“Umm, what?” Atty turned around and glanced down at
her son. Mattox had his face pressed against the rough-hewn poles and was
peering through the small space between them. She automatically checked the
rope tethered to her belt and his. Satisfied he was safe in case he
accidentally fell from the catwalk, she looked over the wall and down the road.
There was nothing as far as she could tell coming from either direction.

“Mummy, hoss.” This time he poked a chubby finger
in the space and pointed toward the north. Atty squinted her eyes, but still
couldn’t spot what her son was talking about.

“Sutters!”

The guard standing below them at the gate peered up
at her. “Yes, Madam?”

“Fetch the Battle Lord. Make sure he brings a
spyglass.”

“Yes, Madam. Have the Battle Lord bring a
spyglass,” the guard repeated and hurried away.

Walking over to where Mattox continued his
investigation between the logs in the compound’s wall, she picked him up and
perched him on her hip. “Show me where the horse is.”

Again, the toddler pointed north. “Hoss. Dere.” His
eyes were a dark pink color, and intently focused on what he was watching. She
tried again to catch what was coming down the road, holding a hand over her
eyes to shield them from the bright sunlight.

“Atty, what’s going on?”

She heard her husband ascending the ladder, and
waited for him to join them before answering. “Mattox sees a horse coming.”

“Hey, son! Where’s the horse, Matt?” Yulen took the
boy from Atty and bounced him on his own hip. Mattox laughed as he clutched his
father’s jerkin with both hands. Yulen gave his wife an odd look. “There’s
traffic moving up and down that road all day, every day. Why did you have me
paged?”

Atty threw a thumb over her shoulder. “Do
you
see
a horse right now?” She watched him check the deserted highway that was the
main artery connecting compounds for over a thousand miles. He took in both
directions before he lifted an eyebrow in her direction. Smiling, Atty nodded.

“I can’t see one, either.”

“
You
can’t, but he can?”

She nodded.

Yulen handed their son over to her, then grabbed
the spyglass from his back pocket. Pulling out the telescoping case, he peered
through it. “Which way?”

“From the north.”

He tried again. After a moment, he moved further
down the catwalk for a better angle. “All right. I see it now. Single rider.”
He lowered the spyglass and pointed. “Come look.”

Atty joined him, first using the spyglass, then
trying to eyeball it. “Damn.”

“Yeah. The boy’s got the eyesight of an eagle.”
Yulen pressed his forehead to his son’s curly locks. “Those Mutah eyes of yours
are quite something, Matt. I can’t wait to find out what else you’re capable of
seeing when you get older and understand what you’re able to do.”

Using the eyeglass again, Atty scanned the horizon.
“I wonder who in their right mind would travel alone?”

“Someone who’s either very well armed, or who
doesn’t know any better, or just doesn’t give a damn.” Yulen dropped a kiss to
his wife’s hair before handing over their son. He also gave the tether an
experimental tug. Atty waited for him to comment about it, but he didn’t. “I
need to get back to work. Don’t wait for me to join you at supper. There’s no
telling how long this meeting will last.”

She nodded, understanding. She and Mattox waved at
the figure who waved back before hurrying away.

“Duddy go bye-bye.”

“He has to go do whatever Battle Lords need to do,
Mattox. Some of the time,
I
don’t quite see the point of what he does,
but that’s not important. He’s a good Battle Lord, and when you get older, he’s
going to teach you everything you need to know, so that when it’s time for you
to take over running Alta Novis, you’ll be just as good as him, if not better.”
She studied the child’s eyes again, noting their pale color. Mattox had heard
what she’d said, although he didn’t quite comprehend everything.

“Duddy Badow Ward.”

Atty laughed and gave the child a buss on the
cheek. “Yep. And that makes you the Badow Pwince. Come on. Let’s go visit
Grandmama. Hold on tight!”

Going down the ladder, she discovered, was just as
difficult climbing up when a hefty two year old was cradled against her chest.
Mattox was also strong for his age, a result of his Mutah heritage, and twice
she had to pause to peel his arm away from her neck so she could breathe.

