Duty: a novel of Rhynan

by Rachel Rossano

  It took me a split second to remember I was Rell.

  He started trotting along the wall walk toward the keep. I followed. An arrow whistled past my head. I dropped behind the nearest turret, fear cutting into my air supply.

  “Rell!”

  Tomas crouched one turret to my right. Once he gained my attention, he signaled to stay down. “Tell Dentin to draw attention.”

  Dentin squatted three turrets away to the left, too far to yell without giving away the message. I shook my head at Tomas.

  Tomas signaled to someone on his right. When he turned back to me, he grimaced. “We have to draw fire so Yerns can disarm the archer.”

  I nodded.

  “I am coming your way.”

  I waved him back. “No. There isn’t room.”

  “I am not about to let you do it.”

  He wasn’t in a position to stop me. I pulled my cloak from my shoulders. Half-frozen sleet sluiced through my layers. Gasping, I clamped my teeth together against the instant shaking. Working within the confines of my cover, I propped the hood on the tip of the sword. Bracing against the slick stone at my back, I lifted my makeshift decoy with shaking arms. Once it creasted the turret’s edge, I pulled it down again. The archer didn’t respond.

  The crack of wood on stone reverberated through the air. I glanced past Dentin in time to see three swordsmen jostle from the tower door.

  Dentin squatted, obviously readying for a fight despite being pinned behind a stone half his height.

  “Don’t be a fool!” Tomas hollered.

  “He doesn’t have a choice.” I yelled in response.

  Dentin ignored us. The first of the three neared him.

  I moved the oilskin so it looked like I was peeking out the side toward Dentin. An arrow glanced off the stone, startling my breath from my lungs. I clenched the rain-slick hilt, flexing my cramping fingers. I had to do this. Dentin wouldn’t hold out long. I took a deep breath.

  Another teasing peek out of the shelter brought another arrow, this one closer. My teeth chattered and my arms shook. My ribs ached.

  “One more time,” I whispered.

  The rhythm of battle began.

  Shoving aside my rising fear, I braced my quivering arms on my knees and jabbed the oilskin out farther toward Dentin.

  The force of the arrow hitting my sword knocked it from my numb hands and over the edge of the walk. My heart fell with it. Metal clattered distantly on the stone in the bailey below. Shuddering silent sobs gripped my chest.

  The archer’s cry of triumph morphed into a shout of anger. He cursed fluently.

  Dentin yelled in pain. His opponent lunged in for the kill only to be set have his shin split by Dentin’s sword and shoved from the wall by his shield. The heavy thud of his body striking the stone turned my stomach.

  Dentin’s relief didn’t last long. The next combatant took the first’s place. I couldn’t decide which was better to die quickly by three to one odds or this slow death by attrition.

  Just as I debated sticking a hand out, anything to spare Dentin, Tomas called out. My head whipped around in time to see Tomas running toward me.

  “On your feet.” Catching my upper arm, he half dragged me along with one hand. When I gained my feet mid run, he let me go.

  “Stay behind me.”

  Dentin drove his opponent backwards to where the walk widened where it joined the tower wall. The remaining combatant dodged Dentin’s shield and lunged at Tomas.

  A deadly test of balance and agility commenced. Tomas blocked a blow aimed for his chest only to be caught in the head by a shield. He stumbled back, teetering for a moment on the edge.

  Suddenly uncoiling at his opponent, Tomas lashed out with sword, catching the man unawares and drawing first blood. The gash along the man’s forearm looked deep.

  Connecting blade to blade, Tomas forced his opponent backwards in a sudden show of strength. The man stumbled, scattering pebbles over the edge.

  Tomas followed him. Sword moving faster than my eyes could follow, he pressed the man backwards.

  My skin prickled. Someone was breathing behind me. Heart stuttering in fear, I pivoted on my left foot and raised my shield in a clumsy attempt at an old training move.

  Nothing prepared me for the force of his blow. I almost dropped my only defense. His blade slid off of the metal rim.

  I fumbled for my knife. At only nine inches long, it was a platry offense against a sword, but the best I had.

