The Dame

NINETEEN

Here, then,” Master Reandu said to Bannagran. He handed the man a long knife. “Do it yourself.” Beside him a pair of younger brothers stiffened.

From the sill of a high window in Chapel Pryd, Bransen listened carefully to every word. A short while earlier, the monks had spoken of King Yeslnik’s edict that all prisoners of Delaval be released and all those taken from Ethelbert’s ranks be executed. Bransen was glad of their reaction, particularly the angry foot stomping of Reandu. For some reason he did not quite understand, Bransen needed to believe the best of this man. He remembered a day when Reandu had helped him finish his chore of lugging chamber pots to the dumping area, when Reandu had subsequently washed the filth from him. There had been tenderness there, once, though it had been suppressed under the orders of severe Bathelais and the even more severe Father Jerak.

Bransen shrank back when Bannagran had stormed into the chapel, full of unfocused anger and agitation.

“Do not try my patience,” Bannagran warned. “My road has been long and wearying. I’ve no tolerance for your stubbornness this day.”

“I have released the Delaval prisoners,” Reandu calmly replied. “Against my better judgment but for your own sake.”

“That was half the edict.”

“You would have me murder helpless captives?”

“King Yeslnik did not demand that of you.”

“Of course. I am simply to turn them over to you so that you might employ some valorless and immoral cad to stab and beat them,” Reandu said, his voice thick with sarcasm that surely spelled defiance. “How easy it is for King Yeslnik to make such a demand, his own hands clean of the blood. How easy it is for Bannagran to follow such a command…”

Up above, the Highwayman could hardly believe that Reandu was showing such independence, such… humanity. This was the man who had declared Garibond’s heresy, which had doomed the innocent man to the fire.

“Silence!” Bannagran yelled.

“Then bloody your own hands, warrior!” Reandu spat back in his face.

“Do you think these hands clean?” the Bear of Honce roared, holding his large, strong paws up before him. “In this war and a dozen before! Do you think I have not killed many men?”

“These are helpless prisoners!”

“Many men undeserving? Men whose only crime was to serve the losing laird? So stained are these hands that your own Abelle could not wash the blood from them! There is no place in your heaven for Bannagran!”

“Then take this dagger and murder the five men of Ethelbert held within Chapel Pryd,” said Reandu. “Cut their throats or stab their hearts.” He held the dagger again, and Bannagran narrowed his eyes and stared at him angrily.

“Because you cannot!” Reandu lectured and pulled the dagger away. “You are a warrior, not a murderer!”

“This is an execution of the convicted, no murder,” Bannagran said.

“Murder!” Reandu reiterated. “These men have committed no crimes.”

Bannagran seemed to gasp for breath for a few moments before replying, “They are to be turned over. All loyal to Ethelbert are to be executed by order of King Yeslnik.”

But Master Reandu was smiling by then, the Highwayman noted from far above. “You’ll not kill them,” he said with confidence.

“Their loyalty to Laird Ethelbert dooms them,” Bannagran answered.

“You cannot ask a man to exchange his loyalty to an opposing laird,” said Reandu. “You know as much.” Reandu paused, and it occurred to Bransen that both he and Bannagran had known all along where this conversation would lead, almost as if they had choreographed it beforehand.

“But if they expressed loyalty to a third party, one neutral in the war, perhaps,” Reandu posited.

“None who don the robes of the Order of Abelle fall under the edict of King Yeslnik, certainly,” Bannagran replied. His guards looked at him curiously, as did all the monks in the room, except Reandu standing before him.

“Of course, because then they will serve the order and not Laird Ethelbert,” Reandu said. “It is curious that you mention that, new Laird of Pryd, for this very morning, all five of the remaining prisoners expressed just such an interest. I happen to have several extra robes that will fit them well.”

“I will see them dressed as such, and this very day,” Bannagran warned. “Else they will face the wrath of King Yeslnik.”

Master Reandu, who looked quite pleased with his cleverness, bowed. Bannagran and his soldiers left the chapel.

Do not hesitate,” Yeslnik said to his brutish guard. “It is imperative that you react as soon as I indicate, true and fast.”

“Me pleasure, me king,” said Brawnwin, a three-hundred-pound behemoth of a man. He carried his great axe casually on one shoulder and could wield it with one hand as easily as most men could wave a short sword. Brawnwin’s head was shaven and looked as if it had been melted on atop his massive shoulders, large rolls of skin falling down the back of that neck and great jowls that seemed to grow out of his collarbones in the front.

“They may come to his defense,” Yeslnik warned. “Their magic is potent.”

“One cut, me king,” Brawnwin assured him.

Drawing power from the imposing brute so readily at his command, Yeslnik stepped a little more lightly as they ascended the long stairs of Chapel Delaval. Until recently, this church of the Order of Abelle had been known as the Chapel of Weeping Brothers, a name dating to the slaughter of the first monks in the city, who took their own lives rather than denounce Abelle in the great tragedy of Cordon Roe. Many of the brothers currently in Chapel Delaval still referred to the place by its older name, a more fitting title this dark day.

