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Post by judicator on Jul 31, 2015 17:30:51 GMT -5
Edhart Bachmeier Saderian 6'2" 210 lbs. Blond hair, medium length Light blue eyes Birth date: May 9, 1736 (27 years old) The son of a homemaking mother and tradesman father, Edhart grew up second of four brothers in a village a day's ride from the capital, Grauwiesen. He had a smith's hammer in hand from the time he could hold one, growing tall in the forge. As their father's stock would swell - orders unclaimed, side projects for the boys to test their skills, teach them knew ones - they would carriage to the capital, a wagon full of iron and steel, and hole up in a cheap inn, sometimes a stable, to pass a few days, sometimes as much as a week, their father selling his goods at the market. The boys would receive a small allowance from their father on these trips, an advance on the goods they made that their father would sell, and so long as the sun was high, they had free reign to explore. Edhart was twelve years old the first time he saw them. He had slipped down a side street, an alley really, followed random side outlets until he spilled into a courtyard. Four walls rose high above it, but the sun shone auspiciously on the space, and it glinted off the pristine armor of one of the King's Halberdiers. His helmet rested on a nearby stoop, but it caught and held the sun with prophetic radiance. The man was massive, scant inches away from seven feet in height. His red hair burned in the noontime luminance, and his stern features were framed by a powerful, immaculately kept beard. Edhart decided then and there that this must be the greatest warrior the world had ever seen. Before him, four boys - two might have been burgeoning men - sparred with heavy wooden cudgels. Their simple tunics were soaked through with sweat, and the fabric around their necks and chests were spotted red; they had all bled from their noses, their mouths. Some had trickling gashes on their foreheads, their arms. They would fight desperately, trying to strike the weapons from each other's hands, wrestling to the ground, butting each other with their heads. When one gained a clear advantage, they would separate and begin again. The Halberdier would bark every few minutes, and the boys would rotate partners, wordlessly changing among each other. Edhart watched them in enamored silence, standing in the mouth of the courtyard with his mouth hanging agape. The Halberdier barked again, and the boys all stopped fighting, turned toward Edhart. They stared at the staring boy. "What do you want, boy?" growled the Halberdier. "These are not free lessons, to fight or to watch." "I ... I was ...," Edhart stammered. His eyes frantically turned from the boys to the Halberdier, back to the long cudgels, their surfaces wrapped in some places with stained cloth, cloth dabbled with the faded redness that marks old blood. "You. Were." The Halberdier stomped over toward the blond youth, the clanking of his mail perforating the still courtyard. "Leav-" "I have money!" Edhart blurted, and his cheeks flushed crimson. The Halberdier loomed over him, his broad shadow dousing the boy in darkness, his silhouette blocking the sun, the sun whose brilliant rays could only frame the massive warrior with a blinding halo. "Well." The fire-haired warrior paused, glowered down at the boy over a bent nose that had probably been broken more times than the boy had years. "Let's see it." Edhart fumbled with his purse strings and tugged the small bag free of his belt. He offered it to the Halberdier with a shaking hand, and he flinched as the giant of man snatched it from his grasp. The Halberdier gave the purse a few small tosses, feeling its weight, hearing the clink of the good Saderian coin inside. He grinned. "Bastian, give the new student your cudgel. You've had enough today." The smallest of the boys obediently walked over, handed his wooden weapon to Edhart. The boy had been through hell that day; one eye was swollen nearly shut, his lips fattened and split. Edhart took the weapon in stupid silence. "Alfwin, work in our new trainee." One of the two older boys stepped forward. He was sixteen, seventeen, maybe. His chest and shoulders had begun to swell the muscle of manhood, though his limbs were still long and wiry. He didn't look like he'd taken much abuse that day, at least nothing compared to the one called Bastian. "But ... he's ...," Edhart faltered. "Changing your mind?" The Halberdier asked. He held the sack of coin back out to the boy in one hand; his other reached for the cudgel. "No!" Edhart clutched the wooden stick to his chest, turned away from the warrior's massive, grasping fingers. "No." "Good," the Halberdier bellowed. "Begin!" Edhart didn't remember