scar beneath his right eye. He would’ve looked fearsome were it not for the honest smile on his face. “My, aren’t these woods just crawling with Nebaran scum today?”

  Sianna struggled to place the man’s face as the other three spread out around him, ready for a fight.

  “Begone! This doesn’t concern you lot,” Hooded Eyes said, obviously wary of the newcomers. He glanced back at the eleven men behind him and, reassured by their superiority of numbers, advanced another step.

  “We don’t take orders from Nebaran shite,” the warrior with the ice-blue eyes said with steely calm.

  “Aye. How in the Abyss are these whoresons so close to Llantry?” Shining purple eyes flashed beneath the cloaked figure’s cowl, and the voice gave the impression of a woman though it was strangely hollow and emotionless.

  “How indeed?” replied the young man with the bow. He stood to Iris’s right, with the young woman with the staff a step in front of him. “Care to explain?” He had shoulder-length dark-brown hair and was slender of build, fairly handsome, with striking rust-colored eyes that had a dangerous gleam in them.

  “You had your chance. No more talking—take them! Spare none but the princess.” Hooded Eyes attacked the young man with the bow.

  Before his strike could get close, the short-haired woman exploded into motion. She stepped forward, easily sweeping his sword aside with her staff, and punched him in the throat. The veteran choked and staggered back a step, and the young woman spun, her foot lashing out and connecting hard with the man’s face. He flopped to the ground. Two more men took his place. The young woman spun, her staff twirling nimbly to deflect a pair of strikes, then she kicked the knee of the man to her right. As he was collapsing with a cry, the end of her staff thunked into his face with a swift jab.

  Sianna, seeing the woman’s other opponent was readying a strike, took advantage of the brief opening and stabbed him through the chest.

  Her other two allies were carving through the Nebarans as well. In a few seconds, half their number were down. Two more fell shortly after. The remaining four apparently didn’t like their chances, for they turned and fled. The young man fired an arrow, taking one of them in the back. The cowled woman ran another one down, grasping the back of his cloak and arresting his momentum so abruptly his feet left the ground and he fell hard on his back. Her right hand drove the dagger through the top of his skull. The woman with the staff swiftly overtook the remaining two, running and sliding in the snow between them, her staff whipping up and entangling their legs. The two went crashing down facefirst into the slushy ground.

  “Surrender, and mayhap the princess will show mercy,” the older man said.

  The remaining two wisely tossed their blades aside. The others were dead, dying, or unconscious.

  “I thank you all for your timely aid,” Sianna said. She approached the older man who had recognized her. “Do I know you, sir? I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage.”

  He bowed. “Dakarai Creel, Highness. At your service.”

  She suddenly realized where she’d seen him. “The monster hunter! I was but a girl when my father hired you.”

  “Aye, you’ve a good memory, Highness.” Creel smiled. “Let me introduce my companions. The youths are Taren and Ferret, and the whirlwind with the staff is Mira.”

  “Well met, all of you. I am Sianna… Queen of Ketania now, by woeful happenstance. My mother was murdered in her chambers, and we were fortunate to escape. This is Iris, and…” She trailed off as she remembered Rafe. “Apologies, I must see if our guardsman survived! He bought us valuable time to escape, at the price of his own life, I fear.” She wiped at her eyes, which suddenly teared up at the thought of Rafe hacked to pieces. “Wait here, Iris. I’ll be back soon.”

  She ran back down the p
ath, Creel and Ferret joining her. Three Nebaran corpses lay in the clearing where they’d rested earlier. A trail of blood led off through the trees, the snow trampled flat by many boots.

  “Someone is ahead—fallen through ice by the sound of it,” Creel warned.

  They crested a small rise following the trail of blood and saw Rafe, struggling weakly to pull himself from a frozen-over pond. He’d apparently been running and fighting to draw off the Nebarans and had fallen through the thin ice. His skin was nearly blue, and the water swirled crimson around him.

  “Rafe, hang on! Can we free him?” Sianna asked.

  “Aye, we’ll get him.” Creel fished around in his pack and pulled out a rope. He tossed it to Rafe.

  At first, the guard didn’t seem to take notice even though it landed a few inches from his arm. Then he slowly gripped the rope, eyes rising until he was staring at Sianna and the other two.

