Maud was biting at her nails waiting. She chewed on her hair. Standing on the catwalk of the wooden walls, overlooking the village towards the setting sun, the foundations of the Vorner and Greshon towers creating jagged shapes on the horizon, she watched. The cold meant nothing. She was warmed by her worry. She was chilled by the uncertainty of the time that was passing as she stared on.
Enya lifted a thick fur cloak over her shoulders. Maud realized she had been hugging her shivers. She didn’t want to look away from where the road faded from her sight. From where the brown and gray crooked line disappeared into the cloudy browns and yellows of the reaped fields. She wanted to know, wanted to see the moment they appeared.
“Thank you,” Maud said, forcing herself to keep from turning to the Paladin beside her.
Every time she turned from the horizon, it wasn’t the thought of missing their approach that gripped her, it was what she saw between those jagged shapes of the towers and the walls she stood on.
Nina’s message had caused Enya to raise the drawbridge for the first time since it was built, the first time since the wooden walls of the fort had appeared seemingly overnight after the arrival of the Baron’s Men to Talkro while Draka was still just a man and not even a Prince, let alone a King.
The shops were emptied, but for the forge that was now hammering away with Egan and three smiths whose thick aprons bore the same crest—with stars that had less points than Draka by one or two—working beside him. Horses were taken from the stables and replaced with livestock. Chickens in wheeled coups, goats, pigs, and cows, now filled the stalls. The barracks were bunked with Maud’s family side-by-side the clerics and newly arrived Paladins. The Bailey was crowded with tents for Isabella’s soldiers.
Maud was confused by it all, it happened so fast. Valmond met her at the gate with guards and swept her into the Hall where Enya had been waiting. While Alice acted as Alice always did, greeting Queen Isabella and Jasmine, ensuring that the two younger children with her were quickly rounded up and kept at her side, Maud was taken away, separated from them. If Nina’s note was true, if the danger was real, if something happened, if they didn’t return…
“How are you doing?” Enya’s voice had softened, lightened into an almost motherly pitch. “I know it is a lot.”
The sun was halfway down. The sky had begun to turn shades of pink flowing into a sea of blues and purples. Maud shook her head at it, searching. “My mother and second father are out there, how do you think I’m doing?”
Enya let out a loud sigh.
Maud tried to blink away the regret for snapping at her. Her worry was making her irate and scared. Angry. Both of them, at once. Is this how it will be, now? Her mother as a Paladin, off fighting battles, too? And if a battle or war goes badly, will she lose them both? She swallowed the thought down.
If God wills it.
She wished that made her feel better, but the knowledge that He once said no to healing her father will always be in the back of her mind as a reminder that His Will is not always her own. Rarely is.
“Forgive me,” Maud allowed her eyes to drift from the road on the horizon to Enya’s concerned face. “How is the Queen? Is she comfortable or whatever is supposed to be done in this situation?”
Enya nodded. “Yes, your Majesty. Alice has taken care of her and the Royal family. Princess Jasmine wishes to speak with you.” She must have seen Maud’s flaring nostrils at the thought of leaving the wall, leaving her watchful post. “When you are ready.”
“Tomorrow,” Maud searched the road again.
The village still seemed so peaceful. Lifting the drawbridge had meant nothing to them. Even the pub still had the sounds of dancing and drunken singing from within.
“I know this is a lot for you to be shouldered with,” Enya’s grin was somewhere between sympathetic and frowning, “But I will be with you every step of the way. I’m sure it will only be for a short time. They’ll be back before the sun rises, I’m sure of it. But if they’re not…”
“Then we must be prepared,” Maud nodded, glowering. “I want to speak with my father’s highest ranking Paladins if they’re not back by midnight mass. Nina says there’s enemies in the village, I want to know what we can do about finding them,” she turned to Enya, unaware of how much anger from the thought that those enemies might have taken the last of her family from her was reflected in her expressions until Enya’s hooded eyes widened from it, “And once we know who they are, what we can do to destroy them. All. Of. Them.”
Enya only nodded.
Maud softened before searching again. “I don’t want to be queen.” She drew in a breath through grinding molars, “If they took my mother from me, Enya, I don’t think I can be as forgiving as Draka has been. I want to believe I would be, but I saw what happened in Strasbourg because of the greed of someone who should have been loyal to their King—Prince, whatever—and I know that my seat will be contested.” She met Enya’s eyes again, “If they are killed, you either raise the red flag or you and your Order get out of my kingdom before my father’s Order do it for you. I trust you, but if they killed my family…stay out of our way if you can’t stomach what I will do to them.”
