01 - The Price of Talent (21 page)

              Meanwhile, Bevan was sitting behind the barricade. He had his sword out and was testing the blade. The carriage approached and came to a halt in front of the log barricade. When it had stopped, Bevan stood up and moved in front of the barricade. When he did this, the closer of the two horsemen trotted up and drew his sword. The horseman in the back though stayed exactly where he was.

“Hullo all!” Said Bevan. “If you would be so kind as to step out of your carriage, drop your weapons and to unload your goods, my friends in the woods there will be nice enough not to shoot you all full of arrows.”

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Said the driver. “I’m not sure I heard you correctly.”

“I said, would you all please put down your weapons and unload your goods.”

“Again, could you repeat that?” Said the driver leaning forward.

              What Bevan could not see, but we could from our vantage point, was that as the driver was leaning forward, pretending not to hear, he was actually reaching for a crossbow in the footwell of the driver’s bench seat.

“All right, let’s take some warning shots.” Said Devlin. “One arrow each. Tiernan, if you can, put an arrow on that crossbow. Tyr, just shoot the carriage”

              So with shaking hands, I pulled the bow tight and aimed at the side of the carriage near the driver. We then all loosed our arrows. Tiernan’s arrow went wide, but still hit the footwell of the driver’s seat, startling the driver who pulled his hand away from his crossbow. I was so nervous, I was happy I hit the carriage. We will ignore that it was almost a foot off what I thought I had been aiming at. Devlin, on the other hand, put an arrow at the feet of the horse of the lead outrider. Then he immediately readied another arrow and did the same for the second rider. Both horses reared and shied away from the arrows at their feet.

              When the first horse reared, the rider fell off and immediately pulled his sword and jumped forward to grab the reins on the bridle. Unfortunately, he was now on the other side of the horse from us, and hidden from our line of sight. Worse, the carriage’s side doors opened up, and two more guards stepped out, each with a loaded crossbow.

“Oh shit!” Said Devlin. “Fire at will!”

              I was so shocked I must have just stood there looking dumb because Devlin looked at me and shouted.

“Tyr! Wake up and start shooting at the guards, they’re going to shoot Bevan.”

              Things suddenly came into focus and the world got really slow. I could hear my pulse hammering in my ear and my breath coming in ragged gasps. I also had managed to grab another arrow and ready it. Not knowing what else to do I shot at the carriage.

              Fortunately, I missed my shot. It went wide of the carriage and hit the dirt in front of the lead horse the first guard was hiding behind. The horse panicked, trying to escape. This forced the guard to fight with the horse to keep it from bolting. It also kept him out of the fray. Meanwhile two arrows had struck the man who exited the carriage nearest to our side of the road. One in his arm and the other in his thigh. He dropped the crossbow when his arm was hit, and it discharged when it hit the ground, sending the bolt into one of the wooden wheels of the carriage.

              As the first guard went down, Bevan was rushing towards the guard trying to keep his horse from bolting. Unfortunately, he had forgotten about the driver, who had grabbed his crossbow and was trying to get a clear shot at Bevan as he ran forward. Worse, all three of us had just fired shots and were grabbing our next arrows. Worse than that, I dropped the arrow I tried to grasp. With no arrow in hand and a crossbow aimed at Bevan I panicked and did the only thing I could.

              There was an audible “WOUMPH!” of sound as the driver and his cross bow burst into flames. Then the screaming began.

              The horse that was panicking bolted, knocking the reins out of the guard’s hands. This pulled him off balance briefly. Bevan, noting his opening, ran forward and ran the guard through with his short sword. Unfortunately, the guard with an arrow in his arm and leg had managed to free his sword with his other arm, and was limping towards Bevan, with nothing but the horses that were attached to the front of the carriage between him and Bevan’s back. Also, the guard on the horse was still mounted and had his sword free. The guard that had exited the other side of the carriage now had a clear shot at Bevan, since the first guard’s horse had bolted. The only thing keeping Bevan from getting shot was the other guard who Bevan had just ran through.

              Fortunately, Bevan was no fool. Instead of letting the first guard fall off his sword, he grabbed him by his sword belt, held him in place with the sword through his chest and kept him between himself and the guard with the crossbow. Unfortunately, holding up another human being in leather armor with a sword and a belt is not the least awkward position to find yourself in, especially when the person you are holding up is rapidly losing strength in his legs. The driver, whom I had immolated, had fallen over in the foot well of the carriage seat and had stopped screaming. He was now just wheezing and twitching.

              At this point, both Tiernan and Devlin had arrows drawn. At the same time, they both shot the guard who already had two arrows in him. One arrow took him in the back while the other hit him in the head. He dropped immediately to one knee and then just sort of fell over in a crumple.

              Seeing this, the last mounted guard galloped towards Bevan with his sword ready. The one still holding his crossbow stood with the carriage between him and our arrows, and he took an aim at Bevan’s head. I immediately realized what was happening. If Bevan used his human shield to guard against the man on horseback, he would leave himself open to the man with the crossbow. If he used the guard to protect himself from the crossbow, he would get his head split open by the swordsman on horseback. Worse, Devlin and Tiernan were reloading while the horseman was charging.

