Vol.7, Ch.3, P.11
Bursting free from the forest, the Decke outriders raced ever onwards to Merkulov. Looking far yonder, they saw the school as it sat encircled by fields of cotton, like an island lost upon a frosted sea. But within that school, whence before had risen a single plume of smoke from the steeple tower, there now fumed a second from the sprawling centre. The company urged their horses on.
Down a hillside their way now ran, before delving into another dell up ahead. Wary of another waylay, they sharpened their senses, steadied their steeds, and gripped their weapons. But when they turned a bend, the van hailed all those behind to halt, for they had found parked suspiciously upon the path ahead a waggon.
“Hn…?”
Volker’s gaze strained at the strangeness as he reined in his horse. The waggon was of the covered sort, tall but faced aside that naught could be seen inside. And though its wheels seemed intact, its yoke hung queerly absent of any beast of burden.
With hushed caution, the war-chief ordered an inspection. These braves, once they trotted nearer the waggon, could find no other like vehicle in the vicinity. Wholly so was it alone; if an ambush were to await inside, it ought comprise but a squad of Men. A manageable threat, but even so, things were too uncertain. Bombs might be abiding therein, or nothing at all, save an ambuscade to come crashing down upon the distracted riders from the hills and outcrops that ominously bestrode the trail. And so did the rest of the company keep a keen watch, whilst the inspectors dismounted and crept up to the waggon. And coming close, the foremost of them reached and drew aside the canvas.
“Hee!?” leapt a miserable cry from within. Jolting, the brave readied his blade; but after a thought, he lowered it, and looked inside.
There he discovered two females cowering. One was a woman thirty or so in her years; the other was a lass, nine or ten in hers. And exactly like the great many of the braves standing vigilant outside, these females were of tawne complexion—of Nafílim stock.
“By the winds,” the brave said to them with wonder, “how came you here?”
“I-I, w… we…” stammered the elder of the two.
Seeing them huddled and trembling together in terror, the brave assayed to soften his voice as he then said, “Come. You may step out. We here mean no harm.”
Obliging but trembling still, the two slowly crawled out of the waggon. And when they came into the light, all could see them clearly for what they were: victims leashed in Londosian slavery.
The brave that had beckoned them out looked between them and the waggon. “A mishap you’ve met? Whilst on the move?” he asked them, grimly guessing their tale. “The horses are missing. But your captors—where are they?”
“A-away… with the horses,” the Nafílim woman answered, weak and unsteady. “Vándýrin p-pounced us… out of the blue.”
To this, the brave quickly scanned the waggon again for signs or scars. None could be found, as far as he could see. Might the captors have unexpectedly drawn the vicious beasts as they fled? Then despite their plight, these two had yet some luck left in them yet, it would seem.
The younger one shivered pitifully and clung to her elder when the brave looked upon them for any hurts. But in so doing, he found their faces to be awfully alike.
“You are family?” he asked next.
“Ye… yes…” said the woman, whose eyes then fell.
O, tragedy. Seized and stolen away, doubtless had mother and daughter suffered unspeakably. The braves beholding them grated in grieving anger.
“…He-Herr, please… my brother…” spoke the little one at last, and aloud as if to rouse her long-wrung throat. But ever as she did, her quaking increased, that even her gaze began to tremble.
“Brother?” asked the brave. “You have one more?”
The daughter half-nodded. “They took him,” she very quietly said. After a pause, she went on a mite more loudly, “Um… where… where is the war-chief…?”
“He is with us,” answered the brave, after a pause of his own. “But for him I may listen.”
“Ple-please… the war-chief… I, I-I…”
I want to tell him, the daughter was struggling to say. Tears had started in her eyes. Her small hands were clasped at her bosom. Pitying the sight, Volker himself rode forth, dismounted, and came down to the captives.
“I am he,” he declared. “Come, speak.”
The daughter, though meeting the war-chief at last, only quavered all the more. “A-ah… um… I…” she hesitated. And looking down, her stare became distant, as one aface a great fear.
“Have peace. The winds are with you now,” Volker assured her. “But your brother. Taken he was, you say?”
“Y-yes… yes…” murmured the lass. But then her hands clasped harder, and her words waned to a whimper. Volker stood by, giving her time to comfort herself, even as the looming emergency raked at him still. And after a moment, the frail little Nafíl finally started to settle.
“Poor child…” said Volker. “Speak when you may.”
“Y… ye… s….”
“…”
“…”
But as her voice vanished, the lass’s tears only teemed—when she shakily reached into her shirt and revealed a knife.
Clumsily but with abandon, she then thrust its blade unto the war-chief. Yet ever before it could find him, the lass was swiftly seized aside by one of the braves anear.
