“The princess?” Hadrian asked.
“Yes, the princess Arista of Melengar. She was with us. I was trying to save them both—I was trying to—but—and now …” Tomas broke down crying again.
Royce exchanged looks with Hadrian and the two quickly moved away from the others to talk. Theron promptly followed.
“You two know something,” he said accusingly. “You got in, didn’t you? You took it. Royce got the sword after all. That’s what it wants.”
Royce nodded.
“You have to give it back,” the farmer said.
“I don’t think giving it back will save your daughter,” Royce told him. “This thing, this Gilarabrywn, is a lot more cunning than we knew. It will—”
“Thrace hired you to bring me that sword,” Theron growled. “That was your job. Remember? You were supposed to steal it and give it to me, so hand it over.”
“Theron, listen—”
“Give it to me now!” the old farmer shouted as he towered menacingly over the thief.
Royce sighed and drew out the broken blade.
Theron took it with a puzzled look, turning the metal over in his hands. “Where’s the rest?”
“This is all I could find.”
“Then it will have to do,” the old man said firmly.
“Theron, I don’t think you can trust this creature. I think even if you hand this over, it will still kill your daughter, the princess, and you.”
“It’s a risk I am willing to take!” he shouted at them. “You two don’t have to be here. You got the sword—you did your job. You’re done. You can leave anytime you want. Go on, get out!”
“Theron,” Hadrian began, “we are not your enemy. Do you think either of us wants Thrace to die?”
Theron started to speak, then closed his mouth, swallowed, and took a breath. “No,” he sighed, “you’re right. I know that. It’s just …” He looked into Hadrian’s eyes with an expression of horrible pain. “She’s all I’ve got left, and I won’t stand for anything that can get her killed. I’ll trade myself to the bloody monster if it will let her live.”
“I know that, Theron,” Hadrian said.
“I just don’t think it will honor the trade,” Royce said.
“We found another over here!” Dillon McDern shouted as he hauled the foppish scholar Tobis Rentinual out of the remains of the smokehouse. The skinny courtier, covered from head to foot in dirt, collapsed on the grass, coughing and sputtering.
“The soil was soft in the cellar …” Tobis managed, then sputtered and coughed. “We—dug into it with our—with our hands.”
“How many?” Dillon asked.
“Five,” Tobis replied, “a woodsman, a castle guard, I think, Sir Erlic, and two others. The guard—” Tobis entered into a coughing fit for a minute, then sat up, doubled over, and spat on the grass.
“Arvid, fetch water from the well!” Dillon ordered his son.
“The guard was badly burned,” Tobis continued. “Two young men dragged him to the smokehouse, saying it had a cellar. Everything around us was on fire except the smokehouse, so the woodsman, Sir Erlic, and I all ran there too. The dirt floor was loose, so we started burrowing. Then something hit the shed and the whole thing came down on us. A beam caught my leg. I think it’s broken.”
The villagers excavated the collapsed shed. They pulled off a wall and dug into the wreckage, peeling back the fragments. They reached the bottom, where they found the others buried alive.
They dragged them out into the light. Sir Erlic and the woodsman looked near dead as they coughed and spat. The burned guard was worse. He was unconscious, but still alive. The last two pulled from the smokehouse ruins were Mauvin and Fanen Pickering, who, like Tobis, were unable to speak for a time but, other than numerous cuts and bruises, were all right.
“Is Hilfred alive?” Fanen asked after having a chance to breathe fresh air and drink a cup of water.
“Who’s Hilfred?” Lena Bothwick asked, holding the cup of water Verna had brought. Fanen pointed to the burned guard across from him and Lena nodded. “He’s not awake, but he’s alive.”
Search parties spread out and combed the rest of the area, finding many more bodies, mostly those of would-be contestants. They also discovered the remains of Archbishop Galien. The old man appeared to have died not from fire, but from being trampled to death. His servant, Carlton, lay inside the manor, apparently not content to die by his master’s side. Arista’s handmaid, Bernice, was also found inside the manor, crushed when the house collapsed. They found no one else alive.
The villagers created stretchers to carry Tobis and Hilfred out of the smoky ruins to the well, where the women tended their wounds. The old common green was a charred patch of black. The great bell, having fallen, lay on its side in the ash.