Firebrand

“I said,” the man told them, “put your weapons away.”

When Karigan and Enver did not obey, an arrow thwacked into Karigan’s saddle right beside her thigh. She fought to control her wildly beating heart as Condor whinnied and sidestepped.

“The next arrow,” the man told her, “will cripple your leg. Put your weapons aside. I am not asking you to disarm.”

True enough, Karigan thought, though she could not quite tear her gaze from the arrow impaled in her saddle. She shook herself and nodded to Enver. He lowered his bow, and she sent her saber home into its scabbard.

“Who are you?” she demanded of the man.

He took his time walking around them to look them over. When he stopped by her stirrup, he gave her an especially hard look. He had a winter’s growth of beard, which almost disguised his youth. The authority he exhibited was what made him appear older than his years.

“Green Rider, eh?” he said.

“I am Rider Sir Karigan G’ladheon, king’s messenger. Now do me the courtesy of telling me who you are.”

“Thought so,” he murmured. He gave her something of a mocking smile. “We can talk later. First you will follow me.” He turned to enter the woods, obviously expecting them to fall in behind him.

Karigan held her hand up to stay Enver and Estral. Estral gazed anxiously at her. They were not going anywhere until the man identified himself and his companions.

“Halt,” she commanded him.

He turned in surprise. “You are not the one giving orders here.”

“I will not take orders from someone who just appears out of the woods, threatens us with arrows, and refuses to identify himself.”

“The north woods are perilous,” he said. “I need to take you to have a conversation with my captain.”

“We are not going anywhere until you tell us who you are.”

“I have heard how stubborn you Greenies can be,” he said, “even with the threat of arrows trained on them, and trust me, Greenie, my archers have not let down their guard.”

Karigan just waited.

The man made a sound of annoyance. “If it eases your mind,” he said, “you’ve been found by a patrol of Sacoridia’s River Unit. I am Lieutenant Miles Rennard, at your service.” Again, the mocking smile, this time as if to challenge her to dispute his claim.

She accepted. “Prove to me you are Sacoridian and not Second Empire.”

“You are a smart girl, Rider Karigan.”

“That’s Rider G’ladheon to you, Lieutenant. If you are a lieutenant.”

He yanked his longknife out of its sheath and she tensed, but he just showed her the blade with its maker’s mark. It was that of one of the smiths who created arms for Sacoridia’s military. It was, in fact, by the same smith who had forged her saber.

“You could have picked that up anywhere,” she told him.

He threw his cloak back to show her his sleeve with its insignia of the River Unit and Sacoridia’s firebrand and crescent moon above it. “I suppose you are going to say I could have gotten this anywhere, as well.”

“Did you?”

“No. It was issued to me by the same quartermaster who issues you Greenies your gear.” He drew out a silver chain from beneath his collar and from it dangled a pendant of the crescent moon, and another of the sun. “Do you think you’d catch a Second Empire rat wearing the sign of Aeryc and Aeryon?”

“Yes, if that rat was trying to pass himself off.”

Lieutenant Rennard bristled. “And do you suppose we were waiting here in the woods just for a Green Rider and—and whoever these other two are to pass by?”

Karigan shrugged. “I have seen Second Empire do all manner of things.”

“I know you have, Rider G’ladheon, for I’ve heard something of your deeds. Apparently you’ve survived Blackveil, and however you did must make for a fascinating tale. As for me, I am who I say I am. We are on routine patrol here, and as a courtesy, I request that you return to camp with us to speak with Captain Treman. I am sure he would wish to have some word from the city.”

Karigan yanked the arrow out of her saddle. The arrowhead’s sharp, broad blades, she observed, could cripple a leg, and do much worse. She handed it to the lieutenant. “If only you had said so to begin with.”

“You believe me, then?”

“Mostly.”

He laughed. “This way, then.”

Karigan and her companions ended up dismounting as the terrain grew more difficult than the Eletian way, with too many low-hanging branches making sitting atop a horse annoying at best, and hazardous at worst.

“Are you sure about this?” Estral whispered to her.

“As sure as just about anything else.” Karigan did not know Captain Treman personally, but she had heard Captain Mapstone and Mara speak highly of him, and he was a decorated warrior. Even if this was some elaborate ruse perpetrated by Second Empire, there would have been no escaping the arrows of Lieutenant Rennard’s archers.

She watched their surroundings as they traveled over the bump and swale of the forest floor and splashed through gullies. They were good, the soldiers of the River Unit. She could only pick out two or three that kept apace of them in the distance.

Enver, who seemed to know what she was looking for, said, “There are twenty of them, Galadheon.”

Twenty! They were good. But so was Enver to have spotted and counted them.