Season of Sacrifice

by Mindy Klasky

  “Where are you taking us?”

  “To Smithcourt, Sun-lord.”

  “But why? Why can’t we go back to Mum? Why can’t we go back to the People?”

  “Your time with the People is over, Sun-lord. It is your destiny to ride to Smithcourt.”

  Destiny. That was a word out of a grown-up’s story, a word bigger than Reade could imagine. He stayed silent for a moment, overwhelmed by the thought of riding away from all the People. He closed his hands about the bavin hanging on his chest, and he felt a little braver. After a moment, he tugged at the stiff golden cloth. “Why do I have to wear this? Why can’t I wear my breeches?”

  “We want to honor you, Sun-lord. Among my people, you are destined for the greatest glory we can bestow. You and your sister.” Before Reade could ask another question, Duke Coren gestured toward his horse. “Come now, Sun-lord. We must ride. We can’t linger if we are going to get to Smithcourt in time.”

  “But—”

  “Sun-lord. Now!” Reade gasped at the stern note in Duke Coren’s voice, and he was amazed to see the nobleman’s hand clench into a fist.

  Reade always asked questions. Reade always asked and Mum always answered, question after question after question, until she finally sent him outside to play with the other boys. Mum never got angry at questions. She never yelled just because Reade was talking. And she never, never hit him. She never even curled her fingers into a fist.

  Reade swallowed all the things he wanted to know—how far was Smithcourt? In time for what? Why was Duke Coren honoring Reade and Maida? Why was Maida sleeping? The duke lifted him onto the horse’s broad back. By the time Duke Coren swung up behind him, Maida was settled in front of Donal. They left the clearing before Reade could learn anything more.

  As the day wore on, Reade tried to sit straight on the horse. He clutched at the animal’s ample mane when the beast resumed its gallop. Every step of the great roan jolted him a little more in the saddle. Before long, he was crying again, great gasping sobs that caught in his throat, while his nose ran and his eyes streamed.

  How was he to know that the inlanders’ huge horse would hurt so much? Da would never have let Reade ride the stallion. Da had punished Reade when he even petted the border pony, last autumn.

  Da. Reade fought against a choking sob. He mustn’t think of Da now. Mum said that Da had gone to fish with the Guardians, along with those four other men. Mum said Reade must be brave, like Alana Woodsinger. The woodsinger’s da had gone fishing, too, and had left to be with the Guardians of Water.

  It wasn’t fair, though. Da had forgotten his promises. He’d said that he and Reade would go out on their own boat that spring. He had promised that Reade could help bring in the nets. But Da had gone on ahead, gone off to fish by himself.

  When Reade thought of fresh, sweet fish, his belly gurgled. He was doubly empty from being sick and the long hours they had traveled. He turned in the saddle to look up at Duke Coren’s bearded face. The man’s eyes glinted beneath his heavy brows, and Reade wondered if he’d be allowed to ask a question now. His spirits lifted when Duke Coren growled, “Aye, Sun-lord? What do you need?”

  The duke’s words were strange. Reade knew that the nobleman could not really mean to call him a lord. Lords did not come from the People. Lords lived in faraway places, in giant villages called towns. They lived in amazing cottages called castles. People bowed down before lords and did their bidding. Lords dressed in fancy robes and ate meat whenever they wanted.

  “Supper please, Y-your Grace. I’m very hungry.”

  “Then supper you shall have.” Reade was cheered by the duke’s smiling voice, and only a few minutes later, he was lifted down from the high horse. His legs shivered as he stood beside the road, shaking as if he’d just been caught in a winter storm. They felt all funny and bendy, the way they did when Reade chased after the bigger boys for an entire afternoon. Before Reade could test a few steps, Donal came over to place Maida beside him. Both men moved away then, walking off among the other soldiers as they shouted orders.

  “Maida?”

  It took a long time for his sister to turn toward him, a long time for her to blink and make her eyes focus. She looked like she’d been asleep, dreaming so deeply that she didn’t recognize him. “Reade?” she asked at last, as if she weren’t certain of his name.

  He was frightened by her voice, by how the one word shook, but he smiled like a big boy. “It’s all right, Maida,” Reade made himself say, pretending that he was Da, pretending that he could protect his sister.

