by Ahimsa Kerp
TRASK
A foot nudged Trask awake as he slept within a patch of heather. He jolted and tried to scramble away, but his cloak tangled in the foliage and snared him to the ground. Trembling, he managed to turn his head. The sight he saw before him melted his fear like warm spring rains on a field of ice.
His son, Nat, stood a scant pace away. The boy clutched his bow, with an arrow nocked, but held it limply at his side. His brown locks were disheveled, hiding half his face, yet failing to cover his sheepish grin.
“I knew it was you,” the boy said. Setting down his bow, he helped pull Trask free of his cloak.
“Nat!” Trask exclaimed, snatching his son into a bear’s hug.
The boy returned the embrace, then said, “Mother said you’d come. She knew it, even after we gave her word from Master Bulware of the muster.”
“Where is she?” asked Trask. “And Bren?”
“In the next hollow, around Ferndale Crag. She said I could come and gather berries, though I wasn’t to talk to anyone. She told me to hide if I spied anyone. But I knew it was you!” Nat stared at his feet, expecting a scolding from his father for disobeying, but Trask only laughed.
“I don’t think she’ll mind.”
Together, they set off down a hillock covered in heather and rapeseed. Trask knew the slope well, as did Nat. They often hunted for pheasant around the Ferndale Crag. Its rise formed a barrier between the Hollows to the south and the more arable lands to the north.
When Trask spied Gleda resting in the shadows of the crag, his heart melted anew. She wrapped her arms around him, nestling her head into his chest. Bren followed, the young boy barely rising to his mother’s shoulders. Like his older brother, he carried a bow, but the stave was too tall for him, and Trask recognized it as his own.
Gleda sank back and met Trask’s gaze. “The Passions bless us.”
Trask shook his head slowly. “Nay, the Passions play at their own game and pay me no heed. It was my own two feet that brought me to you, just as I’d promised.” He tussled Bren’s hair. “Though for a time I worried I’d never reach you.”
“You saw the croft?” Gleda asked.
“Aye’ya, that was good work.” Trask related his travels from Burn Gate to Thrall’s Dale, and then of his anxious rush home after speaking with Jaren Bulware. When he was finished, Gleda told of the boys’ return, and of their decision to head for the Hollows.
“Master Bulware made the bailiff agree to build the holdfast,” said Nat. “But they argued over who would pay for its construction and what men could be called to defend it.”
Gleda asked, “Do you mean to take us to the holdfast?”
Trask glanced at the morning sun, weighing the decision. They could make Burn Gate just after nightfall, assuming they met no trouble along the way. He thought of the Ordained and what they might do if they found him herding his family across the dales. Would they have compassion? Or would they see him the same as any other deserter? Trask studied his boys and wife and realized it didn’t matter what the Ordained did to him as long as his family was safe.
“Dad, look!” Bren cried.
A thick plume of black smoke rose from the far side of Gildan’s Sprite.
“A fire in the forest?” asked Nat.
“No,” said Trask. “It’s the Fairnlin army putting torch to the village at Bael’s Crag.” He closed his eyes, knowing the Passions had made the decision for him. He wouldn’t risk the journey to Burn Gate now. It’d be too dangerous.
Turning to the south, he gazed upon the Hollows, the great depressions formed by snowmelt cascading down the White Hills. The melt left in its wake a richness of exposed loam and undergrowth, and a web of channels. Some reached five times a man’s height in depth, and every summer a handful of wayward sheep were swept away by the powerful torrents that gushed through them during months of heavy rain. They were treacherous, but a known danger, and Trask could think of no safer place to hide his family.
“Come,” he said. “We’re too exposed here. We’ll head into the Hollows.” He reclaimed his bow from Bren and gestured for Nat to take the lead. They would live as the Green People once had, in the dank crevices of the low places, and wait out the storm. He only hoped clear skies would find them before the enemy did.
