Chapter 23

We landed five miles east of Lufkin. It was evening, but not yet dark. There was still plenty of light to see by when we made for the shore. The big job was getting the horses there. The quartermaster removed the railing on the port side of the vessel and then we drove the horses over the side one at a time. We started with the big grey. Thankfully the coast here was mostly sandy beach with a sharp drop off after a few yards into the surf. We were able to get the Windrunner in towards the shore with little difficulty. That made disembarking the horses a little easier. The horses made it with little difficulty, but they certainly weren't happy with taking the first step off the boat.

I took my party and six men from the crew. That included Tobias. Once we were ashore we gathered our kit and saddled up. We wouldn't be riding quite yet. The horses needed to get their land legs again after a week cooped up in pens aboard the Windrunner. We'd be walking them for a while. As for the Windrunner, she put back to sea. I'd left specific orders with the quartermaster and I was certain that he would obey them. He would keep out of sight for a week, avoiding any passing vessels, particularly any Minoan ships. If I hadn't signalled him by then, he would sail back to Oak Hall with a message for Lord Barnabas. Hopefully that wouldn't happen.

We stuck to the beach for as long as we could; heading west towards Lufkin. We only turned inland when the coastline became too rugged for the horses to pass. Even then we only went in far enough to get by any obstructions. The land further in was hilly at best and very rocky and I had no desire to deal with it. Closer to the coast the terrain was flatter and it made our travels easier. I led the way at a fast walk for the first mile and then got us all into a jog. I wanted to cover the distance to Lufkin in as little time as possible. With darkness approaching I wanted to be at Alexander's villa well before it got too dark for me to spy the place out. I wanted a good look at it before we struck.

The intelligence that I'd gathered from the two Minoan crews told me that there was a broad plain to the east of Lufkin that served as the home to the very wealthy of the city. Supposedly there were a dozen or so estates there, besides the one I was looking for. It wasn't a huge area and the estates there were regulated to plots that were no more than a mile square at best, but it was better than living within the walled city and the wealthy appreciated that. These estates grew vegetables for the city as well as fresh fruit and berries and were worked by dozens of slaves. The good thing in all of this was that the Alexander estate was supposedly the furthest out from the city. That meant that we could get up close to it without alerting any of his neighbours.

We arrived in the vicinity of the estates undetected. Darkness had fallen by then and from the look of things, the Minoans weren't night people. There was very little in the way of light or sound coming from any of the villas and estates, and only a little more in the way of illumination showing from the city that lay a couple of miles further down the coast. We could see sentry fires on the walls but that was it. It boded well for what I had in plan. The chances of detection were slim.

I left our horses behind a small line of dunes that ran close to the estates, leaving two guards to watch over them. I then led my people forward. We headed for the estate that was closest to the beach. According to my intelligence, it should be the one I was looking for, however I knew that we'd only know for certain when we'd actually stormed it. Until then we were taking a risk that could leave a lot of people dead. Still we didn't have much of a choice so we pressed on.

The estate had two sets of walls. The first wall ran about the boundary of the property and enclosed it in entirety. This wall was about five feet high and at best it served to delineate the properties from one another. The western part of this enclosure was a communal wall shared with the next estate. The second set of walls on the estate closest to us was more defensive in nature. It enclosed the main house and a couple of outbuildings and the private gardens of the estate. That wall was at least ten feet high. It would make a fun climb unless we could breech a gate without alerting anyone. We'd find out when we got there. For now we struck out along the outer wall working ourselves along it, keeping to the beach side of the property. I didn't want to cross over into the property before we were close to the inner wall, just in case there was someone else there watching that I hadn't detected.