Yeslnik and his entourage of a dozen armed and armored guards shoved past the brothers who answered their knock on the heavy wooden doors.

“Father Pendigrast, immediately,” Yeslnik commanded. “And bring forth all the prisoners delivered to you who have not yet been ushered north to Chapel Abelle.”

“The prisoners, King Yeslnik?” a young monk asked.

“At once! All of them, and in chains!” He waved the young monk away emphatically, giving him a shove with his foot when the monk didn’t move quickly enough. The hapless monk flew several feet before he stumbled and crashed into the side wall.

In moments, Father Pendigrast appeared with three of the higher-ranking brothers. He was one of the younger fathers in the order, not yet forty, promoted because of the untimely death of the father before him and the man’s two expected successors, all taken by the same bout of the grippe that had swept through Delaval City. There was no missing the trepidation on Pendigrast’s face as he moved into the nave and walked along the worn fabric of the carpet that led between the chapel’s center pews. Pendigrast had obviously expected this visit. How could he not, given that Father Artolivan’s edict of disobedience had reached Delaval City that very morning?

“I sent one of your young brothers to fetch Ethelbert’s men,” Yeslnik said as the man approached. “To save you the trouble, of course.”

Pendigrast glanced to his monk companions, closed his eyes briefly, and breathed deeply to steady his obviously frayed nerves. “You have seen the edict of Father Artolivan of Chapel Abelle, who rules my order,” he said quietly.

“Of course,” said Yeslnik. “A meritless writ I will ignore, as will you. Where are the prisoners?”

Pendigrast swallowed hard. “King Yeslnik, Chapel Delaval serves at your pleasure, as it served at the pleasure of Laird Delaval before you.”

“King Delaval,” Yeslnik sharply corrected.

“Yes, of course. King Delaval. But we serve Father Artolivan above all.”

“Get the prisoners,” Yeslnik interrupted.

“My king, I cannot,” said Father Pendigrast.

Yeslnik gave a bored glance at the giant Brawnwin, who came forward suddenly and with a single chop of his axe cut Father Pendigrast apart from shoulder to hip. The man’s legs crumbled beneath him, blood spewing for just a few heartbeats before Pendigrast fell sideways, quite dead. Monks cried out, but Yeslnik’s guards were among the most fierce and violent in all the city. Brandishing their weapons they formed a defensive ring about the king, spear tips thrusting to keep Pendigrast’s entourage back.

Yeslnik looked up. “Who is the new Father of Chapel Delaval?” he calmly asked. The monks all stammered and stuttered until finally one pointed to a man about the same age of Pendigrast.

“Congratulations, Father,” Yeslnik said to him. “Now send your minions to retrieve the prisoners.” Never taking his withering gaze from poor, frightened, newly appointed Father Dennigan, Yeslnik watched as a dozen ragged men were led into the nave in chains.

Yeslnik smiled widely, a most wicked and pleasing idea coming to him. He reached to Brawnwin’s belt and pulled the man’s bronze short sword from its sheath, then tossed it on the ground before Dennigan.

“You kill the first one,” he instructed. “Then hand the blade to the next most superior brother and on down the line.”

“I am no warrior, King Yeslnik,” Dennigan stammered.

“Kill him. Now,” said Yeslnik. “Or explain your failing to Father Pendigrast.”

Hands trembling, Dennigan picked up the sword and moved on shaky legs to the nearest of the prisoners, a young man barely out of his teens. The boy pleaded with his superior to be spared.

“Do it!” King Yeslnik cried.

Dennigan leveled the blade at the prisoner’s throat and whispered that he would try to make it clean. The boy began to cry. Dennigan dropped the blade to the floor and vomited.

“Pathetic,” Yeslnik said. “All of you!” With a flick of his white hand he motioned to two guards, who rushed to the chapel doors and flung them wide. More soldiers charged into the chapel.

“Arrest the brothers and drag those miserable wretches from Ethelbert into the streets,” Yeslnik commanded. He turned to Brawnwin. “I trust that you will find ways to execute them that will amuse me.”

He led Brawnwin’s gaze over to Dennigan, on his knees now, shoulders bobbing violently with great sobs. Yeslnik gave a derisive snort. “Wound him,” he whispered to the brute. “But leave him with enough to make the journey to Chapel Abelle bearing my response to Father Artolivan.”

“And yer answer will be?” Brawnwin asked eagerly.

“The brother who delivered Artolivan’s treasonous writ,” said Yeslnik. “Put his head in a sack.”

Brawnwin’s grin nearly took in his ears.

The next morning, Brother Dennigan felt a heavy boot kick against his back, shoving him from Delaval City’s north gate on the eastern side of the great river. In his hand he held a sack that bore the severed head of Brother Piastafan, the courier from Father Artolivan, his mouth locked wide open in a final, horrified scream. As Dennigan pulled himself from the mud to a kneeling position, a wagon rolled out of the gate and splashed beside him. Brawnwin came forth and grabbed him by the collar. With tremendous strength the brute lifted Dennigan over the side of the wagon and unceremoniously dumped him in.

