by Kate Elliott
Alain understood. “Yes, Father,” he replied. The hounds, on their leashes, padded obediently alongside.
Lavastine took in a deep breath of the autumn air. “No need to hasten to Osna Sound.” He turned to survey his retinue. “We’ve heard no reports of Eika wintering there. I think we may take a few days to go hunting.”
VI
THE CHILDREN OF
GENT
1
SPADES stabbed into loose dirt. From where she stood, Anna caught flecks of soil on her cheek, spray thrown out as the gravediggers filled in the latest grave. They had buried twelve refugees in a mass grave this bitter cold morning, including a young mother and her newborn babe.
Anna had been on her way to the stream, but it was hard not to stop and stare. A few ragged onlookers huddled in the wind. Rain so cold it felt like droplets of ice spattered down, and she tugged her tattered cloak tighter about her shoulders. Here in the camp, corpses went naked into the grave since the living had need of the clothes off their backs.
A child no more than two or three winters old bawled at the lip of the pit. It had straggly hair that might have been blond once, a face matted with filth, a dirty tunic, and nothing covering its feet. It also looked about to fall into the pit with the dead folk. She set down her buckets and hurried forward just as the child slipped and fell to its rump on the crumbling slope.
“Here, now,” she said, grabbing it by the arm and pulling it back. “Don’t fall in, child.” Looking around, she hailed one of the diggers. “Where’s the child’s kin?”
He pointed into the grave, where woman and infant lay bound together by shreds of old cloth, all that the folk in the camp could spare to make sure they weren’t separated in death. With a stab and a heave, he tossed another spadeful of earth onto the grave. A shower of dirt scattered across the waxy faces of mother and child.
“Isn’t there anyone here to look after it?”
“It was crying when we came to carry away the corpse,” he said, “and it’s crying still. Ach, child,” he added, “perhaps it was a blessing that the children of Gent escaped the city, but most of them are orphans now, as is this poor babe. Who’s to care for them when we can’t even care for our own?”
The child, safe away from the rim, had now fastened onto her thigh and it snuffled there, smearing her tunic with snot as it whimpered and coughed.
“Who, indeed?” asked Anna softly. With a finger she touched the Circle of Unity that hung at her chest. “Come, little one. What’s your name?”
The child didn’t seem to know its name, nor could it talk. She pried its arms off her leg and finally, with some coaxing, got the child to drag one of the empty buckets. In this way, with the baby toddling along beside her, they made it to the stream, where they waited in line to dip their wooden buckets into the water.
“Who’s this?” asked one of the older girls, indicating the child who stood fast at Anna’s heels like a starving dog. “I didn’t know you had a little brother.”
“I found him by the new grave.”
“Ach, indeed,” said an older boy. “That would be Widow Artilde’s older child.”
“Widow?” asked Anna. “But she was so young.” Then she realized how stupid the comment sounded as the older children snickered.
“Her husband was a militia man in the city. I suppose he died when the Eika came.”
“Then you know her?” Anna tried to draw the child out from behind her, but the child began to bawl again.
“She’s dead,” said the boy. “Had the baby, and they both of them caught sick and died.”
“Doesn’t anyone want this child?”
But having filled their buckets, the others were already walking away, hauling the precious water back to camp or to Steleshame. So she let the child follow her back to the shelter she and Matthias called home. Indeed, the child seemed unlikely to let her out of its sight.
“God forfend!” exclaimed Helvidius when she ushered the child into the shelter of the canvas awning. A fire burned brightly in a crude hearth built of stones, and the old poet sat on his stool watching over the pot in which they kept a constant hot stew made of anything edible they could scavenge. Today it smelled of mushroom and onion, flavored with the picked-over bones of a goose. The remains of yesterday’s acorn gruel sat in their one bowl next to the fire. Anna handed spoon and bowl to the child. The spoon dropped unregarded from its hand and it used its dirty fingers to shovel down the lukewarm gruel.
