“Rodent,” growled the impudent cyclopian.
The highwayman laughed again. “My papa halfling, he always say, that a halfling’s pride is inversely proportional to his height,” Oliver replied.
“And I assure you,” the halfling continued after a dramatic pause, “I am very short!”
For once, the cyclopian driver seemed to have no reply. It probably didn’t even understand what the halfling had just said, Luthien realized, squatting in the brush, trying hard not to burst out in laughter.
“How far do you think my so fine blade will bend?” Oliver asked with a short chuckle. “Now, I have won the day and your precious co-ins and jew-wels.”
To Oliver’s surprise, though, the single cyclopian guard became six, as soldiers burst out of the coach door and rolled from every conceivable nook in the large wagon, two even coming out from underneath. The highwayman considered the new odds, eased the pressure on his bending rapier, and gave a new finish to his previous thought.
“I could be wrong.”
6
Oliver deBurrows
The fashionable highwayman was about eye level with the cyclopian soldiers as he looked at them from atop his yellow mount. He parried a spear thrust from one direction, yanked the bridle to bring his mount back on two legs and swing the beast about just in time to defeat a slashing sword from behind. He was a flurry of activity, but the cyclopian driver, smiling wickedly, pulled out another weapon: a loaded crossbow.
That would have been the end of the legendary (at least in his own mind) Oliver deBurrows, but a short distance away, in the thicket across the river, young Luthien Bedwyr had found his courage and his heart. Luthien had never been fond of the ever-present greedy merchants, placing them in a category just above cyclopians. The halfling was a thief—that could not be denied—but to Luthien so was the merchant. He didn’t acknowledge the emotions guiding his actions in that critical moment; he only did as his heart dictated.
He was no less surprised than the cyclopian driver when an arrow, Luthien’s arrow, took the brute in the chest and pushed it back down in its seat, the crossbow slipping from its weakening grasp.
If Oliver even saw the shot, he didn’t show it. “Yes, do come on, you with one eye who looks so much like the back end of a cat!” he bellowed at one cyclopian, spinning his rapier in such a dazzling (though totally ineffective) display that the cyclopian took two steps back from the yellow mount and scratched its sloped forehead.
Luthien walked Riverdancer out of the thicket and down the steep bank, the strong horse gaining enough momentum to leap out, barely touching the water, crossing with one running stride. Across the field charged Luthien, bow in hand, shooting as he went.
The cyclopians roared in protest. One gabbed a long halberd from the side of the coach and darted out to meet Luthien, then changed its mind amidst the stream of soaring arrows and slipped in behind the coach’s horses instead. Oliver, entangled in fending attacks from three different positions, didn’t even know what his enemies were yelling about. The halfling did note, though, that the cyclopian now behind his turning mount became distracted.
“Pardon,” he said to the brute in front of him, and he hurled his main gauche so that the opponent had to fall back a step, getting tangled but not hurt as it pushed away the halfheartedly tossed weapon. In the same movement, Oliver swooped off his wide hat and placed it over his mount’s rump, and the pony responded immediately by rearing up and kicking out, straight into the ribs of the distracted cyclopian behind. Oliver, meanwhile, now saw Luthien, riding and shooting. The composed halfling simply shrugged and turned back to the more pressing situation.
It was still two against one, though, and the halfling found himself immediately hard-pressed, even more so because now he held only one weapon.
Another crossbowman, lying flat on top of the coach, changed its target from Oliver to the newest foe. The cyclopian leveled the weapon, but could not get a clear shot as Luthien bent low to the side of his running horse, using Riverdancer as a shield. The cyclopian fired and missed badly, and Luthien came up high enough to return the shot, his arrow knocking into the wood just below the prone cyclopian’s face. Even on the running mount, Luthien managed to reload before the cyclopian, and his second shot, fired no more than twenty feet from the coach, nailed the brute in the face.
Then a halberd was thrust in front of Luthien’s face as the next soldier darted out from behind the horse team. The only defense offered to Luthien was to fall back and to the side, right off of Riverdancer. He landed hard, and only by reminding himself through every inch of the brutal tumble that if he did not get right back up he would soon be skewered did he manage to keep his wits about him. He also wisely held onto the bow, and he whipped it across in front as he finally managed to put his feet under him just in time to bat aside the next thrusting attack.
Oliver was able to line up his pony so that both remaining cyclopians were facing him. His rapier snapped back and forth over the pony’s low-hung head, intercepting cut after cut. The halfling tried to appear nonchalant, even bored, but in truth he was more than a little concerned. These cyclopians were pretty good and their weapons finely made. Still, Oliver had not survived two decades as a highwayman without a few tricks up his puffy white sleeve.
“Behind you!” he cried suddenly, and one of the cyclopians almost fell for the obvious ruse, almost turned its head to look over its shoulder—not an easy feat when you have only one eye located in the middle of your face!
The other cyclopian kept up its attack without a blink, and the foolish one came back doubly hard as soon as it realized how stupid it looked.
But not only did Oliver guess that the brutes wouldn’t fall for the ruse, he hoped they wouldn’t. “Behind you!” he cried again, just to egg them on a bit more, just to make them think that he thought they were stupid. Predictably, both cyclopians growled and pressed harder.
Oliver kicked his heels and his yellow pony leaped forward, right between the brutes. So intent were they on their offensive posture, the cyclopians didn’t even mark Oliver’s swift maneuver as the halfling let go the bridle and rolled off the back end of the pony, turning a complete somersault and landing easily on his feet. The cyclopians swung about as the horse cut between them, and Oliver promptly jabbed his rapier blade deep into the rump of one.
The cyclopian howled and whipped about, and a snap of Oliver’s rapier sent the outraged brute’s sword falling free.
“Foolish one-eyed sniffer of barnyard animals!” the halfling snorted, holding his hands out wide in disbelief. “I, polite Oliver deBurrows, even told you that it would come from behind!” The halfling then assumed his best fencing posture, free hand on hip. He yelled and leaped forward as if to strike, and the wounded cyclopian turned and fled, howling and fiercely rubbing its stuck butt.
The other cyclopian came on, though, viciously.
“You should be so wise as your friend,” Oliver taunted, parrying one swing, ducking a second, and hopping over a third. “You are no match for Oliver deBurrows!”
In response, the cyclopian came on with such a vicious flurry that Oliver was put back on his heels, and though he could have poked his rapier home a dozen times, any offensive strike would surely have allowed the cyclopian a solid hit at him, as well. The creature was strong and its sword nearly as heavy as the halfling, and Oliver wanted no part of that trade.
“I could be wrong,” the halfling admitted again, working furiously to keep the brute off of him. He gave a short and sharp whistle then, but the cyclopian took no note of it.
An instant later, Oliver’s yellow pony slammed into the brute’s back, throwing it facedown on the turf, and the pony continued forward, clambering atop the groaning cyclopian. The curious-looking and curiously trained pony then began hopping up and down, crunching bones with every short jump.