R. Salvatore - The Highwayman

"We've got no coin for you to take," the man said, backing safely out of the sword's reach and sounding less sure of himself.

"I want not your coin," Bransen replied, and he lowered his sword. "Answers I need, and nothing more." He forced all sounds of fury and impatience out of his voice and calmly added, "My apologies, good sir. But please, it is important."

"If talk is all you need, then do it out there," said the obviously terrified man.

"How did you come by these houses?" Bransen asked.

"What do you mean?"

"We been here near to ten years now," the woman added. Bransen heard other voices from inside, off to the side and out of sight.

"How did you come by these houses?"

"Why is that your concern? You're not to take them from us!" the man answered.

"I've no need of any such thing. But I once knew a man who lived here on this lake. He was a friend, and I wish to know why I find you here now, where he should be."

There was some murmuring from within, a whispered conversation that Bransen could not follow.

"His name was Garibond," Bransen said, daring to utter it, though he was concerned about making any connection between Garibond and the Highwayman. But his mounting desperation would not allow for caution at that time. "Garibond Womak. A good and fine man."

More whispering ensued, and then, to Bransen's surprise, the door opened a crack. He moved over to see the two couples standing there in the light of a pair of candles, with the older pair just inside the door and the younger in the shadows behind them. None of the four seemed pleased at that moment.

"Ye knowed Garibond, did ye?" asked the younger woman, a short, plump, and dirty thing with a pug nose and dark rings under her sullen eyes.

"Aye, a good and fine man," said the man standing beside her, his arm draped across her shoulders. "From what I knew of him, I mean, and that weren't much."

"He had that damaged boy," said the older woman. "The one the monks took in when…" Her voice trailed off and she looked away.

"This was his house," Bransen blurted, growing nervous.

"For all his days," replied the older man who had addressed Bransen through the window.

Bransen started to nod, and then the words hit him hard as he came to understand their clear implication.

" 'Twas Taerel, me da there, that buried him them ten years ago," said the younger woman, and she indicated the previous speaker.

"You must be mistaken," Bransen managed to say, trying hard to keep his jaw from quivering. "Ten years, you say?"

"Aye, was ten years," said Taerel.

"Garibond was dead when the monks came and took this…this damaged boy?" Bransen asked, trying desperately to destroy the logic of their claim.

"Was a few weeks later that the monks returned for Garibond," said Taerel, "with the soldiers."

The hairs on the back of Bransen's neck began to stand up.

"Aye," the younger man added. "I was just a boy then, but I'm never to forget that day. They went all through this house, tearing it up, and then they took him." He stepped forward and pointed down the lakeshore to Bransen's right. "Right over there's where they did it."

"Did what?" Bransen's words were hardly more than a whisper.

"They burned him," said the man, who was just a few years older than Bransen.

"Staked him up, branded him a heretic, and burned him alive," Taerel added.

"Bah!" snorted the younger woman. "And them's the ones who're saying that their's is the gentle way and the gentle god, and not like old Bernivvigar. Bah!"

"The m-monks?" Bransen stuttered. "The monks from the chapel murdered Garibond?"

"Aye, Master Bathelais and the others. With the help of Laird Prydae's soldiers, of course. And it weren't murder if Garibond was guilty of heresy as they claimed, I'd say," said Taerel.

"Murder's murder," muttered the younger woman.

Bransen felt his knees go weak and he knew that he had to get out of there. His stomach began to churn. He half turned.

"Highwayman, you've got quite the tale growing about you," said Taerel. "All the town's talking of you, and glad they are that someone's telling Laird Prydae that he cannot keep taking all of our food and…"

The man's voice drifted off behind Bransen as he staggered away, back toward the trees. He couldn't believe what the four had just told him-Master Bathelais and the others would never do such a thing! But Bransen's inner denials rang hollow. He pictured again the knife held by the stranger at the campfire. He wondered suddenly why Garibond had never once come to Chapel Pryd to visit him. Never before had he even considered that fact, but why had his beloved father stayed away for all these years?

A sense of profound aimlessness washed over Bransen, a complete unhinging of all his focus and purpose that manifested itself in his lifeline of chi. He staggered and stumbled and fell more than once as he made for the copse, finally leaning heavily on one tree.

And still there was nothing but the confusion, the scattering of his life energy, the sporadic bursts and twitches-a profound aimlessness. Not even hopelessness, for hopelessness inferred some design and forward thinking, and in Bransen there was none of that. For all his life, he had lived with daily tragedy, with bullying and his helplessness, with the frustration of having a keen mind trapped in a damaged body. For all his life, the dominant feature had ever been pain.

But not like this. Garibond was dead. Branson knew it, he believed it, he held no doubt of it. Garibond, the uncomplaining man who had given so much to him, was simply no more. And all the fantasies that Bransen had entertained of returning to his beloved father whole and strong were no more. All the hopes that Bransen had about living again with Garibond-but in a completely different relationship, one in which he could care for his father as his father had always cared for him-were no more. But Bransen couldn't even focus on any of those things specifically. They were all there, spinning and intertwining in the scattered jumble of his mind, finally settling to a sense of emptiness, a hole he knew he could never fill.

He slipped down to the ground, all strength gone, tears filling his eyes. The knock startled the two women, but before either could begin to react, a second, more impressive banging burst the door askew. Behind the kick came Bannagran, commander of the laird's garrison, the most notable and feared warrior in all central Honce.

Cadayle fell back, as did her mother, and the two started for each other suddenly, needing the comfort of each other's arms.

But Bannagran cut in between them and shoved them apart. And before the women could react or protest, a second unexpected figure strode into their house, one that froze them in place.

"A fine day to you, ladies," said Laird Prydae. Hulking soldiers moved behind him, blocking the morning sunlight as it tried to stream in through the now-open door. "I forgive your lack of preparedness for my visit."

"My liege," said Cadayle's mother, and she fell to one knee and lowered her gaze. Cadayle took the cue and did likewise-or started to, until Bannagran grabbed her by the hair and pulled her back upright. She reached back and pulled at the big man's wrist, but his mighty grip did not weaken at all.

"You were awake late into the night, I expect," Laird Prydae went on. "Meeting the Highwayman, no doubt."

"No, my liege," Cadayle started to say, but she just shrieked instead as Bannagran reached over with his free hand, grabbed the front of her nightdress, and tore it from her, leaving her naked in the room-naked except for a jeweled necklace.

Cadayle looked down at the floor and quickly lifted her hand to cover the stolen necklace.

"You leave her!" her mother cried from across the way, and Cadayle glanced over just in time to see Callen's approach stopped suddenly by a backhanded blow from Bannagran, which sent Callen flying to the floor. Cadayle instinctively started to react, but the big man pulled all the harder on her hair.