“Basics, then,” he murmured, and we went into the fundamentals of our daily drill, our early movements stiff and formal, exactly as we had learned them in the beginning, each move and countermove precise and cleanly executed. As we progressed through the familiar exercises our ease and speed increased, until our staves rang loudly and rhythmically against each other, the intervals between the strikes growing shorter and shorter until the noise was an incessant rattle and the sweat began to roll down our bodies.
And then I saw something from the corner of my eye, and in the instant my concentration broke, Will smashed the staff from my hands, sending it flying to the grassy bank.
“Hold!” I shouted, and he hesitated, his staff already drawn back to push me off my log.
“What?”
“There.” I pointed to a cloaked and hooded figure watching us from the trees along the riverbank.
Will glanced over his shoulder and spun immediately to face the silent presence, twirling the heavy quarterstaff in one hand so that it spun in his fingers. “Get your staff,” he said to me over his shoulder, and I ran to obey him, not looking at the figure on the other bank again until I had rearmed myself and returned to stand by Will’s side. The watcher had not moved, and the shadows of the trees in which he stood obscured him sufficiently that we were unable to tell whether we knew him or not.
“Come out, then, and let us look at you.”
Will’s voice was quiet yet pitched clearly enough for his words to carry to the fellow, who straightened up from the tree he had been leaning against and stepped into the light. He was a stranger, and as he came into full view he reached up and slipped the hood from his head, exposing a full head of thick, golden, shoulder-length hair that caught the sunlight. The face was young and beardless, barely older than Will’s own, and unsmiling as it gazed at us. But it was the size of the fellow, the immense width of the shoulders beneath the cloak, that made me catch my breath. He was almost of a height with Will, I thought, though I could not be sure from the distance that separated us, but he was slimmer somehow. The legs beneath his kilted tunic were long and well formed, bare above the knees and swathed in furlined leggings below, the latter secured by criss-crossed leather straps attached to heavily soled, ankle-high boots. His tunic was richly made, some thick, green fabric that marked him as well born; Will and I had never owned, and seldom seen, anything so fine. A heavy, supple leather belt that held a long, sheathed dagger cinched in his narrow waist.
“Have you no manners, then?” Will said in Scots. “Or are you a thief, creeping up on folk to steal whatever takes your fancy?”
I stiffened at the calculated insult of the jibe, but the yellowhaired stranger merely smiled, flashing brilliantly white teeth, and came to stand at the edge of the bank, beside the bridge. He moved like a cat, lithe and flowing, his arms hanging loosely by his sides.
“You have nothing worth stealing,” he answered easily, the lilt of his voice proclaiming him a Highlander from the North. “I saw that at first glance.” He was still smiling. “I merely wished to cross this bridge and decided to wait until you had thrown the poor wee fellow off before I bothered you for passage.”
I drew myself up, stung, but before I could say a word Will waved me to silence. “The poor wee fellow, as you’ve seen, is no’ so easily budged,” he replied, his voice dangerously quiet to my ears.
“Aye, I know that now. He is stronger than he looks beside your bulk and he fights well. Well enough to withstand the flailings of an oaf twice his size.” His eyes moved to me and I saw that they were startlingly bright blue. “Well done, lad,” he said, and then looked back at Will. “Now, if I ask you civilly, will you move off and let me cross?”
I saw the wolfish grin light up Will’s face and my stomach churned. I sensed that nothing good could come of this.
“Let him cross, Will.”
Will bared his teeth in what I thought of as his mad grin. “Let him cross? I’ll do that, Jamie. I’ll let him cross. But he’ll have to climb over me first.” He turned back to the stranger. “Well, Saxon, d’ye think you can do that?”
The stranger pointed at the staff in Will’s hand.
“What?” Will asked, all innocence, hefting his staff. “Does this bother you? Think naught o’ it. I’ll throw it on the bank there and we’ll settle this bare-handed, just you and me.”
“No, you misunderstand me,” the stranger said quietly. “And misjudge me. Mine is Norse blood, not Saxon. My folk were Vikings, on a time. And you may keep your stick, so be it I can borrow your friend’s.”