A ghost stood where his father should've. The cracked grey headstone displayed his life in small faded text. Three irises lay horizontally across the dull brown dirt in front of it. Before long, Hedric's chest would tighten up, and the tears would soon follow, gushing from his hazy blue eyes. Jayor Hallows, 1222-1268, read the gravestone. Hedric stood there for another minute, feeling the tight breeze wrapping the air around him like a warm hug from his father, the memories of his childhood persisting through it all.
"You didn't deserve for it to end like it did," Hedric muttered under cold breath. The woods entombed his father's burial site like a crowd of city folk gathered around the common jest, waiting for him to entertain. Thousands of thick chestnut brown trunks made a maze of the area, a lively forest sprinkled with spruce, cottonwood, and narrow leaf trees. Their leaves overhead made a roof of shade, with the only rays of sunlight peeking through being the woodless dirt patch Hedric and his mother buried his father. "You always liked the irises, though," added the boy.
Each visit he was no longer a man of twenty, but a mere boy of ten, holding his father's hand, heading to the baker's in the village for the first time. Those were the memories Hedric Hallows cherished when thinking of his father. But sometimes, on the worst days, he felt like he was sixteen again, seizing the shovel away from his mother for she could seldom continue digging her husband's grave without breaking down.
"Sundown is coming, honey," called his mother from the riverline deeper back into the forest.
"Yeah, just…" He stopped suddenly, catching a flood of unexpected tears. "I'm coming, I'll need a moment."
"Well love, we ought to get supper started soon."
Hedric focused on tiny mis-colored imprints on the headstone, their lively shades lost to time and wind. It got worse every time he returned there. He glanced further down, noticing a sparse family of earthworms making a slithered crawl at his feet, the sun bouncing off their inky pink skin.
"Never got to do much," said Hedric, "the two of us. But don't worry, I still pray for your health at meals, so does mother. She's been fine, and so has Springbreaker, although apples' been hard to come by the last few months. It's a shame that this is short, but nothing's new as of late. I'd stay longer if there was more to tell you, but mother's calling me to come help with supper. You'll hear from me again, quite soon, father." He took one final look at the three irises at the foot of the headstone, then turned away.
That evening, Hedric had set the table and piled food on the plates, as outside the sun began submerging, casting a fiery glare across polished cottonwood floorboards. Inescapable scents of sourdough littered the home, while deer legs spun over a hearth, and the few that were finished were dripping with grease and smoothed over with a clutch of soft butter. They accented each other with a perfect mixture of tender and soft, aggressive and infiltrating. A small dish with a clump of cottage cheese lay directly to the right of Hedric and his mom, Dayla's plates.
Dayla Hallows wore a softly knitted bonnet of pale linen, garbed under a crimson rose. Merely everything the Hallows' family dressed in was a product of her sewing. From the maroon, charcoal, and cerulean tunics, to the copper and onyx trousers; all of it was made by her. Hidden beneath her bonnet was a messy forest of curly ginger hair that lead down to the top of her shoulders. Hedric shared her hair color, as did father, although his scalp oft remained bald during his lifetime.
Hedric sat down at the table, his chair scraping against the floor as he pulled himself closer. "How much more is on the stag?" he asked. The meat itself was seared black and bronze. He played around with the haunch, taking a steak knife and a three limbed fork to dig it open. "Two days, maybe three?"
"If your father was here, you know what he'd say," Dayla replied with a soft chuckle. "You can make a stag last for weeks if you do it right!"
Hedric smiled, head anchored downward, staring a hole through his supper. His pale lips—which he had gotten from his mother—disappeared whenever he laughed or drew a smile. It accented his ever-growing collection of freckles which dotted his face.
Dayla pushed herself away from the table, shooting abruptly out of her chair, as it were with most things in her life. Unforeseen and abrupt. She slowly approached the kitchen, peering at the washing barrel that stood there filled with hot water. She retrieved the plates, bowls, pots, and cutlery, and moved them from the countertop, then into the water.
"Take a break for once," Hedric said, "allow me."
"Not now," Dayla told him. "I need you to ride into town and get some carrots for Springbreaker. Oh, and I need some more firewood, too."
