by Alex Aguilar
“Aye, son,” Viktor nodded, as if confirming what he already knew. “What else?”
“Horse shit,” Jossiah Biggs snarled, taking his feet off the wooden stool and walking towards a nearby table where there rested a fresh jug of ale. He poured himself some and spit on the brick floor resentfully. “The Butcher was killed in battle years ago,” he said. Not that the man was very pleasant to begin with, but now that his knighthood had been revoked, he felt even less of a need to act amicably.
“I can assure you he wasn’t, old friend,” Viktor remarked. “He was very much alive when he swung his axe at me.”
Jossiah’s eyes narrowed. “Piss off,” he said in disbelief.
Viktor turned back to the young farmer, fairly eagerly. “Was there anyone else you recognized? Or a name you might have heard?”
“There was a man…” John said. “I-I… I can’t recall his name, it all happened so fast… But I remember his face. And the Butcher called him My Lord.”
“Did he take anyone else?”
“I think we would’ve noticed,” Jossiah hopped into the conversation again.
“I do believe I was asking the boy,” Viktor said.
“Just the princess, sir,” John muttered. “And a boy… A friend.”
He felt a deep sadness overcoming him suddenly. Thomlin had been an innocent bystander, dragged into the middle of an attack. And now, because of him, he might have been dead somewhere.
“I tried to protect them,” John went on, tears building up in his eyes from the guilt. “And I… I…”
His voice began to break as he tried desperately to hold himself together.
His gaze lowered. He breathed inward and outward, slowly and heavily.
“What is it, lad?” Viktor asked, his eyebrows lowering as if he felt pity for John.
The farmer fought back the knot in his throat and breathed heavily. He felt almost ashamed of his tears, especially in front of the famous Sir Viktor Crowley.
“I killed a man, sir…” he admitted out loud for the first time, and he felt a great weight lift from his shoulders. “I killed him…”
Viktor sighed deeply and took a good sip from his drink. He backed away and leaned against his chair as he thought of what to say. He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he had forgotten he was talking to a young lad. “First one?” he asked.
And John, unable to speak further, gave him a gentle nod.
“Well,” Viktor sighed, acknowledging the farmer’s naivety. “There isn’t much to say, son… You were doing what needed to be done to protect her majesty.”
“But I didn’t though, did I?” John said, his eyes conveying sorrow and despair. “I failed her…”
At that moment, something happened that John would never have expected.
He felt a comforting hand on his shoulder that nearly made him twitch. It was the hand of Viktor Crowley, a man known as the bravest knight in all of Vallenghard, who carried the reputation of an emotionless man, though this was mostly due to the fact that he often saved his true persona for his king and comrades-in-arms.
“Keep your head up, son,” Viktor said. “The world isn’t kind to the good-natured… You have to stain your hands sometimes for the good of your kingdom. And it will most certainly take a toll on you… But you must fight it. You can’t let it consume you… You understand? You did your best and that’s all that matters.”
Viktor’s words somehow eased the knot in John’s throat. After two decades of serving the king, Viktor had grown used to losing comrades in battle and the face of a farmer was surely not one he would typically make an effort to remember.
But he remembered John…
There was something in the farmer’s eyes that made it impossible for Viktor to brush away. He saw reckless bravery, above all else, as well as ingenuousness. What the knight had seen, perhaps, were the remnants of a time decades past in which he had the same precise look in his own eyes.
“Wasn’t enough though, was it?” Jossiah Biggs mumbled coldly, his lips pressed against his tankard.
John felt the sting of the man’s words, but he tried not to dwell on them.
“Stand back, old boy,” Viktor said, his brows lowering.
“What? You know I’m right. It makes no difference,” Biggs replied as a drop of ale dribbled down his less-than-elegant beard.
“I said stand back…”
“You can pat the boy’s arse all you want, it won’t bring the princess back.”
