Page 56 of Flanders' Folly
“Just there, across the road.” Robert pointed, then smirked. “Looks as if he and Atholl cannot decide who is in charge.”
Further back from the bickering hens, a hundred soldiers were readying their war horses. If they expected to be handed Todlaw on a silver platter, why dress for battle? Was it all just for show?
Flanders looked west again, hoping in vain to see a banner of a black boar on a red field. But Robert’s father couldn’t possibly know what they were facing. He might only bring a handful of men, and they might well regret coming to Young Duncan’s aid.
The road remained empty.
“I don’t understand,” Robert said at his shoulder. “If the coming danger is evident, why do the horns not repeat? Riders from all directions, but where are they?”
Flanders had a thought. “Perhaps the watchtowers were taken first.”
“Perhaps.”
Both men jumped at three deep throated blasts from the north. They waited to see if they would repeat, and while they counted their breaths, the horn sounded again from the east. Someone had orchestrated carefully.
From all directions, all at once.
It sounded like something he and James would have planned with Stout Duncan.
Then another idea. Maybeno onewas coming!
Flanders found Stephan again to see if the man were preening. If the bastard had planned to take the watch towers only to terrify them, he would be enjoying the chaos on the walls. But instead, Stephan and Atholl looked just as rattled by the alarms as they were.
He recalled Brigid’s vision from late in the night. Riders they weren’t expecting. Maybe the devil himself. Was the enemy not expecting them either?
The screams of horses brought all attention back to the south. All those warhorses were rearing and stamping, rejecting their riders and fleeing like the devil had come for their souls. But another sound caught his attention—a sound that was tuned, perhaps, only tohisear.
Brigid’s quiet whispering...
The sound didn’t last long, only enough to allow him to locate her. There, on the wall, thirty feet to the east. She watched the thrown riders with delight, keeping her attention on them as the last few men lost their steeds.
Though Flanders was compelled to go after her, to pull her from the wall before Stephan noticed her, he turned back to the chaos instead, looking for something... The last horse reared, eyes wide. It screamed and stamped…at the green leafy fronds reaching for its hooves, fronds that were encouraged by the barest wisps of swirling mist. The beast finally broke free and fled after its fellows toward the growing morning light.
The soldiers’ attention was on anything but the ground. The shouting and cursing would have embarrassed any leader.
When Flanders hurried onto the wall walk, the spot where Brigid had stood was empty.
“Flanders,” Robert called.
Though he glanced around, he could find no sign of her, nor that length of brown plaid that had covered her head. Not that he could have done anything about her when Robert clearly needed him.
Robert nodded across the road. The bickering wives had put their arguments aside and were headed to the gate with a dozen torch-bearing guards at their backs, including Atholl’s four. They’d chosen not to come on horseback. Or rather, Brigid had made that choice for them.
“It’s barely dawn,” Robert said.
"Aye, well, it seems our judge has as much honor as his cousin." Flanders checked his dagger and hoped Brigid had done what he asked and had hidden hers. For he feared, if the enemy got inside the walls, she would need it.
Atholl and Stephan came to a halt far enough away that they didn’t have to tip their heads back too far to see Robert.
The traitor’s spawn cleared his throat. “Laird Duncan! I've come to execute my judgment on The Regent’s behalf! I demand ye open yer gates!"
Robert leaned forward and rested his elbows on the barrier, as casual as you please. “My document reads noon. Perhaps ye made a mistake and wrote dawn on yer duplication. But I assure ye, these gates will not budge for the pair of ye this morn…even if the entrance to hell has opened and its occupants come at ye on all sides. Ye shall be offered no sanctuary here!”
As if Robert’s words had been a signal, the alarm from the west sounded once more. Judging by the way both men reacted, they had no idea who might be coming.
"I've reconsidered,” Atholl shouted. “Some of yer people will need more time to reach other destinations,” he reasoned. "Open yer gates now, and I'll ensure them safe passage."
"But David,” Robert teased, “I must refuse, for it seems ye cannot guarantee yer own safety, let alone anyone else’s."
