Chapter 98: The Horn in the Mist

The horn sounded again, closer now, a long bronze note that seemed to hang in the wet air like a blade above the trees. Tom felt it in his chest before he heard it fully, a vibration that traveled through the horse's flank and into his thighs. He did not turn. He kept his eyes fixed on the road ahead, on the pale ribbon of mud that led north toward Wykeham, and he counted.

One. Two. Three. Four riders in de Lacy's colors ahead of him. Two behind. Hugh himself riding at Tom's left shoulder, close enough that the man's breath fogged the cold air between them. Twelve men total, armed with swords and axes, their horses blowing hard from the pace. Tom had counted them when they closed around him at the barn. He had counted them again as they crossed the ford. Counting was what he did. Counting was how he stayed alive.

"Your men," Hugh said, his voice low and conversational, as if they were two merchants discussing the price of wool. "They've grown bold."

"They're not my men," Tom said.

"No? They blew a horn at my back. That suggests a signal. That suggests arrangement." Hugh's gloved hand rested on the pommel of his sword. "You rode with me willingly enough."

"You gave me little choice."

"I gave you every choice. You could have refused. You could have called out. You could have done any number of things." Hugh smiled, and the smile did not reach his eyes. "Instead you mounted and rode. That tells me you wanted to be taken. That tells me you have something to show me, or something to prove. Which is it, warlock?"

Tom said nothing. The road curved through a stand of bare oaks, their branches black against the grey sky, and the horn sounded a third time, farther back now, swallowed by the mist. He thought of Baldric in the village, of the scarred reeve's face when Tom had told him the plan. Baldric had not liked it. Baldric had called it madness, and worse, and then he had nodded and gone to do his part anyway.

"You've made a mistake," Tom said.

"Have I?"

"You think I'm your enemy. I'm not. I'm your tenant, or near enough. I'm the man who put turnips in your fields and lime in your furrows. I'm the man who saved your harvest when the blight took the barley. You know this. You've seen the yields."

Hugh's expression did not change. "I've seen what you've done. That's why I'm here. A man who can make barren earth bloom is worth more than a man who can swing a sword. I'm not a fool, Master Ashwick. I know what you are."

"Do you?"

"I know you're not a warlock. Warlocks don't plant turnips. They don't mend ploughs. They don't sit up with sick cattle." Hugh's voice dropped, almost intimate. "I know you're something else. Something new. And I know the King has taken an interest in you, which means you're dangerous. Dangerous things must be controlled."

They rode in silence for a while. The mist thickened as they climbed the gentle rise toward Wykeham's northern boundary, where the old Roman road cut straight through the fields. Tom could see the manor's smoke in the distance, a grey column rising against the grey sky, and beyond it the dark line of the warehouse roof. The sight of it made his throat tight. The battery was dying. He had maybe a day, maybe less, before the lights went out for good. And when they did, he would be just a man in a strange land, with nothing but his hands and his wits.

That, he thought, might be enough. It had been enough before.

"You'll never hold me," Tom said. "The King's commission gives me protection. You know this. You've seen the seal."

"The King's commission gives you protection in London. In Westminster. In places where the King's law runs." Hugh gestured at the dark trees, the empty road, the mist. "Out here, the King's law is whatever the nearest lord with a sword says it is. And I am the nearest lord with a sword."

They crested the rise. Wykeham lay below them, wrapped in mist, its cottages huddled around the church like sheep around a shepherd. Tom could see the furrows he had planted, the green blades just visible through the thawing mud. He could see the reeve's oak, bare and black against the sky. He could see figures moving in the village, small and distant, going about their morning work.

And he could see, at the ford behind them, the first of the King's men emerging from the trees.

Hugh saw them too. His hand tightened on his sword.

"You planned this," he said.

"I didn't plan anything. I planted turnips. I mended fences. I did what any steward would do." Tom turned in his saddle, meeting Hugh's eyes for the first time since they had left the barn. "You're the one who rode into my village with twelve armed men. You're the one who raised a banner of truce and then took me prisoner. You're the one who's been selling grain to the French while owing the Crown twelve thousand pounds. I didn't do any of that."

Hugh's face went very still.

"You think a piece of paper will save you," he said softly. "You think the King's seal is a shield. It's not. It's a target. The moment Edward's attention turns elsewhere, you're mine. The moment the bishop's men find their courage, you're ash. The moment your little warehouse runs out of miracles, you're nothing but a foreigner with strange ideas and no friends."

"I have friends," Tom said. "You just haven't met them yet."

The King's men were closer now, twenty riders in royal livery, their horses fresh and their swords drawn. At their head rode a man in a black cloak, the same man who had stopped Tom's barge on the river, the same man who had demanded his business and then let him pass when he saw the seal. The man's face was unreadable beneath his hood.

Hugh's men had drawn their weapons. The two groups faced each other across the muddy road, fifty yards apart, and the mist swirled between them like breath.

"You can fight," Tom said. "You'll lose. You can run. You won't get far. Or you can surrender, and maybe—maybe—the King will be merciful."

"I am Sir Hugh de Lacy," Hugh said. "I do not surrender to clerks and commoners."

"Then you'll hang."

"Perhaps." Hugh smiled again, that cold, empty smile. "But not today. And not alone."

He raised his hand. Tom saw the signal, saw the archer in the trees beyond the ford draw back his bowstring, saw the arrow fly. It struck the royal standard-bearer in the shoulder, and the man fell from his horse with a cry. The King's men surged forward. Hugh's men answered.

And in the chaos, in the screaming and the mud and the flashing steel, Tom spurred his horse toward Wykeham, toward the village, toward the green blade in the ground and the woman waiting in the dark. He did not look back. He did not need to. He could hear the horns behind him, and the hoofbeats, and the sound of a world breaking apart.

He rode for the warehouse. He rode for the last light in the battery. He rode for the only thing he had left to give.

Behind him, in the mist, someone was laughing.