“I won’t be a part of senseless violence and neither will any member of Paladinate,” Enya said with a whispering growl, the deepness returning to her voice. “That isn’t what we do. We do as God Wills, not a tyrannical Queen.”
Maud shrugged her gaze away from her. “Then I thank you for all your services to my father and mother, should they be found dead, Paladin.”
Enya gaped in awe, broken only by the steps of an approaching visitor.
“If I didn’t already know differently, I would say those are the words of the trueborn daughter of Draka,” Isabella said to the scoffing of Enya.
“This is a Paladinate Kingdom. A kingdom of God,” Enya bared down on the two women before seeing that Jasmine was joining them. “We don’t take vengeance into our own hands unless it is His Will and by His command alone.”
“She has a right to feel as such,” Isabella challenged her with an almost cheerful tone, passing Maud with a brush of her fingers across her back. “When my father was killed, I felt much the same. It is only natural to want for the murderer to be sent to judgment sooner than they can murder again, n’est pas?”
“My army is at your disposal,” Jasmine went to Maud’s side, opposite Enya, and said into her ear, “I command the men we brought. Three hundred and twenty-eight light horse, with twelve knights, including myself. If the worst has happened, I will send for the rest of my army and support your claim.”
“Thank you,” Maud wanted to show warmth in her grin. Her trembling worry was making it difficult.
“You think that the Holy Sepulcher, who hold the scriptural law stricter than any other Order, will disagree?” Enya was becoming heated to every challenge by the Queen.
“Yes,” Isabella chuckled. “The affairs of men are inferior to those of God. But, on another note, I wonder what it is you believe she intends to do? My dear Maudeline, do you mean to slaughter peasants and exact your revenge on innocents or is it justice brought forth by Paladins who will, with the Holy Spirit commanding their efforts, that you intend to find those enemies?”
“Paladins,” Maud shot Enya a glare. “But I will also do as Solomon did and consolidate my power.”
“There you have it and may rest,” Isabella grinned at the tall woman. “Though, the consolidation might make things a bit messy, but that is what men-at-arms and confession are for.”
Maud swallowed at that. The worried, disgusted glance aimed at her from Enya made her shake her head, “I will do what I can not to need confession and will welcome guidance on that.” And Enya softened while Isabella raised a brow at her.
“A precarious line to walk,” Isabella warned her. “Not impossible, but very nearly so. Either way, you have my support and allegiance. That should deter most external claimants. Internally, however, I cannot say.”
She could only see the last light of the sun casting its glow from behind the shapes of the tower foundations. Tension stiffened her, strangling her veins, forcing her teeth to grind.
“I don’t want to think about it anymore. I feel like everyone wishes they were already dead,” her brows were feeling heavy as the day dimmed before her eyes. “I have had enough of this. Leave me.”
“Surely,” Isabella shifted between her and Enya, “You need someone to console you in such a trying time.”
“We’re here as friends, Princess,” Jasmine sounded far more sincere.
“I said leave,” Maud huffed.
“As you will,” Isabella and Jasmine flowed away from her but Enya remained.
“You, too,” Maud said at nearly a whisper. “I don’t want to be bothered until you have news about them.”
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“Yes, your Majesty,” Enya said somberly.
Before Enya was more than a few steps away, Maud said to her, “Did Father Hagen’s monks finish their markings on the doors and windows?”
Enya stopped with a solemn nod, “Yes. You’re protected from her throughout the keep, your Majesty.”
A tear clung to the edge of Maud’s eye as she said with a long breath, “Good. Enya, I…”
“I know.”
“I just want them safe. They’re all I have left.”
“I know,” Enya grinned as warmly as she seemed able to muster.
Thankfully, that was when the horns at the towers began sounding, whipping their attention back to the dark shadow of the horizon pressed against the pinks and blues of the sunset. Maud narrowed her eyes at the two distant riders galloping hard down the road, joined by other riders from the camps. Her heart suddenly leapt in her chest.
The horns sounded a drumming tune.
“Is it…?” Maud leaned to see, studying the horsemen riding through the village for any sign as to who they were.
There were only two. There should be seven. Her body shook. Two. The horns resounded again with that tune, louder, faster.
“Lower the bridge!” Enya called down to the bailey.