“With all haste to Chapel Abelle,” instructed King Yeslnik, sitting astride his mare just inside the gate. “And you, monk, tell your Father Artolivan that when I am soon finished with Ethelbert, the Order of Abelle will be held accountable for his treason. This is our time of great need, the moment of triumph for the line of Delaval, and I will never forget that Artolivan and your church did not stand with me.”

Dennigan managed to shift to a sitting position and looked back vacantly at the young tyrant.

“Oh, about that boy you were too weak to kill,” Yeslnik said to him. “We stripped him naked, bound his hands, and put him in a sack with some poisonous snakes this morning. Perhaps you heard his screams. They lasted a pleasingly long time.”

Dennigan closed his eyes and shook with silent sobs.

I knew that Yeslnik was an impulsive child, but this surprises me,” Bransen said to Jameston when they regrouped in the woods behind Chapel Pryd after both had witnessed the conversation between Reandu and Bannagran from opposite windows high on the side of the nave.

“You knew he had done as much,” said Jameston. “We heard this at the other chapel, and you said then that Yeslnik’s murderous mind didn’t surprise you.”

“Not Yeslnik,” Bransen corrected. “Nothing bad that comes from him would surprise me. The reactions of Brother Reandu and Bannagran, however… I never thought them so possessed of moral boundaries,” Bransen explained and Jameston nodded. “Especially not Bannagran.”

“Is that the reason?” asked the scout. “Or are the both of them weary already of King Yeslnik?”

It was Bransen’s turn to nod. “Could it be that King Yeslnik is so far beyond the moral boundaries that even the always callous lairds will be put off by his demands?”

“Or it might be that these callous lairds you speak of have a bit of sense and know that they can only ask so much of those they dominate before they find the tines of a pitchfork aimed their way. It didn’t take much convincing by Gwydre to get the people of Vanguard to turn and fight against Ancient Badden.”

“Yeslnik is an idiot.”

“An impetulant one, for sure,” said Jameston.

Bransen nodded, for the word sounded right. After a moment’s reflection, though, Bransen screwed up his face curiously and echoed, “Impetulant?”

“Aye.”

“I don’t know that word,” said Bransen.

“But you know what it means.”

“Impatient? Impetuous? Petulant?”

“Yes.”

Bransen gave a helpless laugh.

“It’s from an old hunter’s song,” Jameston explained. “ ‘The Herstory of History.’ ”

“Herstory?”

“You can figure that part out.”

“True, but why?”

“When you live alone in the forest you learn to speak little and listen a lot,” Jameston explained. “Putting words together to make a quicker point saves you breath.”

“Crazy V would have had a herstory,” said Bransen.

Jameston laughed. “And a good one! And more than a few who knew her would be embarredassed by the tales told of V.”

“Embarred…” Bransen started to echo, then he could only chuckle. “Red-assed? What did you call him?”

“Who? Yeslnik?”

“Impetulant?” asked Bransen.

“Fits him, don’t it?”

“Better than any. King Yeslnik the Impetulant. We should put it on his headstone. Soon.”

“Then let us start the carving of king and stone.”

Jameston paused and let the moment slip aside, watching Bransen as the young man glanced back toward Pryd, the town that had been his home for so many years.

“You are proud of the laird and the monks,” Jameston remarked. “Their actions in dodging Yeslnik’s verdict give you hope.”

Bransen considered that for a few heartbeats. “I cannot deny that. My relationship with Brother Reandu is… complicated.”

“He’s the closest thing you’ve got to family after your wife and mother,” said Jameston. Bransen didn’t argue with that assessment. “Is it time for us to go see him?”

Bransen nodded but did not move. Jameston stepped aside and motioned him to lead the way, but Bransen still made no move.

“You think it harder to test that Writ of Passage now,” Jameston reasoned. “Now you’re hoping they might honor it, and now, with such hopes, you’re more afraid of how you’ll feel if they don’t.”

Bransen took a deep breath.

“Put your mask down over your eyes and walk openly through the town,” Jameston advised. “The people here will remember you. They saved you once. Maybe once again?”

Bransen took off his farmer’s hat and his mask and shook his hair out, which parted it in the middle and showed the star-shaped brooch set on his forehead. His deerskin coat fell to the ground with the hat, and he tied the mask on securely. He looked different from the Highwayman who had left Pryd Town months before. His dark hair was longer, and, of course, he now wore the brooch. His bandanna, once a mask and hood, was now rolled so that it was just a thin strip across his eyes. But the black silk outfit was unmistakable, with one sleeve long, the other torn off at the shoulder, and with a black strip tied about his otherwise bare upper bicep.

The gasps of recognition and whispers of “The Highwayman!” began as soon as Jameston led him from the forest and onto the main road far across the way from Chapel Pryd. The pair moved toward Chapel Pryd, with many people following in their wake.

They knew the Highwayman here in Pryd Town. And they loved him.

