3
The Courage of Women
THE BOWS HUMMED. The arrows streaked across the yard.
Da took three, four strides, and leapt to the porch. An arrow struck him in the back below the ribs. Another flew like an angry insect into the house above Sugar’s head and struck the wall behind her.
“Sparrow!” Mother called.
Da’s momentum carried him into the house, and Mother slammed the door shut.
A second volley of arrows struck the door. One of the men cried out, “I got him! I got him!”
Mother pulled the crossbar on the door in place.
Outside, Midnight and Sky barked viciously.
More bows thrummed outside and the dogs’ barks turned to screams. “Kill it!” someone called. A moment later the dogs fell silent.
Da winced and looked down at his side. The arrow had not gone into the thick of his back, only cut the flesh on the side, but the blood still spilled from him like water. He pressed his hand to the wound.
“Those blackhearts,” he said. He pulled his hand away wet with blood. “Get me a wrap,” he said to Mother. “All these years, and then they treat me like some feral animal.”
Mother took a knife to her dress and cut a long strip. She was furious. “We should have ridden when I first suggested it. Why you can’t listen to me I’ll never know.”
“Well, you won’t have to fret about that much longer, will you?”
Mother made the final cut, then came and tied it around Da to cover and hold the wound. When Da took his hand away, it was dark red. Heavy drops of blood fell to the floor.
“Did you get your mother’s horse?” Da asked Sugar.
“I did,” she said, and the enormity of that single number almost overwhelmed her. One horse was not enough for all four of them. She cursed herself for not having thought to get Sot.
Da nodded. “It’s enough.”
From outside, they heard The Crab yelling at his men. “I want all here to witness that Sparrow has refused the proving. Fire the smithy and the house.”
Moments later Sugar heard arrows snake into the thatch above their heads. Those would have their points wrapped and burning with pitch-soaked rags.
“Fetch me my armor,” said Da.
“What are we going to do?” asked Sugar.
Da looked down into her eyes. “You, my dear, along with Mother and Legs, are going to ride Fancy out of here.”
“You fool,” said Mother. “It’s too late for that.”
Sugar thought Mother had said that in anger, but when Sugar looked up, she could see Mother was not angry—she was wracked with grief.
“I’m going to draw them away from the back,” Da said and took Mother’s hand. “It’s not too late, not for a fool to remedy his foolishness. You three will ride away, and not look back.”
“I don’t want to ride away,” said Sugar. “Besides, where can we go that they won’t find us?”
“Mother will know,” said Da. “Now fetch me my tunic.”
Sugar hesitated, but Mother nodded, so she ran and brought the quilted tunic and helped Da tie it shut. Then Mother dressed him into the mail tunic that extended down to his thighs.
Da couldn’t rout so many men. They were all going to die, yet Da made her cinch the buckles on his breastplate as if he were dressing for parade.
Legs found his way over and grasped Da’s wrist. Fear shone plainly on his face.
Da took Legs’s hand and kissed it. “Be brave, Shen, son of Sparrow, son of Sparrow, son of Shen.” Shen was Legs’s given name, the name of a powerful ancestor whose stories Da loved to tell. Da pressed Leg’s hand to his cheek, then ruffled his wild hair. “You’re going to be fine,” he said.
“I know when you lie, Da,” Legs said.
“You’re going to be fine,” Da said more firmly.
Mother and Sugar finished buckling the breastplate about him. The fire on the roof began to pop and crackle loudly. Smoke filtered in through the shutters.
“Peer out the back and tell me what you can see,” said Mother.
Sugar looked out a small hole in the shutter and surveyed their garden. Fancy neighed nervously and clopped about trying to pull free from the post. She said, “The soldiers are still standing out by the fence. In fact, they’ve backed up.”
“Did you see their faces?” asked Da. “Half of them are petrified. Those are not children out there. I should be stuck like a pin cushion with arrows. But their fear has affected their aim. Would that I were a soul-eater. Then this whole so-called hunt would be at risk. With average luck, I’d kill the lot of them and green our garden with their blood.”
Mother came away from the window. “Perhaps we can make the break together,” she said to Da. “The children and I will ride off first. And in the confusion of them chasing us, you can get on Sot.”