When they reached the ground, the child tried to
run from her, but the tether snapped him backwards, and he landed on his bottom
in the dirt. Mattox turned ruby red eyes to her, showing his frustration and
anger. Chuckling again, she untied him. “Don’t be in such a hurry. All right.
There. Now you can go.”

Finally free from his mother, the toddler hurried
off in the direction of the main lodge. Atty followed, but quickly lost sight
of the child.

The dining hall held a few stragglers, all of whom
greeted her when she entered.

“Mattox?”

“That way,” they answered, pointing to the rear of
the hall.

Atty waved a thank you as she strode through the
room, heading for the partially open doorway with the sign that read CLINIC
nailed on the wall beside it. Without knocking, she entered and passed on
through to the waiting room.

There was one person seated in the narrow area.
Atty didn’t recognize the young man, but he smiled at her as she passed
through.

“Hi, Atty!”

“Hi. Did Mattox come this way?”

Instead of pointing toward the hospital side, the
man indicated the back rooms where MaGrath and Madigan lived. “That way.”

“Thanks.”

She finally found her son sitting in one of the
overstuffed chairs by the fireplace. Across from him, his grandmother sat in a
similar chair as she knitted. Atty paused, taking in the woman’s rounded belly.
She also noted with great concern the dark circles under the woman’s eyes. “How
are you feeling today, Maddy?” Reaching over, she shoved an ottoman over by the
woman, then helped to lift her legs to prop on the cushion. “Better?”

“Thank you. I’ve been fighting the swelling.”

“Scoot over, son,” Atty ordered the boy, and sat
down in the chair beside him. “You didn’t answer me,” she reminded the woman.

Madigan gave her daughter-in-law a wan smile. “I’m
beginning to think I had an easier pregnancy with Yulen.”

“That was over thirty years ago,” Atty reminded
her.

“True.”

The older woman winced. Clutching the side of her
swollen stomach, she caught her breath, eyes squeezed shut. Atty leaned over,
laying a hand on the woman’s leg. “Maddy?”

“It’s...all right. Sometimes...sometimes little MaGrath
gets a bit rambunctious.” She smiled again, but Atty could tell the woman was
in pain.

“I well remember the discomfort Mattox gave me. Can
I get you something?”

“No, no. I’ll be fine. Liam’s always harping that I
don’t get enough rest, but I don’t sleep well in the bed anymore. I’ve spent so
much time in this chair, it’s nearly glued itself to my behind.”

They both laughed softly. Madigan stared into the
fire with a soft look in her eyes.

“I never thought I would admit that having Yulen
before I turned seventeen was a wise decision. At the time, our parents were
furious.”

Atty sat up. “You were sixteen when you got
pregnant? Are you saying you and Rory got married
after
the fact?”

Madigan gave her a trembling smile. “Are you
shocked?”

“No. Well...yeah.”

“Don’t be. So we jumped the gun. We were already
betrothed to each other. We just had to move the date of the wedding up a few
months.”

“Was Liam already in Far Troit, studying to be a
doctor at that time?”

“Oh, he’d left about a year before.”

The room got quiet except for the little noises
Mattox made as he played with a small wooden toy horse. After a while, the
child scooted off the chair and got down on his hands and knees in front of the
fire, pretending to have the animal travel across the stone hearth.

“Have you and Liam decided on any names yet?”

“Ah.” Madigan chuckled and laid her knitting atop
her bulging belly. “That’s still a bone of contention, I’m afraid. We’ve agreed
on Celeste if it’s a girl. That was his mother’s name. But we’re nowhere near
on reaching a compromise on a boy name.”

“Don’t tell me he still wants to name his son
Augustus?” Every time she thought of it, it made her laugh. “Gus MaGrath. Yulen
says it sounds like a prizefighter.”

Atty heard the woman’s heavy sigh, and knew it had
nothing to do with their conversation. This pregnancy was giving the woman
major health issues, and had been ever since the beginning of her second
trimester, but Madigan was determined to see it through. Many said she was too
old to be bearing this baby, yet she loved Liam so much, she was willing to
take the risks to give her husband a child of his own.