Maud sprinted for the steps with a smile beginning to form. It was them. She cast off the thought of there only being two instead of the seven with every step down to greet them. Two meant nothing. Perhaps it was because Adrian wanted to spend time with the knights in a more meager pace. Perhaps her mother and Draka wanted to get back sooner to reassure Maud that they were alright because they didn’t want her to worry.
Her heart skipped a beat when she heard the familiar sound that every infirmarian dreaded from the horns. The call for care for the wounded.
Maud hesitated in her next steps as she crossed before the creaking chains lowering the bridge, already knowing what to expect.
She pulled the fur cloak from her shoulders and tossed it to the nearest rail. She looked herself over. This dress was one of her older ones that she had picked because she was more comfortable in it. She was thankful for that. As she pulled the ribbon from around her waist to tie her hair back, Maud watched the bridge crank and thump into place, finally seeing that the two horsemen were carrying two more with them.
“Stretchers!” Maud called over her shoulder, “Two…” she narrowed her focus on one of the riders. An arrow was sticking out from them that she only caught when it crossed through the purple of the sky, “three! Get three. Prepare the infirmary for four!”
Clerics and knights scrambled. Maud shut her eyes. Please, Lord, let them be alright. Please let them be alive.
The horses clopped across the bridge and into the bailey. Maud rushed to the rider with the arrow sticking out of their side, refusing to look up to see who it was, refusing to pay any heed to the blood that had soaked the saddle and trickled a trail of blood that shimmered in the light of the many torches gathering around them. She lifted the arm from resting on the arrow, causing it to widen its wound. The woman it was stuck into—she wouldn’t look at who it was, she couldn’t—was unconscious but the blood was still warm, still flowing out. She was alive.
Maud kept hold of the arm as she was carried to the stretcher. “Come on, straight to the infirmary!”
“We don’t have one,” it was Samma at the front of the stretcher, shivering and shaking his head with wide eyes.
“The Hall, then,” Maud shouted first to him, then over her shoulder to the others. “Take them to the Hall! Find a physician, infirmarian, anyone who knows care of wounds, find Senna Greshon, too. And you, follow, listen carefully…” She nodded to Samma, “Now, go!”
Samma and the man at Nina’s feet lifted the stretcher while Maud kept Nina’s arm held out and said to the man following beside them, “I need clean linens, scissors, vodka, thread, get the fires burning and bring Dalfur or Egan—whoever you find first—in to make iron red hot, sharpest knives, and his best tweezers. And water, boiling water. Now, go!”
As they crossed through the stables and into the light of the Hall, Maud was already yelling to the guards at the door for them to find cots or beds and racks that can have things hanging from them. She pointed to Leo and Esme, who had rushed to meet them with Alice ushering them, after directing Samma to lower the stretcher onto the ground, “I need you to find volunteers from the Clerics and empty bottles. Clean the bottles in boiling water and with alcohol, the strongest spirits—you listening?—And bring them to me with needles and the butcher with his freshest intestines for sausage. Beef, not pork, if he has any. Tell him to clean them quickly. I mean quickly!”
“I am a donor,” Olaf was at her side, “No one rejects my blood.”
Maud looked up to him after pulling one of Nina’s many knives and nodded, “Good. Find a chair and help get the bottles ready. You know anyone else who is a donor, you fetch them, she lost too much.”
Aurie came into the Hall with Draka’s stretcher, carried by two Clerics. Maud was already cutting the laces of Nina’s leather jerkin when she saw her mother’s battered face and felt her lips parting at the sight though she kept cutting. Aurie’s eyes were nearly swollen shut, her jaw was full of mounds that were bulging all across it, and her brows had become ridges that formed together with her cheeks. If it wasn’t for the darkened blood on parts of her face, Maud would never have known that she was bleeding. But she could tell with a single, fleeting glance that her mother had been wounded as well, that the blood on her face, dripping from her hands and over her boots from within her trousers, from within the chain shirt that had bits split open and hanging nearly in tatters, were hers.
“Get her a cot, too!” Maud called, now forcing herself to concentrate on cutting the leather away from around the arrow without touching it. “And get that armor off!”
“Take care of them, you can take care of me in my room…” Aurie said, standing over her.
Maud growled through gritted teeth, “You will get your plowing armor off and lay your ass on that cot or I will skin your hide, woman.” She called over her shoulders, “Where are the bottles and intestines? I need blood! And anyone find a physician?”
"There is one with the Anatolians," Olaf said from where chairs were being set.
"Send someone to fetch him!" Maud returned to cutting the leather. The blood was slowing its flow from the wound. She quickened. "Get that armor off, I said! The intestines?"
