Close Doesn't Count

The sword felt light in my hand. Carver had seemingly done a fine job with the runes.

“Okay, brother, I think you realize there's a good chance they're already waiting for us.”

Breathe in. I nodded. Breathe out. Gerner gave the signal. Breathe in. The door wasn't locked. Breathe out. Damn it, if that wasn't a trap, I didn't know what was. One last deep breath. We went inside.

Dim light streamed into the hall from above. Two levels. The upper level consisted of a larger platform connected to a door by a walkway. Maybe a third entrance?

We tiptoed toward the central storage area, which was full of crates and barrels. At least they hadn't been able to make their goods disappear.

And then the inevitable happened. Five figures stepped out of the shadows, brandishing sabers and clubs.

The door upstairs opened, and two more people stepped onto the walkway above us. A fully armed man and a strangely dressed woman with a spear.

“It is what it is,” Gerner sighed.

“We were expecting you, dear colleagues! How is business going in Strandburgh?” asked the man from above.

“Excellent, my friend. May I ask who we have the pleasure of meeting?”

“Edo Atten, fleetmaster of the Black Hansa here on Funa. And you must be Winfrith Gerner. But I don't know the boy next to you. Shouldn't there be another tall, bald guy there, too? Whatever… It's nothing personal, but I have to make an example out of you. Nobody interferes in our business.”

“Is that really what you want?” I interjected.

The Blacks' leader looked down at me with amusement.

“Maybe you want to switch sides, boy? You look like you've got what it…”

For a moment, the fleetmaster seemed dazed, and the air around him appeared to shimmer. Was there are third figure next to the woman and him? No. Is must have been wrong.

“No, no, he needs to die too… He could become dangerous… Yes, yes… Monfion take care of them!”

The strange woman jumped down, pushed off with the wooden shaft of her spear, and landed right in front of us.

“I take care of the Cantish witch. Watch my back, brother!” Gerner yelled at me and lunged straight at the woman. She deftly dodged him and prepared to strike back.

The other five guardsmen now rushed at us as well, but one of them fell to the ground immediately when Vedel's sword pierced his throat from behind, whereupon one of the attackers turned away from us and faced the silent giant.

I would only get one chance. I pointed my sword at two of the remaining attackers and unleashed a flash of light. Two runes left.

I shot forward, stabbed one of the two dazed men in the heart with my dagger and shoved him into the other.

A scream pierced the air behind me, and I spun around.

Gerner stood there, his sword lodged in the remaining attacker’s chest. But the scream had not come from our enemy. The witch’s spear had pierced both men, friend and foe alike.

Stay calm. Calm! One step at a time.

I rushed over to the two men I had subdued and finished off the one who had only been knocked down so far.

A leap brought me closer to the witch and Gerner.

Vedel had apparently defeated his second opponent and also rushed toward the witch.

She pulled her spear out of her two victims, whirled it around, and swept the giant off his feet in the blink of an eye. She prepared to leap forward to impale him as well.

I threw my dagger at her back, but as if she had sensed it coming, she dodged it while still in the air.

Vedel was just getting back to his feet when she blew some kind of powder in his face, pushed off with her spear, and took a long leap backward. Instinctively, I rolled away from Vedel as well.

The next moment, a fire flared up out of nowhere and took out the second of the Churls.

The woman and I were now standing face to face. I was on my own.

She seemed rather young, at most one or two years older than me, and had probably once been beautiful, but burns and scars covered her face and scantily clad body.

“Pig!” the witch croaked in a husky voice and started running toward me.

Suddenly, she stopped and flung the spear forward from her wrist. It missed my body by a hair's breadth, and before I knew it, the weapon had been yanked back, and forth again.

This play continued, and I was only able to narrowly dodge the attacks time and time again in a dance at a spearpoint’s mercy.

And then I did it. As I dodged, I hurled my sword at the witch. The woman ducked away from the soaring blade —no time to pull the spear back. I grabbed the wooden handle of her weapon and yanked it toward me with all my strength.

