The Vampire & Her Witch

Finally, when the voices died down and Gilander confirmed that he’d noted down each man’s wager, Owain raised his sword. The blade whistled through the air, sinking into the elk’s flesh with a meaty -THWACK!- as it bit deep, nearly to the bone on his first overhand strike.

But Owain wasn’t done. He flowed smoothly from one cut to the next, using the force of pulling the blade free from the first cut to add strength to the second. The lowest bet from the gathered lords and knights had been seven swings. Owain only allowed himself four to expose the spine and after that, a final, fifth swing to sever it.

Fallen Claw glittered in the fading afternoon light as Owain swung it in a powerful, overhand blow, aimed precisely at the gap between two vertebrae. Then, with a faint -CHUNK- sound, the head came free.

Reynold and Franc staggered under the sudden shift in weight as the body dropped away, but they held their grip on the antlers, hoisting the severed head between them while blood streamed from the stump and pooled in the moss below.

From somewhere behind Erling, Serge Otker let out a ragged cheer that cracked in the middle and turned into a cough. A few of the squires joined in, Riwall’s voice among them, and even Sir Franc allowed himself a brief, tight smile as he helped Reynold to hold the head aloft.

Owain cleaned Fallen Claw on the elk’s flank, inspecting the edge with the careful attention of a man who valued his tools. Whatever he found seemed to satisfy him, and he quickly returned the blade to its scabbard.

”Sir Payl Gawne,” Gilander announced loudly. ”With a wager of seven blows, you’re the closest. We’ll look forward to your company at the high table tomorrow,” he said with a genuine smile. Ever since the younger knight had been injured, opportunities like this came his way far too rarely.

Now that his boys were growing older, it would be good to give the man a chance to share a meal with his liege lord once again, even if the celebrations were bound to be dominated by the barons joining Owain at the high table.

Owain smiled politely at the crippled knight, though he wished the prize hadn’t gone to someone quite so useless. Still, the man had come to the hunt when he called despite his old injuries, and Owain supposed that alone was worthy of a small reward.

The same couldn’t be said for everyone who had come to the hunt, however, and the smile faded from his lips as his gaze found Baron Erling Fayle.

”I’m told the elk’s ear was nicked by an arrow during the pursuit,” Owain said. His voice carried the conversational lightness that Erling had learned to recognize as the sheath over something sharp.

It was the exact same tone he’d heard Owain use at the lodge when cataloguing the absences of the Dunns, the Hanrahans, and everyone else he felt had slighted him by missing the hunt. Pleasant on the surface. Cutting underneath.

”Was that your arrow, Baron Fayle?” Owain asked politely, even though he clearly already knew the answer.

”It was, my Lord,” Erling said. ”The elk charged toward Lord Serge and Lord Tulori at the rapids,” Erling explained. ”I used a signaling arrow to redirect it, and a broadhead to discourage it from turning east. The nick to the ear was... unintentional.”

”A signaling arrow,” Owain repeated, letting the words sit in the air the way a man might set a questionable coin on a table and wait for someone to claim it. ”And a broadhead that managed to wound my quarry without bringing it down.” He paused for a moment, tilting his head as he considered the youthful-looking baron.

”So you’re saying that Lord Serge and Lord Tulori were so inept in this hunt that you needed to come to their rescue?” Owain asked lightly, though there was nothing light about the look in his eyes as he said it.

Serge Otker turned a shade of red that was impossible to miss, even in the fading light of the afternoon gloom. Suddenly, everyone noticed his mud-stained finery and the undignified position he occupied riding behind Tulori Leufroy on the same horse.

”Isn’t it the duty of a senior knight to watch over his juniors?” Erling replied, doing his best to sidestep the trap Owain had laid out for him. ”I think we’re just fortunate that no one was injured, and I missed the elk’s head. It would have spoiled the hunt if my arrow had accidentally found the elk’s eye or temple instead of its ear, don’t you think, Lord Owain?”

”You have a remarkable talent for getting close to your target without actually hitting it, Baron Fayle,” Owain concluded with a dismissive snort. ”One might almost call it a gift.”

A few people laughed at Owain’s ’praise’ for the Coward Baron and around the hollow, there were a number of mutters about Erling’s strange bow and his refusal to hunt demons when Lord Owain had summoned him to do so.

No one, it seemed, felt like Baron Fayle could have delivered a killing blow with his bow, even if he’d wanted to, and the notion only grew funnier the more people piled on with the rumors they’d heard about him in years past.

Erling said nothing. He let the mockery wash over him the way creek water washed over the stones in the rapids, smooth and indifferent, and waited for the current to carry it downstream.

”My Lord,” Gilander interjected, stepping forward with the professional smoothness of a man who had been redirecting his lords from awkward moments for longer than most of the men present had been alive. ”We have perhaps two hours of light remaining. If we are to reach the lodge before full dark, we should begin the return.”

”It is late, isn’t it?” Owain mused, looking briefly at the sky overhead before giving Baron Fayle a final, dismissive glance. ”Then we should hurry back to the lodge. Tonight, Lord Reynold and Sir Franc can take the seats beside me,” he said as a faint smile appeared at the corners of his lips.

”I’m sure they both have plenty of stories to tell about their own conquests,” Owain added. ”Perhaps we can all learn a thing or two about the sort of man who will shine brightly in the battles to come...”