King of the Rising

by Kacen Callender

  Kjerstin sucks her teeth. “They are guards under your command. How do you expect to win this war without any fighters?”

  “I can only hope that there are guards who’ll fight willingly for our freedom.” She shakes her head, but I need her to understand. “I couldn’t force them, Kjerstin. We wouldn’t have been any different from our former masters. I can’t lead a rebellion for freedom by enslaving others.”

  She lets out a breath. Kjerstin sees my point, but she doesn’t accept my methods. She believes that sometimes the brutality of Malthe is necessary. That if we don’t take our power, it will be taken from us instead. “This isn’t a war separate from Nørup Helle. They have to realize this. If we lose the battles, they will be killed or forced back into slavery.”

  “They could do as we bid, and after the rebellion and when the Fjern are all dead, they’d still hold anger for Hans Lollik Helle.” It isn’t only Malthe that I have to worry about desiring more power and doing what he can to take it from me and anyone else who stands in his way. There are others like Zeger across the islands who might want to take power for themselves as well. “One insurgency would end, just for another to begin, and the warring would never end until we’re all dead.”

  Årud Helle is close enough to Nørup Helle that it’s only half a day of sailing. We don’t encounter the Fjern, and I wonder if they have pulled back from their attacks at sea—if they’re planning for a larger-scale attack with the help of Sigourney. The sun is rising by the time we’ve arrived. Kjerstin, Frey, and I leave the ships behind as we did at Nørup Helle, taking a boat to shore. Its bottom scratches the sand as we pull it from the waves. After our experience with Nørup Helle, we’re tense as we walk from the bay and into the dirt of groves. There’s movement. I glance behind us, back to the sea and the ships, when Kjerstin grabs my arm. I turn to look at her, then forward. A line of nearly ten guards have emerged. They stand with their machetes, faces cold. One man steps forward and holds a bow and arrow that he aims directly at me.

  A woman comes from behind them. Though her back is bent, she moves fast. She walks past the line of guards and stops ten paces from us. The woman, named Voshell, sees me and the boat and the ships in the distance. “Speak your name and purpose.”

  I glance at Kjerstin. She doesn’t care that a guard has an arrow pointed at me. If she must fight back for both her safety and mine, she will. Her hand searches for her dagger, strapped to her leg.

  “My name is Løren,” I say. “We come from Hans Lollik Helle.”

  The woman’s eyes narrow. She’s heard this claim before. She remembers the Fjern ships that have passed the island, each with the promise of attack. Årud Helle doesn’t have many guards that survived. They’d barely won the battle. Without much protection, those on the island are afraid of the ships that pass. The woman named Voshell thinks about how, after the battle they’d won, eight islanders had arrived on the shore in a boat of their own. Four men and four women, all of them young and well-suited to fight. They claimed they were from the royal island, and that Hans Lollik Helle had been ambushed by the Fjern. They said they barely escaped with their lives. They said almost everyone had been killed, including me and Malthe and Marieke and all of the leaders.

  The strangers were shown to a house of a Fjern master that still stood. They were given cots to sleep in, and Voshell wished them a peaceful rest. The woman hadn’t been able to sleep in weeks, so she was still awake when she heard the screams. She drew her blade and left her room to see the strangers who had claimed to be from Hans Lollik Helle. They’d taken knives they’d hidden in their clothes and cut the throats of anyone too unfortunate to be near them as they slept. The battle that ensued was quick. The strangers were young and strong, but they were outnumbered, and the islanders of Årud Helle wanted to live more than the strangers wanted to kill them. Five were cut down, and three remained.

  The remaining three were subdued. Voshell demanded to know why the strangers had attacked.

  “We were sent by our masters,” one said, “to avenge the killings of the kongelig, and to return the islands to their rightful owners.”

  They were loyal to the Fjern because this was the only life they’d ever known. But these slaves knew they would not win back Årud Helle. They knew that they were being sent to their deaths. This was the extent of the hold the Fjern had on their minds. These islanders had believed the Fjern when they said their only worth in life was to die.

