by Neil Willcox
in Issue 123, April 2022
Eliza Sky had expected a churchman, though whether a mousy clerk, a stern scholar, or a ranting preacher she had not cared to guess. The thaumaturger who had ridden down from the high elfway into the village looked like none of those. He could have been a soldier with his broad shoulders and wide hips, or perhaps a farmer with his stubby fingers. He took his hat off, to reveal a bald, dark-tanned head.
His accoutrements argued for him being gentry. His dark grey tunic and tan breeches were well-cut from rich fabric, embroidered with knots around the fastenings. His boots shone, his belt was bright.
His horse was good though nothing exceptional. She and Garton strode over to meet him, leaving the other men and horses on guard by the barn. She noted there was no metal on his person, no jewellery, no belt buckle. Not even a knife. Even his horse’s harness was entirely leather and wood.
His servant was a scruff on a hairy cob, the heavy-bodied pony more suitable for pulling a cart.
Garton bowed smoothly and she curtsied, moving the sword out the way of her dress. Skirts and swords were sometimes an awkward combination.
The man dismounted and returned the salutation. “I am Priscus Intandle, Thaumaturger-in-Ordinary of the Lord Regent’s Academy,” he said. “Here in the village of Casterbrook in response to the request of the county examiner.”
Garton nodded in reply. “Garton Sky of Humbledown, deputised by Lord Wild, empowered to keep the peace and do justice.”
“A Cornlander,” said Priscus. Whether he knew Humbledown, had detected the remnants of an accent or perhaps had heard tell of Garton he did not say.
“Aye, though I have been in the service of Lord Wild these fifteen years now.”
Priscus looked him up and down. Fifteen years said that he had served during the late war and Garton was a man whose status could not be neglected. He turned his eyes onto Eliza.
“My daughter, Eliza Sky,” Garton said, introducing her.
“Sir,” she said, dipping another half-curtsy.
“Indeed,” said Priscus, and a sly smile broke out on his face. “Let me introduce my daughter, Julia Intandle.”
The scruff holding the horses was revealed to be a young woman with cropped hair. Eliza snorted; for once she was not the most outrageous of women present. Garton gestured and Davin lurched over from the barn to take the reins.
“Shall we,” said Priscus. It was not a question. The two men entered the barn, their daughters behind them.
It was an old barn, one more part of the landscape than something built by the hand of man. There was a wall missing. During the storm two days ago the river had burst its bank. The waters had not reached the centre of the village, which stood foresightedly on a rise above the water. They had reached out and undermined the corner of the barn. There they could see a body.
“Dead a long time,” said Priscus, looking at the staring skull. In the gloom of the barn his face was shadowed; the light streaming in through the broken wall blinded Eliza from seeing more. She squinted. Priscus spoke again “Though not, perhaps, so long as this barn has been standing.”
“Within living memory,” said Garton, from two paces back. “I have questioned the villagers.”
“Questioned?” Priscus was stooping, taking a look at the bones which Eliza knew had been gnawed by vermin.
“I questioned them gently,” said Garton. “None of them admitted to knowing this was here. Had they, would they have let the Franklin report it? If you could shed any light onto this mystery sir…”
Priscus gestured to his daughter who brought a leather scrip to him. He brought out a slate and chalk. “That is not my task. Should I call up a spirit of the air, or the revenant of this poor soul to question them?”
Eliza shuddered and Julia looked her way. After her mother died and the war had come she had joined Lord Wild’s train as her father’s servant. She had been there on the day the three wizards clashed, seen a regiment of the enemy become insect-men and Aulus the Royal Seer sacrifice himself to summon the Juggernaut. She had no wish to see great magics again.
She knew Garton had similar feelings. When he spoke he was firm though he used soft words. “I would not seek to instruct you as to your own tasks. I have responsibility for the temporal matters, and you those of the supernatural. If I have found out any intelligence that might illuminate your work I will gladly share it with you.”
“I see.” Priscus was sketching the bones. “Quite so. Do you know if this is a sacrifice, or the death has evoked a curse? The bones appear fully human. Have the villagers anything to say on it?”
Garton looked to her, so she brought out her tablet. “They disclaim all knowledge of the corpse sir. I have my chronicle to read here.” She frowned. The light was too poor to make out the wax marks even with the missing wall to let in the sun.
