Only the Valiant (The Way of Steel—Book 2)

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

Royce grabbed the first horse he could find and rode, not caring about the shouts behind him, ducking low on the creature’s back only when arrows flashed past. His mind raced almost as fast as the horse, thinking of the nobleman he’d just killed with a spear.

Worse, his mind flickered full of thoughts of Genevieve, unable to dismiss the image of her standing there above the fighting pit, right there with the man she had forsaken him for. Those thoughts were almost enough to make him stop and let the men behind him catch up. Only his anger pushed him on, making him heel his horse into a gallop.

More arrows came from behind, clattering off the stonework of the surrounding buildings and embedding in their wattle and daub. People threw themselves aside from the charging horse, and Royce did his best to keep it from crashing into any of them. It meant fighting against the reins, wrenching the horse’s head this way and that as its hooves clattered across the cobbles.

More hooves joined in the staccato chorus as men on horseback raced to catch Royce. Some of them might have been knights, but more seemed like sergeants at arms, doing the work of their betters while the nobles stood by safely.

“After him!” one bellowed. “Kill the murderer!”

Royce knew there would be no hope for a peaceful resolution if they caught up with him. The penalty for murder was already death, and he’d slaughtered their duke right in front of them. They wouldn’t give up until they were sure they’d caught him, or until there was no chance of finding him again.

For now, all he could do was keep ahead of them, trusting to a stolen horse, riding out the jolts and the changes in direction while he hoped against hope that he wouldn’t fall. Royce clutched the crystal sword tight in his hand, not wanting his grip on it to falter even for an instant.

A rider got close, a spear leveled to lance into him. Royce hacked the head from the weapon and then struck out at the man wielding it. The pursuer toppled from his horse, and Royce kept riding.

There were more behind, far too many more. Even with the strength and skill he had, Royce doubted he could take on so many men at once. He fled on his stolen horse instead, and while he did so, he tried to work out how he was ever going to get away.

He fled from the town, the fort above receding as Royce’s mount raced over open countryside, taking the ridges and furrows of farmland in its stride. Small streams lay in between, and Royce headed for the narrowest parts, pushing the horse to leap rather than splashing through. Every step it faltered would be one step that the pursuing group of horsemen closed on him.

He headed for farm walls next, the horse clearing the dry stone without touching it. Glancing back, Royce saw one of the pursuing horses clip the wall and tumble, bringing down another with it. It wasn’t enough.

Another of the horsemen drew level with Royce, flinging himself across as if hoping to tumble Royce from his saddle. Royce clung to his horse fiercely, sheer strength keeping him in place as he struck at the soldier with his elbows and head. He saw the flash of a dagger as the man got ready to stab him from behind, and Royce turned hard, shoving at the man with all his strength.

The guardsman tumbled from the moving horse, crunching from the ground and lying still. Royce heeled his horse forward again, but the gap between him and the chasing group had narrowed now.

Royce knew that he couldn’t hope to simply outrun the men behind him. They were too determined, and he had no way of knowing if his horse could outlast theirs. Even if it could, it was only a matter of time before an arrow from a hunting bow wounded the creature too badly for it to run.

He had to think of a better way.

Ahead, he saw a gorge spanned by a small bridge. Royce ignored the bridge, heading instead for a spot where a stout tree fell across the gap. As a child, he and his brothers had run back and forth across it on foot, to the small patch of woodland that lay beyond. Royce had no idea if the horse he rode would be able to make it.

It was his best chance, though, so he guided the animal in the direction of the trunk, forcing it out onto it without breaking from its run. Royce felt one of its hooves slip, and for a moment, his breath caught, but he managed to guide the animal back onto the partially rotten wood.

More arrows flashed by as Royce made his way back onto solid ground. Royce turned, seeing the chasing horses balking at the prospect of crossing the log. Royce hacked at it with the crystal sword, and he felt it give way, the trunk tumbling down to a waiting river below.

“That won’t hold them long,” Royce whispered to his horse, urging it forward again while the men on the other side of the gorge turned their horses, racing up toward the spot where the bridge sat.

It would buy him a minute or two at most, and Royce knew he would have to make the most of it to get away. At the same time, he knew that he couldn’t just run. Running didn’t achieve anything. Running didn’t change anything.

He headed for the woods at full speed, trying to think while he ducked beneath the low branches, attempting to get out of sight. The woodland was quiet save for the sounds of small creatures and whistling birds, the rush of water and the rustle of the trees. Somewhere further off, he heard the sound of a forester playing a tin whistle. Royce hoped that he wouldn’t lead the soldiers to him. He didn’t want to bring trouble down on anyone else.

That thought made him pause among the trees. The men behind him would follow him to his village if he ran there, and yet, if he didn’t, Royce might never be able to gather any support. Worse, the duke’s men might descend on it anyway, determined to punish all those connected to the boy who had brought about his death.

He needed a way to distract the duke’s men from the village, and buy himself time to do everything he needed to do.

The sound of the tin whistle came to Royce again, and he headed in that direction, guiding his horse between the trees. Royce pushed it through as quickly as he could. He was only too aware of how little time cutting away the log bridge would have bought him, and now, he felt as though he needed every second that he could find.

