The Highwayman sotfk-1 Read online

  "Yes, I did it!" the accused man suddenly blurted, and he started to cry. "We did. Oh, but she bewitched me with her charms." He fell forward, facedown on the ground. "Pity, me lord. Pity."

  On a nod from Bernivvigar, a pair of guards moved over and roughly pulled the groveling man aside.

  "Have you anything to say, woman?" the Samhaist asked.

  Callen didn't look up.

  She knew she was doomed, Prydae observed. She had gone past hope now, had settled into that resigned state of empty despair.

  "Now comes the fun," Prydae heard one of the guards standing behind him remark.

  They took the guilty man first, throwing him roughly to the ground. Two men sat on him to hold him still, while another pulled off his trousers. The cuckolded husband, meanwhile, went to the bonfire, where a flat-headed iron brand had been set in place, its end now glowing. By the time he lifted it in his gloved hand and turned, the guilty man was staked to the ground. He lay on his back, naked from the waist down and with his legs spread wide and held firmly in place by leather ties.

  Gasps of excitement and even appreciation, accompanied by a few sympathetic groans, marked the husband's stride as he moved between those widespread legs. The guilty man began to whimper, and all the louder when the cuckolded husband waved the glowing iron before his wide, horror-filled eyes.

  "P-please," he stammered. "Mercy! Mercy! I'll pay you four times, I will! Five times!"

  The glowing brand went in hard against the side of his testicles.

  Prydae had seen several battles in his eighteen years. He had watched men chopped down, squirming and screaming to their deaths. He had seen a woman get cut in half at the waist by a great axe, her top half falling so that she could see her own severed legs, standing there for a long moment before toppling over. But never in all the battles had the young nobleman heard a shriek as bloodcurdling and earsplitting as that from the man sprawled before him.

  The man jerked so violently that he yanked one of the stakes from the ground. That hardly did him any good, for as he tried to kick his leg over in an attempt to cover up, he merely brought the tender flesh of his inner thigh against the side of the hot iron.

  His face locked in a fierce grimace, the wronged husband pressed harder and slapped the flailing leg away. Finally he stepped back, and the wounded man, sobbing and wailing in agony, flipped his leg over again, trying to curl up.

  The guards pulled him up from the ground, and when he tried to duck, one kicked him hard in the groin. He doubled over and fell back to the ground, and so they grabbed him by the ankles and unceremoniously dragged him away, through the jeering and laughing crowd, many of whom spat upon him.

  When finally it settled again, Bernivvigar turned his hawkish gaze upon Callen once more. "Have you anything to say?"

  The woman sniffled but did not look up.

  A nod from him had the guards eagerly stripping off her clothing.

  Despite the gruesome surroundings, Prydae couldn't help but take note of the pretty young thing's naked body. Her breasts were round and full and teasingly upturned, and her belly still had a bit of her girlish fat, just enough to give it an enticing curl. Yes, he should have taken her for a night's pleasure, Prydae realized, and he sighed, for now it was too late.

  Again the aggrieved husband went over to the fire, where the handler was preparing the adder, exciting it and angering it by moving it near the hot embers. With a wicked grin, the dirty man handed over the catch stick, its noose now securely holding the two-foot-long copper-colored snake right behind its triangular head.

  The husband glanced back when he heard Bernivvigar say, "This is your last chance to speak, woman. If you have any words of apology or remorse, this is the moment."

  Callen started to lift her head, as if she wanted to say something. But then she slumped back, as if she hadn't the strength.

  Prydae watched the husband, noting his wince as the guards drew the large canvas bag over his wife's head, pulled it down, then pushed her roughly to the ground and forcing her legs inside. Now she flailed wildly and struggled, until one of the guards kicked her hard in the back.

  They drew the drawstring of the sack, and kicked her again for good measure, and she lay there, sobbing quietly.

  The crowd began to murmur, urging the husband on; and, indeed, there was a hesitation to his every step toward her.

