Braylar told these lies with complete ease and conviction. It was really quite impressive.
Hornman Urlin shaded his eyes against the setting sun and surveyed the wagon again. “And this pauperish cargo of yours of no objectionable nature, what is it then?”
No hesitation. “Quills. Parchment. Inks. A fine stylus or two.”
Urlin laughed, monstrous mustache shaking like a tree bough overburdened with snow. “Quills, is it?”
“Clerics and lawyers are a pestilence on this world, but they do have their uses. A wise man would avoid their company altogether, it’s true, but a man of commerce, a merchant with a strong stomach, he might find a way to work their company to his benefit.”
Hornman Urlin continued to laugh. This seemed like a clever stratagem on Braylar’s part—he claimed to possess goods unlikely to interest a Hornman and his crew, and even those Hornmen who could read and write enjoyed making sport of those who make it their professions. “Fleecing the fleecers? I salute you. But five wagons? That’s what you said, wasn’t it? Five? And guards? For quills?”
Braylar continued to lie as easily as he breathed. “Clerics and lawyers are notorious for clutching their coins with iron fingers, but they’re also vain. And I carry nothing but the finest materials. Even in my depleted state, I refuse to sell unworthy merchandise. For quality, rare quality, the clerics and lawyers paid, and paid dearly. I did well enough to warrant the wagons as my reputation increased, and the guards were necessary to protect my wares. If a merchant loses his goods, he loses everything. But now, well… the plague claims men from all walks, but the last outbreak struck clerics and lawyers with particular ferocity. Perhaps the gods have a sense of humor after all, eh?
“But it’s been years now, and their ranks have been slow to recover. I tell myself that it’s only a matter of time, that more fleecers will be called to their duty soon enough. But until then, I load and unload my single wagon, dream of lost riches, and struggle on. I couldn’t afford a crippled guard in my state. I can barely afford the food to carry me between Fairs. I—” Braylar lifted a hand. “Pray forgive me, good Hornman. I don’t seek your pity. The life of a merchant is hard, and I’m reduced, it’s true, but I carry great hope to the Great Fair. And again, I’m far luckier to have met a Hornman, rather than a nomad or brigand, so forgive me for prattling on. I’m sure even in this wilderness, you have pressing duties.”
If Hornman Urlin’s face was any indication, he didn’t register this deference as feigned, and seemed to enjoy receiving it. “You do me great honor, merchant Thutro. But what I do is duty, duty alone. We see a wagon having wandered far from the road, we investigate. Sorry to hear of your troubles, but duty is duty.”
“Yes, of course. I’m glad to hear that some still take their posts seriously. I thank fortune that I met you. I wish you well, and pray that you continue to protect the innocent, and punish those deserving of it.”
“I pray likewise. But I’m thinking I’ll still need to inspect those wares of yours, innocent though they might be. Man can’t do half of a duty and be done, now can he?”
Braylar paused, and when he responded again, the deference was sliding free. “No, of course. Duty must be fulfilled in total, or not at all. But I’m curious about something, Hornman Urine.”
This wasn’t going to end well.
The Hornman straightened in the saddle, face coloring. “That’s Urlin, merchant. Hornman Urlin.”
Braylar didn’t acknowledge the correction. “Your order is charged with protecting the weary travelers of the world on the well-worn tracks they trod, correct? That, and taxing them egregiously at toll stations, to pay for your noble efforts. But first and foremost, patrolling the road, yes?”
The Hornman nodded curtly. “You hit the mark, merchant. Though I’m misliking your tone. I suggest you rein it in some.”
In Braylarian fashion, he did the opposite. “Therein lies the curiosity, you see. You correctly point out that I’m far from the road, but the same charge could be leveled at you. It strikes me as peculiar that Hornmen would be compelled to ride so far from it. Quite peculiar.
“The road is your lifeblood. In fact, it seems to me that there’s only one reason you might have drifted from the road you’re sworn to protect.”
Hornman Urlin’s patience was drying up. “Two ways of going about this, merchant. You step down off that rig, meekly, let us conduct our business, and we’ll be on our way. Or you keep on crowing like you are, and my men haul you down, beat you bloody, and everything else happens exactly the same. Either way, you’re coming down now. Only decision you need to make is how.”
