Free The Greater Challenge Beyond (The Southern Continent Series Book 3) by Jeffrey Quyle

towards Grange again, but this time Grange was ready, aware that he was likely to be assaulted.  He let his reflexes take over the control of his muscles.  He ducked beneath the looming fist and moved inward towards it, while he reached up and wrenched it downward hard, using both of his own hands to squeeze and viciously twist it, so that Goala cried out in pain and shock, as his large body pivoted in response to the action.
    In a matter of seconds, Grange had the Earl’s arm painfully pinned against the man’s back, while the nobleman was held captive as a shield in front of Grange, protecting him from any attack by the two sons.
    “Back up!” Grange shouted at the two younger men, who were standing in baffled astonishment.  “Back up or I’ll hurt him.”  Grange reached down to the Earl’s hip and pulled his knife free from its scabbard, then raised the knife to Goala’s throat with one hand.
    “We’ll give you space. Don’t do anything rash.” Skore immediately replied.  The two brothers began to shuffle backwards towards the cell’s doorway, then through it and into the darkness beyond.
    “I am not a Bloomingian!” Grange shouted.  “I am just a traveler.  I just want to pass through.  If you’ll release me, and promise not to attack or harass me, I’ll be out of your home in a matter of minutes,” he said as he pressed Goala’s arm upward to painfully guide the man forward towards freedom from the cell.
    They passed over the threshold, one significant step forward for Grange, out of the cell and into a dark hallway.
    “Now lead us out of here,” Grange ordered.
    The two torches slowly moved forward, then began to rise up a set of stairs.
    “You can’t get away with this, Bloomingian,” Goala spoke for the first time since his capture, growling over his shoulder at Grange as they began to follow the Earl’s sons up the stairs.
    “Get away with freedom?  I had it already, before I came here.  Why shouldn’t I get it back?” Grange hissed up at his human shield.
    There was a greater light above, a sign that they were going up into the daylight.  Grange paused as the two sons disappeared from view while they stepped around the corner of the doorway.  He pushed Goala up to the floor level, then pulled the man to a stop, while he peered around the corner and past Goala, trying to gauge the circumstances.
    Oehla and Skore were ten feet away, their torches out and their swords drawn.
    “Guards!” Oehla shouted loudly as he watched his father being held captive.
    “What did you do to me?  Put poison in that wine?” Grange asked Goala as he heard the clump of approaching guards.
    “Just some herbs the witch woman in the village gave me in the past,” Goala answered.  “I should have put poison in it, then stabbed you in the heart while you were unconscious.”
    Men were appearing, additional guards.  They each gasped as they saw and comprehended the circumstances, and within a minute there were a half dozen new blades drawn, blocking an easy exit for Grange.
    “What are you going to do now, traitor?” Goala grunted smugly.
    “Skore!” Grange shouted.  He had a hunch that the red-headed son would be the more reasonable of the two to negotiate with.  “Skore, I’ll let your father go free and unharmed if you let me walk away from your lands,” Grange offered.
    “Make no deal with this traitor!” Goala bellowed, then squealed, as Grange jabbed the man’s own knife point against his throat.
    “We’ll get out of here somehow,” Grange rasped in Goala’s ear as he hitched the man’s twisted arm and drove him a step out into the hallway.  Grange followed, then started inching sideways along the wall, looking for some way to get to the exterior of the castle, and then consider a next step.  They reached a corner, and Grange stopped to peek to his side, where he saw a pair of men with swords waiting, and beyond them, a large open doorway to the outside.
    “Stand back