He came across the first pig less than a minute later, rooting among the litter of the woodland floor for fruit or mushrooms, or something else. It stood almost as high as Royce’s waist would have been if he hadn’t been on horseback, snuffling its way forward, apparently oblivious to him.

More wended their way through the trees, snuffling and hunting for anything they could eat, painted with the marks of at least a couple of farms. The music of the tin whistle was close now, and through a cluster of alder trees, Royce could make out the form of a young man sitting on the stump of a fallen oak.

“Hoi there,” the young man called out as he saw Royce, waving with the arm that held the whistle. “Don’t go riding too hard through here. The pigs are easygoing enough, but if you scare ’em, they be big enough to trip that horse of yours.”

“There are men coming this way,” Royce said, guessing that the best way to do this was to be direct. A young man like this wouldn’t appreciate someone trying to trick him. “Men who want me dead or captured.”

The pig herder looked a little worried by that. “And what’s that to do with me?” he asked. “I’m just out here herding my pigs.”

“Do you think men like that will care about that?” Royce asked. Every peasant knew what the duke’s men could be like, and how dangerous it was to be in their way while they were hunting.

“No,” the herder said. He looked Royce over. “What are they hunting you for, then?”

Royce suspected that if he told the boy the truth, it would be too much for him. Yet what else could he do? He could hardly claim to be a poacher.

“I’m… I killed the duke,” Royce said, not knowing what else to say. He couldn’t ask what he was about to ask without telling this boy the truth. “His men are chasing me, and if they catch me, then they’ll kill me.”

“So you’re planning to lead them into my pigs?” the swineherd said. “And what happens to me if I’m still here when they get here?”

“I have an idea for that,” Royce said. He jumped down from his horse, holding out the reins to the boy. “Take my horse. Ride away from here. It’s the best chance both of us have.”

“You want me to pretend to be you?” the swineherd demanded. “After what you did? Half the kingdom would be after me.”

Royce nodded. The two of them didn’t look alike; Royce was much bigger and more heavily muscled, and even though they both had blond hair to their shoulders, it would never be mistaken for the same. Their features were different too: the swine herder’s round and homely where Royce’s were square jawed and sharpened by violence.

“Not for long. You can ride, can’t you?”

“Aye, my da insisted. I used to canter the cart horse over the fields.”

“This horse will go a lot faster than a canter,” Royce promised, still holding out the reins. “Take the horse, ride ahead of them for a while, and then let it go when they can’t see you. They’ll never know that it was you on the horse, and they will still be looking for me.”

Royce was certain that it would work. If the swineherd kept ahead of the foe, then he would be safe the moment they lost sight of him.

“And that’s all I would have to do?” the swineherd asked. Royce could see that he was considering it.

“Just lead them away from any of the villages,” he said. “I need to get back to mine, and you can return to yours the moment you’ve lost them.”

“So you’re just looking for a way to get away with murder?” the boy asked.

Royce understood. The swineherd wouldn’t want to help with anything so callous as that. It wasn’t just that though. It hadn’t been, even in the moment when he’d flung the spear.

“They oppress us in every way they can,” Royce said. “They take and they take, and they never give anything back. The duke took the woman I loved and gave her to his son. He imprisoned me on an island where I saw boys my age slaughtered. I had to fight to the death in a pit! It’s time that we changed things. It’s time that we made things better.”

He could see the boy considering it.

“If I don’t get back to my village, a lot of people will die,” Royce said. “But if I go and they follow, even more will. I need your help.”

The swineherd took a step forward. “Will I be paid for this?”

Royce spread his hands. He didn’t have anything. “If I can find you again afterward, I’ll find a way to pay you back. How do I find you?”

“I’m Berwick, from Upper Lesham.”

Royce nodded, and that seemed to be enough for the swineherd. He took Royce’s horse and mounted it, heeling it forward and setting off through the trees in a direction that had nothing to do with any of the villages Royce knew. Royce breathed a sigh of relief.

It was short lived. He still needed to get out of sight. He moved back among the trees, finding a spot among the foliage where he could crouch down in the shadow of a trunk, surrounded by fronds of holly.

He crouched there, perfectly still, barely daring to breathe as he waited. Around him, the pigs continued to forage, and one of them got closer to him, nuzzling at the patch of foliage where he hid.

“Get away,” Royce whispered, willing the creature to move on. He fell into silence as he heard the sounds of hooves approaching.

Men came into view, all armored and armed, all looking even angrier than they had in the first flush of the chase. Royce truly hoped that he hadn’t put the swineherd in too much danger by making him a part of his escape.

The pig continued to move too close to him. Royce thought he could see one of the men there watching it, and he froze so still that he didn’t even risk blinking. If the pig reacted to his presence at all, he felt sure that the men would fall on him and kill him.

Then the man looked away, and the soldiers surged forward once again.

“Quickly now!” one of them called. “He can’t have gotten far!”

The soldiers thundered off, following the path that the swineherd had taken, presumably following his tracks. Even when they went, Royce held still, clutching the grip of his sword, making sure it wasn’t some kind of trap designed to lure him out.

Finally, he dared to move, emerging into the clearing and pushing the pigs away from him. He took a moment to look around, trying to get a sense of which direction his village lay in. The deception had bought him some time, but even so, he had to act fast.

He needed to get home before the duke’s men killed everyone there.