Sean had finally relented to her pleas to get out for a while, hoping this little excursion might give her a brief taste of adventure and self-sufficiency for however short a time. Maybe it would help. But Sean Bates had been her protector for a long time, through a variety of terrifying adventures, and wasn’t about to let anything happen to her now that she was home again at last.
“I think ye’ve shot us quite a supper, yer highness,” he said. “Best we get on back to Guv’ment House an’ turn them birds over ta missis Carr afore they spoil. It’s cool up here, but they’ll ripen quick enough once we return to the carriage yonder.” He gestured down slope a mile or so, but then paused suddenly, squinting.
“There are armed horsemen at the carriage,” Rebecca stated, shading her eyes. “Half a dozen? More?”
“I think eight,” Ruik said seriously, his long tail swishing behind his blue Navy kilt. “I can’t see their dress, but they… are not Marines.”
“They ain’t in Guard or marshal livery neither, Your Highness,” said the sharp-eyed gamekeeper with a hint of concern.
The Guard was a small, elite security force dedicated to the protection of the Imperial family. The marshals were the much more numerous Imperial Police. Otherwise, the Empire had always relied on its powerful navy and a small but competent corps of Marines. There was no army. Instead of building an army from scratch, however, the corps of Marines was swelling dramatically, borrowing heavily on the instruction, organization, and experience of their Lemurian-American allies. Until the recent battles on New Scotland and New Ireland, those Marines had never coordinated any large-scale operations however, and there’d been some severe growing pains. In any event, Imperial Marines, Guards, or marshals were the only ones with a legitimate reason to assemble such an armed party, particularly here in an Imperial preserve. That left only brigands, and everyone seemed to realize that fact at once. The reaction was… unexpected.
One of the beaters, a bearded man in a long, threadbare coat, suddenly dove at Mr. Bigelow, driving the gamekeeper to the ground with a startled cry. Another lunged at Sean, grabbing his pistol by its long barrel with a guttural shout. The third beater stood, just as stunned as everyone, his eyes wide in confused panic.
Sean allowed his assailant to yank the barrel from his shoulder and grasp it with both hands, pulling and wrenching savagely. He had only the grip to hold on to, but in this circumstance, for the instant it took, that was enough. He heaved backward suddenly, straitening the other man’s arms, and squeezed the trigger. The pan flashed and a heavy load of small shot blasted out, and its tight pattern at that range struck the man full in the face with the diameter, if not the weight, of a four-pound shot. It didn’t decapitate him, but his head erupted bloody gore and brains back at Sean like an exploding melon and his corpse dropped to the ground without a twitch.
“Goddamn!” Petey squealed, and launched himself toward Rebecca.
Ruik recovered his wits while the first attacker fought with Bigelow to gain control of his fowler that had fallen about two yards away from them. He raced over and aimed his musket, but loaded with bird shot, he feared he couldn’t hit one without the other. Bigelow was crawling on the ground, toward his weapon, while simultaneously trying to hold on to the traitor and keep him from it. But the bigger, bearded man was raining blows upon him, trying to loosen his grip and drag himself over the gamekeeper. Immediately, Ruik reversed his musket. He was a Naval officer, not a Marine, but everyone had to train with the new weapons to some degree. With a trilling cry, backed by his literally inhuman strength, he delivered a creditable butt stroke to the head of Bigelow’s adversary, who went limp and rolled senselessly onto his back.
“Thankee, sir,” Bigelow managed through broken lips, and Ruik helped him to his feet.
“Swell,” Ruik said, pushing him aside to see Princess Rebecca grimly aiming her double at the still-motionless third beater. The man-more of a boy, really-was obviously terrified.
“And what about you, sir?” Sean snarled, stepping toward him. The long pistol was thrust in this belt, leaving his tunic smeared with bloody chunks, and his sword was in his hand.
“I… I… didn’t-couldn’t!”
“Quit jabberin’, boy, an’ speak up!”
“I don’t know those men!” the boy finally managed. “Before God! I never seen ’em before taday!” He looked beseechingly at Bigelow. “You used me before, sur! For His Majesty! I’m as loyal as can be!”
