3. Renard
Renard
The dust cloud is a fair distance away, but closing in fast. The group of twenty or so are still black specks on the desiccated horizon.
Out here, this far into the outskirts of the kingdom, they can only be riding with singular purpose.
Irritation makes my skin itch, less because of who the riders are and what this means, and more because it promises another delay I can ill afford.
The old, instinctive impulse to drop the plow, hurry inside, and prepare a table of refreshments for such a visit rises and before I can quell it, my hands loosen momentarily on the plow handles—the once rough-hewn wood now smooth from years of toil.
Sensing the respite, Magnar nickers and tosses his head, stomping his hooves in the soft clumps of soil.
“You’re falling to laziness, my friend,” I chuckle, digging an apple from my pocket and coming to stand at his head.
His velvety muzzle seeks the fruit eagerly, but my attention stays fixed on the riders cresting the small rise near the river that marks the boundary of my farm.
By the time they cross the bridge, I can make out the gold lion’s glittering whiskers on the silken standard that flutters in the breeze.
Magnar tenses, his old battlefield instincts rearing as mine do.
I scrub my hand across my face, scratching at the close-cropped beard that’s grown in the time since the last visit.
I scan the tidy furrows of earth laid bare, waiting for the glossy grains of winter wheat to be planted, and eventually capitulate—leading Magnar down the last edge of this field that cozies up against the Verge.
I doubt the riders will go anywhere near the infamous woodland, so full of rumored spirits and monstrous legends it’s a wonder there’s any room for the trees.
Sure enough, the retinue halts near the front gate of the cottage, giving my open fields and frightening neighbors a wide berth. Magnar and I take our time plodding back toward the stable and barn, giving the dread and anxiety plenty of time to settle in my gut like the jagged stones they are.
The wheat will get planted, I tell myself, but it does little to soothe my exasperation and still my racing heart.
Rather than meet the dismounted men at the gate, I give them a half-hearted wave and proceed with unhitching Magnar from the plow. The telltale clatter of plate armor heralds the arrival of three overdressed men approaching warily as I tend to my horse.
“You’ve been summoned.”
No fair greeting, no preamble, no pretension about who I am, who they are, and why we all know they’re here. I almost prefer it this way—saves time, anyway.
“He sent the lot of you for that?” I chuckle. “Seems a waste of men when a letter would do.”
“He says you ignore the letters,” the same man says.
“I read them.”
“But you do not reply.”
“Waste of paper just to tell him ‘no.’”
“‘Waste of men, waste of paper.’ If you are so concerned with resources, Regent Arden will be happy to discuss them with you, my lord.” The honorific is bloated with disdain, but such slights are little more than the bite of a flea to a bear nowadays.
“I have wheat to plant,” I say, leading Magnar into his stall and hefting a bucket of feed.
If I can’t get the wheat planted, we won’t have enough to last through winter, and at the rate that folks are coming up to my gate, begging for food…
A frisson of nervous fear sizzles down my spine.
It will be enough. Once the winter wheat is in, and the southern orchard bears fruit, it’ll be enough.
It has to be.
“Your crops can wait. They will wait. We’re to bring you to the seat at Valehar, whether you’re willing or not,” the man says.
The two behind him reach for their swords, but do not draw them.
They’re waiting to see if I’ll be intimidated enough to comply, but it only summons more irritation from me.
Sighing, I lift a pitchfork from the side of the stall and lean against it.
“The wheat cannot wait. Rain’s coming in three days—I can feel it in my knee.
It always acts up when it’s about to rain.
I’ve got to get the grain in the ground, lads.
If Regent Arden wishes to speak with me, I’ll receive him here.
He knows the way. At least, he used to. My apologies you’ve had to journey this far just to hear the same answer.
Stop off in the kitchen on your way out—Millie will have some oatcakes for you,” I say, turning my back on the young soldiers and moving to muck out the stall next to Magnar’s where my cow, Freja, sleeps.
She enjoys grazing too close to the Verge and if I don’t bring her in before the sun goes down, who knows what manner of monstrous creature will snatch her up in the dark.
