Bad Meat And A Fine Tunic

The hooves of their horses crunched in the deep, damp snow. Icicles sparkled, wet, weighing the boughs of the trees that grew loosely around the path. Cathal felt a bead of sweat run down his spine beneath his cuirass and gambeson. The sky was clear and the morning sun strong, and the day was warming quickly. He shot a glance at Mara to see how the wizard was faring. She was tougher than she looked, and though it was obvious she had never spent much time riding cross country, she appeared to be alert, if not comfortable, on the back of her hunter. Not as soft of foot as the palfreys she was no doubt used to riding.

Reynhild and Asha stalked some distance ahead, following the bandits’ unspoiled trail on foot. The outlaws had chosen a bad time to strike so close to Fulcairn, with fresh fallen snow to pick their tracks out as cleanly as letters on a page, especially given the woods-lore of Lady Reynhild and her ranger. The bandits had burned a farmhouse, killed the crofter and his wife, but had not found their children. The eldest son had ridden to the keep, his eyes dry but raw and red, and forced himself into the great hall to beg justice. The sun had barely been creeping into the sky when they had ridden out with their sergeants in tow. The crofter’s son had raged that he be taken along, but this hunt was no place for an angry, untrained boy.

Dolan rode on Cathal’s flank, opposite the wizard. His face was set grim and the butt of his lance in his right stirrup. He knew as well as Cathal that they rode into bloodshed, no matter the course. Folk would die today, who may have lived better lives given a toss of the gods’ dice. Cathal swore none would be his. His sergeants were well trained; not as numerous as those of other realms, but more than a match for the warriors of any other land, spear for spear. Curse the cast of the outlaws’ fortunes. He would see them dead at the end of a blade or at the loop of a noose for their depredations.

Cathal’s grip on his own lance tightened at the soft call of a crow to the south. He turned in his saddle and peered out under his raised visor to search the thick needles of a stand of firs there. Reynhild stood just before them, barely visible but for her alabaster skin and her hair, the deep, burnt red of a dying day. Her face was still and mirthless, as often it was. She caught his gaze and nodded her head backward, made a few swift hand gestures, then disappeared back into the trees. Cathal raised his fist, calling the sergeants to halt. He swung a long leg out and over his warhorse’s back to drop to the snow-laden forest floor. Dolan and Mara followed suit, as did his warriors. The wizard and the mercenary moved to join him.

“Reynhild?” Mara asked, “Has she found them? Where is Asha?”

Cathal shook his head, then set the butt of his lance into the snow and the moss beneath. He drew his longsword from its sheath on his horse’s saddle, and waved at his sergeants to follow.

“Set the pages to watch the mounts.” He said, softly, to Dolan. The mercenary waved at the two youngest recruits, the two lightest armed of the Fulcairn soldiers, then followed Cathal as the young lord strode to follow Reynhild’s trail, the icy boughs of the young firs closing around him.

Cathal knew that he would be hard pressed to track her, had she wished to evade him. She had left a path, bare and plain, for them to follow. Something troubled him. Reynhild had, despite her mostly unreadable expression, seemed too at ease. She should have been more tense. His worries were mostly assuaged, some ten minutes later, when he broke from the tree cover to see Reynhild and the ranger, Asha, a hundred paces away in a clearing strewn with human forms, either dead or in a very deep slumber. Surely the two of them could not have wrought such a thing so bloodlessly, as not one inch of snow had been stained pink. The bandits’ camp still stood, a haphazard scattering of motley tents, no doubt stolen from here and there. Some still bore the markings of noble houses from beyond Wilder’s Gorge. A well travelled band, if not a smart one. Cathal shouldered his great blade and strode easily toward the two woods-women, a bemused look on his face. It was as he approached that he noticed what sat upon the cold earth between them.

It was a cage, fashioned of alders bound at the corners with cord and resin. A ramshackle thing, though perhaps sturdy enough for the form that sat, unclothed and head bowed, within it. His skin was the deep olive of Anuire’s Eastern marches, his hair a thick tumble of matted teak that may have shone, had it seen soap or a comb at any memorable time. His body was wan and wasted, a bundle of ribs poking through skin stretched too thin. He smelled awful, even in the crisp winter air.

