1
I’d thought all the sounds of the forest were familiar. The wind gentling the leaves above the path, or rushing in the high pines. The songs of the little birds, or the cry of the hawk. The soft call of an owl out of the dark. The knocking of the woodcutter’s axe; the quiet chant of a mushroom-hunter. The bright leaping of the brook in the late spring, and the humming silence in the deep snows of winter. The frenzied scrabbling of squirrels in the underbrush. Wagons creaking down the road to market. The single snap of a twig before the deer that broke it freezes, perfectly still.
But this sound was new.
Footsteps, on the road. But so many, and all moving as one, with heavy tread. A sliding clack and rattle I couldn’t place, and the ringing of loose metal. I opened my eyes, and sat up.
A festival procession?
Only one procession came all the way up to our village, and that was in the wintertime. I slid down from the mossy boulder and ran toward the sound.
Traders from far away?
That could be it. But why so many? And why not walk as traders usually did—relaxed, at their ease?
I stepped out onto the bank overlooking the road. Out from under the trees, the sun burned bright.
So that’s what armor sounds like.
But theirs was not like the armor of a knight out of a story. They wore sturdy clothes in flat, deep red, and heavy boots, stained from travel; their armor’s thin steel plates covered their vitals and little more. And they had weapons—swords, spears, blades whose names I didn’t know. But they carried them like someone bored with their trade carries their tools.
At the head of the column, already past me, were a few riders, richly dressed. Maybe they were knights?
The tramping of the company’s feet was dull and loud; the soldiers mostly looked either ahead toward the village, or down at the ground as they marched. But one squinted up at me. He smiled. Almost. His eyes were hard, and uncurious.
I stepped back into the shadow of the forest. I ran for home.
By the time I’d convinced my parents I wasn’t making up a story, and coaxed my mother into laying down her saw, and my father his file, and both of them into coming out of the workshop, and walking into town, the soldiers had already arrived.
Most of the village was gathered in the square, chattering, curious, near the town hall. A few of the soldiers were hastily hammering together the festival stage, under the instructions of the mayor. He looked confused. I’d have thought he looked afraid, too, if I’d thought the mayor could be afraid.
My parents found their way up next to Sarah, the miller. My mother tapped her shoulder. “What’s going on?”
“Dunno.” She jutted her chin toward the soldiers’ banners. “Something to do with business down on the plains.”
The standards swayed in the weak breeze. White, and gold, and the same dark red the soldiers wore, and a galloping horse. It looked faintly familiar, maybe. Perhaps I’d seen it at a fair, further down the valley somewhere?
My father leaned in and laid a hand on my shoulder. “Falke, see there? That’s the mark of the barony, the—the people who rule the land. It’s not often they send anyone up here, but—”
A muttering from up front. The stage was complete enough, and one of the riders from before, a tall man, older than my parents, with dark hair to his shoulders and stern, searching eyes, climbed up to address the gathered crowd.
He looked out over us for a moment. Then, “People of Cold Falls! I am Alrik; I am your emissary. As you know, our baroness of long years, Helena, passed on some months ago.”
I did not know this—not that she was dead; not that she had lived. But the adults didn’t look surprised.
“Her successor is her niece—Baroness Freja.”
He paused with a nod, and seemed to wait for some reaction. After a moment, he went on.
“Helena’s reign, despite her strengths, was a time of laxity. Of softness; of indulgence. Of weakness. Baroness Freja is mending this error. Our barony will shine again, and brilliantly. It will stand proud in the eyes of the world.”
He looked like he thought we might be pleased to hear this. I tried to remember anything I could about this barony, or any lands past the next valley over, which I had seen once, looking down from the pass after a market fair in Saddlereach. A few scraps from lessons came to mind, and nothing more.
“This will again become a land you can take pride in; Freja will make it so.”
Did we not take pride in our valley?
The adults were looking at each other, whispering.
“Her rule is firm and true. As her hand here, we will help you. We will put your labors in order—” he gestured to a fancily dressed man standing near the stage, who looked to be a merchant. Even among merchants, I’d never seen so much cloth of gold on one person. “—and we will collect a more just tribute, proper for a strong land.”
The whispers around me grew louder. Someone called out, “How much tribute?”
The emissary smiled, smiled like he thought a schoolchild was struggling overmuch with a simple lesson. “If you work hard, and I know you will, the tribute need not be more than tripled.”
There was open shouting. I stepped closer to my parents.
The emissary raised a gloved hand, and closed it into a fist. The shouts quieted, but only barely. A twist crossed his lips.
One voice called out high. “We’ve always paid, but what good has it ever done here? What will this new tribute get us?”
He turned and, pointing toward the massed soldiers, spoke in a voice ringing and loud. “The tribute will get you safety.” The soldiers raised their blades high. The shouting faltered. “Safety, and a guiding hand.”
Mutters and whispers. Beside me, Sarah’s fists were clenched tight, but she said nothing.
I looked at the spears, gleaming in the late-morning sun.
Again the emissary smiled, thin like paper. “The promise of the barony, going back generations out of knowing, has always been the protection of the people. Freja’s protection will be near at hand now; no threat will reach you here.”
Silence.
Satisfied, he started saying something about how leaders in each trade should come speak to the rich merchant, but I didn’t understand it, and my mind stayed on the spears, and the clang of his voice. Around me I felt a knot in our bellies like a lean winter.
Why does no one speak?
After a few minutes more, I realized he was stepping off the stage, and people were slowly beginning to move away. My parents turned again to Sarah, quiet, nervous.
My father pinched his moustache. “Do you think they mean it? And can they enforce it? ‘Near at hand,’ he said—how many of them do you think will stay?”
“The words must be empty, surely. Triple? Triple is nonsense; we’d have nothing left. It could just be some ceremony, what with the new baroness. Did they come and make some big show when Helena was crowned?” Sarah hadn’t lived here then.
My parents didn’t remember; they had only been small children.
She crossed her arms. “Well, for certain the soldiers won’t stay. There’s got to be fifty of them at least—where would they even sleep?”
My parents nodded, and we made our way home.
For the rest of the day, my parents talked in low voices as they worked. Twice, groups of three or four soldiers marched down the lane, the clack of their armor strange accompaniment to the growl of the saw and the distant ring of the blacksmith’s hammer. The neighbors who came by the workshop spoke tight and angry, but quiet.
I didn’t go back to the forest, but dug idly around the back garden. When my uncle brought my sisters home from our cousins’, I tried to keep them entertained with old tales. Marden grew bored, and went to look for worms, but Adler had noticed the adults were uneasy, and sat listening to as many stories of the wolves, and the spring fairies, and the spirits in the gullies as I could remember.
My uncle hadn’t been at the square, and stayed a while in the workshop, hearing my parents’ recounting of the speech.
He stopped to tell me goodbye as he left. “You were there, eh? Not to worry; I’m sure it’ll come to nothing. Like a mountain storm that blows itself out before it reaches the valley.” He waved his fingers like wind and snow, and smiled, and headed off along the lane, tools jingling on his belt.
That night, just after we’d sat down to dinner, there was a knock at the door. Adler jumped from the bench and ran to open it. Stepan, the mayor’s assistant, stood at the threshold, half in shadow at the edge of the firelight.
“The mayor requests that—that you bring all your lumber fit for building down to the main gate, first thing in the morning.” He squeezed his cap in his hands.
Sitting across from me, knife halfway through the bread, my father frowned.
My mother cocked her head. “What for?”
Stepan swallowed. “For the barracks.”
He turned and hurried into the night.