Steel and Shadow: An Epic Fantasy (7 page)

             
“Vile crone,” he snarled.  “None deserve your touch,” he told her.  “Consider well the next words you ever speak does your jaw ever heal,” he spat her way as the old woman looked back at him in genuine fear.

             
“Calm yourself, sir,” the blonde said as she approached him fearlessly, and put a gentle hand on Koa’s shoulder.

             
Just that quickly, Jengus noted that Koa’s eyes cleared, and his expression calmed even as the ebony mist around him faded.

             
There was more to this healer, Jengus realized, than he first guessed. 

             
“I shall ease your friend’s pain, and mend her flesh.  You need not fear for her.  My skills do not leave scars.”

             
First, however, she walked over, and touched the old healers jaw, and the suspicious lump left by the blow seemed to just melt away.  She then walked over to Lia, and knelt before her, carefully placing her hands over that bloody, torn flesh.

             
Koa simply nodded as they all watched the young blonde’s hands begin to shimmer, and when she set them on the torn, raw flesh of the lass’s back, the flesh began to knit itself right before their eyes.  She ran those miraculous hands over the redhead’s entire body, easing her pain, and healing even the bruises to her battered features and flesh.  Only then did she stop to sag back on her own haunches as she looked as if she had been laboring for hours under a hot sun.

             
“Have her bathed, sir,” she told Koa quietly now, “And she shall be well.  She only sleeps the sleep of rest now.  Let her wake in her own time, and she will be…..well,” she said, and sagged slightly more.

             
“Are you all right,” Koa asked with very uncharacteristic concern.

             
“Aye.  I just….wearied myself.  The lass was badly hurt inside, too.  It took more than expected to fully heal her.”

             
“How badly,” he asked quietly, looking grim again.

             
“Sir, she will live.  Be content with that.”

             
He rose to pull her to her feet, and stared into her hazel eyes.  Had she been awake, he would have noted her coloring, and known she was not a Hastings.  He would have left her behind.  And Lia might have died without her presence.

             
“You have my gratitude, lass.  Are you a spirit-walker, too?”

             
She gave a faint smile.  “Nay.  I’m but a simple lass.  I learned early, though, that I had a healing touch, and the king conscripted me to tend his own family.”

             
He nodded.  Then turned to Jengus who was staring at the virtual miracle he had just seen.

             
“Does the lass swear not to cause trouble, I would have her treated well,” he said to the commander.”

             
“Of course,” he nodded as the two men all but dragged to him were presented at that very moment.  Jengus had little doubt that Koa would have torn them apart a few moments ago, while caught in his full rage.  Just now, while not merciful, he was looking positively wicked.

             
He eyed the portly lordling, and the burly, bald man who still had a bloody lash dangling from his belt.  The leather looked oiled in blood from it’s discolorations, and said much of the man himself.

             
“So, you like to beat young lasses,” he said, eyeing the pair.  “You like to show your strength to everyone with fist and lash?”

             
The two looked uneasily around, and saw no friend.  Not even among the estate’s silent freemen.  Even Freddie’s sire stood to one side, looking grim, but remaining silent.

             
“You cannot imagine what I could do to you,” Koa said as he walked over to them, hearing the blonde’s soft gasp.  “You cannot imagine what I would like to do you.  Still, because one has strength, does not imply you must abuse others with it.  So I shall show you…..mercy.  The same kind you showed a lass you were told was under our protection.  I shall, if you will accept a punishment I choose, grant you your lives.  If, however, you favor death, I will give you that cold fate here and now.”

             
He turned and eyed Freddie Clarke first.

             
“Well?  Do you favor death, or will you accept my punishment?”

             
Freddie eyed his father, and still the older nobleman said nothing.

             
“Once in your miserable life, little Galdynian, try to stand on your own.  Now, choose,” Jengus sneered at him, obviously deferring to his companion in this matter.

             
“What….  What would you have of me?”

             
“You are too quick to bark orders, and beat helpless folk for little cause,” Koa said firmly.  “Still, for the sake of your sire, who proved to be a more noble and honorable host than you, I will only ask a few tokens of you.”

             
“T-Tokens?”

             
“Aye.  The tongue that barks such careless orders,” he said, making Freddie gasp in horror, “And the hand that dared strike that young lass.”

             
“You must be mad,” he railed at the demon before him.

             
“Ah.  You favor death,” Koa asked quietly, his eyes slowly darkening again, giving him a truly hellish appearance when that happened.

             
“N-Nay!  I….I will….accept your….”

             
“You,” he turned to Robbie without hesitation.  “Carry out his sentence.  Here, and now.”

             
“Do it,” Lord Andrus told his loyal man solemnly. 

             
No one was surprised when Freddie began to whine and plead, his gibbering cut off only by the quick slice of a heated dagger.

             
It did not keep his howl from echoing over the bloody sand that marked the slave’s court behind the manor.  That the sand was so dark suggested there were a lot of abuses carried out here.  He howled all the more when his hand was severed just as neatly as his tongue.

             
Even as the ashen lordling knelt there, clutching his right wrist where blood still flowed, the young blonde healer stepped forward, and gently touched his arm.  Almost at once the wound healed, leaving a smooth stump.  She then brushed her fingers over his lips, and Koa just nodded at her.

