by S E Zbasnik
A warm hand circled her bony shoulders, and with nearly no effort, tugged her close. Hayley gasped, the tears bursting free as she tried to bury her face into Gavin’s thigh. The hand on her back patted soothingly at the top, while she bawled onto his pants.
Her god damn fault, all of it. Shit. Maybe Frederick and the rest being captured was somehow Hayley’s doing as well. Her thieving kept Gavin from being able to arrive to… Damn it, she didn’t want to care. About this. About that. About him.
About anything.
The comforting hand slowed, but it didn’t entirely lift off of her either. Sensing a slow intake of breath from Gavin, Hayley lifted her sorrow-stained cheek off his lap. “I am sorry,” he whispered, a bead of rain falling from his eye. It had to be rain, despite the cloudless sky. He couldn’t be crying, not him. Not now…not because of her.
For a second, his amber eyes darted right to hers. Hayley flushed, realizing she caught him crying but Gavin didn’t wipe away his obvious pain. He shifted in the grass a moment, parted another jagged breath between his flexing lips, and sighed, “Marco’s death was my doing. You were young, too young to even be there.”
She shouldn’t have done it. Should have told someone else about her idea. Someone that was highly trained. Skilled. Larissa would have pulled it off. Maybe she could have even led them in to save Frederick and the others. Hayley’s skin ruptured in massive goosebumps, every dot along her worthless hide holding a small dose of shame. Her stupid fault.
“I knew that, but I thought…” Gavin was still talking to himself. “Once you opened the gate, I should have sent you on. Told you to be…to get to safety. It was the right thing to do.”
His head tumbled to his chest, the chin digging deep into his sternum while Hayley wiggled up to a sitting position. The comforting hand drifted away, plummeting into the grass at his side as she…she didn’t know what to do. Her knight was in shambles, darkness circling his eyes like wolves, his skin as grey as ash in an unkempt fireplace. She wanted to tell him to get better, to yell at him that he had to be better because he was the only person who knew what was going on.
Hayley was no use. She was…a thief, an accidental murderer, an escaped slave, a castoff piece of trash unloved by anyone. She shouldn’t be here. She shouldn’t be anywhere.
“Ser?” her voice flattened into the grass. “If we weren’t there, if you hadn’t…hadn’t tried to save me,” Hayley lifted her head to stare right into his eyes, “would you have gone in after Calvin?”
Gavin blinked rapidly a few times, his lips plopping open in surprise before he full body flinched. “Perhaps,” he whispered to himself.
“Would you have survived?”
He jerked his head to the side, his lips bunched together in a pained smile, “Perhaps not.” Stress was wearing upon him; the man looked like he aged a good ten years in a day. Hayley’s eyes darted to his hands, both cupped in his lap. Dark, graveyard dirt clung to the underpart of his white nails. Where he had to dig apart the earth to bury his friends and those he couldn’t save.
It was her job to help him, to try and fix him, or keep him healthy. Even the Knight-Captain told her to do it. To do whatever was necessary because they needed Gavin on his feet. She needed him, otherwise…otherwise, she’d be a hayseed in the wind.
Sliding over the grass, Hayley drew closer to the crumbling man. She lifted a hand to cup his back in a hug. Gavin didn’t shrug it away, nor cower. Maybe she wasn’t such an ugly scrap after all. Growing more certain in her choices, Hayley inched up on her knees, her face drawing nearer to Gavin’s.
He must have sensed her incoming presence as Gavin turned towards Hayley, confusion on his lips. “Squi—” he began to ask when Hayley planted her mouth over his. It was warm, soothing, almost inviting. For a second, she felt him shift the muscles in his pouty lips, molding them to greet hers when a hand suddenly latched onto Hayley’s shoulder and tugged her back.
“What are you doing?!” Gavin cried, eyes as white as the surf below.
“I…” Hayley’s entire face burned hotter than a forest fire, her gut full of broken glass. “I was…”
“Squire, you’re my squire!” he thundered, whipping his head back and forth.
