They came out to find a wounded Tomis. The bowman was clutching his side where a bleeding cut had taken him. At his feet was a ruffian, stabbed in the neck by the dagger in the bowman’s hand. Along the alley, four more men lay, their bodies precisely stuck by arrows that had cut their charge short.
“Can you run?” Lucan asked without pause.
“Aye,” Tomis answered with a stoneclad face.
Lucan turned to Ryder. “Take us on a different path out of here.”
His second man-at-arms nodded and rushed forward. They followed him, Tomis holding his side, and Georg sheltering Venn under him. They wouldn’t fare well if they were encircled in the open. They took a right as they came out of the alley, and he saw a few scattered men eying them with true hostility.
One of them charged Ryder, and the man-at-arms cut through him without slowing down. Tomis loosed an arrow at a man jumping at them out of a window, and Lucan saw him missing for the first time since he’d met the man. The arrow struck the wooden beam of a large house, and Lucan wondered if this whole affair would send the guard after them. But then again, they wouldn’t be the only ones after them once this was over. The Green Scars should be well and truly provoked now.
Lucan bashed the head of the man who avoided the arrow with the pommel of his sword as the latter landed, and they continued their flight unimpeded. They took two turns, a long run, and another turn before they found themselves in a dark street, unmolested.
“Where to now?” Ryder asked.
“To the inn,” Lucan said. “We will get our belongings and leave.” The sky was already starting to gain some color, and he imagined that sunrise wasn’t far off.
They rushed back to the inn, and once there, they gathered all that they owned. The innkeeper was nowhere to be found, and Cedric only stepped out of his room to peek at them, giving a concerned look to Tomis, who was injured, and a curious look to Venn, who’d been beaten black and blue. At last, Lucan exchanged a silent nod with him before the freeblade returned to his room.
They rushed out of the inn without delaying further. The sun was already rising by then, and Lucan told Ryder to lead them to the market square.
Cutting through familiar streets and alleys, they reached it just as folk were beginning to arrive, with some merchants already there with their stalls. Lucan brought Ryder aside. “Go to Master Orin and ask him to bring urgent—No, do not say urgent. Tell him to bring word to Mistress Yanna. Lord Zesh will take her offer to stay in one of her family’s taverns.”
Ryder nodded solemnly, and Lucan continued, “We will be waiting here.” He looked at the alley they’d taken as a home for now. “Once she sends word back, return to us.” Another nod, and the man-at-arms was gone.
Lucan turned to Venn, who stood in Georg’s shadow. The boy had been quite tame on their journey so far, particularly since Lucan had told him that he would be asking him some pointed questions upon their return.
“Now, it is time that I get some answers.”
With their lips forming thin lines, both Venn and Georg stood silent.
Lucan bore down on the boy. “Who is this girl that man was asking you about?”
“Ah…um,” he stuttered, looking at Lucan with some measure of guilt.
Before Lucan could pressure him more, Georg jumped in to help Venn. “She’s the one who has the Orb.”
Venn’s head bobbed like a chicken’s, nodding at the words. “Yes…she…she has the Orb.”
Lucan raised a brow, his eyes searching both of their faces. There was an oddity here. Something that he didn’t know, and this lie was the last straw. “And who is this girl?”
Venn shook his head. “Only a girl who found the Orb.”
“Where is she then?” Lucan asked.
“I don’t know.”
“They seemed to think that you did.”
“They are fools.”
Lucan hummed with a finger on his chin. “I see, I see. This whole affair is indeed foolish, particularly the instance where you sent me to save your friend.” He gestured at Georg.
With an ashen face, Venn bowed his head. “My apologies, master. I thought there would surely be something of use there. I did not kno–”
“You lie.” Lucan’s face was a hard mask. He’d been led by the nose, and he had only his own greed to blame, but now he would have answers. When he’d met Georg, he’d thought he was trying to hide the truth about the Orb from him when the adventurer feigned ignorance, but perhaps he had been ignorant. Perhaps he’d known of no Orb, because there was no Orb. An Orb somehow changing hands in town without the Guilds smelling it out was already something that many would consider a tall tale.
“Speak the truth to me now,” Lucan said, his voice low but dangerous. “Who is this girl? What are the Greenscars chasing? I have saved your life. I have saved his life.” He pointed at Georg. “And now I have to run like some rabid mongrel fleeing a hunter’s axe.” Seeing the boy growing even more ashen but still refusing to relinquish the truth, Lucan nearly lost his temper. “Speak!”
Georg began, “He was on–”
“If you answer a question in his stead one more time, I will have your mouth stuffed with leather,” Lucan snapped, glaring at the adventurer. Then he stepped forward, looming over the boy.
In response, George stepped even closer to Venn. “You shall not hurt him. I may be starved to weakness, but I will fight you in this alley, and I might yet make enough noise to bring the city guard.” He leaned over the boy and whispered, even as Tomis stepped forward with the hand of his uninjured arm on his sheathed dagger. “Tell him, Venn. He is a good sort, as good as can be in this world.” The adventurer glanced at Lucan. “I am certain that he has some of that honor nobles claim to own.”
Venn closed his eyes, and when he opened them this time, they were wet with unshed tears. “I will be your servant. I will care for your horses. I will clean your privies, your latrines. I will…I will…” He dropped to his two knees, weeping now. Lucan frowned, taking a step back. “Teach me. Teach me to use a weapon, and I will fight your enemies too.”
“What…” Lucan shook his head, confusion interrupting his anger. “Why?”
“I will be your servant,” Venn said, his back bowed. Still on his knees, he looked up at Lucan. “I will work like a slave, I swear it…if you will save my sister.”
A soft breath escaped Lucan in spite of him. He shook his head again, glancing at Tomis, who seemed as inrecudlous as he was. “They’re after your sister?”
Venn nodded slowly, his eyes dead in their sockets, as though any hope within them had been defeated a thousand times over.
Lucan narrowed his eyes, though he wasn’t unmoved by the boy’s tears. After all, not long ago, he’d been trying to save his father, and at one time, he’d been as willing to shed tears and beg for help from others. “And where is she?”
“Now? I don’t know, but we can find her much faster than they can, I know it,” Venn said, some light coming to his eyes. “Will you help me?”
Lucan cocked his head. “Why are they after her?”
Venn grew rigid again, shaking his head after a pause. “I cannot tell you.”
Lucan squeezed his eyes a tad narrower. “Why?”
Venn simply shook his head again.
Lucan scoffed. “The Green Scars know what they pursue, yet you will have me pursue this blind. And you ask that I save your sister?”
“Please,” Venn said.
“I demand your sincerity,” Lucan said. “You have lied to me once already. I will not be blindsided.”
“Please,” Venn pleaded.
“Why?” Lucan said, staring down at the boy, despondent. “Why do they want her? Why will you not simply tell me, Venn?”
Venn answered, his voice breaking, desperate. “Because if I tell you, you will want her too.” And then he cried.