The Huntsman of Adamos (Quartet)- draft
MURDER ON THE MIDCOASTAL ROAD

CH MURDER ON THE MIDCOASTAL ROAD

Carefully, Rieth installed the new doors of the Cat’s Soup Cafe. Bolton had come in his motorized cart and helped bring the doors to Soldiers Cove. The Butcher had expressed awe at the elaborately carved images. Brie couldn’t believe that this community existed completely invisibly. Half the former guardsmen, space fleeters, and mariners living in the cove as farmers, fishermen, or business proprietors were listed as dead or as living in other planets. As Rieth worked on the new door frame, the smell of the savory stew and sweet breads drifted out of the cafe while Fleur cooked. The weather on today’s restday had been clear and dry as Yuli had predicted.

The Veterans and their families admired the doors and were amused by the images in the center. Fishlover the cat rolled around on them and laid next to his doppelganger proudly, drawing laughter from everyone. Yuli’s discovery of the stripped gray wood was complemented and praised. The opposite facing images of Fishlover the cat holding his paw over a bowl of green wood was familiar to all the patrons of the Cat’s Soup. The wrought iron door handles made by Brie, followed the curve of Fishlover’s tail. Finn, the boarding house keeper and a former space fleeter, offered a coin to anyone who would pull the real warrior cat’s tail the way they would pull the handles, everyone wisely declined. Once the doors were installed, everyone ate their fill. Siger and Brie were both shocked that Fleur could cook and cook well.

“This is delicious, my lady,” Siger complimented, and grinned as she favored him with a drool look.

“I’m no lady, Siger. I work, I teach, I wear pants and carry a sword that I will use on you if you keep calling me my lady,” Fleur growled in mock hostility.

“Don’t forget, you refuse to be meek and marry,” Banth added in a teasing tone, much to everyone’s amusement but Rieth knew it had angered the retired veterans of Soldiers Cove when the Lumberton Town Council had demanded their lighthouse keeper find a suitable husband before she became their meek school mistress.

Finn’s wife Stacy asked, “How well does it pay to be meek and married because I think I got cheated?” As Finn pretended hurt in dramatic fashion.

Only Rieth saw the worried concern as Fleur turned to fill the bread basket with more breadsticks, but when she turned back she was grinning mischievously.

When they were stopped laughing at Stacy and Finn’s antics, Fleur answered with a smirk, “Nothing pays well enough to marry the great protector. I’d stay with Finn if I were you, better after-dark benefits.” And Fleur waved a limp breadstick suggestively which started everyone in hysterics.

“Omigawd, Fleur!” Stacy giggled uncontrollably as Finn and Bolton roared and Rieth wheezed in silent laughter.

Siger and Brie looked on in amusement so Rieth wrote to them, ‘Protector Corbin requires extra kindness.’

Both nodded in understanding, then Brie explained that their mother had always said that about foolish people who were less than competent.

Banth slapped his artificial leg as he chortled. Then he leaned over to the laughing Nick and Yuli, “Remember, sons, don’t repeat this outside the Cove.”

Nick nodded. “Don’t worry, my parents feel the same way. I think everyone does. Dad was going on about Protector Corbin trying to charge a protection fee for people traveling to Westfalls from Port Arbor, so the Miners’ Guild started sending armed escorts for the returning miners.”

“I can’t believe the Governor let’s him get away with it,” Stacy complained. “But no one has run against him in decades and Golden doesn’t even have a protector or any guardsmen right now. The Brightwater Protector is trying to keep the people of both isles and three smaller islands safe with only eight guardsmen.”

Brie frowned, “Corbin’s guardsmen aren’t even trained and their swords were in such bad shape that if they had tried to fight with them, they would have fallen apart.” He shook his head, “Your Protector actually got angry that I offered basic sword training to his men, he didn’t refuse the offer but I felt he wanted to.”

Finn patted his shoulder. “You’re a good man, Brie, brother of Rieth, but it won’t do any good. Every Guardsman the veterans of the Cove have trained for the last three decades has been released from service as soon as their two years were up. It’s almost like Corbin wants to be the only trained warrior in Lumberton or on Arbor.”

“His hero complex is going to get someone killed,” Banth growled. “He was almost worthless as a guardsman and hasn’t changed now that he is a protector.”

Siger looked at Banth with surprise. “You knew him then?”

