chapter ten
Revolting
Steelhorn’s voice lifted over the congregated slaves at his front step. “There is no fire, as this fool would have you believe.” He shook Alex by the neck to demonstrate.
Deetra stepped out in front of the crowd. The line of horned half-beasts at the base of the steps glared at her. One stepped in her direction. In response, two dozen men stepped through the front line of the crowd, brandishing swords and spears.
The minotaur stopped and fell back into line with his fellow masters. The dark haired tradesmen took ready positions as a second group came up behind them with simpler weapons and torches.
Deetra glared up at Steelhorn.
“If you kill him, this only goes one way.”
Murmurs spread through the gathered slaves. The words revolt, priestess, and revolution stood out among the chatter.
Steelhorn squeezed the rogue’s throat. Alex kicked and fought, eyes bulging. “What way would that be?” he taunted.
The minotaurs in front of them held clubs, maces, and long, serrated swords at the ready. Deetra looked to Brayden, but Brayden’s face said what she already knew. Attack meant death. The first twenty men to reach them would die, and likely the second twenty.
Alex’s face went from red to blue in Steelhorn’s grasp. The minotaur stared at Deetra in silent challenge. No one moved.
She tried to think of what Ayla would do. The only thing she knew for sure - Ayla would not stand here doing nothing, indecisive. Ayla fought Goreskin in the cabin and threw stones at him in the street. Ayla never hesitated.
Deetra took aim over Alex’s head. She aimed high, and the weapon sailed over the front formation.
Alex dropped his weight onto Steelhorn’s arm, using the firm grip for leverage to throw his legs up and hook his heels around the back of the minotaur’s neck. The spear sunk into Steelhorn’s hip, causing him to bellow and drop Alex to the floor.
Alex landed on the floor in a heap and rolled over the wood planks, gasping and holding his throat.
As if this was the signal they were waiting for, the crowd came alive. Rocks pelted the row of minotaurs in the face and chest. Cries of, Cow, Cursed, and Beast, accompanied each throw.
Above, Steelhorn snapped off the shaft of the barbed spear, then threw open the double doors to the manor and limped inside.
Alex crawled on his belly to the stairs.
The tradesmen, led by Brayden, screamed like savages and surged forward for the attack.
The armed tradesmen rushed past Deetra. They clashed with the minotaur line, driving spears, and swinging swords under the cover of raining stones.
Smith plunged his sword into a furry abdomen. The minotaur brought the head of his mace down on Smith’s spine. They fell together.
Alex lay on his stomach, panting. Deetra yelled to the top of the stairs.
“Alex!”
He scrambled to his feet, his lips and chin awash in blood, and ran half-way up the stairs. He searched the chaos at the bottom. One of the slaves held a torch aloft as he watched the guard before him scramble at the flames engulfing his fur. The cuff and sleeve of Alex’s shirt flew apart as his bow sprung open. He nocked an arrow and fired.
More men screamed in agony toward the front, sacrificing their lives for the revolt Deetra and Alex started. Win or lose, Hillside had taken up the fight. Some of the field-hands picked up stones. Others craned their tanned necks to see the battle, and others fell back, fleeing the cries of their dying fellow man up front.
The torchbearer flinched. Alex’s arrow struck his weapon, knocking it from his hand. It landed in the grass to the side of the stairs. The dry grass caught, and the first wind to cool Deetra’s skin in a week spread it fast - too fast. With a whoosh, the grass blazed, and the fire scorched a trail beside the stairs.
Alex continued firing arrows into the backs of the minotaurs, hooting and hollering. When the trail hit the manor walls, they caught fire in a matter of moments, with a hissing, crackling sound reminiscent of laughter. The fire spread in both directions. It crawled over the door and under the windows. In moments, flames wreathed the manor. They poured in the windows, setting the curtains inside ablaze.
Any retreat blocked by the flames at his back, the last minotaur lifted his sword. A spear pierced his chest, followed by another. The half-beast dropped to one knee. Smith’s son flanked him and drove his sword down between the beast’s neck and shoulder with a grunt. The sword came out of his hands as the minotaur fell forward, snapping the spears lodged in his chest.
Every eye moved to the fire and smoke curling into the air. The arched, double front doors collapsed, belching out fire and black smoke from the inside. A minotaur screamed from inside the manor. Alex ran down the steps, and Deetra pushed through the gawking crowd standing amidst the twisted bodies of the fallen.