  Prydae watched him intently, seeing him pause and imagining the tumult of feelings that must be swirling within him. That hesitation seem to break apart all of a sudden, as the cuckold painted a scowl on his face and moved to the sack with three quick strides. One of the guards pulled up the tied end, and the other pulled open the mouth of the bag.

  "Don't ye miss," the guard holding the open end said, and he gave the cuckold an exaggerated wink.

  The cheering grew louder; the husband looked around. Then he thrust the catch-stick forward, shoving the adder's head far into the bag. With quick hands, the guards helped him force the rest of the squirming snake in, and the husband released one of the drawstrings and pulled back the empty catch-stick.

  The guard drew tight the string and tied it off, then jumped back, letting the sack fall over.

  The crowd hushed; Prydae found himself leaning forward in his chair.

  For a long while, nothing.

  There came a slight movement as the snake began to stir. The woman screamed, and the sack began to thrash.

  They heard her cry out, and a sudden and violent jerk of the sack brought every onlooker to hold his breath and seemed to freeze the scene in place. The sack held still for a moment, then came another jerk, the woman within no doubt reacting to a second bite.

  And again and again.

  It went on for many minutes, when finally the bag went still.

  The snake handler cautiously moved over and slightly opened the tied end, then jumped well back.

  Sometime later, the adder slithered out.

  Prydae sat back in his chair, chilled to the bone.

  "Stake her up at the end of the road," he heard Bernivvigar say, "that all the workmen might be reminded of her crime."

  With that, the old Samhaist turned and walked away, and the crowd began to disperse.

  "It'll take her two days to die, unless an animal gets her," Prydae heard his guard say behind him.

  "Aye, and with the poison burning her, head to toe, all the while."

  The prince sat very still watching the sack. One delicate bare foot had come out of the end and was twisting slowly in the dirt and twitching.

  Prydae finally managed to turn his eyes and consider the monks. Father Jerak was staring at the departing Samhaist, his expression obviously uncomplimentary. The prince noted the young and stern one, Bathelais, had his arms crossed over his chest, eyes set determinedly. Bathelais seemed the most accepting of the group, standing in particular contrast to the monk beside him, a young man Prydae did not know, whose look of horror and distress was so pronounced that the prince had to wonder if the man's eyes would freeze open. Obviously, most of the monks had no liking for this severe Samhaist justice, but they hadn't the power to do anything about it. In times past, the adulteress would often have been spared the sack, with a confession and if she were properly broken of spirit before going in. But now, Prydae understood-as did his father, as did Bernivvigar and the monks of Abelle-this scene was about much more than the life of one pitiful little peasant girl.

  It was about an old Samhaist's declaration of his continuing importance.

  This was justice in Honce, in God's Year 54.

  6

  Along the Rim of Time's Circle They traveled the wide and smooth way out of Ethelbert Holding for many miles to the west, then turned to the north, where the road fast dwindled to a simple cart path, a pair of wet, muddy ruts in the grass.

  "Laird Ethelbert is more interested in pressing forward to Delaval City than to my home of Pryd, apparently," Dynard said with a laugh, for the work on the road extended beyond their vision
to the west.

  "I prefer the untamed lands," SenWi said, and when she glanced at Dynard, she had a little sparkle of excitement in her dark eyes that the monk could not miss.

  He tightened his grip on her hand and strode more boldly forward. Soon after, the couple had left all signs of the road behind them and moved along an even less defined trail, where underbrush obscured the cart ruts and great trees crowded overhead.

  "I know the land, even after all these years," Dynard assured her. "In two weeks' time, we will find Chapel Pryd. We'll not get lost."

  "Little is the care if we do," SenWi replied. "The unknown road oft brings unexpected joys."

  Her reference to Dynard's own journey brought a blush to his cheeks. "And oft brings unexpected dangers," he replied. "The land is rife with powries and goblins, so said Laird Ethelbert. Even when I left, the beasts were all about."

  "I am Jhesta Tu," SenWi reminded him, the words drawing Dynard's eyes back to the ivory and silver hilt of the sword that pointed diagonally above her left shoulder.