Chapel Pryd was close to Castle Pryd, and as the monks obviously heard the approach of the Highwayman and his considerable entourage, for their courtyard gates opened before Bransen even approached, so too, he figured, had some in the castle heard.

He didn’t think about that as he walked through the chapel’s outer wall, a flood of memories greeting him the moment he stepped again onto Chapel Pryd’s courtyard. Up the white stone path, the doors to the chapel proper were also opened, brothers peering with obvious apprehension.

Bransen moved into the large foyer, Jameston beside him, and before he could even ask the astonished young brothers standing there to see the leaders, Master Reandu appeared flanked by several others.

“Bransen!” Master Reandu blurted. “What are you doing here? Are you mad? You left under condition of a strict penalty.”

“Good to meet you, too,” Jameston muttered so that only Bransen and a couple of nearby monks could hear.

“And I return to insist that the condition be revoked,” Bransen said.

“Are you a madman?” Reandu repeated, apprehension growing on his face.

Bransen reached over his shoulder and produced Dame Gwydre’s Writ of Passage from the scroll tube he had tied diagonally across his back. “On the contrary, Brother Reandu,” he said, handing it over.

“Master Reandu,” one of the monks behind corrected sharply.

“I find this to be a most glorious day,” Bransen announced. He offered a smile before finishing, “Master Reandu.”

Before the monk could respond, a shout came from the courtyard. “You!” came the resonating voice of Laird Bannagran.

“The Bear of Honce!” the monk behind Reandu breathed with obvious terror.

“It would have to be, would it not?” Bransen asked as he turned. But any intention he had of parlaying here, of letting Dame Gwydre’s writ carry any weight for him, disappeared as he swung about.

Great axe in hand, a look of sheer outrage on his face, Bannagran didn’t seem to be in any mood for talking. The laird charged with a roar, his axe upright before him, not tipping his hand about the intended angle of his initial cut.

Jameston moved for his bow, but Bransen, drawing his sword with his right hand, pushed Jameston to the side with his left. His sword came out in the blink of an eye, which seemed to surprise Bannagran. He kept coming, though, his axe head slipped over his left shoulder. He turned his foot in with his closing step at the Highwayman, also to the left.

A lesser fighter would have cringed and braced, and thus been cut in half, but the Highwayman anticipated every movement. When Bannagran went into his sudden spin, axe flying to arm’s length, Bransen was already moving. He shifted to his left, dancing past the retreating Jameston. When Bannagran came around, axe slashing powerfully, he hit nothing but air. Too fine a warrior to leave himself open despite the daring move, Bannagran recovered almost immediately, stopping short his swing as soon as he realized the Highwayman’s dodge. Reorienting himself, he squared up with his opponent.

“Are we to do this dance again?” the Highwayman asked. “And who will die this time when you throw your weapon at me in frustration?”

That last question made Bannagran narrow his eyes with anger. He stepped forward fast, chopping down left to right, right to left, and back to the first strike. The Highwayman swayed to his left, to his right, and to his left again, causing three near but complete misses. He countered with a sudden stab of his sword, but Bannagran threw his hips behind him, less gracefully than the Highwayman had dodged the axe swings but effective nonetheless.

The Highwayman thrust again. Bannagran, his hands wide on the handle of his great axe, drove his weapon down to deflect the blade low, then stepped ahead and threw forward his right hand, the lower on his axe, punching the handle at the Highwayman’s face.

Bransen dropped under it and came on lower this time. Bannagran had to throw his feet out behind him wildly to save his shins. He staggered and scrambled as the Highwayman pressed the attack, stabbing at one leg, then the other.

“Read it!” the Highwayman shouted to Master Reandu, the Writ of Passage still rolled in his hand.

The Highwayman duckwalked in a crouch, his sword prodding faster and faster to keep the retreating Bannagran off balance, to keep him working furiously with his feet and his weapon so that the great warrior of Pryd Town could not begin a counterattack.

“I did not return to Pryd to fight you,” the Highwayman said to him.

“I told you to stay away,” Bannagran growled in response. “Forevermore!”

“Things have changed,” the Highwayman insisted.

“The worse for you!” Bannagran shouted as he leaped up and forward, clearing the Highwayman. The warrior landed in a forward roll and came up and around with a great sidelong slash designed to keep the Highwayman far away.

But Bransen was right beside him as he turned. The sword blade hit the axe handle before Bannagran could build any momentum. The Highwayman slid it right up to slam hard at the crook between axe handle and head.

The Highwayman grabbed Bannagran’s chest with his free hand. “I don’t want to fight you!” he yelled in Bannagran’s face.

“Hold, Laird Bannagran!” cried Reandu, who had finally recovered his wits enough to read the scroll.

Bannagran pulled his left hand free of his trapped axe, retracted immediately, and moved to slug the Highwayman, a heavy and powerful punch that would have surely crushed the young warrior’s face. But Bannagran flew backward before he had barely begun the swing, jolted by a blast of lightning-like energy. He landed on his heels but stumbled down to a seated position on the floor some ten feet away, his long black hair flying wildly.