They met at the bottom, but Deetra’s eyes were not on her companion. Instead, she looked up to the doorway, where Steelhorn hobbled and flailed blindly to make his way out amidst the flames burning away his fur.
Alex spun on his heels, bow at the ready. With a glance, he nocked and fired. Steelhorn’s head jerked skyward violently. The crowd became silent, and only the crackle of flames could be heard. The minotaur that had ruled them for so long dropped first to his knees, then crashed down on the steps, the fletches of an arrow poking out from between his eyes.
The remaining tradesmen hoisted their weapons into the air with a victory cry. Deetra ran to Brayden, helping him away from the front. Blood flowed from Brayden’s hairline down to his jaw, his left arm limp at his side.
Alex held a rag over his own broken and bleeding nose. “We should back away before this place explodes.”
“Explodes? What were you stealing from here on those supply runs?”
The bruising already started under Alex’s eyes. His voice came out nasal, and he enunciated like he had swollen lips. The corners of his eyes lifted in a grin.
“Moonshine.”
Deetra would have smiled, but she struggled to carry the much heavier Brayden. Alex ducked in between them and draped Brayden’s good arm over his shoulders. After the rush of battle left him, Brayden could no longer walk unassisted. The tradesmen cleared the way ahead through the crowd that remained, while others brought the wounded away from the manor.
Brayden’s left arm had saved the rest of him from a minotaur club. It lay twisted at his side, broken in too many places to discern the damage. He dripped sweat from the heat and pain. The skin had already stretched tight and turned blue. The dark purple blotches on his shoulder had spread up his neck.
Alex stopped when they reached the road, and adjusted his hold on Brayden. A shorter, stocky, tradesman Deetra did not recognize came over to relieve the rogue. Alex helped him get in position.
“You have someone you can take him to?”
The tradesman nodded and ducked under Brayden’s arm. Brayden held his breath through the transition. Deetra circled around in front of him. He lifted his head and gave her a weak grin.
Deetra kissed him on the cheek and said, “Thank you.”
He smiled at her. “You’re welcome, Deetra the Cow Slayer.”
As the stocky tradesman led Brayden away, Alex beckoned Deetra to join him in the grass on the side of the road.
He lowered the rag held to his nose and inspected it. Touching the tip of his nose with a wince, he met her eyes.
“Go get the horse and meet me at the stables. We need to talk.”
Deetra rode her horse through the slave quarter, and across the road. The Fieldhands, marked by their sun-bleached hair and lithe bodies, cheered as she passed. A smile crept over her face as she headed northwest into the rolling pastures, but she reserved any celebration. The time had not yet come.
Alex and the tradesmen stood on the far side of the pasture, inside the gate to the stable. She kicked the horse into a gallop. A few saw her and waved.
Moments later, she hopped off the horse. It
trotted right through the open gate and into the hands of a stable boy. He took it by the reins and the horse stopped with a nicker and shake of his head.
Alex and the tradesmen gathered around her. A man with gray hair and a steel breastplate with the Hornstall insignia stood next to Alex. Alex introduced them.
“Deetra, this is Dylan.”
Dylan offered Deetra a hand to shake. Deetra stared at him until he dropped it and cleared his throat. He cocked a thumb back at the stables.
“I rode in last night. The guard dispatched me from Hornstall when the arena was taken.”
Deetra faced Alex. “What’s going on?”
The man opened his mouth to reply, but Deetra cut him off. “How did the Garrison know we were going to Hillside?”
“They have no idea, but two escaped slaves from Hillside killed a Master and almost thirty Hornstall guardsmen. I was sent here to bring word to the Masters of the garrison’s arrival. I met with Brayden instead.”
Alex and a few of the tradesmen, including Smith’s son, nodded their confirmation. I told him that they’ll be here by the dinner bell, today. A hundred and -”
Deetra cut him off as eyes widened amongst the tradesmen. “I know how many there are.”
“Brayden and I came up with a plan,” Dylan said as he walked past Deetra and pointed out into the pasture where the horses once took shelter from the sun under slender red alder trees. Now, only small clusters of stumps remained.
Dylan’s eyes went to the smoke rising over the barley field and over the inferno of the manor. “Right now on the riverbank are nine rafts. Enough for seventy people. The garrison had to have seen the smoke already. They’ll be double-timing it. We should each grab a horse, ride and offer anyone willing to fight a place on a raft.”
