branched off from the main road. It was straight and fast rather than curved. Robinton would apologize to the Station Master and hoped they'd encounter no runners on their way. Once on the straight track, they put heels to their mounts. They ran at a pace that Robinton would have considered dangerous at any other time, but both Black and Nip's mount were sure-footed and the track was a pale, thin ribbon they could follow through the night.
Riding and periodically walking their mounts to rest them, they made the Red River by early morning. Urging the tired animals, they kept them moving at whatever pace they could manage until they turned a bend in the road and saw Ruatha Hold ahead of them.
Despairing, Robinton surveyed the hideous dawn-lit scene.
Ropes still dangled from the fire heights of Ruatha Hold – ropes which had allowed Fax's men to approach without arousing the watchwhere Where had the watchman been? Robinton wondered.
Or had he been bribed not to hear? Why had the watchwher not given an alarm? A row of bodies lay crumpled on the stone of the courtyard; long bloody lines showed that the dead had been dragged out of the Hold, down the steps, and to this resting place. Men were coming out of the Hold laden with clothing and the fine furniture which Lady Adessa had brought with her. He saw a knot of frightened people being driven from their cots into the beast- hold, saw men riding off in other directions on runners which had been taken out of the beasthold. Ruatha runners! The animals which Fax had coveted ... and now had possession of. Worse still, as Robinton's eyes returned constantly to the bodies in the courtyard, he noticed smaller ones among the adults and thought of the bright, pert Lessa. She'd've been no more than – what? Nine, ten turns at the most. He reeled in the saddle with nausea and fatigue, and allowed Nip to urge him and Black further into the shadows of their shelter.
Distant shouts and a thundering sound made Robinton look back at the dreadful carnage. The fields were being emptied of their runners and these were being herded back to Fax's beastholds. Groghe must be warned. So must Tarathel and Oterel. There was nothing Robinton and Nip could do here.
They got the best speed possible out of their exhausted mounts on their way to the nearest of Groghe's border checks, where they roused the startled guards and told them to light the beacons to spread the alarm. Then they changed to fresh mounts and sped back towards Fort Hold. There, while Nip charged up the stairs to the Drum Towerut of the Hold, down the steps, and to this resting place. Men were coming out of the Hold laden with clothing and the fine furniture which Lady Adessa had brought with her. He saw a knot of frightened people being driven from their cots into the beast-hold, saw men riding off in other directions on runners which had been taken out of the beasthold. Ruatha runners! The animals which Fax had coveted ... and now had possession of. Worse still, as Robinton's eyes returned constantly to the bodies in the courtyard, he noticed smaller ones among the adults and thought of the bright, pert Lessa. She'd've been no more than – what? Nine, ten turns at the most. He reeled in the saddle with nausea and fatigue, and allowed Nip to urge him and Black further into the shadows of their shelter.
Distant shouts and a thundering sound made Robinton look back at the dreadful carnage. The fields were being emptied of their runners and these were being herded back to Fax's beastholds. Groghe must be warned. So must Tarathel and Oterel. There was nothing Robinton and Nip could do here.
They got the best speed possible out of their exhausted mounts on their way to the nearest of Groghe's border checks, where they roused the startled guards and told them to light the beacons to spread the alarm. Then they changed to fresh mounts and sped back towards Fort Hold. There, while Nip charged up the stairs to the Drum Tower, Robinton banged on Groghe's door, rousing not only the Lord Holder but the entire corridor.
'Fax has invaded Ruatha Hold,' Robinton said, leaning against the door post to get breath enough to speak. The drums began to roll out their dreadful message. Nip hadn't lost his touch with a drumstick.
'What?' Groghe stared unbelieving at the MasterHarper. 'He can't have.'
'He has – and killed them all, even the children. I saw their bodies. I've warned your border men. The beacons are lit.'