             
“As I guessed,” he said quietly.  “Your healing touch comes with a compulsion,” he commented.

             
“Aye, sir,” she nodded.  “I cannot stand by, and let any suffer when I can ease that pain.”

             
He nodded.  “’Tis a shame, but some people deserve their pain.  Still,” he said, lifting the portly noble to his feet now as the man stared in horror at the two of them though his pain was gone, his maiming remained.  “Let your lost hand, and fool’s tongue remind you henceforth to pause, and consider your actions.  For the next blade might seek your heart, rather than an appendage.”

             
He then shoved the man away, and turned to the pale, brutish freeman.

             
“As for you.  You took far too much relish in an innocent’s pain.  Commander, I would have you ride out now, and take the healer with you.  I do not wish her to suffer, but I certainly don’t wish this one to be….soothed too easily.”

             
“I understand, lad,’ he said.  “Sgt. Winters, bring Lia.  Get her cleaned up, and then put her in a cart.  The other women can ride with her.  Sling that lackwitted prince back over a horse.  Move, you curs.  We’ve already wasted time we don’t have.  And, you, lass.  So long as you behave, we’ll not tie and gag you again.”

             
“You have my word, sir,” the healer nodded to him, giving a sympathetic look at the man that Koa still faced as his friend ordered, “Post this dog.  After you strip him.”

             
It was some twenty minutes later before Koa seemed to materialize atop his horse out of nowhere just as they left the forest to start for the grasslands that lined the borderlands where only Franks, rogues, and invaders road.

             
“What did you do,” Lt. Barques asked when no one else spoke.

             
“I had him well lashed, gelded, and branded.  Then they collared him as one of their own slaves.  Let him live the life of one he so disdains, and we’ll see if he learns his own lessons in due time,” he growled.

             
“I’d have done worse,” Jengus admitted.

             
“I was ready to, ere that lass calmed my fury.  Never have I felt such…..peace.  She is more than she seems,” he told them needlessly.

             
“Aye.  I’ve known those with healing touches, but never one that could calm a furious shadow with but a touch.  She’d make a fine healer for our own lads,” Jengus added at the last.

             
“I’ve little doubt that pampered shrew would punish her for daring to aid us,” Koa remarked after a time as he considered the Hastings’ princess.  "For a pretty lass, that one has ice in her eyes, and likely her heart.”

             
“She is a Hastings.”

             
“I did not sense the same taint in the queen,” Koa told him pointedly with a faint smile his way.

             
They had been together long enough for both of them to know the other.  Jengus blushed slightly in spite of himself, knowing that Koa likely guessed he was attracted to the woman who was not quite as old as her husband.  They knew she being a second wife taken when the first died under curious circumstances when she never bore the king any children in the ten years they were wed.

             
“She is a handsome woman.”

             
“Hiding them among the camp followers would make it all the harder for any to find them,” Koa drawled suggestively.

             
“Even the princes?”

             
“The younger ones, at the least, could earn their bread learning a few honest labors for a change.  I’d not trust the older prince to carry water, though.  Let alone aught else.”

             
“Well, I do know our Simon favors lads,” Captain Caleb drawled, naming a half-blood Frankish-Valdoran who was one of their scouts.  “We could let him tend the prince,” he chortled.

             
They all knew that the dark-skinned Franks who roamed the southern plains cared neither way about men that favored men.  To them, pleasure was simply pleasure, wherever you found it.  If wenches weren’t around, they were not adverse to poking a boy’s gate.  Simon, having found few lasses that would even accept him since he was so obviously of Frankish blood, simply developed the habit of favoring lads.

             
“Wouldn’t that make a fine pleasure show,” Sgt. Winters chortled, the burly Xantian with a silvery beard chortled.  “A half-Frank plowing a golden prince?  You might earn more from hiring them out than riding to battle,” he laughed openly.

             
“Speaking of riding out,” Jengus asked only then.  “Where did you send your messenger,” he asked abruptly as he turned to Captain Tode. 

             
The K’Zir frowned, and looked around.  “A messenger rode out?”

             
“Aye.  Two of them, in truth.  The same two that you brought with you,” Samuel Winters nodded.  “One left just after the commander last night, and the next rode out just before we left the duke’s walls.’

             
“I…..”

             
“Don’t bother lying,” Koa told him.  “We left both dangling from a tree ere I left the estate.  They had much to say when I questioned them ere they were….left behind.”

             
“Ah, so they didn’t get far,” Jengus asked innocently.

             
“Not far at all,” Samuel said, he and four other men suddenly closed in around the K’Ziri captain.  “You know how cautious I am, commander.  I try to keep my eye on everyone.  After once being betrayed by a foppish K’Ziri ere I joined you, I learned never to trust one of those greedy, self-serving little prigs.”

             
“Do stay calm, sergeant,” Jengus smiled as one of the men reached, and pulled out the officer’s sword before he could even think to reach for it.  “This vermin isn't going anywhere.”

             
The captain swallowed hard as he found himself easily disarmed, and completely surrounded.

             
“I was….only following orders.”

             
“I do believe that whipmaster back there told me the same thing,” Koa remarked coldly.  “I didn’t believe him either.”