walking back to his family's inn that night, but he must have, because he was there. He trudged up the inn's stairs, pushed open the door to his family's one sparse room. "Edhart, by the Three! What happened to you?!" His mother scrambled over from a meager pot over a meager hearth and cupped his face in her hands. His left eye was surrounded by purpled skin. A dried trickle of blood trailed from his right nostril to the top of his mouth, and his white tunic was rust brown from sweat, from dirt, from blood he had spat into it when a stiff elbow had made him bite his tongue. "Looks like he got into a fight," his older brother observed from the table. He had a book open in front of him - the Holy Scriptures - and he as easily returned to its study as he did interject. Edhart's father got up from a chair, slowly stepped over to his son. "Let's see you." Edhart's mother gave way, and his father took him by his chin, turned his face this way, then that. "Uh huh. And the other boy, what's he look like." "Not as bad." "Uh huh. What was the fight over?" Edhart mumbled, getting caught on his swollen tongue. "What's that?" "I said I asked for it." Edhart lowered his eyes to the ground. If his cheeks hadn't been bruised, they'd have been red. "You asked another boy to beat you about the head." His father grinned and let loose his son's chin. "No, I mean ... it's like a school, and they teach you how to fight like knights. I gave them my money, and-" "You what?" His mother cut in, grabbed him by his face again. Edhart squeezed his eyes shut, grit his teeth to keep from crying. Couldn't she see these bruises? "Easy." Edhart's father put his hand on one of his mother's wrists, and she let go, wrung her hands. "You paid someone to do this to you, boy?" "There's a ... a Halberdier. He's teaching the other boys how to fight. Everyone gets beat up ... eck ... except for Alfwin. He's really good." Edhart looked up at his father with widened eyes, welling tears blinked away in excitement. "Sigmund made me and Burkhard fight him at the same time and-" "Enough." Edhart's father held up his hand. "Dinner's on the stove." "Are you serious?" Edhart's mother wheeled on his father. Her fists clenched at her sides, her knuckles whitening as the pupils of her blue eyes dilated in poorly contained rage. "It's his money," his father replied. "If he wants to spend it on getting punched in the face-" "It was cudgels, Dad." Edhart meekly interjected. His father looked at him, and Edhart shrunk, casting his eyes to the floor. "... cudgeled in the face, then let him. A lesson learned. Besides," Edhart's father lowered his voice and bent his mouth to his wife's ear. "We'll be leaving the city in a few days. We'll go home, and that'll be the end of it." Edhart watched his mother's fists uncurl, the fingers relax into less violent digits. She nodded at something his father said. She fixed her son with another fitful glance. "Dinner, Edhart. On the stove." "I think you look brave," Edhart's younger brother chimed in. "Like one of those beat-up knights in the paintings." "Thanks, Nikolaus." Edhart grinned at the compliment. "And ugly." "... thanks, Nikolaus."
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Post by judicator on Jul 31, 2015 18:30:15 GMT -5
That wasn't the end of it. Edhart was near useless on the journey home, a beaten pulp of a boy thrilled at his own soreness. A few days' rest, though, and he was on his feet and out the door, dragging his younger brothers with him and telling all of the other boys in their small town about the city, about Sigmund the King's Halberdier, whose hair was fire and who was so large he hid the sun. Many of the other boys were fascinated, and they would gather en masse, Edhart giving his poor impersonation of an instructor, showing them what he had learned, and then they'd bludgeon each other until they hadn't the heart for it or were called home for chores, dinner, or just good sense. A few months passed like this, and many of the boys gave up on the crude lessons. Edhart's younger brothers stuck with him, though, cheering him on as he established himself as the premier of adolescent stick fighting.
It came time for another journey to the city. As the boys finished helping their father unload their wagon in the city market, he handed them each their allowance. Edhart bounced in his shoes as he received his, then stopped. He weighed the little bag in his hand, and he looked up at his father, his eyes creased in a sense of betrayal. "This isn't-"
"You've been playing more than you've been forging, Edhart." His father was clearly prepared for this. "You're allowed what you earn."
"But ... this won't be enough!" Edhart's vision blurred, tears masking his blue eyes; he wiped them away with his sleeve.