Bigelow nodded slowly, a strange expression on his face. “Aye, we’ve used him before,” he confirmed, “an’ he seemed a good lad.” He glanced at the faceless corpse. “Them others, they was… recommended.” He turned to look back at the man he’d fought, and his eyes went wide. The bearded beater, his hair matted with blood from Ruik’s blow, was sitting up now. In his hand was a pistol of a cheap, common sort that the Company had long traded in the colonies. The things were hopelessly inaccurate beyond a dozen paces, but they were reliable, and it was pointed at the princess just a few steps away.
“No!” Bigelow roared, and lunged forward just as the pan flashed and fire and smoke bloomed from the muzzle. At that same instant, Ruik, who’d been distracted by the interrogation, brought his musket all the way back up and fired. The long coat covering the assassin’s torso shivered like a sail that just took a broadside and the man fell back, screaming. Ruik didn’t have a bayonet, but he pounced on the man, prepared to smash his skull this time, but his eyes, like everyone’s, went to the princess.
She seemed bewildered, her hand pressing a bloody spray on her bright green hunting frock, just above the belt around her waist. Petey was staring at her, eyes bulging.
“Lass!” Bates yelled. He’d been halfway to the killer, his sword raised. Now he dropped the weapon and rushed to the girl, stripped off her belt, and eased her to the ground.
“It really doesn’t hurt much,” Princess Rebecca softly murmured.
“I must see yer wound, lass,” Sean told her apologetically but forcefully. Tears already streaked his face.
“Of course.”
Sean ripped the coat open, but paused in surprise. There was no blood on her blouse.
The Imperial gamekeeper suddenly coughed, swayed, and collapsed.
“Mr. Bigelow!” cried the boy, kneeling beside him. “It’s him that’s shot!”
Suddenly Sean knew what must have happened. The pistol ball had torn through Bigelow and sprayed the princess with a stream of his blood. The ball may have even been turned downward by a rib and struck her itself, thankfully spent. He quickly opened the blouse over her midriff to assure himself and saw there was indeed a ripening oval bruise, but that was all.
“Thank God!” he breathed.
“I’m not shot?” the princess asked.
“No, but Mr. Bigelow is. He saved your life!”
“Go to him, I beg you!”
“Aye.” Sean stood and looked down at the gamekeeper, but the poor man was clearly gone. “Did he speak?” he asked the boy.
“Aye,” replied the boy through tears of his own. “I understood but a single word-but it made no sense!”
“What was it?”
“McClain.”
“Sur,” Ruik interrupted over the screams of the wounded man he still guarded. “Those other men, on horses-they shot the coach driver. They come this way now!”
“Bind that man,” Sean directed Ruik, “an’ gag ’im. We need ’im ta live, fer a time at least, but I’ve had enough o’ his screamin’! Have ye other than small shot fer that musket?”
“Some,” Ruik said.
“Load it, then.” He paused a moment, deciding whether they could really trust the youngster. He snorted. “Boy? Can ye use Mr. Bigelow’s fowler? He keeps ball in ’is pouch.”
“I know how to load, but I’ve rarely shot.”
“But ye can?”
“Aye.”
Princess Rebecca had restored her clothing and was already pulling the wads atop the bird shot in her d
ouble with a corkscrew-shape device on the end of her ramrod. She poured the shot on the ground, then dropped a single large ball down each barrel. They thunk ed against the powder wads. “They’re loose,” she said in a strange tone. “I have never loaded a weapon for the express purpose of shooting a man before.”
Sean looked at the girl. Despite her words, she still sounded so… calm that it worried him. He fished in his pouch and handed her a portion of a paperlike insect’s nest. “Those’re not men,” he snarled. “Ram more waddin’ ta hold the balls in place, lass,” he added. “Ye have a few fixed charges with which to reload. Do ye not?”
The princess nodded. The riders were coming hard now and were barely half a mile away. Sean clasped the long pistol to his side with the stump of his left arm and proceeded to load it. The process may have looked odd, but he managed it quickly enough.
