The Brat's Final Gambit

The sunset painted the sky a bloody tableau of brooding and angry clouds as the old lady pulled her shawl tightly around herself and hurried home. These were hard times, and nightfall brought terrible danger to those foolish enough to be caught alone and unarmed, even here on the outskirts of Kalavere.

She had once thought of this as a safe area. Until a week ago, that is.

There had hardly ever been any type of crime reported in this part of Kalavere. Anything serious was stuff of the city proper. But not any more, and so she moved on rapidly, weary of every person she passed on the roadside.

Great Lord!

That a grandmother should outlive her own grandson! Such a thing should be forbidden by the powers of the nine heavens. But no. She had lived to see the dead body of her grandson brought back to her home, and her sweet granddaughter abused and left to die in the woods. Quickly, she mounted the stairs to her home and opened the door, crossing into the inviting glow within . . . a glow, she thought bitterly, that would never welcome her grand-baby home from his daytime rambles with his friends.

“I’ve got the poultice,” she said quietly as she come through the foyer into the kitchen, taking off her shawl and hanging it by the fireplace to keep it warm. She did not know why she kept her voice down. Even though her granddaughter made no reaction to sound, she still felt it was only polite. The poor thing had been stripped of every other dignity. Jaela lay in a nook recessed into the kitchen wall. It had held pantry shelves, but those had been moved into the girl’s bedroom. They laid her out there where she could be easily watched and cared for, and she still lay exactly as her grandmother had left her hours before.

Jaela’s, thin figure made only a small rise in the quilts stretched over her. Her head was propped up on a pillow, and long, silky blond strands fell limply across her face, concealing two blackened eyes and a bruised and split lip.

Her grandmother walked over to her and smoothed the wayward strands of loose hair away from her face. A thin line of drool had formed at the edge of the girl’s lips, and her grandmother got a rag from the table, dipped it in a basin of clean water, and dabbed gently at her granddaughter’s cheeks.

“Back from the apothecary’s, I see,” her son announced tiredly as he entered the kitchen. “I cannot thank you enough for all of your help, Mom.”

“I had to hurry. I feared the sun was going to set on me before I got back,” she said, visibly shivering. Then she lifted the quilt and began gingerly applying the poultice to Jaela’s injuries. Wincing, she turned her head away for a moment. “What kind of monster could do this?”

“If I find him . . .” her son began, but his voice cracked before he finished the sentence.

The old woman nodded her head. They both felt the same way. Sometimes justice abandoned the innocent. The Crown guard had seemed doubtful the murderer would ever be caught.

“She had another fit. Keeps calling out for her brother? Did you get the elixir for her nerves?”

“Aye.” Before she could continue, someone knocked firmly at the door.

She and her son looked at one another briefly.

“I’ll get that,” he said. “Stay with Jaela.”

Her son moved behind her to answer the door. She heard him enter the foyer and open it. Although they spoke quietly, she heard the visitor say, “May I come in and speak to you? I have news you will want to hear.”

Her son bade him to enter, and footsteps announced her son’s return with the visitor right behind.

“I’m sorry to disturb you both—I know this is a bad time,” he said quietly, “But I have news of the terrible crime committed you have suffered.”

Quickly, the old woman turned. Out of the corner of her eye, her son tensed visibly.

“What do you know?” he croaked. “You don’t look like you’re with the Crown guard! Has the man that did this been caught?”

“Yes,” the stranger said softly, and paused.

For the first time, the grandmother took in the stranger’s appearance. He was tall and muscular. Even beneath the traveling cloak he wore, she could tell he was large. By his voice, she judged he was a young man, perhaps only four or five years older than Jaela.

But his voice. There was something in it she could not put her finger on . . . the authority of young officer, perhaps.

A low hood obscured everything above his nose. He continued on. “This afternoon, the man who did this to your girl and her brother tried to steal from me.”

Both the son and the grandmother gasped in surprise.

“It was the last mistake he will ever make, I can assure you.”

“Did you . . .?” her son sputtered. His voice rose with anger. “What happened to the bastard? You’re fine by the looks of you. Tell me what happened to the piece of trash!”

“Listen,” the mysterious visitor raised his hand in a calming gesture. “There is a street that runs past the shipyards and an alley just down from the only butcher’s shop on that road. The man’s name is Borl Jardsen. This isn’t the first time he has killed someone. I’ve left him tied up behind some old wine barrels. The guard has been notified, and if you go to the Crown’s dungeons, to the Pit, you can make a charge.”

Jaela’s father’s face cloudy stormy red with anger. “You should’ve killed him. If you knew what he did, you should have killed him,” he demanded, and with a shaking hand, pointed at his daughter. “Look at what he did! She’ll never be able to say it was him that did this.” The man lowered his hand and balled his fists in frustration.

“May I see your girl, sir? I might be able to do something.”

“Take your look,” he cried bitterly. “Get your eyes full of what that man did, and you’ll understand why she can’t make a report on him. There’s nothing beyond those eyes. Nothing.”

The stranger rose and walked to the pallet’s edge. He knelt down and pulled his hood back a little so he could have a better view of the child’s pale, limpid form.

As he did this, the old woman could see that he had strong, ruggedly handsome features and thick, blond hair cut short. He bent down toward her granddaughter, concealing the girl from her view.

Behind her, her son let out a loud gasp and rose.

Quickly, the old woman shifted her position, and her eyes grew wide.

As the stranger knelt motionlessly over the child, her eyes fluttered rapidly. Gradually, a wakening comprehension crept into the girl’s slack visage and a spark of awareness replaced that flat, vacant stare she had worn for days now.

In a quiet, small, weak voice, she looked up into the stranger’s face and said, “You have pretty eyes.”

“Jaela!” her grandmother cried out, overcome with joy and flew to her side, embracing the girl tightly. Her father was right behind her.

“Jaela,” he put his hands on her cheeks, her shoulders, and took her hands into his own, as if he needed to have the feel of her between his fingers to know she was really speaking again.

The visitor spoke up, quietly, “I must go now. See to her health. She will remember Borl’s face, but little else of what happened.”

Jaela’s father turned to him, “I—I cannot thank you enough. What can I do to repay you?”

The mysterious young man reached up and pulled his hood back. Her father looked at him in stunned amazement.

The stranger’s eyes glowed yellow like miniature suns.

When he spoke, there was a burning intensity to his voice, “See to it that the report is made. See to it she and her brother have justice.”

With that, the mysterious young man left and disappeared into the night.

And for days afterward, tales began to circulate among the citizens of one small district in the city of Kalavere that a Dread Lord had appeared in the night. He had arrived to avenge the victims of a horrible crime. It was said that he brought a killer to justice and brought a battered young girl back from the edge of death. It was said that the legends of their return were legends no more, that a change was coming. Some feared it was a sign that the end of times was near. Others, who knew the family that had lost their grandson and nearly lost their daughter, who had seen the state the girl had been left in, said it was a miracle.

And after a while, the entire city was abuzz with the news.