by D. A. Adams
By the lightening of the horizon along the eastern ridge, Leinjar figured there was roughly an hour before dawn. He stared at the silhouette of the mountain, fringed by an aura of purple, and soaked in the beauty. Before the ogre had smashed in the door to the cage, he had long given up on ever seeing the sun rise over the western mountains again, and now standing in this home and watching it, the enormity of what he had endured was clear. He had missed his children’s lives – someone else had seen them off for their first days in school; someone else had taught them to wield a pike; someone else had braided their beards for the first time. Those were a Tredjard father’s responsibilities, and all of that had been taken from him and from them. No matter who had done those things, no matter how patient he had been, no matter his social standing, he was not their daddy. Nothing could ever give that back.
For the first time in as long as he could remember, tears streamed down his cheeks and dampened his beard. He held on to the counter, trying to steady himself, but fell to his knees and sobbed against the worn wood. For the first time in his life, he didn’t try to stop it. He had been able to convince himself his children had been fine without him, but he hadn’t been fine without them, and he missed their faces, the wonder and light in their eyes, the innocent beauty of their laughter. In the cage and on the trip home, the threat of death had remained so palpable he hadn’t allowed himself the luxury of grieving, but now, alone in this kitchen, he surrendered to it.
Some minutes later, a hand touched his shoulder and then stroked his tangled, matted hair. He lifted his face from the cabinet and saw Molgheon beside him. Her eyes also filled with tears, she sat beside him and continued to rub her fingertips across his temple. Usually, she avoided all physical contact, and for one of the most lethal warriors he had ever known, her touch was as tender as any mother’s.
“I won’t pretend to know your pain,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry,” he responded, wiping his nose with the sleeve of his filthy tunic.
“Nothing to be sorry for,” she continued. “You’ve lost more than your share, but right now, you need to pick yourself up, pull yourself together, and not let the others see you like this.”
Leinjar nodded and wiped away his tears.
“You’re their leader,” she said. “They need your strength. It’s a tough road to make it through the valley and to the gate. They need you.”
“Guess a blubbering idiot doesn’t inspire much confidence, huh?”
“Not usually,” she chuckled.
“It just came over me.”
“I know.”
Leinjar grabbed hold of the counter and pulled himself to his feet. Molgheon rose and studied Bressard’s kitchen and pantry as Leinjar had earlier. Her face drooped in sadness, and she briefly described to Leinjar how it had looked most of the times she had been here. There had been canned vegetables, rows upon rows, but also cured meats, ripe cheeses, and baskets of nuts. The yard had always been groomed with a garden on the southern slope to catch the full day’s sun. The only exception was her last visit when his shelves were nearly bare and his meats sent with unit after unit of half-starved Ghaldeons. When Molgheon had arrived, Bressard barely had food remaining to get through winter, and still he had shared with her.
“We need meat ourselves,” Leinjar said, stroking his beard. “Maybe while you hunt, me and the others can do some work around here. Help him out a little as payment.”
“There’s only one problem,” Molgheon said. “I have two bolts left. The others spilled out yesterday.”
“That is a problem.”
“You’ll never make it to the gate,” Torkdohn mocked from the cage, grinning. “You’re all dead already, mark my words.”
“Told you I should’ve kept him gagged,” Leinjar growled, scowling at the slave trader. Torkdohn continued grinning but didn’t say any more.
“We’ll gather as many nuts as we can,” Molgheon said. “This time of year, they should be close to ripe. We can find enough to get us there.”
Leinjar thought about having only nuts to survive on for several days. While he had made it longer on less, he had eaten fairly well since the uprising on the plantation and had become accustomed to having a full belly. They could make it, without a doubt, but he didn’t relish that they would have to cross mountains on such meager sustenance. He looked around the pantry again, hoping to see more food, but if anything, the volume seemed much less the second time.
