Chapter 3 - part 3

Kultas Baer’s tall frame with long, black hair stood in contrast to the field around him. His abundance of muscles rippled as his shovel sunk into the earth. It was near time to plant crops again, and the fields needed tending. The work was tedious, but had made his living for as long as he could remember. The sound of a racing horse in the heat of the day brought most of the small town out to see what was happening. Kultas’ head dropped as he saw his son’s horse bearing only one rider. Neither boy would have abandoned the other. What happened?! Kultas stood impatient and frantic as he waited on the main road heading through town with the townsfolk and town elders, who had been informed, or at least noticed the commotion by now.

Renzoku stopped just short of the crowd and nearly fell off his horse, “Kælon!” he gulped air, “They took him! Hurry, we have to save him. They won’t be able to go further than the plains of Manath with a walking prisoner!”

“Calm yourself, child.” The eldest of the town elder’s said. He was a strong man, just now nearing sixty years of age. Much of the town sought him for wisdom, but no one thought less of his strength for all his age. “Tell us what has happened as slowly and precisely as your mind will allow.”

Renzoku, including that it was not the king’s men but the soldiers of the Korgar that took Kælon, relayed the story to the crowd that continued to grow as he spoke. Time raced on for Renzoku, but the story was over in under a minute. He looked up from telling the story to see Kultas’ head fall. Renzoku reached out to him and fell to his knees, “I’m sorry. I’m not a strong enough warrior to have saved your son, but once he is safe, I will give my life for his.”

“Hush, child.” Isil, Kultas’ wife, placed her hand on the youth’s sweat stained back. “We don’t blame you, but let us pray that it is not as we might fear. Anyone who is willing, come to our house in two hours. At sunset we’ll find their camp and raid it,” she called to the crowd gathered near.

“There are at least thirty, more likely forty, men in the company,” Renzoku frantically added. “It will take every able man. We must be well equipped.”

Kultas turned and face the crowd raising his hand, “Let even the abyss open up and the legions of darkness come forth! There is nothing in all the land or even beyond that will keep me from my son! These Korgar have raped and pillaged us for too long. They have taken what we earned by the sweat of our brow, and now they have taken my son. Who will join my march?”

Kultas spoke with such fervor and might that Renoku thought he might have been a king if he had had different birth. The second of wondering ended quickly, and a series of war shouts came forth.

The group dispersed to prepare; likewise Kultas and Isil came to their home. Kultas hesitated on the footstep of the house a moment to allow himself to be overcome by the anger and fear that he held back. His eyes filled with a rage that only the few who have had their children taken might recognize. Fear of what might happen mixed with anger at himself and those who took Kælon filled his brain only to be routed by the voice of his wife.”
            “Get ready,” Isil scolded the delay in her husband’s actions, knowing only too well what troubled him. “We failed him once because our fears produced lies, but the life of our son must not be destroyed completely, if not for the sake of his mother then for the sake of the whole land of Ardiil.” The rebuke from Isil was the sort that only a strong wife could make: loving, yet stronger than the winds of a hurricane.

“You’re right, Isil. We have to stop them before they make it to the Korgar,” Kultas responded without looking behind at his wife. He moved into the house. Even if the town lacked in courage at the final moment, the town elders would come. It was their sworn duty to protect the Baer family, a duty not called on for several generations.

“With Renzoku and the elders, I will have a group of seventeen.” Kultas said looking at a map of the land.

“You’ll have eighteen.” Isil corrected. “I’ll be kept home. As a warrior and the mother of my son, I won’t let a few men fail my son’s life when I could have helped.”

Kultas looked up to see her firm look as she ornamented her belt herself in a pair of ornate short swords he had not seen for many years. Knowing that a fight would end in futility, he nodded his head and returned his gaze to the map.
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It was near nightfall before the soldiers even began to set up camp. Kælon had lost most of his senses between the beatings and being drug behind the horses when the guards wanted sport, but he was certain that these hills were on the northern edge of the plains of Manath. He had played here often as a child when some of the elders took the sheep here to graze for a few weeks. Kælon and Renzoku used to beg to come along even though the sheep smelled terribly. It was always pleasant to get away from the city and their parents, but those days seemed distant in the face of his current situation. Kælon sat against the tree he was tied to in order to try to regain what little strength he might. Escape would take a lot more strength and mental power than he currently possessed. The fact that he was near his home at least gave him a small advantage.

The sound of metal clanging against metal filled Kælon’s head. He looked around to find three men hammering several metal shapes together to create what looked like a small metal statue, about the size of a man’s torso. After a few minutes of making the pieces fit together, they hammered a metal rod into the end of the shape and let the shape sit in the fire. One of the soldiers looked at Kælon, then back at the object before bellowing with laughter.

Glancing one more time at the fire, the man walked over to Kælon and knelt. “Do you know what that is?” The man asked curtly with his gravely western accent. “It’s a brand for your back. That way, all men will know who you are.” The soldier began to laugh at the defenseless Kælon tied to the tree. The thought of torture seemed to please him.

