Chapter XIII

Wren

When I returned to the castle yard after the noon meal, I caught some of our visitors in the midst of raising the repaired gate. Four men strained to hoist the solid wooden panel with a pulley system while three others guided it into place. Another man prepared to slide the hinge bolts home. I scanned the yard, looking for Tourth, but he was nowhere in sight. Lord Hiller stood near the smoke house, deep in conversation with his captain. I had passed Iscarus instructing the lumbering crew on which trees to fell on my way back.

"Better watch your back," Dardon said from behind me, announcing his arrival by dropping a large stone at my feet. Pushing sweat damp hair from his forehead, he grimaced at me. "Tourth still hasn't cooled down about last night."

I studied his face. "What makes you think that?"

"He asks after you every half hour like clockwork. Even Svhen is beginning to look nervous around him. What did you say to him?"

I shrugged. "Nothing that didn't need saying. Where is he now?" A line of ten men wound through the back gate. Each was burdened with a stone the same size as one at my feet. They looked like just the right size to repair the gap in the wall behind the stables.

Dardon ignored my question. Glancing quickly around the yard as he said, "The cook saved you some lunch in the kitchen. Where did you go all morning? There were bets among the men that you had disappeared because you were too afraid of Tourth to face him."

"Are they afraid of him?"

"Nah, he has just been a regular bear since he woke this morning. I think they aren't used to the idea of a woman standing up to a man."

I nodded. It was a concept that most men didn't understand. "So, where is he?"

"He is cleaning out the keep," Svhen offered, appearing at my elbow, smelling of smoke.

"Thank you, Svhen." I smiled up at him gratefully.

"He is in a rare mood," Svhen warned before continuing over toward Hiller and the captain.

"Not rare enough," Dardon pointed out as he lifted his load again. "Watch your back," he cautioned. Then, with a grunt, he started after the end of the line of men disappearing around the back corner of the stable.

I watched the new front gate settle on its hinges for the first time. Deus give me strength. Then I approached the main door of the keep.

Within the walls, the sunlight filtered through the burned out ceiling two stories above me. The crates of the night before had all been removed, revealing the smooth stones of a great hall. I paused inside the door to admire the newly recovered space. In my mind, I could now envision what it had looked like in all of its glory. The heavy timbered ceiling, seasoned with age, spanning the room easily seven times the size of the great room in my childhood home. The stone floor, worn into hollows with age, covered with a layer of sweet smelling rushes where Tourth, Kat, Philon, Hiller, Iscarus, and Warwick had played as children. The image of Tourth, lanky and carefree with youth abruptly faded from my thoughts when the Tourth of today approached me from the far end of the hall.

"Where were you all morning?" he demanded before he had even reached me. Dirt covered his face and dust tinted his clothing with gray highlights. "You invited these men into my home, gave them instructions to tear it apart, and then disappeared. The least you could have done was stayed and helped me sort them out this morning."

"I could hardly do that since I didn't know what order you wanted things done." I crossed my arms in front of me and studied his features. The anger of the night before, carefully controlled once again, lingered behind his mask. Only the fire in his eyes hinted at its presence. "Besides, I didn't instruct them to do anything. All of these projects were their own idea."

"I suppose they carry building tools and craftsmen everywhere they go while on the road." He stopped barely a foot in front of me, forcing me to look up at him as he glared down at me. "You told them we needed them."

"I mentioned that the keep needed work. Kat filled in the details."

"Still you mentioned it."

I met his glare with icy calm. He hadn't forgiven me. I was sorry to see it, but I cared too much for him and his family to back down now.

"I am leaving."

He blinked and looked aside, momentarily puzzled at my statement. However, he recovered quickly. "Running away?"

"No, studying the enemy. I am going to go assess the Enforcer and his position."

"You can't." His voice was flat, but his hands tensed into fists.

"I can and will. I am the best one for the job."

The anger flared, his gaze biting. "Because only you have the skills?"

"No." I calmly replied. "Because I am the only woman. If you or any of the men went, you would be pressed into labor. I can at least avoid that danger without effort."

"And what if he presses you into a different form of forced labor?" Worry edged his voice despite his efforts to hide it. I took hope in the crack in his façade. He cared despite his current feelings toward my actions. I grabbed onto that worry and reminded myself that he was hurting deeply, more deeply than even I could fully understand. Like a wounded animal afraid of hurting again, he was lashing out.

"I know how to take care of myself, Tourth," I said softly. "Don't worry about me."

Our gazes locked, and he knew that I was reading his face. His expression closed and he turned away.

"When will you be back?" he asked finally.

