Warmoon [ONC 2020]•[Shortlisted]•[Honorable Mention List, Stunning Worlds]

15. Rotmen

Rhoa kicked the brake out of the chain, set her shoulder to the push bar, dug in her feet, and began turning the winch. With a gritty rumble, the counterweights slid downward, and the fortress drawbridge started rising. Several turns later, the drawbridge had reached its housing in front of the portcullis and she set the chain brake again. Then she strode swiftly out of the gatehouse, and began closing the massive ironbound inner gates, sliding the crossbars into place.

Finished with the gates, she ran up the stairs inside the gatehouse tower and began setting the triggers for the mechanical crossbows on the top floor, making sure the feeder stacks were armed with bolts and the aiming apparatus was trained on the killsquare in front of the fortress gates. Then she double-checked the trigger wire, following it along the inside of the wall to the other gatehouse. It was well-oiled and moved freely. If Rokstag and his minions managed to grapple the drawbridge down, she could man both gatehouses at once with a simple pull on the end of the wire.

If the villagers still made it over the wall, she and the Vanguard would be the last and only line of defense.

She took off, then, sprinting along the inside of the parapet to the door to the south Keep tower.

When she ducked into the Armory, she stopped short in the doorway.

The Vanguard was standing by the changing bench, and he had found the armor she had set out for him. He was wearing Isander's spare shoulder plates and armguards over a shirt of chainmail and a long leather tunic. A longsword hung at his hip, and Phane's metal clad boots were on his feet.

He looked up, tying his braids into a thick knot at the back of his head with a strip of leather.

"Your Gran will be fine in a few hours," he said, answering her question before she asked. "Phane will take longer. I was able to pull out the Rot, but he'll have to recover more naturally from the sprak sting."

She nodded her thanks and came all the way in. It was disconcerting, seeing him battle ready. He didn't seem inclined to wear the hood of mail or the antlered helmet she had taken from Radier's collection, but somehow that didn't make him any less intimidating.

Without another word, Rhoa began taking the heavy windlass crossbows down from their racks. The Vanguard stepped up beside her, shouldering two of them while Rhoa slung four quivers of bolts across her back and gathered the other two crossbows. Then they left, spiraling up the south Keep stairwell to the top of the wall.  

They had only just pushed through the door to the east gatehouse when the sound of angry voices and tromping footsteps announced the presence of a crowd gathering on the other edge of the ravine that formed the dry moat. Rokstag hadn't wasted any time.

The Vanguard came to a halt behind her and lowered his crossbows to the floor, peering through one of the three loophole windows in the curved outer wall of the gatehouse.

"You weren't joking," he muttered.

Rhoa clamped a bolt in her teeth, planted the nose of the crossbow on the floor, wedged the toe of her boot into the stirrup, and began cranking the hand winch on the tail of the stock, hauling the string back till it slid over the trigger hook.

Outside, a male voice rang loud: "Strongcastle!"

"It gets better," Rhoa said, plucking the bolt from her teeth. "First Diviner Rokstag wants me to join the cloister as his new ward, or he's going to have me declared a witch by the Order." She slid the bolt deftly into place in the firing channel, then leaned the armed crossbow against the wall under one of the loophole windows. One down. "I was supposed to give him my answer today."