“What, um,” Dolan stammered, he and Mara joining them, “who is that?”

Asha shrugged, an eyebrow arched and her mouth curled in a smirk.

“He wouldn’t say,” Reynhild said, flatly, “Told him who we were and he said he’d wait for you.” She nodded toward Cathal.

Cathal stepped forward and stood before the cage. He reached out and tapped one of the “bars” with the blade of his sword. “I’m here now,” he rumbled, “speak man. Why are you so caged?”

The ravaged figure within lifted its filthy head, revealing a sharp jaw covered in scraggly, unwashed whiskers. The eyes though, they were sharp, and clear. They were a vivid green, though surrounded by dark circles. “Halloo, milord,” the man said in a raspy voice, touched with a strong but soothing accent, “I apologize for my reluctance to speak with your fine huntswomen here, but they seemed as like to skin me for a cloak as free me. While I admit, I would make a fine cloak, I like my skin where it is, such that it is.” The man gestured to himself, gracefully forlorn.

Cathal tilted his head. An odd fellow. “Might I have your name, sirrah?”

The man cackled, his cage rattling with the wracking cough that followed.

“Arturo,” he said, “but I am no sir. And, milord will forgive me, but I am dreadfully thirsty. And dreadfully naked. And milord would do well to recall,” Arturo shot him a meaningful look, “It is dreadfully cold.”

Reynhild snorted, despite herself. Asha glanced at Cathal suggestively. Cathal shook his head in amusement. “I am Cathal. Lord Fulcairn. This is Lady Mara Bersk, Captain Dolan of my house sergeants, you know Lady Reynhild and Asha. What happened here, Arturo? I was told this band was twenty strong. I see nothing but corpses, and none of mine were here to make them.”

A flash of a smile crossed Arturo’s face. He spread his arms, as far as they could, innocently. “Bad meat? Honestly after the incident at the farmstead I had had quite enough of my traveling companions. So yes. The meat was very bad.”

“He poisoned the lot of them.” Dolan said, a hint of reverence in his voice.

Reynhild’s face turned sour. “We should leave him here to freeze.” Mara looked perturbed as well. Cathal could blame neither of them, after what had happened at his brother’s funeral feast.

“Hold now,” Arturo pleaded, “knaves all! Deserved what I gave them they did, surely you know. Quicker and cleaner than what you had planned, I reckon.”

“You are a poisoner.” Cathal stated.

Arturo shook his head. “I am a tailor, by trade, in fact, but was also a courtier once, before life got in the way of it. A man acquires knowledge as he lives, does he not?”

“A tailor?” Mara asked incredulously, “How does a tailor end up imprisoned by bandits in such a cage?”

“Ah! Yes!” Arturo replied, “quite a tale indeed! Best told over wine and bread and fine, dank cheese! In fact, my lovely lord, I have a vision of you already in the fog of my mind. A doublet of grey velvet. Slashed with silk; tawny and pearl…”

“You do need some new tunics.” Reynhild said sardonically.

“… or, or a tunic! Of course! Satin! I shall drape you in sunrise, milord, to remember this day! Please, milord, I am quite thirsty.” Arturo clasped his hands together before him, and bowed beatifically.

“Oh, let him out Cathal, he’s done us a favour after all.” Dolan said in a cheerful tone.

Cathal shot a glance at Mara, who nodded casually, then at Reynhild, who shrugged noncommittally.

“Fine.” Cathal said, “We’ll take you to the keep. Feed you and bathe you, but you’ll be kept under guard for now.” Cathal’s arm moved, a flicker of steel, and the alder cage fell to flinders. Cathal waved for a pair of sergeants. “Water.” He ordered.

Arturo laughed and stood, his manhood dangling in the cold. “You will not be sorry milord Fulcairn! I shall clothe you as Haelyn himself! Such that no mortal shall bear to resist you! AHA! This I promise!”