The Vampire & Her Witch

The morning assembly began as the first grey light seeped through the canopy of hemlock and cedar, turning the darkness of the forest into something that barely qualified as dawn.

The lodge’s great room had been arranged for a lavish pre-hunt meal, with trestle tables set in several rows, all angled so that everyone had a view of the high table at the head of the hall. Owain’s table sat nearest the stone hearth where a fire crackled against the winter chill, and the stuffed head of a great boar gazed out over the assembled hunters.

Sir Gilander sat to Owain’s right side, and Sir Garrik Maeril had taken the other seat of honor to his left. Captain Albyn had been seated at the far end of the table, close enough to the lord’s circle to acknowledge his rising station but far enough removed to discourage conversation with the guests of honor.

There were too many people missing from Owain’s table.

It wasn’t just that Hugo and Rain were missing. Sir Kaefin should have been here with him for this moment, but the man he’d thought of as an older brother had died months ago when the witch, Lynnda, infiltrated the Summer Villa, as had Sir Broll. Sir Tommin should have been here too, but the traitor had abandoned him in order to ’follow his faith’ by serving the Church.

In fact, looking around the high table, there was no one left at his side who Owain would have considered a friend from his younger years, though a few of the people sitting at the lower tables came as close as anyone might.

Owain had done his best to fill up the ranks of his vassals. Sir Payl Gawne had retired to his lands years ago after sustaining injuries that left him unable to grip a sword or a lance, but he still rode well, and he was eager to help Owain in the coming hunt. So eager, in fact, that he’d brought both his sons, aged eight and eleven years old, to ride along and watch the spectacle.

Sir Payl might no longer be a capable warrior, but at least he was loyal and understood the importance of this hunt. Sir Aland Shimmin and Sir Franc Kermeen were both younger knights who had often bemoaned that their responsibilities to their sprawling villages kept them from following Owain into battle against the demons, but they at least had the good sense to show up now, which was more than Owain could say for many of the men who were about to become his vassals.

”Good morning, everyone,” Owain called, shaking off the fog that seemed to have clung to him since he stepped outside this morning. The people at his table barely mattered to him and everyone who might have mattered, even his brother Loman, was either missing or dead.

So be it. A young lord could be surrounded by peers, but within the march that bore his family’s name, he had none, and it was long past time that he remembered that.

”Sir Gilander, our esteemed Master of the Hunt, has arranged a hearty feast to fill your bellies and warm your hearts on this frigid morning,” Owain said, playing the role of the charming host as he stood from his chair at the high table and raised his cup in a signal that his guests should prepare to do the same.

From doors on one side of the great hall, more than a dozen servants poured into the hall, bearing giant wooden platters piled high with everything from venison sausages to wilted winter greens and fresh-baked rolls filled with nuts and dried fruits.

”I know the hour is early, and many of you would rather be in your chambers, under the furs with your warm and loving wives,” he said, nodding in the direction of the older lords and knights. ”So I thank you for leaving them behind to join me as we hunt for a beast fit for a coronation feast,” he said, bowing his head slightly toward the assembled noblemen before raising his cup up high above his head.

”To the hunt!” Owain cried, his voice resounding off the tapestry-covered wooden walls and carrying to the far end of the hall.

”To the hunt!” the lords and knights shouted back, though their enthusiasm was far too lacking to make up for how few people sat at the tables of the hall. Still, Owain had a role to play, and he would play it as well as anyone could.

”Please,” Owain said, gesturing to the heaping serving platters that filled the tables. ”Help yourselves. It’ll be the last warm meal we enjoy for several hours, so don’t be polite for my sake,” he said with a bright, charming smile before he returned to his seat and looked out over the crowd.

The second tier of tables held the barons or the descendants of the barons who had been unwilling to attend the hunt.

Of those that came, the two he knew the best were Baron Wes Iriso and Lord Reynold Aleese.

Long before Rain Aleese had taken Sir Tommin’s place as Owain’s personal guard, Reynold Aleese had been one of Owain’s frequent opponents at tournaments, though the future Aleese baron knew better than to challenge Owain with anything other than a lance in a hand and a fierce steed beneath him.

The same couldn’t be said of Baron Wes Iriso, however. Wes was only a few years older than Owain, but that head start had allowed him to hand a much younger Owain several embarrassing defeats in his first few years competing. Unfortunately, the death of Wes’s father had forced the talented lord to retire before Owain had caught up to him, denying Owain the opportunity to prove that he’d become the better man.

Baron Erling Fayle sat beside Baron Iriso, looking smaller than his title warranted. He was a young man with sandy hair and a face that belonged on a squire rather than a baron. His youthfulness was only made more obvious when you compared him to the actual squires who packed in at the ends of the table, looking like they were only three or four years older than Baron Erling rather than nearly a decade younger.

Beside the youthful baron, Tulori Leufroy picked at a piece of bread with the careful, observant air of a student cataloguing a lecture, while Serge Otker drank his wine with more enthusiasm than the hour justified.

For a moment, Owain wished he hadn’t restricted the gathering to men. At least if the assembled lords had been permitted to bring their women along to watch the hunt, the gathering would have had a few bright spots that his eyes could linger on.

Allowing the men to bring their women, however, would only have made Jocelynn’s absence more noticeable, so he’d chosen to restrict the field as a way of covering up Jocelynn’s blunder of arranging a memorial for her sister during his hunt.

Now that he’d done it, it was too late to regret his decision just because the room full of men looked particularly dour and disinterested in the festivities. Instead, he’d have to find other ways to pass the time while they awaited news from the huntsman.

And perhaps, he thought as he chewed on a venison sausage that had been heavily spiced with fennel, garlic, and hot peppers. Perhaps he could use this time as an opportunity to discern who among his vassals had taken the lead in sabotaging the attendance of his hunt.