Себастьян Кастелл - Traitor's Blade

Kest looked at him out of the corner of his eye. ‘Courage? You think the apple is going to try and bite you?’

Aline giggled.

‘Quiet, swordsman,’ Brasti said haughtily. ‘This is real man’s work.’ He rolled his right shoulder a second time and nocked an arrow. At first he sighted down the arrow and pulled back hard on the bowstring, then he lifted his point up and away to the left.

‘You’re aiming the wrong way,’ Aline said, concern in her voice, but Brasti ignored her and let the arrow fly.

At first I thought he might have overshot, but there was a light wind and as the arrow began arcing back down it veered a little to the right and took the apple clean off the tree.

Aline clapped excitedly. ‘You did it, Brasti!’

Brasti was checking his fingernails as he said, ‘Truly, what manner of man must do such great and terrible things?’

‘One who’s too lazy to pick the apple off the tree himself?’ I offered.

Aline ignored me studiously and focused her attention on Brasti. ‘But how did it work? You aimed too far to the left.’

‘Wind,’ he said. ‘You have to factor in the wind.’

‘But the wind isn’t very strong at all.’

‘Look at the small branches on that tree over there. You see how they’re swaying? This part of the road is protected by that ridge, but up ahead there, the trees are in the open.’

She looked at him with awe. ‘Can you—?’

‘What, hit something else? Uncle Brasti needs to save a few arrows for miscreants, sweetheart.’

‘No, I don’t mean—Well, what I’m wondering is …’ She swallowed hard, and with hope shining out of her eyes, asked, ‘Can you maybe teach me to shoot like that?’

Brasti looked down at her and then over at me. I shrugged. It wasn’t my decision.

‘All right,’ Brasti said, ‘but you learn my way, not yours. Agreed?’

Aline nodded very solemnly. ‘Agreed.’

‘You’re going to need a bow.’

The girl thought about it for a second. ‘I don’t have a bow,’ she said, ‘and I don’t have any money.’

Brasti crossed his arms and looked around at us, then he said, ‘I suppose if I’m to be your archery master then I should give you the bow my master gave me when I became his student.’

‘Really?’ she asked, her voice full of awe.

He walked over to the rear wagon several feet away and rummaged around in the back. When he returned, he held out his hands as if he were holding something incredibly precious. There was nothing there.

‘Here you are,’ he said. ‘Your first bow.’

It looked like the joke had gone too far, for the girl looked as if she might start crying.

‘Oi, now, no need to be cruel,’ Krug said, waving his big bear arms towards her. ‘You come here, little girl. I’ll make you a nice wooden sword to play with.’

I could tell that Aline didn’t want to learn to play with wooden swords, but she started to turn towards the man anyway.

‘Is that your decision then?’ Brasti asked.

‘What?’

‘Have you decided that you no longer wish to learn the way of the arrow?’

‘You know that’s not true,’ she said. ‘Why are you being mean? Why are you all so mean?’

Valiana called from the carriage, ‘Come in here with me, Aline, and leave the silly men to their toys and games.’

Aline started to go, but Brasti stopped her. ‘Last chance,’ he said without a trace of humour in his voice.

‘You know I want to,’ she said miserably.

‘Say it,’ Brasti demanded. He still held his arms out in front of him as if a bow rested on them.

‘I want to learn the way of the arrow.’

‘Say it again.’

‘I want to learn the way of the arrow.’

Brasti knelt on one knee in front of her. ‘Then take this bow,’ he said.

She hesitated.

‘Take it.’

Gingerly she reached forward and pretended to lift the bow from his outstretched arms.

‘Now swear, Aline: swear that you will follow my lessons, always aim true, and above all, treat this bow as if it were the last you will ever own.’

She looked confused but she stammered out, ‘I swear it.’

Brasti rose. ‘Good. Go and put the bow away for now and then come back. You won’t need it for your first lesson.’

Aline ran off to one of the wagons and did a very good job of pretending to place the bow carefully amongst the supplies.

Kest looked at Brasti. ‘I must confess, I’ve never studied archery,’ he began.

‘Well, it’s a bit too sophisticated an art for your kind, Kest.’

‘Perhaps – but I admit to being confused as to the purpose of an imaginary bow.’

‘If you can aim and shoot with perfect form with an imaginary bow, you can do it with a real one.’

‘So this really is how you learned to shoot?’

‘My master did the very same thing to me when I was about her age. An archer needs to trust his form, not the feel of the bow. The archer is the true weapon; the bow is just a long piece of wood.’

A couple of the men snorted at that, but it was hard to question Brasti’s words when he never seemed to miss.

Aline returned and looked up at Brasti. ‘Could you teach me about the wind?’ she asked. ‘How can you tell how much it’s pushing?’

‘Well, you use your eyes first, of course, but then you have to close them so that you can use your ears.’

‘Your ears?’

‘Close your eyes,’ he said.

She did and so did I, and then I felt a little foolish.

‘Now listen. What do you hear?’

‘I hear you, and I hear the men moving around.’

‘Good. What else?’

‘One of the horses is snorting, and I think something is creaking – his bridle, maybe.’

‘Keep going,’ Brasti said. ‘Deeper.’

‘I hear the wind picking up the leaves.’

‘That’s right. You’re doing very well. Now try to listen past it. Try to listen to the sound of the wind coming up again. What does that sound like?’

‘It sounds like – it sounds like a cat, stepping on leaves.’

‘That’s right, like a cat, it’s— Oh shit!’

I opened my eyes and saw Brasti jumping on top of the forward wagon and pulling out his bow and arrows. The real ones.

‘What is it?’ Feltock asked.

‘Cats stepping on leaves,’ he said. ‘At this distance the only thing that sounds like cats stepping on leaves is a group of men trying to move quietly.’

Feltock didn’t hesitate. ‘Arm up – now, damn it! Get the horses back, get the wagons circled, carriage in the centre. Protect the Lady.’

As the men jumped to obey, Feltock asked, ‘Can you tell me how many?’

Brasti shook his head. ‘I can’t be sure, except it’s a lot more than us.’

It didn’t take long to find out, for as soon as the brigands realised that we were pulling out weapons they began to rush towards us. I could see movement in the forest on either side of us.

‘Damned trees,’ Feltock swore. ‘Can’t see a bloody thing – and we’re sitting ducks out in the open road like this.’

The men were forming up, using the cover of the wagons to prepare for a charge, if the right moment came. Brasti was looking for targets, sighting along his bow.

I saw Aline rushing to the wagon where she had put her own ‘bow’ and shouted, ‘Aline! Go to the Lady Valiana and stay there!’

I had to turn because a flurry of arrows hit the ground in front of me.

‘Do you have any more pistols?’ I asked Feltock.

‘They’re rubbish,’ he said. ‘They have to make a dozen of the damned things to get one that shoots straight. Besides, they’re single-shot; they take too damned long to reload.’

Brasti let fly an arrow and I followed its path into the forest where it hit a man in the shoulder.