Elmwood #2
It seemed that he had taken Elmwood’s spoons and begged a lift to Hawkmouth with Han, Winthrop, Lady Isobel, and Miss Floret, as he had “affairs” to manage there, whatever that meant.
They had arrived in Hawkmouth at nightfall as planned and stopped at the Lark and Kettle, which apparently was the best inn in Hawkmouth.
The ladies and Winthrop had taken rooms, intending to catch the coach in the morning.
Nimsby would not normally have stayed at a place of quality, but Han and Winthrop persuaded him to remain for a drink.
Around midnight, a fancy carriage rolled into the innyard, and in marched the Western Harrier himself. It was at this juncture that Winthrop came back inside from having a piss and ran smack into him.
It seemed that the Harrier had heard some gossip circulating in Neck about Lady Isobel running away to the country to be reunited with her outlaw love. When he realized it was Elmwood, he knew that he must have fled to Merewyth after all.
Running into Winthrop only confirmed it, as the Harrier had testified at Elmwood’s trial and knew Winthrop by sight.
When the Harrier apprehended him, Winthrop had attempted to punch him in the face, missed, and took a bad hit to the gut, and the Harrier had declared that he was coming along with him to Merewyth.
It was at this point that Nimsby had decided it was time for a stroll outside.
Once there…well, it was only natural to have a closer peek at such a fine carriage.
And it wasn’t his fault if he noticed that a few of the wheel pins had fallen out, now, was it?
They must have loosened on the road and slipped free some miles back.
The Harrier had dragged Winthrop out of the inn and tossed him into the carriage, intent on setting off for Merewyth with all due haste. Ten paces down the drive, the back wheels fell off the carriage.
“So,” Nimsby finished, taking another swig of ale, “I borrowed a horse from the innkeeper to ride back through the night. Came straight here. The Harrier will have gone to the Hawkmouth wheelwright. He’ll be right behind me.”
Elmwood’s heart was beating in his throat. The Harrier had Winthrop?
“I thought we had more time,” said Hilde. He clasped her hand in his, without thinking. Nimsby looked at their joined hands, then snorted. “What of Han? Did she come back with you?”
“No. She came at him all spark and gunpowder when he laid hands on the lawyer. I snuck out whilst they were tussling.”
“Did you see her at all after that?” asked Hilde, her voice scratchy with anxiety. Elmwood gripped her hand tighter.
“Don’t vex yourself. She knows how to take a hit, and he wouldn’t have bothered much with her when he had the lawyer for a prize. Now you,” continued Nimsby, pointing at Elmwood, “had best be off right quick, for while the Harrier isn’t the law, he for certain thinks he is.”
“He’s right, Elmwood,” said Hilde, gripping his hand tighter. “You must go. Nowhere in the village will be safe, but perhaps if you head up into the hills for a few days…”
Elmwood shook his head. It was wretchedly unfair that this was all happening now and cheating them of the rest of their week. But, he reflected, the time that they had spent together had been so perfect. It was more than he could ever have hoped for. And now it was over.
“Listen to me, Hilde,” he said, taking her other hand and pulling her around to face him. “I’m going to give myself up to the Harrier and face my banishment.”
There was a brief pause where she looked at him like he had just told a very distasteful joke.
“You can’t be serious!” she said, her hands clutching his so tightly it hurt.
“I am. It’s time for me to accept the inevitable conclusion to this path I’ve been on. Your dedication to your responsibilities has made me see that I must meet mine bravely.”
There was another pause, longer this time.
“Your responsibilities? What of your responsibility to me?” she said, sounding so vulnerable that his heart cracked in his chest.
“This is the best way I can help you, Hilde. If I go with the Harrier, that will buy you time.”
She was already shaking her head. “It’s not worth it. I’ve had weeks to come up with a solution, to no avail. There’s no reason to think that whatever time you might gain me would be of any use. You would be throwing your life away for nothing!”
“Please listen. Regardless of how things go at Croftholde, my plan helps you. You know Merewyth is technically Rollo’s property, and I’m his guardian.
I’ve already written a letter instructing Winthrop to turn Rollo’s guardianship over to you when I’m…
well, when I’m gone. Merewyth will be yours, and you’ll have a home for as long as you want it.
The Harrier won’t be able to touch you here.
Even if he takes Croftholde, you’ll have a home, in this place you love. ”
“Are you mad?” she said, almost shouting. “If they carry out your banishment, you’re going to be killed.”
“I know that. I am at peace with it.”
“Well, I most certainly am not!” Now she really was yelling. She pulled away from him. Her shoulders were heaving. This was not how he wanted this to go.
“Hilde, please try to understand.”
