Fortune and Fate

  Karryn was scandalized. “I care! Even when no one can see me! Anyway, Lindy said she might come by later and tell me how the breakfast went. I wish I could have been there, but no, I had to see stupid Douglas Flyten.”

  “Is he a very important man?”

  “His family members have been vassals to House Fortunalt since the very first marlord was named. They aren’t the richest of our Thirteenth House lords, but they’ve been very faithful.” Karryn brooded a moment. “He wouldn’t raise any troops for the war. My father was going to divest him of his lands once he got back from Ghosenhall.” She shrugged. “Of course, my father didn’t come back.”

  “Who made the decision to let him keep his lands?”

  Karryn looked surprised. “I suppose I did. I mean, everything was such a mess those first few months after the war. When Jasper first arrived he spent all his time trying to straighten out the accounts. He would call me or my mother into his study and ask all these questions. ‘Who is Coren Bauler and why does he owe us this much money? Who is Demaray Coverroe and why should we accept an invitation to dinner at her house? Why is Douglas Flyten about to be banned from his Manor?’ My mother said, ‘The Flytens did not support the war,’ and I said, ‘Then we should support the Flytens!’ And Jasper said, ‘Well, good. That’s one easy decision.’ And then he picked up another piece of paper and asked about someone else.”

  Wen was smiling. “Then I suppose it’s no secret why the lord is predisposed to like you.”

  Karryn laughed. “I don’t think he knew he was so close to being dispossessed.”

  “He probably did. He had to know your father was fanatical about this war, and anyone who opposed him risked losing his lands—or his life. It took him some courage to resist. So he must be quite happy that the serramarra has allowed him to retain his property.”

  “I never thought about it like that,” Karryn said. She was starting to look pleased with herself. “Well, I’m happy about it, too.”

  From the front of the coach, there was the softest soughing sound, and then a harsh cry of pain. The horses suddenly stumbled in the traces and the coach began lurching from side to side.

  “What in the red hell—” Wen began, when there was a series of harder thumps and taps, as if rocks had been flung at the sides of the coach. “Get down!” she shouted at Karryn, wheeling her horse around. “Wake your uncle! Moss! Eggles! We’re under attack!”

  Wen leaned low over the saddle and raced to the front of the coach, where the confused horses were pulling in different directions, halfway between bolting and milling to a halt. Yes—an arrow had gone through the driver’s throat, and his hands lay lax on the reins. He was dead. That meant their attackers wanted to stop them here so that they were vulnerable to another volley of arrows.

  Or wanted the crazed horses to go stampeding down the road to the next stand of brush, where a second ambush might lie in wait.

  They were not safe moving or standing still.

  Davey had leapt from his horse onto the driver’s bench and was wrestling the team to a standstill. “Run or halt?” he cried to Wen over the noise of the plunging horses.

  “I don’t know!” she called back. “Just get them under control! And cover your head!”

  He nodded. He had brought his small travel shield with him as he transferred from the horse to the carriage, but it didn’t provide much coverage. Still, he hunched himself into a small shape on the bench, the shield flung up with his left hand to protect his head while, with his right, he pulled on the reins.

  Another sequence of bumps and knocks—another round of arrows hitting the coach. There was a shriek from inside but Wen thought that was only Serephette waking up and expressing fear; she didn’t think any missiles had found a target inside the coach. Eggles had been nicked in the arm, but not badly. He hadn’t even bothered to tie up his wound, but had crawled to the top of the coach and flattened himself on the roof. He had a bow of his own, the long curve hanging over the side of the coach, an arrow nocked and drawn. He was sighting toward a clump of trees lining the western edge of the road. When he let the shot fly, he was rewarded with a cry and the sound of a crashing body.

  But Wen had seen arrows protruding from both sides of the coach. There were attackers on each side of the road—more than one, judging by the output. Three to a side, perhaps? Four? And two more ahead, lying in wait?

  Moss had jumped from the back of the coach and swung herself onto Davey’s horse. Cal and Malton were riding in a tight circle around the coach to distract the archers, moving in a jagged pattern to make themselves harder to hit. But the whole party was exposed and utterly vulnerable. Wen had just kicked the gelding forward to catch up with Cal when Eggles shouted warning of another volley coming. They all hunched in their saddles, shields up. Wen waited for the rattle and thunk of metal tips burying themselves in the wood of the carriage.

  The sound didn’t come. “Son of a bitch,” Eggles said, and Wen flung up her head to see what had happened.

  Arrows littered the ground on both sides of the coach, stopped in midair before they could find their targets. Wen stared around wildly till she caught sight of Moss, struggling to keep Davey’s edgy beast under control, and smiling with a savage satisfaction.

  “Moss! Yes!” Wen cried out, seized with battle jubilation. “Can you keep doing that? Even if arrows come from both sides at once?”

  Moss nodded. “I think so!”