“Could it have been a wayward traveller who took shelter in the wall space of the barn and died there?”
“It seems unlikely.” Garton touched the skull with his boot, rolling it over. A single straight break could be seen down the back. “This person was killed.”
“Violent death.” The first words from Julia. Her voice was deep and cracked.
“Go and get my athame,” said Priscus briskly. He moved a shattered piece of wood aside to let the sunlight in. He frowned at a gleaming brooch revealed in the middle of a star-shaped rust mark. It almost seemed to shine with an inner light. “The extracts of the Voluntary Codex, find the notes on the fool’s gold ritual.”
“Sir,” she said.
“Allow me to accompany you,” said Eliza.
They returned to the sunshine. “You carry a sword,” said Julia.
“You dress like a servant,” said Eliza. “A servant boy.” They smirked at each other, having got the obvious topics out of the way.
“Is this your usual work then? In the service of Lord Wild?” Julia waved her arm, taking in the half dozen riders she and Garton had brought, the villagers staring from the common, the whole waterlogged scene. She splashed as she stomped through a puddle.
Eliza avoided the water. Julia was no servant; someone who had to clean their own boots would not be so careless. “My father serves at Lord Wild’s pleasure. His lordship has tax collectors and bailiffs, judges and marshals for the usual work. When there is something that is out of the ordinary it is my father that he sends to act.”
Julia nodded smartly, her shaggy hair bouncing. She greeted the horse, cautious in a way that made Eliza worry for the gelding’s temper. “I see. Garton Sky is the man who deals with the uncanny. And you accompany him.”
“The unusual, that is for sure. For the uncanny, usually, the church will send a thaumaturger.”
“Indeed.” Julia was rummaging through a saddlebag. “The Lord Regent sponsored the college to encourage the study of natural and unnatural philosophy after the late war. He has commissioned my father to ride on a circuit of the eastern counties to… oh damn.”
“Allow me to help,” said Eliza. With her holding the unneeded items the search was much quicker.
The thaumaturger’s presence here was politics. The Lord Regent extending his control with secular wizards, enabling him to deal with the supernatural without the aid of the church.
Sometimes Eliza wished that she did not have to understand these matters. Yet if she did not how then would she be able to keep her father from trouble?
Julia had found the items she was looking for, a blunt-looking knife of stone and several parchment scraps covered in cramped writing. Eliza returned the items in her hand to the saddlebag. “Here we are,” said Julia, apparently in no hurry to finish the errand. “Two maidens who assist their fathers in their masculine roles.”
“Here we are indeed,” said Eliza. “Though the war has made many women the heads of households and left many men to care for their children. I am not the only armsman who wears petticoats, nor you the only scholar of the fairer sex.”
“Ah no, no scholar I.” At Julia’s modest denial, Eliza indicated the parchment. “I have a passing fair hand for scribing and can do my sums I hope.”
“Both the common script and the glyphs of High Ferrin,” noted Eliza. “The stones on the common have glyphs too, and Casterbrook is said to have been the place the elfboats came to land, meeting travellers on the elfway, in the time before the kings came to these shores.”
“Is that so?” said Julia, looking out at the grey stones, standing sentinel above the villagers.
“So I am told. I can only read the modern tongue, and my letters are a terrible scrawl. Which is a blessing or I would be secretary for my father as well as treasurer.”
“You keep your household accounts?” said Julia, brightening at this topic.
“I keep the company accounts,” said Eliza proudly. She indicated the banner her father was entitled to, a stylised silhouette of the white monolith of Humbledown superimposed on scarlet. It leaned over slightly where it was planted and Brak strolled over to straighten it. He was not the usual standard-bearer. “Thanks to the Lord Regent’s peace we are depleted in numbers; still I ensure that eight files of armsmen are fed, equipped, and paid in due time.”
“What methods do you use?” asked Julia. “I was taught the Leonine calculations at the college. Yet merchants of my acquaintance prefer the two-entry system described in the Summary of Arithmetic.”
Eliza frowned. “The copy of the Summary in Lord Wild’s library is very poor. There are missing chapters and it has errors throughout. My methods are taken from The Perfect Merchant, of which Lord Wild has two editions. It discusses the moral and spiritual aspects of the art of trade, and uses these to derive some most practical methods.”
