A Burning Sky
The bandits, both sets, jumped apart and turned to face us. The only thing I could think about was my brother's words, telling me to stay on the horse as long as possible. We were at a standstill, with the four of us on our horses and pulled taut, ready to spring into action, while the bandits faced us with their swords in the air. Who would make the first move?
It was answered with a yell from one of the bandits, a man dressed as a trader, as he launched himself forward. Galahad had been just infront of us enough that he was the target. He swung his sword at once, catching the sword of the bandit. The sound it made, echoing in the silence of the woods, seemed to cause everything else to move. Suddenly the bandits were all launching forward, swords and axes raised to us. A voice reached out to me while I pulled my sword off of my hip.
"Defend yourself, but try not to kill them." Lancelot's voice had a tinge of humor in it while he spoke, which I ignored. Instead I focused on the man that was moving straight for me. He was shifting his sword from one hand to another, waiting for me to make the first move.
Although I knew that I had the best advantage on the horse, I dismounted with my sword still in my hand and faced my opponent. His eyes were shifting back and forth between my face and the sword I was holding in a firm grip infront of me. I could hear the sounds of the fight around us and it pushed me to move.
It was luck that just as I swung my blade upwards, one of the bandits that had been on the other side of my horse came around. Our swords caught and the bandit that had been infront of me lunged, as if expecting to make a clean cut. It took a mere heartbeat for me to swing out my left leg and kick the sword off its course. As the bandit that had lunged at me staggered, I pushed backwards at the one that had engaged me. My arms were starting to hurt from the sheer force he was using and I could see the other bandit moving forwards again.
Something spooked my horse and she reared up. The bandit that had engaged me was knocked onto his backside as she kicked out at him and with the lack of a foe on that side, I turned to the one that was advancing on me that I had kicked at. I swung and cut into his arm, not enough to severely hurt him but enough that he was stunned and when he looked down at his arm, I turned my sword so that I was gripping the blade and swung it, letting the hilt crash against his skull.
Out of the corner of my eye, I turned to see who was approaching and I barely had time to pull my sword back before it would accidentally clip Galahad's arm. He had raised his sword at the last second as well, so our swords barely connected.
"Is that everyone?" He nodded and turned to the two men near me. I had been at the far side and had dismounted on the left of my horse so I was away from the main fighting. The first man that had been knocked over was holding his arm and face, the first which was bent and the second which was bloody, after being kicked by my horse. I ran my hand over her mane before turning to the other man. He had a little blood on his forehead, some dripping from the wound I had put on his arm, and was unconscious.
"Prisoners." Once Lancelot and Tristan gave the final count- three had been killed, five were not too badly injured, and two were unable to walk for different reasons- we round them up and used rope and twine to bind their wrists and create makeshift chains with which to pull them along behind us. Galahad had tied his horse to the back of the wagon and guided it while Lancelot, Tristan and I watched the prisoners and the woods.
I wondered what we would do if we were attacked again, either by more bandits or even Woads, but the end of the woods soon came in sight. Once we were in the open, I rode ahead to the fort gate to announce that we had prisoners and would need the help of the Roman guards. The guard on duty was Virgil and although I looked around for someone else, I knew that I shouldn't waste time. The faster we could get the prisoners to the cells, the less chance they could do something stupid and hurt someone. He was on top of the fort and I had to call up to give him the information.
"We have seven prisoners." Virgil nodded and swung around to make a call down into the fort and soon the gates were opening up and a slew of armed Roman Guards came out, some on horses and some on foot, and we made our way back to the wagon. Galahad had already untied and mounted his horse, deciding rather to just watch the wagon and prisoners with the help of Tristan.
"Where did Lancelot go?" Tristan pointed towards the other pathway in the forest, on the other side, where the other group would be coming through. I could see that even Tristan and Galahad were itching to head that way too but were supposed to be watching the wagon. When I caught Tristan's eye, I nodded my head to tell them to head off. I could handle the prisoners with the guards.
Once all of the knights were back in the woods, I kept my attention on the guards and the prisoners as we started towards the gate. One of the guards, one that I recognized though I did not know his name, moved to walk beside my horse. I had seen the knights bring back prisoners before, to question or punish accordingly.
When we reached the gates, the guard beside me nodded and said that he would oversee the prisoners being moved to the cells. With no reason to say no, the knights usually departed at this point as well, I dismounted and allowed one of the stable hands to take my horse to her stall for a rub down. I had attached my spare sword, arrows and bow to the saddle and he told me that he would put them with the other weapons.
As I made my way back towards the gate, intent to wait there for any sight of the knights, I almost ran into a woman holding onto a small child. Once I steadied the three of us, I crushed the woman to me tightly.
"Vanora! Are you feeling well?" She smiled, bouncing Ten in her arms lightly and turning her eyes towards the gate. She was waiting for her lover.
"I will feel better when Bors comes home safely. The lout didn't even tell me he was leaving." I laughed and with one arm wrapped around her, we made our way towards the gate opening. I directed her sight to the pathway that they would be coming from and then grabbed Ten from her to give her a break.
"We fight and we fight and sometimes we even fight. I shouldn't have stayed so angry with him." Ten made a cooing sound that sounded almost as if he was agreeing with her and I shushed him lightly, bouncing him the way Vanora had just been doing.