Braylar paid no heed at all. “It seems very likely, in fact, that the reason you slipped so far from your assigned stretch of highway and all the witnesses that travel on it is you seek to engage in something nefarious. In fact, I suspect you want to inspect my supplies not because you suspect them of being contraband, but because you’re inclined to engage in some criminal activity yourself. Yes, it seems very likely you’re thinking of lightening my load. And to that I say, I wouldn’t hand over a wooden penny to a brigand, but I’d at least respect his honesty in the attempt. But you and yours… you’re a perversion of your purpose.”
The Hornman drew his sword slowly. “You got some mouth on you, merchant. You get down off that wagon, real quiet, maybe I let you live. Maybe even leave you a horse. But you keep flapping your tongue, I’m going to cut it out, cut you down, and do a little more cutting just for the sheer pleasure of it.”
Braylar pulled the blanket off his lap and leveled the crossbow at the Hornman. “Granted, this isn’t a siege bow spanned by a windlass, but it’s powerful enough to get the job done. The question isn’t whether the bolt will kill you, but which organ I plunk and how long you lay dying. At this range, I can pick and choose. Do you have a preference?”
We were doomed.
I grabbed the quiver of bolts.
⊕
The leader appraised the crossbow, then the owner, looking at Braylar as if seeing him for the first time. He tried to smile, but it was clearly forced. “It’s one on six, merchant. You’ll die.”
Braylar nodded slowly. “That’s likely true, but you’ll beat me to the afterlife, Urine. You could ride off, and we both could live. But I’m guessing you won’t do that.”
The three soldiers I saw looked at the leader, shifting the grip on their spears, uncertainty on their faces. I couldn’t see the rest, but I’m guessing they shared the same look. The leader licked his lower lip, overlarge mustache jiggling above the pink tip of his tongue, and he seemed to waiver a moment as well, and then, eyes still on Braylar, he jerked his head to the side. I heard horses moving as his men began to close in. The leader pointed his sword at Braylar. “You lower the bolter right now. Do it and—”
Braylar loosed his crossbow. The next instant, the leader fell into the grass and lay twitching there, fingers clutching the fletching on his chest. Braylar threw the crossbow through the flap—it slammed into my arm, knocking the quiver loose, bolts spilling in all directions. I looked up as I tried to reclaim them—two soldiers closed in on Braylar with spears raised overhead. And then he moved as fast as a snake. Faster. He reached beneath his seat and pulled out two smaller steel crossbows, one in each hand.
Both soldiers saw this and instinctively tried to turn their horses from their course. Braylar shot a bolt at each, hitting one soldier in the shoulder as he tried to wheel his horse around, missing the second entirely, though not by much. Both soldiers were riding away from him for the moment, neither a danger of throwing a spear in his direction.
Not so for the third soldier behind them—he came on, spear raised above his shoulder, standing in his stirrups, and all he saw before him was an unarmed man who was about to die.
Braylar tossed the crossbows into the grass on either side and then crouched there, still as stone, head tilted slightly to the left as if he were straining to hear something. Any other man would’ve jumped behind the bench for cover or leaped free of the wagon, or failing that, at least pulled the buckler off his belt. Braylar did nothing. It looked like his courage or rashness had finally deserted him now that he needed it most. I was sure he was a dead man.
And then several things happened in such quick succession, even now I’m uncertain if I perceived them accurately or the precise order in which they occurred. As the young solider cocked his arm back to throw the spear, Braylar flicked the haft of the flail off his thigh with his left hand and reached over and grabbed it in the air with the other. The soldier released the spear as Braylar pulled the flail off his belt and dodged to his right. The spear struck exactly where he’d been crouching, puncturing the bench, splinters flying. I thought he’d fall off the wagon then, but he’d reached back and grabbed the haft of the spear behind him as he moved, despite not being able to see it. This was truly impressive, the sort of thing you only see at fairs by knife throwers and acrobats who’ve rehearsed their movements their entire lives and learned them from their fathers and father’s fathers. But as he was dodging, reaching, and grabbing with his left hand, his right came across his body with the flail, snapping it out towards the young soldier with more speed than I would’ve guessed possible. Though all of this was nearly a blur, and I was witnessing it through a worn patch of canvas, there was one detail I recall with perfect clarity. The boy’s eyes. He clearly expected to pin Braylar to the bench, and when he didn’t, and he saw the unarmed man suddenly armed, it still took his mind a moment to register the danger, and then his eyes began to widen, and continued to widen as he saw the spiked flail heads arcing out towards him. The soldier tried to duck behind his horse’s neck for cover. I couldn’t see the terminus of the attack, only the boy ducking and Braylar grabbing onto the spear behind him with one hand to steady himself as he reached as far to the right as he could, the two spiked heads whistling… but the rest was lost even as I pressed my face as close to the edge of the faded canvas as I could, practically pushing myself through it in an effort to see the result of this impossible act. But thankfully, I saw none of it, and the horse’s hoofbeats combined with the blood pounding in my ears rendered that sense useless as well. I was left to guess if he’d struck or missed.
