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Updated: May 6, 2025
"Forward!" he cried, and away clattered the two companies of horsemen in opposite directions. It was toward the westward that Baron Henry of Trutz-Drachen rode at the head of his men. The early springtide sun shot its rays of misty, yellow light across the rolling tops of the forest trees where the little birds were singing in the glory of the May morning.
Thereupon she went on to tell Otto how Baron Conrad had fulfilled the pledge of revenge that he had made Abbot Otto, how he had watched day after day until one time he had caught the Trutz-Drachen folk, with Baron Frederick at their head, in a narrow defile back of the Kaiserburg; of the fierce fight that was there fought; of how the Roderburgs at last fled, leaving Baron Frederick behind them wounded; of how he had kneeled before the Baron Conrad, asking for mercy, and of how Baron Conrad had answered, "Aye, thou shalt have such mercy as thou deservest," and had therewith raised his great two-handed sword and laid his kneeling enemy dead at one blow.
Now it was Baron Conrad's turn to be summoned to the Imperial Court, for complaint had been lodged against him by his old enemy of Trutz-Drachen Baron Henry the nephew of the old Baron Frederick who had been slain while kneeling in the dust of the road back of the Kaiserburg. No one at Drachenhausen could read but Master Rudolph, the steward, who was sand blind, and little Otto.
Henry of Trutz-Drachen grasped at his horse's mane, but the attack was so fierce, so sudden, and so unexpected that before he could save himself he was dragged to one side and fell crashing in his armor upon the stone roadway of the bridge.
In Castle Trutz-Drachen all was confusion and uproar: flashing torches lit up the dull gray walls; horses neighed and stamped, and men shouted and called to one another in the bustle of making ready. Presently Baron Henry came striding along the corridor clad in light armor, which he had hastily donned when roused from his sleep by the news that his prisoner had escaped.
Now we dress in frieze and live upon what we can get and sometimes that is little enough, with nothing better than sour beer to drink. But there is one comfort in it all, and that is that our good Baron paid back the score he owed the Trutz-Drachen people not only for that, but for all that they had done from the very first."
"How," cried the Baron Henry, "are ye afraid of one man? Then follow me!" and he spurred forward to the bridge-head. But still no one moved in answer, and the Lord of Trutz-Drachen reined back his horse again. He wheeled his horse and glared round upon the stolid faces of his followers, until his eyes seemed fairly to blaze with passion beneath the bars of his vizor.
"Yes," said she, "for if my father and my mother knew that I did such a thing, they would strike me, mayhap send me to my bed alone in the dark." IX. How One-eyed Hans came to Trutz-Drachen.
And then fell silent in the thought of the wonder of it all, and that there should be men in the world that knew nothing of violence and bloodshed; for in all the eight years of her life she had scarcely been outside of the walls of Castle Trutz-Drachen. At another time it was of Otto's mother that they were speaking. "And didst thou never see her, Otto?" said the little girl.
As the sun rose more full and warm, the misty wreaths began to dissolve, until at last they parted and rolled asunder like a white curtain and there, before the pursuing horsemen, lay the crest of the mountain toward which they were riding, and up which the road wound steeply. "Yonder they are," cried a sudden voice behind Baron Henry of Trutz-Drachen, and at the cry all looked upward.
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