Red Rowan: Book 3: Return of the Reluctant Hero

by Helen Gosney

  Fess remembered very well. He’d been looking forward to this moment ever since, though Bella had been concerned and had let him know about it. It was Rowan’s livelihood after all…

  “But, Rowan… I’ve got a troop horse…” he began half-heartedly.

  Rowan looked at him in surprise.

  “Aye, you have, and there’s not a lot wrong with him either, except his paces are a bit bloody rough and he throws his off foreleg out at the trot, but these are better,” he said slowly, “Remember we agreed that the Captain of Den Siddon should have a fine horse of his own to ride, not a troop horse, and he should have one that’s kind to his backside.”

  “ But Rowan, I… I truly shouldn’t take one of these…”

  “Why not? ‘Tisn’t as if I’m trying to bloody corrupt you. And I thought we’d decided. So what’s the problem?”

  Fess shrugged unhappily.

  “I don’t know, really. But… but Bella thought… she was worried that…”

  Ah, so that was it.

  “Fess lad, we’ve been through all this. Don’t fret yourself, and don’t let Bella fret herself either. Horsemaster Ross is very keen on the remaining ones for officers’ mounts, and having seen some of your poor old nags here, I’m not surprised,” Rowan shook his head. There’d been many, many troop horses lost at Messton and it took a long time for the garrisons to replace them with suitable beasts. And of course Rowan’s standards for a suitable mount were quite a bit higher than most. He’d done what he could to improve stock at every garrison he’d been posted to as Horsemaster, and Den Siddon’s troop horses had been coveted by the remainder of the Wirran Guard during his time there. “I’ll just have to remember to drive an extra hard bargain with him. I’m truly not as bad at it as Rose always says.”

  “But Rowan, if you give these two away and sell the rest, you’ll have to ride one of our poor old nags yourself,” Fess tried one last protest, but he was already lost as the dappled stallion Storm snuffled gently at his hand. He remembered the horse’s smooth, lovely paces and the odd, wonderful gait that it had inherited from Mica and sighed.

  Rowan grinned at him.

  “Aye, well, it wouldn’t be the first time, would it? But no, I’m keeping Ashen. I thought about keeping the chestnut or the roan mare, but I’ve had a couple of offers for them that are really too good to refuse. Now, hop onto Storm, laddie, and stop being a bloody old woman. Let’s go and find Cade.”

  **********

  The troopers found it strange to have a living legend in their midst, found it difficult to adapt to his preference for informality, but eventually things worked themselves out as Fess had said they would, and everyone was happy.

  **********

  13. “… it’s not as easy to do as he makes it look.”

  It was raining heavily and had been for several days, and the Sword Master wasn’t about to let his Trophy squad risk injuring themselves in the mud, so they were using the indoor training circles. They were already hard at work when he brought his young recruits in to watch them: some were exercising and some were training with weights, all of them generally keeping themselves busy as they waited for a vacant circle.

  The lads gaped at the grace and speed of the swordsmen as they danced back and forth.

  “Gods, Ulrich,” Costa muttered in dismay, “Do you think any of us will ever be this good?” The lads were still getting used to the wooden practice swords and the flashing sabres were both fascinating and terrifying.

  “I doubt it, lad. I truly bloody doubt it,” Ulrich said to his friend as he craned his neck, looking for the Champion he so desperately wanted to see in action. Ah, there he was. He was tall, certainly taller than all of the others, but of course it was his hair that marked him among the mainly blonde Wirrans, as it always had. Ulrich looked more closely. No, he was marked by more than that, he realised. Not his tattoos and scars, though of course they were obvious. No, it was his intense concentration, his grace and power and sheer speed, the way he made it all look so easy, that set him apart.

  “Now lads, I’m sure you all want to watch the Champion at work,” Stefan smiled at their enthusiastic nods, “That’s good, you can learn a lot just from watching him, but he’s so damned fast you can miss a lot too. We’ll be here for a good while, so I want you to have a good look at everyone, see their different styles, different strategies…”

  “Aye, Sir,” the recruits said as one. They’d been looking forward to this ever since Stefan had mentioned it to them.