“Yes, I knew him when I served the Guardian Kaleth, High Lord of Adamos. Corbin always took shortcuts and sought prestige, which was fine until now. We need a real protector and real guardsmen, these brigands killed a man and Corbin’s reaction was to put a curfew in effect and charge for escorts rather search for the criminals.” Banth’s hands balled into fists and pounded the table as he spoke.

“Easy, Banth, your blood pressure,” Fleur cautioned. Her face showed worry as she put a hand on his arm.

The old veteran patted her hand with a fond smile she couldn’t see. “Don’t worry, Fleur, you won’t have to marry him. They can hire a teacher of their own and you can run our school.”

“We shall see,” Fleur responded. “All children deserve to go to school. In month, there will be another meeting... Now, who wants apple pie?”

Just before sunset, Rieth walked with Fleur back to her house, he was staying at the boarding house with his brother and friend for the night. Inside he could hear Yuli and Nick laughing about something. He followed her as she climbed the stairs to start the light. As she performed her nightly routine, he admired the sea pounding on the rocks and beach far below. It seemed oddly fitting that he found her here, keeping the light that kept many from the danger.

Fleur polished the glass, and started the rotation, feeling the light warm her skin as it swept past. She walked out onto the balcony and found Rieth checking the rail instead of admiring the amazing view as he usually did. She knew it was amazing because she had seen it through her son’s eyes, and for a bitter moment, she regretted her blindness deeply. He reached out and caught her wrist, tapping on the soft inner flesh as he often did.

‘You have some wood rot starting. I should replace these.’

“I’m not surprised. I’ve been here since before Yuli was born. There have been maintenance techs who have come twice over the years, but I don’t think they replaced anything outside.” Her fingers traced the top. “I don’t know why these four railing are wood when the rest inside and out are metal anchored in stone.” Her lips pursed as she bent to feel where the vertical slats were soft.

Rieth wondered if these were something his brother had not finished before his death, Rieth had noticed a few other minor details that seemed to have been finished by someone other than the original builder. He watched her pressing her hands over the damage, assessing it, as they stood she gave the rail a firm shove to test its strength. The entire section gave and fell, crashing onto the stones below before tumbling down the cliff to the beach. Her momentum would have carried her with it if he had not grabbed her. She stood trembling in his arms after the accident. He held her tightly as he tried to calm his own terrified heart. It was 30 stones(meters) to the base of the lighthouse and another 40 stones to the beach.

“Thank you, Rieth,” Fleur whispered, turning her face up toward his.

He kissed her. Kissed her in relief that she hadn’t fallen, kissed her because with the sunset above and sea below, she was so beautiful, and because he just didn’t want to wait any longer. It was slow and lingering. The kind of kiss through which two lonely souls spoke to each other of feelings far deeper than attraction and passion; the kiss whispered of love and hope.

Fleur pulled back, tears burning in her eyes as her heart pounded painfully. She had been kissed like that before, believed all the promises and it had been lies. She didn’t remember exactly when or why or how she knew this, but she was certain of it and from her distorted memories she remembered this kind of kiss had come from someone who later promised to cut out her heart someday.

“I love you,” Rieth whispered against her forehead.

He was such a good man and deserved so much better than her, she thought. She swallowed, chin trembling, tears leaked as she stammered in gasping pain, “I... I’m sorry... I can’t... If he...”

The clanging of a bell echoed up from the town, she jerked away from Rieth and ran to the opposite side of the lighthouse. Her eyes glowed white and he felt her using her magic fully for the first time since he found her.

Her hand stretched toward the trees. “There are brigands on the Midcoastal Road, they are chasing a woman and a child.”

Fleur ran down the exterior stairs, pulling Rieth behind her. Yuli met her at the door with her cloak and sword, Nick tossed Rieth the extra bow and quiver Rieth kept at Fleur’s home, then they all chased Fleur and Fang into the evening. Over his shoulder, Rieth could feel Brie and Siger coming with several of the other veterans. The path to the lighthouse merged with the one to the village in the forest and just beyond the fork, they found a wounded woman carrying a small child. She begged them to save her brother. Yuli and Nick helped her toward the village as Rieth and Fleur ran the other way. They found the man dead. He had been stabbed repeatedly and his throat cut all the way through, even though he was enough Aetherian to revive, he wouldn’t. His life’s blood was almost completely drained out onto the snow-covered road. When Brie, Siger, Bolton, and Finn arrived with six others only a few minutes later, Fleur was cursing vehemently.