After lashing out, Braylar pulled himself back, jumped over the seat and into the wagon, knocking me backwards. He pulled the flap shut and I looked at his weapon, my stomach rolling as I saw the bright spots of blood and a small tuft of brown hair decorating one of the spiked heads. Then I saw the dark spatter of tiny drops on the side of the canvas, like ink that had been flung from the quill of a drunken poet.
I’d been so absorbed in watching I hadn’t retrieved all of the bolts—most were still scattered on the wooden bed of the wagon. Braylar kicked the crossbow at me and hissed, “Load it, you shrunken cock.”
Stunned by everything that was happening, I didn’t respond immediately, but then saw in his eyes that the violence would turn on me in an instant if I failed. I worked the lever as quickly as I could. A moment later, a bolt was in the groove and I started to hand it back to him.
“No,” he said, “you might need to loose it yet.” He pointed at the rear of the wagon. “If you see anyone come through, pull the trigger. Don’t jerk it—you’ll shoot through the roof.”
Horses were whinnying outside, ours and theirs. I heard a horseman ride past on our left. There was a shout, followed by another, but I couldn’t make out what was said. It sounded like they were arguing.
Braylar pulled his helm on, the nasal and cheek guards obscuring much of his face, and snatched the buckler off his belt. It didn’t look like there was room to swing his flail in the wagon, but I thought advising him on matters of bloodletting was probably a bad idea. He glanced at me and gestured towards the rear flap. “If a man comes through there without a bolt in his face, I’ll toss you into the grass to fend for yourself. Do you understand?”
I tried to imagine what it would be like to pull the long trigger as he had, releasing death so quickly.
He shouted, “Attend me! Do you understand?”
I nodded quickly, but silently wondered if I could truly do the horrific thing that he ordered me to do.
I looked at the back flap and held my breath. Trying to distract myself from the possibility of shooting a man in the face, I asked a flurry of questions, my voice a frightened whisper: how had he known the Hornmen were coming? how had he managed to dodge the spear so miraculously? as well as several others I don’t recall. He swore and told me to be silent. I glanced at him, long enough to see that his eyes were closed again. I turned my attention back to the rear and waited quietly as long as my patience could stand it. Unable to stop myself, I said, “Maybe they’ll ride off now. The leader is down, and others wounded. Maybe—”
“Only one is dead. Now watch that back flap and—” He stopped and hissed “Silence!”
I heard another horse galloping past again, very close this time, and then a javelin tore through the canvas on my left and stuck in the side of the barrel behind me, quivering there. It was a little shorter than the spears they carried, but seemed no less deadly for it. It’s amazing my bladder didn’t set free. I stared at the javelin until Braylar yanked it from the barrel and stuck it point down in the floor near his place in the front of the wagon. He looked back at me. “Take those sacks of grain and push them against—”
Another javelin tore through the canvas from the other side and continued its path through the opposite panel, disappearing into the grass.
Then I heard the wagon’s axle creak as the load changed. Someone else had climbed aboard. A moment later I felt Braylar shift and turned to see why. A soldier was pushing through the front flap with his shield and was stepping over the bench. Braylar snapped the flail forward, as if he were wielding a whip, the movement so exact and economical. The spiked heads flashed out and the soldier raised his shield to block the strike. He caught the haft of the flail on the rim but the chains and heads wrapped around and shot behind, striking his hand or arm. The soldier had been throwing his own blow at the same time, but Braylar caught the haft of the small axe with the edge of his buckler. Though the axe didn’t have a spike on top, the soldier thrust it forward towards Braylar’s face. It skidded off his temple as Braylar smashed the solider with his buckler. The soldier’s mouth and nose exploded as if he’d been hit with a stone from a catapult. He opened the red ruin of his mouth, no doubt to scream, but Braylar slammed the edge of the buckler into the side of his head and he toppled backwards out through the flap without a sound.