“How… what you want to do? How we do this?” Ruik asked. With the excitement, his normally excellent English had slipped a bit.
“Well, clearly we must kill ’em or drive ’em off. Don’t fire till I give the word, but then choose yer target wi’ care. We’ll not fire a volley! Princess, yours an’ mine’ll be the least-accurate shots, an’ we must save ’em till they’re nearly on us.”
“I don’t think I can hit a man on a running horse!” the boy cried.
“Are ye daft? Ye an’ Lieutenant Ruik’ll shoot at the horses! Surely ye can hit a target such as that! Wi’ luck, ye’ll dump the riders, an’ p’raps goad the others into firin’!”
Even Ruik knew it would be next to impossible for the riders to hit a mark at a gallop-more difficult than deliberately striking a distant ship with a single, aimed shot from the pitching deck of his own Simms. Walker could do it, but she had advantages no other ship-or man-could match. “I hate to shoot horse,” he said sadly. “They not want to hurt us.”
“Aye,” Sean agreed, “but ye’ve no choice.” He’d seen how delighted Lemurians were to “discover” horses. Most, except possibly some he’d heard of on the Great Southern Isle, had never imagined forming communicative, even emotional bonds with any animal. But so far, every Lemurian he’d seen meet horses automatically liked them and considered them almost people. “Make ready!” he warned.
With a terrified squawk, Petey bolted upslope, running and soaring as fast as he could. “Useless bugger,” Sean said with a grunt. “But maybe smarter than I thought.”
Ruik took a knee to aim his piece, and the boy followed his example.
The six horsemen galloped in against the four of them, short capes flowing behind them. Most apparently carried pistols or some kind of shortened musket, but two had long, heavy swords in their hands. Sean warned tersely that those might be the most dangerous. The range closed rapidly and the tension mounted.
“They coming right at us,” Ruik advised the young man beside him, his pronounced accent the only sign of his nervousness. “That make it easy. Just aim high.” The gamekeeper’s fowler had no rear sight to adjust for elevation, and he’d heard that one of the problems the Imperials had with training novices for their expanding forces was that they tended to jerk their shots low.
“H-how high?” the fellow stuttered.
“That depends,” Ruik confessed. “Faactor Bates know better the range to… trip a horse. I tell you when he say!”
Just waiting for the charge was one of the most terrifying things Princess Rebecca had ever faced. She knew they had to stand their ground, but the fearsome horses and the killers atop them came on with an energetic, remorseless purpose. She knew Sean Bates loved her as his own and would give his life to save her. She also knew he was a skilled and confident fighter, despite his handicap-but, oh, what she would give to have Dennis Silva with them at that moment! The range narrowed inexorably, the horses gasping as they barreled up the slope, hooves thundering, spraying damp clods of earth high in the air.
“At yer convenience, Lieutenant Ruik!” Sean cried at about a hundred paces. For an instant, nothing happened, and in that time, their enemy advanced another twenty or thirty yards. Then Ruik fired, and Rebecca thought she actually saw the vapor trail of his ball cross the humid gap. A deep thwack! followed the sound of the report, and one of the horses staggered and slowed.
“At its nose!” Ruik shouted, and the boy fired next. His ball had an even more dramatic, if accidental, effect. It struck another onrushing horse square in the knee, and it shrieked hideously and tumbled, likely crushing its rider, who was thrown clear, but couldn’t move before the horse rolled over him. The other four assasins sank their spurs and charged in, almost on top of them, pistols aimed and swords raised to strike. Rebecca and Sean took careful aim. Pistols barked, but the balls vroop ed harmlessly past, and Rebecca fired at a man. She missed! Maybe the pistol shots had rattled her-but she was already rattled! Despite what Sean had said, her target was a man! Determination swept her fear aside and she squeezed the rear trigger, blowing the same man backward out of his saddle. A terrible scream drew her gaze to the left. Ruik had avoided a sword stroke with an ease that had to have disconcerted his attacker, and with a powerful leap, he snatched the man from his horse. The loyal beater wasn’t as skillful or agile, and another sword had slammed diagonally across his chest as its wielder galloped past.