“Stupid plan, if you ask me,” said Nimsby, refilling his cup. “You should do the one she said, with the hills.”
“Nimsby, I am deeply appreciative and frankly shocked by the largesse of the good deed you have done me. You have my eternal gratitude. But kindly fuck off for a moment, will you?”
He went, without further comment, though he did turn and shake his head at Elmwood in a manner that strongly implied he was an idiot. Perhaps he was, but he was an idiot who finally knew the right thing to do.
Though it was hard to reconcile himself to that fact when Hilde brought both of her hands up to her face and began to cry.
He went and put a hand on her arm.
“I know that you—” he began, but she interrupted him.
“You said you loved me! How can you love me and do this?” The hurt in her voice was almost enough to sway his resolve, to make him beg her forgiveness for ever thinking to do something so foolish.
But he knew that he must remain on course.
It was the best thing he could do for her—the only thing he could do for her.
He wrapped his arms about her, and to his relief, she let him.
“You told me once that I should be grateful for the things that I have instead of mourning what I’ve lost,” he said.
“I have Rollo, and I have you, and I have the opportunity to do something right for once in my life. I’ve spent all my days running, in one way or another, and I am weary of it.
I didn’t see that until I was forced to stop here, in the Far Gaze, where a lonely widow taught me how to be still and to feel things again. ”
She stiffened in his arms, then pulled back to look him in the eyes. There was something strange in hers, some dawning of understanding that filled him with dread.
“This was what you intended all along,” she said. “When you said that Mr. Winthrop had another plan to save you, you were lying to me. There was never a plan. You always meant to give yourself up.”
He tried to reach for her again, but she stepped away from him.
“I admit that I did lie to you when I invited you here. Perhaps I should not have done it, but I wanted this time with you so badly.” He was pleading with her now, desperate for her to understand, to forgive him, to be his for just a little longer.
The expression on her beautiful face pained him more than when his hip was crushed.
It was worse than all the years of self-loathing and reproach.
More terrible than the guilt of using his Charm.
“I thought we had moved beyond lies,” she said. “But I was just some final lark to you before you made yourself a martyr to your own self-loathing.”
“No, no, no,” he pleaded. “This time together was no lark. It meant everything that you came here to be with me, Hilde. Everything. But I can’t run away anymore!”
“Then what happened to you in Relance? If you’re truly tired of running, tell me what you did that was so terrible you think you deserve to be burned alive as penance for it!”
He didn’t want to tell her. He didn’t want to say it aloud, or even think about it in his own mind, but he couldn’t keep it from her now. She needed to know. She needed to understand.
“I turned them into abominations,” he said, the words spilling out of him.
“They were just foolish boys who joined up because they were poor or brave or ambitious. And I, pompous fucking fool that I am, provoked the Harrier. I got them all killed. I killed them, and then I used my Charm and brought them back and made them tear one another apart until there was nothing left but bloody pieces, all to save my own stupid, worthless life!”
The smell of blood and shit and the terrible weight crushing him and the sounds of screaming horses and the ragged cries of men being ripped apart—it all swelled up. He shoved it back, pushed it down, and slammed the door shut on it, clenching his shaking hands into fists.
He realized that her hands were touching his face, but he flinched away. He couldn’t bear her pity. He didn’t deserve it.
“Elmwood, men who go for soldiers know that they may die. And you certainly are not at fault for the Harrier’s brutality. You bade me not to judge myself with his words. Why are you blaming yourself for his actions?”
“It isn’t just that they died. It’s what I did to them after, and then what they did…”
“They were already dead! That wasn’t your fault!”
“You weren’t there.” She didn’t know. He couldn’t make her understand. She was too good to understand.
She was shaking her head.
“A time will come when you can see that you don’t deserve to be punished for surviving, but if you do this foolish thing now, it will be too late.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he ground out. “It’s my decision.”
“You don’t have to bear this alone,” she said. Her voice was small and soft, and in a flash he knew that even if he told her the whole story of what had happened, even if she did truly understand, she would forgive him. If he let her, she would convince him that he was worth saving.
But he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t deserve her.
“You should go now, before he gets here.”
“Please don’t. Please.”
He pulled away from her touch, stepping back, immediately bereft.
“This is the end, Hilde. I lied to you so that I could have you. And now it’s over. I want you to go.”
He watched the hurt overwhelm her, and as it did, his Hilde disappeared. Her shield fell back into place, and then she was Lady Croft again.
“I suppose you were right,” she said, her voice flat.
“Right?” he asked, barely able to get the word out.
“When you said that we were both so badly broken, there was no hope for us.”
She lifted her chin, and would have seemed defiant if her eyes were not so sad.
“Goodbye, Elmwood,” she said.
Then she was gone.