'Oh, Master Robinton, you look awful,' Groghe's wife said, guiding the Harper to the nearest chair and sensibly getting him a cup of wine. 'You don't mean to tell me dear Lady Adessa's dead, as well. Surely--' She broke off, seeing the answer in the bleakness of his expression. 'Oh, how terrible! How simply terrible! You're right to fear that man, Groghe.'
'I don't fear him, Benoria, I despise him!' Groghe unbuckled his belt and threaded a hefty dagger on to it before he girded himself again.
'Oh, don't, don't, Groghe!' she cried.
'I've got my eyes well and truly open about Fax, m'dear, and hiding from him is not an option!'
'There's nothing you can do, Groghe,' Robinton said, shaking his head. 'By the time you can get there, he'll have completed his looting and be on his way back to Nabol.'
'Well, then, the guards he'll have left at Ruatha shall see me and my men lining the border, MasterHarper, and know that they may not encroach on my lands.'
'I'll rouse the Hall. You'll need as many men as you can muster,' Robinton said.
'Not you, though,' Groghe told him.
Down the hall came Grodon, the current Ford Hold harper, already armed.
'Good lad,' Robinton said, catching him by the arm. 'Go to the Hall. I want every journeyman and apprentice, anyone who can ride and carry a sword, to mount and go with Groghe. If anyone challenges this order ...' He could not continue.
Grodon gripped his shoulder. 'No one will unless they're too deaf to have heard the drums.'
'Good man.' And Robinton watched him clattering down the hallway.
Groghe was banging on doors to speed up the mustering, and the place was alive with armed men and anxious women. Robinton laid his head against the back of the chair, his eyes drooping.
'Here.' Lady Benoria held up the limp hand in which he still held the cup. She filled it again, tears of distress marking her face.
'Are you sure ... about the ... children?'
He nodded. He would never forget those lifeless little bodies. How could Fax possibly claim Ruatha too? Ah, and his heart sank: Lady Gemma.
'Are you hurt?' Lady Benoria exclaimed, touching his arm in anxiety.
He laid one hand on his heart, a dramatic gesture perhaps, but it certainly expressed the coldness which had seized him at the core of his being.
'You should rest,' she said. 'I am,' he had the strength to say, and she went away and let him close his eyes.
Silvina shook him awake. She and Oldive saw him down the stairs of Fort Hold and across what seemed an awfully wide court to the Harper Hall and his bed. Sebell appeared, holding up a glow-basket to light their way up the stairs.
'Nip?' he asked as Silvina and the lad pulled off his boots.
'Took another mount and was gone. Looked like death warmed over,' Oldive told him.
'I made up some food for him,' Sebell said.
'Good lad!' said Robinton, grateful once more for Sebell's adroit assistance. He wondered where Nip would have gone and why, but it was too much to think about and, as he laid his head down, he realized that his cheeks were wet. The last thing he knew, Silvina was covering him with the fur. As if anything would ever cover over the memory of that early morning scene in Ruatha Hold!
Fax had the country thoroughly stirred up. The major western Lord Holders, resolute Oterel, Tarathel, Groghe and Lord Sangel of South Boll, made an orderly march to Nabol to meet the grinning and unrepentant Fax and protest his usurpation of Ruatha Hold and the murder of the entire Bloodline. Robinton joined them with his senior Masters, who were now all too aware of the full tragedy at Ruatha. Nip's report stated that not only the Lord, his Lady and the children had been killed, but anyone in the Hold who was known to have claimed any Ruathan Blood.
In the cramped main Hall of Nabol, Fax, surrounded by contemptuous soldiery, listened to what they said and then told them that if they were not out of his Hold by nightfall, he would order them all slaughtered for trespass.
No one doubted that he would implement that threat.
'You are not Lord Holder of Nabol or Crom or Ruatha by any right, other than that of conquest,' Tarathel said, stiff with outrage but impressive with dignity. 'You will usurp no more lands without full contest at arms.'