  “Cal—you and I’ll ride to the left. Eggles, swap with Moss and ride with Malton. Davey, hold us here. I think there’s an ambush ahead—don’t take us farther.”

  Eggles was on the ground and Moss was hauling herself up to the roof when Davey cried a warning. Moss flung out a hand, and this time the arrows fell even farther away from the roadside, halfway back to the line of trees. Wen could have sworn that, desperate as the situation was, Eggles chortled.

  “Kill them or just stop them?” he inquired from horseback, hunkered down over the animal’s neck.

  “Stop them, but I don’t care if you kill them,” she replied grimly, and then she charged straight for the line of trees on her left.

  Time to fight like a Rider.

  Chapter 28

  THE ARCHERS IN THE TREE WERE LOOSING MORE ARROWS as Wen and Cal galloped up, but Moss’s magic was so disrupting their aim that they might as well have been flinging tinder to the winds. There was one body on the ground where Eggles’s shot had hit home, but through the shivering leaves Wen could make out two men who were very much alive. As the gelding swept under the branches at a full-out run, she kicked her feet free of the stirrups, crouched in the saddle, and grabbed the lowest limb. Swinging herself up, she felt the springy surface sway and dance beneath her boots. One archer was a level above her, the other one even higher. She scrambled up till she was balancing on the lowest branch that held an enemy. One hand clinging to whippy switches, she drew her dagger for close fighting.

  Neither of her enemies had expected her to bring the battle this close to their territory, and her extra weight was making the branch tilt ominously toward the ground. The man who was sharing this precarious perch with her let out a shout of alarm and began inching her way, closer to the trunk and a modicum of stability. The man higher in the tree—slim enough to be a boy, and lightweight enough to have taken up a spot on a thin limb—called out encouragement and began working his way down toward Wen. Those were bad odds. She took a hard grip on the bough above her and jumped up and down, trying to break off the branch beneath her feet. There was a loud crack and suddenly she was standing in upthrust splinters—the branch had shattered, though it didn’t completely tear away. But it was enough. Her assailant let out a horrified cry and went tumbling to the ground. She heard Cal’s shout of triumph and the sound of metal engaging.

  No time to watch that fight. The second archer was almost upon her, and, with the branch broken off so close to her feet, she had practically no room to maneuver. The boy had a small, short sword and was usi
ng it to slash at her fingers where she clung to the bough above. He didn’t seem to have much skill with anything but a bow, but he didn’t need much right now; she was at a clear disadvantage. She let go of her stabilizing grip and balanced on the stub, then had to duck low as he swung again for her forehead. Gods and goddesses, unless she could knock his feet out from under him, she couldn’t possibly get close enough to kill him.

  Retreat and regroup. She plunged back toward the trunk and swung herself around to find purchase on a limb on the other side. Swiftly she climbed another two levels, scraping her hands on the rough bark; her opponent matched her branch for branch.

  Now they were positioned on either side of the tree bole, narrower here closer to the apex of the tree. The boy had his short sword out again, and was stabbing it on either side of the trunk. Wen had sheathed her dagger and pulled her own sword, though fencing around a tree was a little like fencing around a stone column in a palace—ridiculous—except here there was no marble floor to take your weight.

  However, on equal footing, the advantage now was clearly hers. Wen waited for his sword tip to appear and then batted it away, hard, hoping to wrench the hilt from his hand, but after a few tries it was obvious that wasn’t going to work. She edged as close as she dared to the trunk itself, holding on to a thin bough behind her and thrusting her sword around the tree to the full extent of her arm. She connected; she felt the impact of bone a second before the boy’s howl rent the air. She wrenched back so he couldn’t rip the sword from her hands if his body toppled to the ground, but no such luck. He responded with a flurry of wild strokes, energetic enough to let her know she’d only wounded him.

  Still. It had worked once, and he wasn’t good enough to know how good a truly gifted fighter could be. She transferred the sword to her left hand, grabbed a fistful of tree with her right hand, and plunged the sword blindly in his direction. This time his cry was more of a gurgle; she’d caught him in the throat or belly. She pulled back just enough to make room for a second thrust in almost the exact same spot. This time his cry was fainter and sounded more like a cough. It was followed almost immediately by the noise of his body crashing through the lower tree limbs and landing with a sodden thump on the ground.

  Wen sheathed her bloody sword so she could use both hands to shimmy down. Cal’s own battle had devolved into what looked like a wrestling match, but the Fortunalt guard had the archer on the ground with his arm twisted behind him, so Wen didn’t give him more than a passing glance. She spun around to assess the rest of the scene. The coach looked the same, marooned in the middle of the road, Moss perched on its roof swiveling her head to look for danger in all directions. Across the road, Eggles and Malton still engaged in their own fights—no, one attacker was down, and Eggles had turned to offer his help to the less-experienced Malton. All briefly under control except—

  “Willa!” Moss called, waving both arms above her head. From her higher vantage point, she had spotted trouble first. “Coming from the east!”