  The woman called Voshell doesn’t order that the bow and arrow be lowered. She doesn’t care that she sees islanders before her. All she sees are the bodies that have been trained to fight and the two ships that wait at sea. We could just as easily be slaves sent by our masters to attack our own people once again.

  “We weren’t sent by the Fjern,” I assure her. “I’m not like the eight who betrayed you before.”

  Voshell narrows her eyes, realizing that I have kraft. She’s seen islanders with kraft before. Their abilities were always hidden from the masters, but the Fjern would eventually learn the truth. Voshell has seen dozens of hangings of any slave accused of having kraft. She remembers how a girl, only ten years old, was found to have kraft when she accidentally repeated the words of a song her mistress had sung in her head. The mistress took pity on the girl and had her drink a tea that would put her to sleep before its poison stopped her heart. This woman looks at me, a living islander with kraft, and she feels both awe and fear. Kraft in an islander has often been seen as ill luck, inviting death wherever we went.

  But Voshell has heard of me. She remembers when I joined the network of whispers, training under Malthe. She may not trust us, but she does believe that I am who I say I am.

  “And who is Tuve?” she asks, looking at Frey expectantly.

  Kjerstin’s gaze falls to the dirt. “Tuve is dead,” she says. “I’m the new scout leader.”

  Voshell is unsurprised. She nods with her mouth in a hard pressed line. “I thought something was wrong when we didn’t hear from him in the past week.”

  This is a strange thing for her to say. The ambush by the Fjern was a week ago, and Tuve was killed in the fighting—but before the ambush, messengers sent to the northern islands were killed. We shouldn’t have had any contact with Voshell and Årud Helle—at least, this is what Tuve had described. “Tuve has been in contact with you?” I ask.

  She gives me a confused look. “Yes. He came to the island each week to give us updates from Hans Lollik Helle, and to be sure his daughter was still safe.”

  Kjerstin’s eyes widen. She hadn’t realized Tuve had a daughter. I only knew because of the memories I’d seen in the meeting room. It wasn’t something he spoke about freely.

  Voshell gestures at us to follow her. The other islanders of Årud Helle don’t hide their animosity. They’re suspicious of us, and none want us here. We cross the bay and march into the shadows of the groves. The islanders live in the homes of their dead masters as we do on Hans Lollik Helle, but the homes here are in better condition. Fires weren’t set across all of the trees and stone, and in the open fields, only houses that have stood many generations crumble under the weight of time.

  Even with the manors of the dead Fjern still standing, the islanders on Årud Helle have begun to build new houses outside of the groves and in the fields. Some have stones held together with wet sand and others have walls of wood or palms. The village Voshell takes us to is buzzing with life. Islanders have their roles as they carry buckets of milk taken from the penned goats. Men use their machetes to clear nearby brush. Children laugh as they play their games, chasing each other across the dirt under the watchful gazes of women who pound dust from sheets hanging from the branches of trees. Someone sings a prayer song as they tend to a garden. The soil of Årud Helle has never been fertile, and it’s difficult to grow crops here. But the islanders have been determined to make a home for themselves rather than working the dirt for the sake of their masters. They have tended the soil carefully. Roots have spread
and stalks have grown and fruits and vegetables have begun to sprout. It would take attentive work, but Årud Helle could become as prosperous an island as any of the others. Each of the islands have always had their own specific uses: agriculture and crop, fishing, herding, or port and sale like on Jannik Helle. Årud Helle never found its way to profit. In the memories I had seen in Patrika, thanks to Sigourney’s kraft, I could see that she’d inherited the island, and that it had been a path away from a life of poverty in the northern empires. She only saw this island as a path to the crown. She didn’t care for the island as she should have. Our people will. The sight gives a glimpse into what the future of these islands of Hans Lollik might be.