Without thinking, Princess Rebecca dropped her fine fowler and pulled her short hunting sword from the leather sheath at her side. She charged the mounted murderer as he yanked his reins back and turned for another pass. She knew she didn’t have a chance, but in that instant, her fury overrode all other concerns. A heavy boom roared behind her and the target of her rage pitched and dropped his weapon with a yelp. The horse bolted, but after only a few strides the rider toppled from his lurching mount and lay still in the scrub. Princess Rebecca whirled and saw Sean toss his long pistol aside.
That quickly, somehow, only one mounted assassin remained. His horse stood still, perhaps forty paces away, and the rider was jamming his empty pistol into his belt.
“You are the very spawn of Satan!” he screamed at her. “Cast forth from the underworld, from the chambers of fire and darkness to do his bidding! On behalf of His Supreme Holiness, Emperor of the World by the Grace of God, I shall strike you down yet!” He wrenched his own sword from its scabbard then and came for her, urging his horse to a gallop. Princess Rebecca merely stood there, unable to run, her short sword raised to deflect the blow she knew she couldn’t stop. She felt small and all alone in the face of utter evil-until Sean Bates stepped in front of her, raising his own sword.
At that moment, another shot sounded-deeper, louder-and the assassin fell, wailing, to the ground. The horse passed by harmlessly, and the princess and Bates rushed to the fallen man. An instant later, they were joined by Lieutenant Ruik. He was covered in blood and his musket stock was dark and slick. A wisp of smoke still curled from the muzzle of the weapon. Together they regarded the would-be killer. He’d spoken without the accent of the Holy Dominion, but clearly he was a devout follower of its twisted faith. The man had a gaping, bloody hole in his lower-left chest and he spat blood at them.
“You will all die.” He coughed. “This entire land, and yes, even that of your unholy, demon friends will be washed clean with your own blood!”
“Yer makin’ quite the putrid puddle on this land now,” Sean said coldly. “Nothin’ll ever grow on this spot again!”
“I am dying,” the man conceded, “but soon I will be in paradise. You will burn in the lowest chamber of hell!”
“I just may,” Sean conceded, “But I’ll tear yer black heart out wi’ me teeth when I find you there!” He paused, vaguely disappointed, suspecting the assassin hadn’t heard him. He was dead. Briefly, he hugged Princess Rebecca close, then turned to Ruik. “A fine, timely shot!” he complimented. “But how did ye get ta be such a mess?”
“I needed to reload,” Ruik replied, flicking his ears toward the man he’d dragged down. “He not let me.”
Sean stared at the bloody heap Rui
k indicated. “What did ye do? Tear ’im limb from limb?” Ruik didn’t answer, but Sean knew many Lemurians had amazing upper-body strength, particularly sea folk-from which the Navy drew nearly all its officers. “Aye. Well, he’s dead, then. Did we take any alive?”
“Just the one we start with,” Ruik said, “if he’s not dead too now. The one whose horse I shot, he run for coach.” He pointed. “He take fresh horse, I bet. We never catch him.”
Princess Rebecca shaded her eyes. “We won’t, but perhaps they might!” Some distance beyond the coach, charging up from the city, was a squadron of Horse Marines, the Imperial standard flying at the head of the column.
“Aye, here’s the Marines-just in time!” Bates muttered sarcastically. He looked at the Lemurian. “The boy?”
“Dead,” Ruik replied, blinking regret.
“He was loyal,” said the princess, “and we never even knew his name.”
“We’ll find it out,” Sean promised her.
“I just… something just occurred to me,” Ruik said, his English beginning to return to normal. “Those Marines that are coming so fast. Why are they coming at all? Nobody can see us from the city.”
“Maybe the shots were heard?” the princess speculated doubtfully.
“Nay,” Sean said, his brows knitting. “We’ve been shootin’ all mornin’. That’s what we came here to do. The lieutenant’s right; somethin’s afoot. P’raps they already know what this was all about.”
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