We got our first revelation when we were within a hundred feet of the inner wall. To my surprise I heard something moving in the dark. Hearing it, I signalled my party to wait. Then I pulled an arrow from my quiver and nocked it to my bow. Nimue was doing the same. Then I spotted the source of the noise. Two large forms were running towards the wall where we were hiding. The forms looked to be dogs from their silhouettes in the dark and from their movements across the ground. They were obviously well trained because they were not making a sound except for the slap of their pads against the ground as they rushed towards us. They were a hundred feet out when I spotted them. Quickly I took aim and let loose my arrow. The lead animal collapsed and went head over heels when my arrow slammed into his chest. The second animal did the same when Nimue followed my action by letting loose her arrow. After that we stood and waited and listened. When no alarm was sounded, we slipped over the outer wall and moved forward, with me in the lead and the rest trailing me.

The first thing we did was check the buildings that stood between the main wall and the fields of the estate. My guess was that they were barracks for slaves to sleep in, and from the look of them I was pretty certain that I was right. The buildings were built out of stone and they had metal bars across the few windows that pierced the structures' walls. There was also a heavy bolt on the doors of each of the buildings. In total there were three buildings like this, plus two others. When we checked, the others were neither barred nor bolted. One proved to be a tool shed while the other proved to be the bunkhouse of the estate's overseers. They were surprised to see us.

The men were in bed when we stormed into the place. There were four of them. They were in bunks that lined the wall opposite the door to their shack. Beyond the bunks there was a rickety old table and four chairs. The place stank of human odours and chamber pots that hadn't been emptied lately. I wasn't impressed and neither were the four men when we finally dragged them out of their beds and threw them one by one up against the interior wall. While I supervised this, Caitlin found a candle stub and lit it. The light flickered and showed us who we had to deal with and the men got to see who was dealing with them.

The men were naked and they all looked the same; medium tall in height, wiry in build, middle aged and swarthy in appearance. They all had long dark hair that looked like it had never been washed and they stank just as bad as the place.

"Cooperate," I told the men, "and you might live to see tomorrow morning. Do anything else and you will die tonight."

The men nodded their heads in understanding and asked me how they could serve me.

"Whose estate is this?" I asked them directly.

"It is the estate of the esteemed trader, Alexander of Lufkin," replied one of the men, bowing his head as he spoke.

"Is he home?" I demanded to know.

"We do not know sir," the man answered quickly, "for we work here in the fields and not in the house. The people in the house rarely speak to us unless they want something from the gardens that they need and cannot wait for."

I nodded my understanding and pressed on.

"Are there keys to the other buildings," I asked the man in a gruff voice.

"Yes sir," the man declared without hesitation, pointing towards the wall behind me. As he did, Rory reached towards the spot where the man was pointing and lifted a ring of keys off a hook. He jangled them to let me know he had them.

"Are you slaves or freemen?" I queried, glancing from one man to the other.

"We are indentured servants sir," the man replied in a low voice.

"Indentured," I repeated thoughtfully, "which makes you not free but better than a slave. All right then, now listen up and do as I tell you, and you might just live."

The men listened. I told them to turn about and that we'd tie them up for the night and gag them. Three men cooperated with the deal but the fourth tried to be stupid. When Tobias walked up behind him to truss him up, the man turned about and attacked Tobias. He was quick but not quick enough. When his hand fell to the hilt of Tobias' sword, Tobias just shifted to the side, pulling the man with him. As he came about, I thrust my sword into his exposed back. That put an end to his rebellion. When we were done, I left a man to watch over them, with the order to kill them all if even one of them acted up. That put fear into each of the surviving overseers' eyes and a smile on the guard's face. He just nodded his acknowledgement when I gave him the order.

We ignored the other buildings now that we knew what was in them and simply went over the wall. The men in the overseer's hut had answered a couple of other questions while we were trussing them up and one thing that they'd told me was that the main gate and all the entrances through the main wall were bolted shut for the night and that a single guard would be prowling the inner garden and courtyard, accompanied by another dog.