  “I’m scared, Reade. I want Mum.”

  “It’s going to be fine. We’re going to be all right. You don’t need to cry.” He didn’t know if he was making up a story as he spoke the words. He didn’t know if they were going to be fine. But his belly felt a little better when he spoke out loud, and he didn’t feel quite so much like crying himself when he told Maida not to.

  Before Maida could say anything else, Donal walked back to the two of them. His eyes were hard, like old Sarira Woodsinger’s when she’d caught Reade spying on the Spirit Council meeting. The soldier started to say something, as if he were going to order the children not to speak to each other, but then he shook his head, pursed his lips and whistled. Reade only had an instant to wonder at the shrill sound, and then one of the inlander’s dogs bounded to Donal’s side. “Aye, Crusher,” the soldier growled. “Keep an eye on these two. Make sure they don’t move.”

  Reade caught his breath at the dog’s size. Dogs ate boys. Dogs ate boys and girls and men and women. They tore them apart with their sharp teeth, and they swallowed the little pieces down their dark, smelly throats. They scratched at little boy bodies with their blood-black claws, and they crunched on whatever bones were left over.

  Reade shook like the leaves on the trees above him, trembling as if he had been dunked in the ocean in the middle of winter. He heard Maida moan beside him, and he wanted to tell her that he would protect her, that he would keep her safe, but he could not think of the words. He could not think of anything except that dogs ate boys.

  Donal barked some other command to the massive beast and then strode away. Crusher sat on his haunches, his head almost level with Reade’s own. The boy did not let himself meet the dog’s dark brown eyes, did not let himself see how hungry the dog was. Crusher opened his mouth and began to pant, his breath stinking like rotten meat.

  Reade forced himself to stand as still as he could, trying to forget the trembling ache in his legs. He made himself not see the men setting up camp. He made himself not hear the little sobs that caught in Maida’s throat. He made himself not feel the hot trail down his leg as he wet himself, and he did not move his toes in the muddy puddle that formed beneath his golden robe.

  Dogs ate boys.

  Reade could not keep from starting, though, when Duke Coren strode back across the site. “Crusher!” the duke exclaimed, and the dog tilted his ears toward the man, all the while keeping his eyes on the children. Duke Coren followed the animal’s gaze, and Reade quailed beneath the double stare.

  He and Maida had been bad. They had been afraid. They had asked to go back to the People. They had asked, repeatedly, for Mum. They had disappointed Duke Coren. And now, Duke Coren could feed them to the dog.

  “All right, Crusher.” The duke snapped his fingers and made a gesture with his hand, as if he were tossing a hunk of meat to the far end of the camp. The dog rose to all four feet and edged his nose beneath the duke’s hand for just an instant before trotting away from the children.

  Reade’s relief washed over him like a wave on the People’s beach. He dared to fill his lungs with air. Duke Coren had saved him, saved him and Maida, even though Reade had been bad! He stepped forward, away from the clinging mud beneath his feet. For just an instant, his heart clenched as he saw Duke Coren register that mud, and a hot flush of shame painted the boy’s cheeks.

  The duke nodded slowly, and said, “Come along, Sun-lord. Sun-lady. Your suppe
r is ready.” Reade was so relieved at the kindness in the duke’s voice that he almost ran to the man, almost threw himself against the duke’s armored chest. That was how Reade used to launch himself at Da. When Da came back from fishing. Before Da had gone off to fish with the Guardians.

  Maida hung back, though, and Donal finally had to drag her over to the cookfire. Even when the soldiers gave her food, she only sat and cried. She wanted Mum, and she hated the hard bread that the soldiers told her she must eat. Reade showed her how she could hold it in her mouth and work her tongue around it. She could make it soft enough to chew. That made her stop sniffling for a little while. Reade’s chest swelled like a bantam rooster. Mum would be proud of him.

  Before Reade could ask for a second helping of bread, the duke brought him a golden cup filled with sweet water. After the boy had drained the goblet, a soldier tossed him a scratchy blanket. Duke Coren’s saddlebag made a poor excuse for a pillow, but Reade was fast asleep before he could complain.

