LIA
When Lia saw him, she froze, curiosity gripping her. She had never seen a man like him this far from Aberdour’s castle. Typically those clad in torn shirts and muddy brown slacks, like this man, were vagabonds of the city’s stone alleys or slaves to noblemen in their comfortable estates. Then she noticed the shackles on his ankles and the broken chain that once linked them dangling between his feet, and her curiosity melted into fear.
Lia gasped. The bucket of oats slipped from her small hand and spilled on the barn floor.
The man was distressed, his eyes wide and worried. He pressed a single dirty finger to his lips. “Quiet, little girl.”
Lia’s fear vanished. “I’m not a little girl,” she snapped. “I’m ten, and I’m—”
“I said shut up!”
From somewhere outside, a woman called Lia’s name. Her shape appeared, passing by the gaps in the barn boards.
The man pointed his finger at Lia. “Not a word!” he whispered, and then shuffled behind the hay bales.
The door creaked open and a lovely, wide-hipped woman with her brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, poked her head inside. Lia spun around, startled, kicking the spilled oats at her feet.
“Is everything all right?” the woman asked.
“I’m sorry, Abigail. I, uh…” Lia looked down at the mess. Kneeling she started to clean it up. “It just… slipped.”
Abigail made her way across the barn floor, her simple brown dress swaying around her ankles. She knelt next to Lia, holding her pregnant belly as she bent down.
“It’s all right,” she said. “Aggie won’t mind.” She looked up at a white and brown rouncey peering down at them from her stall. “Will you girl?”
The horse shook off a few flies.
Lia paid no mind to either Abigail or the horse. Her every thought was on the escaped prisoner hiding behind the hay bales. She considered grabbing Abigail and racing from the barn, but then her eyes fell on the woman’s belly and Lia knew she couldn’t do anything that would put the baby at risk.
Abigail looked up and exhaled in disappointment. “I hope this isn’t your new tunic,” she said. She brushed her hand along the front of Lia’s shirt, peeling away the layer of hay and dirt that had affixed itself to the dark green fabric, marring the pattern of branches and maple leaves.
“Uh,” was all Lia could say. She looked down at her baggy gray slacks, hoping she hadn’t dirtied them as well, but she had.
“Oh!” Abigail said, and her hand went to her stomach. “Lia, feel. She’s awake.”
Abigail took Lia’s tiny fingers and placed them over the spot where the baby was kicking. Even in the face of her fear, Lia couldn’t help but smile as the little life pushed against her palm.
“How do you know it’s a girl?” she asked.
Abigail smiled. “I don’t, but it’s fun to pretend that I do.” She leaned in close and lowered her voice. “And it confuses Thomas, but don’t tell him I said that.”
Lia forced out a chuckle, trying to sound relaxed.
“Are you all right?” Abigail asked as Lia finished picking up the spilled oats.
“Yes,” she answered. “Just, um, thinking about my school work.” She took the bucket over to the stall and dumped it in Aggie’s feed box. “I left without getting it done. Or my chores.”
Abigail frowned. “Honey, we’ve talked about this. I don’t want your mother getting mad at me.”
“I’m sorry. Some days it’s just nicer here. In fact, it’s always nicer here. Things are peaceful and…” She stopped, her eyes darting toward the hay pile.
“And what?” Abigail asked.
Lia cast the woman a forced smile. “Plus Aggie is far smarter than my dumb horse.”
“Aggie is also very old, but I’m glad you like it here.” The woman walked up to her and gave her a motherly embrace, stroking the straight brown hair cascading like a silky sheet down Lia’s back. “You’ve always been a good help to us, but it can’t be at the expense of your responsibilities at home. Understand?”
Lia pulled away and agreed.
Abigail started for the barn door. “Send your mother and father our love.”
“I will.”
“And come inside and get some breakfast before you leave.”
Lia watched Abigail exit the barn, her breath held in her chest.
The mysterious man emerged from behind the hay bales. He had a raw masculinity that enthralled and intimidated all at the same time.
Lia opened her mouth to speak, but he lifted his finger again and mouthed, “No.” She closed her mouth, not because he had said so, but because of the two other men who slipped into the barn behind him, chains clinking at their feet. One of them, husky and tall, had a murderous look in his bloodshot eyes. The other looked sprightly, with a scrawny torso and protuberant eyes in his bony face. He ducked into a nimble squat and wiped the perspiration from his brow with a tattered sleeve.
“They got a ride,” he said, pointing toward the packhorse, Aggie, as she peeked over her stall.
“One horse, moron,” Fatty said. “And there’s three of us, so don’t even think about it.”
“Shh!” said the first man to his companions.
The three men ignored Lia, their ears tilting up to the dusty brown rafters as though listening for some sound in the forest beyond.
Lia heard the gentle clomping of horse hooves on the rough road outside. The three men with their clinking chains hurried toward the barn wall to peer through the narrow slits between the clapboards.