“Enough!” Viktor slammed his tankard down on the table, causing John a bit of a fright. Viktor’s chair slid and fell backwards as the man leapt to his feet and confronted his lifelong friend. “Shut your bloody mouth, old boy, or I will shut it permanently for you. Because from where I stand, it seems to me that this young lad, a sheep farmer, was doing a far better job at protecting her majesty than you were… You! A royal fucking knight.”
“Ah, so it was my responsibility now, eh?!”
“It was our responsibility! And we all failed, so it’s time you stopped throwing the blame around and began focusing on how in gods’ names we’re coming back from this.”
“There’s no coming back! You’re not a knight anymore, Viktor, face it!”
Jossiah’s words stung his old friend harder than any dagger could. Something in Viktor’s expression had changed. Some of the hope was gone, replaced by sorrow and dread but not yet desperation. The only sounds in the room for a few moments were from the cackling of the fireplace and the muffled clattering of the cook preparing dinner in the next room. And the silence only grew more painful by the second.
Jossiah sighed deeply and gradually, which was the closest thing to an apology the man could ever give anyone. “I’ve had enough of this rubbish,” he said, his voice much calmer than before. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to take as much gold as I can fit into a rucksack, perhaps a wineskin or three, and be on my way. I suggest you do the same.”
Jossiah headed for the door, but came to a halt when his old friend spoke again.
“No…” Viktor said, and the silence that followed allowed for the word to nearly echo.
“No?” Jossiah asked with a raised brow.
Viktor nodded his head from side to side, an expression of fortitude in his entire façade. He had a hand on his belt and the other he used to wipe the sweat from his forehead and brush the hair from his face. The man even began to pace, almost involuntarily as if the blood pumping heatedly through his veins was keeping him from standing still. “I will fix this,” he said. “Mark my words, old friend, I will.”
“I think you’ve had enough for the night, Viktor,” Jossiah said. He then turned to John and added, “Do take the ale from him before he passes out, will you?”
Viktor Crowley slid the tankard off the table so swiftly that it slammed against a brick wall and the remaining ale splashed all over the brick floors. “No!” he said, his voice rising. “I’ll be damned if I’ll allow this to be how it ends.”
“Viktor… with all due respect, old friend, it’s useless to dwell. I’m afraid this is a calamity we won’t be able to move past from.”
“It’s a setback, is what it is.”
“You know that it isn’t…”
“Elaborate?”
“Sure, you might have a lead now. But you haven’t the funds and you haven’t the men. Hell, you haven’t even the title anymore!”
“You have some connections, how much do you suppose we can borrow?”
“As Sir Viktor Crowley, plenty. As a mere peasant, not much I’m afraid.”
“To hell with it,” Viktor said, the smell of the ale starting to tarnish his breath. He only had three tankards’ worth and yet the knight had grown so unused to drinking that it was starting to affect him prematurely. “Listen to me, Jossiah, nobody knows about this,” he said. “No one but the king and the handful of people in that room.”
“You realize that handful of people have connections everywhere, do you? All it
takes is one raven and the whole kingdom will know in a matter of days.”
“Which is why the time to act is now!”
“You mean you plan to take the money and run off?!”
“We will hire a company. A dozen men. Two, at most. We go after these bastards and we steal the princess back.”
“Have you gone mad?!”
“Damn it all to hells, old man!” Viktor raised his voice again. “Were you or were you not a knight of Val Havyn before today?! Why don’t you act like it!?”
“Even if your plan didn’t involve treason, which it does… You’re talking about pursuing a man you know nothing about. You’ve no idea what he’s capable of. Hells, you don’t even know what he looks like!”
“I don’t,” Viktor said, and then aimed at John Huxley with his eyes. “But he does…”
John froze in both anticipation and thrill. It was relatively warm in the room, but it did nothing for the chills he felt throughout his entire body.
“You’re shitting me,” Jossiah snarled. “You’re not seriously suggesting this? He’s a peasant!”
