The whip lashed out again, this time actually striking the tree just above his head. Shreds of bark scattered about his hair and shoulders. Eric’s eyes closed tightly in fear, but he forced himself to laugh.
Reid stopped, silencing his friends with a wave of his arm, and let the whip hang limply at his side. “What’s so funny?” he demanded.
Eric said nothing.
Reid stomped to Eric’s side and grabbed a handful of hair, snapping his head back. “I asked you what you were laughing at.” He pulled harder, forcing Eric’s head to turn in his direction. “Answer me!”
“I was just wondering,” Eric replied smoothly, “if you always miss your target.”
Incensed, Reid stepped quickly back and let fly with the whip, striking him across his left shoulder. Eric cried out, and tears rolled uncontrollably down his cheeks as the whip struck him a second time, then a third.
For the briefest of moments, Eric thought that the fourth strike was the whip, but as a veritable shower of wood and bark chips fell over him he realized that a part of the tree itself had exploded above him. He opened his eyes and heard yet another blast in his ears, and recognized the sound of an Earther hunting weapon; a shotgun.
“Reid! I’ll blow your gods-damned head from your shoulders if you move a muscle!”
The sounds behind him were confusing, and at the same time reassuring: scuffling sounds and fast talking as Reid and the others attempted to deal with whoever it was that had appeared so suddenly; the snort and hooves of a horse, a big one; the ka-chuck-ka-chuck, clack, of two more shells being loaded into the chamber of a shotgun.
“Hello!” Eric shouted. “Who’s there?” There was no answer.
“Is this the way you have been spending your time, Reid, accosting traveling children?” The horse stomped again and Eric heard the sound of the beast’s labored breathing—whoever the newcomer was had come in a hurry. Apparently his pursuers had had a pursuer of their own. There was a pause, and then another heavy sound as the horse leaped the fallen oak, then trotted to where he hung at the tree.
The rider was middle-aged, by Earth standards, and wore clothing that befitted a noble family. He was handsome of face, but wore a troubled expression as their eyes met.
He shook his head as he looked down from his mount. “A mere boy,” he said over his shoulder. “And for this you needed help from Fat Mobo and Paulie the Snake?” He reached for the machete at his waist and cut Eric’s bonds with a single chop. Eric fell back from the tree immediately, but caught himself before collapsing on the ground. He rubbed his wrists, but pointedly ignored the excruciating pain from the blows he’d just taken from Reid’s whip. The stranger looked down at him once more and, apparently assured that he was all right, pulled the reins on his mount and returned his attention to the others.
“I am ashamed,” he said simply. The horse snorted again, punctuating his remark as he pulled on the reins and guided the animal closer to Reid and his friends. Eric smiled in satisfaction at the way the two accomplices shied back from the big horse, but noted that Reid stood his ground, unshaken by the horseman’s strong words. “Mobo, Paulie—leave. I wish to speak to the brave and manly Reid alone.” The two immediately scrambled wordlessly over the oak and rushed back up the trail in the same direction from where the horse had appeared. Reid didn’t bother to bid diem good-bye, but remained where he stood, glaring at the horseman.
“You should mind your own business, Brendan,” he said once his friends had disappeared into the backwoods.
The horse turned slightly as the man slid the shotgun into a saddle holster and smoothly dismounted, landing at Reid’s feet. He removed his riding gloves and tucked them into a loop on the saddle, then, in one fluid motion, turned and backhanded Reid, knocking him backward into the trunk of the fallen oak. “You are my business,” he said.
Reid wiped a bleeding lip with his sleeve and leaped forward, and found himself staring at the knife that had appeared suddenly in Brendan’s hand.
“I’ve taught you nothing,” Brendan spat, shaking his head in disgust. Reid stood back and straightened, and it was obvious even from Eric’s vantage point that the newcomer’s words had hit home, as Reid’s anger seemed to drain from him.
“You’ve taught me much,” Reid replied, his voice at once defiant, but more respectful in tone than it had been moments earlier. “But I sometimes fail to see the value in what you’ve taught.”
Brendan nodded. “That much is obvious. But had I been a stranger out to do you harm, and you had attacked—as you did now—out of anger and unarmed, you might now be watching your blood spill onto the ground, and not merely trickling from a cut lip. Would you have seen a value in my lessons then?”
The boy crossed his arms in silence and stared off into the woods.
“And since when have you taken a liking to the torment of those weaker than you?” Brendan pointed to where Eric stood, almost naked, still rubbing sore wrists.
“But we caught him spying on us!”
“Yes, I know,” Brendan replied. “I encountered your working whore a kilometer up-trail. It was she who told me what happened and the direction you ran. I came up behind you some minutes ago and followed you here.” Eric saw the man smile for the first time since he’d appeared. “If you think I am angry and disappointed, wait until you talk with the whore—”
“I’ll probably never see the drunken bitch again,” Reid interrupted. “She wasn’t that good.”
“Perhaps not. But you’ll go into town and pay her tavern keeper nonetheless.”
Reid started to protest Brendan’s decision, but thought better of it, adding in a low voice, “You’ll not always be able to tell me what to do, you know.”
Brendan casually replaced the knife in the sheath on his belt. If he was offended or concerned by what Reid had said, he didn’t show it.
“That’s true enough. When you reach eighteen, my obligations to your mother will end and you’ll be free to turn your back on House Valtane, although to do so would show even poorer judgment than I’ve seen you display this day alone.” Again, he looked meaningfully at Eric.
The exertion of the chase and the terror of his treatment at Reid’s hands now behind him, Eric felt the cold of the backwoods seeping into his skin. The welts on his back hurt, and he tried to concentrate on the pain as a means of taking his mind on the growing chill. He crossed his arms, covering himself as best he could, and started shivering more intensely than before.
Brendan turned suddenly back to Reid, the look of anger he’d shown earlier once more flashing in his eyes. “Remove your shirt and vest.”
Reid’s mouth moved wordlessly several times before he finally managed to sputter a single “What?”
“Your shirt and vest; take them off. Now!”
He hesitated a moment, but realizing that Brendan was indeed serious, he complied. He removed the vest first, then the shirt, and tossed both into a heap on the ground between them. “Anything else, Master Brendan?” he demanded sarcastically.
Brendan ignored the insult. “For now, no. Get you back to House, where I’ll expect you in the exercise room at exactly six o’clock. It seems you need a refresher in hand-to-hand, not to mention manners. Perhaps we can address both at the same time.”
Reid stood a moment, unmoving, and stared in unabashed contempt for his teacher. Then, without further discourse, he turned sharply and hopped atop the log. He glanced back once at Eric with a look that said he held him personally responsible for the humiliation he’d just received, then hopped down the other side before disappearing into the backwoods at an unhurried jog.