“Ah!” Julia smiled at this. “Perhaps if we remain in the county I can read them. And offer in return the opportunity for curious copyists to see my Summary.”
Eliza thought to accept the invitation, and suggest that they might discuss the arrangements over a cup of good wine when their conversation was interrupted by a terrible crack, as though Providence itself had broken the bowl of the heavens.
“Where is she?” boomed a voice. The two women turned and stared.
Above the barn was a figure wreathed in blue lightning. Clad cap-a-pied in armour finer than Eliza had seen in all her days. A shining suit of plate. White armour they called it when it was polished to perfection.
When she blinked the image remained in her eyes of a gleaming figure in the sunlight.
“Providence and bloody saints above,” declared Julia, dropping the items in her hand.
Priscus’s voice could be heard rising. Eliza could not understand the words. Julia swore again.
“Is that she? My sister gone but a quarter-century? How dare you lay your hand on one of the Ironhearted!”
Ironhearted. A name from myth and legend. The ancient rulers of the Iron Empire, who left this world yet retained their claim to it. Who punished those who breach their incomprehensible rules; punish in such a way that farms and towns are burned.
She felt Julia’s hand grasp her sleeve. “Not the sword,” Julia said.
Her instincts and training disagreed. She had one hand on the twine-wrapped grip, the other on the chape of her scabbard as she broke into a run.
She felt light, her feet barely touching the ground, her belt slipping from her hips and rising. She drew.
The sword flew from the scabbard and ripped out of her hand. “I told you,” screamed Julia. “Not the sword! A lodestar adept can use metal against you!”
Ironhearted. The nails in her boots, the buckle of her belt, the various oddments about her – her knife was trying to dig itself under her ribs as she grasped it with her off-hand. The horses screamed, their tack and shoes pulling at them.
The men were all crammed against the wall of the barn, held there by their armour and gear. So much metal in an armsman’s equipment. In this emergency, the poorest peasant would be better.
Or they would if they were here. The common was emptying. The brave men of the county had been marched off to war these ten years past and many of them never came back.
She was disappointed there were so few brave women in the village.
“Stop!” yelled Julia, almost in her ear. It was hard to hear over the constant crackle from the other side of the barn, the cries of the men and the duelling chants of the Ironhearted and the Thaumaturger. “Mistress, I beg you stop.”
“Stop?” she cried. “My father…”
“Needs our help, but you have lost your sword and will be killed to no purpose.”
Eliza supposed she was right, though all women die in the end. If you were going to do so it might as well be beside your family. She could fight; take a lump of firewood or a fencepost as a cudgel. Was there a light spear somewhere, the head small enough to be held firm against the force of the Ironhearted’s power?
If there were it would never penetrate that superb armour.
“What can we do?”
Julia pointed at a rack alongside the barn that was covered in fibre or twine or something. A memory surfaced. Casterbrook had fishing rights on the river.
It was a tool and to hand. A tool is a weapon her father said. Also, it is not the weapon that makes the warrior but the warrior that makes the weapon. Good words, fine words, not always easy to follow when you try to pull loose a damp, sticky net. Harder still at the moment an armoured man – Brak – is being thrown over a barn to land at your feet.
Julia flinched, but Eliza ignored him. Brak was dead or he was not and what mattered was the net.
She had her end free, slightly bundled. It was too big for two people to handle easily, but she didn’t think the screaming men would be much help. Julia got her last snag off and it swung down between them.
“We only get one chance at this,” said Eliza, voice normal, loud enough for Julia to hear but impossible to make out on the other side of the barn if Providence was with them. Julia nodded. “So we get as close as we can, hidden from sight by the barn. Then forward at a run, no stopping, not for demons nor horror nor your father dead on the ground.” That last was harsh and they could still make out his voice, but it was bloody here, and would be worse over there and Julia needed to be ready for it.
The other woman’s face hardened. “Right,” she said.
“Make sure of your grip now,” said Eliza, taking her own advice and shifting her hands. “Check your footing. We want it slack but not dragging between us until we are close enough then a step away from each other and the net will be taut. We knock them over, onto the ground. Then stay back! Full armour can take a blow that would put a man down. And hitting the steel does more damage to you!”
