Devlin's Luck (39 page)

“Understood,” Didrik said with a salute.

In the end, they found a dozen more folk, all that was left from a village that had once boasted over a hundred souls. Those left were either the very old, or those so sunken into despair that they could not think of anywhere else to go. All those questioned confirmed Nanna’s story. The assessor had been there, and he had made his threats. But he had been whole and well when he left, and after seeing the villagers, Devlin did not see any that looked as if they would have had the courage to murder a man.

Before leaving, Devlin gave Nanna a generous handful of the King’s coin, enough to pay the taxes that were owed. He wished he could do more, but he knew the answers did not lie here. The solution to these villagers’ problems lay with Lord Egeslic, and Devlin intended to demand a full accounting from the Baron of Korinth.

The road took them through the pine woods on the next day, and it was near sunset when they emerged into an open field. A league down the road they could see the outlines of a village.

“Shall we press on?” Lieutenant Didrik asked.

“No,” Devlin said, mindful of how the folk in Nanna’s village had reacted to their arrival. There was no sense in making the same mistake twice. In the darkness Devlin and his troops could easily be mistaken for the Baron’s men, or for raiders.

“There is no need to panic the folk. We will camp here tonight, and tomorrow, when the sun is risen, we will make our entrance.”

His company began to set up camp with the ease of long-established routine. Since the skirmish in Rosmaar they had taken to working together, and Lieutenant Didrik and Ensign Mikkelson had worked out a shared schedule of duties. Tonight it was the soldiers’ turn to prepare the meal, while the guards had the less desirable chore of digging the latrine trench.

Devlin sat on the ground and leaned back on his elbows, as he watched the activity around him. He was still troubled by what he had witnessed the day before, and bothered that he could not understand the Baron’s strange behavior. Why hadn’t the Baron revealed the presence of sea raiders along his coast? Why had he imposed onerous taxes upon his folk? If he needed the coin, why hadn’t he petitioned the King for aid, as had the other border nobles?

He shook his head in frustration, for he felt that the answer lay just beyond his grasp. There was something he was missing. An ingredient that would make the rest take shape and make sense.

He heard a startled exclamation. Then after a moment he heard Didrik exclaim, “May the Gods preserve us.”

Devlin was already on his feet when the lieutenant called his name. Lieutenant Didrik was standing next to two guards with shovels. A small crowd was forming around them.

Devlin pushed his way through the crowd. “What is it?” he asked.

The smell hit him first, a stench of rot and mold, and unclean things brought into the light. And then he looked into the half-dug latrine pit, where he saw the bloated and swollen features of a decomposing corpse, dressed in robes of silk.

“The Assessor Brunin, I presume,” Devlin said.

Twenty-three

DEVLIN GAVE ORDERS THAT THE COMPANY WAS TO retreat back into the forest, while two of their number finished unearthing the body of the assessor. He steeled himself to examine the gruesome corpse, seeking clues as to how the assessor had died. Then he joined his troops in the forest. They spent a cold night, for to light fires might reveal their presence to the village.

In the predawn light the company crept through the woods to surround the village. When Devlin and his officers approached on horseback, some of the villagers began to flee, only to stop short as they caught sight of the guards and soldiers.

Magnus, the elderly village speaker, then emerged from his cottage on the arm of his daughter. His voice was steady as he bade the Chosen One welcome, but his shoulders slumped, and he had the air of a man who has seen the arrival of the troubles he has long feared.

Up until that moment Devlin had nursed a secret hope that the villagers might somehow, improbably, be innocent of the assessor’s death. But Magnus’s attitude proclaimed their guilt far louder than any mere words could.

Devlin, Ensign Mikkelson, and Lieutenant Didrik followed Magnus inside his home, in order to question him in private. But so far the speaker was not cooperating.

“Now I ask again. Who killed the Assessor Brunin, and why did they do this deed?”

Devlin’s words were addressed to the elderly Magnus, but it was his daughter Magnilda who answered.

“I tell you we know nothing of his death. The assessor must have been killed by sea raiders or outlaws,” she said defiantly. A plain woman in her middle years, her stocky frame and muscled arms spoke of one who had spent her life in hard toil. And she had a strength of character to match. For while Magnus had blanched upon learning that Devlin was the Chosen One, Magnilda had taken his appearance in stride.

“I may be a foreigner, but I am not a fool,” Devlin said. “Outlaws or raiders carry weapons. A sword, a dagger, a bow, or even a spear. And they would not have bothered to hide their kill. The Assessor Brunin was strangled, and his body buried not a league from here.”

“Shall I have the company begin questioning the rest of the villagers?” Lieutenant Didrik asked.

“It will do you no good. They will all tell you the same as I. They know not who killed the assessor,” Magnilda answered.

Devlin kept his eyes on her father. “Are you certain this is so? There is no one here who is discontented, unhappy with their neighbors? No one who would wish to seek my favor and a purse of the King’s silver for his service?”

Magnus gave a thin smile. “My people will follow my lead. There are none who have aught to say to you.”

Devlin felt his frustration growing. He knew full well that everyone in this village could name the murderer, for such was the way of a small community. And yet he also knew that if this had been Duncaer, the people would never betray one another to a stranger. He would have to try a different tactic.

“Mayhap you are right. We shall see. But if I do not find the murderer, then I will have to summon the Baron’s armsmen, and you will face his justice.”