"You'll have to talk about that with Sigmund, Edhart. Nothing's free."
"It's not f-"
"Not what?"
Edhart's mouth clamped shut, and he looked at his feet. The market was coming to life, the other merchants finishing arranging their stalls as the morning sun rose into the sky.
"Mm. Get going." The boys dispersed, the two younger following the oldest. Edhart sulked, but he found the familiar side streets, the familiar alleys and turns. There was the courtyard, and there was Sigmund, as massive as a few months ago, armor as brilliant.
"Look who it is." The Halberdier stepped over toward the boy, his lips curled in a smirk. "Thought you'd had enough."
"I live far away," Edhart quietly replied, and he held out his meager bag of coin. Edhart couldn't look at the Halberdier as he reached for it, and he kept his eyes low and to the side.
"Hmmm," Sigmund groaned as he weighed the sack. His thick brow flattened. "This all you have, boy?"
Edhart looked at the Halberdier's knees, nodded.
"Well ... you can fight ...." The Halberdier reached up, stroked his magnificent beard. "... every other day. Off days you'll train: running, exercise. And you can watch."
Edhart looked up with a brilliant smile. He heard the footsteps of someone else entering the courtyard: Alfwin. "Alfwin, Edhart's back," Sigmund said through a tooth-filled grin. "Warm him up."
Away went the week, and Edhart could hardly move on the journey home. It hurt to turn his head; it hurt to breathe. He sat in the back of the emptied wagon next to his older brother, looked over his shoulder as the elder Bachmeier stared into his scripture book.
"You're always reading the Scriptures, Jakob," Edhart lamely observed.
"You're always getting hit in the face."
Edhart paused, searched for a retort, found none. "Why don't you read a different book?"
"Because this one's important."
"Sure, but we hear about it every time we go to church."
"And once every few weeks is enough to understand the mystery of God."
"I guess not, but-"
"So why aren't you always reading it?" Jakob pointedly flipped a page, the parchment bending in an angry flutter as crisp as it was final.
Edhart sulked. He tried to tuck his knees up next to his chest, but it hurt too much. Nikolaus and the youngest, Jonathan, were playing with crude, wooden carvings of knights. His mother and father were at the front of the wagon, muttering something about the state of the roads as the wagon bounced along. He reluctantly looked back toward the book splayed in Jakob's lap.
"Can I read it with you?"
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Post by judicator on Aug 4, 2015 17:52:00 GMT -5
"But I'm saying that if St. Mat is telling them to lift their praise to God, why wouldn't they do as he says if they really hold him in such high esteem?"
"I don't know, Jakob ... because the book says so." Edhart shaved away at a block of wood with a small knife, peeling off thin layer after thin layer of timber into no discernible shape. The new hobby wasn't going well. They bounced and jostled along, the sound of their talk joined by the noise of their old wagon creaking along the road. Boxes of shaped iron groaned the occasional metallic hiss as the goods within shifted and settled. Time had passed - six years, in fact. Edhart was taller than his older brother, now. Broader, too, but that was expected. Edhart lived for two things: swordplay, and forging to fund his swordplay. The muscles winding through his arms, his rigid shoulders attested to that.
"A child's answer." The elder brother rolled his eyes and closed the tome open in his lap, the pages of each half thumping together with resounding finality. "You're too old to think like a child."
"Seeing. Is. Believing," the younger brother appended, each word punctuated with a rake of the knife along the dwindling wood. "They saw St. Mat, and so they gave praise to St. Mat. They could not see God in his works."
"Better." The praise from the elder brother was flat. "You shouldn't make me draw it out of you."
"I'm distracted."
Jakob looked aside at the misshapen block of wood. He blinked, and he looked up to his younger brother with blatant skepticism. "Not by that carving, I hope."
"You're taking oaths with the Cathedral this time." Another pass of the knife, another layer of wood fluttered to the wagon floor.
"And?"
"That's all, I guess."
The elder brother looked back down at the carving, and then he placed the scripture book in Edhart's lap. "Have this. Late birthday present."
Edhart paused, knife halfway through its course in the wood. He set the tragic project aside. "You're not serious."