  Instinct brought up my shield arm to meet his next blow. The downward force of his blow brought me to my knees. His blade bit deep into the metal rim. Wood groaned.

  He brought it down again. I shoved back against the blow this time. The rim of my shield snapped off with a twang.

  The next blow nearly cleaved the wood in two. The tip of his blade stopped inches from my arm. He braced his feet to heave his weapon free, and I saw my opportunity.

  He pulled and I let go. Staggering backwards, his heel missed the edge, coming down on air.

  For an eternity, he hung there, frozen on the verge. Then he was gone.

  A groan drew me to the edge of the walk. Far below, a broken body on the bailey cobbles, limbs twisted unnaturally. My stomach turned. With my heartbeat thundering in my ears, I swallowed back the acidic taste of bile.

  “Rell?” Tomas joined me at the edge.

  He looked past me at the remains. Then wordlessly, he searched my face.

  I found I couldn’t face his scrutiny no matter how symathetic. I focused instead on my shaking hands. Only a minute ago, that mess on the ground below had been a living man. My chest grew cold.

  “I killed a man.” The words tasted bitter.

  “He wanted to kill you.” The sharp edge to Tomas’ voice brought my chin up. The understanding in his eyes counterbalanced the coldness of his voice. “We need to move.” He gestured toward the tower door.

  I turned to obey his unspoken order.

  One body lay sprawled on the walk next to the door. Dentin stood over him.

  “I lost Dentin’s sword over the edge.”

  “We will claim it later.” He handed me the dead man’s. “Can you manage with that one?”

  I wanted to throw the heavy thing aside. “Any sword is better than none.”

  Acknowledging my acceptance with a nod, he stepped over the corpse’s legs. Yanking the tower door open, he gestured for us to enter ahead of him.

  Tomas took the lead. With shield before him and sword drawn, he started down the steep stairs.

  Dentin followed.

  We met no resistance. The door at the base of the tower opened without protest. Despite our caution as we emerged, no one stepped forward to confront us. We ran along the inner bailey wall toward the keep.

  My stomach threatened to empty when we passed the remains of the men from the wall, but I willed it back into place.

  The rain slowed as we entered the inner bailey. Our running feet echoed in the eerie silence.

  When we crossed the opening into the practice yard, Dentin came to an abrupt halt in the center of the archway.

  Three corpses lay in the center of the yard. Arrows jutted from of the backs of two of them. The third lay face up in a puddle of his own blood. I couldn’t see how he died, but I recognized his ash-white hair and red beard in the light from the open stable and armory doors that spilled across the yard.

  I averted my eyes in time to see Dentin’s fingers tighten around the hilt of his sword. He adjusted his grip on his shield straps.

  “Revolt?” I asked.

  “Eliminating witnesses, more like.” Dentin met Tomas’ gaze over my head. I didn’t catch the message in his expression, but I heard Tomas grunt his reply.

  My stomach soured with the thought that Orwin was capable of such brutality. Then in light of his recent activities, it didn’t seem as far-fetched. After arranging my life and others for his benefit without regard for our safety, health, or happiness, taking a life to save his own woul
d have been a small step.

  Dentin changed course. He ran for the nearest entrance to the keep, the door I had used the day I left. I kept up, barely. His legs were longer than mine and more accustomed to running in full gear. My lungs ached from the icy air and exertion. I was so thankful he slowed to pull the door open.

  Immediately inside another body blocked the entrance, sprawled on the stairs as though he had been climbing for the door. Sheathing his sword and bracing himself against the wall on either side, Dentin hurtled the distance, landing hard on the stairs beyond.

  “Move aside.” He motioned for me to get out of the way.

  My legs wouldn’t move. I couldn’t take my eyes from the dead man’s face. The features were familiar in the way a servant’s were. Seen perhaps dozens of times and still not completely recognized as an individual’s face.

  Tomas pushed me to one side, gently, so I braced the door. Grabbing the feet and hands of the body, the two men hauled it down the passage and into the first room.

  I followed, careful to avoid stepping in the blood trail. Some distant part of me screamed at the injustice of so many deaths. Another part urged me to wake up from the nightmare. However, the functioning parts of me kept moving forward, following Tomas and Dentin through the undercroft, across the great hall, and up the main staircase.

