Callum 

The weather was perfect for an ambush.  

Gray clouds hung low over the moors, limiting nature's contrasts to a blend of monotone beiges and dulled greens. A man barely cast a shadow underfoot in this gloom. Still, I was grateful. Despite the clouds, it had not rained in the last few days. The dry weather meant the always-wet moors were only tugging at our boots rather than sucking them into the muck. 

Traveling the rough terrain slowed us down and took more out of the men and horses than sticking to the road, but it was necessary to keep hidden. Behind me, forty-seven of my best fighters waited for my order. 

“Halt. Take twenty minutes to rest and get ready for battle.” I dismounted and handed the reins of my horse to my squire, Janyck.

On the other side of this hill lay the fortress of Breccia. 

I climbed the hill till the grasses gave way to rocks and the towering gray crags. It was an ungainly climb in a full suit of armor – I needed my hands as much as my feet to make it up – but removing the layers of steel would have been more trouble than time would allow. With a final rattle and clank, I stood at the top behind a boulder and looked down at the fortress. 

The cool autumn wind brought a hint of rain, but its relentless push left my eyes dry and sore. Next month would be the fifteenth anniversary of my father’s murder. Within the fortress below two of the three people responsible for it were gathered together. I could not let this chance slip by me.  

Three times, I had tried to get my hands on the Earl of Verbodine. Three times, my father’s murderer had slipped away from me like a slimy eel. 

I had received word from my spies that he would be here with the Marquis of Breccia, the witness I needed to prove Verbodine’s crimes. I also learned a Bondsman had been called. The two lords must be embarking on a new venture. No good could come from them working together again.

Breccia was a relic from a past age built with the strength of the ancient weavers to withstand their brutal wars. Its great wall and keep still stood the test of time and battle with large gray cut stones so tightly fit you could not slip a piece of parchment between them.  

Verbodine slipped up when he chose Breccia. The peaceful era of the last hundred years had lulled its lords to neglect its upkeep. The village within the walls could only be called shabby by an optimist, the farmland beyond looked too small to support the size of the keep, and the orchard prematurely bare for this time of year. The Marquis was known as a vain lord who preferred the delights of the Javroan royal capital of Elistan over his duties to his people and land.

Just as the scouts had described; the north tower, a poorly designed addition, had fallen sometime in the last few years. No effort had been made to clear it away, leaving a precarious hill piled to the top of the forty-foot wall. That would be our entrance. 

“Callum, the gruffs be ready,” Jaspar called out as he scrambled up the rise to reach me. “The boys are still tussling over who gets to ride ‘em.”  

Jaspar Cresces, at fifty-four years strong was the oldest among us. As the Knight Commander of Truehorn Duchy, he led and cared for our army like the father of a hundred sons. A stalwart man built like a tree; he had served my father before me and taught me what it meant to step into my father’s shadow and lead.   

“Their orders have been set no substitutions,” I said firmly. “They best check their codpieces. They are in for a bumpy ride.”  

Gruffallops were monstrous creatures. Taller than a horse, covered in wool thick as a bale of hay, and two huge horns forming spirals as hard as a battering ram. They looked like a goat had mated with a moose. Native to the high mountain range at the center of the continent, we had taken a long detour to secure the use of four bulls. Baron Moretti, who lived more like a madman than a lord, was trying to domesticate them. He raised gruffallops for their milk to make a foul-smelling cheese he adored, which he forced on anyone who dared visit him. 

“You’re sure I shouldn’t ride with the vanguard?” It was a childish impulse, much like the knights I had just admonished for trying the same. I never asked my men to do what I would not do myself, and riding a bucking gruffallop to seize a castle would make for one hell of an adventure.  

“I will be riding at the head of the vanguard,” Remi declared in a huff as he hiked up to make our conference a trio. “Whatever would we do if our dear Duke got bucked off one of the mad creatures and split his precious head open?”  

Remi, wore a shit-eating grin as he waited for my response. My best friend and right-hand man. He excelled with the sword, but his big mouth, bigger ego, and quick temper made him as much a liability as an asset. But, on the battlefield, there was no one better to have at your side than Remi.   

“You’ve a duty young Duke,” Jaspar, ever the voice of reason, “wait for the gates to open. Enter in triumph rather than as a fool, like this one.”  

