The Hollow March

by Chris Galford

  Kasimir simply turned aside, saying nothing. What traces of passion had burned before seemed wholly departed.

  They were nearly to the door before Rurik turned back. His father looked up at him, quizzically.

  “Thank you, I guess—but, but I…” Rurik stammered. Don’t be a fool. Speak. “What is to be done with Chigenda?”

  Love may not have existed between the two of them, but Rurik was beginning to feel a sense of loyalty to the Zuti. Perhaps it was of the moment. Too much hardship breeds a need for connection wherever one can find it, and time and again, the man had saved them, when he had no need. Chigenda may well have been many terrible things, but he was a fellow companion.

  “I will turn him over to the duke. In all likelihood, he will be executed.” Kasimir said it all matter-of-factly, without trace of concern.

  “But he is sworn to us. If you turn him over to us, I will—”

  “There is nothing you can promise here. Everyone knows I have Chigenda. And Chigenda is a murderer. Do not concern yourself with him. He is my problem.”

  Rurik thought of saying something else in Chigenda’s defense, but he could see it would achieve nothing. His father’s mind was already set in stone, and Chigenda had the crimes of a hundred rumors to deny. For him, there could be no escape.

  Nodding somberly, Rurik turned back with Essa and started away. They were passing through the doorway when his father said, “Steel your heart, or lose your mind.”

  Funny, Rurik thought as Rowan and Alviss rose to greet them, I thought it was just my neck at risk.

  * *

  Whether or not her lord had tried to hide it from his daughters, news of Rurik’s return was like a wildfire through the manor. Roswitte could only assume that someone had woken the lady Liesa.

  Roswitte was readying to leave when a shout drew her attention up the main hall’s stairs. Liesa was rarely dressed so plainly. Kasimir’s eldest daughter walked still in her sleeping gown, her long dark hair frazzled, but tied, a fine cloak drawn close about her shoulders to grant an air of respectability. By contrast, her child sister moved with naught but bed clothes to cover her, bare feet taking steps three at a time, leaving her sister’s shouts trailing in her wake.

  Roswitte caught Anelise at the bottom of the stairs and held her until Liesa could catch up.

  “Ros, Ros,” the child cried, as she lifted her up with a grunt, “did you hear? Rurik’s back.”

  Roswitte balanced her little lady on her hip and shook her head. She was bigger than the last time she had attempted such a thing. Growing every day, she had to tell herself. Now Anelise was on the cusp of womanhood, with all her mother’s delicate features. Much changed from the babe she had first seen bloodied in the grass.

  “If I hadn’t, I think your mighty charge would tell us all.”

  “Child, child what are you doing?” Liesa was cross with her sister, but she thanked Roswitte, and more. “We make for his latest prison, but Anelie seems to have it in her head he’s here for her. I think she would handle things much better—or rather, I would handle her much better—if you might accompany us?”

  Already far beyond her duties and far beyond the time of slumber, Roswitte hesitated, but there was no denying Lady Liesa. She had her father’s stubbornness, that one.

  Unfortunately, they found that the Brickheart had beaten them to the chapel. Looking about as pleased as a speared boar, the man dipped his head to his young mistresses, and inquired as to their purpose. Anelise asked after her brother. The captain offered that it would be inappropriate to call at such an hour. The child looked heartbroken. Liesa simply said they were going to see him, and pressed forward. Brickheart ushered them quietly inside.

  As the doors opened, four weary heads swiveled to greet them. On seeing her brother, Anelise squealed, and threw herself at him. The rest of the exile’s party looked startled, but Rurik himself lit up like a torch. Scooping the girl up in his arms, he hugged and spun her. There were many questions, and they descended at a furious pace, but he laughed them off and tried to answer as best he could.

  The elder sister was less kind.

  “Come back for another quick piece, little brother?”

  He looked at her, stunned. Hands on her hips, Liesa’s blue eyes steamed. She quirked an eyebrow at him, then inclined her head and cast a sideways glance at Pescha’s daughter.