“So were you once, old friend,” Viktor said, much more calmly than before. “And so was I. Or have you forgotten that?”
“He’s just a lad!”
“He’s a lad that fought Hudson Blackwood and lived to tell the tale. I’d say he’s our lad!”
“I’ll do it,” John Huxley said abruptly, grasping the attention of both men at once. He took a moment to breathe, easing down the beating of his heart a few notches, allowing for the idea to sink in. And then he nodded nervously at the two men. “If it’ll help bring her majesty back, I’ll do it… I will join you.”
Viktor Crowley turned back to his companion, his eyes eagerly waiting for a comparable response.
Jossiah Biggs sighed and placed a hand to his temples.
“Even if we tried to do this, you haven’t the title anymore, Viktor. King Rowan’s already raging mad. How do you suppose he’ll react the minute you try to announce this voyage?”
“We’ll announce it first thing at dawn,” Viktor said.
“He’ll lose his mind.”
“Worst case, he imprisons me. He won’t have my head.”
“He will.”
“He won’t,” a voice interrupted them, causing every head to turn. Standing at the doorframe was a woman of middle age, brown skin, a round nose, and two streaks of grey contrasting against her oily black hair.
“What are you doing here?” Viktor asked her, his eyes widening.
“Not entirely sure myself,” the Lady replied.
“What did you hear?” Jossiah asked, much more hostile than Viktor had reacted.
She hesitated, only her expression was more disconcerting than it was malicious. “Just enough,” she said.
As the king’s Treasurer, Lady Brunylda Clark had lived in the royal palace for several decades and yet she was sure she had never set foot in that particular room before. Dressed in that elegant turquoise gown and silver jewelry, she looked the most out of place in the room.
The Lady had a reputation of having a certain disdain for the knights of the king’s court. She had gained the trust of King Rowan to such an extent that she had the freedom to pursue and carry out any and all money-related matters with any lord in Gravenstone in the king’s name. And yet, when an assembly was called for, the king seemed to always favor the word and advice of his knights over her own.
The numbers were never in her favor, of course. There were seven knights and only one of her.
But there was a difference between favoring the opinion of the majority and being entirely overlooked; the latter was something the Lady had grown accustomed to during her years of service, much to her own contempt. The current matters, however, had worried her enough to let go of the feud between her and the knights. And so she stood there, fighting back the hostility and lifting her chin up as high as she could.
“If you’re here to blackmail us, Brunylda…” Viktor spoke, but was unable to finish.
“I will loan you the silver,” she said suddenly, and both men were unsure of just how to respond.
John had the sudden impulse to step out of the room, unsure of exactly where he might end up if he chose any particular door. One of the doors opened and the princess’s handmaiden stepped in, only to be glared at by several eyes. And so Brie set the second jug of ale on the nearest table and walked back out quicker than she had stepped in. John might have followed her, had it not been for his curiosity when one of the former knights spoke again.
“She bluffs,” Jossiah grunted.
“Trust goes both ways, Sir Biggs,” Lady Brunylda remarked. “I’m risking just as much as you are.”
“Piss off, you.”
“Let’s hear her out, Jossiah,” Viktor said, his eyes contemplative yet wary.
“She’s a viper, old dog,” Jossiah said scornfully. “And there’s no faster way to lose your head than by trusting a viper. Especially when this one serves the very man that disbarred us.”
“Allow me to make one thing perfectly clear to you, Mister Biggs,” the Lady said with an added weight on the word Mister rather than Sir. She took two steps towards them in such an austere manner that Jossiah nearly felt the impulse to take a step back.
“I serve no man,” she said to him. “I serve Val Havyn… And right now, the man leading it is drowning himself in wine like a whimpering boy. If this city is to remain standing, then you lot might be our only hope.”
Viktor and Brunylda held onto their glares for far longer than they were comfortable with. In a game of blackmail, the one that broke the silence first was the weaker one. Only the Lady was not there to blackmail.