Da fastened his helmet on. “It’s too risky. We need to split them. I should have run to the smithy to draw them away from you, but none of the pieces there would have fit me well. No armor there but what’s made for these short whoreson Mokaddians.”
Smoke hung about the room in hazy streaks. Heat began to press down upon them like they were loaves in an oven.
“It’s time,” Da said. He took Legs’s face in his hands and kissed his cheek, embraced him, then kissed him again. He did the same to Sugar, but when he went to release her, she could not let him go.
She would not. Lords, she would rather die with him. She had her knife. Had he not taught her how to fight?
“You are a delight and solace,” he said. “We named you perfectly. Take care of your brother.” Then he gently forced Sugar away.
He stood and looked at Mother with a fierce light in his eyes. “I could never have found a better woman,” he said, “even in your arguing.”
“You get ready to ride,” Mother said.
“We’re not going to be able to make the break together,” said Da. “It won’t work.”
Mother’s demeanor had changed; she seemed oddly calm. “Sparrow, my heart, haven’t you learned yet that I’m always right?”
What was Mother thinking? Then Sugar realized she had given up. She’d always said that if her babies died, she wanted to go with them. Sugar saw this logic extended to Da as well. And perhaps that was right. They would all die together.
“No,” said Da. “We’ll not take that route. We’ll not walk into their spears and arrows without a struggle. If they want my blood and the blood of my fine wife and children, then they will pay for it. You’re feeling battle dread; hold your course until it passes. You have a chance, Purity. A slim one. Don’t throw it away.”
“I’m not talking of giving up,” said Mother. “We do have a chance, but not in this way. They’ll cut you down before those out back even know what’s happening. You’re a mighty man, Master Sparrow, but even you cannot stand against fifty spears.”
Da’s face was full of confusion. “What better plan is there?”
“I will face them.”
Da’s face softened. “That, Love, is my task. Now ready yourself.”
He turned, but Mother grasped him by the shoulder and held him back. “I will face them,” she said calmly.
Had she gone mad with panic and grief?
“Purity,” Da said. “Love.” He removed her hand and tried to stride to the door, but Mother grasped him again.
“No,” he said and removed her hand. But she took him by the rim of his breastplate with both hands, and, like a man heaving a sack of meal, threw him across the room. He stumbled over a chair and slammed into the far wall.
Many men came far and wide to wrestle Da. Few had thrown him. None had handled him with such force.
Da looked at Mother, his face full of shock. Then he righted himself and strode for the door. Mother planted herself in his path. He tried to push her out of the way, but could not budge her. He renewed his efforts, his arms and neck straining. But it was to no avail.
His expression turned from shock to angry determination.
He took a step back and lunged at her, but Mother simply stepped out of his way and, with one sweep of her foot, took his legs out from underneath him.
Mother reached down and grabbed the haft of his war maul. “I will face them,” she said calmly. “Take off your armor so you can ride more easily.”
Da grasped the head of the maul. “Purity,” he said.
“I will draw them to me,” she said. “And you will ride with the children. It will be best that way. They will not be orphaned, or caught and sold as chattel. You can provide for and protect them as I never could.”
“I don’t understand,” Da said.
“Yes, you do,” she said, and then she tugged the maul out of his grip.
Sugar was confused, alarmed. Where did Mother get such strength?
Mother turned to her. “The way to the woods will be clear. Be ready to fly.”
Then she walked to the front door and put her hand on the crossbar. She paused, taking them all in with her gaze. “I will be waiting for you in brightness.”
She lifted the bar, and in one fluid motion she flung open the door and raced outside. Clouds of smoke billowed in. The roar of the fire above them surged. Out back, Fancy cried with wild panic.
Luckily, neither Sugar nor Legs were standing anywhere within the line of sight from the doorway, for moments later more than a dozen arrows hissed through the smoke, some sticking into the walls, others glancing off a table or chair.
Da stood to go after her and two arrows struck him. One glanced off his breastplate; the other hit him in the mail over his thigh. He grunted at the second, but it did not have an armor-piercing head, and the arrow fell away.
