The Eyes of the Dragon(54)

People are funny, sometimes.

63

That Ben Staad didn't already understand abstractly about this strange new state of affairs he discovered very concretely the next day.

He had driven six cows to market and sold them for a good price (to a stockman who didn't know him, or the price mightn't have been so good). He was walking toward the city gates, when a bunch of loitering men set upon him, calling him murderer and accomplice and names even less pleasant.

Ben did well against them. They beat him quite badly in the end-there were seven of them-but they paid for the privilege with bloody noses, black eyes, and lost teeth. Ben picked himself up and went home, arriving after dark. He ached all over, but he was, all things considered, rather pleased with himself.

His father took one look at him and knew exactly what had happened. "Tell your mother you fell down," he said.

"Aye, Da'," Ben said, knowing his mother would not believe any such story.

"And after this, I'll take the cows to market, or the corn, or whatever we have to take to market... at least until the bankers come an' take the place out from under us."

"No, Da'," Ben said, just as calmly as he had said Aye. For a young man who had taken a bad beating, he was in a very strange mood indeed-almost cheerful, in fact.

"What do you mean, telling me no?" his father asked, thun-derstruck.

"If I run or hide, they'll come after me. If I stand my ground, they'll grow tired soon enough and look for easier sport."

"If someone draws a knife from his boot," Andrew said, voic-ing his greatest fear, "you'll never live to see them grow tired of it, Benny."

Ben put his arms around his father and hugged him tight.

"A man can't outsmart the gods," Ben said, quoting one of Delain's oldest proverbs. "You know that, Da'. And I'll fight for P... for him you'd not have me mention."

His father looked at him sadly and said, "You'll never believe it of him, will you?"

"No," Ben said steadfastly. "Never."

"I think you've become a man while I wasn't looking," his father said. "It's a sad way to have to become a man, scuffling in the streets of the market with gutter louts. And these are sad times that have come to Delain."

"Yes," Ben said. "They are sad times."

"Gods help you," Andrew said, "and gods help this unlucky family."

Chapter 10

64

Thomas had been crowned near the end of along, bitter winter. On the fifteenth day of his reign, the last of that season's great storms fell on Delain. Snow fell fast and thick, and long after dark the wind continued to scream, building drifts like sand dunes.

At nine o'clock on that bitter night, long after anyone sensible should have been out, there was a fist began to fall on the front door of the Staad house. It was not light or timid, that fist; it hammered rapidly and heavily on the stout oak. Answer me and be quick, it said. I haven't all night.

Andrew and Ben sat before the fire, reading. Susan Staad, wife of Andrew and mother of Ben, sat between them, working at a sampler which would read GODS BLESS OUR KING when finished. Emmaline had long since been put to bed. The three of them looked up at the knock, then around at each other. There was only curiosity in Ben's eyes, but both Andrew and Susan were instantly, instinctively afraid.

Andrew rose, putting his reading glasses in his pocket.

"Da'?" Ben asked.

"I'll go," Andrew said.

Let it only be some traveler, lost in the dark and seeking shelter, he hoped, but when he opened the door a soldier of the King stood there on the stoop, stolid and broad-shouldered. A leather hel-met-the helmet of a fighting man-clung to his head. There was a shortsword in his belt, near to hand.

"Your son," he said, and Andrew felt his knees buckle.

"Why do you want him?"

"I come from Peyna," the soldier said, and Andrew under-stood that this was all the answer he was to have.

"Da'?" Ben asked from behind him.

No, Andrew thought miserably, please, this is too much bad luck, not my son, not my son-

"Is that the boy?"

Before Andrew could say no-useless as that would have been-Ben had stepped forward.

"I am Ben Staad," he said. "What do you want with me?"

"You must come with me," the soldier said.

"Where?"

"To the house of Anders Peyna."

"No!" his mother cried from the doorway of their small living room. "No, it's late, it's cold, the roads are full of snow-"

"I have a sleigh," the soldier said inexorably, and Andrew Staad saw the man's hand drop to the shaft of his shortsword.

"I'll come," Ben said, getting his coat.

"Ben-" Andrew began, thinking: We'll never see him again, he's to be taken away from us because he knew the prince.

"It will be all right, Da', "Ben said, and hugged him. And when Andrew felt that young strength embracing him, he could almost believe it. But, he thought, his son had not learned fear yet. He had not learned how cruel the world could be.

Andrew Staad held his wife. The two of them stood in the doorway and watched Ben and the soldier break their way through the drifts toward the sleigh, which was only a shadow in the dark with lanterns glowing eerily on either side. Neither of them spoke as Ben climbed up on one side, the soldier on the other.