Allan paused.
In his right hand was a coin purse. It belonged to an older man standing a few paces away. It had been stolen from the man.
A more accurate statement of the facts was that the man had given it to a young man. That young man had put a knife to the man’s back and demanded his coins. Allan had landed behind the young man, after following him for a few blocks.
Allan didn’t have time to challenge the thief. He came at Allan with his knife. Allan brushed the knife back with the leather gauntlet on his right arm. He used a wind spell to blow the thief into the nearest building wall. The attack didn’t deter the thief. Allan again brushed aside the knife, then struck the thief’s upper chest with his fist. That stopped him. Allan struck the thief in his gut, and used the wind spell again. The thief was sprawled on the street, gasping for air.
In the struggle the thief had dropped the coin purse. Allan picked it up. As he did, the older man said, “Thank you.”
Allan looked at the owner of the purse. The man was of average height with a stout build. His shirt was white and clean. His leggings were dark, as were his boots. His boots and shirt appeared to be new. He had a gold ring on his right ring finger, and two silver rings on the fingers of his left hand. It was the rings and clean clothes that gave Allan pause. Clearly the man was wealthy.
A thought came to him: Would the loss of these coins be so bad to him?
“I don’t know if I should give you these back.” The words were out of his mouth before he realized it.
The older man’s eyes widened. He shook his head. “You’re a thief, too?”
“No.” Allan’s mind raced. “What I mean is, did you earn these?”
“What?”
Remembering that his leather helmet covered the top half of his face, Allan took a confident step towards the man. “There’s men in this city that can afford the loss of a few coins. Are you one of them?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“My grandfather built our brewery. My father ran it well, and now I do the same. I work hard to earn a living.”
“And you pay the men you hire well?”
“As well as I can.”
Allan tossed the purse to the other man. “Here.”
The man caught the purse. “Thank you?”
Allan shook his head. “Don’t thank me. Instead, give a coin or two to a poor fellow on the street.”
The man waved at the thief. “Who? Him?”
Allan knew the young man who had tried to steal the purse. He couldn’t remember his name, but he remembered his face. He had brown eyes, and two scars on his left cheek. He’d lost his father in the same plague that had killed Allan’s parents.
The boy was bitter about the loss, and bitter that it had left him struggling on the streets. That bitterness made him violent at times. Allan and his sister had saw the boy get his scars by taking on a bigger young man over half a loaf of bread, while they and several other youths were hiding out in an abandoned house. The boy got scarred, but the young man was killed.
It would have been just another scene, except that his sister told him not to take the wrong lesson from the fight. “Stealing is always bad,” she had said.
“Why?”
“One, it’s against the law. You steal from the wrong man, and he’ll send the guards after you.”
“How do you know who the wrong man is?”
“That’s it, Allan. You won’t. Two, stealing leads to other troubles. I’ll bet that bigger boy stole that bread. So the guards didn’t get him. That younger boy did.”
“What if he’d shared the bread?”
“That might have kept him alive, but that’s not a reason to steal. Think about it. First you steal from someone who has a full purse. Then you get a little desperate, and you steal from someone with a half-full purse. Then you get really desperate, and you steal from someone with a nearly empty purse. You steal once, and it’s easy to steal again.”
Allan hadn’t learned much of morality from their parents, so he relied on his sister. Back then he wasn’t sure if what she was saying was true. Over time he realized that she was right. They survived as long as they did in part because they had morals and standards.
That was why Allan had followed the young man when he had spotted him. He knew the young man was desperate, and angry, and would do anything to stay alive. That was why he interrupted the theft of the coins.
Allan pointed at the young man, still lying stunned on the street. “Help him?” he asked the older man. “No. But remember him. Being poor made him desperate. Being poor made him angry. If you’d have tried to fight him, you’d be dead.”
“Do you know him?”
“I’ve known young men like him.”
“If you know he’s trouble, why should I help him?”
“You don’t have to help him. You should help who you can. Save those you can from turning into men like him. When you don’t, you create thieves like him.”
The older man shook his head. “Who are you?”
“The man who saved you, and the man who’s asking you to save others.”
Allan didn’t think he had anything more to say. He also heard noise coming up from behind him. He took out his flying rod, tapped it, and soared into the sky above the city. Feeling tired, he decided to head back to the castle.
The Defender: Elderwood Page 5