“How much will you need?” she asked.
“Stop right there, you,” Jossiah said, and placed a hand on Viktor’s shoulder. “If the king finds out about this…”
“Enough to hire fifteen men,” Viktor said, ignoring his friend and keeping his eyes locked on Lady Brunylda’s. He saw pride there. But he also saw distress. And in desperate times, trust was often a risk worth taking.
“Ten men,” she responded, after taking a moment to consider how much she could get away with stealing from the king.
“Thirteen.”
“Twelve.”
By then, Jossiah Biggs had taken a seat at the table across from John. Perhaps it was the ale that was keeping him there, but in reality the man appeared to be invested in any discussion that involved money. But his grimace was still there, as he sat judging every precarious decision that Viktor took.
“You realize we’re already outnumbered as it is,” Viktor said. “We might get slaughtered.”
“Yes,” Lady Brunylda nodded. “But you’re Viktor Crowley… If any man is to ensure the princess’s safe return before getting slaughtered, it’s you.”
Viktor considered it briefly, well aware that he was in a position more vulnerable than he had ever been in. And so he gave the lady a nod of agreement and a half-smirk.
“We have an accord,” he said.
And then they shook hands.
* * *
Not every life is wicked, she had been told all her life.
There is goodness in everyone. It’s only harder to find in certain beings.
In her short life, Princess Magdalena had seen and experienced many things. And those that had lectured her were right, for the most part; not every being was cruel. Except, of course, for those that were.
She opened her eyes and, for a moment, couldn’t remember where she was or what had happened to her. The first thing she felt was moisture beneath her legs; the cold kind of moisture that could bring about a fever on a frosty night. When she tried to move, she realized her hands were tied to a hanging hook, two feet above her head. She was sitting against a wall made of wood on a muddy patch of grass, surrounded by strangers dressed in torn clothing filthier than her dress, which may have been a pastel blue at one point but was now hidden beneath a layer of dirt and
muck.
She was inside of a carelessly built pit, with bars of wood nailed all around to keep them confined. An excuse for a cage, it was. But there wasn’t much that fifteen unarmed prisoners could do against two hundred soldiers with blades.
The strangers around her were also tied up and some were pale and shivery, to the point where they looked as if they were mere minutes away from becoming corpses. A deep sickness began to settle into her stomach and chest, as all the memories began to crawl back into her mind.
She remembered walking safely through her palace, protesting about a gown her father had asked her to wear for a man she had been betrothed to without her consent.
She remembered speaking briefly with a young farmer who had come to the palace to collect a reward.
Then came the invaders… And the chaos in the courtyard…
She remembered Sir Viktor Crowley and her father’s men charging into the fight.
She remembered the young farmer trying to protect her.
And the young boy that was with him… had he survived?
Had the farmer survived?
And what had become of the palace?
The last thing she remembered was staring into the dark eyes of a tall beast of a man that wore a mask over his jaw; a mask lined with long, sharp, inhuman teeth. She could still feel his claw of a hand grasping her face, averting the air from her lungs.
Then there was darkness… Darkness that seemed to never end…
She dreamed she had woken up in her bed, surrounded by soft silk sheets, her handmaiden approaching with a freshly cleaned gown. She could almost feel the morning breeze on her face, almost smell the warm green tea sitting on her bedside table, and almost taste the sweet cornbread she ate with every morning meal. It was a shame to find herself surrounded by such familiarity and comfort, only to wake up to the smell of piss and shit in a place unfamiliar to her.
Nearby, she noticed a subtle glow, and her nose caught the scent of roasting meat. Men had set up camp and were huddled around a firepit near a row of tents, yards away from the prisoners. There were other fires all around, but she couldn’t turn her neck all the way due to the ropes. All she could see in the distance were shadows. And before she could try to make out any of the men’s faces, she became startled at the sound of whispering voices approaching the cage.