"You were angry and you were ill. Even Lancelot would understand that those are two things that do not mix well with a woman." She laughed and then turned away from the path to look at me holding Ten. Though she was laughing and smiling, there was something missing. Something of the warmth and love that she always had seemed to have waned.
"What is on your mind?" She placed a hand on her stomach and then moved it quickly, as if she had been burned somehow. The pain came back into her eyes and I knew that it was not physical. I had seen it once before, that pain, in the eyes of a betrothed servant in Grent's household. The light had faded from her eyes when she found out that she had had a miscarriage.
"Oh Vanora." She shook her head with a small laugh.
"It is not my first one Irissa. It just hurts each time, the same pain in a place that no healer could ever reach. Do not worry about it. And please, do not tell anyone. I will tell Bors tonight, if all is well with this scouting." She had placed her hand on my cheek when she had told me not to worry and gathered her child in her arms, turning back to the path.
We only had to wait for a while longer before we spotted the knights riding towards us. Out of habit, I counted the number of men and horses heading our way and sighed with relief that I counted them all. Vanora's eyes gained a little more of the warmth that had been missing and I smiled at her reaction.
The horses had barely stopped moving before Bors had dismounted and gathered his lover and child to his chest, placing kiss after kiss on her cheeks, forehead, and mouth. It was not the usual passionate or sometimes brutal embrace that I had seen them in before, but it was just as loving.
Lancelot was the first to approach me, since his horse was closest when he dismounted.
"Did they guards take the prisoners?" It was a pointless question, but I nodded anyways. He patted my shoulder and made his way towards the walkway. The stable hands were gathering the horses and we were moving towards the meeting hall. I nodded to Vanora, giving her a smile as I did so, before following them.
Once we were all seated, the stories were exchanged. Apparently Arthur, Bors, Dagonet, and Gawain and come across what they believed to be a similiar ambush but there were only two bandits and they had taken off at the sight of the knights in the woods. After we detailed our ambush, explaining that we had seven prisoners, though one was still unconscious after I hit him in the head with my sword, and three dead bodies in the back of the wagon. They had been covered before brought into the fort, though I imagined they weren't the first bodies the villagers had even seen either way.
Arthur and Dagonet were to make their way to the holding cells to stitch up the prisoners before questioning them. At the door, Dagonet turned around and motioned for me to follow him. It wouldn't hurt to have another set of capable hands. I made my way around the table, pressing my hand against Tristan's arm before leaving the room and catching up to my brother.
He gave my arm a squeeze as we walked, silently asking me if I was alright. I smiled at him and let him wrap an arm around my shoulders as we made our way through the halls. My sword still sat on my hip and my daggers were stashed about my person, so I did not feel uncomfortable walking into the holding cells. As we stepped through the door, nodding at the guards on duty, Dagonet released my shoulder. It would not do well to show a weakness around these people.
Arthur found the one with the least need for medical attention and started to ask him questions while Dagonet and I started to work. It occured to me to point out the two that I had fought for him to work on, thinking they might become hostile if I was the one to look them over.
The second bandit that I moved to work on, checking the cut on his arm, was shaking badly. The few glances I had stolen of his face told me that he was young, probably younger than I was. I cleaned the cut and although it did not need stitching, I told him that I would sew it closed anyways. Although this boy was a bandit, I felt bad for the fear that was in his eyes.
"Please do not let them throw me in jail. Please." It was not up to me and I had no idea what Arthur would decide the punishment would be for the bandits so I kept my mouth shut while I sewed the sides of the wound together. He was wincing and his shaking had not calmed down any.
"I was forced to do this. I was starving and he fed me and told me to come here. I had no other choice." My hand stilled with a few stitchings left to go and I looked at the boy's face. Arthur had heard him speaking and stopped his questioning, turning to listen.
"Who forced you? What were you to do?" He shook his head, raising his free arm to wipe over the tears and sweat that had collected on his face.
"I don't know his name. He wanted me to tell him if someone was dead. A girl. He had her poisoned and wanted to know the result." I rocked back on my heels and stood up, moving to the other side of the holding cell I was in, before I could fall over.
He knew the person that wanted me dead.
A/N: I am sorry that I went away again. I've been having some legal trouble and have been spending a lot of time in court. Sorry sorry, again, sorry.
The poisoning storyline is still in the mix, but it will not be mentioned again (more than in passing at least) for a while now.
Not a lot of Tristan/Irissa romancing in this chapter. The next chapter has a dash more, plus more brother/sister time and even a little Gawain/Irissa and Galahad/Irissa time.
On the topic of Vanora. If you read Freedom and Faith, don't think that I like killing children off. Because I'm a mother. I don't. But I wanted to keep something of accuracy and children in that time had a high fatality rate. And miscarriages were up for many reasons. I didn't want to write something like that, it kills me to do it, but it's important to the time and that makes it important to the story. I'm sorry if anyone was offended by that part.
Until further notice, my sneak peeks have been disbanded. It sucks, I know, but because of the constant rewrites going on, I don't know much ahead of time where I'm taking the story at different times. I hope to continue the sneak peeks once I get a hang of where I'm taking the story. Sorry.