The witch fell face-down, and I kicked her in the head with great force and then twice more in the ribs.

No matter how skilled she was, her body was still that of a woman, so she was unlikely to get back up.

When I looked up at the walkway, it was already empty. The fleetmaster was gone. So I grabbed my sword and rushed over to Gerner, who was writhing on the ground. It seemed he had already wrapped a piece of cloth around his lower body to stop the bleeding.

“It's okay, brother. It’s fine. Just a flesh wound; I’ll be fine. Go check on Vedel first,” the leader groaned at me.

I removed the makeshift bandage and reapplied it properly before rushing over to the burned giant.

He leaned against a barrel and rubbed his eyes; his face was smeared with soot.

“How severe are the burns?” I asked.

“I can hardly see anything! But it'll be okay—just take care of Gerner!”

“Carver!” I heard Gerner yell.

I breathed a sigh of relief.

But it might have been too soon. As I turned toward the exit, I saw Monfion, the witch, back on her feet. She looked terrible and was leaning on her spear.

I returned to a fighting stance and moved quickly toward her.

“Wait! I give up! I’m just a hired blade! Promise me to let me live and I give you all the information you want… I swear, by the sacred tree of Crannash!”

I stood close to her and pointed my sword at the woman’s chest. Blood was running from her nose.

“I don’t know about your people’s sacred tree, but I will hear you out, woman.”

Gerner had hobbled over to my side in the meantime, and Carver was also loitering in the background, knife in his hand.

“Carver! Bring some water over to Vedel! Help him clean his eyes!” I barked.

The boy hurried over.

“Gerner, the more you move, the more blood you lose. We won—relax.”

The man who used to be our leader a few moments ago looked away with clenched teeth, then nodded in understanding.

Monfion cleared her throat, and I looked back at her. She gently tried to push my blade away from her chest. I didn’t give in.

“Speak!”

“Pig,” she murmured.

The tip of my sword was now pressing against her skin and she looked away.

“Whatever the Blacks had stored here was taken away early this morning. It clanged like steel when one of the crates fell over. What you see here is just a decoy. It's all empty.”

“Who was the steel intended for?”

“Don’t know.”

“How did they know we were coming?”

“The Blacks have bought every second ward knight. Maybe even one of your guys.”

“Is that it? Is that all you've got?”

“What else do you want to know?”

Feeling a little helpless, I looked over at Gerner, who was crouching on the floor.

“We've got everything we need, brother. Let her go.”

I lowered my weapon.

“You heard the man!”

“Really? You keep your word? Maybe you’re not a pig after all…”

The witch turned around and hobbled toward the exit.

“Maybe just a piglet,” I heard her murmur.

Carver and I checked the crates and barrels, but they really were empty or contained nothing but frayed nets and ropes.

After a brief rest, I helped Gerner, and Carver guided Vedel. This way we reached a larger fishing port that our wounded leader seemed to know well.

We knocked on the door of a cabin, and an elderly woman opened it. Gerner told us to spend the night at an inn in the harbor and wait at the easternmost pier at sunrise the next morning. He said he would be resting here on the island. With that, Gerner disappeared into the hut, and the old woman slammed the door in our faces.

The evening passed without incident. Carver took care of my blade, Vedel went up to his room early, and I indulged in some cider once more.

Fortunately, a fisherman's widow—who wasn't particularly attractive—joined me as well. Despite her great disappointment and several touchy attempts to push me further, she accepted to simply offer me some warmth.

The next morning, the same skipper picked us up again in his coble, and we returned to Strandburgh.

I told Carver and Vedel—whose eyesight had improved in the meantime—that I would take a bath first and then stop by Stooke's place.

But after my bath, things didn't turn out that way. Frovis was waiting for me in front of the bathhouse.

“Hey, Inomar. You're pretty busy, aren't you? Come on, the beadle is waiting,” said the ward knight with an approving smile.

What did I expect, anyway?