Riot moved carefully through the farmhouse. Those that were not on watch dozed in corners, or chatted in low tones. All except Linner, a man in his fifties with a wiry gray beard, who was peering into the black hole that led to the basement. A sound like a steak being slapped against the wall came from the depths, followed by a low moan.
“Who’s down there Linner?” Riot asked, his voice low.
Linner jumped, before wilting under Riots' stare. “Emmerson and Swan went down there. I’m sorry Sarge,” he stammered.
“And you’re keeping an eye out for them? Get back to your damn post.”
Linner hurried off and Riot made his way cautiously down into the dim basement. It smelled like the men had been using it as a latrine and he tried not to breathe through his nose.
A single half hooded oil lamp cast a dim glow and the prisoner, Gerrard Price, spotted Riot first. He had been bound hand and foot, and Emmerson held him upright as Swan gave him a rib-cracking blow to the kidneys.
“Where’s the money, you Leybound bastard?” Swan hissed, grabbing a fistful of Price's hair and wrenching his head up.
Riot knew this was partially his fault. Beating Mercer publicly made the men in the company arrogant, they thought they could do no wrong, that they were a law unto themselves.
The Faelen weed was in his system, so Riot took care to move slowly so that his sluggish mind didn’t lose track of his limbs. In three short steps, he reached Swan and hauled him backward. The middle-aged man was one of the company's whiners and complainers, and he withered under Riot's glare.
“Sarge, we was just—”
Riot buried his fist in Swan’s gut and didn’t pull the punch, following through so that the man almost folded in half around his forearm before sliding to the floor, making soft gurgling noises.
“Beating a prisoner, Emmerson? That’s a hanging offence,” Riot said to the second man. “I should string you both up, or leave you here for the Long-ears.”
Emmerson released the prisoner and backed away, his hands raised above his head. "C'mon, Sarge, he’s an officer, the money’s just going to be left here.”
No pay for months, who could blame them? Riot might have done the same once. An officer like Mercer would hang them, cut them off like Ruddle’s arm to stop the bleeding. But he wasn’t an officer and he couldn’t afford to be two men down.
“If you're thinking about slipping away in the dark, the Long-ears will catch you, so I’ll offer you this. If you're still here at first light, I’ll see that you get away with a flogging.”
Emmerson carefully stepped around Riot and helped the gasping Swan to his feet, hauling him up the stairs. He hoped they would stay and take their punishment. Emmerson, especially, was a steady man with a crossbow.
As Riot’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he saw two bodies heaped against the wall. One was a pale-faced youth with rolled-up sleeves and deep rutted scars on his forearms.
The second body looked to have been at least part troll and someone had taken an axe to it—a cloven wound on the shoulder that cut halfway down through the chest. There was no axe in the cellar, though, just a rusted short sword on the floor covered in dried blood. Took a fair bit of strength to do something like that.
Riot pulled the filthy gag from Price’s mouth. “You kill both of them?” he asked.
“I did,” Price replied, his refined tone coming from the mouth of a vagrant.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“I’ll cut you free, but I’ll want your word that you won’t escape.”
“Would you give it, if you were me?”
Riot sighed. “No. How about you just agree not to kill anyone else, most importantly me.”
Price hesitated for a moment before nodding, and Riot took up the rusted blade and sawed through the dirty rope.
“Drink?” Riot asked.
Price took the flask and sniffed it warily before taking a deep draft. He started to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand but paused and used his dirty sleeve instead. “Thank you,” he said.
With deep-set eyes and a proud forehead, he looked like the kind of man they would have made king hundreds of years ago. He would certainly have the army wives clucking like hens if he weren’t dressed in ragged homespun, with greasy hair a foot long. He must have soiled himself when they beat him, the reek was almost unbearable.
“Your name's Price?” Riot asked.
“Captain Price.”
“Where did you serve?”
“Black Peaks Regiment, Lothrock Keep.”
Riot whistled softly. The black peaks separated the neighboring kingdom of Taria from the far-away eastern lands. If Price had been that close when Mazral raised their banners, that made him at least a five year veteran of the war. In that time, he’d been pushed all the way across the Tarian kingdom to here.
Riot had served almost three times as long as that, but only in the last year had he faced the Faelen ranks and their deadly red darts.
“Rotten luck that we stumbled onto you,” Riot commented.
“Don’t tell me, you’re just the friend I need.”
“I might be,” Riot sighed, sitting back against the damp wall. The Faelen weed was deep in his system, numbing his muscles and slowing his thoughts, but at least the pain was a distant memory.
“What do you want?” Price asked.
“A bit of quiet would be nice.”
“Not here for my coin?”
Riot shrugged. “Perhaps a farmer will find it in a few years when he’s knocking down a wall.”
Price was silent, his eyes boring into Riot’s. He was only a few years Riot's junior, but he already had the long, steady stare of a veteran.
“Why are you running?” Riot asked.
“What’s it matter?”
“Few hours till morning, might as well chat about something.”
“We’re losing this war. You might be okay getting sent to Erudor, but not me.”
Despite Riot's light gray eyes and the dirty copper hair tied with a wooden ring that marked him as Erudoran, he’d never been to the island kingdom, and it was the last place he would want to go. “Never knew an officer that needed to run,” he said.
Price lifted his hands to display the half-dozen long scars that ran up his forearms. They looked like they had been scored down to the bone, and a dirty gray light wept from them, flowing down to fill the half hundred neat runes on his hands. His skin was blackened and filthy, like he’d been pulling coal out of the ground with his bare hands. “I’m running because of this, what they did to me.”
When the bodies had piled up so high that the army couldn’t hide them and fear and suspicion swept through the ranks, the arcanists turned to the condemned, giving those who were headed for the gallows one last chance to save their skins.
“What did they get you for?” Riot asked.
Price grimaced at the memory, his teeth glinting in the dim light. “At the battle of Belleville, a major called Baines ordered me to open the gates so that he could get out. It was suicide.”
Riot had defended forts and high walls and he knew the maddening fear up on the ramparts, throwing off ladders while crossbow bolts and faelen darts hammered all around. Some men broke under the pressure and tried to open the gate to get out, and then you had no choice but to put them down like any other enemy.
“You killed him?” Riot was surprised. Officers called each other out for perceived slights and petty disputes of honor, but usually in a duel, and those rarely led to death.
“No. I won the duel, and he came for me a week later, and I killed him. Then it was be made leybound or hang.”
“What’s it like?” Riot asked.
“Like you're thirsty, and the ley power is all you can drink, but you can never have enough. I’ve done my time. I’ve served. The Faelen can’t be beaten by the fools in charge of the regiments, and I’ve had enough of seeing good men led to their deaths.”
Sometimes a man wasn’t left with any choice. For what it was worth, Riot found himself liking Price. He was a hard man, perhaps he’d been an officer worthy of serving under at some point.
There was a scuffling of footsteps on the stone stairs, and Cox peered into the dark basement. “Long-ears strutting about, Sarge.”
“Coming,” Riot replied. “Keep the water,” he added to Price as he left.