One of the men in the back—a younger one, by the sound of his voice—swears. I listen to the way he shifts anxiously in his armor as though it doesn’t fit quite right, or he’s unused to the weight of it.
“Let’s just take him and be done with it,” the second man says. “Regent Arden gave us our orders to bring the old fool. We’ve tried the polite way.”
Old fool. It stings a bit, but it’s hardly a misnomer. My knee gives an answering throb and I’m certain I’ve sprouted another handful of gray whiskers in the time since they’ve arrived.
The third man at the back agrees, emboldened by the brash fervor of the second. The first is hesitant, but steps forward slowly.
“The wheat will wait,” he repeats. “Regent Arden cannot.”
Before he can say anything else, the second man rushes forward, taking the words as a call to action.
A dull sort of frustration rises in me and I duck before whirling around, using the pitchfork to sweep the young soldier off balance—easy to do in his oversized armor.
He lands hard on his back, the weight of the armor working against him and knocking the wind out of his lungs.
Immediately the first and third man shout in anger, drawing their swords and lunging for me.
With a nimble step to the side, I lean out of reach of the first man and bring the butt end of my pitchfork up under the neck of his helm, flipping it off his head.
I register the surprise in his eyes just before I flick a wet glob of cow shit off the other end of the pitchfork.
It hits the mark and he flinches away with a startled retching sound.
At this point, the third man reaches me, but I bend just enough to use his momentum against him and flip him onto his back right next to the other young knight, still wheezing on the straw-covered ground.
My back and weak knee ache in protest from the sudden weight of a large, armored body colliding with mine, but it’s all over in a few moments.
“You’ve learned some important lessons today, young squire,” I say, crouching over the youngest man.
“Firstly, haste often leads to mistakes. Secondly, judge not the ability of your opponent by the silver in his hair or his lack of a sword. Anything can be made into a weapon in capable hands. And lastly, lads, it’s wise to make friends with the smithy and the armorer.
Ill-fitting armor is about as useful as no armor at all. ”
The young man utters a foul curse and crawls away while the other two recover and rise. I drop my pitchfork and heft the broadsword I keep tucked away in Magnar’s stall.
“Regent Arden sent us with twenty men. Do you think you can best us all, Renard?”
With the way my knee and back ache, it would be a challenge.
I dread the thought of besting a group of young men—boys, really—all to prove a point.
Perhaps in my youth, I would’ve laughed and dove headfirst into the fray, but I’m not that man anymore.
I swore off violence and bloodshed with my soul and my sanity hanging by threads, and I’m not keen on breaking that oath anytime soon.
I shrug. “I’ve had worse odds. If you three are the best of that lot, I’m more concerned about what Arden will do when you return to Valehar and tell him an aged exile slaughtered your company.”
“We have our orders,” he says, but his resolve is wavering.
“Come inside for some oatcakes and ale. Rest your men, water your horses, and then you can return and tell Arden I wasn’t at home when you called. If he truly wishes to speak with me, he will have to come out to my little farm on the Verge.”
The offer of hospitality seems to encourage the soldiers and after a tense silence, the first man nods.
“Regent Arden will not be pleased,” one of the men says. I put down my sword and toss a rag at him so he can wipe the stinking manure off his face.
“By the time he gets here, I’ll have the wheat planted and will be content to speak with him. There’s no reason for me to be in Valehar, other than to satisfy his laziness and his ego,” I grumble.
“That’s treason!”
“Mayhap. But this wheat will feed Arden’s starving people, and if he wishes to keep his head on his neck and his faltering kingdom intact, he’ll respect my reluctance and leave me to my work.”
Arden won’t see it that way—of course he won’t.
He’ll only see how I defied him, how I continue to defy him, and these too-young soldiers know that.
Pity and guilt edge their way into my gut because these lads will be punished when they return without me in tow.
Absently, I rub a hand across the back of my neck.
The soldiers are quiet as I lead them out of the barn and back toward the main house.
The leader of the group—Bjorn, as it turns out—steps away to tell his men where they may stable their horses and find refreshment.
It will be a tight fit in the hall, but it beats being dragged all the way to Valehar.
Millie meets our sullen group at the front door, fists planted on her ample hips and a sour expression on her face.