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They came crashing down the forest roads, carts and coaches rattling, horses pounding and snorting, drivers cracking their whips and cursing one another.  They came as fast as the wheels would carry them, over mossy flagstones and through lukewarm puddles and over fields that no one seemed to be cultivating. They came without stopping, without rest, rushing forward in the calm, gently rocking interiors of their carriages, sipping wine and wondering aloud what was taking their sweating drivers so long to get them to their destination.

The train of carriages tore through the forest like tiger's claws through a soft, unsuspecting belly, scattering flotillas of oranging leaves and herds of bleating goats in its wake. The thunder of hooves went out before them, rattling stoneware dishes and their peasant owners alike. Cavalry? An army? The leash cult, taken up arms? But then they were past and gone, leaving behind them wheel ruts and broken fences. What was that, the hierophant's retinue, an otherworldly train of spirits, some strange circus, late for an engagement?

The man at the head of the procession pressed his horse, once beautiful and proud, for all the speed her ancient body could muster.  When the horse slowed, her rider laughed and waved and shouted encouragements at the occupants of the coaches; when the horse found speed lost somewhere deep inside her old bones, the rider surged ahead of them to laugh and wave and shout at no one in particular. It was not clear whether he set the pace of the train behind him or if he was pushed along before it.

When the column of carriages burst out of the forest and into the meadows that fell down to the River Fosse, the Baroness Theresa Bramwood was waiting on the bank opposite, her handful of knights arrayed behind her. The lady-knight at her right hand nodded across the water. "There they are, milady. The way-spirits were screaming about their approach all night."

The knight on her left shifted his broad shoulders and rubbed his palms on the two pommels at his belt. His eyes flickered back and forth, counting and figuring odds. 

"There will be no need for that, Sir Sedgwin," the baroness murmured to him, watching the invaders through a brass spyglass. "These are no raiders, and that is no warlord at their head."

"You recognize him?" the lady-knight asked. 

"Unfortunately, Dame Sophia," she nodded, and put the spyglass down. "It's my brother. George."

"What were you thinking?" the Baroness demanded, not caring very much about the thin tent canvas that served as walls or the volume of her voice. Once her brother had crossed the river, she had dragged him back to the pavilion she used for holding court and ordered everyone else out. Now she was pacing back and forth along the length of the dark mahogany table. He looked on, wringing his hands and looking anxious. He'd occasionally look back at the tent wall and the silhouettes of their eavesdroppers, all plainly visible. "What in all the grey world possessed you to bring that... that... circus train to my doorstep?"

George took a half-step forward. "Theresa..."

"Milady Bramwood." Her eyes were cold and sharp; her lips drawn tight. "Don't even think about using given names, George."

Her brother took pains to look pained, and tried again. "Milady Bramwood. You left me at Castle Colhurst months ago. I only assumed you wished me to see to your affairs—"

"I wished for my seneschal to see to my affairs, George, that's why the job was invented." The Baroness turned to stare down the length of the table at him, her fingers gripping the back of a chair. "After my husband was assassinated in my own bedchamber, we left Colhurst in haste with as little baggage as possible. That included you."

George put on as best a face as he could manage. "And I regretted not having the opportunity to support you in that troubling time. Milady."

The Baroness waved an angry hand westward, towards the river and George's entourage. "But now you're making up for it."

"They were mobbing the castle, milady," George protested. "You can't imagine the... the chaos. Extending them hospitality was draining the castle stores, they were taking up every nook and cranny as chambers, the skeleton crew you left behind were going mad. And all any of the gentlemen wanted was an audience with you."

"Did it occur to you I didn't want to see them?" she demanded, looking at him as if she had just discovered, after their entire lives as siblings, that he was an idiot. "Did that cross your mind?"

"Roger Farnwell is among them, Ther— milady," the man nearly sputtered. "Sent to speak with you by your liege Count Beverwick. You can't just deny him audience."

"No, I can't," the raven-haired woman agreed, but in such a manner that made George cringe. "But what I can do is not be there to deny him audience. Which worked just fine as long as he was shacked up in Colhurst with a ready supply of whores."

"You... you knew he was there?"

