Page 141 of Paladin's Faith

The raider caught it immediately. “Hey! What’re you doin’ over there?”

“Nothing!” squeaked the boy, an answer guaranteed to spark paranoia in the most trusting adult.

Heavy footsteps heralded the raider’s approach. Shane tensed, hand closing over his dagger.

“Nothing, eh?” The man stalked up and dealt a stinging slap to the side of the boy’s head. “You’re supposed to be working, you little snot.”

The child fell down. The raider turned to face him, drawing his foot back, which left him both off-balance and with his back to Shane.

Stabbing a man in the kidneys was a remarkably good way to make him think about his life choices, but he only had a second or two to do so before Shane followed up by cutting his throat. He shoved the man to one side so that he didn’t fall on top of the startled boy and waited glumly for the screaming to start.

It didn’t. All six of the children stared at him in silence, round-eyed, like a line of little owls.

Shane wiped his dagger off and pulled the boy to his feet. “Do any of you have somewhere to go?” he asked.

The oldest looking of the children, a girl of perhaps eleven, said, “’M from Hangman’s Glen.”

“Do you think you can get back there on your own?”

She shrugged. “Can try.”

Shane wanted desperately to herd them away himself, but if he did, they would wind up with Wisdom’s people, and he couldn’t bring himself to feed children into the demon’s maw. It’s summer and warm enough. They won’t freeze at night, and they undoubtedly know the area better than you do. “Go north,” he said, “and circle around the hills. Go now. Take the others with you. I don’t know how long the raiders will be distracted.”

The girl nodded. She grabbed the smallest child by the hand and beckoned to the others. “C’mon, you lot. Keep quiet.”

The boy wiped his nose, looking up at Shane. “You gonna kill the rest of them?”

“I’m going to try.”

“Good.” He directed a kick at the dead raider.

“Get going,” said Shane. The others were already crossing the stream and vanishing into the brush. “Stick together. And, lad…?”

“Eh?”

“Button up your trousers.”

The raider holding hadn’t been much to look at from above, and wasn’t much to look at from ground level, either. The huts all shared stone walls where possible, leaving two semi-circles flanking a straggling central area, with the stream on one side and a stone cliff face on the other.

In theory, such a layout should have been defensible and well-protected.

In practice, Shane simply walked up to the half-asleep guard, cut his throat, and ducked back around the edge of the farthest hut.

Someone eventually came out to check on the guard, and Shane cut his throat as well, then dragged the body back out of view. He had a vague urge to find whoever was in charge and yell at them about the value of redundancy in guard posts.

Probably he could have kept doing this for all dozen raiders, except that a woman came past, saw the dead guard in the chair and froze. Her eyes shot to Shane, who gave a tiny wave and put his finger to his lips.

She let out a shriek to wake the dead, and Shane sighed.

The woman stumbled back, still shrieking. A gabble of voices went up from the holding, mostly in the vein of “Who’s yelling?” and “What now?”

If I was a little less chivalrous, I would hit her over the head. But that might kill her and she isn’t attacking me, so I suppose I’m doing this the hard way.

He lifted his arm over his head and swung it in a short circle, hoping Erlick could see him.

“Attack!” the woman finally screamed, taking to her heels. “We’re being attacked!”

The gabble immediately changed in tenor. Shane sheathed his dagger and drew his sword.