“Aagh!?” yelped the daughter, her knife fumbling free from her tiny fingers. Immediately the mother lamented, sinking to her knees and burying her guilt-fraught face in her hands. For the smallest moment, the lass resisted arrest, but seeing it futile, forsook the effort and fell limp. And there in the brave’s stern hold, her whimpers gave way to weeping.
Volker ground his teeth and sighed. He had known all too well it would come to this. Painfully unperturbed, therefore, he picked up the knife and studied it darkly.
“This blade,” he said, “—it is tainted.”
A growl then grated the air. It was Sigmund as he stood afar. “Bugger…!” he cursed with a kick of a stone.
It is none too seldom to exercise the innocence of children for assassination, and to some success, as History would attest. All told, such deceits had hardly the patina of a proper plan. Albeit for his part, Sigmund cared little for that. Just the idea of compelling children to kill was complete and utter anathema to him.
Volker called quietly to the mother and daughter, but found himself empty of aught to say after. Comfort, consolation; there was no recourse here. He intended to forgive them their failed foining, to be sure, but it was clear from their despair that the two’s worries lay elsewhere; that there was more foulness afoot than did meet the eye.
As he searched for a next move, the war-chief looked aside to Malena who had come to see the distress for herself. And nodding knowingly, the former Salvator went to the mother and daughter; and with words and welcome as condoling as could be, she stayed by their side.
Sigmund, meanwhile, grumbled and gazed angrily about. And then he stopped. There, overlooking the dell from not far off, was a high hill crowned with an outcrop of stone. He turned away at once. If there could be any place whence to spy things out unspotted, then that tall perch would certainly serve. With that thought, Sigmund sauntered over to his steed. And in a burst of action, he sprang onto its saddle and goaded it to a lightning gallop.
All the other braves watched with wonder as the former mercenary furiously circled and scaled the hill to its top. And such was his celerity that the scoundrels crouched upon the pinnacle could but scramble and expose themselves to the sudden onset.
“Shite…!?” they all yipped, for Sigmund was now upon them. Three the Men were; and behind them, there sat a tiny Nafílim lad. Younger again than the lass below though he was, the boy had been harshly bound and muffled.
And with all the anger of a storm, “Rrraahh!!” did Sigmund roar, and upon his steed he charged the heartless churls. Thrice his sword then flashed, bright even under the clouded skies; and in a mere second, the three Men fell dead before they could dare resist or misuse their hostage.
In Sigmund’s shimmering shadow, the little lad sat astounded. But before he knew it, unbound he was and brought down to the inconsolate captives below.
“This ’im?” Sigmund asked them, as he descended his horse with the lad in his arms. The answer came quickly enough.
“…Ah!”
“Mama, mama! Sister!”
Springing forth, the three met, and held and clung and cried together as ought a true family. Indeed, the lass’s plea had been genuine: she really did have a brother, one taken hostage that mother and daughter might act to the liking of the onlooking captors.
“Any more of you?” Volker soon enquired.
The mother shook her head. “No… none at all,” she snivelled. “Not even their father…”
This stabbed every heart to hear. But there shone one silver lining: that at the very least, no more slaves in this fiefdom had been forced into this folly. Not that it took much aught to compel such poor pawns.
For a moment, Volker groped once again for words to say. And once more still, he stayed himself. For what could better comfort this family than tears of respair and an embrace yet alive and strong?
Thus did the war-chief turn back to his braves and bade them instead, “Bring two riders. Get this family back to camp. The rest of you—we ride on!”
And at once, all the company bustled. Now liberated and reunited, the family of three were whisked away. And as Volker mounted his steed, Alfred came by upon his own.
“A fool scheme, if ever one there was,” the sorcerer observed, looking bitterly at the now-empty waggon. Volker could but nod back. Taking a hostage, forcing heedance, and withal putting into a child’s hands a weapon purposed to pierce and poison a war-chief—such a design lacked the twist to tease out a success. And so succeed it did not, if even to detain the company for very long.
“For true,” Volker concurred, “but these fools… they care little for it, I think.”
Now was it Alfred that nodded. Put plain, these conspirators would spare no ploy, however hopeless or unpalatable, to get their way. Such was their resolution, their fervour, one now unfolded in full for these braves to see. Albeit in this case, the ruse might have reaped too little for the wreakers’ tastes.
As the company hied back to their haste, Sigmund gave the scene one last look. “They’ll bloody pay…” he snarled under his breath, berating the world for ever pleasing to make a prisoner out of a child, much less a murderer. But as he climbed back upon his steed and spurred it to speed, so did a din strike all the air like a hammer. And far, far away, in miserable Merkulov, there bloomed a westerly blaze. And to follow it was a tremendous trunk of smoke, red and wroth as it reached up to choke the very sky.
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Chapter 3 ─ End
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Notes
Vándýr
(Language: Old Norse) “Evil beast”; the term the Nafílim use to refer to a behemá.
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