This choice: Hold still - keep the ambush in place. • Go Back... His men were growing as alarmed as he was, but Aris motioned for quiet and to remain in place. I don't know what's going on over there, but it doesn't change the need for a blocking force. The whole idea is to make Kefnir run and I've got to think this is likely to do it.
Then, out of the shadowing woods, a small group of men came hurrying. Four of them were strugged under the weight of a great chest. Six wore armor and strode with steel bared and behind them old lord Kefnir struggled to keep up with his money, his face as red as his doublet. Every few steps the old man glanced back over his shoulder and this seemed to help him keep pace. There were a few more men, men at arms perhaps, that straggled behind the lock-box and the knights with their lord, these seemed as nervous as their lord, glancing backward like Kefnir, but also looking around them trying to penetrate the shadows of the forest.
Aris stepped out of concealment and shouted, "Hold there lord Kefnir!"
A few of his men moved out with him, drawing their bows with arrows noched. Kefnir squeeled in fright and then screamed, "Shoot them."
The men behind the lord revealed that they carried bows, drawing at the command, but Aris's men were already firing and they fell or fled. Kefnir shrieked his displeasure and howled for his knights to "strike them down." But there were only six against thirty and they dumped their swords in the dirt and stood with hands raised in surrender. "Cowards!" shouted Kefnir, but the knights glanced at their lord with distain and ignored him.
Suddenly there were many more men in the woods. But before he could order his men to defense Aris saw that Jaren was at their head. "I don't believe this is the whole of the garrison, but I believe we've smoked out the treasury," said Aris to his lieutenant.
"You'd rob an old man on the highway, you're no better than brigands," spit the erstwhile lord of Winebrook.
"Smoked out, that's a good word for it. We set campfires for an army when it got dark, but it seems that a few, well, all of them got away from us." Jaren looked slightly embarassed, "Looks like the smoke and fire sent the rats to scuttling."
As Aris's men approached the lock-box, the bearers and the knights stepped away. Lord Kefnir clung to his riches, "Its mine, you're common thieves I tell you. . ." but he merely slumped on the ground cursing when they lifted it and carried it away.
Aris looked over the scene. What do I want with the old ruin of a castle? A base? Perhaps, and there was reason to want to see what they could find in the castle's armory and larder, but it surely was not worth the lives of my men to take it from the garrison, reduced as it was by a dozen or so men. Jaren's trick had netted them a rich treasure, they could avoid any losses and just take what they had, but maybe there was an even better outcome. What should he do?
Leadership, he knew, was about making decisions, sometimes the quickest was better than the best, but sometimes it was the best.
Word count 560   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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