"I am. I'll receive a new one when I've taken my vows."
"You'll need this for the test."
Jakob smiled, a haughty half-grin as tapped his temple with the tip of his index finger. "I won't."
Edhart traced his fingers over the engraving on the cover. The paint of its golden inlay had faded, chipped away over its years of careful use. "Thank you, Jakob."
The wagon ground to a halt. The two brothers clambered out the back and stepped into the street. It was empty, save for the dawn light breaking through the gaps between buildings, breaking against the lingering shadows of the ebbing night. Empty, save for the robed, pious men and women who stood at the steps of a cathedral rising above. Edhart clutched his brother's tome of scriptures under his arm, but his eyes were drawn to a man distant from the priests. Atop the stairs, a singular man, garbed in shining plate. His hair was richly black, groomed and shined with oils, and he looked over the breaking dawn with imperious indifference. A sword hung at his left hip, and a shield rested across his back. His head turned, looked toward Edhart, caught him staring. A small upturn of his nose, and he looked away. Edhart tightened his grip on his tome and turned back to his brother.
"We won't see you for a while."
"The next time you're in the city, if you make the time."
"Sure. Well. Good luck." Edhart took a step back toward the wagon.
"There is no luck where there is preparation, Edhart." Jakob turned up the steps, enveloped in the throng of robed priests and priestesses. The great double doors of the Cathedral yawned open, and Edhart's brother and his company disappeared within, swallowed by the closing portal. The armored man remained outside. He descended the steps, his mail clanking as his booted feat echoed off the stone. He turned up the street, his strides brisk and purposeful, not sparing a second glance toward the wagon or its attendant. Edhart climbed up into the seat of the wagon.
"Didn't want to say goodbye?" he asked his father. He put the tome down on the seat between them.
"We said our goodbyes last night, had a good talk. You were out, doing that sword playing-"
"Training," Edhart interrupted.
"Training," his father amended, tensing his brow as he fought a smirk away from his lips. "That's why your mom and your brothers didn't come: it's hard to say goodbye twice."
"It's hard once." They completed the rest of the ride to the market square in silence, unloaded the wagon in silence.
"You going to get beat up, today?" His father pulled a small sack of coin from his belt, held it out to his second son.
"I am." Edhart took the purse, held it in a fist.
"I'll see you at sundown, then."
"Sure." Edhart made his way through the city, a journey that had gotten easier with age. A higher vantage made navigating the crowds far easier than for a boy who was staring at everyone's navel. He wasn't the tallest Saderian, but he was tall enough.
"Looking strong, Edhart," Sigmund greeted as the young man stepped into the familiar courtyard. The great Halberdier's red beard was sprouting shocks of gray, but the look had only imparted in the man an image of sinister wisdom, veteran's cunning that ought not be tested.
"Here to get stronger," Edhart replied, and he pitched the man the sack of coin.
Sigmund's lips curled in an odd smile, and he pitched the sack right back. "You're done here, boy. Nothing more for you to learn."
Edhart caught the sack of coin, but he wore no smile. "Nothing more to learn? I have books full of techniques we've never covered: wards, stances, disarms ..."
"And we're not going to cover them. You're done."
"I don't understand."
"Edhart ... what did you expect? You come here once every few months, fight a few days, and then you go home. No sense wasting time in trying to teach you the art." Sigmund folded his arms over his barrel chest.
"So all this time, you were just ... ." Edhart looked down at the sack of coin in his hand, tightened his fist around it.
"Toughening you up."
"Robbing me," Edhart growled through clenched teeth. He snapped his eyes up toward the Halberdier.
"Easy, Edhart. You got exactly what you paid for. Those other boys, they're going somewhere. Their parents paid real money, they got real lessons. Remember Alfwin? Took third in the Melee. You? Puh." Sigmund scoffed, his red beard muting his smile. "You take one hell of a beating, don't you doubt. You ever get in a real fight, you might be all right. But a real warrior? Don't be dumb about this, boy."