“Purity,” Dad roared and raced after her, but when he got to the door, he stopped in shock. He coughed at the smoke and squatted to get under it. “Goh,” he said with a look of wonder on his face.
“Da,” said Sugar and rushed to shut the door. But as she reached the door, she saw what Da was looking at.
Mother had already reached the soldiers. Two men lay on the grass. One was dead. The other screamed out at the wound that had nearly taken his leg.
She moved like a snake, like the wind. She was graceful and absolutely horrible.
She swung into another man’s wooden shield and sent it flying. He cried out and stumbled backward, but before he could reach the ground, she smashed in the side of his head.
Sugar could not believe her eyes. She would not. Such speed and power was unnatural.
“Purity,” said Da, horror and disbelief written in his face.
The great bulk of the men were falling back, some stumbling over each other. In his retreat, one of the bowmen loosed an arrow, but it flew wide of Mother and struck one of his fellows. Another man charged her with a spear, but she swung the maul with blinding speed and cleaved the spear into two.
The Crab yelled for his men to stand and close ranks.
Mother was about to put the whole mob on the run, but two men yelled and rushed her from behind, their javelins held high.
“Mother!” Sugar yelled.
Mother turned just as they cast them. She dodged one, but the other caught her in the shoulder and knocked her back.
“No!” Da roared. He had been in shock, but fury now burned in his eyes.
Mother removed the javelin and defended herself from the sword blows of the man who had thrown it.
A dozen archers came running round the corner from the back of the house. They began to form a line. Mother would not be able to dodge their arrows.
The flames rumbled overhead.
“Get to Fancy,” Da commanded, “and ride.”
Then he rose and stepped out onto the porch and put his helmet upon his head. Someone shouted out a warning, and the mob turned to look.
Da stood in his dark, shining armor, the fire raging above his head, the smoke pouring off the roof.
The men in the yard froze.
“You’ve met the mistress!” Da bellowed. “Now face the master!”
A man dropped his spear, panic shining in his wide eyes.
Da roared and charged into the fray.
“Da!” Sugar called after him.
He had no weapon, and at first, Sugar thought that he too would fly into the soldiers as Mother had, with that awful strength and speed. But Da did not show any sign of dark magic. He charged as a normal man would, an actor playing a role.
But the soldiers did not see through Da’s bluff, and they began to scatter.
Just then The Crab yelled out and galloped across Sugar’s view toward her parents, his sword held high and at the ready.
The house burned like a furnace. The heat began to scorch her lungs with each breath, and she dropped to the floor.
Da ran to one of the dead men and pick up his spear. Then he turned just in time to meet The Crab’s charge. Da yelled and shoved the spear into the neck of The Crab’s mount. The horse screamed, reared, and threw its rider.
“Sugar!” Legs called out.
She turned and saw him holding his bleeding hand to his chest. She’d been wrong—one of the arrows had indeed found a mark.
Fight with Mother and Da, or help Legs?
“Open the door!” she shouted.
“I can’t,” he said.
He could, but was too frightened to do anything. The wisterwife charm he always kept about his neck had fallen out of his tunic. Sugar hoped the wisterwives were indeed looking out for them. But the wisterwives would be able to do nothing if they let the house burn down on top of them. Sugar tore herself from the battle that raged out front and crawled to her brother.
“What’s happening?” he asked.
“We’re going to the woods,” Sugar said. “And then . . .” And then she didn’t know where.
“To Horse?” Legs asked.
“To Horse,” she confirmed. “I’ll get you up on Fancy’s back, and then we’ll ride.” She threw open the back door, but Fancy was gone. She looked out through the haze and billows of smoke to the edges of the yard. No Fancy, but no soldiers either. They all must have run to the front of the house to join the battle.
A log above them made a deafening burst.
“Take my hand,” said Sugar. “We’re going to run to the pond then through the woods to the river. Are you ready?”
There was an immense whoosh, and the heat at Sugar’s back seemed to increase tenfold.
“Now,” she said. And she and Legs bolted from the house and raced down the path between the barn and the pheasant house.
They had visited the new pond many times, for Legs loved the feel of the sun-heated water. Legs knew this route, and so Sugar only needed to keep hold of his hand and call out his orientation points as they came to them. They ran past the garden and privy to Mother’s pheasant house.
