Serenity Valley (29 page)

Lord Goodwin spoke with a strained
smile. “A grand idea, Master Gamel. Lead the way.” Basilea and I
joined the group in front of Goodwin and Bells, leaving no space
for anyone else to slip between. We strolled into the festival
grounds and traveled past the numerous vendor booths. I was pleased
to find the bread tent deserted. As we neared the field in front of
the stage, I saw Ivan and Giselia walking in the opposite
direction. The four of us waved to them. They waved back with
forced smiles on their faces. I noticed Ivan wore a weapons belt
with a long, curved scabbard attached. I could also make out a
curved dagger. Giselia had several handles sticking up from the
bright orange sash around her waist. No one stopped to talk. I
guided our party in the direction I had chosen on the diagram. When
I neared the place I thought was appropriate, I scanned the
treeline with my peripheral vision. My efforts were soon rewarded
by one single flash of bright metal. This was the spot. I addressed
the crowd. “I think this is a good spot, my lord and lady. It comes
highly recommended.” Noticing the flash of light for themselves,
Basilea, Bells, and Goodwin made little gasps as they tried to
refrain from giving the jibe away.

Basilea laid out the blankets on the
grass, then she and I sat down on the blanket closer to the
treeline. Goodwin and Bells took the blanket next to ours. The
mixed entourage started positioning themselves. The uniformed
guards asked several families to please move farther away from the
lord’s group. This would be a perfectly normal procedure regarding
security measures. The guards were helpful in relocating the small
groups and thanked them for their cooperation. Captain Terric
joined the uniformed guard stationed at the southern edge of our
group. I had to admit, he looked mightily fierce in battle dress.
He wore no cloak, making no attempt to hide the long sword strapped
to his back. His sword had earned the name Screamer because of the
horrible bloodcurdling sound it made when he swung it. People said
it sounded like a wounded banshee.

Well, all was in place. Now, the
suspense would begin. I took Basilea’s hand in mine and gave a
light squeeze. I was rewarded with a light kiss on the cheek. I
immediately started giving little squeezes to her hand. She
chuckled and whispered, “Behave yourself, good sir. Only one kiss;
you must wait for another!” We both chuckled. Our playful attempt
to lighten the mood was joined by Goodwin and Bells. We looked to
them and found them smiling at us. Then the waiting started once
again.

Ivan and Giselia had arrived at
Sirates House and met the guards. Many of them were still honing
blades to a razor-like edge. Ivan and Giselia went into the house
but felt too uneasy to relax. Soon they were in the turnout looking
for the horses. Since Gamel and Basilea left them at the fence,
both horses had paced back and forth in front of the gate. Giselia
called to the horses by name. Demon and Mildred froze and went to
attention, heads high, ears pricked forward, nostrils flared as
they searched for the source of the sound. Giselia called again,
louder this time. The horses locked on the direction and took off
at full gallop. The two of them sounded like a stampede of herd
beasties. When they reached Ivan and Giselia, they lowered their
rear legs and slid to a stop, leaving huge gouges in the ground.
Ivan and Giselia started calming them, rubbing on their necks and
talking soothingly. They soon had both horses under control.
Giselia patted Demon on his lathered neck. “It okay, Sir Demon, you
see back they be soon. It all right be for them, safe be for
them.”

Ivan, who particularly liked Mildred,
spoke gently to her. “Mildred, be okay, you see. They not leave
you, soon they return, you see, big girl.” Both horses seemed to
quiet with the attention of the gentle Gypsy couple.

In the treeline, Fulk and Ox had
positioned themselves to allow cross coverage where Goodwin’s party
sat. Fulk had taken a position slightly farther down to cover
anything coming from the direction of the stage. Ox was in position
farther to the rear of the party to cover their backs. Where
Goodwin’s group sat, either archer could find a target if needed.
Ox would be the prime observer and direct actions. Slung from his
neck was Hades Quake, his ancient battle horn. The thespian group
noted that Lord Goodwin had arrived and made preparations to start
the show. I was sitting with Basilea, holding her hand, when a
brightly dressed actor came onto the stage and began an oratory
description of what we would be viewing this evening. That is the
last thing I heard from the stage. All of my senses were focused on
the people sitting in front of me, every sound, every movement,
even the smell that was carried on the air. The foul stench of fear
filled the air, so foul it befitted the event that was about to
take place. A man’s worst sin: murder of his own kind.

