Devlin's Justice (31 page)

Devlin positioned himself at the front of the house, his transverse bow dangling casually from one hand.

Those who worked the fields had already been taken prisoner, so it took a few moments for the alarm to be raised. The door swung open and a young man dashed out of the house calling “Fire,” only to be brought up short as he saw those who waited outside.

The young man rocked back on his heels, nearly falling over.

“What? Who are you?” he asked.

“Fetch your mistress,” Devlin said.

“But the fields—”

“The fields are burning on my command. Fetch your mistress,” Devlin repeated.

The young man backed up slowly, never taking his eyes from Devlin. He disappeared into the house.

A few moments later, a woman emerged. The Assessor Emiliana was diminutive in stature, but her eyes blazed with anger.

“What is the meaning of this?” she asked.

“Emiliana, you have been condemned as a traitor for your support of the invaders,” Devlin said.

Previous attacks had been confined to the Selvarat army and their mercenary troops. As far as she knew, this was the first time that a band had targeted one of the Jorskians who was collaborating with the enemy. Emiliana had made a name for herself in these parts as the first to pledge her loyalty to the invaders. The Selvarats had rewarded her by allowing her to keep her lucrative post as tax collector, but now her own people would judge her sins.

“By what right do you do this?” Emiliana asked.

“By right of arms, and in the name of the people of Jorsk,” Devlin said.

Drakken glanced over her shoulder and saw that the smoke was growing thicker as hungry red flames devoured the crops.

Emiliana’s estate was surrounded by fields, bordered by a small stream on one side and a road on another. The fire they had set would utterly destroy her possessions, but there was little risk that it would spread. The blaze was meant as an object lesson, to show that only those who cooperated with the invaders need fear their neighbor’s wrath.

“So, you mean to kill me?” Emiliana said. “Will you murder an unarmed woman and her children? Is this the famed justice of the Chosen One?”

“You may leave here, with the clothes on your back, and a waterskin each,” Devlin said. “Nothing more.”

“But—” Emiliana protested.

“I would hurry, if I were you,” Captain Drakken advised. “The flames are getting closer.”

Indeed, the wind was already pushing the heat toward them. The wide tree-lined lane would provide an escape route to the open road, but only if they left before the flames reached it.

After one last look, Emiliana disappeared back into the house.

A few moments later, the young man they had seen before emerged, accompanied by an older woman. After a brief search, the servants were allowed to leave. Others swiftly followed. Finally, just as wind-whipped embers began to land on the wooden shingles of the roof, Emiliana emerged. A young boy clutched one of her hands, while she held a baby in her other arm. A pair of waterskins were hung around the boy’s neck.

Drakken swung down from the saddle and walked toward Emiliana. The boy’s face turned white with fear, and not for the first time, she wondered if they had gone too far. What did it mean when even a child was afraid of her? But there was nothing she could do to reassure him. After all, it was by her command that his home was being destroyed and his family impoverished. She could not expect a child to understand. Some days she did not understand herself.

“Let me see the baby,” Drakken ordered.

Emiliana clutched the child to her breast. “I will not let you harm her.”

It was a fine show of devotion, but Drakken was not swayed by such tactics.

“You have little time,” Drakken warned. “And I will not let you leave until I am certain that you have complied with our demands. Unwrap her blanket, and hold the child up.”

The thick smoke surrounded them, making it difficult to breathe.

“Loathsome bitch,” Emiliana cursed. As she unwrapped the blanket a leather purse fell to the ground with a solid clink of metal.

It was as Drakken had expected. It was probably not the only purse. The boy’s loose tunic might well hide treasure, as could the bodice of Emiliana’s dress. But time was indeed running out, and they needed the assessor alive and humiliated, rather than dead and a victim.

“Go,” Drakken ordered.

Emiliana hurried past. Drakken walked back to her horse and swung herself back in the saddle, giving a piercing whistle to summon those fighters who had surrounded the manor house to prevent any from escaping with the assessor’s treasure. As the band re-formed, it followed the assessor and her family down the lane. The servants were waiting at the crossroads, and she watched until the assessor had joined them.