  We passed three more dead. A trail of burning torches, broken furniture, torn tapestries, dripped wax, and occasional blood smears led us up the main stair, right to the door of the lord’s bedchamber. Dentin stopped on the top step and signaled for silence. Tomas turned to relay the message from his perch a few steps below Dentin. I forestalled him by folding my lips around my teeth, clamping my mouth closed, and nodding.

  Someone was crying. The soft whimpers and shuddering breaths filled the silence between another person’s pacing treads.

  “Oh, stop sniveling!” Orwin’s voice echoed out into the corridor through the open bedchamber door.

  “They didn’t have to die.” Rolendis yelled back and then burst into loud sobs.

  “Would you rather we die? Those rats were threatening to hand us over to that army out there. I doubt Lord Irvaine would reward you for your part in our schemes.”

  A loud sniff came from the room. “I have done nothing wrong.”

  “Releasing a prisoner of Lord Irvaine and taking his vargar by force are hardly nothing, woman. If you didn’t carry the heir to the title of Irvaine, Jorndar would have killed you too despite your pretty face.”

  “He can’t. He swore to protect me. It was part of our vows.”

  “Naïve child, that hasn’t stopped men before.”

  Her desolate wail cut across my nerves. Dentin flinched and Tomas cringed.

  Orwin’s foot falls retreated from near the door.

  Dentin took advantage of a momentarily clear shot and dashed across to the other side so that he and Tomas now flanked the doorway.

  “Cease your wailing. We might be able to help each other.” Orwin lowered his voice.

  “Take your hands off my wife, worm!” Jorndar’s anger echoed around us, bouncing through the open doorway, off the empty corridor walls and the cavernous space above the stairs.

  Tomas and Dentin exchanged frowns. We couldn’t see from where he had come. I could only guess he emerged from the secret tunnel.

  “I was merely keeping her company.” Orwin’s voice dropped into subservient tones.

  “I don’t share, Wisten. You touch and you pay, with limbs.”

  “Is the end of the tunnel open?”

  One of them spat. Something metal skittered across the floor.

  “Never reached the end. The middle caved in decades ago. By the look of it someone did it on purpose.” Jorndar cursed. A great crack of something striking wood heralded a deafening crash of pottery. A metal bowl rolled out the open door, wobbled in a circle, and then settled on its bottom.

  Dentin flattened himself against the wall. Tomas and I did likewise. Swords at the ready, we listened in the tense silence that followed.

  “What do we do now?” Orwin whined.

  “Bargain.”

  “With what? We have no money. She isn’t worth anything until she births the boy-child. What do we possibly have to bargain with?”

  Jorndar laughed. “You.” The scrape of a sword coming free of its sheath filled the silence.

  A second sword was drawn.

  “You are mad!”

  “Maybe so, but I am not wanted for treason and you are.” Someone shuffled their feet. “The king arrived yesterday. His banner waves over the camp now. Rumor is he wants the architect of the invasion, the mole. You.”

  “But what about…” Orwin was cut off by the whistle of a sword cutting the air. He scrambled and fell.

  Jorndar laughed. “Yes, I picked a fight with his favorite, but that is insignificant compared to your transgressions.”

  “There is another way.” Orwin’s voice cracked.

  “Do tell.”

  “There is a tunnel under the wall in the garden.”

  “That will only gain us entrance into the town. How do you propose we get past the walls?”

  My cousin rushed to explain. “I know someone who will get us out…for a price.”

  “How much?” Jorndar’s incredulous tone sent chills up my back. He wasn’t buying into Orwin’s plan.

  “A few gold nibs should do it. Nothing much.”

  “Do you have a gold nib?”

  “No.” Silence.

  “Then we are back to my plan.”

  “But…”

  Another whistle ending in a cry of horror from Orwin.

  “I suspected as much. You are a coward.”

  The clash of metal grating against metal set my teeth on edge.

  I still wasn’t in the clear. Orwin had admitted to nothing. If he died before confessing my innocence, I would be as good as dead as well.

