Vol.6, Extra 1, P.1
“A vándýr, you said?” Rolf asked back.
This rather perplexed him. Apparently, within the wood that so sprawled betwixt Hensen and the stronghold of Balasthea, there had been sighted a vándýr—or more familiarly to Rolf’s Londosian ears: a behemá. Now, one would guess the gruesome beasts quite wont to infest a forest. But the rub was, of late had trade and traffick been booming between the fólkheimr and Former Ström, and so had the wood been nigh-entirely secured and vacated of its more vile vermin. Indeed, this would be the first time in many a moon since such a report had come in.
“Y-yes. We beg you to come look, Herr Rolf—er, i-if you can.”
Rolf looked down at the reporting pair. Wide-eyed children they were: a Nafílim lad and lass, both twelve-odd years in age. By their words, the vándýr in question had reared its wretched face hard-by a much-frequented spring of theirs. And with the fear yet fresh in them, they had come together to the garrisons of Hensen, that they might seek the War-Chief Rolf’s help in getting rid of the rascal.
“Right. I’ll see what team’s up to the task, then,” Rolf answered assuredly. “Don’t you worry. You’ll be back swimming without a care in no time.”
In no time, indeed; the two had reported the vándýr as being both small and alone. Just an hour’s trek and hunt, and problem solved. And so, calmly did Rolf round about to a desk to begin the preparations, but he had not picked up a quill when the boy of the two begged after him again: “You… you can’t come, then, Herr Rolf?”
And specifically for him, no less. Of course, grasping well his position and responsibilities, Rolf knew that not lightly could he take on such a request. But deep in his heart, he dearly wished otherwise. It pained him terribly to see the children dispirited.
And as if having espied this, the other braves nearby looked on with sympathy. These subordinates of his knew just how driven he was to win the trust of their kind, a Man amongst Nafílim that he was, and respected him all the more for it. And they knew, too, the natural desire of children to see Rolf the rebel charging in, sword in hand, ready and steady to save the day. After all, he had become quite the household name by this point, and even a heroic one.
Thus did some of the braves come and throw him a lifeline. “Go on, Herr Rolf,” one of them said. “The day’s work to us you can leave.”
“For true,” put in another. “Besides, I know some thumb-twiddlers who’d love little more than to join you.”
“Oh, but I can’t possibly…” a reluctant Rolf trailed off, looking between the children and the braves troubledly. He was glad for the latter’s consideration, to be sure, but this was the military, strict and straight, where little caprice is to be suffered, even if out of charity. At any rate, it more than sufficed to assign an entire team to the errand; including a war-chief just for the sake of it would but more burden the braves back here at base, something Rolf wished to avoid, if he could help it.
But for that, there came another lifeline. “No need to muster the whole host, now,” said a new voice. “Just you and I shall serve.”
All eyes looked aside, and there found Alfred bowing gracefully. It was a glad turn that the former lordling happened to be present, and for Alfred himself: a most important opportunity. For exactly like Rolf, he, too, craved the confidence of the Nafílim people.
“The Herren Rolf and Alf?” remarked a brave, who then snorted. “Now, now! Have mercy on the poor vándýr!”
The other braves beamed and chuckled. And so was it settled: two would go to hunt this unfortunate vándýr—two of Hensen’s utter best.
∵
Through the wood walked Rolf and Alfred. Leading them on was the young lad and lass. As a rule, Rolf was not one to put children in peril’s way, of course, if even to be guided by them. But it was naught to be helped. These children—bless their hearts—could scarce describe to any working degree where they had discovered the vándýr. “Near the spring” was about their best effort. Instead, however, they proposed to lead the expedition themselves. Still, that Rolf accepted—on the grounds that both he and Alfred ought suffice to safeguard these young ones—was a rare judgement on his part, indeed.
Under eaves of swaying green they got on. No sign of aught unsavoury yet. It had been some time since they struck off the forest path and Rolf was beginning to recall a past row with some of the wood wolves here when one of the children called out:
“Over here!”
It was the lass. Being the more boisterous of the two, she had been keeping one lively step ahead. And now that she seemed to have got her full bearings, the group got on more briskly under her eager guidance.
Rolf sensed that they might be nearing their mark, and so presently asked, “So, what more may we know about this bothersome beast of yours?”
“Eh? Ah, er…” stammered the lad, who was nearer. “It’s… it’s houndlike. Wolven, maybe.”
“Wolven, sure.”
“And, um… it was alone! Just one!” the lass put in from the front.
Both exact slivers of information had already been provided back at the garrison. And what is more, any detail whatsoever to leave the children’s lips had proved abstract at best. But seeing as they were, of course, just children, who could scarce be relied upon to track down the plates and cups in a kitchen, Rolf did not press them any further.
“Ah—there! Over there!” exclaimed the lass after a bit further on. “Just past the bush!”
Rolf eyed whither she pointed her finger. “Got it,” he said, unsheathing the soot-steel. “You two stay with Alf. I’ll go have a word with this ‘wolf’.”
With that, off he went, wading swiftly yet warily through the foresaid bush of thickly grown bracken. A deal of rustling was roused as he did so, stopping once he broke past the fronds and foliage. Nay! not so. He had merely halted.