  And so it went for a week. Every morning, the duke roused Reade from a deep sleep. Reade would drink from the golden cup, swallowing every drop of the sweet water. He would chew the dry bread. He would be lifted up to sit in front of Duke Coren.

  If he ever thought of complaining, ever thought of asking for Mum, he remembered Crusher’s intent gaze and the dog’s dripping tongue. Duke Coren had saved him from Crusher. Reade should not bother Duke Coren. He should go with Duke Coren and be good, even if that meant riding away from the People, away from Mum.

  The days passed in a haze.

  They left the forest behind and made their way across open land. In the rare moments when he was awake, Reade began to see signs of people. Separate fields were defined by fences as high as his head. A clear road stretched beneath the horses’ hooves.

  One evening, when the taste of the sweet water had faded from the back of Reade’s throat, he sat up in front of Duke Coren, looking out at the road that snaked before them. They crested one especially long hill and looked down on some whitewashed houses gathered together like eggs from one of Mum’s hens. The cottages were so crowded against each other that there was barely a patch of ground for growing herbs. The village green was striped with footpaths, and a small herd of milk-cows stood in the middle of the grass, chewing their cud.

  Reade cried out when he saw an actual smithy on the far edge of the green. He recognized the anvil from Da’s stories. The gigantic metal block stood by the ashes of an open fire. Looking behind him, Reade swallowed audibly. He could not see the first houses they had passed when they entered this village—no, this town. “Please, Your Grace, are we going to your castle now?”

  “My castle!” the duke barked in the twilight. “We’re nowhere near any castle, Sun-lord. We’ll be another fortnight on the road before we reach Smithcourt.” The duke laughed again. “Just for you, though, we’ll stay at the King’s Horse for the night.”

  The words confused Reade until he looked at the building where Duke Coren had reined to a sudden halt. A great sign blew in the wind—a horse’s head picked out in bright paint, with fiery eyes that flashed at the young boy. A golden crown rested on the magnificent beast’s ears.

  Duke Coren snorted at the sign and muttered under his breath as he lifted Reade down from his flesh-and-blood stallion. “Damned fools! Still, this is the best of the lot in this backwater—supposed to have the only drinkable ale in the entire cursed village.” There was more, but Reade could not catch the words as he trotted to keep up with the scowling duke.

  Reade quickly forgot Duke Coren’s fascinating curses as he stared at the tavern’s strange patrons. Every face he could see was male; each was half covered with a bushy beard. Clouds of pungent smoke filled the air. Most of the men sucked on intricately carved pipes. Every pipe, though, was removed from brown-stained lips as the men gaped at the soldiers and their two golden-robed charges. Reade drew away from the staring faces, backing up until he felt the strength of Duke Coren’s legs against his spine. His hand crept to the bavin about his neck, his fingers closing tightly about its black points.

  A huge, red-faced woman came out of the crowd of awestruck villagers. Her face was puffy, like dough that needed to be punched down. She hesitated for a moment before dropping a rough curtsey to the duke, and then she twisted her chapped hands in an apron that might once have been white. “Good evening, m’lord. I—” She stopped pretending to be polite. “Who are these children?”

  Before Reade could answer, Maida broke free from Donal’s grip, darting toward the fat woman with a cry. “Please!” she sobbed as she buried her face in the dirty apron. “I want my mum!”

  Reade stared at his sister in awe. How did she dare to run to a stranger, to a woman she’d never seen before?

  As Reade watched, he saw that the woman looked afraid, but her hands started to smooth Maida’s tangled hair. The woman whispered something to Maida, and some of the men in the smoky room started to grumble. Two or three climbed to their feet, but they didn’t move any closer to Duke Coren after a dagger flashed into the nobleman’s hand.

  Reade saw the firelight glint on the blade, but Maida did not. She kept her face buried in the fat woman’s skirts. Her words were muffled as she sobbed, “We’ve been on the road for days! They took us away, and they put us in these robes, and they made us ride and ride and ride….”

  Maida sobbed as if she’d lost the last of her rag dolls, and the red-faced woman folded the girl closer against her padded hip, clucking meaningless noises as she stared in shock at Duke Coren. As Reade heard his sister, tears welled up in his own eyes. He did want his mum. And he did want to be back home. Duke Coren hadn’t answered any of his questions, and Reade still didn’t know why they were going to Smithcourt, or why they had to leave the People behind.