“And your justice is different than his? We know too well what to expect from nobles,” Magnilda said scornfully.

The Baron might well put the village to the torch, destroying everything these people owned. It was his right, and from the way his people feared him, it would not be out of character.

Devlin wished fervently that they had never stumbled across the murdered assessor’s body. It was the Gods’ own luck that had led them to that cursed spot. And yet, how much worse would it have been for these folk if it had been the Baron’s armsmen who had found the corpse?

“I am no lord,” Devlin said, willing them to understand. “In my life I have been a metalsmith, a farmer, and now I serve as the Chosen One. I have seen much of hardship and sorrow in this province. But I cannot let this crime pass unpunished. You must persuade the killer to reveal himself and accept his punishment. If he does so, I swear by my name that the judgment will end with his death. There will be no further retribution.”

“The Baron will not honor a promise made in his name,” Magnus said.

“I do not make it in his name. I make it in the name of King Olafur, whom I serve,” Devlin replied.

Magnus exchanged glances with his daughter. “Then I—”

“No, Father!” Magnilda interrupted, seizing his arm. “Say nothing.”

He knew then he had won, and he could afford to be gracious. Devlin rose to his feet. “We will leave you to make your decision.”

He left the cottage and went outside, followed by his officers, to find that the road outside Magnus’s home was filled with villagers. They stood there silently, with hate in their eyes.

This village was farther inland than the others, which perhaps had spared it some of the sea raiders’ attentions. And these folk showed fewer signs of hardship, although most looked as if they were in need of a good meal or three.

Didrik’s eyes raked the crowd. “Do you think the murderer is here? Watching us?”

“Unless he has already fled,” Ensign Mikkelson countered.

Devlin shook his head. “If the murderer had fled the village, the speaker would have given us his name readily enough. A shame that Magnus didn’t think to tell us such a tale. We would have no means of disproving him.”

“You cannot wish that a murderer would go unpunished?” Ensign Mikkelson asked.

No. Devlin wished he had never come to this cursed place, nor heard of the missing assessor.

“For all we know, the assessor brought this on himself. Or the Baron did, with his harsh taxes. If I were one of these folk, I do not know what I would have done. But now that we know the murderer is here, it is my duty to find him and see him hanged.”

Devlin could not repress a shudder at the thought. If he closed his eyes, he could still see the image of the inn-wife and her son, their faces turning purple and their bodies jerking wildly as they danced at the end of the ropes. And if ever two had deserved to die, it had been those evil creatures.

He did not know how he could bring himself to inflict the same horrors upon one of these poor folk. And yet the Geas drove him, forcing him to seek justice for the murdered official.

Magnilda opened the door and beckoned to them. “My father wishes to speak with you,” she said.

Devlin entered, and found that Magnus had risen to his feet. “You must swear to me that only the one responsible will be punished. No other will suffer for the crime,” he said.

“As the Chosen One, I swear this will be so, in the name of King Olafur. I call upon Ensign Mikkelson and Lieutenant Didrik to witness my oath.”

Magnilda went over to her father’s side, and he embraced her. Then he turned, and his eyes met Devlin’s. Devlin drew in a breath as he realized the old man’s intention.

“I am the one you seek,” Magnus declared. “The responsibility for the killing is mine, and mine alone.”

The old man’s withered hands lacked the strength to wring a chicken’s neck, let alone to strangle a grown man.

“And you killed him with your own hands?” Lieutenant Didrik asked.

“I am speaker of the village. The responsibility for the deed is mine,” Magnus said firmly.

Devlin looked at Magnilda, who stood by her father’s side, supporting his withered frame with her strong arms. And he suddenly knew whom Magnus was protecting. The father had decided to sacrifice himself for the sake of his daughter, and for his village, to spare them further pain.

“Your courage does you honor,” Devlin said. “I grant you the burden of this guilt.” Every man had the right to decide when he would die, and for what he would give his life.

“I have one more request. Will you tell me why you did this?” Devlin asked.

Magnus nodded. “The assessor came, with his new taxes. But we were prepared, and had managed to save enough from the fall harvest to sell this spring and earn the coins we needed. When he saw we had the coin, he laughed, and said our taxes were now doubled.”

“It was unfair,” Magnilda broke in. “We had already paid, and yet still he wanted more. I told him he was taxing us into our graves, and he just laughed. He said the Baron had no use for us, and that the sooner we were dead or gone, the better it would be for all. So I—”

“So you were enraged,” Magnus interrupted. “As was I. I said harsh words, and the assessor promised that the Baron would hear of my disloyalty, and that the armsmen would come and drag me before the Baron’s court. I knew that such a thing would mean my death, and so in a fit of rage I killed him.”

He could see how it happened. The assessor had made the same threats in Nanna’s village. But Nanna’s people had been too cowed to defend themselves. It was the assessor’s arrogance that had proved his undoing, for in this village he had encountered someone who would not back down, and whose strength was coupled to a fierce temper.

Devlin wondered whom the assessor had threatened. Had it been the speaker Magnus? Or had Magnilda been acting to save her own life? In the end, it did not matter. The crime had been done, and now he must exact punishment, according to the law.

“I would pardon you if I could,” Devlin said. “But I cannot. The assessor was wrong, but that did not give you the right to kill him. You should have brought your complaints to your lord, or if you did not trust him, to the King’s court.”