              At this point I panicked again and completely lost control. There was another, even louder “WOUMPH!” and the man holding the crossbow started screaming and waiving his crossbow about as he found himself completely engulfed in flames. His crossbow, with string weakened by fire, discharged. Fortunately, a flailing burning man is not a man paying attention to what his crossbow is aimed at. Thus the bolt flew off into the woods harmlessly. Better still, the flailing made the man on horseback rein in his charge. He took one look at the battle field, saw that he was alone, and immediately turned his horse and galloped away down the road.

“SHOOT HIM! SHOOT HIM!” Yelled Devlin as he and Tiernan shot at the rapidly disappearing horses and rider.

Unfortunately, their shots went wide. But with the danger gone, Bevan let the now dead human shield drop off his sword. He then immediately finished off the still burning crossbow man, who had fallen over into a flailing twitching mess. Devlin put an arrow into the crackling remains of the driver and Tiernan put another arrow into the last guard, who was already doing his best impression of a pin cushion with 5 arrows sticking out of him.

Devlin then put down his bow, drew his sword and walked down to the scene of the battle to check on Bevan. Tiernan followed suit, leaving me alone in the woods. So, in a daze, I followed the rest of them down to the ambush site.

When I arrived, I wished I had stayed in the woods. The smell of burnt flesh, and the sound of crackling, like bacon just out of the pan, made me retch. I don’t recall how I ended up on all fours on the ground, but I was glad to be there as I proceeded to throw up everything I had ever eaten in my entire life. I spent the next few minutes being violently ill.

“Bevan, are you ok?” Said Devlin sheathing his sword.

“Yeah, I’m all right I think,” said Bevan. “Thanks to those fire arrows, you guys really saved my bacon. I thought I was done for with the horseman coming at me while I was covered by the guy with the crossbow. By the way, how did you hit him from the other side of the carriage?”

“A very good question,” said Devlin. “Especially considering we don’t have any fire arrows.”

“I think your questions are better directed to Tyr,” said Tiernan.

“He seems a little busy losing his lunch,” said Bevan. “And he also doesn’t appear to have any fire arrows either.”

“I think, once he’s done with what he’s doing, we all need to have a little talk,” said Devlin. “But first we have more pressing concerns. Namely, the guard that got away. We need to clean this up as quickly as we can, empty the carriage of any useful goods, then get the hell out of here.”

              To this suggestion, everyone was in agreement. Devlin, Bevan and Tiernan quickly unloaded the carriage. Inside they found a couple of chests full of coins, and a variety of weapons and equipment. The chests were unloaded first, then the weapons. It was a lot to unload, just the four of us, but it was accomplished quite quickly.

“All this gear presents us with a problem,” said Devlin.

“Yeah, Sapphire hasn’t come back from the longhouse yet with the cart Jarvis took,” said Bevan.

“Do you think we could load up the carriage and take it with us?” asked Tiernan.

“It’s a little big for the footpaths we use,” said Devlin. “I think we need to move this gear by hand off the road and to our campsite.”

“We’ll also need to get rid of the carriage and bodies,” said Tiernan.

“A couple miles down the road there is a clearing,” said Devlin. “I think we put the bodies in the carriage, move the carriage to the field, then set the whole thing on fire.”

“Won’t that draw attention to what just happened?” Said Bevan.

“Yes, hence taking the carriage a few miles away,” said Devlin.

“Why not just bury the bodies?” Said Tiernan.

“And what do we do with the carriage?” said Devlin. “Or the horses for that matter.”

“Do we need more horses?” Asked Bevan.

“We already have one for each cart,” said Tiernan. “More than that will just eat away at our supplies of animal feed and hay.”

“Exactly,” said Devlin. “Which is why I think towing all this to the clearing a few miles away, releasing the horses, and then burning the whole thing down is a good idea. Make it look like they built a fire too close to the carriage. Make it look like an accident.”

“Won’t the guard who escaped tell people what really happened?” Asked Tiernan.

“Unfortunately, yes,” said Devlin. “However, we want to be well away from here by the time the authorities come. In the meantime we don’t want to alert any patrols that happen by here. We need time to clear out.”

“Sapphire should be coming by any day now with the cart,” Tiernan said. “Once she’s arrived at our camp, we can move the money and equipment back to the longhouse and move to another ambush site.”

“As far from here as we can manage,” said Bevan.

              With that decided, we proceeded to move the goods off the road and back to the overlook site. This was harder work than you might imagine. The chests were especially heavy and awkward. It didn’t help that I was still fighting nausea and was quite weak in the knees. Still, the work was done as quickly as the four of us could manage. Putting the bodies in the carriage was an even less pleasant experience. The smell of burnt flesh in the carriage was alarming. Fortunately, Devlin spared me from actually carrying the burnt corpses. He and Bevan got those, Tiernan and I still had to move the non-burnt corpses, which was unpleasant enough. Once everything was loaded up, Devlin got into the driver’s seat of the carriage.

“Tyr, why don’t you come with me,” said Devlin. “Let Tiernan and Bevan move the goods from the overlook to the campsite.”

“Uh, ok,” I said, just realizing it is the first thing I had uttered in quite some time.

              Surprisingly, or perhaps not, Bevan and Tiernan offered no arguments to this. They just collected their things, and headed off to the overlook where we had stored the money and equipment. When they set out into the woods, I got up on the bench beside Devlin, not wanting to get inside the cabin with the corpses. Once up, Devlin snapped the reins and the horses set off down the road.