“What’s this creature?” demanded Helvidius.
“One more helpless than you!” Anna had taken the buckets of water around to the tanners in exchange for scraps of leather. “Can you help me make it something to wear on its feet?”
“You’re not taking this brat in, are you? There’s scarcely room for the three of us.”
But Anna only laughed. The old poet was always grumpy, but she didn’t fear him. “I’ll let him sleep curled at your feet. It’ll be like having a dog.”
He grunted. The child had licked the bowl clean and now began to snivel again. “Dogs don’t whine so,” he said. “Does it have a name?”
“Its mother’s dead, and no one else claimed it. You watch over it while I go haul more water.”
She made four more trips down to the stream. At this time of year, with the winter slaughter underway, the tannery was busy with many new hides, so Matthias had seen to it that she could take his place hauling water and ash for the tanning pits or collecting bark from the forest. He had taken on more skilled work scraping or finishing skins which had cured over summer and autumn. She didn’t mind the work. The activity kept her warm and gave them a certain security that many of the other refugees, dependent on what they could scavenge from the forest or on Mistress Gisela’s charity, did not have.
Yet although the winter slaughter went on, and meat was salted or smoked against the season to come, little of that meat reached the refugees. Once a day a deacon distributed a coarse oat bread at the gate, but there was never enough to go around.
Now, when Anna returned to their shelter from her last trip to the stream, it was to find the child wailing, old Helvidius vainly singing some nonsense tune with all the enthusiasm of a woman proposing marriage to a dowerless man, and Matthias glowering over the stewpot.
“What’s this?” Matthias demanded as she shoved the canvas awning aside. The canvas didn’t really keep out the cold as much as it kept in some of the heat in the fire and their massed bodies. It did keep off rain tolerably well. Still, her toes and fingers ached from the chill and her nose was running. “Where did this come from?”
“It’s a child, Matthias,” she said.
“I can see it’s a child!”
“It had nowhere else to go. I couldn’t just leave it to die! Not after St. Kristine saved it from death at the hands of the Eika.” The child sniffed and babbled something unintelligible but did not let go of the old man’s knee.
“And it stinks!” added Matthias.
It certainly did. “Master Helvidius—”
“I didn’t know it couldn’t take care of such things itself!” the old man wailed. “I’m a poet, not a nursemaid.”
“Well, you must learn how to watch over the child, since it will be under your care all day,” she said tartly.
“Under my care all day!” he cried.
“You mean to keep it?” Matthias looked appalled.
There was a sudden silence.
“We must keep it,” said Anna. “You know we must, Matthias.”
He sighed, but when he did not reply, she knew she had won.
“Well, then,” said Helvidius grudgingly, “if we keep it, we must name it. We could call it Achilleus or Alexandros, after the great princes of ancient Arethousa. Or Cornelius, the Dariyan general who destroyed proud Kartiako, or Teutus of Kallindoia, famous son of the warrior-queen Teuta.”
She had coaxed the child over to her and, by the door flap, was now peeling off the soiled cloth that swaddled its bottom.
She laughed suddenly. “You’d best find a girl’s name, Master Helvidius. We’ll call her Helen, for didn’t Helen survive through many trials?”
“Helen,” said the old poet, his tone softening as he regarded the child. “Fair-haired Helen, true of heart and steadfast in adversity.”
Matthias snorted, disgusted, but he was careful as always to share out the stew equally between them as they each took turns spooning stew out of their shared bowl.
It was dusk outside, almost dark, when they heard shouts from the roadway. Anna thrust little Helen into Helvidius’ arms and ran outside with Matthias. They heard a great commotion and hurried to where the southeast road ran alongside the tanning works in time to see an astonishing procession ride past—noble lords on horseback and more men-at-arms, marching behind them, than she could count.
Even in the twilight their arms and clothing had such a rich gleam that she could only gape at their finery. They laughed, proud, strong young lords, a handful of women riding in their ranks, and appeared not to notice the ragged line of people who had gathered to watch them arrive.
