The Brat's Final Gambit

Niam was worried. For the past week Bug had repeatedly told him that something in the woods had been following her. “Well, follow it back!” he said more lightheartedly than he felt. Bug had been through enough and he didn’t want to add to it. This was probably just her imagination. She punched him in the shoulder. “Hey! You’ve been hanging around Davin too much!”

“I can’t go chasing something that’s following me. I’m too small,” Bug complained.

“It’s what I’d do,” Niam replied with a wolfish grin. “Besides, I don’t want to hear any of this ‘too small’ talk from you.” Bug looked down and tried to smile. It was a sad smile, but still a smile, and Niam had been working hard since Corey’s death to help her find it again.

On this day he walked alone with her from the Sartor estate to her home near Joachim’s manor. A cold wind pushed itself against his jacket, and he put his arm around his little friend to protect her from the blustering eddies pushing and pulling from different directions. Around them, the last of the acorns clinging to tree braches spilled at irregular intervals, and the sound they made resembled someone (or something) keeping pace with them in the brittle underbrush. All Niam wanted was get through the woods and into the open where safety waited. Involuntarily he shivered. Maybe it was Bug’s fearful refrain, but there had been times lately when he too felt a pair of eyes boring into him, hadn’t there?

“It’s cold,” came her small, miserable voice from behind a long scarf wrapped around more of her face than her neck. Niam laughed silently at the comical effect. She stopped just as he led her through the last of the blanket of trees and past the edge of the forest into the well tended landscape of Joachim’s property. One of the count’s sentries waved a friendly greeting to them, and Niam felt himself relax.

“You’re safe, now,” Niam said warmly.

Bug crinkled up her nose and hugged him for what must have been the tenth time that day. Niam looked down at her and pushed windblown strands of hair away from her eyes. “You okay girly-fish?” he asked—for probably the tenth time that day.

“Long as you keep giving me nicknames,” she told him.

“Every day of my life.”

“What if it’s that thing that’s been hunting people that’s following me?” she asked, chewing at her lip.

Niam led her to a mound of hay set out for the horses, where the animals stood cropping at the weathered grass nearby. He sat down with her cross-legged on the scratchy bedding. The sun’s afternoon rays were golden and warm on what could have been a perfect winter day had it not been for the creature menacing the countryside. “It’s called a trall,” Niam reminded her, “and the trall used to be Jalt.”

Though Bug already knew all of this, she liked to make him repeat bits of the story, as if by repetition he were somehow able to control the situation by controlling the story. “It seems like the trall is being pushed farther and farther toward the Korse Mountains,” Niam reassured her. “That doesn’t mean anybody’s safe yet, and that’s why you have to have somebody with you whenever you go out. The estates are all full of guardsmen and the towns and roads are constantly patrolled now.”

“But tralls don’t use roads like we do,” Bug said fearfully.

“Exactly my point,” Niam’s voice was serious.

“I promise,” Bug said. “I won’t go anywhere alone.”

The expression of fear still pulled at the features of Bug’s face. Niam was frustrated that there was nothing he could do to allay her fears. After a few moments of thought, he said, “Jolan Kine told me one sure way you can tell if you’re being stalked by a trall.”

“What’s that?” she asked, her eyes big and circumferenced by anxiety.

“Those times you felt like you were being followed and watched, did you smell anything?”

Bug looked down, searching her memory. “No . . . why?”

“They stink. Horribly.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah. They are foul—all matted in waste and gore. You’d smell him and know without a shadow of a doubt.”

Bug’s face lightened a little. “I didn’t smell anything.” As she said this, another thought must have crossed her mind, because her mouth puckered and her face darkened once more. “What about Salb or Card?”

“Card is locked up and Bode’s been heard bragging about running Salb out of town to Kalavere,” Niam said, and Bug must have heard the sour tone in his voice as he spoke because she said, “He’s a real humanitarian.”

Niam chuckled.

“You’re going back to the bad man’s house soon aren’t you?” she asked hopefully.

“In just a few days,” Niam said, feeling a mixture of fear and eagerness thrill through him where it settled in his stomach. “Jolan Kine’s injury took a lot longer to heal than any of us expected, but with luck, much of this will be done before you know it.” And as Niam said this, he prayed that it was so. Almost a month had passed since their initial foray into the sorcerer’s manor. Joachim was throwing fits over the fact that they couldn’t get into the basement until now.

“My dad says that people are scared. That they want that place burned down and cleansed, and they say that the trall will keep killing until the sorcerer is dead.”

Niam wanted to be there when that happened. “He has to be brought to justice first, Bug—and he will be. There are a lot of people cleaning up the mess he left behind.”

From beyond the stables, a deep, distant voice called out for Bug.

“That’s Dad,” she said.

Niam helped her up and walked her all the way home. On his return, he decided to go slowly back to Maerillus’s home. Soon he needed to make a trip back to his house for his thicker coats. The thought made him sad, though. For a long time now, the house had felt empty, even with his parents there. With them away on business for the count, the place would be as empty as it felt.

