Trouble in the Forest Book One: A Cold Summer Night by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

tightly clenched.
    Sir Humphrey could see now that these men’s clothes had been of good quality and he began to suspect that they were merchants traveling together for protection. He would not be able to dismiss their troubles as minor or unimportant. He would be expected to account for their misfortune, since he was supposed to keep such things from happening at all. He mumbled a concerned phrase or two and passed on to one of the less obviously hurt. “You were set upon by outlaws last night. Will you tell me how it came about?”
    The man, whose eyes were dazed in a face grey with exhaustion, turned to Sir Humphrey. “They were demons, demons and devil, not any outlaws I have ever known. They were not interested in our goods, though they took them and our mules quickly enough. Our lives were forfeit, not our merchandise. They wanted only to have us. Us! Nothing else mattered!” He trembled and moved toward the wall as if needing something to hold him up.
    Sir Humphrey followed after him. “What did your mules have? What were you carrying?”
    Distantly the man answered, “Cloth, for the most part. Cloth and thread. And hides for shoemakers.” He made no complaint of their loss, which struck Sir Humphrey as odd, for merchants were known to wax irate at the deprivation of a single item of trade, not matter how small or unimportant. “It was hideous. Those men. They attacked us as if they would kill us.” Without warning he fell to the ground and lay there, twitching.
    Aghast, Sir Humphrey stood over the man, uncertain of what to do, fearing that the merchant had taken madness from his attackers and was now dangerous to everyone near him. He bellowed to his men to tend to the fallen merchant and turned to one of the others, a meaty youth with rings on his fingers. “What about the outlaws? Did you notice anything about them? How were they armed? How many of them were there? Didn’t you have men-at-arms to escort you?”
    “We had two,” said the young man in a pain-roughened voice. He was favoring his right leg and there was blood on his clothing. “They were cut down first. And they fell quickly. These outlaws knew what they were about. No one could have prevailed against them. No one. They came after the men-at-arms, four or five of the outlaws to each man. The men-at-arms had no chance to defend themselves before they were ...” His face went ashen. “They were gutted, like deer or sheep. They had set aside their mail, you see, and had only their actons. Any sword could go through an acton.” He crossed himself. “I never want to set forth in Sherwood Forest again. Once I return home to London, I will not travel the Great North Road for as long as I live.”
    Sir Humphrey believed him, and thought it strange that a merchant would make such a vow when he depended upon travel to make his trading worthwhile. He left the young man and sought out another of the merchants, a man nearer his own age and looking marginally less ramshackle than the others. “What can you tell me about the outlaws?” he asked, regarding the merchant with keen attention.
    The man shook his head as if still unconvinced of what he had seen. “They were like no outlaws I have ever encountered in England. Nor have I seen their like in France. Only in the Holy Land have I encountered any fighters as bloodthirsty as these men are. And the outlaws have less pity in them than any Islamite.” He crossed himself and tugged his sword out of his wide cloth belt. He made a show of wiping the blade to rid it of its stains, and then rested the tip between his feet, his hands resting on the wide quillons. “They were relentless, and lacked any sign of fear. Never have I seen an attack like theirs for fearlessness. Nothing kept them off long—not wounds, not blows, nothing.”
    “There were a great many of them,” said Sir Humphrey.
    “No more than fifteen or sixteen, I should say. Well-trained by the look of them. And with a leader who was