“You cheat with the gemstones!” Bannagran growled through chattering teeth.

“He has a Writ of Passage from Dame Gwydre of Vanguard!” Master Reandu shouted, “Forgiving him his crimes of theft and praising him for the great victory in the north!”

“What?” Bannagran scrambled to his feet, giving no indication he intended to abandon his battle.

“I fought for her,” the Highwayman explained. “I killed Ancient Badden of the Samhaists and freed her people from the grip of horrible war.”

“That means nothing to me.” Bannagran hoisted his axe as if he meant to charge again.

“In return, Dame Gwydre has pardoned me for my past… difficulties,” the Highwayman said.

“A Writ of Passage,” Master Reandu said again.

“Does that include your murder of King Delaval?”

“My what?”

“I thought not!” Bannagran said and charged again. He came in furiously, his axe working brilliantly in short strokes and stabs with its pointed iron top. Almost any other warrior in Honce would have been cut repeatedly by that barrage, and all in the room gasped and winced, expecting the Highwayman to fall to the floor in pieces.

But to the Highwayman, it seemed as if Bannagran was moving in slow motion. Bransen easily worked his sword, tip up, tip down, left and right, to slap against the axe every time and always before the powerful Bannagran could gain momentum behind his swing.

Silverel rang against iron and tapped against the wooden handle. The Highwayman’s hand moved in a blur before him, perfect aim, perfect angle. The exchange went on for what seemed like an eternity, though it was not more than a score of heartbeats. More gasps echoed in the nave of Chapel Pryd.

Bannagran came in hard, swinging left to right. The Highwayman chopped a shortened downstroke, sliding his sword again along the blade to hook the axe under the head. He continued his rotation through the backhand, high over their heads, then down to the left and low to the right, where an extra shove of that sword nearly swung Bannagran around.

The Laird of Pryd fought to hold his balance but didn’t even recognize that the Highwayman had disengaged and turned his sword with such precision and speed that the tip was in at Bannagran’s throat before he had begun to move his axe again.

All in the room gasped to see the great Bannagran, the Bear of Honce, defeated. But Bannagran wasn’t quite finished yet. With a suddenness that startled everyone except the always cool Highwayman, Bannagran threw himself over backward. At the same time he used his tremendous strength to bring his great axe sweeping up from the side so that as he pursued, the Highwayman had to suddenly retract his blade or have it raked aside by the axe.

Bannagran hit the ground in a roll, throwing himself over and stumbling fast back to his feet, slashing his axe the rest of the way to his right, then back again to the left.

Fast and balanced, the Highwayman rushed in as the axe went to Bannagran’s left, stepping quickly past the man’s right. He flipped his sword to his left hand and stabbed behind his back to the right. Bannagran turned and lurched in a desperate dodge as Bransen ran by him. Though the fine sword did whip past, it seemed to all that he had avoided the blow.

He turned and the Highwayman continued back a couple of steps, then spun to face him directly once more, tossing his sword back to his main hand.

A curious expression crossed Bannagran’s face, and he slyly slipped one hand behind his hip to feel his torn tunic and shirt under the back of his breastplate. He looked questioningly at the Highwayman.

Bransen half shrugged, half nodded to confirm Bannagran’s suspicions: He had lost this fight not once but twice, for in both the movement that had removed the sword from under his chin and in his dodge from the Highwayman’s charge, the only thing that had saved him was Bransen’s mercy. Twice in the span of a few heartbeats, the Highwayman had beaten him.

“Are we to continue this folly all the day?” Bransen asked. “Read the Writ of Passage.”

“You murdered King Delaval!” Bannagran snarled.

“His sword is whole!” Master Reandu cried in sudden realization.

The Highwayman glanced back at him curiously, then looked to his magnificent blade.

“He repaired it!” Bannagran insisted.

Bransen snapped his sword down beside him and retreated three fast steps. “What are you talking about?” he demanded. “My sword, my mother Sen Wi’s sword, has never been broken.”

“The sword that slew King Delaval was broken in half,” Reandu explained.

“In the man’s chest,” another monk added.

“Surely not a blade like this,” said Bransen, presenting his sword before him.

“Exactly so!” Reandu replied pointing to Bannagran. When he looked to the laird, Bransen saw Bannagran draw the top half of a delicately curving blade from a sheath on his hip, a scabbard that Bransen had thought for a long dagger and empty since no hilt had shown there.

“The blade that killed King Delaval,” Bannagran said, holding it up for Bransen and all the others to clearly view. “So much like your own. Too much like your own!”

Bransen turned his blade over up before his eyes, noting the unmistakable similarities. “Where did you get that?” he asked, finding it hard suddenly to even draw breath as the implications of that blade-unmistakably a Jhesta Tu blade-began washing over him.

“From King Delaval’s chest,” Bannagran answered. “And for it, King Yeslnik has declared you guilty of murder.”

“But it is not my blade,” Bransen protested, turning his own over again to accentuate his point.

“It is too similar, possessed by one of like mind and training as you,” Bannagran said.