  Dread filled my chest. My cousin was not a skilled swordsman. I debated the wisdom of storming the duel. If we did, we could possibly save Orwin from dying and taking me with him.

  “Fool, you cannot run from me!” Jorndar yelled.

  Orwin emerged from the room at a run only to be propelled back inside again by Dentin’s shield.

  “He has a point, Wisten. There is only so far one can run.” Dentin stepped into the bedchamber. Tomas and I followed. “Close the door, Rell.”

  I bolted the door and stationed myself against the wall next to it. I wished I could have placed myself on the other side. I was useless either way.

  “Who are you?” Jorndar sneered at Dentin. His gaze flickered briefly over me to Tomas. His scorn hardened into hatred.

  “Tomas the mutt, have you come to beg for your castle back?” He adjusted his grip on the hilt of his sword and drew the knife at his waist. “I will finish you this time.”

  Dentin’s sword whipped up to derail Jorndar’s lunge. Sliding his weapon the length of Jorndar’s blade, Dentin stepped between the childhood adversaries. He forced Jorndar to scramble backwards, barely missing Orwin’s prone form.

  “You forgot me.”

  Jorndar’s gaze lost a bit of its mad glitter as he focused on Dentin again.

  “You do not interest me.”

  The two of them exchanged blows, testing.

  Dentin nodded a bit. “You, on the other hand interest me greatly. I understand you want something.”

  Jorndar’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”

  Orwin, taking advantage of Dentin’s distraction, scrambled to his feet and backed toward the strangely silent Rolendis. She remained perched on the edge of the bed, apparently frozen in surprise. Only her eyes moved, following Dentin.

  “Your wife knows.”

  Orwin froze as attention shifted to Rolendis. I couldn’t see Tomas’ face, his back was to me, but I did see him tilt his head ever so slightly.

  “Who is he, Rolendis?” Jorndar demanded.

  Her lips moved, but no sound came out.


  Tomas took a smooth step to the left, out of Orwin’s direct line of vision.

  “He is Lord Dentin, you fool.” Orwin smirked. “You are crossing swords with the man responsible for the safety of the realm. Now would be a great time for a confession.”

  “What are you babbling about?” Jorndar’s sword dipped as he half-turned to glare at Orwin.

  Dentin leaned in and neatly sliced through Jorndar’s jerkin and tunic to the skin beneath. Jorndar cursed and dropped his knife to clamp his left hand over his right forearm. “I wasn’t looking.”

  “Never been on the battlefield, I take it.” Dentin punctuated his question with a hard stroke. “I don’t take kindly to knights who have never seen combat, especially in view of the conflicts of recent years.” Two more strokes and a half-hearted lunge pressed Jorndar back a step.

  “I served.”

  “Which side? Are you of Trentham or Mendal?”

  “Mendal, of course.”

  “Then why is there record of your knights on Trentham’s books?”

  “I fought at Manowing.”

  “I wouldn’t consider hiding in your tent fighting. Are you a coward as well as a traitor, Sir Jorndar?” Dentin timed a thrust and whipping lunge at Jorndar’s head to match the final question.

  Jorndar ducked and deflected, but only barely. “I am not the traitor here!” He lunged madly at Dentin. “I fought at Manowing under Mendal. I have supported him from the beginning.”

  “You lie.” Dentin cracked Jorndar on the side of the head with the flat of his sword. His opponent fell like a rag doll.

  Rolendis screamed, but the sound was cut off abruptly.

  Orwin held Rolendis against him, bending her awkwardly over his paunch. His knife tip pressed against the underside of her jaw. “No one move or she dies.”

  “You are assuming we wish her to live.”

  Dentin’s cold response provoked a flicker of fear in Orwin’s darting eyes as he tried to keep all three of us in sight at once. An impossible feat since Tomas now stood next to the far left wall and only two strides from the pair.

  Sometime during Jorndar’s confrontation with Dentin, Tomas sheathed his sword. Behind his back, hidden from Orwin but not from me, he held a knife. He glanced at Dentin. Some kind of communication flicked between them.