Still waist-deep in the sea of green, Rolf took a step back. The ground beyond the bush—it was gone. Only after a steep and sudden drop of a passus or two, down into the rocky bank of a brook, did it continue. A single, careless step further, and the small cliff might have got the better of him.
“No luck,” Rolf called back to the others. “The way’s unsafe. We look for another.”
The lass fidgeted. “Oh, s-sorry, Herr Rolf,” she replied. “These bushes, they all look the same!”
“That they do,” said Rolf, seemingly unconcerned. And upon returning to the group, he walked off. The children followed, and soon resumed leading.
“…”
And behind them was Alfred, bending a quiet and doubtful brow.
∵
“Here!” cried the lass. “It was this way, for true!”
“…You know the drill, then,” said Rolf, embarking again with black steel drawn.
They had all come to a grove, trackless but littered with leaves; and further away whither the lass had trained her finger, there rose a root-riddled hill, past which Rolf was ready at last to meet their mark. But soon enough, he stopped his feet—again. The ground was not gone this time, nay, but what lay right afore him was particularly, if not queerly packed with the fallen foliage.
Reversing his hilt-hold, Rolf took a literal stab at the suspicious spot. And sure enough, unseen twigs snapped, and all the fallen leaves collapsed and took another fall—down into a dyke. A pitfall it was, and a rather deeply delved one, at that.
“Ah… erm…” the lass muttered, left at a loss.
“L-look at that!” the lad exclaimed asudden. “Oh, those sloppy, sloppy hunters! Forgetting their traps everywhere!”
Rolf glanced to the children. A fretful flush was on their faces.
“You both seem weary,” he said to them, quiet and flat. “It’s yet only noon. What say we break for a bit?”
And sheathing his blade, the rebel went and sat himself beside a nearby tree. The children exchanged looks. Anxious looks. Then, after a wordless while, the lad spoke.
“H-Herr Rolf,” he called. “The spring, it’s close by now. I can fill our skins, if you like.”
“Not a bad idea,” answered Rolf. “But don’t wander far off, now, you hear?”
After gulping down its last drop, Rolf handed his waterskin to the lad, who then scurried off along with the lass. Alfred saw them off. He made certain they were gone before he himself sat down aface his fellow Man.
“Rolf,” he said gravely, “that hole—it is no hunter’s.”
“No,” agreed Rolf, “but the lie behind it quite convinced, for being brewed on the spot.”
Alfred looked away and sighed. “They are a diligent duo, to their credit,” he remarked. “First a cliff. And then… a pitfall of a Plan B.”
“Diligent, indeed,” Rolf could but agree again.
“…”
“…”
For a while, they both sat in silence. Pained and pensively so. They did not grudge the children. No; in fact, they much pitied them.
“Is it hate they harbour? For us Men?” Alfred said at length. “Or worse… vengeance?”
Rolf half-shook his head. “Both, like as not,” he guessed, “though the latter seems to me the stronger… Arbel, Tallien, Déu Tsellin—plenty of battles of late to lose a loved one to, for instance.”
That the Men could but presume it was darkness that lurked in the children’s hearts was naught to be helped. Rolf recalled the cliff, and how—despite being a shallow drop—he might well have bruised himself rather badly had he missed the edge. And then there was the pitfall lying hard-by. Again, deep it was. Too deep to be some silly children’s prank.
“To hollow such a hole…” Alfred wondered aloud as he eyed the gaping trap. “How their tender hands must have ached.”
“Ached and stung,” added Rolf. “Something moved them to abide the labour. Something personal.”
Holes, gaps, voids. Between the two warring races did such yet span yawningly. And of what embers brooded at the bottom, both Rolf and Alfred knew very well, just as they did the inevitability of even now suffering hate and hostility in Hensen, a home of Nafílim.
Still, these were children. A lad and lass, little over half Rolf’s age. Oh, how both Men rued the world for sowing seeds so corrosive in soil yet so young.
“Tell me, Alf,” Rolf said with sunken spirits. “How ought we tackle this? How ought we take responsibility? We elders?”
“I’m afraid this flavour of feud is unfamiliar to me, as well,” answered Alfred. “Though this I dare say: not with a stern word may this be solved.”
Rolf concurred defeatedly. Nay, forget scolding; not even a good old heart-to-heart might mend these children of their malice, or even their sorrow, for that matter. Oh, were it so simple.
“It is not long since I have settled in Hensen, admittedly,” Alfred reflected, “but nary a day goes by that I do not dwell on the walls that span betwixt Man and Nafílkind.”
In his own youth, Alfred knew a Nafíl for a friend—the one and only friend those fraught years could afford him. And living now in Hensen as he was, the former lordling could never go long without lingering on his long-departed pal.
“Nor for me,” nodded Rolf. “Fretting now fills all my days, it seems.”
But at that last word, both Men heard footfalls hasting nigh. It was the lad, huffing, puffing, and flailing as he came.
“Herren! Herren Rolf, Alf!” he cried. “Help, help!”
At once, both Men sprang to their feet.
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