  “Good lady,” the duke crooned, and Reade remembered how the man had spoken to Alana Woodsinger, back home. The thought made him feel all strange inside. His belly flipped over, and he took his own step toward the red-faced woman, trying to duck away from the nobleman’s hand on his shoulder. Duke Coren, though, tightened his fingers, keeping Reade firmly in place. The duke went on, pitching his voice just above Maida’s sobbing. “Good lady, we have ridden hard, traveling from Land’s End in just a single week. You can see that these children are exhausted.”

  “I can see that this bairn is terrified!”

  “And well she might be, after the horrors that we witnessed in her village. On the Headland of Slaughter.”

  The name of home made Maida wail even louder, and Reade could barely make out her words. “I want to go home! I want my mum!” Reade took a deep breath, ready to cry out, too. Maida was right. They were so far away from Mum and Sartain Fisherman, from Alana Woodsinger and the Tree. Things were scary here, with Duke Coren, and with Donal, and with Crusher, the dog that was probably waiting outside even as the people in the tavern stared.

  Before Reade could start to wail, though, Duke Coren sighed and shook his head. The nobleman made a show of setting his dagger on the long wooden table. When he looked up at the drinking men, his face was exhausted, pale behind his dark beard. “I beg your indulgence, goodwife, honest men. These children are the only ones we were able to save from the Headland of Slaughter, and our journey has been hard. Even now, we haven’t dared to tell them the full story of what they left behind. Perhaps my men can put them to bed abovestairs, and then I can tell you the truth of what happened on the Headland.”

  The red-faced woman started to reply, but Maida interrupted, shrieking, “No! Don’t let them take me away! Don’t let me go! Help me!”

  “Easy, child.” The woman smoothed Maida’s hair like Mum would, but Reade saw the careful look she gave to the dagger that Duke Coren had set upon her table. The woman was afraid, too. “No one is going to take you away. We’ll hear the lord out, though. Hush, girl. Stop your crying.”

  Duke Coren waited until the woman looked up again, and then the nobleman shook his head. His face was sad
, like Sartain Fisherman’s when Da went fishing with the Guardians. The duke sighed, and said, “I’m sorry to bear this horror into your house, good woman. But certainly you’ve heard rumors of the…strange habits out that way, on the Headland of Slaughter.”

  A squawk of protest rose in Reade’s throat. The People weren’t strange! Before he could say anything, though, Duke Coren tightened his grip on Reade’s shoulder. Each of the man’s fingers was a separate little spade, digging into his flesh. Reade wasn’t stupid. He understood an order, even a silent one. Reade was not supposed to talk. He could listen, but he could not talk.

  His heartbeat began to throb beneath Duke Coren’s fingertips, and he knew he would have a bruise beneath the golden cloth. Duke Coren continued, though, as if he weren’t pinching Reade’s flesh to the bone. “You see, good woman, any mention of the horror among those people is painful to this boy.”

  The duke lowered his voice, and each of the villagers leaned a little nearer. Reade was reminded of the People, gathering around the fires in their cottages, eager for the news that Duke Coren had brought when he arrived at the Headland. “A new woodsinger holds sway at Land’s End, good folk. She…she has convinced her people that the Guardians must drink blood before the summer sun can rise.” As Reade gasped in disbelief, Duke Coren dropped his voice to a dark whisper. “They will soon come on raids to the inland, come to steal away your newborn babes. I trust no one has been taken yet?”

  “No, my lord.” The red-faced woman was clearly frightened by Duke Coren’s story. “No one.”

  Now, Reade was more than a little frightened himself. He’d always been afraid of Alana Woodsinger, and Sarira Woodsinger before her. There was something scary about the patched cloak the woodsingers wore, the swirling colors of brown and red, blue and white. They were always busy with the Tree, ordering people around to help them bring water, to help them bring fresh fish to lay in the earth. They could be so mean, telling Reade what he could and couldn’t do. Alana Woodsinger was much stricter than Mum, especially than Mum was now, now that Da was gone.