The Bloody North (The Fallen Crown) (4 page)

The farm was quiet save for the chickens wandering freely by the ruins of the house, clucking. Rowan sat on a fallen tree trunk at the edge of the wood, polishing the edge of the blade – though truth be told, he'd never once known it to be blunt.

We've been through some shit times. But none
as shit as this. And I never thought I'd be carrying you again,
he thought as he regarded the shining metal. It had never lost its lustre, not after all those long years.
What a fool I was to think we'd be parted for long. Two old friends reunited again.

He looked about. The sky had turned a sickly yellow colour, heavy and oppressive.
Ripe with thunder in its belly.
I had a home here. A life. A fresh start.

The stone scraped along the sword's edge as he worked it back and forth. Sat the way he was, hi
s back burned, but he welcomed the pain.

A shame the cut never got infected. A shame my blood didn't turn green and kill me. Would've been better than waking to find them all gone.
Everything I had, burnt to the ground.

"Nothing for me here now," he muttered
aloud. The agony and pain he'd felt before, the crushing grief, replaced by a simmering anger. A fury he was having trouble keeping at bay. It was there in the pain up his back, the wound still fresh. It was there in the way the stone worked the cutting edge of the blade, keeping it sharp. It was there in the way the sky looked ready to split apart in a chorus of electric explosions. All of it and more.

Time to move on,
Rowan thought. He got to his feet. Looked back down at the house.
Wish I could've got them out of there. Wish I could have died with them.

Then he thought:
Maybe I did.

* * *

The village heaved with people by the time Rowan walked sorely back. Horses tied here, there, and everywhere. Scores of men, some drinking in Ceeli's tavern, some outside, others finding food and supplies from the village folk before they moved on. None of them dressed in Regiment uniforms.

Royalists, all of them.

Tarl walked toward Rowan and steered him off to the side. "They're all asking about you up there."

"Who?"

"All of 'em. They say the King's dead. They're carrying on the war in his name, even though the top brass have made deals to stop the fighting. They heard what went on down here. They say it was Breakers what did it."

Row
an nodded once. "Yeah."

"Don't know what they want with you,"
Tarl said.

"Think I might," Rowan said and carried on toward the tavern,
Tarl in tow. All eyes turned to follow him as he strode in, none of them aware of the way his back was singing. Or that he was doing an admirable job of hiding it.

"Rowan
 . . ." Ceeli started to say from behind the bar.

"Giv
e me a beer, will you?" he asked her. A space had been made for him at the bar, men moving aside to let him through. Let him get a drink. "I need it. One for Tarl, too."

"Here you are my luv," Ceeli said.

Rowan said his thanks, lifted the tankard and took a hearty swallow. It felt good. Tarl did the same next to him, though he eyed the tavern nervously as he drank. He hadn't asked about the sword so far. But it was plain as day there, hanging from his belt.

Hasn't noticed it. Why would he? He's a simple farmer. Never been in battle. Never killed anyone,
Rowan thought.
He's a good man. The real deal, not just someone playing at being one. Like I had.

"You Rowan Black?" a voice asked from behind.

Rowan took another draught of his ale, set it down and turned around. "That's me. Who's asking?"

An older man held his hand out. He wore leather armour, had a long grey beard
, and stood nearly tall as a ceiling beam. His weathered hands were covered in tattoos and scars. Rowan took notice of the heavy sword at his hip. A man from the far North, by the looks of him. "Name's Larch West. But most just call me Larch."

The two men shook as e
veryone else looked on, idle chatter dwindling away to be replaced by curious silence. "You been looking for me?"

"Heard what happened up at your place. Real sorry for
that. Wife, and kiddies too, eh?"

"Yeah," Rowan said bitterly.

Larch shook his head slowly. "A sorry business for sure. Makes a man want to do something about it, don't you think?"

"What're you saying?"

The older man's eyes sparkled. Young eyes in such a worn, craggy face. "I heard of you, Rowan Black. Way back in the day. A young man who grew up in the South, ended up working with a dark woman from the East. Bonnet and Black. Ice in your veins, the pair of you," Larch said. "Packed it all in and disappeared, disbanded, was what I heard."

"You heard right," Rowan said.
"Decided that way of life weren't for me no more. Tried to move on. Didn't get far."

Larch glanced down at the sword hanging from his belt. "But ready to get back to it, I reckon. Especially after wh
at's happened here. We could use a man like you, Mister Black. Not just a man with ability, but a man with purpose."

"
That so, huh?"

"Bonnet and Black this,
that and the other. All the time. People know your name, and looking at you, now, I know none of it's bollocks," Larch said. "We've got a spare horse out the front; needs a rider if you're so inclined to join us. Help drive these Breakers back. Get us a King back on the throne."

Rowan stood. He looked at
Tarl. The man's eyes pleaded with him not to do it, but Rowan did anyway. He shook Larch's hand again. "I'll go, but on the understanding you know why I'm riding with you. I want to find the bastard who killed my family. I couldn't give a shit about this civil war, or the King, or whoever takes his place. But I'll do what's needed till I get my revenge. On that you can depend."

"Fair enough son," Larch said.
He sipped his beer. "Fair enough."

