Turning a sharp corner into a narrow alley, I saw four men surrounding a young woman. They had already ripped her dress from her, and one of the attackers had loosened his leggings, exposing his fish-white legs and buttocks.
‘Stop that!’ I shouted. Not the most powerful opening line, I’ll admit, especially when delivered in a high-pitched shriek. But my arrival stunned them momentarily and the naked man struggled to pull up his leggings, while the other three swung to face me. They were a grotesque bunch, ugly and filthy, dressed in greasy rags. Fight them? I would have given all I had not to touch them.
One of them drew a dagger and advanced towards me, grunting out some kind of enquiry. The language he used was as foul as his look. The strangest thoughts come to a man in danger, or so I have found. Here was a man with no regard for his appearance. His face and clothes were filthy, his teeth blackened and rotting, yet his dagger was sharp and bright and clean. What is it that makes a man take more care of a piece of iron than his own body?
‘I am a bard,’ I said.
He nodded sagely and then bade me go away, using language I would not dream of repeating.
‘Step away from the lady, if you please,’ I told them. ‘Otherwise I shall call the Watch.’ There was some laughter at this and two of the other three advanced upon me. One sported a hook such as is used to hang meat, while the second held two lengths of wood with a wire stretched between them. The last of them remained with the girl, holding her by throat and hair.
I had no choice but to run – and I would have done so. But fear had frozen my limbs, and I stood like a sacrificial goat waiting for the knife and the hook and the wicked throat wire.
Suddenly a man leapt from the balcony above to land in their midst, sending two of them sprawling. The one on his feet, he of the meat-hook, swung his weapon at the newcomer, who swayed aside and lashed out with a sword-belt he was holding in his left hand. The buckle caught the man high on the left cheek, spinning him from his feet. It was then that I saw that the newcomer was wearing only one boot and was carrying his sword-belt in his hand. Hurling aside his scabbard he drew his blade, lancing it through the neck of his nearest foe. But the first of the villains I had seen rose up behind the newcomer.
‘Look out!’ I cried. Our unknown helper spun on his heel, his sword plunging into the chest of his opponent. I was behind the man, and I saw the blade emerge from his back; he gave a strangled scream and his knees buckled. The warrior desperately tried to tear his sword loose from the man’s chest, but it was stuck fast. The rogue with the throat-wire leapt upon the newcomer’s back, but before he could twist the wire round his intended victim’s throat he ducked and twisted, hurling his attacker into a wall. As the villain rose groggily the newcomer took two running steps, then launched himself through the air feet first, his one boot cracking against the base of the man’s neck and propelling his face into the wall. There was a sickening thud, followed instantly by the crunching of bones. The sound was nauseating, and my stomach turned. The last of the villains loosed his hold on the girl, throwing her to the ground and sprinting away into the shadows. As the girl fell she struck her head on the cobbles. I ran to her, lifting her gently, She moaned. ‘You bastard! I’ll see you dead! You’ll not escape me!’ shouted a voice from an upper window. I glanced up to see a bearded man upon the balcony. He was hurling abuse at the newcomer. It did not seem to perturb the fellow. Swiftly he wrested his sword clear of the corpse, then gathered his second boot which was lying some distance away against a wall.