Bransen had no answer other than to shake his head. Eventually, he managed to say, “I was in Vanguard when Delaval was murdered. Dame Gwydre will confirm my claim. Last time I was in Delaval City was before the winter, and Laird Delaval-”

“King Delaval!” Bannagran corrected.

“King Delaval,” said Bransen, not wishing to argue such points. “He was very much alive when I left, and I have never returned. That is not my sword, and I have never seen another sword of this type in my life until just this moment!”

Bannagran stared at him hard. If he was softening at all to Bransen’s reasoning, he wasn’t showing it.

“Does the truth not matter?” Bransen asked.

“Not to King Yeslnik,” said Bannagran.

“What is this insanity that has gripped all of Honce?” Bransen asked as he spun around, sheathing his sword in a single fluid movement to address all in the chapel. “Is there no limit to the misery these lairds will inflict for the sake of their own gain?”

“Enough of your speeches!” Bannagran yelled at him. He turned his gaze wider. “All of you be gone!” he demanded. “Now!” Brother, soldier, and peasant alike scrambled to escape the volatile man’s wrath, leaving only Bransen and Jameston, Reandu, and a pair of Bannagran’s guards in the wide nave.

“You have seen Dame Gwydre’s Writ of Passage,” Bransen said when the commotion died away. “She offered to me and my family a full pardon in exchange for my actions on her behalf against Ancient Badden. Will you honor her decree?”

Bannagran paused and continued to stare at him. “Your family? Callen Duwornay and her daughter, you mean.”

“Yes.”

“For them, yes,” said Bannagran. “For you, no. Not until you clear your name with King Yeslnik, and I think that unlikely.”

“And if I do? Am I to be welcomed back in Pryd with Callen and Cadayle beside me?”

Bannagran looked to Reandu, gave a deep and profound sigh, and then stated, to Reandu’s obvious surprise and to Bransen’s, “Yes.”

“Bannagran?” Reandu asked.

“Yes,” the Bear of Honce said again more forcefully and confidently. “I’m sick of it all.”

“I did not mean for you to kill Prydae,” said Bransen. “But I went to his tower to protect my love and would do so again!”

“Silence,” Bannagran warned. “I have given you what you desire and all that I can. Ask no more of me. Understand, Highwayman, that I’ll not tolerate any of your indiscretions should you ever return.”

“I will return.”

“King Yeslnik will never agree.”

“But, my family? You said-”

“They can return to Pryd Town at their leisure,” Bannagran assured him. “That poor woman, Callen, never deserved the sack, though her sniveling lover surely did. The Samhaists are long gone from Pryd Town, so I care not if the Duwornays walk here openly. But you remain another matter.”

“I will clear my name,” Bransen said.

“I am tasked with killing you,” Bannagran admitted.

Bransen laughed. “Care to try again?”

“Bransen!” Reandu and Jameston scolded in unison.

Bannagran held up his hand to silence them and assure them that all was calm here. “Be gone from my town and my holding.”

“I ask two things of you before I leave.”

The Bear of Honce put his hands on his hips and stared at Bransen hard, thinking to question the young man’s nerve in making requests. However, remembering their fight and noting that the young warrior did not flinch or back down, Bannagran merely waited.

“First, I would speak with Master Reandu.”

“You have until the noontime hour.”

“And, second, allow me that broken sword.”

“It is not mine to give.”

“Let me study it at least,” said Bransen, desperation creeping into his voice. Bannagran, Reandu, and particularly Jameston looked at him with surprise.

“Please,” said Bransen. “I believe that to be a Jhesta Tu blade.”

“Like your own.”

“Perhaps.”

Bannagran tossed the blade to the floor at Bransen’s feet. With trembling hands the young man picked it up and turned it over and over, pointing it away from his eyes so that he could study the break.

Wrapped metal. Just like his own sword. Only the Jhesta Tu were known to create such blades. Bransen could hardly draw breath. He closed his eyes and considered the possibilities here, if the Jhesta Tu mystics had truly come to Honce. That long road, that long-avoided road, now loomed before him, within his grasp, as never before.

“Then Laird Ethelbert has hired Jhesta Tu mercenaries from Behr,” Bannagran remarked.

Bransen blinked out of his contemplations. “No,” he said as he tried to sort through Bannagran’s claim. “No.”

“It is such a blade,” said Bannagran.

“Jhesta Tu are not mercenaries. They cannot-”

“That blade slew King Delaval. The wielder of that blade, part of a small band by all reports-and dressed as you are, by all accounts-scaled the castle walls and defeated King Delaval and his elite warriors in short order.”

Bransen couldn’t doubt the claim, but he did not understand the concept of Jhesta Tu mercenaries. If they were fighting for Laird Ethelbert, which seemed likely, then it was for philosophy and preference and not for coin. The notion shook the young man profoundly. “May I keep this?” he asked.

Bannagran held out his big hand. Bransen reluctantly set the sword blade in it.

Bransen turned to Master Reandu. “In private?” The monk nodded and started for a side room.