At Sirates House, all of the guards
protecting the house joined the Gypsies in the open turnout. Ivan
spoke to Renald. “What wrong? Why all men here with
horses?”

Renald answered, “When we hear the
signal, all of us but two,” he pointed to two men, “will run to
battle. We don’t know where yet, but we will follow the
sound.”

Ivan spoke to Giselia for a few
moments in their native tongue then said, “The battle will be
festival grounds in front of stage.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, it will happen there, at
theatre; soon, I think.”

Renald said, “Thank you, Ivan. Men, we
start walking in that direction. Hold at the main house unless you
hear the signal before that.”

The men started moving out. Demon and
Mildred started dancing and prancing in place. Giselia spoke softly
to them. “No, brave horses, you stay; no go, stay with us, no
go.”

Ivan looked at his wife, who had
already started to cry. “Wife mine, I must.”

Tears streamed from Giselia’s eyes
without any restraint. She just gave a painful nod of agreement.
Ivan came to his wife and hugged her. He kissed her tenderly on the
forehead and lips. He dropped to one knee and kissed the palms of
her hands, then he placed her hands on the sides of his face. He
turned without rising, stood, and quickly walked away. Giselia
watched him go while her heart broke. This did not go unnoticed by
the horses. Both of them had started to bellow and snort. Demon
stuck his head straight up in the air, curled his lips back, and
sampled the smells. Mildred soon followed his example. It was all
Giselia could do to keep the two horses from running. She calmed
them and rubbed them. Still, standing in front of them was the only
thing that held them in place.

On the theatre stage, a knight on a
cutout horse trotted back and forth waving a sword. Everyone
viewing the spectacle clapped and cheered, everyone but our group.
Our attentions were elsewhere. Our attentiveness was soon rewarded.
The hair on the back of my neck bristled. Something was amiss, and
I experienced a sense of danger. I reached back and tapped my axe
handle, then spread my fingers and pointed over my head in front of
me. Captain Terric cleared his throat. As the first cloak in front
of us began to fall, Basilea and I rose from our seated positions,
our cloaks lying on the ground below us. Hades Quake let go in a
high-pitched warble that threatened to shatter my teeth. The pitch
changed to a deep bass reverberating tone that shook the ground. I
reached back and released my axe. One twirl and the leather strap
was around my wrist. Basilea stood next to me in a low stance, her
katana sword held by both hands over her head. All around us, I
could hear steel clearing scabbards. Screamer started singing its
song as Terric swung it over his head. The gruesome pitch-changing
warble and screeching was only overpowered by Captain Terric’s
booming voice. “All folk run from the forest! Run from the
trees!”

Demon and Mildred were dancing in
place, snorting and bellowing. Giselia couldn’t hold them much
longer. When Hades Quake sounded, both horses froze instantly and
turned to face the sound, every heightened sense turned in that
direction, nostrils flaring, ears twitching. When Screamer sang,
the horses locked on to the position and distance. Giselia couldn’t
hear Screamer from the house, but the horses could hear it just
fine. Demon squealed and bellowed in anger, twisting and shaking
his head viciously. Giselia moved from in front of him. Within four
strides, he had stretched out and was flying through the turnout.
Occasionally, his feet touched the ground to propel him forward.
Mildred was squealing in front of Giselia. Giselia grabbed her ear
and pulled her huge head down to her level. “Mildred, listen, find
Ivan, find Ivan, take Ivan with you!” Mildred started prancing in
place. Giselia stepped aside and released her. Mildred let out an
angry, bloodcurdling squeal and took off at a flat run.

The first wave of assassins were
close, about thirty yards away. There looked to be about a dozen.
Basilea and I charged them to engage as far from the center of our
group as possible. Fulk had started finding targets in our forward
group. An arrow flew into a man’s eye, and he fell instantly.
Another attacker was stopped when an arrow found his
heart.

