CHAPTER 879: STRANGE HOMECOMING (PART TWO)

Carwyn’s worry that his people would take their own lives rather than fight against the Eldritch ’invaders’ hung in the air like icicles ready to fall on anyone foolish enough to disturb them. It wasn’t something that made sense to Loftur, but then, he’d been born long after the Lothians burned much of the Vale of Mists to the ground, and even then, his people would rather have died trying to cross the mountains than falling to their own claws before the Lothians could capture them. The idea of giving up when there was any hope left was just too strange.

From the other side of Loftur, Captain Barsali asked a few questions in the Eldritch tongue, conversing briefly with their translator before Loftur turned back to Carwyn with a confident smile.

"He says that you shouldn’t worry," Loftur said, giving an approximation of the arena Champion’s words rather than translating directly. "He says that you are a Champion and that Champions do not come from weak people who would die on their own swords instead of fighting."

"He also says that he is eager to meet your father and your woman," Loftur added after the serpentine captain said a few more words. "He wants to tell them of your courage since they weren’t able to see your glory in battle. He says they should be proud of you."

"I don’t know if that’s possible," Carwyn said as he stared into the distance in the direction of his home. "My father fought in the War of Inches. He lost friends in that war, and many of our villagers lost family members. I gave my fealty to his enemies, to the Crimson Knight who slaughtered Light only knows how many people. Forget proud," he said with a huff of bright, white steam. "I’ll be happy if he doesn’t kill me on sight as a traitor."

Loftur and Barsali exchanged more words, speaking at length as the bearish translator explained the War of Inches and the Crimson Knight, Dame Sybyll Hanrahan, to the Champion from across the mountain before he finally turned back to Sir Carwyn.

"Things are different in the arena," Lotfur said. "Captain Barsali has embraced many foes while blood is still hot and wet on the sands. For him, when the reason to fight ends, opponents can become fast friends. He has many friends who he has fought with, friends who gave him scars that he wears with pride and friends who have suffered wounds at his hands."

"He believes that there is no longer a reason for your people and ours to fight," the bearish translator explained. "Because there is no longer a reason to fight, it’s time to embrace each other as friends. He thinks that your father must be a brave Champion to have survived many battles in the War of Inches and that he’ll understand that the time for fighting is over."

"I hope he does," Carwyn said, shifting in his saddle as he spotted the last cart rounding the bend. "We’ll find out soon enough," he continued as the three men began to move again, taking their position at the head of the caravan. "The village is less than an hour away at the pace we’re moving. I just hope the Lord General is right and that they’ll listen to reason when we explain it to them."

He didn’t expect it to be easy to convince a village full of people who had grown up fearing the ’demons’ in the wilderness that those very same ’demons’ were now their trusted neighbors, but Lord General Thane and Lady Ashlynn had given him several tools to use to convince his people. Carwyn only wished that he shared their confidence, or that he could see things as simply as Captain Barsali seemed to.

The remainder of the ride passed in pensive silence, broken only by the steady crunch-creak rhythm of wheels on frozen ground and the occasional snort from horses whose nostrils flared wide in the bitter air. Carwyn found himself flexing his fingers repeatedly to maintain feeling in them, even through his riding gloves. The cold seemed to seep through every gap in his armor, as if it were goading him to rush faster to the warmth of his home and the tender embrace of his wife.

While there was more that both Loftur and Barsali wanted to say to reassure the young knight, both men felt a barrier had sprung up between them and Carwyn, heavier and thicker than the armor he wore. These were his people and his responsibility and the weight of his decision was something he intended to bear alone.

When they finally arrived at Raek village, the sight of it took Carwyn’s breath away and it was all he could do to keep his hands steady on the reins of his borrowed horse to keep himself from galloping toward the village gates.

Raek was an oversized village for its population and much of its interior was still grassland where small herds of goats and the occasional dairy cow grazed. Some knights in the Hanrahan Court chided Carwyn for putting on airs as if he intended to contend for rule of the barony, but Carwyn had never seen it that way.

His father had taught him long ago that it was the duty of a knight to care for his people, to protect them not only from the spears and arrows of their enemies but from the ravages of lean winters and empty bellies as well. It was that advice that led him to transform the village from the small settlement it had once been into something that clearly planned to become greater.

In his father’s era, the village sat next to the rushing waters of the River Belvin. It had been surrounded by a simple wooden palisade ringed with eight wooden watch towers to prepare the village to defend itself from any Eldritch raids.

Under Carwyn’s leadership, however, the village had more than doubled in size, with wooden bridges that crossed the river, and stone culverts that channeled the river under the expanded village walls. It had all been part of his vision to place mills along the river, but when he thought of the possibility that raiders could burn the expensive mills to the ground in a single attack, he worked furiously to expand the village enough to encompass their new, fledgling industry.

Now, as he gazed upon the village that he’d worked so hard to transform, the heavy anxiety that had weighed him down for the entire journey blended with a familiar pride in what he had accomplished over the past few years of hard work. None of it had been easy, and there had been people in the village who insisted that it was foolish to take on so much work when the fruits of their labor were so uncertain, but Carwyn pressed ahead anyway.

"We’ve made difficult changes before," he reminded himself as he prepared to ride forward with two of his soldiers carrying a large, white banner. Captain Barsali fell in beside him, as did Loftur, adding a strange, menacing feeling to the group even though neither man intended to fight today.

"We’ve changed before," Carwyn said softly. "We can do it again..."