Reith rasped out painfully, “Fang can’t track them, they sprinkled some kind of powder on the ground. They know you have a warhound, Fleur.”

“There must be some way to track them. They are getting too bold. It wasn’t even full dark when they attacked this family!” She snarled as she waved her hand at the deepening darkness.

Rieth and Siger shared a look, then Siger said, “My lady, we will attempt to track them.”

Bolton stopped her from following with a hand on her arm, “Fleur, we need you to help calm this man’s family.”

She gave him a curt nod. Fleur hurried ahead toward the village with Fang leading her. Some of the veterans searched for the family’s belongings while Brie and Bolton carried the dead man back.

Brie asked, “Why did you say that to Fleur? How could she calm them, is she a healer?” He used the discernment magic his mother had taught him to lure the truth out of Bolton and give him the feeling of reassurance that Brie could be trusted.

Bolton hesitated then sighed, “I only tell you this because she saved your brother and you owe her a life-debt. Fleur is special, she has some magic. She isn’t a healer, but she can heal souls. She sacrificed everything during the war, and she should be dead. When she came here she was as broken as the rest of us, even if she couldn’t remember the horrors she faced. I would have killed myself if it weren’t for her, Banth would have given up and died, Finn never would have quit drinking and found Stacy, Arthos and Kramer too... We all would still be suffering post-war trauma, but she... She gave us back our hope. We came here to protect her from one who would harm her, but she protected us from harming ourselves. You’re from the old kingdom, you don’t know all the horrors we faced in the war against the shadows. The Dark Prince would use necromancy on those we lost and send them back to fight us. He thought it was funny to watch us grieve, then make us kill those we loved and lost again.”

Brie knew this and he remembered what happened to Bolton, but he asked because the person he was supposed to be would have asked. “That’s terrible. Who did he send back to fight you?”

Bolton bowed his head as they walked. “My sealed one. She died with a dozen others, the dark prince took their bodies and then sent them back filled with shadows. She almost killed me, but I cut off her head. That was the only way to kill the nercrorriors, decapitation. Her name was Kendra and we were going to be joined after the war.”

“I am sorry for your loss.” Was all Brie could say.

He wanted to say more, remind Bolton that there was nothing else he could have done, but that was something Lord Abrieth would have said and he wasn’t Lord Abrieth here. He was just Brie, son of Riles, brother of Rieth, and his glamour must be maintained. He couldn’t ask any more questions because Finn and the others caught up. They had only found a doll dropped by the little girl, and an empty handcart. The Brigands had taken everything the family owned.

Back in town, Fleur was settling the terrified children into large room with three beds while Stacy was tending the woman’s wounds. The woman’s name was Desandra, but she preferred Desa. She explained that her brother Destor had come to work at the mines and she had come to find work as a cook and waitress and keep his children while he worked as they had every year since her sister-in-law died.

They had made it to Lumberton but there was no traveling group going to Westfalls. Her brother said they couldn’t afford the expensive escort fee so they had gone on their own secretly. When the brigands had surrounded them, they had surrendered their belongings to protect her brother’s children. Then one of the brigands had groped her and tried to assault her. The one-eyed man had stabbed her leg when she kicked him, that was when Destor attacked the man and shouted at her and the children to run. Her nephew had sprinted ahead to get help from Soldier’s Cove while she ran carrying her niece.

Desa wept bitterly when they told her that her brother would not revive, lamenting that she didn’t know what she would do without him. Stacy told her she could stay as long as she needed without charge, but Desa insisted she couldn’t impose so Fleur offered her a place at the cafe. Stacy had looked at Fleur oddly, but Fleur just shrugged saying, she would be busy teaching school soon and invited Desa to send her niece and nephew to her free school. Siger and Rieth arrived back in the village several hours later. The brigands had disappeared on the heavily traveled roads, and when the two had gone to the Guardsmen station in Lumberton, no one seemed to know where Corbin was, so they left a message for him to come in the morning and came back.

When Fleur took Yuli and Nick back to her house, she was in a terrible mood, and grumbled that she was going to go home and go to bed before she hurt someone, preferably Corbin.

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