The Sword Maiden

After It All

There was a ringing silence as Daxton lowered his sword.  Blood dripped from the blow he'd dealt Megidil on his head.  Keeping his boot on the sword, Daxton smacked Megidil's sword hand with the flat of his blade.

Megidil yelped and yanked his head away.  Keeping his sword leveled to his enemy, Daxton caught the guard of the blade with his foot and shoved it out of Megidil's reach, then walked around to pick it up.  While he was doing this, Mr. Lotcin was striding over, with Redwar close behind him.

Mr. Lotcin stooped down, grabbed Megidil by the collar of his filthy shirt, and pulled him up.  Megidil stared wide eyed in the huge miner's livid face.

"You will die."  Mr. Lotcin's voice left no doubt of the fact, and it was more than just his anger talking.  It was law in all the Seven Clans of Thathia that kidnappers were either executed or given a life sentence of imprisonment and hard labor, depending on who they'd tried to kidnap.  Mr. Lotcin looked like he was thinking about using his pick-axe on the bandit leader, but instead, he shoved him down in the dirt and turned away to pin his furious gaze on the Mayor of Time's Tale.

The Mayor was looking stunned, as were his Sheriff and deputies.  As the hoard of miners turned to face him, he swallowed several times.

"Mayor Tale!  I give you one chance to explain yourself!"  Mr. Lotcin demanded.

Mayor Tale raised his hands.  "I didn't know they would try to kidnap your wives and children!  Nor did I agree to it!  They were only supposed to go after you."  

"Because of your greed, you brought women and children kidnapping thieves in our town!"  Shouted out one miner.  An angry murmur surged through the crowd, and the Mayor took a step back. 

"Hold."  Mr. Lotcin's voice brought calm.  "Mayor Tale, you're unfit for the office of Mayor.  We'll have to examine you 'n a trial, but for now, we'll put you 'n your Sheriff and deputies on house arrest.  Carl, David, grab some friends and take these men to their 'omes."

I didn't pay attention to what happened to the Mayor after that, because a grunt behind me caught my attention.  Rubbing his jaw and moaning, it was the thug that Mr. Lotcin had hit.

I pressed my lips together, chiding myself for my inattention.  He could have stood up and sneaked on off if Mr. Lotcin hadn't clocked him like that.

But before I could do anything about him, a miner stepped over and grabbed him by the back of his collar.  He dragged the man off towards the direction of the jailhouse.  Copying his example, other miners dragged off Valeria's and Redwar's defeated opponents.  Derrek's had to be picked up and carried, blood dripping from him, and I wondered just what had happened...

I looked down at my blade.  It was not stained with blood, it'd had no chance to draw any.  Reminding myself to check it over more thoroughly later, I sheathed it.

Mr. Lotcin himself took Megidil to the jail.  Redwar waved at the rest of us to come to him.  Derrek was still looking stunned as he slowly made his way over.

I wasn't so slow, anxious to reach my brother.  When I did, I put a hand on his shoulder and shook him.  "Hey, are you alright?"  I scanned him for injuries and didn't see any external ones.

He jerked his head in a nod.  "Yeah.  Sure."  

That was nowhere near enough to convince me, but I couldn't question him more just now, because Redwar was leading us away from the crowd.  

Redwar led us back to the tavern, which was currently empty of everyone.  Even Mr. Time had left. 

He turned to face us.  The tension among us was evident.  We were all still buzzing from the rush of the fight, and that made us jumpy.  Only Redwar seemed to have at least a semblance of calm.

"Well, seeing as we don't have anything else to attend to, you can disperse and do whatever you need to do to calm yourselves down and think through what happened.  We'll meet again before supper to talk." 

I didn't need to ask what we would be talking about.  Redwar wanted to debrief.  He would pick apart the situation, asking us why we did what we did, why we thought that was a good thing to do, if we were right in our choices, what we did wrong, etc. 

I had every intention of using this time to talk to my brother.  Though the shocked look had faded, now he had a blank, stoic mask in its place.  That was the face he always put on when he didn't want me to know what he was thinking, planning, or feeling.  

But before I could speak to him, he brushed past and went towards our rooms.

"Derrek-" I started to go after him, but Redwar caught my arm.   

"Leave him for now, Ravine." 

"But-"  

He firmly shook his head.  "He needs to think and be by himself for a little while.  So do you."  His face softened slightly.  "I know you want to fix things for him, Ravine, but some things he must fix himself."  

I didn't even know what Derrek needed fixing, but as his sister, I needed to be there for him.  I pulled away and opened my mouth to protest, but Redwar again cut me off.

"Trust me in this."  

There wasn't anything else Redwar could have said that would have convinced me so quickly.  And he knew it.  I exhaled and nodded. 

"Go and calm down yourself, Ravine.  Derrek will be alright."  

I nodded again and turned to go out a side door which led to the stables. 

If there was anything that would help calm me down, it would be a certain bay pony named Axe.  He turned his head to me as I slipped into his stall.  The warm smell of hay and horse greeted me. 

"Hey boy."  I came up alongside him and stroked his neck.  He snuffled me before going back to eating on his hay.

The sound of his chewing was soothing in its own, peculiar way.  I placed my hand on his shoulder next to his wither and watched him.

For awhile, we just stood there together as he ate happily along.  The sunlight came in from the stable door and warmed my back.  The peacefulness was broken only when Axe stamped or swished his tail at a fly.

At first, it didn't seem like I could calm down at all.  My mind kept circling through the fight, Derrek, what Daxton had nearly done, Derrek, the fight...

But gradually, as I made a point to focus on Axe, the thoughts lost their power and faded.  I didn't have to deal with them right now.  

But soon enough, I would have to. 

AN:  Somewhat of a filler chapter, but I believe it could introduce some interesting things.  I'm hoping to be able to keep up with weekly updates again on this book.