“Laugh now. I assure you that beore the night is over, I will be free and you and your men no more than dead heaps. The soldier’s confidence didn’t waver in the least; he only laughed harder. Kælon couldn’t believe his own words, he had only said them to try and muster courage, but all he accomplished was to drain what was left of his hope.

“I’ll give you one thing, son of Huor.” The soldier spat. “You have spunk, but the smell of searing flesh will drive even that from you. There are things much worse than death.”

“Huor? Me? No, there’s been a mistake. He’s a myth and I’m the son of a farmer. I’m no king and certainly no threat to your masters.” Kælon was slightly relieved about the mistake, but only enough for a new wave of panic to set in. If they believed he was the legendary son of Huor, then he would die the worst death he could imagine at the hands of the Korgar.

“Our masters disagree,” another soldier said as he approached. “They say you are the son of Huor and that a spectacle must be made of you. Whatever our lords want, our lords get. I guess I ought to apologize if you really aren’t this fabled heir to the throne, but either way you have only a few days or weeks to suffer before you’re dead.”

“But I’m not!” Kælon called after the men, now returning to their work of setting up the camp. Death isn’t so reassuring if it doesn’t come before torture! Kælon became frantic with the thought of being branded with an iron that could easily cover his entire back.

Kælon pulled at the ropes as hard as he could, but to no avail. He also tried cutting the ropes with a rock, but with the backward angle he had to hold the rock at the get to the ropes, their strength wouldn’t budge. About the time his arms started bleeding from the friction, he decided to save his energy and make a run as soon as he had any amount of freedom. The pain in his leg from the arrow seared like a hot iron; the thought only made him want to run faster.

Kælon tried to distract himself by studying his surroundings, but the first thing that caught his eye was the branding iron. The hot red crest of the Huor clan was clearly visible, a phoenix rising with a sword in its grasp. For a moment everything seemed to darken and Kælon passed out.

When he came back to his senses, Kælon saw the men, eating and drinking, gathered around a fire. There was a lot of commotion. He’d hoped they forgot about him as he renewed his efforts to use a rock to free himself. Before he had made any effect on the ropes one of the soldiers stood and raised his glass, “Men, we’ve hunted and we’ve eaten, but we’ve had no entertainment. Perhaps you would like to help me show this beast who the boss around here is,” he said while pointing to Kælon.

Adrenaline began to surge through Kælon’s body as three men came up to hold him while a fourth loosed his ropes. Kælon began to kick wildly as soon as the men were close enough. When one fell from a kick to the head, two more took his place. Six men beat Kælon until he could hardly move, then his clothes were stripped from him and thrown into the fire.

Despite the pain that Kælon was in, he still squirmed with every amount of muscle and adrenaline he could muster. The muscles in his back rolled back and forth as he struggled under the weight of the men holding him face down in the dirt. Behind him, the man who had proposed the entertainment brought the branding iron from the fire and began the short walk toward where Kælon was being held. The men cheered and screamed wildly; the anticipation of the seared flesh growing in everyone’s minds.

When the iron first touched his back, Kælon’s senses were overwhelmed. He couldn’t see, hear, or feel anything for a split second. It did not last long enough. Once the full pain of the iron ensued, Kælon screamed in anguish, every moment the pain being made anew as the brand was pressed further into his skin. Those few seconds were the longest Kælon had ever encountered as everything from his neck to the small of his back was seared. Every thought that rose to his mind fell, countered by only more pain and his every sense groaned of agony.

The stories say that the cry from Kælon’s lips rang through the deepest parts of D’ath Kutar, to the joy of the Korgar, and to the highest peaks of the silent mountains. It was the cry that brought the searching party to the camp where Kælon now lay. When the iron was removed, he could neither cry nor move nor taste the sweetness of death. The world was one blur as the soldiers left Kælon on the ground and cheered and drank.

Kultas, now saw the lights from the camp glaring off of a nearby hill. His horse was ahead of the fifty men who traveled with him, Renzoku and Isil close on his heels. Once the group had crossed the small hill and were heading down into the valley, the soldiers noticed the party, but too late. By the time the orders to prepare were even issued, the raid was upon them. Kultas trampled two and stabbed one before dismounting near his son. Careful of the burns on his back, Kultas screamed in rage for his deformed son.

A soldier tried to attack Kultas from behind only to find his own back stabbed twice by the spear in Renzoku’s hands. Renzoku then turned to throw his spear at a fleeing soldier. The entire host of soldiers was massacred in a matter of minutes; not a single villager who rode with Kultas died in the fray. Rejoicing was quickly silenced by the sight of Isil tending Kælon’s wounds as Kultas wept over him. Three of the elders carried Kælon gently back to the town to care for him. Kælon wanted to speak, to cry, to say a single “thank you,” but nothing would come forth form his limp body and unwilling lips. He, knowing that he was finally safe, allowed his mind the sleep his body already retreated into.