***
From the back of the house, Bressard shuffled into the living room and stopped near the kitchen. He glared at Torkdohn for a moment, his milky eyes flashing with anger, but then looked at Molgheon and smiled. She walked to him, took his arm, and helped him to his chair across the living room. The brown leather had worn on the armrests, seat, and back, and the cushions sagged in the contour of his body. Slowly, he lowered himself and groaned as his joints, battered from two thirds of a century living off the land, crackled and popped.
“Don’t let anyone lie,” he said to Molgheon. “Getting old isn’t fun.”
She patted his hand and smiled.
“I’ve spent most of my life on this mountain. There was a time when I rose before the sun, hunted in the morning, and tended the garden all day. Not anymore. I wish I had more to offer you, but what I’ve got won’t see me through the winter.”
“We’re going to gather nuts,” Molgheon said. “We’ll bring a basket or two back to you.”
“The mountain’s teeming with deer since I can’t hunt them anymore. I see them in my yard all the time. A shot as good as you should have meat, not nuts.”
“I’m down to two bolts,” she said, shrugging.
“Look in there,” Bressard said, pointing at a closet behind the front door.
Molgheon opened it, and on the wall hung Bressard’s bow and a quiver full of arrows. She remembered it from before. Bressard had always been proud of it, for in his late thirties, it had been a gift from a Loorish elf. Bressard had given the elf shelter during a lightning storm one afternoon, and to show his appreciation, the elf had returned a few months later with the bow, carved the perfect size for a dwarf. The elf had then taught him how to make excellent arrows, and during one of her stays, Molgheon had learned a few of those tips from Bressard. She stared at the bow for a few heartbeats, wondering if she should accept the apparent offer to hunt with it.
“Pick it up,” Bressard said. “I’ve kept the string in decent shape, but it’s not been let loose for too long.”
“I’ll be very careful with it,” Molgheon said, lifting it off the hook as if it were a precious work of art. Her old bow had been well-crafted by a Ghaldeon, but compared to how light and precise this one was, hers had been whittled from old lumber in a scrapyard.
She slung the bow across her back and then strapped the quiver to her belt. Then, she told Leinjar to watch the cage and went outside. On the mountainside, even in the middle of summer, the morning air was cold, and as she breathed, her breath steamed out in thin columns. She walked around the house to the eastern end and crept into the thick forest of ponderosa pine. Her eyesight quickly adjusted to the faint light of dawn, and she made her way deep into the woods, moving as silently as a panther. When she found a good clearing, she unslung the bow, notched an arrow, and perched on a fallen tree. She listened to the forest for animals foraging, fattening themselves for the coming winter. In a few minutes, she heard something to her left.
Slowly, she turned on the log and raised the bow. Careful not to draw back too fast and make commotion, she readied for a shot. From the weight of the footsteps, she knew there was a deer a few feet away, but it hadn’t come into sight, so she held herself still, poised to let the arrow fly. When the buck came into view, it was beautiful in the dim light, its lean body stepping gracefully on the forest floor. Molgheon held the shot until it was perfectly clear, then released the string. Before she could blink, the arrow flashed across the short distance and pierced the buck’s heart. The an
imal never saw or heard anything before it crumpled.
Molgheon reslung the bow and walked over to the fallen animal. Its eye stared at her, lifeless and unblinking. She struggled with its weight at first but managed to hoist it across her shoulders and carried it towards the house. She had to stop and lean against a tree twice before she made it back, where smoke now rose from the chimney, but she laid the fresh kill on the back porch and went inside to find someone to clean it. Two of the Ghaldeons followed her outside to see her prey, and their eyes grew wide. One hurried inside to borrow a dressing knife from Bressard, and the other cleared away debris for a spot to clean it.