  “Will you be sparring with the Champion too, Sir?” one of them wanted to know.

  “Aye, maybe later, I think. When he’s worn himself out a bit more,” Stefan laughed.

  **********

  “Well lads, what differences have you noticed between them?” he asked a while later, when the recruits had had a good look at all of the men sparring.

  “The Champion seems to… um… disarm his opponents a lot, Sir,” Ulrich ventured. “Much more than the others do, Sir.”

  Stefan smiled.

  “Aye, he does too. And it’s not as easy to do as he makes it look, believe me, especially with Sergeant Corran over there,” he said, indicating the best swordsman in the garrison after Rowan and himself: a man who’d be among the best swordsmen in Wirran.

  “Well spotted, Ulrich. Why do you think he does it?”

  Ulrich shook his head slowly.

  “No idea, Sir, except that… er…” he faltered.

  “Out with it, lad.”

  “Well, er… except that he can, Sir, and it’s a good way to finish a bout,” Ulrich blushed as Stefan laughed.

  “Sorry, Ulrich. I didn’t mean to laugh at you. You’re right, lad. He says his opponents can’t dispute being disarmed and the judges can’t miss it either.” Rowan also said that the buggers couldn’t come after him and stab him in the back, but Stefan didn’t tell the lads that just yet. “Ah, it looks like he’s taking a break.”

  Rowan came over to them with a smile. The lads’ eyes widened as they saw his sabre.

  “A good day to you, lads,” he said, “You’ve been watching us all pretty closely, have you learnt anything yet?

  “Aye, Sir,” they chorused.

  “So, what have you learnt, Costa?” he asked the sandy-haired lad at the front.

  “I’ve learnt I’ll never be able to do this, Sir. I’ll never be as fast or as good as any of these men,” Costa said sadly.

  “Don’t give up just yet, Costa. None of us just woke up one morning like this, it took a long time and a lot of damned hard work to be able to use a blade like we do,” Rowan said, trying not to laugh at the lad’s downcast face, “You just need to give it a while.”

  “Aye, lad. These are the best swordsmen in the garrison, don’t forget. There’s not many men who are as good as this lot,” Stefan smiled at him.

  “I suppose so, Sir,” Costa didn’t look entirely convinced.

  “Are you going to spar with the Champion now, Sir?” another lad piped up, “He must be a bit worn out by now, Sir.”

  “Um… I, er…” Stefan looked at Rowan, who was trying not to laugh at his discomfiture, “Aye, why not? Just let me warm up a bit…”

  “A bit worn out?” Rowan said to him as they headed for a vacant circle, “I’m not that bloody old and decrepit yet, I hope.”

  “No, unfortunately. I was going to let you run yourself into the ground a bit more before I took you on, so I don’t embarrass myself in front of all these lads,” Stefan laughed. Rowan was more than a challenge now, even for the Sword Master. He still couldn’t really believe the Champion was so tall and so powerful and so devastatingly fast.

  “I truly doubt you’ll do that, Stefan. Now, shall we give them a beautiful exhibition match where nobody works up a sweat and nobody wins,” Rowan smiled at him, “Or shall we give them the real thing?”

  Stefan grinned up at him.

  “A bit of both, I think. How about if we start off slow, show off a bit, and then
really get down to business?”

  Rowan nodded.

  “Aye, let’s do that,” he said, “It’ll show these cheeky buggers what we can really do if we set our minds to it. Have you given them the speech yet?”

  “No, not yet. After this, I think. Perhaps you wouldn’t mind…?”

  “No, I don’t mind, Stefan. I’ll talk to them. Now, let’s get on with it, lad.”

  The rest of the Trophy squad stopped what they were doing and gathered to watch too. A match between the Sword Master and the Champion was always worth watching, even more so if they were both taking it seriously, as they seemed to be.

  The recruits gaped as Stefan and Rowan danced around the circle, light-footed and elegant, a beautiful demonstration of swordsmanship at its best. But they were stunned as the tempo of the bout increased until the two were so swift that they really couldn’t follow it all, and they realised the astounding talent of both men. Before long they also realised, as the squad already had, that Rowan could probably end the bout whenever he chose to: as brilliant as Stefan was, he simply wasn’t going to win. He was giving it a damned good try though. Suddenly something in the demeanour of both men changed; they weren’t playing any more, they meant business. The sabres flashed too swiftly to follow for a few moments and Stefan looked down in dismay as Rowan disarmed him with a move that he simply hadn’t seen coming.