The smoke from the manor fire stayed thick and black for hundreds of feet into the clear blue sky. The wind blew in from the south and fire tore through the barley field. No one watching from a distance would misunderstand - Hillside had revolted. But Deetra didn’t trust Dylan. Who asked him to round up reinforcements?
“Why are you doing this?”
Dylan adjusted his brown tunic under his breastplate and cast his gaze at the ground.“Because I have to attone. I fell from grace, and I am trying to reclaim myself.” Dylan turned to the other tradesmen. “We dont have much time before the army gets here.”
Alex stepped in front of Dylan. “What about the people who don’t get a place on a raft? The children, and people who can't fight?”
“We only have room for so many. I wish we could have done more.”
The color drained from Alex’s face as the realization dawned in his bruised eyes. “We’re leaving them.”
Deetra waved to the stable boy, busy rubbing down her horse. He nodded and pulled the saddle he'd removed from the mount back down from the wall. She refused to leave more than half of Hillside behind to be slaughtered by an army of minotaurs.
Deetra rode over the wide flats of tough, short grasses and up to the winding riverbank. The woodline on the other side sat atop its own hazy reflection in the slow-moving current. The soft wind rippled the image and the water glittered in the mid afternoon sun. From its position in the sky, Deetra guessed they had another two hours before the garrison arrived.
Nine rafts sat side by side, askew on river stones exposed by low waters. The dark-haired tradesmen instructed the field hands around them. The field hands set supply packs together in the center of each raft and bound them together with twine.
Dylan approached her on foot and took the horses reins as she dismounted.
“Smith’s son, Killian, just left. These field hands have pledged to fight for the Freemen.”
Deetra took the reins back from him. “And Alex?”
On cue, Alex came over the last hill before the river on one of Hillside’s workhorses. Deetra led her own away from Dylan. He followed a couple of steps but Deetra held out a hand, ordering him to a stop. She climbed back into the saddle and rode out to meet Alex.
Alex stopped first and Deetra rode up alongside him, facing the other direction at the bottom of the incline. The horses nickered a greeting at one another and swished their tails. Deetra’s mount shied away from the Hillside stock, and she turned it around to get it under control.
Alex wiped sweat from his brow and chin. “I stopped at Brayden’s. He gave me some names I could trust. They’re on their way. The other guys are still -”
“How is he?”
Alex frowned. “The arm’s pretty bad. But he’s up in bed, talking.”
“Did you tell him the plan?”
“He says he trusts Dylan, but if you don’t, to trust your gut.”
“I don’t, and if I really trusted my gut, I would tell Dylan to stick his rafts where the God of Light don’t shine.”
Alex shrugged, and looked over her shoulder to the raft. “Why?”
“He betrayed his people once, and now he says he’s on our side. I dont know how anyone trusts him.”
“Ayla healed him. They prayed together in the crypt. He warned Hillside, came up with a plan to escape. After all that, why wouldn’t we?”
“Because his plan would have sacrificed more than half of Hillside.”
“And, we took care of that. Hillside will be empty when the army gets here.”
Tradesmen and field hands, in groups of eight, lifted their rafts and shuffled them over to the river. The Freemen now numbered seventy-three. Seventy boarded the rafts in the river as the current carried them lazily north, toward Hornstall. Deetra, Alex, and Dylan rode together along the river.
Dylan rode to Deetra’s left, and Alex to her right. She ducked under a low branch. Dylan took his horse into the shallows to avoid it. He turned to her in the saddle as he tugged the reins back toward shore.
“I know it doesn’t feel right, leaving all those people behind. If I could have saved them, I would have. I hope you know that, Alex.”
Alex leaned out to the side, avoiding another tree branch. “We didn't leave anyone behind. They’re packing whatever they can, and following within the hour.”
Dylan whistled. “The riverbank is going to be a tough journey on foot.”
Deetra and Alex shared a look. Alex clucked at his horse to bring it up to a trot and moved ahead of them. “It’s better than waiting to die.”
Alex lied. Deetra had asked him to keep the real plan between them. She told the remaining men and women about the hobbled slaves in Moonvale. She said that if they brought the revolt to Moonvale, they would know their allies by their feet.
When the army arrived, Hillside would already be sacked. By the time the army made it back to Hornstall, Deetra, Alex and the tradesmen would already long-since have used the canals to get inside the city.
Dylan took a sip of water from his canteen and dropped it back in his saddlebag. “I dont know why I didn’t think of that.”
Deetra picked up her horse’s pace to match the slight increase the river’s current and sighed. “Me either.”