HEM
Hem slurped at his pottage like a starved sow. Tillon had found the oats and a pot to cook them in, and to Hem the meal was the best he’d ever tasted. Tired eyes and heavy shoulders ringed their fire, which they huddled against to ward off the early morning chill. The sun remained hidden behind a blanket of thick gray clouds that promised a dank and cold day.
Tillon flopped beside Caulder with a full bladder of stout from one of Jaren Bulware’s casks. He took a long swig, then passed it to his brother. “Ack, the Fairie are about this morning,” he said. He held his cloak up against the fire, trying to dry it. “Not that I mind. We could do with some of their luck.”
Hem snorted. They didn’t need luck. What they needed was some order in the encampment. The forning Fairnlin army could wave a few spears at them, and none would know whether to wave back, charge, or stick themselves up their own arse. Worse, only a few had spears to hold if it came to battle. The rest would be swinging cook pots and water skins.
“It was the Green People who razed Baldairn Motte to the ground,” said one of the crofters. He scanned what remained of the ruins on the middle hill above them. “Can’t say as they’d want to help us any, even if we did manage to catch one.”
Cynric let out a barking laugh. “The Green People already fill the army’s ranks. They’re all around, don’t you see? You are the Green People, or at least what remains of their blood.”
Confused glances were passed around the fire. Tillon leaned back and let out a long whistle. “Hem’s right, this one is mad.”
“The fall of the Baeldans…” Cynric began.
“Happened a long time ago,” Hem spat. If he had a spear, he knew who he’d use it on first. He’d never heard of a skald coming from south of Baardol. Skalds were meant to be hearty northmen who roared tales of savages and bosoms, not a meek blackspur who rambled on about the Fairie and who wrote down what and when.
“Ah, the histories again,” said Tillon. “I suppose, being one of the Green People myself, I should know my own people’s history. The tales say the Fairie are tricksters who can call upon cantrips to fool men. Maybe I could just use my magic and conjure up a wench to explain everything.”
His brother quieted him. Caulder gestured at Cynric, who sat with a wounded expression. “Hairng rose from the fall of the Baeldans,” Caulder said. “Our mothers weaned us from the cradle on those stories. The skald makes some sense. If one tale be true, why not the other?”
“Hairng blood flows from the Baeldans, aye’ya,” said Hem. He glared at Caulder. “But the Fairie are a Passion. No blood of theirs can mix with that of man. It’s unnatural.”
“The Fairie are what the southern storysmiths called the Green People,” said Cynric, finding his voice again. “By the time the stories reached their ears, they were filled with exaggerations of wild creatures using tricks to sneak into strongholds in the dark of night and steal and burn and kill. The ways of the Green People were distorted into feats of magic. But at their heart, the tales are the same as those written by northern skalds.
“The northern versions aren’t as well known because Hairng rose under the dominion of the southern kings, whose influence drew the North away from its Baeldan past. Over the years, Hairng carved back large amounts of the Baeldan kingdom, but never did it revive its history.”
Hem barked denial at the skald—no one was going to tell him he didn’t know his own people’s history. Several others around the fire raised their voices to join the argument, but their clamor was deafened by shouts and the scuttle of feet that surged through the encampment in a giant wave. Men were standing and pointing at something beyond the orchards.
In the morning light, it took Hem
a moment to see the plume of smoke that drifted up and over the trees of the orchards to the south. His heart thumped in his chest. The smoke was so close. He fooled himself into thinking he could smell it, but it was only their own fire.
“A ranging force from the Fairnlin army?” he asked.
“Can’t be the main body,” said Caulder. “Too far west, away from the coast. The Stone Road doesn’t wind that much from North Port to here.”
Tillon folded his arms. “It’s the Ordained. They’re razing the fields, the blackspurs.”
His brother shook his head. “There’d be plumes everywhere if they were doing that. It’s too far from the road, besides. And what good would it be to burn fields so far from the enemy’s march?”
“It’s a fool’s game to guess at the thinking of the Ordained. But they’re behind that fire or I’m one of the Fairie.”
