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."

The Vanguard glanced at her, eyebrow raised, then nodded toward the door to the top of the fortified gateway. "Go on. I'll finish these."

"Strongcastle! We demand that you come out!" 

Rhoa gave the Vanguard a warning glare, but then took a deep breath and did as he suggested, pausing in the narrow exit to collect herself before striding out of the gatehouse tower and onto the gateway parapet walk.

Immediately there were several loud cries of "There she is!"

Grinding her teeth, Rhoa surveyed the ragged band of people on the other side of the ravine. "What do you want?" 

It was soft, bland little Diviner Longstruik who stood at the head of the crowd, not Rokstag. She narrowed her eyes as he lifted his pudgy hands, calling for silence. "We do not seek audience with you, Rhoa. Where is your father?"

"He's very busy at the moment, but I will relay a message!"

Longstruik drew himself up straight, the action oddly stiff. "You have food, shelter and medicine! We ask that you lower the drawbridge so we can bring our children into the fortress!"

That was a blatant lie, which was almost as strange to hear coming out of Longstruik as it was that Rokstag wasn't down there leading the mob. "Where are your children?" she called. "I see only scythes and hammers!"

Longstruik opened his mouth, but Old Marjan suddenly shoved his way to the front, pushing past the Diviner. "For two score years we've stood by and let that thing live!" He shouted, turning to the others around him, one arm raised to point in her direction. "Strongcastle wouldn't do the right thing when she was born. He refused to give her back to the forest. It's as much his fault as her witch mother's for bringing her here, and it's time we correct his mistake! I say we burn them out and end this once and for all!"

Rhoa's hoarse, "Go home!" Died on her lips when Marjan turned to look up at her.

He was lifting his fist in challenge, now, smiling as the crowd began jeering and chanting – but his lips were pulled back too far, his teeth a grotesque bone-white against a mouth full of shiny black tar.

With a gasp, Rhoa yanked Isander's long glass from her pocket and trained it on the villagers. The woman next to Marjan had a trail of black creeping from her ears and down the sides of her neck, staining her smock. Orla's uncle, Tomai Gaffig, had vomited a stream of pitch all down the front of his doublet. The Diviner's eyes were sunken in their sockets, the whites of his eyes weeping that same inky, glossy black. As she watched, his jaw deformed, elongating and opening farther than it should, tearing the corners of his mouth as he shouted something she couldn't make out. He was staring right at her.

The Vanguard came out to stand next to her, arms crossed over his chest as he stared out across the ravine. "They're infected."

Rhoa swallowed hard, the hair rising on her neck. She was about to lower the long glass when she caught a glimpse of a slender figure huddled at the back of the crowd. Hissing a breath through her teeth, she found that spot again and focused the lens on a fall of tangled golden hair. Then she swore and closed her eyes, her throat tight. "They've got Orla."

"Someone you know?" 

Rhoa nodded. "My brother's woman. They've beaten her." She went still, then looked at the Vanguard, eyes wide. "She knows about the sally port."  

The next instant, she ducked instinctively as a hunter's arrow zipped past her face. It flew wide and disappeared into the bailey, but it was all the warning they needed. She darted back into the gatehouse, following on the Vanguard's heels.

The Vanguard whipped around and pressed his back to the wall just inside the doorway, angling his body so he could get a look over the portcullis without presenting a target.

Loud shouting and cheering could be heard outside, then the sound of an axe biting into a tree trunk.

"Where is the sally port?" He asked.

"In the stable." Rhoa hauled a crossbow to her shoulder and stepped into one of the loopholes. "They shouldn't be able to get through it, though. I locked it."

The Vanguard shook his head, then crossed to the stairs that led down to the ground floor. "I've seen a Vanguard stronghold breached by Rotmen in a matter of minutes. Don't underestimate them."

Rhoa glanced at him over her shoulder, green eyes boring into brown as he met her gaze. For one endless heartbeat, she hung on indecision. This could be how he got the Vanguards inside. It could so easily be a trap.

She didn't have any choice. Either she trusted him and he helped her, or all was lost.  "The last stall on the right. There's a hidden panel in the back."

He gave her a small nod before starting down the steps, drawing his sword as he went. "Hold the wall."

She turned back to the loophole. "Be careful."

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