“Is that ’im?” Sprightly asked in a gruff whisper.
No one answered.
Curiosity returned, and Lia drifted toward the barn wall where she pressed her eye up to a knothole. She imagined her mother scolding her for lingering in the presence of these three peculiar men. She half-smiled, knowing she would’ve ignored her mother anyway. She didn’t like playing it safe. She much preferred to gallivant through the woods by day and scale the castle’s bookshelves by night. A day in which she didn’t earn a few new scuffs on her palms or knees was a boring day indeed.
Her eye took in a picturesque country scene where an opening in the forest canopy spilled a wide swath of sunlight onto a stone cottage. Chickens pecked at the dirt near a trickling brook sided by reeds and croaking frogs while a pasture, barely visible through the trees, sat at the rear of the home.
A massive armored horse stomped up next to the cottage, marring the otherwise charming scene. The dark animal bore a tall rider in sinister black plate armor, his metal chest displaying a silver viper—the emblem of the high king. His ferocious appearance made Lia’s heart skip a beat. The large man swung his long leg over his ride’s hindquarters and dismounted. She guessed his height to be nearly seven feet. When he turned, a tremendous broadsword, almost twice as tall as Lia, swayed behind his back.
She noticed a contingent of mounted soldiers coming up over the rise in the road to join the tall man. Clad in black armor and fierce helms, the army carried flags bearing the high king’s crest. Lia’s eyes went wide with fright.
“Black vipers?” said Sprightly, astonished. “Khile, what they doin’ ’ere?”
The fat man shook his head. “Broods don’t come this far north.”
“They do now,” Khile said.
For the last three years Lia had heard rumors that one day the black vipers, soldiers of the new high king, would invade this part of the country, but she had never allowed herself to believe it would happen.
Lia had a sudden urge to be home, safe within the protective walls of Aberdour. Mentally she kicked herself for having snuck off in the morning before doing her schoolwork, for leaving the city without the protection of one of her father’s bodyguards.
The door to the cottage scraped open. Thomas appeared, a middle-aged man with graying brown hair and oafish arms defined from long days of axe wielding. He stepped outside while his wife, Abigail, remained in the doorway.
Lia sprang away from the peephole to run outside and warn Thomas when two strong hands clamped onto her shoulders and yanked her back. She tried to scream except one of the hands replanted itself across her mouth.
“Don’t make a sound!” said the man called Khile. He had firm but gentle hands, like her father’s.
“Why are broods coming after us for?” asked Fatty, his voice quivering.
“They’re not after us,” Khile answered.
Sprightly got up. “Well I’m not hanging around here.”
“You step outside and you’re a dead man,” Khile said.
His companion froze.
“What do you think they’re here to do, huh?” Khile moved toward the barn boards to peek outside. “This is an invasion.”
Lia heard voices outside. She squirmed out of Khile’s clutches and returned to the knothole. She saw Thomas inviting the big armored soldier to the water well. Abigail wiped remnants of the breakfast she was preparing on a mottled white apron and then stood silently in the doorway holding the bulge at her stomach. She looked as nervous as Lia felt.
Thomas raised a bucket of water from the well and offered a ladle to the soldier. The man drank, and said something to Thomas. Lia’s ears perked as she heard mention of Aberdour.
Thomas pointed east in the direction of the city.
The tall man dropped the ladle, removed a thick black dagger from his belt, and plunged it into Thomas’ stomach. Abigail screamed and rushed from the house, hurrying to her dying husband’s prone body.
“No!” The word rushed from Lia’s mouth so fast it surprised her. By the time she realized that she had screamed it loud enough for the soldiers to hear, she was halfway out of the barn. She sprinted up the narrow path to the house as fast as her little legs could move, tears on her cheeks, and hot rage in her stomach.
Abigail cried, cradling Thomas as the last bits of life quivered out of him.
Lia dropped to her knees next to Thomas, calling his name. Her hands reached for him, shaking as they cupped his paling face. He blinked, those beautiful sparkling blue pools, and smiled for one brief moment before death took him.
Lia heard a soldier stomping up next to them, but she ignored him, unable to pull her eyes from Thomas. Only when Abigail gasped did Lia glance up. The soldier yanked her head back and drew a silver blade across her throat, cutting a deep gash that spattered blood onto Lia’s clothes.
A second soldier reached down to grab Lia, but her quick feet were far too clever. She sprang away from the man and sprinted toward the big knight, anger washing through her blood. Her hands slipped from a small leather sleeve the knife her father had given her for her tenth birthday. She had never used it to slice anything other than a dead quail, a piece of rope, and some fabric, but, still, she kept it sharp. It slipped into the armored soldier’s thigh, right between the plates of his armor and deep into the skin. He growled, a sound wrought of pain and irritation. He spun and backhanded Lia across the face with his metal arm. She flew backward into the trampled leaves of the pockmarked road, the right side of her face exploding with pain.
