The Locksmith and the Knight - A Memory
Jul 3, 2014 18:32:46 GMT -5
Gelquie, Killix, and 6 more like this
Post by Shinko on Jul 3, 2014 18:32:46 GMT -5
This little story was bouncing around in my head for days, and would not leave me alone until it was written. Takes place thirty years before the events of Medieval.
Enjoy!
Enjoy!
It was late in the evening, in a small town on the eastern border of Corvus. Most of the inhabitants were no longer up and about. That was good- they always stared when the elvenborn came into their town, despite being right on the border of the Elflands. Even this particular elvenborn, who visited the town at least twice a week.
Belial leaned heavily against his gelding’s neck, relying on the clever animal’s own will to get him where he needed to go. Certainly the elf was in no shape to give his chestnut destrier directions. It was everything he could do not to pass out from the pain in his gauze-wrapped thigh.
Perhaps riding three miles with a sword wound right where flesh meets saddle was not such a good idea, he thought ruefully. Sweat matted his short-cropped blonde hair, plastering his somewhat longer bangs to his face. His skin, already pale by human standards, was ghostly white from earlier blood loss. His pale brown eyes, which sparkled like chips of amber in the daylight, where half-lidded and dull with fatigue.
The commander was going to eviscerate Belial when she found out about this. She’d given him strict orders to stay in bed until his wound healed. And of course she had the right of it- he did no one any favors by sneaking off to the human town, least of all himself.
But driven by a need that even he could not fully comprehend, he had done exactly that. His destrier, Warblade, hadn’t been happy about it, but the loyal creature had eventually complied with his request. And now here they were, in front of the familiar building where his dear friend Morgaine Folet was undergoing an apprenticeship under the town locksmith.
The lights were still on inside, which was a relief. His particular community of elves were absolute sticklers for manners. Good conduct would not have allowed him to awaken the house if it’s inhabitants were already asleep, and he doubted he’d be able to stay conscious in the saddle long enough to find the inn. Inching out of the saddle in the tiniest of increments, gasping as bolts of agony shot up his wounded calf, he finally dismounted. He leaned against Warblade’s neck like a crutch, and gave three knocks on the door. It swung open a moment later, revealing a round face framed by a large blue head scarf that only one or two stray clumps of black hair escaped from.
“We’re clo-” Morgaine started to say, but stopped dead when she saw who it was. “Belial? Wha- do you have any idea how late it is?”
“I have an idea,” he replied with a wan grin, his elvish accent giving the words a light, whispery quality; trilling the “r,” dropping the “h,” entirely and mangling the “th.” “Is this a bad time?”
She continued to stare at the elven man as if he’d grown horns. Belial couldn’t really blame her for that- he’d never sprung on her so unexpectedly before, and certainly he’d never come upon her in her home this late at night. It was entirely improper. But for some reason tonight he couldn’t quite bring himself to care.
Suddenly, the young woman’s widened, and she recoiled. “You’re bleeding!”
He looked down in surprise, to see that she was right. He hadn’t noticed in the dark, but at some point during the trip it seemed that his wound had opened up again. A dark red stain was spreading across the leg of his pants, and he winced. “So it would seem. That would explain why I feel as if I’m about to pass out. Might… might I come in?”
The last emerged more plaintively than he’d intended. Something in his voice seemed to register with the human woman, because she nodded. “Right. I’ll get Master Smithson to send for a healer. In you get.”
Despite being much shorter than Belial, she managed to carry him into the building and help him sit down on a chair inside. As the master locksmith ran out to fetch help, she pressed a rag to his leg.
“Why didn’t your own healers deal with this yet?” she demanded. “It’s deep, but it can’t be more than a flesh wound or you wouldn’t have made it this far on your own.”
“There were many others hurt much worse,” he explained. “They are worn out. My dear friend, you need not go to the expense of a human healer on my behalf, I will be fine soon enough.”
“Hush,” she ordered sternly. “The fact that you’re here at all in your condition, this late at night, is proof enough that you’re in no fit state to make decisions. Consider any opinions you voice regarding your own well being duly disregarded.”
He chuckled at that, but it was a pained sound. The girl looked up at him, the irritation in her face melting into concern.
“What are you doing here, anyway? I take it you didn’t just come to say hi- you know we’ve no place to stable ‘Blade.”
“Warblade will manage on his own, he is not elvenbred but he is still a very smart horse,” the elf replied absently.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
The elf looked up, meeting her dark brown eyes with his bright amber ones. There was pain in those eyes, pain that he could not mask for his human friend as he usually did. “I have lost count.”
“Lost… count?”
“Yes,” he said softly. “Three hundred and twenty-six years I have kept count, but after the mercenary raid two days ago, I finally lost track.”
Morgaine raised an eyebrow. “Of what exactly.”
