Chapter Four

Reign of Terror

"The Purgers are on the move!" Wylder yelled.

"Where?" I asked, jumping up.

"Clement. To the south. The family's got some spurious connection to Countess Giselle who they took last week."

"A friend of a Countess living in Clement?"

"Hardly a friend," he answered, shaking his head. "More like the Countess' former servant. Left her service ten years ago, but that doesn't matter to the Purgers. They've got a name and that's all they need. Come on!"

I grabbed my sword as I hurried for the door with the other revolutionaries, buckling the weapon on as I went. I was getting used to these sudden calls to action. I assumed it was something like being in the military, and that was what we were slowly becoming; an army. Not a large army, or at this point a particularly effective one, but an army nonetheless; the Revolutionary Army of Duke Wylder—although he was no longer a Duke and also preferred to play down his own relevance, preferring to think of it as the ‘People's Army'.

Until our numbers and our strength were greater, there was no point in moving against Balduin, it would be a futile gesture. The plan to assassinate Master Nicolo remained, but Nicolo knew he was a target and no one was more careful—and that meant we had to find the right opportunity. Until then, the revolutionary army could do little but wait.

It had been Wylder's idea to use this frustrating downtime in a productive fashion. Woodfall Gath was living through a reign of terror, under which no man felt safe for himself or his family. The king's guards patrolled the streets, enforcing curfew and cracking down on the ever-expanding list of draconian laws brought in by King Balduin—so many that even the guards themselves had trouble keeping track, let alone the people. The guards worked on the principle that everyone was guilty of something, so if you looked at them funny or they didn't like the look of you, then you'd be arrested. Simple as that.

Then there were the Purgers. They operated mostly at night, and most people didn't know they were the subject of a Purger inquiry until the flames started to lick around their beds. Some died of smoke inhalation without ever being able to answer the charges that were being brought against them. The Purgers didn't represent the law, they were the bloody fist of the king's brand of ‘justice', a justice that existed for him and no one else. It went without saying that Wylder and I and everyone else in the revolutionary army were the targets of the Purgers, but so were our friends, our families, and anyone we'd ever spoken to. They were guilty by association.

If you expressed the opinion that things had been better under the Old Queen, you were guilty of sedition and the Purgers would find you. If you were lucky, they'd kill you, because even being burnt alive was better than being taken back to their dungeons. If you'd spoken to a dissenter in the last week or so, then you were in as much danger as they were. The Purgers weren't really trying to stamp out dissent or bring everyone into line under King Balduin, their job was to create an atmosphere of fear and mistrust, so everyone was too afraid to rebel. In a month or so it might stop, and the relief of the survivors would be such that they would be grateful and might even start thinking, ‘ Good old King Balduin, what a merciful monarch to have called off the Purgers '.

These were the day-to-day dangers which threatened everyone who lived in the Castle Complex. You might be a bit safer in the outskirts, but not much, the Purgers roamed everywhere and overlooked no one. Not even Master Nicolo himself was above suspicion, and while Nicolo could order the guards about, no one but the king himself had control over the Purgers. They were their own law.

It was this atmosphere that Wylder sought to improve however he could. And, of course, I supported him.

"What's the point in being a revolutionary army if you don't occasionally make life thoroughly revolting for the king?" he would comment with a smile.

Wylder was an old soldier. He'd served Queen Nell in some nasty campaigns and had the scars to prove it. He was one of those men who expects to come to a violent end, and while he'd rather do so on the point of a sword than in the dungeons of the Purgers, he wasn't afraid; he would fight because it was what he'd always done, what his father had done before him and what generations of Wylders had done.

"They were probably a bunch of bastards," Wylder commented. "Ancestors have that unfortunate habit. They look good at a distance and it's nice to have their picture on the walls, looking all sorts of brave, but they're not men you'd want to have a drink with."

Someone you wouldn't want to have a drink with was a pretty damning insult when it came from Wylder. His army had initially been filled almost entirely with men he'd be happy to have a drink with, until someone suggested that if he wanted to be more effective, he might want to expand the criteria to include such minority groups as the poor and women. The poor and women were people against whom Wylder held nothing specific—they were the ‘ salt of the earth ', after all, but just not ‘his sort'. He got over this minor prejudice quickly and, to his nominal credit, would now have a drink with people who didn't know which fork to use (and in fact preferred to use their fingers). He'd even have a drink with those unfortunate enough to be born without a penis.

So, with this army at his disposal, rather than having it sitting around and waiting, he determined to put it to good use and, at the same time, give its inexperienced soldiers some battlefield training.

"This way, your Grace."

"You sure, Lummock?"

"Aye, your Grace."

"Please stop calling me that, Lummock."

"Sorry, your Grace.

"‘Sir' will do nicely, thank you. This way?"