Her hands fell on an empty platter on the table. For a moment George thought she was going to fling it at his head, but after a long moment she apparently thought better of it and stepped away from the table. "Of course I knew he was there, George. Do you think I'm completely cut off from my own baronial seat? Have you not heard of letters? I've been sending away for new women to keep Farnwell occupied for two months."

"But look... milady," George tried to be reasonable. "I don't see why you're avoiding him, or any of the others. They just want to help."

The Baroness rolled her eyes and gave her brother a pitying look, as if sympathetic for how difficult it must have been to hide his idiocy for this long.

"You're not exactly a day's ride from the capital, Theresa," he pointed out. "It's a long, hard journey to get here, and I can't imagine why any of these men would undertake such difficulties if they didn't mean to help you."

The Baroness contemplated her brother for a long moment, then let herself fall back into the chaise lounge behind her. "Because you said, 'help a lady,' and all they heard was 'profit from a lady's helplessness,' George. I brought all the courtiers I needed with me. I don't need a court full of slavering opportunists."

"They're not—"

"How many of them are suitors, George?"

"What?"

Bramwood groaned at her brother's seeming naiveté. "How many of these fine, upstanding men, all of whom desire only to lend a hand to my poor, incompetent and womanly self, are expecting a shot at getting my hand in return?"

"Well, I don't know the inner workings of each man's..."

"All of them, safe to say," Bramwood concluded, slapped her hands on her thighs, and stood up. "Which brings us to the troubling part, George."

"...troubling part?" he echoed, sitting down.

"Your involvement in this little expedition." Before he could offer any response, she raised a single finger and silenced him. "You obviously can't marry your own sister to become the new Baron Bramwood. But you can ingratiate yourself to the future Baron Bramwood... perhaps by being the one who introduces him to the lady who will bend over to be the next rung up his social ladder. And by the bells, why introduce just one suitor to your sister when you can introduce twenty all at once." George made as if to speak, but she brandished the finger at him again. "And who knows, since the old Baron Bramwood won enough lands in the war to make this barony larger than most counties, maybe the new Baron Bramwood, by dint of having a penis, will be elevated to Count to match his lands. At which point, your friend the new Count will turn to you, his first and most trusted advisor, and make you Baron Aldcourt. Won't that be nice?"

"Theresa, it's not like that—"

"It is exactly like that, George!" she shouted, full force. In the ringing silence that followed, she moderated her volume. She kicked out a chair and sat down across the table corner from her brother. "I have enough to worry about without my own family trying to profit from my widowing."

It was a long time before George reached forward a tentative hand to touch hers. She didn't flinch backwards. "It wasn't... it wasn't like that, Theresa. Nothing so... planned. Please believe me, I was only trying to help."

She took his hand and squeezed it incrementally. "I know, George. What I don't know is who it was, exactly, you were trying to help. And I imagine you don't, either."

A man, well-dressed in slashed doublet and breeches and slowly sweating through them both, made his way up a rutted track. The fields on either side were packed with golden grain, the autumn afternoon sky above them the color of oiled steel. He did not pay much mind to the crops, or to the immaculately tended fences that wrapped around them; his attention was forward, to the farmhouse built near the top of the hill.

The cobbled-together house sat in front of a wide stretch of packed earth. At this hour the space was littered with farm equipment and a trio of wandering goats, all waiting to be put away for the night. At the center of the mess was a young man hastily and awkwardly chopping firewood. He was obviously trying to beat the setting sun, but this was not the source of his wobbling swings or the haphazard pile of split logs. As the well-dressed man stepped closer, he could see that the woodcutter grasped the axe with only one hand, his other arm ending in a stump at the wrist.

One more log went skittering off in two pieces, and the young man turned to look the newcomer over. Whatever his appraisal was, it did not move him to comment, and he waited for the other man to speak.

The man in the doublet cleared his throat uneasily. "You Blakescroft?"

The axe thudded into one of the larger logs and stayed there, quivering. "Alex Blakescroft," the young man answered. "You?"

"I'm afraid you will not be getting the benefit of my name, Alex," the new man told him flatly. "And you would do best to forget my face, as well. I need to speak with your mother. An opportunity has arisen that Paradise demands we seize."