The raider had his arms folded and his back to a tree. His chin had sagged to his chest, though he lifted it every few minutes to glare at his charges. Shane judged the distance he’d have to cover to reach the man and grimaced. The Saint of Steel had not chosen His warriors for stealth.
Even if Wisdom keeps me from accidentally hurting one of the kids, I don’t trust this fellow not to decide to use one as a shield.
It would have been an excellent situation for Erlick’s bow, but the older man was working his way down the hillside overlooking the steading, where Shane would presumably need him rather more.
Right. If I creep around through the woods, perhaps I can get behind…shit!
One of the children left the stream and went toward the bushes where Shane was lurking. Shane froze, trying not to breathe. Had he been spotted? Would the child raise the alarm?
The boy couldn’t have been much more than eight or nine, and he proved without a doubt that he was a boy by unbuttoning his trousers and pissing about eighteen inches to the left of Shane’s hiding spot. Shane stifled a sigh.
The boy turned slightly from side to side, apparently trying to hit a particular section of shrubbery.
Shane closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable.
It didn’t come. Instead he heard a gasp and opened his eyes to see the boy staring directly at him.
It was very, very hard to use the paladin’s voice in a single whisper, but Shane did his best.
“Shhhh.”
The child’s eyes were huge. Shane risked a whisper. “I’m here to help.”
“I…I…” The boy darted a glance over his shoulder at the raider. Shane winced. Might as well hold up a sign saying, “I Am Doing Something Wrong Over Here.”
The raider caught it immediately. “Hey! What’re you doin’ over there?”
“Nothing!” squeaked the boy, an answer guaranteed to spark paranoia in the most trusting adult.
Heavy footsteps heralded the raider’s approach. Shane tensed, hand closing over his dagger.
“Nothing, eh?” The man stalked up and dealt a stinging slap to the side of the boy’s head. “You’re supposed to be working, you little snot.”
The child fell down. The raider turned to face him, drawing his foot back, which left him both off-balance and with his back to Shane.
Stabbing a man in the kidneys was a remarkably good way to make him think about his life choices, but he only had a second or two to do so before Shane followed up by cutting his throat. He shoved the man to one side so that he didn’t fall on top of the startled boy and waited glumly for the screaming to start.
It didn’t. All six of the children stared at him in silence, round-eyed, like a line of little owls.
Shane wiped his dagger off and pulled the boy to his feet. “Do any of you have somewhere to go?” he asked.
The oldest looking of the children, a girl of perhaps eleven, said, “’M from Hangman’s Glen.”
“Do you think you can get back there on your own?”
She shrugged. “Can try.”
Shane wanted desperately to herd them away himself, but if he did, they would wind up with Wisdom’s people, and he couldn’t bring himself to feed children into the demon’s maw. It’s summer and warm enough. They won’t freeze at night, and they undoubtedly know the area better than you do. “Go north,” he said, “and circle around the hills. Go now. Take the others with you. I don’t know how long the raiders will be distracted.”
The girl nodded. She grabbed the smallest child by the hand and beckoned to the others. “C’mon, you lot. Keep quiet.”
The boy wiped his nose, looking up at Shane. “You gonna kill the rest of them?”
“I’m going to try.”
“Good.” He directed a kick at the dead raider.
“Get going,” said Shane. The others were already crossing the stream and vanishing into the brush. “Stick together. And, lad…？”
“Eh?”
“Button up your trousers.”
THE RAIDER HOLDING hadn’t been much to look at from above, and wasn’t much to look at from ground level, either. The huts all shared stone walls where possible, leaving two semi-circles
flanking a straggling central area, with the stream on one side and a stone cliff face on the other.
In theory, such a layout should have been defensible and well-protected.
In practice, Shane simply walked up to the half-asleep guard, cut his throat, and ducked back around the edge of the farthest hut.
Someone eventually came out to check on the guard, and Shane cut his throat as well, then dragged the body back out of view. He had a vague urge to find whoever was in charge and yell at them about the value of redundancy in guard posts.
Probably he could have kept doing this for all dozen raiders, except that a woman came past, saw the dead guard in the chair and froze. Her eyes shot to Shane, who gave a tiny wave and put his finger to his lips.
She let out a shriek to wake the dead, and Shane sighed.
The woman stumbled back, still shrieking. A gabble of voices went up from the holding, mostly in the vein of “Who’s yelling?” and “What now?”
If I was a little less chivalrous, I would hit her over the head. But that might kill her and she isn’t attacking me, so I suppose I’m doing this the hard way.
He lifted his arm over his head and swung it in a short circle, hoping Erlick could see him.
“Attack!” the woman finally screamed, taking to her heels. “We’re being attacked!”
The gabble immediately changed in tenor. Shane sheathed his dagger and drew his sword.
He hacked through the first man that came charging to see what the problem was, empty-headed and empty-handed. Shane might have felt guilty for taking down such an obviously unwise opponent, but he remembered the faces of the children at the stream and yanked his sword loose with a vicious twist.
Three down. Who’s next?
It was two of them this time, and they were smart enough not to simply come barreling around the corner. They stayed well out of range, took his measure, and one spat on the ground. “Who’re you with?”
“No one you know,” said Shane pleasantly. The black tide was rising inside his head, drunk on bloodshed, and he knew that he could move forward and take the larger one in the gut with the sword, grab his shoulder, turn and block the smaller one’s blow with the big one’s body, throw the dying man into his companion as he pulled his sword loose, and then whichever way the small one went, Shane would be waiting with a blade…
The world jogged sideways and he discovered that he’d already done it and the smaller one was on one knee, staring up at him in astonishment. Unfortunately Shane’s sword was hung up on his collarbone and since the other raiders might be right behind him already, Shane was forced to slam his knee into the man’s face and pry him off the point. Four…five…
Something went zzzip! and Shane turned to find that yes, there was another man coming up behind him, and behind that man was an archer. Fortunately Erlick had gotten his shot off before the archer
had. Shane noted this and appreciated it for half a heartbeat before he threw himself at the next opponent.
Time jumped sideways around him. There was a body at his feet. Which number was it? Was the archer out completely? He’d lost count. The tide didn’t care. The tide flowed forward, carrying him with it, and he heard another arrow and something hit his shoulder and it hurt but pain didn’t matter and it was the left shoulder, he didn’t need the left, he could still swing with the right, and the swing went through a raider’s face who had an axe but didn’t use it nearly as well as Wren did.