  He squeezed her hand again, and they strode off along the forested trail.

  Later that same night, on a hill open to the stars above, SenWi ran her hand over the sleeping Bran's shoulder. The air was warm, but the evening breeze carried a slight chill that amplified and tingled as it moved across the perspiration that still clung to SenWi's naked body.

  Bran slept soundly, his chest rising and falling in a smooth, contented rhythm. Their lovemaking had been particularly energetic that night, with Bran almost ferocious in his advances, and as urgent in the act itself as he had been in their first encounter, years before in the Walk of Clouds.

  Was he trying to reaffirm his love for her to himself? SenWi had to wonder. Was his insistence of action a way for him to defy the obvious disdainful glances that he knew the two of them would face among his unworldly, even intolerant, people?

  SenWi smiled the thought away, not over concerned. Had her beloved Bran Dynard felt any more at ease during his first days in Jacintha or among the xenophobic tribes in the desert of Behr? Had he not been a curiosity of sorts when first he had come to the Walk of Clouds, with his chalky skin and strange ways, his words of Blessed Abelle and magical gemstones?

  SenWi understood. In making love to her that night, under the stars in the summer breeze, Bran had tried to prove to her that he loved her beyond anything else and that there could be no severing of that tie. And he had tried to prove to himself, she presumed, that the curious and doubting expressions of other people mattered not at all.

  His sleep was not restless.

  "My love," SenWi whispered, her words floating on the evening breeze. She bent low over Bran and kissed him, and he gave a little grumble and rolled onto his side, drawing yet another amused smile from SenWi.

  She held faith in his love for her, and never doubted her own for him, and she was doubly glad of that now.

  For she knew.

  With her Jhesta Tu training, her senses attuned so well to the rhythms of her own body, the mystic knew.

  She brought a hand down to her belly. "That is it?" SenWi asked in a halting voice. She was gaining a better command of the Honce language, for she and Dynard had been speaking that alone for the last week of traveling. She moved around the side of the rocky jut on the hillside to stand beside her husband, and followed his gaze to the distant dark shape of a formidable castle, anchored in the back by a wide, round tower.

  Dynard's grin gave her the answer before he verbally confirmed, "Castle Pryd, home of Laird Pryd, who hosts my chapel." He glanced to the west, and noted the sun, now more than halfway to the horizon.

  "This night only if we travel long after…bokri," SenWi answered his unasked question.

  "Sunset," Dynard translated. "Bokri is sunset, as bonewl is sunrise." He extended his hand to her. "Tomorrow morning, then. I am anxious to return to my home, 'tis true, but I will miss our time alone."

  SenWi took his hand and followed him and didn't disagree at all with his observation. The weather had been fine and the company better over the days since they had left the bustle of Ethelbert Holding. It had rained just once, a light sprinkle one dark night, but even in that, SenWi and Bran had huddled and laughed under the sheltering lower boughs of a thick pine, and barely a drop had touched them.

  The Jhesta Tu mystic had enjoyed the journey as much as her companion. They had laughed-mostly Dynard laughing at her as she struggled to master the language-and basked in the scents and sights of the unspoiled Honce wilderness in the late summer. They had been fortunate thus far, for the only monster or dangerous animal they had encountered was a single adder that slithered into their campsite one night. Dynard had reached for a stick, but SenWi had intervened, moving low to face the serpent and swaying her hands rhythmically to calm it and entrance it. With a lightning quick strike, the Jhesta Tu had caught the adder in her grasp right behind its head, and had gently carried it far from the camp, where she then had released it.

  She remembered now the image of Bran Dynard when she had returned to the camp, as he sat there, shaking his head and grinning widely and chuckling with obvious admiration. "You have learned ki-chi-kree," she had said to him. "You, too, could have calmed and caught the serpent."

  To that, Dynard had laughed all the louder and had equated his own command of the Jhesta Tu understanding to that of SenWi's grasp of the language of Honce.