Cynric opened his mouth and raised his arms but thought better of saying anything. They watched the smoke for a time, but Hem couldn’t keep himself from fidgeting. He roamed in circles around the fire, stomping his feet and fussing with his cloak.
Soon rain pelted him. He pulled his cowl up, its cloth already damp enough to feel like he’d dipped his head in a barrel. Their fire hissed as the rain strengthened and a white cloud of smoke started to crawl through the encampment like a fell mist.
Tillon grabbed hold of Hem and shoved two water skins into his gut. “Walk,” the chandler said. Hem followed; he was glad to do anything that involved moving and not thinking. He’d done too much thinking in the past days, and it only led him toward trouble. He was a craftsman, meant to work a mill—not understand the fancy of the Passions. He shifted the skins under his arms and caught up to the chandler.
When he grunted a question, Tillon shrugged and flashed a toothy grin. “Scrounging,” his friend said. “You don’t want to face the blackspurs with nothing but your sour temper, do you?”
Hem sniffed the lashings of one of the skins. “Jaren Bulware give you these?”
Tillon clucked his tongue. He kept his gaze moving as if searching for something only he could see. “We’re good for them. Besides, the brewer owes us.”
“For what?”
“Keeping his boy, Jaren, safe of course.” The chandler stopped and spun on his heel. “There,” he pointed and started off toward the orchards. The encampment had grown almost twice in size. It now stretched into the orchards on one side, across the three hills, and over fields large enough to support a small village.
They wandered through strings of wagons, clusters of common folk, and companies of men-at-arms. Every now and then Hem spied a face he thought he recognized, but either he was mistaken, or the face vanished before he could make his way to it.
Archers shot at butts at the edge of the encampment, and some of those with spears practiced forming a hedge, though even in a line they looked like what they were—a bunch of farmers holding sticks. The men-at-arms who’d brought horses walked their mounts around the open fields and chipped at the mud that had caked onto boots and stuck in hooves.
As a pair of Ordained cantered past, Hem heard Harlow’s voice call out. The cooper waved and padded toward them with a sodden loaf of bread clutched to his chest. Tearing off chunks of the bread, he offered it to Hem and Tillon before shoving a piece into his mouth.
“Wondered where you’d made off to,” he said as he chewed. “Not many from Burn Gate around, it seems.” He shook his head, as if in wonder. When neither Hem nor Tillon said anything, he continued. “But I’ve been hearing strange tidings. They say the Marchers are coming down from the mountains to pillage Hairng. But that’s probably no less than you already know.”
“No, hadn’t heard,” said Tillon. “No less than can be expected, I suppose. I guess we’re better off getting killed by the southerners here, then.”
Hem snorted a laugh. Harlow blinked, then tried to laugh too but wound up coughing. When he recovered, he asked, “You seen Trask’s boys? I’ve kept an eye out but haven’t caught a wind of them one way or another.”
“Nah, if they’re here they’re finding their own way,” said Tillon.
“Aye’ya,” Harlow agreed. “Seems their father’s finding his own way, too. It’s good for him the captains aren’t ordered enough to have marked a muster roll.” The cooper ate the last of his bread and wiped his hands on his trousers.
Hem’s eyes narrowed. “Speak your mind plain.”
“No offense meant. It’s a dangerous path Trask’s taken, is all. I hear the Ordained captured a large lot of deserters up in the White Hills. Gutted them all, folk are saying. And burnt them.”
Hem cringed as the cooper spoke the word. Deserters. He’d managed to press the thought to the back of his mind, but now it sprang out again and brought with it anger he could barely contain. He balled his fists, his nostrils flared.
Tillon caught his look and clapped Harlow on the shoulder. “Well, we’ve business to attend, but keep your ears open.” Pushing the cooper on his way, the chandler stepped in front of Hem. “Ignore that lout. His tales are wilder than the skald’s.”
“Balin’s arse,” spat Hem, relaxing his arms. “At least he’s here with us.”
TRASK
Trask’s stomach clenched as the scent of roasted venison wafted to him. Beside him, Nat lowered his head. The boy wore mud caked upon his face and arms, and leaves and twigs in his hair. Under the moonlight, Trask could barely distinguish him from the tangle of thick roots that formed their place of hiding.