Aurie stammered, wide eyed. She didn’t argue. She pulled the chainmail shirt over her head with a hiss and let it drop to her feet. Maud nearly roared for the rest to come off, but Alice was already bringing her a robe and blanket.
“He’s cleaning them now!” Alice shouted back.
Cots were being unfolded. Dalfur was still in his sleeping shirt when he was brought in with a handful of bundled tools. The brazier was being pulled closer. Adrian was carried in and put on the first cot that was set, then Maud directed Samma and another Cleric to lift Nina onto the next.
“Draka healed Adrian, I healed Draka,” Aurie said with a lisp from her mouth being barely able to move as she was ushered toward the third cot. “It was an ambush. There were so many. Is she—?”
“Before or after the arrows were removed?” Maud waited for Aurie to answer, but her expression made Maud shake her head. “Get their clothes off and search their wounds for any signs of arrowheads or debris left inside, we might need to do surgery.”
The Cleric she had sent for the supplies handed her a corked bottle of vodka. Maud glared at him as she bit the cork and yanked it with her teeth. She spat the cork at him and poured it over where the arrow stuck in Nina’s side, flooding away what blood had yet to congeal. Nina shivered a little with a slight moan. A good sign.
"You!" Maud called to a Cleric as she took another bottle to pour a little more vodka on the wound, "Inform Enya that we are under attack. The village needs to be prepared for siege. Inform Queen Isabella that I require her knights to aid in the defense of the villagers while we fortify the keep. Go!"
Dalfur, after placing a rod in the pyre, ran to her with his bundle of tools. His pursed brows and gaping wonder made her grit her teeth. Maud was on her feet the moment she had the tweezers in hand. She started to squeeze the tweezers around the arrow’s haft before straightening.
She turned to Dalfur’s bewildered face. His puppy eyes were looking at her as if he were observing a stranger. She put the tweezers in his thick, calloused hand, then poured the vodka over it. “I need you to pull it out. Slow and straight. Don’t twist it. Just pull.”
Dalfur’s nod was hesitant.
Maud narrowed her eyes. “Straight, Dalfur. Slow.” When she saw the way he looked down at the tool in his hands and then at Nina, Maud softly put a hand on his, “You’re the strongest man in the village. You can do this. Help me save her life.” She guided his shaky hand toward the arrow, close to where it stuck into the soft pale skin, “Nice and straight.”
“Water’s boiling,” Leo shouted.
As Dalfur tightened the tweezers to grip the arrow, Maud called to Leo, “Put cloths into it and count to one hundred and twenty before you take them out and bring them here.” To Dalfur, “Okay, straight the way it went in. Slowly. Careful…there you go.”
“Over here,” Olaf shouted as Esme brought the butcher in with his basket of intestines. She had bottles in her own basket.
Maud drew in a breath. Clerics knew how to draw blood. She just needed to pay attention to Dalfur’s slow pull that was gushing blood from the wound, her eyes darting between that and Nina’s paled, still face.
“Where’s the rest of the men who went with you?” Enya asked as soon as she came into the Hall and went to Aurie’s side, followed by Senna.
Senna and Samma met glances as she passed him, but she rushed to Maud’s side, though Maud didn’t look up to her. “What do you need me to do?”
“They stayed behind so we could escape,” Aurie was breathing heavily as she laid back on her cot. “There were a lot of them. I think there’s an army coming this way. Saint Olgas.”
“Soak thread in a bowl of vodka for sixty count and clean my mother’s wounds,” Maud had to put a hand on Dalfur’s wrist to slow him down. To Enya, "Where’s the physician that came with the Queen?"
Enya shook her head, gaping and awestruck as she watched Maud help Dalfur pull, "The Princess commanded that their knights remain in the keep or her physician stays in his cot."
Maud shook at Senna, “Stitch her largest wounds first after cleaning it with vodka and the cloths they bring you. If she fights you, have the Clerics hold her down. If you haven’t the stomach for it, throw up on the floor and go back to it. Cross stitch, as tight as you can.” She called to her mother, “I suggest you drink vodka, we don’t have any anesthesia.”
“The rivers, really?” Senna gasped.
Maud shot her a glare as blood flowed between the fingers pressing Nina’s skin from climbing with the wood of the arrow being pulled from her. “I wasn’t asking, Senna.”
Then, her glare turned to Enya as the last of the arrowhead slowly pulled away. "Now, what exactly did she say?"
