David Wragg - Articles of Faith

‘Right, yon fucker!’

The weight lifted from Chel’s chest as the man struggled to his feet. Something whistled through the air and connected with the assassin’s head with a dull clunk. Lemon strode through the door and over Chel’s prone form and punched the reeling man in the throat as he staggered. He collapsed to the floor, gasping, and Lemon crunched her knee into his face. The assassin slumped, passed out on the floor.

‘Where’d this shite-box come from?’

Chel’s own breathing was barely under control, and he felt like the room was spinning even as he lay beside the broken would-be assassin. He managed to wave his good arm toward the empty hatch above.

‘He said he was here to rescue me,’ Tarfel said from his hiding place in the opposite corner.

‘Aye, right. Course he was.’ She stooped to reclaim her hammer.

‘He said there’s a boat coming.’

‘Ah, ancestors’ piss-wine! Now I have to wake everybody up.’

Lemon turned and marched back to the doorway, then paused. ‘Stay here, dullards. For all that is sweet in this shitty world, do not fucken wander off again. Yes?’

Tarfel nodded. Chel managed a groan. Lemon disappeared into the flickering light of the hold, then a moment later a coil of rope came whistling through the door and thumped down onto the boards. ‘And tie that fucker up!’

***

By the time Chel had recovered his feet and spat a bloody mouthful into a corner, Tarfel had made a decent fist of tying up their attacker. Not being a natural knotsman, he’d gone for quantity over quality, and thick balls of contorted rope jutted from the man’s constricted limbs. He’d also found the man’s knife, which he presented to Chel with great solemnity. Uncertain of what to do with it, Chel took it in his good hand and tucked it in his belt as he’d seen others do. He hoped he could keep his balance and avoid falling on it, which seemed the most likely prospect at that point.

Sounds filtered down through the open hatch. Cries and clangs and thumps.

‘Someone’s fighting,’ Tarfel said.

Chel nodded. ‘More than likely. Let’s go, highness.’

‘What do you mean, let’s go? The Clydish oaf said to stay here!’

Chel chewed something salty around his mouth. He could feel his face swelling up again. ‘She did. But all we know at the moment is that people are trying to kill us, or maybe just me to get to you, and that we’re in the hands of mercenaries employed by interfering foreigners. That doesn’t strike me as people we should be bending over backward to keep alongside, highness.’

‘But what good is going up there?’

‘Up there,’ Chel said, ‘is a boat. And if we time it right, we can be away before anyone knows we’re missing, leave these bastards to sort things out between themselves. All we need to do is get to shore. We’re still well north of the lake – this part of the world must be teeming with folk loyal to the crown. So, I say again: let’s go, your highness.’

This time, Tarfel followed.

They crept through the empty hold and up onto the lower deck. The moon was lost behind drifting clouds but the stars were bright, and the scattered forms of bodies lay clear across the planking. Three on the lower deck, another over the rail on the fore tower. The sound of combat came from over their heads, the aft upper deck. Chel ignored it. He had seen what he was looking for.

‘There, grapples!’

He limped forward, feeling every wound and trauma as he crossed the deck with the prince in his wake. A rope ladder dangled from rusty hooks from the barge’s high rail, and Chel peered over the side. There on the slick water below bobbed a long, narrow rowboat, tied against the side.

There was someone in it.

The figure below gave a cry and raised the crossbow in its grip, its projecting bolt-head gleaming in a sudden burst of moonlight. Chel floundered, too shocked to react.

Something whistled past his face, close enough to flutter his hair, and he assumed the bolt had fired and missed. Yet still he could see it in the crossbow below him, even as its owner wobbled. He refocused. Something long and dark was projecting from the top of the figure’s head. Something fletched. Another black arrow swished down toward the boat, thudding into the crossbow wielder. The crossbow clattered against the boat’s hull.

Strong hands gripped him and pulled him back from the rail. He looked around to see Foss, the braided hulk, steering him back toward the hold. Spatters of blood shone on his face in the starlight. Tarfel was already walking ahead of them, unprompted.

Lemon stood in the hold’s low doorway. ‘Aye, right, fancied a spot of night air, did you? Wankers.’ She shot an uneasy look up at the upper deck as they reached her. ‘I won’t mention this if you don’t, but get the fuck back below and maybe we’ll all still be breathing come sun-up, eh? Good lads!’

***

Chel was dozing, exhausted, his head against the door, when he heard the clump of boots on the boards beyond. Shivering awake, he strained an ear to catch Rennic in low conversation with a gruff-voiced woman he took to be the barge’s captain.

‘—him aboard in Sebemir, with three more flimsies,’ he heard the captain saying. ‘Nowt peculiar with any, some of the crew knew ’em. Or of ’em, least.’ He heard her stamp a foot in frustration. ‘Peasy fucker shanked my helm.’ A pause. ‘If any’s left when you spit him out, I’ll take a bite myself.’

Chel didn’t hear Rennic’s reply, but a moment later one set of heavy boots stomped out of earshot. He slid over from the door, mindful of his earlier eavesdropping tumble, and was gratified when it was yanked open a moment later.

Rennic stood in the doorway, head ducked, more than filling the frame. He reached in, past Chel and the blinking prince, and grabbed the bound legs of their would-be assassin. He dragged the man’s slumped and mumbling form over the grimy floor and into the hold. He did not shut the door after him.

Chel and Tarfel peered into the lamp-lit hold. A single chair stood at its centre, and without apparent effort Rennic hoisted the man up onto it, leaving him lolling with the barge’s rise and fall on the water. In the gloom beyond the lamp, Chel made out the huge, implacable form of Foss, arms folded, standing against the wall. Beside him leaned Loveless, and in the corner Lemon squatted, apparently cleaning her ironmongery with a rag. Spider was beside the door, picking his teeth with the point of his curved knife. All looked unharmed, if a little bloody.

Rennic looked around. ‘Any water to hand?’

Loveless stepped forward. ‘Allow me.’ She slapped the man hard across the face. ‘Wake up, shit-head!’

Rennic gave her a long look, eyes narrowed.

‘What? Look, he’s awake. Now keep out of the way.’

The man was blinking, his eyes darting around the hold. A moment later he struggled against his bonds, but only briefly. Tarfel’s knots were good enough, and the man had taken in enough of his situation to realize that even freed of his ropes he’d remain in a tight spot.

Loveless leaned back against a barrel a few feet away from the bound man, her manner relaxed.

‘So,’ she said.

The man looked up. A carpet of dried blood had crusted down one side of his face, and his features looked misshapen from swelling and hammer-induced realignment. His breathing was harsh, each breath in a nasty, rattling wheeze.

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