Far to her right, three of the soldiers fled the battle. She looked back, hoping to see that Mother and Da had scattered the small army.
The whole roof of the house raged with fire; the immense flames wheezed and roared dozens of feet into the sky. Beyond the house, Da and Mother stood side by side. With one hand Mother pressed her wound; in the other she held a sword. Da held an axe and shield.
It appeared they had put the soldiers to flight. But then the soldiers stopped and turned, forming a line. They weren’t fleeing; they were making a space so that the bowmen could shoot without killing a number of their own.
Mother tried to charge the line, but Da stepped in front of her to stand between her and the soldiers.
The bowmen loosed their arrows. These did not fly wide this time, and despite Da shielding her from most of the shafts, Mother fell to the earth.
Da’s battle cry sounded over the raging of the fire. He too charged. The arrows did not penetrate his armor, but a multitude of spears did.
A shout of triumph rose up from the mob.
Legs tugged on her. “Sugar?”
The soldiers converged upon Da like a pack of wild dogs.
She watched their weapons rise and fall. Some began to run toward Mother, but The Crab shouted and brandished his sword to keep them away.
It was a nightmare, but Sugar could not tear her eyes from it.
A man raised a black sword, a Fire blade from the temple, high over Da.
No, she thought. No.
Then the man swung the sword down like he was chopping a mighty block of wood and hacked Da’s head from his body. Then he turned to Mother.
She could not move. Could not breathe.
The Crab waved the black-bladed man away from Mother. Next to him a number of soldiers pointed at her and Legs.
“Sugar,” said Legs, “why are we stopped?”
She realized he had been asking her that over and over, but his voice seemed to come from a great distance; she could barely hear him. It seemed she was watching the whole scene from a great distance.
“It’s too hot,” said Legs and tugged at her.
It was hot. The house fire blazed into the sky. The heat, even at this distance, burned her face.
She took a step back; Legs followed. She took another, then tore her eyes from the scene and broke into a jog. “To the woods, straight through Galson’s fields,” Mother had said.
She glanced back and saw a number of soldiers running toward them.
“To the pond,” she said, her voice sounding strange to her ears. “Over the fence and to the pond.”
Hand in hand, they ran across Galson’s paddock. She felt the knife at her waist. The knife Da had given her. A voice in the back of her mind told her to fight. But the voice was small, so very small.
She saw Fancy lying in the grass, arrows sticking from her, but Sugar only noted it. Her mind was filled with the image of Mother and Da and that terrible black blade. Twice Legs stumbled because of her inattention.
When they reached the pond, Sugar looked back. Soldiers ran through Galson’s paddocks toward them. On the far edge of a paddock, the District Lord rode atop his horse looking for a gate through.
In front of her were the woods. Sugar knew them well. She’d played hide-and-seek here and foraged for acorns and firewood. She’d hidden here from the village boys before Da taught her how to fight. These woods were old and in many places did not allow enough light to the ground to support much more than mushrooms. But mushrooms would not hide them. And even if they had cover, the mob would bring dogs.
So Sugar decided they would take the creek for their path. She and Legs had a small craft there they sometimes floated on. They would ride the water downstream, and just before they reached the confluence with the main river, they would leave the craft and escape into the woods on the other side.
Sugar looked down at the wisterwife charm Legs wore about his neck. Wisterwives were servants of the seven Creators. It was said that even Regret, the Creator who wanted to destroy the world, was served by them, but neither Mother nor Da had ever seen the creature that had left this charm. “Let us hope the wisterwife is watching us,” she said.
Sugar looked back one last time to where Da and Mother had fallen. Da’s body still lay upon the ground, but two of the soldiers were binding Mother’s hands. Was she alive then? Sugar paused to make sure, but there were too many men coming after her and Legs, and the looks on their faces made it plain they were bent on murder. The thought flickered through her mind that this was hopeless; she and Legs weren’t going to escape. But she quickly pushed that idea aside and faced the woods.
“You’ve done this a hundred times, brother. It’s over the bluff, to the creek, and then the river.”