Looking down at her son, Atty noticed the boy
playing with the hand-carved animal that Mastin had made for his godson. “I
wondered where that was. Where did you have it, Mattox? In your pocket?”

“I think it was accidentally stuffed down beside
the seat cushion,” Madigan commented. She started to say more when they caught
the sound of a commotion coming from the clinic. The sound grew louder, until a
guard burst into the living room. He was gasping for breath, having run all the
way.

“Atty!”

She didn’t need to be told any more. Guards didn’t
come seeking her out with that look of urgency on their faces unless there was
a good reason.

“I’ll watch Mattox!” Madigan called out to her as
she bolted from the room to follow the soldier.

They ran toward the front gate and climbed the same
ladder she had used minutes before. Another guard was waiting for her with a
longbow and cradle of arrows when she hit the parapet.

“What’s up?”

Beyond the walls, she could make out the squad of
men already at war with an enemy she couldn’t identify. A second later, the
Battle Lord hurtled through the main gates, along with another dozen men, to
join the skirmish. She watched the horses going in directly, not circling the
group and attacking from the outside as was their normal strategy. There was
something in the center that the men were fighting to protect, and Yulen was
determined to reach it.

“Marauders, my Lady,” the guard stated.

She nodded. In the past few months, she and Yulen,
as well as other Battle Lords from neighboring compounds, had come to realize
that the Bloods had moved on. In which direction, no one was certain. But since
the creatures’ massive defeats while trying to overrun several of the
fortresses last spring, apparently the mutants had decided to leave in search
for easier targets. There hadn’t been a reported Blood attack in the area for
weeks, and that had left the stage wide open for someone to take their place.

With trade opening up between Normal and Mutah
compounds, many towns were

prospering.
As a result, small knots of men calling themselves Marauders had started a
campaign to attack and rob unsuspecting merchants traveling between compounds.
Ordinary families moving from one location to another appeared to be immune to
the raids. But if the caravan looked to contain valuable goods, it was quickly
overrun and decimated. Worse, the Marauders were not squeamish about
slaughtering the drivers and riders if they put up any resistance.

Atty squinted, trying to catch a glimpse of her
husband, now in the middle of the melee. The late September sun was starting
its descent, and the light was almost blindingly bright.

Suddenly, Yulen broke away from the pack. Someone
appeared to be in the saddle behind him, desperately holding onto the Battle
Lord as they galloped across the field toward the main gate. She watched them
draw nearer, when she caught sight of two men, also on horseback, leaving the
main scuffle to pursue. She had an arrow nocked on the bow without thinking,
and aimed it at the nearest man chasing at full gallop.

The arrow’s impact in the center of his chest
lifted the man out of his seat and carried him over the back of the horse.
Although riderless, the animal continue to follow Yulen toward the compound.

The second man saw his partner fall, and pulled up
on the reins. It was the wrong thing to do. The arrow meant for him sunk into
the middle of his face, killing him instantly.

Down the road, the conflict was dissipating. The
few Marauders left were beaten back by Battle Lord’s soldiers, and eventually
disbursed, vanishing amid the thick forest bordering the road.

Atty turned around to see her husband and his
passenger thunder through the gates and come to a halt. Handing the bow back to
the guard, she hurried down the ladder as the two men dismounted.

BOOK: This Battle Lord's Quest

9.98Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

Read Book Download Book

ads

Other books

A River Dies of Thirst by Cobham, Catherine, Darwish, Mahmoud

A Daring Proposition by Jennifer Greene

Fiduciary Duty by Tim Michaels

Family Secrets by Ruth Barrett

Doctor's Orders by Elena M. Reyes

Goddess of Death by Roy Lewis

Japanese Portraits: Pictures of Different People by Donald Richie

The Saint to the Rescue by Leslie Charteris

Stormy Petrel by Mary Stewart

Dragons of the Watch by Donita K. Paul