“I can fight,” insisted Julia, as the two women moved apart, bringing the net off the ground. “The Ironhearted are arrogant to the point of madness. They – she – will not stop fighting simply because she cannot win; indeed she will not believe that she has lost even when defeated.”
“I have known men like that,” said Eliza. “Well then. Follow my lead if you please mistress.”
There was an anguished yell from the other side of the barn that ran up and down Eliza’s spine. The chanting of the thaumaturger choked off into a gurgle and Julia almost stumbled. The two women exchanged looks and, drawing strength from each other, ran towards the corner of the barn.
Eliza reached it first and gasped “Wait,” before sticking her head around the side.
Her father Garton lolled senseless on the floor; beside him was Priscus the thaumaturger. Surrounding him were bits and pieces of metal, a bolt, a broken blade, a part of a plough, a V of clear grass beneath him. He was on his knees, holding his throat.
Before him was the armoured figure, one hand outstretched. As she watched an iron skewer flashed by as their arm twitched, then it slowed and turned aside to land on the grass beside the man.
“Cursed wizard, answer me. Who did this to my sister?” The voice was clear, the accent unusual. The hand twitched again and Eliza could see the brooch from the barn hanging from it.
She was a yard and a half off the ground. Eliza didn’t think that they could throw the net that high and catch her.
She tucked her skirt into her belt and then tied one net corner by it and climbed the barn.
It wobbled under her weight but she had no time for that. The planks were rough and there were holes for her hands and feet. This would work. Despite being dragged back by the net – Julia tried to take the strain off – she made it to the thatched roof.
“Come on,” she said, lying back on the straw, digging in her boots, and heaving the net. Julia practically flew up to a spot a couple of yards over to let the net hang between them. The two women awkwardly got to their feet, one hand on the roof, the other clutching the net.
“She’s in the air, just over from the edge of the barn,” said Eliza, a phrase that struck her as exceedingly novel. “I’ll take the peak.” She began to climb as Julia moved across, towards the end of the barn.
They would get one chance. Had she said that already? She stopped when she saw the top of the helmet shining in the sun. A purple halo danced around it. The Ironhearted was demanding answers again.
She looked at Julia who nodded. They spread the net and then Eliza stood up straight. The two of them ran forward, “Humbledown,” she yelled, as good a battle cry as any.
The armoured woman spun in the air, and began to rise, reacting faster than Eliza thought possible.
With a crash they came together, Eliza still above, a hand striking her in the thigh, spinning her around. To the left of her enemy, and she was still grasping the net.
She dangled from her hands for a moment, then her boots touched the ground. Julia was getting up, grabbing the net, and racing around them.
“What, have, you…” began the Ironhearted, and Eliza gathered herself, let go of the net, and leaped up to grasp more of it. Her weight dragged the armoured woman down.
“Stop this.” She sounded almost puzzled as she tried to raise an arm. The net held it against her side. “Let me go.”
“Look out,” said Julia, and Eliza dropped flat. The Ironhearted began to rise but the metal ploughshare that she had pulled towards them hit her in the legs with a loud clang, denting the metal. She let out a yell and spun over, tangling herself still more in the net, ending up lying on the ground.
Eliza got up, feeling her belt pulling her, her boots dragging her. As the Ironhearted raised her helmet from the ground she leaped forward, landing on her back. She reached for her knife.
Gone. So much for stabbing through the eyeholes. Something struck her on the shoulder, something else clanged off the armour next to her. She couldn’t let her up but if she stayed here she’d be smashed by the flying iron.
She seized the helmet in both hands and drove it down into the soft ground as hard as she could. “Eat the dirt,” she growled, leaning low over armour as bits of metal hammered at her. “Bury yourself in the earth.”
The figure shuddered and one arm broke free of the net somehow, an inhuman strength to it. Perhaps metal magic combined with powerful muscles. The armour was not articulated to let her reach behind her. Eliza felt a numbing blow to the ribs; she had nothing to do other than force the helmet down, squeeze the soil in through the eye slits and breathing holes, suffocate her with the dark earth.
Perhaps the Ironhearted panicked or perhaps she calmed down; in either case she found some strength from somewhere. Her whole body lifted, purple sparks flying from the armour. Eliza screamed in frustration.