“Hey!” Remi interjected.  

“Aye,” I accepted before Remi could start a fight. 

Duty. A four-letter word most foul. 

I devoted my life to duty in all its myriad forms: to the Dukedom, to my widowed mother and younger sister, and to the legacy of my father. Duty had fallen on my shoulders when I inherited the Truehorn Duchy at twelve years old. I devoted myself to fulfilling my duty, even if it meant leaving the fun to others. 

“Tighten your helm and say goodbye to your balls, Remi,” I said and shot a crooked smirk at him. “Ready the gruffallops!” I called down to the rest of my small force. “It’s time we show these lords how the Scarlet Blade Knights earned their name.” 

They replied with a hurrah in low, hushed tones and fists raised. Jaspar whacked a friendly hand on Remi’s back. The force of the blow nearly sent Remi tumbling face-first down the hill. I reflexively looked towards Breccia fearing the sound of clanging metal would carry all the way to the walls. Remi and I glared at him even as a few knights below chuckled at his antics.  

Jaspar shrugged it off with a smile. The big old knight was a Strength Weaver, born with the ability to thread mana into his muscles to increase them exponentially. He conveniently forgot the extent of his power far too often. But he had done what he most likely set out to do, create a moment of levity to take our minds off what lay ahead and shake out the cobwebs of anxiety.  

“Are you ready for this lad?” Jaspar asked.  

“I am ready to be done with Verbodine. I am ready to make him face his crimes.” 

I was ready to pick him up by his skinny neck and hear the bones crack.

Eyes forward, I focused on Breccia. The fortress looked quiet from here. Only a few slow-moving forms wandered the walls. It looked at peace and lightly guarded. I lifted a sunstone over my eye and looked to the sky through wavy transparent crystal until I found the faint glow of the sun hidden behind the thick layers of clouds. It was nearly at its apex, if they were to use a bondsman to form a woven knot between their houses it would be now. 

“It's time.” 

Jaspar folded his hands over each other in a complicated-looking knot of intertwined fingers and blew between his thumbs to make a sharp whistling cry mimicking a hawk. A minute later another cry came back from across the moors. Morretti and his small team were in place and ready.

Remi slid back down the hill to the gruffallop he would ride. Four men were needed to hold each gruffallop's head down to secure the makeshift reins we created from knotted rope tied to the base of the horns. Old iron poles had been cut to size to make the bits. The final touch would be a stick with a rope used to dangle a ball of bait in front of the beasts to encourage them to move in the right direction. It wasn’t pretty, and neither beast nor man would find it comfortable.

The plan had taken shape five days ago out of too much whiskey and frustration in the little hours before dawn. Despite its inebriated beginning, the foundations of the plan were solid. The stones of the fallen tower were as large as a horse, so naturally a horse could not attempt the climb. A man could do it, but too slowly; making for too easy a target and too many losses. The strong hindquarters of the mountain-climbing gruffallops should make quick work of the stones–if their riders managed to hang on. Once inside, the gruffallops would create chaos in the fortress while the knights of the vanguard raised the gate. If all went well, we would simply ride in with minimal bloodshed.   

We tested our theory two days ago under the supervision of Baron Moretti. Taking turns competing to ride the beasts up a small rocky cliff behind his home before he would even agree to let us borrow a few of his beloved beasts. After a series of trials and failures, ending in a not-insignificant number of bruises and dented armor, we decided to use two men to an animal: one to direct the beast and dangle the bait, and the other to keep them both seated. If all went right, we would reach the fortress long before they could mount a proper defense.

“Spare the innocent when you can, but keep yourselves whole,” I called out to the knights and men-at-arms before me. Several, like Jaspar, were old enough to have served my father before me. I knew them all by name and the deeds they had done for the Duchy. “Move fast, protect each other, and we will triumph this day. For Truehorn!”  

They answered my speechifying with another hushed hurrah and echoed cries of Truehorn. Mounted and ready, I waved to Remi and he took off on the first gruffallop with Holwick behind him. They rounded the crags and raced down the sloping hill. The three other gruffallop teams followed behind in a rough run with a skipping gait that tossed the knights about like rag dolls on their backs.   

I should thank Jaspar for talking me out of joining them.