Edhart's fists shook, and his vision blurred with welling tears as Sigmund told him the truth of things. He squeezed his eyes shut, opened them to look at the cobblestones beneath his feet. He turned and walked out of the courtyard, a third of his young life left to dust and blood and a lie that was never spoken until it was true.
"We'll miss you around here, Edhart," Sigmund called after him. He sounded sincere. Edhart walked on, his head bowed as he drifted into the city as it came to life, losing himself in its crowds, taking new side streets that led nowhere, a small sack of coin clutched in his fist.
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Post by judicator on Aug 9, 2015 21:40:34 GMT -5
"Wagon's loaded, Dad." Edhart lashed the last of the crates down and walked to the front of the covered wagon, stooping until he stepped over the back rest for the wagon seat. He plopped down next to his father.
"Huh. You're coming this time."
"I figured Mom has enough help with my brothers staying around, thought you might like the company." Edhart shrugged and settled back.
"Is that what it is? You haven't shown an interest in a few years, since that Halberdier threw you out-"
"I know, Dad. I'm hoping I'll get to see Jakob, too."
"Mm." Edhart's father lightly slapped the reins, and their wagon lurched forward. "Maybe he'll make some time to see you."
They rode on for some hours in silence, the wagon jerking along, bouncing and shaking their bones as they lumbered down the road. "These roads are awful," Edhart commented in a rare, decent stretch.
"Getting worse by the month," his father replied; he seemed less affected. "For a country that lives by its roads, they're in pretty sorry shape."
"Some of the others say it's not like this in other places. They say they have new ways of laying roads, new tools, new-"
"Some of the others," Edhart's father cut in. "Have they been to these other places?"
"I don't think so."
"Neither do I. Keep your heart toward God, Edhart. We do things the honest way because we're honest people."
"That's ... a little direct, Dad." Edhart's brow creased, and he looked aside at the man holding the reins.
"It is. You need to hear it. The rest of the world is awash in sin. They're not looking for the name of God ... not really. They're vain, Edhart, chasing the unnatural. This is home. This is where we'll find God again."
"I didn't say-" The second son's objection was thrown aside as the wagon hit a particular divot in the road. Edhart was bounced from his seat, and he came down on his tailbone. "Ngh ..."
Edhart's father had his own feet braced against the boards beneath them, his back pushed back against the rest, solid and secure. He looked at Edhart, half of his mouth turned up into a grin. "Getting worse by the month, Edhart. It really helps to know the lay of them."
They arrived in the city before the sun had breached the horizon. Edhart helped his father set up his stall, then set off toward the cathedral. The streets were quiet, near empty save for the few people rushing out to work or slogging home from the taverns. Edhart paced along the streets with unhurried strides, his hands in his pockets and his eyes lifted toward the tops of buildings. The flickering orange of torchlight was giving way to the sunrise's soft yellow, cool shadows peeling back from its growing luminance. Edhart crashed into something, something metal by the sound of it. He staggered to the side, catching himself on a building. "Sorry! I wasn't watch-"
"Watch your step, boy," a voice growled back. If the collision had slowed the other man, he didn't show it. His pace was brisk, and it didn't seem like he'd even checked over his shoulder. He walked on, the sword at his hip bouncing against his thigh, a broad shield strapped to his back. His plate armor was polished and keen, catching and throwing the sunlight peeking over top of the street. He turned down a side street, and Edhart saw his face, distant and familiar.
"Sorry," Edhart repeated again, to no one present. He swept his hand through his hair and turned back up the street; there was the Cathedral, twenty paces away. He walked to the edifice, jogged up its steps, and pulled on the right of the two doors.
It didn't budge.
"Mm." Edhart knocked, three solid blows from his right fist against the thick, sturdy wood of the Cathedral door. A minute passed. Two minutes passed. Finally, he heard a scratching on the other side of the door, and it pushed open with deceptive ease. A man in robes - not his brother - stood before him.
"The peace that is borne in Her grace be upon you, child of God. What brings you before Her temple at this early hour?" The man had a dingy cloth clutched in one hand, and his brow glistened with sweat.
"I was hoping to see Jakob," Edhart answered directly, simply.
"If you are here at the evening bell, he'll be free to see you." The man began to pull the door closed; Edhart shot a hand out and caught its edge.