"Fine then. But promise to sit down some, please." Hedric pulled up his fist, drove his fork into the stag's soft leg, then took a final bite. Heading for the door, he added, "I can help you with that when I return.." The door knob twisted and he took a step out. The evening spring air took him by surprise, sending a cold shiver right through him. Hedric turned back, smiling at his mother before grabbing an ivory coat. "Promise not to die on me."
"Yes, yes." She made a waving motion, urging her son out the door. "Be safe."
"I know."
Hedric made a ball with each palm around his reins. The dark brown mane of the gelding's hair brushed against his knuckles alongside the wind. Springbreaker was a young stallion, he was onyx of coat, and quite fast for his age. Dayla had bought him a week after Jayor passed away, so they kept him, and kept him close.
Already strapped to the side of Hedric's waist was a silver rapier almost more scrawny than himself. His eyes retained a faint cast of light from the dying day, shimmers weaker than shadow as the moon grew like a puddle of ice between the stars. His circular face, and plump cheeks of his were seldom to go unnoticed in the village of Shakesparrow. Hedric lifted the reins as he studied the leaves of those spring spruces that made his home hidden.
With an unmistakable abruptness, his mother called, the rattling door spinning stressfully on its hinges. "Wait," Dayla called, "I'm coming with you."
Hedric scooted forward upon the saddle to make room. Dayla mounted the stallion as her son whipped the reins, which sent them for a leisurely trot. Before long, the fence to their house was behind the grassy hills and weeds. Those plain black shingles and smoothed cottonwood walls began shrouding back into the forest as they turned onto the Straight and Sparrow, the path that would lead you to town.
"If I may, why did you decide to tag along?" Hedric asked.
"I couldn't be in that house alone," Dayla replied. "Maybe it's time I start sprouting."
"Sprouting?"
She went silent, seeming to take a moment to think. That left Hedric time to ponder on what she'd said as well. "Well, I believe I ought to find someone new by now, don't you agree?" she said.
He was astonished by the suggestion. Not for her wanting to find anyone other than her husband, or even her wanting to replace her son's father with another man; those thoughts weren't a worry. Hedric was a man grown. He understood the loneliness without a lover, or at least tried. He knew he could never really bare her point of view. It was more so a surprise to him due to how she had kept a tight lip since father died. "You've never mentioned as much," Hedric said quietly. "But if you wish to—"
She cut him off. "It was but a silly thought."
"I do not judge you, mother," assured Hedric. "We just don't…. talk about it, right?" Nothing but the sound of distant branches swaying and rhythmic horseshoes clopping came after. The air was brittle like a shallow frost during winter. "Only I beg that you choose the right man, for it's known that the cruel target the broken."
Dayla let out a sweet chuckle. "Oh, don't worry for me, my sweet boy. I've known my wits since a girl. The weak survive by feeding on their likeness. Either way, when your father came along, I learned just what a true man could be. So, need you worry. I am not going to be swooned like some tavern wench."
"Mother," Hedric snapped. He tried not to break a smile, knowing that even if she couldn't see it, the grin would show through his tone.
"What?"
"You know what." This time he let the smile cross his lips.
"Just…" Dayla started, "why don't you stop worryin? I'm a woman, not a child, and though I appreciate it, I don't need you to be on my watch." The words came out with a slight edge to them. "Pardon me."
"It's all fine." Hedric was sure she didn't mean it to sound so. He brushed it off and kept riding toward Shakesparrow. His father had taken him down this path a couple hundred times since the days he could walk. Nothing has ever changed, even now. Every twisted arm of the aged woods that walled the path in. Each flower-bed of roses, daisies, and irises that stayed watered and tended to by long-running families. Hedric swore to know everyone in this neck of the woods, though over time, the people he once knew left to join the arms or go on other voyages and adventures; though most oft it was merely life intervening.
Most people left without a trace. They left their old lives to rot like a caved in roof of an old shack, growing with moss and new life. They never gave a reason for their disappearance either. Anything would've sufficed, but they'd adopted the principles that Hedric seemingly lacked. And that was to disappear like a cheap trick, letting nary a soul brace for your absence within their daily lives.