Naturally, I went first. With the assistance of Rory I was up and on top of the wall within a heart beat. My long bow followed me up a second later. A second after that I was reaching down and pulling Nimue up so she could join me on the top of the wall. Her bow came up right after that. Then we waited and watched. We didn't have to wait long. A big dog padded about a corner of the big house about a minute later. It was moving quickly and headed directly for us. Behind it appeared a man holding a lantern in one hand and a club in the other. I took the man and Nimue took the dog. Once they'd been dealt with, we waited again. When no alarm rose up from the house or the surroundings, we got to work helping people up and over the wall. Five minutes later we were all heading towards the kitchen door.

It turned out that Nimue was skilled with picking locks. We didn't get into it right then and there, but later she explained that she'd picked up the skill living in Stone Lodge. Her father, the late, great Jared had liked to keep things locked up and out of sight and Nimue had gotten into the habit of picking locks to see what her bastard of a father was up to or what he might be hiding from the people around him. As you can expect, I was very impressed with her ability and I showed her how much later. What matters here is that my little elf had the kitchen door opened in less than a minute and we were all in the house a few seconds later. As a caution, I left one man outside the door, to watch over the exterior and to listen for any trouble that might come from the overseers' lodgings.

We quickly swept through the kitchen. The room and its adjoining cupboards and pantry were empty of anyone so we moved on. A single corridor led out of the room and we followed it. That corridor took us into a central dining room. It too was empty. It was the same for most of the other rooms. The only place we found anyone was in the entry way to the house. There we found a door porter asleep on a rug thrown in front of the main door. We woke him quietly and then questioned him. To my disgust I learned that the master of the house was not home. On the plus side, I learned that his wife and three daughters were. I sent people to rouse them from their sleep as I contemplated what to do next. While I did that, I had a guard truss up the porter. I wasn't feeling that trusting yet.

The wife of Alexander of Lufkin was a short woman of some years. She was probably in her mid to late forties but she looked older. She had steel grey hair and wrinkles and she was plump. Her daughters were not. They were medium tall, slender, and youthful looking, although by the standards of the world they were all of legal age. They were dragged into the dining room by Tobias and his men, in only their sleeping tunics. To add to the indignity of the moment, they also had their hands tied behind their backs. Tobias just pushed them down on to the floor in front of me and then waited for further orders.

"What is the meaning of this?" shrieked the older woman, looking up at me with a face filled with hatred.

"I'm here to see your husband madam," I told the woman in a solemn manner, "and I've learned that he isn't at home. Disappointed at hearing this, I had you roused so that you can tell me where he is. Are you able to do that?"

"What business is of yours where my husband might be?" the woman demanded to know, her voice and face filled with defiance.

"You will tell me where you husband is woman," I told her coldly, "or I will make you watch me rape each of your pretty little daughters."

The woman glared at me angrily at the very suggestion that I might violate her children. The girls in turned whimpered and begged their mother to tell me what I wanted to know. The woman stalled for a moment, looking about the room, pondering what she should do. I decided to accelerate the process. I stood up from where I was seated and walked over to the oldest looking of the three girls. When I got to her, I reached down with my massive hand and took hold of her head in my hand. With a jerk of my arm and a screech from the girl, I pulled her up off the floor. Then with my free hand I tore open her sleeping tunic, exposing her naked, nubile, teenage breasts. The girl screamed a second time as I lowered my mouth down and latched on to her upturned breast with my mouth.

"Stop!" cried the woman frantically. "I'll tell you what you want to know."

I stopped but I did not let the girl go. Instead I retook my seat and I brought the girl with me. I plopped her down on my knee, keeping her a prisoner with my massive hand holding the back of her head, while I toyed with her exposed breasts with my other hand. As I did, I confronted the woman again.

"Speak woman," I barked at her, "and be quick about it or watch in silence as I ravish this pretty thing. Tell me where your husband is? Has he made port yet? Has he sent word to you?"

"My husband is on his way to the capital," the woman said without hesitation. "His ship docked late today and he sent word to us that he was taking a great gift to the king and that he would return in a number of days, hopefully much richer."