  Årud Helle has guards. Before the revolt, there should have been about seventy on the island. It looks like only a quarter of that number remains. But with the massacre of Skov Helle and the events of Nørup, I would be grateful for any number of guards willing to return to the royal island to prepare for the attack on the Fjern.

  As we walk, I notice that the villagers stop their tasks to bow their heads to Voshell. It isn’t that they fear her, like the islanders who fear men like Zeger and Malthe. They respect her. She is the oldest of all the islanders. She’s witnessed much on these islands for so many years. She has seen her brother tied to a tree and whipped for almost an entire day. She watched as they left his body tied to the tree, and after he died, watched the birds begin to pick at his skin. She has seen her mother run from their master and, rather than be caught, swim into the sea and allow herself to drown beneath the surface. She has seen the beginning and end of different revolutions. She watched the smaller revolts as men attacked the Fjern from the fields, and she has seen them cut down and hanged. She had listened to the impassioned speeches of a few claiming that they could take their freedom, only for a slave too afraid of death to tell the master what they had heard, and for anyone who had ever dared to whisper the word of revolution to be tied by their wrists from a tree so that they could die under the heat of the sun and the sting of the salt. Voshell has seen so much. Survived so much. We all understand this is deserving of respect.

  “Tell me everything that you know of the war,” Voshell says as she leads us through the village. We tell her of the battles of Hans Lollik Helle and our struggles with sending messages to the other islands, though I don’t mention I’d included Årud Helle in this. Voshell seems to have already picked up on our confusion and wonders why Tuve wouldn’t have told us that he had been here to the island before he died, visiting his daughter.

  I see the girl now. She hides behind the wall of one of the nearby houses, glancing around the corner to look at me and Kjerstin and Frey. She’s as quiet and watchful as her father was. She’s only ten years old, but she has the gaze of someone much older. She wonders where her father is and why he wouldn’t have come here to Årud Helle with us if we were also from the royal island. She feels that something is wrong, but she’s too afraid to ask. Voshell will have to tell the girl what’s happened later tonight. She doesn’t look forward to this.

  “Have the Fjern attacked Årud Helle?” I ask Voshell.

  “No,” she says. “They bypass us on their ships far out on the horizon, but they never come to shore.” They’ve been focusing their energy on taking the royal island, then, like we thought. “Our only problem has been with Nørup Helle.” This steals our attention. “Martijn was killed, and the man called Zeger took his place as the island’s leader. He never attacked us,” Voshell clarifies when she sees Kjerstin’s alarm, “but he made his threats.”

  “Zeger is dead,” Kjerstin says. “He betrayed us to the Fjern. Tried to capture Løren and hold him for ransom.”

  Voshell nearly laughs. “He met the end he deserved, then.”

  We’ve circled the village and continued on the path. We see the bay in the distance and the islanders that wait on the sand. We’ve been gone long enough that they must be worried.

  “But why did you come here?” Voshell asks me. She asks this with a smile an islander might reserve for another, but the smile is tight with suspicion.

  I tell her the truth plainly. “We need help. Hans Lollik Helle has run low on resources, and we need you to take in those from the island who are not fighting guards.”

  Voshell doesn’t hesitate. “Of course,” she says. “We’ve been careful to ration our supplies. They’ll have to work for their keep, but we’ll take anyone who needs the shelter.”

  I give her my thanks. “There’s something else,” I tell her. “We need guards to return with us to Hans Lollik Helle, to prepare for an attack on Niklasson Helle.”

  This is where Voshell hesitates. She isn’t pleased with the request. She wants all of the fighting islanders to stay here so that they can protect the village. If they leave and lose the battle and each of them are killed, what then? Voshell sees me watching her closely and realizes that I must have heard her thoughts, but she doesn’t fear this. Årud Helle has survived on its own so far, without the help of the leader of the islanders, without the guards of Hans Lollik Helle. I can’t come here with expectations that they will sacrifice themselves for me.