  Since they had agreed that they need not make Castle Pryd that night, they walked leisurely and on a meandering road, with SenWi often rushing to the side to further explore some interesting sight or sound. For their camp, they chose a bare-topped hillock, and from its apex as the sunlight began to fade they could just make out the southernmost reaches of the new and expanding road, less than a mile away.

  "Your world is changing," SenWi remarked as they stared down at that significant development.

  "Greatly, I would guess, when these roads are connected. But for the better," Dynard added, turning a grin SenWi's way. "Better to spread the word of Abelle. Better to take the healing powers of the soul stones to the ends of the land."

  "Better to move about your armies?"

  "If in the pursuit of the monsters that plague the land, then yes."

  SenWi nodded and let the conversation go at that. She was Jhesta Tu, and so she had studied the history of the southern lands of Behr extensively. Many times over the centuries had empires arisen, building roads and marching their armies all about. Most of those roads were lost again now, as were the empires, reclaimed by the desert sands. History moved in circles, the Jhesta Tu believed, a hundred steps forward and ninety-nine backward, so the saying went; and that understanding was based on solid evidence and a collective, often bitter, experience. How many people through the ages had thought themselves moving toward a better existence, toward paradise itself, only to be thrown back into misery at the whims of a foolish ruler or by the stomping of a conquering invader?

  SenWi wondered then if the roads of other empires had crossed this land of Honce, ravaged by time and swallowed by regrown forests. She expected as much.

  She fell asleep comfortably in Bran's tender embrace that evening, her vision of the stars above and thoughts of eternity taking her to a quiet and peaceful slumber. Like all Jhesta Tu, she had trained her body to remain alert to external stimuli even in the deepest sleep, and she awakened sometime near midnight to the distant sound of coarse laughter, drifting on the summer breeze.

  SenWi extricated herself from her husband's arms and slowly rose to her feet, staring off to the north, toward Pryd. She saw the flicker of a torch through the trees, perhaps halfway to the firelight glow showing in the windows of Castle Pryd. The commotion and new lights were somewhere down by the end of the road, she figured.

  She heard Dynard stir and crawl over beside her, where he wearily rose to his knees. "What is it?"

  Some more laughter filtered through.

  "A party?"

  "No," SenWi quickly answered,
for she recognized that there was little joyful mirth in that grating sound. It was more taunting and wicked in timbre. "Not a party."

  She began to dress, and not in the flowery white clothing she typically wore through the days, but in a black suit of silk-the dress of a nighttime hunter.

  "You mean to go down there through the darkness?"

  "In this instance, the darkness might prove our best ally," she replied in a grave voice. She started off down the northern side of the hillock, pulling her silken shirt about her as she went.

  Dynard grabbed his clothes and rushed after, not wanting to lose sight of SenWi in the night. The woods could be confusing and disorienting, he knew, but he knew, too, that his wife could find her way unerringly.

  A few minutes later, the monk found himself crouching behind a bush beside SenWi. She motioned for him to hold his place, and she crept forward toward the flickering torchlight and harsh-toned conversation. The hairs on the back of Dynard's neck were standing on end now, for he could recognize the language of the speakers, if not the words, and knew them to be powries.

  He felt SenWi tense before him, then he moved past so that the scene came into view. A group of five powries stood at the end of the road, prodding, poking, and taunting a young woman, naked and battered, who had been strung up by her wrists, her feet a foot off the ground.

  One powrie said something Dynard could not understand, and the others began to laugh.

  "Ack, but ye're a pretty one, ain't ye?" the spindly-limbed little dwarf then said to the woman, speaking in the language of Honce. She didn't even groan in response, just hung there, twisting slowly and seeming very near to death, if not already there. The powrie poked her naked belly, sending her into a little swing, and the others laughed again.

  "Pretty and with bright blood, eh?" the powrie said, and with a sudden movement, the dwarf brought a knife up and across the inside of the woman's thigh, opening a large wound. Now she did cry out, softly and pitifully, and she tried to wriggle away, but the powrie caught hold of her and slapped his beret against the flowing blood.