Andrew Hartley - Act of Will

An arrow flew out of the night from behind me and scudded past my right shoulder.

I reined my horse towards the central street and tore the helm from my head so that my screams would be heard. I saw a face at a window, small and wide-eyed, and a lamp lit in a house farther down the road. A door to what might have been a tavern creaked open a few inches and I felt eyes on me.

“Raiders!” I shouted. “Crimson raiders! They are coming. Get up! Defend yourselves!”

I turned in the silence and looked back to where the dark line of cavalry were lighting their torches and their arrows. My horse, sensing my unease, reared, and I almost fell off into the wet street. More lights were coming on, more doors and windows cracking warily. And then, with a rumble of hooves, the raiders spread themselves into a wide arc and began their slow and brutal approach.

Someone shouted a question from a window, but I couldn’t tell what they were saying so I just went on screaming the same thing over and over. A few men stumbled sleepily into the street, fumbling with bows and spears, mattocks and hoes. Then there were families with children, wide-eyed and crying, huddled in doorways, watchful and uncertain.

I turned back to the raiders, half hoping that this tiny alarm would deter their attack, but they were not so easily put off. They were coming closer, still slow but just as assured. My little diversion had done nothing. Then their burning arrows were loosed, and with a rush of wind like a great, vengeful sigh, thatch and timber caught fire all over the village. The crying and panic and the hopeless pleading for mercy swelled almost immediately, and it was clear that there would be no fighting from the villagers. I looked back to where the raiders waited, poised for their final assault, and you really couldn’t blame them. Even running seemed futile.

But I remembered the torched village in Shale and how the horse tracks didn’t go beyond the main street. They appeared, they destroyed, and then they disappeared. They didn’t wait around to be seen, and they didn’t hunt for survivors beyond the village limits. If I could get out and into the woods, I might have a chance. What else could I do?

I checked behind me and saw a door open in one of the houses about twenty yards away. A girl came out, maybe ten years old, brown shoulder-length hair and eyes like dinner plates. Holding her hand was a little boy. The raiders were coming and they had nowhere to go. I didn’t have time to go back for them. I couldn’t carry them anyway. And they’d be dead before I got there. Then I’d be dead too. I really didn’t have time to go back for them.

I went back for them.

I turned my horse as well as I have ever turned a horse, though that isn’t saying much, and set it cantering down the street towards them. Beyond them I could see where the raiders were pouring into the village. Some of them were dismounting and entering the houses.

“Give me your hands,” I called to the children. They didn’t scream. They stared. “Climb up,” I insisted. “I won’t hurt you.”

They backed hurriedly inside.

Go, I thought. You tried. You have to get out of here now.

Shooting a desperate look back towards the raiders and hissing terrified, exasperated curses under my breath, I dismounted and followed the kids inside.

“Where are your parents?” I demanded. More silent staring. I took the helm off with an oath and tried again. “Are you alone? Quickly!”

“In the next room,” said the girl.

“Your parents?”

“And granddad,” she said. “And uncle. ”

“I can’t take them all. Only you. Quick.”

I held out my hand, but the boy huddled up to the girl and began to sob.

“We can’t leave them,” said the girl.

I stared at her, disbelieving. She was tiny, and she was at least as scared as I was, but she wasn’t about to change her mind.

“Get them,” I hissed, watching the door behind me. “Get them all. Quickly.”

The little boy ran into the next room, where there was a great deal of shouting and banging, but the girl stayed where she was, looking at me.

“What is your name?” she asked.

“What?”

“My name is Maia,” she said. Her eyes were still wide, but her face showed no distress, more curiosity and a hint of defiance. “What’s yours?”

“Will,” I said, checking behind me.

“Hello, Will.”

“Listen, Maia,” I said, “you are going to have to help get these people out of the village. Is there a back door?”

“Outhouse,” she said, pointing to a door in the far wall.

“Good,” I said. “Make for the outhouse, but keep going. Just run. As far from the houses as you can get.”

“What about the others?”

“Others?” I said.

“In the other houses?”

“We don’t have time,” I said.

“I could go,” said the girl. “I know how to get into Rafe’s house next door. And Mr. and Mrs. Delways’s.”

“There isn’t time,” I said again, turning back to the door.

“I can do it,” she said. And before I could say another word, she was going out the back way, scampering like a rabbit.

Her father came in, pointing a heavy crossbow at me. Behind him a family of faces crowded the doorway. He was a big man with the body and skin of a man who worked outdoors.

“Go out the back way and get clear of the village,” I said.

The father watched me as the little boy led his mother to the back door, his crossbow trained on me. Then suddenly he wheeled the crossbow toward the door, shooting quickly; too quickly.

I heard the bolt slam into the doorframe, and turned to see a raider already in the room, scyax swinging. The unarmed villagers shrank back towards the back door. Only I could stop him from killing them all.

I don’t think he expected a fight, and my crimson cloak had him momentarily confused, so my quick lunge caught him off-guard. He parried unevenly, suddenly too big for the room, as I shifted and cut like a gnat harassing a cow. But it only took a second for him to regain his composure, and then I was the one stumbling backwards, batting unsteadily at his blade as he closed on me. It would be only another moment now.

I was still clutching the bronze helm. With all my strength I hurled it at his head. It clanged against his own like a bell, and for a second he swayed as if concussed. I seized the moment, stepping sideways as he cut blindly, stabbing low and hard. He stepped backwards and sort of shrank, crumpling as if the wound had let all the air out of his body. If he wasn’t dead when he hit the floor, it happened very shortly thereafter.

For a moment I just stood there, breathing hard, feeling my arms shake and the furious, hot, and horrified blood singing in my ears. Then the cries of the boy brought me back, joined with the shouts and wails of the others.

“Quiet!” I said. “They’ll hear you and they’ll come looking for you. Go that way and follow Maia.”

They had to go now, or they would never get out. Outside I could hear the fires getting closer, and there were shouts of command as the raiders moved through the village. I peered out through the doorway, then stepped quickly into the street. Taking my horse by its bridle, I led it quickly round the back. I could still make the woods.

“Will?” It was the little girl. I nearly kept going, but I just couldn’t. I turned and looked at her. “Should we follow you?” she said.

I looked at her and the huddle of terrified villagers behind her, so surprised by her trust that I forgot my own desire to get away.

“Yes,” I said.

And they did.

It was a noisy, messy, and disorderly affair, but they followed. Behind a large timber building farther down the street there were more, maybe ten or twelve, waiting for guidance and some magical path to safety.