“Of… of how many people I’ve killed.”
She stared at him, shocked. He wanted to look away- he didn’t want to see the look on Morgaine’s face at this confession. But this was why he was here, and it would be cowardly to turn away now.
“I never told anyone I was counting before,” he said. “But I felt like I had an… I cannot think of the human word. Obl… ob…”
“Obligation?” Morgaine offered, and Belial nodded.
“I felt that I had an obligation to keep track. A tally of my own sins, as it were. Of the lives that were cut down by my own hands. The knowing helped me feel better, as if I could atone as long as I knew how much I owed.”
“You always spoke as if you loved being a knight,” Morgaine remarked softly. “I’d never have assumed it gave you so much grief.”
“Morgaine,” he said, “When first I began visiting the human town, it was because it helped me to feel better. You humans have such short lives, and so you do not waste a moment of them. You dance, you sing, you swill cheap mead at the taverns- maybe to you this is normal, but for me it is a very liberated way to live. It is not so in the elven lands, where we may live on for centuries.”
The young woman pointed at his leg, her expression wry. “I don’t think you’re going to be enjoying any liberating human dancing with this injury.”
“No, but I only said that this was why I first started coming,” he pointed out. “I kept coming because I met you, and you are the best friend I could have ever asked for- a better friend than anyone I know in the elven lands.”
She laughed outright at this, and tweaked his nose, “I see. You wanted to vent.”
“To… what?” Belial said, not recognizing the human word.
“To talk about what’s been bothering you to someone you trust, and get it off your chest,” she elaborated. “The word usually means to let off pressure in an enclosed space. I would imagine that over three hundred years of bottling your guilt would cause a lot of pressure to build up.”
Belial smiled, his eyes twinkling with good humor. “You are unaccountably wise tonight, Morgaine. One might almost forget that you are an ignorant, uncivilized, short lived human.”
“And if you keep making fun of me, I might forget you’re a stuffy, formal, overly polite elf,” she retorted. Looking down at his leg she grunted. “I think the bleeding’s stopped, for now anyway. Hopefully Master Smithson will be back with the healer soon, and we can patch it up properly. Next time, just have a courier send for me, alright? Only think how upset your commander would be if you died on Warblade’s back trying to come and see me. She would come to give me a lecture, but I wouldn’t take one from her and we’d end up having the world’s most polite shouting match in the middle of the street.”
The elf covered his face with a hand, shoulders shaking as he tried to stifle a laugh at this mental image. In a gentler voice, Morgaine added, “Feeling better?”
“Much,” he replied. “You are a most peculiar human, Morgaine; please don’t ever change.”
She fluttered her fingers at him, like a fine lady given a compliment. Then the door opened, and she stood to greet the healer.
Belial leaned heavily against his gelding’s neck, relying on the clever animal’s own will to get him where he needed to go. Certainly the elf was in no shape to give his chestnut destrier directions. It was everything he could do not to pass out from the pain in his gauze-wrapped thigh.
Perhaps riding three miles with a sword wound right where flesh meets saddle was not such a good idea, he thought ruefully. Sweat matted his short-cropped blonde hair, plastering his somewhat longer bangs to his face. His skin, already pale by human standards, was ghostly white from earlier blood loss. His pale brown eyes, which sparkled like chips of amber in the daylight, where half-lidded and dull with fatigue.
The commander was going to eviscerate Belial when she found out about this. She’d given him strict orders to stay in bed until his wound healed. And of course she had the right of it- he did no one any favors by sneaking off to the human town, least of all himself.
But driven by a need that even he could not fully comprehend, he had done exactly that. His destrier, Warblade, hadn’t been happy about it, but the loyal creature had eventually complied with his request. And now here they were, in front of the familiar building where his dear friend Morgaine Folet was undergoing an apprenticeship under the town locksmith.
The lights were still on inside, which was a relief. His particular community of elves were absolute sticklers for manners. Good conduct would not have allowed him to awaken the house if it’s inhabitants were already asleep, and he doubted he’d be able to stay conscious in the saddle long enough to find the inn. Inching out of the saddle in the tiniest of increments, gasping as bolts of agony shot up his wounded calf, he finally dismounted. He leaned against Warblade’s neck like a crutch, and gave three knocks on the door. It swung open a moment later, revealing a round face framed by a large blue head scarf that only one or two stray clumps of black hair escaped from.
“We’re clo-” Morgaine started to say, but stopped dead when she saw who it was. “Belial? Wha- do you have any idea how late it is?”
“I have an idea,” he replied with a wan grin, his elvish accent giving the words a light, whispery quality; trilling the “r,” dropping the “h,” entirely and mangling the “th.” “Is this a bad time?”
