The Farmer and the Fald by J R Leach

Author:J R Leach
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2021-12-05T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Bed & Breakfast

Will found the sergeant when he woke. His face had grown even uglier since he last saw him. He was bloated, purple and bleeding from his eyes and mouth. Hanged. Riddled with arrow wounds and thoroughly dead.

Duchess had been covered in a cairn of stones, with a lock of her braided mane left atop. Will lay a hand on the stacked rocks and felt uneasy by the kindness.

The knight recalled that they were decent to Duchess even as they bound his wrists; they fed her berries, brushed her down and cleaned her shoes— something Will had neglected for the better part of a season.

I shall ne’er name you ‘goblins’ again, I swear it.

The sergeant’s sword, armour and horse had been pilfered, along with Duchess’s saddle, Will’s lance, armour, and the ten silver Lady DeGrissier had given him.

“That’s only fitting, I suppose,” he muttered listlessly.

He got to his feet, feeling a little vulnerable without his chainmail, greaves and pauldrons. His helm had gone, too. But his sword remained. As did the bejewelled dagger. And, most welcome of all, a full waterskin. Will drank from it thirstily and thanked the fire when he discovered that it was, in fact, a wineskin filled with the sweetest, richest red he had ever tasted.

He had been propped up by a tree, wearing his padded gambeson, threadbare breeches, and old riding boots. All were stained from dusty travel and perspiring use, and now blood, both dried and fresh.

Will’s back still felt slick with blood, but the wound felt less now. Less hot. Less painful. Less likely to fell him.

Did they treat my wounds as well? These elves who might’ve hanged me? Why? Why? It was all he could think. Why? Why? Why?

But all at once, the memory and pressing nature of his task came flooding back. He bid a final farewell to the dutiful beast that had carried him wherever he went for the better part of seven years and continued eastwards. All the while asking himself:

Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?

The sun was not much lower in the sky, Will noted. So he surmised that he had only lost a few hours of daylight. Unless I slept for a whole day and then some. And going by the throbbing in his head and weakness of his grip, he thought it possible.

He journeyed past the brook where Bundon had found him, defeated by his armour. Back past the hanging tree, where he first met the elves. Back to the crossroads he went. Back, back, back. To Bundon’s farm.

Wherever that might be.

He had begun using his longsword as a staff, each step relying more on its support. The sun beat down mercilessly upon him, boiling the blood within, making his head throb endlessly, accentuated by each step.

Throb. Throb. Throb.

After a few minutes of shuffling under the full fury of the sun, Will peeled off his sodden gambeson and left it on the side of the road.

I cannot waste my water on sweat.

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