Molgheon returned to the forest and found a different hiding spot. This time it took nearly an hour for another deer to come close enough for her to have a reasonable shot, but when a good-sized buck wandered into her clearing, she killed it with a single shot, too. Again, she carried the animal to the house, where the two Ghaldeons almost had the first one dressed, and laid this one close to them. They grinned at her, but she didn’t wait for the praise, heading back into the forest. The sun was climbing and would soon clear the ridge across from them, and when it did, the temperature would rise. Once that happened, the odds of finding more easy game would be gone.
She found a third clearing farther north than the first two and settled in, but this time, she only had to sit a few minutes before she made her third kill. During the Resistance, she had lived off the land for long stretches and had hunted practically every day, but back then, wild game had been thinned by both the Ghaldeons and the encroaching humans. A good day’s hunt consisted of maybe a rabbit or two, and deer were virtually non-existent. As she carried this one to the house, she imagined what her unit would have thought if anyone had gotten three deer in one morning. That thought made her smile. Once she placed this one on the ground, she was soaked with sweat and exhausted. She crossed the back porch and entered, where Leinjar was already cooking fresh meat for lunch.
***
Bressard watched the dwarves move about his place, some carrying in wood for his firebox, others bringing fresh meat to the kitchen, and still others taking a break from their labor outside. He had never allowed anyone to do these things for him, even when dozens of soldiers had slept in his yard and on his floor, and had he been a few years younger, he would have scolded them for meddling with his things. Now, with his muscles so weak he could barely walk and his food stores so low he rarely ate more than once a day, he resigned himself to the fact that his time had passed.
The summer before, he had been able to forage for nuts, plant a garden, and can the harvest, and luckily, the yield had been plentiful. If it hadn’t been for the vegetables from the previous year, he would’ve already starved to death because, as spring bloomed into summer, he couldn’t make it to the garden to plant anything. Knowing the food would run out, he realized this would be his last summer, and while he had long felt the presence of death, the absolute knowledge that it was close had saddened him. He wasn’t scared of dying and wasn’t upset he would pass on; what made him sad was knowing his home, as well-built and well cared for as any above ground, would rot into the ground and disappear.
Then, the pretty young soldier had knocked on his door again in the middle of the night. He hadn’t had a visitor for at least ten summers, and when he heard the knock, he had thought maybe it was something blowing against the door or his imagination. His eyesight and hearing were still pretty good, not as good as they once had been, but good enough. Smell and taste were nearly gone, but as far as he could tell, his mind was fairly sharp. Seeing her familiar face had warmed him more than he would’ve believed possible.
Now, sitting in his worn chair, he looked at the slave trader in the cage. While he didn’t recognize the younger one, he knew Torkdohn well. Many years before, the dwarf had been part of the Resistance, a merchant who at great risk to his own life, had delivered food and weapons to the soldiers. Bressard had put him up dozens of times and, at one point, had considered him a friend. But as it became clear the Great Empire could not be stopped and the eastern lands were lost, Torkdohn became one of the Ghaldeons who betrayed his own people for self-preservation and greed. The last time Bressard had seen him was not long after he had become a slave trader, and their parting had not been pleasant. For many years, Bressard had feared Torkdohn would lead the Great Empire to his place, and he would either die at their hands or be hauled off in chains. Seeing his former friend in bondage, Bressard hoped he would pay for the countless lives he had destroyed.
The mountain had been Bressard’s home for seventy years. Before, he had lived to the west in Kehldeon. His father had been a handyman for the prosperous families in the city, and Bressard worked for him and planned to take over the business when his father became too old. In his late teens, he married a beautiful dwarf from a good family, and for three years, his life was as close to perfect as he could imagine. Then, she had died in childbirth, and losing both the love of his life and his first son had been more than he could handle. He wandered east, rarely staying more than a night or two in any township or village. He had no plan for where he was going or what he was going to do. He simply wandered and grieved.