She wondered how long they would have to travel before they found someone willing to take them in.

“I still don’t know if this was for good or ill,” Drakken said. “I never thought I would make war upon children.”

Indeed this entire affair went against her very nature. She had just destroyed acres of valuable crops, which would have fed hungry souls throughout the winter. And even now she could see the manor house ablaze, the fire consuming all within. Coins, jewels, clothes, provisions, foodstuffs. The accumulated wealth of the assessor’s lifetime, destroyed in a few short hours. Such wanton destruction went against everything Drakken believed.

Yet, despite her misgivings, she had obeyed the orders given her and put her faith in Devlin. If the act marked her as unclean, then so be it. Though she felt a moment of resentment as she thought of Stephen, who had been left behind in the base camp. Devlin still protected the minstrel from the worst of the war, finding reasons for Stephen to keep his hands free of the killings. He did not seem to realize that none of them were innocent. All those who followed Devlin bore their share of responsibility for the deeds done in the name of the rebellion, and one day it would fall to history to judge them.

“Come now, what is done is done,” Devlin said, breaking into her grim musings. “If there is a Selvarat patrol within a half dozen leagues, the smoke will draw them here, and we had best be gone before they arrive.”

“We ride,” she called, and the fighters fell into a ragged line, six ahead and the remainder trailing behind.

As they rode, one part of her kept her eyes open, searching for any threat. But another was wondering just what it was that she would be called upon to do next, and if there were any lines left that she was not prepared to cross.

They took a circuitous route to avoid being followed, and it was nearly sunset by the time Devlin and the raiding party rejoined the others in the latest of their forest camps. Drakken saw to the care of those injured, while Devlin sought out the leader of the scouts. She reported that all seemed quiet, but that her instincts warned her of trouble coming. Devlin, whose own instincts for danger had saved them on more than one occasion, listened gravely, then instructed her to double the watch on this night. They would leave in the morning.

At last he made his way back to his tent, where he accepted a basin of water and a rough woolen towel from a round-faced girl who looked to be all of twelve years of age. Someone’s sister or daughter, brought along because her home was no longer safe. He sighed, even as he thanked her. This was no place for a child. But there was no place in Korinth, or indeed anywhere in the occupied lands that could truly be called safe these days.

He scrubbed away the soot from his face and arms, then rinsed out his mouth with a cup of watered wine. When he looked up, he found Stephen watching him.

“What is it?” he asked.

“We’ve news from Sarna,” Stephen said.

The speaker of the nearest village was one of the links on the informal chain of communications that bound the rebels together. Messages were seldom committed to paper, but instead passed from one trusted soul to another. Knowing that Stephen would be disturbed by witnessing the eviction of the traitor Emiliana, Devlin had sent him instead to the village, to see if there were any messages for him.

“And?” Devlin prompted, as he began walking toward the cookfires. The hunters must have had success today, for the remnants of a boar were on a spit by the fire. Small knots of people, many of whom had accompanied Devlin on the raid today, sat around the fire. He nodded in acknowledgment of their greetings, pausing as he saw Turla, one of his rebels, sitting by herself.

“How is your daughter?” he asked.

“She is resting. But her wound is healing, and she is fit to journey,” she hastened to assure him.

“Good.” Turla was barely competent with a spear, but her daughter had shown a flair for the sword. Unfortunately, her daughter had taken a deep slash in a skirmish two days ago. With no true healers, there’d been nothing to do but bandage her wounds and hope for the best. Anyone who could not travel with the band was left behind. It was considered a kindness to slit their throats rather than leaving them to die a slow death.

The cook picked up a wooden trencher and piled a generous portion on top before handing it to Devlin.

“Eat hearty, it will not keep,” the cook advised him. “And we may not see meat again for a while.”

“We’re moving on tomorrow,” Devlin informed him. “You may pass the word.”

With over fifty fighters in this group, they needed to keep moving both to avoid the enemy and to forage for food. No village could afford to feed them for more than a day or two, and venturing into a larger town to buy provisions had its own risks. Perhaps it was time to look at raiding another Selvarat supply caravan.