“Noontime,” Bannagran reiterated as Bransen walked past. “Then be far from Pryd, and return not other than on pain of death unless King Yeslnik has declared your innocence and freedom.”

Bransen didn’t bother to respond.

Master Reandu’s visage and posture changed noticeably when he and Bransen were away from Bannagran and alone in a side room of Chapel Pryd. His face brightened and his step lightened, and his smile seemed truly genuine.

“My heart warms at seeing you walking so tall and straight,” he said.

“You saw it before I left, when you took me to kill Laird Prydae,” Bransen replied curtly. Reandu stiffened and took a step back at the grim reminder of that fateful day.

“But that was because of the soul stone.”

“As is this,” said Bransen. He brushed his long hair aside and indicated the brooch set in his forehead.

Despite his reservations at the initial sharp retort, Reandu moved closer, eyeing the marvelous piece of jewelry. “Yes, but even so,” he said, reaching up to touch the brooch. “You seem more comfortable and stable.”

“I am.”

“All the gems… are they magical? Where did you get such a marvelous piece?”

“They are, and this was put upon my forehead by Father Artolivan of Chapel Abelle,” Bransen answered.

Reandu fell back another step and looked at him incredulously. “Father Artolivan gave that to you?”

“I just said as much.”

“It is… unexpected.”

“That he would offer it, or that I would take it?” Bransen asked.

“Both!”

Bransen chuckled. “I served Dame Gwydre in exchange for her Writ of Passage. I dealt a great blow to the Samhaists when I took Ancient Badden’s head from his shoulders. Father Artolivan knows that I am no enemy to him or his church. Does Brother Reandu?”

“Of course!”

Bransen eyed him doubtfully, then smiled as he produced a second parchment, the writ from Father Artolivan. He handed it to Reandu, who read it with eyes so wide that they seemed as if they might roll from their sockets.

“I understand your actions here, Bransen. Perhaps better than anyone. I saw the punishments you endured at the hands of the people of Pryd, at the demands of Laird Prydae, at-”

“The punishments my innocent father endured?” Bransen interrupted. “At the hands of the Samhaists and Laird Prydae?”

“And at the hands of Chapel Pryd,” Master Reandu admitted without further prompting. “What am I to say, my old friend? I did not approve of the treatment of Garibond, nor do I think the treatment offered to your mother and father fair or wise, though I was not involved in those decisions. I was not a voice of power within Chapel Pryd…”

Reandu’s voice trailed off when Bransen put up a hand. It occurred to Bransen then just how much of the upper hand he had gained in the last few months. Here was Reandu, Master Reandu, the acting leader of Chapel Pryd, stuttering and stammering excuses to him. Bransen did well to hide his amusement for Reandu’s sake. He reminded himself of Reandu’s commitment to him, such as it was, in the dark days.

“I am glad that you were not punished for your actions at Castle Pryd,” Bransen said, referring to Reandu’s intervention against Master Bathelais when Bathelais had sought to stop Bransen with a blast of lightning.

“Master Bathelais did not recover from his fall,” Reandu said, his voice low, his guilt all too clear. “I am not proud of how I attained my current position, but I am grateful to Father Artolivan and the masters at Chapel Abelle for their understanding and faith in me.”

“I have not forgotten the sins of your chapel,” Bransen said. “But neither have I forgotten the day you helped me with the chamber pots or when you washed the filth from me. I am not your enemy, Master Reandu.”

That proclamation brought a profound sigh of relief from the brother. “It does my heart good to see you standing so straight and tall,” he said once again after a few heartbeats of slow and steady breathing. “I do not lament the passing of the Stork.”

“Even if in his stead comes the Highwayman, whom King Yeslnik hates above all?”

“King Yeslnik is wrong,” said Reandu.

The startling words had Bransen lifting his eyebrows.

“And more the fool for the edict he issued to Father Artolivan,” Reandu said, trying to keep his voice low. “He would have our order act as executioners and go back on our promises. Does he believe that the holdings of Honce will rally to his flag when he would so callously murder the many men whose only crime was to serve the lairds they had known all their lives?”

“I watched your conversation with Bannagran earlier this morning,” Bransen admitted, and Reandu looked at him curiously. “Regarding the disposition of the prisoners, who are now brothers, it would seem. I was in a high window overlooking the nave.”

Though they were not in the high-roofed nave, Reandu reflexively glanced up before shaking his head and reminding himself to doubt nothing about this surprising young man.

“I would not have allowed the prisoners to be killed,” Reandu said after he sorted through the startling information.

“You handed Bannagran the knife.”

“Because he would never have killed them,” said Reandu. “Bannagran is no murderer.”

“Garibond,” Bransen said.

Reandu shook his head. “His fire has dimmed with the wisdom of age. He has served the people of Pryd well as steward and now as laird. They have come to trust him and love him, and they follow him into battle.”

Bransen shrugged as if he hardly cared. “I hope you are right, for the sake of the people of Pryd.”