Then, he came across this home and its former owner, a gentle Ghaldeon who had lived here for sixty years. The hermit had taken him in during a snow storm and had let him sleep on the floor in exchange for help with some of the chores the old dwarf could no longer manage. In time, Bressard’s grief had diminished, and the old dwarf became sick with fever. On his death bed, the hermit had asked Bressard to stay in the house and care for it, and having nothing else in life that mattered, Bressard agreed.
As the realization he would starve to death had overtaken him, he often felt he had failed to care for the place, but as soon as he saw the pretty young soldier who had been so kind and generous, hope had blossomed. He knew her husband was gone, and from the weariness in her eyes, he could see she was tired of travel. He would offer her the house and hope she would take it on as he had seventy years before.
***
After carrying the third kill from the forest, Molgheon’s legs shook with fatigue. She returned the bow and quiver to the closet and sat beside Bressard. He was lost in thought, and in the light of late morning, he looked frail and exhausted. Without thinking, Molgheon took his hand. He started from the touch but smiled at her as soon as his eyes focused on her face.
“Molgheon,” he said, motioning for her to lean closer. “There’s something I need to ask you.”
“Anything, my friend.”
“Will you stay with me and help me care for this place?”
“Oh Bressard, I can’t,” she said, touching her hand to her mouth. “I have to deliver them to Dorkhun.”
“My time is short. This home needs a caretaker.”
Molgheon looked around the living room, and for a moment, comfort enveloped her, as if the mountain itself were embracing her. She hadn’t felt at home anywhere since her husband had died. She looked at Torkdohn, who had his back turned and was studying the dwarves in the kitchen. Promises had been made to return him to Roskin for trial, and while she was certain he would be content if the slave trader died along the way, she couldn’t force the others to break their oaths.
“You’ve given so much,” she said to Bressard. “Let me guide these dwarves to the Kiredurk gate, and I’ll return.”
“Are you pacifying one whose beard is thin?”
Molgheon gently gripped his hand and smiled:
“No, my friend. I give you my word.”
“That’s more than enough.”
“Are you hungry?” she asked.
“Very much.”
“Let me see what is ready.”
She rose and moved to the kitchen, shocked at how at ease she was with the decision. This home soothed her, and after a lifetime of hardship, she needed comfort. Bressard would not live much longer; there was no need to pretend differently. If she could provide comfort to his last d
ays, she would do so. The others could continue to Dorkhun without her once she had gotten them to the gate, but there was no need to share her decision with anyone before the time was at hand.
In the kitchen, Leinjar directed the other Tredjards with the cooking and the Ghaldeons with small chores around the house. Molgheon paused, just out of reach of the cage, and watched him issue orders. Half a life as a slave had diminished his social skills, and anyone first meeting him in a refined setting would have dismissed him as a churlish ruffian, but she could see his instinct for leadership. He was sharp or gentle as needed, offering rebukes or encouragement according to the dwarf and the situation. While Crushaw was the best leader she had ever known, Leinjar wasn’t far off. Finally, she stepped into the kitchen and got his attention.
“We should get on the road after sunset,” she said.
“We’ll be ready,” he returned, adding wood to the stove.
“We’ll need to cut cross-country. I can find the way, even in the dark, but we’ll have to leave the cage and wagon here.”
“Really?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at her. “That a good idea?”
“No, but it’s safer than traveling the main roads.”
“I trust you.”
“I need a plate for Bressard,” she said pointing to the cooked meat. Leinjar placed a thin slice on a plate and handed it to her, along with a fork and knife. She took the food to Bressard and asked if he needed help. The old dwarf balanced the plate in his lap and slowly cut a bite. Even though the meat was tender, it took several tries to cut completely, but once he did, he lifted the bite to his mouth and smiled as he chewed.
“I can’t taste much anymore, but that’s good,” he said, cutting again.
“I’m glad you like it,” she said. Satisfied that he could manage on his own, she returned to the kitchen and spoke to Leinjar. “I’m gonna hide the wagon and ready the horses for the walk.”
“You two help her,” he said to the Tredjards without looking up from the stove.