* * *

"What're you doing?" Tarl asked outside. He looked down at the sword. "And where'd you get that from?"

"Had it from years ago," Rowan said. "Deep down, I
always knew I'd use it again. There's no escape sometimes."

"Escape? Escape from what? I don't understand, Rowan. I don't understand any of it,"
Tarl said.

Rowan laid a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Listen mate, there's a lot you don't know. A lot you wouldn't understand. I had a different life before this place, and now it looks
like I'm going back to it."

Tarl
swallowed.

"You've been good to me you have,
Tarl. I won't ever forget it. But I've gotta move on. I've gotta try and find this Quayle. My wife . . . my son . . . and my daughter won't ever rest if I don't," he said, choking back the grief as it welled up again from inside. "I gotta go back to the sword. It's the only thing I have left."

"You don't have to do this, Rowan. There's another way,"
Tarl said, taking a step back.

"No," Rowan said. "
There's not."

"What will you do with your land?"

He shrugged. "You have it. Do something good with it. Don't matter to me anymore. None of it. Everything I loved is turned to dirt now. Maybe you can do something with it, make something grow there."

"I don’t know what to say," Tarl said, confused. His eyes kept drifting to the sword.

"And that’s okay, my friend."

* * *

Rowan pressed gold coins into Ceeli's hand. She shook her head, tried to hand them back. "No! I won't accept them."

He held them firm in her palm. "Take them. You'll need what you can get in the tough times ahead. This country's going to tear itself apart."

Ceeli's eyes searched his. They widened when they found the hardness there. "All right."

He turned to Tarl, shook his hand. "You've been good to me, Tarl. I won't forget it."

"It's still not too late for you to change your mind," Tarl said. "Stay here and rebuild what you had."

Rowan
carefully, painfully got himself up into the saddle of a brown mare Larch had given him. "Some things can never be rebuilt."

"I wish
it weren't true," Tarl said.

As do I,
Rowan thought.

"Take care of your family."

"I will."

"Goodbye to you, Rowan Black,"
Ceeli said as he turned to leave the village he'd called home for years. "And good luck."

"
Thank you both. I'll come back this way, when I can," Rowan called.

He never did
.

Three
summers, three winters . . .
Rowan thought as he looked at the others.
Look how we've changed.

They
gathered in a forest clearing south of a wide valley. Larch with his big arms folded in front of his chest as he spoke. Their horses tied up a ways from the huddled men, stamping their feet impatiently. At one time, to hear Larch's men ride into town was to bear witness to thunder breaking the earth. Instead, they found themselves diminished both in number and morale. Spending so long fighting a war that had already been lost –
decided by those who'd pledged their allegiance with Wagstaff in the beginning
– they had become little more than a posse.

"The
civil war is over," Larch declared. "The Royalist's have lost. The Breakers have managed to do everything they set out to do. Turn this country upside down. Try as we might to win it all back from 'em, it didn't work. They whipped us, so they did."

"Ain't
that right!" one of the others, a tall chap by the name of Fin, chimed in.

"'Tis," Larch agreed. "And as much as it's not how I saw all this playing out,
that's the lay of the land. We're the last rabble in these parts trying to keep it going, keep fighting the good fight, and for what? I think maybe it's worth rethinking it all. Considering where we stand in the grand scheme of things and seeing if we still can't come out of this with our heads."

"What d'you mean?" Rowan asked, looking up at him
from where he sat, whittling a bit of a wood with his small knife. "Give ourselves up?"

"Nobody's saying anything about surrender.
We wouldn't be prisoners. But I've heard talk, and I've seen evidence of it. They're promising amnesty to any who go join 'em. All we gotta do is ride on down to the valley yonder, mark a sheet of paper, and all's forgotten. We can move on. Just like the rest o' Starkgard."

"Sounds an
awful lot like surrender to me . . ." Rowan said.

"Does a bit, Larch," one of the other men –
Drury – agreed, his one good eye looking out over the rest of the crew. "We ain't stood down yet."

"No shame in calling it a day,
when the day is done," Larch said resting his heavy gaze on Rowan. "We can't keep fighting them forever."

Rowan got up. "I can," he said and stalked off. Larch continued talking
as he walked away, his deep reassuring voice convincing the others to go with him, to change sides. To turn their backs on all they'd been through and give it up, once and for all. The world had moved on, it seemed. Starkgard had seen civil war and now it was ending – their sole purpose in staying together ending with it. But he was still no closer to finding the son of a bitch who'd killed his family and crushed his chances at a normal, peaceful life. Three summers and three winters and all he had was a name . . .

Quayle.

Rowan stood under a great big elm and lit a pipe. His back hurt sometimes – the scar from where he'd been cut was a constant reminder of the past. He leaned against the trunk, wide as a man across, and thought on things. Rowan had not had any of the blood he set out for. And the fire down below, the furnace of hell deep inside him that had made him ride along with the Royalists in the first place, still burned.

It
was the house his kids had perished in. It was the smouldering ruin of his hopes and dreams that had kept him going while the seasons drifted by like leaves in autumn.