  Creel and Ferret gripped the rope and heaved the big guard free. Once he was up on the shore, the two gripped his arms and half carried him up the slope.

  “Rafe! Oh, thank Sol you’re alive.” Sianna peered at his wounds, afraid of what she would find. His mail shirt was gashed, and blood had soaked his surcoat and tunic in a couple places, particularly his arm, and his thigh was also bleeding freely.

  “Aye, Your Majesty. I fear I might not be for long, though.” His voice was barely more than a whisper, and he was shivering badly, teeth chattering.

  “Your friend will freeze to death if we don’t get him warmed up quickly,” Creel said. “I don’t like the idea of camping so near where we were ambushed, but your man needs some attention. There was a clearing back there, a short way west of the others. Any idea how many of these bastards are out here in the woods?”

  Sianna shook her head. “I can’t imagine they had more than a couple score to attack the castle. These were likely the remaining assassins. We should question the survivors to make sure.”

  Ferret shocked Sianna by lifting Rafe in her arms although the big man was almost thrice her size. At least Sianna guessed so, for Ferret’s figure was obscured with her bulky clothes. She carried Rafe with ease as they made their way back to the others. Once there, they found the surviving Nebarans had been trussed to a tree. Three remained alive, the rest dead.

  Creel briefly consulted with Taren, then they retreated to the clearing he had mentioned, about fifty paces away. Ferret set Rafe down on a log then went back to stand guard over the prisoners. Taren went about clearing space for a campfire. Mira retrieved firewood though it was mostly wet.

  Sianna marveled at how well the group worked in concert, needing little conversation to coordinate their activities. She opened her mouth to ask what Taren was doing, for he was holding his hands over a stack of damp kindling, his eyes gleaming strangely as if a fire was already reflected in them. Before she could voice her question, flames licked at the kindling as if conjured by his hands, and a moment later, the wood took to light, sizzling as the moisture swiftly evaporated. He gently fed some larger branches on top, which smoked badly at first but then caught fire when they dried. After a few minutes, a bonfire was blazing, the heat welcoming.

  Nice trick.

  Creel helped Rafe out of his surcoat, mail, and soaked clothes, leaving the shivering guard sitting naked before the fire. Sianna blushed and turned away before Creel brought him a blanket, which he wrapped around his shoulders. Mira and Taren dragged another large log over beside the fire.

  “Your Majesty?” Taren asked quietly, somewhat shyly, Sianna thought. “Would you and your lady care to sit by the fire?”

  “Yes, thank you.” She smiled and nodded gratefully to the young man, who looked about the same age as her. Iris thanked them as well, and the two women sat huddled before the blessed warmth of the flames. Sianna realized how cold she truly was, for her breeches had gotten soaked when she fell earlier, and her skin felt as though it was going numb.

  “Please, sit. There’s room for more.” She smiled at her rescuers.

  Taren sat on the log near Sianna after a moment, with Mira joining him to his other side.

  “He’ll be fine,” Creel pronounced after inspecting Rafe’s wounds. He produced a bone needle and some gut string and tore strips from a spare tunic in his pack to use for bandages. He tossed Rafe’s slashed and bloodstained surcoat with the House Atreus falcon into the fire. “It will draw too much attention—we need to move swiftly and stealthily once we are rested.”

  Rafe stared into the fire obliviously with glazed eyes.

  “Here.” Creel stuck a silver flask into his hands. “It’ll help warm you up.”

  The guard grunted and took a cautious swig. His face scrunched up a moment, then he drank a bit more. He winced as Creel stitched up a deep gash in his thigh and bandaged the rest of his wounds, which were shallow enough to not require stitches.

  “Thank you, again,” Sianna said as Rafe mumbled his own thanks. “We would’ve certainly died back there without your aid.”

  Taren spoke up. “It was our pleasure. We arrived right when the Weave wanted us to, right?”

  He glanced at Mira, who smiled and nodded. Sianna sensed that was an ongoing topic of conversation between them.

  Creel left the clearing, and Sianna could barely make out his conversation with Ferret. A couple minutes passed before he returned to the fire and sat on a stone across from Sianna. He took the flask from Rafe’s unresisting hand, and she saw the big man had fallen asleep or unconscious, chin lowered to his chest.

