The ground beneath the boar’s head and nearby body, including the fallen leaves and patches of ferns and moss surrounding it, had turned black. Tendrils of the taint flowed jaggedly from its rotting flesh.

  “In faith of the Christ Jesus,” Father Hagen stood behind Draka with his chin and staff crowned by a cross lifted into the air, finishing his prayer, “The grace of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, Amen.”

  Draka sprinkled holy oil ceremoniously over the corpse and the ground around it. The remains of the boar sizzled and melted into ashen flames. He straightened with a long breath.

  The Father let his staff rest and put a comforting hand on Draka’s shoulder. Monks of Father Hagen’s priory were chanting their melodious blessings, casting ointments, oils, and ashes over the taint of the forest. The ground sprouted flames with each sprinkle. Bursts erupted from around the depths of digging tree roots at their feet. As they carried crosses on the heads of their staves or swung large aspergilla, taking steps into the fires that the oily drops began, they were unharmed.

  “Rest, Paladin,” Hagen’s white bearded face looked grim with worry. His dark eyes regarded Draka’s hesitant nod solemnly. “You have much to do. We will drive the corruption well enough without you tiring yourself further. I'll set camp at the Abbey and keep the corruption at bay until the cohorts arrive.”

  Draka didn’t like the idea of leaving just yet. The monastic knights had wondrously joined with the Diocese when they spread to encircle the corrupted area of the forest. As they kept in pace with the monks casting the oils and calling upon the Almighty to bless the ground before them, Draka caught a few glimpses of guilt in their eyes. He didn’t need to call upon the True Sight to see their hearts. They knew what he was thinking.

  He wanted to judge each of them. He wanted to chastise, to punish—perhaps even permanently maim them—for their failure in protecting the Clevlans. But that was not his place and it was not necessarily their duty. Ultimately, he accepted the blame and held his temper. The piercing glares that shot from him were not so easily hidden, even in the dark of the night only brightened by the glow of the fires and the torches carried by the monastics. They were giving him a wide breadth. If he were any other man, he might have slaughtered the lot of them for this. For all of it. Instead, he went to check that Vigora had returned to her stable.

  Vigora regarded him from the bed of hay in the back of the stable, his torchlight glinting across her pale eyes from where he stood at the opening. He wanted to fall into her, curl up as if he were her foal, and weep the way Aurie and Maud had in his arms. Instead, he leaned the stable door in place and left her there, knowing that her eyes followed him until he was setting his torch into the sconce on one of his porch pillars. There, he sat and lay his head in his hands.

  Never had he failed like this. Not once, in all twenty-three years as a crusader, had he failed to protect his charges. Not like this. They were butchered. Eight men died protecting Aurie alone. Without him. Because of him.

  She was right. He was the cause of all of it. His presence had emboldened the Enemy. His love for their family had made them targets. Because of him, a father and his young son are dead. Because he was now unworthy of the Holy Spirit to work through him, to heal. Or even to resurrect, as he had once done in the siege of Heblem for one of his comrades. Another first that weighed heavily on his heart.

  He had asked and God had said, “No.” In vain. He could feel the Holy Spirit still within him, but it remained silent, distant. If it was to be revoked, the moment would be at its direst. He will soon die for his worthlessness. All he could do was wait.

  Or perhaps not. Draka rubbed his chin, looking toward the Abbey as if he could see it through the night and the dark deep shadows of the forest beyond the glow of his torch. All he needed to do was gather his arms, don his armor, and go to it. Alone. Zealous with rage and faithless in himself, faithful only in that God would carry him far enough to exact vengeance until his death. Once the Holy Spirit revoked itself, he would fight with all his mortal might until he fell into the hands of his enemies. He’s already failed at one oath, why not the other?

  “Draka,” Gerard approached the edge of Draka’s torchlight with one hand extended and another resting anticipatorily on the sword in his belt. It wasn’t until he saw how defensively Gerard was approaching that Draka realized he was on his feet with his own blade drawn. The dried blood of the boar was yet to be cleaned from it. “I know that I failed you, but there are more important things to tend to. Please, friend.”

  Draka sheathed his sword with a tremble that he wished he could hide, even from himself. Gerard stood relieved.