Hedric tried not to get too bitter about it, as they were their own men and their own women now, free to do as they wished. He could do nothing that would get in the way of that, and he was well aware. Instead, he channeled that bitterness elsewhere, along with the anchor on his heart that was his father. Hedric rather put that weight and energy into keeping his mother afloat, be that getting tinder-wood for the hearth, or hunting for supper, or heading down to the markets for fresh grain and vegetables.
Night crawled, the trees had stopped letting any light come through, faint became the direction of the pathway, and flickering on went the neighboring house's lanterns atop porches and doorways. They swung lightly with the smooth breath of the draft. Sheep herders shut their fences, filled their barns with food and water for the night, and went inside to get their rest. Hedric focused on the dim road ahead, clouds of smoke from the village chimneys peering over the treeline.
"I fear we'll be late," said Dayla. "Markets tend to close at dusk."
"Fall is on the horizon," Hedric told her, "don't let the moon fool you."
"Your father always said things like that."
As they strolled closer into Shakesparrow, the houses and markets began to multiply into view. Their closeness made the roofs almost unify under one mass. But still, they were all different households and shops with wildly ranging stories residing behind each wall. "His favorite was the one he used to tell me before training;" Hedric mentioned, "your trust gets you killed."
Dayla always left silent spaces when responding to a topic relating to father. Perhaps, she was just admiring the moon like Hedric was. But when she eventually spoke up, she said, "He did love that one, among many, many others." They neared a bend in the smooth rocky pathway, and once they turned, they both went quiet. Limping beside a bright burning lantern was a hairy vagrant man. Two brown eyes watched the pebbles on the ground. "Let us stop," Dayla announced at the sight of him.
Hedric leaned his head back so he wouldn't be heard by the man, before muttering a confused, "Why?" to his mother.
"I've never once seen a beggar in a hundred miles of here," she said.
"That is exactly why I don't want to stop."
Springbreaker slowly approached the shabby man, his mouth trenched with despair, and his patchy robes matted by sweat and stains. Tears poured into his beard.
"Don't let your father's words cloud your head, boy," Dayla said. "This man seems he needs help, so the very least we can do is stop. That's what your father would want you to do."
Hedric yanked back the reins to bring the gelding to a halt. The man looked surprised that they'd even noticed him, his mind fumbling to find words.
"Can we help you, sir?" Hedric asked.
The beggar's voice was passive and choppy, as if every word preceded a sneeze. "Yes, yes… I would beg you to pardon my eagerness—but it's wholly urgent—you should probably be turning around about now," he said. The man was not ill-mannered, nor was he convincing.
Hedric regarded him, looking down upon his frail body and wondered if the man was delirious, or perhaps in need of food. "For what? Why?"
"Look at my clothes, they are ripped and shredded." The beggar motioned his hands across two large holes that exposed his right shoulder and left hip.
"I can make you some, no price," Dayla said. "Just come back to our house with us after our errands in town, then—"
"No," the man snapped at her, his tan brown eyes shifting into a sharp glare. "Don't."
"What are you talking about?" Hedric grew tired of the vagrant man, doing away with all chivalry after he interrupted his mother. "Are you mad?" But he did not give Hedric a response. Springbreaker shuffled on the gravel impatiently, stomping his hooves into the pebbles, kicking up puffs of dust. "Answer me."
"I am in no need of hospice," the beggar said, "forgive me if I offended you by any means. I just worry for your safety. It can be… it can be scary this late."
Dayla wrapped two arms around her son's torso, clinging onto him as if she were an inch from toppling off her saddle.
"Fine, then," said Hedric. "Is there anything you need, are you in danger?."
"Oh," the beggar exclaimed, "that's your mother?"
We've never seen anyone like you here ever, and I hope to never again, thought Hedric. "Do you need anything?" he asked the man again.
"No, no," he replied. "Nothing, sir." His tears still wet on his cheeks, a smile grew on the man's lips.
"We should go," Dayla muttered close to Hedric's left ear.
Hedric decided whipped the reins. Springbreaker dug into the pathway, bursting toward Shakesparrow with a swift canter. A nervous set of hands let go once the beggar was gone, and Hedric's nerves escaped him.
"I'm sorry for not listening," Dayla said. "I don't know what was up with him."