  “Your Majesty,” Creel said, “we’d better decide what to do with these men we captured. I’m afraid it’s too dangerous to simply let them go.”

  Suddenly, Sianna felt exhausted, the weight of duty heavy on her shoulders, and she wished she could nod off to sleep before the warm fire as Rafe had and let someone else make the decisions. But she couldn’t. She was the rightful Queen of Ketania, and she had to lead. And the decision she faced was a heavy one: to decide the fates of three men—enemies, assassins who had sought to murder them in the keep. They did murder Mother and Sir Colm, Brother Horst, the kitchen boy, and many others.

  “We’ll question them first, and then I’ll decide their fates.” The voice didn’t sound like hers at all—it was stern and decisive.

  Creel nodded and rose, slipping the flask into a pocket and drawing a dagger. He headed off toward the prisoners, and Sianna got to her feet with a sigh. She realized if she was going to tell him to kill those men, she needed to have the courage to look them in the eye first and make her decision. She caught up to Creel a moment later.

  “Time to talk,” Creel growled. He eyed the three captives, Hooded Eyes and two younger men. “How many more of you are out there in these woods? And how did you get into the castle to murder the queen?”

  The three exchanged glances before the veteran spoke. One eye was swollen shut, and his nose was crooked. Dried blood caked his mouth and chin.

  “Free us, and I’ll tell you everything I know,” he said in a thick Nebaran accent.

  “Tell us what you know, and the queen shall decide,” Creel replied evenly.

  The Nebaran studied Sianna with his dark eyes.

  This is the man who ordered the deaths of Iris and the others. Perhaps he slit Mother’s throat, killed people in their sleep in the castle. He would have let his men rape Iris and me.

  She felt something cold grow inside her, keen and hard like the steel of her sword, honed by the whetstone, and she knew then what her orders would be—the necessary choice.

  The veteran evidently saw his death in her face, for he sighed in resignation. “Will you make it quick if I talk?”

  Creel nodded.

  “We attacked the castle with fifty men. Colonel Cornix and the warlord had it set up. We magicked into the castle bailey and fell upon the guards then everyone we could find. Cornix himself cut the queen’s throat.” He looked away, seeing Sianna’s pain and rage. “I had a score and two men remaining to search the woods
upon the warlord’s orders. I think you lot accounted for most of them there.” He nodded back toward where they had fought. “The warlord and colonel left by way of magic once the deed was done.”

  “We put down three more before we came upon you, Majesty,” Creel said. “That’s likely close to all of them. I’ve heard of this Colonel Cornix—the Butcher of Almanes, a murdering whoreson whose crimes were too great for even the imperial army to stomach.”

  “Aye, just so,” Hooded Eyes responded. “The warlord thought he would be a good attack dog, so she freed him and set him loose.”

  “A mad, rabid dog,” Creel muttered.

  “Tell me of this warlord, this Nesnys,” Sianna demanded. “How did she come to be in charge of the emperor’s forces?”

  “I know not whence she came, just that she took command of the armies. Some say the emperor and his wizards prayed to Shaol and in some black ceremony summoned her from the Abyss to grant him victory before he dies. I heard tell she marched into a war council and started barking orders in the emperor’s name. Everyone is afraid to challenge her, along with those three fiends she’s got as lieutenants. Her Triad.” The man shuddered. “Since she won victory at Helmsfield Keep, nobody doubts her tactical instincts. Look what she’s done: crushed your army, slew your king, and now she’s ready to tear your kingdom apart down the middle like a ripe fruit.”

  Sianna’s anger flared at his words, particularly the reminder of her father’s death, but he had the truth of it. Her kingdom was on the verge of falling, and with such ease nobody could have ever dreamed. I cannot dispute this warlord’s genius. But I mean to hold Ketania together until my dying breath.

  Creel was questioning the man on troop movements, but he didn’t have much information other than they were supposed to isolate Llantry and Carran from each other, blocking the trade routes and stamping out the remnants of the king’s army.

  “What of my brothers?” she asked. “Jerard was slain, but what of Dorian?”

  “The younger princeling? I know not. Probably feeding the worms by now.” The assassin turned his head and spat a gob of bloody phlegm on the ground.