“Will we continue on to Veldaren?” Tristan asked.
“Quiet boy, I don’t know!”
He waited until his temper calmed, then resumed.
“And I’m not sure we can. Don’t have the food, and water might end up scarce, too. I need inside to resupply, but that might mean leaving you behind for a while. They won’t know me from shit, but you’re the one they want. That, and I don’t know who Gandrem’s sided with in all this.”
“John was always nice to me,” Tristan said, referring to the lord. “I wish I’d stayed with him. What if…what if I get us inside? Will he keep us safe?”
Matthew shot him a look.
“How could you get us inside?”
“I don’t know. I could run real fast. I’m a fast runner, even Arthur said it!”
Matthew bit his lip. It was just one man, a professional soldier perhaps, but still just one. He touched the old sword at his hip. If he could last for a little while, just a little…
His eyes fell upon the near empty sack that had carried their food.
“I have an idea,” he said. “But you better run like the wind, you hear me? Like it, and faster. My life is depending on those legs of yours.”
*
I ngram mumbled curses as he shifted his weight from foot to foot, trying to generate some heat to counter the cold. After another minute, he pulled a blanket from a saddlebag and wrapped it around his shoulders. Beside him, his horse clomped the ground.
“Blanket ain’t big enough for two of us,” he said. “We’ll get you somewhere warm once we find that brat, though, I promise.”
He and his horse waited a hundred yards beyond the castle’s entrance, near the fork where the main road turned toward him. The woods had been thinned out toward the front, though they were still close enough to make him worry. Nathaniel and the farmer might try to sneak along the walls, using the woods as cover. Doing that was a good way to earn an arrow in your back by a guard, though. They’d come traveling down the road, he felt certain of it. According to his bitch of a wife, he’d left immediately after killing Gert and Ben. Dimwit farmer couldn’t know how many were actually looking, or that they might have beaten him here. Ingram expected him to come riding full gallop, the boy behind him on his horse, thinking he’d finally reached safety. Already Ingram had practiced his excuses for when the castle guards came running.
“Guy looked mad as a dog,” he’d say. “Started hollering for me to hand over my money, then sent the boy to do his dirty work.”
No one would question him for killing two hungry thieves too stupid to know better. Even if they did, what would it matter? Gandrem wouldn’t challenge Arthur, not on something so petty as a dead farmer and his boy.
While he held the rough blanket and looked about, he saw a man approaching. He walked on foot, leading his horse. A large sack lay slung across the saddle. Ingram raised an eyebrow at the sight. No boy, but what could someone be bringing to trade this late in winter?
“Slow down there,” Ingram said, tossing his blanket back toward his horse and putting a hand on his hilt. “Strange time for travel, don’t you think?”
“Pig’s die when they die,” said the man. “Come to see if his lordship would like a fine meal tonight.”
The cogs and wheels in Ingram’s brain were never the most tightly fit, but still they turned the words over, again and again, unable to get rid of a deep feeling of someone pulling something over him.
“Let me see it,” he said. The man continued leading the horse right on by, forcing Ingram to jump in his way. Still the man didn’t slow, and Ingram took several steps backward to prevent from getting knocked over. At last he drew his sword and stood his ground.
“I said let me see,” he said. “I don’t think that’s no pig.”
“If you say so,” said the man. He pulled the sack off the horse with a grunt and plopped it to the ground. “Just a small one, maybe good for John and some of his closest…”
While he talked, his hands messed with a tie at the end. The moment the knot came undone, it flung open, and out ran a boy who even Ingram knew had to be Nathaniel. The boy darted underneath his horse’s legs and then shot straight for the castle.
“Fuck!” Ingram shouted, turning to give chase. This time the farmer, Matthew obviously, got in the way. He wielded an old sword, recently polished but still timeworn and unreliable. Didn’t seem to matter, though, for he wielded it as if it were Ashhur’s blade itself and Ingram the dark-spawn of Karak.
“Outta the way!”
Ingram slashed with his sword, hoping to overpower the unskilled farmer. He blocked, clumsily perhaps, but it still banged his sword away. Instead of pressing the advantage, Matthew retreated, full defensive. Behind him, the little brat hollered like his lungs were on fire.
“He’s gonna kill my pa, he’s gonna kill my pa, he’s gonna kill him!”
Damn right, thought Ingram.
Ingram feinted, smirked at how easily the farmer fell for it, and then cut from the other direction. The edge of his sword slashed into his arm, eliciting a cry of pain. Ingram swung again, lower, hoping to split his belly open. The man put his blade in the way just in time. The metal on metal sound rang out, though there was something funny to it, as if one of their weapons wasn’t flexing like it should. Ingram doubted it was his. Blood spilled down Matthew’s arm, and he saw the elbow below it shaking.
“Should have turned him over,” Ingram said. Their eyes met, and for that brief moment, he could tell Matthew thought the same. Behind him, the guards approached, alerted by the boy. Fear bubbled up Ingram’s throat. Even if he lived, what might Oric do for such a screw up? The least he could do was kill the stupid man who had given them so much trouble. He thrust, the tip nicking ribs before Matthew managed to parry it aside. Stepping closer, Ingram pulled his sword around, smacking it against Matthew’s, which had pulled back to defend, and then he slashed once more at exposed flesh. Matthew fell back, but he was too slow, too unprepared for the maneuver. He was a farmer, not a trained fighter.
The sword cleaved through his shoulder and shattered his collarbone. In the distance, he heard Nathaniel scream. Matthew coughed once, his sword falling from limp fingers. His eyes grew wide. His lips quivered, his skin turning white. Ingram put a boot on his chest and kicked him back, freeing his crimson blade. The body clumped to the ground and lay still.
“Stubborn little shit,” Ingram muttered as he wiped his sword clean on Matthew’s leg.
“Drop your blade!” ordered the two gate guards as they arrived. They had their swords drawn, and Ingram promptly obeyed. He gave Nathaniel a smile, who cowered behind the two guards, tears on his face.
“What is the meaning of this?” asked one as he picked up Ingram’s blade. The other circled around to his back and pressed the tip of his sword against him to ensure he did nothing stupid. A hand reached in, yanking his dagger from his belt and tossing it to the dirt.
“I can explain, though Oric can do it better,” he said. He pointed to the body. “That man there’s a kidnapper. I know it ‘cause we been searching high and low for him. And that boy there, well…”
He turned to Matthew, whose eyes looked like white saucers. He grinned, for he felt his lie building, the slow gears in his head turning.
“That’s Nathaniel Gemcroft, back from the dead, as we always hoped.”
The guards looked to the boy, whose skin had gone pale.
“I wasn’t kidnapped,” he insisted to the guards. “I wasn’t. He was helping me, and you let him kill him. Why didn’t you run? I told you to run!”
He was crying now, snot dripping from his nose. The first guard took him by the hand while the other grabbed Ingram by the arm and led him toward the castle.
“This is something lord Gandrem will settle,” said the guard. “Stay quiet, and answer only when you’ve been asked directly, understand?”
“Sure do, but don’t squeeze so rough. You’ll be treating me like a hero soon enough.”