  “Dammit, Rowan!” he said, “How the hell do you bloody do that?”

  Rowan shook his head.

  “I can’t tell you, Stefan… ‘Tisn’t that I won’t tell you, ‘tis that I can’t. But I can show you, I think… lunge at me again.”

  Stefan did and found himself disarmed again. He shook his head, oblivious of the fascinated onlookers.

  “No, slower, Rowan. I missed it again. And can you use your right hand this time?”

  Rowan nodded and tossed his sabre to his right hand. The recruits gawped a bit more; they hadn’t realised that he could use either hand equally well.

  The other members of the squad watched very closely as Rowan and Stefan went through the sequence several times slowly. Rowan often disarmed them with this manoeuvre, or one very like it, but he was so swift they’d never really been able to work out how he did it. And none had thought to simply ask him.

  “See? You lunge at me, and I sort of turn my body a bit like this, and twist my wrist… so…” Rowan said.

  Stefan nodded slowly.

  “Aye, I think I’ve got it,” he said, “Once more and then I’ll try it on you…”

  He was very pleased when Rowan’s sabre fell to the ground. It rang like a bell, quite unlike the clanking sound everyone else’s sabres made.

  “Now maybe I can bloody disarm you in a bout for a change, laddie,” he said happily.

  Rowan smiled at him.

  “Aye, maybe, but I’d only have to…” he demonstrated a different movement of his wrist and hand, “And that should get me out of trouble, with a bit of luck.”

  They’d been so engrossed in their contest and Rowan’s demonstration afterwards, that they’d almost forgotten their audience. A burst of applause and cheering reminded them though. Rowan bowed to them, laughing.

  “Thank you, lads. ‘Tis a pleasure to perform for you.”

  “Excuse me, Sir…” Ulrich began hesitantly.

  “Aye, Ulrich?” Rowan replied.

  “Do you… um… have a plan for bouts like that, Sir?”

  Rowan and Stefan looked at each other and laughed.

  “The plan is to beat the other fellow, usually, when we’re only playing games like this,” Rowan smiled at Ulrich, “But no, I don’t plan exactly what I’m going to do. You can’t, lad. Your opponent generally doesn’t cooperate and do what you think he’s going to do, so ‘tis no good having a rigid idea in mind and then not knowing what to do if it doesn’t go how you thought it would. You have to be prepared for anything.”

  “But… how?” another lad wanted to know.

  Rowan shrugged.

  “’Tis practice and experience, Elgar. And damned good reflexes. Truly, there’s no simple answer. But if you’re not fast enough to adapt if something happens that you’re not expecting, you’ll get disarmed at best, or a hell of a cut at worst. ‘Tis a great aid to concentration and learning.”

  “You have to keep your mind on what the other man’s doing… a lot seem to drop their shoulder, like this, as they go to lunge…” he showed them what he meant, “’Tis a bad habit to get into, because it gives your opponent warning of what you’re about to do, assuming they’ve got any sense at all. It gives them time to do something about it.”

  Stefan nodded. Rowan really is a damned good teacher, he thought, and he doesn’t miss a thing. No wonder so many of the instructors want his assistance at their classes.

  “Aye lads, he’s right. A couple of the lads in the squad, not mentioning any names, do that and they get into trouble with it every time. It’s a hard habit to break too, so it’s better not to get into it in the first place.”

  **********

  Rowan looked around at the recruits’ eager, fascinated faces. Time for the speech, he thought. He took a deep breath.

  “But lads… pretty as all this is, we’re only playing games here…” Rowan looked at Stefan for a moment. The Sword Master nodded. “Did any of you notice that I try very damned hard to disarm my opponent, and if I do I always end the bout with my sabre at his chest, over his heart?”

  Some of the lads nodded. They had noticed this, and wondered the reason for it when few of the other men did the same.