As Niam walked, he imagined what it must feel like to be Bug. She had been afraid of Bode’s gang since as long as she could remember. Now that there was something that seemed to have stepped out of her worst nightmares running loose in the Lake Valleys, her world had only gotten larger and more terrifying.

Little wonder she was afraid something was following her, but as he stopped and listened, all he heard was the pop of acorns striking dead leaf litter as they fell. Still, he felt a chill travel down his back that was more then just imagination. There was something out there. Something other than the trall. He sensed it.

Bug had only a very limited idea of what was out there. Truth be told he wanted her a little scared. That fear might keep her from doing something foolish. People still reported that Ravel had been spotted lurking around less than reputable swill houses in Old Flood and Havel’s Dock, places far enough away to remain one step away from being captured again.

The forest was darkening and the wind sharpening its cold claws against the hard rimes of frosts yet to coat the land. Niam moved on. All around him the wind rustled dry leaves, lifting clumps and sending them scattering noisily like unseen ghosts kicking up the thick carpet with malicious glee. Niam looked forward to the day when he might be able to enjoy the forest sounds once more without drawing darker feelings from the shadowy places within him. Ravel was out there. The trall was still out there. People were dying. And worse—Kreeth was out there somewhere. Everyone across the Valleys now felt a sense of terror, especially as the sun began to set. When the trall did not have to hide from the light of day, it did most of its killing.

Niam returned to the warm, brightly lit Sartor manor where the scents of bread and roast wafted from the kitchen. Over the next day, a dusting of snow fell across the Valleys. Above the surrounding hills, the peaks of the Korse Mountains rose, their jagged peaks capped in snow like daggers of ice gleaming in the sun. Yet on the ground between the Sartor and Joachim estates ran footprints too obscured by the winds for anyone to tell whether they were from man or beast. In the shadows, a pair of eyes watched, patient and cold.

Maerillus stood just beyond the doorway of the sitting room of Lord Faldon’s estate. He found the place spacious but not overpowering, an elegant testament to a man who toward the last years of his life chose not excess but simplicity. Faldon had long retired to his family home in Havel’s Dock after serving the crown loyally.

Maerillus had gone with his farther, though whether his father or Joachim had insisted more vehemently that he remain behind, he was not sure. After the events at Kreeth’s mansion, Maerillus was not going to be left behind. He needed to get out and away from home. After a protracted morning of nagging, both men knew he was bent on going with them and that they were going to have to flatly forbid him—which might prompt Niam and Davin team up with Maer to concoct a plan to follow and eavesdrop—or mollify him by letting him come. Joachim finally looked at Maerillus’s dad and then said, “Fine. You’ll find out eventually, anyway.”

Maerillus knew Joachim was taking Kine and his father to talk with Lord Faldon about the trall loose in the area, and to explain the constant train of patrols winding through the towns and villages in the Valleys.

While his father had told him to wait as the three men spoke with Faldon, Maerillus knew he was going to have to listen in. There had been something strange in his father’s eyes as they spoke before the meeting, and it incensed Maerillus that there was obviously something important afoot that he needed to know about.

Now he listened. And everything they covered with Faldon, he already knew. After the meeting, the three men remained in the sitting room talking as Faldon left to attend to other matters. They currently sat together talking quietly. “It was that poison,” the Hammer presently grumbled. But another month? This is ridiculous!”

“Kreeth’s property is guarded,” Joachim muttered. “And we will return as soon as we can and see what that bastard has hidden in his basement.”

Kine’s face grew severe. “There’s no telling what he has working down there, but I can tell you it’s nothing good for anyone in the Lake Valleys.”

Joachim’s voice was sour. “But with no one able to go in or out, maybe we’ve mitigated the worst of it.”

Though Maerillus was sure none of the men in the room could see him, Joachim’s temper made him instinctively step back. The man was as testy as a hungry dire wolf.

“There’s more unpleasantness brewing than just this,” Maerillus’s father broke in.

Joachim followed this immediately with an even sourer note. “There’s nothing to be done about that right now. Even if King Gerard’s son is dead and the succession is now in doubt.”

At that, Jolan Kine responded darkly. “Found dead at the dinner table. King’s physician says it was a natural death.”

“You don’t believe it?” Gaius asked in a way that made it clear that the question was more a statement of agreement than curiosity.

“Poisoned arrows, poisoned soup,” Kine said in a sinister voice. “Seems like there might be an awful lot of poison going around these days.”

“If you are right, then either the physician is part of it, or he’s too scared to say anything,” Gaius said, and then chose his words carefully. “You obviously seem to insinuate that the two may be . . . connected.”

Jolan Kine’s words became hard. “I more than suspect that some of my order have been turning attention away from Kreeth, and if the prince’s dinner were poisoned, it would have been from someone high up in Pallodine—Someone with a very dangerous set of skills.”