"When's the evening bell?"
"Twelve hours from the morning bell."
"When's the morning-" A clarion bell rang out in the sky above them. "Oh."
The robed man smiled and pulled the door closed. Edhart turned and descended the steps. At their base, he stopped and looked up and down the still-empty street, then set off for the market place. The man from before came rounding the corner, his long strides showing no signs of slowing. Edhart slipped out of his way, turning sidelong to miss the other man's broad-shouldered march.
"You're learning," the armored man snapped.
Edhart shook his head and stepped back into the street, back on his way. He came into the market just as it was humming to life.
"Dad. Need a hand?"
"No, but you can stay anyway. Jakob was busy?"
"They said to come for him this evening, so ... yes. I guess he was busy."
"Sounds the usual. Have a seat, watch me work."
Edhart hopped up onto the back of the wagon. The men and women that came to his father's stall were varied: would-be warriors, tradesmen, some more dubious-seeming people. His father greeted them all directly; he made firm eye contact, shook everyone's hand. Some bought, some didn't. A lot of the people knew him by name, and Edhart's father knew them. Those people seemed glad to part with their money. Edhart watched it all day, sometimes closely, sometimes with a superficial attention, his mind well away. Noon came and went, and the sun began to fall away. Edhart hopped off of the wagon.
"I'm headed back to the cathedral, Dad. I'll see you back at the inn."
"All right. When you see Jakob, see if he has some time for me this week." His father shoved the last of the crates back into the wagon.
"Right."
Edhart set a brisk pace for the cathedral. The evening bell rung as he was a few strides from its steps, and its doors eased open, spilling forth an array of people, some garbed well, some not. Jakob came last among them, his chin lifted in distinguished piety, robes housing his thin form. The small crowd spilled out into the street and filed away down so many streets, a river branching into smaller streams until the way was dry.
"Edhart," he greeted. "The peace that is borne in Her grace be upon you."
"I've had that one, thank you." Edhart climbed the stairs one at a time, and he was halfway to his brother when the armored man from before strode down the stairs, his hand already moving to the scabbarded blade at his left. Edhart froze in place, lifted his palms in a show of surrender.
"Peace, Richter," Jakob soothed, his face a mask of calm. "He's my brother and wishes no harm upon any of this cathedral."
"As you say." Richter's hand fell away from his sword, but he remained on the steps all the same, his dark eyes boreing into the blond Saderian.
"I just came to see you," Edhart began. He didn't move farther up the steps.
"Obviously. And now you have seen me. What next?"
"I don't know. I thought we could talk. Have dinner, maybe."
"I can't, I'm afraid. My duties bind me to this cathedral most evenings, this one not excepted."
"Right." Edhart rubbed the back of his neck. "I'll ... leave you to it, then."
"Be true in Her light, Edhart." Jakob inclined his head.
"Mm." Edhart turned and walked down the stairs. Twilight was full, casting long shadows over the street. Edhart walked out in the middle of the road and chose a side street, the last soul trickling away from the cathedral that evening. The alleys were dark, receiving little light from the sunset's dying embers. The stewards were making their rounds, lighting torches over the main streets, and the craft halls and other trades were ending their long days, the laboring men and women carrying their haggard selves away, some to home, some to a drink, some elsewhere. The streets ran this way and that, dark alleys giving way to wide streets with blooming auras of flickering light, giving way to more dark alleys that enveloped the people who slipped down them. Edhart chose them at random, a general line aiming somewhere near the inn.
He found people in these alleys as the night drew on. Some were loitering, talking, passing the time. Others were already well drunk, stumbling toward the next tavern or stumbling with a new friend toward the nearest bed. Others weren't waiting so long, bodies pressed tight against dark walls. Edhart passed it all in Grauwiesen, capital of God's country. In an hour or so, the midnight bell would ring out from the cathedral, and today's sins would become tomorrow's. The alleys grew sparser as the night grew longer, and Edhart found himself walking alone. Torchlight loomed ahead, his alley soon to spill into a main street. A pleading voice thinly echoed from around the corner.
"Please! We gave you everything, everything they gave us. I wouldn't lie to you."