Some of the soldiers laughed.
The armored man looked down at Lia, eyes steady and cool. Brown tangles of hair tumbled from his head, veiling his pale face, a stark contrast to his black uniform. He removed her dagger from his leg like a scholar withdraws a quill from an inkwell, and handed it back to her handle first.
“Would you care to try again?” he asked, his voice indifferent, cavernous and cold. “Go for the inside of the thigh this time. Twist the blade to open the wound.”
“I think you should keep her, sir,” one of the soldiers said. “Might make good sport later.”
Bellows of laughter followed.
The large armored man smiled wolfishly. “Kill her,” he said.
From the barn a horse neighed, beckoning the soldiers’ attention. Lia scurried away from them on her hands and knees until she glimpsed Khile bounding toward the house atop Aggie. He arrived at her side in a matter of seconds and pivoted the horse’s flanks to throw the closest soldiers off balance. He reached down and grabbed Lia by the arm. She gave an undignified yelp when he hoisted her onto his lap and urged the horse forward.
Aggie was afraid, Lia could tell, acting half on instinct and half at the commands of the stranger on her back. The horse rushed along the uneven road.
Lia watched the soldiers behind them ready their crossbows as Khile’s two companions stood at the entrance to the barn, looking after him in confusion. Sprightly took a short arrow through the face. Fatty ducked back into the barn as the soldiers moved in to claim his life.
Before Aggie descended the next crest in the road, Lia glimpsed the massive man in the black armor staring after her, calm as an oak tree in a gathering storm.
Lia squirmed to right herself, but Khile shouted at her, “Keep still!”
“I’m slipping!”
He hooked an arm around her small waist and pulled her up in front of him to straddle the animal’s bare back. The road ahead, with woods crowding up to both sides, rushed past in a blur before Lia’s wet eyes.
“Why did he kill them?” she asked. “They didn’t do anything.” Then she thought of the baby in Abigail’s stomach, that precious little girl, or boy. No one would ever know.
“That’s Sir Komor Raven, one of the high king’s marshals,” Khile answered. “He is the very extension of the Black King’s sword itself. He’s led the siege of almost all—”
“I know who he is,” Lia spat, her voice shaking with sorrow and rage. “Everyone knows The Raven.”
“Then you know to fear him.”
“I fear no one! And someday I’m going to kill him for what he did to them.” Lia knew how absurd she sounded. She knew ten-year-old girls didn’t kill soldiers clad in thick armor, but deep within her boiled a growing hate she had never felt before.
“That man will gut you like a fawn,” Khile said.
“I don’t care. I’m going to rip his heart out!”
Khile huffed. “You’re a feisty little thing. What’s your name?”
“Lia Falls.”
Khile’s body tensed. “Falls? Of Aberdour? You’re a princess?” It sounded like less of a question and more an exclamation of disbelief. “What are you doing out here all alone with no protection? Are you crazy?”
Lia didn’t answer. She only sobbed.
“You’re lucky I found you,” Khile said. “Those men would’ve killed you right along with that man and woman.”
“They were my friends,” Lia said, her voice cracking. She shut her eyes as images flooded her mind of Thomas teaching her how to ride, and Abigail helping her brush the coats of their mares. Years of memories flooded through her as tears washed down her cheeks.
“I don’t understand,” she cried. “Why did he kill them? They didn’t do anything?”
“This is the back road to Aberdour, yes?” Khile said. “And you know who Komor is, then surely you know what he’s doing.”
Lia knew the answer, but she didn’t want to say it. Maybe, if she didn’t say it, it wouldn’t be true. Maybe if she squeezed her eyes tight enough the nightmare would end and she would look up to see the post and beam ceiling of her bedroom in the castle, her violet drapes blowing in the crisp morning breeze, sunlight kissing her pale skin.
But this was no nightmare. The black vipers were real, and they were headed for Aberdour, which could only mean one thing: the invasion had finally arrived.
Aggie lurched over a log in the road, forcing Lia to latch onto Khile’s arm. He must have felt her grip, because he brought his arms in closer to her. He smelled of wood and earth.
“Do yourself a favor and forget about Komor The Raven,” Khile said. “Aberdour is about to fall, and that makes you and your brothers and sisters the most important people in the realm right now.”
As Khile pushed the horse hard over the rough road, Lia thought of her home lying not too far ahead. Aberdour. The last free city on Edhen. She wondered if she and Khile would arrive in time to warn the people. Perhaps they already knew. Perhaps the western towers had already spotted the Black King’s army on the crest of the Northern Road. The bells could be sounding throughout the city right now.
Lia longed for her father, Lord Kingsley. She longed for him to scoop her up in the safety of his arms, hold her tight against his barrel chest, and tell her everything was going to be all right. He was supposed to go hunting this morning with her brother Brayden. She wondered if they were out there now, creeping through the trees, bows at the ready, unaware that they were soon to be the prey.
