Tol abandoned stealth. He got up, let out a yell, and charged, firewood held high.
He brought it down hard, smashing into Grane’s left knee. The articulated armor plates took the blow, and Grane’s right boot fell to the floor. The quilt covering him fell away and, in a motion that scared Tol half to death, his armored sleeve fell from the chair arm, clanging against the floor. A dark powder streamed from the boot and Grane’s sleeve.
Tol cupped his hand under the stream, filling his palm with cold grit. Black sand. The armor slowly collapsed as the sand poured out. Tol flung back the visor in time to see the empty coif sinking into the suit’s neck. There was no one inside the richly gilded metal. Stunned, Tol stood there staring at the rapidly deflating suit of armor.
Yarakin broke free of his tormentors and made for the door, howling for help at the top of his lungs. He flung the door open and dashed outside. Immediately he gave an inarticulate yell and snatched the saber from his belt. Tol heard the clash of blades, backed by a chorus of neighing horses.
With Grane’s helmet in hand, Tol ran to the door. The second Pakin soldier, the filthy one who’d caught him last night, lay facedown in the yard. Blood was pooling beneath him. Yarakin was trading frenzied cuts with a man in red-trimmed scale-mail. Egrin!
Yarakin jabbed at Egrin desperately. With power born of desperation, he managed to rake the tip of his sword down Egrin’s left cheek. Blood flowed, and the warden of Juramona gave ground, backing toward Old Acorn, who stood by the pigpen fence.
Tol thought of lobbing the gilded helm at the Pakin, but he wasn’t sure of his aim. The last thing he wanted was to hit Egrin.
Clutching the helm and yelling encouragement, Tol was startled to see his father come charging out of the house with Yarakin’s spear in his hands. He caught the Pakin soldier from behind and drove the spear’s bronze head in. Yarakin whirled, slashing at Bakal. The farmer leaped back, tripped on his unwound leggings, and fell against the cistern.
Blood streaming from his lips, Yarakin brought his saber up, but he’d reached the end of his strength. The sword fell from his hands, and his knees buckled. He was dead by the time he hit the ground.
Freed of their bonds, Tol’s mother and sisters spilled out of the hut, all talking at once. They converged on Bakal. Fortunately, Yarakin’s saber had barely nicked the farmer, making a shallow cut across his windpipe. A hair deeper, and he would have been dead beside his attacker. Ita bound the cut with a strip torn from her skirt, clucking worriedly yet proudly all the while.
Egrin shoved his weapon back in its scabbard and caught Old Acorn’s reins. While the warden tied his horse to the sty, Tol held up Grane’s helmet and cried, “Come inside, sir! Lord Grane!”
Egrin’s hand went to his sword hilt. “Is he here?”
“Yes! No! Well, some of him is!”
Puzzled, the warden followed him into the hut. They examined the empty suit of armor from coif to boots. Every lacing was tied, every buckle fastened. Even the frog at the neck of Grane’s cloak was still hooked. All that remained of the man inside was two hundredweight of fine ebon sand, drifted now around his sabatons. It looked for all the world like Grane had wafted away, leaving behind his fine armor filled with dust.
“I wish Felryn were here,” Egrin said. With the blade of his dagger, he scooped up a small sample of the black sand into his belt pouch. “He might make sense of this.”
Tol told of the sleep spell Grane had cast. Egrin nodded grimly. He’d realized Tol’s peril fairly quickly the night before and had followed in after him, but just as he got close to the hut, he’d fallen into a strange sleep himself. The Pakin on sentry duty had been a victim of his master’s sleep spell too. Fortunately, the sentry dozed in the shade, while Egrin had been awakened as the first rays of the rising sun struck his upturned face.
Outside, Tol’s father had made a tidy pile of the two dead Pakins and their weapons. The dead men’s metal and horses would bring a pretty price at the next trader’s fair.
Egrin left the hut with Tol, and both regarded Grane’s fine gray horse, still tied with the other two. The warden scratched his bearded chin in puzzlement. Lord Odovar would have to be told of these doings, and word sent to the emperor himself.
At his mother’s urging, Tol introduced his family to the warden. Tol’s family were awed that their son knew the warden of Juramona by name.
“You’re Bakal, son of Boren?” Egrin said to Tol’s father. “Those sound like dwarvish names.”
The farmer shuffled his feet in the dirt. “Folks say that, but my father was a man like any other. We do come from the highlands near Thorin, but we had no dealing with dwarves.”
“And you, good lady?”
Her cheeks colored. “I’m Ita, daughter of Paktan and Meri.”
Tol’s sisters, openly admiring the valiant warden, fetched him food and water. While Egrin refreshed himself, Tol brought water and fodder for Old Acorn.
Ita praised Egrin profusely for his care of Tol and his help liberating the farm.
“It’s nothing, lady. Your son and I are comrades,” Egrin said good-naturedly, clapping the boy on the back. “Saved my life, Master Tol did.”
Still deferential, Bakal asked why the warden had come in the first place. Was he tracking the mysterious Lord Grane?
Egrin explained the proposal he’d made to Tol, that the boy return with him to Juramona and become his shield-bearer.
Ever plainspoken, Bakal asked, “Why, master? Why our Tol?”
Egrin held out his hand to the boy, who was holding a bucket of water for Old Acorn. “I’ve seen your son face danger,” he said. “He’s a brave lad, with a cool head and sharp wits for his age. He could go far.” Egrin looked at his own calloused and scarred hands. “And he saved my life at great risk to his own. To become a shield-bearer is a great honor. This is my way of settling the debt.”
Bakal pondered. Tol’s leaving would mean a great loss of help around the farm, but Zalay and Nira were strong and willing helpers and soon would have husbands to help in the fields. The more he thought it out, the more convinced Bakal became.
“I’m for it,” he said at last.
Thinking of Tol’s departure, so soon after he had been restored to the family, set Ita to weeping. Egrin consoled her with talk of visits and gifts. Tol would earn a wage as a shilder, he explained.
Tol’s father called the boy over. “This excellent sir wants you to be his shield-bearer,” Bakal said. “What say you, son?”
“I say, yes!” he replied, and then ran to his mother, who was weeping harder now, and hugged her. He would have done the same to his father, but it no longer seemed like the thing to do.
His uncertainty lasted only a moment before Bakal put out his work-roughened hand. For the first time, father and son shook hands, in the way of men.
Two days later, on the road to Juramona, Tol was swaying uncertainly on the back of Grane’s gray horse. Egrin had left the other two Pakin horses and all the soldiers’ gear with Bakal to sell, but he’d taken Grane’s fine armor to present to Lord Odovar and had given the gray gelding to Tol. Scorched on the leather harness with a branding rod was the animal’s name, Smoke. Tol could not read, but Egrin told him what the letters meant.
Tol wondered why Grane had run; how had he known Egrin was near? The warden shrugged, saying, “That sorcery of his may have warned him. He’s escaped every time we’ve tried to take him. One day…” His words trailed off. Egrin’s lips firmed to a hard, thin line. “One day, we’ll get him.”