"You would if you thought the truth would get you killed."
"I'm not! I'm not ly-" The protest was cut short by the sound of skin clapping against skin. Edhart jogged forward, out into the well-lit street, vacant save for the four men a stone's throw to his left. Three were facing one, the one cupping his cheek with one hand, his other hand begging off with a splayed palm. They were in the void between lights, a gap of darkened pavement between two distant torches.
"Hey!" Edhart walked toward them.
One of the three turned toward him. "Stay away." The man held a hand up in warning. "Not your business, no sense getting hurt over it."
"No sense in anyone getting hurt." Edhart kept walking forward. "Leave this man be, before I call the Halberdiers." Edhart was nearly in reach of them.
"Easy. No one here's looking for any trouble. We can ..." The man stepped forward and buried a knife into Edhart's side. It was the darkness, the play of light between the torches and the shadows; Edhart never saw it coming. Edhart sunk to his knees and rolled to his side, clutching the wound, his breath coming in suddenly ragged gasps.
The man wiped the knife on the inside of his cloak and slid it away in his belt. "We need to hurry, before someone else comes to be a hero." He turned back toward his companions.
"That's you," the first of the three spoke to the fourth, "if you don't get honest."
"I told you, I gave you everyth-"
"Hrk!"
The man with the knife gasped, gurgled, his own weapon crudely protruding from the side of his neck. Edhart lunged for the second. He tried to get a weapon free of his belt, but Edhart caught his wrist, drove him back against the wall of a building. Edhart slammed his forehead into the other man's face, felt cartilage crunching against his skull. He threw his head forward a second time; blood sprayed out from the impact, a wet mess that tinted his blurring vision red. He was dizzy, stumbled backward from the wall. Everything spun around him, and something cut into his arm, another knife. Edhart flailed, crude punches catching air as new, deep lines opened in his arms for each awkward pass. Something punched him in the shoulder, and fleeting clarity showed him the long knife pulling free. Another punch into his stomach, just below his chest. His blood spilled out, already soaking through his tunic, dripping onto God's street below.
Edhart heard the sound of boots scuffing, the dull thud of bodies gracelessly striking the ground. The fourth man and the third rolled, the third ending on top. His knife was brandished, pressing closer to the neck of Edhart's would-be savior. One of the victim's arms was pinned awkwardly beneath him, and his one hand wasn't up to the press of the man on top. The third man's eyes widened in panic as the steel edge inched closer. "No! No-no-no-no-"
Edhart coiled his right arm around the third man's throat, his left diving under the man's left arm and snaking upward, his hand pushing on the base of the other man's skull. Edhart fell backward and wrapped his legs around the other man's trunk, squeezed. It was four seconds, maybe five, before the other man went limp. Edhart didn't let go, held for ten seconds, then twenty. His bleeding arms gave way, his lungs gave way, and he let go, rolled the dead man off of him. Edhart tried to sit up, only managed to lift his head enough to see the blood pooling out of him, staining the street.
"Help ...," he croaked to the fourth man, and with the same wide-eyed panic, that man bolted down the street.
"Here!" Someone's voice, distant. Muffled. There were stars in the sky, blurred into a disjointed white mass. Edhart tried lifting a hand; his arm wouldn't move.
"Here!" That voice again, less distant. The man had come back, and there were others with him. Halberdiers.
"By the Good Three!" Another voice, far more familiar. "Edhart! Told you you'd be all right!"
"Sigmund ...," Edhart whispered, and he turned his head to spit a mouthful of blood, the red paste lamely falling from his lips.
"Told you I toughened you up, you damn fool." Sigmund turned to his companions. "The clinic's two blocks from here. Get him there. We'll get these two to the wagon, that last one in irons." Sigmund turned to the fourth man, Edhart's would-be savior. "Said you don't know any of these men?"
"No! They were trying to rob me, and that one saved me." Half-true.
Sigmund looked aside at his cohort. "Get some answers, but it's probably what he says." Sigmund walked over to the man with the disfigured face, his nose caved and twisted in a grotesque mockery of surprise. Blood had pooled behind his head; he'd struck it on the curb when he hit the ground, and he was dead. "Three for the wagon."