After a long and uncomfortable pause, with Master Reandu clearly caught between his hopes for Bransen and his growing loyalty to Bannagran, the monk asked, “Will you return to Pryd Town when you have cleared your name?”

Bransen replied with a grin that revealed… nothing. For only when he had heard that question had he realized that it hardly mattered. The entire reason for his journey to Pryd, to secure a home for his growing family, hardly mattered to him at that time.

The Jhesta Tu had come to Honce.

While Bransen was meeting with Master Reandu, Jameston Sequin walked out of Chapel Pryd and over to the next impressive structure. He was stopped at the gates of Castle Pryd by grim-faced guards, crossing halberds before him and looking very much like they would enjoy eviscerating him.

Jameston just laughed at them. “Go and tell your laird that a friend of Dame Gwydre of Vanguard would like a word with him,” he instructed.

Neither guard budged.

“Would you deny the Dame of Vanguard access to your Laird Bannagran?” Jameston asked. “Without even asking Laird Bannagran? I’ve known more than a few presumptuous guards. They’re all dead now, of course, but I admire their spirit.”

The guards looked at each other for a moment, then one backed away and started into the castle. He picked up his pace almost at once, which amused Jameston greatly.

Soon after, Jameston found himself standing before Laird Bannagran.

“Jameston Sequin at your service, good Laird of Pryd Town,” he said with a bow. “Come from Vanguard to your door.”

“If you wish to ingratiate your Lady Gwydre to me you would have been wiser to come in to Pryd Town separate from the Highwayman.”

Jameston laughed. “Wouldn’t even have found my way to your town.”

“You find this amusing?” Bannagran asked grimly.

“All of it, in a sad manner,” Jameston replied. “Guess that’s why I spend most of my time walking the forests of Vanguard and Alpinador.”

“What do you want?”

Jameston nodded at Bannagran’s short response. “I’m a good friend of Dame Gwydre and empowered to speak for her. I’d be a sorry emissary if I didn’t pay a visit to the laird.”

“A visit? Should I set a banquet table?”

“I’m not your enemy, nor is Dame Gwydre,” said Jameston.

“The politics of the world are not my own to decide.”

“Just yours to laugh at, helplessly,” Jameston quipped. “Oh, I see that in your eyes, Laird Bannagran of Pryd. Tired of war, tired of stupid lairds and stupider kings and stupider reasons for men killing men.”

“You pretend to know more than you do,” Bannagran replied. “I have no time for your pointless banter. You came seeking audience, and, as you claim to be a spokesman for Dame Gwydre, I granted your request. Do you have anything of value to say, or are you just here to annoy me?”

Jameston laughed at that.

“Do not try my patience,” Bannagran warned. “Other men who have done so have lost their heads.”

“That wouldn’t be a wise choice for you,” Jameston replied. “Gwydre’s got no fight with you, nor do I, and I doubt King Yeslnik would appreciate you starting a war with Vanguard.”

“What do you want?”

“I want to tell you of Bransen, the Highwayman,” Jameston replied. “He had nothing to do with the murder of King Delaval. He was in Vanguard, maybe even in Alpinador, at the time, and I’ve been with him every moment since he sailed south across the gulf with Dame Gwydre.”

“Gwydre is in Honce proper?”

“Left her at Chapel Abelle,” Jameston explained. “I’m not thinking she’s pleased with what she’s seeing here in the south.”

“That is not my concern.”

“But the Highwayman is.”

“And?”

“He had nothing to do with the murder of Delaval.”

“So you believe that matters a whit?”

“Not in your world,” Jameston replied with a snort. “But I think it does to you.”

Bannagran stared at him hard.

“He’s a fine fighter, that one,” Jameston said. Bannagran didn’t blink. “He could have killed you.”

“Your insults do not serve Dame Gwydre here.”

“No insult, just observation,” said Jameston. “You might have saved yourself when he had his blade at your chin, I suppose, but he had you when he went past you, and you know it.”

Bannagran continued his unflinching stare.

“But he didn’t stick you, did he? And he could have, in a fight you started.”

“Do you have a point here, other than to insult?”

“No insult intended,” Jameston said and bowed low. “I’m only saying so because I’m thinking you should take a closer look at this young man you call the Highwayman. There’s more to him than you think.”

“Thank you for your advice. I will inform Dame Gwydre that her observant emissary is a wise man.”

Jameston grinned at the unrelenting sarcasm, seeing it for what it was. “Bransen had nothing to do with Delaval’s death,” he repeated. “That doesn’t matter to King Yeslnik, but I believe it matters to you.”

“Take care your words.”

“Bransen’s not the reason you’re so mad right now,” Jameston dared to press on. “I see the twist in your face, Laird Bannagran of Pryd. You know what is right and what simply is. When what simply is doesn’t match with what is right, it sticks you harder than Bransen’s sword ever could.”

“You presume a lot, emissary.”

“I’ve seen a lot, good laird,” Jameston replied, bowing low again.

“Is there anything more?”

“I’ll pass along your well wishes to Dame Gwydre when I see her again.”

Bannagran just sighed as Jameston took his leave.