  Wen whirled around to see and—Bright Mother burn me!—she saw four riders cantering up from the spot she had considered the likely ambush. Four! She had expected only two more.

  “Finish him off! We have more company,” she called to Cal, racing for the gelding and throwing herself into the saddle. The horse was already running before she got her left foot secure in the stirrups.

  “Hurry!” Moss was shouting, waving her arms even more frantically.

  Wen almost called back, I am! but she heard the sound of pounding hooves and realized Moss hadn’t been addressing her. She risked a glance over her shoulder—yes! Orson and Amie arriving from the rear, and just when they were desperately needed.

  No reason to hold back now. Wen kicked the gelding to a higher speed and leaned low over his neck, holding the reins with her left hand and pulling the sword again with her right. The gelding was battle-hardened; he made no move to veer away as she directed him straight at the oncoming assailants. The lead rider didn’t have the guts. At the last minute he tried to pull his mount aside, and Wen and her horse plowed straight into them. There was a wretched sound of slamming bodies and screaming horse, and the attacker was practically knocked from his saddle. Wen didn’t hesitate. She half stood in her stirrups for greater leverage and swung her sword hard against his chest. A gaping wound opened with clean and shocking suddenness. His face showed nothing but surprise as he relaxed his fingers and dropped both reins and weapon. His falling body twisted to one side of the saddle, and his maddened horse bolted for open land, dragging the dead rider behind it.

  There was a thunder of hooves and suddenly Wen was surrounded by comrades—Orson and Amie, Cal and Eggles—and all around her was the deadly, exuberant clangor of blade against blade. Suddenly her fear was gone. She knew they had the numbers and the skill for victory, and she was seized with battle euphoria. Her blade swung from her hand as if weightless. Her eyes saw everything at once; her body moved without receiving conscious commands. She was a conduit of violence, a weapon sculpted from bone and skin. She struck; she killed; she moved on.

  Until there was no one left to strike, no enemy left standing. Wen drew a hard breath, took a last swift look around, and slowly lowered her sword. With a jolt, her soul reentered her body. She was suddenly herself again, bloody and exhausted, shoulder to shoulder with comrades on a field of broken corpses.

  “What’s our damage?” she asked sharply.

  “Malton is down,” Eggles said, a pant in his voice. In addition to the wound he’d sustained at the beginning of the fight, he’d taken a few cuts to his face and his legs, but he didn’t sound hurt so much as winded. “Don’t know how seriously he’s injured.”

  “The rest of us have all taken some blows, but nothing bad,” Orson said.

  “Moss and Davey were fine when we passed them,” Amie added.

  Wen nodded. “I’m thinking Garth is dead,” she said grimly. “He didn’t ride back to check on us, and he should have when we didn’t appear behind him.”

  She saw a look of grief and fury cross Orson’s face, and then his expression shut down. “I’ll go look for him.”

  “Be careful,” she said. “I think we’ve accounted for all of them—but there were more than I expected.”

  Orson’s gaze was directed downward at one of the dead men. “Not bandits,” he said.

  Wen shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

  Now he looked at her, his eyes hard. The others crowded closer, their horses all whickering and shaking their manes. “Who, then?” Orson asked. “And why?”

  Wen lifted her shoulders in a gesture of ignorance. “Someone who wanted to harm the serramarra.”

  “Kill her, you mean,” Eggles said. “And everyone with her.”

  Wen nodded. “Looks that way.”

  Orson was still watching her. “Who’d want to kill a pretty girl like Karryn?”

  She was suddenly so tired. Almost too tired to sit in the saddle. Tired of intrigue and ambition and bloody bids for power. “Who wanted to kill King Baryn?” she asked wearily. “Someone who wanted his throne.”

  “Someone wants House Fortunalt?” Cal asked, sounding dazed. Despite his inexperience, he’d fought hard. He’d been every bit as good as she’d hoped he’d be when she hired him.

  “No matter what anyone has, someone else wants it,” Wen said. “That’s the lesson I’ve learned too many times to count.” She nodded at Orson. “Go look for Garth. Cal, Eggles, search the bodies and see if you can find anything to identify them. Amie, see what you can do for Malton. I’m going to check on Karryn and the others.”

  They dispersed, not moving as crisply as Riders would have but, sweet gods, doing everything she asked of them. This had been their first test in battle and they had all responded magnificently. Protected their charge, defeated their enemy, taken orders when they could, thought for themselves when they had to. And survived to fight another day.

  Most of them, anyway.

 
Wen turned the gelding’s head and jogged slowly to the coach. Davey had the horses well under control—and his sword at the ready beside him on the bench. Behind him, Moss’s head peered down from the roof. She braced herself with one hand, held a dagger in the other. Wen experienced a surge of pride so fierce that she felt a momentary pain deep in her chest.