Crab-walking backwards, Hayley paddled her limbs to get herself as fast from him as possible before pain struck her. It was too late for her ego which was crumbling to dust. “I know,” she said, bitter tears building in her eyes. The man who hurled her away sat there, frozen in place and gawping. She had to get away, she had to-to run anywhere. Twisting on her knee, Hayley managed to dig a foot into the ground and staggered to her feet. Barely looking up, she broke into a run to get as far from Gavin as she could. Tears trailed her as she went.
Heads turned, trying to watch her, but Hayley was a blur. Any thought of pausing, of stopping, of even letting someone get a look jammed another brick of shame into her gut. The mass of them were slowing her down, the girl uncertain where to go or what to do. All that was ahead was the castle, locked gate and all. Needing to get away from everyone’s judgmental glares, she launched herself into their tiny tent.
Barely making it inside, Hayley crashed to the ground. Jagged breaths came out like burps, sobs providing the noise as Hayley dug her palms around her eyes and tried to not shriek. What did she do? How could she…how was she so bad at this?! Even if she tried, even if she gave everything inside of her, she was bad. Bad at being a squire. Bad at serving her knight. Bad.
“Damn it!” she screamed, smashing a fist into the ground. Pain reverberated up her arm but Hayley shook it away. Her heart was screaming at her brain that they fully shit the bed. He’d get rid of her. He’d finally see that she was a lost cause. Would he take her back to Ostmount or just kick her out now? Force her to wander off into the woods like an unwanted, mangy dog?
Curling up into a tight ball, Hayley flopped onto her side and cried every last stupid tear inside of her. It hurt. Everything hurt. Marco. Finn. The Slavers. Gavin. Hayley. All of her choices, all of her decisions mashed together into one never-ending saga of pain, and at the center of it all was her. Always her, mucking things up.
She hated caring because all it did was make the bad things worse.
“Squire?”
Oh shit.
Hayley froze. Her body was drained of all tears and left with only dry sobs. Still, she tried to wipe away nothing more than salt as if that could hide away her red-stained face and eyes. “May I enter?” Gavin asked softly. He never asked before. This was his tent, she was just using it.
Hayley bobbed her head, before realizing he couldn’t see her. “Yes,” she squeaked out while scrabbling up to her ass and dashing to the back of the tent. It didn’t give her much room, but when she tucked her legs tight to her ugly chest it gave Gavin enough space to enter and keep from accidentally touching her.
For a moment, his eyes darted to the piece of gutter trash tossed into the tent, before they swept for brighter pastures. “I understand that you are…as you age you find yourself in a swamp of…thoughts.” Gavin’s voice was a whisper, his breath nearly punctuating every word. “Thoughts of a…romantically inclined nature. Which can be normal and healthy.” He paused and wrung a hand over the back of his neck. “Lord, guide me.”
Hayley snorted in more of the snot and took a swipe at her nose. She was the least pretty thing in existence. Slime molds were more attractive.
Grunting, Gavin lapped a tongue over his lips and began again. “You are a young girl, and I’m old. Very old. Far, far too old for someone like you to-to want in that way. I…I spend my nights reading over books of strategy and filling out balance sheets. This is, not helping.”
“Are you gonna get rid of me?” leaked out of her. She shouldn’t have put it that way. It was as good as slapping the idea into his head, but Hayley couldn’t stop thinking about it. Her mind was fretting about the fear so bad the edges were fraying.
Gavin shook his head. “No, of course not. You’ve been…you’v
e more than proven yourself as a competent squire. If not in these past few months then in the past days.”
What was he going on about? Competent squire? She’d been failing at this one important duty she didn’t even know about, and the second she tried he shoved her off. Hayley narrowed her eyes at him, “But I was told…”
By Larissa, you idiotic, braindead sow! Damn it, damn it, damn it! Of course, she made it all up. Stuck those thoughts in Hayley’s head knowing she’d fall for it and get herself kicked out. Folding her palms into fists, Hayley began to bang her knuckles on her skull.
“Told what?” Gavin asked, his voice frostier than usual.
“Nothing. Never mind. It was…I was wrong. I shouldn’t have. It’s my fault,” Hayley grumbled into her chest.