"Yes, your Grace."

The members of the People's Army came from all over the Gath and so brought with them an unrivaled knowledge of its warped and ever-shifting geography. Various kings had commissioned definitive maps of Woodfall Gath but they were invariably of little use as people kept making alterations to their homes and businesses.

Roads moved, alleys came and went, one enterprising street had dammed the river to change its course so they could extend the local tavern. What all of this meant was that there was no such thing as an accurate map of the Gath, particularly when you got off the main thoroughfares, so the Purgers stuck to those large arterial roads to get where they were going, marching along in torchlit procession while people hid in their homes.

But the revolutionary army had its own living maps, stored in the heads of the ordinary people who had joined up. We knew every back street and knew where every backstreet had moved to make room for ‘ that new shed what Charlie put up to please his missus. He calls it a ‘tool shed' but we all know it's an extra privy cos his mother-in-law what used to live in Crammer has to have her own on account of her trouble '. Wherever the Purgers were going, we could get there faster. We seldom got news of where they were going to hit until they were actually on their way, but nine times out of ten, we could cut them off.

"How do they do it, Charlotte?" wondered Wylder, as Lummock led us through the maze-like network of the back alleys.

"Same way you used to find your way through your castle," I replied. "Back when you had a castle, anyway. They live here."

"Point taken. Do we have any word on numbers?"

"Otto said there's twenty Purgers and they've brought a troop of guards along as well."

Wylder nodded with a frown. "Guards eh? That's new. And that's more Purgers than usual, as well."

I nodded because it was true. "They're getting wise to us."

But Wylder shook his head. "They're expecting us. But getting wise? I doubt that very much. Not a one of them has fought in a war."

Another distinctive character trait of former-Duke Wylder was his devotion to the cause of peace, balanced against a palpable disdain for anyone who hadn't been through a war. He wasn't a violent man as such, certainly not a cruel one, but he was only comfortable when in conflict; it was what nature had designed him for. Though he was nobility by birth and still observed the social niceties where possible, he had taken to the life of an outlaw like a fish to water because it gave him the opportunity to be at war when there was no war officially on.

We reached the house of the ‘dissenters' before the Purgers and Lummock went in to warn them, while Wylder turned to me.

"You know what to do."

I nodded. Though in Wylder's eyes I had the natural setbacks of being female, a commoner, and a lack of experience when it came to war, Wylder appreciated my training. And I liked it that he now turned to me for certain jobs. My skill at moving through the Complex unseen had made me the de facto scout, and I turned now to head down the street to see how long we had until the Purgers arrived.

But as I turned, I felt a tingle up my spine, a sixth sense many assassins develop during training, telling them that something is wrong. That sense was immediately followed by a sudden glint in the corner of my eye, as of torchlight on the head of an arrow.

"Wylder!"

I hurled myself backwards, tackling the revolutionary leader to the ground (no mean feat as Wylder was a large man). The arrow sang over our heads a heartbeat later and smacked uselessly into a water butt.

Wylder and I didn't waste time with the usual ‘ Thank you ' ‘ Don't mention it ', we were both scrambling up on the instant as that first arrow was followed by more, firing more indiscriminately now, targeting both the building and the revolutionaries. Some of the arrows were flaming and as one landed in the thatch, the house began to smolder.

"Get to cover!" bellowed Wylder, standing amongst the hail of arrows with that air of the indestructible that some generals have. "Charlotte!"

"I'm going!"

I knew my job. Get close to the Purgers and take out as many as I could. My days as an official assassin for hire might be over, but I knew how to kill, and when men were firing flaming arrows into the homes of the innocent, then I was happy to do it.

"Charge!"

Before I could get behind the archers and start to pick them off, the troop of guards accompanying the Purgers charged out of the darkness. There was no way they'd just arrived; no, they'd beaten us to the house and then lain in wait for us. This whole operation wasn't about the people in the house, though, it was about quashing the revolution, and particularly Wylder himself, who was now drawing his sword and leading the charge the other way. I fell in beside him, my own sword drawn. Not so long ago, Nicolo and I had stood shoulder to shoulder like this against Wylder's men. Funny how quickly things could change.

The Purgers being what they were, the volleys of arrows didn't stop just because they were now also firing on their own men, so we fought in amongst the blazing shafts dropping from the night sky.

"There," I heard Wylder growl and looked over at a door leading to a building along the upper floors. Many of the arrows seemed to be coming through that doorway.

We both charged for that point, meeting guards coming the other way. I fought in my usual style, playing to my agility, dodging and weaving while parrying, then getting under my opponent's guard to deal the final blow. Wylder didn't have the strength of his youth, but was still a strong man and used a combination of wily cunning and bludgeoning strength to beat down his opponent.

"Go!"