“Poison used to be one way Hammer’s took down Sorcerers and dark wizards,” Joachim added.

“A practice that was outlawed by Gerard himself,” Gaius said. “I remember the debate.”

“Many of my order were opposed. It’s a damned lot easier to poison a Sorcerer than take him down in person. Gerard never was popular with some of us,” Kine told them.

“And you?” Gaius asked with a raised eyebrow.

Kine smiled crookedly. “I’m a practical man, Gaius.”

“One I imagine with a very dangerous set of skills,” the dark irony in Gaius’s voice was clear.

“Indeed.”

Joachim broke in heatedly before a verbal jousting began. “Those laws have helped bring many Sorcerers to ridicule and scorn because they lived long enough to see trials. And allowing the pubic to see that Sorcerers could be brought to justice has been worth any five assassinations. It’s one area I always disagreed with Jort when the old fox was alive. I want Kreeth tried publically and put down like the animal he is.”

Kine now arched an eyebrow. “Idealistic. But how many of our enemies do you think might be allied? I’d just as soon use a poisoned arrow on Kreeth and then deal with the others. You should be in Pallodine right now, Joachim. Already Count Eason is trying get enough support to move into the Lake Valleys to take care of this ‘so called trall business.’”

Maerillus had never met Eason but he knew him by reputation. The man was sanctimonious, ambitious, and conniving. A lot of merchants had fled Kalavere for the Lake Valleys over the years because of him.

“I know what Eason is trying,” Joachim growled. “He’d be happy to take my title along with my head if he weren’t such a bloody coward.”

“No noble has moved against another in the kingdom in over three hundred years,” Gaius said, distressed at the thought.

“Right now, with Gerard in mourning, there are many in Pallodine taking advantage of the lack of oversight,” Joachim said bluntly. “And I imagine some in his closest circle are making sure that such oversight has blind spots.”

“The repercussions some of these machinations might spell for Maerillus and the boys are frightening,” Gaius worried.

“I’ll get them out of the kingdom before that happens,” Joachim reassured him.

Before they could continue talking, the door across the room opened and Lord Faldon walked in and with a kindly grin announced that it was time for lunch. Maerillus moved away silently, thinking.

Much of what he heard he already knew, and to be honest, the idea that Lord Eason wanted to stir up trouble for Joachim worried Maerillus the most, and not just because the first casualty of an attempt to humiliate or strip the Count of his title would be his father, but also because of what the nasty man might do to the Valleys. He had always wanted to shut down much of the business the Joachim and Sartor families had brought into the area.

Maerillus moved down the hall to muse a little bit. He thought Joachim’s words that there was something he was “going to find out anyway” were perplexing. A pang of worry struck him in his stomach. As he moved down the hall to Faldon’s kitchen to see if he could get one of the maids to find him some bread and cheese, he saw a familiar figure with carelessly thrown blond hair. Her maid’s dress swished as she walked, and Maerillus’s heart made an involuntary leap. “Betsy!” he exclaimed. Betsy looked up in surprise. Her sharp features and pretty red lips took his breath as always. Her eyes met his, and a strange mixture of emotions crossed her face. Maerillus almost frowned, but he held it in check. She seemed elated and frightened the moment she recognized that he was the one who had called her name.

Betsy’s face flushed and she bit her lip nervously. “You always have a way of popping up!”

Maerillus couldn’t help but grin. “I get that a lot now,” he said, fighting butterflies in his chest. Betsy met his gaze for one long moment, and seemed on the verge of saying something, but as she watched Maerillus’s eyes trail from her face down the length of her dress, she hung her head down in shame. The smile on his face became awkward, and fell into an expression of shock and hurt. “You’re pregnant!” he blurted out against his better judgment.

Betsy began to cry. “It was him, Maerillus! That vile man!” she said between trembling lips. “He did this to me while I was under his spell. I promise I didn’t have anyone else in my life! I’m not like that. You must believe me!” She looked up at him with pleading eyes, and for a moment Maerillus was caught up in a torrent of emotions. Kreeth had taken his pleasure against her will—against her knowledge even. In the instant of rage that sprung up inside of him, he had another thought that immediately shamed him.

She was tainted.

But then he caught his composure and silently cursed himself for thinking such a thing. Maerillus thrust the idea from his mind and took ahold of her in a strong embrace. Betsy cried into his shoulder as he ran his fingers through her hair. “Do you think less of me?” She sniffed dejectedly. “I’ll understand if you do.”

Maerillus wanted to scream in fury. When he said, “Of course I don’t,” his voice cracked against his will, and he struggled in vain not to cry. “It’s not your fault Betsy,” he said as tenderly as he could manage. “There’s no shame for you in this. Not for you. Not in my eyes.” Betsy held onto him and wept even harder. They both wept—in pain, shame, and anger at the violation.

For the first time in his life, Maerillus wanted to kill someone.