Edhart was being carried, by the Halberdiers, he guessed. The light of the stars swirled into the flickering orange of the torches, a dizzying mess of color and pulsing brightness. He closed his eyes.
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Post by judicator on Aug 13, 2015 17:11:56 GMT -5
The room was black. Pitch black, the sort of darkness that didn't have to swallow the light because the light didn't dare creep in. There was sound, though. Soft footsteps, the rustle of fabric. Distantly, the latching of heavy doors, the groan of hinges too old to waste oil on. Heavier footsteps, the clank of armor. It was getting closer, the dull click of a thick, hard heel on a thick, hard floor. Closer. Lighter steps dotted around it, sometimes scuffing against the floor. It all stopped at once.
"Edhart."
He opened his eyes. The room wasn't black, not even a little. The sun poured in through an open window, its brightness barely dimmed through a thin curtain and spilling into Edhart's lap. The walls were beige, flatly so. He was in a bed, his hips and below covered in a white sheet. His arms were laced from bicep to wrist in winding bandages, freshly wrapped and uncompromisingly snug. So, too, his bare torso: his shoulder, his ribs, his waist, each encircled with white linen. He tried to sit up, regretted it, tried to cry out. He felt the flesh in his throat strain, crack, delivering no sound. Someone brought a cup to his lips: water. He drank - gulped, more like - and swallowed. He managed a low moan.
"Edhart," the voice repeated. Jakob's voice. Edhart turned his head, and there he was. They were. Jakob, solemn and pious in his robes, and the one he called Richter, armored, glowering, impatient.
"What," came the raspy reply. Frogs had croaked more intelligibly.
"By the grace of God and the Saints you live. Thanks be to God. She smiles on you."
Edhart turned his head back, toward the ceiling. "Nn. Maybe She could smile on someone else for a minute." Edhart heard the rustle of armor.
"He is delirious, in great pain," he heard his brother say. "Edhart, did you know those men you killed?"
Edhart closed his eyes. The room was black again. "No."
"The man you saved?"
"No."
"He was a smuggler, a purveyor of the inspirations of Lazaar. He had sold those men guns, Edhart, to be used here in Grauwiesen, to terrorize Her children. The smuggler is in custody."
"Mm."
"This is God's work, Edhart. Providence! That you chose this journey to come see me, that you were on that street at that hour, that you survived! Edhart, she favors you."
Edhart opened his eyes. It sounded unbelievable. "Do you really believe that?"
"St. Mat, Edhart. Beloved of God, but Her children vainly believed his strength was his own. Will you be blind as they were? Will you not see where Her strength sustains you?"
Edhart turned his head toward his brother. He looked sincere. Richter looked sincere. "I am alive by Her grace," he quietly replied. He didn't feel like a liar. He didn't feel like a liar.
"You are, Edhart," Jakob agreed. "And She will work through you even further, if you have the wisdom to submit to Her will."
"Her will." Edhart looked back toward the ceiling.
"Yes. You will be trained - properly trained, not like the beatings you received from that charlatan Halberdier. By Richter, a true swordsman with unshakable faith. When you are ready, you will be a pilgrim. You shall seek God's name, away from here. Away from home."
Edhart's eyes snapped back toward his brother, toward the armored man flanking him. Richter glowered, but his chin fell in the smallest of grudging nods. "Yes," Edhart heard himself say. "I will."
"Of course you will. It is settled. When you are well, you will return to us at the Cathedral. Until then." Jakob turned, footsteps already carrying him from the room. Richter was close behind.
"Jakob."
Jakob stopped, turned over his shoulder. Richter did the same.
"Where's Dad?"
"He came to see you. I told him you wouldn't be coming home for some time, that he may as well return to his family. You should write him in a few days."
"But you didn't know-"
"The only certainty is God, Edhart. I did know." Jakob walked from the room, Richter behind.
Edhart's head fell back. The sun still shone through the curtains, bright against the white sheet covering his lower half. There was noise outside, the faint din of voices calling out, doors opening and slamming shut in the street. He closed his eyes, and the room was black again.
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