Gareth Ashford's Arc

Chapter 1 of 9

Gareth Ashford had six copper coins and a curse to break. The curse lived three hundred miles east, in the village where he was born. Every winter solstice it turned one newborn to stone. He had sworn to end it. But a quest costs money, and Gareth had none. His father had died in debt, and Gareth owned only cheap leather armor and a sword. So he took the only honest coin he could find. The work was clearing bandits from the forest road. A merchant guild paid in advance. Gareth almost refused, the way he refused the slaver who once hired him. But these outlaws had gutted a caravan and left the drivers dead. He had walked past the wreck that morning. Broken wheels, torn supply sacks, dark stains on the wood. Honest work, for once. He took it. He made camp at dusk under a leaning canvas shelter. He banked a small fire and chewed cold bread. He did not sleep. He had learned long ago to read trouble before it struck. A guard captain once cornered him in an alley, and only watching the man's shoulders had saved him. Now Gareth watched the dark between the trees. They came fast. Not bandits. Goblins. Six of them, lean and grinning, spilling from the brush with blades out. They wanted his supplies and his horse. Gareth kicked the fire into their faces and rolled clear. He took one across the knee, dropped another with his pommel. The rest scattered into the dark, shrieking. One did not run. She circled him, light on her feet, a curved knife in each hand. She wore scraps of leather and a red sash, and she moved better than all the others combined. Gareth did not lunge. He waited. He let her come to him, feint after feint, until her patience broke first. She overreached. He stepped inside her swing, caught her wrist, and put her face-down in the dirt. He had her bound before she stopped cursing. She went still under his knee. "You waited," she said. "Nobody waits." "Gets me more goblins that way." "Snikka," she said, like it was a warning. "Razortooth. Traders pay to not see me. You'll want to let me go." "No," Gareth said. He sat her against a tree and studied her in the firelight. Her yellow eyes measured him right back, searching for the place his patience ran out. The bandits were still out there. The merchants paid for the whole band, dead. But this one worked alone, she said, and alone she knew these woods. She knew where the outlaws slept. Gareth checked her chains and fed the fire. His clean job had just become a captive he did not plan for and a camp of bandits still breathing. He had come for coin to save a village. Now he had a prisoner who might lead him to it, if she did not open his throat first.