The gates of Steleshame had already opened and there, lit by torchlight, Anna saw the mistress of Steleshame and the mayor of Gent waiting to welcome their guests.
“Where are you from?” Matthias shouted, and a man-at-arms called back, “We’ve come from Osterburg, from Duchess Rotrudis.”
When they returned to the shelter and gave their news, Helvidius was beside himself. “That would be one of the duchess’ kinsmen,” he said. “They’ll want a poet at their feasting, and where there is feasting there are leftovers to be had!”
* * *
In the morning she rose with Matthias at the first light of dawn and in the cold dawn began her daily haul of water. The stream ran with a bitter ice flood over her bare fingers, but its chill was nothing to the cold fury that seized her upon returning to their little shelter.
Helvidius and Helen were gone and with them the old poet’s stick and stool and her precious leather bag of dried herbs, onions, four shriveled turnips, and the last of the acorns. No sooner had she stuck her head under the canvas, searching to see what else the old man had taken, than a spear butt prodded her in the back and a harsh voice ordered her to come out.
“I thought we’d cleared this place,” said a soldier to his companion, eyeing Anna with disgust. “These children are as filthy as rats, each and every one.” She gaped at the two soldiers—well fed, well brushed, and warmly dressed—who confronted her. “Go on, then, girl—or are you a boy?”
“Go where?”
“We’re clearing out the camp,” he said. “You’ll be marching east, where we can find homes for you orphans. Now go on, get your things or leave them behind.”
“But my brother—”
This time when he jabbed her with the butt of his spear, his touch wasn’t as gentle. “Take what you need, but only what you can carry. It’s going to be a long march.”
“Where—?”
“Move!” His companion walked on, poking a spear through hovels and the other pathetic shelters the refugees from Gent had put up beyond the tannery, but they were already empty. Indeed, the camp itself was far more quiet than usual, but now that she listened, she heard the nervous buzz of voices from down by the southeast road.
Though she had five knives tucked here and there inside her clothes, she knew it was pointless to resist. She scrambled back inside the canvas shelter, grabbed the pot and bowl, nesting the one inside the other, rolled up their blankets and tied them with a leather cord, and bound up her shawl to make a carry pack. She began to take down the canvas shelter.
“Here, now, leave that!”
“How can I leave that?” she demanded, turning on him. “What if it rains? We’ll need to shelter under something!”
He considered this, hesitating. “We’re to shelter at church estates, but there are so many of you … perhaps it’s wisest to have some shelter of your own. If the weather turns colder, or there’s snow …” He shrugged.
“Is everyone leaving?”
But he wouldn’t answer more of her questions, and she sensed that time was short. The rolled-up canvas was an unwieldy burden, and together with buckets, blankets, and pot she could barely stagger along under the weight.
The sight of the refugees made her sick with terror. Herded into a ragged line along the road, she realized suddenly how very young they all were. For every twenty children there was, perhaps, a single adult—even counting the soldiers, all of them grim as they held spears to prevent any child from slipping out of line. The sheer amount of bawling and wailing was like an assault, a wave of fear spilling out from the children who had escaped Gent and now were being driven away even from the meager shelter they had made here at Steleshame.
Anna spotted Helvidius. He leaned heavily on his stick and little Helen, beside him, sat on the stool with the precious bag of food draped over her lap. She cried without sound, and yellow-green snot ran from her nose. The old poet’s face brightened when he saw Anna.
“Where’s Matthias?” she asked as she came up beside him.
“I don’t know,” said the old man. “I tried to tell them I’m a great poet, that the young lord will be angry at them for sending me away, but they drove me out and didn’t listen! I think they mean to march these four hundred children to the marchlands. I suppose there’s always a need for a pair of growing hands in the wilderness.”
“But this isn’t everyone.”