  “Your last one ended so well.”

  A smile broke and, taking Anelise by the hand, Rurik walked to Liesa and drew her into a hug.

  Brickheart turned to her and asked her to watch the door. The ranger asked if she might go home instead. It would be dawn soon and she had first watch. The man scowled at Roswitte, the flaps of skin about his jaw lending it menace.

  She obeyed, if reluctantly. Brickheart slammed the door behind her.

  As if on cue, Fallit slithered out of the shadows beside her, craning his lecherous lips over her shoulder to whisper in her ear. “Long night?” She jumped, with a little cry.

  Recoiling with a cackle, he cried, “Poor sign of aging, you know, when a forester’s ears start to go,” and put his hands up in a comical show of defense as she began to repeatedly pound him for sneaking up on her.

  Each had their role to fill. Soon enough it was back to thoughts of woods and wild things. And, most importantly, the return of one she had personally thought long dead. Young Rurik had never struck her as a survivalist. Overly dependent on wealth, she had supposed—the prime example of what the commonfolk saw as nobility, and detested them for it.

  “Mayhaps a trip for us one day, no?” Fallit said, teasing a wry smile from her.

  “I think our coin would get us to the woods. No farther.”

  He smirked. “I could work with that.”

  As it turned out, Fallit was covering for one of Matair’s men-at-arms. The man was ill, and a friend, and Fallit had jumped at the opportunity when he heard that she was still about the manor. Both had to admit that four strong walls and a sturdy roof were a vaunted improvement over the wet and the snow.

  He eased his arm around her, drew her close. She playfully slapped his hand, but it did not withdraw.

  “What do you suppose they’re about in there?”

  She shrugged, leaned back against him. Not many were quite so willing to touch her. Not many men saw the world as Fallit did.

  He smiled back sweetly. Neither of them were the fairest of creatures. His face was not the smoothest—it still bore scars from the pox when he was younger. Nor was his body the most pleasing to look at. He was a gentle man, though, and incorrigibly mischievous. He knew how to make her laugh, and he was content in a simple life. No ambition. It might have sounded poorly attached to anyone else, but not with Fallit. It only served to endear him.

  Roswitte’s own hair was thick and matted. Unwashed. Her skin was greased, and her face comely. She was told she had good hips for childbirth, but thoughts of children were the furthest from her mind. Worst of all, she was nearly to her thirtieth year. Far from any semblance of maidenhood, she had long given up hope for any male attentions.

  That last hope had died with her father. After he had gone, there had been no more suitors—not that there had been many before. Already destitute, most of them. Even her meager life would have been a step up for them. If only they could look her in the eye.

  She was tone, from working the longbow. She could put an arrow through iron at two hundred yards. She could butcher a calf and make a fine leather jerkin. She could hunt with the wolves and drop the swiftest of deer, but none of these things were a woman’s right to do, and they scorned her for it. Matair was one of the few to allow such honor. Or disgrace. Even here, she was just a forester.

  A woman could not be a soldier.

  “Does something trouble you?”

  “Merely all this touching. Are you a woman, Fallit?” She leered.

  “If’n you need the proof, I’d be more than pleased to give it.”

  Before she could say another w
ord he yanked her up against him by the hip. Roswitte gasped. There was, assuredly, little doubt of his masculinity at that.

  They sprang apart at a shout from inside. It was not at them. Roswitte craned nearer, trying to hear. Brickheart’s thick voice answered whoever it was, demanding calm.

  A flurry of other voices followed, and it was hard to distinguish between them. Rurik’s, she guessed, and Liesa’s. Then the shout came on again, louder this time, and she was certain it was the Kuric.

  “I will not be unbound, only to leave him behind.”

  Fallit fingered his mace and eased toward the door, but Roswitte pressed him back. For all his looks, Alviss could never hurt a fly that did not deserve it. She only hoped that didn’t include the Brickheart.

  * *

  This is not how it was meant to be.