As they approached the houses and markets, humming of singers in the streets could be heard, and cattle watched him mindlessly. Other than candlelit windows from restless villagers, the moonlight remained their only company while heading in.
Hedric smiled. "Well, if that should teach you anything, make sure you are wary whilst picking your new lover."
"During my forty four years in this world—all of them spent right here—I haven't seen anything of that sort," she argued, her voice thin with fear. The main road of Shakesparrow—a wide stretch of soft soil—started after a right turn twenty roofs away. They progressed slowly to the end of the street where the food market waited for them. Dayla Hallows was a known woman there, as was her son, and her late husband. She chuckled softly then added, "You should have some more faith in me."
"I do," he replied, "but there are plenty of awful people out there. Some of them can hide under your nose, and you would never catch a scent. You were lucky having someone so good."
"Jayor was an angel, and I'm positive that the gods haven't sent anymore down to Saryndor since he's been gone."
Hedric didn't reply instantly, waiting for that tightening in his chest to cease. Thinking back to his visit at the grave-site today sent him diving into memories and bitterness that knocked at his throat. There was a sense of choking on them if he'd not just let it out. "I gave him three irises today."
"He always liked those," said mother.
There was a long silence before Hedric chimed in, asking her to hand him the pouch of silver inside the saddlebags. Dayla searched around for a moment, and then handed him plenty to get what was needed. As they neared the bend in the road, Springbreaker abruptly stopped in his tracks a mere two houses away. Without any hesitation, Hedric whipped the reins and clicked his teeth, but the stallion did not comply with his commands.
"I know you're hungry, boy." Hedric patted Springbreaker's side, the black hide drifting through the spaces between his fingers. Sliding off the stallion's back, Hedric gave the reins to his mother. "I don't want to over-work him. Wait here and be careful. I will come back with everything."
"Be quick," Dayla replied. He could visibly tell she was tensing up, her thighs squeezing Springbreaker's sides.
A creeping thought intruded Hedric's mind, causing him to hand over his rapier as well. "Take this, in case the beggar followed us."
She took the grip, holding it with a feathery grip. "Be quick, now."
Hedric smiled, and then went for the main road.
The dirt moved below his feet, quickening toward the market around the corner. Hedric noticed the homes coming into sight around the turn had all of their doors opened, but no one stood outside, or inside for that matter (for what he could see). He stopped, wondering, waiting for a moment as still no one appeared. He figured there was a new celebration going on down the street. Perhaps a name day celebration, or a town gathering for a lost loved one.
But as Hedric swung himself around the bend of the main road, revealing a much skinnier passage, he saw precisely what the villagers had been doing. There were what seemed to be twenty of them in a line on the street. Every single one was on their knees. Six knights held their longswords to the back of their necks. Hedric couldn't get a better sight of the event, as the shock brought him scurrying back toward his gelding where his mother waited.
Damn me, what did I just see? What was that, gods, what are they doing? They can't be executing them, could they? But why, why would they? Who even were those knights? The questions never seem to run dry for Hedric when attempting to process something shocking. But had he ever seen anything like this? Dayla shouted concerns from atop Springbreaker, before unmounting and going over to her son.
"We need to go back," Hedric told her. "There's men and they're… I don't know, really. But we can't be here."
Dayla promptly handed Hedric the rapier. She could see how ghostly his cheeks had gone, and knew as much that he'd seen something awful. "What is it? Can you describe any of it, carefully?"
"There were knights standing behind men, women, and children." He paused, trying to sort the words out in a meaningful way. "The knights had their longswords drawn against their bare necks, and all the people were on their knees… Six maybe five. I just hope it's not what I think it is."
"Come," Dayla muttered, putting a light guiding hand on his back, helping him mount Springbreaker.
Around the corner echoed out a scream, then the sound of steel thudding into something, and then silence. No time to think about what that was. It was nothing, I'm sure of it. He caught his breath for a brief moment before helping his mother atop the saddle as she'd done him.
