Screams sounded from the other end of the pens. The three of us ignored them, caught up in our own intrigue.
Sef and the man locked eyes. At the same time, I swear, the very air chilled.
I looked down at the stranger’s feet, his boots dulled by a sudden frost as strands of mist rose to drift about.
That wasn’t right…
Sword in hand, Sef squared his shoulders and announced, “You’ll need to do better than that!”
The stranger showed some surprise.
I didn’t understand what they were doing, and had no time to think as I was distracted by a second set of screams. They were followed by a loud and bestial cry.
I turned to discover that the baled up boar was now charging towards us. Pink froth ran from its snout while blood streamed down its side; behind it, the beast’s owner lay tripped up amidst the pen’s ruined fence.
I cried out, “Sef!”
Following the narrow lane, the boar drew closer.
Sef hissed at the stranger, his sword held between them, “Get gone!”
The stranger chuckled. “So much to worry about!”
Sef said, “I can manage.”
“But so little time!”
The boar neared. We only had moments.
I looked for a way through the fence, but the gaps in the lattice were too small, and the canes too thick. The lambs on the other side scattered. “Sef!”
The boar was upon us.
He swung his sword up from between him and the stranger, half-turned, and then brought it down from over his shoulder and out to his side. The move left me under his arm, and between him and his steel.
The beast reached us as the blade’s tip flashed down.
The sword caught the boar on its great wet snout, with the charging animal’s momentum driving its head onto the razor-sharp blade. Sef held it stiffly, forcing its tip into a gap between muck-covered cobbles where he strained to wedge it.
The boar opened its own skull and then collapsed into the path’s mess. After a moment of spasmodic kicking, a wet squeal, and the spray of blood, it finally succumbed to a quick death.
Not wasting the chance, the stranger lunged around Sef’s side and grabbed for me.
I screamed.
Sef brought his knee up to hit the stranger under the jaw, and at the same time lifted his sword and brought the hilt down on top of the man’s head. He then turned and stepped back to pin me protectively between his back and the fence.
The stranger slumped to the ground.
Sef’s blade hung in the air in front of me, half its length red. He asked, “Juvela, are you alright?“
I whispered, “There’s blood on your sword!”
“Juvela, your parents are coming. Tell me you’re alright!”
I took a deep breath. “Yes!”
He stepped away from the fence, freeing me, and then squatted down to be eye to eye. “It’s alright, it’s the boar’s.” He smiled.
Still giddy with fright, I threw my arms around his neck to hug him.
He patted my back with his free hand. “Your parents are nearly here. Please be brave, I really need this job.”
I nodded.
Sef stood as we noticed that the cloaked man had gone.
I said, “He’s gotten away!”
Sef frowned. There wasn’t a trace of him.
My parents arrived.
Father cried out, “Well done!”
Mother dropped down to her knees in front of me. “Are you alright?” She was trembling and close to tears.
“Yes,” I said, “I like Sef, he’s great!”
Father laughed and nodded, while Mother sobbed with relief.
That night they discussed the terms of Sef’s employment over a roast boar dinner.
Sef became my closest friend, and, for me at least, part of the family. He had great patience. Not only did he watch over me, but he also talked and played, telling me stories of his adventures in Fletland.
Few families in Newbank could afford such a luxury, but it did keep me safe. Meanwhile, around us, the abductions not only continued, but worsened.
My burly swordsman never again had to raise a blade to defend me – well, not back then. In my early years I thought it was because I was unique, you know, like most children.
I was special!
The adults around me reinforced the notion by the way they watched me grow. I thought they were looking for something, some telltale sign of my hidden glory beginning to bloom. There wasn’t any. Later, I realised that they were just watching my all too ordinary progress into womanhood.
With its arrival the adults began treating me differently, like some kind of precious jewel. Only Sef didn’t. Secretly we joked that the biggest threat to me came from my overprotective mother and her countless rules.
My father, an observant and warm-hearted man, asked me to be patient with her overbearing ways. He explained that my grandmother’s dying wish was for my mother to take good care of her yet-to-be-born children. He said it plainly, telling me for the first time that Grandma Vilma had died in the riots that saw the Inquisition forced from Ossard, during the dark days known as The Burnings.
That moment had been a turning point for the city.
The expulsion of the Black Fleet marked the beginning of a new age of prosperity for Ossard, even for its marginalised Flets. Gradually the era faded, growing corrupt and wrong. That was when the child stealing had begun.
They never found the bodies, not even their clothes. Rumours abounded to blame everything and everyone. Occasionally, unfortunates would be set upon by accusing mobs, yet the kidnappings continued. It seemed that nothing could stop them.
The only thing the missing children did leave behind were their heartbroken parents, parents who carried unseen but deep wounds. Such hurts don’t heal, instead they’re re-opened by memories as if cut afresh every day. Left untreated they only spoil.
A city is the sum of its souls – when some begin to turn, all stand endangered.
It begged my maturing mind to ask what kind of city could allow such a thing? Perhaps a city too distracted by its own success.
Who cared if Flet children were being stolen from the slums? Not the Heletians ruling Ossard. In the city of Merchant Princes, anyone with the power to help was too busy doing business. In truth, it would take the theft of one of their own before they’d even notice the problem.
In many ways the city was as lost as its stolen children. And as the years passed and I began journeying through my teens, I felt lost too.
As my seventeenth birthday neared, my days revolved around little else than my mother grooming me for marriage. I didn’t know to whom. Nothing had been arranged, but whatever the future brought, a pairing would have more to do with influence and wealth than love. I didn’t care much for the notion.
The rude realisation that I’d soon have my own household and eventually children left me cold. I wasn’t ready for it. I could only hope for a kind man with a good heart, with whom my feelings might change and grow.
In truth, I think my real fear was of becoming like my mother.
Meanwhile, the abductions continued, three or four a season and always of children under twelve. It was a tragedy, but it meant that I was well and truly safe, and that meant that Sef was no longer required.
We all seemed to come to that realisation at the same time, both Sef and I, and my parents. It left me numb.
Surprisingly, Mother insisted on keeping him on. We were too used to having him around and wealthy enough to afford it.
As it turned out, he was as relieved as me that he was being retained – if now on broader duties. I can still picture him standing in our sitting room, anxious, as my father gave him the news. It left him with a huge grin and trying to blink back tears. Seeing the big man so vulnerable made me giggle. He went a deep red at the sound, but then burst out laughing. Even my parents had joined in.