  Such was Rurik’s thought as he doubled back through the manor’s halls. In an hour, they would depart. One of his father’s messengers had come to wake them for it, only to find that none of them yet slept. There was too much thought, too much worry to allow for that. The others did not stir, though.

  It wasn’t as though they needed to pack.

  Alviss had grown despondent. It had been as such since their fight earlier that morning. Brickheart had been ruthless. All knew Chigenda was set for death, knew he had been marked for it long before he had ever met with them, but they did not need to be reminded. Rowan merely shook his head at the news. Alviss took it far more harshly. He had been the one to extend Chigenda’s life as long as this, and he saw it as his responsibility to make sure it continued.

  The Zuti’s past meant little to him. By letting him live, and taking him on, Alviss said he had taken those crimes upon his shoulders. Let him go to the gallows as well. Brickheart seemed eager to oblige. Rurik and the rest had been mortified, and his sisters as well.

  He rounded the corner, made a check for guards. For the moment, he was alone.

  There was something that could have gone better. It had taken all he had not to throw himself at them when they walked through the door. As it was, Anelie took on that role herself. The moment he scooped her into his arms, he felt more at ease than he had in weeks. There was something magical in her smile, even when she beat at his chest and ordered him never to leave again. Sadly, that was one command he could not oblige from the little princess. Few things had been as hard as having to tell her that.

  Liesa had been…well…Liesa. Caught somewhere between sardonic and maternal. When he hugged her though, he felt her give a bit. The shield fell away, and he was reminded that for all her mannerisms, she was his sister too, and his would-be mother. The latter being why she looked so disparagingly at Essa.

  If there was one benefit of the shouting match that transpired, it was that it kept his sister distracted from the poor hunter’s daughter. That was a conversation he did not want to have. Not now. Not ever.

  Supposing Essa remembered anything from her time here as a child, she would know she could not walk into that without springing a trap. Liesa would pick her apart piece by piece until she had assured herself of just how far below her brother his beloved companion was.

  Self-defense, in a sense. For the family. He only wished she had done the same before he first slid his hand up Charlotte’s leg. Not that he would have listened.

  Speaking of traps, he paused to consider any that might await him at the bottom of the stairs. He crouched down, tried to peer into the shadows as best he could, but therein saw nothing but a man scribbling away at his desk. Hiding his smirk, Rurik pressed on, doing his best to lighten his steps on the rickety stairs.

  There was much that could go wrong here, but if he were caught, what more could his father do? Aside from beat him—and he thought the welt from the blow to his head more than sufficed—his father was already doing the worst he might. Sending him away again, off to die as some nameless man in some pointless war.

  You’re doing it wrong.

  He had to stop, had to rethink. There had been no lies in his father’s words. They were blunt, sincere, as they always were. But if you didn’t…? It was hard to forgive. He had spent too long mired in hate to stride casually back into love’s embrace.

  No. Not love.

  Respect, perhaps. Or admiration. But not love. That thought cut him deeper than he might have thought it would, but there it was.

  Even so, he was taking much of his father’s goodwill for granted. The man had given him a way out, a way to escape execution, but now he was merely throwing it back in his face. It was doubtful the old soldier could forgive such a willful betrayal, and for that he was sorry. Even sorrier to think he was risking such pain for a killer, but his conscience weighed on him.

  For all his flaws, the Zuti had stuck by them, even when Alviss had not ordered him to. Besides, they still owed him for saving their lives in Mausche. That deserved some sort of repayment, no matter how foolish.

  Sirche was already facing him by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs. He drew no blade, only dangled his keys out before him. The jailor looked largely unconcerned.

  “Was wondering when one of you would happen by again.”

  Rurik took the keys without a second thought.

  “Are you not worried what my father will do to you?”

  “Lad, I work in the cells day in and day out. Worst thing he could do is put me in one. And frankly, I’d get just as much inspiration there, I think.” He tapped his quill against the open book resting atop the table.