She continued to stare at the elven man as if he’d grown horns. Belial couldn’t really blame her for that- he’d never sprung on her so unexpectedly before, and certainly he’d never come upon her in her home this late at night. It was entirely improper. But for some reason tonight he couldn’t quite bring himself to care.
Suddenly, the young woman’s widened, and she recoiled. “You’re bleeding!”
He looked down in surprise, to see that she was right. He hadn’t noticed in the dark, but at some point during the trip it seemed that his wound had opened up again. A dark red stain was spreading across the leg of his pants, and he winced. “So it would seem. That would explain why I feel as if I’m about to pass out. Might… might I come in?”
The last emerged more plaintively than he’d intended. Something in his voice seemed to register with the human woman, because she nodded. “Right. I’ll get Master Smithson to send for a healer. In you get.”
Despite being much shorter than Belial, she managed to carry him into the building and help him sit down on a chair inside. As the master locksmith ran out to fetch help, she pressed a rag to his leg.
“Why didn’t your own healers deal with this yet?” she demanded. “It’s deep, but it can’t be more than a flesh wound or you wouldn’t have made it this far on your own.”
“There were many others hurt much worse,” he explained. “They are worn out. My dear friend, you need not go to the expense of a human healer on my behalf, I will be fine soon enough.”
“Hush,” she ordered sternly. “The fact that you’re here at all in your condition, this late at night, is proof enough that you’re in no fit state to make decisions. Consider any opinions you voice regarding your own well being duly disregarded.”
He chuckled at that, but it was a pained sound. The girl looked up at him, the irritation in her face melting into concern.
“What are you doing here, anyway? I take it you didn’t just come to say hi- you know we’ve no place to stable ‘Blade.”
“Warblade will manage on his own, he is not elvenbred but he is still a very smart horse,” the elf replied absently.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
The elf looked up, meeting her dark brown eyes with his bright amber ones. There was pain in those eyes, pain that he could not mask for his human friend as he usually did. “I have lost count.”
“Lost… count?”
“Yes,” he said softly. “Three hundred and twenty-six years I have kept count, but after the mercenary raid two days ago, I finally lost track.”
Morgaine raised an eyebrow. “Of what exactly.”
“Of… of how many people I’ve killed.”
She stared at him, shocked. He wanted to look away- he didn’t want to see the look on Morgaine’s face at this confession. But this was why he was here, and it would be cowardly to turn away now.
“I never told anyone I was counting before,” he said. “But I felt like I had an… I cannot think of the human word. Obl… ob…”
“Obligation?” Morgaine offered, and Belial nodded.
“I felt that I had an obligation to keep track. A tally of my own sins, as it were. Of the lives that were cut down by my own hands. The knowing helped me feel better, as if I could atone as long as I knew how much I owed.”
“You always spoke as if you loved being a knight,” Morgaine remarked softly. “I’d never have assumed it gave you so much grief.”
“Morgaine,” he said, “When first I began visiting the human town, it was because it helped me to feel better. You humans have such short lives, and so you do not waste a moment of them. You dance, you sing, you swill cheap mead at the taverns- maybe to you this is normal, but for me it is a very liberated way to live. It is not so in the elven lands, where we may live on for centuries.”
The young woman pointed at his leg, her expression wry. “I don’t think you’re going to be enjoying any liberating human dancing with this injury.”
“No, but I only said that this was why I first started coming,” he pointed out. “I kept coming because I met you, and you are the best friend I could have ever asked for- a better friend than anyone I know in the elven lands.”
She laughed outright at this, and tweaked his nose, “I see. You wanted to vent.”
“To… what?” Belial said, not recognizing the human word.
“To talk about what’s been bothering you to someone you trust, and get it off your chest,” she elaborated. “The word usually means to let off pressure in an enclosed space. I would imagine that over three hundred years of bottling your guilt would cause a lot of pressure to build up.”
Belial smiled, his eyes twinkling with good humor. “You are unaccountably wise tonight, Morgaine. One might almost forget that you are an ignorant, uncivilized, short lived human.”
“And if you keep making fun of me, I might forget you’re a stuffy, formal, overly polite elf,” she retorted. Looking down at his leg she grunted. “I think the bleeding’s stopped, for now anyway. Hopefully Master Smithson will be back with the healer soon, and we can patch it up properly. Next time, just have a courier send for me, alright? Only think how upset your commander would be if you died on Warblade’s back trying to come and see me. She would come to give me a lecture, but I wouldn’t take one from her and we’d end up having the world’s most polite shouting match in the middle of the street.”
The elf covered his face with a hand, shoulders shaking as he tried to stifle a laugh at this mental image. In a gentler voice, Morgaine added, “Feeling better?”
“Much,” he replied. “You are a most peculiar human, Morgaine; please don’t ever change.”
She fluttered her fingers at him, like a fine lady given a compliment. Then the door opened, and she stood to greet the healer.