“Nay, just those deemed useless and a burden. When we first got here from Gent last spring, some third of the children were taken away by farming folk who live west of here, for a strong child is always welcome as a help to work the land. And those who work now for Mistress Gisela, like the blacksmiths—they’ll stay. And a few families who hope to go back to Gent in time, but only those which have an adult to care for the children. Nay, child, all the rest of us will be marched east to Osterburg and farther yet, past the Oder River and into the marchlands—”
“But how far is it?” Helen began to cry out loud, and Anna set down the pot and hoisted the little girl up onto her hip.
“A month or more, two months, three more like. Lady Above, how do they expect these children to walk so far, and how do they intend to feed them along the way?”
Three months. Anna could not really conceive of three months’ time, especially not with winter coming on. “But I don’t want to go,” she said, beginning to cry, beginning to panic. “It’s better to stay here, isn’t it?”
Someone had managed to get a flock of goats together, and in truth the goats milled no more aimlessly than did the frightened children. Pinch-faced toddlers whined and wriggled in the arms of children no older than eight or twelve. An adolescent girl with a swelling belly and her worldly goods tied to her back held tightly onto two young siblings who could not have been more than five or six; they, too, carried bedrolls tied to their thin shoulders. Two boys of about Anna’s age clung together. A girl tied cloth around the feet of a small child to protect it against frost and mud. A little red-haired boy sat alone on the cold ground and sobbed.
“Saved by a miracle,” murmured Master Helvidius. “And now what will become of us?”
The young lord and his retinue waited beside the gate to Steleshame. They only watched, mounted on their fine horses, but the sick feeling in her chest curdled and turned sour. They only watched, but they would enforce this order. Any child who ran into the forest would be hunted down and brought back. Mistress Gisela stood beside them. Anna imagined she surveyed the chaos with satisfaction. Soon she would be rid of most of the refugees who had been such a burden on her, and if Helvidius was right, she would keep exactly those people who would do her the most good.
Ai, Lady. Where was Matthias?
“I have to go find Matthias!” she said to Helvidius. “Keep watch over—” She set Helen down and the little girl set up a howling.
“Don’t leave me!” he gasped, suddenly white and lean
ing on his stick as if he might fall the next instant. “If they go— I don’t believe I can walk so far alone, me and the child—”
“I won’t leave you!” she promised.
“Anna!”
Matthias came running with one of the men from the tannery. They conferred hastily with a sergeant, who stepped back from the pungent smell that clung to their clothes. Quickly enough, Anna, Helvidius, and little Helen were called out of the line.
“Yes,” said Matthias, “this is my grandfather and my two sisters.”
“You’re to stay here, then,” said the sergeant, and dismissed them by turning away to order his soldiers into formation, a group in the van and one at the end and some to march single file on either side of the refugees. Anna could not tell whether this was meant to protect the refugees or to keep them from escaping the line.
“Come on, then, lad,” said the tanner with a frown, glancing toward the mob of children and away as quickly, as if he didn’t like what he saw. “Let’s get back to work.” He walked away.
Anna started after him. She had no desire to stay and watch.
“Anna!” Matthias called her back. “We’re to get a hut. Give the canvas over to those poor souls, and the pot, too. And you may as well give over the food as well, what poor scraps there are. There’s so few of us left here that we won’t want for so much, not until late in the winter, anyway, and those scraps will help them better than us.”
She stared as the soldiers at the van started forward. Slowly, like a lurching cart, the line of children moved forward, and the wailing and crying reached a sudden over-whelming pitch. “I can’t do it,” she said, sobbing. “How can you choose? You do it.” She blindly thrust canvas, pot, and food pouch into Matthias’ arms and then grabbed Helen up and ran as well as she could back toward the tannery precincts. She could not bear to watch the others march away into what danger and what uncertainty she could not imagine, only dreaded to think of walking there herself. Ai, Lady, what would they eat? Where would they shelter? What if the cold autumn winds turned to the cruel storms of winter? How many would even reach the distant east, and what would become of them, saved from Gent and yet driven away from this haven, such as it was, by the greed of householder and duchess working in concert?
