Beinn 5.8
Massoud breathed heavily as he leaned against the rock watching the troops below clean up and dispatch the remaining victims. Too much had gone wrong with this in order for him to feel any sense of victory or elation. The entire ambush had been handled sloppily and it had all started with the oaf next to him who bungled things up by launching too soon. Then there was the interesting occurrence down below with Elspeth. He had seen from his vantage point the apparent magic that had caused Elspeth to miss her target. It all fit together quite nicely and that was the problem wasn’t it? If there was one thing Massoud had learned it was not to be too trusting of coincidences, and other measures of good fortune. If a caster had been in the group then it made sense. But why, Massoud thought to himself wasn’t he wearing the robes of a caster, and why was he grouped with the guards and not the nobleman who was their target? There were of course answers to those questions but they required a bit of a leap of faith and the game Massoud was playing didn’t allow for such luxuries.
He turned to the archer and spoke, “You, come here.” He decided to make this man his liaison with the group and ignore Andrew, who he saw as completely incompetent. The archer stood at his side, clearly attentive. “Who here is your best tracker, and do you have any Ranger’s in the group.”
The archer looked over the team quickly, “You,” he said pointing at one and gazing over a few more, “You. Both of you come here.”
They walked and stood in front of Massoud. “These are the best?”
The master archer nodded his head in the affirmative.
Massoud satisfied, made a note to find out more about this archer as he was clearly quite impressive. He spoke to the two. “Did you see the lone rider leave back down the pass?” They both nodded that they had so Massoud continued. “I want you to bring him back to me, alive if you can dead if you must.” He reached into his cloak and pulled out a purse heavy with coin. “A hundred gold for you both if you succeed, fail me and forfeit your lives.”
The gold was high motivation to them both, and they saw it as an easy mission for such a high price. The chance of failure seemed miniscule. “Done,” they said and they were off.
Impressive thought Massoud. For a team so skilled why had this gotten bungled in such a fashion? There was a mystery here to solve and he had no time to do so. He turned to the archer and spoke so softly only he could hear, “Ready your bow and when I give the word fire as quick and as true as you are able. We will have only one chance and I am in no state to defend either one of us.” The archer nodded, and nonchalantly unslung his bow and put an arrow in it. He held it in such a fashion as to look completely at ease.
The team began to break up and chaos reigned for a bit. After a good ten minutes or so the team from below came into sight. Elspeth was in the lead, smiling and laughing with the men she had led. She was a mere fifteen yards away when Massoud turned to the Archer and whispered, “In her kneecap.” The arrow was flying before Massoud had finished speaking and Massoud realized the archer had not been boasting at all about his abilities. He was a master indeed.
Elspeth cried out and crumpled to the ground. All eyes were on Massoud and he realized the situation could turn ugly all too quickly if he didn’t assert control immediately. “Back all of you”, he said in his best command voice. He strode up to the crumpled woman making all back down by the strength of his presence. Glancing back to the archer he motioned for him to follow, which he did.
“Why,” she managed to get out?
“Because it was all too neat Elspeth, because one got away, one who was a caster, in a land where such are coveted possessions, probably worth more than he whose life we took.”
“You are a fool Massoud,” she spat out between spasms of coughing. “This is easily explained. It is no more than a coincidence.”
Massoud cut her off, “I don’t believe in coincidence,” and with that he turned to the archer and said, “In the throat,” and walked away savoring the sound of an arrow pinning Elspeth to the ground. He should have felt good about the outcome but far too many questions had been surfaced, not the least of which was what had really happened down there.
Leave a Reply