“Watch out! Get off her!” It was Julia’s voice and Eliza had time to realise that she had already decided to trust her unquestioningly. She had let go and rolled aside at the words, before she had begun to think.
The iron nails in the barn had been pulled out, at least one was stuck in her arm. Without the nails, and with the broken wall, and with all the iron in the structure being pulled towards them – and perhaps two grown women climbing and jumping off it – the barn had given up all claim to structural integrity. As the Ironhearted rose up the barn fell down to meet her.
She was hammered to the ground. Eliza almost managed to get away, was hit a glancing blow, and collapsed. “Oh,” she said.
Julia went to her father; he had been caught around the throat by a thin leather cord with metal weights on. He had deflected the metal and been strangled by the cord. It was loose now and he lay on his back rasping. Eliza did not begrudge him getting aid, but she did question the other woman’s sense of priority. She struggled to her knees. She considered getting to her feet. It seemed too hard. She shuffled over.
The planks and thatch that had been a barn shifted. She really needed help for this. “We have to find out.” She choked slightly in the dust, settling into the damp ground. “We have to see. If she is alive. Because if she gets out she will kill us all.”
Priscus mumbled something, which Eliza hoped was agreement, because she was damned if she could do this herself.
She did not. Some of the men could walk and work, and she had them at it ruthlessly, though not so hard as she worked herself. Under the wreckage was the armour. When they uncovered it she carefully hit the helmet twice with a heavy stone, then a third time. Then they stripped the armour from the Ironhearted.
Julia insisted on treating Eliza’s injuries and she had no strength to argue. She saw her father. He was pale; a broken arm and leg and ribs would do that. “My daughter has the command,” he said to the men before they gave him the poppy juice and he slept. At another time she’d have given much to hear those words.
They had the peasants build a cage of wood and they moved the prisoner out of the village, away from any metal. When she awoke she groaned.
“Would you tell me your name?” said Eliza politely.
“Would you tell me yours? For you shall rue the day you laid hands on one of the Ironhearted.”
“I am Eliza Sky of Humbledown, daughter of Garton Sky. And though you did not lay hands on my father, you struck him down nonetheless. Perhaps I shall rue this day, yet I will not be the only one.”
The Ironhearted snorted. “What care I for your father’s woes?”
“Mayhap,” said Julia at an indication from her father. “Mayhap had you asked gently, he would have told you what we knew. How we had found the body of your sister. And we have questioned the villagers again and one told us how a strange woman came here begging shelter, and they gave her leave to stay. And that night a giant with a black sword struck her down and so they hid her remains. And then you would not be in this state.”
She looked with contempt at the wooden bars. “He should have answered. He should have bowed and offered deference. He should have offered service and fealty.”
“You did not give him time to parley. And he is sworn to Lord Wild, not to you!” Eliza growled in anger.
“All this world is ours,” said the woman.
“It is not. Only this cage is yours. The world of men belongs to us.”
“The world of men?” She laughed now, despite the dried blood and bruises that covered her face, despite the thin shift that barely covered her in the cool breeze. “I do not fear the men of this world. Though I will admit to having some respect for the women.” She shook her head, concealing a wince. “You claim this Lord Wild commands you? Then it is he I should deal with. Take me to him.”
“At last we agree.” Eliza turned and walked away towards the cart that had been hastily dismantled and rebuilt with wooden pegs in place of nails.
Priscus grunted and Julia translated. “She is a dangerous prisoner.”
“Yet prisoner she is. It is for Lord Wild to decide what to do with her. Hanged over water perhaps.” She looked idly at the two beside her. “Or ransom, if a herald could be found who knew the way.”
“A parley with the Lodestar lords,” said Julia thoughtfully. “That would be quite an adventure.”
“Indeed it would.” And who would Lord Wild choose to escort such a herald? Eliza Sky and the magician’s daughter if she had anything to say about it. “Indeed it would.”
©April 2022, Neil Willcox
Neil Willcox lives in South East England where he has worked on a fruit farm, in local schools and in the back office of insurance companies. He has previously appeared in Bear Creek Gazette and The Sirens Call. He can be found online at nightofthehats.blogspot.com.