“It is in the past.” He still wouldn’t stop giving her a wide berth, but he wasn’t running out the door or hurling her out of it either. “I…I do understand the temptation at times, as you grow. Teenage years are a fickle… But I’m an adult and you’re still a child. You should be with kids your own age.”
Like Finn? The gropey fingers that tried to yank her shirt off? The joking asshole who’d kidnap her when it suited him? Or Marco…
She hated thinking about his confession because even knowing his fate, even being there watching it, Hayley couldn’t say that she felt the same. She wanted to, badly. To rend her clothing and declare she loved him, but it was all confusing.
“I’m sorry,” she mumbled again, wishing anything would make sense. Somehow her body managed to find a hidden stash of tears, all of them piped straight to her ducts. Hayley burrowed her eyes into her bony knees, dirt from the leggings smearing over her cheeks.
“You’re in pain,” Gavin whispered and, for the first time since coming inside, he sat upon his bed across from Hayley. “We’re all in pain,” he sighed to himself. “And we act out when that happens.”
“I hate that it hurts!” she squeaked, digging her fingers hard into her flesh. “I want it gone. I want to…to not hurt anymore.”
“The hurting means you care,” Gavin said, causing Hayley to bite down hard on her lip. She knew that, which was why she hated even letting herself open for a moment. No more. Draw everything in tight and keep only to herself.
“Hayley,” he whispered, his hand bouncing a half-filled glass of water into her knees. She accepted the cup and took a long drink, her body drained. “Caring is why you saved me.”
“I…I didn’t, I only, I had to…” He thought she saved him? All she did was drag Marco to his death. Gavin did all the saving. He fought off the hordes, he got all that he could to safety. She cowered by the gate and had to be carted away.
Staring deep into the empty cup, Hayley caught a drop of her reflection. The warped face lost deep inside the tunnel blended into the darkness around it. As she twisted the clay mug around, Hayley’s features appeared almost like magic. From the side came Gavin’s hand. It only glanced against the cup, asking if he could take it back. She let go, her eyes staring up to him.
“I know, it is not easy. Now you know the real pain of this life. The real challenges it entails. Would you, knowing this, continue to be my squire?”
Slowly, Hayley bobbed her head. She knew pain, the physical kind that tore apart flesh and bone. She knew the other kind too — the one that rotted your brain and left you weeping in the corner. But this…trust, care, hope, whatever he was offering her — she didn’t understand it at all.
Gavin smiled, “Good.”
Something new churned through the council, not swords and armor but words and sharpened smiles. For two days, they’d sit and talk, heads hunched together while whipping sentences at each other. It all came to a head when a man in robes lined with ermine approached the camp. No one looked happy to see him, Gavin scowling deep and Erin turning away. The only one happy to be there was the man himself, supposedly named the Voice of Reason. He wore the dumbest smile on his face the entire three hours he sat and spoke with the Council.
Hayley half expected him to be hurled out onto his ass, particularly after some vigorous debate caused half the knights to storm out of their meeting. But the Voice remained, that smug smile grinning through a forced meal where everyone sat grumbling through their food. On one side were the stormed out knights, most of them younger and glaring. On the other, the ones who remained to hear him out, including Gavin.
“While I certainly do look forward to breaking bread with all of you,” the Voice began, rising from his spot as a guest of honor. “I believe it is time you come to a decision.”
Mugs smashed to the table, some so loud Hayley could hear the cracks of pottery all the way from down at her squire end. After everything that happened, she’d tried to slink away into the shadows — taking meals anywhere away from people — but Gavin made her come. At least no one hurled rotten vegetables at her. It was something.
Grumbling erupted higher up the table causing all the squires to freeze above their watery stew made up of old bone broth and the remaining stocks. If this lasted any longer they’d need to send out hunters or people to buy up food from merchants. Which seemed to be something the knights up top were pointing out, jabbing at their slightly-better-but-not-by-much dinner. Fantastic feasts on golden platters this was not.
“We agreed to hear them out,” Gavin suddenly lifted his voice, breaking over the growing thunder.