I was across the space in a moment and diving through an open window. The man who had been left to guard the door startled and was in time to see my throwing knife but not in time to avoid it. He dropped and I ran for the stairs, moving swiftly but quietly as only an assassin can. I didn't know how many archers were in this house, but the faster I got to them, the more lives I could save, which was a powerful motivation. The man in the first room didn't hear me coming and never heard me arrive. A peaceful death. I took his bow and remaining arrows and used them on the next few. The fourth heard me coming and I narrowly avoided the arrows he shot at me.

"Rebel in the building!"

Great, now I'd get to find out how many of them there were as they all came for me. But, on the bright side, if they were all trying to kill me then they weren't trying to kill my friends or the family that Lummock would be trying to get to safety. I gave thanks for small blessings.

In the confined space of the corridor that ran along the top floor, I had the advantage of being better able to swing a blade, and the fight against that fourth guard would have been a short one if his friends hadn't shown up as quickly as they did, penning me in and forcing me back into a room. I tried to cover the door while glancing back to the window. The street below was still full of guards and Purgers, Wylder and the revolutionaries still holding their ground before the house.

"Get her!" Came the cry from the corridor.

It was closely followed by. "Why don't you get her?"

"You're always saying how you live the for the fight."

"Yeah, and I'd like to carry on saying it!"

While they were arguing over who was going to fight the girl who'd already killed three of them, I heard Wylder's voice from outside."

"Recall!"

He didn't like the word ‘retreat' so we were merely ‘recalled', but it amounted to the same thing, it meant that the family had been rescued and we could now make a dash for it, having inflicted another bloody nose on the Purgers and their mission.

I loosed the last two arrows I'd borrowed through the open door, making the Purgers think twice before following me, then ran to the window. The street was out of the question, still filled with enemies, so I reached up to grab the roof and haul myself up.

"Up there!" yelled a voice from below.

Damn it.

I just managed to get up onto the roof before the first arrows landed, nipping at my heels as I ran up the slope and then skidded down the far side in comparative safety. I put a few more buildings between the Purgers and me, before dropping into the darkened streets and vanishing off into the night to make my way back to our hideout.

It would be a lie to say there wasn't some sense of exhilaration after the fight and the chase, the same sort of feeling I used to enjoy in training at the Guild. But those feelings were fast tamped down by the reality of the situation. Back at the revolutionary base was a tearful family whose home was now burning to the ground and who, through no fault of their own, were now looking for somewhere else to live, knowing they were being hunted.

And the Revolutionary Army hadn't come away unscathed.

"Three," said Wylder grimly. He shook his head. "During the war that was what we would call an acceptable loss. Hell, I lost a damn sight more than three men under my command on a bad day. But those situations were different; they were real wars with professional soldiers. Not peasants and kids fighting for their lives because they've been left with no choice. There's no glory in that."

I wasn't convinced that there was ever much gory in the business of war, but I took his point. There was a difference between those who chose to fight and those who had run out of other options and fought in the hope of a future which they had once taken for granted and now could no longer see.

There were injured too, tended to by whatever medical staff we could come by. Our best doctor was the man who'd used to take care of Wylder's stable of race horses, who had a habit of using phrases like ‘ He'll be taking the jumps like a champion in a week or so '.

"My lads," regardless of how many women now filled out the ranks or how many of the men were older than Wylder, he insisted on referring to all of us as ‘ my lads ', "it's been a hard one. They gave us a bloody nose and our only comfort is that we gave them a worse one back. But that's small comfort to those in mourning. The names of the dead will be carved on our memorial wall and I shall inform the families personally. This is the price of war. But there is a prize too, and there's a family of seven who would have been burned alive were it not for all of you and for the sacrifice of our fallen comrades. The price is high, but we pay it for a reason. Still," he held up his hand, reaching the point that all his post-battle speeches reached, "you are not soldiers, you are not mine to command off the battlefield. If any of you wish to leave, then you may do so, knowing you have done your bit, served the revolution well, and that you go with my thanks. There is no guilt. You all have families, and the reality of this is a hard one to stomach."

For all his military blather, Wylder was a decent soul at heart.

A few took him up on his offer and left, but they would be replaced by new recruits who would have heard what had happened today and wanted to help. That was the cycle; those who heard of the revolution wanted to join it, and those who saw it firsthand wanted to leave. As long as the former outnumbered the latter then our numbers grew. But slowly. We needed more soldiers to be able to make our move with confidence.

Little victories like saving a family helped. It was one family among many, but it all helped when so many were under threat.

As the thought occurred to me, I couldn't help wondering and worrying about Nicolo. Was Balduin still out to kill him? Might Nicolo come under the suspicion of the Purgers? Would he ever learn the truth about Balduin and about me?

Nicolo was the last person I should have been concerned for, but I couldn't help myself.

I still cared.