But what Larch said was true. They were outnumbered. The King was dead and the bastard
Prime Minister Wagstaff they'd come to call 'High Protector of Starkgard' ran the land in his stead. One monarch replaced with another. It would take an uprising on a huge scale to turn things back the way they'd been and that was just impossible. Futile as trying to stop the great axle on which the world turned.

Larch's deep
bass came from the clearing. ". . . way I see it, you can either go with the flow or drown. Well, I don't know about you boys, but I reckon I've got a few years in me yet. Right now, after all we've been through, I just want to live in peace . . ."

Rowan sighed. He
looked at the pipe in his hands, pressed it to his lips, and drew heavily. The old man talked sense. Of course he did.

All support for the Royalists had gradually died away, as Wagstaff either won the obedience of those who'd opposed him, or swept them away in the process. The King had never been a good ruler. But to remove a monarchy altogether, to restructure the entire country according to the Prime Minister's own grand design
 . . . well, Rowan didn't see that as a step up. Sounded a lot like a dictatorship to him.

But in the face of such odds, t
here was a definite argument to be made in favour of hanging up their armour and accepting the status quo.

But
that'll never do for me. I can't stop the hunt. I won't, not ever. Not till I've had my pound of flesh, soaked my hands in Quayle's filthy blood. Bathed in it. Used it to wash the misery away.

He he
ard footsteps from behind and looked to see Larch plodding toward him through the tree. "Watchya kid," he said with a lopsided grin, same way he always had. "Got any left?"

"Here." Rowan handed him the pipe and watched him smoke. "Better?"

Larch nodded and gave it back. "Yeah. I needed that."

"I reckon you're right. Suggesting what you are," Rowan said.
"Probably for the best. For the men."

"But y
ou don't agree with it," Larch said. "You believe we should fight till the bitter end."

Rowan shook his head. "It's not
that, Larch. You know this was never about a civil war for me. It wasn't ever about who we were fighting against, whose side we were on. It was about catching the cunt calls himself Quayle and stringing him up by his nut sack. Making him pay. For me this has always been my sole motivator. It's not changed."

"I know."

Rowan looked up at the pale sky. "Will the others go along with you?"

"I think so,"
Larch said. "I think they see our fight's over. We're a small band of outlaws fighting a lost cause. It's not worth it any more. We're swimming upstream and growing weaker all the time. Look at our number. How many we've lost. These men deserve better."

"True,
" Rowan said. "Not one of them I'm not proud to stand next to in a fight."

Larch nodded.
"What about you, Black? You going it solo from here on in?"

"If I have to," Rowan said. "If it kills me, I'll find him
, Larch. Bleed him out like a pig."

The older man
stood before him, looked him straight in the eye. "I know you will," he said in a growl. "I've never doubted it. The infamous Rowan Black. The man who took Cabril and defeated the Butcher of Clement. Son, I'm proud to say I rode with you a while. And mighty sorry we can't go no further."

"
Larch . . . you're not worried the minute you lot show your faces down in that valley they'll shoot you through with arrows?"

Larch shrugged. "
They might yet. You know that. Chance we gotta take. That or be the hunted the rest of our lives, however long or short they turn out to be."

"Fair point
."

"Listen, Rowan
 . . . you sure you don't want to rethink all this? Give up the chase? Come with us. You can settle someplace else, start again," Larch said. "Rowan . . .
you can live
."

He
smiled at the thought. "A nice dream, that. But it's all it is," his smile steadily faded. "A dream."

Larch accepted this, didn't say anything further
on the matter. "Like I said, I'm proud to have had you by my side these years," he told Rowan before he returned to the clearing where the others chatted among themselves in low voices. Leaving Rowan to smoke his pipe, look up at the stark black branches against the pure white sky. Alone with his thoughts.

Winter coming, and with it the first
of many snows. Starkgard was a rough country, made all the worse covered in feet of snow and ice. But if he had to go on alone, he would do. There were no second chances, no wiping of the slate.

Quayle stole his life.

Soon as he caught up with him, he would take his.

* * *

"Don't suppose I'll be seeing you again, Rowan Black," Larch said as he got his gear together to lead his crew down to the valley.

"You take care of yourself,
" Rowan said, offering his hand.

They shook. "I will," Larch said.

"See you around, mate," Fin said as he walked past.

"And you."

The others trampsed past him, each offering their good-byes. Drury, Raul Bigfist, Cleaver, Softly Jenkins, Fin Burrowes. All of them, one by one.

They
no doubt think I'm a fool not to go with them. But only Larch understands why it's not an option for me. I don't give a shit about the war, never did. Just hoped to find Quayle and his men, was all. I'm not quitting on anything. Handing myself over to the other side.

"Keep yer pecker up,"
Raul Bigfist called back at him.

They plodded off through the trees,
what remained of Larch's crew. What had started as a small outfit when they first recruited Rowan steadily grew to a small army of nearly a hundred men. Again, reduced to a small handful.

E
verything had come full circle.

Larch did not look back. None of them
did. It wasn't the way they did things. He'd come to know that. No looking back. The only one who had was Rowan.

Off in the trees the horses whinnied.

"Yeah, I know how you feel," Rowan said.