  “Lads, I’ve been well trained and I’ve had a hell of a lot of experience. I do it now without even thinking about it… so why do you think I do it?”

  The lads shook their heads.

  Rowan looked away for a moment, sighed, and looked straight at the recruits again.

  “Well, lads, I do it so that I can kill him quickly and cleanly with a single thrust of the blade.”

  He waited for the horrified gasps to subside and then he continued on quietly, “That’s why we all learn to wield a sabre, lads. Not to win Tournaments and Trophies, not to look pretty dancing around a circle, and not so we can carry one around without falling over it. We learn it so we can kill. None of us wants to go around killing other folk and I truly hope that none of you will ever have to do it, but at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about. Whether it’s with a sabre, a bow, a bloody halberd or your bare hands, that’s the job you’re training for and that’s the job you’ll have to do if ever it becomes necessary again… We can play as many games as we like to practice, get good with a blade, but eventually the time will come again when we’re not playing games, when it’s all deadly serious… And it’ll be just like it was at Messton, when our lives truly depended on our skill with a blade…. But I have to tell you, the ones who survived that weren’t necessarily the prettiest swordsmen going around… they were the toughest, strongest, and fittest of the lot and they did the job they’d been trained for better than the rest. ‘Twas as simple as that. It didn’t matter if their style didn’t win any prizes.” Rowan sighed very softly again.

  “I can’t tell you how much I hope that never happens again, but I know that it will, sometime. So meanwhile, everybody keeps in practice with tournaments and things… but they’re only a means to an end, to keep everyone fit and ready to kill.” He paused again for a moment, studying the lads’ stunned faces. “It all looks beautiful and refined and elegant with us dancing around in the circles, and the tournaments and things are exciting to watch, exciting to be in, but… a sabre truly has only one purpose, lads, and that’s to kill… don’t ever forget it.”

  He watched as the truth of what he’d said sank in. The recruits looked horrified at first, appalled as they realised what the graceful activity before them really meant, but as they thought about it they began to nod to themselves. Good, he thought. Now they know it’s not about playing games, they might just take it seriously.
<
br />   He glanced at Stefan. The Sword Master leaned over to him and said “Thank you, Rowan. You put it a lot better than I could and they’ll take more notice, coming from you.”

  “I hope they do, Stefan.”

  **********

  14. “It was just… just bloody wrong”

  That night there was a tentative-sounding knock at Rowan’s door.

  “Come in, whoever you are. The door’s open,” he said absently. He was reading a book on military history that he’d borrowed from the Museum and Scrap was on his shoulder, purring in his ear. He was surprised to see half a dozen recruits file in and salute him: Rogen, Tharl, Dorn, Borrel, Jarle and Ivan. How very odd, he thought. What are this lot up to?

  “Hello, lads. What can I do for you?” he said, moving Scrap as the little creature bristled and hissed as loudly as it could.

  “I… er… we’re sorry to disturb you, Sir, but… um…” Rogen faltered.

  “I did say to all of you lads to come and see me if you’ve got any problems, Rogen,” Rowan said, still a bit puzzled as to why these particular lads would be there, but willing to give them a fair hearing, “I only bite in very specific circumstances, and this isn’t one of them… speak up, laddie.”

  “Aye, Sir… I…” Rogen gulped, a bit surprised that Rowan hadn’t thrown them all out the door. He could certainly physically do it, he’d picked Rogen up one-handed after all, and Rogen wasn’t small. True, he hadn’t treated any of the lads any differently since the incident with the kitten, but… The rest of the boy’s words came out in a rush. “We wanted to apologise to you, Sir. We were… we were wrong…”

  Rowan looked at all of them thoughtfully and nodded.

  “Aye, you were. ‘Tis wrong to mistreat any creature, let alone one as defenceless as poor little Scrap. Why did you do it?”

  The lads looked down and shuffled their feet miserably.

  “No reason, Sir. Just… just sheer bloody idiocy as you said, Sir. We … we were all idiots, but I’m ashamed to say it was me that started it…” Rogen raised his head a bit, “I was stupid, Sir, and I was wrong. I’m truly sorry, Sir. I shouldn’t have done it. None of us should have.”