The Deadly Feast by Stefon Mears

Author:Stefon Mears [Mears, Stefon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thousand Faces Publishing

Aefric found himself standing atop the crenellation at one corner of the wall that surrounded the courtyard of Herewyn’s tower keep. Beside him stood Ferrin, still smiling as though this were the finest moment of his life. On his other side, the Brightstaff stood tall and secure at the very edge of the granite.

Ferrin had removed his heavy gold chain for the challenge, and allowed Aefric to hang it from the Brightstaff, for safety.

Just below Aefric, on the battlements, stood his Knights of the Lake, a dozen or so other knights, and all the nobles whose hands he’d kissed before Herewyn officially began the Feast.

The nobles stood grouped, closer to the gate, but the knights were spread out along the battlement. Perhaps to catch Ferrin, if he should fall.

For certainly Aefric’s own knights ought to have known that falling presented no threat to their duke.

The many soldiers on the battlements had cleared out from this part of the wall, making room for what was to come.

The whole of the massive, assembled crowd remained outside the tower’s walls. Aefric’s earlier count had to have been low, because he was sure now that there had to be close to five thousand people gathered in the streets nearby.

And all of them stared eagerly up at Aefric and Ferrin as they prepared to engage in the first official contest of the first day of the Feast.

What was worse, the breeze had picked up. Warm, and from the east, putting it in Aefric’s face.

“Your grace understands the challenge?” Ferrin asked, smiling as though he hoped Aefric would ask to have it explained again.

Once, though, had been enough.

“We move, one at a time, along the crenellations to the gate and back. If one of us falls, or even stumbles, that one is the loser, and the contest ends. If neither of us fall, we move on to stage two.”

“When the spiked helmets are added, yes,” Ferrin said with a brusque nod.

“A warning, first,” Aefric said. “You might be tempted to touch the Brightstaff—”

“I know its reputation, your grace,” Ferrin said, raising a halting hand. “I’ve no wish to taste its lightning, as my poor castle doors did. Shall we begin?”

Aefric nodded.

They’d already drawn lots. Ferrin was to go first on the first stage. If the second stage was necessary, Aefric would go first. If the third and final stage was necessary, Ferrin would go first again.

Ferrin held up his hands as Herewyn had, middle fingers crossed. The crowd didn’t mirror the movement, but their restlessness did settle somewhat.

“I have won the lot, and shall go first,” Ferrin said, doing a better job of projecting his voice this time.

“Do your best for Dereth Sehk,” the crowd chanted back.

Ferrin was making a show of it, but Aefric didn’t think the first stage sounded all that challenging. The crenellations were easily three feet across and two feet wide, with no more than three feet between them. True, there was the height to consider — elevation alone could make a simple task feel tricky — but overall, not very hard.

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