  “Balian is enacting the land trust. He’s taken Maudeline’s dowry and cast them out. Tomorrow night, they will be destitute and without shelter unless you, and you alone, do something. I have no right to do anything but enforce it.”

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Draka shook at him in overexaggerated confusion.

  Gerard nodded as if he understood. “I know, I didn’t expect it either. But he did. He took their money and told them they had until sunset tomorrow to be off his land, which is all that Balor owned.”

  Draka rolled his eyes and waved for him to follow inside. Gerard followed him in and to the table where Draka wrote on one of the papers with a dipped pen, “Why didn’t YOU prevent such a thing?” His eyes blazed at Gerard.

  Gerard gulped and took a step back. Again, his hand was defensively on his sword. “I have to enforce the law, Draka. You have your oaths, I have mine. Their land is a family trust, like all the lands here. The inheritor must carry the name, permanently.”

  So, Draka clenched his fists at the thought, a woman can’t inherit it. Only a man. Only Balian. He wrote, “And what of caring for a grieving widow.”

  “He doesn’t care. He’s even talked of having Balor and Alden’s bodies buried somewhere outside the village in an unmarked grave to spite them as well. He’s gone mad, Draka. You, you and only you, can do something about this. If I interfere—well, you know what will happen.”

  Draka sat at the table. “You are no oathbreaker." ...Like I am. He wrote, "What can I do?”

  “I don’t know. If I knew what your rights were, I’d have a better idea,” Gerard slid into one of the other chairs. The fact that the one he chose was still out of Draka’s reach did not go unnoticed. “Do you know what title they are giving you? What rights?”

  Draka shook his head thoughtfully.

  “Of course not.”

  Silence filled the air, broken only by the flapping of flames from the hearth and crackles of insects hidden in the emblazoned logs. Draka wanted to tear his house apart as he had last time, only this time let it burn atop him for finally failing his last oath. How could he be worthy of anything more than destruction at his helplessness?

  His eyes shifted about the room, searching, reaching for a possibility, a way for him to make right what had gone so terribly wrong. But there was nothing he could see. Nothing he could do. His mind rolled through what he remembered of the scriptures, of His teachings, and nothing seemed to answer what he searched for. Except one…for him to marry Maud and take responsibility for Aurie’s care as an in-law. His jaw tightened at that. Neither Aurie—or Maud for that matter—would agree to such an arrangement now. And it certainly wasn’t something he wanted. Not Maud. Perhaps if Aurie…Draka wanted to whip that thought from his head. Wanted to beat it from him. There must be another way.

  And it struck him with a flicker of the shadows dancing at the edges of the firelight, looking like two warriors striking at each other. Like a duel.

  Draka shifted in his seat. His trembling wasn’t from fear. The beating of his heart was rage. The grinding of his teeth, the grip of the quill that bent it in his fist, was what he wanted to do to every knight that didn't protect the Clevlans, to himself, to what nearly cut Aurie apart...to Balian. The Holy Spirit may be revoked, but he is still a skilled fighter. Gerard pursed his brows at him as he frantically dipped his quill and began writing, “How do I challenge a duel?”

  “Duel?” Gerard jumped with a smile. “You brilliant heathen! Yes!”

  Draka underlined his question to emphasize that he actually needed to know.

  Gerard chuckled bashfully, “Right. Well, there are two types of duels permitted by law. A Lord’s duel, which is merely until one concedes or is incapacitated, never purposefully to death.” Draka moved his eyes to show he was letting the thought sink in. “With a Lord’s duel, it is meant to reestablish supremacy over your peer and protect someone’s honor.”

  Draka nodded that he understood. “Other terms than just honor?”

  “Not with a Lord’s Duel. A King’s Duel—which is to the death—is for everything. All that is one’s becomes the victor’s. It is meant to be for ownership. All possessions, including present and future titles, inheritances—everything—go to the victor. Few have used this sort of duel because of that. It is all or death. Never known a king to use it, but there have been Lords who have made such challenges for adultery. The result increases holdings and makes the fallen’s family slaves on their own estates.”

  That was it. Draka grinned. That was how he would do it. He wrote, “How do I challenge Balian?”

  “King’s or Lord’s duel?”

  “King’s.”