Devlin ate swiftly, not even tasting the food.

“What of this Sarna?” he asked Stephen, as he handed the trencher back to the cook. It was rare that Stephen had to be prompted twice to answer a question.

“Let us find Captain Drakken, so I only have to tell the tale once,” Stephen said.

Devlin shrugged. He made his way over to the small clearing where Captain Drakken sat on a flat rock near the tent that held their gear. As she saw him approach she lifted her wineskin and took a long swallow.

“To our success,” she said. Her words were light, but she grimaced as she spoke.

He had known that Drakken did not like what she had been asked to do. They would be lucky if this was the worst of it.

“The raid went well?” Stephen asked.

Devlin accepted the wineskin from Drakken and drank before sitting down on the ground, his folded cloak under him to protect him from the chill earth.

“Success,” Devlin said. “Emiliana’s holdings were destroyed, and she walked out of there with only what she could hide under her cloak, muttering curses upon us all.”

“Did we lose any of ours?” Stephen asked.

“Nothing serious,” Drakken reported. “Thom burned his left hand, and the baker woman was singed when the fire took an unexpected turn.”

“Anna. The baker is Anna Karlswife,” Stephen said. He had a gift for names and faces.

“It was a useful tactic, and a valuable lesson taught to any who might think of casting their lot with the invaders,” Devlin said. “We should pass the word to the other bands.”

“We must tell them to be careful,” Drakken said.

“Yes, if the wind turned, the fire could easily have gotten out of hand and turned back on the forest,” Devlin agreed.

Drakken glared at him. “Tell the bands to be careful in their choice of targets as well. I understand the need to make an example out of traitors, but the innocent should not be made to suffer.”

“You may draft the message,” Devlin said. It was as much of a concession as he was prepared to make. He turned his attention to Stephen. “And what is the news of this Sarna?”

He did not even know if Sarna was a person or a place.

“Sarna is a town in the east, just past where Egeslic had his keep. Didrik has had some success in that zone, and so the local commander finally decided to take action. He went to Sarna, chose three dozen folk at random, and executed them in retaliation.” Stephen’s voice was flat, but his eyes glittered with suppressed emotion.

Devlin held out his hand, and after a moment Drakken handed him the wineskin. He took another swallow, though he knew that there was not enough wine in the entire camp to drown his anger.

“Have you nothing to say?” Stephen’s voice rose. “Those were our people. There were three children among those killed.”

“I heard you,” Devlin said, letting the anger creep into his voice. “What would you have me do? I regret their deaths, but they are not the first innocents to die, nor will they be the last. And at least their deaths may yet be turned to good.”

“How can any good come out of this?” Stephen asked.

“There are no innocents,” Devlin said. “Not anymore. Bertrand has forced them to make a choice. They support the protectorate or they join us as rebels. There is no longer any middle ground.”

“But—” Stephen began.

He was surprised by Stephen’s outrage. The Jorskian army had long executed hostages as a means of controlling the population in Duncaer. Now they had the first taste of what they had doled out to others.

“Have you already forgotten how Kollinar keeps order in Duncaer? Or is it different when it is your own people who are dying?”

Devlin tossed the wineskin to Stephen, who caught it awkwardly in his left hand but refused to drink.

“If you remember, I protested against those killings as well. Wrong is wrong, regardless of who does the deed,” Stephen said.

Devlin bit back a curse. He had known this day would come, and yet he was too tired for a confrontation. It would have been better if Stephen had accompanied the raiding party today and the news of Sarna had been left for another time. At least that way he could have preserved his illusions. For at least a little while longer.

“This is what you asked for when you asked me to lead you,” Devlin said. “You were the one who told me that I was the Chosen One. You were the one who said you would follow me, as I did whatever it took to drive out the invaders.”

He knew his words were harsh, but they masked his anger. Stephen had grieved for the folk of Sarna for only a few hours. For weeks Devlin had grieved for them, along with all those who would perish before he was done. He had known from the moment he accepted the leadership of the rebellion that there would be innocents killed, and that their blood would be on his hands.