“What would the Order itself agree to pay?” Knight-Captain Erin asked, sounding more and more like the only adult at the table. The other knights were wadding their food up in palms as if they planned to flick it at the Voice of Reason.
“Ten percent, as is usual,” a crackling voice rose from the middle of the ancient part of the Order. They didn’t fight, they didn’t clean or cook, they just sat around telling people what to do. Hayley assumed they weren’t even invited to this, just showed up for free food or the like.
A fist smashed to the table, and a face with pink-tinged linen wrapped around an eye dipped closer. “That’s a load of bullshit. It was their fault this happened in the first place!”
More infighting resumed, people harrumphing and cheering for both sides. It quickly devolved into one thinking the Commander and his purse should pay whatever was asked, and the other wanting to try and take the castle again. Hayley’s eyes darkened at the thought of a second attempt. Of how wider those graves would grow. How many faces would come back scarred and ripped to pieces.
“Stop!” Gavin shouted, rising to his feet. Every eye drew to him, his head held high as he took in both sides. “We cannot take the castle back, not without the Knight-Commander’s blessing.”
The side for fighting sneered at the very idea, but no one raced to tell him off. They seemed as bound by the rules as everyone else.
“And if we do not pay the ransom, then…” Gavin’s bleary eyes turned to the Voice who seemed to serve both sides.
The man parted his hands and tipped his head. “There has been ample opportunity and warning. It is not upon their heads but yours. If you don’t choose soon I’m afraid there is little point in suffering so much upkeep with keeping the prisoners alive.”
Shit. Would they just kill them like that? Without a care because they didn’t get some payout? Hayley dug her fingers against the table, her head whipping around to try and find anyone else to explain this. In doing so, she caught sight of Larissa’s wan face. It was only for a second before Hayley’s hackles raised, but the girl looked broken. Beaten down until she was little more than a shadow.
Good. She tried to ruin Hayley. Chase her out of the Order, so…Larissa deserved it.
More arguing commenced, no doubt the same points that had been made for the past day. Every squire turned to watch as their leaders, their masters, their knights bickered like two cats over a dead mouse. They were swiping at each other, nearing closer and closer to the food tossing state as more angry fists met with tables.
“We will pay,” Gavin growled, speaking for every voice there.
“You can’t…” the knight missing an eye shouted first, rising to her feet, but Gavin pinned her in place.
“The votes have already been taken, there will be no more blood shed for the castle.” The man who took it back the first time dipped his head low. “It belongs in Prestonian hands now.”
“They shall be glad to hear of you accepting the truth before you,” the Voice began but he forgot he was severely outnumbered by bitter knights. Two dozen narrowed eyes whipped upon the smug man and — for a moment — his patina cracked. The scared little boy inside gulped. He reached towards Gavin as if the man would protect him.
“What if we don’t have the coin to save ‘em all?” another knight shouted from further down the table.
“Yeah?” a few others joined in, all of them patting at their pockets. Hayley had no concept of money beyond sometimes needing it so she didn’t starve, but she’d been privy to the coin wasting habits of the knights during their last camp together. Drink and friendly company seemed to be where nearly all of it went, leaving…how much behind to save their fellows in arms?
Gavin sighed deep, his eyes shut tight. “We shall pool together what we can. None of our brothers or sisters will be left behind.”
“Then,” the Voice yanked out a scroll on his person and unrolled it upon the table, “I believe it is time we discuss the price for each of their heads. Ser Rosten…”
It took another three days before the deal with done, signatures given, and all of the knights and squires stood outside the castle gates. One of the older ones held the massive lockbox loaded down in the coins and gold they all seemed to pull from their asses. He could barely keep such a heavy box in his arms. So, while they were waiting for the door to open, he placed it on the ground with a loud grunt.
That set the knights teeth on edge, all of them clearly wanting to dash forward and take ownership of such a treasure. A few looked about to attempt it when the front door to the castle proper opened wide. Stumbling out in rags and blinking hard in the sun came those malnourished warriors who’d been imprisoned for nearly two and a half weeks.