Nat cocked his head toward his father and motioned to the bow he carried, then at the pair of riders who’d dismounted in the lee side of a clearing some fifty spans away. The riders were southerners, Trask had no doubt. One wore a russet tunic with an orange device stitched to the breast, while the other had heeled boots meant more for showing off in a city guildhall rather than trekking through a forest. They’d set up a cook fire to roast their deer and tied their mounts to a nearby pine.
Trask had stumbled upon the southerners in the late afternoon, while scavenging for food, and he and Nat had lain hidden for the better part of the evening. He frowned at his son and shook his head. The boy was three years the elder of Bren but still too young to fight a grown man. Nat’s brow furrowed, but before he could speak the whinny of a horse heralded a third rider.
This last rider wore homespun cloth and a beard that had matted into tendrils. His sun-baked cheeks and manner of slouching reminded Trask of Hem, though the southerner had not near the stoutness. The others met him with questioning stares and had to wait while the man dismounted and knuckled his back, muttering to the Passions about the foul weather.
“Well, Lewk?” the one with the device finally asked. “What says the captain?” From the distance and clipped cadence of the southerner’s tongue, Trask could barely make out the words.
“His lordship’s found a sturdy bank a league or so back to water the horses. There’s no way to bring them up here through all this muck. They’re too many in number; their weight too great.”
“Faen’s arse if I’m going to lug this haunch back to the captain,” said the other man, rubbing his hands near the fire for warmth.
“No one’s asking, Caelindes. His lordship has the entire larder in the baggage to eat and stores through the summer at North Port, too. If it’s one boon granted the Lord Constable of the army, it’s a full belly.”
The one called Lewk ignored the other two as they traded baleful stares. He set about tending to his mount and then to his belly. Watching him tear off a hunk of the roasted meat renewed the grumbling in Trask’s stomach. Gleda and the boys had brought a measure of salted lamb and some carrots with them, but it was meager rations in comparison.
Trask glanced at the moon’s passing. Gleda would be fretting that they hadn’t returned. The plumes of smoke from earlier in the day had continued to rise from the direction of Bael’s Crag, on the far side of the forest across the Sprite, until afternoon showers washed them away. What was
left of their haze cast an amber stain over the twilight, like a herald of death rolling through the northern dales.
Rising to a crouch, Trask put a finger to his lips. Nat nodded and began working his way free of the tangle of roots that snaked around them like a weaver’s thatch-work. The southerners had each fallen into a stupor, staring into the flames of their cook fire and sucking on the charred bones of their supper. None of them alerted as Trask and Nat stole away, deeper into the Hollows.
“I could’ve done it,” said Nat when they were a hundred cloth-yards distant. His dirt-caked face scrunched as if he’d bit-ten something sour. “I can shoot apples from a stump at twice that distance.”
“Aye’ya, I know you can. You’re right good with that bow, but ’tis better to be wary and safe than put yourself in harm’s way.”
Nat blinked. “Even when they’ve come to do us harm?”
Trask’s grip tightened on his bow as he used it to balance himself over the uneven footing of loose silt and stone. He studied his son’s questioning frown, but no easy answer came to him.
“Jaren Bulware’s old enough to attend the muster,” said Nat, after a few paces. “His father commanded him to Baldairn Motte.”
A sudden fury came over Trask. He snatched Nat’s shoulder and spun the boy so they faced each other. “To trade stout, not wield a spear. Now leave it, or the Passions take your tongue!”
Nat shivered as Trask released him. He hugged his bow like a babe with a blanket, but his stare remained firm. Trask saw there a boy who’d aged, whose mind worked behind unguarded eyes toward an understanding of his father he couldn’t quite grasp.
“Phaw,” breathed Trask. The anger had left him, replaced by languor. The weight of the past days gathered upon his shoulders. “A man’s family is his first duty,” he said, then began to pick his way along the hollow again.