Whipping the reins harder than he'd ever done before, they turned to the way they'd come into town, the quick gelding streaking underneath. They ran for a mere two minutes before reaching the part where the road split into the Straight and Sparrow pathway. Once they neared it, Hedric's heart missed a beat it seemed, as in the pathway stood two knights wearing curvy armor and gnashing fox breastplates. Quickly, Hedric yanked on the reins, bringing them to a sudden stop which sent clouds of grey dust into the air. The knight's armor glinted in the moonlight, a sweet wink shooting its gazes at Hedric and Dayla. Hedric felt the hairs on his neck raise as he pulled the reins yet again to face them around the other way.
"What are you doing," mother asked, "there's more down there, you said as much, no?" Pure terror had seeped its way into her soft and caring delivery; it was like something not akin to his ear.
"We can find a way to the forest through the alleys," he replied. Steel began rustling behind. Those knights were coming for them. The wind brushed at his cheeks, whipping fiercely as his mother fell forward and slammed against his back. "I know this town well enough to find a way out." But there was no reply. She might've passed out. No time to think. Adrenaline took over completely.
Springbreaker hustled toward the main street. The houses they passed were hauntingly empty. Each window had lit candles, though an abnormal lack of people to be seen inside them. How many did they kill? "Mother," he finally said. She didn't respond, still leaned up on his back, though her arms were unfelt. "Mother?"
He didn't want to ride too close to the knights around the bend from earlier, so he picked an alleyway that was close enough to still keep an eye out, offering a solid shot for escape. Once Hedric found the alleyway, he watched the end of the main street carefully, making sure as to not be seen. But those knights from the Straight and Sparrow are coming, he reminded himself.
He waited for a few long terrible seconds, and once Hedric heard the sounds of a woman crying in the direction of the main street, he knew the knights were still preoccupied. "It's time to go, now." He hopped off the gelding, leaping onto the rough pebbles below. Dayla followed, doing the same as him, making a loud thump on the ground behind him. "We're going to have to leave Springbreaker." After waiting for a response, and getting nothing, he was about to turn around when his eyes caught to something. A limp arm lay between both of his feet on the dusty ground, the hand reaching to his right foot, its fingers twisting and elbow bent backwards at an unnatural angle.
Turning around, Hedric stared on with speechless terror. The hand was Dayla's, and in her back lay a well placed arrow. His mother's jaw was slacked and her shoulders were slumping upward like she was about to give a shrug. He cried to himself, knowing that a scream would alert the knights. It couldn't be, Hedric bent down to touch her still body. Surely she's still alive, only passed out, he thought, tugging at her wrist like a little kid.
"Wake up," he said. Dayla's eyes were still open, an unmoving pale blue beading past him like he wasn't there. "Wake up, damn it!" Hedric begged again, this time coming out more aggressive, like an order. He would never talk to her like that if he was sure she would answer.
Hedric sat in the shape of a ball, resting his head on her chest. The cries and sniveling went on in a strained silence as if not to upset the dead. For several minutes, nothing moved him, despite the looming threat of the knights retreating on him, sure to take his life next. No other thoughts except the memories and regret revolving around his mind consumed him. But it was in that moment of blissful grief that an echo called to him from beyond his cries.
At first it was indiscernible, all assumptions pointing to it being a knight ready to behead him or stick him with an arrow like they did his mother. But as the calls came closer and closer to Hedric, and the words became more and more audible through his tears, he realized it was quite the opposite.
"We have to go," a man said, garbed in draping black cloaks.
Hedric peered up to his face. The gruff tone of his was hidden behind a cloth mask that flailed wildly in the cool night breeze.
"Who are you?" asked Hedric.
The cloaked man lent out a gloved hand, all set to the same black style he was neatly dressed in. "I wish I could've helped her, but she's gone now, and you can't die with her."
"No, no," Hedric cried. "She isn't gone."
"She is."
"Why would I go with you then?"
The cloaked man slipped past Hedric, heading deep into the thin alleyway he meant to take Dayla. "Because those are the King's men that just killed your mother. That'd be enough to make me live to fight another day. Would you rather meet the dull teeth of a knight's blade—go down with no honor—or would you like to fight another day in the name of your mother?"
Hedric had no words, though he rose above Dayla's corpse. "And how do I know you won't kill me?"
"Go back there if you so wish," the cloaked man told him, "but I ask you to remember one thing for me. Your trust gets you killed."