  “You’ve asked us for help because you run low on supplies, yet you take our people to bring back to your island. Why would you do this if you already lack resources to care for them all?”

  “We won’t need them to stay on the island long,” Kjerstin says. “We’ll attack Niklasson Helle as soon as we can. We need the guards to fight if we’re to have any hope in winning the battle.”

  Voshell shakes her head. “The guards are the only defense we have against the Fjern. Without them here, we’re too much at risk.”

  Kjerstin decides it would be better to argue on my behalf. “The true danger is in not winning this war,” she says. “As long as the Fjern remain in these islands, we’ll always face the danger of attack. If you can risk the weeks it might take, then we will have a higher number of guards and a higher chance of winning our freedom. The battle of Niklasson Helle should be the priority.”

  Voshell laughs. “It’s easy for you to say this when you do not live here on Årud Helle. The priority of the islanders under my care is to survive. We will do what we can to live as long as we can. If it means the Fjern will be in these islands longer than we would like, then so be it. But we will not sacrifice ourselves for this battle when it’s obvious that you will not win.”

  Voshell has figured out what Kjerstin and I have been unwilling to outright say: We are losing this war. The Fjern continue to hold the upper hand in every battle and every position. We’re cornered with dwindling supplies and resources and numbers. Voshell is right. There’s a high chance, too, that we will lose the battle of Niklasson Helle. She doesn’t take this fact lightly.

  “This is a pivotal moment for you. This is the first time since the night of the revolt that you will have taken the initiative to leave the safety of your royal island to attack the Fjern, rather than waiting for them to come to you. If you lose your battle,” she says, “the Fjern will see your weakness more clearly than ever before. Nothing would stop them from continuing their attacks. They will take back the royal island and Årud and Nørup Helle and all the other islands we won in the uprising. They will punish anyone who still lives.” Voshell has seen the ways of the Fjern. She understands there’s a chance that they would be willing to kill each and every islander if it meant stamping out any threat of the revolution. This is how much they love their power: Even if it meant the destruction of their crops and coin without any islanders to force into working the fields, they’d kill us all.

  Voshell continues. “When you lose your battle on Niklasson Helle, we’ll need our guards here to protect us against the Fjern if we’re to have any chance of surviving and escaping.”

  “With the guards here, you wouldn’t stand a chance against the Fjern.”

  “We would stand a higher chance than if they were not here,” Voshell says.

  I see that she understands our reaso
ning, but Voshell would rather prolong what she sees as the inevitable—give herself and these islanders on Årud Helle a chance to survive, maybe escape to the northern empires before the Fjern arrive. There must be something that we can do to convince her to allow the guards of Årud Helle to come with us to Hans Lollik Helle.

  Voshell senses my thoughts. “If I was more certain that this wasn’t a battle where I’d be sending my guards to their deaths, I would consider allowing them to join,” she says. “If there’s a chance that they can return with their lives, then this is something that I can agree to.”

  “What would convince you that this is a battle we can win?”

  “Zeger is dead. Did you kill all of his guards as well?”

  “No. They’re all alive,” I say, “except for two that died when they attacked us.”

  “How many of the Nørup guards will come with you?”

  I clench my jaw. “Six.”

  “Six,” she repeats with a growing smile. “And the guards of Skov Helle are dead. And what of Ludjivik Helle?” she asks me.

  “We haven’t contacted them yet.”

  “There will be twenty guards at most, if anyone still lives,” Voshell tells us. “I will require many more guards than that to allow mine to enter this battle.”

  “How many?”

  She tells us one hundred. The request is impossible, but I can see that Voshell is right. We’d come here in desperation, hoping for any number of guards to help us fight Niklasson Helle. But we need more than only twenty if we’re to have any chance.

  Kjerstin wishes to continue arguing, but I interrupt to thank Voshell. “We’ll keep everything you’ve told us in mind.”