Basilea engaged her first attacker.
She moved forward with lightning swift blade strokes, putting her
opponent on the defensive. Always on balance and staying low, she
overpowered the man and opened his stomach, allowing his intestines
to fall out. With her blade held with two hands and to her right
side, she ran to the next attacker.

I ran toward three attackers. With my
left hand, I pulled out a quoits. Using my forward movement as
momentum, I hurled it overhead while coming down on my left foot.
It flew true, and in an instant, it split a man’s face down the
middle, penetrating deep into the brain. Fulk dropped another of
the three by placing an arrow directly in his forehead. That left
one. I pulled the kukri with my left hand. When the man swung his
ugly curved blade at me, I knocked it down with my kukri sword and
brought my great axe down at an angle against the side of his neck.
I felt the razor-sharp blade crush through the vertebrae. His head
tilted over, held on only by some remaining skin and muscle tissue.
I sensed being rushed from my right rear, and I gave the
appropriate twists to my axe handle, dropping and locking the blade
in the handle end. The man charged with his blade high as I
withdrew my axe from the neck, stepping back and squatting low. The
man overshot and was off balance when I pushed the blade into his
chest. Glancing off a rib, the blade continued on its quest to find
the heart. I felt the vibration of one single heartbeat, then
nothing. I had another assailant almost on me from the front. While
I withdrew the handle blade from the man, I threw a death star with
my left hand, embedding it in the new attacker’s forehead. I let
the blade retract into the axe handle and locked it in
place.

At the armory, angry, vicious men in
battle dress waited for the attack signal. At the first sound from
Hades Quake, one hundred screaming men left their imprisonment at
full run. Lieutenant Renald’s group had just cleared the Sirates
House turnout fence when they heard the high-pitched shriek of
Hades Quake. Before the tone had changed to the bass note, eight
screaming, angry soldiers ran past the kitchen with swords drawn.
The kitchen staff ran outside to see what was going on.

Demon slowed his flight just slightly
to measure the paces to the gate. When he neared the gate, he took
off on his right front leg. Tucking his front legs under him, he
easily cleared the top rail. He stretched his hind legs out while
in his descent on the other side, his rear hooves just clicking on
the rail as they cleared. In two strides, he was at full speed
again, screaming with rage, ears pinned, pumping his hard, lean
muscles as fast as they would work. Ten seconds later, he passed
the kitchen staff with mist spraying from his dilated nostrils,
bellowing in anger. Trina yelled, “I’d hate ta be what he be
after!”

Mildred spotted Ivan running ahead of
her. When she was almost even with him, she planted her huge
hindquarters and slid to a stop. Squealing, she knelt down and
looked at Ivan. Ivan said, “Why not, you go my way!” He jumped on
her sweaty back and gripped as hard as he could with his knees as
she rose and started running. He was amazed at how fast she could
accelerate. Within four strides, she was stretched out to a full
run. Ivan was grasping hands full of braids and gripping with his
legs. Once at full speed, Mildred’s run was as smooth as a placid
lake. Ivan spotted the gate and braced himself for a sliding stop.
Mildred didn’t even slow down; she seemed to speed up. At the speed
of an eagle in a dive, her ton of muscle just plowed through the
gate like dry twigs. The kitchen staff heard the loud snap of
splintering wood. Ten seconds later, they felt the earth shake as
one totally pissed off Mildred went squealing by. On her back was a
big Gypsy man holding a handful of braids in his left hand and a
four-foot curved back sword in his right.

Fina shouted, “This is bullshit!
Trina, open the weapons locker! We be under attack!!”

Trina yelled, “It’s about time, by
God!” and all the ladies ran back into the kitchen to get their
weapons.

Perched on the huge tree limb, Ox
fired a quick volley of arrows. Then he would survey the field.
Bells and Goodwin were busy. Although not a master, Goodwin was
doing well. Goodwin was exchanging sword blows with an attacker. He
rushed the man, knocked his sword upward, spun, and stabbed a
dagger into the man’s heart. He moved to the next
attacker.