"Soon, a week at the latest." I studied the line of his stance. "Remember what I said last night. You need to speak to the Lord about what is consuming you before the poison is all that remains."

He stiffened. "Close the door on your way out."

I nodded. It was nothing less than what I expected, yet the coldness in his voice hurt a bit. Father, make him see. Break his pride and draw him to you. I turned away. Crossing the distance to the door, I continued to pray. I stole one last glimpse of his straight form among the patches of shadow and light in the center of the ruined hall. By the time I returned the roof would be repaired and the space useful again. I hoped desperately that the same would be true of Tourth.
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Tourth

She was so infuriating sure of herself. Certain that her assessment was correct. The overwhelming urge to throw something flooded through me again. I thought I had finally quenched it in moving all of the debris and crates out of the great hall, but one brief conversation with her had brought it back. I wanted yell with frustration. However, not even that release was open to me. One holler and forty plus men would come running. I ran my hands through my hair and groaned.

"Did Wren find you?" Hiller asked as he approached from direction of the stairs to the solar.

I grimaced at him. "Yes, she found me. She is leaving to check out the Enforcer."

He nodded. "Know the enemy. A wise move. So, what is the problem?"

I closed my eyes and ignored the question. "Are the new beams going to be long enough to reach across the roof?" I asked instead. I risked glancing at Hiller as he squinted up at the roof.

"Shouldn't be an issue. Svhen says that they should have enough wood prepared to start work on this in two days."

"Your men work fast."

"I should hope so. We have been re-beaming and thatching houses for months now." Catching my puzzled expression, he grimaced. "Raiders along the border take great delight in razing farm houses and barns. As fast as we rebuild them, they demolish them. Scouts say the men wear red and mustard paint on their faces."

"The colors of the Enforcer."

He nodded. "You aren't the only one who wants the man gone. So far we haven’t been able to connect the raiders to the Enforcer beyond their color choices, but it is only a matter of time. If we could get you reinstated as Lord Mynth, overseer of this valley, the Enforcer would have no reason to continue to support the raiders. Then we can remove their presence from our borders."

"And here I thought you were helping me purely on the basis of our fostering together."

Hiller laughed, a loud, uninhibited sound that bounced about the newly cleared hall. "Hardly. You gave me plenty of trouble during those years. I can hardly remember a time when you weren't planning some kind of mischief to get us involved in. I, also, seemed to recall more than a handful of scrapes where I got the rougher portion of the effort and not the reward."

"I can't help it that you were a strong lad," I protested. Memories of those lighter days slipped through and whittled a bit at my dark mood.

"Aye, but you were faster," he muttered with a smile.

"I had to be. If I had let you catch me, I would have never survived your wrath."

He laughed again. I managed a weak smile.

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Wren

Brone shifted his weight beneath the full saddlebags. He sensed that we were leaving again, and he wasn't happy with the prospect. After a year and a half of wandering, staying less than a week in any one village, he and I had covered a great deal of ground. Now that we had lingered here for a few weeks, he seemed inclined to think that this was now our home.

I tightened the cinch on the saddle and frowned. I was beginning to think of it as home too. True my siblings weren't here. However, it felt right to be here. Even if I didn't truly belong to this group, I did believe I needed to defend what they had. Family was precious. I didn't have the opportunity to defend my own family, but I could do something to help this one stay together and safe.

"Going somewhere?"

I looked up to find Iscarus watching me. He stood at Brone's head, stroking the stallion's nose. With his hair awry and his clothing spattered with stone laying compound, he looked more like his brother Warwick than he probably would like to know. I fed the cinch strap through the loops that would keep it from dangling below Brone's belly and turned my attention to the stirrups.

"I am going to investigate the Enforcer's resources and activities on the other end of the valley."

Iscarus grunted. "Are you sure you aren't running away from Tourth?"

I snapped my face around to study his. "Why would I run away from him?"

He shrugged, a movement too precise to be unstudied.

Something was up. I dropped the stirrup and turned to face him. "Everyone seems to be very concerned about how Tourth and I are doing."

"You are the first girl I have known to stand up to him."

I crossed my arms over my chest. "And what is that supposed to mean?"

He smiled. "Tourth has always had a way of scaring off the women. I think it is the intense way he internalizes things. I just want to make sure he doesn't scare you off with all of his emoting."

I thought of Aiden and Arnan and laughed. "There is no chance of that." I claimed the reins and mounted. "Don't let him do anything foolish while I am gone."

He nodded. Stepping back to allow Brone space to move, he lifted a hand in salute. "Safe journey." Brone snorted a response and headed toward the newly hung gate.

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Wren Romany - © 2009 Rachel Rossano