  Rurik nodded skeptically, but he did not object. Sirche had always been a weird one. An amateur poet, in addition to whatever he was about now. Part of him wanted to ask, but the rest reminded him of how little time he had. He headed through the door and into the cells, expecting more guards and finding none. Chigenda lifted his bald, bloodied head in anticipation, and froze in surprise.

  The rest of the guardsmen had not been so easy to break from. There had been three on the chapel. Essa warned him not to go, but she played her part as well, for as marvelously little attention as she liked to give to the civilized world, she certainly knew how to play sick very well. Rowan added to the scene by going on about his cousin’s woes, demanding to know what they were doing there, and lambasting the deplorable offense Kasimir’s men were supposedly visiting upon morality.

  Rurik slipped out amidst the confusion. Getting back in would be impossible, though—at least without being seen. He would get an earful, then.

  “Why come you?” Chigenda did not move from his spot within the cell, even as Rurik neared.

  “To set you free of course.”

  The Zuti’s face darkened. “No tease, little ghost.”

  “Do not make this difficult.” Rurik slid the key in and popped the lock. The door swung in with a lazy creak. Then he started on the shackles. “Move quick. Don’t care where you go. We’ll be in camp, though—you’ll find us by the bloody falcon.”

  The Zuti started to move, but his stare was fixed on the boy, as though he did not believe Rurik still. Rurik did not blame him, in truth. Neither had ever been kind to the other.

  “Debts repaid,” the boy said, by way of explanation.

  Then he turned and walked quickly out of the room.

  How—if—Chigenda were to escape, was not his problem. He had set him free. That made them even, and it washed his hands of the whole affair from then on. What Chigenda chose to do with that freedom was not his problem.

  Rurik felt a dull pang in the pit of his stomach though as he thought of all the things the Zuti might do with that freedom. One death and he could never forgive himself. What was I thinking? Like Alviss before him, his mercy was also to be his burden.

  But the rest of the morning passed in such a blur that there was no real time for worry.

  As casually as he might, he had slipped back into the chapel as the first grey ray of dawn slanted through the windows of the main hall. Inside, he was met with a stern lecture while Brickheart sent off the other guardsman
to fetch back those soldiers sent to find him. Rurik merely shrugged and told them he had wanted one final walk about his home. It wasn’t enough for Brickheart. The master-at-arms had him searched and padded. Brickheart never relented.

  Essa took Rurik into her loving arms and stood on tiptoes to whisper as to whether or not it was done. The lord’s son told her what had happened, careful to make it look as though he were nibbling at her neck—and then he was kissing it, and he could feel the warmth rushing to her cheeks. Rowan made a concerted effort at clearing his throat across the room, and Rurik reluctantly broke from her. Essa looked at him sheepishly, then beamed a promissory smile—of more to come, and more to earn. It was quick, but it was enough. Then her gaze flicked aside, head nodding slightly to a corner of the room. He turned, as one of the pews groaned out the slightest of creaks.

  “You run me ragged all through the night, and then you think to slink off in the morning’s light.”

  Chapter 9

  The army of Jaritz had been gone a full two days by the time the soldiers arrived.

  Roswitte caught herself staring, once again, at the retinue that had come in the name of emperor and country.

  And apparently, Assal.

  She had not been surprised to see the ducal soldiers. The exile’s return and subsequent flight was the talk of the town. As the gaggle of men bedecked in brilliantly blue robes were now. They were the robes of the Church. But the Church had no place in crimes of state. Such had been the Emperor’s declaration years past. Duke Rusthöffen had apparently taken it upon himself to wave that law in the Emperor’s absence.

  What the goose don’t know…She had felt a lurch in the pit of her stomach when she saw them for the first time. As Fallit always said, one should always trust the stomach above all else. It will always lead you true.

  The men had come for Rurik. What they found was a home much reduced, nearly half of all Verdan’s healthy fighting men sent off to fight and to die for their empire. Rurik was gone. So were his friends. Even less pleasing, she later heard, was having to inform them that Chigenda was gone as well. Sometime in the morning of the army’s departure, the Zuti had slipped his hold and vanished into the night.